Dying Wishes (12 page)

“Remember
that young figure skater some years ago, Sergei
Grinkov
?”
Margo chimed in.
 
He was married to
another skater, a lovely young thing. He practiced for hours every day of his
life, but he just collapsed on the ice one day and died instantly of some
previously undiagnosed heart condition.
So
heartbreakin
’.
Then there was that marathon runner
who died in his early fifties. It turned out that his arteries were almost
totally blocked despite all that exercise. I’m afraid death is the one thing
that none of us is immune to.”

I
stirred my coffee innocently and hoped my silence would spur them to a more
detailed account of their misgivings about Margaret’s death. When trying to
elicit information, I’ve found that silence loosens tongues far more
effectively than prodding.

“There’s
more,” Janet ventured after a few moments of tacit consultation with Bitsy.

“How so?”
I asked, trying
not to let my eagerness show. Margo nudged me under the table.

“We
understand that some prescription medication was found in Margaret’s medicine
cabinet, the kind for pretty severe pain, but Margaret never once mentioned any
kind of problem to me.” She looked at Bitsy for confirmation.

“Nor
to me, and she beat the socks off tennis players in our league who were half
her age,” Bitsy mused.

“Perhaps
she didn’t want to make her infirmities common knowledge,” I suggested. “She
obviously took pride in her prowess and didn’t want her image to be diminished.
Some people are very private about their ailments,” I shrugged, hot flashes on
my mind.

Janet
and Bitsy laughed at that. “Are you kidding? Around Vista View aches and pains
and who’s seeing which specialist this week are the main topics of
conversation,” Janet scoffed. “A little pain wouldn’t even have raised an
eyebrow, but not to tell us, her closest friends? That seems very odd, don’t
you think?”

Bitsy
nodded. “And Dr. Petersen was so strange about it when I asked him. He wouldn’t
even confirm or deny that Margaret had a problem.”

That
got my attention. “You asked Dr. Petersen about it?
When?”
I cut myself short. There was that avid interest creeping into my voice again.
Fortunately, Bitsy didn’t seem to notice.

“Oh,
gosh, just a couple of days after Margaret died. It was my six-month blood
pressure check, and I was sitting there with that uncomfortable cuff wrapped
around my arm. It reminded me of what I’d heard about the meds in Margaret’s
medicine chest, and I told him how surprised everyone had been to learn she had
health issues. He got very huffy, all but told me it was none of my business.
He was so curt that my blood pressure shot up five points.” She laughed at the
memory. “Of course, he was perfectly correct. It was none of my business, but
really, the poor woman had passed on, and it wasn’t as if she had a social
disease or something embarrassing like that. It wasn’t exactly an invasion of
privacy at that point.”

“So
he didn’t say yes or no?” I asked carefully. “Doctors take that patient
confidentiality thing pretty seriously these days. HIPPA and the lawyers …”
Margo nudged me again, harder this time.
“Sorry, Janet.
I didn’t mean your husband, of course, but everyone in the health field seems
to be running scared of lawsuits now. ”

Bitsy
shook her head. “No, he didn’t say a word. He removed the cuff, told me to make
another appointment for April with the nurse on my way out and then stalked out
of the examining room. That was very unlike him.”

I
took my time and chose my words with care. “Has Dr. Petersen been your primary
care physician for a long time or just since you’ve lived at Vista View?”

“Oh,
just forever,” Bitsy assured us. “You too, right, Janet? This really is a small
town, and Dr. Petersen has practiced here since I can remember.
 
He’s the primary physician for about half of
Vista View’s residents. That’s one of the reasons the board invited him to be
our on-call physician. It seemed as if everyone was already comfortable with
him, and he has two younger associates who are available when he isn’t.”

Margo
introduced a new topic. “How did your husband’s meeting with Margaret’s cousins
go last night? Was he able to reassure them at all? I’m
assumin
’
that if they were close enough for Margaret to send them all those expensive
jewels, there were in her will.” She let that one dangle in front of Janet.

“Goodness,
I have no idea about that. Gerald is such a clam when it comes to his clients’
affairs, even with me. We both know it’s difficult to find any privacy in a
little community like Wethersfield as it is. Everyone seems to know everyone
else’s business, but frankly, I’ve always been happier not knowing who’s
sleeping with whom.” She clapped one hand over her mouth and blushed violently.
“Metaphorically
speaking,
is what I meant.”

“Uh
huh,” Bitsy teased her. “In the literal sense, that sort of thing seems to be
common knowledge anyway.”

Margo
smiled her sympathy at Janet. “It’s the same with my husband. My John is as
close-mouthed as can be when it comes to police business, and I’m glad he is.
Despite my best efforts to remain ignorant, you wouldn’t believe
what some of our most
upstandin
’ citizens get up to.”

“Oh,
yes, I would,” Bitsy assured her. “Having been involved in a political campaign
yourself,
you shouldn’t be surprised at the dirt that
gets dished about the candidates and everyone else.”

Margo
snorted into her coffee, and I tried to get the conversation back on track. “So
we agree that we’re all clueless in the matter of Margaret Butler’s unfortunate
passing and are likely to remain so. Perhaps it’s time that the Vista View
community accepts that her early death was lamentable but not suspicious in any
way, and it’s happening so soon after Angela
Roncaro’s
death was purely coincidental.”

An
unmistakable gleam of satisfaction came into
Bitsy’s
eyes as she signaled our waitress Sherri for more coffee.

Janet
relaxed visibly. “I guess you’re right,” she agreed, trying in vain to sound
disappointed. “We should all put this behind us and move on. If there were
things in Margaret’s life that she wanted to keep private, she had every right
to do that, and we should respect her wishes.”

“Great,”
Margo said as Sherri refilled our coffee cups and flew off to take an order at
the next table. “
Meetin
’ adjourned. Now, does anyone
know where I can get a good massage?
Spendin
’ all my
nights hunched over a hot computer is just
killin
’ my
back.”

Half
an hour later Bitsy and Janet made their excuses and headed out after thanking
us for our time. Margo tucked a slip of paper on which Janet had noted Tommy
Garcia’s name and phone number into her wallet.

“What
do you think the real agenda was here?” she asked me.

“To
find out what we know and head us off,” I answered promptly.

“How about the manufactured distress about the
circumstances of Margaret Butler’s demise?”

“Misdirection.
If they
can convince us that they have minor misgivings, we won’t be suspicious of
them. Unfortunately, they weren’t very good at concealing their glee when they
thought they’d successfully put us off the scent.”

Margo
grinned as she gazed out the window to the parking lot. “Still aren’t,” she
observed, pointing one beautifully manicured finger to where Janet and Bitsy
were sharing an ill-timed fist bump before getting into the blue Audi. “Guess
those little
ol
’ gals think we were born yesterday.”

“Nice
to know we’re holding up. Did you catch the blush on Janet when she made that
‘who’s sleeping with whom’ gaffe?”

“
Mmmm
, a bit extreme for a woman of her age,” Margo agreed.

“Which
one of them do you think is covering up for the other, and what are they
covering up is what I want to know. So now that we’re more convinced than ever
something’s very wrong here, what’s next?”

Margo
patted her wallet. “I’m getting myself a massage, and I believe
Strutter
may want to get some complaint or other checked
out at Dr. Petersen’s establishment, get chummy with the nurses. As for you,”
she paused, considering, “I think it’s time you got your legal paperwork in
order. Do you have a
livin
’ will, Sugar, because
there’s a lawyer
livin
’ right there at Vista View I
believe can fix you up with one.”

~

I
left Margo calling
Strutter
to make arrangements for
us to compare our findings on the following Tuesday, when we would all be in
the office at the same time. I arrived home to find Armando doing laundry.
Normally, I would have been delighted, but the sight of an open suitcase on the
sofa took the joy out of it.

“Not
again,” I complained, knowing full well his answer would be that yes, once
again he had been summoned to put out some financial fire on behalf of his
employer,
TeleCom
, Inc.
 
Now that
TeleCom’s
business had become international in scope, Armando’s fluent Spanish and ease
among the company’s Mexican and South American clients, not to mention his
detailed knowledge of the contractual agreements in place, was coming in very
useful—for
TeleCom
, not for me.
Even
Gracie, curled up tightly in the armchair, had her eyes squeezed shut to erase
the sight of her favorite person in the whole world leaving once again.

“I
am so sorry,
Cara
, but it will be for
only a few days this time,” he assured me. “I dare not be away for any longer,
or you and your partners will find some way to get yourselves into the warm
water.”

“Hot
water,” I said sadly. I had planned to fill him in on the morning’s
conversation with Janet and Bitsy but decided against it. “Where are you going
this time?”

“Just to San Diego.
It seems like a waste of time to me, as I will spend two whole days flying
there and back, but our CFO wants a representative to handle our interests in
person with this difficult client who is demanding to have everything including
the sun and the moon written into his contract. I will be back on Wednesday.”
He looked at his watch. “I seem to have some time before I need to leave for
the airport.” He reached out and caressed my cheek.
 
“Do you really want to waste it talking about
TeleCom’s
contractual difficulties, or could I
persuade you to return to your bed with me?”

As
it turned out, he could. And then he was gone.

That
evening, feeling very much at loose ends and with nothing much to occupy my
hands or my mind, I called Joey.

“A
call from my mom on a Saturday night?” he said in mock horror. “Has the sky
fallen in Wethersfield, Connecticut? Has hell frozen over?” Then the joking
tone abruptly left his voice. “Are you okay, Ma?”

“Wow,
and I thought your sister was the drama queen in this family. I’m fine. Emma’s
fine. Armando’s fine. He got called away to San Diego on business this
afternoon, but he’ll be back on Wednesday. I just called to check up on the
parents-to-be. How’s Justine doing?”

We
spent a few minutes chatting about Justine’s latest check-up and their
enrollment in a Lamaze class at the nearby hospital. “You and Dad did that,
didn’t you? What did you think of all that panting stuff?”

In
truth, I hadn’t thought much of it, but I didn’t want to tell him that. “Lots
of couples find it very helpful,” I hedged. “At least it gives you something to
do while you’re waiting for the big moment.” Then I hastily changed the
subject. “How’s work going?”

He
filled me in on his new duties as a part-time dispatcher for the trucking
company he worked for. He far preferred driving his big rig, but the
dispatching work brought in a little extra income, which would certainly come
in handy in the months ahead.

“How’s
Jasmine?” he asked out of the blue, throwing me momentarily. He had grown up
with the old cat, as had Emma.

I
looked down at Jasmine, who lay curled up next to me on the couch. Her favorite
heat source was Armando, but tonight she was making do with me. “She’s nearly
twenty-two years old, which is more than one hundred in human years, but she’s
doing fine, considering. Why do you ask?”

He
hesitated but finally spit it out. “Emma emailed me a couple of days ago,
asking if you’d said anything to me. She had a dream that Jasmine died.”

I
frowned. “That’s odd. She never said anything to me about it.” I marveled once
again at the intricacies of family communications. “Surely she must know I
wouldn’t keep anything like that from her, and how could I anyway? I work with
her every day, and she’s in and out of here all the time.”

“Yeah,
it was probably because of one of those nature shows she’s always watching on
TV where some poor critter dies an awful death, but you know
Em
. She thought it was a premonition or something.” His
tone was mocking, but I detected a note of relief. I, on the other hand, felt
suddenly anxious. Emma’s premonitions tended to be right on target.