The Way of the Wicked (Hope Street Church Mysteries Book 2) (17 page)

The sisters laughed and said good-bye. Back inside, the manager’s scowl had deepened. “I’m ready to use my copier now,” she grumbled while straightening one of her five necklaces. “When will it be fixed?”

“In just a few moments, ma’am,” Cooper replied politely through gritted teeth.

“Like the
few minutes
it took you to talk on the phone,” the woman muttered nastily under her breath and then walked out of her office with her nose in the air. Cooper heard her bark a series of curt orders to the salesgirls on the floor, who were already busy assisting customers, folding sweaters, or steaming crinkled blouses.

Retrieving a pair of pliers from her toolbox, Cooper’s thoughts returned to Ashley, who wanted to be a mother so desperately. Cooper reflected that there were certain things people wanted so badly that they’d do anything to get them. For Ashley, it was a baby. For others, it was fame. The person preying on the Door-2-Door clients would cross any line in order to attain valuable items, which could either be sold for profit or hoarded as some kind of twisted secret collection.

“Why are you doing this?” she whispered in quiet anger and then positioned the fuser assembly into the copier’s cavity and replaced the surrounding mechanisms. The copier emitted a rumbling hum as power was restored to its system and Cooper sat beside it for a moment, enjoying the small victory of bringing a machine back to life.

She packed up her tools and forced herself to smile kindly as she asked the petulant manager to sign off on the work order. “If only humans were as easy to fix,” she murmured and headed off to her next assignment.

11

Seated in Dr. Easter’s office, Cooper did her best to feign interest in an old issue of
American Baby
magazine. However, she found the occupants in the waiting room far more captivating than an article on potty training.

Cooper’s gaze traveled to the woman next to her. The woman, who was rubbing her protruding belly in wide concentric circles, was a marked contrast to the slim, pale-faced woman who stood next to the aquarium, biting her nails in agitation and occasionally tapping on the glass so that the fish darted away. Directly across from Cooper, a couple sat with their hands clasped and their heads bent toward one another. Their downcast eyes, tense whispers, and hunched shoulders made it clear that they were frightened, and Cooper hoped the perinatal physician could ease their fear.

Finally, there was a young family occupying half a dozen chairs near the exit. Children between the ages of seven and two chewed on graham crackers, suckled noisily on juice boxes, clambered onto the reduced lap of their pregnant mother, or hung from the belt loops of their fathers’ pants. Despite their parents’ incessant requests to whisper, the children filled the waiting room with squeals, whines, and giggles.

“This place is a circus,” Ashley murmured crossly. “If I have to watch that little boy take apart that uterus model one more time, I’m going to brain him with it.”

“According to this magazine, you should try to talk to young children about disciplinary issues before resorting to violence,” Cooper teased in an attempt to lighten her sister’s mood.

“We’ve been sitting here for almost forty minutes.” Ashley tapped her faux leopard-skin ankle boot impatiently. “I’m sick of waiting. I’ve been waiting months and months to get pregnant and now I can’t stand to waste another second wondering what’s wrong with me.”

Before Cooper could reassure her sister, the receptionist slid open the glass window dividing her file-folder-lined enclosure from the rest of the waiting room. Examining the inside of a manila file, she called out, “Ashley Love?”

“Present!” Cooper smiled as Ashley held up her right arm as though she were in a classroom. Folding her suede coat over her arm, Ashley approached a nurse in pink scrubs who propped open the door leading to the examination rooms. Cooper followed right behind her sister.

“Will this take long?” Ashley asked, her blue eyes anxious.

The nurse shook her head. “No, dear. We’re just going to do an ultrasound. Shouldn’t take too long and it doesn’t hurt a bit.” Taking Ashley’s elbow, she began to steer her into the hallway. “Your sister can come on back once Dr. Easter’s ready to talk to you in his office, all right, sug?”

As Ashley nodded like an obedient child, Cooper’s cell phone rang from within her purse. The nurse pointed at the “Please Turn Off Cell Phones in Waiting Room” sign and scowled.

“I’ll be right here waiting for you. And don’t be nervous, Ashley. Everything’s going to be fine,” Cooper assured her sister as the nurse closed the door.

The Beatles continued to sing from the depths of her bag, so Cooper hustled out the office’s front door and pulled her phone out of her purse just as it fell mute. Noting that the missed call was from Nathan, Cooper settled herself on a bench overlooking a circular bed of fluffy purple dahlias and clusters of gold and orange snapdragons and called him back.

“Are you sitting down?” Nathan asked.

“Uh-oh,” Cooper moaned. “Not more bad news.”

She could sense Nathan choosing his words carefully. “Trish heard from Lali. The police are definitely viewing Mr. Crosby’s death as suspicious and have ordered an autopsy.”

“But that’s good news. An autopsy will reveal how Mr. Crosby was poisoned or drugged. That should help the police find the killer.”

“I don’t know if you heard about the double murder that happened over the weekend, but it’s all over the news. Between that and the high-profile suicide, or apparent
suicide, of a former Olympic gymnast, I don’t think the toxicology lab will move Frank’s case to the top of their list.”

“I heard about the gymnast on the radio this morning,” Cooper said. “Irina Korolev, right? She won four gold medals in her career but was recently caught shoplifting from the petite’s section at Saks.” She watched another pregnant woman waddle into Dr. Easter’s office. “Why do you say ‘apparent’ suicide?”

“The
Times-Dispatch
attested that illegal steroids might be the real cause of death. Tobey showed me the article this morning while I corrected some minor errors on the Big Man site. Because of the article in the paper, he wanted to emphasize that the people using his products are protecting themselves from the harmful misuse of steroids. I have to say, he was really convincing. I think I was wrong to question his sincerity.”

“You’re just being a prudent businessman,” Cooper assured him. “So you think the double murder and Irina’s cases will get pushed ahead of Frank’s?”

Nathan sighed. “Yes. In fact, I called the medical examiner’s office and found out that it takes as much as eight weeks for a complete tox report, so Mr. Crosby’s cause of death could remain a mystery for another two months.”

“Eight weeks? The killer could easily strike again in that amount of time!” Cooper jumped up from the bench. “There must be something we can do.” She began to pace around the circular flower bed and the answer suddenly came to her. “What are you doing for lunch tomorrow, Nathan?”

Perplexed by her sudden change in tone, Nathan hesitated. “Um, I don’t have any plans and I’d love to see you. Is this a ‘date’ date or a quick lunch so we can come up with a brilliant plan to foil the Door-2-Door killer?”

“We
have
had some unusual dates, haven’t we?” Cooper said, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “But this one might be our oddest one yet.”

“I’m almost afraid to ask, but exactly where are we going for this romantic interlude? We’ve already covered dates in dark alleys, hospitals, and being held at gunpoint in an elevator.” Nathan laughed. “What’s left?”

“We haven’t been to this place before,” Cooper said. “We’re going to jail.”

• • •

“Can someone explain Ashley’s problem to me in plain English?” Grammy demanded that night when the Lees gathered for supper.

“She has a bicornuate uterus, Grammy,” Cooper explained patiently. “That means it’s heart-shaped and she could face challenges carrying a baby to term.”

“Can’t they fix that? Cut away the part that indents or somethin’?” Grammy speared a meatball with her fork and popped the whole thing into her mouth.

Cooper grimaced at the thought of a surgeon cutting away bits of her sister’s body. Staring at her plate of linguini and plump meatballs drenched in tomato sauce, she felt her appetite wane. “I don’t think they can fix it like that, Grammy, but Ashley will need surgery to remove the polyps in her uterus. The procedure is scheduled for next week.”

Maggie placed a basket of fragrant garlic bread in the center of the table. “She seemed mighty upset on the phone. I’m glad you went with her today, honey. It warms my heart to see you looking after your baby sister.”

“Unlike that rotten man of hers!” Grammy grunted, her cheeks still stuffed with meatball. “I’d like to get that boy on the phone and give him a piece of my mind!” She jabbed at the air with her sauce-stained fork.

“Have some salad, Ma.” Maggie slid a bowl of greens mixed with Italian dressing toward her mother-in-law. “Let’s give Lincoln the benefit of the doubt. I’m sure he didn’t figure on Ashley being scared about going to the doctor. After all, she’s never been afraid of anything except for spiders.” She sprinkled canned Parmesan cheese on top of her noodles. “I’m right sure Lincoln’ll be there for Ashley’s surgery. After all, she’ll need someone to drive her and look after her when she’s back at home.”

“You’ll see to it, won’t you, son?” Grammy turned to Earl. “That your daughter is taken care of by her man? He won’t make much of a daddy if he can’t take care of his wife.”

Earl pushed his plate away, slowly finished chewing, and folded his hands. “I don’t aim to interfere in either of my girls’ relationships.” He held up his finger to stop Grammy from interrupting. “But don’t you fear. I will make certain that Ashley has the help she needs during this time, even if I have to take off work to do it.” That being said, Earl pulled his dish back within reach and resumed the deliberate consumption of his supper.

“And what about you?” Grammy’s steely gaze settled on Cooper. “Any dates in your future? You haven’t been spendin’ as much time with that Nathan boy as I thought you would.”

“Nathan and I are seeing each other tomorrow. We’re going to visit an incarcerated drug dealer at the county jail. Now, if
that
doesn’t make him fall head over heels for me, I can’t imagine what will.”

If Cooper had been hoping to shock her grandmother, she failed entirely. Grammy’s only reaction was to shrug and reach for the garlic bread. “First you spend time packin’ food for a bunch of old coots and now you’re gonna hang out with the jailbirds.” She waved an aromatic heel of bread at Cooper. “And you wonder why you ain’t married?”

• • •

The next day, Cooper spent the commute into work praying for an extremely busy morning. She hoped to be so caught up in the business of collecting copiers from a large furniture chain undergoing bankruptcy that she could temporarily forget her plans to visit the local jail during her lunch hour.

Upon her return from the furniture store’s Southside location, she backed her van into one of Make It Work!’s garage bays to find Emilio waiting for her on the loading dock.

“Thought I’d give you a hand unloading. I know you can haul these big machines as well as any guy, but I can’t have you hurting yourself when I’m here to help.” His mouth split into a wide, confident grin, making it clear that he expected Cooper to respond to his charm.

Cooper gestured from the ramp attached to the back of the van to the heavy-duty hand truck parked against the side wall. “That’s nice of you, Emilio, but I’ve been loading and unloading copiers for years. I have a system.”

Emilio leaned against the van, crossed his arms so that his fists pushed his well-developed biceps into even larger masses, and snorted. “Fine, fine. I’m down with all that women’s lib stuff. If you want to be Miss Independent, I’ll just hang out and watch you do your thing.” He smiled again.

“Don’t you have shredders to empty?” Cooper asked as she pushed the hand truck up the ramp.

“I finished early so I thought I’d pick up the rest of the machines from that furniture warehouse with you. It’s so cool that the business has gone bankrupt. All that overpriced, ugly stuff will get sold for what it’s really worth. And I can’t stand their commercials, you know?” Emilio snorted derisively. “Every freaking football game I have to sit through five minutes listening to the
Big, big sale!
What a bunch of bull—”

“You’re right. Their ads
are
annoying.” Cooper pushed the edge of the hand truck under the first copier. “Still,” she grunted as she eased straps around the bulk of the machine, “dozens of people are going to lose their jobs because this chain is closing. And in this economy, it’s going to be tough to find new work.”

Emilio shrugged, unconcerned. “They’re always hiring at Burger King.”

Before Cooper had a chance to remark on her coworker’s lack of empathy, Angela arrived at the loading dock, her heels clicking a sharp staccato on the cement floor. “What are you two up to?” she demanded, eyeing Emilio with suspicion.

Cooper was too focused on maneuvering the copier down the ramp to be polite. “What does it look like? I’m unloading the van.”

Angela pretended to be hurt. “There’s no need to get huffy. I just want to take lunch orders.”

“Lunch? You’re on, beautiful!” Emilio sidled over to Angela and held out his arm. When Angela took it, he suddenly whisked her around so that she was facing him and began a spontaneous waltz across the floor. When they returned to where Cooper stood next to the empty hand truck, Emilio dipped Angela so low that her platinum-blonde bob swept the ground. Holding her there, he gazed into her eyes, smiled charmingly, and then kissed her lightly on the cheek.

“Has anyone ever told you that you have the grace of a ballerina?” he whispered, gazing at Angela with what Cooper assumed was feigned devotion.

Over the top of Emilio’s bent head, Cooper noticed Mr. Farmer’s stocky shadow suddenly disappear from the doorway leading into the garage.