I was washing Stump’s towel out in the bathroom sink when I heard Viv’s voice. Ordinarily I would have been glad to see her, but at the moment I wasn’t glad of much of anything. I ached all over. My neck felt like someone had run over it a few times with a car, and the bruise on my stomach was green and purple. Plus, for some reason every bone in my body ached. I supposed it was from the stress or something, but whatever it was, it felt like I was coming off a five-day binge.
Viv poked her head around the bathroom door. “You decent?”
“As I ever am,” I said, wringing out the towel. “What’s going on?”
“Just checking to see how you’re doing.”
“Let me know when you find out, would you?”
Tony rapped on the door. “Salem, I need to go and check on a job. It’ll take a little while. Will you be okay?”
I nodded, although I’ll admit it was a little pathetically. “I’ll be fine.”
“Dinner’s in the oven, I’m keeping it warm for you. Help yourself to anything else you need.”
“Thanks, Tony,” I said.
As soon as he was out the door Viv whispered, “I found a little more information for us to work with.”
“You did?”
She flipped open a little spiral notebook. “Yes. Our suspect’s alibi is his job in Oklahoma City. His boss vouched for him.”
“Oh yeah, I knew that.” I scooched Stump around a little, trying to make her more comfortable. She looked up at me with big, sorrowful brown eyes.
“You what? Hello? Were you going to share that information with your partner?”
“Hello?” I mimicked. “Yes, I was, but then I got a little sidetracked by being attacked and beaten up.”
“How did you find out?”
“I called Sylvia last night and asked her. How did you?”
“I went to her shop this afternoon. She was really grumpy, too.”
“Did she happen to say what kind of work he did? I forgot to ask.”
“He sells water filters. Evidently he signed some big contract for some business the day Lucinda was killed. Couldn’t possibly have been anywhere near here.”
I sighed. “Unless, of course, his boss is lying.”
She sat on the toilet, crossed one leg over the other and swung her foot. “Listen, Salem, maybe it’s time to give up on the Rey angle.”
“But I don’t want to. I want him to be guilty.”
“That would be fine with me. But if he’s innocent, he’s innocent.”
“He has never been innocent.” I groaned and stood. “My whole body hurts.”
“You look awful. Your neck is green.”
“Thanks.”
She looked around the bathroom. “This is a nice place. You sure you don’t want to be married to this guy? He’s pretty hot. And he cooks.” She sing-songed, “He has nice stu-uff.”
“I know.” The thing was, I wasn’t sure if I was sure or not. I wasn’t sure of anything anymore. Living on my own wasn’t exactly going so great for me, what with being broke all the time and my car breaking down and people breaking into my house. But marriage…sheesh. I was even worse at that than I was at being single. “I don’t know if I have much of a choice,” was all I said. I mean, if God was telling Tony not to divorce me, and he was adamant about being obedient, then what chance did I have?
The thought made me feel a little trapped and lightheaded. I needed to get out of there before I hyperventilated. I picked up Stump’s box and carried her to the bedroom and opened the window.
Tony’s backyard was even prettier than his front yard. Three big Spanish Oak trees spread a green canopy over even greener grass. It’s not easy finding shade in West Texas, but Tony had a haven out there. Flagstone lined a broad patio and a walk that curved through the grass to the back gate. If I didn’t know better I’d think I was in Connecticut or something. I supposed. Never having seen Connecticut outside of television. I rested my elbows on the windowsill and wondered what it would be like to actually live in a place like this.
“You know,” Viv said, “If Tony ends up going to prison he’d want someone to look after his stuff. And you are his wife. So this could work out okay for you.”
I knew she was just kidding, but it smacked with a little too much reality for me. “Just hush,” I said. “I don’t want to talk about my marriage.”
She sat on the edge of the bed. “Then let’s get back to suspects. Who else do you not like? Maybe we could find a way to pin this on them.”
“Too bad it’s not that easy.” I sat on the bed and leaned over to scratch Stump’s ears. She was coming out of her stupor and I wondered if I should give her a pill to put her back in. “So if it’s not Tony and it’s not Rey, who could it be?”
“You know what Columbo would do?”
“Something smart, I’m sure.”
“He’d go back and talk to the same people he already talked to.”
I thought about that for a second. If either of us talked to Sylvia again she’d slap us both. I didn’t want to go back to Rick Barlow’s place, not without some kind of protection. So who did that leave? “Remember that girl Stephanie, from the funeral?”
“I was just thinking about her!” Viv slapped her knee. “That’s got to be a God thing, or women’s intuition.”
“Or the path of least resistance.” I stood and looked down at Stump. “Are you going to be good while I’m gone?”
She thumped her tail a couple times. I had no idea what that meant.
I looked at Viv. “Do you think we should take her with us?”
Viv shrugged. “Fine by me.”
“You are so much easier than G-Ma.”
“I’m easier than everybody. Where are we going?”
I thought for a second. “Probably Columbo would have gotten a phone number or address.”
“Probably your husband has his employees’ numbers around here somewhere.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You want me to go snooping through Tony’s stuff?”
“No, I want to see what kind of cook he is. Then I want to go snooping through his stuff.”
You know those people who can’t eat when they’re stressed out? I’m so not one of those people. Food sounded like the best idea I’d heard in a while, and if I knew Tony, whatever he had would be hot, full of cheese and meat and probably sour cream – the real thing – and the very definition of comfort food.
“Let’s go.”
Stump whined when I walked out of the room so I went back and carried her into the kitchen with us. The aroma of whatever Tony had cooked lingered in the air and my stomach growled.
I eyed the kitchen table, a really cute little built-in bench and table setup. A banquette, that was what that was called. I’d seen it on HGTV. I slid Stump’s box onto the table. She sniffed the air and whined.
“Settle down, girl,” Viv said, patting Stump’s head. “You can have some, too.”
I kept my mouth shut and opened the oven. The dish inside looked so good I very nearly took the Lord’s name in vain. I settled for a breathy “Oh my.”
Viv appeared at my shoulder. “We need plates and forks, ASAP.”
“Forget the plates,” I said, grabbing a potholder off the counter. “And at this point forks aren’t necessarily a deal breaker.”
I slid the casserole dish onto the island and rummaged through drawers till I found the silverware. I handed a fork to Viv and dug in.
It came away covered in cheese and some kind of white sauce. I knew it would have sour cream! It was all I could do to blow on it before I shoved it in my mouth.
I had to hold back tears, it was so good. Chunks of white meat chicken, creamy just-spicy-enough sauce, thick gooey cheese, layered with soft corn tortillas.
Viv made a noise but I was too engrossed to ask if it meant if it was good or bad. Hopefully she didn’t like it. That would mean more for me.
No such luck. She hooked her foot around the rung of a stool, scooted it under her bony butt, and settled in.
Eventually I became aware that Stump was whining again, rather insistently. Her nose stuck out above the edge of the box, sniffing wildly. I felt kind of bad, but not bad enough to slow down. Two more bites, I promised myself. Then I’d get her a little.
She grunted and flopped around in the box, trying to get up.
“Oh, okay,” I said, my mouth still half full. “Don’t mess your leg up.” I fished through cabinets and drawers until I found a plastic bowl and scooped some of the enchiladas into it, blowing on them to cool them off. She whined and danced around as best she could with her poor little broken leg.
“I want you to know I’m giving you this against the express wishes of your physician.”
She didn’t care any more than I thought she would. She dove headfirst into the bowl and didn’t come up for air.
I reached down and gingerly felt her bandaged leg. She growled, her face still buried in the bowl. I didn’t know if my touch hurt her leg or if she simply wanted my hands away from any proximity to her food. Either way, I drew my hand back out and left her to her work.
“If you don’t want to be married to this guy, I do,” Viv said, as she slid the casserole dish away and leaned back on her stool, hands on her stomach, and groaned. “Oh, I’m going to need some Tums real soon.”
Viv rummaged through the bathroom for antacid while I searched for an address book. He’d left a note on the table with his cell number on it. I could call him and ask if Stephanie was working that night and if so, where. If I did, he’d want to know why I wanted to talk to her, and then he’d tell me I should just stay out of things and let the police handle it. Where was the fun in that?
I found in my search that Tony was still as compulsively neat as ever. There was one change of clothes in the hamper in his closet. He had a lot of nonfiction books and biographies of people I’d never heard of. He liked jazz music. And somewhere along the way he’d switched from briefs to boxers.
“Why are you looking in there?” Viv said a little too suddenly behind me.
I slammed the drawer and hit my thumb. I stuck it in my mouth. “Some people keep stuff in their drawers.”
“Yes, like their underwear. See, you do still want to be married to this guy. Let’s check the computer in the second bedroom. It’s on, so we wouldn’t even have to figure out his password.”
She took off down the hallway.
“I don’t know, Viv,” I said. “That seems a little intrusive.”
“Since that’s coming from the girl who was just digging through his underwear drawer, I’m going to ignore it.” She slid into the chair behind the computer and grabbed the mouse. “You’re just a technophobe. Don’t worry, it’s not going to blow up on us or sound an alarm or anything.”
She was right. I was a technophobe. I barely knew how to work my cell phone, and most of the time it didn’t work anyway because I kept forgetting to charge it. I pulled up a chair and sat behind her. “What are you looking for?”
“Anything. If I can’t dig around and find something, we’ll do a search on her name.”
She clicked on a few things and different screens popped up. Not having any clue what I was doing, I just sat back and watched, my mind mulling over the possibility of actually living in this house. This neighborhood had Trailertopia beat all kinds of ways. It would be nice to have someone steady to come home to every night. It would be nice to have someone besides Frank, looking for a free dinner. Someone to help me out when things went south. Someone to talk to, have conversations with, laugh with. To have someone to share a life with.
I looked around the neat home office, wondering if, when this was all over, Tony would ask me to move in. He didn’t act as if my very presence repulsed him. In fact, I think a part of him still cared for me, beyond a normal concern for my welfare that most people would have for someone they’d once been married to.
What did I feel for him, though? What did I feel besides a lot of guilt over the way I’d treated him in the past, and guilt in knowing that if we were still married I’d been disgustingly unfaithful to him, I had a lot of admiration for him as a person. Tony was a stand-up guy, solid and dependable, rooted in his values. Did I know anyone else like that? Well, there was Les. Les was like that, and irritatingly cheerful, besides. But Les was also twice my age and in love with his wife – not a good marriage candidate for me.
Marriage candidate – sheesh, get a load of me, sizing up the qualifications of my own husband. I blinked and felt a little dizzy. Husband.
The thing was, yes, I had been sober for a while. A hundred and what…fifty-two days? In a lot of ways I was doing really good, but in other ways, I felt like I was hanging on by my fingernails. I would definitely have headed straight to the bar after seeing Trisha the other day, if God hadn’t intervened and made my car explode. How would I react to the pressure of being married?
Just thinking about it made me nauseated. Of course, that could be due to my overindulgence in chicken enchiladas. Still, there was no question that if Tony and I lived as a real man and wife, I would completely freak out and start to over-think every little thing I said and did. I’d obsess about details and then I’d get irritated with Tony for being so calm all the time, and then I would pick fights with him and use that as an excuse to drink. Possibly.
So, maybe Trailertopia wasn’t such a bad place after all, as soon as I could feel reasonably certain no one was going to break in and chop my head off or anything.
I thought I ought to pray about it, but I was afraid to. After all, God hadn’t exactly been speaking volumes to me like He was other people. It would be just my luck that He’d choose this moment to speak, to tell me I had made a vow to Tony and my duty as a wife was to get myself back with him and be the best wife I could be. I wasn’t a big theologian, but I thought God was pretty big on husbands and wives being together.
“Honey, you do want to be married to this guy,” Viv said. She pointed to some numbers on the screen. “Here’s his profit and loss statement from last year.”
I didn’t really know what I was looking at, just numbers with a lot of zeroes. “Is that, umm…profit or loss?”
“That’s profit, honey. My fourth husband was in his sixties before he was worth that much, and by then he didn’t really like to spend it. Not that I’m complaining. He saved enough for me to get a swanky place at Belle Court.”
I stared at the numbers. I guess I really could cross guilt over ruining Tony’s oyster off my list. He’d done extremely well for himself. I thought he had a small operation, cleaning a few office buildings and places like the church, but judging by the numbers I was looking at, he must be cleaning half the town.
“Why are we looking at this? There are no names and addresses on here.”
“Same reason you were looking in his underwear drawer,” Viv said without apology. “I’m curious.”
“Well, close that and find Stephanie.”
“I saw a folder marked ‘Schedules.’ We’ll look at that first.”
The next thing she opened was a spreadsheet of different names, times, and business names. No wonder Tony was doing so well, I thought as I scanned the list of restaurants, office buildings and business. He even had the new big movie theatre on the north side of town.
The grid was set up with the business name across the top, times down the left side, and names inside boxes throughout the screen. But they were all first initial, last name.
“Do you remember her last name?” I asked.
“I don’t think she gave it.”
“Some detectives we’re turning out to be. We’re going to have to learn to be more observant if we’re going to make a living at this.”
“I know what. She said she and Lucinda worked at the church together, right? So we’ll look for anyone with the first initial S under their list.” She pointed with a long maroon fingernail to the column under FUMC. L. Cruz was there, along with L. Clark, T. Johnson, T. Thompson, S. Patz and S. Hidalgo.
“Hey, look at that.” Viv scrolled across the row of dates. “The night Lucinda was killed, she wasn’t scheduled to work. S. Hidalgo was.”
“Is S. Hidalgo Stephanie?”
“Get a load of this.” She clicked on S. Hidalgo and a smaller box opened up with Stephanie Hidalgo’s full name, address, phone number and Social Security number, along with what she’d made so far that year and how much she’d paid in taxes. “Fancy program with cross references.”
“I wonder why Lucinda worked for her that night.”
“I wonder why Stephanie didn’t say anything about that when we talked to her.”
I was struck by a thought so powerful it rocked me back in my chair. “Oh my gosh! Lucinda and Stephanie are both Hispanic.”
Viv raised an eyebrow. “You’re just now catching on to that?”
“No, I mean, they’re both young Hispanic women, close to the same age. They both have – had long hair. They’re about the same height, give or take an inch or two.”
“You know, you’re getting that same look in your eye Columbo gets when he’s on to something. Of course, he’s got that one lazy eye and you don’t, but –”
“What if it was meant for Stephanie? I mean, what if whoever killed Lucinda thought they were killing Stephanie?”
Viv stared for a second, then the other eyebrow shot up. “Hey! I never thought about that!”
I jumped up. “I’ll bet the police haven’t either! I’ll bet they never even asked.” I fished through Tony’s drawer and found a Post-It note and a pen, writing down Stephanie’s address and phone number.
“This chart says she’s supposed to be working at this office building right now,” Viv said.
“We’ll go there first. But if we can’t get in we’ll just wait at her house.”
I lugged Stump out to Viv’s car and we drove a couple miles to the small office building on the address. The place was deserted except for a little purple hatchback. Evidently Stephanie liked purple.
The front door was locked, of course. “I’ll go around and check for a back or side door,” I told Viv.
The building was long and skinny, with an outside door halfway down. It was locked, but the back door stood open.
I looked in and saw Stephanie carrying a couple of small plastic wastebaskets. She set one inside an interior door and moved down the hall away from me. I lifted a hand and called out to her, but she didn’t acknowledge me. That’s when I saw the cord for the headphones she wore.
I was a little hacked off at her for not telling us about the switch in schedules when we talked to her at the funeral. Of course, it’s possible she had other things on her mind at the time and she hadn’t really taken our “investigation” all that seriously, but still…I couldn’t help but think she was hiding something, just like Sylvia was hiding something. Everyone was hiding something. It was starting to get on my nerves.
So that was probably why I was a little bit mean when I tiptoed down the hallway, sticking to the side away from her. Sometimes, I admit, I have a little bit of a mean streak. Just a little bit.
I wasn’t actually going to do anything, except get right up behind her and say, “Stephanie!” really loud, maybe grab her arm. I’d say it was because she had the headphones on and didn’t hear me the first three times I called her name.
When I was five yards from her I heard a horrendous, ear-piercing wail from outside.
I knew that sound. That was Stump, in the throes of acute separation anxiety.
It had made me jump, though, probably because I was on edge anyway, and because I was trying to be quiet to sneak up on Stephanie. I jerked back and shouted, “Stump, hush!” before I could stop myself.
Stephanie gasped, jumped through the nearest open doorway, and slammed the door.
Well, crud. I stood there a second, looking at the closed door. Then I heard what I thought were whispers, so I tiptoed up and put my ear to the door.
“Hurry!” Stephanie said. She sounded desperate. “He’s right outside the door!”
I lurched back and looked around. He who?
I looked both ways down the hall and didn’t see anyone. I looked into the office behind me, certain Rey or some other killer was bearing down on me. Nothing.
I put my ear back to the door.
“I don’t know. No, I left the back door open because I was carrying out the trash. I just saw him sneaking up behind me and I ran in this office and locked the door. Please hurry!” I heard only panicked, heavy breathing for a few seconds, then, “No, I didn’t see a weapon or anything. But he was a big, hulking guy.”
I stepped back and scowled at the door as it hit me. Hulking, huh? That was it. I was joining Fat Fighters if it took every dime I had.
I pounded on the door. “Stephanie!”
She screamed.
“It’s just me! Salem Grimes. We met at Lucinda’s funeral.”
Silence. I put my ear back to the door.
Mumble mumble.
“I just want to talk to you,” I said. Crud. Double crud. The police were on their way. Should I run or stick around and try to explain? “Tell the police it was a mistake.”
Something tapped me on the shoulder.
I screamed. Usually I wasn’t so much of a screamer but nothing was usual in my world at the moment.
When I screamed, Stephanie screamed.
“What in the world is going on?” Viv shrieked. She was carrying Stump, who flailed around in her box. She shoved the box at me.
“I don’t know!” I shrieked back, hefting Stump. “But the police are on their way, and I’m going to lose some weight if it’s the last thing I do.”
It would have been true irony if the responding officer was that guy Walters. It wasn’t. Some blonde lady cop who clearly hated me on sight came first. Walters showed up three or four minutes after her.
The next twenty minutes were lots of fun. Stephanie didn’t seem to believe me, nor did Walters or the lady cop. I think even Viv was beginning to believe I was making up something. I’d had a lot of experience trying to convince people I’m telling the truth when I wasn’t. It was hard. For some reason, though, it was even harder when I was telling the truth. The female cop kept giving me these disdainful looks and walking a few feet away to murmur to Walters. She’d turn to talk into the radio handset clipped to her shoulder. Then she’d give me another look. I started to wonder if maybe I’d slept with her fiancée, too.
Stephanie stuck to Viv as if the old lady were her lifeline. She gave me doubtful looks while the police decided what to do with us.
“We just wanted to talk to you, I swear,” I told Stephanie. “I’m really sorry I scared you.”
She shook her head, edging closer to Viv. “It’s okay, I’m sorry I panicked. I just…I saw you out of the corner of my eye and it looked like you were sneaking up on me and then you yelled and I’ve kind of been on edge ever since Lucinda…” She shrugged.
I felt like a jerk. I didn’t feel bad enough to come clean and admit I had been sneaking up on her, but enough to pat her arm and tell her I was sorry again. That was pretty big for me; I’m not much of a toucher.
“That’s why we wanted to check up on you. We wondered if maybe you’d considered the possibility that Lucinda wasn’t the intended target for the killer…” Viv raised a penciled-on eyebrow.
Stephanie nodded. “Oh, yeah. I’ve considered that a lot. I mean, I was supposed to be the one to work at the church that night, not her. So I wondered…we’re about the same size and we’re both Hispanic and everything.”
I felt myself deflate a little. Okay, so maybe I wasn’t as ahead of the game as I thought I was. “Did you tell the police that?”
“Of course.” She looked at me like I was crazy. I was getting a little tired of all the different looks I was getting. “I told that Sloan guy, the cute one…hey, there he is.”
Bobby pulled up and got out of his car. He tilted his head at me. “What are you doing now?”
I just lifted one palm and settled Stump against my hip with the other. I’d let him draw his own conclusions.
He talked to Walters and the blonde hatemonger for a couple of minutes, then he sent them on their way. He walked over and squeezed the back of my neck.
“What would happen if you tried to go an entire twenty-four hours without causing trouble?”
“We just came up here to talk to Stephanie about Lucinda’s murder,” Viv said. “There was a misunderstanding and we’re getting it all worked out. No need to worry.”
“Still hot on the case?” Bobby said to Viv. He gave me a look that said he wasn’t exactly thrilled.
“We’re concerned for Stephanie’s welfare, since we learned that she was supposed to be working at the church that night instead of Lucinda.” Viv pierced him with a look. “You were aware of that, were you not?”
Bobby folded his arms across his chest. His jaw twitched a little, and he tried to look amused but I thought a part of him also looked a little called-on-the-carpet. “As a matter of fact I was. Which is why her call was responded to so quickly. We’re keeping an eye on her just in case she’s in any danger.”
See, I thought it hadn’t taken them very long to get there, not nearly as long as it took them to get to my house the night before.
Bobby took my elbow and led me over to Viv’s car. “How are you feeling?”
I nodded and slid Stump back into her cardboard box. She looked up at me with those liquid brown eyes and whimpered. I thought it was mostly for Bobby’s sake, but I scratched her ears anyway. “Not too bad, a little sore and achey, but not bad. I slept all afternoon.”
He stared darkly at my neck for a second. “Did you find a place to stay?”
“Yes, Tony’s letting me stay with him. He’s got an extra bedroom.”
Bobby froze. “Tony.”
“Yes. You know, my not-so-ex-husband?”
“Yes, I know Tony. Accused murderer Tony.”
“Bobby, come on. He’s innocent and –”
“You’re staying in the home of an accused murderer?” His voice rose and he leaned his palm against the roof of the car. “Salem, tell me this is a joke.”
“Why? You’re not going to laugh.”
“Salem, come on! What the hell are you thinking?”
“That he’s my husband and I trust him and he’s the only one who asked me. You know I couldn’t stay at my place.”
“Couldn’t you find someplace to stay that doesn’t have killers?”
“He’s not a killer! He’s being very nice to me.”
“He was very nice to Lucinda Cruz, too.”
“You’re being ridiculous.”
“Me?” He raked his hand through his hair and did a little pace-back-and-forth thing for a couple of seconds. “Salem, don’t you – couldn’t you – “ He groaned and I thought for a second he was going to throttle me.
“What is your deal? Why do you care so much? And do not look at me like that! I’m sick of people looking at me like I’m an idiot.”
“You’re acting like an idiot. Running around town getting yourself involved in who knows what, hanging out with murderers and getting yourself attacked – “
“He didn’t do it!”
“He didn’t attack you, but he did kill Lucinda Cruz! Salem, he is on surveillance tape going straight to the scene of the crime. He left personal possessions at the scene of the crime. He had a romantic relationship with the victim, and he has defense wounds consistent with other evidence found at the crime scene. He did it!” He took a deep breath and backed up half a step, lowering his voice. “Look, I’m sorry. I really am. I know you want to believe in his innocence. But honey, he’s not. Stay away from him. Please.”
He looked so worried. My throat got tight and for a second, I wondered if maybe he could really be right. Could I be lying to myself?
Heck, why not? Maybe I wanted Tony to be innocent so bad that I wasn’t thinking clearly. Maybe I was just making a big fool of myself and Tony was going to kill me, too.
“If Stephanie was the intended target, that would take away one leg of your theory.”
He rolled his lips together. Then he nodded. “One.”
I chewed my lip. That left three. A stool would stand on three legs. For a moment, the image of Tony, head covered and arms bound behind his back, standing on that stool with a noose around his neck flashed in my mind. I swallowed hard.
He gave a short humorless laugh and squeezed my shoulder. “Salem, don’t go back there.”
“Bobby, I have to. Quit worrying about it. Believe me, if Tony didn’t kill me when he was married to me, he’s not going to now.”
“There’s got to be someplace else you can go.”
“There’s not. Les’ son is staying with him, Viv lives in a retirement home that doesn’t allow sleepovers, and G-Ma wants to charge me fifty bucks to stay with her.”
I