Must Love Murder Page 4

  “That’s a lot of casseroles.”

  Tracey didn’t seem to pay attention to any voice but her own. “Yeah, I heard she was so startled to find him dead, she dropped the whole dish right on his face. On his face. He was covered in baked ziti,” she shook her head like she couldn’t imagine anything worse. “It looked like a baked ziti facial, can you believe it? Smothered in it. Anyway, I hope I didn’t get Mabel into trouble today. I’m one of the few neighbors who actually likes her.”

  “What do you mean you hope you didn’t get her into trouble?” I asked.

  “I mean, I told the police everything. I think they had a right to know. I’m not saying your aunt killed Earl. She seems very nice for a gold-digger. But I did tell them about how she and Earl hated each other from the get-go. I also told them about her alleged ‘mafia friends,’ and, of course, the fight I heard yesterday afternoon at her house. That was very loud. We all heard it.”

  I tried to be pleasant, even though Tracey was quickly becoming a hard person to be pleasant around. I set my tea down on the jack-o-lantern coaster she’d given me moments before, and forced a smile. “Yeah, I was there for that fight. It was crazy. Earl was very upset that my aunt set his ex-wife up with a hottie.”

  “A hottie? Does every woman get one of those at the matchmaker club?” She giggled. “I want my ex to suffer…”

  I nodded my head in agreement, but I didn’t want to change the subject. “So you told the police about Earl flipping out yesterday… anything else?”

  Tracey looked down at her flip-flops. “Just that Earl was trying to put your aunt out of business. He’d been talking about nothing else for the last couple of weeks. He called it ‘the neighborhood brothel.’ I’m sorry. I know the police came over to Mabel’s house after I showed them exactly where she lived, but I thought they should know.”

  “Oh, don’t worry about it. They asked her a few questions. They said she wasn’t a suspect.”

  Tracey looked relieved. “Yeah, I didn’t think your aunt could kill someone. If you want to know the truth, I think that ex-wife of Earl’s might’ve had something to do with it, speaking of gold-diggers.”

  Speaking of gold diggers? I pushed my lips together, hoping somehow my anger was coming across like a relaxed smile. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, Judith and Earl were married for seven years. Come on. She’s a lot younger than the man, let’s be honest. Beautiful too. Beautiful women don’t marry old men without a billion reasons, if you know what I mean. I think she was hoping to get lucky like your aunt did, and have the old guy keel over while they were married, leave her with everything…”

  “Oh-kay. So instead she divorced him, got nothing, and then killed him? That doesn’t add up.”

  “Just a feeling I get. She had to be pretty angry. I’d be angry too if I spent seven years with an old fart like Earl and didn’t get a dime out of the divorce. Can you imagine? I spent 20 years with my husband… and if I had nothing to show for it, I’d be ready to kill.”

  I thought about my own divorce. “What’d you get?” I asked.

  She laughed. “Same as everyone. The house and a nice settlement. I mean, it wasn’t much, but it was enough for me to quit my teaching job and start my own company. Yep, I took that money and invested in myself…”

  I thought about the money I inherited after my mom died and how I had invested it in Rocky Road and bigger sweatpants.

  “And now…” she leaned back into the cushions of her couch. “I’m retired.”

  Somehow I stopped myself from strangling her.

  She jumped up from the couch. “Wanna see them?”

  I looked around. “Them?”

  “Product lines from the lingerie company I sold.” She raised her bushy eyebrows at me. “Come on. You know you want to.” She didn’t give me a chance to say that “no, actually, I was good.” She darted down the hall, and I was left, sipping iced tea and wondering what on earth was going to come out of that back room. I hoped to high-tea it wasn’t going to be a fashion show.

  I got up and walked toward the hall, trying to change the subject back to the investigation. “I just remembered something,” I yelled to the woman in the back room. “The day before Earl died, Judith mentioned an embezzlement. You seem to know everything that happens in this neighborhood. Do you know anything about an embezzlement?”

  Tracey didn’t answer. I looked around her living room while I waited. Abstract orange and yellow paintings hung on the walls next to a couple awards, one for Teacher of the Year, and the other for being one of California’s Women of Influence in Business.

  This woman wasn’t much older than me. We were both married for 20 years, yet she’d done so much more with her life. It suddenly felt like the walls were closing in and the air was thick and hot. I’d been having what were probably hot flashes lately. Great. I seriously considered tearing one of the awards off the wall so I could fan myself with it.

  “Ta-da,” she said as she bounded in from the hall, her arms loaded with silky garments on hangers.

  I breathed a sigh of relief that she was still in a stained t-shirt and shorts.

  “Aren’t they gorgeous? You’d never know they’re intended for… you know, bigger girls like us who want a little bit of tummy control without looking like we’re wearing a support garment or something.”

  I tried not to look interested.

  And I wasn’t even sure who this “us” was that she was referring to. I was maybe 20 pounds overweight, 15 if I let a foot dangle off the scale a little.

  She put her hand on my arm as she continued. “You know how awkward it is when you meet a guy and you want to look cute, and then he sees your big ole Spanx come off in the heat of the moment?”

  I shook my head, “no.” I actually had no idea what that was like. I hadn’t been with anyone but my ex-husband for the last 20-some-odd years, and I certainly wasn’t comfortable talking about this subject with... anyone, much less my aunt’s nosey neighbor. Fanning my hot flash furiously with my hand, I sat back down on the couch.

  “I know,” she said, noticing my fanning. “They’re pretty hot, right? Go ahead.” She handed me a short black nightie. “You can try it on if you want.”

  “Thanks.” I took the nightie, but I didn’t move from my seat.

  “Oh speaking about starting a business,” she said like she’d just thought of something important. “Earl started a company while he was married to Judith too. A very profitable prepper company called Survivalist Supplies. Bad business move. If you’re gonna start a company, wait until your divorce is final. That way you don’t have to split…”

  “I’m sorry.” I interrupted, still fanning. “Did you just say prepper?”

  “You know, people who think the end of the world is coming. Earl was one of them, and I guess for him, the end of the world was coming.” She chuckled to herself so hard she wiped her puffy eyes with the seam of a nightie. “And that’s the most surprising part of his death, don’t you think? Apparently, he was shot while cleaning his guns. How did someone sneak up on a prepper while he cleaned his guns? Preppers are trained to suspect a zombie apocalypse at any moment. How did he not sense it?”

  “Yeah, that’s weird,” I said, mentally taking notes because it would be rude to ask for a pen and paper at this point.

  She continued. “Yeah, I’m sure Judith thought she’d get part of the company when they divorced. And she would have too, but it came out in the divorce proceedings that someone embezzled everything… stole from investors, the whole shi-bang. There was nothing left. She got nothing, and Earl was in a heap of trouble over it. Made him extra cranky and paranoid. Poor Earl. He always said he didn’t do it.”

  Poor Earl. So the guy who called women hussies, swung baseball bats around, and probably embezzled money was the poor unfortunate soul in this woman’s universe?

  I thanked Tracey for the tea and the gossip, handed her back the nightie (even though I really wanted to try it on) and told her to come by on Monday if she wanted to create a profile and see the hottie I had lined up for her.

  Then I went to RadioShack to buy a recorder.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  AFTER KICKING MYSELF that I had to spend 20 bucks on a recorder when I knew I had one from college in a junk drawer somewhere, I headed over to my sister’s. She spun me around at the door, squealing. Real high-pitch squeals too because she was never a smoker, and she was genuinely surprised by my look, which made me wonder just how close I actually had been to Quasimodo-status before I went shopping for cool-mom jeans.

  “I’m borrowing those pants,” she said over and over again, like she’s not five inches shorter than I am. “And the top. It’s cute and flouncy. No stains!”

  “Yet,” I reminded her.

  I told her all about working at Aunt Mabel’s, and Earl, and Earl dying, and Aunt Mabel being all suspicious about it…

  It had only been a couple of days since we last talked, but it felt like forever.

  Ben and Bryce, Megan’s twins, were running around the living room, throwing stuffed animals at each other, but because they were three, they were missing a lot. Elephants, bears, and puppies covered her floor and couches. It was the messiest I’d ever seen Megan’s home since we were kids living together, which made me smile secretly to myself. “It won’t be long before you become a frazzled mom just like me.” I said under my breath like a crazy lady.

  Megan caught the stuffed penguin heading for her head like she’d been doing it all day. “So wait. What? Is Aunt Mabel a suspect? Is she in trouble?”

  “She didn’t kill anyone,” I said. “Or at least, I’m pretty sure she didn’t. According to my new best friend, otherwise known as the horrible woman down the street, Earl’s ex-wife killed him, which frankly, doesn’t add up, and I’m not sure about. But I bought this to find out…” I opened my large brown sack-of-a purse and rummaged around just long enough for the moment to lose its climatic effect.

  “Ta-da,” I said, finally finding and pulling out the recorder I had just bought. “I’m Nancy Drew. I’m going to save the day.”

  Her face dropped. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “What?”

  “Remember in high school when you started dating that weird guy with the face tattoo that mom called the ax-murderer?”

  I rolled my eyes. “We went to one movie…”

  “I’m more worried for you now. Don’t go poking your nose into a murder investigation. That only works out for little old ladies on TV. You’re not Angela Lansbury. You have kids who need you alive…. And you know what it’s like to lose a mom. It’s hard at any age. Let the cops handle it.”

  I put the recorder back in my purse as a stuffed elephant smacked me across the face. It hurt more than I thought it would. “You’re being crazy. I won’t let things get dangerous. I’m just going to poke around a little bit, see if I can help Aunt Mabel before her reputation, and her business, are ruined by this.”

  “So, I take it, you like your new job?”

  “I’ve only been working there for two days now, but yeah.”

  I curtsied, did a little spin, then sat back down on the couch. “Aunt Mabel’s a good fashion influence on me if nothing else. Who knew? I’m going to do something with my hair tomorrow before I pick up the kids at Mark’s. I don’t know what yet, maybe straighten it or dye it. Maybe both.”

  Megan leaned over, scrunching her fingers into the mess I called curls. “I think I know the perfect color. Come over tomorrow afternoon, and I’ll fix you up.” More squeals. I could tell, she’d been wanting to do that for a while.

  The boys started yanking the cushions and pillows off the other couch and propped them together to make a lopsided fort.

  “Boys, please,” Megan said. “What do you say we clean up the stuffed animals and balls first, huh? Okay?”

  They ignored her, grabbing nerf guns from the cabinet and shooting each other from various spots of their half-made fort.

  Megan’s lip quivered. “Remember, we clean up first boys, right? Wouldn’t that be fun? That’s what we agreed on, remember?”

  She looked to me, eyebrows raised. I knew she wanted me to help, but I just shrugged. I could easily have taken over for her, but Megan has given me way too many “my kids will never do that” looks when my kids were little for me to want to step in now.

  In other words, I threw a stuffed animal at her and left.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  MY GROWING LIST of suspects was the only thing running through my mind as I headed home from Megan’s. The partner Earl swindled money from, the ex-wife he left with nothing, the hottie boyfriend who got his hand smacked with a baseball bat, my aunt…

  I should be a cop. I’d only been on the case half a day, and I already had a pretty good list. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with my list, but I was pretty sure I knew where my old Nancy Drew books were out in the garage, so I figured I was golden.

  I stopped at Ralph’s on my way home. I didn’t feel like cooking and something told me I should also buy a plant so I could pay the grieving ex-wife a visit tomorrow. It was only good manners to apologize for Earl’s angry outburst and offer my condolences.

  Another $20 down the drain for a few frozen dinners and an orchid.

  As soon as I woke up the next morning, I called my aunt to get Judith’s address.

  “I thought it would be a good idea for the San Diego Matchmaker Club to pay her a visit with a nice plant and offer our condolences about Earl,” I said, opening the plastic around the Little Debbie I was about to have for breakfast.

  My aunt squealed out her enthusiasm. “That’s a wonderful idea, Marcie! Keep this up, and you might earn a permanent spot on the payroll. I’ll call her and tell her you’re stopping by.”

  I couldn’t believe I was going through the trouble of clearing this woman’s name when I was still only working for her “on a trial basis.” I bit into my Nutty Bar so hard crumbs flew onto the counter.

  She easily gave me the address, and the go-ahead. “Just get something nice and not one of those half-dead, Gawd-awful plants from a grocery store or something.”

  I agreed as I scribbled down Judith’s phone number and address on the receipt for my Gawd-awful orchid. Then I grabbed my plant and headed into Del Mar.

  Del Mar is one of the nicer areas of San Diego. It’s a rich beach community, so the fact that Judith lives here made me wonder where the girl got her money. And why, if she already had money and prestige, did she marry Earl, the angry embezzling prepper? Was she the real embezzler here?

  I looked down at my gas tank. It was near empty, and Del Mar was a good 20 miles away from my house. Sleuthing in San Diego was going to be expensive in my gas-guzzler. After throwing another $20 into my tank, I started to become resentful about Mark and his inability to pay child support. Sure, he was paying half the mortgage, but he was going to get that money back as soon as the house sold. If it weren’t for the little bit of money I got when my mom passed away, I don’t know where I’d be right now.

  Judith’s neighborhood was full of multimillion-dollar houses mostly made of glass. I glanced over at the half-dead orchid strapped into my passenger’s seat. Even if it toppled over and spilled everywhere, it would be just another stain on the upholstery that was my life. I couldn’t help but wonder how I’d gone so wrong. And how the people sitting in their gorgeous glass houses had gone so right. We both breathed the same air, as far as I could tell. How in the world did they get to the place of success while I sat in stained upholstery?

  The BMW behind me honked impatiently, and I realized I was going about 10 miles under the speed limit. I pulled my van over to the side and let him pass. And all of the sudden, I realized I was crying.

  I took a deep breath. I knew this was just the perimenopause the doctor was telling me about, but I needed to get myself together. So I tried to think of the positives in life. But I couldn’t.

  What in the world was I doing with my life? What in the world had I done? Dirt-poor and divorced. And now… going through menopause.

  “Come on, Marcie, you can do this,” I said over and over, but the tears just kept coming. So I let myself have the moment.

  Oddly, as soon as I gave into the tears, I found the strength to move on from them. We weren’t hungry. We weren’t homeless. We lived in a beautiful city with love all around us… If I regretted any of that, it meant I didn’t value it. And I did.

  I studied myself in the rear-view mirror, wiping and adding makeup until it looked like I hadn’t been crying nonstop for the last 44 years. Then I headed back onto the road so I could give this crappy flower to the gorgeous woman in her multimillion-dollar glass house.

  ---

  Judith’s house was just like I expected it’d be — the complete opposite of my own. The outside was clean, with shrubs and palm trees that looked sculpted like a professional gardener had trimmed them and not a woman with a pair of scissors and some old socks on her hands. The quaint little flower boxes along the edge of the porch actually had little flowers in them, not sticks and mud. I quickly rang the doorbell before I lost my nerve and ran back out to my car to cry again.

  “Hi. You remember me, right?” I said, practically shoving the plant at her when she opened the door. “I’m Marcie, Mabel’s niece.”

  “Of course,” she said. She looked at the orchid like she wanted to spray it with Lysol. “Your aunt told me you were coming. Come on in. Can I get you anything?”

  “No, I’m fine.” We both sat down on her sleek designer couch. “I just wanted to come by and tell you how sorry we were about the whole Earl incident Friday, and then for him to turn up dead yesterday… I’m very sorry.”