Maximum Security (A Dog Park Mystery) (18 page)

“Well now,” Renee said. “I wonder
if Monica’s young swain has himself an alibi? What do you think,
Lia?”

“He’s fit enough to climb a tree
and shoot off a crossbow. Peter pooh-poohed the idea, but I
wouldn’t be too hasty. Another thing. Someone in the house is
reading
The Hunger Games
. Monica said it was
Stacy.”

“Why is that significant?” Bailey
asked.

“How many teenaged girls do you
know who have read that book and
didn’t
want to pick up a
bow and arrow?”

“So we need to look at Stacy and
Jacob,” Renee said.

“I’d like to take a look at Jacob.
Was he hot?” Bailey asked.

“Wes Bentley hot,” Lia said. “Very
broody looking, like he was in
American Beauty
, except
without the knit cap and the unibrow. He’s still in high school. I
wonder if she knows him in her professional capacity as school
counselor. We could be looking at a very improper
situation.”

“Wes Bentley? I thought that was
Jake Gyllenhaal,” Bailey said.

“Motive?” Lia asked. “What do you
think, Renee?”

“Our young Lothario either wants
the widow for himself, or he is avenging her honor, or both,” Renee
said.

“And Stacy?” Lia asked.

“Maybe she felt betrayed by the
affair? Because George was going to leave?” Renee
pondered.

“Could they have been in it
together?” Bailey asked.

“It’s possible,” Lia said,
shrugging. “But then the motive becomes murkier.”

“How so?” Bailey asked.

“I doubt Stacy is going to help
Jacob in pursuit of her mother. That’s just too disturbing to think
about. It would have to be Jacob helping Stacy for Stacy’s reasons.
And if she has the attention of Jacob to the extent that he would
commit murder for her, why would she care what George was up to?”
Lia explained.

“What if they’re sick, twisted
adolescents, acting out their nihilistic fantasies?” Bailey
suggested.

“Did you get a look at Stacy? She
seem to have nihilistic fantasies to you, Lia?” Renee
asked.

“I only saw pictures of her. She
seems like a straight-arrow, studious type.”

“We have a problem,” Lia
said.

“What’s that?” Renee
asked.

“We need to connect the bow with
someone. Peter and Brent found the owner of the bow, and it came
from a very dubious neighborhood. Not a place middle-class sorts
would care to go, and not people they would care to associate
with.”

“If they identified the owner, why
wasn’t he arrested?” Bailey asked.

“The bow was reported stolen
before George died,” Lia explained.

“And I’m sure they were telling
the absolute truth,” Renee pouted. “So where is this dubious
neighborhood?”

“I don’t know. Peter wouldn’t tell
me, just that it’s dicey. Anyway, I have to draw the line there.
It’s one thing to take food to the Munces. That’s something I’d do,
anyway, that is, if I actually knew George. Which we don’t, really.
But we have no business being anywhere near the guy who owned that
bow.”

“Well, pooh.” Renee made a moue.
“Maybe you’ll find out more when you go back today.”

“Am I going back today?” Lia
asked.

Renee patted Lia’s hand. “Of course
you are. I have today’s offering in the car.”

“Alma, how do you stay so limber?
I know people half your age who aren’t as fit as you are.” Peter
took a drink from his morning Pepsi as he watched his tiny
octogenarian neighbor pick kale from her garden.

“Daily yoga, and fresh greens keep
my hair black. It’s so nice that kale grows on into winter. I can
have homegrown greens almost year round.” She handed the bag to
Peter. “Take these. I bet that girlfriend of yours knows what to do
with them.” She pulled another plastic grocery sack out of her
pocket and resumed pruning the older leaves.

“Yeah. She makes me eat
them.”

Alma chuckled. “You listen to her.
You may think you can eat anything—” She gave his Pepsi a scathing
look. “
—
and get away with it, but you’re
not too far from the day when your body will rebel. So, when are
you going to marry that girl?” She stood up and looked him straight
in the eyes.

Amused, Peter quirked up his mouth
and looked straight back. “I’d marry her tomorrow, but she’s a hard
sell. She likes things the way they are.”

“Why do you want to marry her?
You’re getting the milk for free, aren’t you?”

Peter sputtered. “Alma! You know
it’s not like that.”

“Okay, let’s look at it a
different way. You want a wife, she doesn’t want a husband. Why
don’t you look elsewhere? You’re a handsome young man. You’ve got a
job and you don’t hang out with low-life types. I don’t think it
would be too hard for you to find a wife.”

“I don’t want a wife, I want
Lia.”

“Because?”

“Well . . . because she’s the most
amazing woman I’ve ever met.”

“That’s good then. To make a
marriage work, she has to be your hero. Of course, you have to be
hers, too. Are you her hero?”

“Um, I don’t know. That’s not
exactly something that comes up in daily conversation.”

“Think of it like respect. Do you
respect each other.”

“I think so.”

“I mean, do you like her exactly
as she is, or do you think marriage is going to change things
somehow?”

“I guess I thought we’d buy a
house, make a home together.”

“Uh, huh, and who’s going to iron
your shirts?”

“Nobody irons my shirts. They
don’t need it.”

“That’s good. Too many men think
of wives like their cars. Something they need that makes their life
easier and hopefully looks good; and that they take care of to keep
from whining but mostly ignore.”

“That’s insulting!”

“Just making sure you’re not
expecting Lia to be your housekeeper-sex goddess.”

“You’re harsh, Alma,” he
scolded.

“Marriage is serious business. Too
many young people jump into it thinking it’s going to fix their
lives, when it’s likely to make things harder. If you want a good
marriage, first you have to have respect based on admiration,
trust, and then friendship. You have to have all three things, and
you have to have them on both sides, or it won’t work. “

“You left out love.”

“You’re going to have love at the
start of every relationship, but love isn’t enough to make a
marriage, or even keep itself going. Lots of things kill love, and
you can love someone but not be able to stay married to
them.”

“That’s a lot to think
about.”

“If your girl is balky about
making a commitment, then you need to be building on those three
things, you and she both. So what’s missing?”

The door opened. Lia noted the
questioning look in Monica’s eyes, as if she were uncertain why Lia
was there. The look vanished, replaced by a hesitant smile, very
proper for one who is grieving. “More gifts? You are too kind.
Please come in.” Monica ushered Lia inside. “We still have plenty
of lasagna. It’s lovely, by the way.”

“I brought salmon croquettes
today.”

“Aren’t you the cook.”

“It’s just a hobby,” Lia demurred.
Monica took the covered dish, poured coffee.

“You really don’t have to keep
bringing us food,” Monica said.

“It’s no trouble. I wish there was
more we could do. George was well liked at the park.”

“I never realized. He never
said.”

George hadn’t said, because we
barely knew him. If we had, we would have missed him and called.
Not that I’m going to tell Monica that.

“How is Stacy handling things?”
Lia asked.

“Stacy’s a trooper. She’s my
pillar of strength. I don’t know what I’d do without her. I just
hope this doesn’t send her grades into the sewer. She’s shooting
for Stanford. I suppose we can forget about that, with George
gone.” She sighed. “It’s not like the old days, when you could work
your way through school.”

Monica looked at her watch. “I’m
sorry, I’m expecting my brother and his wife any minute now. I hope
you’ll excuse me. They’re driving in from Indianapolis to help out
with the funeral.” She stood up.

“Has the coroner released George,
then?”

“Not yet, but they said the
anthropologist would be here this week, and then they would release
him. So we’re having the funeral next Tuesday. We’re going to
finalize everything after they get here. I hope you’ll come, and
bring George’s dog park friends.”

She ushered Lia to the door. “Thank
you for the croquettes. I’m sure they’ll make a lovely dinner.
Please don’t trouble about us for tomorrow. We’ll be going out to
eat.”

A teenaged girl with dark hair down
to her waist came up the walk. “Stacy, darling,” Monica called.
“This is Lia. She made that lovely lasagna we had last
night.”

Stacy’s mouth stretched in a parody
of a grin. Pro-forma acknowledgment with ironic undertones. She
slipped inside without saying anything.

~

Lia rendezvoused with Bailey and
Max around the corner from the Munce’s house. Bailey opened the
back door and Max jumped in. She slid into the front seat beside
Lia.

“How come you got to sit inside
and drink coffee while I had to walk Max? She’s your
dog.”

“Monica knows me now, so she might
tell me something. She doesn't know you at all. Max needs the
exercise, and you needed an excuse to loiter.” Max jumped up and
propped her forepaws on top of the seat back so she could lean over
and lick Lia’s ear.

“See, she missed you. She kept
looking at the house, wanting to follow you. I kept telling her she
was going to give us away, but she didn’t care.”

Lia gave Max’s head a scratch.
“Sorry about that. Did you find anything out?”

“I saw a Wes Bently clone coming
home from school. I’m sure it was Jacob. I was able to get his
address, and I texted it along with Stacy’s info down to Trees. He
should be able to get back to us within a day or so. Then we’ll
know if there’s anything off about Stacy or Jacob, like any
criminal or psychiatric history.

“By the way, you’re right. He’s a
hunk.”

“A very young hunk.”

“Spoilsport. Did you find out
anything about Stacy?”

“Monica maintains that Stacy is
the perfect daughter. Good grades, thoughtful, et cetera, et
cetera. The princess made her appearance as I was leaving and
showed a shocking lack of manners. I don’t think Stacy is as
perfect as Monica wants everyone to believe.”

“Jacob drove home. Stacy pulled up
about the same time. They didn’t acknowledge each other. So either
they don’t like each other, or else they don’t want anyone to know
they like each other.”

“Well that’s clear as
mud.”

“Hi, Gorgeous.” Brent flashed
Cynth a perfect, practiced smile as he sat on the edge of her desk.
“How’s our little project coming?

Cynth looked over the top of her
black frame glasses and rolled her eyes. Peter winked at her. She
flipped a heavy, wheat colored braid over her shoulder and pressed
a hand to the full and well-formed bosom lurking underneath her
baggy golf shirt. “Oh Brent,” she said breathily. “I’ve just never
seen anything like this. I never imagined men and women would write
such things to each other. It is positively scandalous.”

Was that a little Scarlett O’Hara
Peter detected in her voice?

Brent leaned forward, crowding her
personal space. “So when are you going to let me have a look at it?
I just want a little peek.”

She leaned back and fanned her face
with a small stack of pages. “I really don’t know if anyone should
be seeing this. Why, looking at it has me quite . . .
flushed.”

“Is that it?” Brent nodded at the
papers.

“Oh, this?” She looked at the
pages she held as if she hadn’t seen them before. “You want this?”
She held the pages out, then pulled them back as Brent reached for
them. She held them close to her face and adjusted her glasses. “I
believe these are for a Detective Dourson. Is your name
Dourson?”

“Cynth, don’t make me
beg.”

“I kinda like making you beg. I
know that’s a rare experience for you. Peter, do you want these?
I’m sorry it took so long. They had me pretending to be a teenager
on Facebook, looking for comments about the bottle bombs at Hughes
High School.” She handed the pages to Peter. “These are rated for
mature audiences, so be sure to keep them away from Junior,
here.”

“Why don’t you come over to my
place?” Brent said. “We’ll see who makes who beg.”

“Oh!” She pressed her hand to her
breast again. “My heart is all aflutter.”

“You know he’s going to show it to
me,” he told Cynth. “Women,” Brent muttered to Peter on their way
out of the IT department.