Skeletons in the Closet (12 page)

He shook his head. “This material has some spandex in it and it needs to be stretched the way it’s going to be worn or it won’t look right. Now hold still.”

I held my breath while Leo carefully colored my boob.

“Hey, Maggie, do you know the timer is….” Neil came to a full stop in the hallway, both in movement and in speech.

I could easily envision the picture he was beholding.

“I’m not even going to ask.”

* * * *

“Hello, sweetheart.” My father-in-law leaned down to give me a subdued kiss on the cheek. To my knowledge, Ralph called every woman he met sweetheart, from family members to the female wait staff at his club. I gathered it was easier than matching names to cup-size. The sixty-two-year-old lawyer was the quintessential silver fox, oozing charm from every pore, and his casual manner allowed him such liberties. After five minutes with Ralph Phillips, I want to drop to my knees and thank God my husband missed out on the domineering pig gene.

As usual, Laura sent him a perturbed glance, and I was only a little surprised when the women’s lib speech didn’t ensue. My mother-in-law had bigger fish to fry today.

“Maggie, what is this I hear about you being arrested? What on Earth happened?”

“It was a simple misunderstanding, Laura.” She had never offered to let me call her Mom, and I was very glad for it. “We’ve got it all taken care of, and it will never happen again.”

My reassurance fell on deaf ears. “We don’t have time to discuss this now, but I had to do some fast talking to keep Mr. Henderson from backing out of today. He heard about your escapade and was ready to blow off the whole deal! Now, he’ll be here in half an hour with his teenage daughter, and so will Mr. Stevenson and Dr. Fredrick and their wives. Please, don’t embarrass me.”

“I’ll do my best,” came out through tight lips.

Neil and Marty appeared, both finely dressed in my husband’s button up shirts and slacks, although Neil made a subtle face at me as he reached for Ralph’s hand.

“Good to see you, Dad.”

“Laura, Ralph, you remember my brother, Marty.”

The introductions over, I ushered my in-laws into the living room.

“Oh, Maggie, the furniture looks wonderful! You see what a little style can do for a room.”

I was glad I had banned my family from the furniture for the duration. Come the morrow, the stains would run rampant, and I wouldn’t care.

“Where are the boys?” Laura queried in a distracted tone.

“I’ll go check on them,” I said, glad for the reprieve.

Josh emerged from the bathroom, dressed in the outfit I’d laid out for him. In the green button-up shirt and black slacks, he looked like a miniature version of his father.

I gave him a kiss on the head. “You look handsome. Your grandparents are here. Where’s your brother?”

“He says he won’t come out.” Josh pointed to the closed bedroom door.

“Go on out, sweets, I’ll talk to him.”

Kenny lay on his bed in his undershirt, face buried in a pillow.

I crossed the room and rested a hand on his shoulder. “What is it, Kenny?”

A sniffle was my only answer.

“You know Grandma and Grandpa are here. Let me help you get dressed.”

A violent head shake, and he clung tighter to the pillow.

I rubbed his back. “Talk to me, Sport.”

“I don’t like this. We never used to have to get all dressed up, except when we went to church. Thanksgiving was fun in Virginia. All of Dad’s friends and their kids, not a bunch of stuffy old people.”

My heart ached in my chest. “Kenny, I know you miss the way everything was, but sometimes things have to change.”

“I know.”

“It’s only a meal, sweetheart. We’ll eat, and then when everybody leaves we can go play some football in the backyard. And think of all the awesome leftovers! You know what a great cook Leo is. We’ll have good food, and when we’re done we’ll send all the old farts packing.”

That elicited a watery laugh. “I’m gonna tell Grandma you called her an old fart.”

“No need,” Laura said from the doorway.

Aw crap.

“Kenny, please finish getting ready.” I stood and marched staunchly ahead to face my doom.

With her features frozen, Laura looked like the evil queen from
The Chronicles of Narnia
. “Margaret, I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t malign us to our grandsons.”

“Laura, I was only trying to cheer him up. He’s having a little trouble adjusting to all the changes, and I meant no harm by it.”

Laura narrowed her green eyes and looked at me as if I had sprouted horns. “Children need to be taught to respect their elders,
not
to mock them. It’s outrageous enough that you don’t work for a living, setting an outdated and passé example for the boys, but do you really need to compound that embarrassment by belittling those more progressive than yourself? You may not have been taught proper respect, however—”

“Now wait a darn minute, lady. My sister has nothing but respect for her elders and she was taught by the best. But respect is earned, and I think you should show Maggie a little consideration in her own house because she has sure earned some.” Of all the unlikely heroes, Marty decided to stand up for me.

I was floored.

Laura glared at Marty and turned on her heel, leaving a cloud of expensive perfume and simmering rage in her wake.

“Marty, I….”

“Save it, Laundry Hag. No one should talk to you like that, no matter what a screw up you can be.”

“Right back at ya, Sprout.”

Marty shifted his weight. “Anyway, I came to tell you that your guests are arriving.”

We made our way back to the gathering where I greeted the stuffy new additions. Leo served appetizers and champagne with impressive efficiency, and no one seemed to notice that Laura ignored both of the Sampson siblings.

Josh, who was totally enamored by Olivia Henderson, offered to show her his computer set up, and Kenny followed them into the other room. I ducked into the kitchen to check on Leopold and the bird.

“How goes it?” Leo placed the turnip in the microwave.

“The spot on my boob was the best part.” I hiccupped.

He eyed me closely. “How much have you had to drink?”

“I’m still conscious, so not enough.” I went to refill my glass. “That’s funny, the bottle is empty.”

“Maggie, my love, you’re shit-faced.”

I held my thumb and forefinger about an inch apart. “Mildly inebriated.” Another hiccup. “Nicely toasted.”

Leo pushed me onto a stool. “You’re drunk as a skunk and you’re not to move from that spot until otherwise directed.”

He sighed and went about his work. I watched him for a minute in silence, but that was all I was capable of.

“I’m a bad mother.”

“I know better than to argue with a nicely toasted person. Turkey will be going on the table in five. Do you think you can relay the news without injuring yourself?”

I gave him my best droll look and lurched off the stool.

“Steady there, Tiger. We don’t want you doing a face plant; it’d ruin the festive mood.”

I snorted and focused all my energy in putting one foot in front of the other.

“Dinner is about to be served, so what would everyone like to drink?” I announced in my perfect hostess voice.

Neil cocked his head at me as he rose. “Why don’t you let me get the drinks, babe. You should sit. You’ve been working so hard today.”

I made an ungracious sound and was about to sit when the doorbell rang.

“Are we expecting anyone else?” I asked Laura with an arched brow.

She shook her head mutely, and I focused on walking to the door. I never noticed before how hard walking could be.

I pasted my most welcoming smile on my face and breathed in the fresh November air as I took in the two uniformed officers at the back door.

“Now, gentlemen, this is getting to be old hat,” I informed them.

“Um, are you Mrs. Phillips?” the impossibly blond young man asked.

I touched a hand to my chest. “That I am.”

“Your husband reported a missing wheelbarrow this morning, is that right?”

Neil appeared behind me. “Yes, yes I did. Have you found it?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Oh good. Where was it?” I asked on a giggle.

“I know it’s the holiday and everything, but do you think the two of you could come down to the station?”

“What’s the meaning of this?” Ralph blustered. “Neil, who are these people?”

“Pay attention, Ralph, look at the uniforms.” Laura was by his side. The doorway felt very crowded, so I took a step outside.

“Sir, we have some questions to ask, and we think it would be better down at the station.”

“What kind of questions?” Neil looked as baffled as I felt.

“Do you need us to ID the wheelbarrow or something? Has more than one rusty old wheelbarrow gone missing?” Champagne plus my mother-in-law equaled a belligerent Laundry Hag.

“No, ma’am.” The chubby red-haired officer cleared his throat.

“Then what’s the problem?”

The blond one looked at Big Red and back to me. “There’s a body in it.”

“
D
o you derive some sort of amusement from asking the same questions in forty different ways? I’ve been here for three hours, while my house is full of holiday guests. I told you, I didn’t know Greg the Gym Rat all that well and I’m very sorry that he’s dead, but that’s no excuse to keep me locked up here for the rest of my life!”

The champagne had worn off a while before, and I was working on belligerent all on my own. It wasn’t hard. Neil and I had been separated as soon as we reached the police station; presumably so they could cross compare our ‘stories’. In all honesty, I can’t say I blamed them; it was a pretty weird tale.

“Humor me, Mrs. Phillips. You took the wheelbarrow to the supermarket and then…?” the butch female detective asked me.

I sighed and took a sip from the axle grease coffee they’d given me, which had turned cold twenty questions ago.

“I took the wheelbarrow so I could do my Thanksgiving shopping. I was running late, it was an impulse. I left it around the back of the building and went inside.”
I paused to take breath, and Butch interjected, as she had done every time I reached this point in the tale.

“Approximately how long were you in the store?”

“Somewhere between half an hour and forty-five minutes. It would have been less, but I picked the wrong line, and checkout took a while.”

“When did you discover someone had taken the wheelbarrow?”

“After I checked out.” I fought a losing battle with my temper, and the pointless string of redundant questions only fueled the fire. “If you’re Hudson’s finest, I’d say we’re all up shit creek.”

Butch ignored my insult. “What did you do when you discovered the wheelbarrow had been taken?”

“I called my house, and my brother came to pick me up.”

“So why didn’t you have him give you a ride in the first place?”

I really didn’t like the smug look on her face.

“Because he wasn’t home when I needed to go!” The stress of the past few weeks was wearing me down and having Butch imply that I was either shady or stupid annoyed the crap out of me, so I stood up. “In case you’ve missed it, Detective, I’m trying to help you out here. I can leave anytime I want, but I feel it’s my job as a good citizen to do what I can, so either ask me something new or get out of my way.”

“You were the ghost writer on that book,
How to Win Friends and Influence People,
weren’t you?”

I guess I had to hand in my title of Master of Observation, since I’d missed the hulking presence of Detective Bradley Patterson in the doorway. That Detective Butch was just as startled was only slightly mollifying.

“Detective Capri, can I speak with you for a moment? We’ll be right back, Mrs. Phillips.” Patterson was dressed casually in a knitted sweater that should have looked ridiculous on his bulky frame but was strangely fitting. He had this,
so what if it’s ugly, my mother made it,
air about him. Butch sent me a withering glance and departed behind Patterson.

I sat back down and laid my head on my folded arms. Anger had kept me conscious to this point, but I was so tired my ears rang. I wanted to find Neil and go home; anything else was too much effort.

The door squeaked, and I looked up. Bradley Patterson had returned with a fresh cup of coffee.

“The way I see it, you have a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Did you know him well?”

I shook my head before holding the Styrofoam cup to my lips. Greg the Gym Rat was dead, shot once execution style in the forehead and tossed into my wheelbarrow five miles from the supermarket where I’d last seen it. “I barely knew him at all. I’d only seen him in person three times. He wasn’t up for any humanitarian awards, but he was all right.”

“Maggie, we’ve found Mr. Kline.”

I gripped the coffee cup in both hands to keep them from shaking. “And…?”

“He was pulled over for speeding along I84, heading southwest into Connecticut. He claimed to be at a campground for the last three days, but there was no one to provide an alibi for him.”

I locked stares with the detective, and the unspoken words hovered between us.
This time.

“He had motive and opportunity, so he’s being held without bail, charged with murder in the first degree.”

I nodded glumly. “What about me. Am I being charged with something?”

Patterson studied my face for a minute before answering. “No. Detective Capri was reluctant to let you leave, and I have no authority here. Hudson is her jurisdiction, but I convinced her that our murder cases are linked. Unfortunately, you’re also connected, so before I let you leave, is there anything you want to tell me?”

“Mr. Kline’s lawyer called me last night and asked if I could go check on him since he wasn’t answering his phone.”

Patterson swore, and I flinched. “Did you?”

I shook my head. “Neil went. He said the place was all shut up and dark.”

“What time was this?”

“A little after ten.”

Patterson stood up, so I followed suit. “I don’t know why you’re connected to all this, Mrs. Phillips. On the surface, it seems like coincidence, but my gut is telling me there’s something else at work here. Do you know of anyone who holds a grudge against you or your family?”

“Well, the woman at the end of the cul-de-sac was less than thrilled when I talked her down to twenty-two cents per paperback at her yard sale a few months back.” I’d been aiming for levity, but the words fell flat.

He offered me a weak smile anyway. “Please be careful out there, Maggie. I’ll check in on you later.”

I nodded and exited through the door he held for me. Neil sat in a chair with fingers steepled across the busy room. Anyone who didn’t know him would think he was utterly serene, but I made out the tense lines around his mouth. He rose in one fluid movement, his gaze trained on me. I scurried to his side, and he grasped my trembling hand in his steady one.

“All set?”

I nodded again, thinking that since the cleaning gig wasn’t working, I could sell myself as a life-sized bobble-head doll.

The march to the car was quiet, and I settled myself in the passenger’s seat without comment. Neil shut the door behind me and made his way to the driver’s door. He sat and shoved the keys in the ignition but made no move to start the car. Instead, he leaned against the seat and closed his eyes. I looked at his beaten-down expression, one that I knew so well. Neil had the ultimate poker face. According to the SEALs who’d served with him, he was adept at showing no weakness in the hot zone, exuding confidence to encourage his team and strike fear into the enemy. When he came home from a strenuous mission, however, he’d let all of the tension out. I suppose it was like a pressure cooker—you had to vent the steam at some point or risk an explosion.

I watched him for a moment, since it was easier than giving in to my own misery. I didn’t want to think about the deaths or the connection I had to these people. Neil took some even breaths, and I studied his handsome profile with the same awe I’d felt for close to a decade whenever I looked at him. He hadn’t aged visibly, and if anything, his confidence and determination were stronger than ever.

“You’re sexy,” I told him.

That got one eye open. “Don’t try to butter me up. I’m so mad and I’m doing my best not to yell at you, but I need a minute here.”

“Why are you mad at me?” I loaded my tone with extra naïveté.

“Maybe because you lied to me about the wheelbarrow? What the hell were you thinking?”

“I told you, the van wouldn’t start, and I had to get to the store!” I knew I had no right to be outraged in the face of his wrath, he was absolutely right to be upset, but I’d learned long ago not to give any ground when going up against a difficult man.

“Maggie, don’t even try to justify your actions. You were thoughtless, and you hid things from me. In my book that means you’re the one in the wrong.”

“Oh, get off your high horse Mr. Perfect; you don’t have a clue what I went through trying to put on a dinner for your parents and their guests! Everything I do is to help protect and support our family, so don’t sit there being all uber sexy and thinking you are in the know about everything! I didn’t hide anything from you, but things started happening so fast, and your parents were coming, and you were at work, so I did what I had to, Neil! It’s what being a SEAL’s wife taught me, that when I’m home, I can’t sit around and worry about what might happen, I have to do whatever I can.

“You don’t know; you don’t understand what I had to go through, worrying about whether you were safe, not knowing when you’d be back and looking to the right and the left and not seeing any relief! Being married to you and your military career made me this way, so you have no frigging right to complain now!”

Tears tracked down my face, and Neil stared at me like I’d grown a third eye, but I was beyond caring. It was my turn to take some deep, even breaths before I got out of the car. I couldn’t be in a confined space with him right now, not because I was angry, but because he was right and I had sucker punched him with a backlog of issues deeper than the Atlantic.

I stepped over the curb, glad I’d put boots on before going to the police station, and headed for home. The trek would have been excruciating in heels. I knew Neil wouldn’t come after me, not right away. There are certain things married couples may never say to one another, but are understood and accepted. I’d trod on sacred ground with my complaints about being a SEAL’s wife, and Neil needed some time to accept that history was not repeating itself.

I fumed for three blocks and was just starting to cool off when my cell phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number, but answered anyway.

“Mrs. Phillips? This is Janice Montgomery.”

Against my better judgment, I had asked Janice to accompany me on the three cleaning jobs I’d scheduled for the weekend. With the holiday season gearing up, the elite of Hudson and the surrounding communities were busier than usual, entertaining and throwing lavish parties, and my reputation as a cleaning service was not only notorious, but reliable too. There was a great deal of background noise from Janice’s end of the line, and I thought I heard a crash.

“Hey, Janice, how’re you doing?”

“Super, Mrs. Phillips, but I wanted to call and let you know that I’m going to be moving.”

“Oh? You’re getting your own place, huh? Smart idea.” I toed a dislodged chunk of concrete and kicked it into the street. There was definitely a crash, followed by some volatile yelling. “Where are you, a construction site?”

A pause ensued, and I picked up on some more foul language.

“Um, no. I’m on my way to North Dakota.”

I stopped torturing the sidewalk. “I’m sorry; you’ll have to repeat that, I thought you said you were going to North Dakota.”

Another crash and what sounded like an animal yelping in pain.

“No, I am going to North Dakota as soon as Daddy lets Jeremy off the hood of the car. We’re getting married, isn’t that cool!”

I heard the words
worthless no good son of a whore
, followed by another crash.

“Uh oh, looks like we won’t be leaving until tomorrow. See, Daddy is payin’ Jeremy back for abandoning me in the first place and once he’s done were gonna go to North Dakota, only I don’t think we’re gonna be able to drive his car with the hood dented in like that. I guess we should get it looked at first.”

“Sounds like a plan.” My voice was faint, and I sat down on the curb. “I guess this means you’re not going to clean with me tomorrow afternoon?”

“No, cleaning is way too hard, and don’t take this the wrong way, Mrs. Phillips, but you’re kind of demanding to work for.”

This kid didn’t have a clue.

“Well, good luck to you, Janice. And congratulations on the wedding.”

“I don’t think we’ll get married until after the baby is born. I wanna get my figure back, ya know?”

Not to mention her fiancée was probably going to need reconstructive surgery by the time Jack Hammer finished pounding the stupidity out of him.

“Take care, Janice, and I’ll mail your check to your dad.”

I hung up before the girl could say anything else. This was freaking perfect. I had no assistant, three cleaning jobs, and a murderer to catch. Not to mention facing up to the wrath of Laura Phillips. Rock bottom was a skyscraper’s height above me.