2 Maid in the Shade (16 page)

L
ucy nodded and said, “Indeed; that would be prudent, I have never seen an old farmer that pissed off, and I’m completely confused about what just happened.”

I
grinned, “I am the mistress of the dark arts. We all have our gifts; you turn all the men on and I tick ‘em off. Ready to head home after the bank?”

“I thought you were going to get Jared something to repay him for the phone
?”

“
Bah! Shopping for men. Other than the Diva pie I can’t think of a thing can you?”

“I can think of one thing he’d like to have.”

I looked over and she licked her lips lasciviously and winked.

“Hmmm,” I said thoughtfully,
“There’s an idea, mind if we do dinner later or rain check it?”

Her
eyes widened. “You are just going to go over there and what? Rip his clothes off?”

T
he fact that I was teasing her had nothing to do with the stinging ripple of heat that washed over me. “You know, I just might. Of course I don’t know how far I would really go with it.” My brow furrowed, “Probably not tonight though, the line is probably already forming for him at some drinking hole. And then there’s—“

“
What?” She asked excitedly.

I
reached over and tugged at her hair playfully. “You’ll never know.”

I
dropped her off at her house twenty minutes later and she gave me a mournful look. “You really aren’t going to tell me if you go over there?”

“Nope,” I said cheerfully.

She sighed heavily, “I could always take him out and get him hammered afterwards and get the scoop.”

I
smirked, “You might have to wait. He’ll probably be really tired for awhile.”

“You aren’t actually going to do this.”

It was fun to toy with her and I had to admit, kind of exciting to think about. I winked at her and restarted the engine. “You enjoy those pies now, you hear?”

J
ared called me about an hour later, just as I was bringing Mosey back in.

“
We just so happened to have a car nearby when Herb took the manuscript from Mae’s mailbox. We can’t hold him on anything, even a felony mail offense since it's his home already, and his mail.”

“
What if you bring up the fact that there were no carrot leavings in the garbage or compost bin, the fact that she had no plans to acknowledge him at all according to her latest manuscript, and I saw him with heavy gloves on shortly after she died?”

“What do the gloves have to do with it
?”

“
You can be sickened just by handling it. Those gloves were thick as oven mitts and his hands are so calloused I don't know that he ordinarily used them at all other than to handle something like Western Water Hemlock. Someone had to have taken away the scraps. Plus, look at her notes; she has the descriptions for the wild carrot which is Queen Anne’s Lace and the hemlock very carefully reversed. If you get a search warrant you'll see his class lecture notes are the opposite.”

“Won't he just say he had them confused too
?”

“Never, his expertise was his whole identity. That will shake his pride.
It’s why he killed her, not for the money, but the recognition. I suspect he was the one who called Anita with the fake injured hawk story to keep her from being poisoned. He must have heard Mae was inviting Anita over to try the recipe.

“
You know,” I added thoughtfully, “I wonder if you’d just ask him informally about the berries he and his friends were picking back when he was a young man out with the woman who he ended up marrying. I’d be curious to know how he would react; it might really throw him off; especially if you ask him if deadly nightshade grew in that area.”

I
had another idea. “Ask him why he hired me. He was able to go in there and mop up. Although I will say, I think he did that to protect me from the poison.”

I
was reconsidering having a bagged salad for supper when Jared called again. “You were right; his class notes were the reverse for identification of the two plants, and the opposite of the pictures he emailed Mae for the book. It’s not enough to find him guilty. We used your idea, hammered away at the fact that he just might not know his topic as well as he thought... Man that got him riled. He even offered to eat the stew when we brought it out.”

“
You should have let him.” I said my voice hard.

“
I don’t know that you’re right on this one. The medical examiner is backed up, checking her stomach contents tomorrow. We ran the stew to the lab.

O
ne strange thing,” he continued, “when we asked him about the berry thing with his former wife, he seemed to sink into his own skin, he just deflated and asked if he could leave. He looked shocked and grief stricken. I felt like we are just torturing that poor guy.”

“
I still think he did it,” I said stubbornly. “Wow, you hear about your garden variety killers but in this case he actually is...”

“
Gretchen! That's terrible!” Jared exclaimed.

“
My God, I have lived to see the day when Jared occupies the moral high ground. Just about anything could happen next.”

“
Girl, anything can happen if you let it.”

“Another cryptic reference to a roll in the hay
?”

“You know, I don't eve
n think of you that way anymore. I'm free of your feminine wiles.”

“Good to know,” I said swe
etly. “Now in your professional opinion, as a lawman, is there any point in wearing anything to bed? How often do you get called out to emergencies where people didn't have time to dress?”

“Just in a fire situation.”

“Hmm, worth the risk then? I mean what is the point of having new silk sheets if you can't feel them against bare skin, am I right? Thank goodness I have my friendly neighborhood lawman to ask these sensitive questions. Asking you is like asking Consuela, better, since I know you well enough to come right out and say, “Hey I was going to sleep in the nude tonight, is there any good reason not to? Consuela might find that weird.”

“She'd probably think you were hitting on her
. Anyway, this season in North Carolina is an iffy time for temperature. You might catch a chill.”

“
True, I'll give that some thought.”

“
You are not dragging me into this little game Gretchen. I don't have an opinion one way or another.”

“
Just checking,” I laughed.

“
So that was just a test? You never, you know, sleep naked?”

“Gotcha,” I laughed, “I'm never, you know, going to tell you.”

After we disconnected the phone rang again; it was a blocked call. I had no desire to let my voice mail back up, so I grudgingly answered, knowing it had to be some telemarketer who had mined my miniscule business from a list, hoping to gouge me for the next fabulous way to get my name out to the public. I answered with my name instead of the business, planning to tell them I was not working presently; feeling guilty about the twilight of half lies telemarketers must deal with.

“Gretchen Gallen,” I answered
.

T
he voice on the other end had a husky and foreign tone. “I am looking for Ben,” she said, launching into the conversation without preamble.

“He doesn't live here and he’s away on business.” I said curtly, disliking her immediately. “And you are
?”

“Irinia,” she said, as though that should be enough.

“He’s away and I’m not sure when he will return to the States,” I ventured uneasily.

“
That is the thing,” she said, “he was supposed to meet me and he has not turned up. I will need his itinerary.”

“I don’t have his itinerary
. Are you one of his clients?”

“Who would have his schedule
?”

“Ma’am, I have no idea. Someone he works with
? How did you get this number?”

S
he ignored my question. “I had hoped you would be better informed, what is your relationship?”

“Close
friend.”

“And yet I’ve never heard him speak of you.”

I was quickly turning from uneasy to mad as hell. “How did you get my name and number then? Maybe YOU aren’t as close to him as you imagine. He’s working for companies abroad. Again, who are you? Who are you to him?”

“
We are in a relationship.”

“
You’re his girlfriend?” I asked, stunned.

“
That is a child’s word, we are intimate.”

“For how long
?” I asked, reeling.

“Long enough for m
e to have his personal contacts,” she said smugly.

“Oh, okay, well
then I’m certainly no threat to your intimate relationship. Have you tried his mother?”

“No,” she said smoothly, “I seem to have spilled wine on our address
book; your number is one I could still read.”

“T
ry to see if you can find the one under Elizabeth then, his mother, she’s frail and bedridden most of the time…”

“I know that,” Irinia said
brusquely.

“And I know you lie like a rug.”

“Perhaps,” She laughed again.

C
learly only one of us was having any fun here.

“I can describe his body in intimate detail if you want to ve
rify the depth of our relations,” she offered huskily. “I was with him when he got his scar.”

“No thanks,” I said, getting pretty hot tempered by now. ”I wouldn't know if you were right
. Looks like our boy Ben got tired of you, I'm tired of you already. Besides, you obviously know little about him, Ben's mother is fit and lives in London, always has.”

“So who is the liar
?”

“I don’t care what you call
me; you don’t know Ben as well as you claim. Tell me what you really want.”

“I want to find him of course. That was not a lie.”

“Then good luck to you. If he wants to find you, he may be delayed but he will move heaven and earth to--I have to go.” I didn’t bother to say goodbye, I just hung up.

A
fterward I let Mosey out and settled at the foot of a massive oak in the clearing. I kept an eye on my dog as I reflected on this new development: Irinia. It was a sexy name, Irinia. It sounded like a woman who smoldered with sensuality, kept secrets, and had assignations. In comparison Gretchen sounded like a wholesome milkmaid, eyes wide with naïveté who enjoyed a small and predictable life.

O
f course, I reasoned, Ben would have relationships before me. And since there never had been any “during me” phase yet, I had no right to be so incensed. And perhaps she didn’t have more details of his life because he didn’t see a future in it or because they didn’t spend time talking.

A
ctually it was something of a relief, I persuaded myself. Ben could hardly charm me into a commitment if he already had companionship here and there. But when he came back things would be different, at least initially. My view of him had changed. I felt as though the best part of my life that I had taken for granted had been cast into eclipse.

I
f I believed only a little of Irinia’s story, I imagined that was how he spent his time away; girls tucked away in villas and villages or stealthy assignations in posh suites. Maybe he had hoped to make a life with me someday as he claimed. It didn’t seem as though the wait had been too onerous.

I
stood up and decided the best thing to do was nothing. Ben was six years older; of course he had relationships. I had two myself in college, although they had been more about timing than passion and I had not left them with any clue as to what all the fuss was about. So of course Ben had them as well--I would probably consider it odd if he didn’t. I hadn’t wanted to think about it. That might have turned into a discussion I wasn’t ready for.

I
realized I had been quite the hypocrite when it came to Ben and his sexual history. He knew nothing of mine and obviously wished to keep it that way. He had even been pleasantly surprised nothing had ever developed with Jared. So there would have been no judgment if I had that fling. Displeasure perhaps, and definitely jealousy, but he indicated he was playing the long game. He had talked of our future together enough to let me know it was a game he expected to win; to win me. He had never exacted any promises of fidelity from me in the interim, and perhaps he had his own reasons.

I
called Harlan a few hours later per his request and he thanked me for finding the fingernail. “It did come from the body,” he said, “there were scrapings but no match to anything so far. Still, it’s enough there to keep the case open. You coming to town again soon?”

“I can.”