Lemon Tart (22 page)

“Bullied her?” Detective Cunningham asked before flipping open
his notebook and reading as if their conversation was casual.

This gave her courage to keep going. “You should have heard
him. He was telling her that if he came back with a warrant he’d trash her
office. She said she’d dealt with him before and couldn’t stand him.” She
remembered what she’d learned about Madsen that afternoon and pushed forward.
“I think I understand more of what’s going on with the two of you now, though.”

“Meaning what?” Cunningham asked, his attention on his notes as
if her opinion didn’t matter much.

“She told me about the attorney general and how Madsen ended up
in Garrison. I bet that drives you crazy.” She smiled, hoping he’d soften into
the Detective Cunningham she’d known that morning.

He looked at her with a steely gaze. “What really drives me
crazy, Mrs. Hoffmiller, is when I give people the benefit of the doubt and they
betray my trust. It not only impedes our investigative work but it makes me
look very foolish.”

Sadie straightened in her chair and blinked. It didn’t seem as
if she’d made much headway to the let’s-work-as-a-team
option as she’d been vying for.

Cunningham leaned forward. “I responded to the call about Ron
Bradley this afternoon at Baxter’s restaurant, but after talking to him, and
being assured the man he assaulted didn’t want to file charges, I let him go
because I had no other reason to detain him since I hadn’t yet talked to Susan
Gimes.”

Sadie swallowed and berated herself for not coming clean
sooner.

“Had I known all of this, I wouldn’t have let him leave. That
means he’s still out there, on the street.”

“You think he did it?” Sadie asked, leaning forward. “You think
he killed Anne?”

Cunningham let out a breath in frustration. “You do,” he said
bluntly. “And the rest of the investigation is moving very slowly. It’s likely
the best lead we’ve got—ten hours late.”

“I’m really sorry,” Sadie said, looking at the carpet beneath
her feet. She thought about the intruder at Anne’s house this evening and felt
even worse. Whoever it was wasn’t Ron, but how would she tell the detective
that?

“Is there anything else you would like to tell me?” he
asked.

“I got some papers at the library,” she said, standing slowly
and heading to the computer desk where she’d left them. She picked up the
papers and brought them to the detective. She sat down and waited until he had
scanned each paper. “I also sent an e-mail to the human resources
person at Riggs and Barker in Boston asking about Anne—that
company is the same one Ron works for—and I thought maybe they
would—”

“Yes, I know.”

Sadie gasped and Detective Cunningham looked up to meet her
eye. “You seem to believe that while you’ve been looking for answers, we’ve
been doing jumping jacks in our back office.” His voice was tight, his hazel
eyes slightly narrowed. “But in fact we have been investigating this—and
we spoke to the head of human resources at the Boston office this evening. When
your e-mail came in she called us; it seemed suspicious to her in
light of Anne’s death, which the entire office had already heard about. But
we’d already let Mr. Bradley drive away from Baxter’s and he hasn’t gone back
home. We have, as they say, lost him.”

“I—I’m so sorry,” Sadie repeated. Cunningham said
nothing, but his expression showed his displeasure. Sadie cleared her throat,
hating how uncomfortable all this had become. “I’m only trying to get answers,”
she said lamely. “I’m not trying to get in the way.”

“Mrs. Hoffmiller,” Detective Cunningham said, sitting forward
and stretching his back. She wondered if he was sore but doubted now would be a
good time to offer him a massage, not to mention it was a rather forward thing
to do seeing as they were alone. “An investigation is like a living thing, with
rhythms and routines. In order for the police to be effective, we need people
to not interfere with those rhythms. I understand that your intentions have not
been malicious. But they are causing problems—do you understand
that?”

Sadie nodded like a child receiving a reprimand. She pushed all
thoughts of the calendar and book from her mind. He’d likely arrest her if she
admitted to breaking into Anne’s house and taking the items. The guilt was
overwhelming.

“Problems not only with this investigation, but with my partner.” He seemed to emphasize
the last word and it confused her. She was certain that Detective Cunningham
and Detective Madsen were pitted against each other. Detective Cunningham
continued. “You witnessed something between Madsen and me this morning that you
should never have seen. The irony is that you were at the root of it.”

“Me?”

“Since we first spoke to you, Detective Madsen felt you were,
at best, a threat to our investigation, if not a suspect. I disagreed. Based on
the reputation you have in this community, and the times that our public
service has crossed paths, I brought you into this investigation and when
Detective Madsen questioned my choices, I dismissed them as overly suspicious.”

Sadie tried to swallow the lump in her throat.

“However, it’s my job
to be overly suspicious, and as Detective Madsen pointed out to our captain
just a little while ago, I have not been doing my job. He was right.”

“Madsen set me up at the library,” Sadie added, but it was a
weak argument. “He gave me the books then followed me and made all kinds of
accusations when the library gave me some of Anne’s things.”

“As I said, he was doing his job. I am grateful for the help
you have given us. But will you please stay out of this now?”

She nodded before considering whether or not she planned to
stay out of it. But she hated that he was angry with her. She wanted to ask if
they knew where Trevor was, if they had made any determinations about the cause
of death, but she didn’t. He wouldn’t tell her anything now.

Detective Cunningham closed his notebook and slipped it in the
inside pocket of his coat. “Is there somewhere you can stay tonight?” he asked.
“Until we can bring Mr. Bradley in for questioning you shouldn’t be home alone.”

“I can probably stay with my sister-in-law,”
Sadie said, though she really didn’t want to. Then again, she wanted to be home
alone waiting for Ron even less.

“That would be a good idea,” Detective Cunningham said,
standing and heading for the door. With his hand on the knob he turned to look
at her. She stood and shifted her weight, hating the tension she had
caused.

“I really am sorry,” she said again, promising herself right
then that she wouldn’t keep anything else from him—and she’d
think about how she could tell him about the second intruder without getting
herself in more trouble.

“I’ll wait in my car until I see that you’re safely at your
sister-in-law’s. And I still need to talk to Mr. Henry.”

“Do you want me to go with you? He might be more open . . .
to a . . . familiar . . .” She let her words vaporize at
Cunningham’s cold look and shuffled her feet clad in pink slippers.
“Okay,” Sadie finally said, nodding.

She let him out and then called Carrie on the cordless phone,
hating the pit in her stomach at having upset Detective Cunningham. He seemed
like a really nice man. She only wished he’d try to understand her situation a
little better. She couldn’t just do nothing.
Carrie’s phone rang and rang. Sadie hung up and dialed again, certain they were
home. She headed into the bedroom to get Anne’s book and calendar. Finally, on
the sixth ring, a frazzled Jack answered the phone.

“Hello,” Jack said with impatience.

“Jack,” Sadie said, putting the book and calendar in the bottom
of a small bag and covering them with her vitamins, slippers, and fingernail
clippers. It was only overnight, but she’d hate to forget something. “It’s me.
Can I stay there tonight?” She added an extra pair of socks, just in case, and
a small first-aid kit—you never knew when it might
come in handy—a shower cap, should she decide to take a shower
in the morning, and her own towel.

Jack paused. “Stay here?” he repeated as if the words she’d
used were long and hard to understand.

She realized she hadn’t told Jack anything about Ron. Did she
dare tell him now? Did he already know? She was tired of keeping secrets.
Taking a deep breath, she said, “The police are looking for Ron, to bring him
in for questioning.” In her mind they would definitely arrest him and throw him
in jail. “They don’t want me home alone.”

Jack was silent and Sadie waited for him to ask why the police
were looking for Ron, but he didn’t. After a few seconds he spoke again. “I’m,
uh, just leaving, but I’m sure Carrie would be glad for the company. I’ll be
back later.”

“Okay, thanks,” she said, though she dreaded going to his house
now more than ever. He must know about Ron. Otherwise he’d have asked more
questions. Her heart sank as her earlier ponderings on who she could trust came
blazing hot into her mind. She grabbed her bathrobe, some clean underwear, face
cream, clear nail polish, and another pair of socks. “I’ll just be a couple
minutes.”

“Make it at least ten,” Jack said. “We’re finishing up some . . .
things. I’ll tell Carrie you’re coming.”

“Okay,” Sadie said, hoping she wasn’t interrupting some kind of
reconciliation. “Ten minutes.”

When Sadie had locked her front door—after
grabbing her pillow, her address book, and an extra pair of pajamas in case she
spilled anything on the set she’d already packed and after securing all her
windows and doors and turning out the lights—she hurried down
the steps. The chill of the day had warmed some, despite how late it was and
she wondered if that meant it might snow. If it had snowed last night there
might have been footprints at Anne’s house. She’d seen a show where the police
caught a bad guy by matching up his shoe tread. As she hurried along the
sidewalk to Jack and Carrie’s she ignored Detective Cunningham’s car idling
further down the circle and looked at the sky. It did look like snow and she
wished she’d brought her coat and put some salt on the steps just in case.
Jack’s truck was no longer in the driveway.

Carrie let her in and Sadie noticed she looked absolutely
exhausted. Maybe she’d been right when she’d said that Sadie wasn’t the only
one who’d had a difficult day. Or maybe she was sick.

“You can take the guest room downstairs,” Carrie said, turning
toward the kitchen. “I was just straightening up, then I was going to get into
a bath.”

“Thanks, I really appreciate you letting me stay,” Sadie said.
A few months ago Carrie’s oldest daughter had surprised Carrie with a home
makeover inspired by a community education class she’d taken on interior
design. She’d repainted the living room in a shade called “Desert Rose.” Sadie
thought it looked more like bologna left on the counter too long. But Carrie
had liked it so Sadie had simply smiled and nodded. Paired with an old
sage-green sofa set and several family portraits in mismatched
frames, the room was really quite sickly looking. There was a fire in the
fireplace, filling the room with heat too thick to be comfortable. Sadie was
glad she didn’t have to sleep on the couch.

“So, Ron, huh?” Carrie said. She glanced up at Sadie quickly,
then went back to straightening the counter in the kitchen.

Sadie wasn’t in the mood to talk about it anymore. “Yeah,” she
said simply. “It’s been a long day.”

“Yes,” Carrie said slowly. She looked toward the kitchen window
to her left and seemed distracted for a moment. But then she looked back and
raised a hand to brush her recently dyed blonde hair from her face—the
new color didn’t suit her fair complexion. She didn’t have any makeup on and
looked rather washed out. She’d never put as much into her appearance and
personal development as Sadie did, and it showed, though Sadie didn’t mean to
judge her too harshly. To each her own.

Carrie said good night and turned toward her bedroom; Sadie
took note of just how much weight her sister-in-law had lost.
Daily gym visits had made quite a difference and Sadie wondered how much she
planned to lose. Already she looked like the Carrie she’d been after just the
first two girls, when she’d still been fairly active. Sadie also wondered, for
the thousandth time, if there was any hope that Carrie and Jack could resolve
their differences and try again. The fact that Jack had come over tonight was a
good sign.

Sadie went downstairs. The guest room was painted stark white,
and cluttered with mismatched leftover furniture pieces from the kids. A
bookshelf had been painted a brilliant green, whereas a cast-off
dresser was covered in bumper stickers with phrases like “Jimmy Buffett for
President” and “Go Navy.” However, outside of looking like a pathetic
secondhand store showroom, it was more comfortable than the meaty walls
upstairs. As soon as the door was shut on the little room with a queen bed and
an old quilt Sadie’s mother had sewed decades earlier, she opened her overnight
bag and pulled out the book she’d taken from Anne’s bookshelf, My Father’s Eyes.

Even in full light Sadie couldn’t read the back cover. It took
her a moment to find her reading glasses in her bag, next to her cough
medicine, and try again. She sat back against the headboard, pulling the quilt
over her legs—it was chilly down here. The back cover seemed to
be an excerpt from the book.

“You’re
ending this?” Marci said, her heart seizing in her chest as she placed a hand
on her belly, pregnant with the life their love had created. “What about our
family? What about me?”

“I’m sorry,” he
said with tears in his dark brown eyes. He reached out and pulled her against
his chest one last time and she thought about how much she’d miss his tight
embrace. Memories of their nights together washed over her like ocean waves
intent to drown her in their depths. “I love you,” he continued, “and you’ve
given me more joy and passion than any other woman ever could. But she’s got
money, Marci, and an impeccable reputation that can further my career. At least
this way I can support you—and our child. What else can I do?”