Moss Hysteria (3 page)

“Sí,”
she said proudly. “Huevos Marisol, my beloved
abuelita
's recipe. My middle name—Marisol—is in her honor. Come!” She opened the curtain so I could walk through. “You don't want it to get cold.”

I didn't want it, period. I wanted Lottie's egg skillet. Why had Lottie let Rosa take over breakfast? She had already invaded my workspace and become Lottie's and Grace's darling. Now this?

“You'll love my
huevos
,” Rosa was saying as she led the way. “I use a special blend of chili peppers, onions, and tomatoes.”

“They're not hot chili peppers, are they?” I asked.

“Of course they are hot,” Rosa replied. “I just cooked them.”

Lottie was already seated at the narrow counter we'd attached to the back wall, forking the egg dish into her mouth. “Sorry to start without you,” she mumbled. “Rosa said I had to eat them before they cooled.”

Rosa patted the wooden stool beside Lottie's, then placed a full plate in front of me. Grace came in with a tray of coffee, cream, and sugar and began to pass out cups.

I sniffed the food on my plate, then took a small bite. It tasted good—at first. And then I swallowed and the burning began.

“Hot peppers,” I rasped. “Water!”

“No water,” Rosa said, putting a piece of toast in my hand. “Bread.”

I stuffed a huge chunk in my mouth and waited for my vision to clear.

“I didn't think they were that hot,” Lottie said.

“They have a little heat,” Rosa said, “but you'll get used to it. Next time I'll use a different kind of pepper.”

There would be a next time? I wanted to push my plate away, but my stomach was so empty that I had to eat. I took a bite of toast with every mouthful of
huevos
, and, as Rosa had promised, I got used to it.

“So?” she asked when I'd finished, draping her arms over my shoulders. “What do you think?”

“To be honest, Rosa—”

“Stop,” she cried. “Nothing good ever comes after ‘To be honest.'”

In the background I could see Grace and Lottie warning me to be kind.

I took a deep breath and pasted on a smile. I was not a good liar. “I was going to say I liked them, but less heat would be better.”

She clapped and then threw her arms around my neck again and hugged me. I glanced at Grace and she gave me a nod. Lottie gave me a thumbs-up.

With breakfast over, we had a meeting in the coffee-and-tea parlor to discuss business matters, and then they wanted to know about the tragedy that had occurred in my new neighborhood. They'd all read Connor MacKay's account in the morning paper.

“The article made it sound as though your neighbor Theda Coros may be a suspect,” Lottie said, pouring herself another cup of coffee.

“Connor MacKay got it wrong,” I said. “He loves to sensationalize his stories. Theda had an appointment with the man, but he never showed up.”

“He was dead in the water,” Rosa said. “How could he show up?”

“Exactly,” I said.

“I know Theda from my bowling league,” Grace said. “She has an interesting history. When we have time, I'll share it with you. But right now, we have fifteen minutes before we open. Spit spot, everyone.”

At that, we went our separate ways, Grace to ready her coffee machines and set her water on to heat, Lottie to restock the glass-fronted case and open the cash register, me to check our flower stock and place orders, and Rosa to start on the tickets waiting on the spindle.

Although the workroom was windowless, the colorful blossoms and heady fragrances made it feel like a tropical garden. Vases of all sizes and containers of dried flowers filled shelves above the counters along two walls. A large slate-covered worktable occupied the middle of the room, two big walk-in coolers took up one side, and a desk holding my computer equipment and telephone filled the other side. Beneath the table were huge bags of potting soil, wet foam, and a plastic-lined trash can.

In the short hallway beyond the workroom were a tiny bathroom and the galley kitchen where we'd had breakfast. At the very back of the building was the exit into the alley.

An hour later I was at the computer, filling out an order form, and Rosa was behind me, seated on a stool at the table humming as she worked. She paused to ask, “Did you talk to your mother this morning?”

“No.”

“You didn't talk to your mother this morning? Don't you talk to her every morning?”

I had to stop thinking about the order I was placing and replay her question in my mind before I could answer. “No.”

“Abby, one day you will lose her and then you will regret not talking to her every day. I phone my mother every morning as soon as I get up just to tell her I love her.”

“Good for you.” I was trying to concentrate. Rosa was not making it easy.

“So your mother didn't tell you about her new art project?”

I stopped again. “My mother doesn't do art anymore. She's writing children's books now.”

“Abby, when you are an artist, you never give up art.”

Well, there you go. My mother wasn't an artist. She may have thought she was. She may have produced a variety of horrendous art projects, such as her giant bowling pin hat rack with Homer Simpson's face painted on it, her Dancing Naked Monkey Table, her beaded jackets made with one-inch wooden beads, her colored feather hats that left dye all over their wearers' heads, or her sea glass sunglasses debacle, all of which she had expected me to sell at my shop. But she was not, in the least sense of the word, an artist. She was a weekend hobbyist—or rather, she had been. Now, besides teaching kindergarten, she wrote children's mysteries, and quite well, too. She'd found her forte at last.

“If you had talked to your mother,” Rosa continued, “you would have heard that we are now collaborating on her newest art project.”

I hit
Enter
by mistake and lost the entire screen. Gone. Just like I wished Rosa was at that moment. I turned to face her. “You're working on an art project
together
?”

“Sí.”

“She loves writing her children's books. Why would she stop?”

“She is going to do both: write books
and
create art. But because her time is more limited, I am helping her with her new project, and it is not ready yet. That is all I am going to say. If you want to know more, you will have to call her—or maybe she will call you.”

My cell phone rang, and I gave a start. But then Marco's face popped up on the screen, and that was also a surprise. He rarely phoned during the morning because it was our busiest time. I took the phone into the kitchen to talk in private. “What's up?”

“Reilly just called to let me know that the coroner has officially ruled the death a homicide. The police are opening a criminal investigation and detectives brought Theda down to the station for an interview early this morning. He said she's still there.”

I glanced at my watch. “It's after ten, Marco. There's no reason for her to be questioned that long, especially since she already gave a statement—unless they've drawn a target on her back. They're not calling her a person of interest, are they?”

“Reilly didn't come out and say that, but I doubt he would have called otherwise. I got the distinct impression his call was intended as a warning.”

“A warning for what?”

“To be cautious. We could be living next door to a murderer.”

“T
heda is not a killer, Marco. My inner radar would be dinging furiously if she was. Will the cops let her answer her phone? I want to text her and tell her to ask for a lawyer.”

“They can't stop her from answering the phone if she hasn't been charged with anything. Hold on. I'm getting a message from Reilly.” Marco put me on hold and then returned moments later. “It's okay. She's been released. They must have cleared her.”

“Thank God.”

“I'll let you get back to work and see you at home later. I'll bring dinner.”

I ended the call and reached for a ticket on the spindle, thinking about how lucky I was. I ran the business of my dreams, had married the man of my dreams, and had built the house of my dreams.

And as an added bonus, our next-door neighbor was not a killer.

When I returned to my desk, Rosa made no further reference to the art project, but at least now I was braced for Mom's impending arrival. Monday afternoon was her designated drop-off day for her artwork. Surprisingly, she didn't appear at three thirty as she usually did.

As Lottie, Rosa, and I took time out for our midafternoon tea break, Lottie brought it up. “Your mom is late,” she said, glancing at the clock on the wall. “Oh, wait. She's a writer now. I keep forgetting she gave up art.”

“An artist never gives up art,” Rosa said, then took a drink of tea.

“So she's back to creating?” Lottie asked.

Rosa merely smiled mysteriously, so I said, “Apparently she and Rosa are working on something.”

Rosa pretended to lock her lips, then winked at Lottie. “It's a secret.”

And hopefully it would stay that way.

•   •   •

Marco brought home a container of white bean chicken chili, two garden salads, and half a loaf of garlic bread. I had set the card table with white soup bowls, colorful paper napkins, and bright orange candles in a pair of white ceramic candlesticks. I even had wine poured. Having dinner in our very own home felt like a celebration.

We toasted our new house, each other, and Seedy, whom we could see across the room sitting on an upholstered chair watching out the front window. Then we chatted about our day as we polished off the food.

Our living room, dining area, and kitchen ran from front to back as one giant room. It had nine-foot ceilings that made the space feel larger, a set of three double-hung windows in the front facing the street and a sliding glass door on the rear wall of the dining area. A granite-topped island separated the dining area from the kitchen.

The walls were painted a basic white because I didn't know what my color scheme was going to be. I needed to tap my cousin Jillian, a fashion consultant, for decorating advice.

In the meantime, we were living with odds and ends—Marco's oak bedroom set, a scarred, red vinyl–topped card table and chairs, a worn tan sofa we'd borrowed from my parents' basement, and Marco's beat-up black leather recliner. I'd had nothing to contribute, having gone from my parents' home to college, to my best friend Nikki's apartment, to Marco's bachelor pad, and back to my parents' home while our house was being built.

“When we buy a new living room set,” I said, watching Seedy circle the chair a few times before settling down, “and we need to do that soon, by the way, we're going to have to train her to stay off the furniture.”

“Good luck with that.” Marco clinked his glass to mine.

“I can do it. I watch
The Dog Whisperer
. Let's go furniture shopping Saturday. It's my weekend off and our neighborhood open house is in two weeks.”

“Shouldn't the neighbors be throwing a welcoming party for us?”

“It'll be fun, Marco. A great way to meet everyone here. We've got that beautiful patio and a big backyard, so we might as well put them to use. So Saturday is okay?”

“As long as we're back by six. We're meeting my mom at Café Venezia's, remember?”

“I still don't understand why she won't tell us what it's for.”

“She likes surprises. I'm just glad
Mama
has her own place now.” Marco often fell into a dialect when he referred to his mother, who still had traces of Italian in her talk. “Living with my sister and her two kids was wearing her down.”

I laughed. “
Your
mother was worn down?”

“She
is
getting older, babe.”

“She's not even sixty yet, Marco. She has more energy than I do.”

The doorbell rang and Marco went to answer it while I cleared the table.

“I hope I'm not interrupting,” Theda said, stepping inside.

“We just finished dinner,” I said. “Come back to the kitchen and talk to me.”

She twisted her fingers together nervously. “Actually, I'd like to talk to you both.”

•   •   •

I sat at the card table with Theda while Marco poured her a glass of red wine. “What's the problem?” he asked, sitting down across from her.

She turned her wineglass back and forth on its base. “I had to talk to the detectives this morning. They sent a squad car to collect me. They said it was just to gather more information, but the way they questioned me, I know they think I had something to do with Dirk's death.”

“What did they ask?” Marco said.

“Was I positive Dirk hadn't shown up at my house? Was I angry about the moss problem? Did I have trouble dealing with Dirk in the past? Was I afraid to tell them that Dirk really had shown up? Over and over, as though they were trying to catch me in a lie. First a young woman talked to me—Detective Wells was her name—and then she left and a Detective Corbison came in to ask the same questions.”

I glanced at Marco. Al Corbison had tried to pin a murder on me in similar circumstances, except I really had been the last one to see the victim alive. I'd delivered flowers to the man's office.

“Detective Corbison was very rude,” Theda continued. “He kept interrupting me and asking me if I was sure that was my final answer, hinting that he had evidence to the contrary. He was obviously trying to get me to change my answer. I told him again and again I did not meet with Dirk Singletary, because he never showed up.”

“But the police did let you go,” Marco said. “That's good.”

“With a caveat not to leave town,” Theda added. “Detective Wells said they'd have to find an alibi witness who could verify my story. I told her I live alone with just my foster cat for company. She said in that case she'd have to find a neighbor. Detective Wells at least was polite.”

“So what can we help you with?” Marco asked.

“I haven't used a lawyer in a decade or longer. If the detectives want to question me again, I wouldn't know whom to call.”

“I'll give you Dave Hammond's phone number,” I told her. “I clerked for him when I was in law school. He's the best you can get. You won't find anyone more conscientious, I guarantee.”

“You went to law school?” Theda asked.

I glanced at Marco and smiled. “Briefly.”

“Abby was destined to be a florist,” Marco said, putting his hand over mine, “and my life partner.”

“Someday I'll tell you the story, Theda.” I pulled up Dave's number on my cell phone and let her type it into her phone. “Call for an appointment tomorrow morning and tell his secretary that I referred you and why. I'm sure Dave will see you as soon as he can. And then if you do get another call from the detectives, Dave can meet you at the police station.”

Theda heaved a sigh of relief. “Thank you. I've never been in this kind of situation before. I volunteer at a cat rescue facility. I'm just an elderly woman who loves animals.”

“Out of curiosity,” I said, “do you know if Dirk had any enemies in the neighborhood?”

“Well,” she said hesitantly, “I wouldn't call them enemies. Let's just say he was widely disliked. He had a smug attitude that people found irritating and condescending. And then there was the missing jewelry, costly pieces that started disappearing not long after Dirk began working at Brandywine.

“First, an elderly couple, dear friends of mine, were robbed of all their gold jewelry while they were out of town on vacation. Police found a window unlocked, so they suspected that one of the construction workers had noticed the house vacant and slipped in after dark. But I questioned that. Thieves take electronics, grab-and-go things. They don't take time to pick through jewelry boxes.

“Then two months ago another friend, a widow on the other side of the park, reported the theft of her diamond necklace and bracelet and blamed the plumbers who'd been working in her house. Because she had a doctor's appointment, Dirk was supposed to let the plumbers in and keep an eye on them. But no evidence was found that pointed to the plumbers, and they passed polygraph tests, so the case was dropped.”

“Was Dirk questioned?” I asked.

“Yes. He said he let the men in and left, which, if true, was wrong of him. He was supposed to stay there until the plumbers were finished.”

“And the police took him at his word?” I asked.

“Yes, they did. Dirk was simply not on the police's radar, so the incident passed. A week later, another neighbor reported her diamond wedding ring missing. Dirk and his assistant had been in her house to patch some nail pops that day, so both men were questioned and released. The police decided she'd lost it. But she knew better. It had been sitting on her dresser and then after Dirk and Rye left, it was gone.

“Then about ten days ago Mitzi Kole told me she was missing an heirloom ring worth twenty thousand dollars in addition to a diamond pendant valued at ten thousand. I asked her if Dirk had been inside her house recently, and she claimed he hadn't. However, I saw him enter via her front door twice that week. When I reminded her of that, she got snippy with me and said he'd just dropped off some information on a security system.

“I didn't contradict her, but I know for a fact that Dirk had been inside her house for at least an hour on each occasion, and those weren't the first times. I know this because the chair I sit in to watch TV faces a window that looks out on her front porch. So why was she lying to me about him being there?”

“Were they having an affair?” I asked.

Theda shrugged. “All I can say is that he wasn't there to repair anything unless the repair required a bottle of wine and box of candy.”

“Did anyone in Brandywine besides you suspect Dirk?” Marco asked.

“Many, and I have a strong hunch that Dirk's assistant does, too, although you'll never get him to say so. You may have met him while your house was under construction. Rye Bishop? Wears his baseball caps backward? Has a little Southern twang in his talk? When something outside warranty work needs repairing, Rye is the guy to fix it. Everyone here loves Rye, by the way. I should say everyone but Dirk.”

“Why?” I asked.

“I don't know,” Theda said. “All I know is that he took perverse pleasure in humiliating Rye, scolding him over some trivial thing or another and making it seem like Rye didn't know what he was doing. It was terrible to witness. I stepped up to his defense once, but Rye later asked me not to. He said it made the situation worse.”

“What was Rye's reaction to Dirk's behavior?” Marco asked.

“He'd just walk away, shaking his head. I think it kept him from punching Dirk in the face.”

“Why wasn't Dirk fired?” I asked. “Surely the residents complained.”

“You bet we complained, straight to the top—Brandon Thorne. But for some odd reason, Brandon ignored our complaints. At our monthly association meetings Dirk was so condescending to Brandon that he almost seemed to be mocking him at times. You'd think for that reason alone Brandon would've fired him. So why didn't he?”

“What's the purpose of the monthly meetings?” Marco asked.

“Connie should've explained that to you. It's our chance to air complaints. Dirk was supposed to log everything we brought up at the meeting and then see that they were fixed. Unfortunately, it was a rare day when he followed up on anything.”

“How often is Brandon here?” Marco asked.

“He's usually at each meeting. He was here last Friday, in fact.”

Theda pushed back the folding chair and rose. “I won't take up any more of your evening. Thank you for your advice and for Mr. Hammond's phone number.”

“Be sure to tell Dave everything you told us when you meet with him,” I said.

“I'll call him first thing in the morning—unless I'm in jail.”

“Don't joke about that,” I said as I walked her to the door. “It happened to me.”

At Theda's shocked look I said, “It was a case of mistaken identity. And Dave was there immediately to straighten it out.”

“If the cops do phone or come to your door before you see Dave,” Marco said, “don't answer. Call us immediately.”