Motherhood Is Murder (5 page)

CHAPTER SEVEN

Protection

To Do:
1. Call Margaret and give her directions to café.
2. Prep contract for her.
3. Figure out how to land her without license.
4. Buy baby keepsake book.
5.
Stretch out lower back.
6. Look up postpartum yoga classes.
I snuggled Laurie into the baby carrier and walked down the street toward the café where Margaret and I had agreed to meet.
As I passed my neighbor’s house, their seventeen-year-old son, Kenny, was leaping down the front steps.
“Kate! Let me see the baby!”
Kenny had spiky hair that was dyed green. He’d graduated from the School of the Arts a few months prior and was now auditioning like crazy with his trombone.
I folded down the flap on the baby carrier and let Kenny take a peek.
He peered over the carrier. “She looks exactly like Jim, but she’s cute.”
“Jim’s cute, too.”
“Only to you, Kate.”
I laughed.
“Whenever you need a babysitter, just let me know,” Kenny said.
“Right. When was the last time you washed your hands, Kenny?”
He looked at his hands. “Dunno.”
“Are you going to the café?” I asked.
Kenny and I often enjoyed a game of backgammon or chess together at the café. He nodded and fell into step with me. As we walked, he pulled his iPod from his pocket and began to untangle the cord of the earphones.
“How’s the auditioning going?” I asked.
He held his hand in the position of a high-five. “You’re looking at the new substitute trombonist for the SF Opera.”
I whooped and gave him a high-five. “Knew you could do it. I’m so proud. Are you going to dye your hair back?”
Kenny’s eyes opened wide and his hand shot up to his hair as though I were threatening to cut it. “Back to what?”
“Your natural color. They’re not going to let you play in the orchestra pit like that, are they?”
Kenny laughed. “I’m only a sub. I’m not in the pit yet.”
“You will be soon,” I said.
We arrived at the café and I paused as Kenny pulled the door open. He made a grand gesture for Laurie and me to enter, then tapped his iPod and wiggled his eyebrows at me. “I’m going to study now.” He snagged a table and popped his earphones in.
I saw Margaret at the counter balancing her baby on her hip. Her eyes were bloodshot and swollen. She wore black stretch pants that clung to her skinny legs and an oversized striped shirt. Her hair was disheveled and she looked like she hadn’t slept in days.
She greeted me with a half smile and a nod, wrestled her baby into the stroller, and picked a table near the window. I ordered my latte and rocked Laurie back and forth in the carrier.
Poor Margaret. I can’t imagine how awful it must be to lose your best friend. Mine was in Paris and I missed her like crazy, but I knew she was coming home soon. Helene never would.
I joined her at the table. She sighed when I sat down.
“I haven’t slept since the cruise. I really haven’t eaten either. Just surviving off caffeine and sugar,” she said, breaking a brownie in half then shoving it into her mouth.
I stirred the foam in my latte and waited. Laurie snoozed, her head nestled in the carrier. Margaret’s baby swung his feet up at me and smiled through the pacifier in his mouth.
Margaret crossed her long legs underneath herself in the chair and sipped her coffee. “Helene and I were best friends since college. She’d always been there for me, you know? Through all the parties and good times and then through some pretty terrible times.”
“Terrible times?” I asked.
I wanted to drink my latte, but hesitated. What if I spilled it on Laurie? Surely it was unsafe to drink hot coffee over her tiny head. I looked around the café. She was still too small for a high chair. Because I had the baby carrier on and my house was so close, I hadn’t thought to bring a stroller, but now I had nowhere to put Laurie.
I stirred the foam again longingly.
Margaret looked over her shoulder. “I think, well, I don’t think. I know she and Bruce were having problems. He’s an investment banker. You know, they work tons of hours. Out of the house all day, most nights, too. Wining and dining clients. And Helene, well, at first she didn’t mind. She liked to shop and travel. She started taking lots of trips to Costa Rica. Loved it there. Wanted me to go, too. But, you know, with two small ones you just figure, later. But Helene didn’t have any hang-ups about going alone.”
“I understand they didn’t have any kids.”
“No. Not yet. Helene was getting to that place, you know, tick tock. Like a time bomb in your head. But Bruce didn’t give any indication of wanting kids. She was really frustrated with that. I also think that’s why she stepped up her travel recently. Probably so discouraged at home that she needed a distraction.”
“Why was she a member of Roo & You?”
Margaret frowned. “Why not? She loved to hang out with us. She had the idea of starting a club when Matthew, my two-year old, was born. I was meeting lots of moms, because I was attending this class on breastfeeding and nutrition.”
I remembered the way Celia and Bruce had huddled at the service.
“Do you think her husband was having an affair?” I asked.
Margaret looked taken aback. “Bruce? No. I don’t think so. They were having problems, sure, but I don’t think he was cheating on her. At least Helene never gave me any indication . . .” She looked miserably at what was left of the brownie on her plate, then shrugged and popped the rest of it in her mouth. “Well, these really are extenuating circumstances, aren’t they?”
I nodded. “Go ahead, I promise no nutrition police are going to pop out of the woodworks here.”
She motioned toward my latte. “You’re not drinking your coffee.”
“Uh . . .” I glanced at Laurie.
“Oh!” Margaret said. “I know how protective new moms are. Here, give me the baby. I’ll tell you I never, not once, spilled hot liquid on my kid’s head. But I know how obsessive the thought can be.”
I unstrapped Laurie and handed her to Margaret, who smiled for the first time that afternoon. The smile brought relief to her face while at the same time highlighting her swollen eyes.
She gazed at Laurie. “You forget how tiny they start out. I mean . . .” She gestured to her baby in the stroller, who was now snoozing. “Marcus is only six months old, but he seems gargantuan compared to your little thing. I can’t believe that he was this size only a few months ago.” Margaret stroked Laurie’s hair. “Is she lifting her head ninety degrees during tummy time?”
What? Ninety degrees!
I knew I was slacking on that tummy time!
I sipped my latte. It was ice cold. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”
Margaret’s eyes grew wide. “Oh,” she said, rounding her mouth and eyes in an exaggerated way.
Was Laurie supposed to be able to hold her head up ninety degrees?
“I mean, she lifts her head. She certainly lifts her head when we do tummy time.”
Margaret nodded sympathetically.
I tried to calm the defensiveness that was swelling inside me. Was my face red? I sipped the cold latte, ignoring the acid flavor. I needed the caffeine anyway.
“When are they supposed to be able to do that?” I asked.
Margaret glanced at her baby and fidgeted slightly. “I don’t really remember, but I thought it was around two months.”
“Well, Laurie’s not quite two months yet. She’s only seven weeks.”
Margaret smiled. “Of course, she’ll be holding her head up in no time. So anyway, I was in this class at the hospital and was becoming very friendly with Evelyn. Helene had the nice idea of forming a group. We would meet at each other’s houses and organize events and stuff. It worked really well for a while.”
“For a while? What happened?”
“I got pregnant again and my neighbor Sara did, too. We asked her to join our group. This may have been one of the things that set Evelyn off, I don’t know. But she seemed different. And we ended up having to ask her to leave the group.”
“Is that why there was so much tension with Evelyn on the cruise?”
Margaret looked at me and shrugged.
“What about the fight Evelyn said she overheard between Helene and Sara?”
“I don’t know anything about that. I asked Sara about it at the funeral, but she said Evelyn was exaggerating. Which, knowing Evelyn, is not at all surprising. I have to find out what happened to Helene. I need your help, Kate.” At this, her eyes filled with tears.
I handed her a napkin off the table. She dabbed at her eyes.
Here was my moment to tell her I didn’t have a license.
It’s nothing to be ashamed of—after all, it’s true. Say it, say it, say it.
“There’s something . . . uh . . . I want—”
“Kate, I have a semiconfession.”
I stopped stuttering and focused on Margaret.
“When I met you and you said you were a PI, I knew I needed to hire you.”
“Hire me for what?”
She sighed. “I’ve suspected for a long time that Alan’s been having an affair. He’s been coming home late and acting distant . . . and . . . well, really the list can go on and on. Point being, I thought I could hire you to follow him. And then maybe, finally, I’d have the truth . . . And . . . Oh God. I feel so guilty.” She broke down and sobbed.
Kenny looked over at us from his table. He made a little sad face showing sympathy then ducked his head again to fiddle with his iPod.
“What do you feel guilty about?” I asked.
“Kate.” She pressed a hand over her heart. “It’s all my fault. I’m scared that it’s my fault.”
“The affair?”
She shook her head vehemently. “Helene!”
“I’m not following you.”
Margaret glanced around the café to see if anyone was listening. At the moment, the only other patron was Kenny, who was vigorously tapping his foot to the beat from his iPod. The barista was refilling the pastry case with chocolate-covered croissants and miniature pumpkin pies. She looked about as interested in our conversation as going to the dentist.
Despite this, Margaret leaned over and whispered, “I think Alan was trying to kill me and instead killed Helene by accident.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Safekeeping

I fought to control my shock. “What? Why?” I asked. I was stunned by Margaret’s words. “You think your husband is trying to kill you?”
Margaret squeezed her eyes shut and nodded. She was still holding Laurie and subconsciously pulled her closer.
“Why do you think that?”
She uncrossed her legs, leaned forward in the chair, and recounted the evening for me. “While we were getting ready for the cruise, Alan and I kept bickering. Everything was going wrong. Remember we were late? I had confronted him about the affair—well, my suspicions about it, and of course, he denied it. But he got very angry, and even though he denied it . . . I know there’s something going on. He didn’t want to go on the cruise at all. But we never get any time alone together anymore so I forced the issue.”
She shrugged. “I guess I thought if I cooled my heels and just showed him we could have fun together that he would fall in love with me again.”
I listened to Margaret in silence. Kenny got up from his table and wiggled his fingers at me and then at the barista on his way out. The barista waved back at Kenny, then looked at our table to see if we needed her. When she noticed we seemed rooted to our chairs, she took off to the back room.
Margaret wiped her eyes. “We left the house, then Alan doubled back saying he forgot something. When I asked him what—he got very upset and started acting so strange—that I dropped it.”
“Just because he was mad at you doesn’t mean he was trying to kill you,” I said.
She put her hand to forehead and rubbed her temple. “There’s more. On the cruise we were at the bar—Helene, Bruce, Alan, and I.” She glanced around the café. “Alan bought the drinks, he grabbed mine from the bar, and I can’t remember exactly—but he seemed to hold on to it for a while, then he sort of made a big deal about which one was mine. Said mine was a double and made a stupid joke about me needing it to loosen up.”
I nodded and waited for her to continue.
“Then Sara and her husband came over and the men all started talking about investments or whatever. And Helene and I were chatting and, I don’t recall exactly, but we were messing around and I think we got our drinks mixed up. Remember she was so tipsy. I think she drank mine and I think Alan slipped something into it.”
“Do you think he went back to the house to get something to put into your drink?”
“He has a lot of prescription stuff at home. He’s a podiatrist M.D. and he has . . . well, never mind, let’s just say he has access to whatever he wants.”
“Margaret, have you spoken to the police?”
Her eyes widened. “Kate, please don’t tell anyone about the drug thing or, really, any of this!”
Why doesn’t she want me to say anything? That doesn’t make sense.
“If you think you’re in danger, you have to tell the police.”
“I called the ME’s office after I spoke with you yesterday. Well, after Alan left. He came home for lunch. Can you believe that? He
never
comes home for lunch. I think he’s trying to keep tabs on me or something—find out what I know. Anyway, after he left, I called the ME’s office and asked the things you asked me, you know, about broken bones or head trauma and stuff. I pried as much information as I could out of the assistant but she didn’t disclose much, just said they were waiting for the toxicology report and that she couldn’t release any more information. I asked her if it looked like murder and she said the office wasn’t calling it a homicide yet.”
“Then why were homicide cops at the funeral?”
Margaret looked surprised. “There were?”
I nodded.
Margaret stroked Laurie’s head and looked down at her baby in the stroller. I motioned for her to hand me Laurie. She did, then absently picked up Marcus’s hand and stroked it while he slept.
“So why would the assistant medical examiner tell me it wasn’t a homicide yet? Do you think she didn’t believe me?” she asked.
I shrugged. “They probably have a protocol to follow. Did you tell her about the drinks and your suspicion on the mix-up?”
Margaret begun to cry. “I don’t want him to find out, Kate. I feel like I’m still in danger. I’m a nervous wreck. I’m not eating at home thinking he might poison me somehow. And forget about sleeping next to him.”
“You have to tell the police. You can’t live like this.” I reached across the table for her hand.
“I need to know what happened.”
“Is there somewhere you can go for a while?”
Margaret shrugged. “Maybe. My mom lives on the peninsula. I was thinking about taking the kids there for a while.”
“That’s a good idea, but you need to talk to the police first.”
Margaret dropped her baby’s hand and looked a little like someone had given her an electrical shock. She nodded then closed her eyes tight, but a tear still escaped. “I never thought I would find myself in this situation.”
“There’s something I need to tell you. I don’t have a PI license.”
Her baby started fussing.
She leaned down and grabbed his hand. “What do you mean? A license?”
“You need several years’ experience before you can apply for your own license and I don’t have that yet.”
“Kate, I don’t have time to shop this around. I’m scared out of my mind. Please help me.”
I marched home excitedly.
I have a case! My career as a PI is taking off.
She didn’t care that I didn’t have a license; she’d signed my contract without even blinking! I was going to do this with or without Galigani’s support. I did a happy dance with Laurie in the carrier then stopped suddenly when I spotted someone on my front steps.
Uh-oh!
It was Inspector McNearny. I froze.
He semifrowned and semiglared at me. “Mrs. Connolly.”
I unstuck myself and moved past him on the stairs. I jabbed my key in the front door. “What can I do for you?”
“Does trouble follow you or are you the cause?”
I stopped fussing with the door. “Are you accusing me of something?”
“No.” He tapped his foot impatiently. “I’d like to ask you a few questions about the cruise the other night.”
“Come on inside.” I opened the door and called out to Jim.
There was a note on the dining room table.
Went to watch the game at Jack’s. Tried your cell phone, but it rang in the other room. Please carry with you and ANSWER it when I call.
Love you!
P.S. Paula called and your mom, too.
McNearny hovered in my doorway.
“Have a seat,” I said, motioning to the living room. “Want anything to drink?”
He stayed in place and pulled out a notebook. “What can you tell me about the dinner cruise the other night?”
“I already told Officer Lee all I know. I told him that night. Is it official now? Was Helene killed?” I asked.
“I ask the questions, Mrs. Connolly,” he said straight-faced.
“Where’s Jones?” I asked, ignoring his attitude.
He glanced at the baby carrier I was still wearing. “His kid’s sick.”
“Sorry to hear that,” I said, unsnapping the carrier and pulling a sleeping Laurie out.
McNearny shrugged. He looked like he could care less about Jones’s kid.
Probably annoyed about Jones missing work.
“I saw you at the funeral.” McNearny glanced at his notes.
“I thought you told Lee that you barely knew the woman.”
“Does that mean I’m not allowed to attend her service?”
“Most people wouldn’t. Let’s cut to the chase—are you working on anything currently?”
“I’m crocheting Laurie a little cap.” I tried to hide my smile and look as serious as he did.
He turned red around the gills. “Mrs. Connolly, if you want to be difficult, I’ll just drag you downtown. Makes no difference to me.”
I glanced around for a spot to place Laurie and settled on her tummy time playmat. “All right. I’ll level with you. I just came from a meeting with Margaret Lipe. She thinks her husband poisoned Helene.”
McNearny looked stunned. He reviewed his notebook. “Is this the doctor we’re talking about?”
“The podiatrist, yeah,” I said.
“And did she happen to mention why he might want to do that?”
“It was an accident.”
McNearny squinted. “What?”
“She thinks he was trying to poison her.”
McNearny shook his head. “Did she tell you what she thought his motive might be?”
“He’s having an affair. At least she suspects that’s the case. She confronted him that evening. Supposedly he got very angry.”
McNearny chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Had she hired you to follow him prior to the cruise?”
“No. Won’t you sit down?”
“No.”
“You’re making me nervous standing there like that.”
“That’s the whole point, Mrs. Connolly.”
I leaned against my dining room table and exhaled. “Have it your way.”
“Okay, out with it. She hired you before the cruise. To follow him, right?”
“No,” I repeated firmly. “Why do you keep asking?”
He ignored my question. “Why were you on that cruise?”
“I told Officer Lee that—I was checking out Roo & You.”
“The mommy club?”
I nodded.
McNearny frowned. “What’s a mommy club doing on a dinner cruise? I mean, isn’t the whole point of those things to get the kids to play together or whatever?”
I ignored the way he practically spat the words “those things.” “That’s one of the purposes, yes.”
“What about the spouses?”
“What do you mean?”
McNearny waved his hand around. “You know, aren’t these mommy clubs just for women?”
“Are you asking why our spouses were with us on the cruise?”
McNearny nodded.
“It was my first meeting with the club. I don’t know all the ins and outs of it. The dinner cruise was supposedly a deviation from their normal meeting. This time they were going to include ‘the boys.’ It sounded fun to me.”
McNearny’s expression looked sour. Probably to him, the idea of spending time with a bunch of moms sounded like anything but fun.
“It was an opportunity to meet some new couples that were also parents. Get to know the ladies from the club a little better before joining,” I continued. “I also wanted the adult time with my husband. I didn’t plan on a murder as part of the date, if you know what I mean.”
“That’s what I’m getting at.”
“I thought you said you weren’t here to accuse me of anything.”
McNearny looked angry. “I’m not accusing you. Here’s what I think—you were hired by Mrs. Lipe to follow her husband and figure out who he was sleeping with and maybe things got out of hand on the cruise.”
“Look, I’m telling you that she didn’t hire me before today. Why would I lie about that?”
McNearny smiled. A huge grin, one that was intended to ridicule me. “You don’t know. Do you?”
“What? What am I suppose to know?”
“Not so smart after all.”
What was I missing? What did he know that I didn’t know?
“Why are you so hostile to me? I’m the one who helped you solve—”
His face turned beet red. “You think you helped solve that? We had that case blown open.”
McNearny and I stared each other down.
He was dead wrong but challenging him wasn’t going to get me closer to solving this case.
I swallowed my pride. “Sorry if I stepped on your toes.”
He stood straighter. “Glad we understand each other.”
I understood all right.
He pointed at me. “You don’t have a license and I don’t want you poking around in this case. If she hired you to follow her husband, to find out who he’s sleeping with, that’s one thing, but absolutely no nosing around in this case. You understand?”
I nodded.
He grunted.
Any doubts I’d had about taking the case had just been wiped from my head. I didn’t know how I would do it, but I was committed to solving this case before McNearny. He didn’t care about the victims, only his reputation with the department.
“So you’re okay if I follow the husband, right?” I tested.
McNearny shrugged. “Sure, let me know what you find out.”
I do the footwork, he takes the glory.
No problem. I didn’t have my ego riding on it. I only wanted the facts.