Moving Is Murder (11 page)

I stopped at Joe’s house, parked the stroller in the driveway with Abby, and ran the mail inside. The house had that closed-up-and-no-one’s-home feeling. The only light came from the green glow of the DVD player
clock. I glanced at it, but I couldn’t read the time. A scratch distorted the numbers, reminding me of Cass talking about the moving damage. After I watered the ficus plant beside the TV cabinet, I did a quick check of the kitchen and bathroom. Then I locked up. Around the side of the house in the empty driveway, Abby cooed at Rex through the chain-link fence. Mitch had fed him and his bowl was half full.

“We should have taken him with us. I bet he would have loved it,” Abby said. Rex sat at attention, his ears perked up, and his mouth open in a doggie grin. Or possibly snarl. I stopped short of the fence. Abby poked her fingers through a hole in the chain link and Rex licked them.

“Maybe next time.” I wasn’t sure I wanted Rex walking beside Livvy. I glanced around the backyard and garage, automatically. Something was off. I walked over to the single garage. The latch on the garage door dangled open. If there had been a lock, it was gone. Joe struck me as the type of person who would use a lock, but in his haze of grief maybe he forgot to put it on the door on his way out of town. I rubbed my arms. With my heart rate slowing, the crisp air chilled me.

I pushed back the old-fashioned folding door. It swung accordion-style back on its hinge. Musty, earthly smells filled the dim garage. Joe’s car, a blue Civic Hatchback, squatted in the gloom. Boxes lined the walls. An assortment of garden tools, fertilizer, plant food, power tools, and antifreeze ranged over shelves near a lawn mower. A cool breeze fanned across my face.

“Abby, come look at this,” I called.

Unpacking Strategies

• Focus on “high-use” rooms, like bathrooms and bedrooms. Bathrooms are usually small rooms with limited items to unpack, so you can finish the job quickly and have a sense of accomplishment in the midst of disarray.
  
• If you’ve got helpers, let several people work on the kitchen, the most time-consuming room to unpack.
  
• Kennel pets for a few days after arrival so you can focus on unpacking.
  
• Setting up appliances can be time-consuming. Concentrate on connecting the washer, dryer, and refrigerator first. Leave the DVD and computer for later.
  
• As you unpack, put things close to where you will use them. Store pans by the stove, plates and glasses near the dishwasher, spices and measuring cups with the mixing bowls.
  
• Eliminate the debris of moving, the boxes and paper, as you unpack. Flatten boxes and put them in the garage, an extra room, or the attic until the moving company returns to pick them up. Or if you’ve moved yourself and don’t want to keep the boxes, check for a recycling center in the Yellow Pages. It may even pick up recyclables like cardboard.
  

I
crossed the garage to examine the jagged hole in the windowpane above the shards of glass scattered over the floor and the boxes. The boxes looked odd, too. Most gaped open with clothes trailing down their sides like batter dripping down the side of a mixing bowl. A few were nearly empty with books or dishes stacked around them.

Abby entered the garage. She’d opened the gate and Rex pushed in front of her and scurried around, nose to the cement, sniffing and whining. “Wow, looks like someone broke in,” Abby said.

“I know. Do you think anything is gone?” I gestured to the lawn mower and power tools.

“Doesn’t look like it, but you’ll have to call Joe, won’t you?”

“And the police, too.” Livvy picked that moment to
begin crying. She had decided it was time for her last feeding. She was like a parking meter, fine until the time expired and then that was it. Nothing else happened until she was fed.

By the time I fed Livvy and got her to bed, Mitch had shown the police the garage and tracked down a number for Joe. Mitch dropped into our favorite overstuffed chair and propped his feet up on the double ottoman.

“Was anything stolen?” I called from the kitchen. Mitch had walked around the garage, telling Joe what he saw.

“Right now, the only things he could say for sure were a cordless drill and a socket set. The police said they’ve had a lot of break-ins lately. Burglars like detached garages. Rex probably scared them away before they got much.”

“Do you realize we’ve moved into a neighborhood with garage break-ins and possibly, a drug house?” I said as I filled my extra-large cup with water. “Not to mention practically your whole squadron right on our doorstep.” Ice cubes crackled as I dropped them in the water. “Someone went through everything. That would take time.” I snapped the lid into place and guzzled the cool water while I walked to the living room. I plunked down on the ottoman and untied my shoes. “Did you tell the police I saw someone drive away without lights last night?”

Mitch nodded and took a drink of my water. “They’ll call you if they need anything else. But I don’t think we’ll hear from them. I got the impression that it was no big deal.”

“Yeah, I read an article in the paper last week. Detached garages are easy targets. Oh. With all the commotion, I almost forgot. I think Jeff is a suspect.” I summarized what Abby had told me on our walk.

“That’s stupid. Jeff can’t be involved,” Mitch said, dismissively.

I pushed the straw around the cup. “You really think so?”

Mitch studied me for a long moment. “No. I know it. You don’t go through all the”—he paused, amended what he was about to say with a glance at Livvy’s door—“crap at the Academy for years and not get to know someone. I know Jeff and he couldn’t have done anything to hurt Cass.”

I kicked off my shoes and said, “But don’t you think it’s—” I broke off when I looked at his face. It had a tight, angry look.

“You think he did it, don’t you? How can you doubt him?”

“How can I not? Everything says he could have done it. He’s experienced with bees and could probably handle wasps, he was smoking, there were probably wasps at the squad, and he was alone right before Cass left the squad. He had time to trap some wasps in a cup and put it in her van. She didn’t lock it.”

“I can’t believe this. You really think he did it?” Mitch stood up and paced the edge of the oriental rug.

“I don’t want to believe it. I
hope
he
didn’t.
How can you be so sure he didn’t?”

“Because he’s my friend and at times like this you don’t doubt your friends. You support them.” Mitch stalked off to the bathroom. I collapsed back onto the ottoman. Oh, man. I hadn’t expected Mitch to be so defensive. A few minutes later I heard the shower.

When the water stopped flowing, I got up and walked down the hall. Mitch had left the bathroom door open a slit. I pushed the door open another inch and humid air oozed into the hall. Mitch, his towel
wrapped around his waist, jerked the shower curtain into place.

“Mitch, you know I like Jeff. I don’t
want
to think these things about him.”

I couldn’t see his face, but his stiff shoulders relaxed. “I know.”

We settled into an uneasy truce. We didn’t talk about Jeff, or really anything else for the rest of the night. The silence between us seemed like a tangible thickness. It weighed us down and separated us into our own quiet worlds.

“Ellie, where’s the baby Tylenol?”

“What?” I pushed myself up on one elbow and rubbed the sleep out of the corners of my eyes.

“Where’s the Tylenol?” Mitch repeated. His question penetrated my fuzzy brain. Livvy. Mitch was holding her, rubbing her back. I had fed her at two
A.M.
and she had gone right back to sleep. In fact, she’d been sleeping, except for a few sneezes. When I heard her crying a few minutes ago I had shaken Mitch’s shoulder and said, “Your turn.” I must have dropped right back to sleep. A hard, deep sleep because I felt like I had been sleeping for two hours instead of ten minutes.

I stumbled into the hall bathroom, our only bathroom. Most of the older homes in this area only had one bath unless someone had updated the house and added another. I opened the medicine cabinet and looked through it by the glow of the nightlight.

Mitch came in with Livvy and I felt her forehead. It was warm and her big blue eyes shined. I resumed my search through the medicine cabinet, wide awake now. If Mitch said she had a fever, I knew she did. I was the
worry wart. He was the relax-don’t-worry-about-it one in our family.

“I know we had some before we moved. But I don’t remember unpacking it,” I said. “I’d better go to the store and get some Tylenol. It might help.”

Mitch nodded and went back to doing the baby bounce, a springy step to keep Livvy from crying. I yanked on jeans and a sweatshirt because it would be cool. Then I brushed my hair and left with one side flattened against my head and wrinkle marks from my pillow across my cheek.

I tossed my sleek black Kate Spade purse wallet into the Cherokee and backed out of our driveway. At least I had a doctor’s appointment for Livvy in the morning. We could find out what she had and get her some medicine if she needed it. I paused, trying to remember which grocery stores were open twenty-four hours. To the right was Rim Rock Road, a quick route downtown. Something would be open there, but I didn’t really want to go downtown at almost three in the morning. To the left was Birch, the next main street that led to a small shopping center with a Copeland’s grocery store, but I didn’t know if it stayed open all night.

A movement down Nineteenth caught my eye. A white car without lights eased out of the driveway next to Joe’s house. I waited until it was at the corner and then I turned left and followed it. At Birch, I turned left just as the car had done. Well, it was the same direction as Copeland’s, I reasoned with myself. I’d just see where it was going for a little way.

I cruised through the eerie, still streets. Widely spaced streetlights flickered over the car. At Sixteenth, I followed the white car into the large parking lot.

Copeland’s squatted at one end of the strip mall,
with LaMont’s, a department store, at the other. In between were a string of smaller shops, a pack and mail place, a beauty shop, a Chinese restaurant, a barbershop, and a dog groomer. The white car parked under a street light at the farthest end of the lot. I slid into one of the open slots in the front row and watched the car in my rearview mirror.

A woman got out of the car. She slipped a green apron over her head, wrapped the strings around her slender waist, and tied them at her back as she walked inside the store.

Automatically, I hooked the long strap of the purse wallet over my shoulder while I stared at the advertised specials posted on the bright windows. It couldn’t have been her. Could it? I saw my eyebrows in the rearview mirror drawn together in a frown. It looked like Friona. But the bored newlywed I had talked to at the squadron barbeque wouldn’t be working at Copeland’s. All the employees wore green aprons. At the squadron, Friona had looked like a model with her long willowy body, and her sullen expression showed she was clearly bored. I couldn’t picture her working nights at a grocery store.

I roamed up and down three aisles of glossy industrial-size floor tiles until I found the children’s medicine. I bought two packages and checked out without seeing anyone who looked like Friona.

“Your receipt,” the checker called. I turned back, took the receipt, and caught a glimpse of a trim, dark-haired young woman walking to the customer service center, where you could buy stamps or lottery tickets. She looked like Friona. She didn’t notice me. I’d have to ask Abby where Friona lived. It was too strange. I
could picture Friona working in an upscale trendy restaurant as a hostess, but at ordinary Copeland’s? At three in the morning? No way.

Garage Solution

• Invest in heavy-duty plastic shelves for the garage. You can set up and break down these shelves quickly without any tools, so you can arrange items in your garage as soon as you unpack them. Then, when it’s time to move again, your storage solutions will go with you.
  

N
orth west Family Health was carved into the side of one of the hills that formed Black Rock Hill, the name of the neighborhood that had grown up over the large rock outcroppings that rimmed the southern side of Vernon. With its basement submerged in the rock, the rest of the red brick building stair-stepped up the hill.

I saw an open slot in the parking lot and twisted the steering wheel to slide into it, but a black Mustang cut me off. It barely squeaked past my front bumper and whipped into the opening. The Mustang had vanity plates that read
AFPILOT.
A short man hopped out of the car and trotted past me as I made another circuit of the lot. That’s how pilots get a reputation for being arrogant, I groused. Finally, I found an empty slot and parked.

I filled out the paperwork and found Urgent Care in the basement. The lack of windows and dim lighting gave the waiting area a gloomy atmosphere. After checking in at the counter shared between Urgent Care and Lab/X-ray, I sat down on one of the cheap, streamlined couches. There were three clinics on this floor and they shared the same waiting area. I vacantly looked across at the Family Practice area as I rocked Livvy’s blanket-covered car seat with my toe. Livvy was worn out. She had slept fitfully, either on Mitch’s shoulder or mine, until five in the morning. Then she had slept in her bed from sheer exhaustion.

I watched the clock creep around from 10:15 to 10:30. This approach to health care was different from the base hospital, where we had been seen before moving to Vernon. At the base hospital the idea, as far as I could tell, was move patients in and out as quickly as possible. I’d never had to wait long. In fact, the appointment desk usually told you to arrive fifteen minutes early, so they could get your vital signs and get your paperwork done. Livvy was sleeping, so I’d give them a few more minutes before I checked on our appointment.