Thugs and Kisses (13 page)

“I told you we went to Santa Barbara to see Steele’s ex-wife.”

“And I believe you. But I also know you have a habit of only telling half the truth, especially when cornered with a question you’d rather not answer.”

Who, me?

“You do know that Sally is being questioned in connection with Donny Oliver’s death, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do. Like me, she had an ugly past experience with Donny.”

He started to say something but stopped. I could almost see him weighing his words, like apples at the grocers. “Odelia, I want you to call me once Sally drops you off. You are going straight home, aren’t you?”

“Actually, I wanted to stop by my office first. Sally and I are going to check something out, and then she’ll bring me home.”

“No, Odelia, come straight home. That’s an order.”

Excuse me!
was what I was thinking, but instead I asked, “What’s up, Dev?”

What Dev told me made me want to jump from Sally’s moving Jeep. The only thing that stopped me was the fear of being either run over or dragged down the 405 Freeway at seventy miles per hour. Instead, I told her to pull off at the next exit because I had to pee.

“So what did Detective Frye tell you?”

Sally had pulled off the freeway and traveled a short distance until she spotted a Starbucks. As soon as she parked, she turned to question me.

“Nothing, just wanted to know when I’d be home.”

“Bullshit, Odelia. You turned white and almost leapt from the car.”

I said nothing, just stared at her.

“It’s not what you think, Odelia.”

“So, tell me, what
am
I supposed to think?”

“I’ll bet the good detective told you that I tried to kill Donny just a few months ago.”

I swallowed and nodded. “He said you were charged with attempted homicide—that you almost killed Donny with a butcher knife.”

“And he’s right.”

My hand tightened on the door handle. Sally noticed.

“I was only charged, Odelia, not convicted. The charges were dropped.”

“That’s great for you, but it doesn’t negate the fact that you tried to kill him.”

“Like I said, it’s not what you think.” She looked over at the coffee shop. “Let’s get some coffee. We always do well over coffee.” She gave me a small smile. “You like pumpkin pie?” I nodded, still in shock, still thinking I should run, and now I
really
had to pee.

When I came out of the ladies’ room, Sally was seated at a table with two very tall cups. I sniffed mine and was rewarded with a lovely spicy aroma, just like pumpkin pie. I took a small sip of the hot brew. It was absolutely delicious.

“It’s their pumpkin spice latte,” she explained. “They only have it in the fall.” She was unwrapping cellophane from a sandwich. “Want half? It’s chicken tarragon salad.” When I hesitated, she held out half of the sandwich to me. “Come on, Odelia, it’s been hours since lunch, and you only had a salad. Besides, you don’t look so hot.”

I accepted the half sandwich and took a small bite. It was a bit on the dry side but very tasty. After I swallowed, wincing as it passed down my sore throat, I focused on Sally. “Why didn’t you tell me you tried to kill Donny?”

“Because I knew you’d freak out, which you did, and I needed your help. I knew eventually you would find out or be told, but I thought we could make some headway before that happened.” She sipped her coffee. “I know I’m a prime suspect, considering what’s happened between Donny and me, but I didn’t kill him, Odelia.”

“But you tried to?”

“Yes, and truthfully, I’m sorry I failed.” She looked me in the eye. “You want to hear my side, or do you still want to run?”

I glanced over my shoulder first, to make sure of my options. “I’m all ears.”

“It was this past June. We were all supposed to go to this award dinner for Lucas. He’s a teacher, and he and several other teachers were receiving special awards from the school district. At the last minute, Davy’s babysitter—Davy’s my grandson—cancelled, so Jill said for us to go and she’d stay with the baby. We didn’t want to leave her behind, but we couldn’t find another sitter on such short notice.”

She took a bite of sandwich, chewed, and washed it down with her coffee. “Lucas had invited Donny and Cindy to the award dinner also, and they came. Donny showed up half drunk and was sipping from a flask most of the evening. He asked about the baby, and we told him Davy was home with Jill. When it was time to leave, Donny was nowhere to be found. We ending up taking Cindy home.” Sally blew out a deep breath. “Boy, was she angry.”

She started playing with the cardboard holder on the outside of her coffee cup, nervously peeling it away in small strips. “After we dropped Cindy off, we headed to Lucas’s house. When we got there, we found Jill and Donny fighting.”

“Donny had gone to Lucas’s home?”

“Yes. Jill was blocking the door to Davy’s room, and Donny was calling her every obscene name in the book, saying he was taking Davy. Lucas made a dash for Donny but not in time to stop him from punching Jill in the side of her head.” Sally’s eyes started to tear as she talked. “Jill fell to the floor like a ton of bricks. I thought she’d been killed.”

“In the movies, this is where you would run into the kitchen, grab a knife, and go after him.”

“And that’s exactly what happened. I got him pretty good, too. Stuck him like the pig he is … was.” Sally swallowed hard. “When I saw Jill lifeless on the floor and Donny yelling that Davy belonged with him, I went insane. I couldn’t let him hurt another person I loved.”

“What happened to Jill? She’s okay now, isn’t she?”

Sally nodded. “She had a concussion from the blow and spent the night in the hospital. Donny was in the hospital for a few days. I was charged with attempted murder, and Donny was charged with assault and attempted kidnapping. In the end, all the charges were dropped, and the police wrote it off as just another family squabble.”

Sally dabbed her eyes and wiped her nose with a napkin. “Like I told you before, Odelia, I’m not sorry he’s gone. I didn’t kill him, but I want to shake the hand of who did.”

It’s a funny thing, trust. Everyone wants to trust and be trusted. Yet, as adults, we know better than to trust everyone we meet. And very early on we teach children not to trust strangers. Somewhere along the road of life, hopefully we learn who to trust and who not to trust, for the truth of it is, sometimes we can trust strangers more than we can trust those closest to us.

Because of my non-date with Dev, Greg now had a trust issue with me. Dev rightfully accused me of editing my responses to questions, so his trust in me regarding my word was shaky. On the other hand, Carl Yates trusted me to find Michael Steele and to keep confidential the problem with the Silhouette lawsuit. Sally trusted me to help her prove she didn’t kill Donny Oliver, but at the same time she was asking me to trust her even though she didn’t tell me earlier about her attempt to murder Donny.

It was Saturday morning, and I was barely able to trust myself to scramble an egg without a major accident. I had gone to bed the night before feeling like crap and woke up feeling crappier. I definitely had a cold.

By the time we’d finished our pumpkin spice lattes, I had agreed to continue to help Sally investigate Donny Oliver’s murder. She called Cindy from her cell before we left Starbucks and asked if we could drop by either Saturday or Sunday. Cindy said Saturday would be best, so today at two o’clock Sally was going to pick me up once again, and we would head for Donny’s house, a bundt cake baked by Jill in hand.

Sally said she was still available to help me with Steele’s disappearance, but I wasn’t sure about that situation any longer. With his car found, the firm may decide to see if he eventually turns up. But no matter what the firm decided, I still wanted to check out the situation with the documents, and I still wanted to know what happened to Steele. As I scrambled eggs in my misery, I prayed he was somewhere, anywhere but skipped out of the country. Because, if Steele, for whatever reason, did tamper with legal documents and then vamoosed for greener pastures, I vow on my last Thin Mint to hunt his miserable ass down.

You can trust me on this.

Originally the plan after Santa Barbara was to go directly to my office. It would be near the end of the day and most of the staff would have been gone by the time we got there, especially on a Friday night. But because of Sally’s duplicity and Dev’s warning, I decided to make the trip to Woobie alone. Sally said she understood.

As soon as I got home, I called Dev back and let him know I was safe and sound. I also told him what Sally had told me, and got the response I expected. Although Dev seemed sympathetic toward Sally about what had happened earlier this year, he reminded me that the bottom line was that she had, indeed, tried to kill Donny Oliver, and that she was one of the people in attendance at the reunion when he was murdered. I wanted to remind him that I was also in attendance at the reunion when Donny was murdered, and that I had killed someone. Seems I was one up on Sally Kipman after all.

But in spite of Dev’s cautionary remarks, somehow I knew that if the police had hard evidence against Sally, she wouldn’t be wandering the streets right now; she would be in jail or at least would have been brought in. According to her, she’d only been questioned so far.

Originally, Dev had called to tell me about Steele’s car being found. I told him that the firm had already told me the news. Dev didn’t seem to know much more than that, or at least he didn’t mention anything else. I wondered if the firm had swept the document thing under the rug and why.

Halfway though my discussion with Dev, my sore throat got the best of me, and I decided to skip the office and go in on Saturday morning. Fewer people were there then anyway, so fewer questions. My call to Dev ended with him telling me to stay away from Sally. I never mentioned that we were meeting again, this time to visit Donny’s wife. Hey, he didn’t ask; I didn’t tell.

After breakfast, I decided to throw a quick load of laundry in the washer. As I bent down to pick up the dirty clothes, my head about imploded. It felt almost like it did the night I was swilling martinis with Sally, but without the accompanying nice buzz. Steadying myself by holding on to the washer, I stared at the containers of detergent, bleach, and softener on the shelf above the machines to regain my focus. Stuck to the bottle of laundry detergent was a hot pink sticky note from Cruz Valenz, my cleaning lady.
Need more
was all the note said.

Cruz has been cleaning my home every other Wednesday for several years, and during that entire time I have begged, cajoled, requested, and even ordered her to write down the items I needed to replenish on a note pad in the kitchen, where I would easily see it. But no, instead, she continues to stick notes on near-empty bottles, cartons, and containers. Since Cruz does such a wonderful job and is such a nice lady, I finally caved, and now after each time she comes to clean, I scour the house looking for the notes as if they were clues to hidden treasure at the grocery store. I must have missed the one on the laundry soap the last time she was here.

As I studied the note, I knew it should mean more to me than to just buy more detergent, but what? Laundry forgotten, I sniffled and studied it until it finally came to me. Locating my tote bag, I rooted around inside for the two business cards I had taken from Steele’s home, but came up empty-handed. I know I took them. Scrounging around in my soggy memory bank, I replayed my activities the day I checked out Steele’s condo in Laguna Beach.

Let’s see, I remember taking the cards out of the plastic sleeve and putting them … putting them …

I dashed upstairs and rummaged in my closet to find the suit jacket I had worn to work that day. Sure enough, the two business cards were tucked inside one of the pockets.

First, I called Melinda’s Maid Service but only reached a recording. I left my name and cell phone number at the tone. Then I made a call to Let Mother Do It. On the third ring, a woman answered, sounding slightly out of breath.

“Hi,” I said, hoping my sniffling didn’t make me sound like a pervert. “I found your business card and was wondering if you are a maid service.”

The woman hesitated long enough for me to wonder if we were still connected, then said, “We can do most anything you need to be done—
anything
.” The woman, who I guessed by her voice to be older, really stressed the word
anything
. If she’d been writing it, it would have been underlined and circled, followed by an exclamation point.

“Anything? That’s pretty broad.”

The woman laughed. “Let’s just say we’re open to special requests. Doesn’t mean we’ll accommodate them, but we certainly try.” The woman’s voice was warm and cuddly, like a favorite plush toy—just the sort of voice you’d expect manning the telephone of a business with the word
mother
in its name.

“Really, how interesting.” I paused. “But you do provide housekeeping services, correct?”

The woman hesitated once again. “Primarily, yes.”

“Cute name, by the way.”

“Thank you. Did you call with a special request, dear? Or are you just looking for someone to clean your home?”

“Neither, really. I just need to ask you a quick question, if you don’t mind?”

“Of course, go right ahead.”

“Do you do housecleaning for a man named Michael Steele? He lives in Laguna Beach.”

The hesitation this time was the longest. “We really can’t divulge our client list, dear. Most of our clients strive for privacy.”

“I understand,” I said, though I really didn’t. I thought housekeepers were thrilled to provide reference names, unless, of course, Let Mother Do It had a lot of celebrity clientele. Celebrities don’t just strive for privacy, they often hunger for it, especially in Southern California.

“Is that how you found out about us, from this Mr. Steele?”

“Sort of. I found the card at his home.”

“What is your name, dear?”

“Odelia, Odelia Grey. I work for Mr. Steele.”

Another hesitation. “Then why don’t you ask him personally if he uses our services. If you work for him, then that should not be a problem.”

“Unfortunately, Mr. Steele is missing. That’s why I’m calling. I wanted to know if you clean his house regularly or had cleaned it recently. I was hoping I might find out something to help me find him.”

“Missing? Heavens! Sounds like you need one of those private detectives, not Let Mother Do It.”

“You’re probably right.” I wiped my runny nose with a nearby tissue. “I’m sorry I bothered you. Thank you for your time.”

“You know, dear, considering the unusual circumstances, I don’t think it would be too terrible to give you a little information.” She paused. “I mean, what harm would it do to tell you that Let Mother Do It has never worked for a Mr. Steele in Laguna Beach, or anywhere else for that matter. Maybe he was given our card by a friend of his. All our new business comes from referrals.”

“Are you sure you’ve never done work for Mr. Steele? No errands, laundry, cooking, anything?”

“I’m positive, dear. After all, I’m Mother, and Mother knows everything.”

I laughed, but it came out like a snort. “Father knows best, but Mother knows everything?”

“Father knows best only after Mother tells him what he knows.”

I laughed again, and this time it came out with a cough. “Excuse me, but I’m nursing a cold.”

“Don’t forget to take some tea with honey, dear. You’ll feel a lot better.”

Tea with honey? If I wasn’t meeting Sally in four hours, it would be tea, all right … tea followed by a NyQuil shooter or two.