Marcia Talley - This Enemy Town

“You may have no choice, Hannah,” Cheevers interrupted.

“It was an accident,” I insisted. “Dorothy and I were dismantling the sets, she dropped the box cutter and it fell on my arm.” I glanced from my husband to Dorothy’s lawyer, searching their somber faces for any sign of support. “That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.”

Paul’s mouth gave a twitch of a smile. “Right.”

Cheevers adjusted his tie, a masterpiece in bright blue, decorated with battleships, circa World War II. “An accident.”

That “accident” had required fifteen stitches. With my bandaged arm, I saluted Kevin’s bandaged cheek. “We’re a pair, aren’t we?”

Kevin grinned.

“How’s the eye, Kevin?” Paul asked.

“Absolutely A-okay, Professor. The antibiotics are doing their thing. The IV comes out today, then I’ll have to take pills for a while.” He tapped his temple with an index finger. “The doctor says the eye will be good as new.”

“I was thinking,” Emma said from her perch at the foot of Kevin’s hospital bed. “It’s just like Sweeney Todd.”

Cheevers, who hadn’t seen the musical, asked, “In what way?”

“Well, you know at the end, where Sweeney kills the poor, mad beggar woman he didn’t recognize as his wife? Kevin’s mother spiked Adam’s Dr Pepper, thinking that he’d be drinking it, but she ended up drugging Kevin instead.”

Emma was right, I thought. Sweeney was blinded by revenge, and in the end destroyed the one person in the world that his poisoned heart still loved. And Dorothy? In her obsession over her son’s career, she nearly took it from him.

I stepped forward and joined the huddle of people gathered around Kevin’s bed. “Kevin, I’ve been puzzling over something. On the day of the matinee, you went to Mahan, drank the Dr Pepper, went down to the makeup room and then went out and got in your car. What the heck did you do that for?”

Kevin smiled. “It sounds a bit weird, doesn’t it? It’s like this. I was eating Sunday dinner at my sponsors’ when I got the call that I’d be going on in Adam’s place, so I high-tailed it over to Mahan and got into the Beadle’s costume.”

“It’s my fault, I’m afraid,” another voice interrupted. Professor Medwin Black, swathed against the February cold in wool from head to foot, bustled into the room, instantly bringing Kevin’s visitor count to three over quota. “You may recall that Adam Monroe played the Beadle bald. We had such a good bit of stage business going with it that I insisted Kevin wear a pate.”

“Pate?” Paul’s handsome brow wrinkled attractively.

“A bald wig,” Kevin explained. “We couldn’t get it to fit right,” he said, continuing the story. “I looked like a kid wearing a Halloween costume from Kmart, so I said the hell with it, I’ll just go back to the Hall and shave my head. That’s where I was going when the wall ran into me.”

Emma rested her hands on her hips. “So, how come you drank Adam’s soda, Kev?”

“I figured if I had his part, I could have his stupid soda, too.”

“I’m glad you didn’t shave your head, Kevin,” Emma said, giving him a sisterly peck on the cheek.

“I don’t know about that.” Kevin grinned. “Simone might find it very attractive.”

“Who’s Simone?” I asked.

“My nurse. She’s hot.”

I remembered the attractive blonde who had just left the room after recording Kevin’s vitals, and although I suspected my advice might fall on deaf ears, I said, “Kevin! You can’t date a lieutenant. She outranks you.”

“My God, Kev, they’ll fry you for frat!”

“What she said,” I agreed, pointing a finger at Emma.

Kevin threw me an exaggerated wink. “If you don’t ask, Mrs. Ives, I will never, ever tell.”

To the real-life Pair-o-Docs-Barry Talley and David White-who together have produced musicals that have thrilled, delighted, and astonished Annapolis audiences for two decades. Thanks for agreeing to go on sabbatical for the duration of this book so those two other guys could direct Sweeney Todd .

To Helen Arguello for help building sets, and Ensign Paul Wood, USN, producer of the 2004 Glee Club musical and backstage guide extraordinaire. From the dressing rooms below to the dizzying heights of Mahan Hall’s amazing clock tower… ooooh, thanks, especially for manning the camera while I was cowering on the balcony. And to Randy Martell, who has all the keys.

To Vice Admiral Ronald A. Route, Naval Inspector General, for advice on Navy policy and procedure; Capt. Keith Bowman, USN, who responded to my request for information by inviting me on a tour of the Pentagon; Lt. Jonathan Glass, MC, USNR, for valuable help with the medical bits; and Special Agent Marina Murphy, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Annapolis Regional Authority, who answered a bazillion questions about FBI investigations. If I got it wrong, it’s my mistake, and not theirs.

I have been overwhelmed by the generous outpouring of support from my Naval Academy friends-midshipmen, faculty and staff, both past and present. I based all the cool characters on you, of course. The rotten ones I made up.

To friend and fellow mystery author, Donna Andrews, who was nearly arrested while checking out a location for me in Fairfax, VA. Be careful where you point your camera, and of course I would have bailed you out! Does Homeland Security take VISA?

To Luci Zahrey, the “Poison Lady” who would be very, very dangerous should she ever turn to crime.

To my writers groups-Sujata Massey, John Mann, Janice McLane, and Karen Diegmueller, in Baltimore, and Janet Benrey, Trish Marshall, Mary Ellen Hughes, Ray Flynt, Sherriel Mattingly, and Lyn Taylor, in Annapolis-for tough love.

To my amazing editor, Sarah Durand; her can-do assistant, Jeremy Cesarec; to my publicist, Danielle Bartlett, and everyone at Harper Collins who makes it such an incredibly supportive place for a mystery writer to be.

To my web diva and lunch buddy, Barbara Parker. Come see what Barbara can do at www.marciatalley.com .

To Marisa Young and James Cheevers, whose generous bids at charity auctions sponsored by Malice Domestic, Inc. and the Friends of the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra, respectively, bought them the right to be characters in this book.

And to Kate Charles and Deborah Crombie-Plot Fest Forever! And, when are we going to do another one?

MARCIA TALLEY is the author of four previous books featuring Hannah Ives. A winner of the Malice Domestic writing grant and an Agatha Award nominee for Best First Novel, Ms. Talley won an Agatha and an Anthony Award for her short story “Too Many Cooks.” She is the editor of two mystery collaborations, and her short stories have been published in numerous magazines and anthologies. She lives with her husband in Annapolis, Maryland. You can visit her website at www.marciatalley.com.

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