Donna Andrews - Chesapeake Crimes - This Job Is Murder!

Given the number of daily aggravations she faced, Rainey ended up meditating a lot.

Work continued for the next week, at its usual pace. Sessions, agreements, and then Henry and Barbara were due to come in for another appointment.

Henry called a few hours before their scheduled time, sounding strained. “Rainey, I’ve got to cancel. Barbara has to go out of town to see her parents; they’re old, and she’s worried about them.”

“You sound tense or sarcastic or something. Are you?”

“I don’t know. I think she might be stalling about equal custody-buyer’s remorse or whatever. She made a commitment, and now she’s looking for ways to pretend she didn’t.”

“Henry,” Rainey said, “I don’t think you need to worry. You both seemed to be working in good faith, and Barbara agreed that the two of you would share time with the children equally. Shall we schedule for next week and focus on the last details then?”

Henry agreed, though he clearly was worried.

“I’ll speak to Barbara,” he said, “and I’ll let you know if there’s a problem. Otherwise, same day, same time, next week.”

The day before their next appointment, Henry called again.

“Rainey, I don’t know whether Barbara’s coming tomorrow or not. I kind of lost it when she got back from visiting her parents in Chicago.”

“You lost it? What happened?”

“Awww. You know, it was a hard week taking care of the kids alone. They were acting out and whining for Mommy, and Barbara didn’t call when she said she would.” He paused.

“So?”

“So she came in all bubbly and giggly, while I was putting dinner on the table, as if she’d spent the day drinking champagne instead of dragging luggage through airports after a downer visit with her parents. I told her I knew she was having an affair. Well, I kind of yelled at her in front of the kids. Then I said, ‘Tell me who it is!’ and she looked at me as if I was a worm, and she shifted gears completely from the happy, bubbly mood and said, very coldly, ‘You are scum to suggest that.’ She started to walk away, and I threw the mac-and-cheese casserole at the wall.”

“Did you throw it at her?”

“No, I just got so mad, I threw it at the dining room wall. It didn’t even splatter on her. And I cleaned it all up myself and took the kids out to eat.”

“So…is there a problem?”

“I’m afraid to ask her if she’s coming to tomorrow’s appointment. Will you call her?”

“Sure. Assume it’s on unless I call you back to the contrary.”

Thank God Henry couldn’t see her face. The thought of mild-mannered, dull Henry flinging a dish of mac and cheese at the wall had made her grin.

When she called Barbara, Rainey asked if they could work things out. Barbara said yes, that she had been relieved to get away, and she knew Henry had been stressed staying home, and he had misunderstood the cause of her euphoria.

“I couldn’t exactly tell him I was just ecstatic to have been out of his presence, could I?”

“Not really,” Rainey agreed. “But, Barbara, if there is someone else important in your life, Henry might be intuiting the presence of what we call a ‘ghost’ at the mediation table. You know, someone who isn’t there but whose presence is somehow making a difference.”

“There is no ghost at the table,” Barbara said in a firm voice, unlike her usual Marilyn Monroe whisper.

Rainey called Lawrence and told him all about the conversations, including the fact that Henry thought Miss Mouse had a lover (and wasn’t that a hoot?).

“Lori,” he said, “Give it a rest. Let’s just get this one done, okay?”

What was his problem? He never called her Lori, the other derivative of her given name, Lorraine, unless he was annoyed. He knew she hated the name.

“Okay, Larry,” she snapped back, emphasizing the Larry . She knew Lawrence thought it made him sound like a youngster, a lightweight, rather than a professional.

But when he arrived for their sessions the next morning, they were a team, as usual. They had a session with one of the local real estate moguls and his wife and sat chatting afterward about what the odds were that the husband didn’t already have a girlfriend.

“Men never get out of marriages unless they have girlfriends, Lawrence. Haven’t you noticed? It must be something psychological,” Rainey said.

“Well, pal,” Lawrence replied, “you might have noticed that a fair number of women have boyfriends on the back burner, too.”

“Nope, it’s not the same. Sometimes women leave a marriage just because it isn’t working, not because of somebody else. But men-the only issue is whether they hide the girlfriend or the wife finds out.”

The phone rang in the outer office, interrupting their conversation. Rainey went to pick it up and then transferred the call to the conference room and pressed the button for speakerphone. It was Arnold Eldridge, a former courtroom adversary. She knew Arnold all too well; he was a terrible lawyer, lacking in common sense, creating problems where none existed, just to flog the files and make more money. Worse, he was dismally unattractive, so there wasn’t even the consolation of dealing with someone inept but cute. His thin hair stuck to his skull in a bad comb-over; his face was cratered from adolescent acne, and, in all seasons, he wore lumpy brown tweed suits. After numerous confrontations with him, Rainey started to seethe at the sound of his voice. She struggled to keep her own voice level and polite.

“Rainey,” he began, and she interjected, “Arnold, I have Lawrence here in my office as well. I understand you now represent Barbara and are calling about today’s appointment?”

“Rainey and Lawrence,” he continued, with exaggerated courtesy, “I want to let you know that I have advised Barbara to discontinue mediation. Her husband got violent when she came back from visiting her elderly parents, and mediation is unsuitable in situations of domestic violence.”

“Arnold,” Rainey said, “I just spoke with Barbara yesterday. All Henry did was throw a dish of mac and cheese at the wall. That isn’t domestic violence. They were making good progress in mediation.”

“Rainey, I didn’t call to argue with you. Barbara is my client now. I have had her husband served with a restraining order, which will keep him away from her and the children. We will be litigating this case. She will not be returning to mediation.”

“Arnold, that’s not a good idea,” Rainey said, trying to reason with him. “Henry is terrified of losing his children, and he’ll be very upset. They were doing so well in mediation until she took this trip. Can’t you help us keep a lid on things and keep them in a process that’s working?”

“He’s a violent man,” Arnold said flatly. “He needs to understand that the law will not permit that kind of behavior.”

Oh, Lord, Rainey thought, and looked at Lawrence in utter frustration.

“Arnold,” Lawrence said, “please tell Barbara that if she changes her mind and wants to come back into mediation, we’ll be pleased to continue working with them.”

After they hung up, Rainey was ready to beat her head against a wall; Lawrence seemed to take the situation more philosophically. He said he thought he’d use the time freed up by the canceled appointment to go grocery shopping. After he left the office, she watched him through the window. He pulled his bike away from the meter he had locked it to and pedaled away.

Rainey called Henry. “I’m so sorry this happened, Henry! I feel sure Barbara will figure out that Arnold isn’t helpful, and you’ll be fine. You did a lot of good work in mediation.”