David Handler - The Snow White Christmas Cookie

“Paulette, are you positive you don’t want me to call Casey for you? I’m sure he’ll want to come straight home.”

“The Rustic is his home. This is just where he sleeps.”

“Is there anybody I can call for you?”

“Why would you want to do that?”

“So someone can be with you. You shouldn’t be alone at a time like this.”

“I am alone,” she said, reaching for her wineglass. “I’m going to be alone for the whole rest of my life. I may as well start getting used to it.”

“So how’s my good friend Yolie Snipes?”

“She’s been happier. An entire boxed set of Feds will be swarming all over this by tomorrow morning. Yolie doesn’t play well with others.”

“Is she still partnered with Toni the Tiger?”

“She is.”

“Which one of them has started wearing patchouli?”

“Mitch, how on earth did?…”

“You reeked of it when you walked in that door. And I happen to know that there are no head shops in Dorset.”

Des shook her head at him. “I swear, sometimes you terrify me.”

All she’d wanted to do when she walked in that door was shuck her wet uni, jump into a hot shower and then into Mitch’s nice, warm bed. But Mitch, who was seven-tenths Jewish mother, had insisted she eat a late supper after her shower. So now she was seated on a blanket in front of the fire stuffing herself on the world’s most gigantic, delicious meat loaf sandwich. Clemmie and Quirt were crouched next to her, sniffing at her plate with keen, busy-nosed interest. Outside, the rain was still coming down. It was good to be warm and dry in front of this fire with Mitch and the cats. It was good to be Des Mitry tonight-as opposed to Paulette Zander, who was sitting in that dingy house with only a gallon jug of cheap Chablis and her dead boyfriend’s electric train set for company.

“You’re positive that Hank’s death wasn’t a suicide?”

“Couldn’t be more positive.” Des set aside the remains of her sandwich and took a sip from her glass of milk. “Someone staged the suicide scene, sent Paulette that text message and then took off in a second car. Whoever did it had a partner. We’re looking for two people.”

Mitch gazed thoughtfully into the fire for a long moment before he said, “Are you going to finish that sandwich?”

“It’s all yours.”

He dove in, continuing to stare into the fire. She knew that stare. His wheels were turning.

“What are you thinking, doughboy?”

“That I should have put some of Sheila Enman’s bread-and-butter pickles on this. Also something truly crazy. What if Bryce’s suicide was staged, too?”

“That’s not crazy at all. Yolie’s already fast-tracking Bryce’s autopsy. Although I don’t understand why someone would want to kill Bryce.”

“Why Josie would want to kill him, you mean.”

She frowned at him. “Josie?”

“No one else was out here this morning when he died. There were no tire tracks in the snow, no footprints.”

“Okay, let’s say you’re right about that.…”

“Oh, I’m right.”

“Why would Josie do it?”

“I can help you when it comes to a motive,” he said, shoving the last of her sandwich into his mouth. “Mighty big one, too.”

“Well, don’t be bashful. Let’s hear it.”

“Josie showed up here not long after you left with some very interesting news-Bryce asked Glynis Fairchild-Forniaux to draw up his will for him last week. He hadn’t had one before, apparently. Guess who he left his house to? Go ahead, take a wild guess.”

“Um, okay, somebody who has long blond hair and isn’t named Preston?”

“Bingo. Glynis phoned Josie to warn her that Preston totally freaked when he found out. Glynis thinks Preston will contest it in court. She wants Josie to hire a lawyer and stand her ground.”

“Is she going to?”

“Too soon to tell. Josie seemed genuinely stunned by the whole thing. Swore to me that she didn’t know a thing about what Bryce had done.”

“Did you believe her?”

“Honestly? When it comes to Josie I’m not sure what to believe.” Mitch gulped down what was left of Des’s milk. The man did not know how to leave any food or beverage untouched. “Let’s just riff here for a sec. Let’s say Josie killed Bryce so that she could score his megamillions house, okay?”

“Okay…”

“Why would she need to kill Hank, too?”

Des settled back against a big throw pillow. It had been a long, grueling day. Her body was starting to relax. Not her head though. “We know that Hank was a client of hers a couple of months back.”

Mitch nodded. “And let’s say Hank was stealing that stuff from his route. What if he supplied Josie with the prescription meds that killed Bryce?”

“Bryce had perfectly legit prescription bottles.”

“That Josie told us were full at the time of his death. Let’s say she lied about that. Let’s say those bottles of Vicodin, Xanax and Ambien were actually empty. For all we know, Bryce was still using them on a daily basis. We only have Josie’s word for it that he was drug free these past weeks. Besides, we don’t know that those are the actual drugs he swallowed this morning.”

“Agreed. That’s why we need his toxicology results. We also need to take a good, hard look at that suicide Post-it of his.”

“What about it?”

“Josie told us that ‘Just an awkward stage’ was a pet phrase of Bryce’s. That he used it a lot.”

“So?…”

“So we’ve been assuming that Bryce wrote it this morning when he was preparing to do himself in. But he could have written it days or even weeks ago. Stuck it on the fridge or the bathroom mirror. Our lab people can determine how long the ink’s been drying on the Post-it. If that ink’s more than twenty-four hours old, then right away this gets way more interesting.”

Mitch looked at her in astonishment. “I didn’t know they could do that.”

“Maybe Josie doesn’t either.” Des lay there, her mind working through it. “Let’s say you’re right. Let’s say Josie convinced Hank to supply her with some of his stolen prescription meds. Hell, let’s go all the way in and say she’s the one who convinced him to steal the damned stuff in the first place. How did she manage that? We talking about role-playing exercises on her office sofa again?”

“She could have offered Hank something a lot more enticing than her body.”

“Like what?”

“Like a healthy share of the proceeds once she sold Bryce’s house. More than enough money for him to get out of the mess he was in with his ex-wife. He and Josie no doubt talked about his financial problems when she was helping him quit smoking. Mind you, that would mean she knew weeks ago that Bryce intended to leave her his house and that she lied to me about it tonight to cover her tracks. But I have no problem believing that.”

“I don’t either. I also have no problem believing she was doing Hank just for good measure. It’s still the world’s best form of persuasion.”

“Then she bumped him off tonight because he could implicate her in Bryce’s death.”

“And because she didn’t need him anymore,” Des said. “It’s nice and neat. Appallingly so.”

“Wait, I just thought of something. Josie never left the island tonight. I would have heard her car.”

“What if she walked across the causeway and got picked up? Hank’s killer had a partner, remember? Someone else was waiting in a getaway car.”

He tilted his head at her. “Someone like Casey Zander?”

“He’s certainly a likely candidate. I also have my eye on Pat Faulstich. Everywhere I go I keep tripping over him. He was rummaging through the mailboxes when I had Dorset Street staked out this afternoon. And tonight he showed up on Kinney Road-supposedly to plow the neighboring driveways.”