Julia Spencer-Fleming - To Darkness And To Death

She didn’t have to finish. Lisa could guess. The patient tells the doctor. The doctor tells the police. The police arrest her husband. It reminded her of the circle game they played as kids. The cheese stands alone, the cheese stands alone…

“Thank you,” she said.

“I’m doing this for you, not for him,” Rachel went on. “If anyone finds out, it’ll mean my job. Not to mention what it’ll do to my marriage. Be smart. Take care of yourself for a change.”

“Thank you,” Lisa repeated.

“I love you,” her sister said.

“I love you, too.”

Rachel’s voice was replaced by a toneless buzz. Carefully, carefully, Lisa replaced the receiver in the cradle. She caught a glimpse of her blurred reflection in the microwave door. I’m happy, she thought. She pinched her cheeks for color, ruffled her hair jauntily. It’s just another Saturday afternoon. She strolled back into the living room.

Kevin Flynn, who had been examining the photos hanging on the wall, turned. “Everything okay?” he asked brightly.

“Yep.” She settled herself in the middle of the sofa, tucking one leg under her. She wasn’t up to controlling her face, voice, hands, and legs all at the same time. She grabbed a pillow, a souvenir from their honeymoon in Aruba with scenes from the island stitched on the cover. She wrapped her arms around it, one hand on a conch shell, one on a palm tree. “Just my friend Denise. Denise Hammond, you remember her.”

It helped if she thought of him as little Kevin Flynn, who had been a painfully thin freshman during her senior year at Millers Kill High. Skinny Flynnie, that had been his nickname. She did her best to ignore his uniform, the belt strapped around his waist like Batman’s utility belt, for chrissakes, his gun.

She wouldn’t think about his gun.

Kevin lowered himself into the only other seat in the room, the wooden rocking chair. “Yeah, I remember her. Whatever happened to her?”

“She moved to Glens Falls. Got a job at the Post-Star. ” She put on a teasing voice, one part of her marveling that she sounded so natural. “You should look her up. She’s still single, and she says a good man is hard to find.”

Kevin blushed. “She’s older than me.”

“That only matters in high school. Once you’re both out, who cares?”

He shook his head. Evidently she wasn’t the only one who remembered Skinny Flynnie.

What would I be saying if I didn’t know what I know now? What would she have done if the phone hadn’t rung a minute after Kevin knocked on her door, asking to come in? She’d ask him why he was here. Innocent people did that.

“You didn’t come all the way out here for dating advice,” she said, still using that where did it come from? teasing tone. “What brings you to my door?”

“Uh, is Randy at home?”

She concentrated on keeping her voice even, her hands relaxed. “No, he’s been gone all day. Running errands. You know. Typical Saturday stuff.”

“He didn’t bring you home? From your job at Haudenosaunee?”

“No.”

“Oh. See, the chief bumped into him while he was on his way up there-Randy, I mean, not the chief. I wanted to ask him if he had seen anything while he was up there. And you, too, of course, I want to ask you.”

She was lost. Did Kevin have a coldheartedly clever way of befuddling suspects until they spilled everything? What the hell did anything up at Haudenosaunee have to do with Randy and… and… Her mind slid over the rest of that sentence. “I don’t understand,” she said honestly.

He sighed. “Sorry. I’m still getting the hang of questioning people.” He drew himself up straight and tilted forward, stopping the gentle rocking he had slipped into. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but your employer, Eugene van der Hoeven, is dead.”

What he said was so far from what she had expected, it took her several minutes to decipher his meaning.

“Lisa? Are you okay?”

She stared at him. “Mr. van der Hoeven’s dead?”

“Yeah.”

“How? What happened to him?” She hoped her voice wasn’t as light and bubbly as she felt. Poor Mr. van der Hoeven. She tried not to smile. Poor, poor Mr. van der Hoeven.

“Uh, I don’t think I can give you any details yet. We do know he was killed sometime between twelve-thirty and two o’clock. I was hoping you could give me some details.”

“I don’t know what I can tell you. He was alive and well when I left at noon.”

“Did you drive yourself home? Is that why Randy didn’t pick you up after all?”

Careful. “No, I got a ride with a woman named Clare Fergusson. I knew Randy was going to be running around town, so I told him I’d find my own way home. He must have forgotten.”

“Reverend Fergusson?” Kevin glanced up from the small wire-bound notebook where he was writing down her words. “Do you think she might have gone back up to Haudenosaunee after she dropped you home?”

“I don’t think so. She was done with the search team for the day.”

“Do you know if Eugene van der Hoeven had any enemies? Had he fought with anyone?”

She made a face. “I cleaned up after him for four years, but I don’t know much about the man. He was neat, polite, and always gave me a good Christmas bonus. He never had anybody to stay at Haudenosaunee except family-his sisters and his dad, while he was alive.” She hesitated. “I was worried that Millie van der Hoeven was getting into something not so good.”

Kevin looked up from his notebook.

“But your chief probably knows about it. I told it to Ms. Fergusson this morning, and she said she was friends with the chief and she would tell him.” She untwisted her leg and tucked the other one up. “Starting from when Millie got here at the end of the summer, I’ve been finding these pamphlets and letters from the Planetary Liberation Army.”

Kevin looked impressed.

“You’ve heard of them? Yeah, they’re a nasty bunch. Anyhow, it worried me. Millie is one hardcore earth mama. And it always struck me as strange, the way she just up and left her own home in Montana to move in with her brother.”

“Did she ever mention leaving?”

“Nope. Isn’t that weird? Makes me wonder if she maybe had to leave her other home.”

“Huh.” He riffled through his notes. “Anything else you want to tell me?”

The innocent question punched her in her gut. She shook her head.

“Okay.” He flapped the notebook closed. “It looks like Randy was one of the last people up there before Mr. van der Hoeven was killed, so we’ll want to talk with him as soon as we can. Let him know when he gets home, okay?”

She nodded. “Let me walk you out,” she said, unfolding herself from the couch, pleased to find her legs didn’t wobble at all. At the front door, she blocked his way with her arm on the doorknob, smiling up at him. He blushed again. “Give some thought to what I said about Denise, hmm?”

He mumbled something, and she opened the door.

Just in time to hear tires crunching down the drive. She and Kevin both looked out as her husband’s pickup rolled to a stop next to where Officer Flynn’s squad car was parked.

Kevin turned to her.

Skinny Flynnie, she reminded herself. Skinny Flynnie.

“Hey,” he said happily. “Randy’s home.”

W e are not the first to be, Banished by our fears from Thee; Give us courage, let us hear, Heaven’s trumpets ringing clear.”

“No! No! Tenors-you’re supposed to be trumpets! Not kazoos!”

Clare, unfolding a chair, paused. “They sounded pretty good to me,” she said to Terry McKellan.