Sue Grafton - K Is For Killer

She shook her head. "He's not home yet."

"Mind if I come in?" I pictured her playing dumb, a reaction ranging anywhere from denial to duh.

She looked at me and she looked at the leather case, apparently unable to think of a thing to say except, "Oh."

She stepped back from the door, and I went into the darkened hall, following as she led the way toward the kitchen at the rear. A glance to the left showed Jack, the sticky-fingered toddler, lying in a stupor on the couch, watching a cartoon video. The infant slept, slumped sideways in a well-padded portable car seat while colored images flickered across its face.

The kitchen still smelled like the sautéed onions and ground beef from dinner on Monday, which seemed like ages ago. Some of the dishes piled in the sink looked the same, too, though several other meals' worth had been piled on top. She was probably the type who waited until everything was used before she ventured into the washing process. "You want some coffee?" she asked. I could see a fresh pot on a Mr. Coffee stand, the mechanism still spitting out the last few drops.

"That'd be nice," I said. I sat down at the banquette and checked the kitchen table for sticky spots. I found a clear couple of inches and propped my elbow with care.

She took down a mug and filled it, then refilled hers before she put the pot back on the machine. In profile, her nose seemed too long for her face, but the effect in certain lights was lovely nonetheless. Her neck was long and her ears elfin, her short-cropped dark hair trimmed to wisps around her face. Her eyes were lined in smudged black, and her lip gloss was a brownish tint.

I put the leather case in the middle of the table.

She took a seat on the bench, pulling her feet up under her. She ran her hand through her hair, her expression somewhat sheepish. "I kept meaning to take that out, but I never got around to it. What a dork."

"You installed surveillance equipment?"

"Wasn't much. Just a mike and a tape recorder."

"Why?"

"I don't know. I was worried," she said. Her dark eyes seemed enormous, filled with innocence.

"I'm listening."

Color was rising in her face. "I thought J.D. and Lorna might be fooling around, but I was wrong." There was a baby bottle half-full of formula sitting on the table. She unscrewed the nipple and used the contents for cream. She offered me some, but I declined.

"What was it, voice-activated?"

"Well, yeah. I know it sounds kind of dumb in retrospect, but I'd just found out I was pregnant with the baby, and I was throwing up all day. Jack wasn't even out of diapers, and I was frantic about J.D. I knew I was being bitchy, but I couldn't help myself. I looked horrible and felt worse. And there was Lorna, slim and elegant. I'm not stupid. I figured out what she did for a living, and so did he. J.D. started finding excuses for going back there every other day. I knew if I confronted him, he'd laugh in my face, so I borrowed some of Daddy's stuff."

"Were they having an affair?"

Her expression was self-mocking. "He fixed her toilet. One of her screens had come loose, and he fixed that, too. The most he ever did was complain about me, and even that wasn't bad. She had a fit and chewed him out. She said he had a hell of a nerve when I was the one doing all the suffering and hard work. Also, she got on him because he didn't lift a finger with Jack. That's when he started cooking, which has been a big help. I feel bad I never thanked her, but I wasn't supposed to know she'd come to my defense."

"How'd you know how to install the bug?"

"I've watched Daddy do it. Lorna was gone a lot, so it wasn't hard. The doorbell never worked, but the box was there. I just drilled a hole in the floor and then crawled under the cabin. All I had to do was make sure the tape was close enough to the edge of the porch so I could switch it without a hassle. We kept the gardening tools under there. Any time I weeded, I would find a way to check the tape."

"How many tapes did you run?"

"I only used one tape, but the first time was a bust because the mike was defective and didn't pick up half the time. Second try was better, but the sound was distorted, so you couldn't hear too well. She had the radio on. She played this jazz station all the time. Up front there's this little fragment with her and J.D. I had to listen three times to be sure it was him. Then her drying her hair… that was entertaining. I got her end of a couple of phone calls, that, whole business where she's cranking on J.D. Then more music, only country this time, then she's talking to some guy. That part's left over from the first round, I think."

"Did you tell the police?"

"There wasn't anything to tell. Besides, I was embarrassed," she said. "I didn't want J.D. to know I didn't trust him, especially when it turned out he's innocent. I felt like a fool. Plus, the whole thing's illegal, so why incriminate myself? I'm still worried they'll start thinking it was J.D. who killed her. It scared me silly when you started in on us, but at least this way I can prove the two of them were friends and got along okay."

I stared at her. "Are you trying to tell me you still have the tapes?"

"Well, sure, but there's only one," she said. "The first time was mostly static, so I went ahead and taped over it."

"You mind if I listen?"

"You mean right now?"

"If you don't mind."

She unfolded herself and got up from the table. She moved out into the hallway and disappeared from sight. Moments later she returned with an empty cassette box and a little tape recorder, the cassette already in place and visible through the oval window. "I guess I didn't have to keep this, but it made me feel better. Really, J.D. couldn't have killed her because he wasn't even in town. He took off Friday morning on a fishing trip. She wasn't killed until Saturday when he was miles away."

"Where were you that day?"

"I was gone too. I decided to go part of the way with him. He took me as far as Santa Maria and dropped Jack and me at my sister's on Friday. I spent a week with her and then came home on the bus."

"You have any objections to giving me her name and number?"

"You don't believe me?"

"Let's don't get into that, Leda. You're not exactly a Girl Scout," I said.

"Well, I know, but that doesn't mean I'd kill anyone."

"What about J.D.? Can he verify his whereabouts?"

"You can ask my sister's husband, Nick. That's who he went to Nacimiento with."

I made a note of the name and number.

Leda punched the play button on the recorder. After a brief interval of white noise, the sound seemed to jump out. The reception was dismal, filled with clunks and banging as people moved around. With the equipment so close, the knocking on the door sounded like lightning cracks. A chair scraped, and someone thunked across the floor.

"Oh, hi. Come on in. I got the check right here."

There were a couple of inaudible remarks between the two of them. The front door closed like a muffled explosion.

Footsteps clunking. "How's Leda feeling?"

"She's kind of down in the dumps, but she was this way last time. She gets to feeling fat and ugly. She's convinced I'm going out to screw around on her, so she busts out crying every time I leave the house."

I put out a hand. "Hold on a minute. That's J.D.'s voice?"

She pushed pause, and the recording stopped. "Yeah, I know. It's hard to recognize. I had to play it two or three times myself. You want to hear it again?"

"If you don't mind," I said. "I've never heard Lorna's voice, but I'm assuming you can identify her as well."

"Well, sure," Leda said. She punched the rewind button. When the tape stopped, she pressed play, and we listened to the opening again. "Oh, hi. Come on in. I got the check right here."