Ферн Майклз - Truth and Justice

“Maggie is right. What is it about Bella and her case that’s got us in this funk?” Kathryn demanded, her voice so irritated, the others blinked, wondering if something else was bothering the long-distance truck driver.

“Maybe because her husband was injured and died, and no one told her for over eleven months?” Yoko said softly. “I think that might make me a little crazy, to say the least.”

“Eleven months of writing letters and believing her husband was going to come home to her and they were going to raise a family might have something to do with it,” Alexis said, a catch in her voice. “I know that would bother me. How do you get over something like that?”

“It’s everything,” Nikki said quietly. “Bella is just simply too young. To us, she’s still a kid. Well, sort of. You know what I mean, young. I know it happens, but she’s our . . . our first up-close-and-personal case where love is involved. I think I read somewhere that the military, the army in particular, is so careful about stuff like this. All that time Andy . . . I guess it’s okay to call him Andy . . . was in a hospital almost within walking distance of where Bella lived, and no one told her. This is just eating at me. I want to . . . to do something to someone. I want a payback, and I want it now. I know that’s impossible at the moment, but I feel better having expressed myself out loud.”

“Whoa! Whoa!” Maggie bellowed. “Before we start dishing out blame, we need to look to Andy. It was his job to notify the military of his new status. I get the in-love part, the two-day honeymoon, and I get the deployment. Even so, Bella and making sure she was taken care of should have been the only thing on his mind. It was his idea to have her freeze her eggs, his idea to donate his sperm. So he was thinking ahead in that regard. Meaning he might come back impaired or not come back at all. So if he was thinking of all that, why didn’t he think to do the paperwork that would see that his new wife was taken care of if something happened to him?

“I’m thinking of his military life insurance, not to mention his military pay. Where did he think that was going to go? We need to find out where it was going prior to the marriage. It doesn’t make any sense to me whatsoever. Not to Maggie Spritzer, private citizen, Maggie Spritzer, Vigilante in training, and it sure as hell doesn’t compute to me as Maggie Spritzer, Washington Post reporter.”

“Maggie’s right. She summed it up perfectly,” Myra and Annie said in unison.

“That means we’re back to square one,” Nikki pointed out. “Let’s do a rehash of what we know. Everything Bella told us and everything we were able to pull out of her with the exception of the one thing she can’t remember,” Nikki said.

“Before we do that, I want to go on the record saying it bothers me that Bella knows so little about the man she married. Speaking for myself here, Alan and I had a short courtship before we got married. And yet I knew every single thing there was to know about him, practically from the moment he fell out of his mother’s womb. Just the way he knew everything about me. I get it that Bella and Andy were in love and into each other. But so were Alan and me, and yet we talked and talked, kissed until our lips were bruised, and made love twenty-four/seven, and we still talked and learned all there was to know about each other. Tell me it wasn’t the same with all of you. Go ahead, I’m waiting,” Kathryn said angrily. “And yeah, I’m mad as hell here, so there!”

“I for one agree with Kathryn,” Alexis said.

Heads bobbed up and down in agreement with Kathryn.

“It’s almost like there’s some secret to Andy’s past he didn’t share,” Yoko said.

“Then we need to find out what that secret is,” Myra said. “Let’s make a list of what we do know and what we don’t know, and take it from there. I don’t see any other way to parcel out assignments. I’m certainly up for suggestions. Right now, the only thing we know is that tomorrow morning Isabelle is . . . um . . . going to be doing some . . . um, work that none of us know how to do. What she finds out might turn out to be a whole bunch of nothing. Or it might turn out to be a treasure trove of things we need to know. Now, who wants to go first?”

Maggie’s hand shot high in the air. “I’d like to take on Andy and his sister. I wasn’t here when you all talked to Bella, but from what I gather from what has been said here, she knew next to zip about her new husband’s sister. Right off the bat, that strikes me as strange. And she wasn’t interested enough to ask questions. Don’t you all find that strange? Or is it just me?”

Once again, heads bobbed up and down. “Go for it, darling girl, and leave no stone unturned. We want to know everything, every nitpicking detail,” Myra said.

“I’m on it,” Maggie said, a devilish gleam in her eyes. As one, the girls shuddered because they all knew how relentless Maggie could be when she was stalking prey. Whatever was out there to find about Andy’s sister, Maggie would find it.

Chapter 7

“Listen up, girls. Today is a brand-new day, and we have to make it work for us. I think we’re off to a good start, and you’ll see why in a second. We all need to thank Nikki and Yoko, who rose early and went to the village and brought us back these lovely breakfast sandwiches and . . . they told me . . . they ordered Antonio’s to deliver lunch and Pagoda to deliver dinner. Today, we are good to go, ladies. What that means is we can work straight through the day and not worry about our meals or the cleanup,” Myra said happily. “I just love it when things work out so easily,” she continued to babble.

An hour later, the girls looked around to make sure they were leaving Myra’s kitchen neat and tidy since Myra was extra particular about her kitchen. Sometimes she was worse than Charles when it came to, “everything has a place, and that’s where I want to see it.” End of story.

“All right then, girls, let’s get to it,” Myra announced, once everyone was comfortable and seated at the large, round table in the war room. “I’ve been thinking about this case all night. I couldn’t sleep thinking about poor Bella. Why is it things like this happen to nice people like Bella?” Annie asked fretfully. “And yet . . .” Annie hadn’t finished what she was about to say when Alexis started to talk over her.

Alexis clucked her tongue and shook her head. “Now, Annie, you know there is no answer, and even if there were, we are never going to find out what it is. Things are what they are, and we have to live with it. We also know that no one and nothing is as it seems. I hate to be the one saying this because I am the one that brought Bella to us, but I’m going to say it anyway. Somewhere, something is off. It’s not something I know, it’s more like something I feel, and I, for one, always pay attention to my gut instincts. I cannot explain it any better than to say it’s just something I know. I believe you’ve all had that feeling at one time or another because we’ve talked about it on several occasions. Like I said, nothing and no one are what they seem. Having said that, I’m now afraid to take that thought any further, so I’m tossing it out to you all for your input.”

No one, not even Annie, knew what to say to Alexis’s declaration, so none of them spoke in response. They all knew time would prove that ditty right or wrong, and they’d deal with it when that happened.

Nikki and Alexis walked up to the dais, where Charles’s wall of electronics waited for them. The two lawyers worked in tandem as Myra called the meeting down below to order. The room went silent as iPhones came out, were turned to record, and placed in front of each sister.