Motherhood Is Murder (16 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Preparation

We sent Jim with a list of items to our neighborhood Radio Shack. Then Mom proceeded to dial Dr. Alan Lipe’s office looking for an appointment. I warned her that he was booked up for a month and I’d only gotten my appointment because of a cancellation. She ignored me and dialed.
Paula, wanting to appear convincing, was at my computer researching midwives and the benefits of home births. With my primary PI tools in use, the computer and the phone, I reclined on the couch with Laurie in one arm and the
Idiot’s Guide
in the other. As soon as I began to read, my doorbell rang.
I put Laurie in her bouncy chair and answered the door. It was Galigani.
“Hey, what are you doing here?” I asked, motioning him inside.
“I got your e-mail. I figured I could help you set up some accounts and . . .” He spotted Mom and Paula. “I didn’t know you were having a party—”
Mom hung up and practically bounded over in her Converse. “Albert!”
He gave her a warm hug and kiss on the cheek.
“How was your cruise, Vera?” he asked Mom.
As far as I knew, Mom had told him that she was going with friends and I cringed to see how she would answer, but fortunately for Mom, Paula saved her by joining us and introducing herself.
Laurie began to cry from the bouncy chair.
“She’s hungry.” I picked her and headed to the bedroom to nurse her. Paula and Mom stayed in the living room with Galigani and filled him in.
By the time I’d finished with Laurie and laid her down for a nap, Jim had returned with the purchases. In addition to getting all the items on the list, he bought Laurie a stuffed purple puppy that had an imbedded digital recorder. He placed it next to Laurie in the crib to record her cute little coos.
Galigani assisted me with setting up the devices we were going to use for Paula and Mom. The microphones were just slightly bigger then a memory card and the receiver/ recorder part was about the size and shape of a cell phone. I tested all the parts, and for fun recorded myself giving a grave warning to Paula.
My voice came out of the device.
“Paula, can you hear me? Do NOT get caught. This is serious business and I’m depending on you to get the secrets of the universe and report back to me.”
Paula listened to the recording, blowing air into each cheek alternately and frowning. When the recorder clicked off, Paula’s face relaxed and she smiled. “This is gonna be fun.”
We secured the equipment to the inside of Paula’s maternity blouse and instructed her to go to the garden and tape a conversation with Jim. Satisfied with our testing, we sent Paula and Mom out into the field. Paula was going to drop in on Celia and Mom had scored an appointment with her general doctor. She was planning on getting a real referral to Alan’s practice in the hopes that she might actually get her bunion problem taken care of.
After Mom and Paula left, Galigani helped me learn the ropes on background checks and grilled me a bit over my meeting with Gary. I shared with him the transcript of the interview from Gary and Bruce’s meeting with Inspectors McNearny and Jones.
Galigani perused the report. “Does Mac know you’re still working on this case?”
McNearny and Galigani had been partners years ago. From comments Galigani made occasionally, I was never sure how close or not they actually were.
I recapped my meetings with McNearny.
Galigani scratched his head. “He said it was okay for you to follow Alan?”
I nodded.
Galigani sighed. “Then it’s a waste of time for your mom and Paula to pursue him.”
“Why?”
“If Mac didn’t mind you investigating him, then he’s not the guy. They have information we don’t have. Remember they talked to all the people on the boat that night. No. They’re looking into someone else.”

Around 3 P.M., directly after I had nursed Laurie and put her down for a nap, Paula returned from Celia’s.
We made tea and camped out in my kitchen nook.
We put the recorder on the table between us and pressed Play. Paula’s voice came on:
Paula: Okay I’m in the car outside of Celia’s center. Testing 123.
The recorder clicked.
Paula: All right. I just played my test and it worked. I hope I don’t botch things.
Sounds of Paula getting out of the car. The car door slams.
Paula: I’m walking toward the entrance. I’m going to shut up now so she doesn’t think I’m some weirdo who talks to herself.
Sounds of a door opening.
Paula: Hello?
Celia: Oh hi. Can I help you?
Sounds of shuffling.
“We can fast-forward a bit. This part’s all small talk,” Paula said.
I nodded. Paula pressed the forward button on the recorder and held it down for several seconds. When she released it, the recording continued.
Celia: Are you interested in a home birth?
Paula: Yeah. I had my son at the hospital and I’d like to try—
Celia: Did you have a bad experience?
Paula: No. Not really. Just, you know, I don’t really like hospitals.
Celia: Most healthy people don’t. That’s one of the benefits of the home births. There’s less stress and fear in a home.
Paula: Do you . . . I mean would you do it at my house?
Celia: Whatever you’re comfortable with. This can be your home away from home. A lot of people prefer the center, and remember, not everyone who wants a home birth has a home. This center is for everyone. Would you like to see the birthing room?
Paula: Uh . . . no.
I raised an eyebrow at Paula. She paused the tape.
“Why didn’t you go look at the room?” I asked.
“For what? I’m not actually going to have my baby there, you know. Not even for you.”
I laughed. “Still. You could have checked it out. It’s actually kind of nice.”
Paula giggled. “I knew that would kill you. You can’t stand the thought that I had an opportunity to poke around and didn’t.”
“Well, you have to be sort of convincing. I mean, you’re there on the pretext of wanting to hire a midwife and then you don’t even look at the facility.”
Paula waved her hand. “Ah, no big deal. She gave me this and I oohed and aahed at all the right places.”
She pulled a glossy brochure from her purse. It contained several pictures of the birthing room, complete with a birth tub and balls.
“Did you ask her about her boyfriend?” I asked.
Paula nodded and pressed the Play button on the recorder.
Paula: How long have you been doing this?
Celia: Almost three years.
Paula: Are you certified?
Celia: Of course.
I sipped my tea. “You asked her for certification?”
Paula nodded. “Yeah. I was trying to get a groove on her. She gave me enough rubbish on the benefits of home births and births in a ‘home away from home’ to make me think she was legit.”
She fidgeted with the recorder and the playback resumed.
Paula: So are you a nurse?
Celia: I was. Yes. In Miami. An ob-gyn nurse. Then I decided to go into business for myself and really focus on what I love. You know if you just give your dreams a chance, it can change your life. You’re dreaming of having your baby without all the trappings of the hospital. I can help you.
When are you due? Who’s your doctor now?
Paula: Uh. In March. Dr. Reynolds.
Celia: Do you have her number?
Paula: What?
Celia: I can call your doctor and begin the process to find out if you’re a good candidate for home birth—
Paula: Oh no. I mean, I have to think about it. You know, talk to my husband. You know how men are. Are you married?
Celia: No.
Paula: You have a boyfriend?
Celia: Not at the moment.
Silence.
I raised an eyebrow. Paula held up her hand, indicating for me to wait.
Celia: I was seeing someone, but well . . . things got complicated.
Paula: I’m sorry. Affairs of the heart can be complicated. Was it recent?
Celia: Yes. Very.
Paula: My toughest breakup was this married guy I was seeing. It wasn’t one of those, was it?
Celia: Actually . . .
Paula: Oh, sweetheart. I’m so sorry. I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t stand being second. Well, he would tell me I was first, but he wouldn’t leave her—
Celia: Yes. That’s it. We broke it off because he won’t leave her.
Paula: Don’t worry—there’s plenty of Tom, Dick, and Alans out there.
I laughed.
Paula stopped the tape. “That’s pretty much it.”
“Wait! What was her reaction when you mentioned Alan?”
“Nothing. She just kind of looked sad and shrugged. The rest of the tape is her persuading me to leave my OB and become her client. You know, having a home birth gives you maximum control over your birth experience, blah blah. You can listen to it later; hearing the sales pitch once was enough for me.”
“Tell me how you really feel about it.”
Paula laughed. “Well, I got her to say she was with a married guy. But not who. I didn’t know how to get that part without downright asking her—are you seeing a podiatrist name Alan?”
“It’s okay. You did great. Good stuff to go on.” I raised my eyebrow at her. “I never knew you had a thing for married men. I promise I won’t tell your husband. Unless . . . I wonder how much my silence is worth to you . . .”
Paula jogged my elbow. “Don’t be a twit. That lie was only to elicit her feelings of camaraderie. If this tape surfaces on the Internet, I know where to find you.”
I laughed, then hugged her. “You’re the best. Thank you for suffering for me.”
She rolled her eyes. “Okay, okay, you don’t have to slobber all over me. Just keep in mind that you owe me one.”
That evening I tried my hand at chicken cacciatore, pulling the recipe straight from the library cookbook with the only modification being that I liberally splashed wine into the pot.
While tasting the sauce, Mom called me and reported that her doctor had given her a referral to Dr. Lipe and she had scored an appointment for the morning. We agreed she would come straight to my house after the visit.
I dialed Margaret and left another message.
While waiting for the chicken to finish cooking, I typed up the tape from Paula and e-mailed it to Gary’s office then called it a day.
Dejected, I sat down to dinner.
“Honey! This is outstanding,” Jim raved.
“Glad you like it.” I was holding Laurie and staring into her beautiful little face.
How could she be so complete and so tiny at the same time?
“What’s wrong, honey?” Jim asked.
I picked at the chicken and sighed. “I’m bummed that I’m not making more progress on the case. I wanted to solve it before Thanksgiving and just have a peaceful holiday with you guys.”
Jim squeezed me hand. “Don’t worry, honey, if you fail at the PI biz, you can still make me chicken cacciatore anytime.”
I cleared the plates and kicked Jim on my way to the kitchen.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Talking

To Do:
1. Why would anyone poison Celia?
2. Where is Margaret?
3. Must get house in order for Thanksgiving! (in progress).
4. Shop, cook, clean (in progress).
5. ?
6.
7. Pick up exercise regimen after the holiday.
The following afternoon, I was busy trimming a keepsake lock from Laurie when Mom showed up on my doorstep with a little swagger in her step.
I ushered her into the house and showed her the lock of hair I’d placed in the delicate pink ballerina box Paula had brought Laurie from Paris.
“Oh! It’s darling!” She rubbed Laurie’s cheeks and cooed at her. Laurie watched Mom’s face and stuck her little puppy tongue out.
I’d read that this is an infant’s way of communicating. They’re trying to imitate the way a mouth moves during speech. They even take turns, watching you first, as though they are having a conversation with you.
Mom laughed and proceeded to stick her tongue out at Laurie. Laurie rolled her tongue and gurgled. Mom did the same. Pretty soon I had a couple of drooling fools on my hands.
“Did you find anything out from Alan?” I asked.
“Maybe,” Mom said with a smug look on her face. “Listen to the tape. It’s in my purse. Oh, and bring me my Cheaters. I want to cut some of Laurie’s hair for me, too.”
I grabbed the recorder and handed Mom her glasses. She immediately went into action and clipped the only remaining long hair Laurie had.
Laurie was beginning to lose the hair on the back of her head and I feared she’d go completely bald before I could save some baby hair. But now after the radical hair-cut Mom had given her, I wondered if it had been a wise decision.
I pressed the Play button on the device.
Mom: Good morning. I have an appointment with Dr. Lipe. Is that you, Joan?
Joan: Vera! How are you? I didn’t make the connection that it was you!
I pressed Stop on the recorder and raised my hands to Mom. “You know her?”
Mom laughed. “Isn’t that a coincidence? I met her a few weeks ago at a dinner party. I told you about her. She’s the lady who wanted to take home some leftover crackers, remember?”
“I can’t believe you know her.” I pressed Play again on the recorder.
Joan: Let me take you right in.
Sounds of a door opening and shuffling.
“This next part is my visit with the doctor. He gave me a good solution for my bunions.”
I pressed Stop on the recording. “Let me guess. You need an orthotic.”
“Yes!” Mom said excitedly.
“Okay, you can spare me the details of the visit,” I said, fast-forwarding the device a bit. “Did you get any more information?”
“Oh yes. Let me see.” Mom took the recorder and pressed a few buttons back and forth. “Here we go.”
Mom: Okay, Joan. Looks like I need to come back. Do you have anything for next week?
Joan: Let me check.
Sounds of pages turning.
Joan: Next week the doctor is out due to the holiday. How about the first week in December?
Mom: Yes, that will work. The doctor is so handsome, isn’t he?
Joan (giggling): Oh! You think so?
Mom: I’m sure a lot of woman do. Is he married?
Joan: Well, yes. Currently, but you know there’s such a high rate of divorce these days.
Mom: Oh. That’s too bad. You think he’s heading for a divorce?
Silence.
Joan (whispering): He was seeing the wife’s best friend.
Mom: Tsk, tsk, tsk.
Joan (whispering): But she (long pause) died!
Mom (sharp intake of breathe): Oh!
Joan: It was in the papers. So tragic. A bay dinner cruise.
Mom: Oh dear!
Joan: He hasn’t been the same since.
Mom stopped the tape and thumped me on the back. “What do you think about your ol’ mom now?” She laughed and whooped. “You don’t mind the gossip so much when it yields you a juicy bit, do you?”
I held my head, feeling like if I didn’t, my brain would explode and then there would be one more thing to clean up around here.
The phone rang.
“Want me to get that?” Mom asked. “You look a little pale.”
It was Helene? Alan had been sleeping with Helene?
No wonder. Margaret said he’d been getting home on time after the night on the boat. Of course, because his mistress was dead.
My answering machine kicked on. Galigani’s voice filled the air.
“Kid! I got something for you. The doc was sleeping with the vic. Call me.”
Mom grabbed the phone before Galigani could hang up. “Hello, Albert. Just one second, Kate’s right here . . . Oh tonight? . . . Sure, I’d love to have dinner with you.”
My chest felt tight and my head throbbed. Lives were going on all around, Mom had a date, Celia had her business, Paula would have her baby soon, but Helene was dead and gone.
Why? Why would Alan have killed his mistress? Had she threatened to tell Margaret? Could he have done it? Maybe he’d killed her by accident as Margaret had feared.
Mom passed me the phone. I semigrunted.
Galigani laughed. “What’s the matter, kid? We’re making progress.”
“How did you find out it was Helene?” I asked.
“This is confidential. Okay? You
cannot
disclose to Barramendi, understand?”
There was a lump forming in my throat the size of a walnut.
I was so in over my head.
I swallowed past the lump. “Yeah,” my voice cracked.
“I’m holding the police report from the night on the cruise. Officer Lee questioned you. Do you remember?”
“Yes. I remember.”
“Well, there were a few officers there and Officer Rebecca Burke took a statement from one witness who’d overheard a discussion between Helene and Alan.”
I recalled the woman officer on board. I had seen her talking to a silver-haired woman who had been gesticulating madly.
“According to the statement,” Galigani said, “the witness overheard a discussion between the deceased and Alan. He was planning to leave his wife. There was some talk of moving to North Carolina together. Then they were interrupted by another woman. The doc left the scene and the two women had an argument. The deceased was canceling a home extension or construction project. The other woman got very agitated. That’s when our witness decided to clear out of there and in the process ended up spilling her drink on the woman.”
Sara.
So if Alan and Helene were planning on running away together, it made sense that Helene would cancel the home remodeling plans. And it would also make sense that Bruce didn’t know she’d done it. But what about the adoption? Hadn’t Helene wanted kids? Had she really been planning to leave Bruce and stop the adoption proceedings?
Maybe she only seemed to be agreeing with Alan about moving to North Carolina. Maybe she was scared of him.
“What do you think?” I asked Galigani. “You think the doc did it?”
“It’s not the doc.”
“Why do you say that?”
“There is another very important thing in the prelim report,” Galigani said.
I rubbed my temples. “What’s that?”
“The doc’s the one who pushed the ME to run a tox screen. There’s no way he’d do that if he killed her. I told you McNearny knew something we didn’t.”
“How did you get him to share this report with you?”
“I didn’t. Mac doesn’t share. He’s by the book and he’s tough.”
“Who then? Did you woo the lady officer?”
Mom, who was hovering near me rocking Laurie back and forth, scowled at the mention of another lady and I had to laugh at her double standard.
“Jones,” Galigani said. “He was taking a couple days off, spending a little time with his kid. I dropped in on him and we had a couple beers. Don’t mention any of this to anybody or we’ll have no one left to play in the sand-box with.
Capisce
?”
“I
capisce
all right,” I said.
Did Bruce know about the affair?
That would fit. He’d found out about the affair and killed Helene, then he must have feared Celia knew something and took a whack at her.
“So you think Bruce did it?” I asked Galigani.
“No. Killing the wife maybe, but the midwife at his place makes no sense. I think it might have been Margaret.”
“Margaret?” I asked.
Mom nodded her agreement.
Margaret? If she was guilty, then I was a ruse designed to throw suspicion off her. Why else would someone guilty hire a PI?
Had I been used as a pawn?
No! Couldn’t be.
“As far as I know, Margaret wasn’t with Celia that day of the poisoning. Only Bruce, Evelyn, and I saw her that day. And why would Margaret poison Celia anyway? She had been her midwife.”
“What about at Bruce’s house?” Mom asked.
“What?” Galigani and I asked at the same time. I put Galigani on speaker phone and Mom got close to the microphone.
“Maybe Margaret was over at Bruce’s before Celia got there. Maybe she mixed a little cocktail intended for Bruce.”
“Why, though?” I asked.
Mom shrugged. “I can only do so much work for free.”
Galigani snorted through the phone line. “I’m working on getting the tox results right now. Maybe they’ll shed a little light on some of this stuff, but let’s not hold our breath.”
After Mom left, I tried phoning Margaret and ended up leaving another voice mail. She had effectively disappeared. I wondered if “going to her mother’s” was a euphemism for “skipping town.”
Both Mom and Galigani had suggested Margaret was the murderer, but if my client was guilty—what did it make me?
Was I just being prideful?
Had Margaret played me? Perhaps she had found out about Helene’s betrayal. Or had she legitimately believed she was in danger from Alan?
And what about Evelyn? She’d been on the cruise and had seen Celia the day of the poisoning. But what possible motive could she have for killing Helene, or Celia for that matter?
Was getting kicked out of a mommy group motive enough to kill someone?
Hardly.
No matter how peeved it had made her, I couldn’t see it being cause for murder. Unless there was something else to the story?
Why had she been on the cruise anyway? She must have known that the night would be fraught with friction. It seemed silly to insist on going when she knew she would be seated with a bunch of women who didn’t like her.
And then there was the fact that her husband was leaving the country for a work assignment. Wouldn’t she rather have had a private date night?
Still, as strange as it seemed to me, it didn’t gel as a motive for murder. Perhaps she thought getting kicked out of the group was a slight on her kid? Could she be that overprotective as to kill in retaliation for the snub?
And then what would be her motive to hurt Celia?
No. It didn’t make sense.
No matter how many times I wrapped my head around it, I came up with Bruce. He had motive because of the affair, and opportunity—he was on the boat and at his house.
I dialed Gary and reported to him about Helene and Alan’s affair.
“It’s not looking good for Bruce,” I said.
There was silence on the phone. Finally Gary said, “Well, we just have to look harder. I think there’s something suspicious about Margaret. Check into that.”
Another one who wanted to peg it on Margaret!
“I can, of course,” I said.
If she’ll call me back!
“It’s just that the truth may be that Bruce is responsible,” I said.
“The truth is overrated,” Gary replied as he hung up on me.
For the umpteenth time I reviewed the transcript Gary had given me. Neither Inspector Jones nor Inspector McNearny had questioned Bruce on Helene’s affair, yet surely they would have known about it from the preliminary interviews. Why hadn’t they asked him?