Motherhood is Murder Read online

  Stop pretending I was somebody I wasn’t. Thin, confident, experienced. And start telling the truth.

  When I emerged from the restroom, Gary was seated comfortably on the couch looking completely untraumatized. In fact, he looked so relaxed holding a cup of coffee in one hand and flipping through a file that rested on his lap with the other, that I wondered if I had imagined the entire incident.

  He looked up when I entered and smiled. “We won’t get the preliminary report the uniforms took on the evening of November fifth or any of the medical examiner’s findings from the toxicology screen unless they formally charge Bruce. The only thing in here are my notes from the police interview the other day.” He closed the file and rose, indicated a coffee tray on a side table. “Help yourself. I’m going to ask Mandy to photocopy this for you.”

  He left the room and I poured myself a cup of coffee. I sat on the couch and tested the girdle. Everything held. I tried not to focus on the girdle and sipped the coffee instead.

  Gary returned, smiling. “Here we go. This is the full transcription from the interview.”

  He handed me the file and I opened it.

  It looked like somebody had written the pages in German. I fought to keep my eyes from glazing over from the legalese.

  Might as well start with something I knew.

  I recounted for him my first meeting with Helene and Margaret and then began on the dinner cruise.

  “You were on the cruise?” Gary asked.

  I nodded. “Yeah. It was my first night meeting most of the mommy group.”

  Gary looked confused.

  I waved away his concern. “Long story. Anyway, what I do know is that there were reports of Helene and Sara fighting just before Helene’s demise.”

  Gary didn’t try to hide his surprise. His eyebrows rose, although due to the asymmetry of his face, his right eyebrow shot up quite high while his left one moved only slightly. I had to smile in spite of myself.

  “Where did you get this information?” he asked.

  “Another former member of the Roo & You group. She was asked to leave the group because her kid bit a baby.”

  Gary rose, crossed to his desk, and picked up a legal pad. “Really? I used to be a biter.”

  I laughed. “Is that where you got your nickname?” Gary looked taken aback.

  Oops. Perhaps I shouldn’t have mentioned that.

  “You know about my nickname?”

  I swallowed. Well, my foot was in it now. May as well proceed.

  “Sure. Gary the Grizzly.”

  He laughed and looked pleased with himself. “My reputation precedes me, huh?”

  I smiled.

  He scribbled something on the legal pad. “Okay, what else do you know?”

  I explained that, according to several sources, Dr. Alan Lipe was having an affair. That he and his wife, Margaret, had fought that evening and Margaret suspected he may have poisoned Helene by mistake.

  Gary took notes. When I finished, he looked up. “What else you got?”

  “What else do you got?” I countered.

  Gary smiled. “Ah. Tough cookie, huh? You want a little quid pro quo?”

  I nodded.

  “I’m giving you a copy of my client’s interrogation.”

  “He asked you to,” I answered.

  Gary chewed on the cap of his pen and squinted at me. “Are we on the same team here?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Has Bruce hired you, or what?”

  I glanced around the room. “Not exactly.”

  “Who are you working for?” Gary asked.

  Time to come clean.

  “I was hired by Margaret Lipe.”

  Gary nodded. “You think Bruce is guilty.”

  “I don’t know what to think,” I said. “It was just Bruce, Celia, and I at his place, and I know I didn’t poison Celia.”

  “What does Margaret Lipe think?” Gary asked.

  I hesitated. Frankly I didn’t know what Margaret thought about the attempt on Celia’s life, because she hadn’t called me back.

  How much should I disclose to Gary?

  Did I have any obligation of confidentiality to Margaret?

  “Well, Margaret suspected Alan, and I understand that for Helene’s murder—but what about Celia? If it was just the three of us at Bruce’s house, how can it be anyone other than Bruce?” I asked.

  “Maybe Celia was with the doctor right before she showed up at Bruce’s. Maybe she’s the other woman and the doc told her he was going to get rid of his wife and then botched it. But now Celia knows about the accident and he’s scared she’ll say something to the police, so he slips her something on her way to Bruce’s.”

  “If that’s the case, wouldn’t Celia tell the police that her lover killed Helene and then maybe tried to poison her?”

  Gary shrugged. “Maybe she hasn’t put it all together. Or maybe she’s protecting him. You’d be surprised about the things people don’t tell the police. Well, probably you wouldn’t, if you’ve been doing PI work long.”

  I tried to look as experienced as I could by composing my features into a serious reflective look and nodded.

  He must have bought into my acting because he said, “Let’s start there, with the midwife. She knows something. Stake her out, see where she goes. Maybe we’ll get lucky.” He chomped on the pen cap thoughtfully. “You think we can come to an arrangement?” he asked.

  I studied his eyes. “What kind of an arrangement?”

  “I have a PI I use to look into things. Because you know my time . . .”

  “Right. Your time is pretty valuable.”

  Gary smiled.

  “Your reputation precedes you.” I laughed.

  “Now, see! Sweet-talk like that will get you everywhere. I mean nowhere,” he corrected, shaking a finger at me, but with his disarming grin lighting up his face. “What I’m thinking is I can hire a PI, but they’d have to run around and do the same work you just did. So, I’d be behind the curve—”

  “Isn’t what you’re proposing a conflict of interest?” I asked.

  “Whose interest?”

  “My client’s. Sort of breach of confidentiality.”

  Gary frowned. “You’re not bound to confidentiality. Unless, of course, you bound yourself in your own contract. Which I hope you didn’t. Because it wouldn’t stand up in a court of law and you’d just be misleading your client. You should let me review that for you. Anyway, as you know under the Business and Professions Code, Article 6, Disciplinary Proceedings, Sections 7561-7567, you are free to report illegal activity as you see fit or risk suspension of your license, fees, jail time, you name it—whatever the Review Board decides.”

  All right, so I didn’t have to worry about confidentiality, but how could I tell him I had no worries about a license suspension either?

  “Why don’t you tell me exactly what you’re proposing?” I asked.

  “Simple, you work for me. I’ll double your hourly rate. Or are you working on a project basis?”

  “Hourly.”

  “Great. Hourly. I’ll double your rate. You can continue to work independently, so keep your contract with Margaret, I don’t care about that. But let me know everything you find out. I mean everything. I’d like a daily report. Doable?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Unstable

  To Do:

  1. Stake out Celia.

  2. Build up milk supply.

  3. Buy Laurie swing contraption thing (like baby Amanda) for two-month milestone.

  4. Research safety re: computers in nursery.

  5. Look up Business and Professions Code, Article 6.

  “He wants you to work for him?” Paula asked.

  “I don’t know if I can do that, though, ethically, you know?” I was seated at her dining room table nursing Laurie.

  Paula had swaddled Laurie in a special swaddling blanket with Velcro closures on the sides and around her belly. When I complained and told her Laurie had outgrown the swaddle, she’d pooh-poohed me and told me that babies slept much better swaddled. I could hardly argue as apparently Lau
rie had been sacked out since I’d left.

  I rubbed Laurie’s cheek and secretly thought the swaddle looked like a straitjacket. “I’ll break you out of it as soon as we leave, Sugarplum,” I whispered in her ear. “I’m an expert in breaking out of Velcro.”

  Paula was working furiously on a scrapbook of Danny’s first year, and Danny was running back and forth between the dining room and his bedroom bringing us Lego pieces, one at a time.

  Each time Danny returned from his room, he’d hand me a piece saying, “ ’Go piece.”

  I’d say, “Yes! Lego piece,” then oohed and aahed as he attached the piece to the tower he was building.

  Paula gave me a dismissive wave. “Come on, Kate. You know I’m the last person you should be discussing ethics with. Take the money! Of course you should work for him.”

  “But that would be double billing or something like that.”

  Paula laughed. “Well, duh. That’s the beauty of it.”

  I sighed and helped Danny connect a piece to the tower. He yelped with happiness and then charged back to his room.

  Paula scrunched her face. “I promised myself I would finish this darn book before the baby came. I can’t have Danny’s first year looming over me when I have the other one’s first year to capture. But I swear I hate this scrapbooking.”

  “You do? But you’re so good at it.”

  “Why would you think I’m good at it? I never do it.”

  I looked around the table. She had neatly arranged the photos in one stack, stickers in another stack, and colored paper in a third stack. “Well, look at all the organization and care you’ve put into it.”

  “It’s all a façade,” Paula said.

  I laughed. Danny zoomed back into the room and handed me a Lego piece. “Danny’s good at building—why don’t you let him put it all together?”

  Paula sighed. “The end result would probably be the same.”

  At home, I fussed with dinner. On the drive from Paula’s I thought I’d had a wonderful time-saving idea. Crock pot cooking! Just throw all the ingredients into a pot and voilŕ—dinner!

  When I got home, I realized that would mean I actually had to have the ingredients on hand, not to mention the six- or seven-hour lead time for cooking.

  While inventorying the fridge, I grabbed a piece of cheese and popped it into my mouth. Then, I looked in the cupboard for some crackers.

  Hmmm, did we have any wine?

  I found a bottle and opened it, pouring myself a glass.

  I had recently read an article online that allowed breastfeeding moms one to two glasses of alcohol a day. What a hoot! I thought I wasn’t supposed to have any alcohol. Well, everything in moderation. Certainly the occasional glass of wine wasn’t going to hurt Laurie. And definitely the last few days had been trying. I needed something to take the edge off.

  I continued my search for crackers.

  Maybe I could make a little appetizer plate for Jim and me—cheese, crackers, nuts, and fruit . . .

  My daydream was cut short with the discovery that we didn’t have any crackers, nuts, or fruit.

  Man! I had to get to the store.

  I took a sip of wine, sliced another piece of cheese, and ate it anyway. Didn’t wine count for fruit?

  I cracked open the file from Gary. It was a transcript of Inspectors Jones and McNearny questioning Bruce. Only they hadn’t been able to ask him much. Gary had coached Bruce and he’d only made a small statement about being grieved over his wife and shocked about the incident at his house. He repeated the same statement to most of the questions until Gary put a sudden stop to the questioning by quoting a statute and ending the interview.

  Short and simple, they needed to officially charge him if they were going to get any answers. And without evidence, they couldn’t charge him.

  I grabbed the phone and dialed Margaret. I got no answer but left her a second message. Where was she? She was supposed to be at her mother’s but there was no answer there either.

  What kind of investigator can’t get in touch with her client?

  I heard the front door creak open and knew my time for dinner prep had run out.

  I’m a failure as a housewife.

  Jim clunked down the hallway and peered into the kitchen. He inhaled deeply. “Hi, honey.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  He let out his breath and dropped his briefcase on the floor. “My client put a hold on the project.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Did you watch the news today?”

  I shook my head.

  “The market’s crashed. People are kind of freaking out. So, Dirk wasn’t able to secure funding for the project.”

  My mind flashed on Bruce Chambers. His clients would be scared, too.

  “What does it mean for us?” I asked.

  Jim shrugged. “Well, we don’t have much in the market, so in that regard we’re fine. But if they don’t get funding for my project, that means I’m out of work again.”

  During my maternity leave from my corporate job, Jim had been let go from his. He’d been able to land a freelance client and the income had been large enough, or so we thought, to last us awhile so I had left my corporate gig.

  I felt my heart constrict. “They gave you a retainer, though.”

  Jim closed his eyes. “That’s not a guarantee. My contract states that if the project moves forward, I apply it to the cost of the project. If they back out in the first sixty days, I have to return fifty percent.”

  I grabbed the stovetop for support.

  He wrapped his arms around my shoulders and pulled me into him. “Don’t worry, honey. Things will be okay. If this falls through, I’ll find something else.”

  I wanted to say that I would go back to my secure corporate income, but I choked on the words.

  There was no way. I couldn’t go back now. I had tasted the freedom and excitement of entrepreneurship. Even with doubts surrounding a steady income stream, nothing could bring me to sacrifice myself to the doldrums of my office job again.

  Could it?

  Laurie squeaked from the nursery. She had been asleep for about an hour in the crib and that was the maximum she had ever slept at the dinnertime hour, what Jim and I were beginning to call the “witching hour.”

  “I’ll get the squirrel,” Jim said. As he left the kitchen, he asked the inevitable, “What’s for dinner?”

  “Nothing,” I called after him.

  Jim laughed. “Okay, open a can of soup. We’re on austerity anyway.”

  I groaned. “But I’m nursing and I’m really hungry.”

  Jim returned to the kitchen with Laurie bundled in his arms. “Okay, screw it. Let’s order a pizza.”

  I squinted at him and bit my lip. “I may have good news.”

  Jim raised an eyebrow. “Good. Something to celebrate. What is it?”

  “I got a pseudo-job offer today. I think it will keep up our income stream anyway.”

  Jim held Laurie out to look into her face. “Mommy got a job offer,” he said.

  Laurie was holding her head so well these days we no longer cradled it. Yet as Jim was holding her up and she was looking at him happily and gurgling, her head started to wobble and she suddenly pitched herself headfirst into Jim’s chest.

  “Whoa,” Jim said. “She’s excited.”

  We laughed.

  “What kind of offer?” he asked.

  I filled him in on the details.

  His face displayed an array of emotions as I recounted Gary’s offer. I left out the girdle-popping incident—no need to sound like a complete moron in front of my number one fan.

  When I’d finished talking, he was silent for a moment.

  Finally I asked, “So do you approve? Can I take him up on it?”

  He shuffled Laurie from one shoulder to the other. “Kate, I don’t ever want to keep you from doing something you want to do.” He wrapped his free arm around me. “I just want you to be safe. Promise me you’ll be careful.”

  I kissed him. “I promise.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Watchful
r />   To Do:

  1. ?

  2. Throw out stupid girdle and exercise—there is no substitute.

  3. Find Margaret—why isn’t she calling me back?

  4. Get Laurie outfit for Thanksgiving.

  5. Groceries!!!

  In the morning I looked out my front window and saw our neighbor Kenny washing his van. It was an old white van with tinted windows.

  A van?

  His van would be perfect for a stakeout!

  I rapped on the window. He looked up and waved when he saw me. I picked Laurie up, wrapped her in a blanket, then ran down the stairs.

  “Hi, Kenny, can I use your van? I want to check something out.”

  “Sure. Is your car in the shop?”

  “No. I need to go on a stakeout,” I said proudly.

  Kenny bobbed his head up and down. “Cool.”

  I observed Celia’s midwife center from inside Kenny’s van. There was no activity.

  Wow. I was on a stakeout.

  I’d done a stakeout on my first case, but Jim had been with me, so it felt more like I was hanging out with my husband—which I was—instead of a stakeout. And following Alan last week didn’t count because that was really only following—so now it was official—my first stakeout.

  And I actually felt prepared. I had stopped by Mom’s to water her plants and borrowed her binoculars, then I’d bought lunch.

  Practically a legitimate PI.

  And with two paying clients no less!

  Where was Margaret?

  I unwrapped the bagel I’d purchased from the shop up the street. Cream cheese dripped over the side but the tomatoes and spinach were still crisp. If I waited any longer to eat it, the veggies would start to wilt.

  Oh, well, better eat it now. If Celia kept me waiting too long, I could always get something else from the shop.

  Wait. What if I missed her leaving?

  I used my binoculars to check out the shop.

  Binoculars! A real PI tool.

  Oh, I was growing, growing, growing!

  Never mind the fact that I had borrowed them from Mom.