A Cup of Jo (16 page)

'Charges of . . . indecent mimicry?'

Kevin hesitated, then got it. 'Exactly.'

I liked the man and it was good to see him animated, but the time had come to steer the discussion toward my agenda. 'I understand the sheriff talked with you.'

'Nice way of putting it.' His face was flushed. 'All the time he's asking me if I was jealous or if Jo had been unfaithful, I have no idea the guy who's asking the questions is the one who already knows the answers.'

'Did you suspect?' We were still sitting side by side, faces forward, not looking at each other.

'About the affair? No.' A pause. 'You?'

'No.'

'You and the sheriff were – what, engaged or something?'

'No, just dating.' Seeing each other. Not even sure it was a relationship. 'It's a lot harder for you.'

Duh. Of course it's harder for him. Not only did Kevin's wife cheat on him, but she's dead. And, oh yeah, the police thought – hell, might still think – he killed her.

Kevin glanced quickly at me and then away. 'If you trust someone and they betray that trust . . . well, nothing's harder than that.'

Amen. 'So now the authorities are questioning Pavlik,' I said. 'Does that mean they've cleared you?'

It should have been an awkward question to handle, but, somehow, it didn't seem to be.

'For now.' Kevin's big shoulders went up and down. 'Between the background film the television crews have – the B-roll I think it's called – and me seeing and talking to people, the cops can't find a time that I could have killed Jo and gotten her into the cup without somebody seeing something.'

'That's a relief.' I knew I was saying it weakly, but I meant it. Nothing could bring JoLynne back or change what she and Pavlik had done, but the last thing I wanted was for Kevin to be falsely accused of her killing. 'I've been told the cause of death was asphyxiation. Do you know anything more than that?'

Also, an apparently awkward question, but again it didn't feel that way.

'She was –' he swallowed hard – 'burked.'

The word sounded like 'burped' and I knew it couldn't be that. 'I'm sorry, Kevin. But . . .?'

'B-u-r-k. I'd never heard of it either.' He was staring off in the distance, almost reciting. 'The cops told me it's when you hold someone's nose and mouth closed until they suffocate.'

Awful. The murderer could be looking right into the victim's eyes as life began to fade from them. 'But JoLynne would have struggled.'

A barely noticeable shake of the head, then almost a spasm. 'Not if you're sitting on the person's chest, arms pinned under your knees.'

'JoLynne was so little, I guess it wouldn't have to be someone very big.' God help me, I was thinking of Pavlik at almost six feet. Or Kevin, himself, a giant of a man. Or even . . .

'If you do it right, they tell me, anyone can . . .'

Do it right. When the act itself was so wrong. 'Do you think Pavlik killed JoLynne?'

'Not for me to say.' A shrug. 'She's gone. Nothing will change that.' A silence, then: 'Do you?'

'Do I what?'

'Think the sheriff did it?'

I started to shake my head automatically, but after the way Kevin had opened up to me, I owed it to him to really consider his question. Not to mention my owing Pavlik as well.

No matter what kind of sugar-coating you layered on, 'my' sheriff knew that I cared about him. Yet, instead of being with me as much as his demanding job would allow, he'd started an affair with a married woman.

That did not mean he was a killer.

Yet, like Sarah, I believed Pavlik would kill. He'd take a life to protect me. Or to protect someone else. He would kill to defend his country – or his county – and the people in it. Pavlik would use deadly force to stop an armed bad guy.

My lover might even kill in anger. Or for revenge.

But Pavlik could
not
sit on a woman's chest, pinch her nose closed, place a hand over her mouth and watch the light drain from her terrified eyes.

That he could never do.

'No.' I turned to Kevin. 'No. Pavlik did not kill JoLynne.'

Chapter Thirteen

My answer did, however, pretty much kill the conversation. And if that weren't enough, Sarah arrived to put a second bullet in its head.

'I've been looking for you everywhere,' she said, standing on the gravel below where Kevin and I were seated. 'Are you going to stay out here all day? Tomorrow's Saturday and you're off. We have to talk about scheduling.' Then, as an afterthought to Kevin: 'Sorry.'

'That's OK.' He hopped off the train platform. 'I have to get going anyway. Ragnar's car is in the repair shop, and I said I'd pick him up around noon.

'Noon?' I asked. 'It's not that late, is it?'

'Nah, but he lives out in the boonies. Pain in the butt, only we need him.'

'Ragnar is one of Kevin's guys, Sarah. He also—'

'I'm sure he's fascinating.'

My. Weren't we in a snit all of a sudden?

'OK, I'm coming in.' I brushed off my bum and turned to the props man. 'It was good talking to you, Kevin. Let me know if there's anything I can do.'

'Same here, Maggy. Thanks.'

Sarah waited for Kevin to drive away before asking, 'Does he know about his wife and Pavlik?'

'Ohhh, yeah.'

'Must have been a sprightly discussion out here.' Sarah inspected me. 'Are you all right?'

'Of course.'

'Of course?'

'Yes.' I led the way around the corner to the front entrance. 'It's not like being cheated on is exactly new to me.'

'Ahh, that's a good sign,' Sarah said, climbing the steps after me. 'You're blaming Pavlik and your ex rather than yourself. And about time, too.'

I stopped at the door. 'I wasn't blaming myself.'

A rude noise. 'Like hell you weren't. It's what you always do.'

She put her palms together and laid them aside one cheek, a la Pauline, the damsel perennially in peril. 'Oh, woe is me. What could I have done to make my husband of twenty years run off with his bimboid hygienist?'

'First off, Rachel wasn't a bimboid.' A slut, sure, but a rich one with more brains than my ex-husband. 'Secondly, you barely knew me back then. You can't have any idea how I reacted.'

'I do, too.' Sarah opened the door to usher me into our shop. 'To know you is . . . well, to know you.'

I could feel my fingers curl involuntarily.

'Oh, dear,' a voice behind us said. 'Isn't that just the most irritating thing someone can possibly say?'

I pivoted, running into Sarah who was still holding the door open for me.

She let go, the automatic closer taking over.

A hand caught the door before it could shut itself. A yellow-gloved hand. 'I'm so sorry,' Christy said. 'I didn't mean to eavesdrop.'

'Then don't,' Sarah said. 'Maggy, will you please go in?'

But Christy was still talking. 'It's just that people have said that about me and Ronny, and he hasn't even gone to trial yet.'

She followed us over the threshold. 'They'll say, "I
know
you, Christy. You'll never be happy with a felon." Or "I
know
you, Christy. You won't be able to set so much as a foot in that filthy jail." Just goes to show.'

The piano teacher stood in the middle of our coffeehouse, feet wide, yellow fists planted defiantly on her hips, like a superhero. 'No one really knows you. Except . . .
you
.'

A smattering of applause from the peanut gallery, which consisted of Jerome and Amy, seated at a table together by the window. Jerome had left the shop with Kate earlier, but apparently wended his way back.

Christy blushed in response. 'Sorry. I guess I get so, so . . .'

'Passionate,' Amy said, rising to wait on her. 'Passion's a good thing.'

Christy looked like she was going to cry. 'It's just that I'm not used to, to . . .'

'Touching human flesh?' Sarah said in my ear. 'I wonder if Cousin Ronny and Christy are . . . conjugating.'

As in conjugal visits. I smacked my partner in the shoulder. 'That's mean.'

And none of Sarah's business, either. Besides, Courageous Christy was too busy fighting grime, if not crime, to have a personal life. Maybe she should dump Ronny and hook up with Ragnar. They could share an invisible phone booth.

All right, a very
clean
invisible phone booth.

I waved Amy back to her table. 'I've got this.' I pushed through the swinging door into the service area behind the windows.

'I've been waiting for you.'

'Holy shit, Pavlik,' I said, hand on my heart, checking to be sure it was still beating. 'Are you going to make a habit of scaring the hell out of me?'

He didn't look much like a sheriff in his jeans and a black, long-sleeved Harley-Davidson 'Fat Boys Rule' T-shirt. I was surprised I hadn't heard him vroom up on his motorcycle, but I'd been otherwise engaged.

Pavlik held up a hand. 'Sorry.'

Yeah, everybody was sorry today.

I went to the service windows and stuck my head through one. 'Christy, can I get you something?'

'Not this second, Maggy.' The piano teacher was sitting with Amy and Jerome at their table, deep in conversation.

For her part, Sarah had disappeared. I had a feeling I now knew why she'd been so eager to get me to come inside.

I turned to Pavlik, hovering by the sink. 'I assume Sarah smuggled you past our airtight security?'

Pavlik looked hurt. 'I walked through the front door.'

'So why are you hiding in here?'

'I wanted to talk to you and Sarah thought it would be better—'

'Gotcha.' I leaned against the door jamb to the kitchen, facing him. 'I understand there's been a twist in your case.'

'I wasn't having an affair with JoLynne, Maggy.'

Pavlik's eyes, which I'd come to believe reflected his moods, were basic gray. No sparkling blue floaters, like when he was teasing me and happy, or brooding charcoal embers, like when he was angry. In short, they told me nothing.

I tried to pull in a deep breath, but it was like a sledgehammer had collapsed a lung. 'Are you a suspect in her murder?'

'No,' he said, reaching for me.

I slid to the side, away from him.

Pavlik dropped his hand. 'I mean, at least I don't think so. Not seriously.'

'You don't
think
so?' Directing the subject to him, keeping the 'us' of it all at bay for the time being. 'I understand they bounced you off the investigation.'

'Standard procedure.' His jaw was set. 'The Milwaukee County Department is taking over.'

Sheriff Walensky – not someone I'd expect to have Pavlik's back. Except maybe to stick a knife in it.

'I don't think you killed her.'

Pavlik closed his eyes. When he opened them again, they were nearly black. 'Thank you.'

Ironic? Facetious? Sarcastic, even? After nearly a year and a half of intimacy, all of a sudden I couldn't read him anymore.

Christy was right. We don't know people. How could we possibly?

'Is there something I can do to help?' I meant it as a genuine offer.

'You can believe me.' A vein in his temple was throbbing.

'I told you I did.'

'I mean about the affair.'

I wanted to. 'You had one with Wynona Counsel you didn't tell me about. They move in the same circles.'

'So you think I was doing all of them? Maggy, you overestimate me.' A flash of the old Pavlik.

'You didn't tell me about Wynona.'

'I did when you asked.'

I shook my head, fighting the impulse to capitulate. 'That's a cop-out and you know it.'

'You're right.'

I waited.

Pavlik studied the floor before finally meeting my eyes again. 'I was dating Wynona before you and I met. And when we
did
meet, you were entangled in a case I was investigating. It would have been unethical for us to become involved with each other.'

'I agree.' I was trying not to yield any ground, nor soften my tone of voice or body language.

Pavlik sighed. 'The two of you . . . overlapped about six months.'

Overlapped. Like a tag team. 'You said Wynona dumped you?'

'She confronted me. Said she could tell I was seeing someone else.'

'What did you do?'

Pavlik looked me straight in the eye. For what that was worth anymore. 'I told Wynona she was right. I was seeing someone else and I intended to continue.'

Willpower fading, I could feel myself wanting to believe.

Pavlik put his hands on my shoulders. 'I didn't lie to Wynona and I didn't lie to you about her. Maybe I should have disclosed that relationship upfront, but . . . have you told me everything you did in the months before we got together? Or soon after?'

Of course not. But old movies, red wine and take-out food weren't exactly sizzling nights on the town.

'No,' I said, figuring I'd let his imagination chew on that. 'You said you'd never met JoLynne. Is that true? Scout's honor?'

'Scout's honor.' A little shake at my shoulders. 'I need you to believe me.'

'I need that, too.' I thought for a second. 'But why would Rebecca lie about the affair? Or, alternatively, why would JoLynne lie to Rebecca about it?'

'I wish I knew.' Pavlik pulled me into his arms and kissed the top of my head.

'Uh-uh,' I said. 'Not good enough.'

'Not . . .?'

I pulled his head down to mine so that our lips aligned.

Damn, but the man could kiss.

'Where is he?' a demanding voice from out front.

Pavlik and I broke apart, looking around frantically like two guilty teenagers.

'We know he came in here!' A second woman's voice thundered. Definitely different from the first, but similar at the same time.

As in old.

I signaled for Pavlik to go into the storeroom and moved stealthily to the service window. Staying to one side of the opening, I peeked out.

And was proved right. Milling around was a troop of nine or ten women, all of them upwards of eighty and all of them armed with . . . cellphones.

Sarah was standing her ground bravely. 'Who are you talking about?'

'The sheriff.' Now this voice I knew. Sophie Daystrom pushed her way to the front of the pack and held up her phone. 'He was spotted by CuteGal, who reported to the rest of us on Twitter.'