A Denial of Death (30 page)

Jack put the mini-van in gear. "Don't forget I need to take tomorrow off to finish up some pottery pieces. If there's anything else you need to do to help Ralph, we should do it today. I can work as late as you need me tonight."

"Let's stop by Ralph's insurance agency on the way home then," Helen said. "I want to be sure Samantha is really over her crush on Ralph. After that, there's nothing much I can do until Charlene returns, except for pestering Tate to represent Ralph, and I can do that without a car."

*  *  *

Helen prepared a story about having forgotten what she needed to bring for an insurance quote, although she hated the way it made her sound like she was on the verge of dementia. The story turned out to be unnecessary, since Samantha was out of the office, reassuring some of the agency's commercial clients that Ralph's arrest was just a big misunderstanding.

The young, blonde co-worker who'd been left alone in the insurance agency today was more than happy to gossip with a prospective client when her boss wasn't here looking over her shoulder. The woman confirmed Samantha used to have a crush on Ralph, but it had faded once she met her current boyfriend. They were engaged now, and everyone who'd seen them together was convinced they were deeply in love with no reservations.

That was one more unlikely suspect completely crossed off her list, Helen thought as she returned to the mini-van. It had taken so little time to get the information that she actually caught Jack unprepared for once. She got to the passenger door before he looked up from the gaming console. He scrambled out of the back and into the driver's seat. "Sorry, Ms. Binney. Just testing out the options."

"Did the gaming console change your mind about driving mini-vans?"

He chuckled. "Not really. The screen's a lot bigger than my smartphone, though."

"Maybe Ed can install something similar in whatever vehicle we get."

"Anything you want, Ms. Binney."

Helen sent Jack to return the mini-van, reassuring him she wouldn't need a ride anywhere tonight or tomorrow.

Tate's car was parked in its usual spot. Inside the garage, the floor fan had been moved to within two feet of where Tate was hand-sanding yet another lamp stem. He was working by feel, the way Betty and Josie could do their needlework without looking at their hands. Tate stared across the workbench at the shelves where his exotic wood collection was stored. He didn't acknowledge her presence, even as she noisily dragged the ragged, sawdust-covered director's chair over near where he was working.

He ought to know by now that ignoring her wouldn't make her go away. She'd become far too accustomed to being overlooked since her divorce to let it deter her now. "How's Ralph?"

He started and dropped both the lamp stem and his sandpaper. "Landlords aren't allowed to enter their tenants' premises without notice, you know. You should at least knock."

"I did," Helen said. "You didn't tell me to go away, so I took your silence as an invitation."

"I was thinking."

"About Ralph's case?"

"Among other things." Tate picked up the lamp stem and dabbed at a dent with the sandpaper. "Have you solved the case yet?"

"I'm working on it. Have you signed on to represent Ralph?"

"That's what I was thinking about. Ralph is in shock, and he couldn't tell me anything useful."

"So you still think the police are right and it's a routine domestic assault, not worth your time."

"Convince me otherwise." He looked at her but resumed sanding as if it helped him formulate his questions. "What do you know that the police don't? They've got the date she disappeared, a five-day window when she could have been killed before the foundation was poured, and the body in a hole that Ralph controlled. Plus, there's the life insurance policy he's the beneficiary of. Even the seventy-five thousand dollars that Angie was keeping a secret, if that's ever found, could be used against him. The fact that she was keeping it secret might be viewed as an indication she was stockpiling resources in order to leave Ralph, which is yet another possible motive for Ralph to kill her." Tate put the lamp stem and sandpaper down again and dropped into the second director's chair to give her his full attention. "So, what have you got in Ralph's defense?"

"Not much." It was refreshing, being able to tell Tate everything without keeping back any doubts or reservations. Her role with her ex-husband had always been a hybrid of both adviser and cheerleader. He'd relied on her advice, but he'd expected it to be presented exclusively in positive terms. She hadn't minded at the time, but in retrospect it would have been nice to be able to share everything with him, even her occasional lack of confidence in their plans. "If we could find Charlene, she has access to the secret bank account. I was thinking you might be able to get the records and prove someone other than Ralph was using the ATM card after Angie died."

"Which would suggest this other person killed Angie for the money. That might be enough to create reasonable doubt for a jury." He nodded. "I like it, but it's not exactly a guaranteed win. What else have you got?"

"Mostly just people who might have wanted Angie dead but aren't credible suspects, even for reasonable doubt purposes. Samantha is over her crush on Ralph, Terri Green was out of town—"

"Terri Greene?" Tate said. "You suspected the town's favorite high school coach of murder?"

"I was being thorough, like you yourself suggested I should be," Helen said, indignant. "Unlike Hank Peterson, I'm considering everyone, not making rash assumptions. I would have thought you'd appreciate that."

"I do, but how could you possibly have suspected a woman who has selflessly dedicated her entire life to teaching, coaching, and literacy?"

"You have to admit she had the means to kill Angie. Have you ever taken a close look at Terri's hands? They're huge and strong, and Angie was short and not particularly athletic looking. I bet Terri could have killed Angie with one finger."

"If you're trying to convince me to represent Ralph, it's not working," Tate said. "There's no way I'm standing up in front of a jury of his peers and suggesting that Terri Greene killed Angie. If there was ever a case for jury nullification, that would be it. No one in this town would ever convict Terri of murder even if she confessed in gory detail on the witness stand. They might even convict Ralph, just to punish him for dragging Terri into the case."

"Don't worry," Helen said. "I've ruled Terri out already. She has an alibi."

"I'm almost afraid to ask who else you suspect."

"No one and everyone. Angie was threatening Martha Waddell's job, she was bullying a disabled neighbor, and she stiffed the cabbie who took her to Charlene's. Those are just the people we know she mistreated, but she did the same sorts of things to everyone, so pretty much everyone in town is a suspect."

"At least you've abandoned the money laundering theory."

"Unless you think a jury would go for it," Helen said hopefully.

He shook his head.

"That's what I thought," Helen said. "Now that we know SLP is a publisher, not some sort of criminal enterprise, it doesn't seem likely they were also laundering money. And I can't see any reason why Angie's publisher would want to kill her. She was making money for them, after all. Enough money to make it worth overlooking her rotten personality."

"So, to sum up," Tate said, "you want me to establish reasonable doubt by blaming the victim: she was such a jerk that only her husband could stand her, and just about anyone else in town could have been tempted, at some point, to kill her."

"Anyone except Barry, the stiffed cabbie," Helen said. "He would never be tempted to kill anyone. He's practically a saint. Went on a three-day silent retreat to atone for just being angry with Angie. Can you imagine what he'd have done for penance if he'd killed someone?"

"Ruling out suspects is supposed to be the prosecution's job, not the defense's," Tate said. "You're not giving me anything to work with here."

"But think of what a challenge it would be to represent Ralph. You've got to admit it's not a typical, boring case with obvious suspects and motives," Helen said. She didn’t buy Detective Peterson’s theory about a serial killer, but she needed something to intrigue Tate. "And don't forget Charlene's disappearance. There may not be just one murder, but two. The first-ever serial murder case in Wharton."

Tate picked up the abandoned lamp stem and ran his fingers over it while he stared at his exotic wood collection again for a couple minutes. Finally, he returned his gaze to Helen. "All right. I do like a challenge. I've got admit, you and your cases are never boring. But you owe me now. I'll have Adam draw up the representation agreement so I can go see Ralph first thing tomorrow morning."

*  *  *

After Tate left, Helen went into the cottage for a light dinner since it was too hot to cook, and a check-in with her nieces via internet videoconferencing. Laura was still bubbling over with excitement about her pregnancy, and all the things she was doing to make sure the baby had the best possible nutrition and environment for development. From time to time, she even held up books, opened to particularly informative charts.

Laura never completely ran out of baby-related small talk, but eventually Lily was able to change the subject, asking Helen, "When were you going to tell us the police found Angie Decker's body and arrested her husband?"

"After I found out who's been spying on me for you."

"We're worried about you, Aunt Helen," Laura said soothingly. "It's not good for the baby if I'm stressed out. You wouldn't want anything bad to happen to your grand-niece or -nephew, would you?"

"Of course not." If a large family made her niece happy, then Helen wished her the best with it. "That's why I keep telling you I'm fine and you can stop hovering."

"It's not like we're asking for a minute-by-minute report of your day," Lily said. "The last thing we knew, you were looking for a missing person, and now she's dead, and the person you'd befriended was arrested for the murder. It's not unreasonable for us to be worried about you."

"Ralph didn't do it," Helen said.

Lily wasn't that easily distracted from her point. "That's not exactly reassuring. If you're right, the killer is still loose, and he probably knows you're looking for him."

"I'm perfectly safe. Jack is with me whenever I'm away from home, and Tate is here most of the daytime, working in the garage." Helen neglected to volunteer that Tate might be away from his studio for long stretches of time, working on Ralph's defense until the real killer was caught. "And don't forget the state-of-the-art security system you insisted I get."

"Is it activated?" Lily said.

Helen glanced over her shoulder at where the unlit keypad, visible behind her on the computer screen, signaled its inactive status. "I forgot."

"Oh, Aunt Helen," Laura said with a sigh. "Please take better care of yourself. If not for yourself, then for us and our children."

Helen crossed the room to activate the alarm and then returned to her computer. "There. It's set. You saw me do it. Now let's talk about something more interesting than my shortfallings."

Lily glanced down at a notepad on her desk. "I learned something today that you might find interesting. I was curious about that publisher Angie wrote for, and I did some more research. You wouldn't believe how cut-throat the publishing world can be. Some authors are generous with their time and advice, but others seem to think it's an author-eat-author world. If you could get Angie's pen name, I might be able to find out if Angie was having a feud with any other authors."

Great, Helen thought. More vague and unlikely suspects to consider. Tate was going to have to amend his theory of the case from
everyone in town had a reason to kill the victim
, to
everyone in the world who knew her, in person or even virtually, had a reason to kill the victim
. Still, she'd have to tell Tate about the possibility of widening the pool of suspects, just in case it was useful.

"Charlene probably knows the pen name, but she's missing." Too late, Helen realized her nieces would have been better off not knowing this latest twist in the case.

Laura mumbled something about needing a cup of herbal tea for her stress. Her video image flickered and disappeared.

Lily irritably tapped a pen on her notepad. "I swear, I'm going to put eavesdropping bugs all around the cottage if you don't get better about sharing the risks you're facing. One missing, later-found-dead person in your town could be an accident. Two is premeditated, and hints at higher body counts to come."

"Charlene is probably just out looking for her sister," Helen said. "They were very close."

"I'm close to Laura, and if she went missing, I wouldn't be out looking for her on my own. I'd be making a ruckus, getting the local police, the state police, the FBI, and everyone else I could think of to look for her. It's far more effective for family members to go to the media than to participate in the boots-on-the-ground search."

"Charlene doesn't have all your resources and skills," Helen said. "And you don't really know what you'd do if Laura was missing. It's easy to think you'd be rational when you're just imagining it at a time when Laura is actually safe."

"It's
not
easy," Lily said. "Just thinking about something happening to Laura chokes me up. I can still think clearly enough to know that I would ask for help from every single known law enforcement agency and probably all the imaginary, black-ops ones too, just in case one of them really does exist. In fact, if you don't stop getting involved with homicides, I'm going to start compiling a list of resources to call for when you finally go too far and someone makes you disappear."

"I'm not going to disappear." Helen spent the next ten minutes calming Lily down and promising not to take any real risks.

Still, after the call was ended Helen couldn't stop thinking about what Lily had said about searching for a missing sister and the fierceness with which she'd said it. Why hadn't Charlene made a big fuss with both the police and the media, demanding help from the authorities? For the first week or so she might have believed everything was fine, but why had she kept quiet later?