Dirty Tricks: A Kate Lawrence Mystery (12 page)

Ten

Saturday brought with it the usual
flurry of domestic chores. I’d heard Armando let himself into the kitchen
through the connecting door to the garage sometime after midnight, so I knew he
must be exhausted. In order to let him sleep as long as he could, I tiptoed out
to do the grocery shopping and a few other errands in mid-morning.

I hate grocery shopping, but today
I took my time and made a thorough job of it. I picked out a plump roasting
chicken, along with some fresh lemons and elephant garlic that I’d use to stuff
it. Then I gathered the ingredients for homemade scalloped potatoes and an
apple pie, two of Armando’s favorites, before checking off all of the usual
items on my weekly list.

After filling the
Jetta’s
gas tank and darting into CVS to pick up some
necessities before one of their incessant coupons expired, I thought about
rewarding myself with a cup of the Town Line Diner’s excellent coffee but
decided against it since May and her visiting friend Judy were joining Margo,
Strutter
and me there for our weekly brunch the next
morning. Instead, I hauled my accumulated shopping home and got busy on the
laundry before beginning what promised to be a long session of cooking. I’m
reasonably competent in the kitchen, and I love watching cooking shows on
television, but six days a week, our dinner is a couple of pieces of baked
chicken with either rice or potatoes, a big green salad and a nuked frozen
vegetable, period. Only occasionally did I pamper Armando with a home-cooked
spread, but it felt like the thing to do this weekend.

A few minutes after noon, the man
himself stumbled downstairs to the kitchen in search of coffee. The brewer
having long since turned off, I poured a
mugful
,
added a teaspoon of sugar, and placed it in the microwave to reheat.

“Hi, handsome, how did it go last
night?” I said, making an effort to keep my tone light. He looked as if he’d
been run over and left for dead, but he probably wouldn’t appreciate my telling
him so. “Did you get everything done that you needed to do?” I busied myself
breaking open a cinnamon bagel and putting it in the toaster oven.

He eased himself onto a stool at
the kitchen counter and reached greedily for the mug I placed before him. “Not
entirely, I am afraid. I was so tired for the last couple of hours, I cannot
even remember exactly what I was doing, and I must return to the office this
afternoon. I am still tired. How can that be? I have been sleeping for almost
twelve hours.”

You’re depressed and scared, I
thought, and that’s what depressed, scared people do. “Face it, honey, you’re
not twenty-two years old anymore, and you’ve been putting in a lot of extra
hours. I’m so sorry you have to go back in this afternoon. Give yourself a
break.” I paused to let him get a couple more sips of coffee down.
“Anything new to report?”

He grimaced and shook his head.
“Nothing
definite,
and I am weary of speculating about
what might or might not come to pass. What is new with your ladies?” That was
his term for my partners. “Has Margo’s
tia
been the victim of any more practical jokes?”

Happy to have a new subject of
conversation, I prattled away about the dog and the locksmith and May’s visit
to Vista View the previous day while I toasted a bagel for him, then rinsed and
stuffed the chicken for dinner and peeled potatoes and apples. As worn out as
he was, Armando listened attentively, probably as happy for the distraction as
I was to provide it.

“These events do not seem to be
the sort of thing an adult would choose as acts of revenge. They strike me more
as the work of children,” he observed when I wound down. “Bats, pumpkins, a
neighborhood dog are all things that ill-mannered, small boys might think of,
do you not agree?”

I saw what he meant. “But revenge
for what? May hasn’t done anything to the neighborhood kids or anyone else. She
doesn’t even know the people in the surrounding houses, unless you count our
unfortunate introduction to her neighbor Carla Peterson on Thursday. Why would
anyone, adult or child, be angry with her?”

“That is indeed a mystery, but
then, you and your ladies have become very clever about solving mysteries. I am
sure you will uncover the reason.” He got up to pour himself more coffee and
put the mug in the microwave. “Have you heard from Emma or Joey lately?” he
asked while the machine hummed.

“Joey, no, but then I rarely do.”
My truck-driving son epitomized the old saying, a son is a son till he takes a
wife, and I got a phone call only when he had something momentous—or
calamitous—to report. “I had lunch with Emma the other day, though.”

I paused to consider how much I
should reveal about Emma’s long-distance love interest. The relationship was in
its very early days, so attaching even potential importance to it seemed
premature. Still, she was flying across the country to spend more time with the
man. I chose my words with care.

“Do you remember Ellen McDougal,
Emma’s friend from high school who lives in California now?”

“I do not, but then, Emma has so
many friends,
it
is hard to keep track of the names.”

“Well, anyway, Emma goes out there
every year or so to visit Ellen and her family. She just got back, as a matter
of fact, but she’s thinking about returning to the West Coast in a couple of
weeks.” I swallowed hard and turned away to the sink to wash my hands and hide
my face. Armando wasn’t deceived.

“What is it,
Cara
?” he asked gently. “Has our princess decided to move to
California?” Then after a moment’s consideration, “Has she met a man?”

I dried my hands on a dish towel
and turned back to face him. “Not
yet,
and yes. His
name is Russell, and he’s an environmental engineer. He’s Ellen’s
brother-in-law and was visiting the family while Emma was there this time, but
he lives in Elkton, Oregon,” I finished lamely while I watched my husband’s
face twist in dismay. He struggled to restore an unruffled expression, but he
wasn’t fooling me.

“That is wonderful news. I am happy
for them both, but it is a little too soon to be planning a wedding, is it not?
You know I want nothing but happiness for Emma, but if she should decide to
make a life with this Russell, I would miss her very much.” He was quiet for a
moment and stared out the kitchen window. “Life has many twists and turns, does
it not?”

It does indeed, I thought.

The rest of the afternoon flew by.
Armando showered and dragged himself back to
TeleCom
while I threw myself into an orgy of vacuuming, dusting and floor mopping. I
badly needed to blow off some steam. My physical exertions weren’t quite enough
to do it, so I did what I usually do when agitated. Around five o’clock I
poured myself a glass of wine and phoned Emma to check in, but my call went
directly to voice mail.

By eight-thirty I had eaten a
delayed dinner of overcooked chicken by myself and sat drumming my fingers on
the kitchen table. Even Gracie, whose afternoon naptime had been disturbed by
my noisy housework, had deserted me. I decided to assert my wifely prerogative
and telephoned Armando at
TeleCom
. “That’s it,” I
told him firmly. “Get your tail home.
Now.”
It was
symptomatic of his bone weariness that he didn’t even protest.

“Yes, Ma’am,” was all he said
before disconnecting, and within half an hour he was slumped in the double
recliner before our fireplace, nursing a cup of cinnamon tea at the end of yet
another long day.

“Any closer to knowing how this
proposed acquisition is going to turn out?” I asked him once again, unable to
squelch my curiosity as I brought him a plate of dinner. Gracie gazed at her
man adoringly but was loath to leave her spot on the hearth, so I was able to
ease into the seat next to Armando.

“Yes and no, which I realize is
not the answer you are looking for,” he answered. “Unfortunately, it is all I
have to offer.” His eyes over the rim of his cup were apologetic.

I wrestled with my annoyance.
Dealing with uncertainty and indecision has never been one of my strengths, but
it seemed that I had little choice. Part of me wanted to yell, “Then
tell
George
Dunphy
you quit, and
start looking for another job,” but I knew that would be useless. Armando’s
youth in South America had been fraught with insecurity. As a man of almost
thirty, he had moved to the U.S., taught himself English, then clawed his way
to an accounting degree and a top spot in the
TeleCom
hierarchy. Nothing would budge him out of there short of a pink slip and an
escort to the exit.

“Tell me about the yes part,” I
urged him now.

A smile teased at the corners of
his mouth. “When I tell you what is in store for me on Tuesday and Wednesday of
this week, you will be very glad you are no longer with the company.”

Armando and I had met during my
tenure as
TeleCom’s
marketing manager years ago.

“I’ve been happy about that for a
long time. What’s going on?”

He considered for a moment. “Do
you remember our having to endure a very long, rainy weekend at a golf resort
on Long Island when George decided we must all be trained in team building?”

I laughed out loud. “How could I
forget? We were supposed to solve puzzles and climb ropes and fall backward
into our team members’ arms with our eyes closed to show them our trust, along
with a whole lot of other silly stuff that was all the rage in human resource
circles back then. As I recall, just about everyone came home with killer colds
and hangovers, but you and I did some team building, didn’t we, handsome?”

I tweaked his nose gently and was
rewarded with something more like a real smile.

“I do remember one or two meetings
which took place in your room very late at night.”

“There wasn’t much conversation,
but we did lots of bonding.”

“You gave me your cold.”

“Along with my heart,” I
remembered. “That was the weekend that did it for me.
Why all
the reminiscing, enjoyable as it is?”

He blew out a breath, and the
smile vanished. “It has been decided by the acquisition team that the
management employees of
OmniFutures
and
TeleCom
must spend two days and nights in each other’s
company this coming week. We have been summoned to a conference center in
Southbury on Monday afternoon for this purpose.”

“What purpose?” I prodded. “The
acquisition hasn’t even been approved yet.”

“I believe
OmniFutures
wishes to see who among the
TeleCom
managers would
fit well within their corporate culture, should the purchase go through.”

“Corporate culture, huh. There’s
some jargon I haven’t heard in years,” I sneered. “I haven’t missed it a
bit.”
 
I reached for Armando’s tea and
took a sip. “What can George possibly
be
thinking?
TeleCom
was such a great little company when all the big
decisions were made around the picnic table out behind the old factory building
in East Hartford, remember? Then George was persuaded to move into that
tricked-out building in Prestige Park and take
TeleCom
public, which was a bad decision, and now this. Well, at least you and the
others at
TeleCom
may be able to get George to see
the target painted on his back, because there surely is one. He may walk away
from this with a healthy bank account, but I hope he’s thinking about what to
do with himself for the rest of his life.”

I handed Armando his teacup and
got up to retrieve his dinner plate from the side table and reheat it once
again. The roast chicken, done to perfection several hours ago, looked pretty
sad.

“You know what?” I continued. “You
should think of this ghastly little get-together as a two-way street. They may
be checking you out, but you should do the same to them. Look them all over and
decide whether this is a group you can enjoy being part of—or at least tolerate,”
I amended more honestly as I headed back to the kitchen.

“I will miss you,
Cara
,” he said to my retreating back.

I turned around and wiggled my
eyebrows. “Between now and Monday, I plan to make absolutely sure of that.”

By the time I returned with his
twice-reheated dinner, Gracie had assumed her rightful place in the seat next
to him, and Armando was asleep, his head slumped forward on his chest. The cat
lay tightly curled next to him with her eyes squeezed shut as if daring me to
protest. I didn’t.

Instead, I scratched the top of
her head and made sure the TV remote was within Armando’s reach in case he
awakened. Then I returned his dinner to the microwave and took myself to my
bathroom for a long, thoughtful bubble bath.

Sunday morning I looked forward to
brunch with
Strutter
and Margo at the Town Line
Diner, our regular haunt, and especially so since May and her visiting author
Judy Holloway would be joining us. The conversation promised to be lively, as
I’d noticed it generally was when May was a part of it.

Judy proved to be a slightly built
salt-and-pepper brunette with a penchant for earrings that were color
coordinated to her outfit
a la
Lesley
Stahl of
60 Minutes
fame. Today’s
yellow and rose hoops matched the autumn colors of her light sweater perfectly.
Although dissimilar in appearance, she and May were clearly sisters under the
skin. As they laughed and joked their way through the introductions, their
comfort with each other was evident.