Murder of a Royal Pain

“Talk to him and find out,” Skye prodded. “You’re a tough criminal lawyer; surely you’re not afraid of my brother.”

“He might not even want to speak to me.”

“You’ll never know until you try,” Skye encouraged.

“So you think I should call him?”

“I think you should get naked, put on your fur coat, and show up on his doorstep.” Skye smirked. “It’s hard for a man to stay angry when he’s hard.”

Loretta giggled. “That’s not a bad idea.” Her voice was hopeful. “I’ll let you know what happens.”

“Not the play-by-play.” Skye so did not want to know the details of her brother’s sex life. “Just the final outcome.”

She and Loretta said good-bye, and Skye put the phone in its cradle, but before she could walk away, it rang again. Thinking it might be Loretta needing another pep talk, Skye scooped up the receiver and heard, “We’re home. How come you never returned any of my calls? What in the world have you gotten yourself into this time?”

She cringed. May was back, and there would be hell to pay.

Skye dreaded entering her office on Monday. The body had been removed Friday night before Skye had arrived, so at least she didn’t have a picture in her mind of poor Gloria dead. But the guilt of knowing that the woman had died from poison that was probably meant for Skye was hard for her to shake. Still, it wasn’t as if Homer would give her another space to use. She was pleasantly surprised he was springing for a new chair.

She checked the schedule on the office door; Jackie was at the junior high, so Skye had the office to herself. That reminded her—however much Homer and the other principals sang Jackie’s praises, Skye had yet to see her produce much in the way of results. The woman did a lot of talking, but hadn’t written one social history or Individual Educational Plan goal. It seemed to Skye that when all was said and done concerning Jackie, far more was said than done.

Skye shrugged, then dragged a folding chair from the closet to sit on. Jackie wasn’t her problem. Figuring out who wanted her dead was what she needed to focus on. But, when Simon called at ten, she still hadn’t made any progress toward that goal.

He said, “I got the results from the lab. Your cookies were dosed with atropine.”

“What’s that?”

“The scientific name is dl-hyoscyamine. It’s from the belladonna plant. The type that was put in your cookies is a medication found in prescription eyedrops.”

“Oh.” Skye tried to remember if she had seen anyone using eyedrops lately.

“The funny thing is that an atropine overdose is not considered life threatening.”

“Then why did Gloria die?”

“The ME concluded that because she was taking digoxin for her heart condition, the atropine intensified the effect of that drug to a fatal level.”

“So her death was an accident,” Skye speculated. “Whoever injected my Oreos wanted me sick, not dead.”

“Or they didn’t know an atropine overdose isn’t usually fatal.”

Skye thanked Simon and hung up, then called Wally. Simon had already reported his findings to him, and Wally told Skye there hadn’t been any hits on the fingerprints yet. Disappointed, Skye closed her office and left for the elementary school. She and the team were meeting with Vassily’s parents at eleven to draw up an IEP for the little boy.

Although Skye was distracted, the conference went well. Mr. and Mrs. Warner agreed to the proposed IEP, and Vassily was set to start school on Wednesday. They were finished before noon, and Skye decided to return to the high school to talk to Elvira Doozier.

Normally Skye avoided taking students out of gym, since most of the kids enjoyed the class, or at least hated it less than the academic subjects, but Elvira was a different story. When Elvira arrived in the psych office, she said, “Thanks for getting me away from those Twinkies.”

“Twinkies?” Skye hadn’t heard that expression before.

“Overly processed, too sweet to be real, and leave a bad aftertaste.” When Skye still look puzzled, Elvira explained, “Most of the Pops are in my class.”

“You meant the popular girls?” Skye studied the adolescent, who nodded, then flung herself into a chair and began examining her belly-button ring. She was dressed in low-riding wide-legged denims and a hooded crop top. Her dyed black hair fell to the middle of her back, and her face was eerily pale.

Elvira hung out with the Rebels. Of Scumble River High’s cliques, it was by far the roughest. And unlike the teacher-pleasing groups, they did not volunteer information to adults. Skye was counting on the fact that over the past four years she had built a relationship with Elvira and her family, odd as that bond might be.

Skye started to offer Elvira a piece of candy before she remembered that Wally had suggested she not keep any food in her office for the time being. Without a bribe, how could she loosen up the teen?

Hmm, giving her an opportunity to show how smart she is might work. “Hey, do you know anything about cell phones?”

“If someone said I had one at school, they were lying.” Elvira peered suspiciously out from under her hair. “Mine’s out of minutes and I have to wait until I get my Social Security check the first of the month before I can pay the bill.”

“No one said anything. I was just wondering if you could help with mine.” Skye dug in her tote bag and handed the small silver device to the girl. “I can’t figure out how to get into my voice mail.”

“You’re supposed to be so smart, and you can’t figure out how to use your own cell phone.” Disdain dripped from Elvira’s words.

Skye stopped herself from rolling her eyes and leaned back in her chair. “No one can be good at everything.” Teenagers had attitudes rivaled only by French waiters, and required similar treatment: Never let them see that they got under your skin. “So, can you figure it out?”

“I’ll take a look.” Elvira flipped open the phone and pressed the ON button.

While the girl studied the keypad, Skye said as casually as she could, “Hey, I saw your brother Friday night. Interesting business he’s starting.”

Elvira snorted, but didn’t shift her attention from the phone.

“He mentioned he decided to become a Ghostflusher when you told him how badly I’d been frightened during the first haunted-house dress rehearsal.”

Elvira’s fingers were flying over the tiny buttons, but she paused to smirk. “Yeah. She said you were practically peeing your pants.”

“Really? Who said that?” Skye watched the girl closely, but she still seemed engrossed in the electronic device. “I thought I was alone when I was that panicked.”

“The social worker. Last Monday I stopped by the Scoop office to talk to Xenia, and Ms. Jennings was telling all the kids there the story about how you kicked in the doors of the bathroom stalls and were afraid of a toy ax and screamed when you ran into a rubber hand in the hall.” Elvira passed Skye the phone. “Anyway, you press this little triangle on the left, scroll down to voice mail, and type in your PIN number.”

“Thanks.” Skye wondered what her PIN number was. “I figured you could help.”

“Yeah.” Elvira got up and sauntered toward the door. “And you figured if you gave me something to do, I’d tell you what you wanted to know.”

“Uh. I didn’t . . .” Skye’s cheeks flushed. “Well, I mean—”

“I can read you like a comic book.” Elvira shook her head. “Just ask next time. I really hate it when adults try to manipulate me.”

“Sorry,” Skye called as the girl walked out of the office, slamming the door behind her. Shoot. She’d have to make things up to her somehow, but right now she had to consider what Elvira had said.

Why would Jackie ridicule Skye to the students? What did she gain? Skye had had a bad feeling about Jackie from the beginning, but she’d written it off as jealousy. Except now that she thought about it, it seemed that all the trouble had started when the social worker was hired.

Since Jackie’s arrival, both Skye and the school had been having nothing but problems. The social worker had