I considered asking him to retarditerate his point, but I couldn’t stand to hear him butcher the language any more. I changed the subject. “How’s your online class going, Mrs. Berns?”
Not my smartest move. She filled us in with such hyper-specific detail that we were all too embarrassed to look at each other by the time our food came. We ate with our heads down, shoveling the food in quickly to get the night over with. Mrs. Berns won the clean plate award, clearing her filet mignon and baked potato before it got cold.
“Damn that’s better than hospital food.” She pushed her plate away, a wide smile on her plate. “Bernard, I believe it’s time for a kiss.”
“But I’m not done with my steak yet,” he groused.
She flicked him on the forehead like a bad dog and then pulled him in close. If you’ve ever watched old people kiss, you’ve noticed that they appear to have to pop through a small, invisible barrier to touch lips, like two opposite pole magnets shoved together. Mrs. Berns did not kiss like that. Her magnet was always turned the right way, and her public passion made me even more uncomfortable than her tales of studying human sexuality. Johnny tapped my leg, and I realized I’d been staring.
“I’m full. Want to move over to the bar so we can give these two some privacy?”
I looked longingly at my half-eaten brick oven margherita pizza. It was delicious.
“I’ll have them box it up for you,” Mrs. Berns said out of the corner of her mouth. I was unsurprised to learn that she had 360-degree vision while kissing. She was a modern miracle when it came to the art of love.
“Thanks,” I said, but made no move to stand.
“And Bernard will talk to you before you leave.”
That’s what I needed to hear. “We’ll be at the bar.” I crammed my hands into my pockets so Johnny couldn’t grab one of them again and followed him into the other room. It was packed, even on a Wednesday, but he found a quiet corner. We nursed our water, standing in uncomfortable silence.
“Mira?” He asked. “Do you like me?”
Ohmygodyes. Liked him so much that I didn’t want to jinx him, that I’d rather move to India than ruin his life with my bad luck, that I wanted to throw him to the ground right now and ride him like a merry-go-round. “Yeah.”
“Then why does it always feel like you’re running away?” He took my hand again. I squelched the urge to not yank it back.
“I’m a little damaged,” I said, embarrassed that I’d blushed when I said it. “I’m not… your type.”
He pulled me in close. I was about to make some crack about us taking notes from Mrs. Berns and Bernard when his warm lips brushed against mine, soft, and then harder, his tongue gently exploring the edges of my mouth. I sighed and fell against his hard body, loving the feel of his hand in my hair. He pulled back slightly and moved his mouth to my ear, landing soft butterfly kisses on the edge. “That’s for me to decide,” he whispered huskily.
“Yes,” I said, not sure what I was agreeing to.
“Will you go to Mrs. Berns’ wedding with me?”
At that moment, I would have gone to the landfill to pick out furniture with him. “Uh-hunh.” I pushed back against his mouth. His tongue was magic. I heard a soft chuckle, a vibration against my ear, before his mouth moved to the base of my neck. I swear the only reason I didn’t mount him like a farm animal right there in the bar was that a siren blared past the front of Stella’s, an ambulance followed by two police cars. My heart clutched. They were racing toward the north side of the town, and there were lots of people I cared about on the north side of town.
I stepped back, tamping down my libido with fear. “I have to see what’s happening.”
His eyes were stormy with passion but cleared quickly. “I’ll drive.”
We raced outside and realized it would be quicker to walk than drive. Stella’s was on a rise on Lake Street, and we could see that the emergency vehicles had screamed past us and pulled into the Big Chief Motor Lodge a half mile directly north. It was their second time there in under a week. We dashed north, covering the distance in less than five minutes, arriving out of breath and in time to witness the ambulance crew hurrying up to the lakeside second story with a stretcher between them.
It was such an odd juxtaposition of the scene after Webber was found that I felt unbalanced in the cool October air and reached out to Johnny. He grabbed my arm to steady me and we kept moving forward, on the scene in time to see the ambulance crew hurry down the stairs and toward us with an unconscious Arnold Swydecker on a gurney, skin gray, yellow foam bubbling out the corner of his mouth.
19
The realization set me on my heels. Swinton was in love with Swydecker. I tried to fit that epiphany into the puzzle of Webber’s murder but didn’t know where it belonged. Was she Swydecker’s alibi, the woman he’d rather go to jail for than reveal as his lover? The only thing certain was that being involved with her boss’ opponent must have caused her a great deal of stress. Enough stress to kill, though?
Bernard showed up on our heels, having left the gimpy Mrs. Berns on the street out front of Stella’s. After some begging, I convinced Johnny that it was absolutely necessary to go back and drive Mrs. Berns home because she shouldn’t be so active this soon after her accident. Bernard insisted on staying to dig around for a story, which struck me as incredibly tacky, but I wasn’t sure I was any better.
The ambulance pulled out, as did Wohnt with Swinton in his car. I didn’t recognize the police officer who had stayed behind to secure the scene, but he was determined that Bernard and I were not to interfere, were not even to have access to the second floor. Bernard listened before charging to the lobby to make a call on his cell phone, presumably to his editor. I did not listen, which is why when the officer strode to his car to retrieve his police tape, I was able to sprint to the second floor unnoticed.
Swydecker’s door was open and I darted in. I knew I had only a few seconds. A quick visual scan showed me the exact same room I’d been in during the interview except for a messy pile of paper pooling on the floor and an old-fashioned women’s handkerchief lying by the bed. I reached for it but heard footsteps coming up the stairs and only had time to make out two of the three letters monogrammed on the white cloth: a G and an S. Grace Swinton, the woman who hadn’t slept in her bed the night of Webber’s murder and who looked like her world had ended when Swydecker was whisked away by ambulance. I was now willing to bet my car that she was Swydecker’s alibi the night of the murder and he hers, but that neither one of them could risk their careers by coming forth.
Knowing I was on borrowed time, I flew out of the room, my heart thumping in my ears, and rushed to the far end of the second floor walkway a split second before the police officer came into view. If he glared at me, I didn’t see. I had my back to him, pretending to knock on Glokkmann’s door. I heard a rustle of tape being unwound and glanced to my right, just enough to see that the officer had strung “Do Not Cross” tape across the entrance to his half of the second story and was doing the same to Swydecker’s room.
Meanwhile, on the other side of Glokkmann’s door, a howling fight was underway. I heard the crash of glass, a loud thud, and then the most violent sound of all: quiet.
20
