That stopped me. “You think Deanna shot Maddie. But you don’t dare go to the police, so you’ve come here to stop me from asking questions. Did she shoot Pat, too?”
“I—I don’t know. I had some trades pending to look over. My personal finances—my license was already gone.”
Thanks to Pat.
Ellingson continued. “She’d gone for a walk. She hadn’t said anything about dropping in next door. I noticed a movement outside and saw her leaving the Hallorans’ house.”
“The hedge didn’t block your view?”
“I could see the top of her head. We’ve let the hedge grow since then. She didn’t come straight home—took her walk, I assumed. Then—” He stopped, his eyes briefly unfocused as he shook his head slightly.
“Then what?” I asked, my voice low but urgent. Had the lipstick been Deanna’s? I thought I heard another beep, but Ellingson didn’t seem to notice.
“Then I went upstairs to my office. Half an hour later, more or less, I heard someone calling. I ignored it—thought it was kids messing around. Finally, I looked out and saw Pat crawling across the little deck outside their back door. Bleeding.” Ellingson’s face was pale, drained by the memory. “He’d called and called. The words hadn’t really registered. When they finally did . . .”
When they did, he’d done everything he could, according to the accounts in the paper, but it was too late. The guilt he felt, if I was sizing things up right, came in triplicate: He’d been slow to grasp his neighbor’s distress. He suspected his wife of murder but had kept his mouth shut.
Now, he feared that if she’d been desperate enough to shoot Pat, she must have shot Maddie, too.
He couldn’t know that the same gun had been used in both shootings. The police had kept that detail quiet while they tried to trace it. But I understood why he assumed the two crimes were connected, and that the connection was his wife.
And why the tensions between Bruce and Deanna Ellingson were driving their son out of the house, and why Bruce had moved into the room with the pink-and-orange flowered bedspread.
The electronic beep sounded again, followed by the grinding of gears and pulleys as the garage door opened. I heard the rev of a motor as a car pulled in.
Arf began barking. I put a hand out to hush him and saw that he was barking not at the approaching vehicle, but at the outside door as it slammed shut. Ellingson was gone.
I exhaled heavily. The driver parked and shut off the engine. Glenn. A moment later, he climbed out, leather satchel in hand.
“Howdy, neighbors. Answering the canine call of nature?” He ran a hand over Arf’s head. I was too rattled to reply. “Late meeting up north. Hey, I’ve got another issue for the HOA. Took three tries before the garage door opened.”
The beeps.
“I’ve got one, too,” I said and told him about the dirty outside light fixture as we climbed the wide stairs.
“That’s an easy fix,” he said. We reached our floor. “G’night, Paprika. Sleep tight.” Fat chance. Instead of a date with a second glass of pinot and a twisty-turny fictional mystery, I had a telephone date with Detective Michael Tracy.
Twewnty-Seven
Researchers say we categorize foods based on experience of past interaction, so we think of pancakes as breakfast food but not Brussels sprouts or spaghetti. Obviously, cold pizza contradicts the theory.
THIS TIME I WAS THE ONE TRUDGING DOWN TO POLICE headquarters for a morning meeting. I swung by the shop first, to help Sandra get ready to open and make sure she was okay keeping the dog for a few hours, then whip up a couple of samples that had been simmering in my brain.
On a Saturday morning, the SPD lobby was eerily silent. Detective Armstrong met me, looking even taller than usual in his skinny jeans, his weekend nod to professional attire a blue-and-white striped dress shirt. Inside a small conference room, Detective Tracy sat at one end of the table, his camel sport coat slung over the back of the chair. Special Agent Greer gave no sign that we’d chatted uncomfortably a few nights ago when she introduced the man at the other end of the table, her partner, Special Agent Javier Navarro.
Who bore absolutely no resemblance to Smoking Man.
“I filled them in,” Tracy said. “But we’d all like to hear the whole story in your own words.”
“Good morning to you, too, Detective.” I pulled out a chair. Armstrong closed the door and took the seat next to me. Step by step, I relayed my Friday night encounter with Bruce Ellingson, punctuated by sips of hot coffee. Though Tag swears they serve only the good stuff in his precinct, I hadn’t trusted the supply here and brought my own. Brother Cadfael might find comfort in an herbal tincture, but dark roast feeds my soul.
I finished. Tracy glared at me. “Your Nancy Drew routine could have gotten you killed.”
“Never my favorite fictional detective, though I do love her cars.” That blue Mustang. I sure missed mine. My dad’s.
“Go back,” Agent Navarro said, twirling a finger in the air. “To when you went to his house earlier in the week.”
“That hadn’t been my plan,” I said. “I was just scouting the neighborhood—it’s a few blocks from where my family lived, and I hadn’t been down that street in ages. Well, since Sunday.” I explained about meeting Laurel for breakfast Sunday morning, taking a walk, then going back on Tuesday. “Ellingson assumed I was house-hunting, and I conned him into showing me his rose garden so I could see what he could see from the house, when he saw Pat crawling across the back deck. If you see what I mean.”
Navarro looked down the table at Tracy. “We’re still scouring the records,
