waiting for more.
“She was already dead?”
“Her head was smashed on the marble floor, her blood was everywhere, and she wasn’t breathing. I’m no expert, but I’m pretty sure that means she was dead.”
“You didn’t touch the body? Move anything? Pick up anything that might be evidence?”
“Oh come on, how stupid do you think I am?” I had a feeling I didn’t want to hear his answer, so I barreled on. “Like I told that other cop, I was supposed to meet Marjorie here this morning to talk about a commemoration the cemetery is planning. I showed up. I found her. She was dead. End of story.”
“Was there anyone else around?”
I thought back to when I arrived at the memorial. “Marjorie’s car was parked outside. There was nobody else here.”
“Could someone have come down the steps after you arrived?” Though he didn’t need to, he waved in the general direction of the stairway that led to the balcony. “Could they have gotten past you without you seeing?”
“Only if I was blind and deaf. If somebody was up there when I got here, they’re still up there.”
“We’ve looked.”
“Then whoever that somebody is . . .” I gave him time to jump in and maybe supply me with a little information, and when he didn’t, I kept on going. “They were gone before I walked in.”
Quinn took his time flipping the page of his notebook before he asked, “You knew the victim?”
“Since you’re going to hear it from everybody who works here, you might as well hear it from me first. Yes, I knew her. She was a volunteer here at Garden View, and the biggest pain in the behind I’ve ever met. Well . . .” My smile was so sweet it hurt. “The second biggest.”
He ignored the dig. Too bad. I thought it was a pretty good one. “So what you’re telling me is that you think there might be someone here in the cemetery who wanted to see her dead.”
I laughed. Let’s face it; it was the only logical response. “I said she was a pain, I didn’t say anyone wanted to kill her. Oh . . .” I thought about Gloria Henninger of the pink bathrobe and the dog. I thought about how Marjorie made Doris cry and almost leave a volunteer job she loved, and I thought about Ray, who wasn’t smiling when he left Marjorie’s house the other night. I thought about me. Oh yeah, I’d wanted to kill Marjorie plenty of times. This wasn’t the proper occasion to admit it.
“Don’t tell me you have a theory.”
Quinn must have read the look in my eyes, but even though it was kind of what I was going to tell him—that I didn’t have a theory so much as I had a couple interesting snippets of information to tell him about—I didn’t. That’s what he got for rolling his eyes.
I kept my smile firmly in place. “No theories.”
“You could always ask one of those dead people to help out. You know, the ones you claim you talk to.”
I got up, the better to let him know that his big, bad interrogator persona didn’t scare me in the least. “Already have. He didn’t see a thing.”
Inside his starched shirt, Quinn’s shoulders stiffened. “Right.”
“He didn’t hear anything, either.”
His smile was so brittle I waited for it to shatter. “I’m grateful you took the time to talk to him for me. If he’s here . . .” He glanced all around the office, and of course, he didn’t see anything. Then again, I didn’t, either. The president and his cabinet were MIA. “I really shouldn’t leave without talking to every witness.”
“He won’t talk to you. And you can’t see him. You don’t have the Gift.”
“And you do?”
I shrugged like it was no big deal, but of course, it was.
“Is he here now?”
“Nope. He told me he has more important things to do. By that, I assume he meant more important things than talking to you. Come to think of it . . .” I took a step toward the door. “I’m pretty sure I have more important things to do than talking to you, too.”
“More important than a murder investigation?”
I grabbed my purse, the better to let him know that he was boring me and I was out of there. Just in case he missed it, I stepped around him when I said, “Looks like you’re the only one who cares.”
“You think?” The office was small and it didn’t take me long to get to the doorway. I stopped there and looked at Quinn over my shoulder just as he added, “You’re the one who’s always getting involved in investigations. So apparently, you care, too. Maybe we could actually get somewhere with this conversation if you’d tell me why.”
“Why I care? Or why I get involved? I’ve already told you why.”
“Oh, that’s right! The Gift. Well, this time, I’m going to tell you something.” He closed in on me so fast, I didn’t have a chance to move, and when he looked me in the eye and lowered his voice, I swear, I knew exactly how the bad guys felt when Quinn nailed them. He had a scary side. I was supposed to quake in my open-toe mules. Which was exactly why I yawned.
“I’m serious, Pepper.” When I made a move to walk out of the office, Quinn grabbed my arm. The familiar heat of his skin against mine was almost enough to melt my composure. No way I was going to let that happen. Not right in front of him, anyway. I yanked my arm out of his grasp. “I don’t want you mixed up with this case, you got that?”
“That’s sweet.” I batted my eyelashes. “You’re concerned about me.”
“I’m concerned about my case. I don’t want you getting in the way and screwing anything up.”
My chin came up. “Like I ever have.”
“Like you always have.” He beat me out of the office and over to the door of the memorial and stopped there just as he was about to open it. “Consider yourself warned. I don’t want you anywhere near this case. Mind your own business. And leave the mystery solving up to the professionals.”
“Leave the mystery solving up to the professionals.”
Oh yeah, that was me grumbling to myself and sounding all bitchy and bitter. Like anyone could blame me? It was an hour since Quinn had left with that parting shot, and even though he and his cop buddies and the paramedics were gone, I was still at the memorial. That’s because Ella had called and asked me to stick around. Apparently, a couple reporters were being pretty pushy about getting the inside track on the murder, and photos to go with it, and she wanted to make sure no one snuck around that crime scene tape and got into the building. Why didn’t I just lock up the memorial and get the hell out of Dodge? My thoughts exactly, especially once the coroner came and left with Marjorie’s body. No such luck. See, Ella also wanted me to wait for the cleaning crew that would be by to clean up . . . well, everything that needed to be cleaned up. For now, the place was as quiet as the tomb it was. Except for my grumbling. With time on my hands and nothing better to do, I did what I always do best: I obsessed as only a woman can who’s been insulted, minimized, and irritated beyond reason by the man she’d once loved.
I was trying to keep myself busy and focused by looking through the latest issue of the employee newsletter, but let’s face it, reading about landscaping plans for the fall and the upcoming holiday schedule would never be enough to get my mind off Quinn. I side-handed the newsletter across the office and watched the pages hit, scatter, and skid down the wall.
Even that didn’t make me feel one bit better.
But never let it be said that Pepper Martin is not self-aware. I was plenty pissed at Quinn, sure, but I knew there was one—and only one—way to make myself feel better. Not incidentally, what I had in mind would also make him feel worse. I am hardly the type who’s into revenge, at least except in the most extreme cases (which this was), but as soon as I thought of the plan, things started looking up.
I rooted through the desk for a pad of paper, and when I didn’t find one, I went over to the door and the visitors’ book we keep there for people to sign. I ripped out some of the pages in the back of the book where nobody would notice they were gone, grabbed the nearby pen, and got down to some serious self-healing. The cure for my obsession was obvious: if I was going to silence Quinn’s voice inside my head and rid myself of the memory of that condescending look he gave me when he said, “Leave the mystery solving up to the professionals,” I would
