Double Shot

this morning, you didn’t lock your thirty-eight back in your glove compartment, did you?”

I thought back, now wholly confused. I must have locked the compartment. I’d unlocked it when I’d shown my gun to the officer investigating the attack. He’d left when Julian and Liz arrived. Then we’d been in such a hurry to get new food, my body had hurt so much from being hit, and I’d been so worried about Roger Mannis showing up…no, I remembered replacing the gun, but not relocking the compartment. But aside from that cop, Marla, and Tom, who knew I kept a gun in the van? And Marla would never have done this. She was working at the bake sale, and she would have joked that that was much more important than shooting the Jerk.

Tom reached for my cell phone and pressed the buttons for Marla’s cell. She must have answered right away, because Tom began talking almost immediately.

“Trouble here, Marla. We need you to find a criminal attorney for Goldy and have him meet her down at the department ASAP.” Tom paused. “What do you mean, why? Of course she didn’t do it. But things aren’t going too well. We’ll tell you more later.” Then he pressed End. I could just imagine Marla hurling her cell phone against whatever wall was convenient. She hated people hanging up on her.

Tom handed me my phone. “Put this in your pocket. We’re going to have to talk quickly because—”

“Oh, Lord, Tom, I’m going to be sick.”

“Listen to me. Look at me.”

I focused on those green eyes, usually liquid with love. Now they were stern, commanding. My stomach tightened even more. “Say as little as possible, understand? Don’t worry that it makes you look guilty.” He touched my cheek, as if to soften his words. “Do not talk about being attacked this morning. Do not tell them the gun went off in your hand. Do not even tell them you have a gun. Give as brief a statement as possible. Then when you get down to the department, demand to confer with your lawyer.” His eyes turned gentle. “You have to trust me on this.”

“I trust you on everything,” I said weakly.

Two detectives were sauntering down the driveway. I knew they were detectives because they wore dark suits and sober ties. One held a clipboard. The other signaled to Tom that they wanted to talk to me. Panic rose in my throat, as it had so many nights when John Richard had been raging, hollering, and throwing things. The memory of that fear immobilized me.

I wanted to bolt.

My mind, so blank a while ago, was now whirling. This morning I’d been beaten up and sabotaged. Of course I’d suspected the Jerk. I’d taken my thirty-eight into the Roundhouse and been so startled by rodents, I’d accidentally fired at the floor. And now I had gunshot residue on my hands. John Richard had been shot with my gun, stolen from my glove compartment that I’d stupidly forgotten to lock. He’d been killed sometime in the three hours between when I’d last seen him at the Roundhouse and four o’clock. And when I’d last seen him at the Roundhouse, sixty-plus people had witnessed the two of us locked in a shouting match.

“Mrs. Korman? I mean, Mrs. Schulz?” said the first detective, a young, red-haired fellow with a name tag that said “Reilly.” His clipboard, I noticed, was filled with bright white paper. Behind him was someone else I didn’t recognize, a taller, older man with black hair, a ruddy complexion, and “Blackridge” on his name tag. “Could you get out of your vehicle and talk to us for a few minutes?”

I obeyed him. Tom had put his career on the line by checking my glove compartment, to see if the weapon they’d found was mine. My dear husband. How different he was from the one who now lay dead up in the garage.

Everything will be all right, I told myself. But it sure didn’t feel that way.

6

Will you give us permission to search your vehicle?”

Reilly asked in the same formal tone.

“Yes, yes, of course,” I said automatically. And then I had a horrible thought: What if the killer who’d taken my gun had planted something in my car? The detectives had already nodded at two crime-scene guys; one of them clambered into the car. Tom looked at me and gave a thumbs-up. I wanted to feel confident, but I didn’t.

I took a deep breath and followed the detectives halfway around the cul-de-sac, until we arrived at a department car.

“When did you get here, Mrs. Schulz?” Reilly asked, his blue eyes flat.

“Just before four. Maybe five, ten of.”

He scribbled. “And why were you here?”

“John Richard Korman, the man who was…shot, is, was my ex-husband. This morning, well, actually, this afternoon, he…” Suddenly I couldn’t stand it. Literally. “I need to sit down.”

They opened the doors of the department car, and the three of us slid in. Blackridge sat in the driver’s seat. Reilly, beside me in the back, told me to keep on with my story.

“He, John Richard, said he had a late tee time for playing golf with Arch. Arch is our fifteen-year-old son who just left.” Neither detective spoke. Reilly motioned for me to go on. “John Richard said for me to bring Arch over at four, which I did.”

When Reilly wrote, his short, pale, freckled fingers moved very fast. Blackridge’s face, meanwhile, was impassive. When a groan escaped me, the detectives exchanged a glance.

“When you got here,” Blackridge asked, “was anyone else here?”

“Yes, someone was.” I described the down-at-the-heels fellow with the skeletal face. Blackridge wanted to know about the man’s car, and seemed surprised that I’d written down the license number. Reilly retrieved the piece of paper I offered from my pocket and took more notes.

“What made you do that?” Blackridge again. “Take down this man’s license number, I mean.”

“He called me ‘Mrs. Korman.’ I guess he assumed I was John Richard’s wife because Arch was up at the door yelling, ‘Dad! Dad! Open the door!’ Anyway, the man wanted to know if I had his money.”

“ ‘His money,’ ” Blackridge repeated. “What money?”

“Well,” I said, “obviously, money the Jer—uh, John Richard owed him!” As Arch would say, Duh. Through all this, Reilly wrote.

“Then what did you do?” Blackridge demanded.

“Nothing. The guy seemed to get nervous. He left. Then I went up to the door with Arch. We both banged on it and rang the bell.”

“You banged on the door?” Blackridge’s dark brown eyes pierced me. “Why?”

I sighed. “Because I was sure John Richard was in there.” I ordered myself to get the anger out of my voice before saying any more. In a calmer tone, I went on: “You have to understand. John Richard had been very insistent that I bring Arch over promptly at four. I was convinced he was hiding out from this fellow, one of his creditors, who wanted his money. But I figured that since the guy had driven off, John Richard just wasn’t aware that the coast was clear. So when he still didn’t answer the door, I said to Arch, ‘Let’s try one more time.’ ” I stopped talking, trying to recall what had happened next. What had happened exactly.

“Then what?” Blackridge prompted me after a few moments.

“I walked around to the garage.”

“Where was your son?”

“I told him to wait at the front door.”

“You said, ‘Let’s try one more time.’ Why didn’t you have your son go with you?”

“I don’t know.” Why did the truth have to look so bad? Just wait here, honey, while I go pretend to discover Dad, dead. Heat rose to my cheeks. I added, “I told my son I was just checking to see if the Audi was there.”

The detectives traded another look.

Blackridge said, “Go on.”