Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Bonnie and her friends gathered around Rosa again that evening after their day of reconnaissance. Rosa had not been released as planned. Her concussion “bore a little more caution than most,” Bonnie assumed due to the brain tumor, so Rosa had to stay another night.
Jenna had moved the floral arrangements throughout the room, and the scent was so powerful she’d made Diane open the windows. The nurses, who seemed to be run ragged, had promised to re-gift them to other patients when they found a free minute. Bonnie hadn’t seen one sitting still yet.
She sat on a big, deep windowsill beside some Shasta daisies without much of a scent. Diane took the bedside chair, and Bonnie, the recliner in the corner, after pushing it closer to the bed.
“How did the celebratory lunch go?” Diane asked.
Bonnie said, “Well, I learned that Sam and Marina have been divorced for a year and didn’t tell me.”
“Oh my frickin’ God!” Rosa sat up straighter in her hospital bed, then winced and pressed a hand to her ribcage.
“Sam said it happened right after Mark’s death, and he didn’t have the heart to tell me.”
“Your son treats you like you’d break in a strong wind, Bonnie,” Christine said. “You know that, right?”
“You know, he really does,” Bonnie said, nodding. “I think he’s overcompensating for living so far away. But he’s a good man.”
They all agreed verbally, talking over each other to ensure her of it.
“And it’s not entirely his fault if he doesn’t understand me,” she went on, musing as she did.
“I don’t think I’ve ever let my family see who I really am.
” She shrugged and felt her understanding deepen.
“I’ve always tried to maintain the mom-image, and now the grandma-parts of myself like they’re my role and I can’t break character.
But those aren’t the whole of me. It’s weird, isn’t it? ”
Diane nodded. “I think we all do that, to some extent. We show people the parts of us we think they want to see.”
“I’m living proof,” Rosa said, “for now.”
Everyone groaned at her dark humor.
Bonnie said, “They’ve been taking turns living with the kids in the house in Flint, and they keep an apartment for whoever’s not home that week. They say it’s cheaper that way.”
“I’d need my own apartment,” Christine muttered.
“Apparently they’re planning to do the same thing here, with the house anyway,” Bonnie said. “And Marina’s opening her own law office.”
“That’s great for her!” Diane said.
“It is,” Bonnie agreed. “But…really, that’s enough about all that. We have business.” She pulled out her burner phone as a signal she was moving on.
“Well, you’ve always wanted them to move closer,” Diane said, seeking the positive as she got up and closed the hospital room door. “I wish Tim would move home, but there’s not much call for Hollywood creature creators on the east coast.”
“Maybe in the city,” Christine added. “But the timing of Sam’s return couldn’t be worse. If ever there was a case of ‘be careful what you wish for…’”
“Oh, I’m glad they’re home. I want them home.” Bonnie sighed heavily. “At least the close proximity gave me the chance to get into Sam’s files on Mr. Terrence.” She lowered her voice to a whisper on the dead man’s name.
“You did?” Rosa widened her eyes. “What did you find?”
Bonnie moved closer, holding the phone so Rosa could see. “I photographed all the pages in the files Sam brought home. There was a laptop too, but I didn’t get into that. Maybe tonight while he’s sleeping.”
“Is it his work computer?” Diane asked.
Bonnie nodded, still scrolling.
“Then it won’t be easy to unlock. Probably, it’ll require his fingerprint or face, or even a keycard of some kind. Show us what you’ve got.” Diane leaned closer so she could see.
Bonnie found the shots, and they gathered nearer the bed to view them, commenting on the notes as they read them. “They found a hard drive under the floorboards of Mr. Terrence’s place with a lot of child pornography on it,” Bonnie said.
“There was some blood spatter on the living room ceiling.” Rosa closed her eyes and tipped her head back against the pillows. “The frickin’ ceiling.”
Bonnie went on, having already read everything she’d photographed. “Sam’s working theory, not that he’s told me, is that someone found out what Mr. Terrence was up to and killed him. Which is way too close to what happened.”
Diane nodded. “Okay, okay, we’ll just come up with a way to send Sam off in another direction.”
“How?” Bonnie asked, and she heard the hint of desperation in her own tone.
“We’ll come up with something,” Rosa said, and squeezed her friend’s hand. “What about you, Christine?”
Christine said, “I interrupted Dangerous Dan’s massage by pulling the fire alarm at the Marlborough Club—thanks for the idea, Diane—and then I went through his clothes while he was outside in a spa robe.
He’s an idiot. Keeps a little notebook in his pocket where he’s written down the key codes for his house, car, office, and phone. ”
“Did you steal the book?” Diane whispered.
“Just copied everything down. It never even occurred to me to take a picture with my burner phone like Bonnie, here. Apparently I really am old. I did steal this, though.” She held out a hotel key card.
It was gold. “Excelsior Hotel,” Christine said, even though they could all read it for themselves.
“Penthouse suite. But he didn’t go there.
He went home. I drove by later to make sure. ”
Bonnie said, “One of us needs to check that penthouse out right away, before he
heads back there.”
“It can’t be me,” Christine went on. “After our run-in, I wouldn’t be able to come up with an excuse or pretend to be the maid if he caught me in his suite.”
“Wait,” Bonnie said. “The keys you found at Mr. Terrence’s place.” She dug in her teal and yellow bag and eventually pulled the keyring out with its two keys dangling, one large and silver, one small and gold.
“Jeez, woman, you just carry the evidence around with you?” Christine hissed.
“Look at the gold key.” Bonnie showed them its markings.
An E on the left, an H on the right, and an X that crossed between them, covering the entire head.
“EXH,” she said. “Excelsior Hotel. I bet this goes to something in that penthouse. And the silver key, with the two Ds. Dangerous Dan. That one looks custom. You really hit the jackpot, Christine.”
Christine tilted her head and made an exaggerated grimace. “Actually, what I hit was Dangerous Dan. In the jaw. With my fist. In front of a crowd of witnesses.”
“What?” All three said the word at once, their inflections identical.
“He spots me, comes right up to me and says, ‘I know who you are,’ in this mysterious tone like he thinks he’s the villain in a cheap thriller. Jerk.”
“And that’s when you hit him?” Rosa asked.
“No. Then he says, ‘How’s your friend Rosa? I heard she was in an accident.’ That’s when I hit him.”
“I’d have hit him too,” Diane said.
“I’d have hit him harder,” Bonnie added.
“Sorry Bon. There wasn’t a frying pan nearby.” Christine’s joke fell flat. “Frankly, I was surprised I had it in me. Knocked him right on his ass. Best part, his robe flew open and everyone saw his shriveled-up junk.”
“Oh my God, Christine, he’ll come after you next, for sure.” Rosa rubbed her arms as if a chill had gone through her.
Diane said, “I’ll search the penthouse. Give me the keys.
” As Christine handed her the keycard, and Bonnie passed her the silver and gold keys, she went on.
“I did a little research, and there are three funerals this week. Tuesday and Thursday at a little cemetery in Willet, although they don’t always dig the graves the night before when the funerals are in the afternoon, and both of those are.
There’s one Friday at Cortland Rural, and they usually do dig the night before, but it’s just so public, right on 281 like it is.
” She stopped speaking and looked at Bonnie.
Bonnie said, “My turn to report. Okay. Well, I’ve come up with the method. The roots of water hemlock, ground up with a Benadryl in a big, fat, lovely muffin, using a recipe sweet and rich enough to mask the taste.”
“Seriously, Bonnie?” Christine asked. “Some roots and an antihistamine?”
Rosa said, “What are you, secretly a witch?” And shook her head in disbelief. “It sounds too easy.”
“The water hemlock is the most poisonous plant in North America,” Bonnie said, “Cicutoxin is the key ingredient, and it’s most heavily concentrated in the roots.
There was some growing right along the lakeshore, and I already went and got a bunch.
It’s drying in Mark’s old jerky dehydrator in the shed right now.
” She flipped through the phone’s photos and showed the others an image of the plant in question.
“I thought that was Queen Anne’s Lace,” Diane said.
“Nope, but sometimes people think it is. Even eating the leaves will make cows and sheep sick. Just handling it is dangerous. I checked a lot of other stuff, though. There’s deadly nightshade, but the potent type doesn’t grow locally.
Local nightshade would only give him a bad belly ache.
And of course there are mushrooms, but they take too long to work and when they do it’s…
messy. I’m telling you, water hemlock’s the way to go.
It’ll take a good hour to work. The Benadryl will make him sleep while it does, so he’ll never know anything’s wrong. ”
“It’s chilling how thoroughly you’ve thought this through, Bon-Bon,” Diane said softly.
“Well, you know, only if we have to,” Bonnie replied.
“Where did you do all this research, Bonnie?” Rosa asked softly.
“I took that herbal course, remember? Poisons were covered in the foraging section, under what to leave alone. I followed up at the library. Left no trace.” Bonnie was proud of herself for covering her tracks so well. Yes, she was becoming a top-notch criminal. Maybe they all were.
“Okay then. Murder muffins it is. Now, about you, Christine,” Diane said, changing the subject to one that had been nagging at Bonnie, too. “I know there’s something wrong. You’ve been acting off ever since we hacked the pervert’s phone.”
Everyone nodded.
“I bet it’s the thought of having to do what we might have to do to Dangerous Dan,” Bonnie said. “That’s it, isn’t it?”
Christine shook her head. She said, “You can’t be making murder muffins with the kids in your house, Bonnie. It’s too risky. Come over and do your baking at the lake house.”
“Or my place,” Diane said.
“No, Harry’s around too much,” Christine said. “Jeff will be at the office for a few hours every day this week. It has to be my place. We don’t want anybody else anywhere near these killer confections. Agreed?”
Everyone nodded except Rosa, who said, “That was a nice pivot, Christine. Way to change the subject.”
Bonnie raised her eyebrows high. “Oh, wow, you did, didn’t you?”
“So spill, Christine,” Rosa said. “We’re in this together. We can’t be keeping secrets from each other. Not now.”
“Oh, look who’s talking,” Christine said.
“That was a pre-existing secret.” Rosa returned her serve. “And it’s out now. So it’s your turn. Spill.”
Christine swallowed hard. “It’s like it’s not real until I tell you three, you know?”
Her eyes were moistening, which alarmed Bonnie, because Christine did not get emotional unless the emotion was anger.
“We’ve got you, hon, whatever it is.” Diane put a hand on her shoulder.
Christine sighed. “Who has Terrence’s phone?”
Bonnie took the dead pedophile’s phone from her pocket and passed it to her. Christine opened it with the code they all knew. She scrolled to the screenshot of the database and expanded the digits on the screen until just one license plate number filled it to show them. “Do you recognize this one?”
The letters on the screen were MDLFCRSS.
They all frowned at the plate, and Bonnie said aloud, “Midlife crisis?”
Then Diane gasped and clapped a hand to her chest. “Oh my God, Christine!”
“Yeah,” she said. Bonnie noticed that her hands were trembling very slightly. “That’s the custom plate on Jeff’s Ferrari,” she said. “Unless someone in some other state has the same plate, my husband’s on the Goddamn list.”