A Grave Issue Page 19

  I wasn’t well versed in arson investigations, but I guessed I would have to take her word for it. I didn’t want to find out if she was right. I needed to keep her talking. I had to buy enough time for Nate to bring help. “Why, Rosemarie? I really don’t understand why.”

  “Really? I was losing everything. Everything! Vincent was dead. And Alan?” She shook her head.

  “Yes.” I leaned forward. “Alan.”

  “Do you know what time Kyle came to bail Lola out the day we had our . . . disagreement?” she asked. “Disagreement” seemed a pretty mild description of what had happened in the Magnolia Room, but I let it pass. I wanted to hear more. “Two o’clock. Lola was out of a cell and on her way home by two o’clock. Do you know what time Alan came for me?”

  I remembered Monique saying that there had been a lot of messages on Alan’s phone that afternoon. “Later than two o’clock, I’m guessing.”

  “Four o’clock!” she screamed. “Four! I called and called and called. I called his cell phone. I called the bank. No one knew where he was. He was supposed to be my person.”

  “Your person?” I asked.

  “Yes, my person. The person who comes when I call. The person who bails me out of jail, who comes to the emergency room when I’m hurt, who has my back in a fight. My person. Lola’s person came for her right away. She hadn’t even had her phone call yet and Kyle was there. Where was Alan?” She made a face and turned away.

  Oh, her person. Like Jasmine was my person.

  “And you should have smelled him when he came home that night.” She put her hand over her mouth.

  “So you suspected he’d been with another woman?” I asked.

  “Suspected? I knew! I’d already been suspicious.” She shook her head. “I’d seen the signs: the late nights, the phone calls he’d hang up on the second I came in the room, the waxing.”

  I really would have rather not known about Alan waxing. “But the smell was what made you decide he was definitely cheating?”

  “The smell and that big hickey on his chest. Oh, he tried to hide it. Came to bed with a T-shirt, saying he was cold. Cold? Who is ever cold in the Central Valley in the summer?” She shook her head.

  “When did you decide to kill him?” I asked.

  She sighed. “It wasn’t really planned. Everything came together in some weird way. It was like the universe was telling me to kill him, like it was meant to be.”

  I was pretty sure if the universe told you something like that, you were supposed to hang up on it and call a doctor immediately. “How so?”

  “Alan knew I was mad at him, so he was being all extrahelpful. He offered to go down to the chicken coop to collect the eggs for me. He hated doing that. Those eggs aren’t so clean when you take them right from the coop, and he didn’t like to get his hands dirty. I stood on the porch and watched him walk over the hill toward the coop. While I was standing there, I saw Kyle leave his house with the dogs. I knew he’d be gone for close to an hour. It hit me like a thunderclap. I knew where Kyle and Lola kept their gun. I knew they almost never locked their house, and if they did, they kept their spare key in that ceramic duck.”

  Horse, I corrected silently.

  “It seemed fitting. Kyle took Vincent from me by not controlling his vicious attack dogs and never had to pay the price. I decided I’d get rid of two men I hated at once. It wouldn’t bring Vincent back, but there would at least be justice for his death, and I’d get rid of Alan all with one shot.” She giggled. It was a horrible sound.

  “Vincent?” Monique whispered.

  “My emu.” She wiped at her eye. “Damn it! I loved that bird.”

  Monique turned to me. “How can someone love an emu?”

  I shrugged. I also had wondered about the nature of Rosemarie’s relationship with her emu. “The heart wants what the heart wants.” I turned back to Rosemarie. “But now Monique? I mean, I know who she was to Alan, but why kill her?”

  “Another one who wasn’t getting punished for anything! She slept with my husband. Not once, but many times. And what happened to her? She ended up with a bunch of property and a new business. How was that fair? So I called in a raid on the marijuana grows, and now I’m going to burn her up.” Rosemarie smiled. “It’s going to feel so good.”

  She had a point. It wasn’t exactly fair, but if you killed everyone who got some kind of unfair deal, the world would have a much sparser population.

  “Maybe if you’d paid Alan as much attention as you’d paid that damn emu, he wouldn’t have been looking for a little something-something somewhere else,” Monique said, stepping forward. “How fair was it that he left his first wife just so you could snub him for some stupid faux ostrich?”

  I threw her a glance. I didn’t think antagonizing Rosemarie was a good way for any of us to get out of there alive.

  “Faux ostrich!” Rosemarie screamed. “You little hussy!”

  “Me? Well, I’m rubber and you’re glue,” Monique said. “How was what I did with Alan any different than what you did with Alan when he was still married to Christine?”

  Rosemarie’s lips tightened. “It was totally different. We were in love. We were destined to be together. You . . . you were just a distraction.”

  “Distracting enough that he was going to leave you.” Monique jutted out a hip.

  Rosemarie snarled.

  The door flew open. Carlotta and Luke burst in, guns drawn. Rafe was right behind them, camera up and clicking. “Hold it right there, Rosemarie. Put that torch down!” Luke yelled.

  Monique screamed. “She did it! She killed Alan!”

  “We know. We heard everything.” Carlotta didn’t even glance at Monique. She kept her eyes trained on Rosemarie just like Jasmine had never looked away from Walter. “Come on, Rosemarie. You don’t want to do this. You don’t want to hurt any more people. Put the torch down.”

  Rosemarie’s hands began to tremble. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Sure you do,” Officer Haynes said, her voice silky smooth. “Put the torch on the floor, and put the lighter down too.”

  Rosemarie looked back and forth at the wad of cloth in her hands and the lighter as if she wasn’t really sure how they got there. “I didn’t have any choice,” she said.

  “Of course not,” Carlotta agreed. “What else could you have done? We all understand that. Just put the torch down.”

  Rosemarie began to weep, her shoulders shaking. She swiped at her nose with the back of her arm.

  Monique made a noise of disgust. “Oh, for Pete’s sake! Why are you sniveling? You killed him. You killed the man who loved me. I’m the one who gets to cry. Not you!”

  Rosemarie’s head came up, her eyes blazing with hatred. “You! You should get nothing.” And with that, she flicked the lighter and touched it to the torch. It went up like a Roman candle.

  Rosemarie threw the ignited torch at Monique. Somehow my old volleyball instincts kicked in. I launched myself, stretching my arms out in front of me, bandaged hands clasped together, and I bumped that torch halfway across the room. Rafe raced for it, pulled off his shirt, and smothered the fire.

  Rosemarie took off toward the side door, but it wouldn’t open. She pounded a few times on the door as if someone might come and let her escape the trap she’d set for Monique and then sank to the floor. Carlotta hauled her to her feet. “Rosemarie Brewer, you are under arrest for the murder of Alan Brewer and”—she looked around the room—“and probably a bunch of other stuff, but we’ll start there. You have the right to remain silent . . .” They marched out of the room.

  I sat down hard in one of the plastic chairs. Rafe came over and sat down next to me. “I have no idea how I’m going to write that up.”

  I gave him some side eye. “I’m sure you’ll figure something out. I, however, have no comment.”

  He smiled. “It’d be easier with some help.”

  “What kind of help?” I asked, leaning into him. Suddenly I was
terribly cold, and I could feel his warmth next to me.

  He threw an arm around my shoulder. “The kind that does some articles for the paper.”

  “Feature stuff? Recipes? New store openings?” I made a disgusted noise in the back of my throat.

  He shook his head. “No. Real stuff. I mean, you figured all this out. What else might you be able to figure out?”

  Not him, apparently.

  “I think this could be the start of a beautiful friendship.” He pulled me a little closer.

  I became all too aware of the fact that he wasn’t wearing a shirt and that he looked pretty good that way.

  Before I could reply, Nate and Jasmine came skidding into the room. “We just saw Carlotta leaving with Rosemarie in handcuffs. What’s going on?” Jaz demanded.

  Nate looked at me sitting there with Rafe’s naked arm resting on my shoulder. His gaze darted back and forth between us. “You’re okay then?” he asked.

  “A little shaken, but okay.” I looked over at Jasmine and said, “It’s a long story.”

  Monique snorted. “No, it’s not. Rosemarie tried to kill me with a torch. Desiree saved me.”

  Jasmine’s eyebrows went up. “You’re a hero again?”

  “I guess it depends on how you frame it.” I was exhausted—too exhausted to claim hero status. I stood up. “I think I just want to go home.”

  “I’ll walk you,” Nate said.

  Rafe stood too and shrugged into the burned remnants of his shirt. “I’ll get over to the newspaper and try to write this up. I want it up on the website tonight.”

  We all walked out of the Civic Center as Luke walked up with a big roll of crime scene tape to stretch around it. He gave me a salute as we walked away. “Nice work, Desiree.”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  We stopped at the Turner Family booth to let Uncle Joey know I was going home and walked the blocks to the funeral home in silence. When we got there, I walked back to the stairs to the family entrance. I turned to Nate. “Thanks. I think I’ve got it from here.”

  “Desiree,” he said.

  I held up a hand to stop him. “Whatever it is, can it wait?”

  “Not really,” he said. He leaned down and kissed me. Just one soft, sweet kiss. I heard a boom and looked up. The first fireworks were going off in the town square.

  He grinned. “Good timing. For once.”

  I shook my head. “Good night.”

  I trudged up the stairs. There was an envelope addressed to Donna and me wedged into the doorframe. I pulled it out and opened it. There was a card inside with one word written on it: Sorry.

  I stared at it. I knew that handwriting. I knew that quirky little way of making a y. It was my dad’s handwriting.

  I raced inside and grabbed my laptop. Donna was in the living room, sitting on the couch. I carried my laptop over to Donna. “Can you help me with this?”

  “Sure. Why?” She took it from me.

  I held up my bandaged hands. “Typing’s not working out so well for me at the moment.”

  “Got it. What do you want me to do?” She flipped the computer open.

  I guided her through the steps to get to the video stored from the motion-sensitive camera. She clicked it open. “You’re taping our house?”

  I nodded. There were a few little clips from when a bird flew up on the back porch and another one as a squirrel scampered across. Uncle Joey went in and out. Greg went in and out. I did too. Then a figure walked into view.

  Donna gasped, and I sucked in some air. The person was tall and lanky. The kind of person who spent a lot of time indoors. He slid an envelope into the doorframe and then turned to walk away. When he turned, his face was in full view.

  “Dad,” we said in unison.

  * * *

  The Verbena Free Press

  SUNDAY, JULY 30

  Local Businesswoman Traps Murderer, Saves Day

  Desiree Turner, assistant funeral director at Turner Family Funeral Home, faced off with Rosemarie Brewer, wife and alleged murderer of Alan Brewer, in the Civic Center hall during the Fire Festival this past Friday night. Ms. Turner had become suspicious of Ms. Brewer and Ms. Brewer’s intentions toward Monique Woodall. She followed the two women into the Civic Center to find Ms. Brewer brandishing a gasoline-soaked torch and a lighter and threatening to burn down the Civic Center with Ms. Woodall in it.

  Officer Carlotta Haynes and Detective Luke Butler of the Verbena Police Department were able to apprehend Ms. Brewer before any damage was done.

  Officer Haynes said, “We do not recommend citizens taking the law into their own hands ever. The correct procedure when you suspect wrongdoing is to contact the police and let them take care of it.”

  Ms. Turner declined to comment on the situation.

  Full Disclosure: Desiree Turner will be joining the staff of the Verbena Free Press as a roving reporter starting in August of this year.