Overview, with its haughty position well above the river, had claimed yet another victim, it seemed.

  CHAPTER 5

  Tommy Cantwell, Rosalie’s longtime, gangly coroner, turned to Ross and Wendy and delivered the verdict—his narrow, sad face drooping even further. “Looks like a cocaine overdose to me, folks. She’s got traces on the tips of her fingers, some in her nose, there’s a residue on the table, and I believe she clearly snorted quite a few lines with that straw. I could do a tox panel to verify it, but I think this is a no-brainer. Her liver temp also shows that she’s been dead about sixteen hours, so this happened yesterday evening sometime.”

  Answering Wendy’s 911 call, first responders had arrived promptly at Overview, and Ross, Wendy, and Tommy were now huddled out on the veranda. On the sidewalk beyond, a small crowd had gathered with their phones, attracted by Ross’s police car, the coroner’s car, and the ambulance parked in front. Very few people could resist the pull of such vehicles when they sprang into action with their speed, garish lights, and wailing sirens.

  “Will you be performing an autopsy?” Ross said. “Do you think I need to get the CID out here?”

  “Doesn’t appear to be a crime, so an autopsy may not be necessary, unless it’s requested by the next of kin,” Tommy told him. “Don’t think we need to send this’n down to Jackson to the ME.”

  “I don’t know about the next of kin. She’d just moved to Rosalie about a month or so ago,” Wendy volunteered. “She was about to open up her practice as a psychic this coming week. I did get to work with her a bit in planning a bridge lesson we held here a couple of days ago, but she never mentioned any relatives to me. I know for a fact that she was single. She told me once she didn’t think any man could put up with the strange life she led.”

  Ross sounded quite emphatic. “I’ve taken all the pictures I need to, and I bagged the note. We need to determine if it was actually written in her handwriting. I’ll get in touch with the landlord and get a sample of her signature from the rental agreement. Doesn’t Bailey Sessions still own this?”

  “He does,” Wendy said. “He’ll be horrified to hear what’s happened at his investment, of course. Aurelia was the first person to rent Overview in almost a decade because of its creepy reputation.”

  “Confirm the signature and that’d about do it,” Tommy said. “Suicides are sad things, but they happen all the time. Some say it’s the pressure of modern life. Unless that’s a phony note, I think we can safely rule out homicide.”

  Ross wondered if it would end up being that simple but gave Tommy a reassuring wink anyway. “I’ll let you know one way or another soon.”

  Wendy and Ross moved aside and watched the covered body being whisked away on a gurney by the paramedics to the ambulance, and then Ross locked the front door behind him.

  “I need to talk to you,” Wendy told him as they headed toward their cars while the crowd dispersed after taking their last shots with their phones. “I’ll come to the station unless you’ve got something pressing on your schedule.”

  He gave her a quick peck on the cheek. “I’m wide open right now. See you in just a few.”

  * * *

  Wendy was sitting across from Ross at his desk and would simply not relent. “I don’t care what Tommy Cantwell says, suicide is completely out of character for a woman like Aurelia Spangler. I’m an excellent judge of character, and I have to repeat that working with her on the bridge lessons and cold reading sessions was a pleasure. She was certain that it was the right way to introduce herself to Rosalieans, and I agreed with her. She had every reason to be optimistic about her decision to move here. To have her give up like that just a couple of days later makes no sense at all. There’s something missing here.”

  Ross did not answer right away. He had to admit that he had not had the sort of contact with Aurelia Spangler that his wife had. He was careful to tread lightly. “I respect your views, sweetheart. But let me ask you this: Did she ever mention using drugs to you?”

  Wendy was frowning now. “No, but not that many people come right out and admit to something like that. I mean, it could end up incriminating them down the line somewhere, don’t you think?”

  “True enough. But we know that there was a bit of drama after those cold readings took place. We’ve since learned that Aurelia told Milton about a vision of a knife being plunged into a tuxedo shirt. It obviously affected both of them in a profound way. Milton has disappeared, and now Aurelia has committed suicide, or so it seems. Clearly, that reading had unintended consequences. So, what I’m saying is that the Aurelia you worked with was evidently altered by that vision. The question is: Why did it alter her enough to cause her to take her own life?”

  Wendy’s face suddenly lit up, and she pointed her index finger at her husband.

  “Absolutely. I go back to my original point that it was out of character for her. Why was she unable to handle this particular reading when she no doubt handled thousands of others quite effectively? She told me she’d been doing this professionally for nearly twenty years. She had to have encountered everything under the sun. Why was this not business as usual?”

  “Well, our BOLO hasn’t turned up Milton Bagdad yet,” Ross added. “Why is he on the lam anyway? It looks suspicious enough, but imagine if Aurelia’s death wasn’t a suicide. Suppose Tommy Cantwell is wrong, and it was a homicide. Did Milton have anything to do with it? Is that why he’s disappeared?”

  “Just relying upon my instincts, I can’t imagine that young man doing such a thing. That seems out of character for him, too.”

  He gave Wendy a long, thoughtful stare. “You have every right to think there’s more to this than an overdose of cocaine. But we need some hard evidence to support that theory.”

  Wendy rose from her chair, sounding like a woman on a mission. “I can do my part. I’m going back to the newspaper and will let Lyndell in on this. She’d already been interested in my doing a special human-interest piece on teaching the bridge newbies. Now we have an unexpected death thrown into the mix. This changes the assignment entirely. Suddenly, it’s not about bridge, it’s about death.”

  “Wait . . . sit back down a minute,” Ross told her, gently motioning with his hand. She complied but gave him a quizzical look.

  “You and Lyndell need to keep something in mind. If this is a suicide, and there’s no next of kin to enlighten us about Aurelia any further, there won’t be much of a story to tell. You’re an investigative reporter, but what will you be investigating if it’s made clear that the poor woman really committed suicide? Aurelia deserves a certain amount of respect. She’s entitled to her privacy postmortem. You’re still acting and sounding like you’re certain this was a homicide. You could be wrong. Don’t dismiss the possibility. Work it out with Lyndell.”

  Wendy felt a sensation at the back of her neck, as if someone or something was pressing on it, and her eyes widened. “You’re right. I was. But I can’t help it. Something keeps gnawing at me that this wasn’t a suicide, and I think you and the CID should go on that assumption, too.”

  “You know that’s not how we operate, unless there’s evidence to back us up. Right now, there’s not much more we can do. We have to go by what Tommy says. But since you’ll be doing this human-interest article, that gives you the perfect opportunity to interview the other newbies and see if anything significant or overlooked comes out of that.”

  Wendy smiled. “Which puts me right back where I left off. I’m headed to Lyndell’s office right now.”

  * * *

  The first thing that Wendy did when she returned to her cubicle at the Citizen was to text the other newbies the startling news about Aurelia. She’d accumulated all their numbers during the period she and Aurelia had been coordinating the bridge lesson, and she decided not to omit the missing Milton Bagdad. Perhaps the message would bring him out of hiding, wherever he was.

  Then, three words followed inside her head that made her shiver: if he’s alive. She took her time with the text and provided as much detail as she could—she had become quite accomplished at manipulating her thumbs without very many typos to exasperate her.

  Next, she covered all bases by sitting down with Lyndell in her editorial office and bringing her up to date on the suicide as well. After giving Lyndell a minute or so to digest the tragic news, she said, “How do you think this changes my assignment on the bridge newbies?”

  Lyndell answered quickly and with some authority. “Unfortunately, I think it would be in poor taste to do the bridge lesson article now that this suicide has occurred among your group. You can’t treat bridge lessons and a suicide as subjects of equal importance. A matter of life and death versus a card game? It’s simply no contest. They don’t belong in the same article. The two just don’t go together. They’ll have to be two separate articles.”

  Wendy could not disguise her disappointment, and there was a hint of an edge to her words. “Did Ross by any chance call you?”

  Lyndell gave her a curious stare. “No, as a matter of fact, he didn’t. But I gather from your question that he feels the same way that I do about the assignment. Do I read you right?”

  “Yes, you do.” Wendy was frustrated but pressed on. “It’s just that I have this gut feeling that won’t go away. The physical evidence regarding Aurelia Spangler’s death screams suicide, but I can’t get her positive attitude out of my head. She was just not the suicidal type.”

  Lyndell sat back in her chair and took her time before speaking. “I’ve been in this business long enough to know that people sometimes don’t behave according to type. You have the time-honored example of the serial killer that everybody says was a model citizen or was so friendly and helpful to the neighbors and that sort of thing. So-and-so would help little old ladies across the street or help weed flower beds and so forth. If you ask me, it has to do with their protective coloration and throwing people off their scent.”

  “You may be right,” Wendy said, putting the palm of her hand to her temple in contemplation. “They probably go out of their way to look like model citizens beyond reproach.”

  “Anyway,” Lyndell continued, “I think the same thing applies to some people who take their own lives. Friends and neighbors will say that whoever it was seemed perfectly normal and happy going about their daily routine. But deep inside, at that core where everybody truly lives all by themselves, something very wrong or wicked or intolerable was going on all the time. That you can never really know about sometimes until it’s just too late and you’re stuck with the gruesome headlines.”

  “I grant you that,” Wendy said, her tone less certain now. “Human nature is sometimes a great puzzle, and I understand what you’re saying about the article. I just wish there were some way that I could do my job without—”

  Wendy’s subdued, bell-like ringtone interrupted her train of thought. She leaned forward and picked up her cell on the edge of Lyndell’s desk, where she had put it when she first came in; then she glanced at it quickly and saw that it was a call from Vance Quimby.

  “Excuse me while I take this. It’s from one of my newbies. I’m sure it’s about Aurelia’s suicide.”

  Lyndell nodded and said, “Go right ahead and answer it, then. We’re almost through here.”

  Wendy was hardly prepared for the avalanche of anguished words that followed, however, once she had uttered a simple “hello” in normal, even tones, and Vance Quimby had hurriedly identified himself.

  “I have to talk to you right now, Wendy. I need to come over there and tell you what’s really been going on behind the scenes. Something has gone horribly wrong, and I don’t know how anyone found out. All I can tell you is that Aurelia could not have committed suicide. I know without a doubt that someone murdered her. I can’t go into why I know this right now, but I do. Once I give you the full story, you’ll understand the big picture. So, can you see me now at the paper? Can you make time for me? You just have to.”

  Wendy finally got in a word. “Yes, of course I can, but is this something you need to tell the police first? It sounds like it to me.”

  “Yes, I will go to them, but I want to run it all past you first. I’d feel better letting them in on it after you’ve heard it first—because I have a confession to make. Well, sort of.”

  Wendy tried to sound as calm and reassuring as possible, even though her insides were churning with excitement. “Of course, I’ll make time for you right now. Come right on over.”

  Lyndell broached the awkwardness that followed the end of the call. “Well, your side of the conversation certainly sounded intriguing. You should have seen some of the expressions on your face. It was like you were going through all the emotions as an acting exercise.”

  “I’ll bet I was convincing, too,” Wendy said, and then repeated the gist of the call to her. Both women sat in silence for a while, trying to piece things together. The word confession had them particularly intrigued. Was Vance Quimby going to confess to murdering Aurelia Spangler? Had he done something as horrendous as acting out his very own, original murder plot?

  Another call on Wendy’s phone startled them out of their conjectures, and Wendy shrugged at Lyndell with a hint of a smile. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this popular, but I’m equally sure it’s not for the right reasons.”

  This time the call was from Sarah Ann O’Rourke. As she prepared to answer, Wendy began to wonder what power she had unleashed with her texts. Did Sarah Ann have something she needed to get off her chest, too? Another confession, perhaps?

  “I’m shocked by Aurelia’s suicide,” Sarah Ann was saying, her voice a bit breathless.

  “But there’s something you need to know. It may or may not be of significance, but I have to get it out there. It’s about my mother. And please don’t ever tell her that I made this call to you. I’m not at home right now, or I’d never even risk this. I’m at the Student Union at the college, and I was wondering if we could meet in the food court and talk.”

  Wendy glanced at the time on her phone and wondered how long the meeting with Vance Quimby would last. Well, she could certainly control that, no matter what Vance had to reveal to her. Keeping a tight schedule came with being a reporter of any kind.

  “I have some business to conduct for about an hour here at the paper,” Wendy said. “But how about we meet at the food court around an hour and a half from now? Can you hang around that long, or would you rather come here?”

  Sarah Ann sounded agitated and stumbled over her words. “Well, I . . . guess I could come . . . no, it would be better if you came here. Mother . . . Mother doesn’t approve of you because you’re teaching me bridge . . . or at least you were before this happened. She says I should stay away from the paper as well. I hate to say it, but she has her spies around town who tell her where I go to eat and shop. It’s those church people of hers who quote Scripture in their letters to the editor on just about every subject under the sun. They’re like those old vinyl records where the needle would get stuck in one of the grooves. Just recently, there was this blues band playing at Smoot’s Grocery on Broad Street, and I wanted to see them, so I did just that. I’m twenty-one, you know, but I didn’t order any liquor because, well, I’m just not that interested. Of course, Mother’s always lecturing me about that, too—”

  Wendy decided to break in. “Listen, dear, I appreciate all the confidence you’ve put in me, but save something for our meeting. I’ll text you if it looks like I’m gonna be late, okay?”

  After the call had ended, Wendy brought Lyndell up to speed and then said, “I guess I should prepare myself to hear from Charlotte Ruth and Milton Bagdad, too. Well, I’ll tell you what I told Ross. I think this suicide is not what it appears to be, and these calls are only confirming my suspicions.”

  “Go with your gut,” Lyndell said with an encouraging smile. “It’s the nature of journalism.”

  CHAPTER 6

  Milton Bagdad threw his cell onto the unmade bed in the cheap motel room smelling of bug spray that he had rented near Rolling Fork in the Mississippi Delta. It also smelled of residual smoke, even though he had specifically asked for a nonsmoking room. He didn’t call the front desk and complain about it, though. His mind was on other things. The text he had received from Wendy Winchester a few minutes earlier made him more paranoid than ever. Was there truly a safe place to hide? Would his ultimate fate pursue him no matter where he went? Aurelia Spangler was gone now. Would he be next? He frowned and then shut his eyes tightly, as if that might protect him from whatever danger might be lurking out there. According to Aurelia’s vision, he should have been the one to go—and in brutal fashion at that. He was the one who wore the tuxedo shirts. He was the one who should have taken the knife. Still, he was perplexed. Wendy had said Aurelia’s death was due to an overdose of cocaine. What did that have to do with knives and tuxedo shirts? What alternate universe was he inhabiting now?

  He could not forget the look of pure terror in Aurelia’s eyes as she had revealed the crux of her vision involving him—against her better judgment, she had told him. Then she had said, “I’ve had these moments before, and frankly, they terrify me.” She had put the palm of her hand to her forehead as if her temperature were soaring to near-fatal heights.

  Taking a great gasp of air, she had said to him next, “I can’t see through to any more of this. The beginning and the end elude me, but I know this vision has both. And I can also tell you that there is so much deceit at the heart of this. I see the knife to the shirt materializing soon. It’s inevitable. Something has been set in motion that can’t be stopped. The upshot is that someone out there is beyond wicked, and no one has an inkling that they are. They don’t abide by the rules, and they don’t care. But I don’t have the ability to see this through. That’s been my dilemma for the longest time. I’m being totally honest with you now.”