Death In Duplicate

TWENTY-EIGHT

HE WAS SCREWED AND HE KNEW IT. THIS PLACE MADE Perry Island Care Center look like Canyon Ranch. The pay was rotten, the staff incompetent, the management only interested in making a profit. The residents… He couldn’t help himself; he woke up in the middle of the night worrying about the residents. Not that they were worth it. Poor and old and boring. Maybe they’d be better off dead. He sure hoped he didn’t end up like them, all alone in a rotten nursing home.

Susan stopped at Kathleen’s house only long enough to say hello to Jerry’s parents before heading straight home. Chrissy was walking out the door as she turned into the driveway.

“Have to run, Mom,” her daughter called out without slowing down. “I’m meeting Erika and I’m fifteen minutes late!” She climbed into her car and had the key in the ignition before her mother could protest.

“Where are the twins? And Shannon?”

“The babies are in the nursery and Shannon is in the kitchen. Everything’s fine.” Chrissy waved out of the window of her car and backed down the driveway.

Susan parked her car in the garage and used the connecting door to enter the house. Shannon was, in fact, in the kitchen, skimming through one of Susan’s favorite cookbooks as she ate her lunch. The baby monitor sat on the table next to an almost empty soup bowl.

Shannon looked up when Susan entered the room. “Hi. There’s still some tomato soup left if you would like some.”

“No, thanks. I’ve already eaten.” Susan wasn’t sure whether to mention P.I.C.C. or not.

“The babies are both bathed and are sleeping. Chrissy and I didn’t know if you had any plans, but we thought I could make dinner tonight. I do a wonderful chicken and chickpea tagine that she and Stephen like. Except for couscous and chicken thighs, you had all the ingredients here. I dashed out earlier and got what I needed. I hope it’s okay with you.”

Susan smiled. “I don’t know a single woman who wouldn’t be thrilled to have someone cook dinner for her. Perhaps I could whip up something for dessert.”

“Sounds great to me, but Chrissy is trying to lose weight.”

“I’ll do fruit in brandy. There’s Ben & Jerry’s vanilla in the freezer. Chrissy can skip the ice cream if she’s worried about calories, and the men can have double scoops. You, too,” she added glancing over at Shannon ’s slender figure.

“I’ve been thin since my first year of nursing school. You burn lots of calories being a nurse.” Shannon got up to put her empty bowl in the dishwasher.

“Even in a nursing home?” Susan asked. She removed her jacket, draped it on a chair, opened the refrigerator, and began pulling fruit out and placing it on a nearby counter.

“Especially in a nursing home. When people are in wheelchairs someone else has to do their walking for them. When I was growing up, my mother used to say that taking care of people at the beginning and the end of their lives is some of the hardest work there is-as well as the most rewarding.”

“And you’ve done both,” Susan said, examining a quart of blueberries for any signs of mold. “Which do you prefer?”

Shannon seemed to consider the question seriously. “I’m not sure. Old people… well, I always planned on working with old people. But taking care of babies is wonderful.”

“Rosie and Ethan are your second job with babies?” Susan asked, picking up a pineapple and breathing in its tangy scent.

“Yes. They’re so adorable and this job is a dream-nice family, nice home. What more could anyone ask for.”

“Cookies?” Susan muttered, opening a cupboard door.

Shannon looked startled. “Cookies?”

“They would go well with the fruit and ice cream and I know the men would love some. I was just wondering if I had some stashed away. But no. When I buy them, I eat them.”

“I’m the same way,” Shannon admitted. “But we could bake some. Brownies are quick.”

“Good idea. I use the basic Joy of Cooking recipe and add a half teaspoon of almond extract.”

“Yummy. My favorite brownie recipe has a layer of raspberry jam in the chocolate.”

“That sounds wonderful.”

“It might be interesting to combine recipes. You know, make the brownies with almond extract the way you usually do and then add a layer of raspberry jam. If you have jam.”

Susan reached up and opened a cupboard high over her coffeepot. “I always have jam,” she explained as about a half dozen jars were revealed. “I buy it, but no one in the family has time for breakfast these days, so it just hangs around.” She pulled down a crock of French raspberry jam. “I think this will do.”

Shannon nodded and the women got busy.

Susan had forgotten how comforting it was to share the kitchen with another person who enjoys cooking. They discussed ingredients, recipes, family favorites, nothing of any importance to anyone who didn’t share their enthusiasm. Susan forgot her quandary over whether to tell Shannon of the morning spent at P.I.C.C. when the twins woke up and decided that nothing would do except for them to join their grandmother and nurse in the kitchen.

When Chrissy walked into the kitchen two hours later, the babies were perched on the table in their baby seats, surrounded by a tray of cooling brownies and a crystal bowl of fruit, sugared, brandied, and sprinkled with fresh mint leaves. (Rosie had grabbed a spray of mint and waved it around for a bit, much to the delight of the women.) An exotic combination of cinnamon, cardamom, cumin, coriander, and vanilla emanated from the oven where the chicken tagine was beginning its long, slow baking. Shannon was playing “this little piggy” with Ethan’s toes, much to his sister’s delight, and Susan was filling the dishwasher with dirty crockery.

“Mother, I thought you were going to go to that place on Perry Island today. Stephen said you told him you might be back late. That’s why I thought Shannon could cook dinner for us all,” Chrissy commented, brushing an imaginary lock of hair off her daughter’s forehead.

Susan glanced over at Shannon who had stopped wiping strawberry pulp off the cutting board and was staring at her. “Actually I was there. Kathleen and I went over this morning,” she admitted.

“Did you find what you wanted? Stephen said you told him that Kathleen was looking for a cottage to rent this summer vacation.”

“Yes. She is.”

Chrissy continued her questions, oblivious to the change of mood in the room. “Did she find a place?”

“She spoke with the real estate agent there and there are a few possibilities,” Susan answered. Shannon had picked up the sponge again and was scrubbing with more energy than necessary to do the job.

“That’s interesting. Oh, I think Ethan needs changing. I’ll take him upstairs. Maybe you could bring up Rosie when you’re done there, Shannon?”

“Of course. I should only be a few minutes.”

Susan waited until her daughter’s footsteps could no longer be heard on the stairs before turning to Shannon. “I was going to tell you,” she began.

“Tell me what? You have every right to go out to Perry without letting me know about it.”

“But I’m trying to help,” Susan explained. “As long as the person who killed the residents of P.I.C.C. is at large, you and your cousin will be suspects.”

“Are you trying to solve those murders? I thought you and your friend were helping the police figure out who killed your neighbor’s family.” Shannon picked tiny pieces off the edge of the sponge as she spoke.

“Yes, but I’m looking into both Nadine’s and Blaine’s lives and there is a connection to Perry Island. And, maybe even your cousin.”

“Mike! That isn’t possible. Mike worked at P.I.C.C., but that’s all. He’s not related to P.I.C.C.”

“Contrary to what you think, he may have been staying in a house that the Baineses own on the island when he ‘disappeared.’ ”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

Shannon carefully placed the now mutilated sponge down on the sink and turned to look at Susan. “If I could get Mike to talk to you-”

“That would be incredible! He may be the only person who can answer some of the questions I have.”

“If I can get him to talk to you, will you have to tell your friend the police chief about it?”

“Do you think you could convince him to talk to me?”

“You didn’t answer my question. Would you have to tell the police chief if you talk to Mike?”

“Ah… To tell you the truth, I should, but Brett…”

“Is a cop who is looking for a killer and who will probably be thrilled to have someone turn an ex-junkie over to him as a possible suspect.”

“That’s not true,” Susan protested. “Brett isn’t like that. He’s fair and honest and caring and-”

“And investigating a double murder.”

“Yes, but he’s not going to arrest the first suspect he finds. If Mike is innocent, he doesn’t have anything to worry about,” Susan said.

“But he won’t arrest Mike if he doesn’t know about him,” Shannon said reasonably. “And if he’s only investigating the murders next door, he won’t know anything at all about Mike.”

Susan, who knew this wasn’t true, didn’t say anything immediately. Carefully covering the fruit salad with Saran Wrap, she placed it in the refrigerator and then turned back to Shannon. “I can’t keep anything from Brett that might help him discover the identity of a murderer. It would be illegal.” She wasn’t really sure whether this was true or not. “But there are a lot of things about the situation out at P.I.C.C. that Mike might know-and no one else. Talking to him would be a real help.”

Shannon stared down into the sink. “I’m not sure he’ll even call me back if I leave a message on his phone.”

“But you could try! You could tell him that it’s important, that I’m trying to help.”

“I know that, but… I don’t know how to explain…”

Susan waited quietly for Shannon to continue.

“I love my cousin,” she began slowly. “I’m an only child and Mike is, too. He’s younger than I am and we didn’t have a whole lot in common when we were growing up. But when Mike was thirteen, his father died and his mother began to depend on my parents more and more. They spent time together and Mike and I did, too. We became close in some ways, but not in others.”

“Sounds a little like my kids. Chrissy’s brother is very different than she is, but they’ve become closer as they got older.”

“He has the room she’s painting in, right?”

“Yes.”

“Where is he now?”

“At school. He’s a senior at Cornell.”

“Oh, well, Mike didn’t have a lot of interest in school. He did a lot of stupid things after his dad died.”

“But you said he had cleaned up his act.”

“Yes, I think so, but…” She shrugged.

“You never really know, right?”

“Right. I worry about him. He’s grown up so much, but still… He’s young and he’s made a lot of mistakes, and he doesn’t handle pressure well.”

“But if all this could be cleared up. If I can figure out who killed Nadine and Blaine and what was going on at the Perry Island Care Center, it would take the pressure off him.”

“That’s true.”

Susan was glad Shannon agreed rather than asking her just how she was going to perform this particular series of miracles.