Far From True

Fifty-five

The Chalmers-Duncomb-Blackmore triangle was starting to gel in Barry Duckworth’s mind. The three couples had been friends. Georgina Blackmore had been in Adam Chalmers’s car when the screen came down. The six of them were in some kind of group-sex lifestyle thing.

There was that room.

And, according to Cal Weaver, there were sex videos, which someone had spirited out of that house in a hurry after word spread that Adam and Miriam had been killed in an accident.

Except Miriam hadn’t been killed.

Not then.

But she’d been murdered since her return home. And it happened after Duckworth had delivered the news that she was still alive to Duncomb and Blackmore — who were busy having a DVD viewing fest when he’d arrived.

You didn’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to think all those things were connected.

Duncomb, Duckworth concluded, was one tough son of a bitch. But the professor wasn’t. He was the weak link. Duckworth figured if he could get that man alone in a room, he’d talk. If he didn’t confess to Miriam Chalmers’s murder himself, he’d point Duckworth in the right direction.

Plus, there was the ex-wife Felicia Chalmers. Cal had seen her parked down the street from the Chalmers home shortly before Miriam showed up.

Duckworth wondered what one called a group of suspects. It was a gaggle for geese. Herd for cows. Pack for wolves.

Too bad the collective for crows was a murder. It would be so appropriate here for suspects. A murder of suspects. But since that was taken, maybe a guilt of suspects. A suspicion of suspects.

Maybe he had more important things to think about.

When he got to Felicia Chalmers’s building, he buzzed her apartment from the lobby. When there was no answer, he hit the button for the superintendent. A short, dark-haired man in a checked shirt with rolled-up sleeves finally showed up. Once Duckworth had shown his ID, the man answered his questions.

“I think she works today,” he told Duckworth. “This is Tuesday, right? She gets Sunday, Monday off. If you think she’s done something wrong, I don’t think so. She’s good people. She never causes me any trouble.”

“You know where she works?”

“Nissan.”

“What?”

“Nissan dealer,” he said. “She sells cars.”

Duckworth headed for Promise Falls Nissan. He parked in the visitors’ area and entered the showroom, where new cars sparkled under the artificial light. He was barely three steps into the showroom when he was pounced upon by a young, eager-looking man in a blue suit.

“How can I help you today?” he said, flashing teeth with a game-show smile.

“I’m looking for Felicia Chalmers,” he said.

“Are you sure? Because if you’re looking to get into something new, I can certainly help you.”

“No, it’s Ms. Chalmers I want to see.”

The man’s face fell. He turned to a woman sitting behind the reception desk and said, “Can you help this guy find Felicia?” Dejected, he wandered off. The woman picked up her phone and instantly her voice could be heard throughout the building. “Felicia? Come to reception.”

Seconds later, Felicia Chalmers approached. She’d learned to smile at the same place as the other salesperson.

“You were looking for me?” she said, extending a hand.

“Barry Duckworth,” he said. “I wonder if I could talk to you.”

“Of course! Follow me to my office.”

It was actually a desk surrounded on three sides by gray-fabric-covered partitions. Felicia slipped in behind the desk and motioned to Duckworth to take a chair.

“So you’re looking to get a new car?” she asked.

“I’m afraid not,” he said.

“Oh. Well, if you’re looking for something previously owned, I could have you talk to Gary, but lease payments are so reasonable, it’s not hard to get into something new and not have to worry about—”

“I’m with the Promise Falls police.” He flashed his ID for the second time in less than an hour. “I’m a detective.”

“Oh! I see. If this is about the car that went missing, you should really be talking to the manager.”

“A missing car?”

“It was weeks ago. Someone took an Xterra out for a test-drive and never came back. He showed us a driver’s license, but it turned out to be bogus.”

“That’s not why I’m here.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“I want to ask why you were parked out front of your ex-husband’s house last night.”

She couldn’t have looked any more stunned if he’d stood up and dropped his pants in front of her.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Last night. You were seen parked in your car near the home of Adam and Miriam Chalmers. I’d like to ask you about that.”

“Uh, I was just... sitting there is all.”

“Why?”

“Well... you know he died, right?”

“Yes, I do.”

“And I guess I was feeling — I don’t know — a little sad. Thinking about our life together. I was out driving and I went by the house where I once had a life with him. Is there a law against that? This has been kind of an upsetting time for me.”

“And yet here you are at work, only a couple of days later.”

“What am I supposed to do? Sit around at home and mope? Look, Adam was an okay guy, and I feel sick about what happened, but you have to move on, you know?”

Duckworth asked, “What time did you get there? Last night.”

She shook her head. “I don’t even know. Maybe eight or nine? Maybe a little after that?”

“Did you get out of your car? Did you go up to the house? Knock on the door?”

“No.”

“What time did you leave?”

Felicia thought. “This man came by — he’s a detective? He’d been out to see me yesterday morning. Weaver? He came by and saw me, and that was when I left.” A lightbulb went off. “Hang on, is he the one who told you I was there?”

“You didn’t go back?”

“What’s this about?” she asked. “So what if I went out there?” When Duckworth didn’t answer right away, she said, “Look, I’ll level with you.”

He sat up in his chair. “Okay.”

“I’ve been telling my lawyer I should be entitled to something as Adam’s only surviving ex, to some kind of claim on the estate. He says it’ll go to the daughter, but there has to be a loophole somewhere, right? I mean, we were still in touch. I gave him emotional support. Right? So I was kind of checking out the neighborhood, seeing if there were houses for sale. Then I was going to look them up online, see what they were going for. I mean, I don’t know what Adam might have left. In terms of an estate, you know? He kind of went through money. But just in case, I wanted to—”

Duckworth leaned forward. “You didn’t see Miriam Chalmers arrive home last night? You’d left by then?”

Felicia’s mouth opened, but it took a few seconds for her to find the words she wanted to say. Turned out to be only one: “What?”

“Last night, did you witness Miriam Chalmers return home?”

“What — what are you talking about? Miriam’s dead. She died in the accident with Adam.”

“Miriam wasn’t killed in the drive-in bombing.”

“Oh no,” Felicia said.

“Oh no?”

She tried to recover. “I mean, wow. I had no idea she was alive. But wasn’t someone killed in the car with Adam? They said someone was with him.”

“Someone was. But it wasn’t Miriam.”

“Who?”

“Do you know someone named Georgina Blackmore?”

Felicia shook her head. “Georgina? I think Adam might have mentioned her, but... holy shit. This changes everything. I’m going to have to call my lawyer, tell him... I can’t believe this.” She cleared her throat, shuffled some car brochures on her desk, raised her head, an actress getting ready to shift roles. “Well, then, my heart goes out to Miriam. What a terrible tragedy for her. But at least she’s okay. So, maybe I’m not Adam’s only surviving ex-wife. And that’s fine. I probably wasn’t entitled to anything anyway. Not that this is about me.”

She went to reach for the desk phone, then pulled her hand back. “I don’t understand why you’re here. What difference does it make where I was parked or what I was doing last night?”

“Did you see anyone else, other than Mr. Weaver, last night, around the Chalmers home?”

“No. No one. What is going on?”

“You’re still Adam’s only surviving ex-wife,” Duckworth told her. “I wouldn’t call off your lawyer just yet. There may still be a silver lining in this for you.”