Dirty Tricks: A Kate Lawrence Mystery Read online

  I checked my watch. “And you made it all the way to ten forty-five? You’re made of sterner stuff than I am, May.” I filled a mug for each of us and led the way down the six stairs from the lobby level to our sunny little office at the rear of the building. “Margo and Strutter are out at the moment, so I need to stay close to the phone,” I explained as I settled May on our small sofa, her coffee beside her. She looked around with interest at the large desk holding my laptop computer, two visitors’ chairs, and a wall of three-drawer file cabinets that constituted the rest of the room’s furnishings. The autumn sunshine spilling through the rear windows enlivened the colors of the Amish quilt hanging on the remaining wall. They were echoed in the late blooms from Strutter’s garden, casually arranged in a pewter vase on the corner of the desk.

  “Cheerful but not too girlie,” May approved. “I can see why you like the coziness of this space. The upstairs is very attractive, of course, but it’s just a bit echo-y and intimidatin’. This is much nicer.” She reached for her coffee and took a greedy swig.

  I knew what she meant. The lobby on the main floor of the building known as the Law Barn had once housed several paralegals, as well as a receptionist and a comfortably furnished client waiting area, during the real estate boom of the 1990s. The collapse of that market in 2009 had forced the temporary closing of many local businesses, including Mack Realty. We’d been fortunate to be able to reclaim a portion of our old digs when the market improved a couple of years after that.

  “We’re probably another year from being able to hire a receptionist,” I told May now, “but things are getting better month by month. We’re hopeful. By the way, how are things coming along with the renovations on your new place?”

  May put her empty mug on the side table and passed one impeccably manicured hand over her forehead. “I’m sure everything will be just lovely when it’s done, but my dear, the noise. I simply had no idea. What with the hammers and saws and drills and what have you, there’s not a moment’s peace. I don’t know what made me think I’d be able to work in that racket, not to mention how distracting those good lookin’ construction workers are,” she finished with a wink.

  No question about it, I thought. This woman is clearly Margo’s blood relative.

  “The truth is, that’s why I’ve come to see you today, to cast myself upon your mercy.” She leaned forward, and I could see traces of fatigue around her eyes. “I must have a place to work for a week or two until things settle down at my house. Margo and her adorable hubby offered me their guest room, of course, but I think that might be pushin’ the limits of family affection to the straining point. In any event, I don’t need a place to sleep. Those boys do put down their noisemakers and go home by suppertime, thank heaven. It would just be for a few hours during the day, and Margo mentioned you had an extra room here somewhere.” She paused hopefully.

  For a moment I couldn’t think what she meant. Then I remembered the small office next to the coffee-copier room on the main floor. During the first year of Mack Realty’s existence, it had been occupied by a chatty mortgage broker who’d spent most of her time on the phone. A California native, she couldn’t adjust to our variable New England climate and soon departed, leaving the office vacant. It wasn’t long before our files containing the staggering amount of paperwork required for real estate transactions spilled into the space. Neatly labeled cabinets now lined two interior walls, and office supplies occupied shelves on part of the third, but a desk and chair remained in the room, and a large window overlooked the Law Barn’s tiny back lawn, taken up mostly by a comfortable pen for Margo’s devoted Labrador Retriever, Rhett Butler. Not wanting to commit myself before talking it over with my partners, I stalled for time.

  “What kind of work do you do?” I inquired, wondering in what kind of cottage industry this genteel, mature woman might be engaged. Rare book searches? Geneology research? “I don’t recall Margo saying specifically, just that it involves a lot of computer work—but what doesn’t these days?”

  “I’m a writer, dear. Cozy mystery novels. I do the Ariadne Merriwether series, have for years. There are eleven titles in the series now about an elderly snoop in a Florida retirement community. Frankly, she’s kind of an annoyin’ busybody, but for some reason, we old ladies seem to like readin’ about other old ladies.” She laughed merrily and shrugged.

  I laughed along with her. “Well, if they’re still reading after eleven titles, you must be doing something right. Is it hard to think up new story lines?”

  “Oh, goodness no. There’s always something new to say about human relationships, which is a good thing, because when you’re a midlist author with a successful series, you need to produce a new book every so often. I’d hate to disappoint my readers. Ariadne is almost a real person to them and to me now. I love her to death, but to tell you the truth, she does get on my nerves sometimes.” Here May lowered her voice conspiratorially. “Fortunately, I have an alter ego, so I can take a break. She’s quite a bit younger than I am, and her interests are, shall we say, accordingly age appropriate.”

  I wasn’t following. “An alter ego? You mean like that little boy’s mom in the comic strip, Rose something, the cheerful suburban wife and mother who occasionally morphs into a biker babe?”

  Again the tinkling laugh. “You’ve got it, but in my case, I turn into M.M. Farnsworth, the publisher of a whole different kind of books.”

  I tried to fathom what the antithesis would be of cozy mysteries set in a retirement home. “What makes them so different? Are they how-to manuals? Cookbooks? Sado-masochistic pornography?” I joked.

  “Goodness, no,” May protested. “I could never advocate violence of any kind in my writin’ or my publishing. I feel very strongly about that.” A sly grin crept over her face. “But you’re getting warmer.”

  I blinked at her suspiciously. “What kind of books do you publish exactly, May?”

  She looked right and left, assuring herself that we were alone in the office before gazing at me appraisingly. “I’ll tell you, because you’re Margo’s best friend and business partner, but you must never breathe a word outside this room. Fans of my mystery series would be appalled, not to mention my new Yankee neighbors. Pinky swear?”

  I nodded mutely, hoping I wasn’t about to have my suspicions confirmed.

  May twinkled at me gently. “Romance novels, dear, the most delicious, sexy stuff you can imagine. I publish an entire line of traditional and erotic romances under the imprint of Romantic Nights Press,” she giggled. “People just love ‘em. I swear it’s like printing money in my basement.”

  “You’ve been holding out on me.” I glared at Margo over the rim of my wineglass, and she had the grace to look abashed. She and Strutter were already seated in our regular booth when I arrived at Village Pizza, our have-dinner-and-catch-up place on occasional weeknights when the demands of our various husbands and, in Strutter’s case, kids permitted.

  “I had it on the agenda for tonight’s get-together to let you know May might drop by lookin’ for me, but I had no idea it would be today, and I didn’t know until about ten minutes ago she planned to ask you about sharin’ the Law Barn.” Margo pouted her perfect lips into a sorry face and tucked a strand of blonde hair back into her chignon.

  “Your aunt wants office space at the Law Barn?” Strutter asked, puzzled. “I thought she wrote her mystery books on a home computer.” Her aquamarine eyes lifted briefly from the menu she was studying, as if we all didn’t know it by heart, and I enjoyed the impact of the Jamaican beauty’s milk chocolate skin framed by soft curls falling to her shoulders, as everyone who looked at her did.

  “Yes, yes, but never mind that. She’s welcome to the desk in that old office next to the coffee room if she wants it for a while, but you’re not going to believe what she plans to do there.”

  “Oh, dear,” Margo murmured and took a swig of her own wine. “Did Auntie May say a little more than she should have about her work this mornin
’?”

  “Uh huh,” I said drily, “you could say that. I almost fell on the floor, and I was sitting down at the time.”

  Strutter frowned, erasing her dazzling dimples. “Damn, I guess that optometrist was right about my needing reading glasses. I can hardly make out this menu. What are you talking about, Kate? Doesn’t Maybelle Farnsworth write the Ariadne Merriwether mysteries? My mom just loves them.”

  I raised an eyebrow at Margo. “Are you going to tell her, or do you want me to do it?”

  Margo squirmed uncomfortably. “Oh, my goodness, you’re makin’ a big deal out of nothin’ at all. Romance novels are very big business in the publishin’ world today. Some of them can be pretty tacky, I admit, but it’s not as if erotica is illegal or anything.”

  Strutter’s expression changed from curious to alarmed. “Erotica? My mother is reading pornography?”

  I couldn’t help giggling a little. “No, silly. Your mother’s virtue remains unsullied. The Ariadne Merriwether mysteries are perfectly tame, no sex, no violence, but Margo’s dear old Auntie May has a secret second vocation as M. M. Farnsworth, the publisher of romance novels and, uh, romantic erotica. At least that’s what she calls it. I haven’t read any of her titles personally.”

  Margo visibly relaxed. “Lots of Auntie’s titles are the usual bodice rippers and light romantic fluff—you know, what you expect when you think of a romance novel. But unlike you, I have read some of the more stimulatin’ titles she publishes, and whooeeee! There’s one author named Naughty Nanette who could give E.L. James and Sylvia Day a run for their money anytime, and her novels are a whole lot more reasonably priced. You should try one. Better yet, you gals and your hubbies should try readin’ one together.” She grinned at us across the table. “I’ll suggest a couple.”

  I chuckled, imagining my Armando’s reaction if I ever attempted such a thing, while Strutter struggled to make sense of Margo’s revelation about her aunt. Her eyes darted from one of us to the other, food forgotten for the moment.

  “Wait a minute now. Are we talking about the same Maybelle Farnsworth who just moved up here from Atlanta and bought that little house on Wheeler Road, the one that’s being updated with new kitchen cabinets and bathroom fixtures?”

  “And wirin’ and plumbin’ and a gas fireplace log, not to mention having a wall or two knocked out to open up the first floor. Yes, that’s my Auntie May,” Margo confirmed. “I tried to tell her there was no way she was going to be able to work there during the day with all the construction noise, but she insisted she could just shut herself up in her bedroom with her laptop, and she’d be fine.”

  “But, but …” Strutter spluttered, “she’s over seventy years old, isn’t she? Are you seriously telling me that a woman of her age is spending her days writing sexy novels?”

  “Not writin’ them, publishin’ them. They’re written by other people. It’s a very lucrative market these days, especially with the success of Fifty Shades of Grey and its sequels. What with Kindles and Nooks and all sorts of other electronic readin’ devices, people can read whatever they want in complete privacy with nobody the wiser. You can even read right on your desktop computer without your boss knowin’ a thing about it.”

  “Is that how you while away the hours at Vista View?” I twitted her. “And all this time I thought you were playing Solitaire while you warmed the chair at the sales desk.” Vista View was a local retirement community represented by Mack Realty. My partners and I each put in one six-hour stint a week at the sales desk in the lobby, fielding inquiries and handing out promotional literature to visitors. Business isn’t steady, so we all depend on our laptops for entertainment. That was especially true now that our longtime friend, Ginny Preston, had retired as Vista View’s business manager and moved south with her husband to be closer to their grown son. Without Ginny to lunch with, the Vista View days had grown long and rather dull.

  “The chair hasn’t been the only thing gettin’ warm, Sugar. If I weren’t already havin’ hot flashes, those Naughty Nannette titles would sure do the trick,” Margo teased me right back. “Anyway, is May takin’ us up on the offer of the spare desk at the Law Barn?”

  “Sure is. I told her I needed to be sure it was all right with both of you and the landlord, but I was fairly certain it wouldn’t be a problem. She practically leaped at the opportunity, poor thing. She looked absolutely frazzled. She’ll be with us tomorrow morning, says all she needs is her laptop, internet access and her cell phone, and she can do business anywhere.”

  “Huh, shades of Millie Haines,” Strutter commented, referring to the mortgage broker who had occupied that space before decamping to return to her native California. “I guess it’s true that you can do business almost anywhere these days. When we had to leave the Law Barn and work out of our houses for a couple of years, I don’t think most people were even aware of the change.” Her dimples reappeared suddenly, and she threw her head back and guffawed. “An erotic romance publisher in Old Wethersfield! The founding fathers will be spinning in the churchyard for sure.”

  “Not to mention a few of our present day citizens,” I agreed. “Those puritanical instincts run deep, so if we want to continue to attract customers, I think we’d best keep May’s alternate job description to ourselves. By the way, I never got a chance to ask you why your aunt moved to Connecticut. She was born and raised in the South, wasn’t she?”

  “Born and raised, yes, but she hasn’t spent her whole life in Georgia,” Margo filled us in. “Uncle Douglas was quite the economics guru and spent, oh, eight or ten years, I guess it was, teaching at Yale University, when he wasn’t flying around the world to give seminars in Tokyo or Abu Dhabi or some such, so Auntie May is no stranger to Connecticut. That’s probably why her southern drawl isn’t as pronounced as mine.”

  “As if you don’t turn that on and off like a faucet. Did they divorce, or is May a widow?” Strutter asked.

  “My uncle died in 1995, very suddenly of a major stroke right in the middle of a lecture he was givin’ to a graduate seminar. It was a fine way to go, actually, doin’ what he loved to do, but May and I were just devastated. He was the big brother I adored, and May was somethin’ between a mama and a big sister to me.”

  “They didn’t have children of their own?” I wanted to know.

  “They didn’t, more by choice than anything, since Uncle Doug was always circumnavigatin’ the world, and Auntie May enjoyed being the perfect wife, hostess and companion when she wasn’t solving the social problems of Atlanta as a volunteer dynamo, and she took me right along with her.” She smiled fondly. “Why, I can remember her climbin’ up into a big ol’ sycamore tree some developer was threatening to cut down to make room for one more tacky condominium on his parcel of land. She boosted me up ahead of her, and the two of us just sat there on a comfy branch, singing songs and watchin’ the crowd gather until somebody got around to callin’ the local newspaper. When she saw the van pull up with a reporter and a photographer, Auntie whipped a compact out of the pocket of her pedal pushers—that’s what we called capris back then—and fixed her face real quick before givin’ those folks an earful about longevity and respect and the rights of other living things on this planet. I remember thinking she was just about the finest woman I’d ever known or would know.”

  “What happened?” Strutter and I demanded simultaneously, snapping Margo back into the present.

  “Oh! She got a round of applause and her picture in the evenin’ edition, and the developer agreed to leave that old sycamore tree right where it was,” Margo reported triumphantly, “and then we went home and cooked Uncle Doug’s supper.”

  We all smiled at the story. “Well, I think she’s absolutely charming. Obviously, she figured out another kind of life for herself after your uncle’s death and has made a success of that, too, however unconventional it may be. As far as the good folks of Wethersfield need to know, Maybelle Farnsworth is the author of genteel mystery novels, nothing more. Some thi
ngs don’t need to be common knowledge,” I concluded.

  “Don’t worry, I don’t even plan to tell J.D., and can you imagine how Charlie would take this news?” Strutter assured us, referring to her husband and teenage son.

  “It’ll be our dirty little secret, Sugar, no pun intended,” Margo agreed, and we all turned our attention to the pasta specials.

  Despite our lengthy perusal of the menu, we wound up ordering our usual favorites: cod fillets for me, pasta primavera for Strutter, and homestyle lasagna for Margo, who, annoyingly enough, never seemed to gain an ounce. After we placed our order, we continued sharing the details of our day.

  “How did things go at Vista View?” I asked Margo, who had taken her shift at the sales desk. “Wasn’t today the first day for Ginny’s replacement?”

  “As a matter of fact, it was. Isabelle Marchand is the name. I didn’t have an opportunity to say more than hello and good luck, but I can tell this lady is about as different from Ginny as she could possibly be.”

  “In what way? All young and perky and annoying, I suppose,” said Strutter. “Even the optometrist I saw this morning looked about twelve years old.”

  Margo chuckled. “That’s because you just turned fifty. As I recall, that’s when even the new cops at the P.D. started lookin’ too young to be trusted with firearms, so get used to it.”

  Margo’s husband John was the head of the Wethersfield Police Department’s homicide division, so she knew whereof she spoke.

  “Anyway, this Marchand gal is definitely not young and perky. She’s probably a few years younger than Ginny, but she doesn’t seem to have Ginny’s spark. All business, you know? Kind of a loner. I don’t think our relationship is going to be warm and fuzzy. She’ll probably want a spreadsheet on her desk every mornin’ even if there aren’t any sales or rentals to report.”