Big Boned Read online

  “Oh.” She wanted to see his apartment? Why? “It’s just down the block…”

  “I wonder if you can help me, then, Heather…” For the first time, I noticed Pam was carting a wheelie suitcase behind her, and had one of those quilted overnight bags in a red and white floral pattern slung over one shoulder. “Surely you would know.” Her wide, friendly face—not pretty, exactly, and completely makeup free, but certainly pleasant-looking—was creased with concern. “Since you worked with Owen…Has anyone been giving Garfield his pills?”

  “Uh…” I’d exchanged puzzled looks with Tom. “Who, ma’am?”

  “Garfield.” Dr. Veatch’s ex had looked at us like we were morons. “Owen’s cat.”

  Owen had a cat? Owen owned—had made himself responsible for—another life? Granted of the four-legged variety—but still. It was true, of course, that Owen had been fond of the cartoon Garfield, to a degree none of the rest of us could understand.

  But that he’d kept a cat, in his apartment? Owen, the driest, least warm person I had ever met, had owned a PET?

  I’d had no idea.

  It changed my perception of Owen. I’ll admit it. It sounds stupid, but it’s true: It made me like him more.

  Well, okay: It made me like him, at all.

  I guess my surprise must have shown on my face, since Pam, looking horrified, had cried, “You mean the poor thing hasn’t had any food or water since yesterday? He’s got thyroid disease! He needs a pill daily!”

  I’d walked her to Dr. Veatch’s apartment myself while Tom scooted back to our office to hold down the fort. Then I’d waited with her for the building super, gone with her to the apartment, helped her with the key (the locks in these old buildings can be tricky), and waited tensely while she’d called, “Garfield! Garfield? Here, puss, puss.”

  The cat had been fine, of course. A big, menacing orange thing, just like its namesake, it had needed only a can (well, okay, two) of food, some water, and a tiny white pill—kept in a prescription bottle Pam seemed to have no trouble finding, in a decorative blue and white sugar bowl that matched all the other china in the hutch in Owen’s dining room cabinet—before it was good as new, purring and contented in Pam’s lap.

  Not knowing what else to do, I’d left her there. The cat seemed to know her, and, well, whatever, it wasn’t like Dr. Veatch needed the place anymore. Obviously the president’s office would reassign the apartment to someone in good time. But Pam clearly loved the cat, and somebody needed to take care of it. So it seemed logical to leave her there with it.

  And it wasn’t like Simon Hague was going to let her bring it into Wasser Hall. I knew Simon and his pet unfriendly policies (I myself have been known to turn a blind eye to the occasional kitten or iguana, so long as all room and suitemates were amenable to the situation, and I didn’t get a call from a parent complaining later on). I wouldn’t have put it past Simon to have refused Pam entrance into his building if she’d been carting Garfield along with her, pet of recently murdered former staff member or no.

  No, Pam and Owen’s cat were fine as—and where—they were.

  Though I figured a well-placed call to Detective Canavan, just to make sure his detectives were finished going through Owen’s personal things, wouldn’t hurt.

  By the time I got back to Fischer Hall, left the message with Detective Canavan, and remembered Gavin, he’d hung up.

  But it isn’t, I find, when I finally get through to the Rock Ridge Police Department, like there’s more than one prisoner at the jail there. Or more than one police officer I have to get through in order to speak to the chief, either. Henry T. O’Malley, the chief of police himself, in fact, answers on the first ring.

  “Is this the Heather Wells?” he wants to know. “The same one my kid made me listen to over and over about ten years ago, until I thought I would go mental and shoot myself under the chin with my own weapon?”

  I ignore the question and instead ask one of my own. “May I inquire as to why you are holding Gavin McGoren in your town’s jail, sir?”

  “‘Every time I see you, I get a Sugar Rush,’” he sings. Not badly, for a nonprofessional. “‘You’re like candy. You give me a Sugar Rush.’”

  “Whatever he did,” I say, “I’m sure he didn’t mean it. He just gets a little overexcited sometimes. He’s only twenty-one.”

  “Trespassing on private property,” Chief O’Malley reads aloud from what I assume is Gavin’s arrest report. “Breaking and entering…although between you and me, that one’ll probably be dropped. It’s not breaking if someone opens the window for you, and it’s not entering if you’re invited, whatever the girl’s father wants to believe. Oh, and public urination. He’s going to have a hard time getting out of that one. Unzipped right in front of me—”

  Unbelievably, in the background, I can hear Gavin yelling, “I told you I had to go!”

  “You simmer down back there,” the chief yells back, seemingly over his shoulder. I have to hold the phone away from my face in order to keep my eardrum from being broken. “You’re just lucky it was me who answered the call and not one of the Staties, or you’d be sitting over in the Westchester lockup. You think they’d have brought you coffee and waffles for breakfast this morning, huh? Do you? With real fresh-squeezed orange juice?”

  In the background, I hear Gavin grudgingly admit, “No.”

  “Then remember yourself,” Chief O’Malley advises him. “Now,” he says, into the phone. “Where were we? Oh, yes. ‘Sugar Rush. Don’t tell me stay on my diet. You have simply got to try it.’ The words are forever imprinted in my memory. My daughter sang them morning, noon, and night. For two years.”

  “Sorry about that,” I say. Seriously, why do I always get the sarcastic and jaded law enforcement officers, and never the sweet, enthusiastic ones? Are there any sweet, enthusiastic ones? “So how much is his bail?”

  “Let me see,” Chief O’Malley says, shuffling through the papers on his desk, while in the background, I could hear Gavin yelling, “Can I talk to her, please? You said I get one phone call. Well, I never got my phone call, because I never actually got to talk to her. So could I please talk to her? Could you let me out of here so I could talk to her, please? Please?”

  “Mr. McGoren is being held on five thousand dollars bail,” Chief O’Malley says, finally, in response to my question.

  “Five thousand dollars?” My voice rises to such a squeak that I see Tom’s head appear around the doorway, his eyebrows raised questioningly. “For trespassing? And public urination?”

  “And breaking and entering,” Chief O’Malley reminds me.

  “You said those charges would be dropped!”

  “But they haven’t yet.”

  “That…that…” I can’t breathe. “That’s highway robbery!”

  “We’re a simple little town, Ms. Wells,” Chief O’Malley says. “We don’t see much crime. When we do, we hit it. Hard. We have to maintain certain standards to ensure that we stay a simple little town.”

  “Where am I going to get five thousand dollars?” I wail.

  “I suggested Mr. McGoren phone his parents,” Chief O’Malley says. “But for reasons he is reluctant to share with me, he preferred to call you.”

  “Just let me TALK to her!” Gavin shouts, in the background.

  “Was it Jamie Price’s parents?” I ask. “Who called you? It was her house you found him in?”

  “I am not at liberty to discuss the details of Mr. McGoren’s case with you at this time,” Chief O’Malley says. “But yes. And,” he goes on, a bit primly, “I would like to add that he was not fully clothed at the time of my apprehending him, when he was, in fact, crawling out of the younger Ms. Price’s bedroom window. And I don’t mean when he unzipped to relieve himself, either. That was later.”

  “Hey!” I hear Gavin protest.

  “Oh God.” I drop my head to my desk. I do not need this. On today of all days. I can hear, off in the distance, the protesters outside chanting,
“What do we want? Health benefits for all! When do we want them? Now!”

  “Tell him I’ll be there as soon as I can,” I say.

  “Take your time,” Chief O’Malley says cheerfully. “I’m enjoying the company. It’s not often I get anyone sober in here, much less college-educated. For lunch I’m thinking about picking up chicken wings.” Then he holds the phone away from his mouth for a moment and calls to Gavin, “Hey, kid. You’re not a vegetarian, are you?”

  “Heather!” I hear Gavin scream. “I have to tell you something! It wasn’t Sebastian! It wasn’t—”

  Then the line goes dead. Chief O’Malley, having evidently reached the end of his patience, has hung up.

  When I raise my head again, Tom is standing by my desk, looking down at me worriedly.

  “Wait…” he says. “Who was that you were just talking about? Gavin? Or Sebastian Blumenthal?”

  “Gavin,” I say, to my keyboard.

  “He’s in jail, too? Like…literally?”

  “Like, literally. Tom. I gotta go up there.”

  “Where?” Tom looks confused. “Owen’s apartment? You were just there. How much hand-holding does that lady need? I mean, they were divorced, right? Maybe you should send Gillian up there for a little grief counseling. The two of them look like they’d get along great, anyway—”

  “No, I mean, I have to go to Westchester,” I say. I’m already rolling my chair back and rising from my desk. “I have to talk to Gavin.”

  “Right now?” Tom looks shocked. And a little scared. “You’re gonna leave me alone? With all that going on outside?” He casts a nervous look at the window—now firmly shut, the blinds drawn—through which Dr. Veatch had been shot. “And that?”

  “You’ll be all right,” I tell him. “You have the student workers. Both desks are fully scheduled. All of Dr. Veatch’s appointments are canceled. For God’s sake, Tom, you’ve been handling the frats. They’re way harder than this place.”

  “Yeah,” Tom says nervously. “But nobody gets murdered there.”

  “I’ll be back as soon as I can,” I say. “I’ll probably only be gone a few hours. You can reach me on my cell if you need me. If anyone asks where I am, tell them I had a family emergency. Understand? Don’t tell anyone about Gavin. It’s really important.”

  “Okay.” Tom looks unhappy.

  “I mean it, Tom.”

  “Okay!”

  Satisfied, I turn to go—and nearly careen with my best friend (and former backup dancer, now wife of rock legend Frank Robillard) Patty, who is clutching a half-dozen bridal magazines to her ever-so-slightly burgeoning belly. But she has an excuse—and it’s not grande café mochas with whipped cream, but being the four months’ pregnant mom of a three-year-old.

  “Who told you?” I demand, staring at the glossy copy of Elegant Bride that’s staring up at me.

  Patty flicks an accusing look at Tom, who shrugs and says, “Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you, Heather. Patty called while you were next door with Owen’s ex. Oooh, you got the May issue! My God, it weighs as much as a Thanksgiving turkey.”

  “I can’t believe you told him first and not me.” Patty, who even when not pregnant has a tendency to glow in an irritatingly radiant manner, lowers herself with a dancer’s grace into the blue vinyl chair beside my desk and picks up one of the magazines. “I think she should go with pure white. Ivory will make her look sallow. What do you think, Tom?”

  “I was thinking just the opposite,” Tom says, settling down at my desk. “A cream will bring out the rosy tones in her skin.”

  “Do you know there’s a gigantic rat across the street from your building, with all sorts of people parading around it?” Patty asks. “And when were you going to tell me about your boss being shot in the head yesterday, Heather? This is ridiculous. How long do you plan on working in this death trap? You can’t have lost another boss.”

  “I was telling her to wait until she’s had eight,” Tom says, with a laugh, “then quit, and say—”

  “—eight is enough!” they both finish.

  “Hold that thought,” I say, “I’ll be right back.”

  And I dart from the office before either of them can say another word, or look up from the glossy photo they are admiring, of a Jackie O style wedding gown that in a million, trillion years would never look good on a girl like me.

  14

  * * *

  You are my little sippy cup

  If I drop you and I pick you up

  You won’t have spilled

  Then I can drink you up

  “Stab Me in the Eyeballs”

  Written by Heather Wells

  * * *

  “I don’t get it,” I say, as we cruise up the Hutchinson River Parkway.

  “What don’t you get?” Cooper wants to know.

  Other cars are passing us at an alarming rate, some of the drivers giving us dirty looks—and even dirtier gestures—as they go by.

  But Cooper doesn’t seem to mind. He is being supremely cautious with his ’74 2002 BMW, handling it as softly as a baby—which is a good thing, because a jolt—or anything over fifty-five miles per hour—could shake the ancient four-door apart.

  I feel lucky to have caught him after a recent cleaning binge. My feet, for once, aren’t sitting in three inches of fast-food detritus, but on the actual floor mats the car came with.

  “When Sarah and Gavin asked you yesterday if you’d drive them to Rock Ridge, you said no. But when I told you I needed to get up there, you couldn’t grab the keys fast enough.” I study his profile curiously. “What gives?”

  “Do you think there’s a distance I wouldn’t go,” Cooper asks, shifting, “for a chance to see that kid in the slammer?”

  I roll my eyes. Of course the reason he’d dived for the keys the minute I’d walked into his office and said, “I need a ride to Westchester. Gavin’s in jail,” had been because he’d wanted to laugh at Gavin for getting caught with his pants down, not because he knows I entertain big-sisterly feelings for Gavin and had wanted to help get him out of the jam he’s currently in.

  Men.

  On the other hand…men. I try not to be overly conscious of the sexiness of the sleek dark hairs on the back of the hand on the gearshift next to me. What is wrong with me, anyway? I already have a boyfriend. A boyfriend who wants to marry me. I’m pretty sure.

  It’s just that the backs of Tad’s hands aren’t hairy. Not that he doesn’t have hair on them. It’s just that he’s blond, so you can’t really see them.

  Not that hairy hands or lack thereof necessarily constitute sexiness or anything. There just seems to be something particularly sexy—even predatory, in a sort of thrillingly masculine way—about Cooper’s. It’s hard not to think about how those hands would feel on my naked body. All over my naked body.

  “Why are you staring at my fingers?” Cooper wants to know.

  Oh God.

  “I just d-don’t,” I stammer, tearing my gaze from his hand. “D-don’t understand how Sebastian could have shot Owen. I mean, I saw Sebastian right after the murder. Like a couple hours after. And he was joking around. There’s no way he could have done it. No way he’s that good of an actor.”

  “Ah. So you’re going for the old just-because-he-had-the-murder-weapon-on-him-doesn’t-mean-he-did-it defense,” Cooper says, with a shrug. “Well, it’s an oldie, but goodie. But I suppose someone else could have shot the guy and slipped the gun in Sebastian’s bag…”

  “Exactly!” I cry, brightening, as a Volvo station wagon being driven by an angelic-looking soccer mom—who gives us the finger—passes us just as we’re merging onto I–684. “That has to be what happened. So that means it has to have been someone with whom Sebastian came into contact yesterday morning, sometime between the murder and his arrest. Which,” I add, glumly, “could’ve been a million and a half people. I’m sure he was all over campus, between his classes, his GSC stuff, and everything else Sebastian is into. I saw him in the chess circle i
n the park with Sarah and all those reporters. Any one of those homeless guys in there could’ve walked up and slipped anything they wanted into that bag, and he never would’ve noticed. No one would’ve.”

  “Well, I’m sure his lawyers are on it,” Cooper says calmly.

  “Don’t they need to find, I don’t know, gunpowder residue on his hands?” I ask. “And witnesses?”

  “He’s got motive,” Cooper says. “And the murder weapon. And no alibi. The DA’s probably thinking this one’s pretty open-and-shut.”

  “Right. Except for one thing,” I grumble. “Sebastian didn’t do it.”

  My cell phone chirps. Patty’s on the line. I know she can’t be particularly pleased with me, but I’m surprised by just how immediately she makes her unhappiness with me known when I pick up.

  “Right back?” she barks. “You’re on your way to Westchester? But you’ll be right back?”

  “I had to go,” I say. Patty’s normally the most cheerful of women. Except when she’s in her first trimester. And second. And, now that I think back to right before Indiana was born, her third, too. In fact, pretty much during her whole pregnancy. “I didn’t want to get into it right then.”

  “Why? Because you knew I’d tell you you’re crazy?” Patty demands. “Because going to Rock Ridge to bail a kid who isn’t even your own out of jail is crazy? Just like marrying a guy you’ve only been going out with for three months is crazy?”

  I have to hold the phone away from my head, she’s yelling so loudly. I can’t help glancing at Cooper to see if he’s overheard. But he’s messing with the tape deck—oh yes, the 2002 only has a tape deck—to turn up the dulcet tones of Ella. I think I’m safe.

  “I’m not going to Rock Ridge to bail him out,” I growl into my phone. “I’m just going there to talk to him. Besides”—I lower my voice further, turning my head toward the window—“you’re the one who brought the bridal magazines over. Plus, he hasn’t even asked me yet. All he said was that he had something he wanted to—”