Free Dead Head: A Dirty Business Mystery by Rosemary Harris

write that screenplay I’ve always wanted to write. Meryl Streep—she’s from Connecticut, isn’t she? Or is it Maine? It’s one of those states up there. Maybe she’ll be interested. She could play Caroline. No, she’s too old. No, she can do anything.”
    I could almost hear the wheels turning. She’d be planning her Oscar acceptance speech in a minute. “You are officially going off the reservation and I’m hanging up now.” And I did. Whatever last shreds of privacy Caroline and her family still had, I wasn’t going to be the one to tear them down. Hopefully someone was shielding her kids from the vultures that now circled the family.
    Besides, appearances to the contrary, I
didn’t
know her. None of us did. Even her husband and her kids hadn’t known she wasn’t Caroline Sturgis.
    I’d told Lucy everything I knew. It was unclear if anyone had helped her escape, but it seemed likely. That was all most of us knew because since her arrest Caroline hadn’t given a statement to anyone.
    How do you live with something like that hanging over your head for twenty-five years? Constantly covering your steps and worrying about slipping up. Now it made more sense why a smart, creative woman like Caroline didn’t work but stayed home, doing her crafts andquietly numbing herself with alcohol. She was hiding, staying under the radar.
    The story was like roadkill: it was impossible not to pay attention. People in Springfield who barely knew Caroline were giving interviews, and the residents of her hometown in Michigan dug back decades to find the slimmest reminiscence. One of her second-grade classmates volunteered the significant factoid that Caroline/Monica always liked to make up stories. Which of course meant nothing but gave the talking heads copy to read while nodding gravely. Opinions were everywhere. With each day more snippets of the story leaked out and were rehashed mercilessly all over town, including at the Paradise Diner.
    Babe wasn’t behind the counter when I arrived, so I grabbed a newspaper, slipped into my favorite booth in the back, and got the attention of one of the singing waitresses with the universal cup-drinking motion that said I needed coffee. Eyebrow Girl brought me a mug and a slice of cake.
    “What’s this?” I asked.
    “Olive oil cake,” she said, bored. “Pete wants you to try it.” She dropped the plate on the table with a clatter. “Sorry.”
    Sure she was.
    Olive oil and cake are not two things I generally associated together, but for free, I was willing to give it a shot. It was delicious with a slightly nutty flavor, and I was shaving off another sliver of the dense cake with a spoon when Babe slid onto the banquette opposite me. She looked tired, but I was enough of a friend not to say so.
    “What have you been up to?” I asked. “Neil back?”
    “I wish. Putting in a new lock on the back door. I should be putting in a new door, but I’ll wait until Neil comes home. That the olive oil cake?” she said. I nodded, handing her the spoon. “Whodathunkit, right? Giada recipe. Not that that girl looks like she’s ever eaten a piece of cake in her life.”
    Babe’s appearance brought the sullen waitress back with an automatic cup for Babe and a refill for me.
    “Thanks, Terry. So what do you think?” she said when the girl left.
    “I think you’re right: she’s probably never eaten an entire piece of this cake and I think the boobs are real,” I said.
    “Not Giada. Caroline…Monica…whatever the hell her name is. Pretty wild, huh, federal marshals coming to take her away? The Main Street Moms must be having a field day with this one. They’ll be dining on this for a year. I guess now we know why Caroline was so hot to put the business in your name. She’s been invisible so long it was probably second nature to her not to put anything in her own name.”
    In all the excitement, that hadn’t occurred to me. Had Caroline done something related to the business