Free Duffel Bags And Drownings by Dorothy Howell Page A

what I knew, leaving out everything about how I was actually
     investigating the murder.
    Jack shook his head. “There’s no connection with your murder victim.”
    “But the guy you were following was cheating?” I asked.
    “He was cheating,” Jack said.
    I’d hoped for a red hot lead that would take me to Jeri’s murderer but it seemed that
     another of my theories had fizzled.
    “Stay out of this,” Jack told me. I didn’t promise that I would—Jack wouldn’t have
     believed me anyway. I said good-bye and took the elevator up to L.A. Affairs.
    The office was unusually quiet—I guess all the planners were lying low, afraid Edie
     or Priscilla would capture them in the hallway and give them that dreadful event to
     handle—so I went to the breakroom. No one else was there. I made myself a cup of coffee—which
     took no time at all, oddly enough—and went to my office.
    I was disappointed that Jack hadn’t been any help with my investigation into Jeri’s
     murder, but I still had another source of information I could turn to.
    Sierra, who worked at Cady Faye Catering and had been in culinary school with both
     Jeri and Lourdes, had told me that an attorney named Horowitz was handling the divorce
     of Jeri’s married boyfriend, and that Jeri’s roommate who worked in his office could
     confirm everything. Since I didn’t have much else to go on, I decided to check her
     out.
    I spent a couple of hours doing some actual work, then looked up the attorney on the
     Internet, gathered my things and headed out.
    * * *
    The office of attorney Rowland Horowitz was located on Alameda Avenue in Burbank.
     It was an older, one-story stucco building that looked as if it had been there for
     a while. I parked in the rear and went inside.
    The reception area was small with hardwood floors, nice furniture, a year’s worth
     of magazines on a side table, and a little glass window where the receptionist sat.
     Nobody was waiting. The place was silent. I figured most everybody was out for lunch.
    Sierra had told me that Jeri’s roommate was named Molly. The girl behind the glass
     could definitely have been a Molly. She was about my age, with red hair she’d styled
     in a ponytail.
    She looked like an open, honest person, not someone who’d hold back the info I was
     after concerning Jeri’s married boyfriend who, hopefully, had a psycho wife that might
     have attacked and killed Jeri.
    I mean that in the nicest way.
    “Hi,” I said, and introduced myself as I approached the window. “Are you Molly? Sierra
     said I should talk to you. It’s about Jeri.”
    She gasped and pressed her palms to her cheeks.
    “I can’t believe that happened to Jeri. Getting killed like that, at the place she
     loved,” she whispered. “She was so nice. I mean, really nice. The best roommate ever.”
    “Everybody says that about Jeri,” I agreed. “Well, except for some people at the catering
     company.”
    Molly frowned. “I know. That one girl there, what was her name, Lourdes? Jeri told
     me all about her.”
    “Some people were talking crap about Jeri because her boyfriend was still married,”
     I said.
    “They shouldn’t say those things about Jeri and him,” Molly told me. “He was definitely
     getting a divorce—not that he wanted one, to start with. His wife was cheating on
     him. But he was totally onboard with ending it. Mr. Horowitz is handling the whole
     thing.”
    “So there wasn’t a future ex-wife in the picture who might have had it in for Jeri?”
     I asked.
    Molly gasped and her eyes widened. “No way. Absolutely not.”
    Okay, so my theory hadn’t panned out.
    “I can’t believe people are saying those things.” Molly seemed angry now. “Well, fine.
     If the place goes out of business like Jeri thought it might, I guess they have it
     coming.”
    According to Fay, business had tripled in the last year. I’d seen for myself that
     they were expanding into the two storefronts that bordered their