Free A Sensitive Kind of Murder (A Kate Jasper Mystery) by Jaqueline Girdner

sat back down to our lunch. I don’t think either of us wanted to risk the phone call another kiss might generate. There wasn’t much left of lunch, but that not much was mostly dessert—coconut milk pudding with strawberry chunks and drizzled carob sauce.
    I brought a teaspoon to my lips and licked. It wasn’t Wayne, but it was delicious.
    “Garrett called Laura,” Wayne mumbled through his own mouthful. “Laura told him Steve’s death was being treated as a murder. Garrett’s calling all the other group members to let them know—”
    We might as well have been kissing because the doorbell rang before Wayne could even finish his sentence or I could finish my dessert.
    I stomped to the door and flung it open.
    A sincere-looking, well-dressed young woman stood in front of me. I’d never seen her before.
    “Are you a solicitor?” I demanded.
    “No,” she said. “Are you Kate Jasper?”
    “I…” I began.
    But then I looked behind her and saw a man with a camera. A truck with a video dish and a TV station emblem on its side pulled into the driveway.
    It was worse than a solicitor.
    It was the media.
     
     
    - Six -
     
    I didn’t think to shut the door. Instead, I opened and shut my mouth a few times for exercise as our whole yard sprouted with media beings: animal, vegetable, and mineral. They popped up everywhere. TV vans, cars with press signs on their dashboards, and worse, their occupants, unloading all their instruments for the inquisition: sound and video equipment, cameras, microphones, notepads, and mouths. Especially mouths.
    “Ms. Jasper?” the sincere looking, well-dressed young woman in front of me began. Her formal tone told me that her station’s cameras were rolling, even if some of the other stations’ were a little slower. “We’re here at your home today to speak to you about witnessing the death of Steve Summers, husband of Marin Assemblywoman Laura Summers. This isn’t the first death you’ve witnessed in Marin County, is it? In fact, some call you The Typhoid—”
    “Don’t say it,” I warned through gritted teeth.
    She paused for less than an instant before her mouth opened again. “Steve Summers was the victim this time—a respected journalist, your friend, and, of course, the husband of Assemblywoman Laura Summers.”
    Then Wayne was behind me, his hand on my shoulder. I didn’t have to turn my head to see the gargoyle stare he was aiming at the young woman—I could feel it.
    “Is it true that Steve Summers was killed in a botched assassination attempt on Laura Summers?”
    “But Laura Summers wasn’t killed, Steve Summers was,” I replied, then gave myself a mental kick for having spoken at all. Still, what was this woman talking about?
    “Rumors are that Laura Summers was the intended victim!” a new voice shouted. I saw an older man in a perfect suit behind the young woman. “What did you see—”
    “No comment,” Wayne broke in.
    “Are you Mr. Caruso?” the young woman asked, finding some perverse encouragement from his non-comment.
    “Mr. Caruso, isn’t it true that you were in some kind of radical political group with Mr. Summers?” another voice shouted. And then everyone was shouting.
    “Did Mr. Summers agree with his wife’s political stands?”
    “Did Steve Summers believe in the violent overthrow of the United States government?”
    “Is it true that Steve Summers had a C.I.A. background?”
    “Didn’t Steve Summers cause a suicide with one of his articles?”
    “How did Assemblywoman Summers feel about her husband’s political activities?”
    “Was the assemblywoman present when her husband was killed?” my original inquisitor demanded, still looking sincere.
    “That’s it,” Wayne announced. “No comment. Goodbye.”
    He shut the door, but it caught on the foot of the young woman who’d started it all off, leaving at least a six inch gap between us and privacy.
    I looked at her blue, high-heeled shoe. Did I dare step on it? Or