Free One Hot Mess by Lois Greiman Page A

showed through the window. “Can I do anything? Get you a glass of water? Call a friend?”
    She glanced up, face etched with sorrow. “He sent you, didn't he?”
    I chanced a careful step closer. “Who's he?”
    “Her old man. She was married for…” She choked a laugh. “Jesus, for twenty years. 'Til Jess went off to college. She stayed with him 'til then, but even after that—” She shook her head.
    I eased cautiously onto the grass beside her. “After that what?” I asked, but maybe she didn't hear me.
    “I was always so proud of her. Smart, pretty, successful. Always wanted her to be proud of me, but…” Her voice trailed away.
    I was nodding. I don't know why. “Do you think he had something to do with her death?”
    She blinked at me, eyes shiny with tears. “What?”
    “Her ex. Do you think he had something to do with your sisters death?”
    She stared at me a full five seconds, then laughed out loud. The sound was choked and watery. She wiped her nose on her wrist, leaving the gun on the grass as she settled back on her haunches. “Who are you and what do you really want?”
    I pondered that for a moment, glanced at the car, and decided I was more likely to be rescued by a swarm of wild bees than my ever-faithful hound. “I just…1 was hoping to find out how this happened.” I motioned weakly toward the garage. “Kathy's death.”
    She staggered to her feet. “You a cop?”
    “No.” I rose, too, thinking it might be a good idea to be upright in case she started taking potshots at me.
    “A private investigator?”
    “I'm a psychologist,” I said.
    “Are you kidding me?”
    “Sometimes it surprises me, too,” I said.
    She scowled at me for an instant, then turned away and walked into the house, leaving the gun on the lawn and the door open behind her.
    I stood there for a good three minutes wondering what a normal person would do, but I hadn't encountered a lot of normal in the past… well, lifetime, so finally I picked up the gun between my forefinger and thumb, turned, and followed her inside.
    The house was as cute as a Cabbage Patch Kid. Carefully framed period photographs graced the entry. The walls of the kitchen were papered with tiny rows of flowers. Geraniums bloomed in the window above the sink.
    The woman with the chestnut hair sat sprawled on a slat-back chair near the table, face blank, hand wrapped around a coffee mug.
    “You take yours black?” she asked.
    It took me a minute to catch up, but when I did I set the gun on the counter. “I don't drink coffee,” I said.
    She glanced up as if startled from her sorrow. “Ever?”
    “Not unless it's banned by the Diabetes Foundation.”
    The shadow of a grin crept across her haunted face. “Who sent you?”
    I pondered that for a second. “An old friend of hers asked me to look into her death.”
    “So you really didn't know her?”
    I shook my head, and she laughed a little.
    “She always said I was too damn jealous, but she was so…” She drew a deep breath and gazed into the living room. The hardwood floor gleamed like honey. An untrimmed tree looked strangely naked against the bay window. “…so amazing. I told her I'd have to be crazy not to be jealous.”
    I don't know why it took that long for the lightbulb to flash on, but it finally did. “So you were her…”
    She waited for me to finish the sentence. I floundered around like a beached mackerel for a couple of stupid lifetimes and finally came up with “… partner?”
    Her snort was neither ladylike nor polite. Standing up, she went to the coffeepot and refilled her mug. “God, that's a stupid term. It sounds like we were in harness together. Kat and Queenie.” She chuckled. “Not bad names for draft horses.”
    She was babbling.
    “I'm sorry. I just didn't—” I began lamely, but she was waving it off.
    “It's all right. No one could figure out what to call us, even if they knew. And hardly anybody knew.” She was gazing past the geraniums