Valedictory

By Richard Stein

When Jonah Aaron graduated from Nashvilles Academic Magnet High School, he was voted the most interesting member of the class of 1997. His classmates predicted that he would become a CIA operative and that he would be bringing the best-looking woman in the room to the tenth-year reunion. Twelve years later, Jonah is married to screenwriter Elana Grey, once known as the hottest young redhead in country music. But instead of the CIA, Jonah has become a partner in Brandenburg and Aaron Entertainment and a producer of television shows and independent films. Jonah skipped the tenth-year reunion and never even bothered to investigate when the valedictorian of his senior class was murdered shortly after graduation. But now, Jonah has two reasons to investigate the crime: he feels sorry for the victims brother and he thinks that the investigation may lead to a script for the highly rated comedic-drama police procedural, which is a cornerstone of his production company.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Mar 24, 2016
• ISBN: 9781514478370

Richard Stein

Dr. Richard Stein is an emeritus professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University. He and his wife live in the Forest Hills section of Nashville but spend winters in Del Mar, California. He is the author of six previously published novels, including The Dana Twins & Related Matters, Angels from Rikenny, three Jonah Aaron-Elana Grey mysteries, and one previous Caitlin Logan mystery entitled Spoiler Alert.

Book preview

Copyright © 2016 by Richard Stein.

ISBN:      Softcover         978-1-5144-7838-7

                eBook              978-1-5144-7837-0

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 03/23/2016

Xlibris

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

738208

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

AUTHOR’S NOTE

THE JONAH SLAMMER EPISODE GUIDE: LAST UPDATED JUNE 2010

THE CAST

EPISODE GUIDE: THE ELANA GREY EPISODES

THEME SONG

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

ALSO BY RICHARD STEIN

No Cause for Shame

Reasonable Degree of Certainty

The Dana Twins and Related Matters

Angels from Rikenny

CHAPTER ONE

E VERY YEAR, ON the anniversary of her death, I drove to Hillcrest Cemetery where, under the shade of a post oak, my former high school classmate Margot Wells was buried alongside her parents. Even though she had once told a heinous lie that could have destroyed my life along with the life of my friend, Cary Wagner, I brought flowers as I had once promised her brother that I would do. Had I known the entire story I wouldn’t have been there. Of course, very few of us ever have the privilege of knowing the entire story about anything. And there was another reason for my annual purchase of a bouquet of daisies at the local mini-mart. I took a perverse pleasure in celebrating the fact that I was alive and well, my reputation intact, while Margot was six feet under and her brother, Kenny, was in pr ison.

The first time I made the trip, a year after Margot’s murder, I found the dead resting in presumably hallowed ground. Years later, the Hillcrest Baptist Congregation dissolved; the property was sold; the church building was demolished. In its place a Taco Bell was erected. Without an adjacent church watching over its departed parishioners the cemetery had become littered with burrito wrappers and used condoms, the logical consequences of being located only half a block away from East Nashville High School.

I had no idea if Margot would have considered the condoms to be a desecration of her final resting place or if she would have been pleased that the local teenagers were practicing safe sex. The burrito wrappers would probably have offended her. Margot had been one of the few students at Andrew Jackson High School to support the Board of Education’s campaign to remove non-nutritional snacks from the vending machines at Nashville’s public high schools and to have them replaced with fresh fruit. Then again, Margot might not have been sincerely opposed to junk food and fast food. She might have taken a contrarian position simply to ostracize herself even further from the student body – in which case she had succeeded.

It was a warm October afternoon as I approached Margot’s grave for what would be my final visit. An overweight man, not much older than I, wearing a white shirt and dark slacks and smoking a cigarette was staring at Margot’s tombstone. Judging from the pile of cigarette butts around his feet he had been there about an hour.

I almost didn’t recognize him. In the years since I had last seen him, he had shaved his head and put on about fifty pounds. Little of it was muscle. However, the scars by his right eye and by the left side of his jaw were a dead giveaway as to his identity. Since those features, along with broken ribs, a ruptured spleen, and his slight lisp, were his souvenirs from our last encounter a decade earlier, I suppose I should have approached with caution. However, being a friendly man, I simply extended my right hand. Hello, Kenny. As we shook hands I noticed the edge of a prison tattoo below the cuff of his shirt.

I was hoping to run into you, Jonah. I didn’t expect that I would.

I sent word through your lawyer that I would come once a year to put flowers on Margot’s grave. You said that there was no one else to do it. I honor my commitments. I had no idea you’d gotten out. That was only partially true. The Department of Corrections had informed me that Kenny had been a model prisoner, had made parole, and was being released sometime in October. I was wearing a sports jacket in eighty-degree heat to hide the Walther-22 in my shoulder holster. I may be friendly, but I am neither stupid nor reckless.

I got out four days ago. Did you ever run into anybody while you were making your deliveries?

Not a soul.

I thought maybe whoever killed her would show up out of guilt. I’d like to talk to you about Margot’s death. Do you have a few minutes?

I almost said no. I had enough time to drive out here, Kenny. I can spare a few more minutes as long as you put out the cigarette. I don’t like the smell of tobacco.

He glared at me for a moment but before I started to walk away, he took one final puff and dropped the butt on the ground with the others. He stepped on it in the same casual manner that he had once pulled a knife on me and tried to snuff out my life. He had better luck killing the cigarette. Thanks for bringing the flowers, Jonah.

You’re welcome.

My sister was such a sweet pretty girl.

Had anyone else made the statement I would have laughed. Margot Wells was not sweet. Pretty is in the eye of the beholder, but from my point of view Margot was neither attractive nor unattractive. She had been a tall thin girl with light brown hair. She was flat as a board and her legs resembled toothpicks. I never understood how they supported her fragile frame let alone propelled her from class to class. While many girls at Andrew Jackson High School, Nashville’s academic magnet, wore their dresses short and tight, from the start of our freshman year, Margot wore loose fitting granny dresses that dragged along the floor as if she wanted to both deny her sexuality and advertise that she had better things to do than sew a hem.

As I had said nothing, Kenny continued. What do you remember about my sister, Jonah? Not the stuff at the end. What do you remember from going to school with her? She was my kid sister and I barely knew her.

I tried thinking of something that would be of comfort. There wasn’t anything so I answered honestly. In our four years at Andrew Jackson, I never saw her smile.

She didn’t have a lot to smile about.

I nodded. Margot’s mother spent her daughter’s high school years living with and dying of breast cancer. Margot was not one to share information and the only reason I was aware of the situation was that three weeks before graduation a messenger from the principal’s office interrupted our Advanced Placement American History class to deliver a note to Kenny’s sister. Margot picked up her books, told the teacher that she might be out of school for a couple of days, and without shedding a tear - or showing any emotion for that matter, walked out of the room.

Margot returned the next day. When one of the girls in the class asked her what had happened, she informed them her mother had finally succumbed to breast cancer. Margot added that the funeral would be the next day and that she saw no reason to miss an entire day of class just to sit around the house and watch her father and brother get drunk.

You’re right, Kenny, she didn’t have a lot about which to smile. Then again, I can’t tell you much about her other than that she got good grades. Despite having a ton of classes with her, we only had one conversation in four years.

What about?

Right before graduation, I congratulated her on the fact that as class valedictorian she was going to be speaking at graduation. She told me that it was an insane idea to think that someone who had buried her head in books for four years could give a meaningful commentary on the real world and on what awaited us out there. She said she was going to give a terrible speech and that the only saving grace would be that no one would be paying attention.

It was a shitty speech, Jonah. I don’t know about anyone else, but I was listening.

I had been listening too, but I chose not to mention that I agreed with Kenny’s assessment. Margot’s three-minute platitude laden litany had been pure drivel. After the graduation, almost everyone was talking about Cary Wagner’s thoughtful salutatorian’s address. As we had filed out of the auditorium, I had seen Margot standing with Kenny and their father, a man who would be dead of cirrhosis three months later. I thought of walking over to say something – but there had been nothing to say. That was the last time I ever saw her.

Did Margot say anything else to you that one time you talked? I’m just trying to make some memories.

I saw no point in holding back. Well, she took the opportunity to tell me that I was an idiot for going to work for my uncle as an investigator instead of going to college when I finished high school. When I informed her that I was going to return to school in a year – which I did – she called me a liar and predicted I would never go back. When I told her that her valedictory address might not be as bad as she thought it would be, and that she might have some insight into the world, given that her mother had been ill, she almost spat in my face and asked me what the hell I knew about being sick with cancer.

That is a fair point, Jonah.

So I told her that my father was a cancer specialist and that he often said that cancer was sometimes harder on families than on patients. In response to that, she said that all doctors were quacks and she told me that I didn’t know anything about her mother… I think you can see why I didn’t spend a lot of time talking to her.

That was Margot. She could be a bitch.

Kenny didn’t have to convince me. Sixteen and a half months after graduation, Margot had falsely accused Cary Wagner and me of raping her. As the authorities had determined immediately, and as Kenny had learned too late, Cary and I had been nowhere near the scene of the alleged crime.

Tell me, Jonah, how did you know our mom had cancer? I didn’t think Margot ever talked about it.

She didn’t, but when your mother died, I overheard Margot telling some of the girls in our class that the cancer had finally gotten her.

Kenny sighed. Our mother had cancer, but that’s not what killed her. Mom overdosed. I was the one who found the body.

God, Kenny, I’m sorry. I had no idea.

It wasn’t a surprise or nothing. He shrugged his shoulders. Mom’s mother, our grandmother, hanged herself. Mom was treated for depression with every medicine in the book. She even got electric shock therapy. After Mom died, Margot said that if things ran true to form, someday she would kill herself, too. I guess her getting murdered kept that from happening.

Cemeteries depress me, but this was getting worse by the moment.

Anything else you want to tell me, Jonah?

I had nothing to add about his sister. I wondered if Kenny wanted me to apologize for the beating he had taken, but among my flaws, being hypocritical isn’t one of them. There were, however, some things I did regret. I’m sorry Duke died in the fight. I’m sorry you went to prison because of it.

Though I hardly ever thought about it, now that I was standing next to Kenny at Margot’s grave, I could almost visualize what had happened a decade earlier. Cary had hired me to be his bodyguard after Kenny had phoned to announce Cary’s impending death from unnatural causes. On the evening that ended Duke Sneed’s life, Cary and his girlfriend, Jenny, went to dinner at a restaurant near Music Row. I accompanied them and sat by myself at a nearby table where I couldn’t help but overhear Jenny point out that my presence was an unnecessary precaution that was costing Cary more than three times what they were paying for their meal.

Jenny changed her tune less than five minutes after leaving the restaurant when we reached the parking garage and saw two men with knives - Kenny and his buddy Duke Sneed - approaching. Duke was a small skinny feral man, five inches shorter than I was. But, emboldened by the blade he was brandishing, he was a lethal force. Despite the fact that it was the honor of Kenny’s sister that was theoretically being avenged, the hangdog expression on Kenny’s face told me that he really didn’t want to be there as he walked two paces behind his buddy.

Being trained in self-defense, I knew exactly what to do. After Duke lunged at me, I grabbed the wrist holding the knife, twisted it, and kicked him in the shoulder forcing him away from me. I heard a loud cracking noise resembling a gunshot echo in the garage as Duke’s arm snapped. Duke screamed. Jenny ran and hid behind a car. Cary stayed and prepared to fight.

But there was no need for Cary to do anything. As Duke fell backwards, Kenny had tried to catch him. Duke’s scream had little to do with his broken arm and everything to do with the fact that he had been impaled on Kenny’s knife. As Duke bled out, Kenny, whose knife had sliced through his friend’s aorta, put up his fists begging for a fight.

I knew how to box and I had the presence of mind to be disciplined. Kenny, who flailed rather than fought, wouldn’t have had a chance even if he had been sober. For fifteen seconds, I ducked everything Kenny threw before going on the offensive. My first punch, a left jab, shattered the bones around his right eye. The medical term is a blowout fracture. My second punch, a right hook, broke his jaw and caused him to bite off the tip of his tongue. Before he hit the ground, I pummeled him with a series of body blows, breaking a few of his ribs and rupturing his spleen.

Ironically, I had been carrying a gun for which I had a permit. If I had drawn it, I would have shot Duke in the foot. Kenny would have run away. That would have been that.

Theoretically, all men are equal before the law, but that’s not the way the real world works. Had the situation been reversed, had Cary and I come after Kenny and Duke, and had Cary been impaled on my knife, since we were Vanderbilt students from wealthy families in the tony Belle Meade section of Nashville, Cary’s death would have been ruled an accident. If I had been charged with anything, my lawyer would have gotten the case dismissed. But Kenny Wells was on probation for receiving stolen property. Duke Sneed had done hard time for his involvement in a car theft ring. The District Attorney decided to charge Kenny with second degree murder on the basis that Duke had died in the commission of a felony - attempted murder - and that Kenny was responsible. Kenny’s public defender couldn’t keep the jury from adopting the prosecutor’s assessment.

It wasn’t your fault Jonah. You had every right to defend yourself. We shouldn’t have been there and you ain’t responsible for the D.A. throwing the book at me. He looked at the ground. You could have quit after you broke my jaw and busted up my eye socket. I bit off a piece of my tongue, you know. You didn’t have to break my ribs, too.

Adrenaline kicked in. It’s not every day that two guys come at me and a friend pointing knives.

At least you called 9-1-1. The doctors said I would have bled to death from the ruptured spleen if they hadn’t gotten me into surgery in time. That was so stupid of me and Duke, and not just because you had done nothing to Margot. Margot had once told me that you had been trained by some guy who had been a Navy Seal. She told me that back in school you always said you were a dangerous man. Instead of listening to her, I laughed. I figured that you were just a nineteen year old kid. You weren’t supposed to be able to do what you did.

It wasn’t supposed to happen like it did. I was just trying to disarm him.

And if I read the sports section or watched ESPN… His voice trailed off. If I had the good sense not to believe my sister about what happened at the Epworth’s pool house, the whole thing wouldn’t have happened.

I’m glad you feel that way.

I’ve had ten years to think about it. I’m not looking for trouble. I just wonder what really happened with my sister. Did you ever look into Margot’s murder? I know you planned on becoming an investigator. Margot said you even had a bunch of rules for investigators that weren’t all that stupid.

Finding justice for her had never been on my to-do list. No. I figured that bringing the flowers was more than enough. You never figured out why she lied about Cary and me did you?

No. It was stupid of me to believe her. As much as I hated you at the time, I’m glad no one else believed her story.

Me too. Having a million alibi witnesses kind of works that way.

That was not an exaggeration. Eleven days before her death, Margot Wells had attended a small dinner party hosted by Janie Epworth at Janie’s parents’ home in Belle Meade. After the guests had departed, Janie’s mother, Virginia, had noticed that a light was on in the pool house and had gone to investigate the waste of electricity. She had found Margot naked and doing the best she could to cover herself with sofa pillows. Margot had informed Mrs. Epworth, and then the Belle Meade police, that Cary Wagner and I had accosted her as she left the party, had taken her to the pool house, and had raped her.

However, unknown to Margot, despite the fact that Andrew Jackson High was the academic magnet school and had no football team, Cary and I had both walked-on to play football for the Vanderbilt Commodores. The two of us were short on talent and long on energy and determination, characteristics which led to our being assigned to special teams – kickoff and punt coverage. That night, Vanderbilt’s 24-13 loss to LSU had been televised on ESPN and Cary and I had been shown, helmetless, on the sidelines after I had caused the kick returner to fumble a punt and Cary had recovered the ball in the end zone. As a result, Cary and I not only were never officially considered suspects, we didn’t even merit being persons of interest.

Informed of our alibis, Margot nevertheless stuck to her guns. I had no idea if Margot was raped that night, but by naming Cary and me as her assailants, she had destroyed her credibility and compromised any potential prosecution. The authorities therefore decided that whatever sexual activity had occurred in the pool house was not a police matter.

Since the accusation of two Vanderbilt students would have been front page news and the retraction would have been buried somewhere deep within the newspaper, Cary and I might have been forever stigmatized in Nashville as the guys who got away with raping Margot Wells. As it was, no one except for Kenny had ever suspected that we had been guilty of the crime. Even Mrs. Epworth hadn’t believed Margot after her husband had come down to the pool house, bringing a robe to our accuser, and had informed his wife that Margot was mistaken. Charles Epworth had been watching the game on television and he reported that Cary Wagner had been entering the end zone at the time Margot claimed that Cary and I were entering her body.

Tell me Kenny, do you have any idea what really happened?

At the Epworth’s pool house?

I nodded.

No. I was a dumbass. She told me you guys raped her and I believed her. I know that you and Cary didn’t do it. My public defender showed me the newspapers while I was awaiting trial for Duke’s death. The public defender said that if I kept on claiming that Duke and I were defending my sister’s honor that I would look so stupid that they would put me away for thirty years to life. And by the time my public defender and I had that conversation, I couldn’t exactly ask Margot what had happened because… His voice faded off.

The night that Duke Sneed and Kenny had attacked Cary and me was the same night that Margot had died. Her car had broken down on Ellington Parkway as she had driven home from work. According to the news reports, someone had stumbled upon her and her car and had shot her to death. The brief brawl involving Kenny, Duke, Cary and me had not only put Duke in the morgue and - through a legal technicality - put Kenny in prison, it had given Cary, me, and even Kenny, alibis for our whereabouts at the time of Margot’s death.

I went to talk to the police yesterday, Jonah. They wouldn’t tell me nothing. They said the case was closed, but that they had no obligation to talk to me.

Closed? But they wouldn’t give you details? That doesn’t make much sense.

I don’t know. Maybe since I went after Cary and you when I thought the two of you had raped Margot, they didn’t want to give me any information. Just so you know, I got more sense than to go after anyone even if the cops gave me a name. I ain’t going back to prison. Anyway, could you talk to the police for me? Maybe they’ll tell you something that they wouldn’t tell me.

I chuckled. And then you want me to tell you what I found out so that you can play vigilante but in a way that doesn’t get you back to prison?

He started to light another cigarette, saw me glaring at him, and put it back in the pack. No. I just want to know what happened to my kid sister. All I know is someone shot her as she got out of her car and then dragged her into the weeds at the side of the road. I don’t know if she got raped. I don’t know if she put up a fight. I don’t know if she suffered. No one told me nothing. And the sad part is, she was really angry when she went to work that day. She said someone had been hassling her. She asked me to drive her to and from work but… I had other plans. If I had driven her that night, instead of trying to prove I was a big shot by going after you and Cary, she wouldn’t be dead. Duke wouldn’t be dead. I wouldn’t have wasted ten years of my life. I still think that it’s bullshit that I got charged with second degree murder because Duke died. And by the way, despite the fact that I made those calls and threatened you guys, we weren’t going to kill you. We were just going to cut you up a little bit.

You have no idea what a relief that is.

For the first time since we had started talking he smiled. Anyway, I got some information that I’m not sure the police have, but I don’t know what to do with it. Just find out if the case is closed or cold or whatever. If there’s anything to do, I’ll hire an investigator… Are you interested?

I’m not an investigator. It didn’t work out.

What happened? You couldn’t hack it?

I shook my head. "When you were in prison, did you ever see that science-fiction film Angels from Rikenny?"

Yeah. I did. Cool movie. What about it?

To make a long story short, early on, the project hit a dead end and I got hired as an investigator to do what amounted to a deep background check. I found out something important. The project moved ahead. I invested most of my trust fund money and ended up owning thirty percent of the film.

Kenny’s eyes widened. Holy shit. That movie made a fortune.

The low budget film had done just that. When it came out five years ago one of the trade papers joked that I was the highest paid investigator on the planet, two planets if one counted Rikenny.

I didn’t know you had anything to do with that. I guess having a lot of money would make somebody less interested in something dangerous like being an investigator.

That was part of it. Around the same time, I went on a ride-along with the police and got involved in a shootout. It made me wonder just what I was doing. Frankly, being an investigator involved a lot of drudgery and a lot of computer work. I had thought it would be kind of glamorous. It wasn’t that way at all.

So you ended up in show business.

Do you know Ojliagiba Studios?

Never heard of it.

It’s a big place in North Nashville that looks like an airplane hangar. Milton Brandenburg and I own a chunk of it. They used to make music videos there. We still do, but now we also use it for motion pictures and television…

He interrupted. "Jonah Slammer – that cop show. Right?"

Right.

"I heard that it was filmed in Nashville and that Elana Grey the hot redhead who used to be a country singer wrote for it. I may have been behind bars but I got People Magazine. So, you ain’t available to be an investigator and look into it for me?"

It’s not my line of work anymore. My brother Barry runs Aaron Investigations these days. If you’d like, I’ll talk to him. He’s in Hawaii on his honeymoon, but he’ll be back in a couple of weeks. He might look into it for you.

I’ll think about it. Tell me, Jonah, what do you think happened? I got no idea what happened in the pool house after Janie Epworth’s little party. I don’t know why Margot lied about it. Margot was my sister, but I didn’t know what was going on in her life. I mean, I saw my sister as a sweet, innocent bookworm. I got no idea if she did or didn’t even have a boyfriend.

Like I said before, Kenny, I know less about her than you do. I sat in class with her a couple of hours a day but I barely talked to her. I hadn’t seen her in over a year when she was killed. You lived with her.

Not quite. I left that mess of a family when I was seventeen. Let’s just say my dad and me didn’t get along and leave it at that. The point is, I really don’t know much about my sister. I don’t even know where all that money came from.

What money?

He shuffled his feet before responding. After Margot died, as next of kin I got the money in her savings account. It was more than seventy thousand bucks. I used some of it to pay for her funeral and to pay off the money I had borrowed to bury my dad and my mom. When Margot graduated high school she had next to nothing. She took a year off to work at that jeans store before she started college. She made eleven bucks an hour. It don’t add up.

Kenny was right. At five hundred dollars a week, Margot wouldn’t have had that much money if she had saved every penny. Did you mention it to the police?

No. I knew what they would say. They would have wondered if she was selling drugs or selling herself. Just because she told a false story about the rape don’t mean that she was a whore or a drug dealer.

It didn’t mean that she wasn’t and the fact that Kenny attributed that suspicion to the police meant that he was considering the possibility himself. I tell you what, Kenny. I’ll talk to the police and find out the status of the investigation for you. Maybe it is closed. If not, if you need an investigator, I’ll put in a good word with my brother.

You sure you won’t do it? If someone got away with murder all those years ago and someone starts looking into it, that someone might be in trouble. I’d rather it was you than Barry.

What exactly are you saying? Are you wanting to put me in the line of fire because of what happened in the fight?

He threw up his hands. No. No! I didn’t mean it that way. I only meant that I know that you can take care of yourself. To emphasize the point he rubbed his jaw. I don’t want to put your brother in any danger. If someone thinks they got away with killing my sister, coming after them might be a problem. I don’t know if your brother could handle it.

I thought it over. I found the prospect of working for Kenny Wells a bit distasteful. Nevertheless, I took my cell phone out of my pocket and speed dialed a number. I tell you what. Marty Hogan with Nashville Homicide is a friend of mine. Let me find out where things stand and you can decide on the next step after that.

He’s the guy I talked to yesterday. He didn’t tell me much.

The call went to Marty’s voicemail. I left a message for him to call me back. Look, I don’t know for sure, but I suspect he told you everything, which is probably nothing. Maybe you misunderstood and the case is a cold case, not a closed case. I bet they have no idea who killed your sister. According to the papers, her car broke down and she had the bad luck that whoever stopped at the scene turned out to be a psychopath. How does a private investigator do anything with that?

He weighed what I had said. Maybe you’re right. Maybe I should just put it behind me. A lot of things happen in this world that we never really get to the bottom of. Maybe this is meant to be one of them. Thanks again for bringing the flowers. He looked down at the ground and kicked up a weed in a clod of dirt. Still, she was my sister, and I can’t help but feel that I let her down.

Unfortunately, no matter what anyone does, it won’t change anything for Margot. I realized that I had been holding the flowers the entire time we had been talking. I put the bouquet of daisies next to the roses that he had brought. I think it’s time for me to go. I’ll get back to you after I talk to my friend in Homicide.

Kenny wrote his name and a phone number on a receipt from Taco Bell and handed it to me. After eleven years there ain’t no rush. It’s just that I got nothing else to do. And if you don’t mind, think about looking into what happened at the pool house. I’ve had a lot of time to think about it, and I’m sure that whatever happened there is tied to her death. But you’re probably right. No one is going to figure out who killed her.

Despite the fact that her lie could have destroyed Cary Wagner’s life and my life, I had always felt a little bit sorry for Margot. Now, I was starting to feel sorry for Kenny. I tell you what. I’ll do better than talk to Marty Hogan in Homicide. I’ll meet with him and review the case files. I’ll find out where things stand and get back to you. It might take a couple of days to arrange a meeting, but after that, you and I can talk about whether or not it’s worth your while to have someone look into it. I handed him my business card. If you don’t hear from me in three or four days, call me.

Thanks, I appreciate it. He looked at the card. Jonah Aaron, Brandenburg and Aaron Entertainment. You’re a partner. You done all right for yourself.

I’ve been lucky. Do us both a favor, and stay out of trouble. This is the last time that I bring flowers to Margot’s grave. Next year, if you want flowers there, you’re going to have to do it yourself.

That’s fine by me.

I didn’t plan to devote a significant amount of time to finding justice for Margot Wells. On the other hand, I had always wondered what had happened in the Epworth’s pool house the night of the dinner party and Kenny had piqued my interest by mentioning the money in Margot’s bank account. Just the same, I expected that my brief inquiry into Margot Wells’ death would come to a quick conclusion.

CHAPTER TWO

W HEN PEOPLE ASK me what I do as a partner in Brandenburg and Aaron Entertainment, I usually say a little of this and a little of that to cover the fact that I