Wine, Dine and Christmas Crimes by Maria Swan (brene brown rising strong .txt) 📕

of us against two of them—but maybe Wolf counted for two. Still. “Monica here has been a big help,” she said with a straight face.

Leta and Brenda seemed content to pull out a chair.

Wolf pulled out his phone again. “I’m calling my lawyer,” he said. “What this young lady told me changes everything.” Right. He was probably calling a hit man. Lawyer, my eye.

“The detectives couldn’t get rid of us fast enough, they received the postmortem toxicology report of that poor gal, and you could feel the change in the air,” Brenda said.

The air on the 28th floor may have been more rarified, but as soon as Brenda spoke I could feel the changes in Kay’s dining room. She turned white and said, “No.”

That got everyone’s attention.

“No what?” Did I actually said that out loud? Why?

Wolf stopped fiddling with his phone and stopped pacing too. “Kay, what is it?” he asked.

She kept shaking her head like a broken toy. “I let Ana take my Diazepam,” Kay said.

I had absolutely no clue what that was. Apparently I was the exception because a chorus of “No, no, please say you didn’t,” followed her confession.

“One?” Wolf asked.

Kay shrugged, kept her head down. “Kay, you don’t know?” That was Brenda. I waited for Leta’s input. It never came.

“I felt sorry for the girl. I figured, what the heck, it will relax her. She knew where I keep it. She didn’t want to stay here to wait for you, Dale. She left in hurry, with her clothes in a paper bag. Poor, poor Ana, always thinking of others. I asked why she didn’t change here, she didn’t want to mess up the bathroom and assured me she could change her clothes over at Diane’s on the nineteenth floor. She’d done it before. I found out afterword that Diane was in a minor fender bender at the Fashion Mall and wasn’t home. How did Ana end up in that empty condo? Who let her in?” She spoke while looking straight at me.

Without flinching, I returned her look. “That thing she took...would that make her sick enough to throw up?”

Kay didn’t answer. She started crying again.

“I’m definitely calling the lawyer,” Wolf said. “If I had been here on time to pick her up she might still be alive.”

The creepy, weird feelings that had me ready to run must have been hitting home with Leta. She kept rearranging her sitting bones on the dining room chair, or in plain English, she was squirming. “The cops are sending the experts to sift through the dumpster where I discarded the garbage bags from the party,” she said. “They hope to find that poor gal’s stuff in there. No idea why.”

“They suggested that since the B&B Catering van was the only vehicle to leave the premises before they searched all vehicles,” Brenda said, “that might have been a way for the killer to discard Ana’s things without getting caught. And Leta was driving the van. Here and back.”

“Wow, Leta, where did you dump the garbage?” I asked.

“Where I always do. In the 2 dumpsters at the apartment complex where I live.” She spoke without looking at me. “After every job, I drive home and stop to empty the van, everything gets separated as we clean, recycling and trash. Then the bags are tied and in the appropriate dumpster they go. Have no clue when they get emptied. It’s a private company.”

“Wait, and just how are Miss Martin’s things ending up in your garbage? Makes no sense.”

Leta kept her eyes on her hands folded on her lap and said nothing, which led me to believe she knew stuff she wasn’t sharing. But what?

I would have liked to know more about the mysterious bartender, so I asked.

“He’s not a real bartender,” Brenda said. “He served cocktails before dinner with the hors d’oeuvres. He keeps bar up at the top floor when they have catered parties. So he’s familiar with the routine.”

“Yes,” Leta said. “He suggested I get the ice from the ice machine. He must have found the poor soul when he went up to put back the few gadgets he had borrowed for mixing—I’m guessing after every guest here sat down to eat. Yes, that’s it because he opened the wine and poured each guest a glass before he left. That was our busiest time, so I didn’t pay much attention. Should we get going?” she asked Brenda.

“Wait.” Wolf was up and pacing again. “Monica, who gave you the code for the condo? I know it wasn’t public because I checked the listing one evening, just out of curiosity, and it said to call the listing agent.”

“Sunny, my boss, she gave me the whole folder, and the code was there. You must have known, right, Kay? Certainly you wanted to see it inside. It’s your neighborhood.”

Kay shook her head. “Long story, personal. That’s why you ended up with the file.” She shrugged and avoided my eyes. Ah!

Five minutes later the three of us stepped out of the elevator, and Leta headed to her car. I followed Brenda to her Honda, knowing that all I had learned today was probably nothing more than a fat pack of lies.

TWENTY

“IS IT JUST me or does it feel like with all the pretenses of near royalty, The Nest is just another overpriced, overrated condo complex?” I said to Brenda who had been driving in silence since we said goodbye to Leta.

“If it isn’t already, it’s headed that way,” was her short answer. I blamed her moody behavior on the e-cigarettes. “The whole back history of that poor girl and all the do-gooders who in reality used her, is bound to surface. What do you think happened between Kay and the sisters who listed the doomed condo?” she asked.

“No clue, then again, maybe it’s between Kay and the condo owner? So happy I’m out of that mess. Just the idea of having to talk to that weirdo doorman makes me want to scream. What happened to him?