On Turpentine Lane(80)

“What higher compliment than that?” said Nick.

“Have you told Mom and Dad?” Joel asked.

“Not yet. Soon. This was our trial run.”

Brian said, “I feel a little funny. Like we crashed your engagement party.”

“Nonsense,” said Nick. “You’re our forensic family.”

“Let me take pictures,” said Patty. “At least we can do that much. The family portrait won’t have to be a selfie.”

“In front of the fireplace would be good,” I said.

Leslie said, “Just you three, really, Faith and Nick and Joel,” steering me by the shoulders between the two men.

I waited for Joel to agree, surely remembering photos documenting life with his short-term ex-wife. Instead, he said, “No, Les. You’re in the picture if it’s okay with the bride and groom.”

“Of course.”

Nick said, “How did it get this far that I’m marrying a Frankel and I’ve only met Joel in the driveway?”

“A hundred and ten inches of snow,” said Joel. “There’s your answer.”

“Say ‘whiskey,’?” Patty directed, then snapped away.

Nick said, thankfully with a grin, “So, Joel, I understand you told your mother I was gay.”

“Look how well that worked out,” Joel said. “It was kind of brilliant of me.”

“And entirely fictional,” I added for the Dolans’ benefit. “It was Joel being cute.”

“He is very cute, isn’t he?” said Leslie.

“Can you see why I wanted her in the picture?” Joel asked.

“So do we,” I said.

“Have you set a date?” Patty asked.

Nick said, “Not that I know of. Have we?”

I said, “I might let my parents weigh in on that.”

“Hullo, ice sculpture and prime rib,” said Joel. “Are there any chateaus around that rent out their ballrooms?”

“There’s always right here, under our outlaw roof,” said Nick. “On Halloween. We’ll invite Mrs. Lavoie and Theresa.”

I said, “I’m going to make a toast now.”

The group went silent. “Nick?” I said. “I should probably save this for our wedding, but in case we elope—and there’s no one there to hear it except some strangers at city hall enlisted as witnesses—let me say this now: I look back and I picture that former person—me—sharing an office with you, my secret crush . . . if anyone had told me then that we would live together, that we’d food shop and cook and drive to work in one car, let alone kiss . . . let alone share a bed. And now this! Engaged . . . well, I never would’ve believed her, that former me. I pinch myself every day.”

Nick said so softly, so heretofore un-Nick-like, that we all leaned closer, “Me, too, kid.” Then: “In that office, watching you blot the sentences you’d written with your fountain pen. And eat cheese sandwiches you brought in a wax-paper bag. I thought it was obvious. I thought you could tell. I thought we’d be sent to Human Resources jail.”

“Now you kiss,” said Leslie.



Was it Nick or I who asked Brian before he left, “Anything new on the case?”

He grimaced. “I didn’t think this was the time or the place to talk business—”

Nick said, “What better place than this?”

“It will probably be in the Echo tomorrow.”

What did I expect to hear that didn’t fit our happy occasion? That Anna Lavoie was going free?

“It was Theresa Tindle,” Brian said.

It took a few long seconds for that to register.

“The daughter,” he said.

“What about her?” I asked.

“Arrested.”

Theresa “Terry” Tindle, lately not of Maui, if ever. “Why? What for?”

“Manslaughter.”

“Of?” asked Nick.

Brian cocked his head toward the kitchen and beyond.

“The daughter did it?” I whispered. “How do you know?”

“Not from the batty mother, I assume,” said Nick.

“The sister came to us,” he said.

What sister? Jeannette, of course—chronic tipster, the sibling Theresa had never known until I made the match.

Brian said, “I’m only telling you because it’s going to be in the paper tomorrow.”

“Is she in jail?”

“Out. On bail.”

“She must’ve been a kid when she did it,” I said.

“Not a kid under the law. Sixteen. And was sent away. She pushed the first stepfather, and her mother apparently thought it was such a good idea, and easy—if a kid could do it—whammo. Good-bye, husband number three.”

I asked if Mrs. Lavoie had been rearrested—if there was such a thing.

“She’s already in custody. Don’t forget she’s ninety-one. Just had a birthday . . .”

“What about the blood? All that crime-scene investigation in my still-torn-up basement.”

“We know the blood was from males. Head injuries bleed a lot. But no match and no likelihood of a match.”

“I take it you didn’t exhume either body?” I asked.