Dying to Teach Read online

  “No!” came Josh’s sharp reply. “We’re trying to keep her from any more…of that.”

  Angie understood the kind of love that formed Josh’s emotions. And his offer. Total and complete desperation to keep his wife out of jail. It would also cause the personality changes that had Cilla so upset. Upset enough to think he might be cheating.

  “Where is the cottage exactly?”

  “In the mountains. It’s small and secluded. No neighbors. Fireplace, with all the bells and whistles.”

  Angie again thought as she finished the rest of the now-cold coffee. “I am truly sorry for your troubles. I know how these things can get out of hand. I really think you should seek out professional assistance. Yes, it’s intrusive but it’s a method that works. Trust me.” When neither Philmore reacted to her statement, she said, “All right, Mr. Philmore. I’ll take your deal. Do you want me to sign something, to swear not to open my mouth?”

  “That won’t be necessary. You have an honest face. I can just sign over the deed to you.”

  Angie unzipped her handbag. Josh’s hand shot out to stop her. “The meal’s on us.” As she stood up, so did Josh. He took hold of her hand. His was very cold and sent shivers up her arm. “We appreciate this, really.”

  As Angie left, she passed José on his way into the restaurant. She pretended not to know him.

  FORTY-ONE

  After leaving the wire off at the police station, Jarvis took Angelina back to the hotel to change clothes and pick up some pain meds. He would’ve liked to stay a bit longer in the great penthouse suite and explore new horizons, but they were short on time so he didn’t bring up the subject. Plenty of time for that starting tomorrow. Starting tomorrow, he would do what he could to bring their relationship to the “next level,” though he wasn’t entirely sure how to go about it. Perhaps new scenery. No, no, he’d tried that plan last month and it nearly got them both killed.

  No, what they needed was a new outlook. A plan for the relationship itself. Angelina thrived on order and symmetry; she would be up for a discussion on this topic. Yes, a hike up Mount Major. There was a perfect spot near the crest. He’d bring her favorite lunch—veggie wraps with herb dressing. And he wouldn’t mention marriage. All he would talk about was their overall relationship, that it was good but what could they do to make it better, closer, more simpatico, between them?

  Angelina came out of the bathroom wearing the new dress she’d gotten at Cilla’s shop. It was—well, there were no words to describe how she looked. With her hair twisted up on her head, it left her shoulders bare and begging to be touched. Still he didn’t make a move. Did she look disappointed?

  He grinned inside. Yes, let her stew a little.

  They stopped for dinner at a small, quiet restaurant where, several times, she accused him of “being in outer space.” He’d smiled knowingly and kept eating as tomorrow’s plans churned and grew in his mind.

  With bellies full of pasta, they headed to the school for the final show. He had to admit, she’d done a great job. The relationship Angelina had developed with the kids came as a complete surprise to him. And possibly to her also. Many times over the year and half he’d known her, she’d said how she and kids didn’t get along. That lack of rapport was the real reason she never wanted children. But time and again, over the last week, he’d seen how she handled problems, settled disputes, organized situations. And bonded with the kids—particularly with Kiana Smith. It was amazing.

  Suddenly Jose’s words boomed into Jarvis’s head. “Right now, I’m zoned in on Kiana Smith as the killer.” Jarvis himself couldn’t see it, but…what if it turned out to be true? That would blow Angelina all to hell.

  A few cars were in the lot. He recognized many of them as belonging to the kids.

  Inside the dressing room—that still smelled like a locker room, and would smell like a locker room even if a million air fresheners hung from the ceiling—people bustled back and forth in normal pre-show excitement. The excitement was like a physical thing. It was almost as though he could see it. He could tell Angelina felt it too. Of course she would. She straightened up and dove into the crowd.

  Evan stopped to say hello. He had on the costume for his first scene—black jeans and a leather jacket that reminded Jarvis of his one-time appearance on stage. The boy looked calm and well rested.

  “How’s it going?” Jarvis asked.

  Evan read the correct meaning into his words. “I’m coming to terms with things. Kee is helping.”

  “You really like her, don’t you?”

  “Yeah, but I know there’s no future for us.”

  “Not sure what you mean.”

  He threw up his hands. “Look at her! She’s got it all, looks, intelligence. And she’s focused—determined. What would she see in somebody like me?”

  “Want to know what I think?”

  “Sure.” His eyes said he wasn’t just being polite; he really did want to know, so Jarvis said, “She cares for you more than she wants to show.”

  He didn’t ask how Jarvis knew. He didn’t ask why she wouldn’t show it. He did ask, “How do I get through to her?”

  “Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

  “Whatever it is.” Angelina’s voice sent tingles up his arms as she stepped up beside them, “he’s right. Keep doing what you’re doing.”

  “Did you hear what we said?” Evan asked.

  “No. But if it comes from Jarvis, it’s good advice. By the way, I’m sure you know Kiana’s starting work at Prince and Pauper on Monday.”

  Evan nodded. “That’ll really help toward her scholarship.”

  “My partner and I are in the midst of a new production. We’re having a terrible time with the musical score. We wondered if you might agree to come help us with it.”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “If you don’t want to, that’s fine. We’ll understand.”

  “No! I want to. I just—why would you—oh, never mind. I’ll be there after school.”

  “We’ll have to work something out because of the distance you have to travel. It wouldn’t make sense to drive every day. Probably what we’ll do, if it’s okay with all your parents, is have you come and stay for the weekends.”

  This announcement had Jarvis’s head swinging around so fast he almost hurt himself. Had she just offered to bring two strangers—teens nonetheless—into her anally neat home? He must’ve misheard.

  When she added, “My partner has generously offered to let you stay with him,” Jarvis relaxed. His senses hadn’t gone totally off-kilter.

  One of the stagehands ran up to them. “Does anybody know where the box of jewelry is?”

  “It was on the table over there.” Evan pointed across the room.

  “It’s not there.”

  Angelina gestured to a line of wooden benches between the rows of lockers. “It was over there last night.”

  “Thanks.” They all turned and watched the boy hurry there and bend, back to them, and begin tearing through the mile-high stash of stuff.

  Angelina’s, “Oh. My. God,” got Jarvis and Evan’s instant attention.

  Jarvis couldn’t stop the wide grin that broke onto his face. Which made Evan frown. In most people’s worlds, those words would bring worry or all-encompassing fear.

  “What’s so funny?” Evan asked.

  “Not funny. This is great! It means she’s figured things out. Put the puzzle pieces together.”

  “She knows who murdered Gwen?”

  Evan’s words captured the attention of several people. Word spread like an atomic explosion. Soon the entire cast and crew had gathered around them, crammed in a long oval shape between the rows of lockers.

  A concerned Kiana elbowed between two boys and came to stand beside Angelina.

  “Okay,” Jarvis said, “spill it.”

  But his woman was in another place. Pacing in a wide circle, between Jarvis, Evan and Kiana and the stagehands. Jarvis gestured for them to ba
ck up and make room.

  Angelina was muttering. He could only pick up a few words now and then as she passed. “Birth certificate…” A headshake. “Marriage license…photos.” Another head shake. “Wrong, wrong, wrong. Not the cops.” She slapped a palm on one temple. “Stupid.” Another slap. “Think. Think.”

  Suddenly she stopped pacing and shook herself back to the present. She noticed everyone gawking at her and gave a sheepish grin. “Sorry guys. False alarm. I thought I had it.”

  Many disappointed faces showed around the group. But Jarvis remained undaunted. It meant she was working on things. It meant a solution would be forthcoming. Soon.

  A check of the clock said they needed to be moving outdoors. Cast members gathered what they needed and together they all filed outside.

  “Oh wait,” Angelina said. “I have to use the ladies room.”

  “Go ahead,” Jarvis told the kids. “I’ll wait for her. We’ll be right out.” He let the door swing shut and stood near the bench while Angelina disappeared into the toilet area.

  To pass the time, he wandered around the locker room looking for the missing box of jewelry, and didn’t find it. He checked his watch. She’d been in there almost ten minutes. Unusual for her to be gone so long. Probably she’d zoned into that other world and was working out murder clues. He knocked on the door. The sound echoed off the cement block walls.

  No answer. He knocked again and called her name.

  Still nothing.

  * * * *

  Angie wanted to shout for Jarvis to run for help. But she knew him. Knew he’d come storming in. And get himself hurt. But the gun to her temple prevented her from shouting a warning.

  As expected, the door burst open. Jarvis erupted into the room, gun drawn. Her captor spun around, an elbow caught her on the side of the head. An explosion of pain toppled her sideways. She knocked her head on the wall. Everything went black. As she sagged to the floor, a gun went off.

  FORTY-TWO

  Angie came to with somebody kneeling beside her. Fingers came away from her throat—somebody checking her pulse? Or sizing her for a garrote? As her vision cleared, she could see the original situation hadn’t improved. She’d been in the cubicle when Jarvis entered. Now she was lying on the floor in front of the row of sinks. To the left were the showers. Slightly behind were the toilet stalls, where one of the toilets whooshed water from a faulty valve. She’d been checking it when the attacker struck her.

  Rays from a streetlight streamed through the half-dozen rectangular windows near the ceiling, and illuminated her most recent predicament. From outside, the muffled voices of gathering spectators almost overshadowed the sound of the water.

  She raised a hand to brush hair from her face and came away with something sticky. There was no mistaking the blood on her hand.

  “Good, you’re awake. I wouldn’t want you dying yet.”

  Tears prevented her seeing behind the gun waving in her face, but the voice was chillingly familiar. And not completely unexpected.

  “Why are you doing this?” Stupid question. The reason was clear as mountain spring water.

  “Sit up.” Pushing back the pain vaulting around in her head, Angie struggled to a sitting position by bracing her hands on either side of her. One hand touched wetness. She didn’t have to be a detective to know it too was blood.

  The gruesome situation took a turn for the worse seeing Jarvis sprawled beside her. In the pool of blood. He lay in a semi-fetal position facing away from her. Blood encircled his torso. She reached out to touch him, to seek a pulse, to do something, but the gun menaced closer and she jerked her hand back.

  Angie managed to focus on his backside enough to see that it was moving. But for how long? “H-he’s hurt.” Maybe dead.

  “No kidding.”

  “Don’t make this worse for yourself. You already have one murder charge hanging over your head.”

  “So, what’s two more?”

  This couldn’t be happening. Angie assessed Jarvis’s condition. He must be gut-shot—the blood was closer to that area. The puddle didn’t seem to be growing. She counted the rise and fall of his breaths—seemed to be fairly regular and without stress. How long before things went downhill?

  “Look. The show’s about to start. Very soon, someone’s going to come looking for me. If you leave now, you can escape. I won’t tell anyone it was you.”

  “Right.”

  “Okay, what if I promise not to tell anyone for an hour? That should give you time to get away. Think about it. In a minute somebody will come. They’ll figure out what’s going on and run for help. You do remember that the place is crawling with cops and security guards, right? They’ll take you down without a thought.”

  No verbal response but there was a flicker of hesitation.

  “What are your options? You either run or try killing everyone who comes through that door. Sooner or later you’ll run out of ammunition and be trapped here—a sitting duck, with dead bodies all over the place. You try to run then and someone’s going to kill you. It’s a given.”

  This time the response was a double blink of the eyes. Good, a little more hesitation. Hurry up, make a decision!

  The puddle around Jarvis hadn’t expanded. As a former nurse, the fact was small consolation since so many things could affect the flow of blood—specifically internal bleeding.

  Okay. Okay. She had to think of things she could change, namely the gun looming a foot from her left temple. “So, how did you get in my hotel room?”

  “Simple, pretend to be Jarvis and ask for a key.”

  The movement came out of nowhere. Something black zipped across her line of vision. Before her brain could process anything more than it was a human being, the attacker dropped to the floor with a grunt and a heavy thud. The wrestling began. Angie shot to her feet, prepared to jump into the fray. Where was the gun? As the bodies rolled and tussled, she spotted it now and then. Wait, Jarvis’s gun? There, under the farthest sink. She ran, picked it up and—as she aimed and shouted for their attention, the other gun went off.

  She kept her gun aimed at the floor, at the person wearing a brown jacket. Brown rimmed glasses lay broken near her right foot. She kicked them away. The rescuer in black leather and denim stood up and moved away from the body. His face was red, his hair tousled. Evan Harris was the best sight she’d seen in years.

  “Call 911,” Angie said. Evan took a phone from his hip pocket. After he dialed, she handed him the gun. She didn’t need to tell him what to do with it. He’d already aimed the thing at the person on the floor.

  She knelt beside Jarvis. And rolled him gently onto his back. His eyes were closed. His skin ghostly white. Blood stained the entire front of his new suit. She pushed up the stiff white sleeve and two-fingered the pulse at his wrist.

  The bathroom door burst open. José entered, gun drawn. He was followed by a pair of white-suited EMTs. Angie gratefully relinquished command. All she could do now was pray as they assessed, stabilized, loaded and left with her friend, confidant, and lover.

  She started to follow but was halted by José’s touch on her arm. “I’ll take you in a few minutes. Help me straighten this out a minute, would you?”

  Angie threw a desperate glance at the propped-open door. The stretcher was just disappearing around the corner. “Please.”

  There was nothing she could do for him right now. She’d only get in the way at the hospital. Besides, he faced hours of assessment and tests—if he lived till then.

  She sucked in some courage, nodded at José, walked to the body and kicked it hard in the ribs.

  “Feel better?”

  “Marginally.”

  “You all right?” he asked Evan, who’d backed from the commotion and stood in the farthest corner crammed between the last sink and the wall. His skin was almost as pale as Jarvis’s. She went to him and wrapped him in her arms. He sagged against her. And then the sobs came. They wracked his thin body. Nobody said a word for a long time,
though, behind her she heard people enter, turn over the body and begin collecting evidence.

  Finally Evan was all cried out. He straightened his spine and backed away.

  “Throw some water on your face.”

  He did so, dashing handfuls up and over his hair. She pushed a wad of brown paper towels at him. He scrubbed them over his hair and heaved them in the trash, then turned to her looking a bit sheepish. She took his hand and led him from the room. They sat side-by-side in the main locker room, letting the investigation go on around them.

  Finally Evan found words. “I don’t understand. Why would Mr. Philmore kill Ms. Forest?”

  FORTY-THREE

  Angie sat in a padded chair just outside the surgery room doors at St. Joseph’s Hospital. She wanted to be as close as possible when the surgeon exited with news. Good news. Great news. It had to be.

  For the umpteenth time she wiped her palms on an un-bloody section of the green dress. A motion down the long hallway gave her something to look at beside the doors. A crowd was moving in her direction. Angie got to her feet as the cast and crew—except for Evan, who’d been escorted home—rushed toward her. After hugs all around, they settled in chairs and on the floor. Kiana took the chair beside her.

  Angie prepared to explain what the cops hadn’t had time to. With her eyes she asked Kiana for permission to divulge her secret. Kiana shook her head and spoke for herself, telling how Gwen was her real-life mom. Surprised faces glowed around the group.

  “I always wondered how you got to be so close to her,” one of the girls said.

  “There’s more,” Kiana said. She pulled in a long breath and went on to explain the college relationship with Mr. Reynolds, leaving out the news of his homosexuality.

  “Mr. Reynolds is your father?”

  “Yes. I didn’t learn this till yesterday.”

  “But how is any of that related to Ms. Forest being killed?”