Bundle of Trouble(25)

Closing my eyes, I tried to clear my mind. Visions of Michelle popped into my head again, crowding out all other thoughts. I tried to think about something else. Laurie. Yes. I’d think of Laurie. Sweet Laurie. Innocence. Pure life.

Suddenly my breasts started to leak, soaking my night-gown. Great. Way to go, Kate.

Hold out on the baby and you leak anyway. I may as well feed her, right? Either that or lie here wet and have nightmares.

The breast pump was in the corner of the bedroom. I could get up and learn to use that. I’d need to start stocking up on milk to cover Laurie during the hours I’d be at the office.

The office? Ugh. How much longer on my maternity leave? Three weeks.

Three weeks. Twenty-one days. Five hundred and four hours. Wait. It was already 5 A.M. So that meant four hundred ninety-nine hours.

I closed my eyes. How depressing.

Wasn’t there a way to stay home with Laurie? I mulled over the question, drifting off to sleep, forgetting to feed Laurie, use the pump, or stress over Michelle and George.





It was 9 A.M. Jim had left for the office hours ago. Laurie and I lay in bed, nursing. It seemed like we’d been nursing all morning. Making up for lost nutrition throughout the night.

I felt even more drained now than I had at 5 A.M. We were about to doze off when the doorbell rang. Laurie nodded off. I groaned. I put her into the bassinet and grabbed a robe. Who could it be at this time of day?

I stumbled to the front door and peered out the peephole. All I could see was a broad chest in a blue button shirt. Definitely not UPS.

“Who is it?”

“Investigator Galigani. Is Kate Connolly in?”

The police? What now? Shouldn’t he flash his badge at me or something? Was I getting overly paranoid?

“Where’s your badge?”

“I’m not with the police. I’m a private investigator.”

“Who hired you?”

He bent down to look through the peephole. I saw one green eye peering at me. I involuntarily pulled away.

“Mrs. Avery,” he said into the peephole.

“Mrs. Avery is dead,” I said.

The eye shifted. “Gloria Avery is dead?”

Who was Gloria?

I placed the chain lock on the door and opened it two inches.

Investigator Galigani was tall, dark, and not handsome. He had a huge black mustache on a very round face. He frowned at the chain, which only succeeded in making him look mean and angry.

“I don’t know who Gloria is,” I said. “I meant Michelle Avery is dead.”

“Ah.” His face softened a bit. “Are you Kate?”

I nodded.

“May I come in, ma’am?”

There was the “ma’am” again. I glanced down at my pale green terrycloth robe. No! Why did I have to get interrogated again? Especially looking like this.

“I’ve got a newborn. I’m really tired—”

“It’ll only take a minute.”

“How do I know that you are who you say you are?”

The ends of his mustache turned up. “Here’s my card.”

What did that prove? I let his card hang between his fingers. He wiggled it at me. I took it.

“Would you like to call Mrs. Avery?” he asked. “She’ll verify that she’s hired me.”

“Do you have a photo ID?”

His face broke apart with laughter. Mustache going one way, bottom lip the other way.

I tried not to be offended. “What good would it do if she says she hired ‘Galigani’ when all I have to prove that you’re Galigani is a business card?”

“You’re right. Here you go.” He opened his wallet and shoved his driver’s license at me. “This, too.” He dug into the wallet and pulled out a worn private investigator license from the State of California issued to Albert Galigani.

“What’s her number?”

His face registered surprise. “You’re actually going to call her?”

“I’m a new mom, my car’s been broken into twice, my brother-in-law is missing, and I found my friend dead yesterday. I can’t let a stranger into my house. What if you try to kill me?”

“If I was going to kill you, I could have done it through the crack in the door. But please, by all means, call Mrs. Avery.”

He was right. He could have already killed me.

I shut the door in his face. He rang the bell again. I ignored him, got out the phonebook.

Ah! Here was an instance where actually using the phonebook would be faster than an online lookup. Okay, so maybe the books were still good for something.

I found two numbers under Avery, Michelle’s and another one. I dialed the second one.

The doorbell rang again. Let him wait.

I got voice mail. Of course. No one answers their phone anymore. I left a message. Why couldn’t anything be easy? The bell rang yet again. I opened the door with the chain in place.