Day Shift
Page 6

The waiter arrived with the coffeepot to refresh Olivia’s cup. Manfred took the opportunity to order a large breakfast. He would need the fuel.
Her face growing somber, Olivia said, “In a totally weird coincidence, I saw the Devlins last night. I haven’t seen them in five years, I guess. They seemed just fine, so normal. I just can’t understand it.”
So the dead couple had been the Devlins.
“I never met them,” Manfred said firmly and a bit more loudly than necessary. “But I saw a body being removed down the hall from me, and the policeman wouldn’t tell me what had happened. Though it seems you know?”
“Yes, a horrible thing. Stuart . . . well, I hate to even say it, but apparently last night Stuart and Lucy had some kind of argument in their room, and he killed her. And then himself.”
He stared at her. There was nothing in her face or eyes, no subtext. “Oh, Jesus,” he said, stunned and sickened. He scrambled to recover his composure. “Did anyone hear them fighting? That’s really . . . awful.”
“It is,” she agreed, after a gulp of coffee. “I ran into them in Veneto last night, and we ended up having dinner together. They were kind of sniping at each other, but that’s the way some couples do, you know? They’d been married so long. It just seems incredible.”
“It seems incredible to me, too,” he said, aware that his voice was way too grim. He made another effort to relax. “So assuming the police let you go, what are your plans for the day?”
Olivia gave him a gentle smile. “I had always planned to spend another night here, and I’ll stick to that. I hate to sound shallow, but I guess I’ll just go on with my little shopping trip. That was my agenda for today. Now I kind of want to take my mind off them. I can’t help them or change the situation, after all.” She looked down at her cup and shrugged. “You know when you come to Big D, you’ve got to shop at the Galleria. A gal’s gotta have clothes. I’ll take in a movie, maybe go to a comedy club tonight. I could use a good laugh, especially after all this. You want to tag along?”
“Sorry,” he said. “I’m here to work, and I’m booked up today and tomorrow.” He was free both evenings, but he knew he’d need the time to recuperate. Besides, just now he didn’t want to go anywhere with Olivia.
“Work?” There was a faint question in her voice.
“Private readings.”
She looked at him seriously, as if she were really seeing him for the first time. “I hope you make a bundle,” she said.
“That’s the plan,” he said, and the waiter set his plate in front of him. He was glad of the interruption. Olivia smiled at his heaped plate, but he didn’t react. He poured syrup on his stuffed French toast and cut it up, hoping his appetite would return. He ate a lot on days he was working one-on-one, because the last thing he wanted was to get woozy. He dug into his food, gradually feeling hungrier since everything was delicious. Olivia drank more coffee, but he was glad she let the conversation drop so he could eat in peace. She charged her meal to her room and gathered up her cell phone and newspaper.
“Were you going to mention this to Lemuel?” Manfred asked.
She paused in pushing back her chair. “Why not?”
“Just wanted to be sure we were on the same page.” If there was one person in the world Manfred did not want to keep a secret from, that person was Lemuel.
A stocky man in a sports shirt pulled up another chair to the table. Startled, Manfred looked from the man’s dark face to Olivia. She looked mildly questioning and not at all alarmed.
“Manfred, this is Detective Sterling, Bonnet Park police.”
“Manfred Bernardo.” He shook the detective’s hand. “Did you want to talk to me, or shall I scoot along?” He glanced at his watch. He had thirty minutes until he had to meet his first client.
“Just a few moments of your time,” the detective said. He had a soft, conciliatory voice, contrasting sharply with a stern face. Olivia nodded and left, without a backward glance.
Great, Manfred thought. He did his best to look open and innocent. “I have an appointment soon,” he said, trying to sound neutral, when Detective Sterling didn’t speak immediately. “This is a working weekend, for me.”
“You know Miss Charity.”
“Sure. We live in the same town.”
“You met here by prearrangement?”
“No.” Manfred smiled. “We see plenty of each other in Midnight.”
“You ate in the restaurant here in the hotel last night?”
“I did. Had an eight o’clock reservation.”
“And you saw Miss Charity then?”
“I saw the back of her head, turns out. I was facing away from her, but there are mirrors all over this place. I even thought, ‘She looks familiar,’ but she didn’t turn around, and I was reading. I didn’t realize who it was until I saw her this morning.”
“What was she doing?” The detective looked down at a notepad covered with scribbles, but Manfred was sure he didn’t need to check someone else’s account—the waiter’s? Another diner’s?
“Last night? Talking to an older couple. I’d never met them.”
“How did they seem to be getting along, to you?”
Manfred let his surprise show. “Since I didn’t think I knew any of the people, I didn’t pay a lot of attention,” he said. “If something out of the ordinary had happened, I’m sure I’d would remember it. Raised voices or throwing a drink . . . major drama.”