Pink Balloons and Other Deadly Things (Mystery Series - Book One) by Nancy Tesler Read Free Book Online Page B

found them?
    About to close the bottom drawer, I noticed a jumble of keys crammed together at the rear. Scooping them up, I laid them out on the desk. Two I recognized as belonging to the Alpine house; most could have been to anything. But one was attached to a sterling silver key ring shaped like a heart and with the initials D.S. clearly engraved in the center.
    Why would Rich have the keys to Dot's apartment? I would have expected him to have Erica’s keys, but Dot’s? Surely he wasn't involved in an intimate way with her ? Not Rich, who hired and fired gorgeous models every day of the week. There could be a thousand other reasons why Rich would have Dot's keys. Like this was where she parked an extra set in case of emergency. Or maybe he'd stopped by to feed her cat when she went on vacation. Except I was pretty sure Dot didn't have a cat. I was nine hundred and ninety-nine reasons short, still working on it, when I heard the lock turning. I just had time to return all the keys but Dot's, which I dropped into my jacket pocket. The door swung open. I looked up into the dark-ringed, angry eyes of the stranger who used to be my beloved.
    “WHAT’RE YOU DOING HERE?”
    Every time I see Rich, I have to make a conscious effort to remember that we're no longer connected. He looked drained. I could tell he’d been drinking. His complexion was blotched and ruddy, and a toddler would have been steadier on his feet.
    Rich is a big man, even-featured, broad-shouldered, with the beginnings of a middle-age paunch that he takes great pains to camouflage behind well-tailored clothing. Only those of us privileged to have viewed him in the buff (which, I was coming to believe had probably included a large percentage of the tri-state area’s female population) would be aware of it. It was a shock to see him unshaven, his usually well-styled thick black hair unkempt, his shirt-tail crumpled and hanging out of pants that looked like a dog had mistaken them for a chew toy. Chances were he had been wearing those clothes since Sunday morning. I hoped that was it, because even sober, Rich would be furious at finding me going through his things. Smashed, he might be—-really unpleasant.
    I sidled around the desk, relieved he didn't seem to notice that I had taken over his chair. Some perverse piece of me, responding like Pavlov's dog to old conditioning, wanted to reach out and comfort him. Another piece ached to crawl into his arms and have my own fears lulled.
    Old habits die hard.
    “The kids,” I began. “They're scared, Rich. They need you. All this media attention has---”
    “Come to gloat, have you?”
    I drew back. “That’s a horrible thing to say!”
    He pushed past me and flopped onto the sofa. “Come on, you hated her. You wanted her dead.”
    “Apparently I wasn't the only one,” I protested, flushing. “Maybe you ought to be thinking about who else had reason to feel that way instead of attacking me.”
    He buried his face in his hands, and his tone suddenly altered. “It's been awful, Carrie. You can't imagine. Finding her like that...” A shudder traveled through him, and he lifted his head and looked at me in a way that, in the old days, would have had me rubbing his back and serving up enormous portions of wifely sympathy. Oddly, I was moved even now. Seeing him hurting, vulnerable, brought memories of closer times flooding back.
    “I know,” I murmured, patting his shoulder. “You must be---”
    “Don't know how I'm going to manage without her.”
    My hand stopped mid-pat as my sympathy evaporated like summer mist. I remembered his protestations of undying love to me. “You’re a survivor. You'll survive.”
    He shook his head. “She was a marvel. Tough, mean when she had to be. Sales went through the ceiling after she took over.”
    And it hit me. Rich hadn't left me for another woman, per se. He'd left me for a business woman who could send sales through the ceiling! Granted, one with undeniable