“You have arrived,” the deep male voice with the Italian accent said.I had named him Bruno, and sometimes I talked back to him.In this case I told him, “Thank you,” and pulled up to the curb and cut the engine, and peered through the windshield at the house.
Or building, rather.
Five stories tall, with at least sixty windows just on the front.A big sign next to the entrance saidSheridan Farms Assisted Living Community.
A retirement home.Someone had attempted to give it the same Victorian flair as the surrounding homes, but while it had something of the air of an old turn-of-the-century hotel, they hadn’t quite managed to get rid of the institutional.It gave off more of a Victorian insane asylum vibe, if that isn’t too politically incorrect a comparison.
I opened the car door and got out.And made my way into the lobby.
At least that looked more like a hotel than an asylum.Lots of green plants and plush sofas.I deduced—from the looks of it, and the fact that it was located in prosperous Williamson County—that only rich old people could afford to live here.
The young woman behind the reception desk was wearing a trim, blue uniform rather than the expected scrubs.“Can I help you?”
“I’m looking for Araminta Tucker,” I said.
Her elegant brows drew together.“Are you a relative?”
“Just a friend.Of a friend.”Or something like that.“I wanted to talk to her about her neighbor.”Former neighbor.“Mrs.Grimshaw.”
“Are you with the police?”
I blinked.“No.Have the police been here?”
“She said they’d be coming,” the receptionist said.
“Who did?Ms.Tucker?”
She nodded.
“No,” I said.“I’m not with the police.”Although I supposed there was a chance they might show up.If the blonde was, or became, a suspect in Mrs.Grimshaw’s murder.
“Identification?”
It took me a second to realize that she was asking for mine.I dug in my wallet and pulled out my driver’s license.She scanned it and handed it back, along with a sticker that said ‘visitor’ along with a grainy black-and-white depiction of my face.My driver’s license photo is bad enough; the grainy copy of it looked like something out of a horror movie.
I peeled the back off and put the sticker on my coat.
“Sign here.”She pointed to the empty line at the bottom of a visitor’s log.I wrote Araminta Tucker’s name down as the person I was visiting, and scrawled my signature next to it.
“Unit 204,” the receptionist said.“Second floor.Elevator’s down there.”She pointed down the hallway.
I thanked her and headed off.And wondered how Araminta Tucker had known that the police might show up to talk to her.
The answer to that, at least, became very clear when I got off the elevator on the second floor and headed down the hall toward unit 204.The closer I got, the louder I could hear the sound of a TV.By the time I stood outside the door—cracked open an inch or two—I could barely hear myself think.There was no chance at all that Ms.Tucker would hear a knock, so I dispensed with politesse and just pushed the door open.
It led into a small living room, with an ornate velvet sofa against one wall, flanked by two equally elegant wingback chairs.The coffee table was glass, and sported an oversize, fake flower arrangement full of spiky gladiolus and what I thought might be moonflowers.The sound was up so high on the TV that the vase rattled against the glass.
Ms.Tucker sat on the sofa, legs tucked up Indian style.She was tiny, with a bouffant hairdo of impossibly black hair, and two beady black eyes in a small, wrinkled face.Her hands were fisted, and she was swearing at the screen like a sergeant major in a military movie.
I looked at the screen.Ice hockey.
Really?
I cleared my throat.She flapped a hand at me.“Hush, girl.”
Hush?How had she even been able to hear me with the noise coming from the TV?
And girl?It’s been decades since I was a girl.Although to a woman twice my age, maybe I looked younger than I was.
