A Dead Sister (Jessica Huntington Desert Cities Mystery) Read online

  Less than two weeks later, Kelly was dead. Without the hope of reconciliation, Jessica was despondent, even when trying to console Tommy. Tommy tried to make her feel better by saying how sorry Kelly was about what had happened that night. He swore she intended to apologize. She planned on visiting Jessica in the OC to hash things out if she was willing to give their friendship another chance.

  “She really wanted to explain,” Tommy insisted.

  “Explain what?” Jessica could not understand. “It was pretty clear to me that Kelly just did not like anything about me, Tommy.”

  “You have got to be kidding, Jessica. Kelly loved you almost as much as she loved me.” Tommy’s eyes, dark with sorrow and red-rimmed from crying, had started to fill with tears again. He was so distraught Jessica accepted what he had to say.

  “I’m sure you’re right Tommy. You knew her better than anyone.” Did he really? Did anyone know what was going on with Kelly Fontana? Jessica had done her best to forgive Kelly and herself for that night. She had moved on, relegating it to the past. Here it all was again, after that enigmatic call from Frank. Now what?

  CHAPTER 5

  Sunday morning, Jessica awoke early. She surprised Bernadette by fixing coffee and an omelet for her. After breakfast, Jessica helped load Bernadette’s luggage and a stack of presents into the huge Escalade that the petite Bernadette loved to drive.

  Jessica was subdued, unhappy about those sad memories of Kelly Fontana. The prospect of being alone at the house for nearly a week also got her down. She even felt a bit sorry for herself. Of course, she had no hope of evading Bernadette’s emotion-detecting superpowers.

  “It’ll be okay, Jessica. A little quiet time isn’t a bad thing.” Bernadette stopped what she was doing and took both of Jessica’s hands in her own. “You’ve got a lot to think about. Like whether you’re going to go to work for that good-looking attorney, or date him. It’s kind of hard to do both, you know. You have all that reading to do before you see Father Martin again, that insurance company to fight with, and all those laps to swim.” She brushed Jessica’s cheek with a kiss.

  “I know you’re right, Bernadette. I have plenty to do. After all we’ve been through in the last month quiet is good. It’ll be a blessing if the only fireworks in my life are the ones being set off by the city of Palm Desert. Don’t worry St. Bernadette, I’ll be alright.”

  Bernadette pulled herself up into the driver’s seat of the SUV, shut the door and started the engine. Then she rolled down the window. “I’ll be back on Friday, and the boys will be back then, too. Why don’t you plan a get-together for us? You’re always so good at doing things like that. Why not get those caterers back here again? They did a great job last time.”

  Jessica felt like a ten-year-old being forced to stay home and do her homework or chores. She couldn’t just invite herself along for a visit with Bernadette’s sister‘s family. Scuffing the ground with the toe of her sandal, she finally agreed.

  “Oh, all right, that’s a good idea. You drive carefully, okay?”

  “I promise! No distracted driving for me. No talking on the phone, no sexting like that Weiner guy,” she said. That last comment evoked a little twitch from Jessica’s lips, almost a smile. Bernadette put on her dark glasses, “See, no messing with my sunglasses while I drive. And Jessica,” she paused.

  Jessica looked up, “Yes?”

  “I love you and I left something for you in the kitchen. Go see. It’s something special for you and Frank when he visits this afternoon.”

  “I love you too, Bernadette,” Jessica said. She stood on her toes and leaned in through the window to give Bernadette a kiss goodbye. Bernadette backed out of the garage, handling that gargantuan vehicle as if it were nothing. Jessica waved as the door started to shut again after Bernadette hit the button on the garage door opener. Jessica’s mood had lightened in anticipation of what she might find in the kitchen. It had not been in the fridge, or she would have seen it when she fixed breakfast for them. Where then?

  As soon as she stepped into the kitchen, she spotted it. Not in the fridge, but on it. It was cake. Not just any cake, but Bernadette’s Mexican chocolate cake. Made with Mexican chocolate, spices and chilies, it was rich, moist, and melted in your mouth. Topped with her fudge frosting, it was, by itself, a reason to live. Jessica held out hope that someday, Bernadette would share her recipe. That chipotle-roasted chicken was not the only fantastic thing that Bernadette had prepared while Jessica was working out in the pool or dilly-dallying in her bedroom yesterday. How she got so much done in so little time was a mystery—a blessed one.

  Bernadette’s recipe for life was as mysterious as her recipe for chocolate cake. Was the secret ingredient hidden in those dense volumes Father Martin had given her to read? Did they contain anything that might reveal the source of Bernadette’s boundless kindness and joyous spirit? Jessica spent the next hour trying to figure that out. She found some of what she read intriguing. No “road to Damascus” experience, but there were a few moments marked by a thoughtful “hmm.”

  She was struck by the sense of conviction shared by the believers who wrote so passionately about the desire to know God. A singular voice engaged in the pursuit of answers to the most terrifying questions about being human. Jessica came away from her reading without answers to those questions per se, but with a greater appreciation for the process of such inquiry. Perhaps that old adage applied: that it was not only the destination, but the journey that mattered too.

  Jessica set the books aside and ventured out for a swim. She had some miles to put in if she was going to eat that cake. Still immersed in a reflective state induced by her reading, Jessica looked around at the paradise in which she lived. It was hot, extremely hot, for the last day of June. Saturday, the mercury had climbed to 122 degrees, and it was headed close to that again. When the heat beats full-on, the desert shimmers, creating the sensation that everything around you is pulsing and alive, even the inert matter. Odd in a place supposedly so bereft of living things.

  Jessica had spent a lot of time hiking and riding on horseback in the surrounding desert. Beyond the reach of the synthetic Arcadia of country clubs and resorts a realm of rugged desert terrain waited to be discovered. That realm hums with life. In a few natural oases, 200 hundred-year-old Washingtonia palm trees shelter ponds fed by bubbling springs. The springs originate from a massive underground aquifer that supplies much of the drinking water in the Coachella Valley. The tall shaggy palms stand, like bearded old men, keeping watch over their desert refuges.

  Even in areas rarely touched by water, desert life abounds. The desert is home to a surprising array of drought-tolerant succulents, wildflowers, scrub and brush. Those habitats harbor wildlife, ranging from insects and reptiles to songbirds, roadrunners, wild cats and bighorn sheep. The desert not only plays host to a stream of human visitors each year, but to birds and butterflies as well. Situated near the Pacific Flyway, the nearby Salton Sea serves as a rest stop for migrating birds which also show up in water hazards on golf courses or water features at resorts. Monarch butterflies dance their way through the Coachella Valley on their sojourns to winter in Mexico and on their return north in spring and summer.

  Much of the blow-sand desert has been destroyed by development, which blocks the movement of sand, halting dune formation and restoration. But the living landscape of dunes and hummocks can still be found in places like the Coachella Valley Preserve. Also home to a stunning example of the natural oases that sustained native Cahuilla for hundreds of years before the valley was discovered by outsiders. Hiking was something Jessica looked forward to in the fall when summer yielded its grip on the desert landscape.

  Maybe it was the reading she had done, or just the early stages of heat stroke, but Jessica felt called to take part. She had the urge to fall in sync, somehow, with the living desert around her. Diving into the swimming pool, she found her rhythm, gliding through the water. Jessica imagined herself linked to the intractab
le durability of the desert, steadfast and resilient under even the most extreme conditions. She would endure and rebound. Perhaps she might find what she was looking for after all if she just kept at it.

  After finishing her workout, Jessica struggled to hang on to that hopeful mood as long as she could. The minute the doorbell rang, other emotions took over. In the lead was a ton of apprehension. Frank Fontana was right on-time as Jessica went to the front door to welcome him. Accustomed to living in Riverside, where it was 20 degrees cooler, Frank was obviously uncomfortable in the heat.

  “Come on in, Frank. Let me get you something cool to drink.” Jessica had been inspired to make fresh-squeezed lemonade for the two of them. The tall frosty glasses were garnished with sprigs of fresh mint from the pint-sized kitchen herb garden that flourished under Bernadette’s care. “I made us some lemonade, and you won’t believe what Bernadette left for us—chocolate cake! I hope you have room for cake, even though I’m sure Aunt Evelyn stuffed you.” Jessica led Frank to the table in the morning room, where she had set out the glasses of lemonade and a pitcher for refills. In the center of the table was that cake. Three tiers high, covered with swirls of fudge frosting.

  “That looks amazing. I haven’t had Bernadette’s chocolate cake in years, but I haven’t forgotten how good it was. Mom and Dad eat lunch pretty early. They’re up at dawn and ready for lunch by 11:00. My kids are still groggy at that time of day. That’s more like breakfast time around our house if they don’t have school. Anyway, Mom and Dad held off until 11:30 when I rousted the kids into bathing suits and flip-flops so they could sit at the dining table. They both scarfed down food like they hadn’t been fed in weeks! I have the grocery bills to prove otherwise. They must eat about 10,000 calories a day each, minus the ten percent or so that ends up on the kitchen floor after each feeding frenzy.”

  Jessica flashed for a moment on “feeding time” at the home of Laura’s sister, Sara, who swore that as much food ended up on the floor as in her two toddlers. Ten percent on the floor was an improvement. She couldn’t remember ever being that sloppy at their age. Maybe her memory failed her, since she was pretty oblivious to clean-up duties while growing up. Getting anything on her hands, face or clothes, even by age 5 or 6, had disturbed Jessica. The thought of leaving a trail of crumbs on the floor of the kitchen would have been unimaginable to the fastidious 12-year-old Jessica.

  “I’m sure it made Aunt Evelyn happy that they enjoyed the meal. And it sounds like it has been long enough since you ate to have plenty of room for cake and maybe a little ice cream to cool you off?”

  Frank was guzzling his lemonade, and let out a sigh of approval as he put the glass down. “I’d make room for that cake even if I had just eaten a horse,” he said, smiling broadly. “This lemonade is doing a good job beating back the heat, but ice cream sounds too good to pass up.” He smiled again, looking a bit shy as he spoke.

  “Jessica, you look great. Much better than you did at Roger’s funeral.” Frank picked up the glass and finished his lemonade.

  As Jessica moved to the table and leaned over him to pick up the pitcher, she was close enough to feel the heat rising from his body. She caught a whiff of something fresh and clean like wood or sage and soap. His dark hair was a little shaggy, parted on one side and combed back just off his forehead. Maybe the scent was from was something he had used on his hair, which looked like it had just been washed. He could use a haircut. With the hours he had to work as a cop, and raising two kids on his own, a haircut was probably not high on his “to do” list.

  He was clean-shaven and wore a lightweight long-sleeved shirt in a camel color which drew out the hint of olive in his complexion. It made his dark eyes seem even darker. His sleeves were rolled up, exposing an inexpensive watch that could use a new faux-leather band. He wore jeans and what looked like motorcycle boots. She couldn’t remember ever seeing him on a motorcycle. Maybe he had had motorcycle duty as a cop before he rose through the ranks to detective. Moving his glass closer, to pour him more lemonade, she brushed against his arm. A little tingle shot through her body.

  “Whoa, cuz!” she thought to herself, as she refilled his glass and stepped away.

  Frank wasn’t her cousin, of course, but for a number of reasons, he had always been off limits. Ahead of her in high school by two years, he had been a big man on their small campus. On the baseball, tennis and golf teams, he excelled at each sport. He was active in student government and, although not the top student in his class, he was among them. Because of her friendship with his real cousin, Kelly Fontana, she and Frank mixed outside of school. Otherwise, their paths might never have crossed.

  It wasn’t just the age difference. By the time she got to St. Theresa’s, where he was a junior in high school, it was clear that he wasn’t available, anyway. Frank Fontana had a sweetheart. Like his father, Donato Fontana, Frank had fallen in love with an Irish girl, one Mary Catherine McNeil. Also like his father, who married his Irish sweetheart, Evelyn Mae Burns, when they were both young, Frank married Mary not long after graduating from high school. Unfortunately, Frank and Mary had not figured out how to make their marriage last like Uncle Don and Aunt Evelyn. They were nearing the end of their fourth decade as a married couple. Frank’s marriage lasted only a few years longer than Jessica’s.

  Flustered, Jessica started to walk away from the table, still holding the pitcher. It was her turn to look a bit shy, as she turned around and put the pitcher back on the table. She resumed her trip to the kitchen for the ice cream and a scoop. “What had gone wrong with Frank’s marriage?” she wondered. Not that it was any of her business. She tried to shift her focus back to the subject that had brought him there, Kelly Fontana.

  When she came back to the table, she made sure to keep her distance. She strained to come up with something to say while she cut the cake and scooped the ice cream. “I was trying to remember how old your kids are. It’s kind of shocking that you’ll soon have two teenagers on your hands.”

  “Evie is ten going on twenty-five, and Frankie is twelve. Those ten thousand calories a day he puts away are being put to good use. He’s only a couple inches shorter than me.” He picked up his fork, pausing as he gazed out the window.

  “You’re not the only one in shock about how soon they’ll be teenagers. When I tell one of them to do this or stop doing that, I catch myself expecting to see this accommodating six-year-old say, ‘Okay Daddy’. Instead, I get resistance, sometimes even belligerent questions asking me why! Half the time, I’m too tired to offer any reasonable explanation. For God’s sake, it just seems so obvious why you should put your dirty clothes in the hamper and your dirty dishes in the dishwasher. Or why you should get off the phone at ten when you have to be up at six for school the next day. I hear myself saying, ‘because I said so, that’s why!’ You can imagine how effective that is.” He shook his head as he dug into the chocolate cake on his plate.

  “That sounds grueling,” Jessica offered, as she took a bite of her own plate of cake and ice cream. As expected, the cake was ambrosial! The rush of chocolate and sugar, with a hint of spice, sent a surge to Jessica’s pleasure centers, still on high alert from that close encounter with Cousin Frank.

  She stole a glance at him as he pondered the cake he was about to eat. He looked a lot like Uncle Don. Well, a lot like Uncle Don had when he was closer in age to Frank. His was a pleasant face, not exactly handsome in the conventional sense, but attractive. Maybe a little like Andy Garcia or John Cusack. “Good cop faces,” Jessica had often thought about Uncle Don and Cousin Frank. Honest, dependable and direct, always able to look you in the eye.

  Uncle Don and Aunt Evelyn’s house had a whole wall covered with family photos. It was filled end-to-end with pictures from three or four generations of Fontana family members. There were baby photos, school pictures and graduations. A picture of Uncle Don snapped when he first put on the uniform was positioned near a similar one of Frank taken decades later. Wedding photos and p
ictures from their honeymoons were there, too. One portrayed Uncle Don and Aunt Evelyn at the Grand Canyon, the photo faded with age. Cousin Frank and Mary posed in another, a blissful young couple somewhere in Hawai’i.

  Jessica was always a tad envious of that wall with all those family memories on display. Her mother and the design divas she worked with over the years would have been appalled. Although Jessica rather liked it, her impulse to order things would have forced her to arrange the photos in a more systematic way.

  “Yeah, kids are tough. Even the good ones can push you to your limits. And then there are the ones who lose their way.” He put the cake he had been moving around on his plate into his mouth. You could tell the alarms were going off in his brain, chasing away some of the melancholy that had closed in around him.

  “Wow! This is even more fantastic than I remembered.” With that, he attacked the rest of the cake with gusto. Watching him eat, Jessica abandoned any attempt to be demure, and devoured her cake too. “That cake is amazing. Would it kill us to eat a second piece?”

  “Let’s find out,” Jessica suggested, cutting more cake and scooping out the rest of the pint container of French vanilla ice cream. Spurred on by sugar and chocolate, they chattered away. He asked her for details about the events that had led up to the discovery of Roger’s killer. Uncle Don had given him the run-down, but he wanted to hear the whole story. Her account of how she had eluded assailants with the use of her iPhone and Jimmy Choos, and what a headache she had become for Detective Hernandez, had him in stitches. Frank said that, according to Uncle Don, she was still a topic of discussion among police officers in the Coachella Valley. As the story passed from person to person, the number of bad guys the “classy lady lawyer from Mission Hills” vanquished had grown to more than half a dozen. They had added to her ad hoc arsenal too, including stories about whacking bad guys with designer handbags and champagne bottles.