“In that little strip mall at the top of Main?”
She nodded once. “I get off at twelve-thirty.”
“I’ll be there.”
Chapter 119
OUR KNEES ALMOST TOUCHED under the small table at the back of the restaurant near the restrooms. We had salads and coffee in front of us, but Rebecca wasn’t eating. And she wasn’t yet ready to talk.
She pulled on the little gold cross hanging from a chain around her neck, sliding it back and forth.
I thought I understood her conflict. She wanted to be the one to tell the real information, but at the same time, she didn’t want to blow the whistle where her friends could hear it.
“I don’t know anything, understand?” Rebecca said at last. “And I certainly don’t know anything about the murders. But Ben was under some kind of shadow lately.”
“Can you elaborate, Rebecca?”
“Well, he was unusually moody. Snapped at a couple of his patients, which, let me tell you, was rare. When I asked him what was going on, he denied that he was having problems.”
“You knew Lorelei?”
“Sure. They met at church, and frankly I was surprised Ben married her. I think he was lonely and she looked up to him.” Rebecca sighed. “Lorelei was pretty simple. She was a childlike woman who liked to shop. No one hated her.”
“Interesting observation,” I said. And that was all the encouragement Rebecca needed to say what she’d wanted to say all along.
She looked as though she were standing on the edge of a diving board and the pool was far, far below.
She took a breath and dove.
“Did you know about the first Mrs. O’Malley?” she asked me. “Did you know that Sandra O’Malley killed herself? Hanged herself in her own garage?”
Chapter 120
I FELT THAT PECULIAR crawly feeling at my hairline that often presaged a breakthrough.
“Yes,” I said, “I read that Sandra O’Malley committed suicide. What do you know about it?”
“It was so unexpected,” Rebecca said. “No one knew . . . I didn’t know she was so depressed.”
“So why do you think she took her own life?”
Rebecca forked her Caesar salad around on her plate, finally putting the utensil down without eating a bite.
“I never found out,” she said. “Ben wasn’t talking, but if I had to guess, I’d say that he was abusing her.”
“Abusing her how?”
“Humiliating her. Treating her like she was nothing. When I heard him talk to her, I’d cringe.” She made the gesture now, pulling her shoulders up, lowering her chin.
“Did she complain about it?”
“No. Sandra wouldn’t have done that. She was so compliant, so nice. She didn’t even squawk when he started having an affair.”
The wheels inside my head were sure turning, but they weren’t getting traction yet. Rebecca pursed her lips with distaste.
“He’d been seeing this same woman for years, was still seeing her after he married Lorelei, I’m sure of it. She was calling the office up to the day he died.”
“Rebecca,” I said patiently, although I couldn’t stand the suspense for another second. “Rebecca. What was the other woman’s name?”