The Alpine Vengeance: An Emma Lord Mystery Read Free Page B

around since time began. In my opinion, Alzheimer’s is a cliché diagnosis for shutting out the past, refusing to recognize the present, and fending off the future. I can’t blame Marv for any of that.”
    Once again, I wondered if Vida was thinking of herself—and Roger. “Milo should know how a prison death is handled,” I said. “Next of kin would be notified. Larry’s kids, I suppose.” I suddenly remembered Denise. “Oh, my God! Ginny was just talking to me about Denise Petersen Jensen. I wonder if she—Denise, I mean—knows.”
    “Ginny?” Vida scowled. “Why was she talking about Denise?”
    A quick check of my watch told me it was going on ten. The morning was passing too quickly. I still hadn’t written my editorial. In fact, I hadn’t even decided on a topic. “Ginny’s waffling about coming back to work. She wants to wait until after New Year’s, and she suggested Denise as a fill-in.”
    “Oh, for goodness sakes!” Vida stopped just short of removing her glasses and attacking her eyes again. “Denise is a nitwit! And whatever is wrong with Ginny? I thought she had more gumption than to act as if she’d been paralyzed in a car accident instead of merely having a baby. If you tell me she’s pleading postpartum whatever it’s called, I’ll lose all respect for her. Such nonsense! What’s wrong with young women these days? That’s what I’ve said all along about equality between the sexes. Why on earth did women ever want to lower themselves to the level of men? Ginny’s a perfect example, what my dear motherwould’ve called a ‘weak sister.’ She was, of course, referring to
men
who behaved like weak sisters.”
    I’d heard similar rants many times from Vida, and given the tales she’d told about the early female residents of Alpine, most of them could’ve given Paul Bunyan a run for his money. Or his ox or axe or …
    But Vida wasn’t finished. “Even Buck, who I must confess is sometimes rather old-fashioned in his views, thinks that women make excellent fighter pilots. He calls it their ‘mother lioness nature,’ in this case defending their country instead of their cubs.”
    Buck Bardeen was a retired air force colonel who had been Vida’s longtime companion. His brother, Henry, managed the ski lodge, and although I didn’t know Buck well, he was obviously a man who could put up with Vida while accepting whatever limits—physical and emotional—she might set. “Understandable,” I agreed. “Most women can—”
    I was interrupted by Mitch Laskey, who was standing in the doorway. “I’m off to interview the new prof at the college,” he said. “I’ll check the police log on my way back, okay?”
    I nodded. “Sure. Good luck. He’s science, right?”
    Mitch, who is in his fifties and a veteran of the
Detroit Free Press
, grinned at me. “Whatever he teaches will have to be translated. Science is not my specialty. Give me race riots, drug busts, crooks in high places, and a UAW strike with blood on the picket line any day.” With a casual wave, he headed back through the newsroom.
    “Detroit,” Vida murmured. “It’s a wonder Mitch and his wife got out alive.”
    “They lived in Royal Oak, a suburb,” I reminded Vida.
    “It’s still Detroit.”
    I didn’t argue. The Laskeys had moved to Alpine because their son was serving a five-year term in the Monroe CorrectionalComplex for dealing drugs. Mitch and Brenda had thought he’d moved out west to find himself. Instead, he’d found a market and a supplier for doing business as usual. Troy Laskey might as well have stayed in Michigan.
    Vida had gotten to her feet. “I’ll call Al Driggers. As funeral director, he should know if Denise or her grandparents have been notified of Larry’s death.”
    “Okay.” I slumped in my chair as Vida walked out in her splay-footed manner. I was still pondering my various problems a few minutes later when Leo came into my office.
    “You look like the last rose of