Uncommon Grounds Read Free Page A

That didn’t stop me from feeling guilty, though. About work, about home—it didn’t matter. Guilt is as much a part of my Norwegian heritage as the ice Ted swore coursed through my veins. Just because I told him to bite me when he said he didn’t love me anymore. Not that I’m bitter.
    I pulled up the driveway and stopped in front of Caron’s big Cape Cod. Toby, a pudgy golden retriever, ran up to greet us and I turned off the engine and sat back. Caron was staring fixedly out the front windshield.
    She hadn’t spoken a word since we left the shop, which was very unCaron-like. She normally chattered when she was upset. Now she wouldn’t even look at me.
    “Listen, we need to talk about this,” I said. “I know you were close to Patricia—”
    She turned toward me and started to say something, but then stopped, putting her hands up to her face. “I can’t,” she mumbled through her fingers, and then started fumbling with the car door. Finally getting it open, she dashed up the sidewalk, Toby at her heels. The front door, when it slammed, nearly took off the dog’s nose.
    I climbed out of the van and walked up to the door. Toby and I looked at each other and decided to investigate. I rang the doorbell, and Toby sniffed. No answer to the bell, but the dog seemed to be deriving some pleasure from a wad of chewing gum stuck to the mat.
    I left him to his fun and headed back to the van. Inside, I folded my arms on the steering wheel and tried to think. One partner dead, another catatonic. This wasn’t good.
    The crunching of tires on the gravel apron of the driveway interrupted my thoughts, what few there were of them. Caron’s husband Bernie was home. He pulled his Navigator up next to me and got out. I watched in my side mirror as he disappeared around the back of my van and then reappeared in my window.
    I adored Bernie, all bald, five-foot six inches of him. He and Ted had been best friends in college. In fact, Bernie had introduced me to Ted. When Ted and I separated, he took the car and the boat, but I got to keep Caron and Bernie. I figured I came out on top.
    Bernie was saying something, so I rolled down my window.“...I stopped by the library lobby to pick up a tax form and Mary told me about Patricia. What happened?”
    I didn’t waste time wondering how Mary, the head librarian at the Brookhills Public Library, had heard the news. Like Laurel, Mary knew everyone and everything in town.
    “I’m not sure. She was on the floor when we got there.” I frowned. “Caron’s the one who found her. She’s really upset. I’m worried about her.”
    Bernie stepped back from the van and looked toward the house. “I’ll go talk to her.” He started up the driveway, hesitated, and turned back. “Had Patricia been sick?”
    “Not that I know of. She...”Now I hesitated. “Bernie, she had a burn on her hand. There also was a scorch mark on the metal counter.”
    He looked puzzled. “What are you saying, Maggy?”
    I didn’t answer.
    Then he got it. “Electrocution? You think Patricia was electrocuted? By what? Your coffee machine?” He shook his head. “I find that hard to believe, Maggy. But if it’s true, David Harper has one hell of a lawsuit.”
    Spoken like a lawyer. Still shaking his head, Bernie continued up the driveway to the house, apparently choosing the catatonic wife in the house to the lunatic in the driveway. The lesser of two feebles.
    I drove home to wait for Gary’s phone call.
    My house is up the creek, and I mean that literally. Poplar Creek runs the length of Brookhills, forming the town’s west boundary. Living downstream is fashionable, upstream is unfashionable. And the farther down or up, the more fashionable or unfashionable you get. Got it?
    Down, good.
    Up, bad.
    I was bad.
    In fact, the only thing badder, or farther upstream from me in Brookhills, was Christ Christian Church, which I think got special dispensation from God.
    But divorce has its privileges, too, and