"What is the matter with you?" Kirk hissed at Mindy after they left his mother and Tom Hartman in the country club's parking lot.
"What do you mean?" Mindy asked. Mentally she was working on her lead. Double murder--twenty years apart! Did whoever kill Mary Austin also slay Ron Schuyler? Was ex-lover involved? Who is Ron's Love Child? Mindy frowned. She wanted her lead to be catchy but not too kitschy. More USA Today than National Enquirer. Then again, she always heard back in J school that the Enquirer paid big bucks. Mindy made up her mind. She was going for the bucks.
"I mean why did you have to tell my mother about your loony tunes idea that whoever murdered Mary Austin might have killed Ron Schuyler? That's just stupid."
"I never said that," Mindy denied.
"You said they might be connected. How else could they be connected?"
"Well, I certainly don't know. I'm a journalist, not a detective. I don't see what you're getting all defensive about anyway, Kirk. Honestly, you're acting like you think your own mother killed Ron."
"Who also happens to be my own father," Kirk reminded her.
Mindy sighed. "Damn. I am something of an insensitive oaf, aren't I? I'm sorry, Kirk. I see a juicy story and my common sense flies out the window. I'll apologize to your mother."
"That would be nice," Kirk snapped. "I'd also appreciate it if you'd drop this double murder crap. It's just sensationalist garbage."
"No," Mindy corrected, "it's journalism."
"What's the difference?"
"Ouch. I'm going to forgive you for that, Kirk, because your dad was just murdered but please remember that I take my career very seriously." So seriously that Mindy knew if she had to choose between her live-in boyfriend's oh-so-tender feelings and the possibility of a shot of getting a position at a real newspaper, it was going to be bye-bye-love all the way. Boyfriends could be found anywhere. Careers in journalism not so much.
Chelsea Van Husen didn't know what to do. She know what she should do--go home, take a hot bath and forget this day ever happened--but she didn't know what she was supposed to do. Should she drive down to the police station and pick up her husband? Should she go through the drive through at McDonald's and drown her sorrow in Big Mac's? Should she stop by the Schuyler's and offer her condolences to Mavis? Ha! It would be a frosty day in hell when that happened. If anyone should be offering condolences, Mavis should be crawling on her hands and knees to say "Sawry!" to Chelsea.
The country club's ballroom was slowly emptying and as she watched the other couples depart, heads dropped and voices low as they discussed the untimely but not exactly unwelcome demise of Ron Schuyler, Chelsea wished more than anything that she was one half of one of those couples. She wanted to be going home with Peter instead of sitting at the country club all alone, her hair done up like a rooster in shock therapy, her new shapewear so tight that she felt like she was wearing an all-body tourniquet. This plain sucked.
And it was all Mavis Schuyler's fault. If Mavis hadn't chased Chelsea's husband then Chelsea wouldn't be in this pickle. And Ron Schuyler wouldn't be dead.
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