MURDER MOST WANTED

By

Bliss Addison

Excerpt

“POMPOUS ASS!”

Oh my. Calliope Fenwick covered her mouth with her hand. She usually kept her astute observations of Frederick Q. Thornhill III to herself. This afternoon, however, he was particularly vexing. No one else stood up for the candy striper when The Third insulted her, so, surely, no one would begrudge Calliope the slur.

Without being obvious, she glanced around the card table, first at her husband, Wilson, then at Grace, The Third’s wife. They watched Dottie Armstrong zip around the recreation hall in her new front wheel drive motorized mobility scooter.

Thankful neither her best friend nor her husband paid the least attention to her, Calliope relaxed her tense shoulders and waited for The Third’s comeback. To her utter surprise, he only rolled his eyes.

What was up with that?

She should worry.

The Third shot the cuffs of his monogrammed white shirt. "Can we play cards now, or does her royal highness have more insults to sling?" 

“Royal highness?” This type of smart remark never failed to incite Calliope’s trigger. "Frederick—"

Wilson coughed into his hand — his polite way of telling her to shut up and forget about it.

She swallowed the comeback and took the deck of cards in her hand. “High card deals,” she said, flipping the top card, an Ace, in front of Wilson. "Your deal, hon."

The Third smiled at her, a grin that said: I’m too smart for you, Calliope.

The man never let up. He acted as though he wanted her to kill him. "Frederick, has anyone ever told you—" 

Wilson yawned, widely and noisily.

Calliope took that as a cue. She bit her tongue, thinking she would make up her lapse to Wilson later with a fine Merlot, a porterhouse steak and…well…she’d see where that took them.

The Third plucked a chocolate-iced brownie from the plate, popped the square in his mouth, and chewed slowly.

“That’s your fourth brownie today, Frederick," Grace said. "Remember what the doctor told you?" 

"How can I not when you constantly remind me?”  He shoved another one in his mouth.

"She's just looking out for your health." Calliope didn't mean to spit the words. Oh, all right, she did. No one could infuriate her like The Third, and he seemed to take great enjoyment doing so.

Why Grace wanted that sorry excuse for a husband to live a long and healthy life mystified Calliope. Placed in Grace's shoes, she'd make sure the man had a cholesterol level to the moon. 

Grace patted Calliope's hand. "It's okay, dear. He didn't mean to snap at me." 

The Third jerked his head toward Grace. "Stop apologizing for me!"

Why Grace insisted on playing down her husband's nastiness was another mystery to Calliope. He did mean it. In fact, he meant every snide, condescending remark that spewed from his bird-like mouth.

The man should be shot.

Oh my.

God would punish her for such thoughts. She'd say three extra Our Fathers at rosary tonight. 

"Shh, Frederick,” Grace said, glancing around the room. “You're creating a scene. People are watching." 

He peered over his shoulder and scowled at the residents staring at him. "What're you looking at?" He turned, smoothed his perfectly coifed silvery hair and smiled at Grace, obviously enjoying her embarrassment, then sneered at Calliope.

She returned the gesture with equal enthusiasm and did so without Wilson noticing, she happily noted. Or maybe he saw but had given up on her.

"Get me a coffee, Grace,” he said, jerking his head toward the refreshment stand in the gathering room. “And I don't want any of that damn sugar substitute or whatever you put in it. It makes the coffee taste funny." 

Calliope curtained her chuckle behind a yawn. She thought the old curmudgeon hadn’t noticed. When Grace and The Third went grocery shopping last week, she slipped into their apartment and laced his dark roast arabica coffee with a concoction witch Esmerelda had whipped up. Belladonna, if memory served.

It upset Calliope that Grace took the blame for something she didn’t do. But if the potion sweetened him, though she had yet to see any sign of that, the end would make up for the discomfort Grace suffered in the interim.

“Now, woman!” he said and pounded his foot against the floor.

Calliope had all she could take. "Get it yourself, Frederick. God gave you legs, spindly, though they are.”  She drew a deep breath hoping to quell the desire to swat that toupee off his bald-as-a-baby's-ass head. 

"Mind your business, you old—" 

"Please, Frederick, don't make another scene." Grace looked at Calliope and smiled. "It's no trouble, really. It's my job to see to my husband's wants." 

“No, it’s not!” Something solid hit Calliope’s shin. She massaged her leg and looked across the table at Wilson who peered around the room. Though he whistled a ditty beneath his breath, he looked as guilty as sin. He wouldn’t get such a fine Merlot with dinner tonight. She turned her attention to her BFF.

Grace, full of grace. For the life of her, Calliope couldn't understand why Grace stayed in a marriage that caused her such pain and heartache. ‘Til death do us part, she had quoted when Calliope asked her why she stayed with him. I made a promise before God, before my family and friends. Promises are meant to be kept.

Calliope was certain God would understand if Grace left The Third.

The man deserved to die a slow tortuous death for what he put Grace through all these years. Her friends agreed with her too.

Unfortunately, The Third did not appear destined for the great beyond any time soon. Not even God wanted him.

Often, Calliope devised ways of putting the Almighty’s plans for The Third into force, but as much as she would like to see the cantankerous bastard dead, she couldn't take a life. For one reason, she was one of those people who always got caught in the act of doing something she shouldn’t. For another, she didn’t have the chutzpah to kill, and even if she did, bragging about it from a jail cell seemed a partial victory. 

Biting down hard on her tongue, she watched The Third belittle Grace. He enjoyed making her life miserable. The man needed an attitude makeover, that's a fact.

Short of killing him, how was Calliope to do that?

Drugs, perhaps. They would need to be potent, though. He obviously had the constitution of a horse.

In idle talk with her son, Abbott, he had told her that drug pushers filled the streets of downtown Toronto. She could easily convince Wilson to make the forty-five minute drive from Hampstead. While he browsed the bookstores, she could check out the streets and back alleys for people selling drugs. 

"Calliope, it's your move." 

Distantly, Grace's voice broke into her thoughts. "My move?"

"It must be Alzheimer's," Grace said and laughed. 

Going along with the joke, Calliope stared at Wilson and asked, "Who are you?" 

Wilson cleared his throat. "Your ... your husband." 

"Oh." She examined his portly frame and studied his blue eyes and bushy brows, as though seeing him for the first time. In the silence that followed, she peered around the room. Streams of light from the setting sun shone through the windows. Golden-agers lounged on sofas and recliners watching television or chatting. "Where am I?" 

"Don't you remember?" 

The worry in Grace's voice spurred her to tell the truth. She laughed. "Of course, I remember. I was just pulling your legs."  Lately, though, there were times when Calliope mistook the day of the week. Just last month she had forgotten her granddaughter Maya’s birthday.

* * * *

AFTER CALLIOPE PAID HER daily penance to the Lord for her unholy thoughts, and while their husbands watched the evening football game on television, she assembled her friends, The Saving Grace Brigade, they jokingly referred to themselves, in the solarium. 

Calliope shared the sofa with Madge O'Leary, Bitsy Green and Florence Jones, all eighty years old like her, but dressed and coifed more conservatively. 

Across from them on the love seat sat Hannah Williams and Rose Smith, robust women and younger by a whopping three years.

The overstuffed chair sandwiched between them all but swallowed up Celia Cooke, a spit of a woman with dyed red hair and the freckles of a teenager. 

"Something needs to be done about Frederick and fast," Calliope said, getting right to the point. "He's going to put Grace in her grave." She shuddered for effect. 

Madge tsk-tsked. "The poor dear. She can't go on much longer." 

The other women murmured their agreement. 

Celia leaned in toward them and said conspiratorially, "She told me the other day Frederick's like a frickin' rabbit, screwing her morning, noon and night." She raised her eyebrows and stuck her tongue in her cheek, apparently happy with the reaction this latest revelation had on the brigade when they gasped and shook their heads. " Uh-huh," she said, grinning slyly. Her dentures clicked together, keeping time with the rapid nods of her head.

The bastard. Calliope wasn't aware of that, but Grace didn't tell her everything. Maybe with good reason. Without warning, a man’s hairy ass ― The Third’s hairy ass, she guessed, thankful the Lord, in His infinite compassion, had spared her the reality ― flashed before her eyes. She blinked repeatedly to shake off the imagery, but the effigy held on. Damn him. Take deep breaths, Calliope. Deep, deep…deep breaths. Even as she concentrated on breathing, her mind filled with centerfolds of The Third. Oh, good Lord. Bile rose in her throat. She gagged. Come on, girl. Don’t fold. She took one deep from the bottom of her stomach breath and exhaled, sending the disgusting effigy to the netherworld. She huffed a great sigh and smoothed her hair, certain it stood in peaks. 

With a renewed interest in the meeting, Calliope’s attention rejoined the women.

"Oh, my," Olive said, placing her hand against her heart. "The poor woman."

Florence's mouth fell open. "How dreadful for her." She crossed herself and gazed heavenward. "God have pity on her kind-hearted soul."

Hannah placed a hand on the side of her face. "I can't imagine ...morning, noon and night, you say?" She stared into space, then shook her head.

Rose swallowed and crossed her legs. "We must start a prayer vigil for her immediately."

Calliope patted Rose's hand. "We will, dear, but just in case He doesn't hear our prayers, we need to do something about The Third and quickly before he screws Grace to death and he will, if we let it continue. The man's an ogre and is getting more obnoxious and contrary every day."

"What more can we do?" Rose asked. "That potion didn't have any affect on him. The witch said it was guaranteed to make him happy and carefree." 

Calliope grimaced. "I agree. If anything, it had the opposite effect." 

"The magic spell didn't work, either," Hannah said and sighed. "I'm convinced Esmerelda isn't a witch at all. She probably doesn't know toadstool from cow shit. Waste of good money, that's all it was." 

"The same goes for travel tabs," Beatrice said, leaning forward. "They put me out like a light. The Third must have the constitution of a horse." 

Florence heaved a sigh. "Let's face it, ladies, we're out of options. There's nothing more we can do." 

“Not so fast.” Calliope raised a finger in the air. "Maybe there is. We're all agreed something needs to be done about him?" The other women nodded. "And it's up to us to do it?" They nodded again. "Okay." She looked over her shoulder to make sure no one lurked behind them and beckoned her friends closer. "Here's what I have in mind."