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FORTY-ONE

“Hey, Mom,” Kevin said, when I entered the kitchen the next morning. “Some guy is trashing you and Dad on social media.”

“That’s nice,” I said. “I hope he spelled our names right.”

“Sorry, Mom,” Kevin said, putting on his most adorable sad face. “No names. It just says, ‘The blatantly suspicious drowning of former mayoral candidate Minna Schultz was the culmination of a heavily funded, well-executed corporate and political plot to silence her tenacious environmental efforts.’”

“Well, that sucks,” Alex said, joining the fun. “It’s too vague. This town is full of corporate and political villains. How are people supposed to know the Dunns done did the deed?”

Katie slammed her hands on the table and jumped up. “You people sicken me! That poor woman gave her life so that the privileged among us could forever have a spectacular view of Magic Pond. I’m done being a Dunn. I’m changing my last name!”

“To what, you ungrateful child?” Alex snapped.

“Schultz!” She tossed her hair defiantly and stormed out of the room.

“Aaaaaaaaand scene!” Kevin called out.

Katie pranced back into the room, throwing kisses and taking bows, while the rest of us applauded.

And that was that.

Within minutes, my kids were off to school, my husband was back in Alex World, and I was in the car on the way to work. But that impromptu little tableau had touched a nerve. When the four of us were actually under the same roof and in the same room together, we were the happiest family in the world.

I should have been overwhelmed with gratitude. But one ugly thought kept getting in the way. Who would take my place when I was gone?

Fortunately, the aftermath of the death of my political rival kept me so busy that I had no time to pay attention to my demons.

At 4:00 p.m., the chief came to my office with an update on the investigation.

“Good afternoon, Madam Mayor,” he said, lowering himself into the barely comfortable government-issue side chair across from my desk.

He was in great shape for a forty-five-year-old man. Tall, lean, no sign of middle-age paunch, a full head of closely cropped silver-gray hair, a neatly trimmed beard, and an affable smile. According to Lizzie, who knows everything about everybody, he was “happily divorced after twenty years of marriage, but not dating, and not really looking.”

“Good afternoon, Chief,” I said. “You’re smiling.”

“It’s my way of throwing people off. It’s a little trick my dad taught me years ago.”

“And how is Judge Vanderbergen these days?”

“He’s doing his best to navigate retirement. He spent the winter driving my mom nuts. Now that spring is here, he’ll go up to the cabin and annoy the hell out of the fish. Mom loves to tell everyone that they have something between them that does wonders for their marriage.” He paused. “Two hundred miles of New York State Thruway.”

I laughed. “Send your parents my best. So... what have you got?”

“Minna Schultz’s lungs contained pond water.”

“So she was alive when she went in,” I said.

“That’s correct. The ME has concluded that the cause of death was consistent with drowning. She also did a quick tox that showed traces of clonazepam in Minna’s system. Not enough to kill her, but it’s common for people who are hell-bent on drowning to pop pills so they lose consciousness once they hit the drink. Otherwise, their survival instincts would kick in and they’d fight to stay alive.

“We searched her house and found a bottle of Klonopin. The prescribing doc was Ezra Perkins. I swung by his office, and he told me he’s been treating her for depression and anxiety for years. She went into a tailspin when she lost the election and the townhouse project went south. I got a statement from Dr. Perkins, took it to the ME, and she said we have no proof that Minna took the pills on her own.”

“Were there any signs of a struggle? Any defensive wounds? Any indication that someone forced her to take the pills?” I asked.

“None. Not on her person or in her house, but...”

I groaned. Nothing good ever follows the word but .

“The ME waved it off. She said, ‘Someone could have slipped them in her Chardonnay,’ which, by the way, along with a couple of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on English muffins, were the only contents they found in her stomach.”

“Peanut butter, jelly, and white wine?” I said.

“Clearly Minna marched to the beat of her own drum,” he said.

“Damn her!” I said. “She spent the better part of a year accusing my husband of environmental genocide. You would think she’d have at least dashed off a quick suicide note condemning her oppressors. She wasn’t the type to skulk off quietly.”

“No suicide note, but we found this.” He removed some papers from his pocket. “They’re drafts of an apology letter. They were on her laptop, written a week before her body was found. I printed them out.”

“Who was she apologizing to?”

“Misty Sinclair.”

My stomach knotted. “Misty?”

“Minna Schultz hosed, cheated, screwed over, and downright made a lot of people miserable, but I can’t think of anyone who she owed an amend to more than Misty. Here’s her first attempt,” he said, handing me a sheet of paper. “Look at the time stamp on it.”

“June first at 9:22 p.m.,” I said. “That’s the same day she had the final showdown with Alex at the hospital.”

I read it.

Dear Misty. whan I saw you in town over the MemrialDay weekend I was totally oerwhelmed. I know I shouldnt have run off but I needed time to think. I know you blame me forwhat your father did but

“It’s riddled with typos,” I said. “She must have been totally drunk.”

“And at a loss for words. Her second stab was time-stamped three minutes after the first. She ran out of steam even faster on this one.” He handed me a sheet of paper that was almost blank.

Dear Mistyy—first and foremost I am a envvironmentalitst

“And here’s the last one. It was written the following morning at 5:49,” he said, handing it to me.

Dear Misty, 25 years ago when I campaigned against the use of toxic solvents by your father in his dry cleaning business, I had no idea that my strong stance would lead to such a tragic outcome. You were too young and too raw back then for me to explain to you that my protests were out of my heartfelt concern for the health and welfare of our community and not the vindictive business attack for which I was accused.

Then when I saw you in town over this past holiday weekend all the pain that I have tried to bury since that night came flooding back to the surface, and I was too overwhelmed to talk to you. So I ran. I’m sorry for that, and I’m deeply sorry for your loss. And while I know you can never forgive me, I want you to know that I did not put a gun in your father’s hand, and that simple truth has helped me sleep these past 25 years. You deserve so much more than this simple note, but maybe it will serve to open a door, and that one day we will find a way to heal together.

Sincerely yours,

Minna Schultz

“Wow,” I said. “A little defensive, but it reads like a genuine apology. And no typos. It’s like she woke up sober the morning after and spilled her guts out. Do you know if she ever sent this to Misty?”

“It’s not in her sent email, and I plan to contact Ms. Sinclair and find out. But what’s important here is not whether she sent this letter but that she wrote it. It attests to the fact that Minna Schultz was filled with guilt and remorse just before her death.”

“And do you think that it will convince the ME to call it suicide?”

“Not by itself. But add that to the fact that Minna’s shrink corroborated that she was clinically depressed, her assistant said she’d been moody and despondent, and Dr. Dunn can recount her meltdown on June first and her vow to get even if it’s the last thing she did.”

“Excellent police work, Chief,” I said. “Thank you.”

His lips parted and turned upward.

“You’re smiling again,” I said.

He shrugged. “No promises, but the ME told me off the record that she’s leaning toward calling it a suicide. I think showing her this letter to Misty Sinclair is going to clinch the deal.”

The smile got broader. It wasn’t the little trick his father taught him to throw people off. It was the real deal. A victory smile.

Twenty-four hours later, the medical examiner signed Minna’s death certificate. Cause of death: Drowning. Manner of death: Suicide.

Two days after that, my doctor told me I had four to six months to live.