It was Wednesday and I was running a bit late. I ran across the south parking lot with my pocketbook
and tote bag in one hand and my 12-pack of Diet Orange Sunkist in the other. Burdened with an unwieldy load I
navigated precariously through both the front door and the outer lobby entrance. Once inside I wound my way around
the tall wooden, teepee-like structures that served both as organic art installations and intimate meeting pods. I veered
around rows of sleek wood and black laminate desk units precariously balancing my parcels. Upon reaching my desk, I
quickly dispatched my paraphernalia and logged on to my computer. The meeting reminder popped up with a ‘bing’ to confirm a 10 am conference call, reminding me that I wanted to reread the project file before jumping on the call.

I noticed the message light blinking and hoped it would be something quick. I’d have to hustle if I was going to
review that file. The message was from Ken Farley. That was a blast from the past! Ken and I had worked together at
an ad agency in southern Connecticut for a number of years, which now seemed like a lifetime ago. The message was
oddly cryptic.

“Wow Donna, that must have been some shock for you, huh? All things considered you must be really torn about how to feel. I’d sure love to know what you’re thinking. ”

Geez, was Ken on the sauce now? I couldn’t imagine what on earth he could be talking about.

Oh well, no point in taxing my brain. I might as well just call him. Logic would dictate that I wait until AFTER the pending conference call to indulge my curiosity, but I was never one to be a slave to logic. Once on the phone Ken was no less cryptic. I put up with about two minutes of his nonstop gibberish before I really started to lose my temper.

“Hey Ken, “what the hell are you talking about?!”
I lost no time in expressing my impatience. That seemed to help him focus.

“You mean you haven’t heard?” he asked.

“Guess not,” I tried to hold on to what was left of my patience, “why don’t you fill me in?”

“Your old buddy Betty Jean bought the farm!”

“Thornton?”

“That’s what I’m saying,” Ken pressed, “you didn’t hear about it?”

“How would I have heard about it all the way out here in Omaha?” He really could be thick sometimes.

“Man Donna, Didn’t you know she moved to Omaha three months ago?”

The man was talking pure nonsense now. Betty Jean and I had worked together for several years when I was in the Connecticut marketplace. I had moved to Omaha ten years before and had seen neither hide nor hair of BJ for, at least two years prior to that, which was definitely how I liked it. Betty Jean move to the heartland? Never! She fancied herself a big city “player” and a fashionista. There was no way she was moving to Omaha, Nebraska.

I, on the other hand, Donna Leigh, harbor no such fancies. After a lifetime as an Easterner, I virtually leapt at the
opportunity to join the prestigious advertising firm, Marcel, when the call came from an overzealous recruiter.
At the time, I had no way of knowing that public holding company shell games would result in an opportunity to buy the very brand I had respected for so many years from afar. Now, my partners and I were charged with the sacred task of taking this piece of history into the next phase of marketing.

Self delusion for BJ did not stop at her perceived importance in the world of business. She also considered herself to be fashion-forward in the extreme. On the fashion side of the equation she and I could not have been more different. Tailored black business was my wardrobe staple. Admittedly it wasn’t exactly groundbreaking , but at least I’d never shown up at a business dinner attired in a white linen jumpsuit, festooned from neck to toe with twelve- inch tall basketball players as had my former nemesis, Betty Jean. In my humble opinion, she could not have looked more
ridiculous if she’d been wearing the 50-gallon garbage drum parked by the side door, yet she faced a sea of Brooks Brothers clad marketers with a smug, almost arrogant, smile on her self-satisfied face. She perused the room to ensure that everyone had taken notice of her latest fashion statement. A lingering glance must have sated her obsessive desire
for attention; there was no denying that every eye in the room rested on her. That was one amazing thing about BJ, she
lacked the ability to discern genuine admiration as rarely as that occurred from a desperate attempt to keep from
laughing in her face. It was that blissful ignorance which enabled her to bask in delusions of imagined grandeur. I almost envied her that.

Ken was saying BJ is dead? It just wasn’t sinking in. This had to be some kind of a lame joke. It was hard enough to accept that she was dead much less that she had died in, of all places, Omaha, Nebraska, my home.

“Ken, I’m sure you’re mistaken, you of all people should know that Betty Jean would no sooner move to Omaha than I would move to Appalachia…”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Donna,” Ken persisted , “she did move to Omaha, and now she’s dead.”

My head was starting to hurt with an intense feeling of pressure strong enough to crack even the thickest of skulls. I heard what he was saying, but it just wasn’t sinking in. In the past Ken had always been a good source of information. A career PR guy, he took pride in knowing not only what was going on, but why. Maybe it was time to shut up and let him fill in the blanks. Shutting up was not my best thing!

“I honestly can’t believe you didn’t know BJ was in Omaha,” Ken continued, “she’d been telling everyone she was moving there so the two of you could go into business together. In fact an article ran in the Times Courier just as she was preparing to move.”

Ken took a slight break here. Good thing because I was pretty sure I felt something pop in my head. If there was bleeding in the brain I’d want to clear the line and dial 911. My life must have flashed before my eyes because I started seeing images of the past. I had worked with Betty Jean at my first advertising agency, the one I joined after making the move from teaching English. She was my immediate supervisor. And she hated my guts. So her supervisory skills consisted of emotional abuse and abject criticism. At times I even caught wind that she’d fabricated work order memos addressed to me, but never delivered, so she could complain about my incompetence. She was often heard announcing to anyone within earshot that I’d “lost yet another memo.” I would never have had proof of this duplicity had it not been for her sloppy work habits. Inadvertently leaving evidence of her betrayal in various unfinished stages around the agency, my fair minded colleagues found several of these gems and ultimately pieced together a clear picture of her draconian master plan. I shuddered as I recalled that disconcerting time in my early career. I had learned that talent and brains are not always enough, and that there were people who would expend energy to deliberately hurt someone else. Although I was to see additional proof of this occasionally, over the years, I continue to be baffled by the motivation behind such cowardly behavior.

Even with conclusive proof in hand, my vindication was subdued at best. When you’re as slippery as BJ it isn’t tough to weasel out of even the tightest of jams. It didn’t hurt that she was handling all the media for our largest aerospace account, and the boss needed her more than she did me. It was a lesson in office politics which formed that little bit of paranoid edge that would serve me well as I climbed the advertising ladder. We damn sure never learned about the mean streets in my naively innocent days of teaching high school.

Remarkably, I let this torture continue for about three and a half years. To the uninitiated I would appear to have been an idiot not to have gotten the hell out of there ASAP; but in the dog eat dog world of agency business, I was industriously building my resume and my skill set by learning as much as humanly possible at one of the two most acclaimed ad agencies in Connecticut. I was loathe to jeopardize this rare opportunity; to do so would have been career suicide. At any rate, over time even BJ had to acknowledge that I was a reliable and talented employee. A fact that only served to make it easy for her to dump all her work on me, so she did.

No, going into business with Betty Jean would never be a consideration for me, although she did approach me, indirectly, about starting a business together while I was still working in the New Haven market. My answer back then had been a resounding “no”, and the years had done nothing to change how I felt on that issue. Besides, my partners and I already owned the Omaha-based ad agency, Marcel. Even if BJ and I hadn’t had a history of hostility, I would never have convinced them to allow her to waltz in as a fourth owner.

“Ken, you’re sure this isn’t some lame practical joke?” I asked grabbing my ipad and heading into the nearest conference room. I gently latching the door behind me, adjusted my headphone and waited for Ken’s response. My hasty dash for privacy was undoubtedly a bit late, these thin-walled conference rooms hardly provided the desired level of sound barrier anyway. Folks seated near them were constantly reminding us that you can pretty much hear every word uttered within their walls – unless you whispered and blasted the fan simultaneously. Needless to say we were often reduced to improvised sign language and cryptic notes in order to contain meeting room content.

Nevertheless, I felt compelled to take my best shot.

Several months earlier, Marcel had moved Corporate headquarters from comfortable, new construction suburbia into a classic, historic, downtown loft, replete with high ceilings, crumbling exposed brick and ancient pipes, the latter occasionally causing unwelcome, not to mention malodorously unpleasant surprises . These same pipes periodically released a toxic drip wreaking havoc on both technology and paperwork; the Chinese water torture `a la Omaha.
Our new setting was the perfect place to ditch the old fashioned, isolated executive offices and opt for a far more collaborative and integrated environment. It created a surprisingly energized atmosphere, making us wonder why we hadn’t made the change years earlier. Naturally, there are inherent challenges in any work environment. Having to be cognizant of the content and volume of phone calls was one of those challenges, but the head phones and additional conference space made it arguably doable.

“I’m dead serious, Donna,… oh, Jeez, that was tacky,” Ken offered.
So typically Ken, even in a crisis he couldn’t stop with the lame jokes.

“Wow, it’s hard to believe BJ is really dead,” I hesitated. “Where did she die?”

“From what I heard, it was in the NoDo office she was renting to house your new joint venture. But Donna,” Ken continued, “they’re saying she was murdered.”

It seemed so real, but now I was positive that Ken’s call was nothing more than a bizarre dream, meaning I must still be home in bed all safe and sound. The whole thing was just too fantastic for my brain to process unless it could be explained away as nothing more than a vivid and chilling dream. Perhaps gherkin pickles had not been the best choice for a night time snack!

It was a relief realizing the whole Ken ‘blast from the past’ would invariably boil down to a food induced nightmare. I wondered how long it would take before blessed consciousness returned and I could once again take charge of my mental faculties. But then it started again…

“Donna, are you still there?” he whispered.

“Wouldn’t have expected to be dreaming about Betty Jean and Ken.” I mused.

“You’re not dreaming, Donna. It’s all real.” Ken assured me.

“Can’t be.” I countered. “I’ve gone all these years never knowing anyone who was murdered. And now, within a few months time, two of the women who have labored to make my working life a living hell have been murdered right here, practically in my back yard. Do you know the statistical probability of something like that? ”

“Would it help if you went online and checked one of your local news sites? Go ahead, I’ll wait,” Ken urged.

I didn’t really know what I hoped to accomplish but I grabbd my ipad and popped the url of one of our local news sources in. Up jumped an article about a recently murdered transplant from Connecticut. I was pretty sure you couldn’t really Google stuff in dreams; crap, that meant I had to start believing this insanity might actually be real. If what Ken was saying was true, I had once again unwittingly become a major player in a murder investigation.

My head was definitely hurting.

If I was having trouble convincing my old pal Ken that I didn’t know what BJ had been up to, how was I going to convince Warren?

Detective Warren was in charge of murder investigations in Omaha. I knew her from a recent murder investigation in which I’d unwittingly played a fairly major role. The vic, as most cop show buffs know that’s the term we use for victim in law enforcement, had also been a former co-worker, Claire Dockens. The rocky history she and I had had involved me in her murder investigation, in spades. In order to clear myself, my colleague Kyle (another Dockens dissenter) and I had gone about trying to help solve the crime. While in retrospect I believe my involvement only added to the chaos, most folks insist I singlehandedly solved the mystery. Now, mere months after life had settled down again, here was another murder for which I would almost certainly be the prime suspect. I wasn’t sure I was up to that conference call after all.

As I pushed open the French door leading out of the compact conference room I caught an odd swoosh of movement out of the corner of my eye. It was followed by a gut-wrenching clatter. My eye followed the swoosh to a strange pile of moving, jean and sweater clad human extremities struggling for an apparently unattainable goal.

“Did you get all that?” I asked as I casually strolled toward my desk. Clearly Babs and Peg, the wonderful and seasoned Marcel staffers who had provided a good percentage of the brains and more than enough of the muscle in my journey through the last murder investigation were already gearing up to jump into the fray once again. One glance told me that “my girls” had been leaning into a free-standing bookshelf in an attempt to get close enough for the scoop. My hasty exit must have upset their proverbial applecart. It’s not like it was the first time. Guess those walls weren’t thin enough.
Had I any remaining doubts of the veracity of this assumption they were erased by the roomful of hysterical laughter that accompanied me back to my work space.

“Have a nice trip, ladies?” I heard from across the room. I just shook my head.

That’s when I spotted Kyle sauntering over to my desk as he fought to regain his composure. Unlike the majority of the staff who delighted in making Babs and Peg realize the full humiliation of their eavesdropping calamity, Kyle would never want to make them feel worse than they already did; he was a genuinely nice guy!

On top of his extreme niceness, Kyle always looked so put together. The day must have been filled with internal meetings as he was dressed in the ‘brunch on Fisherman’s Wharf’ elegant, business casual style that was his stock in trade. Beautiful clothing sized perfectly to frame his fit and toned physique. His pale yellow silk trousers and button down beach style short-sleeved shirt were the perfect compliments to his stylishly coifed blond tresses. I lost no time in filling him in on the whole Thornton problem.

“Unbelievable,” Kyle said. “How could something like this happen again so soon? “ And as an afterthought, “Don’t worry, Donna, we’ll figure this one out together, just like last time!”

God bless Kyle. Kyle Thoroughgood was my crime-solving partner, as well as my colleague and friend. I could count on him for anything. Last time he and I had both expected to be suspects since we’d both had rocky relationships with the “vic.” Surprisingly, we didn’t get much heat from the cops. We experienced sleuths were known to slip into homicide lingo when we were “on the case.”

This time Kyle was willing to jump right in with both feet, even though he’d never heard of the “vic” until right at that moment. If I remembered correctly from our last adventure this would be an incredibly time consuming little hobby, and it had been grueling on Kyle to actively participate in the investigation without falling behind on his unrelenting work schedule. Kyle was our GM so he was actively involved with virtually all of our clients.

“You know now that I think of it, I do remember hearing about that murder on the news. The details sounded very, very odd. Maybe you should call Warren before she has a chance to come after you.”
Probably good advice. But not something I looked forward to doing.

SPECIAL BONUS- CHAPTER 2:

After thinking it through I lost no time in calling Detective Warren. Maybe, if I took a proactive role, the Omaha homicide team would be less likely to place me at the top of their suspect list. Warren was an early-thirties career cop with brains and street smarts. Physically she gave Castle’s Detective Beckett a run for her money, but on the whole she was a lot sharper than Kate.

“Well now Ms. Leigh,” Detective Warren mused, “I have to admit it surprised me to learn that you’re featured prominently in this new murder. Am I wrong in seeing a trend here?”

Okay, I guess I had that coming. I mean let’s face it: being knee-deep in two back-to-back murder investigations was probably no big deal if you were a crack dealer, but it had to be somewhat out of the ordinary for your average ad agency owner. I was guessing the fact that I’d been a fairly recent transplant to the Omaha market, would serve to stimulate the good detective’s imagination. I mean coming from the northeast, I was still pretty much of a wild card to a lot of the sensible, well-balanced, Midwesterners who so graciously tolerate outsiders. Tolerate that is, until the tell-tale neuroses, so often present in east coast escapees, rears its ugly head.

Since my arrival in the Omaha market I’d heard many a tale about east coast transplants and their certifiable behavior. From the comments it wasn’t clear if out-of-towners were the only ones to exhibit this behavior, or if acting certifiable was just grist for the mill. I mean, were we easterners really the only insanity Midwesterners saw, or were we just exhibiting an unfamiliar form of insanity? Either way, it appeared as though east coast sanity was on a timer – when it went off – so did we. Perhaps they were beginning to wonder if my insanity timer had sounded, somehow resulting in multiple homicides. Before too much longer I feared they would feel certain of it. It’s not as though I could blame Warren; I didn’t believe in coincidence either.

“This time you brought our vic from your old stomping ground, eh? Were you worried that things might get a little boring for the old Omaha PD, eh?” Warren continued.

She’s got that cop lingo down too, though I suppose you’d expect that from a police detective, and ‘eh?’ What was with ‘eh?’ I guessed the good detective had spent some time in Canada.

The mind tends to wander when serious trouble appears imminent; I could feel my damn menopausal furnace starting to crank up in preparation for a fuel injected power surge. Menopause has an uncanny ability to smell fear and ensure, by virtue of turning you into a wet dish rag, that you look your worst and seem nervous as hell. Comes in real handy during major campaign presentations and murder investigations. That old ad campaign about “never letting them see you sweat” – ha! And don’t even get me started about bloating, weight gain, sleepless nights and so on… Tough to appear calm and cool even on my best days. But I digress.

Straining to regain focus of the issue at hand, the thought crossed my mind that Warren had a right to be concerned about my involvement. I certainly was. I genuinely hoped that this second murder would not cause her to wonder if I was not, ultimately, the cause of all the problems after all. In our last encounter with murder, she’d been surprisingly adept at sifting through the facts and eliminating elements that only circumstantially appeared incriminating. Not once in the entire investigation did she jump to ridiculous conclusions like the clownish TV cops always do. Her assumptions were always that I should be treated as a resource, a distinction that met with my utmost approval and gratitude. I’d have hated for that to change with this untimely second murder cropping up and ensnaring me in what appeared to be a far more damning way. No, I wouldn’t have blamed Warren if she turned on me, but I would deeply regret it.

“Detective Warren,” I began hesitantly.

“No worries, Leigh,” she chimed in before I could get any further. “No one suspects you at this point. We will, however, be needing to debrief you on your knowledge of the vic and her recent lifestyle changes. It would also help if you could make a list of all the people you know in Connecticut that we should be looking at. We can ask the local constabulary for their help; I don’t suppose you ever solved any murders with them?”

The “at this point” gave me pause, not to mention heartburn.

“No, sorry, Claire Dockens was my first murder.” I suppressed a huge sigh of relief, “I don’t know any Connecticut police. Oh well, there was that time when I inadvertently interrupted a sting operation in Fairfield County, but that was just a bizarre fluke, kind of a funny story, really.”

I could see from the look on Warren’s face that my feeble attempt at humor had fallen on deaf ears. But true to my nature, I kept talking anyway.

“I really thought the gas station was back up and operating when I pulled up to the pump on that cold and gray Connecticut day. In a million years I never expected to be reaching for the hose – blink – and find myself standing dead center in a circle miraculously and instantaneously formed by SWAT team trucks and unmarked cars. When they all jumped out, fully armed, and started barking questions as to the whereabouts of the station owner, I realized that menopause had once again left me with egg on my face.”

Yeah, better add memory loss to that list!

“I was simply doing what I always do, gassing up to the station where I always prepare for the grueling fifty-nine mile commute home. I’d just fill up and then make my way up the Merit Parkway and onto Route 8. The problem was that I knew that station had been shut down for weeks. Hadn’t I driven by twice a day swearing at the inconvenience of having to find another place to gas up? Until that fateful day when, engrossed in thoughts of my late afternoon meeting and plagued by a challenged memory, I pulled up to the pump without a care in the world, for about a quarter of a second, which was how long it took before law enforcement in the state of Connecticut converged on me in full force.”

I shuddered at the memory.

“Let me tell you it was no easy task convincing those guys I was just an innocent commuter. In retrospect, I could see how they might be reluctant to accept that I was completely oblivious to the multitude of signs, posted on every visible surface on and around the station and its property, which should have tipped me off even if my otherwise engaged brain cells had led me astray. Once the reality of the situation had sunk in, you could see the guys on the SWAT team were really deflated. I guess those stakeouts take their toll, they’d been hoping for a spectacular take-down as a payoff for all of their diligence. I really lucked out that they believed me and didn’t decide to detain me for further questioning. Perhaps this time the inevitable menopausal drenching actually worked in my favor. I’ll never really know. Although, I have to admit I’ve often wondered just what that station owner had gotten…”

“Leigh,” Detective Warren’s commanding voice brought me back to the present and away from my ruminations of a past encounter with law enforcement, “gotta head out now, but I’d like you to stop by the station at 4:00 today so we can begin our debriefing.”

“Sure thing, Detective.” I answered quickly. It wouldn’t do to annoy her in the least. Plenty of time for that as the investigation progressed.

“Oh, and Leigh,” Warren added, “it’s pretty clear you’ve had your share of excitement. I’ll get some serious laughs telling your gas station SWAT team story back at the station. Who knows, maybe danger just manages to find you.”

Hanging up the phone I was mentally admonishing my nervous blathering – man, my mouth could get me into some tight jams. My business partner, Donny, came sauntering over. As a big guy, Donny worked hard to maintain a fit and trim physique. His usual office uniform consisted of a pair of ‘big and tall’ jeans and a golf shirt. He worked to fold his lanky frame into a nearby chair.

“So Donna,” he chuckled unable to keep a straight face; there’d been a lot of cackling going on and I was pretty sure it was all at my expense. “I hear you’ve got another murder on your hands and I wanted to thank you.”

“Thank me for what, Donny?” I sighed expectantly sensing a snotty comment on the way.

“Well, you know,” he ruminated, “when I moved back here to Omaha, you know from Chicago, I was a little afraid that life outside the big city would be a bit dull for me. But thanks to you, life has become like a constant whodunit, and it never ceases to amuse me.”

“Don’t you have a proposal to write or something, smart ass?” I offered.

“Oh, now don’t get sore, Donna. I don’t think I could stand it if you shut me out of your new excellent adventure, he offered through his increasingly intense bursts of laughter. After this parting comment, Donny made his exit, I would imagine, in search of another victim.

Now I was starting to remember some of the crap I’d taken as we worked our way through Claire’s investigation. Funny how well we manage to bury certain unpleasant recollections, until circumstances drag them back with a vengeance. I had a lot to get done before my four o’clock with Warren. No time to think about BJ. Anyway, thinking about her was threatening to make my head explode. Just as I finished signing expense reports, my other partner bustled in. Wow. Today Liv was in another one of her ‘art-as-clothes’ vibrant outfits. This one was Kelley green and navy with flowing wavy shapes of solid green, solid navy and intertwined stripes of both, creating a feeling of gentle movement as it flowed over her matching navy slacks and navy and Kelley spiked heels. Pewter jewelry in similar wave patterns embellished her chunky multi-level necklace and the matching dangling earrings and half a dozen coordinating bangle bracelets. I took a minute to take it all in while Liv lost no time in diving in to the topic du jour.

“Again Donna?” she asked with obvious concern. “How well did you know this one?”

“Donny tell you?” I asked, “he’s having just a little too much fun with this whole thing.”

“No. I read about the murder on Facebook last night, you know when I couldn’t sleep,” Liv offered, “and when I saw that the victim had come from the Connecticut ad community, I figured you must know her.”

Amazing. How did she do that? If you set her down on a deserted island with nothing but Facebook and Twitter I guarantee she’d know more about what was going on in the world than 80% of us back on the mainland. She had a mind like a steel trap and that made her an awesome business partner. Donny was sharp as hell too. As a business partner he was a huge asset, but he lived for those moments when he could bust my chops, and these damn ‘acquaintances’ getting murdered were the gifts that just kept right on giving – for Donny!

I spent the next few minutes filling Liv in on what little I did know about the vic and her somewhat odd lifestyle. She was as stunned as I that BJ had announced she was moving to Omaha in order to go into business with me.

“I have to ask this, Donna.” Liv began hesitantly, “did you encourage the victim to come out here in order to try and convince Donny and me to allow her to buy into Marcel?”

“Liv.” I had to admit she’d asked a damn good question. “Liv,” I started again “I’m glad you asked instead of just assuming, and honestly, I would sooner agree to be the lone woman on a Greek freighter than to ever go into business with that FREAKIN’ NUT JOB!! ” I guess I started to raise my voice at the end there, but I could see from her reaction that Liv knew I was leveling with her. Our partnership was too important to ever have her think I’d try anything underhanded like that. I made a mental note to call Donny after we were done to assure him as well. He hadn’t asked, but I wanted there to be absolutely no doubt.

Liv and I finished up after I answered a few more questions about Betty Jean. Then Liv said, “I know this is going to suck the whole agency in once again. I’d caution you to keep them out of it, but they all had so much fun watching Claire’s investigation unfold, I am sure there’d be no point. I do have to admit, somehow they managed to meet all of their deadlines last time, so I’ll just have to assume that this time it will be more of the same.”

With that she headed off to a conference call with one of our Kansas City clients to discuss their latest product launch. I made a quick call to Donny and assure him that I had not made any plans for bringing BJ into our partnership. “Donna, I never thought you were planning that even for a moment. I know how important ethics are to you, and it’s just not something you’d ever do without your partners’ prior agreement.” I really appreciated his vote of confidence. He knew me well.

“And besides,” Donny chirped. I could almost hear him smiling. Here it comes! “If you did I’d enjoy jerking you both around for awhile before bursting your big old self-inflated bubble.”

I rolled my eyes as I mentally acknowledged the truth of his statement. Under the circumstances he described, I’d be as vulnerable as a baby mouse in a house full of hungry cats. That pile of work on my desk wasn’t going to do itself. I decided to shoot for a few very productive hours before changing focus to compile my Connecticut suspect list for Warren.