Death in a Difficult Position Page 2

  Beneath the portrait was a tower of clear plastic shelves offering brochures with titles like Praying Your Way to Sobriety, Praying Your Way to Heterosexuality, Praying Your Way to Weight Control, Praying Your Way to . . .

  Something buzzed on Lance’s desk. He smiled wryly at her as though they shared a private joke. Your table is ready? “He’ll see you now.” He sounded like God himself had agreed to a quick five minutes.

  He rose and walked over to the door leading to the back offices. He held the door for her, and A.J. rose. She followed Lance down a short bare hallway to a small office with bookshelves, a desk, and a pair of comfortable chairs. Frankly, the office could have contained a bed of nails and an iron maiden—the only thing A.J. really noticed was the man seated behind the desk.

  The Reverend David Goode stood. “Miss Alexander. What can I do for you?”

  He had a wonderful speaking voice, deep and mellifluous. It matched his looks. He was, quite simply, the most handsome man A.J. had ever seen—and as a former freelance marketing consultant she’d seen one or two prime specimens in her time. Her boyfriend, Detective Jake Oberlin, was ruggedly good-looking, and her exhusband, Andy, was almost beautiful, but the Reverend David Goode was in a class all his own.

  He was probably about forty, but every feature—from his smooth, unlined forehead to the dimple in his chin—was flawless. His hair was dark and glossy, his eyes sparkled a heavenly blue, and his mouth was sensitive but firm—with just a hint of sensuality.

  A.J. stuck her hand out automatically. “Thank you for seeing me on such short notice.”

  “Not at all. I’m very glad you’ve taken this first step.” Goode gestured to one of the chairs in front of his desk. “Please sit down.”

  “Well, I felt I had to take this step. I’m hearing some really disturbing things.”

  “I imagine so.” Goode smiled briefly and sympathetically. He waited for A.J. to sit before taking his own chair once more.

  “Friends are telling me that you’ve denounced my business, denounced yoga in general and me in particular. In fact, I’ve heard myself and my work described as demonic.”

  She felt silly saying the word. It sounded so ridiculously overdramatic, but Goode didn’t refute it. Instead, he said with that same maddening sympathy, “And you’re naturally upset and beginning to question things you’ve previously taken for granted.”

  “Sort of. To start with, I’m questioning why you didn’t have the courtesy to talk to me before saying such defamatory things to your congregation.”

  “As you would say, if the mountain won’t come to Muhammad, Muhammad must go to the mountain.” Goode smiled the breathtaking smile of the photograph in his front office.

  “Actually, I wouldn’t say that,” A.J. replied. “What I would say is that before you started spouting a lot of ignorant and possibly libelous nonsense, you should have had the courtesy to speak to me.”

  Goode’s benign expression never wavered. “And what is it you would have told me?” he inquired politely.

  “First of all, I would have asked you where you got such bizarre ideas about yoga. And me.”

  Goode sighed. “I’m afraid you put me in a difficult position.”

  “How am I putting you in a difficult position?”

  “A.J.—I’m sorry. May I call you A.J.?”

  A.J. nodded curtly.

  “You’re an intelligent young woman—certainly a very attractive woman.” He winked. A.J.’s mouth parted indignantly, but Goode overrode any objection she might have made by continuing. “Intelligence, however, is a twoedged sword. I’m sure you believe sincerely in the work that you do. I’m sure you believe sincerely that your efforts to convert—”

  It was an effort to keep her voice level. “I’m not trying to convert anyone.”

  Goode held his hand up. “Please. You’re angry because you feel the truth of what I’m saying, but if you’ll be quiet and listen with your heart rather than allowing your thoughts to confuse you, I’m sure you’ll begin to understand.”

  “Understand what? That exercise is bad? That meditation is unhealthy?”

  Goode looked pained. “You’re far too smart to believe that yoga is simply about physical activity. It’s not possible to separate the philosophical and spiritual aspects of the practice.”

  “There’s nothing harmful or even anti-Christian in the philosophical or spiritual aspects of yoga.”

  The pitying look he gave her sparked a very unspiritual response within A.J. She smothered it. Or tried to. It kept rising up like a cobra beneath a carpet.

  “You can’t see it yet. Your yoga is descended from Eastern religion. It’s a heathen practice, pure and simple. And the funny thing is, even other Eastern religions say the same thing.”

  “I think this was a waste of time.” A.J. stood up. Goode rose, too. “Not at all! Not at all. The fact that you sought me out is a very positive sign.” He came around the desk and placed both hands on A.J.’s shoulders.

  A.J. stiffened. Maybe it was a Man of the Cloth thing. Or maybe he didn’t get the concept of personal space. Maybe he was just very, very friendly. Laying hands on someone with whom you were having an argument seemed inappropriate to A.J., but maybe it was different for ministers.

  She stepped back, and his hands fell away. “I can’t stop you preaching against yoga, but if you continue to make defamatory statements about me, I’m going to seek legal counsel.”

  Goode’s blue gaze held her own. “We’re not enemies, you know. Your coming here today proves that.”

  “My coming here today proves that I’m a reasonable person who would prefer to work things out civilly.”

  Goode nodded. “I know. My actions may seem harsh. In time you’ll come to see that what I’m doing is for your good as well as the good of our community.”

  “So in other words, you’re not going to stop?”

  He cast a sorrowful look at her, and A.J. couldn’t help thinking Goode was playing to the nonexistent studio cameras. She knew what he would say before he opened his mouth.

  “No, A.J.,” he said solemnly. “I’m afraid I can’t stop now.”

  Two

  Back at the studio, A.J. was still fuming over her wasteof-time meeting with Reverend Goode when Emma ushered in Michaela and Mocha Ritchie for their four o’clock appointment.

  Given the weather, which was getting steadily worse as the afternoon poured by, and the disheartening phone conversation she’d had with Bradley Meagher, her lawyer, A.J. had been hoping the Ritchies would cancel. What kind of people named their daughter Mocha, anyway?

  But Michaela Ritchie was there at four o’clock on the dot, Mocha in tow.

  “Please have a seat,” A.J. invited as the women were led into the upstairs conference room. “Can I offer you coffee? Tea? Cucumber water?”

  “No, thank you.” Michaela Ritchie was very short and very trim. She looked a well-cared-for forty. Her makeup could have been applied by a professional artist; her hair was a lovely, if premature, silver cropped close to her head.

  Mocha was probably about fifteen, although the dyed black hair, heavy kohl eye makeup, and sparkly lip gloss made it difficult to be sure. She was—there was no polite word for it—fat. Technically obese. Clothes couldn’t camouflage the problem, but the black thigh-high boots were a mistake, and the oversized purple Benetton-style sweater she was wearing as a dress certainly accentuated the problem.

  A number of problems—because what kind of parent let their child out of the house looking like an overfed hooker? It was especially disconcerting given how severely chic Michaela Ritchie was.

  A.J. smiled at Mocha. Mocha stared stonily back.

  “You’re certainly out in the middle of nowhere.” Michaela threw a disparaging look at the conference room’s long windows, which framed glistening pine trees rising out of the rainy mist. She sat down at the oval table and pulled out her cell phone, checking messages in a businesslike fashion.

  “Less and less
so,” A.J. said. “There used to be nothing around us for miles, but now we’ve got the Carriage House Inn right down the road. Bikers still love this stretch.”

  “Sit down, Mocha.” The snap in Michaela’s voice startled A.J., but Mocha didn’t bat a black-rimmed eye. Enigmatic as an Egyptian princess, she seated herself next to her mother and folded her woolly purple arms.

  A.J. finished pouring herself a cup of tea. “Are you sure I can’t get either of you anything?” She carried her mug to the table and sat down opposite the Ritchies.

  Michaela dropped her phone in her Gucci bag and said without preamble, “Mocha’s pediatrician recommended we try yoga. Mocha’s father is in favor of it, so we’ll give this a shot. I think six months is a reasonable amount of time, don’t you?”

  A.J. spared a glance at Mocha’s impassive face. Nothing. Michaela looked equally removed from the proceedings.

  “I’m sorry? I feel like I’m missing something. Six months is a reasonable amount of time for what?”

  Michaela made an exasperated sound. “I think one look at my daughter should make it clear what the problem is.”

  Well, that was brutally frank. A.J. smiled warmly at Mocha, who looked right through her.

  “What do you hope to achieve by enrolling at Sacred Balance, Mocha?”

  “I want to get my stepmother off my back.”

  Michaela made an amused sound and met A.J.’s gaze in cool challenge. A light dawned. This, apparently, was the part where A.J. was supposed to concede defeat, say there was nothing she could do with such an attitude, and send Mocha and Frosty Freeze on their chilly way.

  And that, at one time, was exactly what she would have done. But at one time she wouldn’t have been running a yoga studio. Not for love or money or anything in between.

  She removed a form from her folder, slid the membership enrollment sheet across the table to Mocha. “Please fill this out to the best of your ability, Mocha. Take your time and feel free to ask any questions you like in the section on the back page. Candidly, the more honest you are and the more questions you ask, the better. We want to make sure we tailor a program to suit you.”

  Mocha snorted, sounding uncannily like her stepmother.

  A.J. smiled at Michaela with all the professional sincerity she could muster. “Would you like to see the facilities? Perhaps talk to some of our instructors or other students?”

  “Oh, by all means.” Michaela sounded bored as she rose.

  “Please excuse us,” A.J. said to Mocha, who was hunched over the table, filling in the form in tiny script.

  “You’re excused.”

  Michaela met A.J.’s gaze with something unpleasantly like satisfaction. A.J. led the way from the room.

  “I thought it might be helpful if you shared your expectations for the next six months,” she said as the door to the conference room swung shut.

  “Honestly? My expectation is zero. You’ll get zero cooperation from my stepdaughter, and you’ll get zero results. But this is what the doctor suggested, and it’s what my husband wants, so this is what we’re doing.”

  A.J. didn’t love all her clients, but she could rarely remember disliking one as immediately and intensely as she did Michaela Ritchie. Perhaps her expression gave her away, because Michaela added, “Sorry, but we’re not all living a version of Leave It to Beaver. Mocha and I don’t get along. It’s that simple.”

  A.J., knowing firsthand that family relationships were anything but simple, restrained herself and led the way to the showers, steamy and pleasantly scented by shampoo and soap at that hour. She extolled the efficiency and beauty of their up-to-the-minute plumbing to Mrs. Ritchie, and then asked, “Does Mocha have any health issues we need to be aware of?”

  “Not according to her doctor. If you want my opinion, Mocha’s weight is merely another form of acting out. If you decide to take her on, I’ll have her doctor forward her medical records.”

  “I can’t see any reason we wouldn’t take Mocha on.”

  “No?” Michaela smiled. But her smile faded. In fact, her face fell, as a tall woman wrapped in a white terry robe and holding a blow-dryer approached the built-in table and mirror of the blow-dryer station.

  A.J., too, did a double take. The woman’s face was oddly familiar, but thanks to the white toweling around her hair, it took a few seconds to place her as the Reverend Goode’s companion in the portrait that hung in his Stillbrook office.

  The woman smiled at her politely, smiled at Michaela—then her expression also froze.

  She nodded curtly to Michaela. Michaela nodded curtly back. Turning abruptly away, Michaela left the shower area. A.J. followed, still trying to put a name to the client in the white terry robe.

  She was sure she had seen the woman at the studio before, but no particulars came to mind. That was odd. A.J. prided herself on, at the very least, knowing all her clients by name.

  The moment in the shower room had been too obvious to ignore—at least in A.J.’s opinion. “Do you know—” she began.

  “No, I don’t,” Michaela said. “I know of her, of course. That’s Mrs. Goode. The Reverend Goode’s wife. Look, can I be honest? I don’t need the grand tour. I’m quite sure your facilities are state of the art. In fact, I know they are. My husband and I did our homework. I’d just as soon wait for Mocha in the car. I’m sure she’d prefer that, too.”

  “If that’s what you’d—”

  Michaela Ritchie was already walking away toward the main staircase.

  “I don’t think I’m imagining things either.” A.J. set down her wineglass. She and Jake were having dinner at his house, A.J. having opted for Jake and Jake’s homemade lasagna over a rainy drive home, cold leftovers, and an aging Labrador retriever who, though he would be delighted to see her, would spend most of the evening snoring atop her feet.

  So it was a doggie door and dry kibbles for Monster tonight, and no doubt A.J. would hear about it tomorrow.

  Jake served himself another helping of lasagna—lasagna with meat sauce. Though red meat was something A.J. now limited in her diet, she refused to feel guilty over her thorough enjoyment of the meal. Jake was a surprisingly good cook. The beef was very lean and there was just a hint of fennel in the sauce. “What do you think is going on?”

  A.J. shook her head. “According to Emma, Oriel Goode uses one of our free guest passes every couple of weeks or so. That’s really not the idea behind the promotion. The whole idea is that the guest will realize what a terrific place Sacred Balance is and enroll, but it’s not something we’re going to make an issue of.”

  “She’d have trouble enrolling given her husband’s view of yoga, right?”

  “Right. True.”

  “As for the Ritchie woman’s reaction, I’m sure you’ve heard some of the rumors about the good Reverend Goode.”

  “Well . . .” A.J. flashed Jake a quick, rueful smile, reaching for her wineglass once more. “I don’t believe everything I hear, but he does seem to take a . . . hands-on approach.”

  Jake’s dark brows drew together in a formidable line. “Did he come on to you?”

  “I doubt it. I think he’s probably a little weak on the concept of personal space. It probably goes with the job.”

  “Yeah, well, reverend or not, the guy’s already got a reputation as a womanizer. I’m guessing that was what was behind that little moment in the ladies’ locker room.”

  A.J. snorted at the idea of calling her tile floors, granite counters, and stylish, ergonomic fixtures anything so plebian as a “locker room.”

  “That visit to see Goode was probably a mistake any way you look at it. I feel like I played right into his hand. Not that he could have known I’d come calling.”

  “Sure he did.” Jake chewed, swallowed. “He was lying in wait for you.”

  “How do you figure that?”

  “He’d have to be stupid not to know you were going to pay him a visit. And one thing I don’t hear is that David Goode is stupid.” Jake put
his fork down and pushed his plate away. “He threw down the gauntlet at Sunday’s service. He had to know you’d pick it up. Either you or Lily. Or both of you.”

  “Do you think I should have ignored him?”

  “Hard to say. You not noticing him would certainly annoy him. But ignoring him wouldn’t make him go away.”

  “I don’t know that there is any way of making him go away. Mr. Meagher thinks suing for slander is liable to give the Reverend Goode the very thing he wants.”

  “Free publicity,” agreed Jake. “Yep. There’s nothing like a messy lawsuit.”

  “And the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that that’s what this whole thing is about.”

  Jake’s eyes were very green in the muted light of the candles. The candles were there less for romantic effect and more because the power had been knocked out an hour earlier, though there was no denying the softened illumination added a certain cozy intimacy. “You don’t think the good reverend is sincere?”

  “I don’t know that for a fact, but it’s hard for me to believe an educated person could seriously believe that there’s anything in the study of yoga that would be contradictory to Christianity, let alone dangerous.”

  “You’re not religious,” Jake pointed out.

  “I’m not antireligious. I’ve just never been a big churchgoer.”

  Jake’s nod was noncommittal.

  “Are you?” Sometimes it caught A.J. off guard how many things they still didn’t know about each other.

  “Not something I think a lot about either way,” Jake said. “So Meagher advised you not to sue?”

  “He said we should keep an eye on the situation.”

  “Seems like good advice. You don’t think the reverend is really harming your business, do you?”

  “I think it’s too early to tell. Given the financial climate, I can’t say I’m thrilled with someone coming up with more reasons for clients to cut us out of their monthly budgets.”