Chow Down (A Melanie Travis Mystery)

my fingers on the steering wheel. Instead I reminded myself that patience was a virtue to be cultivated, even under trying circumstances.
    “I can see that,” I said. “There’s been a fair amount of upheaval in your life recently.”
    A grimace twisted Lisa’s mouth. “You can say it, you know. My husband died. It’s amazing how many different ways people find to dance around the reality. It’s like everybody thinks that if they come up with a suitable euphemism, it will make all of us feel better. Well, maybe it works for them, but it doesn’t for me.”
    All righty then. Since we were done trying to put a nice face on things, she wasn’t the only one who could be blunt.
    “Larry died under suspicious circumstances,” I said.
    “Another reason why I felt I needed to get away.”
    Fortunately most of the traffic on the highway was heading into the city. I could take my eyes off the road without fear of causing a major pileup. “Were you afraid? Did you feel threatened?”
    “No . . . Yes . . . No.” She didn’t sound sure of either answer. I put that aside for the time being.
    “There must have been something that made you run away. After all, you left all your dogs behind.”
    “Not Yoda. And besides, a friend was looking after the others.”
    Judging by her dismissive tone, she seemed to think that the fact that she’d left first Sue, and now Bertie, holding the bag was unimportant.
    “Only for one day. Sue expected you to be back that afternoon.”
    “What can I say? I had a change of plans.”
    “Caused by what?”
    Lisa turned and leveled a look my way. “Is that really any of your business?”
    Well . . . No. But I wasn’t about to admit that. Instead I zigzagged the conversation in another direction.
    “Would you like to know where your Yorkies are now?”
    “I assume they’re right where I left them.”
    “No, they’re not. Sue had other things to do. She took the dogs and boarded them at a nearby kennel.”
    Lisa swore under her breath. I wondered if she was picturing the size of her board bill. Good. That meant that Bertie stood a chance of being paid for her time and trouble.
    “If you’d given your friend the courtesy of letting her know your plans, you could have had a say in what happened to your dogs,” I pointed out. The fact that Lisa was annoyed didn’t slow me down. If anything, it made me want to push her harder. “Sue had no idea when you’d be coming back. She called around to all your friends. She contacted the local police.”
    “Then she overreacted.”
    “You left behind your entire family of dogs. They were sitting in pens in your basement. Who would do something like that if they had a choice? Sue was worried about you. She thought maybe something terrible had happened.”
    “The Yorkies weren’t my family,” Lisa said shortly. “They were Larry’s. His dream, his mission, his accomplishment. It’s not that I don’t care about what happens to them, but I’m not about to let them run my whole life anymore. You know what showing can be like . . .”
    She looked at me and I nodded.
    “It takes over everything if you let it. People get obsessed with competing, with winning. I’ve spent my life doing exactly what was expected of me. I’ve always been the good girl who did what other people wanted. And where did all that good behavior get me? Nowhere that I wanted to be. It was time I did something for myself for a change.”
    I pondered that as we zipped across the New York–Connecticut border. It sounded as though Lisa’s problems had started long before her husband’s death.
    “Was Larry one of those people who was obsessed with winning?” I asked.
    “Yes. Of course, I never could have admitted that before. Larry would have found my words unseemly and disloyal. Even now, it’s hard for me to realize that he’s really gone and I can speak my mind as I choose.”
    “Your marriage wasn’t a happy one.”
    “It had its happy moments. More in the beginning than later. I thought I married for love. Afterward I found out that my husband saw me as little more than another prize that had been worth pursuing and winning.”
    “So,” I said, probing carefully, “I guess you’re not sorry he’s dead.”
    “Of course I’m sorry he’s dead!” Lisa snapped. “I only wanted to be free of him. I didn’t want him to die.”
    So she said. I wondered if a lie detector would turn up a different answer.
    “Why didn’t you get a