Steamed

job was now tragically highlighted by the sun glaring through the windows. “What’s going on with that stripe there?” Josh asked innocently.
    “I’ll tell you later,” I muttered with embarrassment.
    Ade and I met up in the bathroom and gossiped for about thirty seconds while we threw on clothes. I barely got to whisper to her about mauling Josh before Owen thumped the door with his hand.
    “Move it! We’re not going to Spago.”
    We hurried up, and I didn’t notice until later that I hadn’t even bothered to put on makeup or worry about my hair. Josh, my self-image therapist. I could practically hear the outraged reaction of my feminist classmates at social work school to that idea. Dependent on a man for— Still, I wasn’t worried about my appearance, and that had to count for something, didn’t it?
    When we emerged, Josh and Owen were talking.
    “So, Stein’s your roommate?” Owen asked. “Was he around the night this Eric dude got killed?”
    “No, he was working the night Eric was murdered. He can’t give me an alibi. But”—he smiled at us—“he makes a mean omelette.”
    “Don’t worry, man.” Owen patted Josh’s back. “I have a feeling Chloe’s not going to let you go off and rot in jail.”
    “Good. A conjugal visit isn’t exactly what I had in mind.” He winked at me. “The good news is that I haven’t heard from the detective in a few days. I’m not sure how strongly he suspects me. I mean, he’s actually been pretty nice to me this past week. You know, polite and formal, but I get the feeling he’s just trying to do his job. I don’t think he’s out to get me just to pin the murder on someone. I’m the easiest suspect right now. All right, that’s enough. No more murder talk today.”
    “Yes, sir.” Adrianna saluted Josh. “We’re ready to go!”
    As we were heading out the back door, the phone rang. “Let me just grab that before we go, okay?” I rushed back inside and picked up the phone. “Hello?”
    “Chloe? It’s Sheryl Rafferty, dear.” Dammit. I hadn’t heard from her since the funeral and thought I was free. “Oh, um, hi. How are you?”
    “As well as can be expected, I guess,” Sheryl’s shrill voice ripped through my hangover headache. “Phil and I would like to have you over for dinner tonight. We’d like to talk to you about some things. Can you come? Around six?”
    Now, the last thing I wanted to do was have dinner with the Raffertys. The only reason I even thought about accepting the invitation was the possibility of learning something about Eric that would point to a suspect other than Josh. I agreed to dinner, but said I wouldn’t be able to stay long. School work and all that, I lied.
    “Who was that?” Adrianna asked.
    “Actually,“ I hesitated, not wanting to freak out Josh, “it was Eric’s mother, Sheryl. She and Phil want me to come over for dinner to discuss something. I said I’d go.”
    “Are you nuts?” Ade yelled. “I thought you’d gotten rid of them.”
    “I haven’t gotten around to it. Yet. I haven’t even talked to them since the funeral. I’ll tell them tonight that I wasn’t Eric’s fiancee. But I was thinking that if I talk to them and find out more about Eric, maybe I can find a good suspect to pass on to Detective Hurley. With luck, maybe the real murderer.”
    Josh looked at me. “Chloe, you don’t have to do that. Please. I’ll be fine. Call her back and tell her no. Just explain everything over the phone. You don’t have to suffer through dinner with them for my sake.”
    “I want to. We all know you’re not the murderer, but somebody is. Maybe the Raffertys are. Both of them. Or one of them. And maybe I can get some useful information. Besides, they’re still mourning their son’s death. At least I guess they are,” I said, thinking about my Group Therapy class’s hypotheses. “All right, we said no more murder talk. So let’s get out of here.”
    We walked down the back stairs and ran smack into Noah.
    With the trashy blonde.
    I hadn’t noticed her car outside, but I’d been too focused on half-naked Josh to see much of anything else.
    “Noah,” I said cooly, grabbing Josh’s hand.
    “Veronica?” Josh said. Owen, Ade, and I whipped around to stare at Josh.
    Noah spoke first. “You two know each other?” he asked the skank.
    “Yeah,” she bubbled. “I do the books for Magellan, right, Josh?”
    What the hell is going on? Eric’s ex-girlfriend is dating my ex? Is