Needled to Death Read online

  “WELCOME TO THIS WEEK’S MEETING OF OUR BEREAVEMENT SUPPORT GROUP,” I BEGIN.

  “I want to start by reviewing the ground rules first, both as a refresher for those of you who have been here before and to inform our new visitor.”

  Predictably, most of those who have been coming for a while roll their eyes or shift impatiently in their seats. But reciting the ground rules is a must.

  “First and foremost, remember that anything said in this room is confidential and is not to be discussed or relayed to anyone outside of the group. Remember that we are here to share experiences, not advice. Be respectful and sensitive to one another by silencing your cell phones, avoiding side conversations, and listening to others without passing judgment. And finally, try to refrain from using offensive language.”

  I pause and scan the faces in the group. “Any questions about the rules?”

  I’m answered with a sea of shaking heads and murmured declinations.

  “Okay then. Since we have someone new here tonight, let’s start by going around the group and stating your name and who it is you’ve lost.” I turn and smile at Sharon Cochran. “Sharon, would you like to start?”

  I’m pleased when she nods, even though it’s an almost spastic motion. My pleasure then dissipates as she completely derails the evening’s agenda.

  “My name is Sharon Cochran, and I’m here because the cops say my son committed suicide. But I know he was murdered and I’m hoping you can help me find his killer.”

  Books by Annelise Ryan

  A Helping Hands Mystery

  Needled to Death

  A Mattie Winston Mystery

  Working Stiff

  Scared Stiff

  Frozen Stiff

  Lucky Stiff

  Board Stiff

  Stiff Penalty

  Stiff Competition

  Dead in the Water

  Dead Calm

  Dead of Winter

  Coming in March 2020:

  Dead Ringer

  Books by Allyson K. Abbott

  (who also writes as Annelise Ryan):

  A Mack’s Bar Mystery

  Murder on the Rocks

  Murder With a Twist

  In the Drink

  Shots in the Dark

  A Toast to Murder

  Last Call

  Needled To Death

  Annelise Ryan

  KENSINGTON BOOKS

  KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  “WELCOME TO THIS WEEK’S MEETING OF OUR BEREAVEMENT SUPPORT GROUP,” I BEGIN.

  Also by

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Teaser chapter

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  KENSINGTON BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  119 West 40th Street

  New York, NY 10018

  Copyright © 2019 by Beth Amos

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.

  If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  Kensington and the K logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  ISBN: 978-1-4967-1943-0

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4967-1945-4 (eBook)

  ISBN-10: 1-4967-1945-X (eBook)

  For Larry

  Chapter One

  I can still see the shadows of death on some of their faces, evident in the droop of their eyes, the taut, thin line of their lips, and the pale, pasty coloring of their skin from spending too much time indoors hiding away from society and life. It’s evident, too, in the tentative and wary way they walk, their shoulders hunched over defensively, as if they’re expecting another grievous blow to descend upon them at any second.

  Some people wear their cloak of grief for a long time. Others shrug it off in good time and good order, eager and able to get on with their lives, even if it’s only a few small steps at a time. The people who are with me tonight tend more toward the former group, and it’s my job to try to help them become members of the latter group.

  I’m about to start the session when a new face enters the room—a woman who looks to be in her mid-to-late forties—and I’m tempted to clap my hands with delight. This would be both inappropriate and unprofessional, so I quickly rein in the impulse and focus on forming a smile that looks warm and welcoming, and hopefully doesn’t show the excitement I feel. I hurry over to her, aware of the curious stares coming from the others in the room.

  “Hello,” I say. “Are you here for the bereavement group?” The question is rhetorical, since this woman is wearing her mantle of grief like a heavy shawl. Her face is expressionless, her shoulders are slumped, and her movements are sluggish and zombielike. She looks down at me—nearly everyone I meet looks down at me in the strictly physical sense, since I’m barely five feet tall—and nods mechanically.

  “Well, welcome,” I tell her, touching her arm with my hand. “I’m Hildy Schneider. I’m a social worker here at the hospital, and I run this group.”

  She nods again but says nothing. I suspect her loss is a recent one, very recent. Who was it? I wonder. Based on her age, a parent is a good guess if one assumes the natural order of things. But I’ve learned that death doesn’t care much for order.

  “What’s your name?” I ask, hoping to ease her out of the frozen, deer-in-the-headlights stance she currently has. She looks at me, but I get a strong sense that she doesn’t see me. I’ve encountered this before and suspect she’s mentally viewing some memory reel as it plays repeatedly. I tighten my touch on her arm slightly, hoping the physical connection will ground her. It does.

  She blinks several times, flashes an awkward, pained attempt at a smile, and says, “Sorry. I’m Sharon Cochran.” Her voice is mechanical, rote, with no lilt or feeling behind it.

  “I’m glad you’re here, Sharon,” I say. “Can I get you something to drink? A water, or some coffee?”

  She looks at me with brown eyes that are stone-cold and dull, and then shakes her head.<
br />
  “There are some cookies, too,” I say. “Can I get you one?”

  Again, she shakes her head, her gaze drifting away from mine. The others in the room have lowered the tenor of their conversations to soft, whispered murmurs, no doubt so the newcomer won’t hear them talking about her.

  “Sharon?” I say firmly, wanting to bring her attention back to me. “Have you ever been to a support group before?”

  “No.”

  “Okay. Let me give you a brief overview of how the group works. We meet every week on Thursday evenings unless there is a holiday that falls on that day. In that case, we often meet the evening before. Attendance is totally voluntary. Come as little or as often as you want and come as many times and for as long as you want. Typically, I pick a topic for us to focus on each week, and I talk a little about that topic before opening things up to the group.” She is looking down at the purse she is clutching, fidgeting with its clasp, making it hard for me to tell if she’s hearing me or not. I continue anyway.

  “The members of the group have the option of discussing something relative to their individual grief issues and experiences, and if it happens to be related to the topic at hand, that’s great. But it doesn’t have to be. Anyone who wants to talk may do so, but there is also no obligation to do so. The others who are here tonight have all been coming for some time, and they do plenty of talking. You might feel like an outsider because of that, but I promise you that if you commit the time and effort to attending several sessions, that will dissipate. It’s a very friendly and supportive group of people, and all of them share one thing in common with you. They’ve all lost someone close to them.”

  She looks at me then, and I see the first spark of life in those mud brown eyes. “How?” she asks.

  I’m confused by the question. “How what?”

  “How did the others die?”

  “Oh. Well, there’s a mix. And rather than my trying to give you any background on the others, I think it will work better if you let them tell you their stories.” I again ponder who it is Sharon has lost. Maybe it was a spouse?

  “Any suicides?” she asks. Her eyes are scanning the others in the room.

  “Yes,” I say. “Did you lose someone to suicide?”

  She nods slowly, frowning and surveying the other attendees.

  “There is someone here who lost her husband to suicide,” I say. “She hasn’t had anyone else who shares her situation up until now. I can introduce you to her, if you like.”

  “No.” Flat, dead, robotic. “What about homicide?” she says, eyes still roving, though I get the sense that she isn’t focusing on anything or anyone.

  “What about it?” I reply, unsure where she’s going.

  “Has anyone here lost someone to murder?”

  “No.” Something in the back of my brain connects with something in my gut, and instinct makes me qualify my answer. “Well, none of the group members have lost anyone to murder,” I clarify, “but I have. My mother was murdered when I was little.”

  I see a spark of interest soften her face, and she looks me in the eye for the first time. “Did they catch who did it?” she asks, which strikes me as an odd thing to ask before expressing some token condolence or inquiring about the circumstances. Though most people merely make an awkward attempt at changing the subject whenever I bring it up.

  “No, they never did,” I tell her, feeling a familiar ache at the thought. I glance at the clock on the wall and see that it reads two minutes past seven. “I need to get things started,” I say. “But I’d like to talk with you some more after the group ends, if you can stay for a bit.”

  “Sure,” she says, and she gifts me with a tentative smile.

  I give her shoulder a reassuring squeeze and then address the room at large, speaking loudly. “Okay, everyone, let’s get started.”

  This command is typically followed by one last dash to the snack table to get another cookie, or to top off a cup of coffee. Generally, I allow a minute or so for people to heed my request, and then I start regardless of what’s going on or who might be still hovering over the cookies. Tonight, however, the presence of a newcomer has intrigued everyone enough that things get changed up. The music of the various conversations stops as if on cue and everyone quickly claims a seat as if we are playing a game of musical chairs. I suspect they are eager to rubberneck on someone else’s misery for a change.

  The dynamics always change when someone new joins a group. Most of the time it’s a good thing, if knowing that someone is struggling with grief can ever be considered a good thing. I’ve been spearheading this group for nearly two years now, and its composition and size has ebbed and flowed, fluctuating with some regularity. This is good because when all the players stay the same, things can get stagnant. A little fresh blood always invigorates the group.

  I’ve had people who came only once, some who came for a handful of sessions, and two regulars who have been here since the group’s inception. The average stay is about ten to twelve weeks for most. Some come alone, others with friends or relatives. The size of the group varies, too, having reached twenty-two people at its peak, though for the past two months it’s been a core group of nine. We are in Wisconsin, so in the winter months the weather sometimes forces cancellations or keeps the group smaller. Now that it’s springtime, I’ve been hoping the group would see some new blood.

  I always arrange the chairs in a circle, and while this configuration is designed to create a feeling of community and equality, people tend to form smaller niches within the larger circle, mini groups where they feel the most comfortable.

  My two die-hard attendees (though I should probably try to come up with a less offensive descriptor, under the circumstances), the ones who have been coming since I started the group, are Charlie Matheson and Betty Cronk.

  Charlie is in his fifties, a widower, with a full head of gray hair that typically stands like a rooster comb by the end of a session, thanks to his habit of running his hands through it. Charlie works here at the hospital in the maintenance department and fancies himself as some sort of soothsayer or prognosticator. He swears he can “read” people and predict their futures after chatting with them for a few minutes. While I don’t deny that the man has accurately predicted the behaviors of some of the group members in the past, it has less to do with any special powers he has than it does his ability to recognize when he has annoyed someone to the point of action. It didn’t take a wizard to figure out that Hailey Crane, a teenager who came to the group with her mother when her father died, would decide to leave the group after one session as Charlie predicted. The fact that, despite my attempts to rein him in, Charlie badgered the girl a couple of times to “open up” and “express yourself” when she clearly didn’t want to be there helped with that prediction.

  I had a stern talk with Charlie after that, and I’ve had to do so on other occasions as well, since his actions often necessitate a cease-and-desist warning. If I let him, Charlie would take over the group. I’ve come to realize that he sees himself as my assistant, a coleader or facilitator of sorts, a perception I try hard to extinguish every week. I should probably ban him from the group, but he has a reputation around the hospital of being something of a tattletale. Whenever someone does something he doesn’t like he’s quick to run to the human resources department and file a complaint. He knows how to play the system and isn’t afraid to do so.

  Since I can’t steer clear of Charlie, I do my best to control him instead. I don’t want to be on Charlie’s bad side, so I struggle to balance my occasional desire to kill or maim him with my best professional façade. I don’t have the luxury of picking and choosing my clients or patients in this hospital setting, and it’s a simple fact of my professional life that I won’t like some of them, and some of them won’t like me.

  Betty, my other long-term attendee, is a widow in her fifties, a stern, hard woman with a sharp-edged face, a tall, lean body, and a no-nonsense attitude. She wears her
hair in a tight bun and dresses in drab, sack-like dresses, holey cardigans, heavy stockings, and utilitarian shoes. Betty’s husband, Ned, was a quintessential Caspar Milquetoast kind of guy who not only let his wife lead him around by the nose but seemed to like it. Theirs was a match made in heaven, but when heaven came calling for Ned, Betty found she didn’t know what to do with her bossy personality. She and Ned never had any children—Just as well, I think, as I imagine little Bettys running around like creepy Addams Family Wednesdays—and not surprisingly, Betty doesn’t have many friends. She came to the grief group because she felt befuddled and confused, a rudderless ship adrift on a foreign sea. And she found the perfect home for her acerbic style.

  Unfortunately for me, her style is often at odds with what my group is about, and like Charlie, she can be a disruptive influence. The two of them keep me on my toes, I’ll give them that. Tonight, with a newcomer in the mix, I know I will need to be extra vigilant and stay on top of them both lest things get out of control. They’re like sharks smelling fresh blood in the water.

  Charlie and Betty don’t like each other, and they often seat themselves on either side of me—a subtle way, I suspect, of declaring their perceived leadership status. This works in my favor, however, because it’s much easier to shut them up if they are within a hand’s reach.

  Charlie swears I once pinched him hard enough to leave a bruise on his thigh, a mark he offered to show me after everyone else had left for the night.

  “Charlie, that would be completely inappropriate!” I chastised as he started to undo his pants.

  He paused in undoing his belt and blinked at me several times. Then he smiled and refastened the belt. “Yes, I suppose it would be,” he said with a shrug and a smile.