“I told you!” Mendez gloated as they walked across the parking lot. “I knew it!”

“Could have been an innocent attorney-client dinner,” Hicks said.

“You don’t sneak out of town to an out-of-the-way restaurant nobody knows for a simple client dinner.”

Hicks conceded the point.

“That bastard!” Mendez said. “I want him in the box. Now.”

“It’s not against the law to have dinner,” Hicks said. “Or to cheat on your wife, for that matter.”

“He’s connected to a murder victim.”

“He’s a lawyer. He’ll never consent.”

“He’s got a big ego,” Mendez said, pulling open his car door. “Maybe he’ll want to prove us wrong.”

“What do you think about Foster?” Hicks asked as they got in the car.

“Single artsy teacher with no pregnant co-eds?” Mendez said. “Sounds gay to me.”

“He was pretty cool about it.”

“If he’s used to people assuming he’s gay, maybe it’s no big deal to him.”

“There’s a big difference between someone saying you’re gay and someone being able to prove it,” Hicks said. “We didn’t ask him who he was with at that out-of-the-way dinner.”

“Like you said: There’s no law against having dinner. Unless he was making out with another guy between courses, it doesn’t matter who he was with,” Mendez said.

“I see,” Hicks said. “It’s okay for Foster to meet a boyfriend for dinner, but Marissa Fordham being seen with Steve Morgan gives Morgan a motive for murder. That’s some double standard you’ve got there, compadre.”

“Don’t ridicule my theory of the crime,” Mendez said. “I mean, do you really think the powers that be at McAster would be shocked to find out their music director is gay? That’s like saying they’d be shocked to find out half the girls’ softball team are lesbians. Would they really care?”

“They’d care if there were photographs,” Hicks pointed out.

“So would Steve Morgan,” Mendez countered.

Chapter 33

33

The adrenaline for the upcoming confrontation coursed through Mendez all the way to the Morgan home ... then crashed. Steve Morgan’s Trans Am was not in the driveway.

“Maybe it’s in the garage,” Hicks said.

“It was parked outside last night.”

“Last night? What are you doing? Stalking the guy?”

“I was just driving around, thinking. I came by here.”

“You’re obsessed.”

“I’m tenacious. It’s only obsession if there’s nothing to back it up.”

They sat at the curb for a moment, Mendez regrouping his thoughts.

“Let’s go in,” he said. “We’ll talk to Mrs. Morgan. Light a fire.”

Sara Morgan was not pleased to see them. It took her several moments to come to the door. She was dressed like a welder in bib overalls and a heavy leather apron with equally heavy leather gloves. Her hair was up in a messy topknot with long curls slipping free all around.