Dying in the Dark by Valerie Wilson Wesley Page B

one, and I dropped the fourth on the way to the kitchen last week. These are the only two I have left. I never use them when I'm alone, I only use them when I have company, which is rare these days. When I'm alone, I drink out of a plain old, ugly water glass.”
    ‘A water glass?” I didn't hide my surprise, and she laughed at my response.
    “These dainty little things don't hold enough booze if I want to get seriously drunk. But I like things to match when somebody visits me. I need to have order, and matching glasses and dishes keep me from feeling like my life has dissolved into chaos.”
    “I know what you mean,” I said as if I did. Truth was, my life stayed in chaos, and all the matching glasses in the world wouldn't straighten it out. As a matter of fact, nothing in my kitchen matched. Not glasses, dishes, spoons, or forks, and I was too busy and broke to give a damn one way or the other.
    “So you threw one at your husband? That's something I alwayswanted to do to my ex,” I said. But if I'd aimed something at De-Wayne Curtis it would have been a damn sight deadlier than a glass.
    ‘Actually he's not my ex yet. Despite everything that has happened between us, we haven't begun divorce proceedings.”
    “Is there any chance of reconciliation?”
    Her answer was in the look she shot me as well as in her laughter, and I found myself laughing with her. Suddenly, I could see what Celia might have seen in her. She had a mischievous, seductive edge that broke through her tight middle-class veneer as subtly as the black lace teddy peeking from her white Gap blouse.
    “So Celia broke one of your glasses, too?” I veered back to the reason for my visit. “How did that happen?”
    “She didn't throw it at me, if that's what you're asking. Celia wasn't the type to throw things. I'm the type to throw things.”
    I took a nibble of cheese and a sip of my drink. She poured herself another one and raised it in a toast.
    “To Celia,” she said.
    “To Celia.”
    She finished it off and dabbed her lips with one of the linen cocktail napkins on the tray. They, too, must have been left over from her former life.
    “I've had enough,” she said, which surprised me since she'd just pegged herself as a drunk, and I knew from life with father that drunks never got enough. She went into the kitchen, filled a glass with ice water, came back, and set it next to the one that had contained her drink. “I've been drinking too much these days,” she confided as if we'd been friends for years.
    “Then you'd better toss out those water glasses and get yourself some juice glasses instead,” I suggested.
    “You're probably right,” she said with a good-natured smile.
    “Maybe you're still grieving the loss of Celia,” I offered, and she nodded that it was the truth.
    “I know I have to stop drinking and get back to living, but it's harder than it sounds.” She looked disconcerted for a moment, and I took the lull in our conversation to glance at the key words I'd scribbled in my notebook: Celia Jones, Drew Sampson, Rebecca Donovan, Aaron Dawson.
    I rarely take notes during an interview. I have a good memory and if I've written down key words, I can always recall what was said. I decided to start with “Celia” and work my way down the list. I closed my book and dropped my pen back into my bag, as if the interview were over and we were just two women sitting around talking about nothing.
    “You're right about Celia,” I said. “She wasn't the type to throw things, even in high school.”
    She looked surprised. “So you knew Celia, too. I thought that you were simply involved with her case on a professional level.”
    “No, Celia and I were best friends in high school. We were inseparable.”
    “Funny, she never mentioned you, and she told me almost everything about her life.” She was suspicious, and I remembered what Larry had said about how possessive she'd been.
    “We grew apart over the years, but I still cared