Premium Point, Westchester, was a neighbourhood that behaved as if death were something that happened to other people. To be more precise, only to the poor.
Detective Paul Lais parked his unmarked dark sedan against the kerb outside the gate, stepping out into a suffocatingly perfect spring morning. The lawns were manicured to the millimetre, the hydrangeas bloomed in synchronised, pastel obedience, and the air smelled of expensive fertiliser and sea breeze. It was a jarring contrast to the metallic stench of Dr. Choclaire's morgue.
Death didn't belong here. Yet, it was the last place Arthur Brown had been seen alive.
Lais took one last sip of his bitter coffee before starting his round of interviews. There were forty houses in total in this gated community, but only thirty-one were currently inhabited. Arthur Brown lived fairly close to the gate, still well protected from the outside world.
The detective walked up the driveway of the house next to Brown's, flipping open his notepad. A woman in Lululemon leggings and a wide-brimmed designer straw hat was aggressively sweeping her immaculate porch.
"Detective Lais, NYPD," he introduced himself, flashing his badge. "I'm looking into the timeline of Arthur Brown's last afternoon. You are his next-door neighbour?"
"Mrs. Miller," the woman sighed, leaning on her broom. "It's so tragic about Mr. Brown. A heart attack, they said?"
"Something like that," Lais lied smoothly. "Did you see him arrive home two days ago, around 5:45 PM?"
"Briefly. My daughters, Lena and Lea, had a little lemonade stand out front. I heard an angry voice yelling at some co-worker, I suppose, so I looked out the kitchen window to check on my girls. They were still there selling lemonade, but they looked a little scared of him, so I went outside to make sure they were okay. Nothing happened, though. He was cross and shouting as usual, then rushed to his door—again, as usual. He appeared to always be in a hurry."
"Did he interact with anyone? Did he buy a drink from your daughters?" Lais asked, his pen hovering. If Brown had ingested something here, the vector was crucial.
Mrs. Miller let out a short, cynical laugh. "Arthur? Buy lemonade from children? Detective. Arthur Brown viewed kids the same way he viewed dandelions. As weeds. He ignored them completely and marched straight into his house. I don't think he even looked at them. Lena and Lea just happened to be in his way."
Lais suppressed a frustrated sigh and wrote it down. A dead end. "Did anyone else see him?" Lais asked.
Mrs. Miller pointed with her chin toward the stunning, minimalist grey house directly across the street. "Vera might have. She was out in her aunt's garden around that time. She's the only one who actually manages to keep her orchids alive in this climate."
Lais thanked her and crossed the street, his heavy footsteps sounding loud on the pristine pavement. As he approached, he saw her.
Vera was kneeling gracefully by a flowerbed, holding a pair of polished gardening shears. She was wearing a soft, light blue cashmere sweater, dark cropped tailored trousers, and big designer sunglasses that covered half of her face. She looked like she had just stepped out of a high-end lifestyle magazine.
"Excuse me, ma'am. Are you Vera?" Lais asked.
"I am," she replied, her voice smooth and modulated, carrying a faint, untraceable European elegance. She stood up, stripping off a pair of sleek gardening gloves and setting the shears down. "How may I help you, Officer?"
"Detective Lais," the detective said, showing his badge. "I'm retracing Arthur Brown's steps. Mrs. Miller mentioned you were in your garden when he arrived home two days ago."
Vera offered a polite, sympathetic smile. It was the exact smile a well-bred woman gives when forced to discuss something unpleasant. "Ah, yes. Poor Arthur. It's quite shocking. I was just out here trimming my orchids when he pulled into his driveway."
"Did you notice anything unusual about him? Did he speak to you, or to anyone else on the street?" Lais watched her face carefully. Homicide detectives were trained to look out for micro-expressions. A twitch of the eye, a tightening of the jaw, a subtle shift in weight—or anything else that has actually been discarded by the scientific community.
Vera gave him absolutely nothing.
"He was exactly as he always was, Detective: in a terrible rush," Vera said smoothly, her green eyes locking onto his with chilling calm. "He was arguing with someone over the phone. He got out of his car, slammed the door, and went straight inside. He didn't even acknowledge the Miller twins and their stand."
Lais frowned. It matched Mrs. Miller's story perfectly. It was a watertight narrative.
"I see," Lais said, closing his notepad. "We are going to subpoena the Homeowners Association's security footage just to be thorough and establish a definitive timeline. But I appreciate your help, Vera."
"Of course, Detective," Vera said, picking up her shears again. "I hope the footage gives you the clarity you need. It must be a very frustrating job, trying to find sense in a sudden tragedy."
"It has its moments," Lais muttered.
"Ah, one last thing, Vera. You live here with your aunt, right?" the detective asked, stepping back down onto the pavement.
"Yes. I moved here a few months ago from Italy to help her with housekeeping and other things while she is busy working."
The detective sighed, acknowledging the dead end. "So, I am guessing she wasn't home two days ago, around the time Arthur came back?"
"You guessed right. She's currently working on an important exhibition abroad," Vera replied, totally expecting this last question.
He nodded, said goodbye, and turned away, walking over to the other houses for his interrogations. He didn't have high hopes that others had seen Arthur because those houses were so far apart, and many inhabitants were on holiday or business travel. Rich people stuff, he thought.
After a few stories confirming the information he had gotten from Vera and Mrs. Miller, the detective walked back to his car. The case was slipping through his fingers. He had a dead millionaire, a clean coffee mug, and a neighbourhood where absolutely nothing out of the ordinary had happened. His only hope now was the HOA security cameras. If the cameras confirmed Brown went straight inside, the poisoning had to have happened at the office, and Choclaire's timeline was wrong.
He opened his car door, but paused, looking back across the street.
Vera was gracefully snipping a dead leaf from an orchid.
Lais couldn't quite put his finger on it, but a tiny, irrational itch started at the base of his neck. Most people, when questioned by a homicide detective, showed some sign of nerves. A fidget, an over-explanation, a need to fill the silence.
Vera hadn't shown a single drop of anxiety. Her pulse hadn't quickened. Her breathing was perfectly even. She was entirely, unnervingly still.
The same went for most of the other gated community inhabitants whom he'd just questioned.
Could this possibly be a grand rich cover-up? Nah, highly unlikely. They're just rich people with good manners, Lais told himself, getting into the car and starting the engine. Stop seeing monsters in the suburbs.
As the unmarked police car pulled away, Vera didn't look up. She simply smiled at her orchids, the metallic snip of her shears echoing softly in the quiet street.