Killer Pancake by Diane Mott Davidson

I'd used for the cookies and flung it against the wall. I screamed as brown powder exploded everywhere. John Richard dusted his hands and gave me a look: Now why did you make that necessary?
    "Get out," I said evenly. "Leave. Nine and a half minutes, and you're in a lot of trouble." He'd thrown something because he was thwarted. I wouldn't go to the hospital with him, and I had paid.
    The Jerk assumed an attitude of nonchalance and shrugged. Then, without another word, he withdrew from the kitchen and sauntered his Bermuda-shorted self through the front door. I followed, pressed the bolt into place and armed the system, then ran back to the phone.
    "Miss G:?" I broke out in a sweat from the relief of hearing Tom's old term of endearment. "Will you please talk to me?"
    "He's gone," I said breathlessly. "Can you tell me where, I mean, how long ago did she... how is she?" I remembered all too vividly Marla's sad history, that her father had died from a. heart attack when she was very young.
    "She's okay. In the Coronary Care Unit at Southwest Hospital. She had a mild heart attack this morning either before or after jogging around Aspen Meadow Lake. Since when is she a jogger?"
    "Since never," I replied angrily, "and she's on some weird lemon-and-rice diet - "
    "Not anymore, she isn't. You coming down here or what? I probably won't be able to stay. The investigation of the death over in the mall garage is getting under way."
    I replied that I was on my way and that he shouldn't wait for me. I scribbled a note to Arch: Back by dinner. How was I going to tell Arch what had happened to Julian or Marla? He adored them both. Stepping out the back door, I glanced around to make sure the Jerk wasn't lurking in the bushes. That would have been typical of him. I also checked the van's rear area. It was empty. I locked the doors, gunned the engine, and let the speedometer needle quiver past seventy as I raced back to Denver. I wished I didn't know as much as I did about the statistics of heart disease running in families.
    My best-friendship with Marla had blossomed out of the bitterness of being divorced from the same horrid man. I shook my head and thought of the cloud of brown cocoa powder erupting as it hit the wall. To get emotional control over his cruelty,
    Marla and I alternately reviled and ridiculed John Richard. But through the years, the relationship between Marla and me had deepened beyond our mutual crisis. We'd formed a discussion group called Amour Anonymous, for women addicted to their relationships. I zipped past Westside Mall and headed for the parking lot at Southwest Hospital.
    Our Amour Anonymous meetings had been alternately heartfelt and hilarious. And when the group petered out, as those kinds of groups tend to do, Marla and I remained steadfast to each other with daily phone calls and long talks over shared meals.
    Moreover, Marla's generosity with her considerable wealth meant not only that she was one of my best clients, but that she also referred me to all her rich friends. The people in Marla's address book had provided an endless stream of assignments for
    Goldilocks' Catering, including Babs Braithwaite of the upcoming Independence Day party.
    My hands clutched the steering wheel. If the Jerk was right and they wouldn't admit me to the CCU, I was going to have to come up with some way to talk my way in. Just thinking of John Richard made my flesh crawl. How dare he break into my house and blame my cooking for what had happened to Marla? Of course, that kind of behavior was nothing new for him. John Richard
    Korman, whose mother had been a hard-core alcoholic, frequently had just enough whiskey to release the enraged demon that lived inside.
    But there was some truth in what he said. Marla was indeed a large-bodied woman. She ate with gusto, then dieted remorsefully, never for very long or to much effect. Eventually she always resumed her passionate affair with chocolate chip cookies and cream-filled cakes.