Sudden Exposure by Susan Dunlap

later.”
    Bryn nodded dismissively.
    “Girls’ Team customers—”
    “ Members .”
    “Or employees? Is there anyone who feels he or she has been pushed aside?”
    “I don’t push people aside!”
    “Should she add them to the list?” Ellen asked. I glanced at her just in time to see the smallest of grins fade from her lips.
    “Ellen!” Bryn snapped. “Get me some tea.”
    Ellen blanched, jumped up, and pushed the kitchen door to swing closed behind her.
    Glancing after her, Bryn sighed. I had the sense that she wanted to say something ameliorating but had no idea just what was appropriate. And she wasn’t about to wimp out in front of me, not again. My guess was that she was as unnerved by Ellen’s jab and dance as Ellen was frightened of her knockout punches.
    Bryn had said she was so strapped for money she couldn’t afford to hire anyone but a relative. That explained her half of the bargain. But Ellen? Surely she could do better than be at the beck and call of a tetchy, self-absorbed cousin …
    “Bryn, just what does Ellen know about this?”
    She started to protest, but I held out a palm. “No. Ellen knows something. The two of you are bouncing it back and forth out of my reach. It’s key to this investigation, right? What is it?” I gave her a moment to respond, then demanded, “What about diving competitors?”
    “You can’t cheat in diving, for Chrissakes! Can’t hide anything. You’re up there on the platform like a pimple on the end of a tongue. Only thing you can do is kiss up to the judges. And I damned well didn’t do that!”
    It was a big defensive burst for a series of incidents that she’d been living off ever since. If she had done anything amiss in the Olympics, the media would have jumped on it. “If it’s not that, what is it?”
    “Either arrest Johnson, or stop pretending you’re doing anything but wasting my time.”
    With anyone else I would have walked out of there, and written a report loaded with “refused cooperation.” “I won’t tell people how to exercise if you won’t run the police department.”
    “I don’t need—”
    Taking a deep breath, I translated grow up : “Ellen told me one of your strengths was putting problems behind you and focusing on the issue at hand. I’d appreciate your doing that now.”
    She hesitated, then shouted, “Ellen, the tea! It doesn’t have to be dead black.”
    Ellen hurried in, cup in one hand, pot in the other. She moved to the far side of Bryn, put the cup on the end table next to the Shiva, and bent over to pour. The bitter smell of green tea cut the air. Her movements had the same deadpan quality of her earlier comments. She didn’t look at Bryn at all. It was to me she gave the smallest of smiles before she settled on the penitent’s seat.
    Later , I told myself, get Ellen later. You can’t let them bounce you back and forth too. “How about nudists, Bryn?” I asked, recalling my speculations with Howard. “This is an out-of-the-way place for them.”
    “Don’t bug me with your other cases. You want to know about Johnson?”
    I gave up. “Okay, let’s talk about Sam Johnson. He opens a health club a couple blocks from yours, he buys the house next door to you. Why?”
    “I have no idea. It’s like locusts eating your crop and then your children. Flood washing away—”
    “I get the point! But the man had to have had some reason, even if it’s a crazy one. Which came first, the house or the health club?”
    “The house. It’s been going on forever.”
    “Forever?”
    “Over a year. The rip-off gym’s only been open three months.” Now she was sitting up, leaning forward toward me, her eyes sparkling the way I remembered them from the Olympic interviews.
    I shifted my weight on the stool, jiggling the baton and flashlight as I moved. “I know, Bryn, that you spent years preparing The Girls’ Team, but it wouldn’t necessarily take Sam that long.” I held my hand out to forestall her sarcastic