Deadly Gamble (11 page)

The house itself looked antebellum, and therefore wildly out of place in a shit-heel town in the belly button of Arizona. I must have been there often, as a child, but I couldn't work up a memory to save my life. Maybe, I speculated, my folks and the Larimers hadn't been close. The disparities between their lifestyles would surely have made things awkward.

I left the cemetery map on the seat, grabbed my purse, and headed for the massive front door, with its lion's-head knocker. If there was a butler, I could send him to fetch my garbage-bag suitcase.

As if.
My real plan was to wait until it got dark, sneak out, and carry my stuff into the guesthouse by the back door. If guesthouses
had
back doors.

Before my hand came to rest on the gleaming lion's head, the great portal opened, and Clive stood in the gap, flanked by marble floors, a grand, curving staircase and a very beautiful woman seated in a wheelchair.

“You came,” he said fondly.

I smiled, though my stomach was quivering. I hadn't even stepped into the house yet, and already I felt like an impostor, up to no good. God, why hadn't I bought a suitcase, or better yet, borrowed one of Greer's gold Halliburtons?

“Sorry I'm late,” I said. “Traffic.”

“Come in,” my uncle commanded good-naturedly. “We've been waiting for you.” He turned, looked down at the aging goddess in the wheelchair. Blond hair perfectly coiffed. Makeup artful. Pearls at the neckline of her black St. John suit. “Barbara, look who's here. It's Mary Jo.”

I didn't correct him. In a place like that, “Mary Jo” sounded a lot better than “Mojo.” I met Barbara's blue eyes, nodded and waited. She went over me like a CAT scan, but I supposed it was natural, after all that had happened.

“Welcome home, Mary Jo,” she finally said. I don't think I imagined the faint note of reserve in her voice.

The Larimer mansion was about as likely to be my home as the White House, but I figured it would have been rude to say so. The woman had problems enough, stuck in that wheelchair, without some long-lost relative giving her backtalk in her own foyer.

“Thank you,” I said. The author of the
Damn Fool's Guide to Proper Etiquette
would have been proud.

A young man in jeans and a green polo shirt appeared from the periphery of my vision. I figured him for the senator's bodyguard, or maybe a traveling massage therapist. He didn't look like any butler I'd ever seen.

Not that I'd ever actually seen one, except in the movies.

“Joseph will move your car, if that's all right,” Clive said diplomatically.

Right. No good having my battered Volvo hunkered in the middle of the drive when the next limo rolled in. Besides, the neighbors might see it, and by now, they probably had their binoculars out. I handed over the keys.

Joseph looked me over like he thought Clive and Barbara ought to check my pockets before I left, but he had the good grace not to say anything.

Barbara wheeled into a cavernous parlor, to the right of the entryway, and since Clive followed, so did I. My mind was on Joseph, however. He was about to get an eyeful of my luggage, and I wouldn't put it past him to go through my glove box, either.

Cocktails were served by a maid in an honest-to-God uniform, complete with ruffled apron and one of those little white hats. They must have paid her extra to wear it.

After the elegant and costly booze, there were little quiches and things wrapped in bacon, and after
that,
an eight-course dinner.

I kept waiting for the probing questions, but it seemed none were forthcoming. The Larimers talked about their wonderful children—a doctor, a lawyer and a couple of Indian chiefs.

“Mary Jo is in the medical field,” Clive told Barbara, at one point. The way he made it sound, I was doing neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins instead of punching in Medicare codes.

“Isn't that nice?” Barbara said sunnily, but every once in a while, I caught her looking at me the same way Joseph had.

When dessert was served, Mrs. Larimer announced that she was feeling a little ill.

Clive excused himself, as well as his wife, and wheeled Barbara out of the dining room. I sat there, staring down at my Bananas Whatever, and wondered whether I was expected to wait until Clive came back to get lost or just go ahead and make myself scarce right away.

I heard a whirring sound in the near distance and decided it was an elevator.

I was about to get out of my chair and go looking for the guesthouse—or just hightail it for Jolie's place in Tucson—when Joseph came through the door that probably led to the kitchen.

He fixed me with a glare and snapped, “Who are you and what the hell are you trying to pull?”

W
ho are you and what the hell are you trying to pull?

Joseph's question pulsed between us. It was merely rude on the surface, but I sensed a more disturbing undercurrent, and my body was sending subtle, visceral read-outs from some database deep in the subterranean regions of my brain.

I pushed back from the Larimers' dining room table and stood to face the militant massage therapist. No need for him to know that my knees were a little unsteady.

I
was
intimidated; Joseph was maybe thirty and very fit, and even though I'd practiced on Bert, I hadn't mastered the techniques from
The Damn Fool's Guide to Self-Defense for Women
to the degree that I could fend off anybody who really wanted to hurt me.

My m.o. in situations like that was simple and to the point: bluff to the big dogs.

“Who are you?”
I retorted. “And what gives you the right to talk to me like that?”

Joseph flushed, not with embarrassment, but with rage. He had a buzz cut, and the skin underneath turned pink. “I'm the senator's personal assistant,” he answered, “and bodyguard.”

“And you perceive me as a threat?” I asked, with a lightness I didn't feel.

“I've worked for Senator and Mrs. Larimer for five years,” Joseph replied, “and in all that time, he's never mentioned having a niece. Now, all of a sudden, when he's about to declare his candidacy for governor,
you
turn up, out of nowhere.”

“Either you're not a local, or you didn't do your homework,” I said mildly, but with an edge.

Joseph cast a glance toward the great arched doorway leading into the entryway and lowered his voice a notch. “I know about the Mayhugh murders, if that's what you're talking about. Senator Larimer's sister and her husband were killed. I also know that you—if you really are his niece, that is—disappeared twenty-three years ago. My question is, what brings you back now, after all this time?”

“My answer is, it's really none of your damn business, and if you want to pursue the subject further, you'd better ask my uncle.”

Joseph glared at me.

The faint mechanical sound came again, and it was a good bet Clive was riding the elevator back down to the main floor.

I smiled a little. I could see that Joseph had no intention of asking his employer about me in the immediate future; he turned, without another word, and disappeared into the kitchen.

I'd won the skirmish, but I hadn't seen the last of the senator's personal assistant and bodyguard. That was a given.

I had just sat down again when my uncle walked in, looking rattled and slightly wan. “I've called Barbara's physician,” he said, shoving a hand through his heretofore tidy gray hair. “She's suffered some kind of setback, it would seem. She asked me to apologize for deserting you on your first evening here.”

I stood. I wasn't Barbara's new best friend, and she wasn't mine, but the woman
was
in a wheelchair, and I was not unsympathetic. “It would probably be better if I left,” I said.

“Please, don't,” my uncle responded, and he sounded sincere, though of course there was always the possibility that he was just trying to be polite. “There are so many things I want to ask you about. And Barbara is bound to feel better in the morning. The doctor will give her something, and she'll rest. That's what she needs—rest.”

I nodded, though in truth I had no way of knowing what Barbara needed. “I'm sorry she's ill. And of course you need to be with her. I was planning to visit my sister in Tucson anyway, so—”

The senator interrupted, frowning. “You have a sister?”

Naturally he'd be confused. We were almost total strangers to each other, but he knew Geoff and I were our parents' only children, and with both of them dead, the chances of family expansion were nil.

I leaned down to collect my purse from the floor next to my chair, straightened again. “Jolie's an honorary sibling,” I said. “I'll explain later. In the meantime, I'll get out of your way so you can concentrate on taking care of Mrs. Larimer.”

He looked relieved, but regretful, too. “You will stay the night, won't you? I'll have Joseph show you to the guesthouse, and in the morning, we can have breakfast on the patio. Make up for lost time.” He paused. “It's important to me, Mary Jo. When you get to my age, you realize that nothing matters as much as family.”

As
if
I wanted to be alone with Joseph. “I'll find the guesthouse on my own,” I said. “Is there anything I can do for Mrs.—”

“Barbara,” Clive corrected gently. “Please, call her Barbara.”

I would have been more comfortable if the injunction had come from
Barbara
herself, but I conceded with a nod. Since Joseph had departed through the kitchen, I decided to take the long way around, through the front door, even if I had to stumble around in the dark to find the appointed sleeping quarters.

I waited, and when my uncle looked blank, I reiterated, “If I can help in any way, just let me know.”

Clive shook his head. “No. I appreciate your understanding, Mary Jo. I'll have Joseph walk you out—”

“That's okay,” I said, hoping I didn't sound as nervous as I felt. After all, just because I'd refused Joseph as an escort, that didn't mean he wouldn't jump out at me from behind a shrub between there and the backyard, presumably where I'd find the guesthouse.

“Nonsense,” my uncle argued. “Joseph!”

The troll stuck his head in from the kitchen. “Yes, sir?”

“If you'd see Miss Sheepshanks to the casita, I'd appreciate it. Mrs. Larimer is ill, and I'd like to get back upstairs and sit with her until the doctor arrives. You'll watch for him and let him in when he gets here?”

Joseph almost saluted. “Of course, Senator,” he said.

Shit,
I thought.

“I really don't want to impose,” I said, but my uncle had already turned his back, and he was walking away. If he heard me, he gave no sign of it.

“No imposition,” Joseph told me, with a little grin of triumph.

Besides bolting, my choices were limited. And, I remembered, the redoubtable assistant/bodyguard had driven my car around back when I arrived anyway. Since I couldn't leave without the Volvo, I sighed and reluctantly followed Joseph through a kitchen large enough to serve a mid-size hotel, toward a rear door.

“Don't get any ideas about ingratiating yourself with Senator and Mrs. Larimer and moving into the casita on a permanent basis,” Joseph warned quietly, once we were outside.

Every cicada in the state must have been in that yard, singing backup.

“I have a job, an apartment and a life,” I answered evenly. What I
wanted
to say was considerably less polite, but I was alone in the dark with the man, and if I yelled for help, nobody would hear me over the bug chorus. Assuming there was anyone around in the first place.

“Keep it that way,” Joseph said, leading the way along a broad flagstone path. I noted towering topiary on either side, and heard a waterfall somewhere nearby.

“How do you know I'm not a nice person?” I challenged.

Joseph didn't answer.

We must have triggered a motion light somewhere, because suddenly the “casita” sprang into sharp relief against the night sky. It was about the size of the three-bedroom tract houses in one of Nick's better developments, with its own modified courtyard and burbling fountain. Lamps behind the wooden blinds in the windows came on automatically, issuing an uncertain welcome.

“I put your…stuff inside,” Joseph informed me, swinging open the front door. So he'd seen my garbage-bag luggage. I'd been hoping, foolishly, I know, that he'd overlooked it somehow. “Don't get too comfortable, and if you need anything, call somebody else.”

Mentally, I threw patience into the same category as truth and discretion. “Bite me, Buckaroo,” I said sweetly. “This is a here-today-gone-tomorrow kind of thing, and frankly, I'd rather be homeless than live within five miles of you.”

At this, Joseph turned to look at me, and I thought I glimpsed a grudging respect in his eyes. It was gone quickly. “I guess we understand each other,” he said.

“Only partially correct,” I said, moving past him and through the open doorway into a spacious, tiled front room. “I understand
you.
The reverse, unfortunately, is not true.”

“Whatever,” Joseph said.

I shut the door in his face and turned the dead bolt. He probably had a key, but I doubted he'd sneak in and murder me in my bed while I slept—assuming, of course, that I
would
sleep, which was doubtful. The senator would surely notice my absence when he showed up for that patio breakfast in the morning, and it went without saying that wholesale slaughter would make a mess in
ye auld
casita.

Putting Joseph out of my mind as best I could, I took the grand tour. There were three bedrooms, each with its own bath, a kitchen half the size of my entire apartment and a master suite with a Jacuzzi tub and flat-screen plasma TV that came down out of the ceiling at the push of a button in a little console on the bedside table. Looking at that place, I almost reconsidered my stance on mooching.

My one-bedroom digs over Bad-Ass Bert's suffered by comparison.

My cell phone launched into a muffled tune as I was emptying the trash bag in the middle of the bed. I rummaged, checked the caller ID and debated answering. The number on the panel was Tucker's.

I'm a sucker for punishment. I thumbed the talk button and snapped, “What?”

“I guess I deserve that,” Tucker said.

“I guess you do,” I answered, fishing my nightgown out of the pile of semifolded clothes I'd laundered that morning.

He chuckled. “If I knew where you were,” he cajoled, “maybe I'd send flowers.”

“Is there a point to this call?”

“Yeah.” All rumbly and gruff, followed by a note of boyish mischief. “I'm trying to find out where you are.”

“Why don't you just ask me?”

“I did. In a roundabout sort of way.”

“I'm in Senator and Mrs. Clive Larimer's guesthouse,” I said. “Cactus Bend, off Highway 10 east. Do you want the zip code?”

“Are you premenstrual or something?”

I sighed. “Just tired.”
And scared to death you're getting it on with your ex-wife
.

“Isn't Cactus Bend where—?”

Obviously, Tucker had been doing some research.

“Where my folks were murdered?” I finished for him. “Yes.” I paused. “I thought you were undercover.”

“I'm on a break. Look, Moje—”

I plunked down on the edge of the bed and squeezed my eyes shut.
Here it comes,
I thought, and tried to brace myself. “Just say it, will you?”

He hesitated. He was a cop; he picked up nuances. “What exactly are you
expecting
me to say?”

My peepers popped open. “I don't have the faintest idea,” I said.

“Liar,” Tucker countered. “Give it up, Moje. You've on the peck about something, I can tell by your tone, and you've obviously written a script for this particular conversation, so how about feeding me my lines?”

Heat surged into my face. “If you want to go back to your wife and kids, it's your business,” I blurted.

“Go back to—?”

A wonderful/horrible possibility dawned on me. Wonderful because I might be wrong, and horrible for the same reason. The chances seemed good that I'd just made an ass out of myself.

I tried to brave it through. “Isn't that what you were going to tell me?”

“No,” he said. He sounded terse and, at the same time, as though he might be trying not to laugh. “It isn't. If you're thinking of picking up some extra bucks as a phone psychic, forget it. You don't have the goods.”

I rocked back and forth on the edge of the bed, feeling like the mother of all fools. Maybe if I pulled the garbage bag over my head and cinched the pull-ties at my waist, I could end it all. It would save Joseph the trouble, along with that pesky stretch in prison.

“Are you still there?” Tucker pressed.

“Yeah,” I squeaked.

“I'm not going back to Allison,” he said, “so put that out of your head.”

I reached for the garbage bag. Pondered the cons of self-suffocation. There weren't any pros, as it turned out. “Then what?” Very small voice.

“It's job-related. As in, I'm going to disappear for a couple of days, minimum. If you see my face on the evening news, or on the front page, don't panic. Right now, that's all I can say.”