Sound of Secrets (31 page)

"You can lay in my arms, can’t you?" he asked softly, and she nodded. He kissed her gently on the forehead. "Then I’m not going anywhere."

Palm Beach gleamed, from the sun beaming on the white-sand beaches to the sparkling windows of the trendy shops on Worth Avenue to the shimmering-clean parquet tile in the Palm Beach Hotel.

Cara looked around in appreciation as she, Karen and Gray walked through the beautifully appointed lobby. High-backed sofas and chairs fashioned out of a sumptuous green leather flanked jade tables. A spouting fountain graced the center of the room, its sheets of water cascading into a bowl that contained a mini-paradise with strategically placed rocks and greenery. Crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling in regular intervals, shining light on the scene.

"If this Rosa Martinez is my Rosa Martinez, she must have done very well for herself," Karen said, echoing Cara’s thoughts.

"Maybe that’s why she doesn’t want to talk to us," Gray said as they approached the ground-floor room which served as the headquarters for the department of housekeeping. "Maybe she doesn’t want anything from her past to interfere with the good fortune of her present."

Gray knocked. When he got no answer, he pulled open the door and they entered. The office was empty. Smaller than it first appeared, it contained a mid-sized desk flanked by comfortable upholstered chairs. The desk was neatly organized with papers arranged in orderly stacks and a desk calendar covering much of its surface.

A photograph of two smiling, dark-haired young men who looked enough alike to be twins occupied a prominent position on the table. Cara assumed they were Rosa’s sons, possibly the same ones she had worked so hard to bring to the United States.

"She’s not here." Gray stated the obvious. "You two wait here while I see if I can get someone to track her down."

In typical fashion, he didn’t wait to find out if they agreed with his plan. He just assumed they would. Since what he’d proposed made sense, Cara didn’t see the point in chasing him down to point that out.

"I’m glad we’re getting a moment alone, Cara," Karen said.

The other woman looked sleek and sophisticated in a sleeveless teal pantsuit tailored to accentuate her curves. Cara had sat next to Gray in the front seat on the drive to Palm Beach with Karen doing most of the talking. Much of it, surprisingly, had been about Tyler Shaw. Cara wasn’t sure when Karen had given up pursuing Gray, but Tyler clearly was the man occupying her thoughts.

"Cara? Do you mean you're not going to call me Sarah today?" Cara let her brows raise, not quite ready to forgive and forget.

"Ouch." Karen grimaced dramatically. "I deserved that. I acted abominably toward you, and I apologize. Calling you on the phone like that was reprehensible. I know I shouldn’t expect it. I even know I don’t deserve it — after all, I can be a real bitch — but I was hoping you’d forgive me."

Karen smiled, and there was something so charming and guileless about it that the last remnants of Cara’s anger disappeared.

"Gray’s forgiven me," Karen continued, "although, considering the fool way I acted, God knows he would have been justified if he hadn’t. The thing is I’m head over my high heels in love with Tyler, and Tyler’s closer to Gray than he is to his own brothers. Now I’m not asking you to be my sister, but I was really, really hoping we could be friends. Do you think you can forgive me enough for that?"

Cara considered the other woman, finally understanding why Gray had constantly defended her and why Tyler Shaw had fallen in love with her. Despite her pricey hairstyle and immaculate makeup, there wasn’t anything artificial about Karen.

With the fervency of a lifelong only child, Cara almost wished they could be sisters. But that, like her dream of Gray’s love, was impossible.

"Of course I can forgive you. You’ve made some bad assumptions about me and Gray, though. It’s not that way between us." Cara thought of the self-deception she had practiced the night before. As Gray held her through the long night, she’d imagined things were different between them. In the cool light of day, however, she had to be realistic. Gray wasn't in love with her. "I’m not staying in Secret Sound indefinitely. In fact, I won’t be here much longer."

"You won’t? How can that be? The way you and Gray look at each other, I thought that..."

Karen’s voice trailed off when the door opened, revealing the short, ample-figured woman who bustled through the door. She wore a white uniform too tight across the hips, and her black hair was liberally streaked with gray. She stopped in the middle of the room, wariness in her small brown eyes as she looked from Cara to Karen.

"Rosa? That is you, isn’t it, Rosa?" Karen smiled and got to her feet. "It’s Karen Rhett. You remember me, don’t you, Rosa? You used to braid my hair and let me sit on your lap while you read me stories. I loved sitting on your lap."

"
Dios mio
." She put a hand to her forehead, and tears shimmered in her eyes. "
Mi paloma pequena
."

"Of course.” Karen walked toward the older, smaller woman and took her hand. "
Mi paloma pequena
. My little dove. That’s what you used to call me, because I chased the birds in the park."

"And the
patos
and the
ardillas
. You both do. That’s what
tu hermano
do that day. Chase the
ardilla
."

"A squirrel," Karen translated, glancing at Cara. "Rosa, this is
mi amiga
Cara Donnelly. We want to ask you about what happened that day."

Something akin to fear bloomed in the older woman’s eyes. "A man. He call yesterday to talk. I hang up. I afraid he ask me about that day. That he blame me like your parents."

The door flapped open, and Gray’s voice preceded him. "No luck. I can’t..."

He trailed off when he spotted Rosa Martinez in the middle of the room. Cara thought she looked small and scared. Karen held her hand, the picture of composure.

"Rosa, this is
mi amigo
Gray DeBerg," she said, omitting that he was police chief of Secret Sound. Wisely, Cara thought. "He’s the man who called you yesterday. He doesn’t blame you for anything. None of us do. We just want to know what happened to my brother."

"Why?" Rosa's eyes darted from Karen to Cara to Gray and then back again. "Why now? After so much time?"

"Nobody ever found out what happened to him, Rosa," Karen answered firmly, and it dawned on Cara that Karen’s stake in this was as great as hers. Skippy had been her brother. "Some, uh, things have happened, and we think we might have another chance to solve the mystery."

Rosa tried to tug her hand away, but Karen held tight. Her jaw tightened. "Please, Rosa? I need to know. Please tell your
paloma pequena
."

Cara held her breath, afraid Rosa would refuse and another avenue would slam shut. Then the older woman, tears still brimming in her eyes, nodded. She sank into one of the upholstered chairs instead of behind the desk, and Karen took the chair next to her. Rosa started to talk, addressing her words to Karen as though nobody else was in the room. Cara glanced at Gray, and he put his index finger to his lips.

"I always so careful to watch you, except that day,” Rosa said, her voice shaking. “That’s why your parents say is my fault. They tell me to leave. That it all my fault."

"What happened, Rosa?" Karen pressed. "What happened that day?"

Sadness marred her features, deepening the lines on her face, drooping her mouth. "A woman is there, at the park. I talk to her. You swing on swing. Skippy, he see
ardilla
. He chase. Little girl, she run after him. I think they fine. But they gone. Both gone."

"By little girl, do you mean me?" Karen asked.

Rosa shook her head vigorously. "No. You swing."

Cara’s heart thumped painfully in her chest, and she couldn’t stop herself from interjecting. "Was there another girl in the park that day?"

Rosa’s eyes never left Karen. "
Si
. Another girl. The woman I talk to, her girl. Her family, they visiting town. The man who take Skippy, he take this girl, too."
"But why?" This time, it was Gray who spoke. "Why would the kidnapper take this girl if she was a tourist?”

Rosa still didn’t look anywhere but at Karen. "I don’t know kidnapper. The policeman, he think I need money to bring my sons from Ecuador. Is true, but I no get money that way. I love you. I love
tu hermano
. I never do anything to hurt you."

"I believe you, Rosa." Karen picked up the other woman’s hands once again. "Now tell us about the girl. Do you know why the kidnapper took her?"

She nodded. "The police, they think kidnapper get confused, think this girl you. She four years old, like you. And her name, it sound like your name. When he call Karen, they think she come instead."

Cara’s throat went dry. "The name? Do you remember the name?" Rosa didn’t reply, so she persisted. "Was it Cara?"

Rosa nodded just once.

"Yes," she said. "Cara. That is the name."

Gray watched Curtis Rhett walk out of the office of the Secret Sound Sun at six o’clock that night, right on schedule. He might be a workaholic who spent most of his waking hours at the newspaper. He was also a creature of habit.

Every Wednesday at six, after his staff met to decide the lineup of the next day’s newspaper, Curtis took an hour to indulge his passion for chicken lo mein and egg rolls at Dim Sun’s, Secret Sound’s only Chinese restaurant.

Gray had accompanied Curtis on several occasions. Tonight Curtis was alone. He was dressed in one of his customary suits, but he’d shed his jacket. His dark, conservative tie stood out against the crisp white shirt that Gray knew he had laundered and pressed at Jerry Swart’s Dry Cleaners.

The managing editor’s pace was quick so as not to waste any of the time that was always in such short supply. Gray stamped out his half-smoked cigarette and emerged from the shadows alongside the building, easily falling into step beside him. Curtis took a quick look at him before returning his attention to where he was going.

"I don’t appreciate you ignoring my request," Curtis said, his tone more clipped than usual. "I’m not talking to you. Speak to my lawyer if you have questions."

"Do you know what you sound like?" Gray had intended to keep calm. His frustration bubbled to the surface, mixed with his anger and spilled into his voice. "A guilty man with something to hide."

Curtis laughed shortly, without a trace of humor. "You sound naive. A good journalist knows that innocent men sometimes end up in jail for crimes they didn't commit. I’m a good journalist making sure that doesn’t happen to me."

He picked up his pace, and Gray matched it. No matter what noise Curtis made about a lawyer, he was a talker by nature. Hell, he talked so much when they went fishing that he either scared the fish away or failed to notice they were biting.

"I’m going to subpoena your records," Gray said, trying to rattle him. "Money that people donated to the community center through your newspaper is missing, and the trail leads to your office."

All around them, Secret Sound’s business community was shutting down for the night. Office workers headed home, traffic had picked up and the warmth of the day had disappeared along with the sun. It would have been a typical November evening if Gray hadn’t accused a man he loved and admired of stealing.

"You disappoint me, Gray. I always thought you were so clever," Curtis muttered under his breath, as though he couldn’t help himself. "First of all, it’s never been
my
newspaper. It’s my brother’s. Secondly, never once, in all the years I’ve worked at the Sun, have I ever handled a donation."

His denial had the ring of truth. Gray reconsidered what he knew about the missing donations, which was precious little. His father had written a series of newspaper columns with Curtis's blessing, members of the community had opened their wallets and money was missing. Period. Had he blamed Curtis for a crime he hadn’t committed solely because he was sure he’d committed another, more serious one?

Gray plowed doggedly on, even as he acknowledged his doubts that Curtis was cold-hearted enough to steal from a project he had helped promote. "Even if you didn’t take the money, I’m reasonably sure I can prove you tried to run Cara down and that you attacked her."

Curtis didn’t answer but kept walking determinedly down the sidewalk in the direction of Dim Sun’s. Gray waited until the block was free of other pedestrians before he spoke again.

"Come on, man," he growled in frustration. "This is just you and me here. I don’t want to talk to your lawyer. I want to talk to you. I want you to convince me that you didn’t kidnap Skippy. That you didn’t try to kill Cara.
"If you’re innocent, I want you to tell me how Skippy could have been locked up in the storage shed behind your house before he died."

Curtis stopped walking and turned, the set of his shoulders as stiff as the line of his lips. "How could you possibly know where my nephew spent his last days?"

"It doesn’t matter how I know," Gray said, unwilling to put Cara into further danger by telling Curtis about her returning memories. "What matters is that Skippy was locked in your shed. Suppose you tell me how anybody besides you could have kidnapped him? Especially since Skippy was kidnapped in December, and you bought that house in November of the same year."

"That’s right. I did." Curtis rose to his full height. "What did you think? That I’d deny it? What would be the point when you have the records? Well, here’s another thing for you to check. I didn’t move into that house until a few months after I bought it."

Gray snorted. "You expect me to believe that?"

"I don’t expect anything from you anymore. It’s the truth. My wife broke her leg before we closed on the house. The place we were renting had only one story so we stayed there until Lucy got her cast off."

"If the house was empty," Gray scoffed, "that makes the storage shed an even more convenient place to hide a child."

"It also makes it just as likely that somebody else hid him there. I had some roofing work done before I moved in, and I hired somebody to mow the lawn. You’ve seen the place. The back yard is virtually isolated. Anybody could have gone back there and used that shed."