Suspicion of Malice (25 page)

What if Nikki had found out that Roger had seen
a divorce lawyer? Had she looked in the Yellow
Pages under HIT MEN?

Gail pushed aside the notes and came out of her
office for a follow-up mug of American coffee. She
avoided Miriam's inquisitive glances. She went back inside, closed the door, and stared at the telephone. Buzzing on caffeine, back in control of her confi
dence, she punched in Anthony's private line. She did not want to speak to his secretary.

"iQuien habla?"

"This is Gail. I just got in. Miriam said you'd
called?"

"Gail, hello. I didn't expect you on this line. How are you today? Better?"

"I'm fine. I was fine last night." Realizing she'd
begun pacing, she said, "Well, how do we do this? I suppose we could discuss strategy, but first, it
might be a good idea to pool our information. That would save time. Each of us could do a detailed
memorandum bringing the other up to date."

"You're still angry."

Momentarily confused, Gail stopped walking.
"What?"

"If I made you angry last night, I'm very sorry. It
was all
...
maybe a little intense. I was thinking of
my client first, as you were. I promise you, we aren't enemies. We have to work together for this to suc
ceed, and anything I can do, I will."

He had never been able to erase the soft Spanish
accent, and it gave his words a quiet intimacy that
told Gail immediately how bitchy she'd sounded. She
leaned against the edge of the desk. "You're right.
And I'm sorry for being so
...
uncivil just then. Let me start over. I just picked up copies of Charlene
Marks's notes from her consultation with Roger Cresswell. Should I fax them over with a memo?"

The little exhalation on the other end of the line
might have been a chuckle. He said, "No memos.
Just tell me what Charlene says. Roger Cresswell's
wife had a lover. Do we know who it was?"

"Unfortunately, no. I'll double-check with Char
lene, but Roger may not have known either. Maybe he was suspicious for nothing."

"How long had they been having marital problems?" Anthony asked.

"Let me see. . . . Her notes don't say. They'd been
married four years. Nikki was twenty-two at the
time. He was twenty-eight. Oh, get this. He bought
her a set of boobs for Christmas, before they got married."

"What? Some books? I didn't—"

"Boobs. Implants. Fake
tetas."

"Feliz navidad,"
Anthony said.

"He gave her whatever she wanted, then com
plained she expected too much." Gail read from the previous page. "They had the usual condo, cars, boat.
Stocks, mutual funds,
et cetera,
but liabilities exceeded
assets, except for Roger's stock in the family com
pany, worth about twenty million dollars. I don't
know if that's gross, net or wishful thinking."

"Not much for a company of that size. There must
be some debt."

"Don't make Roger sound so poverty-stricken. His
parents were loaded. Okay, how do we do this?"
Gail asked. "We can't send out subpoenas for depositions. We aren't the police. We can't make anyone
talk."

"Neither can they," he said, "but people do talk.
If you go after them in the right way, they open up
to you. My investigator can do background checks, but he can't get close to the family. I can. Nate is my
contact, and I hope to be able to talk to them
personally."

"Shouldn't I be there?" Gail said.

There was a long pause, then a slight tapping noise
as if he were bouncing a pen on his black granite
desk. "No, you're Bobby Gonzalez's lawyer. If they
found out, they would be suspicious of your
motives."

"All right," she said grudgingly. "What about alibis? We can't send the police after someone who
wasn't
there."

"You assume that our suspect pulled the trigger
himself. He could have hired someone else. Unfortu
nately, the police won't give us their reports, so if we want to know about alibis, we'll have to start
from zero. No, I remember hearing that Roger's wife
was spending the weekend with a friend in West
Palm Beach. So Nikki has an alibi. Jack Pascoe told
Nate that he was with Diane Cresswell after the party was over. She's Roger's cousin, a ballerina with the
Miami City Ballet. She lives in the cottage on Pascoe's
property, and supposedly they were up all night talk
ing in his kitchen—if you can believe that."

"Anthony, she's only twenty. How old is Jack
Pascoe?"

"About my age. You know, Gail, this has been known to occur."

"Yes, but they're cousins."

"No, no, they aren't related by blood, only by marriage. Jack was Roger's cousin. Roger was Diane's cousin."

Gail began drawing a chart on another page, then put an X through it. "Nate Harris knows who's who,
doesn't he? Could you ask him to do a list?"

"I have one. I'll fax it. Here, write this down. Nate
told me that Roger came to Jack's house that night around nine-thirty, and he and Jack went into the study. Ten minutes later, Roger came out, walked
right past Nate, and slammed the front door when
he left. Nate asked, and Jack told him it was nothing. Quote, 'the same shit.' He was referring to their long
standing competition for Claire's affections. In
wealthy families, this usually comes down to money. Roger was Claire's only child, but Jack was her only other relative. Aside from millions of dollars' worth of other assets, Claire has an art gallery in her home
devoted to her daughter's paintings. Jack is an art
dealer, and . . . well, you can see."

"Talk about motive." Gail added, "This is getting
a little sticky for you, isn't it? If the media find out
Nate was at the crime scene, and that you advised
him not to talk—"

"Nate had nothing relevant to add."

"So you thought."

There was a long pause, then he said, "Maybe I
shouldn't have told you about that. I don't know—
are we co-counsel or adversaries?"

His question, so simply phrased, echoed with complications. Gail said, "I think whatever we discuss
between us is confidential. We have to start there/'

She could hear his pen tapping on the desk. Then
his breath in her ear as he sighed. "Yes. We'll start
with that. You've always been discreet. There was
nothing I ever told you that you didn't hold in confidence. If I implied otherwise, I'm sorry."

Feeling the conversation sliding away from her,
Gail said, "So let's not worry about it. When are you going to see Jack Pascoe?"

"As soon as possible," Anthony said. "Nate is setting it up, otherwise I wouldn't expect much cooperation. I hope to see the crime scene early next week."

"I'd like to go along."

"No, I'll do it."

"Why can't I go?"

"Gail, didn't I just explain that you shouldn't in
vestigate the case?"

"You were talking about interviewing witnesses."

"No," Anthony said firmly. "If you want to be
involved, why don't you be responsible for putting
everything into writing and keeping track of
details?"

Gail had put Diane Cresswell's telephone number
on her desk. She took the piece of paper and turned
it over. "So what you want me to do, basically, is to
stay home and keep the place tidied up."

"Could I be so lucky?"

"Ha-ha. Please bear in mind," she said, "that if we don't come up with something within a week, I'll have
to get Bobby off the hook myself, and saving Nate Harris
is not my priority."

"Tell me, Ms. Connor, was your client able to explain
where he was after the party, now that his alibi wit
ness has recanted?"

Gail picked up a paper clip and twisted it open.
"Oh, that's right. I need to see about that, don't I?"

"When can I talk to him?"

"Is that necessary? He may not want to talk to
you."

"I don't care what he wants." Clearly enunciating
each word, Anthony repeated, "When can I talk to him?"

With the phone still tucked under her ear, she bent
the paper clip into a crank shape and turned it.
"When can I talk to Judge Harris?"

"For what reason? He isn't a suspect."

"Does he have information about the Cresswell
family? Was he at the scene?"

A sigh of forbearance preceded Anthony's reply. "I'll see what I can arrange. And Bobby? What about
this weekend? Oh, you have Karen coming home. Of
course you want to spend some time with her. Shall
we say Monday morning?"

"Monday is Labor Day."

"Good. You have nothing else on your schedule.
Do you want to bring him to my office, or for me to
come to yours?"

"Why don't we just do it on a conference call?"

"You're kidding."

"No."

"Ay, mi Dios.
Yes, maybe we should write memos.
I agree. Memos and faxes. Is that how you want to
handle it? To avoid contact? We can send e-mail. No,
let's go into a chat room right now, on our comput
ers. Why don't we do that?"

"Anthony—"

"We could put one of those little cameras on the
monitor to see with—unless you object to that too."
When she didn't reply, he said, "What do you think
will happen if we talk face to face? Tell me. What
would happen?"

"We would start screaming at each other?"

"I'm not screaming at you."

"Yes, you are."

"I am not."

"Are too."

Then he laughed. "If I was—and I don't think so—
then I apologize."

Gail said the word again in her head.
Apolozhice.
"Am I being difficult?"

"Yes, but I'm used to it."

"Oh, thanks. All right, what about Nate?"

"At my office. Is late Tuesday afternoon good for you? Or we could have dinner together, the three of
us. I think he would enjoy seeing you again."

Gail wanted to take the phone from her ear and stare at it. She said, "You don't mean that, do you?"

Several seconds ticked by.

"No." The silence went on until he said, "You
know something funny? I forgot we don't do that
anymore. Have dinner together. It's true, I forgot. We
were talking as if
...
as if we . . . My brain must have slipped backward. No, I didn't mean to say it.
Never mind. What else do we need to discuss, be
cause I have a client waiting for me."

The room went out of focus, and her breath
stopped.

"Gail?"

"Oh, sorry. I think that's it for now."

"Good. Let me know about Monday, the time and
so forth." He laughed. "And don't forget to fax me your memo."

There was a click, then nothing. Still staring across
her office, Gail finally heard the telephone company's
announcement:
If you'd like to make a call, please hang up and try again
—

She put back the handset and sat for a while longer
trying to figure out exactly what she was feeling.
Finally she pinned it down. The same sickening rush of terror that had accompanied her only hot-air balloon ride, when at two thousand feet the gas jets had clogged, and the pilot couldn't get the valve cleared,
and a gust of wind had pushed the balloon, rapidly sinking, toward the Everglades, and on the horizon lightning had danced among gathering clouds.

Chapter 14

The instant his conversation with Gail Connor was over, Anthony stood up from his desk so quickly
that his leather chair wheeled backward and
slammed into the credenza, knocking over a perfectly balanced, abstract metal sculpture. He recovered the fallen piece from the carpet and set the nail-like point back on its vertical support, where it bobbled and dipped. What must she have thought, listening to his
lapse, and worse, his inane attempt to explain it? With the flick of a finger, he set the cantilevered
metal into a swooping spin.