Suspicion of Malice (39 page)

Bobby slid off the fender. The knife was behind
his back, stuck in his belt.

"Yo, dog." Bobby held his hand up, and Sean
slapped it.

"Whassup?" Sean said, "Sorry about the alibi, bro.
Cops were leaning on me bad. Your woman can back
you up, yo?"

"No doubt." Two silhouettes moving in behind
Sean.

Sean said, "You want to go out?"

"No, I gotta hang here."

"Where's the stuff?"

"In the trunk.” Sean came with him, running his
mouth, already high on something. Bobby could see how it would go before he made the first move. Sean outweighed him fifty pounds, and he came crashing down in slo-mo. Hair bouncing on his forehead, and the leaves coming up, then falling back, and the elongated grunt. Then Bobby had him on his stomach, a
knee in his back, arm pulled up tight.

He let Sean see the knife snap open. There was
enough light for that.

"Oh, Jesus. Oh, shit, man, what are you—" Pres
sure on the arm made him whimper.

"I could cut you and leave you here. Rich white
boy doing a deal, should've known better."

"Get the fuck off." Sean jerked. Bobby leaned his
knee into Sean's back and stuck the point of the blade
through the little ring in his eyebrow. He started crying. "Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. Bobby, I'm sorry, man. Don't. Please. Please don't kill me. Please. Take the
money. Take it all. There's more in the car."

"That's not what I want." He leaned close to Sean's
face. Sean was sweating, and leaves and sand were
stuck to his cheek. His eye rolled. The stink of shit came from Sean's pants.

"You know that three hundred dollars you loaned
me, bro? Where'd you get it?"

Chapter 19

The school bus from Biscayne Academy made
stops in Irene's neighborhood, and Gail could
have put Karen on it, but they had a ritual at the
start of every new year: Mom and Dad would drive
her there and stand outside watching while Karen
ran into the building with her friends. Last year, Gail
and Dave had gone through the divorce, and he'd
been sailing near Puerto Rico, but he'd sent a post
card. Gail had told him he'd better show up this
time, or Karen would be horribly disappointed. He wouldn't be flying back to St. John till next week, so
there was no excuse. He promised to be at Irene's
house by 7:30.

Gail looked at her watch, then shouted into the
hall, "Karen! We're leaving in
ten minutes!"
With a
guilty smile at Irene, she said, "It used to be so peaceful here, didn't it? Just you and the cats."

"I love having you girls around. Did you eat? Gail, you can't have just coffee." She opened the refrigera
tor. "What about some fruit yogurt? Eat something
or I'll worry." Irene shoved a carton of peach and a
spoon into Gail's hands.

Grasping the spoon to keep from dropping it, Gail
winced. She had not known that hitting someone in
the face could be so painful. She sat down at the
table and scooted the gray cat away from her ankles.
It was a struggle not to slump in the chair. She had
hardly slept last night. The sound of a slamming
door had replayed over and over in her mind. Anthony walking out. Telling her she was a piece of stone and
then
walking out. Several times over the
past few weeks Gail had played with thoughts of
what he might do if he found out she was pregnant.
In her imagination he had usually done the same
thing he had done yesterday—walk out—but always,
before the door slammed, there had been that one glimmer of hope that he might turn around and rush back to her, saying he was sorry, that he loved her,
that he could never leave her, or some other equally
improbable shit. All Gail wanted now was to be rid
of this damned case so they could deal with each
other at a distance again.

"Mother? I need a favor. I'd like to meet Claire Cresswell. Could you introduce me? Is there a board
meeting at the ballet you plan to go to this week?"

Irene dropped the last of Karen's breakfast dishes
into the dishwasher. "I believe so. I'm not on the board, but we could find some excuse. Do you think
I should hang out a sign? Irene Connor, Private In
vestigations. I'll buy a trench coat."

Gail smiled at her mother's pink slacks and flower-
printed top. "Here's another mission. I found out
that Claire's daughter, Maggie, attempted suicide at
age fifteen. It's been over twenty years, but I'd like
to know what happened."

Irene turned around. "Oh, my. I heard she was a problem as a child, but not
this.
What did she do?"

"Tried to hang herself from the rod in her bedroom closet. They sent her to a mental hospital somewhere
in Central Florida, then in Vermont, and she didn't
come home for years. There was a gallery exhibition of her works here in Miami, and she met Judge Har
ris. Everyone says they were happily married. But she overdosed on pills in a cottage not fifty yards
from where her brother was shot to death last
month."

The telephone on the wall rang as Irene was saying, "Yes, of course, I'll find out what I can, but it won't be easy. Twenty years—" She picked up the phone. "Hello . . . Oh, hi, Dave, how are you? . . .
Sure, just a second." She held it out to Gail. A look
between the two of them asked the same question: Was he coming?

He wasn't. He and his friends had come back late
from their fishing trip. A broken motor. He had for
gotten to set the alarm. It would take him half an hour to get there.

"Dave, how could you? Karen was counting on this, especially since you missed last year. You promised . . . Being sorry doesn't help. . . . Okay,
fine, never mind. Go back to sleep.... No, you explain it to her." Gail hung up and stared at the phone until her temper cooled. Such a stone-hearted bitch.

She found Karen sitting on the edge of the single bed in her room, buckling her shoes. This year Biscayne Academy had gone to uniforms—plaid skirts and white tops. Gail stared down at a pair of screaming green socks.

"Your dad called."

"I heard." "

"Did you? Sorry. He said he'd call you tonight.
Their motor broke, and he got in late." Gail sat on
the edge of the bed. "You want to ask Gramma to
come along?"

"Sure, she can come." Karen leaned down to do
the other buckle, and her honey-brown hair fell over
her shoulders. "Dad is like that, you know. I mean, I love him a lot, but you can't count on him. You
sort of have to make plans for yourself."

"Oh, sweetie. I don't want you to grow up cynical
and disappointed."

"I'm not." Flipping her hair back, Karen sat up.
Her brows were sun-blond over bright blue eyes.
"Who was that girl who tried to kill herself?"

"Do you eavesdrop on everything? That was a
long time ago. The daughter of a friend of your
gramma's." Gail put an arm around Karen and
pulled her close. "She was unhappy and thought life
had no meaning. But it does." Gail kissed the top
of Karen's head. "Don't ever forget how sweet and
precious it is, and how much I love you."

"Mom? Could we discuss this in the car? Please. I
don't want to be late my first day." Karen got up
and slung her book bag over her shoulder. She kissed
Gail lightly on the cheek. "Really, Mom, you shouldn't
worry so much."

Charlene Marks said, "You know what would show some real growth in this man? If he actually believed
it was Dave's baby, and he could say, and mean it,
"Gail, I understand why you turned to Dave. I was such a jerk. This isn't my child, but I still love you,
and I will pay loads of money to help you raise it.
And I'll stay out of your life until you call me.' "

"Not under threat of death would Anthony say
such a thing."

"Then you should look for someone more civilized
and forward thinking. You're not going to marry
him, are you?"

"Oh, please."

"Here's a happy marriage. You're in bed on your
honeymoon, and a 747 crashes through the roof and
kills both of you. But my profession as a divorce
lawyer has jaded me to some extent. Okay, what can
I do for you?"

"I need to find Nikki Cresswell. I assume Antho
ny's investigator has a work address, but I don't
want to call his office and ask. Did you write any
thing in the file besides 'ad agency'?"

Charlene led her into a storage room on the other side of the suite. She found the right file cabinet and
pulled open a drawer, walking her fingers through
the folders. "Cresswell, Cresswell . . . What are you
going to do, ask her if she shot her husband?"

"A little more subtlety, I think."

"But why? According to Roger, she has the brain
of a Barbie doll." Charlene opened a file. "Oh. Too
bad. All I wrote was 'ad agency, Coconut Grove.'
Well, how many can there be?"

There were six in the Yellow Pages. Gail got a hit on the second one, Bader-Miranda Advertising on Ti
gertail Avenue. Nikki wasn't in yet, but they ex
pected her any minute. Leaving Miriam to reschedule
the ten o'clock client for after lunch, Gail drove the six miles to the agency and found out that Nikki
wouldn't be in till after eleven. She was having a pedicure at Biaggi.

The salon was a block away at the Mayfair Shops.
Gail opened the door. The place had shiny wood
floors, suspended halogen lights, silver walls, hairdressers in black, and a waiting area with red leather chairs, all occupied by women flipping through fash
ion magazines or chatting on cell phones.

Latin jazz played on hidden speakers. At the front
desk a woman in leopard print tights was passing
out espresso, blocking the receptionist's view. Gail
slipped past the desk and around a frosted glass di
vider. Her nose was filled with the smells of coconuts and almond, hair conditioner and coloring, and the
medicinal ping of nail polish remover. In the back
a red-haired woman was reading a copy of
People
magazine. She was wrapped in a black salon robe,
and her feet were in a vibrating foot bath scented
with eucalyptus.

"Excuse me. Ms. Cresswell?"

The eyes, a green that existed only in contact
lenses, made a quick, dismissive inventory: thin
blond woman pushing thirty-five, tailored gray dress
above her knees, shoulder bag, plain gold earrings,
knock-off watch. She took the business card that
Gail extended.

"My name is Gail Connor. Your office said you'd
be here. Could I talk to you for a minute?"

A small exhalation of air—such an inconvenience. "What is this in reference to?" The voice was breathy
and childlike. Her glossy pink mouth seemed de
signed to stay open, and the gaping vee of the salon robe revealed the curves of breasts as round and firm as grapefruit.

Gail didn't want to lie too blatantly. She would be seeing this woman again on the family yacht next
weekend, the bereaved widow sprinkling her husband's earthly remains into the Atlantic. Whatever Gail said had to tie in with Anthony's cover story:
He'd been hired by Claire Cresswell to look into Rog
er's financial dealings at the company.

She smiled down into the big green eyes. "My law
firm is looking into the pension and profit sharing
plans at Cresswell Yachts. We think you may be enti
tled to receive your late husband's account, but many of the records are missing. I shouldn't be talking to you, but. . . well, I'm not getting a lot of cooperation from management. I was hoping to talk to you in
confidence. Could I sit down?"

“Sure.”

Gail cleared some fashion magazines off a chair
and pulled it over. "Love the nails. Are they acrylic?"

Nikki held up a hand and twiddled her fingers. A
diamond ring sparkled. "Gel coats. They work really well with French manicures. How much money was
Roger supposed to get?"