The Brush Off (22 page)

Trudy and I cringed. She smiled weakly. “I got rid of them.”

“Yeah, you sure did. What technique.”
Oo-ee.
I didn’t want to be around Scythe when he found out about this one. “You might want to take the next exit, in case they put an APB out on us.”

She swallowed hard. “We can take the long way to Terrell Hills.”

“Good idea.”

We were still at least ten miles from the Villitas’ Guaraty Street address. Since few roads in San Antonio were actually straight and even fewer ran through without being broken up by a stream, drainage ditch, sudden one-way access, or road construction, it took a while to wind our way there. Thank goodness Trudy grew up in the city, or we’d still be wandering around.

The drive did give us time to review what we’d learned in the case. Ricardo was interested in a political race, presumably the one in which the Villita son was running. Gerald thought he nursed a decades-old broken heart. He and Celine Villita might have a history. Or he and the Villita son might have a history. What we still didn’t know was what proof was in the pudding. Or what the Johnstone-Van Dykes had to do with anything. Or what two mistakes Ricardo made—besides borrowing my brush, that is.

The Villita estate was grandiose even on a street lined with stunningly expensive old homes. Set back from the street, behind a rock wall and iron gates, its green-tiled roof rose above the oak trees. Trudy stopped at the intercom box and pressed the button.

“Hola?”

Trudy looked silently at me. I’d do the talking.

“Hello,
habla inglés?
”

“Sí.”

“Please tell Señora Villita that I’d like to see her.”

“You don’t have appointment.”

“No, tell her I’m Trudy Trujillo, a friend of Jolie Dupont’s.”

I shoved my hand over Trudy’s mouth before she could get it all the way open.

“Sí.”
The maid sounded like her going to fetch the
señora
would be a waste of her time.

Trudy finally shrugged in acceptance, and I dropped my hand from her mouth. Just then, the maid’s voice crackled again over the intercom, surprise and curiosity evident in her voice. “
Entrase, por favor. La señora
will be with you
pronto.
”

“Gracias.”

The heavy gates opened at a ponderous pace. I worried for a moment that it would give Celine time to escape out the back, but I reminded myself if she hadn’t wanted to see us, she wouldn’t have let us in and would have sent some goons with baseball bats out to pound a warning on Trude’s car. The maid waited at the front door of the three-story rock mansion. It was as imposing as the senator himself. His presence in person was larger than life; the power of his political office only multiplied the effect. I hoped he wasn’t at home this evening, or I might just lose my nerve.

“Come.” The uniformed maid beckoned as I got out of the Miata. Trudy sent me a smile as the maid shut the door behind me.

The maid escorted me to the sitting room just beyond the foyer, which seemed unusually small for a home that had to be at least ten thousand square feet. As I settled in the sitting room, I realized that it had been renovated that way on purpose. The sitting room had been part of the foyer at one time and had been built in. Perhaps these people didn’t want anyone lingering, as company tended to do in foyers. A guest was to be put in her room, a compartment, dealt with, and then sent on her way.

I wasn’t left to mull the issue long. The maid hadn’t been gone thirty seconds when Celine Villita appeared in the doorway, shutting the double doors behind her. Dressed in an expensive black-and-white St. John knit skirt suit, panty hose, and Via Spago pumps that likely cost more than my annual dental plan, she looked pale and tense. Even a face-lift couldn’t hide the unhappiness in her thin face; her brown eyes reflected it. Her thick hair, recently dyed Amazon Midnight, was drawn back in a French twist. This woman was trying hard to be sophisticated and controlled. She might once have been the carefree young girl in the photo, but I was far from certain. I stood, racking my brain for a way to get her to smile.

We shook hands—hers was limp, apathetic. She smelled like lavender. But I cautioned myself—it was a common scent.

“You say you’re a friend of Jolie’s, but do I know you?”

“We’ve met. I styled your hair once a long time ago. I am Jolie’s stylist. I have a shop in Monte Vista.”

“Oh, yes.” She gave my hairdo a once-over. “Your hair. It’s different.”

I sighed internally. Couldn’t anyone notice anything else about me? “It’s been different probably three dozen times since I saw you. I like to change it every month or so.”

Suddenly, realization washed over her face. “You’re not a Trujillo, you’re Reyn Marten Sawyer. You’re the one they say killed Ricardo!”

If it was an act, it was Academy Award winning. It took a lot of a package this carefully presented to show real emotion. She was clearly horrified; her hand was at her throat. She swallowed several times and fought to retain her composure.

I had to admit I was disappointed. I didn’t want to take her off my suspect list completely. After all, guilt and the emotional defense necessary to get away with murder could make a person act all sorts of funny ways. Still, my intuition told me while she didn’t do it, she might be the key to finding who did.

“I don’t know which ‘they’ you are referring to, but if it is the media, then you ought to know a lot better than I do how ‘they’ might create a misleading perception. Tell me they’ve never done that to your husband?”

She nodded once, crossed her arms over her chest, and moved to the picture window that overlooked the elaborate gardens sloping down the property to the right. As she gazed outside, she asked, “You’re telling me you didn’t kill him?”

I really wanted to answer,
What’s it to you?
but bit my tongue. The conversation felt precarious, as if choosing the wrong word would get me escorted back to the Miata at warp speed. She was the one who opened the conversation to Ricardo; if I treaded carefully, I might be able to learn something. I was close, I just didn’t know to what. I remembered when I was about ten, trying to get a rattlesnake to leave its hole without coiling and striking me. Why I wanted to do this, who knows. But I had a stick and poked all around it without ever touching the snake, and finally, maybe an hour later, it slithered away. Perhaps if I used this technique with Celine Villita, the truth would come slithering out.

“I didn’t kill him. He was my friend and mentor for years. I’m trying to find out who did kill him.”

“What brought you here?”

Uh-oh.
This was a tricky one. Perhaps telling her I’d broken into his house and found a secret compartment with a photo of someone who might resemble her with a lock of hair that might be hers would be a little too direct. I went for the jugular instead. “It’s really about your son.”

She spun then, facing me, a fierce mother tiger. “What about him?”

“I understand Ricardo was getting ready to make a big donation to his campaign.”

Celine relaxed slightly. “Ricardo donated to a lot of political campaigns.”

“Did he?”

Oops.
She realized she might have let too much go there, but her years in politics allowed her to cover it smoothly. She rubbed her left hand up her right arm. Over and over again. Nervous gesture? “Oh, come on, Miss Sawyer, he was well known as a philanthrophist. San Antonio will really miss him.”

“I didn’t realize politics was the object of philanthropy.”

“It is when the representative supports important charities with his legislation.”

“I’m sure that’s why Ricardo was so interested in Jon’s campaign.”

Celine’s arm rubbing was getting almost manic. “Maybe. After all, Jon’s father is a champion of minority charities.”

There was something eerie about her saying that after the accolades issued to Ricardo at the funeral for his support of minority children’s charities.

“But I wonder how Ricardo heard about Jon running. Even the newspapers don’t have wind of it yet, do they?”

Celine would have no hair left on her arm at this rate. She wasn’t surprised. She knew Ricardo knew, which meant either he told her, or someone who told him told her. “A few connected people knew. I guess they were so excited by Jon’s candidacy they jumped the gun.”

She’d stopped the arm rubbing and stood unnaturally still. I was getting too close to something. She was about to coil and strike me right out of there. Time to lie. I smiled. “I know that must be it. I’ve heard wonderful things about your son. He must be exceptional.”

Her chest puffed a little with parental pride. She turned to me, relaxing in a beatific smile. Suddenly, the years fell away, and she was the girl in the photo in Ricardo’s wall. “He
is
exceptional. So caring and sensitive to the concerns of the community. He will make a wonderful representative. Jon is a gentle, wise soul, despite his youth.”

Gentle? He’d be eaten alive in the world of Texas politics, where it was still the Wild West with a cutthroat cowboy culture despite the suits. Surely, Celine and her husband knew that; they’d lived it long ago, before he made it to D.C. Perhaps they had cautioned Jon about the dangers and were just being supportive of his decision to run.

“We would be lucky to have him in Austin.”

“Yes,” she said, distracted by the entrance of a Mercedes sedan that pulled through the gate and down past the garden to the garage. She looked at me. “I’m afraid I’m out of time. I wish I could help you in your search for Ricardo’s murderer, but I really can’t. It doesn’t have anything to do with Jon.”

She was suddenly anxious to get me out of there. Who was in the sedan? Even though I was afraid it might be her powerful husband, I stood firmly rooted at the window. “So, how did you know Ricardo?”

I’d caught her off-guard. For half a second, she looked afraid but again covered well. She waved her hand in the air. “Oh, we’d known each other since high school. He was an old acquaintance. That’s all. We knew each other way back then. We hadn’t talked in years.”

She was lying, then; her eyes slid from mine just before she spoke her last sentence. Was she Ricardo’s
mi cara?

A dark-haired man got out of the sedan, talking on a cellular telephone. Even from a distance, I recognized him as the young man from the photos. He gestured as he talked and began walking toward the garden. I gasped. It was Ricardo’s son. The photos could not capture what was so obvious in person. There was no denying it. He moved with that casual elegance I’d never seen another man exhibit. His gestures were Ricardo’s. His profile was Ricardo’s.

“It’s time for you to leave,” Celine snapped.

Maybe I shouldn’t have gasped. Not out loud, anyway.

S
INCE
C
ELINE WAS ALREADY TEETERING OFF-
balance and I was already an unwelcome guest, I proceeded with Plan B: Forgo politeness, and get as much information as I could before I was thrown out.

“Does anyone call you
‘mi cara’?”

A flush flew up her neck. “I don’t think that’s any of your business. In fact, none of this seems to be your business.”

“Actually, it is,” I said, “because Ricardo in his will seems to have left his salons, all of Ricardo’s Realm, to me.”

“Congratulations,” she said bitterly.

“No, your sympathies is more like it. I don’t want the salons. I have my own life.”

Her gaze flicked to the young man, who sat down on a concrete bench next to a yellow rosebush bursting with blooms. “Then get on with it, and leave us alone.”

I followed her gaze. “Is that Jon?”

“Miss Sawyer.” She faced me. “I hope you don’t go off in the wrong direction in your investigation, no matter how well intentioned it may be. Involving yourself in other people’s lives can be very dangerous. Someone is already dead. I would hate to see you get hurt as well.”

The words were vague, the tone pointed. I knew when I’d been threatened. Unfortunately, it made my perverse nature try to get a more direct threat out of her. It worked.

“Mrs. Villita, I am loyal to a fault to my friends, and Ricardo was one of my good ones. I was once described as a pit bull. When I get something in my mouth, it takes knocking me in the head to get me to let go. It’s going to take a pretty big stick to stop me from trying to find Ricardo’s killer.”

“Don’t make me tell my husband you’ve been here. He is as much of what you call a pit bull about his family and his career. Just having you here at his home threatens us both.”

“How so?”

“There’s no need to play games, Miss Sawyer. Just know that you need to redirect your investigation, or you will be hurt.”

“I’m not afraid of that.”

“Not afraid of losing your reputation, your business? And how about your family?” She saw that took me aback. “There are more painful ways to hurt than your body, trust me. Stay away from the Villitas. I will have Rosa show you out.”

I heard the ringing of a telephone as she flung open the double doors and marched down the hall to the left. With her tied up hunting down Rosa and handling the phone call, I estimated that I had about thirty seconds to find my way to the garden and Jon Villita. I went straight across the tiny foyer and down the hall that ran parallel to the one Celine had used. I slipped through the first doorway and into an office, which fortunately had French doors to the outside. They were locked. I checked the top drawer of the desk, found a set of keys, fumbled for a moment with a few of them, and finally fit the right one into the lock as I heard the squeak of Rosa’s rubber-soled footsteps.

I left the keys in the lock as I eased the door shut. I picked through the rosebushes, letting the thorns scrape across my skin as I made my way through the garden without the luxury of the path. I hid underneath one as I heard a door at the house open.

“Jon,
mi hijo
.”

“Yes, Mother?” He called about fifty feet ahead and to the right of me.

I reaimed myself and waited.

“Come inside now. I need your help.”

“I’ll be right there.”

What else could she say?
The woman who figured out your real parentage is skulking around the grounds?
The door shut, reluctantly. Even as far away as I was, I heard the sigh Jon blew out. As I searched for the path, so I wouldn’t leap out of the bushes and scare him, I wondered if he knew Ricardo was his father. I’d bet not. Had Senator Villita found out and killed Ricardo? Had Ricardo threatened to tell Jon, expose his heritage? And how did the other news clipping fit in?

I rounded a corner and saw Jon, still sitting on the bench, leaning his elbows on his thighs, staring at his hands laced between his knees, cell phone beside him.

“Mr. Villita?” I called softly.

He looked up, surprised, but he stood graciously and held out his hand. “Please call me Jon.”

I hesitated for just a moment as I got over the shock of his voice sounding exactly like Ricardo’s. I put my hand in his, and we shook. “Reyn Sawyer.”

He looked like he was doing his best to try to place me. “Have we met? I used to pride myself on never forgetting a face or a name. But I’m sorry, with this campaign I’ve met so many people. They say as a politician, I need to find ways to talk around not remembering someone, but I can’t do that. I prefer to be honest.”

“I prefer that, too,” I said with a smile. I liked him immediately. There was a weariness about him unusual for someone so young, but also a genuineness that was refreshing. “And you haven’t forgotten my face or my name. We’ve never met before.”

“Well, I promise not to forget your name, Reyn. It’s just unusual enough for me to remember. And your hair, that I won’t forget.”

I smiled back at his grin and resisted the urge to return the good-natured jibe. His hairstyle was the height of aged conservative—a side-parted medium-length that was what a sixty-year-old politician might wear.

“Ah, now, memorizing my hairstyle won’t help you, since I change my color and style almost as often as my clothes,” I told him.

“A master of disguise?”

“No.” I laughed, feeling a small twist in my gut as it occurred to me I might have to become a master of disguise if Celine sicced the senator on me. And what about my mom and dad, my sisters and brothers and nieces and nephews? “It’s nothing so dramatic. I’m a hairstylist, and I like change.”

“Hairstylist. I bet that’s a fun job, making people feel better about themselves.”

He gets it!
I looked at Jon Villita more closely. I wondered about how much genetics play a part in how we turn out. Maybe more than I ever thought, if a man with the blood of a beauty salon magnate and raised by a U.S. senator still found hairstyling a high calling.

“I like it,” I admitted. “But the job you’re running for is an important one. Maybe it’s better to be important than to have fun.”

“You think so?” he asked. “Even if you’re miserable while you’re being important?”

“Politics isn’t your thing?”

He glanced guiltily at the house. “Are you a friend of my mother and father?”

“No, just met your mother, never met your father, and don’t especially want to.”

He laughed. “I don’t blame you. He’s a good man, don’t get me wrong. But we’re just two different people. I respect what he’s accomplished and what he enjoys. But he doesn’t offer me the same respect.”

The way he was talking about the senator, I guessed Jon didn’t know about his parentage. I went fishing just to be sure. “Sometimes being a parent is a difficult thing.”

Jon didn’t bite. He truly didn’t know anything about Ricardo. “Are you a parent?”

“Oh, no, haven’t even gotten to first base. I need to find someone to love first.”

“That’s another thing. Anyone I’d fall in love with wouldn’t be good at politics, which would mean I wouldn’t be allowed to marry her without a lot of pain and suffering. You know, I’d rather fall in love with a nice girl and have an ordinary job than be groomed for the White House at twenty-five.” He paused and sighed.

“I guess that sounds whiny.”

“No, it sounds like you know yourself better than most twenty-five-year-olds do. That’s pretty wise, if you ask me. Have you told your parents?”

“I have, and they don’t think I’m old enough to make a life-changing decision like that. I’m old enough to represent an entire constituency and make decisions for them but not for myself?” He blew out another sigh. “I guess it doesn’t matter. I don’t have another option. I refuse to use my father to get a job, but where could I go in this town where they wouldn’t know the name Villita?”

He sounded so trapped my heart went out to him. Before I could find comforting words, he blew out yet another sigh and struggled to change the subject. “Did you know that hairstylist who was murdered?”

“Yes. He was a good friend of mine.”

“I’m so sorry.” Wow. He really was.

“What do you know about it?” I was fishing again. Maybe Daddy had brought it up at the dinner table. Maybe I’d get lucky, and Jon had heard the senator discussing the murder plan with the brush-wielding hit man.

“Not much,” Jon admitted. “My dad told his speech-writer to use it in a speech she wrote for me to give today at the Rotary Club. It was an example for the need for better crime control. It seemed so cold to use this poor man’s death in a political platform when he wasn’t even memorialized yet. I left it out. Got in trouble, too.”

Good for him. The boy had balls.

“Jon!” Celine called from the house. Surely, she’d seen us sitting there by now, but what could she do other than drag him away like a five-year-old or get me in the sights of her rifle and take me out like a sniper? The frantic note in her voice worked better than anything on this sensitive young man whose spirit was about to be trampled to death in the political arena.

“Mom sounds like she’s about to lose it.” Jon stood and shook my hand. “She’s been on edge the last day or so. I’d better go see what she needs. Nice to meet you, Reyn. I hope we get to talk again one day.”

“Me, too,” I said as I watched him go. I resisted the urge to back all the way to the Miata. Of course, even if I saw the bullet coming, what would I do—duck? Karate chop it? Besides, if they were going to silence me, I figured it would be an “accident” that would not happen on the grounds of their pristine home. That would leave too many people asking too many questions.

Trudy had the motor running, but I forced myself to almost meander to the car. I looked over the grounds, fingered the leaves of bushes as I passed, smelled the pungent blossom of a jasmine vine. I knew Celine was watching, and I didn’t want her to think I was scared.

My nose started running before I got to the Miata. The sneezing began before I opened the passenger door. Who says I’m not a good detective? I’ve discovered I’m violently allergic to blooming jasmine.

With snot cascading down the back of my throat and my nostrils in gallons, we made our less-than-dignified exit from the Villita estate. I searched my purse for anything to use to stem the flow, but I never seem to have any tissues. I was going to make a terrible mother one day. The good ones always seemed to have a tissue handy. I had to settle on the sock. Hey, it was clean.

Trudy looked at me. “Your cell phone rang while you were in there.”

“Yeah?” I fished out the phone. It didn’t show I had any missed calls.

I looked at her in question. She looked at me in apology. I had a bad feeling about this.

“I answered it,” she said as she headed east on Guaraty.

“I thought it might be someone who heard your challenge at the funeral and wanted to give us a tip.”

I couldn’t argue with that one. It was a smart move. “Okay. I still hear a ‘but.’ ”

“It was Jackson.” She looked at me quickly, then back to the road. “Lieutenant Scythe.”

“Uh-huh.”

“He wanted to know where we were. I explained that the mishap on the freeway with the other police car was an accident. He didn’t seem mad about it.”

Sure.

“You didn’t tell him where we were, did you?”

I looked in the rearview mirror and saw my nemesis four car lengths behind. Scythe looked ready to bite a nail in two. Could it get any worse?

I knew better than to ask myself that question.

“Don’t worry, Reyn, I didn’t give away our location for free. I made a deal.”