The Jewelry Case (23 page)

"Well?" Paisley asked, stepping back for him to come in. "What did you find out at the library in Berkeley?"

Instead of responding, he studied her face critically. "You look better today," he decided. "No purple circles under your eyes. And all that tousled hair around your shoulders gives you a sort of sexy, Sophia Loren look. So the intruder didn't return?"

"No," she said carefully. No reason to mention those betraying Vans tread marks in the garden. She would deal with Kevin in her own way. "What did you learn in Berkeley?" she repeated.

"Unfortunately, nothing about the Nightingale of Warsaw," he said, falling onto the sofa and crossing his sneakers on the coffee table. Worn out black-and-white Converse high-tops, not Vans, she noted. "But if you want some juicy stuff on other scandalous 19th century babes, like Lola Montez or Helena Modjeska, I'm your guy. Did you know Lola lived in Grass Valley after breaking up with the King of Bavaria, and that she carried a stash of jewels with her wherever she went? She also kept a pet bear tied up in her front yard, that is, until it attacked her."

She drooped with disappointment. "So your trip was a waste?"

"Not at all. I had a great time with my college friends last night, whooping it up until two o'clock in the morning at a popular vegan restaurant in downtown Berkeley. Too bad you didn't join me," he added. "All this moping around the house isn't good for you. And you would have enhanced my prestige as well. You should have heard what my buddies said when I told them I was working for a hot young opera star. One of them has actually heard of you. Said you'd won some prestigious competitions a few years ago."

She ignored the compliment. Her brief-lived opera career was not something she wanted to think about right now, nor the competition where she had met Jonathan. "Here." She held out the diary, pleased to see his eyes light up with curiosity. "Take a look and tell me what you make of it."

Ian took the small book, handling its brittle pages as carefully as she had, his lean face glowing with curiosity. "So this is Esther's childhood journal? Find anything helpful?" he asked, leafing through its pages.

"I'm not sure. I want to see what you think."

He was a fast reader. As the minutes passed, his face grew absorbed. The light from the reading lamp cast dark shadows under his heavy brow ridges and highlighted the prominence of his high cheekbones. Finally he looked up, his eyes sober. "I feel a definite chill between young Esther and Auntie Henka. Interesting."

"So you gathered that too? Did you ever meet her? She was Jonathan's grandmother, so she might still have been alive when you were growing up."

He nodded. "As a matter of fact, yeah, I saw her occasionally when I was a kid, when she was eighty years old or so. She would come outside in an old-fashioned dark dress to sweep the porch or cut the roses. By then she was widowed and living with Jonathan's parents. Jonathan was just about to leave for Julliard, and had no use for snotty younger brats like me. Yeah, I remember her. You don't forget a woman like that."

"So?" Paisley tried to hide her impatience. "What was Henka like?"

His face grew thoughtful. "Severe. Didn't smile a lot. To be honest, Great-grandma Perleman always looked as if she had sucked on a proverbial lemon. I don't envy poor little Esther, growing up under that woman's thumb. No wonder she lit out as soon as she grew up and didn't come back until the witch was dead."

As Paisley pondered this, her gaze wandered out the parlor window. Then she gasped, forgetting Aunt Henka, Esther, and the diary. "Is that the car?"

He followed her regard indulgently. "Yup. That's my baby. I haven't had time to wash it yet, but
….
"

She rushed outside. It was even older than she had expected, faded yellow with hand-painted black racing stripes, and bore a striking resemblance to Herbie from
The Love Bug
. She could tell the stripes down the hood were hand-painted because they were slightly crooked. The vinyl seats were cracked, held together with black electrical tape. She ran her hand over the warm hood.

Ian watched her like a mother noting a stranger's reaction to a remarkably ugly baby: protective and poised to take umbrage. "Like I said, it's been in the garage for a long time. But it should be reliable."

"It's perfect," she said promptly, banishing forever memories of Jonathan's shiny red Porsche. Her old self would have turned up her nose in disgust, but her new self knew this was exactly what she needed: something cheap that would get her from point A to point B.

Ian visibly relaxed. "Now that you've got wheels, you can explore. There's a lot more to Northern California than River Bend. How about a drive to test it out?"

"With you?" Lately, their relationship seemed to be progressing rapidly beyond that of employer/employee, and she sensed that going for a drive with Ian would do just that. She was tempted, but, still bruised by her rocky relationship with Jonathan and by her conflicted feelings toward Steve, she was reluctant to add more complications to what had been supposed to be a relaxing, peaceful summer in limbo.

He shrugged, unoffended. "I grew up here. I can point out all the sights."

What sights he could be referring to, she could not imagine. She hadn't noticed much more than a few spindly vineyards and boring subdivisions between here and the freeway. Besides, he had just got back from a long trip to Berkeley; he ought to have had his fill of driving.

But after writing him a check to pay for the Volkswagen, wincing a little at the thought of how little funds remained in her account, she found herself getting behind the wheel, adjusting the driver's seat to fit her shorter legs, and waiting patiently while he folded himself into the passenger side.

"How did you ever fit into this thing?" she wondered.

Ian slouched in his seat, but his head still scraped the car's ceiling. "I was shorter in high school. I grew my last four inches in college."

Laughing, she turned the wheels in the direction of the Fish Shack. They passed wineries and rolling fields of grape vines and lavender just starting to bloom. The river for which River Bend was named, a tributary of the Sacramento River, wound lazily across the landscape. She relaxed. There was something therapeutic about the peaceful fields rolling by outside the window.

As she drove, Ian regaled her with stories about eccentric professors who locked themselves accidentally out of their classrooms, and sophomoric pranks he had pulled with his friends, the latest of which involved parking a car on top of one of the university buildings during spring break. Ian was surprisingly interesting, she thought, listening. So many men only wanted to talk about sports, or politics
,
or themselves.

After a while, she found herself talking as well, and Ian listened. She told him about bouncing around the country as a military brat, settling in Omaha, the summer with the children's opera company, and, finally, the fateful singing competition where Jonathan had noticed her and decided to direct her career. The increasingly prestigious roles. Winning the part of Mimi, the role that would have cemented her career and put her in the top flight of sopranos. She found that she was able to talk about Jonathan without that old, dull pain in her midsection.

Just then, she noticed a neatly lettered sign announcing the Sunny Acres Retirement Home. White-painted gates framed a steep private road that wound up a lushly landscaped hill which must have a gorgeous view over the river. The name of the place sounded familiar. Hadn't one of the men she had watched playing chess at the senior center—Hugo, was it, or Walter?—mentioned that Esther had spent her last days at a retirement home? This must have been the one. As of its own volition, the VW turned and started up the long driveway.

Chapter Ten

As they left the main road, Ian sent her a questioning look. "Why the detour? Do you know someone up here?"

"No, but Esther must have," Paisley answered, steering up the twisting road that led to the retirement home. "Didn't she spend her last days here? She might have told someone something that could help us. It's a long shot, but it can't hurt."

Ian settled back in his seat. "Why not? I've got nothing better to do."

She pointedly did not mention the thesis he was supposed to be working on. Instead, she pulled into a parking space at the top of the hill. She was curious to see the place where Esther had spent her last days.

Paisley was pleased to find the retirement center was spotlessly clean, with stucco walls, a Mediterranean-style tile roof, and window boxes overflowing with geraniums. It was surrounded by gardens and provided a lovely view over the valley. In the distance, she could see the river winding past the town.

Several inhabitants sat outside the low building enjoying the setting sun. They smiled and nodded as Ian and she passed.

Hugo and Walter, the chess-players at the senior center, had said Esther had lived at Sunny Acres for only a few months. Even so, and as pleasant as the facility appeared, Paisley thought it must have pained the old woman to leave her home, her familiar surroundings, to come here and live among strangers. On the other hand, she thought, smiling a little, Esther had probably organized a book group and shuffleboard competitions during her stay.

Ian was escorting Paisley toward the information desk when she saw a dark-haired teenager wheeling an old woman across the lobby. He saw them at the same time and stopped in his tracks.

"Kevin! What are you doing here?" Paisley exclaimed.

His eyes fell and he shuffled his feet, as if wishing he could disappear. "H-hi, Mrs. Perleman."

"Call me Paisley," she said automatically. "Do you volunteer here?"

He hesitated before answering, while the white-haired woman in the wheelchair tapped the armrest impatiently. "I come up here every weekend and help out," he said at last. "Sunny Acres is low on staff. There's always something to do."

He said good-bye and pushed the wheelchair away, while the old woman glared at Paisley from under bushy gray eyebrows. The woman in the wheelchair looked like a child's image of a witch, with a thin, turned-down mouth, knobby fingers, and whiskers sprouting from her chin. Someone had written on the sticky-backed paper nametag on her blouse, "Hello, I'm Maude Avery." Some activity had ended for the residents in the recreation room, who were filtering out of the glass double-doors in dabs and dribbles.

Paisley was ashamed of her reaction to the woman in the wheelchair. The old woman couldn't help her appearance, and as for her hostile look, it was natural to resent a stranger who was preventing her from getting to the next activity, a bingo game, perhaps, or a TV broadcasting The People's Court.

"Go ahead, Kevin," Paisley said. "But please see me when you're finished. There's something I'd like to ask you."

Kevin glanced down at the old woman as if for her reaction. "Okay," he said unenthusiastically. As he pushed the wheelchair away, he bent and spoke into the old woman's ear with the same concern he had shown when Paisley had scraped her knee. A nice kid, she thought, in spite of his reserve. So what had caused the shutters to bang down, just when she thought they were becoming friends?

The last thought caused another pang of guilt for what she was about to ask him to do. It was clear Kevin was busy: working for his step-father, helping at the senior home ... and now she was going to try to talk him into taking on yet another time-consuming project. Maybe there was a good reason he hadn't returned her calls.

While she waited in the lobby, Ian wandered off. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him to talking to the receptionist, a young blond.

She tapped her fingers against her knee until Kevin returned, and she looked up at him with relief. "Let's go outside, where there's more privacy."

As she led the teenager toward the door, she glanced at his feet. He was wearing Vans. Even if the tag on the side hadn't said so, the distinct pattern the soles left in the dirt pathway was crisp and familiar. It was what she had expected.

Roses were in full bloom near a sycamore tree, and they drenched the air with perfume. As they sat under the tree, on a bench overlooking the valley, Kevin twisted his hands and fidgeted. Did he suspect she knew he had burglarized her house? Or was his conscience bothering him? Either way, now was the perfect time to confront him.

No
. Something inside held her back. Kevin was no criminal, she was sure of it. The fact that he had done such an amateurish job proved it. And nothing had been missing. She had left her purse and her iPhone in plain sight, and neither had been touched. Perhaps if she gained his trust, she thought, she could find what his motive was. In any case, she needed a Pirate King. That trumped everything.

She began, her voice crisp and professional. "I heard you perform at an open-mic night recently. Your voice is perfect for a part in a musical production I'm working on."

The tension seemed to drain out of him, as if he had been expecting a blow which had not materialized. "You mean
The Pirates of Penzance
?"

"You know about it?"

He didn't exactly roll his eyes, but he gave her a look that has at one time or another crossed every teenager's face. Of course he knew about it. Virtually every kid in town was involved in the production, either backstage or in the cast. Besides, there were those impossible-to-miss Jolly Roger banners plastered all over town: the big one hanging over the main street, and the posters in the windows of all the shops.