“I’m not home. I’m at Serena’s. Jimmy, you need to stop her.”
“From what?”
“Herself,” Mallory said, enigmatic words that came with no further explanation.
But they were enough to have Jimmy hailing a cab. Given that all of the Broadway shows had recently let out, and throngs of people and tackily costumed characters crowded the pedestrian malls of Times Square, crossing the island took time, eliciting rare impatience within Jimmy. His mind swirled with the sudden shift in cases from Mickey Dean to Serena Carson, two larger than life personalities that set off different responses: one a thug and one a victim, or so he’d once thought. The implications of Mallory’s call had him thinking back to his initial meeting with Serena, when she hired him to protect her.
“I don’t like to think of you as a bodyguard, more like my guardian angel.”
“Not sure how much of an angel I am. We all have a devil inside of us.”
“That’s what keeps us honest, Jimmy, knowing our potential, what we’re capable of.”
They were chilling words then. Just what was Serena Carson capable of? He thought back to the snowy night of the Nutcracker benefit, how fearful she’d been of Henderson Carlyle starting up trouble, and hadn’t he confirmed those fears? He’d justified Jimmy’s paycheck, yet when push came to shove, Serena had dumped Jimmy in favor of a boy toy for the night. Except the joke had been on her, because the man she went home with, Robbie Danvers, had in reality been the lover of the man stalking her.
None of it made any sense, and his confusion continued as the cab at last turned up Madison Avenue. Lights synchronized, and it was a quick ride to 64th Street, where Jimmy hopped out not unlike that Sunday morning when he’d left the security of Steven Wang’s bed only to find a body sliced to death on the steps of Serena’s home. Something nagged at Jimmy still as he made his way to the brownstone. Something was different. He stopped with the memory of Henderson’s body still fresh in his mind.
He thought of the weapon which had ended his life: a knife, no doubt a sizable one.
Only mysteries remained on the steps.
Then it hit him: Where was Officer Sanchez or someone else, a change in shift? No cops were present. Had Mallory gotten Serena off? Was she no longer under house arrest or suspicion?
He stared up at the door, knowing what waited inside. “Truth,” he thought, “At last.”
Jimmy dashed up the stairs, suddenly uncomfortable with the idea of Mallory being inside with Serena alone. Was Mallory in danger, or was it Serena herself? Jimmy pushed thoughts away, just concentrated on being a man of action. It was what was needed then.
He turned the knob and found it unlocked. It gave him comfort that he was expected, but what to expect when you were expecting? He thought of Meaghan’s book of the same title. His first instinct was to ensure that Mallory was fine. He breathed a sigh of relief as she came toward him from the living room appearing no worse for wear. She was still dressed in her work suit. Unusual worry lines crinkled her eyes.
“You okay?”
“Oh, she’s fine,” he heard. “I knew she’d call you. In fact I sort of encouraged it.”
The response hadn’t come from Mallory. Jimmy looked up the winding staircase where he saw Serena Carson, dressed in a smart dark suit with a wide-brimmed hat hooding her eyes, starting down. He thought he could still see the spark which her aura gave off. She was electric and alive, and with each step she took, he noted she appeared in complete control of the situation. A purse dangled from her thin arm. Jimmy noticed it matched the two suitcases that stood at the base of the stairs.
“Leaving for somewhere another benefit?” he asked.
“Yes, I’m off on the Serena Carson Survival Trip. I did want to say, ‘Good-bye.’”
“You can’t escape, Serena. You’re under house arrest.”
She pulled the material of her pants up, revealing an ankle devoid of the tracking device.
“The police will know,” he said.
“The police are no longer an issue. I’ll be long gone before they discover it’s no longer on my person.”
“How did you get the device off?”
“Money can buy anything and anyone. I did with you.”
Her biting comment scored a direct hit on his integrity. Had he been seduced by the allure of a big paycheck? Serena had reached the base of the stairs, where she paused before Jimmy. She touched his scruffy cheek, offered up a smile. “You were such a safe choice, an easy pawn. Trust me, Jimmy, I was mightily tempted to see what would happen if I invited you…” Her darkened eyes drifted upwards, her intent implicit. “There’s never been a man Serena Carson couldn’t handle or, for a night, change.”
“Except Robbie Danvers,” Jimmy suddenly said.
He’d struck a chord, but she recovered quickly, waving the idea off as she paraded into the living room. She went for the decanters on the table behind the sofa and poured herself a brandy, not unlike he’d done for her the night Henderson was murdered. “Boy,” Jimmy thought, “She was good, calculating, cold, and driven by her own needs and no one else’s.” He’d fooled her that night, and he’d been tricked again when she begged him to prove her innocence. It was an unwinnable case, he realized, because he knew she was guilty as hell.
Serena’s expression changed. The innocent woman was suddenly like an uncaged animal ready to pounce. “When did you figure it out?”
“Only recently. An innocent thing, really, I was slicing a piece of cake.”
“Unlike the slicing I did, but I’ll tell you, Jimmy, it felt so good to see the intense pain I inflicted. The power consumed me as I watched the life drain out of him. It was about time. He thought he had so much control over me, over us. He deserved to die an awful death.”
“Them,” Jimmy said, “Don’t forget Robbie.”
She waved that comment off again and again took a sip from her drink. “He was useless.”
“In bed or elsewhere?”
“He was way out of his league. He thought he could pick up where Henderson left off.”
“If not in the bedroom, then I’m assuming financially? He tried to blackmail you.”
“You’re very smart, Jimmy, a little late in your deductions but wily nonetheless.”
Mallory came up beside him, touching his arm. “Jimmy, what’s going on?”
“What’s going on is that Serena Carson is guilty of two murders, two very nasty ones.”
“Not like I’m Mata Hari,” she said.
“Perhaps worse. Let me put the whole thing in perspective,” Jimmy said, “If I may.”
“Oh, by all means. I’m curious to know what you figured out,” Serena said. Her confidence was chilling.
In the dim light of the living room, where once Jimmy had sought to bring her comfort, he faced her from a different perspective and an awareness that she might just have another trick up her couture sleeve. He’d have to stay alert. He did not intend to end up like her two previous victims, but he could tell she was dying to confirm what Jimmy had begun to suspect. She was so proud of her accomplishment.
“Help Is Here was Henderson’s playground,” he began, “A place where Henderson could climb the social ladder, entertain lonely society ladies who had too much time on their hands. Oh, and acquire lots of money. Lady Grey confirmed for me that Henderson slept with all of you to deepen his threadbare pockets. His family kept him on an allowance, and, in fact, they’d banished him from their home base of Santa Fe, where he was already accused of beating women. He came to New York, bought his way into Help Is Here, then took full advantage. From what I gathered at the holiday party, he seduced all of you including Mitzy and Flopsy, because you all talked about his…shall we say, his prowess? When he didn’t get the big payoff, he’d use violence to let you all know how unhappy he was. Probably some of the ladies gave in and paid him the money he wanted to go away. Many of them were married, including the CEO, Melissa Harris-J’Arnoud.”
“A st
upid woman. Why would she sleep with Henderson when she has Philippe?”
“Because Dr. J’Arnoud is never around and he plays around even more, or so Melissa claimed. Women do get lonely while living in the shadow of influential men.”
“A major reason I never married.”
“Also, you’d have to have a heart in order to fall in love.”
“Oh, Jimmy, petty insults really don’t land where you think.”
“Which only proves my point,” he said.
Serena crossed the living room and refilled her drink. She checked the watch, glittering with diamonds like she only had so much time for Jimmy’s shining reveal. Perhaps that was true. A car was expected to whisk her away in the dead of night. Not on Jimmy’s watch. It had gone on too long with too many deceptions. He took a step further, trying to keep her close but also to maintain a careful distance. The purse continued to dangle from her arm. “What was inside it,” he wondered. He thought about the knife she’d used, her modus operandi.
“Can you move this along, Jimmy? Enough about Henderson. Let’s get to me.”
It was all about her. It always had been. She used everyone around her, Jimmy included.
“I’d served my purpose the night of the benefit. I accompanied you, protected you, and was even photographed with you. I was proof you were scared. What did you call me?”
“My guardian angel,” she said, “A handsome one at that.”
“Except it was you who was played that night by a devil that bested you.”
“He might have won the first round. He lost the fight.”
Mallory had taken a seat on the arm of the sofa. Jimmy noticed the fear on her face, and he considered telling her to leave. Except he needed a witness, and as a lawyer for a respected firm, she would be ideal. He would protect her. He was her brother, her guardian now. Serena waited, a sigh escaping her lips.
“Why don’t you take over from here, Serena? How did it play out?”
“Well, it certainly wasn’t premeditated,” she said, “More like seizing opportunity.”
“You left the benefit with Robbie Danvers, and then…”
“We left in his limo. In the back seat, we kissed, and my hand reached down. I was getting no response. He just said he was nervous, what with the driver perhaps listening. He then suggested we return to my brownstone. Charming, good-looking, and youthful like he could go all night. He was just what I wanted especially after Henderson manhandled me. I wanted a real man.”
He actually grinned, taunting her. “Except what you got instead was Henderson’s secret lover posing as a rich playboy. You need to work on your gaydar.”
“I suspected he might go both ways. A girl likes a challenge.”
“So unlike what you told me and the police, you didn’t go to a hotel. You came here.”
“I don’t like to admit this, Jimmy, but I was set up from the start of the night.”
“Let me guess. Robbie admitted Henderson to the premises.”
“I’d gone for champagne and prepared a snack plate. We’d barely eaten.”
“Which is why you had a knife handy.”
She offered up a devious smile. “Serendipity, I suppose. Some might call it fate. Anyway, enough philosophy. Robbie was gone, sent away, and standing in his place was Henderson Carlyle. What a wicked grin he wore, knowing he had bested me using his lover to take advantage of my weakness in wanting to bed younger men. He laughed in my face and aid no woman would control him or report him to the authorities. He told me that when he was done with me, he would be the one fucking Robbie. He was hard inside his pants, that much was obvious. That’s when he lashed out at me. He made contact with my shoulder. The pain wasn’t as bad as the shame I felt for allowing myself to be in this situation.”
“So it was self-defense,” Mallory suddenly said. “I can help you, Serena.”
Serena laughed. “I refuse to live the next few years battling the legal system. Besides, what happened…a jury might not see it that way. I grabbed the knife and shoved it at him. I missed his cheek by a hair. He actually backed away, a typical bully afraid when someone struck back. I began to scream at him, threatening to slice him up.”
“With a cheese knife?” Jimmy asked.
“See, that’s where everything changed. I chased him out of my home, using the small knife to get him out onto the stoop. He just laughed at me. He said it wasn’t over. He’d get the payday he wanted, or he’d tell the police that I tried to kill him. That’s when I saw red. I was tired of it all, of being threatened, of that sick, contemptible smile on his face. As he stood on the steps, I threw the knife at him. It landed squarely in his chest, a direct hit. He stared at it, he stared at me, and he watched the blood start to drip from the wound. Oh, it wasn’t a fatal blow, hardly. No, that came later.” She paused, set down her drink, almost as if she no longer needed the fortification in reliving the night her world was shattered.
“Serena, you went back into the house…”
“And I returned with the butcher knife from the kitchen.”
Jimmy didn’t need to know the other details. He’d seen the results of her handiwork. So, while some might argue it was self-defense, she’d already inflicted her damage when she instead went back for more, going too far in her evisceration of her enemy. Besides it wasn’t so much the murder of Henderson Carlyle that would seal her fate of a life in prison, if not worse, but what she’d done to Robbie Danvers.
It was time to wrap it up. Jimmy had a phone call to make. Detective Barone would want to know what he knew and to confirm what the police already suspected. It was enough for them to have placed Serena under arrest. They’d been right. They just didn’t have the supporting evidence. Now Jimmy did. He knew the truth.
“Robbie came to you and confessed he knew you’d killed Henderson.”
“Like I said, he was out of his league. Amateur, he thought I’d give up a million dollars to buy my freedom. Ha, it only cost me five thousand dollars to send Officer Sanchez on an errand.”
That explained two mysteries: Robbie’s murder and Sanchez being AWOL. He hoped it was the truth, that Sanchez was not lying in a bloody heap in the basement. “So you killed Robbie in the same manner as Henderson, trying to deflect blame.”
Serena smoothed down her suit jacket, started toward the foyer of her brownstone, perhaps for the last time. Jimmy knew she would be taken into custody. Jimmy knew it was the end game for the poor little rich girl who’d used the only thing she had in this world to define her: money. He tried to feel bad for her. She’s lost so much at a young age, but in the ensuing years she used her plight to gain sympathy and acceptance. The question he had to ask himself, and perhaps one day he’d ask her, just what was it she wanted in this life?
From an inner closet in the foyer, Serena grabbed a long, dark brown mink coat.
“I’m sorry to end our little chat, but I have a car waiting. Good-bye, Jimmy.”
“You’re not going anywhere, Serena.”
“On the contrary, I am, never to be seen again.”
From that still dangling purse, she pulled out first the tracking device, which she dropped carelessly to the floor, a discarded piece of her past. Her action made her smile with delicious irony. When Jimmy looked back up, he saw that her hand held something far more deadly than a knife. It gleamed under the light of the front entrance.
“Mallory,” she said, waving the small pistol in the air, “You’ll accompany me.”
“No, Mallory…stay where you are.” He turned to Serena. “Take me.”
“Oh, I don’t think so. A brute like you, you might manhandle me just like Henderson. No, I’ll take my chances with the lovely Mallory. Let me leave here in peace, and she’ll remain unharmed. Don’t be foolish and try and stop me. At the moment she’s my insurance. Let’s go, you pretty thing. Oh, and Jimmy, dear, I’ve already made the second payment I promised, a direct deposit to your account. You’ve been richly rewarded for forgetting all about me. I thin
k that’s a fair enough trade, don’t you think?”
The gun pointed at her, Mallory rose from the sofa. Jimmy made eye contact with her. He had wondered why his sister had been here so late at night. Now he knew. Serena had staged the entire thing, calling a meeting with her lawyer, knowing the only way she could escape safely was to take a hostage and who better than for her to take but her guardian’s sister? Serena took hold of Mallory’s arm, pushed her forward and told her to take hold of the two suitcases that waited by the staircase, all while keeping a wary, cautious eye on Jimmy. He stood his ground, knowing she wouldn’t hesitate to put a bullet in him. His shoulder ached from memory. He didn’t need another scar or, worse, a permanent end. He felt as impotent as Robbie Danvers must have been in her bed, unable to act and under to perform under pressure.
At last he stepped forward into the doorframe. Serena had left the door open, giving him a front-row seat to her departure. He watched as the two women approached an idling black Lincoln Town Car. Mallory stuffed the two suitcases into a trunk that popped up. Serena opened the back door, still holding the gun against his sister’s side. Mallory got in first, and Serena followed behind her and slammed the door shut, a note of finality to the moment. But the car didn’t speed off, not right away. The other side passenger door suddenly opened, and Mallory stepped out. Jimmy breathed a sigh of relief, even as the car then zoomed off down the street like it was an airplane ready for take-off, whisking Serena Carson off to whatever life she thought awaited her.
Mallory came rushing to his side, the two of them standing on the stoop, the scene of the original crime. He hugged her, grateful that she was safe. He wasn’t sure whose heart was thumping faster, his or hers. He could feel both.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. She’s a piece of work,” Mallory said.
“Did she say anything before she released you?”
“She actually had a tear in her eye, Jimmy. What she said, and I don’t think she was talking to me, not with that faraway look in her eyes, what she said was, ‘I probably should have perished in that plane crash too.’ Sad to think such a tragic moment so early in her life defined her.”
Guardian Angel Page 25
