A View to a Kill

by Cheryl Bradshaw

  “What happened after you found out the truth about Chelsea?” I asked.

  “Alexandra begged me to stay in the marriage, to give us another chance. Not because she loved me, and not because she was sorry, but because she wanted to keep our perfect illusion of a life intact. How could I after her betrayal?”

  “If you felt that way, why didn’t you file for divorce and move on with your life?”

  “I thought about it. Almost went through with it a couple of times. It’s like I said before. Chelsea wasn’t mine by blood, but to me, she was still my little girl. If we divorced, Alex would have done everything in her power to keep Chelsea away from me, even if it hurt Chelsea in the process. It would have been her way of making me pay for not giving her what she wanted.”

  I thought about Alexandra, about how different people could be when the veil was lifted. Once the true identity was revealed, the perfect picture took on a stain that couldn’t be removed.

  “What about the money she was giving you?” I asked.

  “I wasn’t extorting money from her. Early in the marriage, before I found out about Chelsea, I used some of the money I made from my own accounting business on investments. At the time, I tried to involve Alexandra in those investments. She had no interest. That’s what I’ve been living on all these years. Aside from the regular bills any couple has, I haven’t asked that woman for a dime in ages.”

  “You would rather have me believe you were a womanizer, interested in Alexandra’s money, than be honest with me?”

  “If it kept the truth from coming out, yes. Chelsea may act like she hates me right now, but she’ll come around. She always does.”

  “Why did Alexandra go to so much effort to paint you like a villain?” I asked. “She tried turning Chelsea against you.”

  “Alexandra was in love with Roland Sinclair. She planned to marry him.”

  “How? He’s already married.”

  “Not many know this, but his wife is dying. I don’t believe she’ll be around in three months. Alexandra planned to be there for him after his wife died. In my opinion, this was the reason she was writing one last book. She was burnt out on the whole process. They would have finally been free to build a life together.”

  “And Chelsea? When did Alex plan to give her the news?”

  “After Chelsea’s marriage, but Alex had already planted the seed, telling Chelsea I’ve been with other women, making me look bad so she would despise me and welcome Roland into her life when the time came. Alex probably hoped Chelsea would see Roland as some kind of savior to her grieving mother.”

  “How long have you known about Alexandra’s plans with Roland?”

  “A couple weeks.”

  “You know how bad that sounds, right?” I said.

  “I do.”

  “You’re the one with the most compelling motive, the one person who needed Alexandra dead the most.”

  “I just told you the truth, and I believe you know that. I also believe you no longer think I had anything to do with her death, because I didn’t.”

  Telling me what he thought I should believe didn’t make me certain of his innocence. I wasn’t sure of anything anymore. “Even if you didn’t kill your wife, I’m still convinced you took her laptop.”

  Porter stood, walked into another room, returning seconds later with a gray laptop clutched in his hand. “I took this the night before the police came to search the house, so I could read the book Alexandra had written.”

  “Why?”

  “The person who killed Alex is now going after my daughter. If something she’d written was tied to Alex’s murder, I wanted to know about it.”

  “What can you tell me about the book?” I asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “What do you mean? You’re holding the laptop. You must have found something.”

  “I knew the password to get into Alex’s computer, but the book file is protected. I can’t get into it.”

  “Who else knew about the book?” I asked.

  “Barbara Berry.”

  “Anyone else?”

  “I don’t know. Roland possibly, and then whomever she talked to or interviewed prior to her death.”

  “Barbara Berry told me she didn’t know what the book was about,” I said.

  He laughed. “Of course she did. The woman is a liar.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “Trust me. Alex would have told her agent.”

  I recalled my previous conversation with Barbara. If she knew about Alexandra’s book, what else was she hiding? I thought about the two names written on the piece of paper Barbara gave me. “Barbara suggested you killed Alexandra.”

  He cocked his head back, laughed. “Witch. Doesn’t surprise me.”

  “She also suggested Doyle Eldridge.”

  Porter swished a hand through the air. “Doyle’s harmless. He’d never hurt Alex. He’s just a longtime fan with a crush.”

  “Maybe. Either way, you need to turn Alexandra’s laptop over to the police. They can open the file, figure out what’s really in that book. Take it in, give it to Detective Murphy.”

  “And I’m just supposed to trust he’ll keep his mouth shut if the book contains what I think it does?”

  “Tell him your concerns. I believe you can count on him to be discreet. I’d also like you to think about talking to Chelsea. She’s going through a lot right now, but the way things are going, I believe the truth is going to come out. You don’t want it coming from someone other than you.”

  He nodded several times, entwined his fingers over one knee. “I’ll think about it. In the meantime, here’s something you should think about. Barbara Berry lied to you and then tried to get you to believe I had something to do with Alex’s murder. Maybe you need to ask yourself why.”

  CHAPTER 38

  I left Porter’s house uncertain whether he was father of the year or if he was much more cunning, a man with a gift of spinning things in his favor. I’d started to feel like a pointer on a board game, whirring around and around before stopping on a color which sent me in a whole new direction. I’d started out determined to find Alexandra’s killer. Now, the more I knew about her, the more disgusted I was. I questioned my motives for deciding to stay, deciding it all came down to one thing: curiosity.

  Given my questionable trust in Porter, I called Murphy, gave him a heads-up on the laptop. I kept my word and didn’t mention Chelsea. Not just for Porter’s benefit, but for hers too.

  In the spirit of sharing, Murphy told me the fingerprints found at the scene where Louis Massey died led police to the home of Bucky Fox, a thief known for pimping hot merchandise on the street. Turned out, Louis’s death wasn’t connected to Alexandra. He died for showing off, running his mouth to the wrong people. It reminded me of a quote I once read by Napoleon Hill. “Money without brains is always dangerous.”

  CHAPTER 39

  An hour later, I huddled next to Finch as we walked through a frigid park where Doyle Eldridge’s son told us his dad liked to go after his daily walk to the coffee shop. Nine benches and several mistaken identities later, we found Doyle leaning against a bald cypress, his head buried in the pages of a Patricia Cornwell book about Jack the Ripper. He sensed our presence, wiped his eyes, and looked up.

  “Hello, Miss Jax,” he said. “I knew you’d come.”

  “How?”

  “I’ve been keeping an eye on things.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “It does matter,” Finch said. “She asked you a question. Answer it.”

  “Would you like to know a fun fact?” Doyle asked. “I’ve known Alexandra since grade school. We were in the same class in the first and fourth grades, you see. My family moved away when school ended after my fourth year, and we lost touch for a while until I moved back again in the eleventh grade. I’ll never forget the day we sat in English class when she looked at me and said she was going to be a famous wr
iter one day.”

  He definitely was odd. With each reply, his head bobbed around like there wasn’t enough support to hold it up.

  “If Alexandra has known you all these years, why didn’t she ever tell anyone?”

  “Why was it important for them to know? It was no one’s business. I guess you could say I was a confidant, someone she could talk to like she would a girlfriend. She didn’t have any of those, but she always had me.”

  What she had was a plethora of hidden doors, each containing its own unique secret.

  “Barbara Berry didn’t see you as Alexandra’s friend. She saw you as her stalker.”

  He shrugged. “I know.”

  “And?”

  “She’s entitled to her opinion. It doesn’t make it true.”

  “It doesn’t make it a lie either. Did you give Alexandra a scrapbook where you’d pasted your head and Alexandra’s head onto a bride and groom?”

  He beamed with pride. “Matter of fact, I did.”

  “Why?”

  He snapped shut the book he was holding, stood, folded his arms in front of him. “I don’t see how answering any of your questions is going to help you find what you’re really after.”

  “It might. You were obsessed with Alexandra. Isn’t that true?”

  “Wasn’t everyone?”

  “Everyone didn’t take the time to make her a scrapbook,” I said. “You did. Did you love her?”

  He nodded. “I did.”

  “Must have been hard when you found out she was in love with someone else.”

  “If you mean Mr. Sinclair, I’ve known about him for years. And you’re right. It would have been grand if she had loved me the way I loved her, but she didn’t. I pasted our faces into the scrapbook to remind her of something she once gave to me when we were in grade school. Just a little card one Valentine’s Day. I wanted to know if she still remembered. She did.”

  “Where were you the night she was murdered?” I asked.

  “At home, with my son, just like I told police.”

  “All night?”

  “All night. The love I had for Alexandra was the kind of love a brother has for his sister, not a man for a woman. It wasn’t sexual, and it wasn’t wrong.”

  Aside from his odd behavior, which I assumed may have just been the way he’d always been, I believed him. “Thank you for giving me a few minutes of your time.”

  “You came all this way to talk to me and you’re not even going to ask me about the book?”

  “What book?”

  “The one Alexandra was writing when she died.”

  “How do you know about it?”

  “I told you, we were friends. She knew she could talk to me about anything and I’d keep quiet.”

  “Who was the subject of the book?”

  “She was.”

  “Alexandra?”

  He nodded.

  “I don’t follow. She writes about criminals, just like I do. Why would she be the subject of her own book?”

  He raised a brow. “You’re assuming the book was the same kind she’d written before. It wasn’t. It was the story of her life. Her memoir.”

  CHAPTER 40

  Elias Pratt

  December 27, 1989

  Over the last several years, Elias had grown accustomed to the eye candy Alexandra provided during each visit, her titillating style of dress, her sassy I pretend to care but I really don’t attitude. On the outside, she was bold and brazen; yet a softer more vulnerable side lingered, a side concealed from everyone except him.

  Piece by piece, Alexandra’s hardened shell had chipped away the more they saw each other. Small clues at first, like the way she sheepishly looked down when he said something that made her blush, or when she tucked a few strands of her hair behind her ear when his eyes lingered on hers for too long. The formalities of the past were gone. He was no longer referred to as Mr. Pratt. He was Elias. She was Alexa. And he’d achieved exactly what he wanted.

  Today when he saw her, everything about her was off, different, like she was a changed person. She wore black from head to toe, her supple flesh covered with a turtleneck beneath a frumpy cardigan sweater.

  It wasn’t like her.

  It wasn’t like her at all.

  She made no eye contact before sitting across from him, spoke no pleasantries, offered no greeting.

  “What’s wrong, Alexa?” he asked.

  She cleared her throat, furrowed her brow. “Nothing. I don’t have a lot of time today, Elias.”

  “What’s eating you? Tell me.”

  “Nothing. It’s nothing. Everything’s fine.”

  Except it wasn’t.

  “Are those tears in your eyes?”

  They were tears.

  She breathed heavily, struggling to keep her composure in front of him. Aware he understood what was happening, she bit her lower lip like the gesture would prevent an onslaught of water from dripping down her face.

  But a tear did drop.

  Then another.

  Then the floodgates opened.

  She was in full-blown, meltdown mode—a magnificent sight to see.

  Everything he’d wanted, everything he’d hoped for was finally coming true.

  “Talk to me,” he said. “Tell me what’s wrong. Are you upset because we’ve reached the end? We both knew the time would come when my last stay of execution would be denied.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not that.”

  He didn’t believe her.

  What else could it be?

  “I’ve made my peace, prayed to whatever god will listen,” he said.

  Using the sleeve of her sweater, she wiped the tears from her face. “Dammit! I can’t do this today, Elias. I’m sorry. I have to go.”

  She stood halfway up, then sat back down again. Pressing a hand to her stomach, she closed her eyes, slowed her breathing.

  “What the hell’s going on with you today?” he asked.

  Without opening her eyes, she said, “I’m not feeling well.”

  “Go home. Get some rest.”

  “No! This may be the last time I’ll see you again before they ... before you ...”

  She couldn’t say it.

  Before he died.

  Fourteen days.

  Fourteen days and it would be all over.

  “It’s going to be okay, you know,” he said.

  “It’s not going to be okay.”

  “Sure it is. You’ll finally publish your book, and I’ll be ... well, in hell if you believe in such things.”

  She thrust a hand over her mouth, but it was too late. Pieces of semi-processed food erupted, spraying the room. Elias threw his hands up, pushed his chair backward. An armed guard rushed to Alexandra’s side. She tried pushing him away, but he took her by the arm anyway. “Miss, let me help you.”

  Alexandra pressed a hand to her stomach, glanced down, then locked eyes with Elias. Reality came into focus, and he saw what he was meant to see.

  “Wait a minute. Are you ...?”

  A slight nod from Alexandra provided the answer.

  Alexandra wrenched her arm free, said to the guard, “Call someone to clean this up please.”

  The guard didn’t move.

  “Don’t think about it,” Alexandra pressed. “Do it.”

  Unsure of how to handle the predicament, the guard kept an eye on Alexandra while backing toward the door. He opened it partway, yelled for help.

  “Congratulations,” Elias said. “I’m happy for you.”

  “If that’s true, you should be happy for yourself as well,” she whispered. “I haven’t had sex with my husband in weeks. It isn’t his baby, Elias. It’s yours.”

  CHAPTER 41

  Alexandra Weston

  Ten Minutes Later

  Alexandra sat inside her car in a parking lot next to the prison. She rarely cried, but today was a rare day. After confirming her pregnancy a couple weeks earlier, she’d had several outbursts like this one. First t
he denial, then the decision on whether to keep the baby or get rid of it, followed by a plan on how to keep the baby’s father a secret, and whether or not she’d tell Elias the truth. One day earlier she’d decided against telling him. Now, having done it minutes before, she drove both fists into the center of her steering wheel and screamed.

  Why did you tell him?

  Why? Why? Why?

  She could question it all she wanted. She knew why. Somehow over the years, she’d fallen in love with him. Even now, it was hard for her to believe. She was a logical woman. A woman who never made the slightest misstep when it came to her career. In all her years as a writer, she’d never allowed the flirtations of her subjects to get in the way of her work before.

  Until now.

  Until him.

  He hadn’t just made her feel special, and wanted, and whole. He knew her. He saw a part of her no one else did. Her family, her husband, the few friends she had, all of them accepted what little she revealed about herself, a single layer in a much more complex, multi-layered person.

  Elias was the opposite. He worked his way in, piece by piece, visit after visit, until she felt raw and naked in his presence. She fought her feelings for years until the awareness of knowing their time was coming to an end overshadowed all else. All reason. All logic. Somehow, it no longer mattered.

  CHAPTER 42

  Present Day

  Now in her eighties, Loretta Pratt’s timeworn, wrinkled face exhibited a life marred by heartache and despair, each elongated, deep-set wrinkle like crooked lines on a map, connecting one hardship to the next. As I stood there on her front porch, staring for entirely too long, I couldn’t help but wonder what else in her life had gone awry, or if the overwhelming loss of her son all those years ago was enough to ebb the beauty and light I was sure she once had.

  Loretta barely looked in my direction before waving us into the house. She offered a slight nod then turned, using her cane to lead the way. We followed her into a spotless living room where a single color dominated the sparse décor: white. White piano. White sofa. Furry white rug covering a real hardwood floor. The room had a museum feel to it. Clean. Unstained. Pure. Stodgy.