“Bobby Taylor?” I throw out.
“That’s it,” Benny says. “Bobby Taylor. He was some guy she’d known way back when. Sounds as if you know him, too?”
“Well, sort of—”
“This Bobby Taylor started bothering her at work, and it escalated. A couple of times he really made a scene in here. Almost attacked her the last time. Then she took off,” he says. “This Bobby guy came back one more time. He threatened me, tried to force me to tell him where she’d gone. Of course, I was in the dark as much as he was. I told the guy if he ever set foot in my place again, I’d call the police. That was it. Never saw him after that.”
“Sounds like a lot of drama,” Will says.
“But that wasn’t the end of it.” Benny snorts with a half-laugh. “Some detective showed up a month later trying to find Julie. I guess his boss had been her fiancé.” Benny rubs his whisker-shadowed chin. “We couldn’t help him either at that point since none of us had heard from her.”
I look at Will. “Sounds like another dead end.” I push aside my plate.
“Hold on,” the tavern owner says, getting up. “Be right back.” He walks over to the bar, opens a black leather binder, and flips through the pages. Then he writes on a piece of paper and returns to our table.
“Give Mara Smith a call. She was one of the three original shot girls, and she and Julie became close friends. I remember she heard from Julie sometime after that detective came by. Maybe Mara’s still in touch with Julie.” He hands me the paper with the number on it. “These days Mara’s in Greenwich married with kids. Don’t mean to rush off, but I’ve got to get back to work.” He shakes our hands and walks up a stairway, most likely to his office.
Will and I decide to stick around and enjoy people-watching. It turns out to be beer pong night. Several long, rectangular tables have been set up with six-cup triangles at each end.
I smile at the lyrics of a favorite Leonard Cohen song, “Closing Time,” coming through the bar’s sound system. Two-man teams gather, pour beer into the cups on each edge, and commence aiming at the cups with ping pong balls. A ball dunks in, and the team whose cup it is must drink the beer. People circle around the tables cheering their friends, who shoot a variety of arc, bounce, and fastballs while the rowdiness factor grows.
The teams become increasingly raucous as they swill down the beer and play, and the now unruly crowd cheers them on. Hearing Leonard Cohen’s gravelly voice is getting harder.
“Am I showing my age, Will, if I tell you all this noise—not Leonard Cohen by the way—the nonmusic noise is giving me a headache?”
“Decibel level is pretty high,” he agrees. “Want to call it a night?” We walk in the direction of the front door, passing one of the beer pong tables.
I notice what sounds like an argument coming from the table, this one about four deep in spectators. A crashing noise interrupts a booming voice yelling, “You mother—”
I stand frozen, watching the group, even though Will is tugging at my arm.
A woman screams, “Watch out! Baby, watch out—”
Suddenly a tall, burly guy in a do-rag, sleeveless shirt, torn jeans, and combat boots comes flying at me through a break in the crowd. All I can think as everything goes slow motion for me is how did this guy get in dressed like that? Benny’s has a clearly stated dress code on the website—no do-rags, no sleeveless shirts, and no combat boots.
He’s huge, and he’s hurtling right toward me. If he hits me, I’m toast. I see the crowd turn to follow the guy’s trajectory, and I see Will, out of the corner of my eye, focus on a different big guy, also breaking dress code, who moves toward him.
Just as my guy is ready to slam into me, I duck down, sideways, into a crouch. Since this giant is now connecting with thin air where I once stood, and since he’s sailing over my crouched body, he falls. His head bangs into a table, and his body crashes into empty chairs, knocking everything over.
When we practice this in class, the person who attacks moves into a graceful forward roll rather than slamming onto the floor. But this is real life, and the guy is out for a while.
I look over again at Will. Guy number two must think Will is part of the reason his friend is out cold on the floor, and he comes at Will with an overhead strike. I watch my third-degree black belt buddy go on the offensive.
Will gets right into the guy’s space on the side, grabbing the striking arm at the elbow, where he can control him. In my mind I hear Isabella Sensei telling class how important it is to control your opponent’s elbow in certain techniques. In a split second I know that Will plans a kaitenage, or rotary-type throw.
Will quickly and firmly grips the man’s neck with his other hand and pushes his attacker low to the ground. Simultaneously with this movement, Will also shoves the guy’s elbow-held arm into his side throwing the attacker forward and down with a turn of his hips. This guy, just like his friend, crashes into some chairs, finally coming to his own dead stop. He raises himself, dazed, moaning and barely moving.
The beer pong game has stopped, of course, and the crowd watches the two of us in stunned silence. I smile at Will and notice a flash to the side. I turn in time to see a woman in cut-off short-shorts with chains and a hoodie rush at me. From the angle of her arm, I’m certain she plans to attack me with a cross-hand strike.
I’m shocked to see a knife in her striking hand. OK, OK, OK—I’ve practiced this a thousand times in class (slight exaggeration), and I hope the technique works. Do not panic. Breathe.
Sliding in for a direct entry, I bring my arms up my center, almost as if I’m starting to pray. One of my hands explodes toward her face and shoves her chin back. My other hand clamps overhand between the elbow and wrist of her knife-wielding arm.
My arm that originally went for her face now crosses over my other arm and grabs her wrist overhand. I extend my arms to keep her blade at a distance so that it can’t slash me and execute a quick pivot while I push her down to the floor. She screams out a string of profanities as her knee hits the floor first and takes the painful weight of her fall.
Ms. Short Cut-offs is now flat on the floor with her knife-wielding arm straight out, palm up. I quickly pull up her elbow, which positions her wrist at an ugly angle, and she immediately releases the knife. Will kicks it away from all three attackers, and our waiter, Tom, stops it with his foot before someone else can go for it. Other barmen step in to secure the wrists of the three attackers with plastic ties.
Will grabs my arm, pulling me up. “Good job, Ms. Shodan, but quit while you’re ahead. Let’s get out of here.”
The beat of Leonard Cohen continues pounding from all directions. Unbeknownst to us, Benny Sullivan, this time with the unlit cigarette hanging from the side of his mouth, has been standing outside his office watching the commotion from the loft space above. He hollers down to us, “Who are you two, really?”
I look up and smile on the way out of the bar and call up to him loudly. “Like I said before, just a housewife from New Jersey.”
Chapter Thirty-One
“Here to see Mara Smith,” I say to the man in the small guard house at the entrance to the very private community of Taconic Harbor.
He peers into my driver’s side window and smiles at me. “Yes, Ma’am. Make a left turn, and it’s the seventh house on the right.” The security guard waves me through, and in my rearview mirror I see him write down my license plate number.
Driving down the curvy road in this exclusive Greenwich, Connecticut enclave, I catch glimpses through walls, gates and hedges of perfectly maintained homes and grounds. My iPod plays Abba’s “Money, Money, Money,” and I sing along.
I slow my Mustang in order to get a better look at early-twentieth-century grand white elephants that must cost a fortune in upkeep. Scattered among these testaments to new wealth a century before, I catch sight of today’s testosterone-produced tributes to hedge-fund excess…uh, success. These massive structures are too, too what—shiny, monstro
us, and new?
I make a right at the seventh driveway and pull up to a version of Scarlett O’Hara’s Tara on steroids. Oh, dear. While staring at bulging Corinthian columns that reach three stories high to a widow’s walk, I sing along to Abba more quietly.
One half of a massive, shiny, black double-door opens, and a slender figure in deep purple yoga clothes springs down the steps, her luscious, thick, red hair bouncing on her shoulders. Two yapping Yorkshire terriers leap down after her, protecting their mistress from unfamiliar visitors.
“Hi, there!” She waves to me.
I step out of my car, and the little dogs swirl around my feet making a racket. “Hush, Trixie, Falco,” the redhead orders. “Oh, I’m so sorry,” she says to me. “I hope you like dogs.”
I squat down and stretch out the top of my hand for sniffs from two cold noses. “It’s fine. I’ve got a German shepherd at home.” The Yorkies settle down.
“I’m Mara Smith.” I hear a slight Southern drawl in her welcoming voice.
“I’m Ronnie Lake. Thanks for seeing me.” We shake hands, and I gaze around the property, hoping I’m displaying a fitting degree of admiration. Mara watches me.
To my surprise, she directs my gaze above her hedge to a lovely old stone mansion with a steep slate roof across the road. “Now, that’s where I’d love to live, even though I’m just positive it’s a money pit.” She giggles. “But since my husband sold his business five years ago, he’s become a builder. Said he always wanted to create big, beautiful houses. He built this place and our other homes in Boca Grande and up on Nantucket. Don’t get me wrong. I just love Mike to death, but all our houses are so huge…” She rolls her eyes and giggles again. “…and definitely over the top.”
“Oh, no—” I interject.
“Where do you live, Ronnie?”
“Over in Willowbrook, New Jersey—”
“Oh, I thought you were here in Greenwich.” She looks at me as if intrigued and then beams a million-dollar smile. “Mike is from New Jersey, too. He grew up in Asbury Park.” She walks back up the steps. “Come on, Ronnie. Let’s go out back and sit where we have a view of the water.”
I follow Mara through a long marble-floored hallway lined with fluted pedestals holding a mix of antique and contemporary sculptures. I discreetly glance through doors as we walk, and the mistress of the house notices my curiosity. She stops at one door, and we look into an enormous empty room, maybe four times the size of the largest room at Meadow Farm. Massive paintings hanging on all the walls are the only adornment. The two Yorkies dash in and chase each other around the expanse as if they were in an Olympic stadium.
“Mike likes to call this the gallery, because he collects art, but it’s really our party room,” Mara says. “We keep it empty, so that we never have to move out the furniture when we entertain a big group.”
Well, now… “That’s very practical, Mara,” I tell her approvingly.
“Ronnie, guess how many bedrooms in this house.” She giggles. But before I can even hazard a guess, she blurts out, “Twelve! In case we have weekend guests for a house party. Can you imagine? Mike planned it that way for the resale value.”
“How many do you actually use?” I ask.
“Only a few.” She shrugs. “Most of them I never even furnished…just keep the doors closed.” She smiles. “Enough of this. Let’s go outside.”
Mara and I continue walking. This mini museum mile leads to the back of the house, and we step onto a terrace with a spectacular view of the harbor.
We head toward a cluster of oversized outdoor furniture positioned to take in the panorama and sink into their plush cushions. Trixie and Falco hop up on a chaise to better observe what Mara and I are up to.
“I never get tired of looking at the water.” Mara reaches for a huge pitcher of lemonade on the glass coffee table.
“With this view, I wouldn’t either,” I say, as I watch sailboats moored at the yacht club on the other side of the harbor bob in the water.
“Ronnie, I don’t mean to brag about my wonderful husband, but Mike made it even more spectacular than when we first bought this property. It was hilly toward the water with giant boulders and too many trees.” Mara fills two tumblers and hands me one.
“You don’t mean to tell me—”
“Exactly. Mike used some of his earthmoving equipment and got rid of those hills and the boulders. Then he cut down the trees and created this beautiful smooth lawn that swoops down to the water.” She grins like a kid getting a pony. “He says he feels as though he’s in The Great Gatsby when he walks on this perfect grass at dusk with a cocktail and stares out at the lights over there.”
“Mara, it is amazing, and it’s great how you appreciate and enjoy it all.” I can’t help but like her.
“The kids are at camp until the afternoon, and my tennis game was cancelled.” She takes a drink. “When you called this morning, I really thought you were already in Greenwich. I never in a million years thought you were in New Jersey.”
“Oh, it’s not that far.” I sip the lemonade. “Anyway, as I said on the phone, I’ve got this deadline looming for a family gathering. And none of us have seen Terry in a long time—I guess you knew her as Julie—so I decided to try to find her.” I can’t help but notice that Mara, about thirty-five, is one fit lady in her gorgeous yoga clothes. Probably has an enormous gym in the basement of this monster manse where she works out every day.
“So, you’re kind of playing detective?” She giggles.
“Yeah, right.” I roll my eyes in agreement, and we giggle together. “I kept hitting dead ends, until I got to Benny’s Bar. I met the owner, and he suggested I get in touch with you, since you and Ter—I mean Julie—were good friends.” From shot girl at Benny’s Bar & Grill to housewife and mom living in a Greenwich palace, Mara Smith hasn’t done too badly for herself. No siree.
“Mara?”
“Yes?”
“Did Terry ever tell you why she changed her name to Julie Jones when she went to work at Benny’s?”
“I think it probably had to do with this guy she had grown up with who was big trouble,” Mara says.
“Oh, yeah.” I roll my eyes yet again. “Bobby Taylor, right?”
“That’s the guy, Ronnie. A real lowlife.”
“How long was Bobby around?” I ask as Trixie jumps off the chaise and then into my lap.
“I guess it was only a couple of weeks,” she answers as Falco also hops down and squeaks. Mara picks him up. “But he was bad news. I think he hit her and grabbed her hard. One time I saw bruises on one of her shoulders and the other bicep when she took off her sweater, and her cheek was kind of swollen. She told the boss she had been to the dentist, but I knew it wasn’t true.”
That Bobby Taylor sure had one helluva grip. “That’s awful,” I say and make a face. “But are you sure it was Bobby Taylor? Maybe it was someone else?” I scratch Trixie’s head as she looks at me with deep dark eyes. These Yorkie fur-balls are adorable.
“Absolutely.” Mara is certain. “It was Bobby Taylor. One night I caught him pushing Julie around in the alley behind the bar. I hollered at him, pulled out my phone to call the police, and he ran.” Mara drinks her lemonade while Falco squirms in her other arm. “Julie begged me not to tell Benny or anyone else at work. She was afraid she’d lose her job.”
I act horrified, though I’m not entirely acting, of course. “Did this happen a lot during the two weeks he was around?”
“I don’t know. She wouldn’t talk about it with me. Then one day she was gone, except for a letter she left me to give to the boss.” Mara gets a sad expression on her face. “Just gone. Nobody knew where. I really missed her.”
Mara and I sit quietly watching a sail boat pass by. “I think she got pregnant.” Her voice is almost a whisper, and my head whips toward her.
“Excuse me?” I say.
“Some time after she took off, I got a few letters and postcards from her. I don’t have them a
nymore, but I remember in one of the last ones she wrote me she was pregnant.” Mara shrugs her shoulders and says, “But then she stopped writing, and we lost touch. I don’t know how that all worked out…if she ever even had a baby.”
“Do you think it happened while she was still at Benny’s?” I ask. “And do you think Bobby Taylor could have been the father?”
“Who knows when it happened. But no way was it Bobby Taylor. If he was, then he must have raped her, because she couldn’t stand him.” We put the Yorkies on the ground, and they chase each other in circles around the terrace. Mara continues, “Look, he may have hit her, but I got the feeling that she could pretty much take care of herself. She wasn’t afraid of him—”
“Did she have a boyfriend while she worked at Benny’s?” I interrupt. “You would have known, right?”
“Positively, and she did not,” Mara says. “She was pretty sad about a breakup she’d had…some guy she was about to marry. She never said his name, but he definitely was the one she cared about.” She shakes her head. “I lost touch with Julie after that.” A breeze blows, and Mara pushes her hair out of her face. “We both just got on with our lives.”
We’re quiet for a long moment, as I let these thoughts sink in. A baby. If she was pregnant, that scenario could have played out in different ways. I flash on Francesca with Tía Connie in Scranton and do the math. Working at Benny’s Bar & Grill could have overlapped the time when Francesca was conceived.
And now I have two candidates as the father. First, that creep Bobby Taylor harassing her at work and, who knows, perhaps raping her. And second, Juliana running into her ex-fiancé, John Palmer, in the city after their break-up and spending the night together. I mean, Palmer pretty much told me so with his ‘the next morning she was gone’ comment when I was in Salt Lake City.
Finishing my lemonade, I look at my watch. “Mara, thank you for sharing all this with me. Not sure it brings me any closer to finding her in time for our reunion, but I’m not giving up yet.”
Stunner Page 18
