The Perfect Summer (Hubbard's Point)

by Rice, Luanne

  “Why you?” Bay asked. “Of all the trust funds at Shoreline, why Eliza's?”

  Dan cleared his throat, tucked his chin down slightly, staring Bay right in the eyes. “I think,” he said, “because of you. Or, maybe I should say, us.”

  “What?”

  “Those letters of ours,” Dan said.

  “He showed them to you?”

  “No,” Dan said, shaking his head. “No. But he knew a lot about me. He knew that I had always worked with my hands, that I didn't much care about bank accounts and money—things I had written to you about. Even though that was so long ago, people don't really change, in important ways. And I guess a lifetime of not caring about stuff like that makes me a bad bet as a dad with a kid who has a trust fund.”

  “Sean picked you,” Bay said, breathless, “because you weren't paying attention.”

  “It's a great feeling,” Dan said, “to know that you were singled out for being a total dupe, a jerk just asking to have the wool pulled over his eyes.”

  Bay blinked, nodding. She couldn't say anything to console him, because she knew how he felt. Exactly.

  “Bay,” he said, rising, walking around the desk. As he approached, she felt a primal urge to be held, to hold him again, but instead she took a step back.

  “No . . .” she said, shaking, moving toward the door. “Even if you didn't take the money, I hate that you thought about it. I can't stand that Sean tried to use your daughter.”

  “Bay, please—”

  “You know what the worst part is?” Bay asked, tears in her eyes. “Annie's boat. Do you know what that little model boat meant to her? She made it for him. And he was willing to use it as just another prop in his rotten con jobs.”

  “You know what the irony is?” Danny asked, eyes pained. “I think, in the end, he really wanted me to build Annie the boat. Because why else would he have come back to leave me the model? That was long after I'd told him I wasn't interested in helping him.”

  “That detail almost doesn't matter,” Bay said.

  “I know.”

  “Good-bye, Danny,” Bay said, trembling inside and out. “I have to think about all this.”

  Out in the parking lot, she fumbled with the car keys, slamming the car door behind her. The shame of what Sean had done, sleazing around, trying to get into a young girl's trust fund, all for money, made her sick. How could she not have known? Had she been living in another world?

  She tried to track the time: Sean had changed after Mark Boland was made president. He'd become angrier, more competitive. Had he suddenly thought more money would make up for his career disappointment? Had he somehow imagined that plundering his clients' money would make him feel like a bigger man? And what about that lie, his promise to Bay that he would change?

  “You're pathetic!” Bay screamed, alone in her own car. “How could you have done it?”

  Her husband's crimes suddenly became real. Until this minute, she'd known in the abstract—with cops and agents asking questions, the papers reporting vague details. Even Augusta hadn't brought it all home to her so searingly. But Danny had just made it real. Now Bay had the picture of her husband trying to get Danny to let him use Eliza's trust, trying to recruit another father to be a slimeball.

  “I hate you, Sean,” Bay sobbed. She knew she didn't want to see Dan again, didn't want to face the man who'd seen Sean in action, or be reminded of who her husband really was. She hated Sean for his crimes, for throwing away everything they had, their home together, their beautiful children. And she hated him for tainting something that had been clean and precious that had been hers alone. Driving away, she nearly hit Joe Holmes entering the parking lot.

  26

  SAW MRS. MCCABE PULLING OUT OF HERE IN A hurry,” Joe said, carefully watching Dan Connolly's face. His eyes looked uneasy, and they kept flicking toward the door, as if Bay McCabe might walk back in at any minute.

  “Yep,” Connolly said.

  Joe nodded, waiting for him to offer more, but he didn't.

  “Listen,” Joe said. “I have a few more questions for you. About your wife's death.”

  “Okay,” Connolly said, tensing his jaw. “Go ahead.”

  “I've read the police reports, and all the follow-ups,” Joe said. “And everything I've found indicates that Charlotte was hit by a red van. Not a truck. Is that right?”

  “A dark red van,” Dan corrected. “At least, that's what Eliza thought at first.”

  Joe nodded. “Yes. The police report stated that she was—” he paused, wanting to be sensitive, “—traumatized by the event. That she was unable to be questioned much, because of her mental state.”

  “She was wrecked by it,” Dan said.

  “So there's no—no doubt about her memory, about what she saw? Is it possible it was a truck, but she thought it was a van? Do you think she knows the difference?”

  Dan gestured toward the parking lot. “I run a boatyard,” he said. “She's grown up around lots of both. She knows the difference. On the other hand, she's a young girl, who saw her mother killed. Her memories of that night are confused.”

  “Would you mind if I talked to Eliza?” Joe asked. “Just to confirm what she saw—”

  “Is this about Eliza?” Connolly asked sharply. “Or about me?”

  Surprised but not showing it, Joe took a breath. “Why don't you tell me,” he asked slowly, “what you have in mind?”

  Dan shook his head, then rested his forehead in his hands. Joe sat back, giving him time. He knew that Dan had something to say, and he'd held the story inside as long as he could. It was eating him up: Joe knew the signs.

  “I'm glad you're here,” Dan finally said. “I was going to call you. There's something I have to tell you. It's about Sean McCabe and my daughter's trust fund . . . the Eliza Day trust.”

  BACK AT THE OFFICE, JOE HOLMES CALLED HIS CHIEF, NICK Nicholson, to report that he now had confirmation that McCabe had wanted to use the Eliza Day trust to “park” funds embezzled from other accounts.

  “Was Dan Connolly involved?” the chief asked.

  “No. I'm sure of it. But it's weird—I went to ask Connolly questions about his wife's death, and he winds up answering questions about McCabe.”

  “You had already noticed irregularities in the trust.”

  “Yes. Which Connolly didn't even know about. The wrongdoing occurred before his wife's death. He was unaware.”

  “So, if McCabe was already parking money in the Eliza Day trust, why would he need Connolly's participation?”

  “McCabe was all over him, the minute he figured out that Connolly's business was in trouble.”

  “Business in trouble?” Nick asked skeptically.

  “I know, I know,” Joe said. Usually that was a red flag for financial misdeeds, but his gut told him that this time it wasn't. “Look, I might be wrong, but I think McCabe and the UNSUB were just waiting Connolly out.”

  “Waiting him out?”

  “Yeah. He was ripe for the picking. After his wife's death, he had some difficulty holding it together. The business, his daughter . . . everything was falling apart around his ears, and he was running as fast as he could to hold on.

  “Anyway, here's my theory. McCabe had been using the trust already; he wanted Connolly's go-ahead to start actually taking money—not just parking it. If Dan Connolly was broke or desperate enough, Sean could look like a hero, sending funds his way while skimming for himself.”

  “So, Sean was trying to recruit someone new.”

  “Yes.”

  “The way he'd recruited people before. Because he didn't do this alone.”

  “Right,” Joe said. McCabe was kiting checks, money orders; he would deposit small amounts into his Anchor account. The big money would be parked in large accounts, like the Eliza Day trust.

  Joe examined the trust statements spread across his desk. “Eventually funds were moved offshore. But that came later. I think he used other trusts as well—as a trustee, he could
write checks, retrieve the money when needed.”

  “He probably preyed on people who had had recent losses, deaths—people like Connolly who weren't interested in the financial details.”

  “Right,” Joe said. “But then it gets interesting. About a month before he died, McCabe starts paying people back. It's subtle, in just a couple of cases—but I think if I keep digging, I'll find a pattern there.”

  “You're saying he found a conscience? That's rare—he's been successfully stealing from his clients for how long? And he suddenly decides to go clean?”

  What happened to you, Joe wondered, staring at the balance sheets. What changed your mind?

  “I'm staring at that first big deposit, sixty-two thousand dollars, going into the Eliza Day trust just over a year and a half ago,” Joe said quietly, running his finger down the column.

  “Before Mrs. Connolly died.”

  “She did know,” Joe said, reviewing the papers.

  “Was she part of the thing?” Nick asked.

  “Or did it get her killed?” Joe asked, staring at the numbers, and then at the notations and drawing on the manila folder. “Could she be ‘the girl'?”

  “Doesn't track. The timing's off.”

  “True. It couldn't be Charlie getting killed—that was a full year before he started making restitution on the accounts. So, what happened to Sean?”

  “Maybe the UNSUB threatened his family. Keep going along, or he'd hurt his wife. Or one of their daughters.”

  “Run her down with a truck?” A dark red van? Joe wondered.

  “Hasn't happened yet—maybe Sean took the bullet for whoever it was. He followed through on his plan to get out, and his buddy killed him. Why bother with his family now?”

  “And have you noticed all the trouble started after Boland got to Shoreline? The UNSUB has to be Boland,” Joe said.

  “Can't be Boland,” Nick said. “He was clean at Anchor Trust. There was never a complaint, never even a hint of wrongdoing on his watch. What, he goes over to a new bank and suddenly goes bad? Doesn't work that way. No, he walked into the den of thieves and shook everything up.”

  “So you think the partner is someone who was working with Sean before Boland arrived? Someone Sean enticed to join him?”

  “What about Fiona Mills, on that trip to Denver—”

  “Fiona Mills,” Joe said. “You know, during my last interview with her, she told me she was missing a silver trophy.”

  “Oh—that reminds me. Got a fax to send you; stand by.” Joe heard the sounds of paper rustling, the line dialing. His fax began to whir. He carried the phone across the office, to see what was coming through.

  “It's the results on that silver cup,” Nick said. “The one McCabe had in the safety-deposit box. Mickey sent the silversmith markings down to Quantico, and they farmed them out to some scholar at Penn. Turns out, from the markings, the cup's not that old—made in 1945.”

  Tucking the phone under his chin, Joe opened the safe, removed the cup. He stared at its handsome design, its long stem, the leaves and vines entwined at its base, and then scanned the report:

  The silvermaker's mark is that of Giovanni Armori, who worked in Florence, Italy, from 1930–1945. This chalice was the last he ever made, and it was produced for the parents of Anne-Marie Vezeley of Paris, for the occasion of a Catholic mass celebrating her wedding to the art dealer Jean-Paul Laurent.

  Armori was killed by the Germans on the same day he completed this commission; a courier for the Vezeley family escaped with the chalice, but he reported Armori's death. Many of the silvermaker's records were burned at the same time—just two weeks before the Americans arrived to liberate the region, in April, 1945.

  The chalice, a gift to the young couple from Anne-Marie's parents, remained in the Vezeley-Laurent family for twenty-five years. During that time, Jean-Paul Laurent, who specialized in prints, became known for selling prints by the most influential artists of the day, both in Paris and abroad. He and his wife enjoyed an exalted social life, and during the sixties, there were reports of Laurent smuggling works of art stolen by the Nazis out of Paris.

  This activity placed him within our field of interest. During the early 1970's, surveillance of the family apartment on the Avenue Montaigne in Paris's Eighth Arrondissement revealed that Madame Laurent entertained artists while her husband traveled on business. She was the lover of, among others, Pablo Picasso and Hugh Renwick.

  Agents reported a vicious fight one night, following Renwick's arrival at the apartment, direct from his flight into Orly, to discover Picasso on the balcony in his underwear. Shouting ensued, and a fight of such violence that police were called to break it up. It was during this altercation that Renwick sustained his famous scar. Although it came at the hand—and knife—of Picasso, Madame Laurent paid the police to keep it secret.

  As a way of mollifying Renwick, and perhaps buying his silence as well, Madame Laurent made a gift to him of the Armori chalice.

  The Armori chalice then crossed the Atlantic, smuggled in the luggage—the painting case—of Hugh Renwick, and has been assumed to be at his family home, Firefly Hill in Black Hall, Connecticut, ever since.

  “So,” Joe said, as he read, “this cup belongs to Augusta Renwick.”

  “The rich really are different,” Nick said. “But we knew that.”

  “The question is, did she give the chalice to McCabe or did he take it?”

  “Maybe she's our UNSUB,” Nick said.

  “Augusta Renwick?” Joe laughed. “I don't think so. You'd have to meet her to appreciate how wrong you are.”

  “Think about it,” Nick said. “She's old, she's rich, she's bored. She has some young—well, young to her—studly banker managing her affairs. They get to talking. She tells him about the artistic shenanigans of her husband Hugh, a little smuggling here, a little beating up Picasso there—next thing you know, they're Bonnie and Clyde.”

  “I'll remember that when I go question her.”

  “Good luck,” Nick said. “Quite a town you've stumbled into.”

  “Yeah. Black Hall. Garden spot of the East Coast. Just don't bank your money here,” Joe said, checking his watch. Andy's had closed while he'd been talking to Nick, reviewing the information about the cup.

  So, no running into Tara tonight.

  On the other hand, it felt good to have solved one part of the three-part safety-deposit box mystery. That left two to go. And the chance to drop in on the inimitable Mrs. Renwick.

  27

  YOU FOUND IT,” AUGUSTA RENWICK SAID BREATHILY, clutching the silver chalice to her heart. “My Florizar cup!”

  “Florizar cup?” Joe Holmes asked, frowning.

  “Yes,” Augusta said. “That's the name of my favorite drink—shall I fix us one?”

  “I'm on duty, Mrs. Renwick,” Joe said. “And I'll have to have that cup back, for evidence.”

  “Well, I'm not on duty, and you'll get it back after we discuss a few things. Come out with me to the flower room, and tell me what the Federal Bureau of Investigation is doing with my Florizar cup.”

  Firefly Hill, her home, was truly incredible, filled with Hugh Renwick's paintings, statues of the Buddha and Hindu deities carved from rare jade and exotic woods, a totem pole, a cabinet of what looked like Fabergé eggs, and about a million pictures of the Renwick sisters, their husbands, and their children. The flower room had a stainless steel sink and counter, and Augusta explained that, although it doubled as a bar now, it had traditionally been used all summer for arranging flowers.

  “Firefly Hill used to have magnificent gardens and now, thanks to Bay McCabe, will again. How is that case coming, by the way? Have you retrieved any of my money?”

  “No, but we retrieved your cup,” he said, watching her carefully as she stood on tiptoes, reaching for a bottle.

  “What does that have to do with the case?” she asked, indicating that she would like him to get the bottle down.

  “First, tell me what you kno
w about the cup, Mrs. Renwick. Why did you call it ‘Florizar'?”

  She laughed, clinking ice cubes into the silver cup and also into a tall glass. “A joke,” she said. “A private joke. You see, I used to tell myself that I always came in second . . . with my own husband. While he was out romancing the wives of other men, I was home with our beautiful girls. I was like the second-place finisher.”

  Joe nodded, waiting. At eighty or so, the woman was still charming and beautiful. Cold air blew through the flower room's uninsulated walls, but as if untouched by the chill, she happily cut slices of lime and ginger.

  “You see, Mr. Holmes,” she said. “Florizar ran second in the 1900 Kentucky Derby, after Lieutenant Gibson.” She filled the glass with Diet Coke, dropped in some lime and ginger, and handed it to him. “I prevailed, however. I married Hugh, and we loved each other until he died; in our own fashion, of course.”

  “The man was very fortunate,” Joe said.

  “Indeed. A true Florizar has some lovely Russian vodka in it—are you sure you wouldn't like some?”

  “I'm on duty, ma'am,” he reminded her.

  She peered at him, raising her glass to toast. “Someday, when you are not on duty, it would be a true pleasure to drink with you.”

  “I agree,” he said, smiling.

  “Now, dear, tell me,” Augusta said. “Where did you find the cup?”

  “It was in a safety-deposit box rented by Sean McCabe.”

  “I knew it!” she gasped. “I told Tara I thought he had taken it.”

  “Mrs. Renwick,” Joe said, jolted by the mention of Tara's name, “what did you tell her? What made you think McCabe would have taken it?”

  Mrs. Renwick opened her mouth to speak, but then a strange thing happened. She took a long, thoughtful drink from her Florizar, and her violet eyes sparkled.