“He doesn’t want the Dracula stuff?” she asked.
“It’s not his type.”
As she tottered away, Victor produced a cell phone, which I recognized as Swing’s. “I’ve been going through Pierre’s emails and texts,” he said. “Also his calendar.”
“Find anything interesting?” I stuck the straw into my drink.
“Not really,” he said. “Nothing on his social media either.”
“No posts like ‘So-and-so wants to do me in, I’d better watch my back’?”
“If only it were that simple.” Listlessly he thumbed the screen, his forehead marred by a slight frown.
“What?” I said. He didn’t look up. “What’s bothering you, Victor?”
“Nothing. It’s just… I’m frustrated by the lack of progress. Every day that passes makes it’s less likely Pierre’s killer will be caught.”
I sensed that wasn’t the whole story. Instead of harassing him further, I held out my hand for the phone. With a sigh he passed it to me.
As I scrolled through Swing’s emails, I began to comprehend the source of Victor’s discomfort. He’d told Cullen that whenever Swing had found himself involved in the occasional serious relationship, he’d never cheated. He had too much honor for that, according to Victor. And yet the emails I was now reading, sent to and from several women in the days before Swing’s death, left little doubt that Cullen was right and that Victor hadn’t known his brother as well as he thought he had. Swing had been cheating on his fiancée big time.
He and Chloe had exchanged emails, too, of course, but surprisingly, those all pertained to business. Where were the intimate little messages? The cloying emoticons and XOXOXOs? It seemed odd until I considered that they were engaged and lived in the same town. Why waste effort on lovey-dovey emails to your betrothed when the two of you can get your lovey-dovey on in person anytime you want?
Maybe that was their problem, the whole absence-makes-the-heart-grow-fonder thing. Maybe Swing was the kind of guy who thrived on the chase and got bored once he’d snagged his quarry. He wouldn’t be the first.
His emails were brief and to the point, composed for the most part of sentence fragments and abbreviations, with few fancy-schmancy flourishes such as punctuation or capitalization. The communications of a busy man.
I glanced at Victor, who sat staring out the window, lost in thought, even after Cheyenne plunked his smoothie in front of him. I thumbed an icon on the screen, producing Swing’s texting history. More of same. Terse, get-to-the-point texts, even when arranging an assignation with this or that nubile young thing. I recognized the name of a well-known model who’d tossed back a few before grabbing the mic during Swing’s funeral reception. So. I was right. It hadn’t been all lies and exaggerations.
“Victor, I…” What could I say? I’m sorry you had to find out your revered late brother was fallible?
He shrugged and held out his hand for the phone. “Did you look at the calendar?” When I shook my head, he pulled up Swing’s electronic calendar and angled the phone so we could both see the screen. The entries here were downright cryptic. Plus they were in a combination of English and French that made them next to impossible to decipher—for me at least.
“The calendar agrees with the emails and texts,” he said.
“You mean like when he arranged his, um, meetings—”
“His dates. Like here after he texted this Brianna to meet him at the Greenwich Hotel at seven o’clock on August nineteenth.” Swing’s calendar reminder for 7:00 p.m. that day was b green.
“You know,” I said, “maybe Swing had every intention of settling down and being a faithful husband once he and Chloe got married. Maybe this was kind of a last hurrah?”
His expression said, Thanks for trying. “I know you think I’m being unrealistic about Pierre, about his character, but I knew him, Jane. This…” He tossed his hand at the phone. “It just doesn’t feel right.” He meandered through his brother’s calendar, scrolling backward in time through the summer. A gentle smile tugged at his mouth.
“What?” I peered at the entry for July 4: dom p. “He saw Dom that day? What does p mean?”
His smile grew lopsided. “Naturally you would read it that way. Pierre took Chloe to the fireworks on July Fourth, remember? The white tablecloth, the champagne? Dom Perignon has always been his favorite.”
“Ah, I get it. But that’s his whole calendar entry for the night he proposes to Chloe? A reminder to bring champagne?”
“This is typical Pierre. It would be tragic if he forgot the most important thing—the Dom Perignon! Without that, it’s just a picnic with explosions.”
“And, hello? An engagement ring,” I reminded him.
“Yes, but without the right champagne?” Victor let his Gallic shrug say the rest.
Movement from beyond the big picture windows snagged my attention. Three teenage girls stood on the sidewalk staring in at us, their faces practically pressed to the glass. I say they were staring at us, but that’s not quite accurate. All their attention was on Victor.
The instant he turned toward them, they erupted in giggles. “Do you know them?” he asked.
“The blond one looks familiar,” I said. “I think I’ve seen her around town.”
She appeared to be the bold one, egging on the other two. Within seconds they stood next to our table.
“Mr. Doo-wat?” The girl wore fashionable black-framed glasses, her pale hair cut in a severe bob. She blushed fiercely. “I’m Ariel. This is Phoebe and Mandy,” she added, indicating her pals. All three had backpacks slung over their shoulders. Clearly they’d just gotten out of school. Phoebe was a tall Asian girl. Mandy had a blue streak in her long brown hair.
“A pleasure to meet you,” Victor said, which triggered another bout of giggles. “This is my friend Jane.”
They dutifully murmured “hi,” with barely a glance in my direction.
“We just want you to know,” Ariel said, “that we think you’re totally innocent.”
“We know you’re totally innocent,” Mandy said.
Phoebe said, “Like you couldn’t have done what they say you did.”
“How can they even think that?” Ariel said.
“Uh…” Victor glanced at me as if seeking guidance.
My eye-shrug said, You’re on your own.
“Well, I appreciate your confidence,” he said. “Thank you.”
I asked, “Do you girls go to Crystal Harbor High?”
They nodded in unison. Phoebe said, “Like, everyone at school’s talking about Swing and who might’ve killed him.”
“What are they saying?” I asked.
“Well, some kids think Victor did it,” Mandy said, “’cause they read it on some stupid site or something.”
“It’s so unfair!” Ariel said. “Anybody can tell you’re innocent.”
Why? Because he was a hottie? Lee Romano’s words invaded my thoughts. Ted Bundy was young and good-looking too.
Phoebe shoved her phone and a Sharpie at Victor. The phone was enclosed in a pink metallic case. “Would you, like, sign my phone?”
“I’m… not comfortable doing that,” he said.
Ariel smacked her friend’s shoulder. “I told you not to ask him.”
“Listen, girls.” I stood, prompting Victor to do the same. “We have to get going, but it was nice meeting you.”
“Hang in there,” Mandy told him.
“We’re rooting for you,” Ariel said, as if Swing’s murder investigation were some sort of sporting event.
After I dropped Victor off at the house, I swung by the high school, where swim practice had just let out. Tucker hopped into the car and I drove us to the home of the late Dr. Walters, whose collection of antique medical instruments I was in the process of cataloging. I’d promised the boy he could take a look at the collection, and the doc’s family had no problem with it.
Yeah, don’t tell me yet what a swell person I am. I had an ulter
ior motive for keeping Kari’s boyfriend busy for an hour or so, and even though it was something that had to be done, it didn’t keep my conscience from tweaking me when the boy thanked me yet again for doing him this cool favor.
He was fascinated by the bizarre old devices. I’d wondered about the sort of people who collect this stuff, but viewing the artifacts through Tucker’s eyes as he fiddled with the wooden stethoscope, the brass-and-glass syringe, the stained chloroform inhaler, I began to see the appeal. He spent a long time examining a military amputation set from the Civil War, speculating aloud on how many limbs this particular bone saw might have severed.
And okay, this whole exercise could be considered kind of creepy in light of our town’s recent unsolved murder, but I chose not to dwell on that. And nearly succeeded.
Tucker was lifting the lid on an exquisitely decorated porcelain jar labeled “Leeches” when my cell phone burped, informing me a text had come in. It was Martin: Where are you? I texted back: Doc’s house. His response came almost immediately: Address. I supplied it, adding, You done yet?
He didn’t text back and I forgot about it as Tucker began to tell me everything he knew about the medical use of leeches, both historical and current. Yeah, that’s right, the medical establishment has essentially come full circle and once again embraces the application of blood-sucking worms as a viable therapy. Oh, and maggots, too.
No, I did not make that up! Tucker told me all about it, and for the record, I’ll take leeches over maggots. Just in case I’m ever, you know, unconscious and you have to make the decision for me.
Tucker, no doubt inspired by the look on my face, was still regaling me with the gruesome particulars of how maggots are used for wound therapy (“Open your laptop, there are some cool videos”) when the doorbell rang a few minutes later. Thank you! I mentally cried as I jumped up to answer it.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, looking past Martin to that big Harley of his parked haphazardly in the driveway. “I thought we were going to—” I shut my trap since Tucker was within earshot, in the living room just beyond the front vestibule.
I couldn’t recall ever seeing the padre look so grave. We’d planned to meet up at Murray’s Pub a few hours later so he could report back on the thing I’d asked him to do. Not a Death Diva assignment, more along the lines of a personal favor.
Relief softened his expression as he looked me over. Relief at what? He ignored my inquisitive expression and gazed past me to Tucker, who was carefully repacking the leech jar in bubble wrap. They exchanged greetings and Martin joined us as we finished perusing the collection. The boy didn’t ask what the padre was doing there, for which I was grateful since I didn’t know myself.
When we were finally done, it was nearly dinnertime. I asked Martin, “Do you still want to, um, go for a beer later?”
He shrugged, clearly preoccupied. “Maybe.”
As I drove Tucker to his family home on the other side of Crystal Harbor, Martin stayed right behind us on his Harley. Tucker didn’t appear to notice, but my gaze kept flicking to the rearview mirror. I shivered. I wasn’t liking this one little bit.
Martin hung back a half block while I dropped off Tucker, who thanked me yet again before disappearing into his house. My phone burped. I really should find a more polite-sounding text notification. It was the padre, natch, telling me to meet him at the railroad station a couple of miles away.
We pulled up next to the waiting room at the same time. He dismounted and joined me in my car, sliding into the passenger seat recently vacated by Tucker. Afternoon rush hour was in full swing. An eastbound train had just come through. Passengers descended the staircase from the platform level, some headed to the parking lot, some to idling cars and taxis.
Martin turned to me, his expression bleak. “It’s him.”
I clapped a hand over the gasp that erupted. My heart kicked. “No! No, it can’t be Tucker.”
“We have to call this in.” The cops, he meant. Cullen.
“Wait.” I grabbed his hand, which felt hot under my icy fingers. “Just… Just tell me. Tell me what you found.”
I’d asked Martin to watch the Nearings’ house that afternoon. I knew their housekeeper went home at four o’clock. I knew the boy’s parents would both be at work. I knew Tucker had one sibling, an older married sister who lived in Jersey. Once he was certain no one was home, Martin was to quickly and quietly enter the house—and yes, we’re talking about that cute little lock-pick set he never leaves home without—and slip up to Tucker’s room to check on his shoe size while I kept the boy occupied clear across town with assorted bone saws and leech jars. Quick and simple, no harm done.
All right, yes, technically it was breaking and entering, but you tell me what you would have done under the same circumstances, with Detective Paul Cullen in charge of an investigation that threatened to send your ex-husband, who just happened to be The Nicest Guy in the World, to prison for the rest of his life for a horrible crime that he definitely, no doubt about it, could not have committed.
Martin is the only person I could have asked to perform this particular favor. He knows it and I think he likes it that way, likes being the bad boy with a shadowy past, likes having me depend on him when things get hairy.
He said, “I found the shoes, Jane.”
“So he wears size thirteen, so what?” I swallowed hard. “That doesn’t make him a killer. It doesn’t prove anything.”
“No, I mean I found the shoes.” He waited for that to sink in.
A strange sound escaped my throat, a small animal sound.
Martin squeezed my hand. He sighed. Something told me he didn’t want this to be true any more than I did. “The sneakers in Tucker’s closet have the exact same soles as the pictures you sent me,” he said. I’d emailed him the shoe-print photos I’d taken in the restaurant kitchen.
“There must be hundreds of guys with those exact same sneakers,” I said. “Thousands. It doesn’t—”
“There’s blood,” he said. “Dried blood in the treads.”
“How can you be sure it’s bl—” I cut myself off and raised a hand, forestalling his answer, knowing it would come under the broad category of Things I Would Rather Not Know About Martin.
So. I’d spent the past couple of hours at the doc’s house with the person who’d almost certainly plunged that big knife into Swing’s chest. Just the two of us, Tucker and me. “Why didn’t you call or text me with this as soon as you knew?” I asked.
“I was afraid that if you knew, you wouldn’t be able to keep your cool,” he said. “You might have given it away, put yourself in danger—more danger than you were already in, that is, just being there alone with him.”
I wanted to tell him he was wrong, that I would have been the consummate actress, that Tucker never would have suspected a thing. But deep inside, I knew Martin had made the right call.
“You made it over there pretty fast,” I said, “from Tucker’s house to the doc’s. What if you’d gotten stopped for speeding?”
“They’d have had to catch me first.”
I imagined Martin on that big motorcycle, burning rubber, running lights, because of me. Because I’d been alone with a presumptive murderer. His concern sparked a warm little glow of satisfaction, immediately snuffed out by the bigger issue confronting us.
Tucker. Kari’s besotted beau.
I love you, Kari. I’d do anything for you. Anything!
I groped for the door handle as that papaya-ginger smoothie I’d consumed hours earlier threatened to make a repeat appearance. I staggered away from the car and suddenly Martin’s hands were on me, those solid, sturdy hands steering me around the car and onto the walkway flanking the waiting room, which at the moment was nearly deserted. I couldn’t get air, I was drowning.
He held me and coached me through this strange new thing called breathing. I shook my head, trying to form words. I was not to talk, he instructed, my job was to breathe, to think about nothing
else. So I did. I pulled air in and pushed it out. I did it again and then again. My head dropped to his hard shoulder and he smelled so good and I was trembling too badly to stand on my own. My heart banged and banged and I knew he had to feel it, he was holding me so close.
Gradually I registered his arm banded around my back, his other hand stroking my hair. My armpits were damp. I felt like I’d run a race. But my breathing had eased at last. The dizziness had abated. I closed my eyes and allowed myself simply to feel Martin’s warmth, the enveloping security of his embrace, and tried to forget what had prompted it.
Finally I raised my head. He brushed strands of hair off my face. He searched my eyes. “Okay?”
“That wasn’t a panic attack,” I said.
“Of course not,” he said, without a hint of a smirk, a kindness that made me want to kiss him.
“I don’t get panic attacks. I don’t know what that was.”
“All right.”
He seemed in no hurry to release me, so I gently pulled away, fearing the awkwardness of a lingering embrace more than the loss of his comforting warmth. Silly me.
Instead I hugged myself. “I guess I assumed we’d get together at Murray’s later and you’d tell me he wears size twelve and he’s in the clear.”
“I wish it had worked out that way.”
“Okay.” I took a deep breath. “What’s next?”
“Cullen.”
I groaned. “Fine, but what do I say when he asks how I found out about Tucker’s bloody shoes?”
“You’re not going to talk to him, I am.”
“Oh yeah, big improvement,” I said. “He’ll really listen to you. Where are you going?”
I followed Martin around the building to a secluded spot under the train trestle that housed a pay phone. Okay, I guess it made sense to call anonymously. But… “Won’t he recognize your voice?” I asked.
Perforating Pierre (Jane Delaney Mysteries Book 3) Page 14
