Angel Sleuth

by Lesley A. Diehl

  Mary Jane sighed and got up from the table. “Well, I’m glad that’s settled then.”

  “There’s more.”

  Mary Jane sank back into the chair. “Oh. What?”

  “Your name. It’s not Smith, is it?”

  “Smith? Uh, not usually.”

  “And it’s also not Cousin Mary’s last name either, is it?”

  “Of course it is or was, until I changed it.”

  “Changed it? Why?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  Kaitlin sat in the chair across from Mary Jane. “Try me.” By now, she thought Mary Jane would be squirming around in her seat, but not a flinch, not a twitch. She looked as if she’d just walked through a field of daisies. If she was in the Witness Protection Program, wouldn’t she be a little uncomfortable with someone cross-examining her this way? Maybe she was used to intensive interrogations.

  “It was to honor my father.”

  “Your father?”

  “Sleepy.”

  “Your last name is Sleepy?”

  “No, silly,” she said. She got up, put her bowl in the sink, and began washing it. “Well, that was his nickname. His full name was Antonio Botano.”

  Again, thought Kaitlin. Again, this conversation was going nowhere. She gritted her teeth and tried to keep the frustration out of her voice. “I don’t get it.”

  “Oh, right. You never met Daddy. He was usually too busy to come visit with Mom and me. Besides, Dad had narcolepsy, and it was kind of hard socializing. You could never tell when he’d fall asleep.”

  “He had what? Oh, never mind. I still don’t get it. If your name isn’t Botano, and it’s not Smith, and it’s not Sleepy, then please, please tell me what it is.” Kaitlin clasped her hands together as if in prayer and gave Mary Jane a pleading look.

  “Well, it’s Pajamas.”

  The back door swung open and Jeremy rushed in.

  “No sign of Dessie?” asked Mary Jane.

  “No,” Jeremy said.

  Kaitlin sat, brain-confused at the table, wondering if Jeremy’s interruption had just saved her from Mary Jane’s version of Hide-And-Seek. She watched Mary Jane throw soapy hands around her son and give him a hug.

  “I’m so sorry, sweetie,” she said to her son.

  “Me too,” said Kaitlin.

  * * *

  There was a small wrinkle in Friday evening’s plans. Nothing too serious. Kaitlin would be attending with two dates. Paul agreed to be her escort, and he seemed excited about the prospect of breathing the same air as some wealthy citizens of the Hudson River valley and midtown Manhattan.

  But Jim insisted the gathering offered the right opportunity for collaring Hiram. Rather than have the state police skulking about the place, Kaitlin persuaded him to squire her to the party and make the bust himself. He assured her that his backup would be down the drive on the main road and not climbing around in the petunia beds or hanging from the clematis vines.

  She didn’t have the nerve to inform either Paul or Jim about the other attending as her date also. She figured she’d manage some explanation when the night arrived.

  * * *

  “Who’s that?” Paul was sipping a glass of dry sherry in her living room Friday evening when a car pulled up in front of the house. He dressed in a red plaid bow tie with white dinner jacket and dark pants. He’d slicked his white hair back with pomade, and he smelled of Old Spice.

  The courage to tell him about her other swain failed her earlier when the cab dropped him at her door, and he presented Kaitlin with a flower corsage made up of a single gardenia. She couldn’t remember the last time she received flowers. She had flowers at her wedding, but she’d chosen them and paid for them too. Then she remembered. It had to have been when Hiram took me to the prom. She removed the pin from the Paul’s arrangement and chose to wear it on her wrist using the elastic provided.

  Jim rang the doorbell and waited on the porch with a box in his hand. She hesitated, knowing she had caught herself in the middle of a triangle, and she would have to extract herself somehow.

  “Aren’t you going to answer that?” Paul asked.

  “In,” was all she could say.

  Jim stepped into the living room and spied Paul on the couch. He looked confused for a moment, then approached Paul, who arose from the couch. They introduced themselves, shook hands and turned to stare at Kaitlin, the expressions on their faces inviting some explanation.

  She took a deep breath and glanced at Jim. He wore an Armani suit, a kind of rumpled-casual-lots-of-money look so different from what she expected of a cop. But he looked fine in it, and he smelled of some expensive men’s cologne. The box he held read “Flanders’s Flowers.”

  “Better give me that.” She took the container out of his hands, opened it, and extracted a wrist corsage which she placed on her other arm. Now she had a single gardenia on each wrist.

  “I think we should sit down for this.” Kaitlin poured Jim a sherry, refilled Paul’s glass and wished she could upend a bottle of scotch down her throat.

  “I asked Paul to be my date.” She looked at Jim. “And I asked Jim along to arrest someone.” That ought to be explanation enough. She could have used Mary Jane’s singularly slippery approach to difficult situations, but she and Mac had left earlier for Mother’s party. The two men sat on the couch sipping their drinks. Kaitlin sank into the recliner and wrung her hands.

  “Well, I guess that makes sense then,” Paul said. Jim nodded his head in agreement.

  * * *

  Her mother was speechless when she introduced her dates.

  “I said a date, dear, not an entourage of men,” Arlene whispered in her ear.

  She presented Jim as a reporter from another weekly newspaper, and Paul came as himself, her dancing partner from ARC. Mother’s husband, Harold, showed them to the bar and made several introductions. Most of the people at the party were business executives, doctors, lawyers, traders, and media moguls, people Harold knew from the days he worked on Wall Street.

  Mother told her the party was a small get together with just a few people, but Kaitlin knew better than to be misled by that description. There were almost a hundred people in the room, and it was early. The wealthier guests, especially those who thought overly well of themselves, would make an entrance later.

  Paul’s blue eyes twinkled in the chandeliers’ light. He seemed doubly pleased when he heard music from a small ensemble playing in the nearby ballroom. He held his arm out to Kaitlin’s mother, and the pair led the way for couples to join them in a foxtrot.

  “Should we?” asked Jim. He was a big man, but graceful enough to attract the attention of most of the women in the room. He could probably stumble his way across the dance floor like a drunken monkey and draw the same looks of admiration and, yes, passion. He held Kaitlin at arm’s length. She could feel the muscles in his shoulders move underneath his coat, and her knees felt like gelatin.

  She was about to suggest they sit down when Paul tapped Jim on the shoulder to cut in. He twirled her away from Jim and Mother.

  Looking elegant in a filmy apricot dress, Mary Jane danced in Mac’s arms. “Hi,” she said.

  “Look who’s here.” Paul nodded toward the ballroom entrance. Kaitlin caught a glimpse of someone who looked familiar, but she couldn’t remember where she had seen him. He was entering the door with a briefcase, handing his coat over to the valet. He paused in the doorway, running one hand through his wavy black hair. His glance touched people in the room, coming to rest on Arlene and Harold.

  Paul filled her in. “You probably never met him, but he’s Dr. Robert Sardino; he’s on the board of directors at ARC.

  Of course. Kaitlin remembered Toliver mentioning Sardino’s name when he reprimanded her for eavesdropping outside his office.

  “No, I never met him, but I saw him once.” She told Paul about the conversation she overheard. The music stopped, and Arlene hurried across the floor with Jim in tow.

  “D
r. Sardino just arrived. I’m dying for you to meet him. Where’s Mary Jane and her date, that big, gruff looking guy?”

  “Right here,” Kaitlin said. She turned to the spot she’d last seen Mary Jane, but all she caught was a glimpse of frothy silk dancing in the doorway to the terrace. Then it disappeared.

  Chapter 24

  “They were right here, Mother,” said Kaitlin.

  “No matter. I can introduce them later.” Arlene pulled Jim after her while herding Paul and Kaitlin toward the entrance to the ballroom.

  “Arlene. I hope I’m only fashionably late, and I do apologize for my shabby appearance, but I drove right up from my clinic and didn’t have time to change. I hope you’ll forgive me.” Sardino’s dark face wore that sheen heavily bearded men evidenced when they shaved too close or too often. Kaitlin caught a whiff of expensive European men’s cologne when she got near him.

  He took Arlene’s hand in his and raised it to his lips. His appearance was anything but shabby, at least with respect to dress and grooming. It was clear he wore more money on his back than Kaitlin usually saw in a year. But he made her feel uncomfortable, as if he were assessing her worth on the call girl market.

  “And this must be your lovely daughter.” He went for her hand, but she raised it and wiggled her fingers in a wave at him.

  “Hi. I think we’re ships passing in the night. I’ve been appointed the ombudsman at ARC, and you’re on the board.”

  “You must give me your number, and I’ll call you next time I’m there for a board meeting. We can have coffee.”

  Smooth. The man was definitely smooth. He turned toward Paul and Jim. Arlene made introductions. Paul made no mention of being a resident at ARC, and Jim kept the cover of newspaper reporter.

  Dr. Sardino’s attention wandered to others in the room. Kaitlin suspected he thought he was wasting his time with them and wanted more interesting, perhaps wealthier prey. The three of them wandered off, but not before she heard him ask her mother where he could store his briefcase for safe keeping. Arlene nodded to one of the servants, handed him the briefcase and whispered in his ear. All Kaitlin caught of her mother’s words were “master bedroom.”

  “Stay here, Kaitlin. Paul, you keep an eye on her. I’ve got to make a phone call.” Jim flipped open his cell phone and walked through the French doors out onto the terrace.

  Kaitlin glanced for a brief moment at Jim’s retreating back, but her eyes quickly returned to the man carrying Sardino’s briefcase as he made for the stairs.

  “Uhm, Paul. I gotta pee, and I usually don’t need a chaperone for my bathroom activities. I’ll be back in a jiff.”

  Before Paul could say no, she dashed out of the ballroom and into the foyer. Kaitlin assumed all of the bedrooms were on the second floor, so she headed up the curved staircase, looking for the master bedroom.

  She was opening one of the doors when a voice from behind her enquired, “May I help you miss?” It was the manservant, and his hands were empty.

  “Ah, yes. Mother asked me to get something out of her bedroom, but I don’t know which one is hers.” She held her breath, worried he would hear the quaver in her voice and guess she was lying.

  “Yes, Miss.” He pointed down the hall. “It’s the second door on the left, Miss.” He turned on his heel and continued back down the hallway toward the stairs. She let out her breath and swallowed the dry fear in her throat.

  She opened the door to a room about half the size of the ballroom, but equipped with a huge four poster bed draped in shades of red and gold satin. She suppressed a giggle. The place looked like a bordello. Off the room on either side was a bathroom. She could fit the entire downstairs of her Aldensville house in each one of them.

  She assumed the briefcase would be in clear view, but the room, aside from its opulent furnishings was empty. She got down on her hands and knees and looked under the bed. Nothing there. Just her luck. It was probably locked in a safe. As she was getting to her feet, she heard voices in the hall. The door to the room began to open. She looked around for a hiding place. Only the bed. She wiggled under it.

  “Arlene, Arlene, I’m so disappointed. I thought you were impressed with the medications I prescribed for you.” It was Dr. Sardino’s voice.

  “Well, I am, Bob.” Bob? Mother called this slimy character Bob?

  “Then why are you and Harold so reluctant to invest in my pharmaceutical company? We have the highest manufacturing standards, and we sell at the lowest prices. Drug companies that charge exorbitant prices for medications are ripping off the American public, and no one is making any real money except for a few big companies. It’s a monopoly. If my enterprise takes off, you and Harold will reap the benefits of drugs at a reasonable price, and even the poor will be able to afford their medications.”

  “Harold wants to see a prospectus before he decides.”

  “Yes, yes, and I have it with me. Now where did you put that briefcase?”

  She saw her mother’s shoes approach and heard a rustling noise near the head of the bed.

  “Here it is,” Arlene said. “Just where I asked our man Jeffrey to place it for safe keeping. I knew you wouldn’t want it lying around in plain sight.”

  “Ah ha. How clever of you, putting it under your pillow. You know, I’ve always thought of you as a very clever woman, Arlene, and a very attractive one, too.”

  What a line of…

  Someone sat down on the bed. From the shoes she knew it was Sardino. She could hear him leafing through papers.

  “Here we are. Now be a good girl and make sure that Harold sees this, soon, tonight if possible. We need to move fast on this one. I have other investors who want in, and I can’t promise a share to everyone.”

  She felt the bed move a bit and again heard the stirring noises of Sardino, probably replacing the briefcase in its hiding place. She could see the feet move across the floor. The light from the hallway penetrated the room when the door opened, and footsteps sounded down the hall.

  What a break! Sooner or later a thorough search might turn up the briefcase, but Mother saved her the effort. She crawled out from under the bed, pushed the pillow to one side and pulled back the satin spread.

  There were few papers in the briefcase; most of them were copies of the prospectus mentioned in the conversation and some folded up letters. Letters. She unfolded them and clicked on the bedside lamp for a closer look. Well, well. Frederica Hatfield’s letters.

  She scanned them and sank down onto the bed in shock.

  “Wowwee.” Too loud. She clapped her hand over her mouth. Again she heard footsteps. She slipped the letters back into the briefcase, placed it under the pillow and clicked off the light. It was too late to hide under the bed. The doorknob turned, and Dr. Sardino and her mother again entered the room.

  “Kaitlin. What are you doing?” Arlene asked.

  “I, uh, er, I was using the bathroom.” She gestured toward the room on the right.

  “We were just here and didn’t hear you,” Sardino said. Kaitlin didn’t care for the look on his face. He reminded her of a snake about to strike a field mouse.

  “I was just finishing up, washing my hands.” She held them up as if asking Mother to approve of her doing a good job. Dumb.

  “And you can’t hear the water running with the door closed. Soundproofed so that you don’t wake anyone sleeping in the bedroom,” Arlene said. She turned one of her thousand watt smiles on Sardino. Kaitlin didn’t know if she was speaking the truth or if she was trying to protect Kaitlin from Sardino for some reason.

  It was Kaitlin’s turn to back him down. “And just what are you doing up here, Dr. Sardino?” She tried to keep from glancing at the bed, hoping she’d smoothed the bedspread when she replaced the briefcase.

  “I came up to get my briefcase. Unfortunately, I have to leave early. Something just came up. I had a call from my service.” Sardino held up his cell phone. “You two go on ahead, and I’ll join you in a minute.”

&nb
sp; Out in the hall, Arlene gave her one of those what-have-you-been-up-to looks, but before she could say anything to Kaitlin, Sardino joined them, briefcase in hand, and they all headed back down to the party.

  “Where have you been?” Jim grabbed her arm as she reentered the ballroom. His tone of voice was sharp. But then, in a friendlier manner as if to apologize for his rudeness, he said, “Paul is dying to dance a tango with you.”

  She gave Sardino the smallest of good-bye waves, not that she was afraid he would kiss her hand. She was afraid he would bite it.

  As the strains of a tango filled the ballroom, Paul held his hand out to Kaitlin and twirled her into his arms. It could have been Scent of a Woman, or a fifties movie set in a nightclub in old Havana. She needed only a rose between her teeth to complete the picture. Paul and Kaitlin made a striking couple; Paul with his full head of white hair, and her with the slinky black dress she had borrowed from Brittany.

  She managed to step on his toes only once. Paul was a terrific dancer. The onlookers applauded them loudly when they finished, and they took a bow. She was flushed with happiness, not only at the joy of dancing with so skilled a partner, but because she knew a secret, one kept for close to forty years. And it was a doozy.

  Sweaty from the exertion of the dance, she excused herself and headed toward the French doors opening out from the ballroom to the back terrace. A breeze blew through the trees on the lawn and across the patio. Kaitlin welcomed its cooling effects by throwing her arms out and whirling around the patio in exuberance.

  An arm reached out from the shadows and curled itself around her waist. “Kaitlin.”

  Jim? No, it was the swain from hell.

  Hiram’s lips hovered close to her ear. “I understand you have a deal for me. I give you information about those letters, you give me a break with the cops, and what else did you have in mind?”

  His hand moved up from her waist lingering just below her breast. He bent his mouth to her neck, but then moved away from her.