Royal Heist

by Lynda La Plante

  “Philip Simmons?” she asked.

  “That’s right. He’s running the show. I get his orders from his architect and designers. They come down and check everything’s to their specifications.”

  “Do you have a contact number for Mr. Simmons?”

  The number he passed over was for a law firm in East Hampton. When she asked to be shown around, he said it was not possible.

  “Did you ever meet someone called David Lyons?”

  “Who?”

  “David Lyons was a business associate of Alex Moreno’s, and I wondered if you had ever met him here. Small, dark-haired, balding.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Would you mind if I showed you a photograph? It will only take a minute.”

  She took it out and passed it to Donnelly. She pointed to David. “That’s him.”

  He stared at the photograph, shook his head, and was about to pass it back when Sylvia stopped him. “Is that Philip Simmons with him? Just to the right.” She pointed to de Jersey.

  Donnelly stared at the picture. “It sort of looks like him. I dunno. Could be him.”

  “But you’re not certain? Please, look at it closely. Is that Philip Simmons?” Her heart was pounding.

  Donnelly stared at the photograph, then handed it back. “Like I said, it could be, but it’s hard to tell. Mr. Simmons has a mustache and red hair.”

  “But you do think it looks like him?”

  “Yes, sort of. What is all this about? Why are you here?”

  She stood up, rather flustered. “I’m trying to trace Mr. Simmons.”

  “Then I suggest you talk to his lawyers. I gave you their number.” He was obviously impatient for her to leave.

  Sylvia walked out of the Portakabin, then decided to take matters into her own hands. She wanted to check out the property, and if anyone asked she would say she was just another English tourist. She inched back over the wooden planks, then onto the path to the house. She made her way to the pool house and peered inside. A white marble floor had already been laid, and ornate light fittings were being hung. A boy with paint-stained dungarees passed her. “Hi there,” he said affably.

  “This is going to be very nice.”

  “Yeah, it sure is. That marble was shipped in from Italy, and one of those lights cost more than my year’s salary.” He grinned.

  “It’s a very large swimming pool,” she said.

  “Yeah, it’s one of the first things that was done out here. One end’s more than ten feet. Diving board’s gonna go at that end, and over there they’re gonna lay a tennis court.”

  Sylvia thanked him and headed for the guesthouse. She peered inside. It looked fit for Royalty. Then she returned to the cab.

  She had lunch in the hotel dining room. Her waiter was a young, rather handsome boy with dark, slanting eyes. He suggested the eggs Benedict, which were a specialty and served with home-cured ham. After she had finished he asked if she’d enjoyed it. “Delicious, thank you.”

  She decided to take a chance. “I wonder if you can help me. I’m trying to find someone who used to stay at this hotel, a friend. I’m desperate to get in touch with him. His name is Alex Moreno.” She looked at him directly. “Did you ever meet him?”

  “I met him,” he said softly.

  Sylvia flushed. Could she have struck lucky? “Oh, great! I can see you’re working now, but could we talk later?”

  “I’m off duty at two thirty, unless we get busy.” He stepped back.

  “I’m in room—”

  He shook his head. “Staff are not allowed to go into guests’ rooms, invited or not. House rules. I’ll be in the hotel parking lot at two thirty.”

  “What’s your name?” she asked.

  “Ricky.” He walked away but turned back briefly and gave her a dazzling smile.

  Sylvia went to the coffee area, where she ordered a cappuccino, disappointed that Donnelly had not clearly identified Simmons and de Jersey as the same man. She wondered if she was being foolish. Then, at two fifteen she saw Ricky leave the hotel and meet a blond man on the pavement. They talked for a few moments, then walked out of sight. Promptly at two thirty she went into the hotel car park. It was almost empty, with no more than seven parked vehicles. A black, soft-topped Jeep headed toward her. The blond she had seen talking to Ricky was driving, and Ricky was sitting in the small backseat.

  “Hi, you want to hop in?” he said. “We can drive to the beach.” He was tanned with white teeth, bluer than blue eyes, and a whiter than white cap-sleeved T-shirt.

  Sylvia climbed into the passenger seat.

  “I’m Clint,” said the driver. “What’s your name?”

  “Sylvia,” she said. “Where are we going?” she asked nervously.

  “Just to the beach. You want to talk, right?” All the way there, Clint chatted like a tour guide while Ricky remained silent.

  When they arrived, Clint helped her out and suggested they take a walk. Sylvia looked at Ricky, who remained in the backseat. “Aren’t you coming?” she asked.

  “It’s not me you need to talk to.” He nodded to Clint, who was putting on a leather jacket.

  Sylvia walked beside him. The wind was bitingly cold, so she pushed her hands into her coat pockets.

  “So, is there some cash in this for me?” he asked, staring ahead.

  “Well, I hadn’t anticipated paying anyone, but I can go a couple of hundred. I don’t know what you know that might help me.”

  “Maybe something, maybe nothing.” He hunched his shoulders against the wind.

  “You met Moreno?”

  He nodded, and they walked in silence. After a moment she said she needed to know what he could tell her before she agreed to pay him.

  He stopped. “Say five hundred?”

  Sylvia sighed. She was really cold now. “Okay, but it’s got to be worth it.”

  “Cash?”

  “Yes,” she said sharply.

  They walked on, and he turned toward some sand dunes. She followed him, and as they reached the dunes he jumped into a hollow. “Out of the wind here,” he said and sat down.

  Sylvia joined him. “So, what do you know about Alex Moreno?”

  Clint held out his hand. She opened her purse and counted out five hundred dollars. He pocketed them. “He was a real sharp dresser, designer labels, down to his socks. Never wore anything but the purest cashmere sweaters.” She had not paid out five hundred bucks for a clothing catalog, but she said nothing. “I used to meet him when he came down looking for property over the summer. He always ended up at a place called the Swamp, real late, always alone. Sometimes he’d have way too much to drink. He liked the odd joint too, always asking around if anyone had any grass. I guess he was down there maybe four or five times over a few months, and then one night, it would be about the sixth time I’d seen him, he said he was celebrating and did I want to have a drink with him. I said yeah. We both worked there, you see, me and Ricky. That’s how we met. Anyway, Moreno was sitting up at the bar, and he’d had a few already. He said he wanted to get blown, so after we closed he was waiting with his flash new Lexus. We went back to his hotel. He was drunk, and he told me he’d done this great deal, bought some property and got all the building permits agreed. He said it had taken months.”

  “When was this?”

  “Oh, around July, maybe mid-August. Next time I met up with him would have been around mid-November. Ricky tipped me off that he was in town. He was staying at the Maidstone. I got a call from him. He wanted to see me, so I met up with him at the Blue Parrot—it’s a bar on Main Street. We had a few drinks and went back to his hotel room. We were on the bed when he starts crying. He tells me he’s got into real trouble financially. He rambled on and on, blubbering like a kid about how it was all falling apart. Then he passed out. I took my money and left. I could have taken a lot more, but I reckoned he was the type to cause trouble.”

  “When was the last time you saw him?”

  “Okay,
this would be just after Christmas and he came in real late. We met up again in the bar. He looked beat, needed a shave, but was all cashmered up as usual.”

  “December?”

  “Yeah, said he’d come to sort out his property. He was having a hard time meeting payments. I thought he was just trying it on again, you know, not wanting to pay me, but then he says he’s real serious about me, wants me to come to New York. He was drinking heavily, said he was staying at the Maidstone as usual but he was meeting someone real early the following morning. Said he was gonna check out of the hotel before breakfast. He said he’d take me to New York and told me to get a taxi to his place for eight. I live way out in Montauk, right? So, anyway, this time he was real edgy, like nervous all the time. Kept on about how much trouble he was in and that he was having a lot of pressure from some guy.”

  “Did he tell you his name?”

  “Just that it was some builder.”

  “Donnelly?” she asked.

  “I can’t remember. I was real buzzy about him offering to take me to New York and to travel with him. He was making me big promises and, you know, come winter out here, it’s hard to make a living. Summer’s when I make the dough.”

  “You get paid for sex?”

  Clint’s face tightened. “Moreno offered me a trip, lady. Whatever I get paid for is my own goddamned business.”

  “I’m sorry. Please go on. You agreed to accompany him to New York and then what?”

  “That I’d see him after this meeting he had was over.”

  “Did he say who he was meeting?”

  “No, but it was at his property. It’s a huge place over in Georgica Ponds. I was to get there and we’d drive to New York together.” Clint yawned and ruffled his hair. “So I’m packed and ready at seven. This guy was always going on about the place he had in New York just across from Central Park. He sort of made out that he was getting out of his problems, said something about his company crashing but that he might be doing some big deal and his finances would be in better shape and if I wanted we could go to Bermuda.” He was staring at the ocean. “So one of my mates gives me a ride in to the gas station on the corner. I just had to walk across to Georgica Road and over to where Moreno’s house was.”

  “Did you meet up with him?”

  Clint shook his head. “No. There were trucks and stuff around, big diggers, so I reckoned it had to be the right place. It was still quite dark and there were lights on, but I couldn’t see him or his car, so I took a walk around, and a few streets away I saw his Lexus parked, which I thought was odd. I hung around it for a while, maybe ten, fifteen minutes, then started walking back along the lane. I could hear machines turning over, so I reckoned the builders were starting work. I headed into the drive, and the noise was really loud. Then it stopped, so I kept walking, and what had been making all the noise was a machine to flatten down the earth in the bottom of the swimming pool.”

  “So work had started?”

  “I dunno. There was just this one guy working the big compressor machine. There was no one else around. I wondered if maybe I’d got the wrong place. Like I said, Alex’s car was some distance from the site.”

  “Did you go in?”

  “No. I stood watching for a while, then I left to go back to the Lexus.”

  “Could you describe the man you say was using this machine?”

  “Er, not really, he was a good distance away from me. But it wasn’t Moreno. Too big for him.”

  Sylvia licked her lips. She opened her bag to look for the photograph. “What did you do next?”

  “I hung around at the car, maybe another ten minutes or so, then I went back to the garage cos I had Moreno’s cell phone number. There’s a pay phone there, so I reckoned I’d better call him and find out what was going on.”

  “Did you get hold of him?” she asked impatiently.

  “No, I tried, but it just rang then clicked into his message service. I wasn’t sure what to do and I was hungry now, so I grabbed some breakfast. I was thinking of giving up, then decided I’d check one last time to see if Moreno’s car was still there. Then, just as I was heading back across the road, I saw it turning left onto the highway. He had to drive right past me almost. I waved and yelled, but it just drove on.”

  “With Moreno driving?”

  “No, it was the guy I’d seen by the pool. I never got a good look at him. All I could see were wide shoulders—he was hunched over the wheel and in profile to me.”

  “Then what?”

  “So now I go back again to the building site. Figured maybe this guy was getting coffee or somethin’ for Moreno. It was quite a walk, and I had a big bag to carry. All the guys were starting work. They were concreting over the bottom of the swimming pool for the lining.”

  “Did you see Moreno?”

  “I asked if anyone knew where he was, but nobody had seen him. I finally gave up and went home.”

  “Did he contact you again?”

  “No. I called his cell phone a few times, but it was dead.” He shrugged. “That’s it.”

  Sylvia was chilled to the bone, but she wasn’t through, not after paying out five hundred dollars. She brought out the photograph of herself and David at the Christmas party. Her hand shook, partly from the cold and partly because she knew this might be the confirmation she had been looking for.

  “Was this the man you saw at the building site?”

  Clint looked at the photograph intently. There was a short pause and Sylvia held her breath.

  “I think so. Can’t be sure, though. Now I think of it, the guy I saw had reddish hair and this guy’s blond, right?” He tapped Edward de Jersey’s image.

  She sat tensely. “Is this the man who was at the building site?”

  Clint took a deep breath. “I’m pretty sure it is. But, like I said, it was dark, and when he drove past me I only got a profile. But it could be him.”

  “Could be isn’t good enough,” she said. “Please, really look at the photograph. It’s very, very important.”

  Clint sighed. “It was a while back now, three months.” He stared hard at the photograph. “Yes, it’s him.”

  Sylvia replaced the photograph in her handbag and smiled. Her lips were almost blue it was so cold. No wonder de Jersey hadn’t wanted to help her trace Philip Simmons. He’d threatened her, and now she was pretty sure that those threats had been designed to throw her off the scent, but she’d show him! Edward de Jersey, alias Philip Simmons, was going to pay her handsomely for what she had discovered.

  CHAPTER

  20

  Over lunch a couple of days later, Christina told de Jersey that she was planning a dinner party.

  “Who do you want to invite?” he asked, as he unfolded his napkin.

  “I don’t know. Maybe some of the jockeys and trainers, make it a fun evening.” She ladled out the spinach soup. “What do you think?”

  “Sounds good to me. We’ve not had a staff get-together for a long time.” He broke up his bread and dipped it into the soup.

  “Shall I organize it, then?”

  “Sure.”

  He looked up in surprise as her roll hit his head. “What was that for?”

  She glared at him. “Do you think I’m blind, stupid, or what? I want you to stop treating me like a child and start telling me the truth. The yard is like a morgue. The entire east wing is empty, and half of the staff are missing. We’re in dire financial trouble, aren’t we?”

  “Ten points.”

  “Don’t use that sarcastic tone with me.”

  “I wasn’t aware that I was using any specific tone.”

  “God, I hate you when you’re like this. It’s like I’m sitting opposite a stranger. If things are bad, then we should discuss it like adults.”

  “And what could you do about it, my darling? Did your mother leave you a vast legacy?”

  She stood up, walked round to him, removed his soup plate, went to the kitchen, and threw it into the sink. She re
turned with a large bowl of salad and banged it down on the table. “Help yourself.”

  “Thank you,” he said. She returned to the kitchen and came back with a roasted chicken. She banged that down too, jabbed it with a carving knife, then returned to her seat.

  “Throwing a tantrum, Christina, is not going to help. Pass me your plate and I’ll serve.”

  It whizzed past his head and crashed against the wall. “I’m waiting for you to tell me what is going on,” she said. “Or do you want me to go out and ask Donald Fleming?”

  She poured herself a glass of wine as he carved the chicken breast. Eventually he said, “It’s those investments I lost out on. The situation is worse than I initially thought. A lot worse.”

  “How long have you known?”

  “Quite a while. I just didn’t want to bother you with it. With your mother’s illness, I felt you had enough to worry about without me adding to it.”

  “How bad is it, then?” she asked.

  “Well, I’ve had to sell off a lot of the horses, and I’ll probably have to sell more. Now is the time to do it. I shouldn’t be away too long. Couple of days.”

  “Where are you going?” she snapped.

  “To look at some auctions, maybe Dublin. I’m not sure.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “If you want.”

  “What I want, Edward, is for you to be honest with me. If you’re saying we’re in financial trouble, why buy more horses?”

  “I’m more than likely going to try to find buyers for the ones I have to let go. Does that answer your question?”

  “Why are you being like this?”

  He pushed away his plate and sighed. “Because it’s breaking my heart.”

  “So you have to hurt me too?”

  “Not intentionally. But I have a lot to think about and—”

  “Maybe if you shared it, it wouldn’t be so bad.”

  She was shocked when he met her eyes. His were brimming with tears.

  “Oh, Edward,” she said softly.

  “Christina …” He turned away from her, and she got up to put her arms around him. “I’m sorry,” he said.