Homicide in Hardcover

by Kate Carlisle

  “I will be fine,” I insisted.

  “Of course you will.” He absently kneaded my shoulder blade and I felt a rush of something like electricity zing across my shoulders and down my spine. How did he do that?

  “Take more potassium this week,” he advised. “It will improve your ability to sleep and awake refreshed.”

  “Yes, okay.”

  “And eat oatmeal,” he said. “It will boost your sex drive.”

  I choked on the water and he patted my back.

  “Gotcha,” he said, his eyes sparkling.

  “Good one,” I whispered between coughs.

  “Anything that helps us remember the moment is a good one indeed,” he murmured, then straightened to his full height, signaling that our conversation was over. Then he snapped his fingers, something I’d never seen him do.

  He smiled and spread his hands. “You see, gracious, had I truly been in the moment, I would have remembered what I wished to tell you in the first place.”

  My eyes widened at his revelation, but I had no comeback and he didn’t expect one.

  “Gavin will be reading Abraham’s last will and testament at four this afternoon in the tearoom. Your presence is required, of course.”

  Before I could protest, he brought his palms together as though he were going to pray, then bowed his head briefly. “Namasté,” he said, and walked away.

  I needed a minute and took another gulp of water. Guru Bob always left me feeling completely charged but also kind of spacey.

  “Sweetie.” Mom stopped me right inside the kitchen door and pulled me over to a deserted corner.

  “Mom, whoa. Watch the sweater. What’s up?”

  “Is that cashmere?” she asked, rubbing it between her fingers. “Nice.”

  I pried my sleeve away from her nervous hands. “What’s wrong, Mom?”

  “Why were the police here?”

  “They just had a few questions.”

  “So they drove all the way to Sonoma? On a Saturday? That’s very strange.” She paced a few feet, then whirled around. “Don’t you think that’s strange?”

  “I think it’s good that they’re working the case.” And why was she so nervous? Had the police spooked her?

  “What did you tell them? Are you in trouble?”

  “Mom, it’s nothing. A misunderstanding, that’s all. Don’t worry.”

  “I’m your mother. I get paid to worry.” She folded her arms tightly across her chest and shook her head.

  I smiled and rubbed her arms. “Mom, everything’s fine. They just needed to clarify something and now they’re gone. Everything’s groovy.”

  “Groovy.” She exhaled heavily. “Right. Good.”

  “Jeez, Mom, you’d think they were going to arrest me or something.”

  “Don’t say that!” She grabbed a wooden spoon from the utility shelf and held it out. “Knock on wood.”

  “Mom, this is crazy.”

  “Just do it.”

  I rapped the spoon with my knuckles and she tossed the spoon back on the shelf. Then she reached out and rubbed my forehead with her thumb to stimulate my third eye. This was supposed to open my clogged channels and allow me to tune into the right universal vibration in order to see the world from a higher place.

  Or something like that. I grabbed her hand and squeezed it. “I love you, Mom.”

  I thought she would burst into tears. She grabbed me in her arms and held on tight. “I love you, too, sweetie. I’d just die if something happened to you.”

  I hugged her, but had to wonder why she was so nervous about the police being around. Was it because she was hiding her own reasons for sneaking into the Covington that night? Her behavior was making all my suspicious little nerve channels vibrate more than ever.

  It was after two before I was able to sneak out the kitchen door and run down to Abraham’s studio without being followed. I figured I had just enough time to search the place and be back for the reading of the will at four o’clock.

  The studio was unchanged from the last time I’d seen it. Drawers were still opened with papers jammed in every which way or crumpled and thrown around. The stack of birch book covers was a jumble and there were shells and rocks scattered across the worktable and the floor. I started to pick them up, then realized I didn’t have time to straighten things. I would try to get up here sometime during the week to take care of it, but right now, I needed to search for the missing journals.

  It took almost an hour of meticulously searching through every drawer and cupboard and shelf, but I finally found the two journals that covered the work Abraham had done on the Winslow books. Why he’d kept them in plain sight on his desk, I’d never know. It was the last place I thought to look. There was no time to read them right now, so I shoved them into my bag.

  I hadn’t found anything that might be the missing item from the Faust. “GW1941.” I’d done a quick check, but there was nothing tucked inside the journals, no slip of paper or directions or anything. I held out hope that Abraham had written down the details of what he’d found and where he’d put it. I’d know more tonight after I read the journals. Right now I had to get out of here and back to the ranch before someone came snooping around.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  I bolted, knocking my elbow against the solid brass book press. I whipped around, furious and in pain. “If one more person sneaks up on me, I swear I’ll-”

  “I saw you steal something.”

  I pulled the journals out. “They’re mine. I work with Abraham. Now, who the hell are you?”

  But I knew who she was. I recognized her by that headful of curly dark hair. It was Anandalla, the woman who’d left the cocktail napkin note. The woman who’d rushed out of the Buena Vista last night, causing me to run uphill in uncomfortable shoes. I’m not sure I could forgive her for that. She was even more petite than I’d thought. Also unforgivable.

  Was she also a cold-blooded killer?

  “What are you doing here?” I demanded.

  “None of your business.” She sounded like a snotty kid. But then she scooped up an X-Acto knife and waved it at me. “Answer my question first.”

  Snotty and dangerous.

  I straightened up, happy to use the height card to intimidate and taunt, not that it seemed to be doing much good. “I’m Brooklyn Wainwright, Abraham Karastovsky’s very good friend and colleague. I work here with him. I belong here. What’s your story?”

  She surveyed the room for a full minute, decidedly uncomfortable. Her gaze finally met mine and she said defiantly, “I’m Abraham’s daughter.”

  Chapter 11

  My mouth dropped open. “You are not.”

  She threw down the knife and planted her hands on her hips. “Am, too.”

  Okay, this was unexpected. I studied her for a minute, then wondered how I hadn’t seen it before. The hair was a dead giveaway, the same curly dark mop as Abraham’s. She looked about twenty-five years old, probably five feet two, short for someone who claimed Abraham for a father. Her mother had to be really short.

  “I’m sorry,” I said helplessly. “I didn’t know Abraham had a daughter.”

  She blurted out a harsh laugh. “Yeah, well, neither did he till a week ago.”

  “You’re kidding me. Where did you come from? When did he… hmm.”

  She shrugged. “I live in Seattle with my mom. She only told me a month ago who my father is.” She grabbed a spool of sewing thread and rolled it between her hands. “She’s, um… My mom’s dying. Of cancer. Guess she figured it was time to come clean.” She put the thread down and rubbed her eyes. “I’m so tired. I’ve been staying with a girlfriend near Ghirardelli Square. She’s kind of a night owl.”

  “Did you…” How did I ask this question? “Did you get a chance to meet Abraham?”

  “Yeah.” She smiled. It transformed her face and I realized she was even younger than I’d first thought. Late teens or early twenties, maybe.

  “He’s a
big bear, isn’t he?” she continued, chuckling. “We had a great dinner in the City; then I came out here the other night to meet him, see his place, but he wasn’t here. I left him a note but he didn’t call.”

  She looked perturbed. “He told me all about you, even showed me your picture.”

  “My picture?”

  “Yeah, the one he carries in his wallet.” She said it like an accusation. Hey, it wasn’t my fault if she was miffed. But why was she talking about him in the present tense? I was getting a bad feeling.

  “Anyway,” she continued, “I told him I’d meet him at the Buena Vista last night but he didn’t show up. Then all of a sudden you were there. I recognized you and I-I didn’t know what to do, so I took off.” She waved her hands helplessly. “Probably a chickenshit reaction, but it was weird to see you there. I felt a little threatened, I guess. Fight or flight, you know? So I ran.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “So I thought I’d try to snag him here today, but no such luck. And here you are. Must be my lucky day.”

  I would’ve risen to the sarcastic bait but I couldn’t. She didn’t know. Now what? I really wished my mom were here. She would handle this so much better than I could.

  “I’m sorry, Anandalla,” I said, clasping my hands tightly. “Abraham died a few days ago.”

  “What?” She shook her head. “No, I just saw him. What’s today?”

  “It’s true,” I said softly. “I’m sorry.”

  Her eyes were wide, filled with shock. “No, no, I’m supposed to… um, no.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s not possible,” she whispered. “You’re lying. You’re just…”

  She blinked a few times and gulped. Then her face crumpled as the tears started. She buried her face in her hands and her shoulders hitched as she cried silently.

  I grabbed a stool and forced her to sit. She laid her head on the surface of the worktable and continued to cry with heart-wrenching sobs. I rubbed her back but felt completely useless. I rifled through my purse and found a packet of tissues and shoved one into her hand.

  I couldn’t believe it. After a lifetime of not knowing, this girl finally had a chance to meet her father. And now he was gone. And her mother was dying, too. How could anyone survive that much pain?

  My heart broke for Abraham, too. What a happy shock it must’ve been to find out he had a daughter after all these years. At the same time, I felt a spurt of anger for Anandalla’s mother. How could that woman have kept them both in the dark for so many years?

  And I suddenly realized this must’ve been what Abraham had been talking about the night of the Covington opening. “Life is good, Brooklyn,” he’d said, hugging me. “I didn’t think it could get any better, but it can.”

  At the time, I thought he’d been referring to the overwhelming success of the exhibition. Now I realized he’d been talking about his daughter. It was so unfair.

  Anandalla’s sobs echoed in the room and reached right inside me. As always, no one cried alone when I was nearby. I wiped my damp cheeks as I put my hand on her arm.

  “I’m so sorry, Anandalla,” I said. “He was a good man and I know he would’ve gone to any lengths to find you if he’d known. I-I don’t know what else to say. It’s just a tragedy.”

  Anandalla sat up, took in a big breath and let it out. She hopped off the stool and absently pulled at the cuffs of her jacket. “Yeah. It sucks.”

  “That pretty much sums it up,” I said.

  After a moment, she blurted, “You can call me Annie.”

  “Annie?”

  “My mom tried to be Hindu for a while, so that’s where I got the name.”

  “There was a lot of that going around back in the day.”

  She snickered. “Yeah. After a few years, she went back to being a legal secretary and I’ve been Annie ever since.”

  “I like the name Annie.”

  “Thanks. So I guess I’m going to be an orphan,” she said with a chuckle, but it set off a fresh bout of tears and another round of heavy sobs.

  I pulled her into my arms and held her. After a few minutes, she stopped sobbing but began to gasp with heavy jerks as she tried to catch her breath.

  “Easy,” I said. “Take it slow.” I patted her back. Her breathing slowed, deepened, softened.

  Finally, she stepped away. “I’ll be okay.”

  “I don’t know how,” I said. “I’d be a complete disaster.”

  “Denial helps. I’m hoping it’ll kick in any minute now.”

  “Well, I can promise you one thing.”

  She dabbed the tissue along her wet temple. “Yeah? What?”

  “You’ll never be an orphan. Not while you’ve got the Fellowship around you.”

  “The what?”

  I sighed. “I guess your mother never told you about that, either.”

  She took a defensive step back. I was making an educated guess that her mother had kept Abraham from her because of his connection to the commune and Guru Bob. To an outsider, Guru Bob had often been mistaken for a cult leader. But he wasn’t, just as his followers weren’t held captive and hypnotized into drinking Kool-Aid.

  “What exactly didn’t my mother tell me?” Annie asked as she swiped her eyes dry with her knuckles. Some of her Goth eye makeup smeared across her cheek and I handed her another tissue.

  “I could try to explain but it would take hours.” I grabbed my bag. “Why don’t I show you instead?”

  The three hundred or so assorted family and friends still partying at the town hall were overwhelmed by the news that Abraham had a daughter. But never let it be said that the members of the Fellowship for Spiritual Enlightenment and Higher Artistic Consciousness couldn’t rise to the occasion and welcome a newcomer into the fold.

  Literally.

  They closed in, encircling Annie in a warm, loving, sugary sweet human sandwich as they plied her with good wine and platefuls of delectable treats, then began peppering her with nosy questions and sentimental stories.

  After twenty minutes, Annie was able to catch my eye. I almost laughed at her unmasked look of sheer terror. She was in serious danger of frying from happy face overload. I took pity on her and worked my way through the crowd to rescue her, but I was too late. My mother had cleverly intervened. She assured everyone they’d have their chance for a one-on-one heart-to-heart with Annie, then tucked her firmly under her wing and whisked her away to our house.

  It was pretty much guaranteed I was about to inherit a third sister. I needed another sibling the way I needed a sixth toe. Or a twelfth toe. You know, an extra one on each foot. Never mind.

  Three hours later, as the lights of the City cast a foggy glow on San Francisco Bay, I headed west on Highway 37 toward home. I gripped the steering wheel and tried to concentrate on the road. It wasn’t easy and it had nothing to do with the darkness or the fog. No, I was blown away by the fact that I was six million dollars wealthier than I’d been this morning.

  Six. Million. Dollars.

  Except for a generous bequest to his housekeeper and assorted knickknacks to friends plus a few rare books to Guru Bob, Abraham had left his entire estate to me.

  Me. I got it all. His house, his business, his library of books and papers, his portfolio of property and stock investments, which, his lawyer hastened to assure me, were extensive.

  The daughter of his heart, he’d called me in his will. After hearing that, I’d run through the rest of my packet of tissues.

  After the will was read, my father had to hold me up as we walked outside. I was in a daze. I had to escape. I couldn’t go to my family’s house. I didn’t want to talk to anyone, especially Annie.

  As soon as I’d promised my dad I’d call when I got home, I jumped in my car and escaped Dharma. I felt guilty leaving but knew it would only get worse if I had to look into Annie’s sad eyes and know she was wondering what might’ve happened, if only.

  If only her mother hadn’t lied. If only Abraham
were alive.

  It was obvious Abraham hadn’t had a clue Annie existed until a few days before he died. Her name was never mentioned in the will.

  I shook my head as I swung onto the 101, still in shock over the full disclosure of Abraham’s net worth. I knew property values in Sonoma were high and everyone who’d invested in the commune and Dharma had made money over the years, thanks to smart fiscal planning by Guru Bob and my dad and a few others.

  Naturally, Guru Bob had presented a cosmically correct reason for making sound investments since the more money one had, the less negativity one suffered. Maybe that theory didn’t translate out in the real world, but in Dharma, people were pretty darn happy and grateful most of the time. At least, that was the goal. But just in case they forgot, Guru Bob was always there to remind them to be joyful, damn it.

  So, Abraham was loaded. Who knew? And I was in a quandary. What was I supposed to do with Abraham’s stuff now that Annie was in the picture?

  I could sign his house over to her. I didn’t need a house in Dharma. There was no mortgage to worry about and Annie might be happy to live there once her mother was gone. She might enjoy the small community that would envelop her as one of their own. But that was a decision she probably didn’t want to think about for a while.

  It was too much for me to think about right now, too. As I hit the bridge, then drove through the Fast Track lane at the bridge toll plaza, I made up my mind to call a family meeting next week. My sibs and parents would probably agree that Annie should have Abraham’s house. I would also find a way to give her some money or a portion of the investments. I didn’t think she’d care about Abraham’s books or his business as much as I did.

  My brother Jackson, always the pragmatic one, would insist that Annie undergo a paternity test. So would the lawyers. But if anyone had a doubt that she and Abraham were related, they’d just have to look at all that hair.

  The poor girl would need a chunk of Abraham’s money just to support the hair products she’d require for the rest of her life. And I think Abraham would be pleased to know she was roaming around in that big house of his.