Taylor, sitting here so precious and so happy, is a fair trade for your best friend’s life?
God, how could she possibly choose correctly? There was no right answer.
Not then. Not now.
But if something had happened to Leah—and if Thomas was responsible—she didn’t think she’d be able to live with herself.
“How was your day?” Scott held the cell phone as he stripped off his shirt, standing in the bathroom at the station. Then he wedged the phone between his shoulder and ear, reaching for soap and a towel. The guys would give him a hard time if he was in here too long.
And there was no way he was saying good-night to Tricia out there with all of them listening, razzing him, minding his business.
“Fine.” It had taken too long for her to answer and Scott’s neck tightened.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Just…lonely.”
Oh. Well…good. He was, too.
“It was kind of an intense weekend,” he said.
“Yeah.”
“Hold on, will you?”
“Of course.”
He splashed a handful of water over his face, swiped it with a soapy washcloth and towel and quickly brushed his teeth.
“So what’d you and Taylor do today?”
“Swung in the park. Had lunch at KFC. Watched old Lassie videos.”
“With Timmy?” Taylor had a real things for dogs. Blue ones. Smart collie ones. And mutts in the park.
“Yeah.”
Pants unbuckled, ready to slip off at his bunk, Scott faced the door. He had to be getting back out there. “What’d you have for dinner?”
“Macaroni and cheese.”
She hated it about as much as Taylor loved it, which meant she’d probably eaten very little. He rubbed at the ache in his solar plexus, left the bathroom and walked outside. The guys would rile him about his obvious need for private conversation with the woman he’d picked up in a bar and been stuck with ever since, but at the moment he didn’t give a flying damn.
“You haven’t been thinking too much, have you?” he asked quietly as soon as he was outside. “About last night, I mean? Having second thoughts about staying?”
Not that he didn’t have second thoughts about her being there. At least once a day, it seemed. Especially at times like now, when he felt so helpless and out of control. Her past was a void and he sensed danger there and it frightened him.
But she didn’t need him to worry about her. She could take care of herself.
“No.”
Okay, well, fine.
“I…” She stopped, sighed, sounding almost frustrated. “I want to tell you something that has no relevance to anything, but I don’t want you to ask any questions. Is that fair?”
“It is in my book.” He’d accept anything as fair if it meant she was going to talk to him. Not that he wanted to hear so much that he’d have to get further involved. He just wanted to know enough so he wouldn’t have to worry.
“I—when I was growing up, I had this best friend. Leah was her name.” Tricia’s voice took on the soft note that melted him. So loving, compassionate. Honest.
“We met when we were three—our mothers knew each other. Neither of us ever had another close friend after that.”
If he hadn’t known Alicia, he probably wouldn’t have understood that. “Didn’t you get sick of each other?”
“Not really. We just fit, you know?”
He hadn’t, before Alicia. “Yeah.”
“Anyway, I was thinking about her today. Remembering the summer before we graduated from high school.”
Leaning against the back wall of the station, surrounded by yard and a privacy fence, Scott slid down to the cement, intrigued as hell. If this was what his questions last night had brought him, glimpses of a younger Tricia, he hadn’t made such a bad mistake in forcing the issue.
“We found this clearing. It was a cliff, really, high above the tracks for an old mining train.”
Which could’ve put her in a million places in California and Arizona alone.
“We christened it our sacred place and whenever either of us had a problem or needed some time alone, that’s where we’d go. Inevitably, if one of us went up, the other one found her there. It was kind of weird.”
“Some psychic communication going on there, huh?”
“I don’t know. I’m not sure I believe in any of that stuff. I just know that’s what usually happened.”
“So what made you think about it today?”
Had she heard from her friend? Or had she needed some time alone, an escape to work out problems?
“Nothing in particular.” Her voice changed, became more cheerful. She was putting up those damned social walls again.
“When’s the last time you were there?”
“I don’t know. A while ago.” She paused and then, to his surprise, continued in a softer tone. “We could only get there on horseback, but a few years ago we discovered this old cart trail that wound up one side of the mountain. An old hermit lives up there, about half a mile down from our cliff.”
There was something significant here. Scott had no idea what. Or why. But his instincts were loud and clear. As they’d been the day before, when she’d disappeared and gone all the way to the Hotel Del to use the bathroom.
Ignore them, man.
“A hermit,” he said, mind racing in spite of his directive. “Did he ever talk to you?”
“Sometimes. Whenever we stopped. He was a nice guy. Stooped, skinny, with this long gray beard. Grand-fatherly, sort of like a gnome. I think he kind of adopted me and my friend. You know, growing up in the west you hear about these guys who live their whole lives alone in the mountains or the desert, but I’d never met one before.”
She was talking. Telling him more about her life in five minutes than he’d heard in almost two years of living with her.
He’d never met one of those old hermits. But, like her, he’d always heard about them. “So, he lives up there all alone?”
“Yeah. He’s a pretty amazing old guy. He was actually born up there.” Scott couldn’t help grinning at the quiet animation in Tricia’s voice. This was one of the most captivating sides of the woman who was turning his world on a different axis. A side he saw far too seldom.
“He says, and I believe him,” she went on, “that his great-grandfather was a merchant in San Francisco—a competitor of Sam Brannan’s. You ever hear of him?”
The cement was getting hard under his butt. “Wasn’t he the guy from San Francisco who made a mint during the Gold Rush?”
“Yeah, by selling shovels!”
“I remember reading about him in high school. When he heard about the discovery of gold, he bought up every axe, pick and shovel to be had, then ran through town telling everyone about the discovery of gold….”
“Something the two men who’d found it wanted to keep secret, of course,” she said.
“Yeah, old Sam Brannan never dug for gold but it made him richer than most. A true entrepreneur.” Scott’s voice didn’t drip with admiration.
“Remind you of someone you know?”
“More than one.” The cool night air, the full moon and the sky filled with stars, were perfect for a man who was searching for peace.
“Money can do funny things to people, huh?”
“You speaking from personal experience?” he asked.
“You see me spending lots of money?” The edge was back in her voice.
“You were telling me about your hermit friend. Something about his great-grandfather and Sam Brannon?” he asked quickly before she could shut down on him.
“When Sam got so rich in town, virtually running the hermit’s great-grandfather out of business, the destitute man settled on one of the northernmost mining trails off what’s now Highway 49 to run a depot with his wife.”
Tricia never used names. Not her friend’s. And not the hermit’s. Scott figured that was intentional. He rubbed t
he back of his neck, telling himself he didn’t care. Her secrets—or reasons for keeping them—were nothing to do with him.
As the old saying had it, ignorance was bliss. And if she was involved in something illegal, his ignorance was also his innocence.
“His grandfather and father were born up there.” Tricia was continuing with her story. “So was he and so were his six older brothers and sisters. After the Gold Rush, when all the trails closed down, his grandparents and parents stayed up there, raising their kids off the land, growing their food, home-schooling them. At one time they had quite a ranch. But eventually as the trails disappeared and the area grew more and more remote, all his siblings moved away. He never did.”
“Did he ever marry?”
“Not that I know of. He didn’t say. And I didn’t ever ask questions.”
Because that was her nature? Or did she not ask questions because she hadn’t wanted any questions asked of her? And even if that was so, how could he find fault with it? In the beginning, Tricia’s lack of inquisitiveness was one of the qualities that had drawn him to her.
Scott glanced over as the big metal door squeaked open. They really needed to oil that thing. Cliff looked out at him, revealed by the fluorescent bulb inside.
Scott raised his eyebrows. An answering shake of the head from his engineer, assured him that all was well. With a quick nod, he let Cliff know he was fine. The older man went back inside, leaving Scott in darkness.
“How does he get his food?” he asked Tricia now.
“Grows most of it.” She paused and he heard water running in the tub. He’d never met a woman who liked bubble baths as much as Tricia did.
Not that he was complaining. As soon as he could afford it on his paycheck, he was going to knock out the front wall of the master suite and install a jetted tub big enough to fit them both—with McCall faucets.
“Otherwise I’m not sure. Maybe he has someone who brings stuff up from Reno.”
Scott straightened, stood, his palms sweating. Was Reno the closest major city to this mountain retreat, then? Did that mean she was from Reno?
Had she just given him the first real piece of information about herself? Was she starting to trust him?
It shouldn’t matter. Didn’t matter. Couldn’t matter.
But it did.
Scott spent another five minutes telling her good-night, all the while admonishing himself to forget it. Let go of things that weren’t his business.
And by three in the morning, when he lay in his bunk in the station still wide-awake, listening to Joe snore above him, he knew he wasn’t going to disregard a damn thing. He already felt responsible for the death of one woman; he wasn’t going to stand by helpless a second time.
7
Thomas had known Leah was having her period. What did that say about their relationship?
That they were intimate.
Tricia sat at her sewing machine early Monday morning. She’d slept little the night before. Mostly by her own choice. The couple of times she’d fallen asleep she’d woken up from nightmares soaked with sweat. There’d been no Scott to comfort her.
The nightmares were getting worse.
Thankfully she had a lot of sewing to get done for a drop-off on Coronado Tuesday afternoon. Her only client—a Coronado dry cleaner—was keeping Taylor fed and clothed. Not that Scott wouldn’t help if she’d let him.
Where was her gold metallic thread? She’d seen it recently. Glancing up at the peg board of threads in front of her, Tricia’s gaze moved down the rows. And, as all the colors blended together, forgot what she was looking for.
Instead, visions of Leah and Thomas Whitehead together flashed through her mind—making her sick. It couldn’t be.
But Leah had been in his car. That much was irrefutable. They’d had breakfast together and been involved in an intense conversation.
Dropping the one-of-a-kind evening gown she was redesigning from off-the-shoulder to something a bit more becoming to the wealthy—and rather plump—Mrs. Gainhurst, Tricia stumbled down the dark hall to an equally dark kitchen. The sun wouldn’t be up for another hour.
But she needed some coffee. Laced with brandy. Not that she had any in the house. She hadn’t drunk alcohol since she’d found out she was pregnant with Taylor.
Before that, however…
No, she couldn’t go back to that time. Those memories would take her so far off course she risked being unable to return to the present…
Holding her head, Tricia leaned against the cupboard, waiting for the coffee to drip. She’d made it strong. Just because she hadn’t had any sleep didn’t mean her son would be lacking energy.
Leah and Thomas? Eyes closed, she lifted her head to the ceiling. There had to be some logical explanation. A legal battle, maybe. Or some favor Leah was begging for her kid’s charity. Thomas, in his newly elected position and with his obsessive need for voter appreciation, would be a good bet for big bucks.
It couldn’t be any more than that. As she reached for a coffee mug, a moment of peace settled her stomach, if not the nerves that felt ready to jump out of her skin.
And the blood on the car seat?
Sloshing coffee over the side of the cup, Tricia set the pot down, slid down to the cold linoleum floor and buried her head in her hands.
Either Thomas and Leah were intimate enough for him to know that she was having her period. Or Leah had been in his car hurt—and he was covering that up by lying about his knowledge of Leah’s private bodily functions.
For the life of her, she couldn’t figure out which scenario was worse.
Both made her wish she was dead.
When the next call came in from the team of San Francisco detectives, Thomas was out speaking to a group of impressionable young men at California’s most elite all-boys’ boarding school, Kingsley Prep. His high school alma mater. Sitting on the dais at ten-thirty Tuesday morning wearing a black silk suit, white shirt and his red Kingsley tie, he started when the cell phone vibrating against his hip indicated an incoming call.
Recognizing the number showing on the phone’s display, he felt his smile slipping, but just for the split second it took to steady himself.
The only reason Kilgore Douglas would be calling him here was if there’d been more trouble over the Montgomery woman’s disappearance. He’d hoped to be done with all of that. Had counted on it.
The talk didn’t go particularly well, the boys much less impressed than he’d expected. They hadn’t laughed at many of the little asides he’d delivered to charm and engage them. Which was further cause for internal unrest. He generally came away from these talks buoyed, remembering his own busy days within the walls of Kingsley, recalling his early popularity. And usually that was accompanied by the adulation and respect the current group of boys heaped upon him. After the past week, his worry over Leah, he’d really been looking forward to this morning.
Thomas didn’t like being disappointed.
Nor did he like being summoned.
“What’s this about?” he asked his attorney as they met in front of the police station.
“Forensics went through Montgomery’s condo with a fine-tooth comb. They found something.”
Holding the door for his attorney, Thomas followed the other man inside. “I have not seen that woman since Monday morning. I certainly didn’t kill her.”
Would he never be free from the pangs of regret? The loneliness? Didn’t anyone understand how hard this was on him?
“I know.”
Good. That felt better.
“I’m assuming there’s still no word on her whereabouts?”
Douglas’s form-fitting navy suit jacket moved as if one with his shoulder as he shrugged. “Not unless that’s what we’re here to find out.” He switched his brown leather briefcase to his left hand, reaching with his right to push the elevator button. In this particular precinct the interrogation rooms were all on the second floor.
When he’d met this team l
ess than two years ago, they’d been on the first floor. In another precinct. Closer to downtown.
Just thinking about those first days after Kate’s disappearance, reliving, even from this distance, those nights of coming home to a house devoid of his wife’s energy was enough to make him stumble a step or two.
That was why he tried not to think about Kate, beyond acknowledging the constant emptiness in his house, his life. When he thought of all the money he’d spent on private detectives only to turn up nothing…
“Let me do the talking,” Kilgore Douglas said as the elevator doors slid open on the second floor.
“I prefer to speak for myself.”
“And anything you say can and will be used—”
“I know the drill, Counselor,” Thomas said, forcing himself to smile at his employee and friend. “I appreciate that you’re just doing your job and looking out for my best interests as a friend, but I’m not guilty of anything. And until I’m accused, I simply want a second set of eyes and ears, not a defense attorney.”
“Fine.” Douglas’s smile was somewhat distant. “Agreed.”
Kilgore Douglas might be the highest paid attorney in Thomas’s firm, but Thomas, even semiretired, was still the rainmaker.
San Francisco Gazette
Wednesday, April 13, 2005
Page 24. Section E
Heiress’s Condo Searched
New evidence turned up on Monday at the condominium of missing heiress Leah Montgomery. The search by the city’s top forensic team was instigated, due, in part, to the persistence of Montgomery’s family, particularly her sister, Carley Winchester, wife of San Francisco councilman Benny Winchester. This latest search turned up something significant enough to have Senator Thomas Whitehead called back in for questioning. Police are releasing no further information at this time.
Whitehead left an appearance at Kingsley Prep, his high school alma mater, yesterday morning to appear at police headquarters. After an hour in an interrogation room with detectives, Whitehead, accompanied by defense attorney Kilgore Douglas, emerged minus his customary smile. He refused to comment to the press. No charges have been filed. Leah Montgomery, recently voted San Francisco’s most eligible “bachelorette,” has been missing since she failed to appear at a children’s charity function she was due to host last Monday.
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