A Secondhand Murder

by Lesley A. Diehl

  “Weren’t you worried that she might try to steal the locket from you on the spot?”

  Grandy shook her head. “Your grandfather was in the next room.”

  “Ah.”

  “Valerie stared for the longest time, then said, ‘It’s beautiful. Guard it with your life.’”

  “A threat?”

  “Maybe. I couldn’t tell.”

  Grandy and I sat in silence for several minutes. “Valerie was a bundle of contradictions,” I said.

  Grandy nodded.

  “The pictures?” I leaned closer to the locket.

  “Your mother and you, of course.”

  “Oh, Grandy.” I threw my arms around her and hugged her as if I’d never let her go.

  “Hey, you’re squeezing me too tight. You might leave permanent indentations, girl.” She was hugging me back, though.

  “I love you.”

  “That’s good. Then you won’t mind if I come along with you and Mr. Napolitani on your adventure tonight.”

  Chapter 15

  “This is a very bad idea.” I steered my rental down the Beeline Highway heading for West Palm. Grandy sat beside me in her new black warm-up suit. I could feel her wriggle with excitement in her seat. “Stop that jiggling. This isn’t a party we’re going to, you know.”

  She ignored my comments, just as she had ignored all the pleading, begging, and threatening I had directed her way since learning that Mr. Napolitani had invited her along on our evening exploration. If I had his cell number, perhaps I would have called off this jaunt. He had cleverly avoided giving me any way to contact him, and he blocked his number when he made calls to my phone. That was why he was rich and feared and I owned a secondhand shop.

  I had to go ahead with my plan. I knew I couldn’t get Frida interested in searching the Sanders’ house. She wanted to do things the legal way. I didn’t. Although, my actions could get me caught, and I could spend time in jail. As much as I liked having Grandy as a roomie, I didn’t think she’d welcome sharing a cell with me. I’d start to whimper the minute the jail door closed. She was tough. I only thought of myself as tough. I’d never been tested. Well, tonight was the night.

  “Mr. Napolitani has some experience in these things. I can’t believe he’d do anything to jeopardize your life or mine,” said Grandy.

  That was comforting, but not necessarily true. His risk-taking threshold had to be a lot higher than either of ours. What we saw as dangerous was only an evening’s entertainment for him.

  I pulled into a strip mall a mile from the Sanders’ house and parked at the side of the building under an oak tree. It cast shadows onto the car and made me feel as if we were somewhat hidden from other vehicles in the lot. The mall held a dry cleaners, a tile shop, several empty storefronts, and at the far end, a convenience store. At this time of night, all the shops were closed, with the exception of the convenience store.

  Napolitani’s black SUV backed in next to me.

  He rolled down his window. “I brought backup.” The interior of the car was too dark for me to see who was in his passenger seat. “We’ll take my car and leave yours here. Get in.”

  Grandy and I hopped out of my car. The overhead light in the SUV didn’t come on when I opened the back door.

  “Hey, your light’s not working,” I said.

  Napolitani turned in his seat. “That’s the way I like it.” A smile lifted the corners of his mouth.

  I didn’t. I still couldn’t identify the passenger, who remained shrouded in the deep shadow of the tree.

  Napolitani ratcheted up his grin. “Perhaps after we finish our business, we can have a drink.”

  Grandy nodded. Fine, I thought. A drink, if we’re not in West Palm’s city lock-up.

  “So, everyone knows everyone now,” Napolitani said.

  The passenger in front shifted his body slightly, and I caught his face in the streetlight.

  “Jerry! No way.” I grabbed Grandy and reached for the door handle.

  The door wouldn’t open.

  “I suppose this is the way you like your door handles too, right?” I tried to keep my tone light. My heart was in my throat. I could barely get the words out of my mouth. Why had I decided to entrust our lives to a Mafia don, especially one who employed my ex as his assistant? I lost it.

  “Let us out.” I hammered on the door.

  “Evie, honey baby, calm down.” Jerry turned and reached into the backseat for my arm.

  Napolitani hit a switch and the door suddenly swung open, catching me off balance. My body pitched forward and, if Grandy hadn’t grabbed my shirt, I would have fallen out onto the ground.

  “Eve, you need to get a hold of yourself.” Grandy pulled me back onto the seat. “I’m sure Mr. Napolitani means no harm.”

  “No harm? Why does he have to lock us in then?”

  “This is the family car,” he said. “I have two grandchildren, both under the age of five. I always have the doors on automatic lock to make certain the kids are safe.”

  “Oh.” I could feel a flush of embarrassment spreading up my neck and into my face. Suddenly I was grateful for the darkness, as it hid my reddening cheeks. “Sorry I overreacted, but why is Jerry here? What help can he possibly be?”

  “He can wait with the car, keep it running, while we search the place. I didn’t have time to bring another man down here. Jerry was available and eager to help out.”

  Eager? Only because he wanted to impress his future father-in-law.

  “Okay, but he stays in the car.” I had no faith in Jerry’s ability to stay calm if anything went wrong at the house.

  Napolitani’s information said the house would be deserted. Sanders and his family were at a charity affair and the house staff was off for the night. I hoped his sources were reliable. They appeared to be. With the exception of a dim light in one of the windows, the place was dark.

  Napolitani parked the car around the corner, leaving Jerry inside. Grandy, Napolitani, and I walked past the residence and turned down a path that led us along the side of the house. Our way was blocked by a wrought-iron gate—the only potential opening that I had seen in the high fence around the back of the building.

  “How do we get over that?” I asked. “I guess I could climb onto your shoulders and …”

  Napolitani pushed on the gate. It swung open.

  “How did you …” I didn’t want to know how he had managed to get the gate unlocked. If we were caught, Grandy and I would be safer being ignorant of Napolitani’s arrangements. The smile on his face told me that keeping us ignorant had been part of his plan.

  “I can’t imagine what you think you’ll find here, Eve,” he said.

  We approached a set of French doors leading to the kitchen. I remembered its location from Madeleine’s and my consignment trips.

  Napolitani straightened his tie as if he expected to be invited in for a drink. “I said I’d help you, but maybe you can fill me in on what you’re looking for so I can search also.”

  “A missing knife. Anything else that looks, uh, suspicious.”

  That sounded so lame.

  “No, no, my dear.” Grandy almost faded into the night in her black warm-up gear. “You’re looking for a particular knife.”

  I turned to Grandy. “So you say. I can’t figure out …”

  At that moment a car turned into the driveway, its headlights illuminating the front and sides of the house. The three of us pressed ourselves against the stucco siding, hoping that whoever was in the car wouldn’t explore the backyard.

  No lights came on, but we heard the front door open and footsteps echo through the entryway. The sound came closer, getting louder as a door opened. Through the darkness, we could see a spot of light bouncing around the kitchen. It was someone with a flashlight, no more eager to be spotted than we were.

  Something dropped onto the tile floor. “Damn,” a voice said from inside.

  Grandy stuck her head above the window frame to the left of
the French doors.

  “Get down.” I pulled her out of sight.

  “Was that a man’s or a woman’s voice?” asked Napolitani.

  “I don’t know, but I saw someone in there messing around on the counters and the island. I think …” Grandy’s head popped up once more over the window ledge.

  I grabbed her again. “Will you stay down, please?”

  I took a chance and looked over the window ledge. Grandy’s head joined mine.

  “Somebody’s on the floor looking for what was dropped,” Grandy said. “Now they’re fiddling around with something, maybe the knife set. C’mon, we can catch them in the act.” Before she could move, the flashlight went out and the footsteps retreated from the kitchen back into the hallway. We heard the front door opening and closing. The car in the driveway started up and drove off.

  “That was close. What were you thinking, Grandy? We can’t barge in there. It’s against the law.”

  “You think breaking in after the culprit gets away is legal? That is what we’re going to do, right?”

  The appearance of someone in the Sanders’ supposedly empty house had frightened me enough that I was reconsidering my plan—what I had of one, anyways.

  “We could just shine the light through the French doors and see if the knife is there or not. Grandy thinks she saw the knife set on the center island.” My earlier resolve was gone, despite Napolitani having assured me that he was the best man around for breaking, entering, and disarming alarm systems. He could do it so well that no one would even know the system had been tampered with.

  “I need to see it up close.” Grandy sounded insistent.

  Napolitani turned to me. “I thought you wanted a look, too. Otherwise, why am I here?”

  “Fine. Let’s go.” To my own ear, my voice sounded as weak as fast food coffee.

  “I’m right behind you” The voice came from our rear.

  Who? Then I realized. “Jerry, what the hell are you doing here?”

  Napolitani didn’t even act surprised, merely shook his head and sighed deeply.

  “I saw a car pull up and thought I’d warn you.”

  “That’s not your job.” Napolitani seemed to think little of Jerry’s appearance. “What the hell. C’mon then. I can keep an eye on you.”

  “We already know about the car. We saw it pull into the drive and we watched as someone rifled through the kitchen drawers. Whoever was in the house is gone now, so you’re a little late with your news.” My sigh was identical to Napolitani’s. Jerry was such a loser.

  “Not that car,” he said. “The one with Madeleine and Alex in it.”

  Why was I not surprised?

  “Where are they now? You did manage to make them go away, didn’t you?”

  “And miss all this fun?” Alex’s mouth was only a hair’s breadth away from my ear. “You’re such a bad liar, Eve. Neighborhood watch. Ha!”

  “Hey there,” Madeleine said.

  The two of them stood behind us, stooped low to hide their presence from anyone inside, looking as if they really did belong in our burgling gang.

  “I thought you were on a date. What happened?”

  “He chickened out and cancelled, the coward.” Madeleine sounded depressed.

  Alex chimed in. “Whatever you’re planning, stop and think. This is illegal and—”

  I whirled around on him. “Oh, shut up. We really don’t need your PI take on this.”

  In the heat of our argument, we had forgotten about Grandy, Napolitani, and Jerry. While the three of us were discussing the hows and whys of our presence here, the three of them had entered the house.

  “C’mere, Evie,” said Grandy. “A complete knife set, yet …”

  “Damn, Alex. You told me that whoever had taken the knife would put it back here, and you were right. Now I’ve got nothing. I can’t prove it was ever gone or that it’s not the right one,” I said.

  Alex tried to hold me back, but I walked through the open door to join the others at the island. Napolitani pointed his flashlight at the knife set. Grandy was standing so close to the set that her nose almost rested on one of the handles.

  “Be careful, Grandy. You’ll cut yourself or leave a nose print.” I grinned, although I knew she couldn’t see me in the dark.

  Grandy’s head popped up from its inspection. “Does the FBI have a database of nose prints, too?” She dropped her head once again to the knives. “Very interesting.” She continued to stare at the set.

  “Forget it. This trip had been for nothing.” I turned to leave.

  “I don’t get it. What’s going on with the knife thing?” Madeleine entered and paused behind me. “I can’t see a damn thing in here. I’m afraid I’ll trip over something.”

  “Just walk slowly. I’m right in front of you. Watch your step. You know how you are.”

  “You don’t have to remind me. I’m doing my best. I’ll hang onto the wall for balance.”

  “No. Don’t touch anything.” My warning came too late.

  “Oh, there’s a box of some kind here. What—”

  The house alarm began blaring.

  “She tripped it somehow. We’d better get out of here. The cops will be showing up any minute.” Napolitani herded all of us outside, but he stayed behind. “I’ll reset the alarm. Maybe they’ll think it was a malfunction.”

  Madeleine and Alex ran out and jumped into the car that they had arrived in. Grandy and I headed for the SUV, but had to wait there until Napolitani arrived to unlock the doors. Then it hit me. One of our merry band of house breakers was missing.

  “Where’s Jerry?”

  Chapter 16

  “Someone has to go back and look for him.” It was my suggestion. I knew he’d get himself into trouble.

  “Where?” asked Grandy.

  “In the house. Maybe he took a tour of the place while we were busy in the kitchen. He could be trapped. The cops will think he was the one who broke in.”

  “He did break in … with us,” said Grandy.

  We both turned to Napolitani.

  “Don’t look at me. I’m not going. You’re not either. Jerry’s on his own.”

  As if to underscore the danger of remaining any longer, the distant sound of sirens filled the tropical night.

  “Get in.” Napolitani opened the car door.

  Grandy slid into the backseat. I hesitated. “Let me take a peek through the kitchen windows. I’ll just be a minute.”

  I ran down the pathway leading to the rear of the house and pressed my nose up against the French doors. No Jerry. The sirens were getting closer. I worked my way around the house, checking the inside rooms from each window, but I saw no one. At the window of what appeared to be a dimly lit study, I thought I caught movement. I leaned in closer. Jerry. He was opening and closing the drawers of a massive desk that stood in the middle of the room. I banged on the glass and his head shot up. He moved toward me and raised his hand. There was a gun in it.

  “Jerry.” I didn’t want to yell, but I hoped he heard me over the house’s air-conditioning. “What are you doing? Get the hell out of there. The cops are coming.”

  He recognized me, shook his head and opened the window. “Here, take these.” He handed me a sheaf of papers. Before I could reply, the window closed and Jerry moved away.

  The sound of the sirens seemed to be holding at the same level now, as if something had stopped them in their progress toward the house. Was that good or bad? I didn’t have time to think about an answer. I had to find a way into the place so that I could get Jerry out. Somehow. I’d have to break the glass in one of the French doors. I tucked the papers Jerry gave me under my shirt and turned toward the kitchen once more.

  The sirens continued wailing but they still weren’t getting any closer. Stay there, stay there. As I bent to pick up a small landscaping rock to break the window, a hand grabbed my shoulder.

  “Don’t do that.” It was Alex.

  I stood back up.

 
“Now turn around,” he said.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Rescuing you, as usual.”

  “Jerry’s in there. I need to get him out.”

  “He’s a big boy. Let him figure it out. Besides, he’s not your responsibility, not anymore.”

  The sirens stopped blaring.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  “Napolitani just heard it on the police scanner. Apparently Sanders’ son entered the house earlier, just as the three of you were about to break in. He thought he punched the wrong code into the alarm and made it go off. He notified the police and they called off the alert. I’ll bet they’ll be here anyway, just to check on his story. So let’s go, Eve.”

  “Jerry.”

  “If you’re so hung up on the guy, why did you divorce him?” I heard disgust in his voice.

  “It’s not what you think. It’s just that he gets into messes and …”

  “You get him out.” Alex grabbed my arm and pulled me toward him. I fell against his chest. He looked down into my face through the moonlit shadows, his azure eyes made opalescent by the night.

  “I don’t know why I bother.” He pulled me closer and kissed me, his lips moving insistently against mine. I opened my mouth to protest, but my silly objection turned into a sigh of satisfaction as I kissed him back, my arms moving around his neck, my fingers playing with the tendrils of hair that fell loose on his collar. I wanted to remain there longer, but reality intruded, in the form of Napolitani.

  “You kids might want to do that someplace else. Sanders, his son and a few cops are on their way. No rush, but wrap up the romance, would you? Soon.”

  Alex and I broke away from each other. He headed toward his car, and I went in the opposite direction, following Napolitani toward the SUV.

  “Jerry’s in the house.” I caught up to Napolitani.

  “I know. We couldn’t have planned it any better, I guess.”

  “Planned what?”

  “I guess you could say it was serendipitous. Mr. Sanders had something of Jerry’s. He took this opportunity to get it back.”

  We reached the car, and I slid into the empty passenger’s seat. Napolitani drove off.