Cynthia Hamilton - Madeline Dawkins 02 - A High Price to Pay

by Cynthia Hamilton

  “What are you two doing here?” Eames asked the private investigators, his tone accusing and blunt.

  “We are here at the request of Mr. Alexander,” Mike said, matching Eames in attitude.

  “For what purpose?”

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to ask him, as we’re not at liberty to discuss our privileged conversation with anyone,” Mike replied coolly. Ross’s voice suddenly rose, momentarily putting a halt to the muscle flexing.

  “What do you mean you can’t rescind the warrant? You signed it.” Ross’s voice trailed off again as he shut the door to the library.

  “In case you failed to grasp the fact, your ‘partner’ is on the short list of suspects in the murder of Vivian Story,” Eames said.

  “You know that’s totally ludicrous,” Mike shot back. “In case your memory failed you, my ‘partner’ has herself been the victim of two very recent crimes—breaking and entering and attempted murder. With all that going on, do you seriously believe she has the motive or inclination to kill her own client? Doesn’t that strike you as just a tad unlikely?”

  “Could the two of you please stop talking as though I’m not here,” Madeline butted in. “I’m a suspect in the technical sense of being in the vicinity of the crime when it was committed, but so were four other people. And Mike makes a point that’s hard to dismiss. Plus, killing my own client when I know I’m going to show up on surveillance footage would be sheer stupidity. I sincerely hope the SBPD has a more sophisticated way of detecting probable suspects.”

  Mike wore a lopsided grin in appreciation of his partner’s chutzpah, while Eames’s cocky expression lost most of its smug authority. But the victory of MDPI over the law was short lived.

  Ross returned to the foyer and thrust the warrant back at Detective Eames. “You can do your damn search for the item mentioned, but if any of you disturb my sleeping wife, I will sue your asses from here to doomsday. Do you understand me?”

  In lieu of a response, Detective Eames folded the warrant slowly and placed it in his jacket pocket. Without a word, he headed up the stairs.

  Mike pressed in the last pushpin and stood back to regard the two incident boards. The one on the wall across from his desk was devoted to photos and other data regarding Vivian Story’s death and the disappearance of her jewelry. The board on the wall to the right was covered in index cards that laid out the timeline of the two crimes committed against Madeline. He backed up and rested against his desk next to her as they contemplated the two complex cases.

  “Okay,” he said, picking up his coffee, hoping the caffeine and the boards would bring the details into clearer focus. He took a sip and waited. Somewhere in all this information were the keys to unlocking three mysteries. Madeline got up and switched the order of two index cards and stepped off to the side to let Mike see the changes.

  “Why do I feel like the answers are staring us in the face?” he asked.

  “Because they probably are,” Madeline replied. “What are we missing?” She went back to her former vantage point, her head pivoting from one cork board to the other. She barked out a sharp, ironic laugh.

  “What is it?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Tell me,” Mike coaxed.

  “I’m sure it’s just the product of an overwrought mind.”

  “Tell me,” Mike insisted. Madeline positioned herself between the two boards, then hesitated.

  “Never mind, it’s too farfetched,” she said.

  “Would you just tell me, for God’s sake.”

  “All right…the assault on me started with the death of Rick Yeoman…” she said, coming back to the desk to write his name on an index card. She moved the first card on her board down and placed the new one at the top.

  “You mean psychologically,” Mike surmised.

  “Yes. That should’ve been enough warning by itself.”

  “Warning against what, exactly?”

  Madeline mulled this over. What was Usherwood’s game plan? The attempt on her life seemed to be the final blow that failed. If he was only trying to make her pay for her testimony against him, then all this would make sense and would be in keeping with his extremely warped sense of justice. It would also follow that he wasn’t through with her yet.

  “Of what’s to come,” she said at length.

  “So, killing Yeoman and rearranging your furniture were the appetizers to the main course of a fatal car crash caused by compromised brake lines…?”

  “Yes. But the big crescendo fell flat. So, what does a devious sadist like Usherwood do to make up for his failure to kill me—and you?”

  “Try again?” Mike said after attempting to divine the answer from Madeline’s expression.

  “What if…” Madeline said as she pointed to both incident boards, “these two situations are linked somehow…?”

  “Vivian’s murder and your attempted murder?” Mike asked, clearly baffled by the suggestion.

  “Yeoman’s death, the psychological assault on my home, the brake failure and Vivian’s death…” Mike still looked puzzled. “Okay, I know it’s sort of a stretch, but I’m finding it more than a bit curious that after almost being killed, I’m now considered a suspect in Vivian’s murder.”

  Mike’s mouth went slack as he connected Madeline’s dots. “You’re suggesting Lionel Usherwood killed Vivian so you would be framed for her murder?” Hearing her wild notion repeated back to her by Mike’s unlikely voice of reason made her slump dejectedly. “Problem with that idea is the attempt on our lives happened after Vivian’s death.”

  “Right.” Madeline let out a self-deprecating laugh and rubbed her sore neck. “I told you I wasn’t thinking clearly. It was just a wild theory, anyway,” she said, returning to her perch on Mike’s desk. “I think I’ve gone too long without sleep.”

  “Maybe your theory’s not all that wild,” Mike said, getting to his feet as he examined both boards. “So far, we don’t have a clear motive-plus-opportunity combo with any of the five suspects, counting you. But the big question here is how would Usherwood gain access to the house when it was heavily guarded?” The question spurred him to his computer.

  “What are you looking up?” Madeline asked, coming around to look over his shoulder. What she saw was an aerial view of dense vegetation dotted with sprawling structures, land bisected by snaky gray paths she recognized as roads. Mike zoomed in closer to the Alexander estate, then shifted toward the rear of the property to the parcels directly adjacent to it.

  He hit the plus sign again, and as the image refocused, they found themselves staring at what looked to be a subdivided parcel directly behind the estate, with several residences on it.

  “I know that street,” Madeline said, checking her contacts on her cell phone for confirmation. “Lindsey Paul lives at the very end.”

  “Give me the address,” Mike said as he opened Google Earth. Madeline gave it to him and within seconds he was closing in on the street.

  “I can’t quite tell—is this street gated?”

  “No, but most of the individual properties have gates.”

  “How about your friend’s place?” Mike asked.

  “No gate. She runs a photography studio in her guesthouse, so people are always coming and going. And I wouldn’t call us ‘friends’ anymore,” Madeline said with a meaningful look. Not many of her former friendships survived the breakup of her marriage and the exposé of her ex-husband’s illegal business dealings. Many of those friends and acquaintances who didn’t take a sizable financial hit were still scandalized by the events that precipitated Madeline’s fall from the height of Montecito society and the incarceration of Steven Ridley.

  “Think it would be possible for Usherwood to access the Alexander’s property from her place?”

  “He definitely could gain access onto her parcel. But I don’t know what type of
security Ross has on his perimeter. You’d think it would all be buttoned down. I could ask him, though technically speaking we’re supposed to be concentrating on finding Teresa and clues to her past,” Madeline reminded him as she turned her attention to the far left side of Vivian’s board.

  Under the index card with Teresa’s name was the photo Madeline had taken of Vivian and the girl, and the photos of Vivian and her missing jewels. Underneath these were cards with the names and contact info for Teresa’s previous employers. Tacked to the side were Teresa’s fake SSN and fictitious address.

  Of the three mysteries before them, Teresa’s whereabouts and history didn’t seem as compelling when compared to murder and attempted murder. Yet, that was their only official case, the one they’d been paid to carry out.

  Madeline let out a defeated huff. She had taken on a relatively simple assignment, but her prior commitment to Cherie had hampered her ability to deal with it in a timely manner. Her stomach knotted at the thought that had she been more diligent…had she been less absorbed in Cherie’s self-obsessed melodrama…had Lauren not failed to give her Vivian’s note right away…

  “I’m surprised Lauren didn’t show up this morning,” Mike said, as if reading her thoughts.

  “It’s a Saturday,” Madeline reminded him.

  “Yeah, but she would’ve been working anyway…”

  “I sent her a text telling her not to come in,” Madeline said, keeping her eyes averted to the incident boards. Mike chewed his lip methodically. Having known his partner all her adult life, there were times when he knew her as well as she knew herself.

  “Are you really going to lay the blame for Vivian’s death at that poor kid’s feet?” he asked, his tone even and nonthreatening. Madeline spun around and glared at him, lips parted in exasperation, as if the question was as much of an affront as Lauren’s inattention to her job.

  “It’s not for me to place blame,” she said, though she did blame her assistant. The justification repeated itself over and over in her mind until Mike’s reproachful stare made her consciously dismiss it.

  “At any rate, we need to get our hands on some solid facts about our mystery girl,” she said as she examined the photo. “I think we need to make a new flyer and plaster it all over town, especially in the Hispanic areas.”

  Mike opened another program and pulled up the old flyer. He swiveled the laptop around so Madeline could see it.

  “Maybe we should do two flyers—one in English and one in Spanish,” Madeline suggested. “And maybe we should offer a reward of some kind…”

  Mike copied the document and began changing the text. “What are we offering a reward for, and how much?” he asked as he translated the copy. Madeline mulled this over for a moment.

  “How about we change the heading to read ‘Missing—Please help us find Teresa’,” she offered tentatively. Mike typed it in and sat back.

  “What if Teresa is the name she uses with gringos?” he asked.

  “Okay…good point. Let’s go with the standard ‘Have you seen me?’” Mike nodded and made the change. “Then, under her picture, put in quotes ‘Teresa Maria Gomez’, then under that, ‘Last seen near Isla Vista. If you have any information on this young woman’s whereabouts, please call 805-777-5843. $500 reward to anyone who has information that will help us find her.’”

  Mike finished the flyer in English and read it aloud.

  “What do you think?” Madeline asked.

  “I think we probably need a height and weight description, and anything else that might make her more readily identifiable.”

  “Well, she’s…” Madeline used her hand to approximate Teresa’s height, making allowances for the platform heels she was wearing. “About five-foot-three or four,” she guessed. “Couldn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds.” Mike’s fingers typed in the statistics while he kept his eyes on Madeline, waiting for more telling characteristics.

  “Problem is we don’t really know much about her. She seems to have a knack for gaining the confidence of those in need of her services without ever divulging much about her past. What she gave Helen was complete fabrication.”

  Madeline turned back to the board. She gathered up the index cards with the contacts she’d gotten from Sybil Wately.

  “While you work on that, I’m going to try to reach these women again. Eleven o’clock on a Saturday…maybe I’ll have better luck this time,” she said as she headed for her own office. As long as we have at least one lead, we still have hope, she tried to convince herself. But she couldn’t shake the feeling Teresa Maria Gomez had vanished like a ghost.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  Mike unlocked the door just as Madeline was ending a phone call. He placed the two stacks of flyers on Lauren’s desk and walked into Madeline’s private office. As had become his habit, he scanned the parking lot for signs of law enforcement protection from her window. The lot was already filling up, but he didn’t see any marked or unmarked cars.

  “Any luck?” he asked.

  “Not really,” she said as she typed up her notes. “Did manage to speak with the two women who hadn’t returned my calls, but I didn’t learn anything new from either of them. They both remembered Teresa as being pleasant and reliable…quiet, polite, a Godsend, etcetera. But I don’t think they gave her background a single thought. As with her two other former employers, they both found her ‘serendipitously’ through the deaths of their parents’ friends.”

  “That’s a creepy scenario,” Mike said, draping his lanky frame on the chair across from her. “I guess we could always wait until Vivian’s memorial and see if she turns up to find her next employer.” Madeline shot him a look—partly critical, partly amused, partly intrigued.

  “Hopefully, we’ll find her before then,” she said, swiveling around to face him. “I also called Sybil Wately and Susan Kellogg again to see if they remembered anything else that might be of help.”

  “No luck?”

  “No luck.”

  “So, what’s the plan now?”

  “I guess we split up and start handing out flyers.” Neither one of them was very enthusiastic about a day filled with accosting strangers, especially after a long, sleepless night. The private eye’s job was never glamorous, but it could be rewarding. They’d never get rich from it, but they both loved solving puzzles, righting wrongs and sorting out other people’s messes as a means of keeping their grey matter sharp.

  As they were shutting down the office, Madeline’s phone rang. It was Ross Alexander.

  “This is Madeline.”

  “They’re taking Cherie in for questioning,” Ross said. He sounded like he was just barely holding it together. Madeline put the call on speaker so Mike could hear the news.

  “Is she coherent enough to answer questions?”

  “I’ve never seen her so out of it. We had to literally pull her out of bed and pour coffee down her to get her eyes open.” Ross held his hand over the phone as he spoke to someone else. “I regret letting the doctor give her a sedative last night. God knows what else she had in her system. She looks like hell.”

  “Have the detectives already left the house?”

  “No. They’re waiting around for Cherie to get dressed. She’s completely distraught. Helen’s up there with her right now trying to get her pulled together. Oh Jesus. I can’t believe any of this,” Ross said weakly.

  “So, they’re actually taking her in?” Madeline asked, looking at Mike with alarm.

  “Apparently.”

  “Have you called an attorney?”

  “I just called Larry Sloan and got his assistant.” It didn’t surprise Madeline that Ross would seek out one of the most high-profile defense attorneys in the country. “Hopefully I’ll hear back soon. But what do I do in the meantime?” Ross asked, his voice quavering with emotion.

  Madeline exhaled slowly, her
eyes glued to Mike’s. He shook his head and shrugged. “I can give you the name of a good local attorney who can cover things until you speak with Larry Sloan,” Madeline suggested. “Cherie needs legal representation immediately.”

  “Right. Okay, what’s his name?” Ross asked. They could hear the sound of frantic searching in the background.

  “Her name is Liz Sweet, but don’t let that fool you. She’s a barracuda. If I were ever on the wrong side of the law, she’s who I’d call,” Madeline said, regretting her choice of words as soon as they left her mouth. “Which detective did you speak to?”

  “Detective Ronald Pulaski of the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department,” Ross read off mechanically. “This place is still crawling with uniforms. Do they honestly believe my wife would kill my mother with a houseful of people waiting for her downstairs? This is absolute insanity.”

  “Did they find…what was used…?” Madeline couldn’t bring herself to say “murder weapon” while speaking to the deceased’s son.

  “I assume so,” Ross replied hotly. “They’re not telling me a damn thing. The warrant said they were looking for a ‘silk cord.’ But that doesn’t really tell me a whole hell of lot.” Madeline immediately thought of the cords used to hold back the silk drapes adorning the dining pavilion. So many people could’ve had access to one of those.

  “Okay,” Madeline said, keeping her voice calm and soothing, “I’ll send you the contact info for Liz Sweet.”

  “Please do,” Ross said before ending the call. Madeline looked at Mike searchingly, though she didn’t know what she hoped to find on his features.

  “You have to admit, she was our pick for the murder,” he said. Madeline eased herself onto the corner of Lauren’s desk and searched her contacts until she found Detective Slovitch’s cell number. She placed the call. It went immediately to voicemail. She decided not to leave a message.

  “Yes, but if the cord was taken from outside the house, then that opens up the field to other possible suspects,” she said.