“We were looking for Leona Barber’s sandal,” I volunteered.
“In the rain? At that dinky little deserted airport? Honestly, Colleen, where are your brains? I swear, you get that from your father’s side of the family!”
I groaned—a long, highly audible sound to make sure my mother heard it.
“What’s your excuse?” she said to Bevin.
“I guess I take after the Flemings, too.”
“Two idiots! Did you at least find the sandal?”
“Sort of,” I told her.
“What does that mean?’
“Don’t ask, Ma.”
We carried our coffee into the dining room, where Bobby, Dennis, and my father were playing cards at the table.
“What’s this?” Bevin asked. “Go Fish?”
My father looked up from his hand. “Texas Hold’em.”
“You’re teaching my kid Texas Hold’em?” she asked, incredulous.
“You didn’t think I’d just plunk them down in front the television, did you? I don’t believe in that. They should do something useful with their spare time. Learn something!”
“Texas Hold’em?” Bevin repeated.
“I’ll bet they’ve pretty much mastered seven-card stud,” I told her. “It’s like playing Yahtzee—three of a kind, four of a kind, a straight. This is a little more complicated, but they stand a much better chance to win at Texas Hold’em. They use common cards.”
“You’re as bad as your father. Your whole family’s nuts.”
I nodded, agreeing wholeheartedly. She was right. We were all a little off.
Bobby looked up from his hand. “Can Dennis stay over?”
Dennis gave Bevin sad, puppy-dog eyes. “Please, Mom?”
“No way,” she told him. “It’s a school night. We’re going home, and you’re going straight to bed. After that, mommy’s peeling off these wet clothes and getting into a pair of nice, dry pajamas. Then I might just drink myself blind.”
“I’ll drive you guys home,” I offered. “I have to stop to check on Sara anyway.”
My mother poked her head into the dining room. “She’s asleep upstairs.”
“Why?” I asked. “What happened?”
“She came over because she was upset. Something about this Christian guy and some kind of disagreement,” my mother told me. “I didn’t really understand what she was talking about. She’s just like you, Colleen. Always looking for trouble, fighting with some nice Christian boy …”
“Christian Grasso,” I informed my mother. “He’s a boy from school, not a religion.”
“Oh! Well, I told her she could stay overnight. Let Bobby stay, too. I’ll get them up in time for school.”
“Great,” I said. “After I drop Bevin off, I’m going to see Ken Rhodes to tell him about the sandal.”
“You’re seeing Ken Rhodes looking like that?” my mother asked. “My God, Colleen. You look like a drowned dog!”
I took Bevin’s coffee mug and gave both hers and mine back to my mother. “Nobody cares what I look like.”
“He’s a man, isn’t he?” she said. “Trust me, he’ll care!”
14
I drove Dennis and Bevin home and then turned into my own driveway. My mother was right. Men did care how women looked. Ken Rhodes was a man. He always dressed impeccably, even when casual. And though our relationship seemed stuck somewhere between purely professional and family friend and something with potential, I didn’t want to look like a drowned rat when I saw him. I decided to up my game a bit. I ran inside and bounded upstairs to put on mascara, some lip gloss, and neat, dry clothes. Pleased with my appearance, I drove out to Ken’s condo tower on Bay Boulevard, where it stood like some kind of monument to opulence for uber-rich, New Jersey shore residents. I always felt like I was out of my element whenever I visited the building. The fact that my ex, Neil, lived there, too, made my blood boil.
I pulled the Sentra into the visitor’s parking lot and cut the engine. A quick glance in the rearview mirror made me glad I had taken a few minutes to dry out my hair and change my clothes. I gave myself a big thumbs-up before climbing out of the car. I ran down the short walkway to the building’s entrance, where a friendly doorman jumped into service and let me in.
“Eighth floor?” he asked politely. “Apartment 8C? Mr. Rhodes, right, ma’am?”
I had only met this man once before, when I had visited the building months ago. I couldn’t imagine how he remembered me, but I supposed that was part of his job, and he was obviously very good at it. I thought his Christmas tips from the residents alone would set him up for life.
“Thanks. Yes. Ken Rhodes. He isn’t expecting me.”
“That’s fine, Mrs. Caruso. Go right up,” he said, as though I were a familiar face instead of a rare visitor.
I took the center elevator up to the eighth floor and pressed the buzzer on “C.” Ken didn’t look surprised to see me. He grinned, but I guessed it wasn’t due to the pleasure of my company.
“What happened to you this time?” he asked. Of course, Ken looked amazing in loose-fitting sweatpants and a faded Rowan University T-shirt.
How could he look so good so late in the evening? I wondered.
I entered the condo and closed the door behind me. “Nothing happened to me. I just thought I should tell you right away—I found Leona Barber’s missing sandal.”
Ken’s face went lead-story serious. “Are you kidding me? You found the sandal? Where?”
I sat down on the leather sofa in the living room, not waiting for an invitation. “I went out to the airport with Bevin tonight. It was around back, in that grassy area behind the hangar. The police never looked there. They spent most of their time searching the field where they found Leona’s body.”
Ken had been there the day the police searched the field. “I remember. What made you look out back near the hangar?”
“A hunch, I guess. I just figured it was odd that they found her wearing only one sandal. I thought maybe there was a struggle getting her into whatever plane she got herself tossed from, and her shoe fell off. I saw a few of those smaller planes out back near the hangar. Did you know they leave planes out in the rain?”
Ken sat down in a big, comfortable-looking leather lounge chair. “The hangar isn’t all that big. Did you think they shove all the planes together inside like patio furniture cushions every time it rains?”
“I guess not. But if there’s ever a really strong wind, what’s to keep those tiny planes from getting blown into the field?”
“Sometimes they blow over, but most of them have chocks, I’m sure,” he told me.
“Chucks?” I asked.
“Chocks. They’re things they shove against the wheels to keep …” He saw the puzzled look on my face. “They’re usually yellow. Some of them look like those wedges that you put under doors to keep them open. You didn’t see those?”
I shrugged. I didn’t really take any notice. Out at that airport, my main concern had been Leona’s sandal, not the particulars of aircraft upkeep. “Anyway, the planes all looked like two-seaters. Don’t you think it’s unlikely that Leona did a swan dive from a two-seater—especially if she struggled enough to lose her shoe getting into the plane? There must have been three people inside—Leona, of course, one person to fly the plane, and someone else to push her out.”
“Makes sense,” he said. “You really gave this a lot of thought, Colleen. I’m impressed.”
I shouldn’t have smiled, but I couldn’t help myself. It wasn’t every day that Ken Rhodes gave a compliment.
“Of course, the police came,” I told him. “But we didn’t get arrested. That nice cop, James O’Reilly, spotted our flashlight while he was cruising out on the highway. He always treats me like I’m his senile great-grandmother.”
“Gee, Colleen, I can’t imagine why,” Ken said.
“He went back around the building and put the sandal in an evidence bag.”
“You waited for hi
m to make sure he brought it out, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, well, that, and I didn’t want to drive away and leave the kid all alone in the pouring rain. No wonder he spotted our flashlight from the highway. It’s so dark and spooky out there.”
“He’s an adult, Colleen. You know, a big boy—with a big gun.”
“I realize that,” I said. I shivered and shifted my weight. I had changed my pants, but neglected to change my underwear. I was afraid the wet would leak through, and the back of my thighs would stick to the leather sofa.
“Are you having a problem?” Ken asked.
“Some of my clothes are still a little damp in spots,” I admitted.
“Would you like a towel to sit on?”
I held up my hand. “No, thank you. A damp bottom isn’t exactly a catastrophe.”
“Not for you,” he quipped. “I’d like to get everything that happened tonight on the computer before it starts to fade from your memory. I suppose you didn’t take notes out at the airport.”
“In the pouring rain?” I asked.
“Maybe in the car after you found the sandal?”
“No.”
“Too bad. We’ll just have to rely on your razor-sharp memory,” he said, then paused to consider what had just come out of his mouth and shook his head. “Dear God, we’re in trouble, and we haven’t even started the story yet.” He got up and went down a short hallway and came back with a big, fluffy towel. Ken tossed it to me. “Sit on this. I don’t know how to get water stains out of leather sofas.”
I looked around the room. Everything was in order and sparkling clean. The place appeared way too fastidious, especially for a single guy. I wondered if my rock-hard boss had obsessive-compulsive disorder. What had he thought of the chaos in my house the night we came home with the pizzas? He must have had an internal meltdown when we were working at my desk in the den.
I slipped the towel under me, feeling like a puppy who couldn’t be trusted on the furniture. “There isn’t much to tell. I wish I’d thought to get a shot of the sandal, though, but it wouldn’t have made a difference. It was really dark out there, and the rain was coming down hard. The picture would have been worthless.”
Ken got up from the chair and went toward the kitchen. “I’ll put on some coffee. Meanwhile, would you go into the den and get my laptop? You can set it up on the coffee table.”
I ventured down the hall in search of Ken Rhodes’s den and couldn’t resist taking a peek inside his bathroom. It looked way cleaner than mine—all black and white tiles, with brushed-nickel faucets and hardware. Everything looked polished to the hilt. Obsessive-compulsive disorder, I thought. Either that or he had a service come in every day to shine the place up. As impressive as his pristine digs were, I couldn’t envision Ken Rhodes doing the Soft Scrub-and-Windex routine.
I continued on and got a look at Ken’s bedroom though the open doorway—roomy and very masculine, with dark wood furniture and a huge down duvet that covered the bed. I noticed some prints above the headboard. They looked very abstract, like various geometric shapes in beige, tan, and brown. No socks on the floor, no old cups on the night stand, not even anything in the little trash can. OCD, I reminded myself.
Such a neat person. And so annoyingly organized.
The puzzle pieces to Ken Rhodes suddenly lined up in front of me. Perfectly dressed. Immaculately groomed. Every room in his home in pristine condition. Oh my God, was Ken Rhodes gay?
That’s nothing more than a stereotype, I told myself. You can’t go around believing in clichés.
Still, it would be just like me to throw myself at a gay man.
I found the den behind the final door. The room was twinkling clean. I couldn’t imagine how anyone could concentrate in such a sterile environment. A treadmill stood against a wall close to a window. Some sort of odd-looking weight contraption had been set up in the opposite corner. This was where Ken Rhodes kept his mind sharp and his body rock hard. My breath sped up just imagining him on the weight bench, a dumbbell in hand. This room, more than the rest of the condo, defined him. Strong, professional, in control.
Apparently, my brain couldn’t quite figure him out … but my body knew exactly how it felt about Ken Rhodes.
I spotted a laptop atop a polished wood desk near the door. I picked it up and brought it into the living room.
Ken carried in two steaming glass mugs from the kitchen and handed one to me.
“The coffee smells good. You made it?”
“The coffee machine made it. A Keurig. Can’t screw that up.”
My coffee maker at home had set me back about ten bucks, on sale at ShopRite with my Price Plus card. Not that I was jealous—well, yes, I was jealous. Ken’s Keurig was, no doubt, a top-of-the-line item. After the months I had spent scrimping just to get by, I had developed a fairly good-sized chip that I carried on my shoulder like a boulder.
I took a sip from the mug. The coffee tasted as good as it smelled—unlike the sewage my mother gave me earlier. I finished half the cup before putting it down on the coffee table. I didn’t see any coasters. Ken hunched over his laptop next to me. His thigh bumped up against mine.
“Do you need a timeline of events or …” I began.
“Write the whole thing down as you remember it,” he suggested, sliding the computer in front of me.
I dove right in and started typing. After a few minutes, I could feel him leaning in, reading the screen as my fingers flew over the keys. I could just barely feel the hint of his breath on my shoulder and could smell some sort of masculine soap—a scent so understated that I could only detect it when he was in very close proximity. How was a girl supposed to concentrate with that going on?
“I can’t do it like this if you’re going to be looking over my shoulder,” I told him point-blank.
He leaned back. “I know. Sorry. But you have to change it.”
“Change it? Why? These words are gold!”
“It’s reading like something you grabbed from the police blotter,” Ken pointed out. “Officer James O’Reilly might have taken the sandal into evidence, but he certainly didn’t discover it. You did. You need to make that perfectly clear. It’s your column, remember? A personal account of your activities.”
I corrected my mistake and wrote the complete story—my version—from the trek out in the pouring rain with a friend who wished to remain anonymous, to Officer O’Reilly’s retrieval of the sandal. It took two hours, including spell-check, to finish.
“Okay, save it and then print it out,” Ken instructed.
I glanced around the room. There wasn’t a printer anywhere in sight. Ken noticed my dilemma. “It’s in my den,” he explained. “Wireless.”
I shrugged. Though I did have a laptop with the capability, I only possessed an old printer that I had to plug into the back of my computer every time I wanted to print something out. I hit the print key and heard the distant clicks of the printer ejecting pages one by one in the other room.
“The thing that eats at me the most about this whole story is that I know there had to be three people in the plane,” I told him. “Most of the planes at the airport were little two-seater jobs. There are three four-seaters, and Hank Barber owns all of them. I have another hunch about this.”
“What’s that?” Ken asked.
“I don’t think Hank Barber had anything to do with Leona’s death. He seems so broken up over it.”
“Then go with your instincts, but keep your mind open to other possibilities. What about Dizzie Oliver? Any hunches there?”
“The Hot Air King might have been involved in his wife’s death, but Trina Cranford could have had a motive, too. With Dizzie out of the picture, Trina’s Tresses would sure get a lot more clients. Trina wasn’t at Dizzie’s wake—at least not while I was there. I wonder if she showed up at all. They knew each other, if only in a professional way. Hank Barber attended. He sat behind Matthew, chatting with him when I walked in. They’re the best of friends, acc
ording to the mechanic at the airport. I have to figure out just how close they really are.”
“How about Leona? What kind of job did she have? Are there kids? You’re going to dig a little deeper, aren’t you?”
“I’ll go back to the airport tomorrow and ask Drake Tuttle. He’s full of information, and he loves to talk. Hank Barber isn’t the talkative type, and I doubt he’ll ever speak to me again after the questions I asked him this morning.”
I rubbed my eyes. It had been a grueling day. I felt dead tired and achy.
“Are you hungry?” Ken Rhodes asked me.
“Dear God! You’re not going to cook, are you?”
He gave me a slight smile. “I’m like you. I don’t cook either. I was thinking of that diner a few blocks from here. I could use something, and I’m sure you can, too. You’re always hungry.”
Leave it to my indelicate boss to mention my enormous appetite.
“Actually, I skipped dinner. The kids ate at my mother’s house, and I wasn’t about to go out to that airport after eating something she made. I could use a burger.”
We took the elevator down and strolled through the lobby. As we exited the building, I noticed the rain had finally stopped. We passed the visitor’s parking lot, which was quiet, and walked toward the street, where traffic was light but steady. A Lexus passed by, going south on Bay Boulevard. I had to pause for a moment. At first, I thought it might be my ex behind the wheel. Ken also noticed the car and read my mind.
“It’s not him,” he said. “But what if it was? You’re single. You’re over twenty-one—well over twenty-one.”
“Thanks loads!” I laughed.
He took my arm and led me down the street. “You’re going to run into him now and then, Colleen. You can’t get mad every time you see a Lexus. Do you plan to go through the rest of your life hating his guts? It takes a lot of energy to keep up that kind of pace. You need to relax, take a deep breath, and let go of the rage. For the benefit of you and your kids, consider taking the high road.”
Hide nor Hair (A Jersey Girl Cozy Mystery Book 2) Page 11
