“You can’t find stuff in your pockets, either,” the little girl said.
“This is Mia.” Colleen patted the top of the little girl’s head. “She is my pride and my joy and the light of my life.”
It was said lightly, with a fond smile, and Sonora got the feeling that Colleen Caplan often introduced Mia that way, and always meant it.
“We lost the garage door opener again.” Mia bent over and picked at one of the laces on her hiking boots.
“But I do have my keys!” Colleen Caplan patted her pockets again and frowned. “At least I think I do.” She seemed out of breath in the heat. Her neck looked sweaty. She peered into the Nissan. “There.” Opened the door. A huge set of keys hung from a cobalt blue fuzzy ball that Colleen Caplan held up and waved at Sonora.
Sonora moved around to the other side of the car, opened and closed the passenger door that had not caught earlier.
“Mrs. Caplan, I was supposed to meet your husband here, and—”
“Come in then. We have air-conditioning!”
There was no doubt, Sonora thought, looking at the house, that the Caplans had air-conditioning as well as every other household convenience, but Colleen Caplan’s words throbbed with such unbridled enthusiasm that Sonora had to smile. And it was very hot.
“Thank you, I will.”
31
They went through a side door into the kitchen, which looked clean enough beneath the kind of clutter that accumulates very quickly with a kid in the house. Sonora, looking at Colleen Caplan, almost said two kids in the house.
There were open cans of Chef Boy-Ar-Dee ravioli on the cabinets, a wad of damp paper towels at the foot of a huge white double-door refrigerator. Sonora looked at the fridge. It had an ice-maker and ice water in the door, just like the one in the Winchells’ kitchen, except newer. Maybe she would put one on her Sears charge account, and pay it off in six-dollar monthly installments for the rest of her natural life.
The house looked brand new. There was a breakfast nook in the kitchen with an oak table. Everything was white white white. Spotlights showed that there were no cobwebs over the gold-knobbed cabinets.
“Mrs. Caplan—” Sonora said.
“Call me Collie.” She opened the refrigerator, which was full of bright red cans of Coke and shiny green cans of Mello Yello. She smiled over her shoulder at Sonora. “Soda? We also have coffee and wine.” The last was added awkwardly. A sentence she threw in for sophisticates who liked such things.
“A Coke would be great,” Sonora said.
“Let me find the cookies and we’ll sit down.”
Where to sit proved to be a problem, with Mia peeping into a white-carpeted living room with the air of one in front of a museum exhibit. She looked over her shoulder at Collie. “She’s company. We can sit in here if it’s company.”
Collie Caplan pursed her lips, stopped midstride.
“Oh no we can’t.” Mia was still talking, sounding regretful. “The no-food rule.”
“You know, honey, it’s my house too.” Collie smiled but it was a small, tight thing, and it did not light her eyes. She looked worried. She looked tired.
Sonora looked at the white brocade couch. “Please don’t ask me to go in there and eat a cookie.”
Something like shame passed over Collie Caplan’s face. She straightened her shoulders. Winked at the little girl who watched her, hands clasped behind her back.
“Don’t be silly, Mia. Spills can be cleaned up, I had the couch Scotchgarded.”
Something uncompromising in her voice. Sonora and Mia followed her into the living room.
“Sit down,” Collie invited.
Sonora looked around the room, chose a wing-back chair in hunter green leather, set her legs between the edge of the chair and a footstool. Even if she’d been inclined to put her feet up, which she wasn’t, there was no doubt in her mind that footstools in this house weren’t for feet.
Collie sat on the edge of the couch. Mia settled beside her, thighs touching.
Something about the two of them together, side by side, muscles tense, poised for flight, made Sonora sad.
She told herself to be careful of jumping to conclusions about Gage Caplan, knew when she did that it was a wasted effort. The conclusions were coming fast and furious.
“Collie, want your back pillow?”
“No thanks.” Collie’s voice had gone quiet. Sonora saw dark circles under the woman’s eyes. A lot of sleepless nights. Which might be due to the pregnancy, or might not. Collie patted Mia’s leg. “But thanks for asking. Why don’t you take the cookies down to our den and watch a video?”
“Can I watch Pulp Fiction?”
“No.”
Mia grinned suddenly, the smile of a kid who was testing the waters. “It’s time for Ricki Lake.”
“That will broaden your mind,” Collie said darkly, but Mia was already gone.
Sonora waited but did not hear the sound of a television.
“Did my husband say he was going to meet you here?” Collie asked.
Sonora nodded.
“He probably just got held up. I’m surprised he agreed to leave the office. You know the jury’s out?”
“He told me they were waiting on a verdict, but he thought it would be a while.”
Collie licked her lips. “Maybe the jury came in.”
They looked at each other.
“I hope he nails this guy,” Sonora said.
“If anybody can do it, it’s Gage,” Collie said, serious now.
“I hear a lot of good things about him,” Sonora said, but Collie picked up on something in her voice, and her eyes went narrow and watchful.
“How long have you and Mr. Caplan been married?”
“Five years.” She twisted her khaki shorts in one thick finger.
Sonora smelled vanilla, noticed the dry chips of potpourri in a crystal bowl by her shoulder. Next to the potpourri was a candy dish, with a clump of hard candy, red-striped pillow shapes, that had stuck together. It was the kind of candy no one ate, no telling how long it had been there. Added a touch of color, at any rate.
“Did you know his first wife?”
Collie shook her head, twisted her finger first one way, then the next. “She was the prettiest thing, just like Mia. Mia’s not mine, you know, but she is mine, if you know what I mean.”
Sonora knew what she meant. Collie and Mia were what she and Heather were, on a good day, what she and Tim had been, before aliens took him away and left her with a teenager.
She knew a good mother when she saw one.
“Mia was only two when Micah died.” Collie got up, opened the seat of the piano stool in front of a gleaming black grand piano. Rummaged. Looked over her shoulder at Sonora. “She played. Gage bought this piano for her on her birthday the year before she died. He keeps all her music and her pictures in here. Sometimes Mia likes to look at them.”
The photo album was dingy white vinyl, bought in less affluent days. Sticky fingerprints on the front cover. Likely Mia thumbed them quite a bit. Collie handed the album to Sonora, opened it in the middle.
“This is our favorite. Mia and me.”
Micah had been small and slight in the way of many Asian women. Her eyes were dark like Mia’s, face very round.
“Micah was Korean, Japanese, and American mixed. She got adopted by her dad when he was in the Korean War. They—her parents—they live in Kentucky.”
Sonora looked up from the picture. “Where in Kentucky?”
“London.”
London, Kentucky was the last place Julia Winchell had bought gas, according to the records from her BP Oil account.
“What’s their name?”
“Ainsley. Grey and Dorrie Ainsley. They’re Mia’s grandparents, so I see them a lot. They’ve really been good to me.” Collie was moving back to the couch, hand tucked into the small of her back. “Dorrie and me—and I, I should say—we have a lot in common.” She grinned at Sonora. “Both of us have Ame
rasian daughters. And neither of us could have kids of our own.” She settled back on the couch so carefully, Sonora could almost feel the backache. Collie patted her belly. “This is some miracle baby. I really tried everything before I met Gage. Spent a fortune—time, money, and effort. My first husband and I did. I explained all that to Gage before we got married. But he had Mia and was absolutely positive he didn’t want any more.”
She stared at the wall over Sonora’s left shoulder. “Got one anyway!” She scratched the end of her nose. “I was thrilled. For me, it was a dream come true. If somebody would have told me all those years ago I would finally have one of my own … I guess it would have saved me a lot of wear and tear and medical bills.”
“What happened to your first husband?” Probably shouldn’t ask, Sonora thought. But she was curious.
Collie looked at the floor, then back up at Sonora. “Left me. One of those office affair things. They’re married. Got kids.” She bit her bottom lip. “Both real happy. She seems like a real nice girl.”
Sonora cocked her head to one side. “Has everyone gotten so civilized that the ex-wife has to speak well of the woman her husband was fooling around with?”
Collie’s mouth opened, then she laughed. “No, really. I feel sorry for her because she’s married to him. Believe me, he’s fooling around on her too. I thank God for Gage every day.”
Sonora forced a smile. She did not think that Gage Caplan was a husband any sane woman should be thankful for.
She looked down at the picture of Micah. She was wearing one of those fuzzy pink mohair sweaters with white pearl buttons. She held Mia up to the camera, eyes squinting in the sun. Mia was maybe three months old, and her mouth was curled in a toothless baby smile, gums pink and bare, hair a soft black wisp on her head.
“It was terrible how she died,” Sonora said mildly, watching Collie.
Collie nodded, and Sonora saw she had the worried look that was beginning to be familiar. “They never caught him,” she said softly.
“They suspected Mr. Caplan, didn’t they? For a while?”
Collie sat forward, arms wrapped around herself like she was cold, though her face was flushed, and a line of sweat filmed her upper lip. She nodded.
“Did you know him then?” Sonora asked.
“No. I wish I had. It was a terrible time for him, I could have been a comfort. Gage has a very sad side to him, he just doesn’t let most people see.”
“I’m sure he has a lot of sides to him,” Sonora said.
Collie’s look was intelligent. “I can’t decide if you like him or not. Most women do, you know.”
“Do they?” Sonora asked.
Collie nodded. “Oh yes. And they think, why did he marry her. Big nose and overweight.” She glanced at her belly. “I look like this even when I’m not pregnant.”
“Since we’re being blunt,” Sonora said. Collie looked at her. “Have you ever had any suspicions that Gage had something to do with Micah’s death? I mean, did it never cross your mind?”
“That’s blunt all right.”
Sonora nodded, kept smiling. In her experience, you could say very outrageous things if you smiled.
“No, of course not. It’s never crossed my mind. I know Gage. Do you know exactly how she died?”
“Yes,” Sonora said, but Collie kept talking, like she’d never heard.
“Somebody drowned her in a creek. They took her purse. It was weird, because no one could understand what she was doing there. Gage thinks maybe somebody hid in the backseat of her car, or forced her off the road. And of course, what he never tells anyone, is about the overnight case they found in the trunk of the car. An overnight case with a sexy negligee.”
“He told you.”
“I’m not just anyone. I think it’s very … very good of him not to bring that up. Not to try and hurt her reputation. When everyone suspected him.”
“If another car forced her off the road, there might well be scratches on the paint of her car. There weren’t.”
Collie scooted back on the couch. “You know the case pretty well.”
“I’ve studied it.”
“Then you know she was pregnant.”
“Kind of blows the nightie theory.”
Collie rubbed the back of her neck. “Not necessarily.”
“It’s thin, Collie.”
“Seven and a half months pregnant. A perfect baby—a little sister for Mia. I used to think about that all the time. It had to be some kind of a monster, to kill her like that when she was pregnant.”
It had been Sonora’s experience that pregnancy did not give a woman any protection from violence. Sometimes she wondered if it made her a target. She did not share these thoughts.
“Do you think it happens very often?” Sonora asked kindly.
“What do you mean?” Collie was twisting her shorts again.
“That a stranger kills a pregnant woman for no particular reason? Yeah, her purse was missing. But she still had her engagement ring on. Big diamond, it’s in the report. She wasn’t molested.”
Collie’s lips turned down in a deep frown that would have been comical on her clown face, if her eyes had not been so sad.
“I just don’t get this. I don’t get what you’re trying to tell me.”
Sonora watched her. “I’m not trying to tell you anything. I do know the case pretty well. Is there anything you want to ask me?”
“No,” Collie said. Quickly. With force.
Denial was an amazing thing, Sonora thought. But she was on shaky ground.
The phone rang, and Collie jumped. “Sorry. Excuse me.” She got up, headed into the kitchen. “Hello? What? No, I do not want a maintenance agreement on a freezer. Well for one thing, we haven’t bought one. No. Thanks. No problem.”
The phone clicked into place. Collie came back, moving slowly, an anxious look in her eyes. “Are you reopening the case? Micah’s death? Do you have new evidence, or something?”
“No, we’re not reopening that case, not right now. I’m looking into something else—a missing person. Would you know if your husband has had any calls from a Julia Winchell, anytime in the last few weeks?”
Worry swept across Collie’s face like a storm warning. “I … we had quite a few hang-ups a couple weeks ago. But no, as far as I know, nobody by that name called here. Our number’s unlisted, for obvious reasons. We don’t give it out much.”
The phone rang again.
Collie laughed, but the smile did not reach her eyes. “Right on cue.”
She headed back to the kitchen, hand pressed into the small of her back. Sonora heard her pick up the phone, pitch her voice low. Sonora could not make out the words. She wished Sam was along. He was the best eavesdropper. She’d been to one too many rock concerts.
She heard Collie calling softly to Mia. “Get fixed up, honey. That was Daddy on the phone. The verdict’s in.”
Sonora heard Mia’s gasp. “Did Daddy win?”
“Yes, sweetie, Daddy won.”
Sonora bit her lip. At least she knew why she’d been stood up. The good news was Gage Caplan got a conviction. The bad news was Gage Caplan got a conviction.
She was going to bring down the DA who nailed Jim Drury?
Joy.
32
Gage had sent Sonora a message through his wife—which Sonora found high-handed—a request for a favor. He was clearly in the mood to ask.
Would she drive Collie and Mia into town so they could join him and his staff in an impromptu and informal celebration? In return, he would take some time to let Sonora ask those questions she needed to ask.
If he had thought to annoy her, he had guessed wrong. He would be full of himself, in his element. Guard down. She looked forward to watching him.
She would have said she was almost enjoying the chase, but a look at Collie Caplan, strapped uncomfortably into the passenger’s seat, and Mia, sitting stiffly in the back in a clean denim jumper and black patent leather shoes, quelled
any little thrill of the hunt.
If she got Caplan they were out a dad and a husband. If she didn’t, they got to keep a killer.
Sonora glanced at Collie—pregnant, like Micah. What had made Gage Caplan kill a wife who was seven months pregnant with his child? Why could he not wait until the child was born?
Unless the child was the point.
Not his? Could he be that sure?
Collie had made it clear, whether she realized it or not, that Caplan was not happy over her pregnancy.
Plenty of pregnancies began with reluctance, Sonora thought.
She needed to know why the first wife had to go.
33
The office was a mess. Boxes of files, loose rolls of faxes, and a coating of multicolored strings of confetti.
They were drinking champagne out of little plastic champagne glasses. Mia edged close to Collie, who edged close to Sonora. Collie took Mia’s hand, and Sonora noticed that the second Mrs. Gage Caplan was trembling.
It could have been a scene from a movie. A young woman, blazer off, in a tight black skirt and tuxedo-style white shirt, perched on the edge of a desk, legs swinging, medium high heels slipping off one slender ankle. She wore a gold ankle bracelet. Sonora noticed Collie studying it.
Collie’s ankles were very likely thick and swollen in this heat and at this stage of her pregnancy.
Gage had his sleeves rolled up precisely two turns, exactly right for the sexy man about town. He looked good. He felt good. Physically large, dominating the room with presence and personality, a come-and-get-me-and-I’ll-eat-you smile on his face. He had a nice tan.
Sonora wondered how he managed the tan with all the hours he had to have been putting in.
Collie had changed out of the shorts, making the unfortunate choice of a maternity ensemble that was just cause to have the designer shot or sentenced to a pregnancy of his or her own. It was a two-piece affair, in palest pink—tiny puff sleeves and an overblouse draping a pleated skirt with a stretch panel in front.
Sonora had seen better looking lampshades.
The overblouse tied in the back, empire style, with a big bow that would have been appropriate for Mia. It had large pockets, and baby blocks sporting the ABCs had been stitched on each side.
Eyeshot Page 13
