“Admit it,” he said. She cringed from the threat in his voice. “Tell me the truth, Joan.” Now he had his hands on the naked flesh of her upper arms and was shaking her. The doorbell rang again. Who could it be? Maybe whoever it was would save her. Through her fear she was getting confused, wondering what truth he was talking about. Was he talking about himself? Was he talking about Daniel? “What really happened, Joan?” he was saying, over and over. She squeezed her eyes shut, tried to block him out, but he wouldn’t move, he wouldn’t step back, he wouldn’t let go.
Then the doorbell rang again. This time she heard Elvia scamper past. Milo released her and reared backward. She had a chance to hoist herself out of the armchair and squeeze past him, but he reacted fast, so fast, and spun around to grab her again, his grip unyielding.
Then Elvia pulled open the door. Into Joan’s home walked Alicia Maldonado, her black eyes flaring with a terrible light. Though they looked past her, straight at Milo.
*
“What in the world are you doing here?” Alicia said the first thing that came into her head, foolish though it was. It was obvious what Milo was doing, standing with a flushed face and guilty eyes clutching Joan in his arms.
Immediately Milo released Joan and stepped toward Alicia. “Joan got me fired,” he said. “She did the same thing to me she did to you.”
Is that why you’ve got your arms around her? she wanted to scream. Is that why you haven’t called since we slept together? “Stop.” She raised her hand against him, steeling herself against whatever clever explanation he might concoct for the scene she’d just witnessed. “Stop right there. I don’t want to hear it.”
He stepped closer, incredulity stamped on his face. “You’re not even going to hear me out?”
“No. I’ve done too much of that already.” She didn’t know what to believe anymore. First Milo was a reporter, then he was Joan’s lover, then he was her lover, now Joan’s again ... who could believe a word that came out of that man’s mouth? Pain shot through her, pain brewed of heartache and disappointment and dreams dashed. And right at the edge of it, tantalizingly close but out of reach, was crazy, crazy hope that this time—maybe this time—he was telling the whole truth and nothing but.
Joan stepped forward. "There’s no reason for any of you to be in my house.” She glared at Alicia. “You’re not even employed by the district attorney anymore. I want all of you to leave. Right now.”
Louella flashed her ID badge from the D.A.’s investigations department. “We’re not leaving, Mrs. Gaines. We’d like you to consent to a search of this property.”
“What? I will not! Why should I? It was searched before!” Joan put her hands on her hips and shook her blond head vigorously. “I will not be put through that again.” Again she glowered at Alicia. “And that woman has no right to be here.”
“Actually, I have a judge’s permission,” Alicia said.
“So do we.” Louella handed Joan the search warrant.
Alicia watched Joan carefully. She gave a good imitation of control, though as she read the warrant her skin paled a shade and the hands holding the document betrayed a tremor. It was better, easier, to focus on Joan than on Milo, who hovered between Joan and herself, probably trying to decide where to align his forces.
He edged closer to Alicia then, apparently making his choice. “Listen to me.” His eyes bored into hers. “I’m telling you the truth.”
Maybe, maybe not. She stared back at him, refusing to flinch, refusing even to blink. “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”
“Believe this. I never lied to you. I’m not lying now. Joan got me fired and I came here to confront her.” Briefly he shut his eyes and Alicia watched frustration contort his features. She wanted to believe him. She wanted so much to believe him. But while she wondered whether she could or not, Louella stepped forward.
“Mr. Pappas, we will have to detain you while this property is being searched.”
“What? Detain me?” He shook his head, then pulled a cell phone from his pocket. “No. I’m calling my lawyer.”
Shikegawa walked in past the housekeeper, who stood at the front door wringing her hands. “What’s going on here?” he said.
“Everything is fine,” Alicia said, then she turned to Milo. “Would you just cooperate? Please?” She hadn’t meant for it to sound like a naked plea but somehow it had. He looked at her and for a second she felt thrust back in time, to that unforgettable interlude when it was just him and her and their bed in the Ritz-Carlton Hotel.
He seemed to remember that too, because he said, “All right, Alicia,” and then without another word turned to follow Bucky Sheridan through the swinging door into the kitchen.
She didn’t know whether she felt better or worse when he’d done what she asked. The Gaines’ living room was full of people yet still felt oddly bereft. But he was gone and there was nothing for it but to go on with the search. That’s why I’m here, she reminded herself. Not for Milo but for the case.
Louella turned to Joan. “Mrs. Gaines, we’d like you to wait in the library.”
Alicia watched horror spread over the new widow’s face. “In the library?” she repeated, her hand flying to her throat.
Alicia knew the choice of location was no accident. Mentally she applauded Louella, her excitement at what she was about to do beginning to gain the upper hand over her confusion.
A female sheriff’s deputy led Joan away, the widow’s blond head bent and her hands clutched over her face.
Louella then turned to Alicia, in her eyes a question.
“I’m fine,” Alicia said. And she was. She was the prosecutor again, fighting for her job, fighting for her reputation, fighting for her life. “Let’s do it.”
Chapter 24
I’ll go crazy if I have to stay here much longer. Joan could find no position in the library where she was comfortable. She couldn’t sit for longer than seconds in the leather armchair. She couldn’t even think of trying to pass the time by pulling a book off the shelves. She resorted to pacing the Kashan rug, even crouching on it and rocking back and forth. It had to be seventy degrees inside but still she wanted to wrap her arms around herself and warm her body, which was so very, very cold.
What are they doing here? Why are they making me a prisoner in this horrible room? Treebeard is the one going to trial! And how did that Maldonado creature, who doesn’t even have a job anymore, convince a judge to give her a warrant?
That woman was the source of all her problems. That was the only thing that was clear in the midst of this insanity.
Joan walked to the library’s sole window, which offered a north-facing view along the bluff, and became even more agitated. Two police cars were in front of her property. And people were gathering around them with curious looks on their faces, as if there would be something entertaining to see, a spectacle about to begin.
She had a paralyzing thought. Maybe she would be the spectacle, the clown in the biggest of the circus’s three rings.
But how could that be? It was Treebeard going to trial! And did she see a TV camera out there? Oh, God, she saw two.
Why? Why were they hounding her? She shuddered, remembering the last time the press had mobbed outside her home.
Behind her she could swear she heard laughter, more of a cackle really, and spun on her heels. “Who’s there?”
No one responded. There was no one to respond. She was alone in the library. But then she thought she heard it again, by the window this time, as though the laugher were darting and weaving about the room. She twirled around to face in the other direction. No one was there, either.
“Who is it?” That cry was her own voice, she realized, calling out shrilly into the empty space.
The door to the library opened. Joan let out a yelp before she saw it was the female sheriff’s deputy.
Who was frowning. “Are you all right, Mrs. Gaines?”
Joan ran up to her. “No, I’m not all right! I don’
t want to be here. I want to go upstairs to my bedroom.”
The deputy shook her head no. “I’ve been asked to keep you here, ma’am.”
“That’s crazy!” Then she heard the phone ring. “I want to answer the phone,” Joan declared, though she never answered it unless she was alone in the house. Elvia always did. Then, as if by psychic command, Elvia appeared in the hallway behind the deputy. For once Joan was delighted to see her face, which at least was familiar and didn’t hold any surprises.
“Mr. Whipple called before, missus, and now it’s Mr. Barlowe from Headwaters.” Elvia held out the cordless phone. Joan snatched it and turned away. The library door clicked shut behind her.
Now this was the right idea! She should’ve called somebody herself. Why hadn’t she thought of that? Ever since Milo had burst in, her mind hadn’t been working right. But now she’d call Gossett to get these people out of her home. Maybe he could bring over that defense lawyer he’d put on retainer and scare them out. Make them see that two could play at this game.
She put the receiver to her mouth. “Craig?” At this point she was happy even to talk to Barlowe.
He didn’t say hello. “What do you know about Hank Cassidy?”
“The lumberman?”
“You do know him. Fuck!”
She heard a crashing sound, like glass breaking, and pulled the receiver away from her ear. Damn! She should have thought first and spoken second.
Because now Barlowe was back on the line, raving like a madman. “I’m getting calls from everybody, you name it. The California Forestry Association, the EPA, Department of Forestry, Frederick Whipple, even the governor’s office. And the media, Joan, the media! We are in serious shit thanks to you. I knew you’d do something asinine but I never could’ve predicted this.”
She was having trouble keeping the receiver at her ear, her hand was trembling so badly. “What are you talking about?”
“Lumbermen are singing like canaries! About you paying them cash to cut down old-growth trees and planning to ship the timber overseas! Are you denying it, Joan? Are you?”
“Of course I’m—” she began, but Barlowe cut her off.
“Don’t lie to me! Because if you tell me the truth, me at least, maybe we can control this thing. But not if you lie!”
Joan heard Barlowe gulp for breath on the other end of the line, but all she could do was clutch the receiver, hardly able to breathe herself. What should she say? What should she do? She needed advice, from Gossett or Whipple, even her mother, someone older who knew how to manage things.
Because she had no idea.
“What happened?” she asked timidly, lamely, which set Barlowe off on another tear.
“What happened?” he shouted. “You really want to know, Joan? We had a major accident last night, that’s what happened! Turns out some of our men did a little extra cutting on the side on one of our biggest, oldest trees. And believe me, it wasn’t one we had officially earmarked. That baby was nearly two hundred years old and about as off-limits as you can get. And guess who went down with it?”
No. Oh, no.
“Yes. Your friend Hank Cassidy. Who, thanks to you and this insane scheme of yours, is dead.”
*
Alicia mounted the stairs to the second floor of the Gaines home, criminalist Andy Shikegawa approaching her on his way down. He carried his small crimson leather journal, his crime-scene bible, in which all his notes were jotted in a careful hand.
“Find anything?” she asked—stupidly, because surely she would have heard if he had.
He shook his head. “No.”
“You’ve gone through the master suite? And the other bedrooms?”
“Also Gaines’ home office,” he said, then pinched the bridge of his nose, pushing down his wire-frame glasses. “Got any aspirin?”
“No, but I’m sure Louella does.”
“She’s downstairs with Lucy?” Lucy Johnson, the second DOJ criminalist, who’d also been present at the initial search of the crime scene.
“Yes,” then, casually, “Mind if I look around upstairs?”
He stepped aside to get out of her way. “Be my guest.”
Alicia climbed the last of the stairs, hope fading fast. So far they’d found nothing. Who did when revisiting a crime scene over a month after the fact? Still, she’d had to push for the search, her last chance to trap Joan. But all too easily she could imagine an ignominious retreat, tail between her legs, Shikegawa and Johnson and Louella too kind to deliver a single I told you so.
And what would Milo say? Milo who sat downstairs, detained by this last-ditch search she had made happen. When all of this was over, would he think her a fool or a hero? She didn’t know which she would choose herself. Merely pondering the future beyond this search sent a rogue wave of doubt crashing through her. If this ended with her finding nothing, Joan would win. She would lose. And what of her and Milo? Was there a her and Milo?
I can’t think about him now. By force of will she pushed Milo out of her mind as she arrived at the second-floor landing, where the hardwood gave way to creamy white carpeting, thick and luxurious. To her right was the door to the master suite, all the way open. The interior was flooded with sun, thanks to a huge bay window giving on to a stunning view of Carmel Point and the bay. Along the corridor were half-open doors to bedrooms, three of them, and at the end of the hall to her left was what had been Daniel Gaines’ home office. Her legs led her in that direction.
She stopped on the threshold. It was a small room, clearly a working office. It was obvious from its simplicity, from the bulging dog-eared files to the rolling swivel chair on a scarred rectangle of Plexiglas, that its owner had been Daniel and not Joan. Alicia guessed that the library downstairs, where Gaines had died, was where he’d held meetings. This was where he’d done actual work.
She stepped farther into the room and approached the desk, set opposite the door beneath the room’s only window, over which a shade was half-pulled to block the sun. Deeper inside she noticed a faint lingering scent of men’s cologne, as if Daniel Gaines had just been present, sitting at the desk, working on his computer. Here, where no doubt he had spent many hours, Alicia felt the man as she did nowhere else in his house. It was unnerving.
On a small side table left of the desk hunched a copier/fax; beneath it on the floor was a bulky laser printer. The desk’s surface was completely covered by a phone, the desktop computer, stacks of files, and, she then noticed, an open box of Gaines campaign stationery. There was the red-white-and-blue logo that Treebeard had described and which she herself had seen on New Year’s Eve when Louella had given her a sample.
She stared at it. From downstairs she could make out the murmur of conversation; in that silent room she heard only her own breathing.
Of course Gaines would have the stationery here. This was his home office. Another thought prompted her to kneel in front of the laser printer, which was linked by thick, dusty cords to the computer. She latched her fingers beneath its paper tray and tugged. The tray pulled open. Loaded into it, again, was the stationery.
Shikegawa and Johnson went through the computer when they were collecting evidence from the house, on the Saturday when Gaines’ body was discovered. If the letter Treebeard described had been here, they would have found it, right?
Then again, they hadn’t been looking for it, for the simple reason that they didn’t know it existed. The only reason she knew was because of what Treebeard had told her when she interviewed him at the jail, and that was a week after the Gaines home was searched. The only other person who’d heard Treebeard’s account of the letter was his defense attorney, Jerome Brown.
Alicia had told only Louella about it. She hadn’t said a word to Penrose or Shikegawa or Johnson. Before this second search of the Gaines home, only Louella had helped her investigate the possibility that someone other than Treebeard had murdered Daniel Gaines.
Alicia stood up, then pulled out the desk’s rolling chair and
sat down. It creaked at her weight and slid sideways a few inches on the Plexiglas sheet, as slippery as ice. The computer was booted up, its screen saver a black background with stars shooting toward her as if she were hurtling through space. One touch of the keyboard brought up Windows Desktop, which displayed all the usual icons: My Computer, Internet Explorer, Recycle Bin.
She launched Windows Explorer, then opened the My Documents folder. Beneath it were a dozen subsidiary folders, which broke down further into personal, Headwaters, campaign, and trust categories.
It can’t be here, she told herself, but trolled through the folders anyway. This is a waste of time, her brain said, but her fingers pecked away on the keyboard regardless, rebellious agents going about their own business. Why would the letter be on Daniel Gaines’ computer anyway? He wouldn’t have framed Treebeard for his own murder!
After a few minutes it occurred to her to use the Find function. What word should she search for? She typed in Treebeard then clicked on Find Now. No files appeared. Maybe Bracewell. That was one name Treebeard had said had appeared on the letter.
Bracewell’s name brought up a huge number of files. Alicia was partway through them when another thought struck her. Wouldn’t whoever had written the letter have avoided saving it on the hard disk? Wouldn’t they have written it, printed it, and deleted it, never saving it? They might have thought that would make it as if the letter had never existed.
But Alicia knew the letter wouldn’t just disappear. Even if it had never been saved it would remain among the Temp files unless those files had been purged from the hard disk. She knew from her own habits that she very rarely did that kind of computer housekeeping.
Alicia minimized the files she’d been scanning, then brought up the Temp files. There were tons of them, but it was possible to search for files created on a specific date. She typed in December seventeenth through nineteenth, the nineteenth being the day before Daniel Gaines was murdered, the day on which Treebeard said he received the letter.
To Catch the Moon Page 34
