No Harm (The Kate Teague Mysteries Book 1)

by Wendy Hornsby

  “You told Mina earlier that Miles babbled on for a while.” Dolph dabbed at the corners of his mouth, as if he had eaten. “Besides the cricket thing, what did he say?”

  “He said his baby is safe now. And to trust hope.”

  “Well, that’s always good advice.”

  “What is?”

  “Trust Hope. Hope is English for Esperanza, you know.”

  “Is that what he meant?”

  “Sure. Esperanza anglicized her name when she came up from Mexico, asked us to call her Hope. And we did, until she went to work for your mother. Your mother thought Esperanza was more highbrow.” He sipped his coffee. “Did you talk to Esperanza at all this morning?”

  Kate shook her head. “Her day off. She took the bus to her sister’s last night and won’t be back till after dinner tonight. I don’t know what she could tell me anyway.”

  “Ask her about the housekeeper’s baby. Esperanza knows everything about anything that ever happened here. The problem is getting her to talk about it.”

  “Know who I think I might call?”

  “Who?”

  “Susan Ratcher.”

  “Don’t do that. And quit pacing. I’m getting a crick in my neck watching you. Pour yourself some more coffee and land somewhere.”

  She pushed aside a stack of legal-size manila folders piled on the corner of the desk to make room for her empty coffee cup. The stack tipped over and spilled across the polished desk surface before she could catch it, folders and their contents cascading onto the carpet.

  “Sorry.” Kate knelt to gather it all together. “You’ll have to sort these out yourself. I don’t know what goes where.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” He poured himself a third cup of coffee. As Kate put the papers back on the desk, her own name, typed in boldface across the middle of the top sheet, caught her eye.

  “What is all this?”

  “No reason not to tell you.” He joined her behind the desk and put his reading glasses on, ready for work. “I’m writing a new will.”

  “Which reminds me. You said you’d send one of your staff over to redo mine.”

  “I will,” he said, sitting down and sorting through the pile. “But I want you to hold off a few more days.”

  “Hold off for what?”

  “Wait until we get a look at Miles’s will.”

  “Oh, jeez.” She rubbed at the dull thumping in her temples. “Miles isn’t even dead. Yet.”

  “Hold on there. I’m no ghoul. Miles and I talked about this weeks ago. He said he would have old Tom Bodge send over a copy.”

  “Tom Bodge?” Kate asked, incredulous. She remembered Old Tom, all 280 asthmatic pounds of him. “He can’t still be around.”

  “He is,” Dolph laughed. “Very round. He isn’t practicing law anymore, though. Miles entrusted his will to Tom because, he said, Tom could be depended on to keep his mouth shut. Even with a snootful of pink gin. Anyway, I don’t actually need to see the document. I’m sure you’re Miles’s sole legatee.”

  Kate thought of all the people he knew before his illness, all the charities he’d been involved with. “Why?”

  “Because of conversations we had when we drew up our wills, before Dad died. You kids, you and Reece and Nugie, were still in school and we wanted to make sure you all had enough to get through in case something happened. Since Reece and Nugie were part of my wife’s family, and I was paying the tuition for their preparation, I covered them and Miles was to make provisions for you.”

  “Sounds fair enough.”

  “At the time it was. But things have changed since then. Reece is self-supporting now, and Nugie, God love her, is beyond need.”

  The tempo of the pounding in her head increased. “You’re not dispossessing Reece are you?”

  “Dispossessing? No. He’s well taken care of by Mina. But what I plan to do is put all three shares of Dad’s estate back together. You, Miles, and I are all equal partners right now. In the not so distant future…”

  “I’ll be all alone up here.”

  “As it were,” he nodded.

  “I don’t like it,” Kate protested. “I suspect I know how you’re going to take care of Mina. She’ll get the interest from a trust during the remainder of her life, just like Mother did. Then the capital will revert to me. Right?”

  “Essentially.”

  “There won’t be anything for Reece except a few trinkets in a bottom drawer.”

  “What drawer?”

  “Doesn’t matter. It’s not fair.” She pounded the desk with her fist. “There’s no need to cut Reece out.”

  “You sound like Mina,” Dolph said wearily. “I’ve already done what I thought was appropriate for Reece. He’s educated, self-sufficient. Moving beyond that, what I want to do is rejoin the three shares of the family estates. You notice I said family. It has nothing to do with Reece.”

  “All this,” she swept her arms wide, taking in the expanse of bluff outside the windows, “is a tremendous responsibility. It would be nice to have someone to share the burden with.”

  “I have faith in you, Kate, you’ll manage. Anyway, once it’s yours, you can do anything you want with it.”

  “Hadn’t thought of that.” She ruffled his sparse white hair. “Why don’t you just live forever and save me a lot of bother?”

  “I don’t want to live forever.” He pushed all the papers into one folder and dumped the mess into a bottom drawer. “I’m getting tired.”

  “I don’t know why.” Kate glanced out at the expanse of cool lawn. “Business seems to be slow down at the family store. All the hired help seems to have time off.”

  “Slow?” Dolph took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “We’re swamped. But Carl’s doing such a great job riding herd down there, I thought I’d stay home for a few days.”

  “I wasn’t talking about you,” she said, realizing that something was very wrong. She watched Carl striding across the lawn from the direction of her house. From his heavy posture she knew why he had come, and she steeled herself in preparation. “I meant Carl.”

  “What now?” Color drained from Dolph’s face as he saw Carl through the window. He stood up and took Kate’s arm, and together they went over to the open French doors and waited.

  Carl stopped just inside the threshold, with his hands clasped in front of him like a mortician at a fifty-dollar funeral.

  “The hospital called the office,” he said. “I thought I’d better come personally.”

  “Miles?” Kate’s voice sounded hollow against the silence. “He’s dead?”

  “Yes.” Carl unclasped his hands in a gesture of helplessness as tears formed in Dolph’s eyes and spilled down the valleys of his bloodless face. Dolph reached out and drew Kate close.

  “Poor Miles,” she sighed, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand. She buried her head against Dolph’s chest and tried to imagine Miles gone forever. When her father died and she felt he’d abandoned her and left her stuck in the emotional morass between her mother and grandfather, Miles had rescued her time after time. By just loving her he had saved her from disappearing into a fantasy world where life seemed safer and she could live again with her magical father. Miles had stayed close by through the years, reassuring her even after his illness had locked him inside its lonely cocoon. He always watched over her from his window.

  Kate took a deep breath and looked up at Dolph, saw the grief on his face, the anguish for the brother lost and everything they’d shared, and for all the vanished possibilities. “What happens now?”

  “Well.” Struggling for composure, Dolph’s voice boomed too loud. Kate saw the effort it took him to square his shoulders. “We’ll have a look at his will, see if he left us any funeral instructions. I’ll call old Tom Bodge and set up a meeting for tomorrow. If that’s okay with you.”

  “Whatever you arrange will be fine.” Kate kissed him lightly on his pale cheek. “Mina has to be told. Shall I do it?”

&
nbsp; “Dear God.” Dolph put his hands over his face and wept.

  Kate hung up the telephone in Dolph’s kitchen. The bland efficiency of the hospital clerk made it easier for Kate to deal with the business end of Miles’s death. “The mortuary is removing the body from the hospital sometime today.”

  Carl nervously tapped a spoon against the edge of a can of drain cleaner by the sink. He seemed unusually jittery and upset, moved perhaps, Kate thought, by Dolph’s grief, and unsure about what his role here was, business partner or member of the family. He thumped the can with the spoon; an exclamation point. “I’ll go with you to the mortuary.”

  “Why? It’s awful there.”

  “Just to be with you. We always seem to pull together in a tragedy.” He dropped his gaze almost shyly and watched the tapping spoon while he spoke. “I need to make it up to you for bugging you yesterday about your job. Esperanza and my mother gave me hell for it.” A self-deprecating grin lit his face, making him very appealing.

  “Wish I’d been there,” she smiled, envisioning the scene. “Anyway, we won’t do anything about funeral plans until we see the will.”

  “If he didn’t leave instructions you’ll probably just do something like your mother’s, won’t you? Bury him up there with her and your father.”

  “No way.” She put her hand over the spoon to stop its annoying rat-a-tat. “We could never bury Miles near Mother.”

  “Why?” he asked sharply.

  “Carl, we think Miles killed Mother.”

  “That’s insane.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “I just.… Oh hell.” Carl threw the spoon into the sink a jarring clatter. It matched the angry, exasperated tone of his voice. “I’m trying Kate. I really am. But … never mind. You going home?”

  “No.” She backed away from him, physically and emotionally, to make space for herself. Her handbag was open on the tile counter by the telephone. She capped her pen and tossed it in with the jumble of notes and gum wrappers. “I have an errand to run.”

  “Now?” He took a deep breath and wiped his forehead. “I was hoping we could spend some time together.”

  “I’m going to see Susan Ratcher.”

  “Why on earth?”

  “She should be told about Miles. After all, they were married once.” Kate reached past him to open the door. “And there are a few things I want to ask her about.”

  “Can’t you just call her, for God’s sake?”

  “I need to talk to her, Carl. I’m going to see her.”

  “No.” His face was red. “That’s dumb.”

  “Dumb?”

  Chagrined, he tried to soften his anger. “You shouldn’t be alone.”

  “You’re right. I’ll take someone along.” Kate lifted the keys to Dolph’s Mercedes from a hook by the back door. “Tell Dolph I’m taking his car. There might be a bomb in mine.”

  “Kate, please don’t go.” He was begging now, almost desperate.

  “Why not? What are you afraid I’ll find out?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You didn’t have something to do with that deal between Sy and Mother did you?”

  “Shit. No.” The heat had drained from his voice, and ice filled the void.

  “Then what can she tell me? Maybe I was adopted or something? Right now that might be good news.” She left him standing in the kitchen looking glum and defeated.

  Angry energy left over from the argument surged through her as she started Dolph’s car with a roar. She was angry at Carl for making her mad, and angry with herself for letting him get to her so easily. It’s time for him to move out, she decided, with or without his mother.

  She screeched to a stop in front of Miles’s house and jumped out of the car. Sprinting up the walk she yelled, “Reece! If you’re in there, open up.” She banged on the door. “Reece!”

  “What is it?” He gave her a molelike squint from the doorway, shielding his eyes from the bright sunlight. He had a flat draftsman’s pencil over each ear. “What’s going on?”

  “Come with me.” She grabbed him by the hand and pulled him along. “I have an errand to run and I need a bodyguard.”

  “Okay, okay. But let me get some shoes on.” He disappeared into the dark house and came right back, hopping on one foot then the other as he slipped on his battered, stringless sneakers. “Where’re we going?”

  “To see Susan Ratcher.”

  “Lucky us.” Reece settled down in his seat and crossed his arms over his chest. “Why are you being so fierce?”

  “Argument with Carl.”

  “That explains a lot. Now you need a real macho man, like me, to push around.”

  She glanced at him and smiled. “Am I pushing you around?”

  “No more than usual. So, what inspires this visit to Mrs. Ratcher, the fight with Carl?”

  “No, no.” Breath caught in her throat as she remembered. She slowed down. “Reece, Miles died.”

  “Good God.” He sat up and draped an arm around her. “I’m sorry, kid. Poor old guy. I don’t know what to say.”

  She reached out and patted his hairy knee, glad he was there, as always.

  “Wait a minute. I’m slow but I just got it. Susan’s his ex-wife and our mission is to tell her about Miles?”

  “That, too. But mostly I want to ask her about the bastard. It’s something I need to do for both Miles and me. To save his baby and my neck.” She glanced at Reece. “Mother took me to her house a couple times. But I’m not sure I can find it again, can you?”

  “I think so. Go up by the country club.” He waved his hand in the general direction they would follow. “Is this visit what you and Attila were fighting about?”

  “Yeah. Carl thinks it’s ‘dumb.’”

  “Then it has my blessing. Drive on, Macduff.”

  They drove north, away from the beach, passing through older neighborhoods caught somewhere between decaying and historic. Once past the freeway and an old, once-posh business district, Reece strained forward, trying to read street signs. He pointed to the left. “There. Miramar Drive.”

  Kate turned onto a broad street shaded with massive elms. It was a neighborhood of large and graceful houses built during the 1920s when the first orange groves had been subdivided for wealthy midwesterners who could afford to escape to the milder winters of California. They brought their architecture with them; the immense old houses, set back from the street on high, smooth lawns, were built in the style dubbed “Iowa farmhouse” by local historians.

  Kate looked down the street of similar, shingle-sided houses. “Now where?”

  “Somewhere in the middle of the block,” Reece said. “On the left. Just park here. We’ll find it.”

  They got out of the car and walked down the street, looking for something that would identify the Ratchers’ house. Under the canopy of old trees the still air was pleasantly cool.

  Reece nodded toward a white house. “I think that’s the Ratchers’.”

  “Yeah, looks like it.” Kate was beginning to feel that maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.

  Reece held her hand, probably sensing her hesitation, maybe feeling some of his own. “We could skip this. Go get a pizza instead.”

  “No. We’re here,” she said with firm resolution. “Let’s get on with it.”

  The lawn on either side of the front walkway looked as if it hadn’t had water since the last spring rainfall. From the condition of the house, once a fine specimen of its kind, Kate knew that the Ratchers had fallen on hard times. She couldn’t remember, had old Mr. Ratcher, Sy’s father, died?

  Reece scanned across the wide front. “What the place needs is a quick infusion of cash.” He looked down at Kate. “But I guess we all should know that by now.”

  “Yeah.” A dry chip of paint scuttled across the toe of her shoe as she crossed the porch to ring the doorbell.

  Reece leaned close to her. “Last chance. Double mushrooms, hold the anchovies.”

  “
Too late,” she said as a crack of dark appeared at the edge of the door. Then the door was flung wide.

  “Kate? Reece?” Susan Ratcher raised long, graceful fingers to check the perfection of her hair. “This is a surprise.” She looked like Mother and Mina, Kate thought—trim, poised, impeccable. Except that her dress was more than a few seasons old.

  “Hello, Mrs. Ratcher,” Kate said. “We’d like to talk to you.”

  Susan Ratcher hesitated, a hopeful sort of flicker slipping across her face. “Please come in.”

  Kate tried to ignore the damp, disused smell of the place as Susan led them into what had been called a sun-parlor at the time the house was built. Heavy drapes now shut out all but a faint glimmer of light.

  “Did you want to see Sy?” Susan stood in the middle of the room, the fingers of her clasped hands fluttering nervous arpeggios. “He’s at his office right now. But I’ll call him and he can be here in five minutes. Or they’ll page him if he’s out somewhere. You don’t mind waiting, do you?”

  Kate heard the desperation in Susan’s voice and felt uneasy about having raised false hopes just by coming here. “Actually, it’s you we want to speak with.”

  Obviously struggling to contain her disappointment, Susan turned away to open the drapes, using the time to regain her composure. She came and sat across from Kate in an old wicker rocker. “I thought maybe you had reconsidered Sy’s proposal.”

  “Uh, Mrs. Ratcher.” Kate shot Reece a quick sidelong glance, hoping for sudden inspiration to make this easier. After turning down Sy, how much help could they expect from Susan? “Right now, I don’t think Sy’s condo development is feasible.”

  “Maybe not,” Susan conceded, “with Miles so sick and all.”

  “Mrs. Ratcher.” Reece gripped Kate’s hand tighter. “I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but Miles passed away this morning.”