Whittaker 03 The Secrets We Keep

by Donna White Glaser

  Why do I do this to myself?

  To be fair, his eyes were an arresting blue and his personality far more dynamic than his mother’s or even Trinnie’s, for that matter. If I strained, I could picture him in a tux and tails, hair pulled back, conducting a symphony orchestra. On the other hand, it was easier to imagine him wielding the REJECT stamp behind the loan desk of a car dealership.

  I’d rather have swallowed my own tongue than encourage his interest, but I plowed ahead, telling him how much Trinnie had meant to me. He interrupted, still moistly clasping my hand as he talked about “dear Katrina’s death.” Strangely, it sounded like a script, but maybe it was learning Trinnie’s given name that threw me. Hoping for an unrehearsed response, I asked him what his favorite memory of her was.

  Irritation flashed acrossed his face; he smoothed his mustache down as though he could erase its brief appearance on his features. “Uh, well… Katrina had this yellow tabby. Not a purebred or anything, but she…”

  “Bruce,” his mother interrupted. “I don’t believe you’ve met Mrs. Elisabeth Collier. Her husband James is Martin Collier’s son and president of NorthStar bank. Be a dear and escort these ladies to the pictorial display.”

  “Happy to, Mother. Won’t you step this way, Mrs. Collier? And Miss…”

  “Ms. Whittaker,” I answered. “Violet Whittaker. I’d love to see pictures of Trinnie as she was growing up.”

  “Lovely,” Beth said.

  There didn’t appear to be a casket, open or otherwise, anywhere in sight. Instead, a picture gallery offered the lone tribute to the daughter of the family. We trailed over to several tables covered with beautifully framed snapshots and portraits of Trinnie as she grew up. The display, dwindling as she reached adolescence, cut off completely around the time she finished high school. The last was of Trinnie in cap and gown towering a good three inches over a handsome gentleman. He looked familiar. Although I couldn’t place his name, I knew he wasn’t Trinnie’s father. Not unless she’d been conceived when he was in grade school. They both looked uncomfortable, perhaps because of the height discrepancy.

  Moving on, I looked for photos featuring mother and daughter together but, aside from formal family groupings, couldn’t find any. In those, Kitty invariably had her arm entwined with Bruce’s, leaving a tired looking man, presumably Trinnie’s father, standing slightly apart. In almost every one, Trinnie knelt—alone—in front of the trio. It didn’t take Freud to pick up on the family dynamics.

  “Is this Trinnie’s father?” I asked, turning to Bruce as I picked up a picture of the tired man smiling down at a gawky, pre-teen version of my friend.

  “Yes, that’s George. He died when Trinnie was fourteen. Heart attack, I think.”

  “You think?” I repeated. “He was your step-father, wasn’t he?”

  Bruce looked uncomfortable. “Yes, of course. But we weren’t close. My own father, Brad St. James, stayed very much involved in my upbringing. It wasn’t like I thought of George as a surrogate.”

  “I see,” I said, although I didn’t. “Despite your estrangement, it must have been a terrible shock to learn Trinnie had been murdered. You must have so many questions. I know I do.”

  “I’m sure the police have everything under control. Now, if you will excuse me, I must see to the other guests. Perhaps,” he said to me directly, “we could get together later on and discuss Katrina in more… depth.” His eyes ran up and down the length of my body before he drifted back to his mother’s side. Their heads bent in conversation, and her eyes flicked over Beth and me.

  Apparently, Trinnie hailed from a family with slippery eyes.

  I turned to Beth. “Did that man just make a pass at me at his sister’s funeral?”

  “He just wants to explore the depths of his adoration for his sister,” she drawled. “You were tempted, weren’t you? I could tell. Who’s going to tell poor Eli?”

  “Tell him I left him for a greasy, wormy-lipped, mama’s boy. With money.”

  “Oh yes, with money. I don’t know about you, Letty, but those two just jumped to the top of my suspect list. That is one cold dame.”

  “You can say that again. By the way, what was with that weird pause Bruce made when he mentioned his dad? What was that about?”

  “I think he was waiting for us to genuflect. The St. Jameses are from the Cities, and put the crust in upper-crust. Listen, I know some people who know some people who may know some of the history on these folks. I never realized Trinnie was connected with the St. Jameses.”

  “Technically, she’s not. That was Bruce’s dad. Anyway, with the anonymity in AA, I rarely know anyone’s last name. Even hearing your surname just now seemed weird. But if you know anyone who can fill us in on the St. James clan, by all means, follow it up.”

  The back of my neck tingled and I spun abruptly, coming face-to-face with an older version of the short man in Trinnie’s graduation picture.

  Now I recognized him.

  “Judge Fochs!” I said. Next to me, Beth stiffened. It took me a minute, but then… Foxy. I gulped. What does he have to do with Trinnie?

  TWENTY

  The youngest judge in Family Court, Fochs was also the kind of man GQ could feature in a photo-shoot entitled, “The Distinguished Gentleman.” Prematurely gray with accompanying dimples, his election to the bench had caused quite a stir among the ladies. And a few men as well. His only fault was height-deficiency. The man barely stood 5‘5,” but in court this was only noticeable when he walked from the bench to his inner chamber. Rumor was, a prominent local artist had asked (and been denied) permission to sculpt his likeness. Had it been allowed, it would have surely resembled an ancient Grecian bust.

  I’d put it on my piano. If I had one.

  “Ms. Whittaker. How nice to see you again, barring the circumstances, of course.”

  “Please. Call me Letty.”

  “And I’m Jonathan.”

  Apparently he was far more skilled than I at shifting gears from the professional world to personal. The fact that he remembered my name was equally impressive. “So, you knew Trinnie?”

  “Oh, yes. George Banbridge was instrumental in my campaign. Trinnie, too. Such a shame.” He turned and smiled across the room at Kitty. We caught her staring at us, a fixed expression molded on her face. She turned away.

  “It is a shame,” I said.

  “Not really a surprise, though, considering…” He let the thought trail off discreetly, but scrutinized my face, waiting for a reaction.

  Not fully understanding his connection to the family left me at a disadvantage. In her Fourth Step, Trinnie had said he blamed her. But for what? Unsure how best to proceed, I fell back on honesty. A little of it, anyway.

  “It certainly shocked me,” I said. “I found her.”

  “Ah, indeed? I apologize, my dear. I wasn’t aware of that. How awful for you.”

  “It was. It’s left me with a lot of unanswered questions,” I said. “I hadn’t seen her for quite some time. There are aspects of her life before I met her that I’m curious about.”

  “I can understand that. There are parts of her life that I, too, would like to understand. Unanswered questions have a nasty habit of turning into regrets. Perhaps you’d like to meet for lunch?”

  “Uh…yes. That would be—”

  “Tomorrow? Both of you, of course.” He belatedly turned to include Beth.

  She begged off, stating that she had a prior engagement. The judge nodded, then made his way to Kitty’s side. She slid her hand possessively under his arm, shooting another pointed glance in my direction.

  “Better watch out,” Beth said. “You could end up in a cat fight.”

  I snorted. “Think they’re an item?”

  “She seems to think so, anyway. What do you think she’ll do when she finds out he asked you to lunch?”

  “Better question is why did he ask me? That seemed a little weird.”

  “Maybe you’ll end up in the middle of a love
triangle. Kitty loves Judgy, Judgy loves Letty. Could be interesting.”

  “As entertaining as that might be, I didn’t feel like he was into me. Actually, I couldn’t get a read on him at all.”

  “I guess you’ll find out tomorrow. In the meantime, I suppose we better get busy. Let’s split up,” Beth said. “We still need to find out about Trinnie’s husbands-slash-boyfriends. We should have asked Bruce.”

  “I’ll ask Fochs at lunch. But for right now, I think we should mingle and see what else we can pick up. Either that or you can have a go at Kitty again.”

  “God forbid!” Beth clutched her chest. “What sicko named her Kitty to begin with? Does she look like a kitty to you?”

  “She’s the most un-fluffy individual I have ever met in my entire life. Can you imagine being raised by her? No wonder Trinnie drank.”

  “That woman couldn’t provide the emotional warmth it would take to raise earthworms,” Beth observed. “I’m not surprised Trinnie was so pissed at her dad for dying. Any kid would feel deserted. Here’s another question—what kind of guy would marry her to begin with?”

  “I’ll see what Fochs says. He says George helped him with the campaign.”

  “Don’t forget to find out what you can about Brucie-boy,” Beth said. “Remember that question we had about funny stuff between those two? Nothing we saw tonight would rule that out.”

  “I completely agree. Another strange thing—Kitty interrupted a little story Bruce was telling me, something about a cat Trinnie had. I couldn’t tell if it was deliberate or just bad manners.”

  “Uh oh. Speak of the devil, here comes Bruce now. He’s heading straight for you. You are drawing the fellas like flies to honey, aren’t you?”

  I had no time to reply before being enveloped by Bruce’s over-cologned presence.

  “Well, hello there, my little shrinking Violet. I wanted to make sure I had a chance to talk to you before you took off. How exactly did you say you knew Katrina?”

  “We were friends,” I said. “By the way, I noticed the service tonight is being held by an Episcopalian minister. Is that the family’s denomination?”

  “Well, as much as anything else, I guess. We aren’t a church-going family, but it’s always beneficial to have some affiliations. A friend of Mother’s liked this minister, so we went with it, even though I’m not sure I agree with the concept of a woman minister. I don’t know how Katrina felt one way or another about the whole thing.”

  I may not have been an active church-goer, but it was still strange to hear something as fundamental as religion being trivialized in this manner, especially at a funeral. Plus, I was pretty sure Bruce had just called the lady minister an “it.” Something was off about the how completely oblivious Bruce was to the impression he projected. Either he was incredibly narcissistic, very stupid, or didn’t care. Further reflection made me realize the three weren’t mutually exclusive, and in fact, made better sense combined. I got a grip, and asked whether Trinnie had been married, although I knew she had.

  “Sure,” he answered. “Katrina had two failed marriages. First one was to a loser she met when she was at the tech college. Michael Thomas. It only lasted about two years because he drank like a fish. Despite those incidents in high school, we think Katrina really got sucked into the drinking scene when she started seeing him. In fact, she got put on academic suspension and ended up dropping out. Of a tech college. Complete waste of money. Mother was livid.

  “Then she hooked up with Billy Anders; she called him something else, but I forget what. If you knew Katrina, you must be aware of her childish little habit of giving people pet names. She even wanted us to call her by some diminutive, but Mother refused. After all, she was named after Mother; she should have been honored. Anyway, that marriage only lasted a short time before she got fed up with his constant nagging. He used to follow her from bar to bar trying to get her to come home. He had no clue how to handle Katrina.”

  I swallowed bile at the thought of what Bruce might think was the best way to “handle” a woman. Despite that, Anders sounded like a possible stalker, but when asked, Bruce rejected the notion.

  “He was just a nice guy,” he said. “Too nice. Even Katrina admitted she didn’t deserve him. In fact, she supposedly broke up with him, because he made her feel guilty. I’m really surprised not to see him here tonight, although I heard he moved out east. Anyway, those were her two marriages. Mother was disgusted with both choices. Can’t say that I blame her.”

  “Trinnie didn’t, by any chance, call Billy ‘Angel,’ did she?”

  “She did. That’s very smart of you. I like that in a woman.” His lips glistened at me. “How about you? Are you married?”

  “No. I seem to remember something about a split with the family. That would have been after—” I stopped, leaving a dangling, fill-in-the-blank hole.

  Bruce fell in. “Katrina did absolutely everything she could to embarrass us and bring down the family name. I can’t tell you how many times she got drunk and made a huge scene at some function. She constantly made up stories, accusing people of the most horrible things. Really, you can’t imagine the lies she’s told.”

  “I see,” I said. “It must have been very difficult for you. How did the family respond?”

  “Well, basically she was told to shape up or ship out. And she shipped. The only one she stayed in contact with was our Aunt Pauline. I think Pauline even gave her money from time to time, although she was specifically asked to not interfere. At any rate, that all ended when she died. Aunt Pauline, I mean. I’m sure—we all were—that Katrina needed some tough love.”

  “But look what happened.”

  “That wasn’t our fault. She picked a bad neighborhood to live in, invited God knows who up to her apartment, and carried on lots of sordid, little affairs with married men. If she chose to live that kind of lifestyle, who could stop her?”

  “Looks like somebody did,” I answered. I was tired of this spud-nosed ass. I scanned the crowd, wishing the service would begin, but the genteel grandfather clock residing next to the front door showed there was still a half an hour before the ceremony started. My stomach felt queasy, whether from the smell of dying roses or from dealing with Trinnie’s creepy half-brother I didn’t know.

  As I noted the time, the door opened and an attractive man in his late forties came in. He stood half-in, half-out of the entrance and, for a moment, looked as though he planned to slip back out. Instead, he squared his shoulders and came in. Although attractive in a serious sort of way, what really caught my attention was the gold cross pinned to the lapel of his black suit. He couldn’t be the officiating minister; Bruce had just told me that was a woman. With Bruce’s voice droning in my ear, I searched the crowd for Beth. Locating her, I wiggled my eyebrows at the Reverend Whoever. She picked up the signal and swiftly crossed the room, a social huntress stalking unwary prey.

  By the time I turned back to Bruce, I had missed a significant piece of conversation. Social customs being what they were, when Bruce asked for my business card, I handed one over. But as soon as the stiff white rectangle cleared the confines of my purse, I cringed. Since getting sober, honesty—a troublesome virtue—had become a habit. Too much of one, I sometimes thought. I should have told him I didn’t have any cards at the moment.

  Next thing I knew he was droning on about some restaurant and what time he would make reservations. Frantically, I tried to reassemble the bits and pieces of dialogue that had been subliminally wafting around my ears while I’d signaling Beth. This was like one of those nightmares where I kept trying to speak and the words got caught in my throat, causing vile and nasty things to occur. And they were certainly occurring.

  Bruce assured me he would call my office beforehand to confirm our date for this Friday.

  Shit.

  My own fault for being distracted, but it felt like I’d been conned. He was slick, and I’d underestimated him. The only silver lining was that he hadn’t scored my
home phone. Bruce apparently subscribed to the hit-and-run philosophy of securing dates. Grasping my business card in his sticky little hand, he oozed off to greet some mourners, leaving me standing there feeling vaguely victimized.

  Great—two dates with two suspects in less than ten minutes. Beth was going to love this.

  TWENTY ONE

  We stopped at Coffee Traders on the way home from the funeral.

  “Seriously, Letty,” Beth said, “I don’t think going out with either of those two is a good idea. After all, they’re right at the top of the suspect list. Maybe you should reconsider.”

  “I’d love to, but the fact that they are on the suspect list is why I have to do it. It sure as hell wasn’t Bruce’s charm. And all we know about the judge is that he blamed Trinnie for something. He agreed that there were unanswered questions, so it won’t look funny if I ask him any. Besides, we’ll be in public. I’ll be in restaurants both times, and I’ll have my own car.”

  “You better hope Miss Kitty doesn’t find out or you’ll lose your eyes.” Beth clawed at my face.

  “I doubt I’ll get much out of the judge. He’s too politically astute to let something slip. Still, he did offer the invitation.”

  “That’s a little suspicious, too,” Beth said. “Especially if he’s dating Kitty.”

  “We don’t know that he is.”

  “True. But she looked awfully possessive.”

  “Bruce bothers me the most. He’s the poster child for creepy, and he’s definitely making a pass, so I’ll have that to deal with, too.” A shudder racked my body.

  Beth, fiddling with the sugar packets, didn’t answer right away. Her eyes were troubled. Then, she grinned as a new thought apparently occurred to her. “Are you going to tell Eli?”

  I shrugged. “I might. For all we know, he could be a suspect, too. We never verified him being in the Caribbean.”

  “You weren’t kissing him like he was a suspect.”