“Well, there’s Jason Wheeler. He was in here tonight. I suppose he could have done it, but I can’t imagine why. I hardly know the man.”
The inspectors brows rose. “Oh? A recent acquaintance, then?”
“You must have spoken to him. He lives one floor down, just moved in last week.”
“Hmm.” Allen flipped back several pages, running his fingertip down a row of names. “No, doesn’t seem to be here.”
“Wheeler said he was around after Miss Hunnicott’s death.”
“Did he? I don’t have him down. There’re two flats on each floor, except for the ground floor, which has the equipment room and the manager’s flat. I’ve talked to all the occupants except for the couple in one of the fourth-floor flats who’re away on holiday. But I don’t have Jason Wheeler. 2A? Is that his flat number?”
“I think so.”
“Well, I tried the door yesterday, but no one was there. I suppose I’ll have to try again.”
“Tonight?”
“No, not tonight. We have no evidence to connect him with the ketchup. We can’t accuse a man for no reason. What about your friend of last evening? Have you known him long?”
“Not long. But he’s a respected businessman. He wouldn’t do anything to harm me.” But did she really know that? He’d been in Maurice St. Clair’s room this evening, and he hadn’t sounded too pleased to find her on the phone.
“Did he have an opportunity?” Allen went on doggedly.
“I suppose so. He was here last night for a while.” But he’d kissed her so sweetly. Surely a guilty man wouldn’t have shown such caring and tenderness. “In any case, I used the soap after he left and it was okay.”
“Anyone else?”
“No one else that I know of. It looks like someone’s trying to rattle me, make sure I know he can come and go as he pleases.”
The inspector closed his notebook. “Nothing else appears to be touched. I’m sure you’ll be all right if you put the chain on the door.”
“Tell me,” Sam said in a pleasant voice as she walked the inspector to the door. “Was Miss Hunnicott’s death an accident, or did somebody push her?”
He regarded her through narrowed eyes. “It’s a police matter, but I can say this much. The autopsy results were inconclusive. We’re calling it an accident for the moment.”
A diplomatic answer if she’d ever heard one. Sam ground her teeth, but wished the man a polite good night.
Tense and dispirited, Sam paced restlessly about the flat. The walls around her were beginning to feel more like a prison than a shelter. In the kitchen she picked up the day’s mail, which she hadn’t opened. She sifted idly through the envelopes. The last one caught her attention. The return address was that of Mr. Collins’s office.
Another threat?
The envelope tucked inside reassured her, if only slightly. It was postmarked London, sent from the Grosvenor Hotel. She tore it open, scanning to the bottom of the short note inside.
Aunt Olivia.
“Dear Samantha,” her aunt had written. “I’ll be in London for several weeks. I’m giving this to Mr. Collins to forward to you, wherever you are. If you receive it, please get in touch. Perhaps we can get together.”
New energy pulsed through Samantha’s veins. Aunt Olivia knew Bennett and was familiar with many of his business dealings and social acquaintances. Just the person to quiz to find out what Bennett was up to.
She looked at the clock. It was just after midnight. Going to the living room, she picked up the phone, dialing the Grosvenor’s number that was displayed on the letterhead. Olivia was a night person who often read for hours in bed.
She was right. Olivia answered the phone at once.
“Aunt Olivia, this is Samantha.”
“Samantha. Already? How nice to hear from you. Where are you?”
Until that instant Sam hadn’t realized she must make a decision. Was she going to go on hiding? Or was she going to face the past, dangerous or not?
“I’m here in London.” It hardly mattered, she realized. The police knew her story; they’d offered protection. And her mysterious enemy had probably known who she was for days. ”Practically around the corner.”
“Isn’t that wonderful?” Aunt Olivia said. Her tone changed into one of mock severity. “What have you been up to, Samantha? It wasn’t very nice of you to run off like that and not tell anyone where you were going.”
“I needed some time to myself. I’m sorry you worried.”
“Of course not, child. I didn’t worry. You’re an adult. Do what you want. I only wondered.”
“I’d like to see you, Aunt Olivia. Could we have lunch?”
“I’m afraid I have tomorrow and Thursday already booked, but after that I’m free.”
Sam bit her lip in frustration. “You wouldn’t be able to see me sooner, would you?”
“I’m afraid not, Samantha. I’ve promised these people. But I’ve got an idea. How about if we go to Paris for the weekend? It’ll be like old times.”
Old times. That might work in her favor. They would have more time, and Sam could broach the topic of Bennett casually.
“Yes, that sounds like fun,” she said. “I’ve got a job but it’ll be finished Thursday.”
They discussed the details of transportation. After hanging up the phone, Sam stared at it for a long moment. Aunt Olivia hadn’t asked her any questions, nor had she seemed particularly surprised to hear from Samantha.
Was it possible she’d known Sam was in London?
* * * *
Tony finally contacted Sam at 6:45 on Thursday morning, waking her from a sound sleep.
“Where have you been?” Even through her early morning grogginess, she could hear the impatience in his voice. And the anger. “Your line is either busy or you’re not there. I’ve been going crazy thinking something happened to you. Fortunately, Inspector Allen told me you were okay, at least when he left you Tuesday night.”
“I was at Professor Eldridge’s until late last night. I went straight to bed. The line couldn’t have been busy.”
“It was, for half the evening,” he insisted. She heard the deep inhalation of his breath. When he spoke next, he sounded calmer. “What did Allen say about the latest incident? Damn, I don’t even know what it was.”
She was truly awake by now. Sitting up in the bed, she raked her tangled hair back with one hand. “Ketchup in the soap dispenser. Just your ordinary Friday the Thirteenth kind of joke. Nothing life threatening.”
“And since?”
“Nothing’s happened. But as you pointed out, I haven’t been here.”
“Well, I may have something. Do you know anything about Québec Separatists?”
“What? I thought that sort of thing died out years ago. Wasn’t it in the early Seventies that there was such a fuss? What does that have to do with Bennett or what’s going on now?”
“I’m not sure,” Tony said. “So Bennett never mentioned where his sympathies might lie?”
“Never.” Sam was positive. They’d never discussed politics.
“I have to talk to you, Sam,” Tony said. “It’s too complicated to go into on the phone. When can I see you?”
“Monday.” She thought for a moment. “Yes, I should be back some time Monday.”
“Monday!” Tony’s bellow could have reached her without the electronic assistance of the telephone. “It can’t wait until Monday.”
“Well, it will have to. I’m going to Paris with Aunt Olivia for the weekend.”
“Aunt Olivia? Your aunt Olivia?”
“My aunt Olivia. Who else would it be? I told you she was in London. She’s at the Grosvenor. I got a note from her through Mr. Collins and I phoned her. She’s the perfect person to tell me what’s been going on with Bennett.”
“I guess that means you’re out of hiding for good.” He sounded oddly subdued.
“There wasn’t much point any more, was there? Look, Tony, I have to get to work if
I’m to finish up the job today. That’s why I stayed so late last night.”
“It’s dangerous at night on the buses or the Tube.”
“Tony.” Her voice rose in exasperation. “I took a taxi home. The professor insisted. And you weren’t available the other night. I can manage my own life. I always have.”
“So that’s what this is about. I should have come over Tuesday night.” The statement with rich with meaning.
“As it turned out, I handled it without you. Goodbye, Tony. Ring me Monday.”
Gently she hung up, cutting off his shout of frustration. The phone immediately began to ring again, but she shut out the sound by going into the shower and turning on the water. Tony had to learn that she hadn’t relinquished control of her life to him just because he’d offered a sympathetic shoulder once or twice.
She was strong. She could handle it herself.
Then why did she feel like crying?
* * * *
In spite of the ninety-minute delay caused by stacked flights at Heathrow, Samantha and Aunt Olivia arrived in Paris in time for lunch on Friday. Checking into the hotel where Olivia had made reservations for two single rooms took only moments.
“This hotel?” Sam asked in dismay as Aunt Olivia signed the register with a flourish.
“Of course, my dear. Haven’t I always stayed here? It may be under new management, but I understand the standards are as high as ever. I wouldn’t dream of staying anywhere else.”
Neither would Sam, under ordinary circumstances. She also had enjoyed the pleasant, refined atmosphere of the Paris Etoile on several occasions, the first time as a child of ten in the company of Aunt Olivia. But the Paris Etoile had become the Worldwide Etoile, part of the company division Tony managed. It made her feel strange to stay in one of Tony’s hotels, especially after her abrupt dismissal of him the last time they’d spoken.
“It’s all right, isn’t it?” Aunt Olivia’s firm voice told Sam she had no patience with arguments. And Sam acquiesced. Her objections were too nebulous to put into words, and in any case, she hadn’t told her aunt about Tony.
“We’ll go out for lunch now,” Olivia continued. “The concierge will see that our cases are taken to our rooms.”
“How is Bennett?” Sam asked when they were seated in the sunny courtyard of a restaurant that was also a favorite of Olivia’s.
“He’s held up surprising well considering his desolation when he realized you’d left.”
Desolation? Sam almost laughed. Desolation was not an emotion she associated with Bennett Price. But if that was how he’d chosen to display his disappointment in public, so be it.
He must have wanted their marriage very badly. For the money? She shook her head behind the menu the waiter placed in her hands. She couldn’t figure it. Bennett had stood to gain very little from her in that area.
Aunt Olivia, usually a nonstop talker, showed no sign of elaborating as she perched her reading glasses on her nose and perused her own menu. Sam tried one more tack. “His business is going well, I take it?”
“Hmm? ”Olivia inclined her head around the tall menu, peering over the half frames of her glasses. “Oh. Oh, yes, his business is doing very well. I think I’ll have the seafood salad.”
“I’ll have the same,” Sam said without having read a word.
“And a bottle of champagne,” Olivia ordered as the waiter picked up the menus. “We have to celebrate.”
“Celebrate what?”
“Why, our finding you, of course. We missed you, Samantha. We’ll be glad to have you back.”
Samantha stared at her. “I haven’t said I’m going back.”
“You must suit yourself, Samantha, but we love you. And Montréal is your home.”
Was there a hidden meaning behind the words? Sam wondered. Her feeling that something was off strengthened. Olivia, always lively and restless, seemed more highly strung than usual, one moment chattering about people they both knew, the next falling into an introspective silence that wasn’t at all like her.
People didn’t change that much in six months, did they? Outwardly Olivia looked the same, her artfully coifed blonde hair gleaming, her smooth skin belying her fifty years even in the sunlight.
Olivia leaned forward. “We must do some shopping this afternoon, Samantha. Why did you leave all your good clothes behind?” She waved her hand. “No matter, you need some new things anyway.” Her smile widened. “It’ll be like old times, the two of us taking the shops by storm.”
After the work she’d put in during the past week, and the upheavals her life had undergone in the same time period, shopping was the last thing on Sam’s mind, but she smiled and graciously agreed. She hadn’t the heart to disappoint her aunt.
The Champs Elysées was bathed in a golden sunset by the time they returned to the hotel laden with parcels and bags. Olivia wore the look of a woman who has taken on the world of merchandising and won. Sam’s feet ached. She didn’t need all the clothes her aunt had pressed on her and insisted on paying for.
“What’s the family fortune for, if not to spend on nice things?” she’d said in answer to Sam’s protests.
It was the old days all over again, and for a time Sam allowed herself to wallow in pleasant nostalgia. But as they rode up to their rooms, her earlier uneasiness flooded back.
Not once had Olivia asked for the story behind Sam’s abrupt flight. Sam would have thought she’d be dying of curiosity. With no mother and a distant father, Olivia was the one Sam had always confided in as a teenager—not quite a parent, but more dependable than a friend. Sam knew her aunt. Olivia had a boundless inquisitiveness about human relations, especially when it concerned those nearest to her.
The elevator door slid open. “Don’t you want to know what happened with Bennett and me?” Sam blurted.
Olivia eyed her with nothing more than mild interest. “You’re an adult now, Samantha. I wouldn’t dream of poking into your affairs. Do you have your key? Here are our rooms. Shall we meet in an hour or so? I’ve made reservations in the restaurant downstairs. They have a new chef, who is considered one of the best in Paris.” She patted Sam’s shoulder. “An hour, then.”
Sam blew out a long breath as she closed the door of her room. Was it possible that her aunt Olivia had been cloned, and that they’d left out some vital ingredient? Something didn’t add up. And she wasn’t learning anything about Bennett’s present feelings toward her or whether he was behind the incidents.
The large bouquet of red roses on the bureau caught her eye as she pushed away from the door. The aroma hung in the air, heavy and sweet. Sam’s skin suddenly quivered with an odd sense of foreboding.
She walked across the room, her feet dragging on the dense carpet. Nestled among the blossoms was a white envelope. Her fingers shook as she tore it open.
The words were typed in stark black letters: “Time is running out.”
Chapter Ten
The room faded to a frightening gray swirl that spun around her. Sam’s nerveless fingers lost their grip on the card and it fluttered to the carpet.
Even here, she’d been followed. She wanted to scream. She wanted to throw the flowers across the room.
Instead she gulped in several deep breaths and backed slowly toward the door. Jerking the handle, she opened it and fled down the hall to her aunt’s room.
“Aunt Olivia, let me in.” She banged her fist against the heavy oak panels. “Let me in.”
The door opened so abruptly that Sam almost fell inside.
“What is it, child?” Olivia frowned as she reached for a robe.
“The roses,” Sam gasped. The trembling started in her knees and quickly tracked up her body, leaving in its wake a clammy sweat.
“Roses?” To Sam’s amazement Olivia smiled. “Wasn’t that kind of the management to send us roses?”
Sam’s eyes widened as she saw the vase on her aunt’s bureau. White roses. “The management?” she stammered, forcing the words past t
he constriction in her throat. “But the note—”
“Note?” Olivia’s brow creased as she fastened her robe over her slip. “There was no note.”
“There was with mine.”
Olivia pulled open the door. “Show me.”
The door to Sam’s room still stood ajar, but the room was undisturbed. Sam’s handbag lay on the bed where she’d dropped it. The fragrance of the red roses scented the air.
“Where is this note?” Olivia demanded as Sam came to a halt in the center of the room.
Frantically she searched every corner, her gaze skittering around the room. “It’s gone. It’s not here.” Her shoulders slumped. Was she going crazy?
Aunt Olivia wrapped an arm around Sam’s back and led her to the bed, sitting down beside her. “Samantha, you seem overwrought. Have you been working too hard?”
Working too hard. If only that were the problem. With an effort Sam gathered her composure. “There was a note, but it’s gone now.”
“What did the note say?” Olivia asked gently.
“’Time is running out.’”
“Sounds like something out of a fortune cookie.” Aunt Olivia gave a tinkling laugh. “It’s probably somebody’s idea of a joke.” She laughed again, and gave Sam an arch look. “I saw the young man at the desk looking at you. I think you’ve made a conquest.”
It was tempting to dismiss the incident, and Sam could have if it had been an isolated case. But in the context of the past week, she couldn’t ignore the implied threat. Yet, without the note and in the face of her aunt’s disbelief, she had no proof of anything.
“Yes, it probably was a joke.” She drew away from Olivia’s embrace, forcing herself to smile. “I’m sorry I bothered you. I’ll be ready shortly.”
Olivia walked toward the door, looking back at Sam briefly with an indulgent smile. “Take your time. And then come to my room. I’m sure a good dinner will fix you up.”
* * * *
In the dining room the headwaiter greeted Olivia like an old friend, and led them to an excellent table by the windows. Samantha glanced around as they waited for their drinks. The room was half empty, lit by chandeliers that reflected from the glass.
Past Tense Page 11
