Sandy said, “You have visitors. They don’t have appointments.” Eyes firmly fixed on the computer, she wore a visage as stony as Mt. Tallac.
The new chairs offered excellent support for the superbly toned rear ends of Marianne Strong and Gene Malavoy.
Malavoy jumped up and rushed toward Nina. Sandy put her fingers on the phone and said, “Breathe on her, I punch 911.”
He pulled back his arm.
Marianne burst into tears. “You ruined my life!” she sobbed.
Nina said, “Sandy, my office,” then walked swiftly into it, taking off her coat as she went, Sandy following.
Sandy closed the door and fingered her belt buckle. “You want me to get rid of them for you? They’re outta control.”
“Get the recorder out and turn it on and hide it. Then come in and stay here with me,” Nina said, “and if he makes a move, make the call. Now bring them in.” The door swung open. Marianne entered, followed by Gene.
“Sit down and control yourself,” Nina said.
“Ta gueule!” Marianne cried. “You’ve destroyed us! I’ll sue you! You’ve got Kelly in your pocket, and you’ve scared the Koreans.”
“Sue me for what?”
“Gene and I—we know how to run Paradise. We’re completely prepared. We’ve worked for this for so long, and here you come, tangling everything up!”
“Sit down,” Nina said calmly, “or get out.”
Marianne sat down, and after a moment, Malavoy did, too. “You called Korea. You lied about me and Gene.”
“You’re quick with a brick for somebody who lives in a glass house,” Nina said. “And you’re misinformed. I asked a few questions when I realized you had set up a side deal without informing Philip. Then I had one of my investigators look at you and Gene a little harder. You don’t have the qualifications you claimed.”
Malavoy clenched his fist. Paul had told her he was only twenty-five years old. That meant he had come to Tahoe at twenty-two.
“Where’s the proof of an MBA from the University of Chicago, for starters, Gene?” Nina knew how hard it was to get into that university. She had been accepted but hadn’t had the money to attend.
“He’s smart and he’s quick,” Marianne said. “He’s as good as anyone.”
“Someone with a real MBA from that school deserves it. Gene doesn’t and has no business claiming it. He claimed a credential that takes unusual intelligence, a king’s ransom, or a scholarship based on extraordinary ability and abnormal dedication to attain. And how about this assertion that Gene was chief financial officer at Paradise? He never was. Two minutes’ research would expose that lie. The Koreans made a mistake not investigating our boy here.”
“You know what you’ve done? You’ve demolished our lives,” Gene said. “You’ve destroyed Paradise. Marianne and I would do a fantastic job there. We love the resort. It’s our lifelong dream to run it.”
“But you and Marianne had to destroy the Strongs first,” Nina said. “I don’t take kindly to that. I believe Marianne married Jim Strong’s brother, Alex, to become involved with the family business and get a green card.”
“I did not! And I didn’t kill Alex! Ask anyone! Jim killed him! I wasn’t there on that mountain. I had nothing, not one thing, to do with my husband’s death,” Marianne said. “I admit I wished him dead, okay? That’s my confession. That’s it. But Jim killed him, not me.”
“The buyers will know by now that you two lied about who you were,” Nina went on. She laid her hands on her desk, palms down, and looked, really looked, at them. Marianne was falling apart, her mascara in a pair of streamlets arcing down her cheeks. Malavoy looked more scared than enraged.
Nina looked at Sandy, who held her cell phone at the ready.
“We beg you. Call Korea. Tell them it’s all right,” Marianne said. “You may not see it right at this moment, but I swear it’s for the best. The resort could thrive under our administration, grow almost as big as Heavenly. We are ambitious, and we know what we’re doing. You think someone from Korea or somewhere else with a big degree will do better? No. Because we love the place. We have a decent contract with Korea. Because of you, they may back out. If you tell them we can do the work, we can do it! Do you have any idea how hard we have worked to be ready for this?”
“Oh, I don’t know if Gene has been working all that hard,” Nina said. “You had plenty of time for your girlfriend, didn’t you?”
“Eh?” Malavoy said.
“You were Cyndi Amore’s boyfriend, weren’t you?”
“Who?” Malavoy said. “I don’t know—”
“What are you talking about?” Marianne looked furious. “Here you go again, saying creepy things. Gene has no girlfriend.”
“Gene here matches the description of the killer of a young woman who was afraid of him. The investigator has advised me that she told her friend her lover was pulling a scam involving the Paradise sale.”
“What? What woman?” Malavoy said. Whether he was really innocent and wounded was impossible to tell.
“We’ll see what you know and what you don’t,” Nina said.
“You think Gene killed someone? Are you crazy?” Marianne cried. “You’re an idiot. What gall!”
“And so the pot calls the kettle black,” Sandy said.
They all turned toward her stolid self, propped in Nina’s doorway, arms crossed, phone in hand.
“Go on. Call the police,” Marianne said. “Do it. I have nothing to fear.”
“Okay.” Sandy walked calmly toward the outer office. Five minutes later, she returned. “On their way.”
Marianne got up, pushing back the new chair so hard it fell against the wall.
The left side of Sandy’s lip curled up into a snarl.
Marianne recoiled from her expression. “We’re going. You’re not thinking right. You’re making a big mistake accusing Gene.” She and Malavoy left.
Nina put her bare feet up on her desk, wishing she kept a bottle in her bottom drawer like a Raymond Chandler character.
Sandy frowned. “We should fill out a report. She damaged our property.”
“She did?”
Sandy pulled the chair back into place, fingering a minor scratch on the back. Nina went over with a tissue to rub it. The scratch disappeared. “Did you really punch 911?”
“I should have.”
Nina met Paul after work at the HQ Center Bar at the MontBleu Casino, which had taken over Paul’s old favorite, Caesars Tahoe.
“Ordered the house white for you,” Paul said, cocking his head and staring at her as if she had grown wings or fangs or something.
She tapped her frosty glass against his beer mug. “Cheers.” She took a drink. “Ahh.”
He continued his scrutiny until she felt so uncomfortable, she found herself fidgeting under his gaze. “What?”
“You look—”
She remembered her new hairdo. “I know. It’s my hair. This guy? He’s cutting away and I’m distracted and—”
“So young. You look beautiful.”
For a second she couldn’t speak. “Thanks, Paul. Really.” She smiled at him, and he smiled back. His words and smile felt like water flowing into the desert.
They looked around.
“Hasn’t changed that much since it was Caesars,” Nina said.
“Too much blue light. I’m drowning. Not for me.”
“You don’t like change much, do you, Paul?”
“I liked those old plaster busts of Caesar everywhere. I liked the hookup with Roman depravity. At heart, I’m a traditionalist.”
“Funny tag for a man who has had two wives.”
“Hey, you’ve had two husbands. That’s normal these days.”
“Is that the new tradition? If it is, that’s sad, isn’t it?” For a few quiet moments they watched sports on the big-screen televisions that dominated the area above the bartender and listened to the innocuous background music.
“That guy over there.” Paul indicated a direction
with his mug. “Lost at the tables today.”
Nina looked over at a sad sack drooping over a whiskey with a beer chaser. “Paul, how did you know the two cases might be connected?”
“It’s a small town. Maybe I should have considered it before. I called Johnny Castro again. He said Cyndi found a new interest in skiing about the same time she brought home the new underwear. And she only skied by herself at Paradise.”
“Wow. You were just guessing when you sent me to Genie. But now we know. Cyndi was killed because she knew his plans. She was killed to stop the leak.”
“Not entirely,” Paul said. “Remember Brenda Bee. And why did Genie escape the killer’s attention?”
They both were momentarily distracted as the dejected-looking man finished off his drink, piled an undue number of bills on the table, and staggered for the door, reaching into his pocket for more cash. This night would not end well for him.
“Men don’t understand how deep female friendships go,” Nina said. “If she ever mentioned her friend Genie, the killer zoned out and got bored. He wasn’t clued in on how women tell each other everything.”
“But Cyndi didn’t tell Genie who he was.”
“He must have been very persuasive on that point.”
“You tell Andrea everything?” Paul tapped his finger on the sleek wooden table. “Because I wouldn’t like Andrea to know about me and you, and how it all went down. And I do mean all.”
“Hush, you.” Nina felt a blush creeping up her neck.
“Or, hey, you and Kurt. You and Collier. You talk about all your men.”
She punched his arm. “You make me sound like such a slut, and a person who doesn’t give a damn about other people’s privacy. I spend all my time protecting people’s privacy.”
“I’m not suggesting any such thing, just wondering how big that luscious mouth of yours really is when it comes to your own life.”
“I don’t tell Andrea everything.”
“Most things?”
“Probably more than I should.”
Paul let air out from between his teeth. “Cyndi, Cyndi, Cyndi. She’s key to this. Our killer was sleeping with her. It wasn’t the mechanic. I don’t think Jesse is the one, in spite of Cyndi’s husband being convinced of it. Once we know who her lover was, we have our murderer. It’s one asshole causing all this.”
“I agree. I’m looking around at men involved in this case. Michael Stamp. Married, but let’s face it, that’s no guarantee of much. I have always seen him as honorable. Next, we have the escrow guy, Nelson Hendricks.”
Paul said, “I checked into him. Never did a thing wrong, never strayed off the straight and narrow. Not so far, anyway. He’s even friendly with Fred Cheney. They’re both officers in the local chapter of the NAACP. Hendricks got the account through Eric’s influence or maybe through Michael Stamp’s. On the other hand, sick wife. Who knows what’s up with that?”
“And then there’s Gene Malavoy,” Nina finished. “He and Marianne lied left and right to the Koreans. I confronted him flat out today at my office and accused him of being Cyndi’s lover. But he covered himself. His denial doesn’t convince me, but he didn’t give me anything new either.”
“You accused him of being a killer?”
“More or less.”
“Interesting technique. I don’t use it enough. Look him in the eye and say, ‘You did it,’ and see what the guy does. See if he develops a telltale wet spot on his fly.”
“Gene’s fly stayed dry.”
“So. You were observing carefully, eh? Well, here’s my report for today. Get ready. This rates what the Brits used to call Certificate X. I went by the resort earlier today for a quick visit with Marianne. She wasn’t at the ski school. I was invited to check her room. When she didn’t answer my knock, I tried the door. It opened.”
Nina shook her head. “You are so bad.”
“Stepped into the semidark and found a body.”
“What? Paul! Oh, no!”
“Not a dead body, Nina. An all too lively body. I stepped inside and what should I see but Marianne’s white butt on the bed, wiggling in the refreshing mountain air.”
Nina felt a smile creeping around her lips. “As always discreet, you apologized and left immediately.”
“I waited like a gentleman for her to notice and change position. She’s an agile one. So. Guess who she was with?”
“Please. I beg you not to tell me it was her half brother, Gene. I hate that stuff. I avoid it at the movies.”
He nodded. “It was Gene. But here’s happy news, my secretly conservative but admirable soul. Gene’s not Marianne’s half brother. He’s her lover.”
“No.”
Paul nodded. “Has been all along. Even when she was married to Philip’s son Alex. Marianne imported Gene from France. She loves him. He loves her. They make loving fun.”
“Are you sure?”
“Sure as shootin’.”
Nina made a fist. “What a pair. All along, they’ve been conspiring to take over the resort together. Paul, it’s hard to imagine any family so betrayed as the Strongs.”
“Could be Gene. Cheating on his fake sis. Lies upon lies upon lies. But c’mon, let’s get down to the obvious. I think it’s Brinkman. He propped up the Brazilian bit. He got involved with the resort years ago, before Jim even disappeared.”
“Forget that. Eric and I spoke yesterday morning. He suspects you, Paul.”
“Of what?”
“Of everything.” She recounted their conversation from the salon.
“Look, honey. He’s got his eye on you and would love to take me out of the picture, that’s obvious. The part that’s less obvious is that by attacking me, he distracts you from looking hard at him.”
Paul kept his cool, but Nina could hear the controlled anger in his terseness. She checked her watch. “I’m sorry to ditch so soon, but I have to go get Bob. He’s visiting with Kurt.”
“Kurt’s still in town?”
“For another week or so. He’s winding up.”
“How are you with that?”
“Okay. Scared. Sad. I’ll spill the gory details to Andrea, where I can freely indulge my fury without criticism. Don’t get any madder, but Eric said he is taking his suspicions of you to Philip and asking him to forbid me from sharing any more information. He wants me not to talk to you until I’m discharged as Philip’s attorney.”
Paul didn’t blow up as Nina had half expected. He was either controlling his temper better or hiding it better. He shook his head. “I’m glad you brought up Philip again. To continue an earlier, ongoing rant, his troubles are are my fault. I need to tell him the truth.”
She drank the rest of her wine and pulled her bag onto her shoulder. “How’s it fruitful, thinking that way?”
“I’ve caused too much harm and continue to cause it. I don’t like Philip losing the resort. I don’t like his conniving relatives. But most of all, I don’t like the heart problem. The stress of not knowing what happened to his son must be killing him.”
“And you plan to resolve that how?”
“I plan to tell him what happened to Jim. Can’t wait any longer on this. Then the cops.”
“He just got discharged from the hospital. Tonight’s not the right time.”
“Okay, but this has to stop soon. I have an idea. Call Kurt and ask him to keep Bob for the evening.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Paul said, “it’s Brinkman. He knows Hendricks. He wants that money and he’s figured out some way to get it through that escrow office. I’m going to confront him. You in?”
“Don’t go. I think you’re wrong. It’s not Eric and this is not your case. I’ve been warned off speaking with you about it.”
“If we can stop a major crime and help Philip, to be thinking ahead about saving my own ass, but that’s the way of my people, it may help when I fess up to Philip and the police. I’m going to Eric’s place at Incline. Will you come?”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” Nina said. “Maybe I can keep you from making a huge mistake.”
CHAPTER 29
“He seems to like risks. I wonder if he was planning to blackmail me,” Paul said.
“Where are you?” Nina asked.
“Moving through Zephyr Cove. You?”
“I don’t see you, but close enough. We probably shouldn’t be talking on the phone.”
“Focus, Nina. I think we need to have this conversation.”
Nina and Paul were in separate cars, talking on their hands-free phones, driving up toward Eric Brinkman’s place in Incline Village, located about forty minutes north of South Lake Tahoe.
“Why do you believe Eric followed you in the first place?” Nina asked. Beyond the tree line the moon followed her. She was beginning to tire but she wasn’t going to say anything about that.
“Now there’s an interesting subject. I think he’s a rich guy who likes to play PI.”
“He does it for fun?”
“My profession is fun, in a postapocalyptic sort of way. He got himself a license and he got himself some jobs around Tahoe, and one of them was to see who was pilfering from Paradise two years ago. Maybe he knew where Jim was in the days after he disappeared and was following him. Maybe he followed me that night from your house the night I took Jim out. Maybe he followed me when I buried the body. Then he would know where the grave was. Then he heard about the pending sale and realized he might be able to separate out some of that money and pounce on it, like a hungry lioness separating out a tasty emu.”
“But the money will be in a bank,” Nina said. “He might be able to separate it out, but how could he get at it? Ah. How about by offering Nelson Hendricks a share?”
“That’s how the scam works,” Paul said. “Hendricks has to be involved.”
“The escrowed money gets wired somewhere else the minute it gets into his hands,” Nina said. “Paul, that’s tomorrow morning! Wednesday. The wire’s due in first thing!”
“I’m realizing there’s gonna be an embezzlement that’ll stand as one of the big ones. Except for one thing. We’re gonna prevent it. And it’s Brinkman, like I keep saying. He forged the paperwork from Brazil. He dug up Jim’s body when there was a danger someone might figure out Jim was definitely dead.”
Dreams of the Dead Page 26
