Fortunately for him, two less obvious suspects had fallen right in his lap. The key was the seemingly unimportant fact she had shared with him.
Their religion prohibited divorce. Having a signed settlement agreement did not constitute the wife's freedom. Teri Gambini might have been stuck with her good-for-nothing husband until, as the vows said, death parted them. A widow, on the other hand, had the church's permission to remarry.
Besides that, the lovers had made one major error besides letting him see how they cared for each other. Having two witnesses to the alleged thug's threat was overkill. Kidder figured the man could have been hired to dress up and reel off the standard threatening words, but Kidder didn't buy the idea that one of the mob's errand boys was quite that stupid. A single witness, made to overhear the incident accidentally, would have been far more credible. The two suspects he had in mind, however, would have been acting on emotion, not intellect.
And between the two of them, Teri Gambini was clearly the weaker. It wouldn't take much to break that nervous little bird. Why, he bet he could have her warbling a confession in less time than it took to clean his weapon.
Chapter 7
As the sun rose Friday morning, Teri was no closer to getting any answers. She had no idea where her husband was, and she still couldn't imagine what Detective Kidder had been looking for. Nor had Kidder been in touch with her again. With each passing day she grew more certain that Rico had met with some terrible fate, but the lack of any proof to back it up had left her in a nerve-wracking limbo.
Selena's unexpected arrival at the studio door just as she was about to start working didn't help any.
"Teri! You look absolutely awful," Selena exclaimed without her usual tact. "Do you have the flu?"
For a brief moment Teri was tempted to say yes and let it go at that. She wasn't sure she was up to repeating everything again and then convincing Selena not to worry about her. But eventually Selena would find out the truth and be hurt that Teri hadn't considered her enough of a friend to confide something so important. "No, it's not the flu. I've had a rough couple of days. But why are you here? I thought I let you know I wouldn't need you until Monday."
Selena rolled her eyes. "You may have said that but the tone of your voice told me something was wrong. Now that I see you, I'm more worried than I was before. What's going on?"
Teri sat down at the table and Selena followed her lead. "Rico's missing." When Selena didn't react to that with so much as a raised eyebrow, Teri reworded her statement. "I threw him out Thursday night after that cretin was here. Now no one's seen him since sometime Saturday."
"How nice."
"Selena! What an awful thing to say!"
Selena's perfect brow creased from that mild criticism, and her calm expression altered to one of bewilderment. "But it's the truth. Surely between the two of us we can speak the truth."
Teri felt acid flush into her stomach at the thought of how Detective Kidder would interpret Selena's offhand comment. "Selena, please. Don't say something like that, even in jest."
"Why? No one's here but us. We both know you wanted to get rid of him, and now it looks like you got what you wished for." Her face broke into a rare ear-to-ear smile. "And you don't even have to double my paychecks." She giggled and gave Teri a playful poke.
Teri failed to understand what was so comical, but Selena was quick to fill her in.
"Don't you remember what you said? We were sitting right here, having coffee. You had just found out Rico had been lying to you again, and you said, 'If I thought for one minute you could get Rico out of my life permanently by having sex with him, I'd not only give you my blessing, I'd double your next dozen paychecks!' Then we laughed so hard you had tears in your eyes. It was one of the best times I've ever had!"
Selena's aquamarine eyes glowed with a joyous light, but Teri couldn't bring herself to share her pleasure in recalling the conversation. She remembered it all right, but with an enormous amount of guilt that she'd ever had such a wicked thought. But Selena not only remembered it, she'd memorized the exact words. And for Selena to call it one of her best times seemed to make the bad joke that much worse. "Selena—"
"Oh, now, don't you worry." Selena squeezed Teri's forearm and whispered breathily, "Your secret wish is safe with me. I'd never tell a soul."
"I know but, it's just that there's this detective—"
"What?" Selena's eyes abruptly filled with anger.
"I had to report Rico's disappearance to the police."
"But I wanted... I mean, why didn't you call me? I would have handled that for you, or at least gone along with you. Really, Teri, you shouldn't have tried to take care of this on your own. It was thoughtless and inconsiderate. After all, that's what best friends are for."
Teri couldn't understand what had caused Selena's anger, but as her irritated expression was replaced by a hangdog look of devotion, she realized the young woman felt left out. She again decided not to mention that Drew had been with her. In a far corner of her mind, she noted that Selena had added the word "best" to their friendship.
Teri tried for a diplomatic excuse. "I didn't want to drag you into any of this, whatever it's about. But the police came by because they got a call from Rico's supervisor, and then there was that thug. Anyway, the only reason I even mentioned it is because this detective came by and, well, he made me a little nervous. I don't think he'd think our conversation was all that humorous." Now Selena looked crushed. Teri sighed. She simply couldn't win today.
"I would never, ever do or say anything to hurt you, Teri. You must trust me about that."
Teri mentally squirmed under the piercing gaze Selena fixed on her. She suddenly needed some breathing room and got up from the table. "As long as you're here, how about if you do some posing for me? I need to get my mind busy."
Selena brightened immediately. "Great! What are we doing today?"
"I just wanted to do some sketches for another idea I had. It would help if you had short curly hair. I think there's a red wig like that in the prop cabinet."
As usual, once Teri started working, she lost track of time, and Selena never complained, no matter how long she had been holding the same pose. It was late morning when a knock on the door interrupted them. When Teri saw that it was Detective Kidder, her first hope was that he had news about Rico. Her second was that Selena would be true to her promise.
This time, as soon as Teri let him in, he was ready to get down to business. This time, Teri did the stalling. She didn't want to take any chances with Selena. God knew what she would say with the intention of defending her.
"Detective Kidder, this is my model, Selena. We were right in the middle of working, but if it's something urgent..."
"No, nothing yet. I'll only keep you a few minutes. I was wondering—"
Teri cut him off by turning to Selena and saying, "Selena, why don't you relax for a few minutes. I'll go outside to talk to the detective."
Selena glided past the two of them with a flip of her wrist. "Stay here. If you don't mind, I'll go out for a walk instead. I'm rather stiff from holding that last pose."
Teri flushed, both from the awareness that Selena knew she didn't want to talk in front of her and the reminder that she had thoughtlessly caused Selena some physical discomfort.
* * *
Selena closed the door behind her and descended the wooden stairs with a heavy foot. A moment later she tiptoed back up and pressed her back against the wall, grateful for the warm weather that had made Teri open the window. She could hear the conversation as clearly as if she were inside with them.
"Light and sweet, right?"
So Teri was fixing the detective a cup of coffee. Good—she hadn't missed anything important. She supposed it was natural for Teri to want to talk to the officer in private, but it hurt all the same. She wanted to share every moment of this victory with her dear friend, which included dealings with the police. Teri simply wasn't mentally equipped to sidestep the kind
s of questions they might ask, like she was. She knew how to keep law enforcement types from being suspicious.
Teri was acting most peculiarly. Selena had thought she'd be happy about her freedom, but she seemed very upset instead. She hadn't even laughed over their private joke. That was the moment Selena decided not to tell her about what she'd done for her. She realized then that Teri didn't want to know the details any more than her own mother had.
As part of her mind eavesdropped on the conversation going on inside the studio, her gaze drifted down the wooden steps, and she recalled another flight of stairs and another time she had stood listening...
* * *
Eight-year-old Selena stood outside her father's room for several seconds and listened to his loud snores. As her mother would say, the drunken son-of-a-bitch was passed out again. She only hoped she could wake him up at the right time. Juliette's plan counted on that.
But he couldn't wake up too soon, either. So she stayed as quiet as a little mouse while she went back to her room and pulled her special box out of the closet. She hadn't known when she would need the things in the box, but Juliette had told her to be ready at any time. Even when she took something out to play with it, she was always very careful to put it back in the box. And the time had finally come for her to use it all as Juliette had planned.
Mommy didn't work in the evenings very often, and when she did, Selena usually stayed at a friend's house or with her aunt. She was lucky tonight, though. No one had been able to take her. It hadn't been too hard for Selena to make her mother believe she'd be okay if she stayed home. She promised to hide if Daddy started getting drunk-mean.
Just as Juliette had told her to, she carried the box to the stairs and went to work. Very carefully she took out each thing and placed it on a step. First one roller skate, then another on the next step, six marbles on the next, then three golf balls after that, and so on, until she was on the floor and her box was empty.
The stairway was too dark for her to see how it looked when she was finished, but she knew she mustn't turn on any lights. Everything had to be just right for the plan to work. Clinging to the polished railing, she carefully made her way back up the edge of the stairs to her father's bedroom.
Then she screamed at the top of her lungs.
"Daddy! Daddy! Help!"
As soon as she heard him groaning and the bed-springs squeaking she climbed onto the railing and slid to the bottom.
"Daddy! Help me! There's a fire in the kitchen!"
She moved to the side of the stairs and waited for his feet to appear at the top.
Then she watched him fly through the air like some great, clumsy bird.
As Selena saw his body crash down, bouncing and tumbling all the way to the floor, she thought she'd have to remember to tell Juliette that the first roller skate was the only thing they had needed after all.
She waited to make sure he wasn't going to get up before walking over to him. She needn't have worried. As soon as she saw his half-open eyes staring at the ceiling, she knew it had worked.
Just like in the movie she and Juliette had seen.
Smiling, she remembered the next part of the plan. She had to make sure every single thing was returned to the box before putting it away in her closet again. The only problem she had was when she had to search under his body to find one last marble. He was much heavier than she'd thought he'd be, but Juliette had warned her how important it was to make sure nothing was left behind to place the blame on her.
She was sound asleep when her mother came home, but she woke up when she heard crying. She couldn't understand why being rid of their enemy would cause her mother to cry, but it made her decide to hold off telling her mother the secret for a little while.
* * *
At the first hint that Detective Kidder was finished poking and prodding at Teri, Selena abandoned her memories and crept back down the stairs. She didn't like this police officer any more than the others she had dealt with in the past. When he came outside and saw her, he asked if she could describe the thug who'd threatened Teri in front of so many witnesses. Putting on her "dumb blonde" routine, even though she was still wearing the red wig, she gave him a vague list of characteristics, as if she could barely recall the incident, even going so far as to stupidly ask if it was important. She made quite sure, however, that what she did say matched perfectly with the disguise she had created.
After he had gone and she and Teri resumed their earlier positions, Selena encouraged her to relate the conversation as if she hadn't heard every word.
Teri continued to sketch as she talked. "So far he's narrowed down the place where Rico delivered the last piece of mail but it didn't help much. It was a single family residence and no one was home that whole day. He wanted to know if Rico might have been having an affair with someone along his route."
"That seems like a strange question. Why do you think he'd ask that?"
Teri shrugged. "Maybe he was thinking of a "Desperate Housewives" sort of scenario. You know, sexy but bored young thing in a quiet development... husband comes home and finds them in bed..."
Selena giggled. "I can see that. So what did you tell him?"
"The truth. For all I knew he could have had a regular lover who he stopped and visited every day on his lunch break, or he could have had a hundred different thirty-minute stopovers. I assumed he was cheating, but I didn't actually know when or where."
"Hopefully the husband killed his cheating wife too," Selena said with a laugh. Teri gave her a disapproving look that Selena didn't understand, but then she changed the subject.
"He wanted to confirm my description of the guy who threatened me. Again."
"Yeah, he stopped me outside and asked the same thing. I gave him my home phone number in case he has any more questions."
"I'm sorry you have to be involved at all. If you just hadn't been here that day..." She shook her head and sighed. "He also asked for Drew's. I offered to go to the station and look at mug shots to see if I could find the guy, but he said that could wait until we were certain about, uh, you know."
Selena nodded her understanding. She also would have preferred not to involve anyone else, but the photographer's presence would turn out to be a blessing, as long as he described the man the same as they had. Selena was just sorry it would further embarrass Teri. She had to give the detective credit on one point, though. She hadn't thought anyone would start working on the missing mailman so quickly. Instead of having to wait until someone reported a bad smell coming from the apartment where Rico was rotting, it looked like Detective Kidder was going to track him down in record time.
Teri seemed very disturbed about not knowing for sure what had happened to her husband. Since Selena had decided not to tell her just yet about the favor she'd performed, it now looked like only the discovery of Rico's body would give her some peace.
Once the corpse was found, that should also take care of Detective Kidder and his annoying questions. One look at the stumps at the ends of Rico's arms and any cop around the New York City area would automatically assume the Irish mob was responsible. And that the crime was unsolvable.
Before Selena left an hour later, she stuffed the red wig into her purse. She wasn't sure how bright the detective was, but just in case, she would be sure to wear it if she had to meet with him again. It wouldn't do to have him know how easily she could change her appearance.
* * *
Drew and his two models showed up shortly after Selena had departed, and Teri relinquished the studio to them. She had the strongest urge to clean her house and rationalized that the physical exertion would probably do her some good.
Her urge paid off. When Drew knocked at the kitchen door to tell her they were finished, her spirits had risen enough to greet him with a genuine smile. "Do you have time to come in?"
"Sure. My microwave dinner will wait for me."
"A microwave dinner? I think I can offer better than that."
"I accep
t," he said with a grin that revealed he'd been angling for the invitation.
Teri raised both eyebrows and laughed. "In that case I suppose you don't care that it's escargots and sautéed frogs' legs, with a side of slimy fried okra."
He hung his hat on the back of a chair. "I think I'll just stick with the okra, thank you."
"Yecch! I should have known a cowboy would have no sense of haute cuisine. I can assure you, okra's one food you'll never find in my kitchen."
"So, how's it goin'? When I first saw you today, you looked like you'd lost your best friend. Ah, jeez, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that."
"Hey, I'm not that sensitive. I've already realized what a perfect gentleman you are." His concern for her feelings made Selena's lighthearted remarks sound cruel by comparison. Drew had called her Wednesday and Thursday, as promised. Each call had been brief—he had only wanted to make sure she was okay—but hearing his soft drawl had somehow comforted her in an otherwise panicky situation.
"Have I thanked you yet for keeping tabs on me?"
"At least a dozen times. And I don't mind tellin' you again, it was my pleasure, ma'am."
"It's good you added the ma'am, or I might have doubted your sincerity. And how's your new neighbor?" One of the times Drew had called, she'd heard a woman's voice in the background.
"She happened to catch me as I was leavin' today. She says hello."
"Maybe she's another cowboy lover."
He laughed. "Yeah, come to think of it, she was eyein' my, uh, boots with a heap of interest." When Teri smirked at him, he added, "'Course, it was hard to tell exactly what she was lookin' at through those thick bifocals." He winked and Teri threw a potholder at him.
"How's steak and fries sound?" Teri asked, opening the refrigerator.
"Much better. So, how'd your day go?"
"Fine... for about an hour. Then Selena dropped in and stayed until just before you got here. And Detective Kidder came by—"
"Again?"
She nodded. She had told him about the first visit without making a big deal about it, but Drew had read between the lines.
Wicked Obsessions Page 8
