Suspicion of Malice

by Barbara Parker

  "I don't give a damn." He unzipped his pants and forced her hand inside.

  "We can't, not now."

  Her skin scraped painfully on the teeth of the zipper. Ted backed her into the desk. "You haven't let me touch you since Roger. Don't you think I'm entitled?"

  “Ted, stop! It's too dangerous. For God's sake, will you think?"

  He let her go, taking some time zipping back up, letting her see what she'd missed. While she readjusted her clothing, he started tossing things from his desk into an empty box. His radio, a clock, the charger for his telephone. "I ought to put this shit in my truck and keep going. Get the hell out of here, far as I can go. Is that what you want?"

  Ted Stamos needed his hand held.

  "Please, Ted, don't say things like that to me." Liz felt tears scald her eyes, the result of weary frustration. "Oh, darling, please don't." She put her arms around his waist, pressing herself against him. "As soon as it's safe, we'll be together. I'm yours, you know that, but we have to be careful. Do you love me? You just said you want me, but do you love me?"

  His yes came out on a laugh. "I love you more than any man ought to."

  "I have to know I can trust you completely. That you'll do anything for me. Prove you love me, Ted. Or are you using me to get what you want out of this company?"

  "No, mat's crazy, Elizabeth. You know how I feel."

  "I need you, Ted. Now more than ever." She brought her face close to his, whispering against his cheek, "We're in danger of losing everything. I couldn't stand that, after all we’ve been through. I want you so much, but we have a problem. One I never anticipated. We have to do something."

  "What problem?"

  "Listen to me carefully. Diane is not my daughter. It's true. Her real mother was Maggie Cresswell. She got pregnant at fifteen, and by the time Porter and Claire found out, it was too late. They told Maggie the baby was put up for adoption, but the truth is, Porter gave it to Dub and me. I didn't want to, but he promised Dub half the company, and Dub said yes. Nobody knew the truth. But Diane has been asking questions lately. She said, 'Why do I look like Aunt Claire and not like you?' My heart stopped! She's going to find out. She's Porter's only heir. Porter will be dead soon, and if she makes a claim, she'll get all his shares in the company. Fifty-one percent. She'll sell it to Broward Marine. They've made Porter an offer already! What would happen to us? Everything we've worked for would be gone. We have to do something about Diane."

  Ted stared at her.

  "We have to do it, Ted. There's no other way. It can be an accident. A fall. She could slip off the seawall. She doesn't swim. Don't look at me like that. She isn't my daughter! She hates me. She said so in those very words. She calls me horrible things. Porter made us take her. I am so afraid of what she'll do when she finds out. And she will. Oh, she will, Ted, and then we are lost."

  As if in pain, Ted went over to the desk and sat heavily on the edge of it. "Maggie had a baby?"

  "Yes. Diane is hers."

  Ted laughed. He tried to hold it back, but he exploded in laughter, falling into his chair, laughing until Liz wanted to hit him. "Stop it! What is the matter with you?"

  "I knew Maggie when we were teenagers. I went over there to do some carpentry work, and we had sex in the guest room over the garage. Diane could be my kid."

  "That's impossible. She isn't yours."

  "She might be. I could take a DNA test. Jesus Christ. If she was my daughter ... I'd have to help her run the company, wouldn't I?" He started laughing again. "I'd have more than you. Wouldn't that be a kick in the ass?"

  "Shut up, Ted. She's not yours. She's Porter's."

  His grin disappeared, and he stared up at her. "Porter's? What do you mean?"

  "What do you think I mean?"

  "That's sick."

  "I know it's true because I know Porter. I know what he is. I thought something funny was going on when I first met him, when Maggie was only eleven. I know because Roger told me when he was a kid that his father liked to read bedtime stories to Maggie with the door shut. I could see the way he looked at her, the way he touched her. I know because my father did the same thing to me!" Liz was unable to repress a shudder of disgust. "She isn't like other people. She shouldn't have been born."

  Ted got out of his chair. His face had flushed red. "I'm not going to murder a twenty-year-old girl. Are you crazy?"

  "We have no choice. The minute Diane suspects she's Maggie's daughter, we'll lose everything!" Sensing the conversation spinning out of control, Liz put her hands on Ted's shoulders. "I couldn't bear being without you. You feel the same way about me, don't you? Say you love me, Ted. Say it."

  "Oh, Jesus." He pushed her hands away. "I'm getting out of here."

  "Where are you going?"

  "I don't know. I've got to think."

  "You can't leave. Ted, I love you."

  "Let go of me." He walked out the door, arm still raised as if warding her off.

  "What do you want? You can have anything." Running onto the catwalk, Liz stopped him with arms around his waist. She pressed her cheek against his back. "Don't leave me, Ted. Be with me. You know I love you. I need you so much."

  "What you want me to do ... it's too much. Roger was one thing—he deserved it. But this. Oh, Jesus. You're sick. You're one sick bitch."

  What happened next unfolded clearly and slowly, and Liz could see her mind processing the facts like watching a mathematical solution worked out on a computer screen. Her body responded and all she could do was watch it happen.

  It didn't take much. A quick jerking motion toward the edge of the catwalk, hands between the shoulder blades, a strong push.

  Ted hit the railing hard at hip level, and the momentum was enough to send his torso over the edge and pick up his feet. He balanced, arms flailing. Liz could have caught the fabric of his shirt. She knew there was time, a split second or so, and her hand was poised to reach for him. And then the railing gave way. With a loud snap the horizontal bar broke from one post and swung from the other. Ted dropped, and the space in front of her was empty.

  There was a crashing of wood and the deeper thud of a body.

  Twisted metal hung from the railing post. Moving away from the gap, Liz steadied herself on the unbroken portion of the railing and peered over the edge. Ted had landed in a boat hull thirty feet below her, facedown. She scanned the assembly floor, the quiet lines of boats. The big doors at either end had been rolled shut, and the far corners of the building were dark. The windows under the roof were pale gray, and long fluorescent tubes in wire cages pressed their weak light into the enormous space. No one was running toward the noise. There were no footsteps, no demands to know what had happened. The security guard would come by, but he wouldn't be able to see into the hull. Unless someone noticed the broken railing, Ted Stamos wouldn't be found until Monday morning, when the men came to lay in the next layer of fiberglass.

  With the toe of her sneaker Liz tipped over a box as if Ted might have stumbled over the contents. Things slid to the floor—a stapler, a desk diary. A black-and-white photograph of his father standing in front of a boat. Pens, pencils, a jar of paper clips.

  She heard a moan and looked over the side again. Ted's hand lifted from the boat hull. He was alive. She turned and ran down the stairs, coming out on the ground floor.

  The mold was supported by a scaffolding of lumber three feet above her head. There was a ladder allowing access for the workers, and Liz climbed it. The hull was made of overlapping layers of fiberglass, an inch thick at the bottom, less at the top. A long box-shaped form gave strength to the keel, and heavy ribs supported the sides. Ted lay facedown across one of them in the bow of the boat. His knee had broken, and his leg was bent at an odd angle. His face was toward her, cheek pressed against the hull. Blood oozed from his mouth and darkened his teeth. He struggled to raise his forearm, and the skin made a sticky popping sound as it pulled free from the resin.

  "Eliz—Elizabeth. Please. Help. I can't . . .
move." He hit the boat hull with his open palm. "Elizabeth!"

  The men had just laid down a new layer of glass, and the resin was drying. Brownish red, sticky, glistening like an open wound. Within an hour or so it would be completely set. They would have to tear Ted loose to get him out of there. The thought made fire leap across her skin.

  "Help me. Help. Please."

  Liz went down the ladder and sat huddled in a ball on the concrete floor. She pressed her hands over her ears. If he would only shut up. The guard would be along soon, and Ted would tell. He would tell everything. His hand was beating slowly on the hull. Thud. Thud. She got up and ran from one place to another, looking for a bar, a rod, a two-by-four. Something heavy. They would say his head cracked on the gunwale.

  "Be quiet. Be quiet, damn you."

  The moans diminished in volume as she ran farther down the line of boats. The carpenters had been working in one of them. She opened a tool chest and found a twenty-ounce claw hammer. She tested its weight, her fingers tight on the rubber grip. She thought she could reach him. If she leaned down, she could reach him. How many blows would it take? But it would be obvious. A hammer. And what if she dropped it? Her fingerprints—

  "Somebody! Somebody, help. Please."

  His voice was getting stronger, and it echoed on the high walls.

  Liz clenched her teeth. "Shut up." Quickly she put the hammer back and closed the drawer. She had seen the resin tanks near the hull where Ted lay. The stainless steel tanks were on wheels, and a hose ran from each one to a resin gun. There was a rusty fifty-five-gallon drum used for trash, and in it she found some old paintbrushes and rollers. She pulled out a brush. The resin had hardened on the handle, but the bristles had some play in them. She flipped a switch on the tank. The compressor motor came on, and Liz snapped it off after a few seconds. She squeezed the resin gun. The liquid came out, the color of honey. She wet the brush with it, hoping there would be enough.

  Sick with fear that someone would see her, she climbed the ladder again. Ted was four feet below. His eye followed her movements, focusing on the brush coming closer. She leaned over as far as she could reach.

  "Don't. No. Elizabeth. God's sake—"

  She touched the brush to his nose, dabbing the resin into his nostrils. Not too much. They would say it happened that way when he fell into the hull. Then she placed the brush firmly against his mouth. His eye rolled, and she looked away. She could feel him trying to push the brush away with his tongue and lips, and she pressed it tighter. Mmmpphhh. Mmmffj. His palm hit the hull. Thud, thud . . . thud. Thud. Each time he lifted his arm she heard the popping noises of drying resin.

  She was leaning over the gunwale, and she felt the vibrations in her hipbones. Thud . . . thud. He gasped in a breath, and she adjusted the brush, pressing harder. Her arm shook from the strain. She thought about the extra shirts in the office storeroom. She would have to put one of those on and throw away this one.

  "Oh, no!"

  Roger's wallet was still in the front pocket of Ted's jeans. They would find it. Liz wondered about climbing in to get it, then realized what they would think. They would think what was already true—Ted had killed him.

  She looked around the assembly building again. Still no one. The thudding had stopped. Ted was quiet now, but Liz counted off another full minute on her watch. Finally she looked down at his face. His eye stared at the hull. She slowly pulled the brush away. Waited. Nothing.

  As she went down the ladder she wiped off her fingerprints with the hem of her shirt, which was already ruined. Then the handle of the brush. The bristles touched her shirt, leaving a red smear of blood on the white fabric. She wrapped the brush in a piece of newspaper and tucked it under her arm.

  Unseen, Liz ran across the darkening boat yard to the office building, punching in her access code at the back door. The halls were eerily quiet. She found the box of company shirts and put one on in the ladies' room, then washed her hands, using nail polish remover to clean off the resin. She saw herself in the mirror, astonished that she recognized her own face. She stashed the old shirt and the brush in her tote bag and went out the front entrance to her car. She smiled and waved at the security guard on the way through the gate.

  It was late, and Liz felt the pressure of time, but she made a detour off the expressway. Behind a Cuban shopping center south of the airport she found a green dumpster, opened the lid, and tossed her shirt and the now stiffened brush inside.

  Once that was done, she used her cell phone to check in with Sean. On my way, she cheerfully told him. They chatted for a couple of minutes about what movies he'd picked up, and she told him to keep the pizza warm.

  Chapter 26

  The weekend weather was typical for late summer in Miami: temperatures in the mid-nineties, humidity over eighty percent. Conditions like these accelerated the decomposition of flesh, and so security at the boat yard noticed the smell before they finally located the body around eight o'clock Sunday morning.

  The matter might have remained a routine Miami P.D. accident investigation, except that when the victim was finally cut out of his clothes and freed from the fiberglass, a wallet was found in the front pocket of his jeans. The M.E. opened it and saw the face of a young blond man, Roger C. Cresswell, age thirty-two. Recognizing the name from a county case, he put in a call to Frank Britton of Miami-Dade Homicide.

  At 1:45 Anthony Quintana turned his car onto the short dead-end street leading to Cresswell Yachts. He and Gail Connor were planning to board the Lady Claire with family and friends of the late Roger Cresswell, whose ashes would be scattered at sea. Roger's mother had instructed them to park close to the dock, but Gail pointed out the activity going on in the yard. Several city and county units were clustered around the open end of the main assembly building.

  Anthony parked in the lot and they got out. Yellow tape strung between sawhorses barred entry through the wide door. As they walked closer, Anthony spotted Frank Britton talking to a crime-scene tech with a camera. Britton finished his conversation and came over. Sweat dampened his blue sports shirt, and his collar was open.

  "Well, Tony Quintana, don't you turn up everywhere," he said. Light slid over the lenses of his sunglasses as he turned to Gail. "Hello again, Ms. Connor. Y'all just happened to be driving by?"

  Anthony said, "We're meeting the Cresswells at the dock. They're taking Roger's ashes out to sea in the family boat. What's going on, Frank?"

  "Oh, yeah, I heard about the boat trip. What happened is, one of the construction supervisors fell and killed himself. You want to guess what we found in his pocket? Roger Cresswell's wallet."

  "Ay, mi Dios. Which supervisor?"

  "Ted Stamos. His office overlooked the floor, and he took a dive over the railing. We think it had to be Friday because he landed in one of the molds where they'd just laid down some fiberglass. He was stuck like a fly on flypaper. Security had to call the owners for permission to saw him out. They got here a little while ago with their families. We took some statements and sent them over to the boat. They're pretty shaken up. Stamos worked here all his life. So did his father."

  Anthony exchanged a glance with Gail, hoping she read the warning in his eyes not to say too much. "Do you think he shot Roger Cresswell?"

  "Damned if I know." Hands on hips, Britton swung around to look into the building. "A few weeks ago we interviewed Stamos along with everybody else connected to Roger, and he said he was with Duncan Cresswell and a dozen other guys at a strip club from nine-fifteen till one o'clock a.m. Half an hour ago Duncan says, 'You know, Detective, I'm just not sure Ted was there the whole time. I'd been drinking. I don't remember.’ And I go, 'Well, did Ted have any problems with Roger?' 'Oh, yeah, all kinds of problems.’ 'Well, why the fuck—' Excuse me, Ms. Connor. 'Why didn't you tell me that before?' 'You didn't ask, Detective.’ Jesus. So now I've got a new suspect we had to peel off a boat hull. That throws all my pet theories into the can. A very confusing situation."

  Anthony gaz
ed into the assembly building. Lines of sleek white motor yachts extended to the other end of the long, vaulted space. Ted Stamos lay unattended fifty yards away under a yellow plastic sheet. Confusing indeed. If Sean Cresswell had taken the wallet, then how in the name of God had it wound up in Ted Stamos's pocket? Anthony could not raise this question without implicating Bobby Gonzalez in an assault.

  He checked his watch. They had a little time. "Could you show me Stamos's body?"

  Britton hesitated, then nodded. "Sure. I'll warn you, it's not pretty."

  To Gail, Anthony said, "Do you want to come with us?"

  Her lips tightened as she looked at him—she resented his suggestion that it might be too much for her. Then her eyes shifted to the body, and she shook her head. "No, I'll wait here. Don't be long. It's almost two o'clock."

  Britton lifted the crime-scene tape, and Anthony bent to go under. The half dozen officers on the scene watched them walk deeper into the building. Fans stirred the air, but not enough to waft away the sticky-sweet aroma of rotting meat. Anthony asked if they had found the pistol used to kill Roger Cresswell.

  "Not in Stamos's office, and not at his apartment. I sent a detective over to check. He didn't find the Rolex either, but Stamos could have pawned it."

  Anthony knew that if Sean Cresswell had told Bobby the truth, the Rolex had vanished under a table at Club Apocalypse the night of Roger's murder.

  They passed three unfinished boats to get to the one where Ted Stamos had landed. Lumber from the scaffolding had been pulled out of the way. The front end of the hull lay in pieces on the foor, and one section about six feet in length had been propped up against the next boat in line. Tattered remnants of blue jeans and a plaid shirt made the twisted outline of a man.

  Britton pulled back the tarpaulin. Stamos lay face up on the bare concrete. Bits of fabric still adhered to his chest and thighs. The decaying skin had turned several shades darker, and chunks of it were missing. One leg bent sideways at the knee. A piece of fiberglass was still attached to his hair and cheek, and the one eye in view was a narrow slit. His tongue had turned purplish brown, protruding through broken teeth.