Elysia made a dismissing sound. “You can do that anytime. Why don’t you come by for dinner?”
A.J.’s brows drew together. “I was there for dinner last night.”
“There’s no reason we can’t have dinner two nights in a row. We used to have dinner every night.”
“How about another night? I’m bushed.”
Elysia’s tone changed, grew coaxing. “The truth is, I thought we might discuss my wedding plans.”
A.J.’s stomach knotted. “What’s the rush? You’ve only known the man a few months.”
“I knew your father less than twelve hours before I’d decided to marry him.”
“I knew my father. Dean Sullivan is not my father.” A.J. was trying to joke, but somehow it hadn’t come out all that lightheartedly.
“Of course not, darling,” Elysia assured her, “but Dean is a lovely man in his own right. You’ll see, once you know him a little better. You want me to be happy, don’t you?”
“Not necessarily.”
Elysia laughed her husky laugh. “You’re more my daughter than you’d like to believe, you know.”
That was undoubtedly intended as a compliment. It served to make A.J. cagey. “You didn’t invite me over to discuss wedding plans. What’s going on?”
“True. True. Dean and I are already agreed on a small, private wedding. No worries there. I thought you might like to drop by this evening and discuss whatever it was you were doing at Lily’s this afternoon.”
After an astonished moment A.J. put two and two together. “The news van.”
Elysia chuckled. “I’m afraid so.”
A.J. let out a long, exasperated breath. “Mother, it’s true that I went to Lily’s. Lily asked for my help, and I’m going to try and do what I can for her, but I don’t really feel that discussing it in front of the entire cast of Golden Gumshoes would be appropriate.”
“That is a shame,” Elysia murmured, “because it just so happens that Trini—I mean, Marcie—has some information that might prove very useful to you.”
“I can’t keep them straight. Which one is Marcie and what information does she have?”
“Marcie plays Trini. She’s our weapons expert.”
“That much, I grasped. Well, not about her being a weapons expert. I don’t understand why mature lady sleuths would need a weapons expert.”
“You really should watch the show, pumpkin. It’s very entertaining. The episode where Marcie found us a tank—”
“A tank? I don’t even want to think about that. Which one is Trini, er, Marcie in real life?”
“Tall, slender, red hair. Looks like a jaded pixie.”
“Er, right. What information does she have?”
“You’ll have to pay us a visit to find out, won’t you?”
“Mother!”
“We’ll see you half-past six?”
“Mother.”
“Cheerie-bye, pet.”
Elysia disconnected.
Nine
“I know how much you were looking forward to seeing Eat Pray Love tonight, but we’re going to have to postpone.”
Monster took the news with his usual composure, panting cheerfully as he followed A.J. from the front door to the kitchen. A.J. sorted through the day’s mail—mostly catalogs with a few bills just to break the monotony—then tossed the catalogs in the recycle bin and the bills on the kitchen table.
Monster sat down in front of his bowl and eyed her expectantly.
“Nope, we’re going out,” A.J. told him. “And if dinner is half as good tonight as it was last night, it might even be worth it. Mother got rid of the ferret, though, so don’t get your hopes up.”
In her bedroom she changed into a pair of faded Vince flare leg jeans and a short gray marled-knit “Greenwich” sweater by Ella Moss over a white silk tank. She looked through her aunt’s jewelry box and selected a pair of elegant S-curved sterling and cultured pearl earrings. Diantha had been photographed wearing the earrings many times, including an iconic LIFE magazine layout. A.J. fastened one earring in her right earlobe.
“I just can’t believe she’s going to marry him.”
She blinked at her reflection in the mirror, surprised that she had given voice to that thought. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Dean’s probably a very nice guy. It’s just I feel like I only got her back and now . . .”
Well, maybe it was better not to examine whatever it was too closely. A.J. turned to Monster and placed her hands on her hips. “You’re just going to wear what you’ve been wearing all day? You’re not going to shave at least?”
Monster tilted his head. He thumped his tail on the wooden floor. A.J. laughed and knelt, ruffling his ears. “You’re my best beau. Yes, you are.” She kissed the top of his nose and stood up.
“Okay, let’s go. But remember. Don’t say anything about her mashed potatoes. She’s very sensitive about them.”
She switched off the bedroom light.
A pajama party seemed to be in progress at Starlight Farm.
Elysia, wearing a purple velvet dressing gown with a mandarin collar, greeted A.J. and Monster at the door. She led the way to the family room with its plump leather sofas, ottomans, and big-screen TV. Petra, wearing men’s-style white silk pajamas, was sitting cross-legged tapping away at her laptop. Marcie, ensconced in a chair by the fireplace, was wearing one of those vintage-looking plaid Beacon bathrobes. She appeared to be going through a stack of People magazines and making notes. They greeted A.J. cheerfully.
A large silver tray, littered with china cups, dishes, a pot of cocoa, and a plate of brownies, took up the center of the coffee table. A couple of white pizza boxes took up the rest.
Conspicuously missing, in A.J.’s opinion, were bridal magazines and the happy groom.
“Where’s Dean?” Monster cautiously sniffed the corner of a pizza box. “Monster!” Monster flattened his ears and threw her a guilty look.
“He went into the village to have a pint. Have a slice of pizza, pumpkin. We need to get to work before he comes home.”
Chastened, Monster took the chair across from Marcie, curling up in a tight ball and burying his nose in his tail. A.J. investigated the white boxes and selected a slice of still-warm veggie pizza.
“Doesn’t Dean approve of sleuthing?”
Petra gave a short laugh. A.J. gave her mother an inquiring look. Elysia ignored them both.
“Marcie believes she knows your Reverend Goode.”
“Really?”
Marcie set aside the stack of magazines. “Except his name wasn’t Goode.” She moved over to the sofa beside Petra. “Show her.”
“Petra is our computer genius,” Elysia informed A.J.
“In real life or the show?”
“Both.”
Petra turned the laptop so that A.J. could see the screen. Miracle Skin Transformation read the headline.
“Are you sure . . . ?”
Petra peered at the screen from over the top of her spectacles. She frowned. “Oops.” She clicked on another window and the Los Angeles Times came up with the heading Socialite Found Dead in Bathtub. A.J. scanned the brief article that followed.
Socialite and heiress to the Smithy yacht-building fortune, Jill Smithy-Powell, 46, was found dead in her Laurel Canyon home last Monday. The LAPD has so far revealed little about the case, including how the publicist and fashion importer was killed, but Smithy-Powell’s husband of two months, Maxwell Powell, is being sought for questioning. Police found the body after receiving a domestic disturbance call about 3 a.m. Monday. Smithy-Powell was well-known within social and philanthropic circles, and handled the publicity for the nonprofit Girls Can Dream annual Black and White Gala to benefit underprivileged girls. The website of Fiore Brune, the jewelry import company she founded in 1997, has been converted to a memorial page.
The date of the article was January 2001. “Interesting. I’m not sure I’m following. Are you suggesting . . . Well, what, exactly?”
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Petra clicked and brought up the tribute page on the former Fiore Brune site. “Not that page,” Elysia said. “Find the photos of Powell.”
More clicking and Petra brought up a page showing photos of blonde and pretty Jill Smithy-Powell and a tall, handsome, dark-haired, bearded man.
“Good lord,” A.J. said, peering more closely at the screen.
“You see?” Elysia said triumphantly.
A.J. continued to study the images. “It does look a lot like David Goode. A younger David Goode.”
“It’s a decade later. He’s bound to show a little wear and tear.”
“The beard makes it hard to be sure.”
Elysia said, “No, it doesn’t.”
“The police never found Maxwell Powell?”
“See for yourself.”
Elysia nodded at Petra, but A.J. said, “I’ll take your word for it. Was Jill Smithy-Powell’s murder ever solved?”
“No.” That was Marcie. She ruffled her hair absently. It stuck up in tufts, reminding A.J. of Suze. “It never was. If you read the tribute page, her family still offers a reward for any information leading to the arrest and conviction of her murderer—and for the discovery of Maxwell Powell’s whereabouts.”
“So they’re not openly accusing him of her murder? Was he ever charged?”
“Well, no. They couldn’t find him.”
Elysia put in, “He wasn’t cleared either. He simply vanished. As though he’d never existed. You can read the details for yourself.”
A.J. said slowly, “Maybe he was killed, too.”
“That’s one theory. Not many people subscribe to it, but it is a possibility. However, if that’s the case, why was his body never discovered?”
A.J. shook her head. “I don’t see how the police could have failed to find him, though.”
“People do disappear even in this age of technology.”
A.J. was thinking about Kirkland Bath’s small religious sect living and working in the remote wilds of Baja, California. Not a bad place to hide out if you were on the lam from the law. Of course you’d have to already know about the New Dawn Church, but it wasn’t impossible that it could have happened like that.
“Marcie knew Jill. She’s positive that David Goode and Maxwell Powell are one and the same.”
“Well, not positive,” Marcie qualified. “I never got a chance to see the reverend close up, but his voice sounded the same. Max Powell had a distinctive voice.”
“We can fix that,” A.J. said. “May I?” Petra pushed aside the pizza cartons, swiveled the laptop A.J.’s way, and A.J. typed in the address for YouTube. She brought up Goode’s recent interview on Channel 3.
Goode was speaking earnestly to the interviewer. “Our materialist, reality-based culture doesn’t want to admit that evil exists as a physical manifestation. We want to talk in abstracts and try and rationalize away the evidence of our eyes. But evil does exist. It walks among us and it can sometimes take a terrible, monstrous form.”
The perky news announcer said, “When you say ‘monstrous form’ do you mean—”
“I mean ‘monstrous’ literally. What I witnessed last night was not someone in costume and it was certainly no hallucination.”
Marcie looked up wide-eyed. “It really is him!” “Was,” Petra said grimly. “It looks like the Smithy family eventually got justice for Jill.”
The thought gave A.J. pause. She said to Marcie, “Did you actually know Max Powell?”
Marcie said, “We all knew Max. Not well, granted. But we knew him.”
“What was he like?”
“Charming. I guarantee you not one of us expected what happened to Jill. Even after the murder, even after Max disappeared, we all kept thinking there had to be some mistake, some other explanation. He just wasn’t the type.”
If there was one thing A.J. had learned over the past months it was that there was no particular “type” of person destined to be either victim or perpetrator.
“Interesting, no?” Elysia said. “Although, frankly, I’m not in such a hurry to dismiss that little chit Sarah,” Elysia said.
A.J. did a double take. “That little what?”
“Chit.”
“Oh. What on earth do you have against Sarah?”
Elysia’s eye kindled. “That girl is using Bradley.”
Petra and Marcie exchanged tolerant looks.
A.J. said, “It seemed to me to be an even exchange of goods and services.”
“That’s a rather cynical attitude.”
A.J. shrugged. “Mr. Meagher seems happy.” It also seemed to her a case of the pot calling the kettle black.
“Did it somehow escape your notice that that girl was having an affair with the dead man?”
“He wasn’t dead when they were having their affair.”
Elysia pinned her with a glinting eye. “Most unamusing, Anna Jolie.”
“Mother, you have absolutely no proof that Sarah was lying about her relationship with Goode. Even if she was lying, it’s obvious from her shocked reaction at hearing he was dead that she didn’t kill him.”
Elysia shook her head. Marcie and Petra gave her pitying looks. Elysia said, “You can’t go by her reaction at dinner. The girl’s an actress.”
“The girl’s the host of a cooking show.”
“If she’s pretending to know anything about cooking, she’s the biggest actress to ever step foot in this house.”
Petra and Marcie seemed to find that hilarious. A.J. managed to preserve her expression. Just. “I see. What is it you think she was acting about? Knowing Goode or killing him? Or both?”
“Time will tell,” Elysia said darkly.
The next morning brought the pleasant surprise of book galleys in the mail.
Before her untimely death, Diantha had completed work on a manuscript that was part memoir, part philosophical treatise, and part instruction manual. A.J. had found the manuscript when she’d been sorting through her aunt’s belongings after she’d inherited Deer Hollow farm. She had completed the copyedits and, at the publisher’s request, written an introduction to the work.
She spent several peaceful hours poring over the galleys. In a strange way it was like spending time with Aunt Di. She could hear her aunt’s voice so clearly in the written words.
Jake called late morning, and they arranged to meet for a late lunch at the new pub and grill that had taken the place of their favorite Italian restaurant—another victim fallen to the recession.
Jake was waiting at a table by the time A.J. arrived at the restaurant. A.J. sat down and looked around. “This is cute.”
“Mmm.” Jake studied the menu.
The pub was decorated in dark wood and shining brass fixtures. The lighting was supplied by old-fashioned-looking amber lanterns, and the leather booths were large and comfortable.
A.J. spied a familiar couple near the back. Mr. Meagher and Sarah Ray were also having lunch together. She started to wave hello, but they looked rather . . . intimate. Sarah was giggling at something Mr. Meagher had said sotto voce.
A.J. sank back in the leather sofa. “What do you know about Sarah Ray?”
Jake looked up from the menu. “Not a lot. Why?”
“How long has she lived here?”
“A few years, I guess.”
“Where did she come from?”
“One of the Dakotas, I think.”
“Dakota? So that little Southern belle act she does is just a shtick?”
“I never noticed a Southern belle thing. I’m pretty sure she’s from North Dakota. Why?” Jake glanced around and spotted Sarah and Mr. Meagher. “Oh. I see. What have you got against Sarah?”
“Nothing. Mother’s sure she’s going to break Mr. Meagher’s heart.”
“And your mother thinks that’s her job?”
A.J. made a face. “I think Mother does really care for Mr. Meagher. I don’t know why they never quite managed to . . .”
“Connect?”
&nbs
p; A.J. nodded.
“They probably know each other too well by now. They’ve been friends too long.”
“But you’d think that would be a great basis for marriage.”
“You want my take on it?”
“Do you have a take on it?”
Jake laid his menu down. “I think your mom’s afraid.” “My mother? Afraid of a man? Have you met the woman?”
“I think you’re right. I think she’s fond of Meagher and she doesn’t want to risk a friendship that’s so important to her.”
“I never quite thought of it that way.”
“I doubt if she thinks of it that way either. Anyway, I think Meagher is perfectly safe in young Sarah’s hands.”
A.J. watched Sarah giggling again as Mr. Meagher whispered something to her. She sniffed. “She’s not that young either.”
Jake laughed.
The waiter appeared at last. A.J. ordered a French dip with shaved, lean, perfectly roasted beef on a warm, crusty French roll. Jake opted for a spicy sloppy joe.
As the waiter withdrew with their orders, A.J. said, “Before I forget, Andy asked us to Thanksgiving dinner.”
Jake’s brows rose. “Is that something you want to do? Spend the holiday with your ex?”
“I’m as surprised as you probably are to hear it, but yes. I do miss Andy—and he makes chestnut stuffing like no one in the world.”
Jake sighed. “Your mother is going, I guess?”
“As far as I know. Unless they’re going to Dean’s family. I assume he has family. I’ve really heard almost nothing about his background.”
Jake’s mouth quirked. “Have you asked anything about his background?”
“No. And don’t give me that look. I plan to get to know Dean. We’ve got plenty of time if he’s going to be my stepdaddy.”
“Okay. Well, about Thanksgiving. I’m not sure I have the day off. It’s a premium holiday for the married guys, but if I do, we can spend Thanksgiving in Manhattan. So long as I get turkey and all the trimmings and not some weird tofu substitute.”
“Don’t worry about that.”
They talked until their lunches came and the next few minutes were occupied with the simple pleasure of good food properly prepared and served.
Death in a Difficult Position Page 9
