by Libby Howard
The kids went up for their bedtime routine and I headed to the kitchen, pulling out recipes for muffins, pies, and zucchini bread. There wouldn’t be time to make anything tonight, but I could pick out a recipe, make sure I had the ingredients, then spend a lovely evening tomorrow baking something yummy.
Orange spice muffins. Yes, that was it. They’d be perfect for a cool March post-yoga breakfast. Maybe I’d grab a bottle of champagne and squeeze some oranges, and Daisy and I would indulge a bit. I chuckled, thinking what Judge Beck would say to see us drinking mimosas at six in the morning. Wine on the porch with Daisy the first day he’d come by. Wine the evening after I’d discovered Caryn Swanson’s body. Booze after yoga. He was going to think I was a total lush.
Well, what use was it being a sixty-year-old widow if I couldn’t be allowed some eccentricities? Still amused and thinking of other new and outrageous things I might want to start making part of my daily routine, I went to the study and packed up my files for tomorrow.
And there was the note with Sydney Vaughn’s phone number. I unfolded it, smoothing the crease as I climbed the stairs to my bedroom. I might as well have this right by my bedside so I didn’t forget to call the one person who might have a clue as to who the murderer was in our midst.
Chapter 18
Five in the morning came far too soon. I brushed my teeth, splashed some water on my face, and hoped I’d be coherent enough to speak with Sydney Vaughn pre-coffee. I might have felt like my brain was stuffed with cotton, but the woman on the other end of the phone line was wide awake and chipper.
At least she was chipper until I told her who I was.
“I don’t want the police to know anything,” she told me in a low voice. “Illegality aside, it would kill my parents to know what I was doing. No one in this town would ever let me forget it. And aside from that, I don’t want to have that sicko come after me. He’s already killed Caryn. I’m sure he wouldn’t think twice about killing me, too.”
Her voice choked on the last two sentences, and I remembered Chelsea say that Caryn and Sydney had been friends.
“How did you get started in this? And what was the process?”
“I met Caryn through some mutual friends. We were talking one night and I was complaining about the cost of grad school and how I’d be paying student loans until I was sixty. She said I could make good money as an “escort.” I was interested and when we spoke later, she said there was a whole lot more money if I would have sex with the guys. It was totally discrete, all cash through Caryn, so nothing changed hands with me. She’d message me and describe the client, and if I was interested, she’d set it up.”
Sounded pretty straight forward, high-end prostitution. Not something to kill someone over.
“After a few months, she told me a few clients were kinky. She’d tell me what they liked, and if I agreed to it, the pay was huge. It was some weird stuff, but nothing harmful to me.”
I didn’t want to know, but I knew I had to ask. “What type of kinky stuff?”
“Not tying up or spanking or stuff like that. Mostly guys who want to slobber all over your feet, or have you pretend that they’re babies, or pee on them. Like I said, weird stuff, but nothing where I’d be scared or feel like I was in danger. They were nice guys. And like I said, the money was good.”
Would someone kill over the possibility of being exposed as liking this sort of stuff? Maybe if they were a school teacher, or a corporate CEO, or a politician. “Did you know these clients? I mean, were they local? Did they give you names or phone numbers?”
“Caryn had all that. I called them by a fake name. And they weren’t local. I remember one guy saying he drove two hours to meet me. That’s how private these guys wanted to keep this. It’s not like I wanted anyone to know about it either. That’s why Caryn picked the girls she did. The clients could be confident that we weren’t about to blackmail them or reveal their secrets, even if we found out who they were. We had just as much to lose as they did.”
“But if Caryn was about to turn over her client list, her black book, maybe someone decided they had too much too lose?”
“She wasn’t going to turn it over. They didn’t have anything on her that would stick, and she was determined to ride it out.”
“But someone didn’t know that,” I countered.
“They…that’s who she was meeting Friday night. She’d gotten out of jail and said she needed to meet a client—a special client that she’d been providing for on her own. She wanted to reassure him that she wasn’t going to expose him.”
“Was she blackmailing him?” I could see no other reason for this guy to kill her, unless he didn’t believe that she was going to hold out.
“No! She didn’t need to blackmail him. This guy paid really well. Like really, really well. Caryn had enough cash set aside to buy a house. She couldn’t deposit it all because the banks report large deposits, so she was stockpiling cash until she figured out a way to get it through the system and make it legitimate. But the last few times I saw her, she was worried. This guy liked intense stuff and it had reached the point where Caryn was getting scared. But what could she do?”
“She could stop seeing him. Tell him the deal was off and he’d need to go elsewhere.”
“She couldn’t. There was the money, but she said was worried if she cut him off, he’d make things hard for her, mess up her business. She told me that she’d found out that he’d killed a girl a long time ago. He said it was an accident. But while she wasn’t worried he’d do that to her, it still bothered her.”
Well, yeah. Providing sex to a guy who had murdered a girl “a long time ago” would bother any sane woman. The insane part was that she continued to do it. “And she didn’t go to the police?”
“And say what? A john might ruin her business unless she let him choke her during sex? That he’d said he’d accidently killed someone, but she had no idea who or when? Caryn said the guy had connections and money. No one would believe her. Even if it went to trial, he’d probably be acquitted. When she went missing, I thought maybe she went into hiding, but after I heard they found her dead, I knew this guy killed her.”
Choke her? I’ll admit I’m not particularly prudish and I’d managed to hear about all sorts of strange things consenting adults did, but choking? How could that possibly be fun, either on the giving or the receiving end? “You said she was supposed to meet him?”
“Yeah. Friday night. She was going to reassure him that she wasn’t going to turn over the client list or turn him in. She thought that as long as he knew she wouldn’t expose him, then he’d be okay, and he’d probably go somewhere else for his kink since she had the police on her tail.”
It made sense. But if this client hadn’t killed Caryn, who had? A different client that wasn’t reassured she was going to keep her mouth shut? A jealous wife?
“I have the book.”
“What?” I couldn’t have heard Sydney right.
“It was in my post box yesterday morning. Caryn must have put it in the mail Friday before she went to meet that guy.” Sydney’s voice broke on a sob. “Oh, God. She must have known he might do something. She must have known.”
“Sydney, you have to give that book to the police,” I urged her. “They’re looking for it. Caryn was murdered, and that book might have the killer’s name.”
“I can’t. I don’t want anyone to know what I did. Caryn was my friend, and I want her murderer to rot in jail for the rest of his life, but I don’t want my life ruined. And I don’t want him coming after me.”
“Can you give it to the police anonymously? Mail it to them?”
She sniffed. “I’ll bring it to you. I don’t want it to get lost in the mail, but I can’t take it in myself. Just tell them you found it. You’re an investigator, say you discovered it somewhere.”
I was a skip tracer, not an investigator, but it didn’t matter enough to correct Sydney. “I’m leaving for work at eight. Can you get it here befor
e then? Or I can meet you.”
“No, I don’t want to be seen meeting you either. And I’ll be out on calls until afternoon. Can I just bring it by your house? Do you have somewhere I can put it?”
I was going to have an ulcer worrying all afternoon that it had gotten stolen, or rained on, or chewed by a roaming neighborhood dog. But if this was the only way to get the book, I’d have to deal. “There’s a grill in the back yard. The gate is unlocked. Just stick it in the grill.”
I’d need to make sure there weren’t any wasp nests in the grill before I went to work, and put down some foil so the book didn’t get charcoal dust on it.
I gave Sydney my address and my phone number, telling her to call me if there were any problems or if she needed to talk again. Then I hung up, threw on my clothes, and ran downstairs to make coffee before morning yoga with Daisy.
Chapter 19
J.T. was out delivering the Creditcorp files that I’d finally managed to complete, leaving me with background checks on three of his potential bail clients. Normally he didn’t go to this length on petty theft and felony possession, but having Caryn Swanson vanish for a few days made him extra cautious. I watched the clock, eager to get back home and check inside my grill for the black book.
Finally, I could take it no longer and ran home around one o’clock. I’d whacked out three, thankfully empty, wasp nests from the cooker, then carefully covered both the grill and the inside of the lid so the evidence wouldn’t have greasy black marks all over it. When I lifted the lid, I breathed out in relief to see a leather-bound book, the type people use for journaling inside. I paged through it briefly, Taco yowling at my feet for attention. Caryn seemed to have written her notes in some kind of code. I was pretty sure it didn’t rise to the level of military intelligence, so figured with a few hours of work I might be able to decode enough of it to hopefully point me in the right direction. Then, I’d need to find a way to get it to the police without implicating Sydney or coming across as a total idiot. Or a person of interest. I’d found the body. I’d found Caryn’s car. Now I amazingly “found” the black book?
Once I got back to the office, I got to work, copying down the numbers and initials and the number of times they were repeated. Whoever choking-guy was, he was clearly a regular and the most likely suspect. I wasn’t completely ruling out other regular clients, but I figured he’d be one of the ones with the most entries. Luckily for all her code work, Caryn seemed to use a standard date and time format to account for the scheduled meetings. I marked up a calendar with the codes, then stood back to see what I had.
I was guessing the first set of letters and numbers represented the client. The second set was the service provider. Then the two sets of numbers following were the amount the client paid, then the amount due to the provider. The last set, from what I could tell, indicated what, if any, the kink was to be.
There were a lot of repeats, but only one happened all year long, and that one had a single payment number, which had to mean Caryn herself was taking care of that client. BBR5. I’d need to figure out who that was since CS1 stood for Caryn. The payments were high in the beginning, but as time went on, they got astoundingly large. And the set of letters and numbers sometimes repeated but more often changed. The last twenty entries were BP, the early ones labeled as a 1 and the last few as a 3. Was that the amount of times or the length or something to indicate the intensity? Given that Sydney had said this guy liked to choke his partners, I was assuming BP was breath play.
Ugh. I was going to need to shower in Lysol after this was all over. I sorted all the kinks and quickly discovered that this BBR5, unlike the others, seemed to be pretty much straight sex until the breath play commenced. I was no expert, but I would have assumed autoerotic asphyxiation would come after a progressively intense pattern of BDSM, not this. It seemed that this guy’s only kink interest was the breath play.
But why would that be something that would have gotten Caryn killed? It didn’t seem nearly as off-putting as having someone pee on you, but there was a kind of psycho, serial killer vibe to it. I hated to judge, but as much as I wouldn’t want a school teacher who was into rubber nun suits, one that enjoyed choking their sexual partners would be a job-ending revelation. It would be a job-ending revelation for most all careers.
I read the book cover to cover and found nothing to indicate who BBR5 could be. There had to be something more. Maybe Caryn’s cell phone had a listing that could be traced, or her e-mails would provide some indication of who this was. Either way, I didn’t have the resources to get that information. It was time to call the police.
First, I called J.T., who came straight back to the office, amazed that someone would have left such a valuable piece of evidence on our doorstep while I was out at lunch. Why us? Why not the police or Caryn’s lawyer? I shrugged, and slapped on my best poker face, trying to appear innocent. He glanced through the book, then handed it over to the detective that had come by. We answered questions, and I began to pack up my files for more evening at-home work. Just as the detective was leaving, Pete Briscane came through the door. He blinked in surprise to see the officer, then they exchanged some polite conversation while I stalled, pretending to look through a file cabinet.
“Pete!” J.T. walked over and shook the mayor’s hand, slapping him on the shoulder. “Sushi or that new Italian place in Milford?”
Ah. I knew they were friends, and that Pete had confided in J.T. some issue with his son. Guess tonight’s dinner would be part two of the man’s family troubles. Poor guy.
“Italian. I’ve been dying to try that place. Donna is gluten-free, so we never get to go.” He looked out the window at the detective getting into his car. “You found the black book? Weird that it would have turned up here.”
“Kay found it on the doorstep when she got back from lunch. I’m assuming one of Caryn Swanson’s girls had it but was too afraid of implicating herself to turn it in.”
The mayor looked over at me, his blue eyes twinkling. “Did you look through it? I know, I know, I’m just as much of a gossip as everyone else in this town. We’ve never had a prostitution ring bust before, and I can’t recall the last murder. I’m curious who her clients were.”
I smiled back, stuffing a few extra folders into my bag that I wouldn’t need. “I’ll admit I did read it. It was mostly in code though—letters and numbers. I’m sure the police will figure it out.”
He sighed. “I hope so. Then we can all go back to normal and worry about things like who is going to race in this year’s regatta. You’re sponsoring a boat, aren’t you, J.T.?”
My boss rolled his eyes. “I’m sure you’ll talk me into it eventually. Let’s go. Kay, will you lock up?”
I nodded and watched the two men leave, still teasing each other over the regatta. Pete Briscane was such a nice guy. Too bad he had such a reprobate for a son. I looked down at the sticky note attached to a file folder with David Briscane’s name on it. Tonight’s work should wrap up fairly quickly. If I had a chance, maybe I’d dig into David’s background a bit more. Because the mayor wasn’t the only nosy, gossipy one in this town.
Chapter 20
I took a break from work, baking up muffins and a pie while eating salad and listening to classic rock. The house was oddly quiet. Funny how after decades of just Eli and I followed by a month of me and a cat, I’d quickly gotten used to a roommate and two teenagers. In three days, I’d come to love the bustle and the coming and going of the three additions to my home. But tonight, the kids were with their mother, and from Judge Beck’s absence, I guessed he’d taken advantage of that fact to catch up on some work.
Which is what I intended to do myself. Leaving the pie out to cool, safeguarded from the cat by an elaborate ring of wire racks and cookie sheets, I grabbed one of the muffins, fixed a pot of tea, and headed into my study. By eight o’clock, I’d finished the two background checks for the bail customers, and was just beginning to pull up a case search on David Briscane whe
n the judge came through the front door.
“There’s muffins in the kitchen,” I called out. “Don’t eat the pie. It’s for tomorrow night.”
He poked his head in. “I won’t say no to a muffin, and I’ll be sure to be home early tomorrow if there’s pie in the plans.”
“Apple spice with a cheddar cheese crust,” I told him. “I’m going to cook that chicken I’m thawing in the fridge, too. You’re welcome to leftovers if you end up working late again.”
He came into the room, rubbing his eyes with one hand. “Thanks. I feel guilty sponging dinner off you, but I’m so far behind on these briefs. Picking the kids up from school, getting them dinner, and getting them to school the next morning takes a bite out of my workday. I never appreciated how much time parenting takes. Heather always did all of this, where my role was just to work and bring in the money to support the four of us. Juggling both a job and the kids is more difficult than I thought.”
“Change is hard. You’ll get a routine down soon enough. And it won’t all be shopping for purses and makeup with your teenage daughter.”
He grimaced, half-sitting on the edge of my desk. “I hope not. Her softball games are fun, but I hope this purse-and-makeup phase goes away soon.”
“Don’t count on it,” I teased, turning back to my computer screen.
Judge Beck followed my gaze, scowling as he saw the case search I’d pulled up. “You’re checking on David Briscane?”
I nodded. “Just being nosy. J.T. said he was in town to meet with his father last weekend. I know he’d been in a bunch of trouble as a kid and wondered if he’d shaped up or not.”
