A Job to Kill For

by Janice Kaplan

  “Have you had a lot of dry eye? Halos? Trouble with night vision? I’m always worried about side effects,” I said.

  “No problems,” she said amiably, renewing her role as friendly cop. Then moving on, she said, “But let’s say you’re right about the necklace. If Billy had something that valuable, why sell it at Christie’s?”

  “Where else would he go? He’s not…I mean, he wasn’t…” I paused, unable to get the tenses right—or take in what I’d seen. I’d hardly known Billy Mann and I didn’t know if I trusted him. But dead? I cleared my throat. “Anyway, you don’t sell something like that on eBay, and he’s not the kind to have a lot of socialite friends who’d want to buy it from him.”

  Detective Wilson shook his head. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Fields, but your story doesn’t add up. Not the socialite kind, fine. Then also not Cassie Crawford’s kind.”

  “Wrong,” I said. “He is…was…everybody’s kind. Any woman would sleep with him. I would.”

  Every head in the room swiveled around to stare at me.

  “You had sex with Billy Mann?” Detective Wilson finally asked, speaking very slowly.

  “No, of course not. I’m married.” I wouldn’t let myself wonder if Dan shared my fervor for fidelity. “Are you married, Detective?”

  He gave a barely perceptible nod, his jowly chin hitting against his barrel chest.

  “How long?”

  He looked over at McSweeney, who raised an eyebrow, as if telling him to humor me.

  “Fourteen years.”

  “Good for you. Not quite long enough to be an applause line on Oprah, but better than many. Decent marriage?”

  He nodded again and shot a nasty look at McSweeney, whom he now clearly blamed for getting him into this conversation.

  “I’m glad to hear it, but I bet you look at the occasional copy of Playboy, right? Daydream about someone else?”

  “I only look at crime reports,” he grumbled.

  “Really? Well trust me, Detective, your wife fantasizes now and then. Women do that. It’s usually about someone manly, the kind who has a motorcycle and tattoo and will give her a great orgasm.”

  Detective Wilson turned bright red, a beach ball left too long in the sun. Across the room, Erica McSweeney snickered. Jack Rosenfeld turned away and propped his face against his hand so Wilson wouldn’t see him smirk.

  “We’re not discussing org—orga—” Wilson cleared his throat, unable to say the word. “Sex,” he concluded instead.

  “Of course we’re discussing orgasms. Cassie and Billy. Whether or not they hooked up recently, as the kids say.”

  “Roger Crawford happens to be a rich, powerful man,” Detective Wilson said, finally.

  “Rich and powerful are decent aphrodisiacs,” I admitted. “But maybe not everything.”

  “You think his young wife would be unfaithful to him in the first year of marriage, just to have a good”—again the word caught in his throat—“a good roll in the hay?”

  “Honestly, Detective, I don’t know what went on between Cassie and Billy. I don’t know how he got the necklace. And I don’t know if any of it is connected to the bullet in his back.”

  Detective Wilson stood up. “Thank you for your insights, Mrs. Fields. We’ll have further questions another time.”

  He left the room quickly, eager to get back to his wife before the Hell’s Angels did.

  Ashley didn’t wake up until almost noon the next day, and I hung around all morning, waiting to talk to her. She finally came downstairs in frilly pink baby-doll pajamas that made her look more babe than baby.

  “You’re not in jail,” she said snidely when she saw me. “What a shame.”

  “Honey, I’m so sorry. I can’t apologize enough for ruining your night. I can imagine how embarrassing that was for you.”

  “Having my mother hauled off by the cops? What’s embarrassing?”

  She opened the refrigerator and took out two carrot sticks.

  “Can I make you some breakfast?” I asked. “Pancakes? Scrambled eggs? Oatmeal?”

  “You could,” she said. “But why bother? I’d just go to the bathroom and barf.”

  Uh-oh. Go to the bathroom and barf? I had worried about this since she spit out her Gerber baby pears at eight months old. Eating disorders were like the common cold among privileged girls in LA—fast-spreading and hard to avoid. Now it had happened. I had to handle the problem right now.

  I put my hands on her shoulders.

  “I understand the pressure teen girls feel to be thin,” I said. “We’ll deal with it together. Thank you for telling me. That’s the first step to being cured.”

  She took my hands off her shoulders and looked at me oddly.

  “Being cured of what?” she asked.

  “Bulimia, I assume.”

  “Who said anything about bulimia?”

  “If you eat, you’ll barf.”

  She sat down and put a hand against her tummy. “I have an upset stomach. After you left last night, I kept trying to develop a taste for caviar. Too much Osetra doesn’t sit well.”

  “That’s all?”

  “Yuh-huh-uh,” she said, turning her affirmation into a singsong censure of parental stupidity.

  I sighed. “What else happened after I left?”

  “Apologize a little more first.”

  My guilt returned almost immediately. “Oh, honey, I really tried to make it a special night for you. Better than Tara’s party could possibly be. The last thing I want is to drag you into any unpleasantness. You don’t deserve it.”

  She let a moment pass. “Is that all?”

  “Tell me how I can make it up to you. I’ll do anything.”

  Clearly what she’d been waiting for. “I need a new iPod.”

  “What’s wrong with yours?”

  “I lost it.”

  I grimaced. “You know the rule. Lose something and you have to replace it yourself.”

  “You said you’d do anything,” she wheedled.

  “If you need music, I could teach you to whistle,” I joked. “Or I could sing. I was the only one in my sorority who knew the entire score to Kiss Me, Kate.”

  Ashley sat back and crossed her arms in front of her stomach. “My life can’t get much worse,” she moaned. “Number one, my mother gets dragged off by the police and I’m humiliated.” She raised a finger. “Two, I’m practically dying from eating bad caviar.” Another finger raised. “And three, I had to beg a ride home after the party.” She waggled the raised digits and groaned again. “Shame. Embarrassment. All of it your fault. And you won’t buy me a crummy iPod?”

  I put my fingers against my temples and gently massaged. Wasn’t this what they should really teach in Lamaze class? All that time spent learning how to breathe during delivery, when talking to a teenage daughter turned out to be what took your breath away.

  “All I can tell you is how sorry I am,” I said, repeating my mantra.

  “You can also buy me an iPod,” she said, near tears.

  I know bad parenting when I see it. I know no mother ever bought her daughter’s good opinion with a checkbook. Children need love, support, and good values—not designer dresses and electronic toys.

  “Sure, honey, an iPod. Any color you want.” Why make a fuss? Every kid had an iPod. Maybe she’d teach me how to download Jon Stewart.

  The tears disappeared and Ashley smiled. “Thanks, Mom. Phat.”

  “I am?” I ran my fingers down my hips.

  “The other kind of phat. The one that’s good.”

  “Sounds like we’re back on eating disorders.”

  She laughed. “So after you left the party, I was mortified.”

  “And probably worried about me,” I said, prompting.

  “Mortified,” she repeated. Her tears had disappeared, and she looked triumphant. “For about five minutes. Until Lindsay Lohan came over and said she knew how I felt to have a parent wanted by the police. Her dad had been in jail—whole big scandal—
and she knows it’s humiliating and I must want to die and she gave me a hug. Then Macaulay Culkin—remember him from Home Alone?—joined us to commiserate about his awful parents.” Her eyes sparkled. “I mean, Mom, thank you sooo much for getting arrested.”

  “You’re welcome,” I said, completely confused by the turn the conversation had taken. I could have mentioned that I hadn’t been arrested, but I’d hate to lower her status with the Kids of Bad Parents club.

  She did a little pirouette. “It turned out to be the best night of my life! Hanging out with Lindsay Lohan and Macaulay Culkin, and all because of you.”

  “All that and an iPod, too,” I muttered.

  “Lindsay and Mac both ended up in rehab because of their parents,” Ashley continued, unfazed. “But I had one glass of Sprite and called it a night.”

  Thank goodness for small things. I didn’t look forward to visiting my daughter at Betty Ford. I took a deep breath. On the other hand, I could definitely use a Lamaze refresher.

  Since Ashley would survive, I didn’t cancel my appointment with a new client named Paige Hardy, who’d called and asked me to meet her at an auction showroom. I arrived early to survey the objects on display. And what a display! The pieces all dated from the Ming dynasty and seemed in as near-to-perfect condition as sixteenth-century chests, chairs and paintings could be. I could barely stop staring at an intricately engraved cabinet that glistened with rich reds and searing gold in an intricate mélange of dragons and phoenix decorations. I glanced at the auction price sheet and gasped. We’d practically have to sell our house to afford it, and while the elaborate drawers were exquisite, they didn’t offer a lot of living space.

  My client came in wearing short shorts and wedged espadrilles that showed off her long, tanned legs. With her blond hair pulled back in a simple barrette and a face that glowed despite minimal makeup, she looked like the captain of the college pep squad. But in LA, age is always inscrutable. No use trying to guess the vintage of anything more complex than a Napa Valley merlot.

  “Nice to meet you,” I said, shaking her hand. No nail polish, but neatly rounded fingernails and well-kept cuticles.

  “You too,” she said.

  “You picked an incredible place to browse,” I said, gesturing around the room. “Are you interested in buying, or are we just looking?”

  I kept my tone even, because who knew? The only thing riskier to judge than age in LA was net worth. A beautiful twentysomething in short shorts had as good a likelihood of writing a check for a million bucks as anyone else.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” she said vaguely. “A friend of mine had been looking forward to the auction. But she never made it.”

  I looked at her quizzically. “Are you bidding as her agent?”

  “I wish. I wish.” Tears sprang to her eyes, and she pulled a tissue out of a vinyl see-through tote that could have been either Kmart or Kate Spade. Amazing what designers could call chic.

  Paige walked across the room, and I scurried to keep up with her long strides. She pointed to a classic Ming vase encased behind glass, the shaded blue flowers almost alive on the shiny porcelain.

  “Don’t you think that would have looked pretty on the Biedermeier table in Cassie Crawford’s place? Or would the styles be too different to combine?”

  I took a long moment to compose myself.

  “I’m a fan of mixing epochs and styles,” I said finally. “Biedermeier’s straight lines gives it an unexpectedly modern feel. Oddly enough, the balance and harmony of Ming pieces does the same. Putting them together would create a very special synchronicity across centuries and continents.”

  “How interesting,” she said. But I had the feeling she didn’t really care much about Biedermeier, bling, or Ming.

  “Is Cassie the friend who couldn’t come?” I asked softly.

  She nodded and dabbed at her eyes again. “You decorated beautifully for her. Exactly what she wanted.”

  “You saw the penthouse.”

  “The day before she died. She loved everything about it.”

  I nodded, starting to understand why she’d called. “So you heard about me from Cassie. I’m not really here to help you decorate, right?”

  She smiled. “Well, you can if you want. But I’ve just felt so helpless. Someone has to solve her murder. You were there.”

  “And you’re her friend. Maybe we can help each other.”

  She nodded. “Exactly what I was hoping.”

  Paige moved away from the vase and sat down on an ornate divan. I hesitated, but since the piece looked to be nineteenth-century French rather than fourteenth-century Chinese, I figured it had been put there for using, not selling. I sat down next to her and realized the seats had been positioned carefully so that we both directly faced an exquisite painting of Daoist immortals walking on water. According to the catalogue, the piece had a floor bid of five million.

  “I didn’t know Cassie had been at the penthouse the night before she died, but I’d guessed. Were you the only one with her?” I asked.

  “Yes, just us,” Paige said. “We didn’t stay long. She had some papers she wanted to stash.”

  “In the library?” I ventured.

  “Right.” Paige let my deduction pass. “Cassie scampered up the ladder, and we joked that she could always have a future clearing gutters.”

  “Any idea what the papers were?”

  She shook her head. “No. I thought maybe something about Roger. Information to protect herself if he turned cruel during the divorce.”

  “Had that been settled? That they’d divorce?”

  “Not really. Cassie believed in happily ever after, but I told her she was in denial. She loved him. I don’t know why, but she really did.”

  “She certainly wanted to impress him with the apartment.”

  “I don’t think he had any intention of living there. He bought it for her. Smart, right? It looks better in front of a judge if you give the ex a place to live, even though it’s not in the prenup. Three mil and he comes across as mister generous—and no judge will make him give up one of the houses he really cares about.”

  I nodded thoughtfully. “How do you and Cassie know each other?”

  “We were friends since eighth grade,” she said. “My dad was in the foreign service and we moved all the time—Chile, China, India, and Portugal. When we got to Orange County, the kids seemed very provincial, and I didn’t try to make friends. But Cassie was nice to me and it stuck. I moved to Hong Kong in eleventh grade, but we stayed in touch.”

  “Did you go to college together?”

  “No, I took a degree abroad. We connected back here.”

  “Close friends?”

  “Very. And we kept getting closer. She didn’t have a lot of people to talk to about her marriage. It was all too public. But we trusted each other. She knew I’d always be on her side.”

  I nodded, understanding. Paige and Cassie. Molly and me. In a wild, ever-changing world, the old bonds mattered. A friend should be more than someone you met on Facebook and sent a text message on her birthday. History had weight. Loyalty made a difference. Like the Ming vase, a real friend had irreplaceable worth.

  “You must know the people in Cassie’s life,” I said. “Do you have a favorite suspect?”

  Paige studied her fingernails for a moment. “I just think the police are missing something. Their perspective gets distorted when there’s this much money involved.”

  “A billion can be distracting,” I admitted.

  “Cassie didn’t care about being rich,” Paige said. “Now that she’s…gone, the press has turned her into the bimbo who got the billionaire. It’s not fair.”

  “How would you describe her?”

  For an answer, Paige turned to me and gave a little smile. “Let’s start this way. What would you guess I do?”

  I wisely hadn’t tried to deduce her age or finances—now I had to speculate about her career? Dancer or model seemed obvious. Maybe a producer or p
ublicist. She had definite flair.

  “Something in entertainment,” I said, going for the obvious.

  “I teach sixth grade at an inner-city school in LA,” she said flatly.

  I nodded, grateful that she’d ended the guessing game before I fully embarrassed myself. “It might have taken me awhile to come up with that,” I admitted.

  “Cassie and I stayed friends because we shared values,” she said. “Being wealthy allowed her to be charitable, but she got annoyed at all the society women with their blatant displays and fancy balls.”

  I smiled. “I know the feeling. My husband always wants to know why he has to put on a tuxedo to make a donation.”

  “Cassie contributed in ways that people would never know.”

  I nodded again, not doubting her. But before we conferred sainthood on the deceased, I had a couple of questions.

  “Did you know her friend Billy Mann?” I asked.

  “I knew of him but never met him. They dated years ago and stayed good friends.”

  “I think they saw each other quite recently.”

  “Cassie didn’t have an affair, if that’s what you’re suggesting,” Paige said. “She didn’t believe in them. Even for revenge.”

  I paused, taking it in. “You mean you think Roger dallied?”

  “I do,” she said evenly. “I think he dallied with your friend Molly. In fact, I don’t have any doubt.”

  I turned away from her, and briefly focused on the painting centered on the opposite wall. Birds and plum blossoms fluttered around a kimono-clad woman who knelt sedately in the bottom left. I suddenly wanted to buy the painting and absorb its Zen vibes. Or maybe I just wanted to go join her in the seventeenth century. Though with my luck, her samurai husband would die under suspicious circumstances.

  “Molly and Roger had a complex relationship,” I said, echoing what my friend had once told me. “But not what you think. You really shouldn’t make accusations.”

  Paige ran a finger across the smooth edge of her thumbnail.

  “Cassie left her sunglasses in the penthouse.”

  “Pardon?”

  “After we left that evening, she realized she’d forgotten her Chanel shades. She had to rush to a dinner, so I said I’d go back and get them for her. When I arrived, Molly and Roger were there.”