Stuart Woods 6 Stone Barrington Novels

by Stuart Woods

  The women came back, and Manolo poured their coffee.

  “Did Marc Blumberg see you today?” Stone asked Arrington.

  “He came in time for lunch, and by the time he left, I was ‘prepped,’ as he put it. Sounds as though someone had shaved my pubic hair and painted my belly orange.”

  Dino made a face. “Such imagery! Only a woman could put it that way.”

  “Men are such babies,” Mary Ann said. “So easily shocked. Dino, you couldn’t make it as a woman for a single day.”

  “And I wouldn’t want to try,” Dino said.

  They chatted for another hour, then Stone rose and announced his departure. Dino was stifling yawns by this time, too, and he and Mary Ann departed for the guesthouse.

  Arrington walked Stone to the door. “I’m sorry about my behavior last time,” she said. “I realize now that it wasn’t your fault, that you were the victim.”

  “Hardly that,” Stone said. “I knew what I was getting into.”

  “No, you didn’t,” she said at the door, resting her head on his shoulder. “You never do.”

  Stone put a finger under her chin, raised her head, and kissed her lightly. “I’m glad you and I are all right again.”

  “So am I.”

  “If it’s any help, I’m already working on an Italian divorce.”

  “Any kind will do.”

  “I’d better go.”

  “Good night, sweet prince.”

  “And angels sing me to my rest? Not just yet, I hope.”

  He walked toward the car, then he stopped and turned. She was still standing in the doorway. “Arrington?”

  “Yes?”

  “I seem to recall that you never wore terrycloth robes.”

  “What a good memory you have. I always liked plain cotton or silk. What an odd thing to remember.”

  “Oh, I remember a lot more,” he said, as he waved good night and got into the car.

  All the way back to Centurion he thought about what she used to wear.

  Fifty-three

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING MARC BLUMBERG CALLED and asked Stone to come to his office to discuss the motion to dismiss. Stone left Centurion and on his way passed the spot where he’d had the flat tire, reminding him that he had left the damaged tire at a service station for repair. He stopped to pick it up, and as he opened the trunk he saw Felipe Cordova’s Nikes. He’d completely forgotten about them.

  He arrived at Blumberg’s office and was shown in and given coffee, while Marc finished a meeting in his conference room. Shortly, the lawyer came into his office and sat down at his desk.

  “So,” said Stone, “what’s your plan? Who are we going to call?”

  “Nobody,” Marc replied. “That’s my plan.”

  “Come again?”

  “My plan is to cross-examine the prosecution’s witnesses to within an inch of their lives. After all, it’s they who have to make a case, not we.”

  “You don’t think we ought to try?” Stone asked doubtfully.

  “Let me ask you something, Stone: Can we prove Arrington didn’t shoot Vance?”

  “Maybe not.”

  “If we could prove she didn’t do it, we’d be home free, but we can’t. So we’re going to have to cast so much doubt on the prosecution’s case that the judge will throw it out.”

  “And how are we going to do that?” Stone asked.

  “I know Beverly Walters better than you,” Marc replied.

  “How well, Marc?”

  “Well enough, trust me.”

  “All right, I’ll trust you.”

  “Have you got any other ideas about how we might proceed?”

  Stone took a deep breath. “I think we ought to call Felipe Cordova.”

  “I thought he was lost in darkest Mexico.”

  “He was, but he’s back in L.A. Brandy Garcia gave me a heads up.”

  “Doesn’t it bother you that the prosecution would call Cordova, if they knew what we knew about his actions that night?”

  “No.”

  “Stone, we’re going to have Beverly Walters on the stand saying she saw Arrington shoot Vance, while Arrington doesn’t remember what she did or didn’t do. Cordova is just going to back up Beverly’s story, isn’t he?”

  “I don’t think so,” Stone said.

  “And why not?”

  “A couple of reasons. First, Vanessa Pike told me she drove Beverly to the Calder house, and that Beverly saw what happened from the rear of the house, at the doors to the pool.”

  “Wait a minute. What Vanessa told you was that she drove somebody to Vance’s; she didn’t say who.”

  “But we know it was Beverly.”

  “How do we know that?”

  “Because Charlene Joiner says that the two of them left her house together that evening, after a day lying around the pool.”

  “At what time?”

  “At just about the time it would have taken for them to drive to the Calder house and arrive at the time Vance was being shot.”

  “Will Charlene testify to that?”

  “Yes, to that and more.”

  “What else?”

  “She’ll testify that Beverly was wearing a terrycloth robe over a bathing suit when she left her house.”

  “So?”

  “Cordova says he saw a woman next to Vance’s body, and she was wearing a terrycloth robe.”

  “Did he see her face?”

  “No.”

  “Then it could have been Arrington.”

  “Arrington doesn’t wear terrycloth robes. She likes plain cotton or silk.”

  “Can we prove that?”

  “We can call her maid, who would know her wardrobe intimately, and who got her out of the tub and into a robe.”

  “I like it,” Blumberg said. “But how are we going to put Beverly in the house?”

  “I think she’ll admit being outside, and it’s a short step from the back door into the hallway where Vance died. And there’s this, Marc: I’d be willing to bet that Cordova is not mentioned in Beverly’s story, because she didn’t see him.”

  “Yeah, but can Cordova prove he was there?”

  “The police can; they’ve got a photograph of his shoeprint.”

  “But you have the shoe.”

  “Yes, it’s in the trunk of my car. I bought the shoes from Cordova in Mexico.”

  “Nikes, weren’t they?”

  “Right.”

  “There are millions of pairs of Nikes out there.”

  “There aren’t millions of size twelves, and remember, Cordova’s have a cut across the heel of the sole that shows up in the photograph.”

  “You know, Stone, I think we’re awfully close to being able to prove that Arrington didn’t kill Vance.”

  “Close but not quite there. Cordova didn’t see Beverly shoot him.”

  “And we don’t have a motive.”

  “Or the weapon.”

  “Shit!” Blumberg said. “What could her motive be?”

  “I think they were sleeping together. It could be that he told her to get lost, and she reacted badly.”

  “Could be, but how do we prove that?”

  “I wish Vanessa were still alive; she could probably tell us.”

  “I’d give a million bucks for that gun with her prints on it.”

  “So would I,” Stone agreed, “but it doesn’t look as though we’re ever going to find it.”

  “I’d give a lot for a witness who could put Beverly in the sack with Vance, too.”

  “Oddly enough, Beverly is known among her friends as a blabbermouth, but apparently, she never blabbed about a relationship with Vance.”

  “Except maybe to Vanessa.”

  “Maybe, but we’ll never know.”

  Marc suddenly stood up. “Jesus,” he said, “I just thought of something. Vanessa kept a diary.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “She kept it in her handbag, and she’d write in it at odd moments. I tried to rea
d it once, but it was one of those things like high school girls have, with a tiny lock on it.”

  “I know the kind you mean,” Stone said.

  Marc sat down again. “But it must have been in the house with her; it would have burned.”

  “I think I can find out about that,” Stone said.

  “How? From the investigating officer?”

  “I have a friend in the department.”

  “Use my phone,” Marc said, pointing across the room to a phone on a coffee table.

  Stone went to the phone and dialed Rick Grant’s direct line.

  “Captain Grant.”

  “Rick, it’s Stone Barrington. Can we meet somewhere?”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Stone.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re defending Arrington Calder, and, I have to tell you, the investigators on the Vanessa Pike case are looking at you funny.”

  “All right, then will you do this for me? Call those officers and ask them if they found Vanessa’s diary in their search of the premises after the fire.”

  “Why?”

  “Because, if it still exists, it may have some information about Vance Calder’s murder.”

  “If that’s true, then it would have to go to Durkee and his partner, too.”

  “All I want is a copy. We could subpoena it, if we have to.”

  “All right, I’ll check on it and get back to you.”

  “Thanks, Rick.” He hung up and turned back to Marc. “If we hit paydirt in the diary, then we can demand that the cops get a search warrant for Beverly’s house. Maybe the gun is there.”

  “Wouldn’t that be nice?” Blumberg said.

  Stone stood up suddenly.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To Vanessa’s house. I don’t think I feel comfortable with the cops seeing that diary before we do.”

  “Let me know what you find.”

  Stone headed for the door.

  Fifty-four

  STONE DROVE SLOWLY UP VANESSA’S STREET AND DOWN again, making sure that nobody from the police or fire departments was at the site. Satisfied, he parked across the street and got out of the car.

  The house was a sad shell, with most of the roof gone and with large gaps in the walls. He ducked under the yellow police tape and stepped through one of the gaps into what had been the living room. The acrid smell of burned dwelling filled his nostrils, and with a shudder, he thought he detected a faint whiff of seared meat. A few charred sticks of what had been furniture remained in the room and the remains of the sofa were recognizable. He recalled that he and Vanessa had sat there, sipping their drinks and talking, no more than an hour before she had died.

  He walked on a runner of plastic sheeting that had been placed there like a sidewalk by the fire department investigators, to avoid disturbing evidence. As he moved through the rooms he noticed that the ash around him had a smooth surface, and telltale marks showed that the debris had been raked, in search of evidence. If anything were left of Vanessa’s diary, which he doubted, then the investigators would surely have found it. His trip here had been for naught. Her purse and the diary had probably been in the kitchen, and there was no longer a kitchen.

  Then he turned and saw something he hadn’t seen before: the garage. He hadn’t seen it, because on his last visit, the house had been in the way, but now he could look through a giant, charred hole and see the little building. It seemed older than the house, or maybe it had just not been updated over the years, the way the house had been. It looked like something out of the twenties, a meager, clapboard structure with two doors, the old-fashioned kind that featured a brass handle in the middle of the door. One turned the handle, lifted, and the door rose. Surely electric openers would have been added by this time.

  He tried the doors. The first didn’t move, but the second operated as it had been designed to. It took some effort, but he got the door halfway open and stepped under it. He tried a light switch on the wall, but nothing happened. The power had either been interrupted by the fire or turned off by the fire department.

  A single car, a Mazda Miata, was in the garage. It was red, small, and cute, and he reflected that Vanessa would have looked good in it, her hair blowing in the wind. The top was up, and he tried the passenger door: locked. He walked around the car and tried the driver’s door, with success. He found the trunk release and popped the lid. There was a spare, flat, and the jack, and an old pair of sneakers—nothing else.

  He went back to the driver’s door and tried to sit in the seat, but found himself jammed, until he could locate the release and move the seat backward. The courtesy lights illuminated the interior, and he looked around.

  Women made a terrible mess of cars, he thought. The most fastidious woman seemed unable to avoid the buildup of used Kleenex, fast-food wrappers, and old paper cups in her automobile. He checked the tiny glove compartment, which held only a couple of parking tickets and a lipstick tube. There were some road maps in a door pocket, and nothing behind the sun visors. He got out of the car, and as he did, moved the driver’s seat forward and checked behind it. Nothing there. He reached across and felt behind the passenger seat, and he came in contact with something made of canvas.

  He reached over, unlocked the passenger door from the inside, then walked around the car and opened the door. He moved the seat forward and extracted a beat-up canvas carryall bearing the logo of a bookstore chain. He set it on top of the car and checked its contents. Inside was a thick book on interior design, a wrinkled bikini, a bottle of suntan lotion, and a leather-covered book with a binding flap that ended in a brass tip secured by a tiny lock. Stamped on the front of the book, in gilded letters, was “My Diary.” If the cops had thought to search the car, they had done a lousy job, Stone thought. He tried opening it, but the lock held.

  He put the carryall back where he had found it, closed the car doors, returned the garage door to its original position, and walked back to his car. He was tempted to try to open the diary here, but he decided it might be best to do it elsewhere. He drove back to Marc Blumberg’s building.

  He walked into Marc’s office, smiling, holding up the leather diary.

  Marc took it and turned it over in his hands. “It’s not burned at all,” he said.

  “It wasn’t in the house,” Stone replied. “I found it in her car, in the garage.”

  “Can you pick a lock, or shall I pry it open?” Marc asked.

  “Hang on a minute; what’s our legal position? I took this from her car with nobody’s permission. Given that, do we want to break into it?”

  “We can open it with the permission of her executor,” Marc said.

  “Do you know who he is?”

  Marc grinned. “You’re looking at him. Here’s a paper clip.”

  Stone straightened the wire and began probing the lock. It was simple; one turn and it was open. He set the diary on Marc’s desk and began flipping pages, while the two of them bent over it.

  “Funny, I don’t recognize any names,” Marc said. “We knew a lot of the same people.”

  “Maybe she’s giving people code names; if somebody got into the diary, it might save embarrassment.”

  “Let’s start at the end and work backward,” Marc said. They began reading; Vanessa had written in a small, but very legible, hand.

  “Look, in the last entry she says she’s going to Palm Springs to ‘Herbert’s’ house. I wonder why she called me Herbert?”

  “I guess you just look like a Herbert, Marc.”

  “Yeah.” He flipped back farther in the book. “There’s mention here of a Hilda, quite often. Think that could be Beverly?”

  “We need a context to figure this out,” Stone said, turning pages. “Here, the pages are dated; this is the day Vance was shot. There’s mention of Hilda, Magda, and Jake.”

  “Jake was Vance’s character in one of his recent movies,” Marc said. “Fear Everything, I think.”

  “She mentions lu
nch around the pool at Magda’s. That must be Charlene Joiner. Here we go!” He began reading aloud. “‘When we left Magda’s, Hilda insisted on going to Jake’s house, which I thought was nuts. She knew about this service entrance at the rear of the property. I wouldn’t get out of the car, but Hilda, bold as brass, walked to the house. Hilda has admitted screwing Jake, but, Jesus, I never thought she’d have the guts to go to his house. She must have been gone ten minutes, then there was a noise, and a minute later, she came running back, breathless, and told me to get the hell out of there. She wouldn’t say what happened but I’d be willing to bet that she ran into Mrs. Jake. God, that must have been embarrassing! She was still breathing hard when I dropped her off at her house. I’ve never seen her so discombobulated. I know I’ll eventually hear about this from somebody else, even though she won’t discuss it. Hilda can never keep her mouth shut for long—she’ll either brag about this, or try for sympathy. Jesus, I’m so glad I didn’t go with her!’”

  “Well, that’s pretty clear,” Marc said, “but I’d feel a lot better if she had just said that she’d watched Beverly shoot Vance.”

  “All we’ve really got here is what Vanessa told me.”

  “Yeah, we’ve got to get Beverly to admit that she’s Hilda, or get corroboration from Charlene on the stand that they were at her house that day.”

  Stone was flipping forward through the pages, looking at the dates after Vance’s murder. “Look at this,” he said. “‘Hilda keeps trying to tell me something, but she can’t get it out. She seems very guilty about something. Having seen the papers, it’s not hard to figure out that Jake was killed while we were at his house, but Hilda won’t tell me what she saw there. I keep thinking maybe I should go to the police. I’ve got to ask Herbert about this, but how am I going to do that without betraying Hilda’s confidence?’”

  “I wish to God she had asked me,” Marc said. “Maybe I could have done something to prevent her death.”

  “Wait a minute,” Stone said, “are you thinking that Beverly set the fire at Vanessa’s, because she knew too much?”

  “It wouldn’t be the first murder that was committed to cover up another murder,” Marc said.