Her heart thumped more vigorously than it had the evening she’d stolen Patty’s photos. She wasn’t planning to steal anything today. But confronting the blond woman . . . who knew what would happen? Lainie was a schoolteacher. A suburban mom with a squeaky-clean vocabulary. What was she doing, chasing after the woman who’d caused her soccer teammate to fire a nail gun into her husband’s head?
A confrontation could be dangerous. Lainie could run fast and she could kick hard, but she hadn’t taken a self-defense class in twenty years. All she remembered of that class was the importance of screaming and the execution of a jerking motion with the heel of her palm that was supposed to drive an attacker’s nose upward and into his brain. The anatomical aspects of that maneuver had never quite made sense to her. Fortunately, she’d never had to defend herself against an assault in sleepy crime-free Rockford.
Lately, Rockford wasn’t so sleepy and crime-free. But that jerking hand trick probably wouldn’t have done much good against a nail gun, anyway.
Lainie felt reasonably certain that the blond woman wouldn’t attack her with a nail gun. The only risk she faced was making a complete ass of herself. At least that was what she told herself repeatedly as she tried to exert mental control over her speeding pulse.
She hadn’t told anyone where she was going. Peter would have driven out to Rockford and wrapped her in duct tape to keep her home if she’d mentioned her plan to him, and Karen would have decided to call in sick at the bank and accompany Lainie, for protection or for fun. Angie would have clung to her and begged her not to go, and Sheila would have offered to accompany her and then called at the last minute to say one of her kids had an ear infection or an ingrown toenail.
And Stavik . . . Lainie had spoken to him a few times since their Saturday afternoon romp. Each call had reinforced her certainty that he was innocent, but then she would get off the phone and question her objectivity. She needed to be objective while she did whatever the hell she was doing in Burlington right now, so she’d told him not to call for a few days.
“I’m working on something,” she’d explained vaguely. “It could be brilliant or stupid. Once I’ve done it, I’ll let you know.”
She parked in the visitor’s lot and wandered through the complex until she found the unit numbered sixteen. Brilliant or stupid? she wondered as she walked up to the front door and forced her respiration to remain slow and steady. She rang the bell. No one answered.
Neither brilliant nor stupid, she answered herself. Blondie wasn’t home. Assuming Unit Sixteen was where she lived.
Lainie took a deep breath and peeked inside the mailbox: a couple of bills, an advertising circular for a rug shampooing service, and the May issue of Cosmopolitan. The advertisement was addressed to “Resident.” The bills and magazines were addressed to Bree Daniels.
She rang the doorbell again, then bit her lip. What if Bree was gone for the day, at work, or off searching for some new married man to seduce, someone who could take the place of Arthur in her heart? Lainie might waste hours loitering at the complex and accomplish nothing. That would qualify this mission as stupid, not brilliant.
A decorative wooden bench stood near the walk, and Lainie abandoned Unit Sixteen’s porch and sat. From her perch on the hard bench, she had a clear view of the door. If Bree showed up, Lainie would see her. If Bree showed up and turned out to be a flat-chested brunette . . . Stupid, not brilliant.
She comforted herself with the thought that this was probably the way detectives went about their jobs. They followed a hunch, they sat, they waited, they twiddled their thumbs and contemplated how hungry they were and hoped their efforts would fall into the brilliant category.
A squirrel scampered over the lawn and up into the branches of a maple tree across the walk from Lainie, its fluffy gray tail levitating behind it. An elderly woman walking a grouchy-looking pug passed Lainie on the walk. The dog halted and barked wildly at the squirrel, who remained in the tree’s branches, safely out of reach. The woman, petite and slightly hunched, glowered at her dog. If that woman was Bree, Lainie would volunteer to have “Stupid” tattooed on her forehead.
The woman gave the dog’s leash a stern yank and they continued down the walk, bypassing Unit Sixteen and sparing Lainie the indignity of a facial tattoo. From the parking lot, she heard the beeps of someone unlocking a car. A jet out of Logan Airport droned westward overhead, carrying passengers somewhere more exciting than Burlington, Massachusetts. Late spring warmth hovered in the air, teasing with the promise of summer.
Lainie would spend that summer on soccer fields, she promised herself. Not inside the state women’s prison. No matter what it took, she would clear her name.
A mosquito buzzed near her ear and she swatted the air. She removed her cardigan and tied the sleeves around her neck, then decided that made her look too preppy, so she untied the sleeves and put the sweater back on. Too warm. She took the sweater off and held it in her lap. Looked at her watch, nostalgically reminisced about the piles of celebrity magazines in Jackson Bray’s waiting room, smacked the mosquito that landed on her forearm, contemplated reading Bree’s copy of Cosmo while she waited—and then noticed a woman with lush platinum-blond hair sauntering up the walk.
The woman wore designer jeans and a tight yellow T-shirt with a scallop-edged neckline, and she carried a plastic shopping bag in each hand. Dark sunglasses disguised her face, but Lainie would recognize those boobs anywhere. Each one was the size of the world globe she kept on display in her classroom. Many an unevolved man probably believed he could experience the wonders of the world by exploring a pair of breasts like those.
Lainie sprang to her feet and intercepted the woman just a few steps from her front door. “Bree Daniels?” she asked.
The woman peered at her—or at least Lainie assumed she was peering. Her eyes were invisible behind the dark lenses of her sunglasses. “Who wants to know?”
Lainie’s heart palpitated. Stay calm, she ordered herself. She had already survived a night behind bars and sex without commitment. She could survive this encounter. “I’m Elaine Smith,” she said, deciding to join Jackson Bray’s sorority of anonymous Smith women.
Bree Daniels continued to stare at her through the dark glasses. “Yeah?”
A deep breath helped to steady Lainie’s hand as she pulled her prints of the photos of Bree and Arthur Cavanagh from an outer pocket of her purse and showed them to Bree.
The woman pursed her pouty lips, then muttered, “Shit.” More loudly, she said, “All right, come on inside. I’m not going to stand out here talking while my ice cream melts.”
Lainie followed her up the walk to Unit Sixteen. Bree handed her one of the bags, pulled her mail out of the box, and juggled it and the other bag while she dug her key from the tiny purse hanging on a narrow leather cord around her neck. She unlocked the door and they entered.
Her kitchen was excruciatingly yellow and overwhelmed by a cloying daisy motif. The curtains, the dishtowel, the plastic tablecloth on the pedestal table, the magnets clinging to the yellow refrigerator—everywhere Lainie looked she saw daisies. The effect was jarring. Daisies symbolized purity, girlishness, sweet innocence. Bree Daniels exemplified none of those things.
Bree dropped her shopping bag on the yellow counter and then took the bag Lainie was holding. “All right, so, what are we talking about here?” she asked, turning her back to Lainie while she unloaded her groceries into the refrigerator.
Lainie had rehearsed her approach on the drive to Burlington. At times it had sounded totally implausible to her, but she hadn’t been able to think of a better story. “I’m here investigating the investigator who took those photos,” she said. “He seems to have missed the most important pictures.”
“What important pictures?”
“In none of the photos are you and Arthur Cavanagh, well, doing anything even approac
hing intimacy.”
Bree whirled around and barked a laugh. “So, you think the guy who shot the pictures missed something?”
“I don’t know. Did he?”
Bree studied her for a minute, then turned back to her task of refrigerating her purchases. “Who are you working for?” she asked.
“I can’t divulge that.”
Bree peered over her shoulder. “Patty?” she guessed.
Lainie shrugged one shoulder noncommittally and maintained a neutral expression. Bree must have learned Patty’s name from Arthur. Maybe he’d called Bree Patty by mistake while they were engaged in an activity Lainie had no photos of. If Bree wanted to think Lainie was working for Patty, so be it.
“I thought Patty knew all this already,” Bree said. “I kept her posted. There was never any intimacy between me and Arthur. Don’t ask me why. He wasn’t like most guys.”
It became increasingly more difficult for Lainie to keep her expression neutral. What had Bree kept Patty posted about, and why? “I take it you know lots of guys,” Lainie said, her tone as bland as possible.
“I run a personal escort service. I have plenty of clients.” Bree pulled a quart container of ice cream from the bottom of the second shopping bag, pried off the top, and then plucked a teaspoon from the bright yellow drying rack next to the sink. “Arthur didn’t want intimacy. I tried, God knows, but he just didn’t want it. None of this should be news to Patty.”
Why would Arthur’s “escort” keep Arthur’s wife apprised of their relationship, or lack thereof? Lainie pretended she knew what Bree was talking about, hoping that Bree would just keep talking. “Why do you think he refused to have sex with you?” she asked.
“Beats me.” Bree dipped her spoon into the ice cream, scooped up a dollop, and sucked it off the spoon. “You want some of this? I’ll give you your own spoon.”
“No, thanks.”
Bree ate another spoonful of ice cream. “I mean, look, I’m sorry whoever was tailing us didn’t get hot photos for Patty. I did the best I could. Arthur just wasn’t into it.”
“Yet he saw you more than once.”
“He liked me.” She said this matter-of-factly, no hint of bragging in her tone.
“But if you’re a professional escort”—Lainie tried not to choke on the euphemism—“why would Arthur pay you for your time if he didn’t want to do what he was paying you for?”
“He wasn’t—” She clamped her mouth shut, then took a long breath, took a bite of ice cream, and said, “What I’m saying is, it was just one of those things. He must have liked my company, or maybe he just enjoyed ogling me. I’d call him, ask if he wanted to get together, and he’d always say yes. And we’d get together. Just not all the way together.”
Think, Lainie. This isn’t making sense. Patty seemed convinced that Arthur was having an affair. Stavik seemed equally convinced that Arthur would never have an affair. And here was Arthur’s professional “escort,” saying Arthur had paid for her services and then not partaken of them. Why would he have done that?
“It’s not a big deal,” Bree said, then twirled her tongue over the mound of ice cream on her spoon. “Butter pecan,” she said. “My favorite. This is the good stuff, not the store brand. You sure you don’t want some?”
“No. Really, thank you.”
“So anyway . . .” Bree leaned against the yellow counter and glanced at the photos, sitting in a neat stack on her kitchen table. “Your guy got those pictures. Not as hot as he wanted, but I did my best. And now Arthur’s dead, so the pictures don’t matter anymore. What’s the big deal?”
Lainie wasn’t sure. All she knew was that a big deal was hidden somewhere in Bree’s bizarre story. “What did you do with Arthur when you got together with him, other than not getting all the way together?”
“We talked, we laughed, we flirted. He was a big flirt, I’ll give him that.” Bree flicked her tongue over her full lips to capture the creamy residue left by her spoon.
“In one of the photos, you’re at the site where he was putting up new houses,” Lainie noted.
“Mmm.” Bree stared thoughtfully into the tub of ice cream for a moment, then looked up. “He wanted to show me where he worked. He was really into those mansions he was building. Just looking at that house under construction, I could see how he got so rich. I mean, not like I’m a civil engineer or anything, but if he ever finished that house, it would have been spectacular. Even I could see that.
“He liked to show me around, walk me through the building, tell me which rooms would go where, describe the details. ‘This’ll be the master bath,’ he’d say. ‘Sunken whirlpool tub over here, three-head walk-in shower over there. Bidet in the corner.’ Can you imagine? He was going to put a bidet in that house.” She shook her head in awe.
“I remember the first time he asked me if I’d like to see his tools, and I thought that meant he was going to show me, you know, his tools. Instead, he took me to that mansion he was building and unlocked this storage locker full of actual tools.” She shook her head. “Funny guy. He loved showing me his equipment, explaining how everything worked. His job really meant something to him. Besides lots of money, I mean.”
Lainie remained baffled. She decided to try a different tack. “Why did you go to Patty Cavanagh’s soccer game?”
If Bree hadn’t been at that game, she would have reacted to Lainie’s question with puzzlement. She didn’t seem puzzled at all, which meant Lainie hadn’t been mistaken. Bree had indeed attended the Burlington game.
“Patty could’ve told you that herself. I kept trying to talk to her, and she kept shutting me down. I called her house. I went to her house. I banged on her door. She refused to answer. Then I read in the local paper—they’ve got this listing of stuff going on in town, and it mentioned that this Rockford ladies’ soccer team would be playing in Burlington, and I remembered Arthur telling me Patty played soccer. So I moseyed over, and sure enough, there she was. She wouldn’t talk to me there either. Do me a favor—the next time you see her, tell her she’d better start talking to me, and I mean ASAP.”
“Why do you want to talk to her?”
“We have business to discuss.”
Business. Bree had business with Patty. “What kind of business? Tell me about it, and I’ll convey your message to her.”
“She knows what it’s about,” Bree said. “The only business I deal in.”
“Sex?”
Bree tossed back her head and laughed. “Money.”
Bree had money business with Patty? As Alice would say in the Lewis Carroll book Lainie’s class had been reading, curiouser and curiouser.“Patty owes you money?”
“You got that right.” Bree dropped her spoon into the sink and pressed the lid back on the container of ice cream.
“How much money?”
“I guess that depends on how much she inherits. But it’s a lot more than she thought she was going to wind up with.” Bree turned, opened the freezer, and slid the ice cream carton into it. “You tell Patty. She’ll understand.”
“I don’t understand,” Lainie said.
“Like I’m supposed to care.” She shrugged. “You work for her, so do her a favor. Tell her I fixed things up for her and I want my share. A deal’s a deal. She can afford it.”
“Your share of what?”
“She’ll know what I’m talking about.” Bree sniffed, her little nose twitching with indignation and irritation. “Without me, she’d have wound up with nothing. All I’m asking is that she pays up. She owes me and she knows it.” She crossed to the table to look at the pictures. “I’ve got a great profile, don’t I,” she said, inspecting one of the photos closely.
If one liked breasts as big as the Hindenburg, yes, she had a great profile. Lainie gathered the photos and slid them into her purse. “Are th
ere any other messages you want me to pass along to Patty?”
“Just that she’d better get in touch with me soon. It’s time for her to do the right thing. A thank-you would be nice, too.” The threatening undertone in Bree’s voice contrasted with the cheerful daisy motif of her kitchen.
“I’ll let her know,” Lainie said, as if she had any idea what she was supposed to tell Patty. “I appreciate your talking to me,” she added, starting down the hall toward the front door.
Bree accompanied her. “No problem,” she said. “You let Patty know it’s time to get with the program, all right? She owes me big.”
Lainie smiled, nodded, and stepped outside. She kept her smile intact until Bree shut the door behind her with a loud thump. Then her smile dissolved, leaving bemusement in its place.
What the hell was Bree talking about?
Lainie walked to the end of the row of townhouses and followed the paved path to the visitors’ lot. Once she was settled behind the wheel of her Volvo, she closed her eyes and ordered her brain to sift through everything Bree had said, everything Lainie knew.
Patty claimed her husband had been unfaithful. Bree insisted that, at least technically, he hadn’t. Bree had some sort of relationship with Patty—enough of a relationship that she’d attended Patty’s soccer game to talk to her. Enough of a relationship that Patty was avoiding her. Enough that Bree felt Patty owed her money.
For what? Trying to seduce Patty’s husband? Why should Patty pay Bree for that? Had Patty, not Arthur, been the one to hire Bree?
He obviously hadn’t wanted what Bree was selling. He’d been a shrewd businessman. An executive who resisted paying his crew overtime when they’d earned it certainly wouldn’t have paid a supplier if he’d had no interest in what she was supplying.
Dead Ball Page 27
