Born To Be Wild

by Catherine Coulter

  Clyde shrugged. “It’s a solid story line, pet. Bernie told me sleeping with Damian is only phase one of Sunday’s revenge. He said they’re working on a twist that’ll have everyone slack-jawed for Sweeps Week. The soap fanzines are already stirring things up with all their speculation.”

  “Sleeping with Damian will lessen Sunday, maybe forever.”

  Clyde ’s sparse gray eyebrows flew up. “Hmmm,” he said, stroking the straggly Vandyke trying to cover his chin. “If I know Bernie, he’s probably whipping lots of stuff into the pot to see what floats to the surface. Okay, okay, I’ll mention it again. He’s the final word, Mary Lisa, no one else, you know that. We’ve all got to trust his instincts. He got us here.” He turned away when one of the actors wanted to ask him about something.

  “Ha!” Lou Lou said under her breath next to Mary Lisa’s ear. “You’re the one who got us here.”

  “No, I just goosed things up. Come on, Lou Lou, what he means is that Bernie Barlow has been the soap’s head writer, guru, and creative genius for well nigh seventeen years. Only the network people have the power to force him to change his mind.”

  “Yeah, yeah, and since they don’t even agree on what constitutes casual Friday, Bernie always does what he pleases.”

  Mary Lisa nodded. Since the network lived and died by the weekly Nielsen ratings that still cranked syrup-slow out of the fax each Thursday, and BTBW had been at the top of the heap since shortly after Mary Lisa arrived, Bernie was golden. Not to mention that very recent Emmy for best soap. It didn’t look good for Sunday’s staying out of Damian’s bed.

  “Look at the bright side,” Clyde continued, happy as a clam, turning back to her. “If they have Susan attempt suicide or something, it might even have viewers cheering for Susan and Lydia. And you’d be the most hated daytime star on TV for a while, until Sunday magicks the viewers again.”

  Jeff strolled over in his tux. “Not going to happen, Clyde. The viewers hate whomever Sunday hates, and that includes her half sister and mother.”

  “Whatever. Okay, kiddo, I’ll pass this on to Bernie, give him a headache. Now, it’s time for Sunday to make her assignation with Damian.”

  Lou Lou said, “Susan shouldn’t only attempt suicide, she should succeed, that’s what I say.” She said it low enough for only Mary Lisa’s ears so one could carry it back to Margie.

  Three minutes later, Mary Lisa’s hair was scrutinized, her dangling curls coaxed a bit lower, now nearly touching her shoulders, one of them twisting around a jet earring. She checked the monitor, and…Sunday resumes the same expression.

  She smiles at Damian. The camera catches her full face, eyes slumberous as her hands lightly stroke up his arms. From the corner of her eye she sees her half sister, Susan, walking into the ballroom with their mother, Lydia, and she gives a small calculated smile. She stops stroking his arms even as she presses closer, her breasts against him, leans up, and whispers, “All you have to do is unfasten the collar around my neck and this gown drops.”

  Damian looks like he wants to leap on her. His eyes dilate a bit, he’s breathing hard.

  She laughs. “But not here. Here’s your lovely wife, the old warship steaming along behind her. Why don’t you call me after you’ve seduced your little woman and made her happy?”

  Damian sees his wife from the corner of his eye, but he can’t help himself. After a brief moment of uncertainty, he says, “Yes.”

  The camera moves to Susan’s face. She’s been crying but now she’s wearing a brave look. “Damian,” she says softly and lightly touches her fingertips to his forearm. “Take me home.”

  Damian looks down at her, his expression unreadable, holds it, holds it, until-

  “Clear!”

  In the dressing room, Mary Lisa heard Margie say angrily, “I heard about what you said, Lou Lou!”

  “How is that possible? I barely heard myself.”

  “You said I should commit suicide, that I should succeed. Dammit, Susan isn’t about to do that. Never.”

  “Hey, it’s just another idea for Sweeps Week,” Lou Lou said easily around a mouthful of eye shadow pencils. “They could pretend you’re in a coma, bring you back in a couple of months. Hey, it’s no worse than poor Mary Lisa having to sleep with Susan’s husband.”

  “It’s not going to happen,” Mary Lisa said. “Don’t worry about it.” She remembered what Detective Vasquez had said about a stranger listening in. Someone who didn’t know would have no clue who was talking about whom. Mary Lisa smiled at Margie, who seemed mollified, and walked away, whistling, to have a bubble-gum-chewing Mavis help her out of the black gown.

  It was Wednesday. It was Mary Lisa’s last scene. She had four whole days off. Her hip didn’t hurt.

  EIGHT

  Goddard Bay , Oregon

  Chief of Police Jack Wolf looked down at the metal table where Jason Maynard’s body lay, cold and gray, a green sheet pulled to his waist. His head no longer looked human from all the blows the killer had rained down on him.

  The medical examiner, Dr. Washington Hughes, a big hulk of a man who’d played pro football defensive tackle for the Vikings in the ’80s, stood next to him. “What you saw at the scene is what you get, Chief. Someone struck him hard enough on the back of the head with the golf club to kill him instantly. As you can see, the murderer didn’t stop with the kill blow. So far, I’ve counted another half-dozen blows to the face. I’ve very seldom in my career seen a head and face this destroyed. The bloody golf club they found lying beside his body checks out as the murder weapon.”

  Jack stared down at the man he’d known only well enough to speak with about the coastal weather when they chanced to meet on the street. Jack bought his insurance from Jason’s father-in-law.

  He said, “It bespeaks a fine rage.”

  “Sure does. Out-of-control rage at work here, Chief.”

  It was impossible to tell now, but once Jason Maynard had been a handsome, fair-complexioned man with blondish hair and hazel eyes and a ready smile. “Okay, somehow, the murderer came up behind him, delivered the first blow to the back of his head. I’m thinking he bounced off the passenger side of the green Camry and fell onto his back on the garage floor. From the blood splatters, he didn’t hit the Mercedes, but collapsed between the two cars. Then the murderer struck his face, half a dozen times you said? I’m inclined to believe the murderer knew he was already dead, but it didn’t matter because he was in the red zone. And he struck only his face, to obliterate him? To make him disappear, no longer exist?”

  “Did you ever see anything this bad in Chicago?”

  “Yeah,” Jack said, “I did, but I’ll tell you, Doc, it’s a shock to see it here in a quiet town like Goddard Bay. We may have someone walking around here who’s deeply disturbed. Looking at all the blood splatters in that garage and on the two cars, I’d have to say he was even beyond the red zone, he was crazed, no brakes, no functioning brain at work. He was over the edge. But now I bet he’s flying high because he thinks he’s gotten away with it.”

  “A man did this, you think?”

  Jack shrugged. “There isn’t any particular heft to a golf club. Could just as easily be a woman.” He looked down at Jason Maynard again. “Such a damned waste. It really pisses me off.”

  “Glad you’re the one who has to nail him-or her-and not me.”

  Jack looked him up and down, snorted. “Whoever it is, you could twist off his neck with one hand.”

  Dr. Hughes grinned, flexed his hands. “Maybe, but I wouldn’t enjoy it, and I wouldn’t be any good at finding him.”

  “Can you give me an idea of when this happened?”

  “I’d say he was killed between six and eight hours before the time Mrs. Maynard found him this morning, sometime in the early morning, maybe around one a.m.”

  “Anything from the tox screen on him yet? Alcohol levels? Drugs?”

  “I’ll get that all to you by tomorrow, noon.” Dr. Hughes looked down at the wreck of a man he�
��d known only slightly, a good-looking young man of thirty-four, who, until early this morning, had a long life in front of him. “He was healthy as a horse until this. He was fit, took care of himself.”

  “No defensive wounds?”

  “None. As I said, the first blow to the back of his head took him down, killed him instantly. It had to be a friend, family member, someone he trusted, right? Someone he would have let follow him into the garage?”

  Jack nodded. “We’ll find out who he’d been out with. We still don’t know who that golf clubs belongs to. If it was Jason’s, the club might have been right there when the murderer went over the edge and grabbed it. But there was no golf bag. Maybe the murderer grabbed the golf club out of his own bag and used it.”

  “That means it would have been where? In his backseat?”

  “Someplace handy, that’s for sure,” Jack said. “We’ll see. I’ll bet my Beretta he knew his killer very well indeed. And he didn’t think the person was a threat because he turned his back. I suppose someone could have been waiting for him, hiding in the garage without Jason Maynard seeing him, and come up behind him.” Jack frowned. “But it would have been hard to surprise him like that. No place to hide.” He sighed. “And that would mean premeditation. I can’t buy that. The person found out something, and lost it. This was sudden, uncontrolled.”

  Jack picked up the golf club that was leaning beside the door in a plastic bag, already examined by the forensic people. “I don’t golf. What can you tell me about this?”

  “It’s a Callaway, a Big Bertha Fusion FT-3 driver.”

  “Expensive?”

  “Very, but about the same as some of the other big names. They’re excellent.”

  “Would there be a whole lot of them out at the country club?”

  “Sure. This is an affluent area.”

  “Okay, thanks. I’ll be in touch.” Jack left the morgue, actually a converted room in the basement of the Goddard Bay Community Hospital. At that moment, Jack was very glad he wasn’t in Chicago with its chains of command and its protocols. He was free to do what he thought best. He punched up his friend John Goddard on his cell.

  John answered, listened. When Jack finished, he said, “I thought I was going to throw up. I didn’t know a human being had that much blood in him-and other stuff. It was everywhere. That was pretty ugly, Jack.”

  “Yeah, it was. Okay, I’m heading over to interview Marci Maynard. I’m betting she knows our murderer. You want to come?”

  John thought about it. “No, I think it would be best if I stayed out of the investigation for now. This is a big case for us. I don’t want to be accused of crossing any lines, of manufacturing evidence for an indictment.”

  “Okay, no problem. Hey, John, you don’t golf much these days, do you?”

  “No, not much. Jason was hit over the head with a driver, right?”

  “Yeah, a Callaway.”

  “Good clubs, used by lots of pros, probably a lot of our locals as well. You might need some luck tracking that down. Oh yeah, Jack, something else. This isn’t about the murder. This is about-well, it’s a favor, a big one. I’m in a little trouble here.” He told Jack about Kelly Beverly, the engagement ring, and the reservations at Le Fleur de Beijing that evening.

  Jack laughed, couldn’t help it. “She knocked you right out of your boots, did she?”

  “She knocked them into the next town, Jack. I was a goner. You can take this to the bank: I swear on the grave of my crazy uncle Albert that I’m never going to do it again.”

  “Yeah, yeah, that’s what you used to say when we were hanging our heads over the john the morning after one of those sorority parties.”

  “Okay, you’re right. I don’t want it again until I’m more mature, more able to control my brain afterward.”

  “Think a moment about a guy’s hard wiring.”

  “Okay, maybe you’re right. Will you help me out here?”

  “So you want me to come fetch you at the Fleur de Beijing at exactly nine-thirty tonight, with something urgent about the case. That’ll give you an hour-you’re sure you’ll have gotten yourself off the hook by then?”

  “If I haven’t, shoot me.”

  Jack grinned into his cell. He knew John didn’t really need him to be there, only wanted some help to make a graceful exit after breaking up with Kelly. It had happened before. They’d met at Princeton, John a psychology major because he didn’t know yet what he wanted to do with his life, and Jack in many of the same psych classes because he knew all along he wanted to be a cop. As it turned out John had gone to law school, while Jack went on for his master’s degree in forensic science. The FBI had called, which was gratifying, but he’d wanted something local, and moved back to where his family lived, in Chicago. But now he was here, in Goddard Bay, largely because John Goddard, the newly elected district attorney, had called him at the perfect time. An eighteen-year-old boy, wasted on crack, had shot him in the side after missing him twice. Jack finally returned fire, killing him. Two months later, he was the newly elected chief of police in Goddard Bay. To his surprise, but not to John’s, he really liked the job.

  Jack said, “Okay, you got an hour to save your ass before I come and haul it out. I’ll let you know what I find out from Marci Maynard. Wives, I’ve discovered over the years, always know something, if not everything.”

  NINE

  Jack didn’t drive back to the Maynard house on Westview but directly to Marci’s parents’ house. Milo and Olivia Hildebrand had come to get her not ten minutes after Jack had arrived at the crime scene that morning. Jason Maynard’s parents lived across the country in Hartford, Connecticut, and Jack had hated to make that call. They’d be arriving tomorrow.

  Milo Hildebrand, the owner of a local insurance company, savvy and well-off, seemingly sane and balanced, answered the door. “Hi, Jack, come on in. I think Marci’s sleeping; our doctor gave her a sedative. Let me check.”

  “No problem, Milo. I need to speak to you and Mrs. Hildebrand in any case. Now is fine.”

  Olivia Hildebrand, looking thin and pale, sat on a high-backed chair in the antique-filled living room, her knees pressed together, her hands locked around them, wearing some sort of designer knit thing. She looked up when he came into the living room, then immediately back down again. He didn’t know her well, only by sight, really. He knew Milo because he bought insurance from him.

  “Mrs. Hildebrand,” he said and walked to her, stretching out his hand to her. She was forced to let go of her knees. She shook his hand, her own hand limp, and said in a thread of a voice, “Please sit down, Chief. Would you like some coffee?”

  Jack would very much have liked some coffee, but looking at those dull eyes and paper-white skin, he shook his head. “No, thank you, Mrs. Hildebrand, I’m fine. I’m very sorry to bother you but I need your help.”

  “Hello, Chief Wolf.”

  Jack looked up to see Patricia Bigelow walk into the living room.

  “Patricia,” he said, nodding. “What are you doing here?”

  “She’s our lawyer, Jack,” Milo said. “I called her right after we brought Marci here. She will see to it that we’re all legally protected.”

  “Your choice,” Jack said, nodding to her, but he wasn’t happy about this. He could only hope she wouldn’t interfere with his questioning to impress her clients. Pat Bigelow had been in Goddard Bay a bit longer than he. She was a good criminal attorney, and according to John, a thorn in his side more than once. She was known to take no prisoners. She charged the moon, but her clients seemed to think she was worth it. She was able to hide all her toughness and her hard edges well. She was nice looking really, actually appeared more suited to hosting garden parties than defending crooks. She had soft blond hair, cut short, lovely sharp features, and long legs that she showed off, particularly in front of male-heavy juries.

  “Don’t worry, Chief, I have no intention of trying to hinder any legitimate fact-finding. I just don’t want to see any
sort of intimidation. Are we clear?”

  Milo waved him to a chair, and said to his wife, his voice soft and easy, “He’s here to speak to us, and to Marci, Livie. It’s his job. He’s got to find out who killed Jason.”

  “Well, he can’t see Marci! She’s ill, in shock, really-”

  There was a flash of impatience in Milo ’s dark eyes, just as quickly gone, and he kept his voice soft. “Jack knows she’s asleep. He also knows she’s torn up about this mess. The chief isn’t going to do anything to hurt her.”

  Olivia Hildebrand didn’t move, nodded slightly, and turned her eyes to Jack’s face. “It’s not just a mess, Chief. Jason is dead. That’s much more than a mess.”

  Jack nodded. “Yes, it is. Can you please tell me when you last saw Jason Maynard?”

  Milo said, “As you know, Jack, Jason worked for me, so the last time I saw him was yesterday afternoon when he left the office for the day.”

  “And you, Mrs. Hildebrand?”

  “At dinner last Tuesday night. They always come to dinner on Tuesday nights. I served spinach lasagna, Jason’s favorite dish.”

  Milo Hildebrand took his wife’s hand, gently squeezed it. “Yes, yes, Livie, Jack doesn’t need the dinner menu. It was a pleasant evening, Jack, no surprises, no inkling of anything wrong with either Jason or Marci.”

  Jack continued smoothly, “Mrs. Hildebrand, how did Jason seem to you Tuesday night?”

  “As Milo said-” She stopped and began shaking her head. He persevered. “Think back, Mrs. Hildebrand. Was he different in any way to you? Perhaps distracted? How did he and Marci deal with each other?”

  Milo opened his mouth to speak, but Jack shook his head at him, never looking away from Mrs. Hildebrand. Next time, he would get her alone. He hadn’t realized Milo was this dominant, but he wasn’t surprised. Olivia Hildebrand had spent her whole married life inside this home, completely dependent on Milo. He looked around. She’d made it a beautiful home. He’d seen stunning antiques in another home in Goddard Bay, but he couldn’t remember where at the moment.