A Bitch Called Hope (22 page)

Alice looked over at Lennox’s drawing. “The Hierophant, you know, from the tarot deck?”

Lennox did not. But his face was definitely Father McMahon’s.

“What’s going on?” Lennox said. “Father Mac’s grinding your character under his heel?”

“He’d do that, you see, because the Hierophant stands for organized religion. The establishment. And these angels are rebels. When Gabe saw Father Mac at the Pike party, he got the idea for the character.”

“That seems really strange to me,” Lennox said.

“I know,” Alice said. “He didn’t even know about Bill or Father Mac until I got busted with all that money in my backpack. I told Gabe it wasn’t funny. I told him I wouldn’t model for him anymore unless he drew a different face.”

“But he didn’t,” Lennox said.

“He would have, only he got killed instead.”

Lennox had a bad feeling about this. Alice was not safe here; she might not be safe going to school either. Whoever hit Gabe had been familiar with his schedule. She said, “Let’s get out of here.”

Chapter 35

By ten thirty the next morning the snow had melted and turned to drizzle. Lennox was showered and dressed and headed for Scott’s apartment for an interview. Alice was still asleep in the guest room. She’d agreed to hole up at Lennox’s until the end of the investigation. It was hard to know who got more sleep, Alice or Lennox; both of them were jumpy as hell.

It was a gird your loins kind of day. Lennox, who always carried a gun in her car, stuck a pocket Taser in her back pocket just to be on the safe side.

She got to Scott’s a little before eleven. His front room was in the same state of chaos as the last time minus the scotch and beer bottles plus a new Mac and the biggest flat screen she’d ever seen. The blinds were drawn, the television was on and tuned to cable news, the floor covered with bits of trash the size and consistency of cat litter. A stack of newspapers leaned against the wall. The place smelled like dirty laundry, cigarette smoke and Chinese take-out.

“I made some coffee,” Scott said. “It’s in the kitchen.”

She sat at the Formica table and watched him pour coffee into turquoise and orange fiesta ware. The table and the dishes were new since the last time she’d been there. “I like this retro,” she said. “It fits the apartment.”

“Priscilla wanted to do something with the kitchen.” He grinned. “You know how you women are.”

Someday, she’d love to get the chance to get right in his face, say tell me Scott, you’re obviously such a big expert, tell me how we women are.

“You want milk?” Scott said. “No. I remember, you like sugar.” He smiled like he was very pleased with himself. “What do you want to talk about?”

“I want to know more about your folks’ Christmas party. Do you go every year?”

“Just the last couple. Priscilla likes that kind of stuff.” Scott patted the pocket of his flannel shirt, this one a pale blue and gray plaid. He lit a cigarette and blew the smoke in the direction of the ceiling.

“How about Father Mac?” she said. “He comes every year?”

Scott chuckled. “Mac’s probably never turned down a free scotch since I can remember.”

“How about Doctor Engstrom?”

“That prick.” Scott pulled in a big lungful of smoke then exhaled out his nose. “I never paid any attention until he was in our face.”

“What about your brother?”

“Are you kidding? None of us had seen Dan for years. It was like wow! The prodigal son returns. Bring out the fatted calf.”

“Was he prodigal?”

“Hell, I don’t know. We did have prime rib, though, in honor of Danny boy coming back to good old Portland.” Scott tapped his ashes onto an already brimming ashtray. Stretched his legs so that his foot grazed Lennox’s.

How many years? Three, Scott thought. Lennox moved her foot out of reach. “Couldn’t he get away from work?” she said.

“That’s what he said. The old man said it was bullshit. Wall Street practically rolls up the sidewalk in December, according to Pop. So his flight gets in at four, Priscilla and I come over at five and Dan and the old man are shouting at each other. We could hear them from the driveway.” He stopped and looked like the heavens had parted and he was handed an insight. “Maybe that’s why Dan didn’t come home so much.”

“Could you hear what they were fighting about?”

“Money.” Scott shrugged. “I heard Dan say, ‘You owe me.’ ‘I don’t owe you a goddamn thing,’ the old man says. Priscilla and I are at the front door going holy shit. Do we turn around and go home or what?”

“What did you do?”

“We let ourselves in. We found Mom crying in the kitchen.”

“Then what happened?” she said.

“More yelling. You couldn’t hear the actual words from the kitchen. Mom, Priscilla and I kind of hunkered down, drank wine until they came out.”

Dan is desperate. If Jillian goes to the police, Dan goes to jail. His own father could save him and refuses. How could she not feel sorry for him and at the same time wonder? Bill was a heart attack waiting to happen.

Scott reached for another smoke; his eyes slid from the end of his cigarette to Lennox’s face to see what kind of effect his story was having on her.

“Scott, tell me, who do you think murdered your father?”

His head snapped back. “I don’t know. I haven’t really thought about it.”

“You don’t think your mom did it, do you?”

“Of course not.”

“Well then, you must have a theory.”

His eyes glanced off hers. He swallowed. “I figured Doctor Jerk-off for it; he’s so hot to marry Mom.” His leg bounced under the table. “I hate to say it. Maybe my brother?”

“It’s possible,” she said. She acted like she was buying it. See where he’d go next.

He leaned across the table so that his wrist brushed against her sleeve. “A guy doesn’t want to think his own brother would.”

“Is there something other than the fight that makes you suspect him?”

“No,” he said. “It’s crazy. Right?”

“He needs money; his own father won’t help him. It’s definitely a motive,” she said. “Is it true Bill stopped paying your living expenses six months ago?”

Scott shrugged. “I had my teaching gig. I lived frugally. It worked out.”

“So you didn’t fight with your old man,” she said.

“I’m not a fighter, I’m a lover.” And then he winked at her.

Sometimes it took all her strength to stay professional. She said, “Mind if I use your bathroom?”

“Top of the stairs past the bedroom. You want me to show you?”

She told him she could figure it out. She walked past the bedroom. The bed was unmade, clothing lying off the bed or on the floor. Bright pink and silver shopping bags from the spendier boutiques roosted on top of the dresser and overstuffed chair. Priscilla had been busy.
You know how you women are.

Lennox locked the bathroom door and turned on the tap. She eased the door open on their medicine cabinet and struck pay dirt. The shelves were crammed with prescription drugs, the labels all made out to Delia. Scott was doing some major pharming, thanks to his mother and her candyman. All three shelves loaded with Vicodin, Ativan, Valium and Vitamin R, Ritalin. Lennox would lay down serious money that Delia never had attention deficit disorder but, God bless, she got rid of those pesky fifteen pounds. Lennox took a picture of the open cabinet with her cell phone.

Priscilla had said it. Scott had his way with his mama’s medicine cabinet. He also knew about the will prior to his father’s death. Maybe he got tired of playing the starving artist. Maybe Priscilla started showing signs of restlessness, more scenes like the one with Bill the night of the party. Dan wasn’t the only one with a motive.

Lennox eased the top drawer open beneath the sink. Lipsticks, eyeliner, dental floss. Two of the lipsticks were Dior’s
Brown Sugar
. The brand of lipstick that showed up on Bill’s inhaler. The lipstick smudge was Priscilla’s. Lennox took a picture of the drawer and the label on the lipstick.

Flushed the toilet. Washed her hands.

Scott was waiting for her on the other side of the door. “What were you doing in there?” he said.

He stepped towards her until he was inches away, his breath reeking of coffee and cigarettes. She pushed his chest. Said, “You never heard of personal space?”

“You don’t have to snoop,” he said. “You want to know something, ask me. I’ve been cooperative, haven’t I?”

“Back off, Scott,” she said.

He kept pressing against her, making her walk backwards towards the stairway. “You were snooping. I know,” he said in a singsong voice as if he were talking to a child.

She pushed him again. “I’m working hard to get your mother out of jail.”

“Tell me what you were looking for,” he said and edged her backwards.

She glanced over her shoulder. She was a foot from the staircase. One little shove and she’d fall down the stairs backwards. Believe it, she used her cop voice when she said, “I don’t want to hurt you.” She reached in her back pocket with her free hand. With one fluid motion she had the Taser. Held it in front of her.

Scott dropped her arm and jumped back. “You come over here with a weapon?” His eyes bugged out with disbelief. He looked like he might cry. “You’d Taser me? What kind of a bullshit setup is this?”

“I hope you don’t hold this against me,” she said. But she knew he would.

Lennox saw herself out. The sky grew darker; the bare branches of the avenue trees rattled in a sudden gust of wind. It was going to hail. She stepped up her pace. Scott was a wretch, but did he murder his dad? Were his nerves steady enough that he could plant the insulin inhaler in his dad’s sock drawer? Did he realize the police would investigate Bill’s death? And if he did, did he realize he was framing his mother for the murder?

How did Priscilla’s lipstick land on the prescription label?

The hail was the size of peas by the time she pulled into the parking lot of Pike Development.

Chapter 36

Lennox drove up and down the rows of cars in the parking lot until she found Bill’s Cadillac Escalade parked on the side of the office building adjacent to the wetlands. She parked next to it. The freeway traffic roared from a quarter mile away. She was dreading this.

Hail speckled the blue hood of the Escalade. Lennox studied the bumper. The right side and up around the headlight looked as if the paint might have been recently retouched. It looked pristine whereas the other side of the bumper had little nicks from gravel and whatnot. She ran her finger over the painted area. The right side bumper and the body up over the headlight looked to have been dented then pulled out.

Dan came hurrying out the front door of the office, still struggling to get his arm into the sleeve of his peacoat. The gum soles of his boots splashed through the puddles on the asphalt as he moved towards her. He looked half puzzled, half irritated.

“What are you doing, Lennox?” he said.

She pointed out the dents, the touch-up paint. “Looks like you had some front end damage here.”

“What?” he said. He looked closer. “That’s nothing. It was probably there all along.”

“You’re saying this vehicle hasn’t had a trip to the body shop recently?”

Dan started to say something, then brought himself up short. If the look on his face was a leading indicator, he was not liking her just now. “You’ve obviously got a theory,” he said. “Let’s have it.”

“Gabe Makem was hit by a dark blue Cadillac.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Gabe Makem was a caterer at your parents’ party. He saw something that night that he used to blackmail the murderer with. He was run over two days ago.”

“I read about a hit-and-run.” His eyes skittered across her face. “When did that happen?”

“Two nights ago,” she said.

“I was with Mac. He picked me up here at three in the afternoon and we went to Hunter’s Ridge.”

“Did you take the Escalade?”

“No. Mac drove. He says the Mercedes is easier on his back. We went to Hunter’s Ridge. Went through the whole inspection report, item by item, Mac bitching the whole time, how I was mismanaging the project. I apologized all over the place and he cheered up. Drove out to east county, showed me a tract of land he was interested in. Then we went to Jake’s for dinner.”

She said, “Is there anybody other than Father Mac who can corroborate your story?”

He shot her the darkest look yet.

He turned and marched into the office. He didn’t look back. Lennox followed him through the glass doors to the receptionist’s desk. The receptionist wore no makeup, which made her look like she was in junior high.

“Would you check my calendar?” Dan said to her. “Tuesday.”

The receptionist clicked through the computer program until she came up with the correct day. “Fidelity Title one o’clock. A three o’clock with Father Mac,” she said.

“Do you remember when you left the office that day?” Lennox asked the receptionist.

“I have to leave at five thirty to pick up my daughter at daycare.” So much for junior high.

“Do you remember seeing Dan’s Escalade in the parking lot when you left?”

“Uh.” She looked up as if the memory was lodged in her bangs. “I saw it in the parking lot one night when I was going home,” she said. “It could’ve been Monday or Tuesday. I can’t remember.”

They walked down the hall to his corner office. The wetlands outside his window looked dark and lifeless.

Dan sat behind his desk and motioned her to the chair facing him. He lifted the phone from the cradle, dialed a number and handed it to Lennox. “Mac’s my alibi. Talk to him.”

The phone rang four times. A female voice finally answered. Father McMahon was with His Excellency, Archbishop Harris. Lennox left a message for Father Mac to call her.

She said, “All I’m doing is gathering information and verifying it.”

“But it’s the second murder you can’t rule me out for,” he said.

What did he want from her? I’m so sorry, Danny. Please don’t take this the wrong way. She was a fucking cop. She said, “If we could put our feelings aside and you let me do my job, we’ll get through this.”

Dan met her gaze. “I can’t do that.” He reached across his desk as if he’d take her hand, then stopped himself. “Do you want coffee?” he said.