A Crazy Little Thing Called Death (33 page)

“Get in the car,” he told me. “Stay low.”

My voice cracked. “Michael—”

“It’ll be okay. Some of the Pescaras are coming, that’s all. It’s not as complicated as Bloom says. We’re going to talk. It’s the only way to settle this mess without anybody else dying. If Bloom doesn’t screw up, we may finally solve the cop killing—”

“But you’re in danger. You’re putting yourself in jeopardy to make things right.”

“Sound familiar?”

I heard the edge in his voice, and he glanced away—sorry, perhaps, to have let his true thoughts slip out. He reached for the helmet that swung from the handlebar of the motorcycle.

A lot of things made sense then—what made us so alike, for one. And what frightened both of us the most about each other. We were always going to barge around helping other people. No matter what the cost.

“Look,” Michael said, “you and I could be happy sailing around on a yacht, putting suntan lotion on each other and drinking champagne in bed every night, but that’s not reality, is it? Not for us.”

Our whole relationship seemed to hang in the air between us. It was as if we had spent a year together waiting for this very conversation. My heart hurt in my chest, and I reached for his hand.

He didn’t smile. “I’ve been thinking. If the cops still aren’t convinced about Huckabee’s death, we could change things.”

“What do you mean?”

“We could spin it. We have enough information to make Braga look guilty. It wouldn’t be hard to convince the police that he killed Huckabee as some kind of favor for the Devines.”

“Why would we do that?”

“If he went to jail for murder, Nora, we could get the kid. It would take some work, but we could make it happen. You could have your daughter.”

I stepped back.

He said, “We could raise her ourselves, you and me.”

Hope—or some insane imitation of it—rose in me. For a brief moment I indulged in the fantasy. I could see it clearly. The three of us a family. Together and happy.

And just as quickly, the truth of what he suggested hit me hard. Here it was at last—the difference between his moral code and mine. The fact that I even considered his proposition made me flinch. Who was this person I had become? I didn’t recognize myself anymore. He had presented me with a deal with the devil, and the wrongness of it didn’t matter to him as long as he achieved his end result.

“We’d be lying,” I said.

“Does it matter?”

“Michael—”

“Braga’s no angel. Is he fit to be your daughter’s father?”

“But—”

“We could do it,” he said.

How different we were. Our compasses pointed to opposite poles. My friends and family had told me over and over that we came from different worlds, and I had resisted their arguments. I loved him, yes. But here, at last, was the dividing line.

He said, “You could have your child back.”

She was never mine,
I nearly said. The words were in my mouth.

The trees around us were suddenly silent, and the voices of the police behind me hushed. The water of the river paused, and the earth stood still.

A single sound cracked the air—a pop, a bang or a shot—whatever it was, I’ll never forget the sound it made coming from behind me in the woods.

A spout of water jumped up from the river. Just as I felt the air part beside my ear.

Then three more—very fast. Three shots, and they struck Michael squarely in the chest. His Pescara cousins had chosen not to talk. The police presence blew Michael’s plan.

The force of the bullets hit him hard. Enough to throw him back, head snapping, off his feet, propelled into space. I saw the shock in his eyes, fleeting as the last breath that left his lungs, before he was knocked down into the water. He landed on his back against the rocks, arms thrown wide. I saw him there, my own heart stopping with the force of impact.

And then the river moved over him, washing across his body.

I
n June, I was nearly able to function again. And I was finally permitted back at work after a six-week suspension for taking a bribe from Potty Devine that I had not been able to explain adequately. My suspension was punishment for perhaps the worse sin of giving the silly story of Penny Devine’s couture collection to a rival newspaper.

So I was back at square one, trying to prove I could do a job I was never trained to do. But I needed it. And I had decided to learn how to do it right.

I thought I could manage attending a small event, so I went to a fund-raiser at the museum where Penny’s collection would have a permanent home. Dilly’s curator friend chose a few of the important pieces and put them on mannequins, then invited some of the city’s better-dressed benefactors to ask for money to finance a real show for the public next year.

My friend Jill Mascione’s catering company provided the food—mimicking the menu from the Academy Awards dinner to enhance the Hollywood theme of the evening. I didn’t taste any of it, but many of the guests raved. Instead of bearing flowers, the tables were decorated with miniature Oscars standing in swirls of golden sand. Three different large screens projected movie clips of Penny Devine’s career. Two women in gold lamé dresses passed out programs at the doorway to the museum’s garden room, where the clothing was on display. Guests mingled among the mannequins, admiring the clothes.

I wore Penny’s little black Chanel with a long silk scarf around my neck, black opera-length gloves to hide the still-visible gashes on my forearms, and Audrey Hepburn-style dark sunglasses in case I lost my composure. I had wanted my donation of Penny’s collection to be anonymous, but those sorts of secrets were hard to keep, and many people whispered kind remarks in my ear.

Lexie Paine found me in the crowd and kissed me gently. “Sweetie, you look ten times better. Almost yourself again.”

“Thanks, Lex. You look like a million, of course.” I admired her white dress—a copy of the famous Elizabeth Taylor white chiffon from
A Place in the Sun
. Her escort looked nothing like Montgomery Clift, although just as handsome in a summer-weight dinner jacket. “Hello, Crewe. Thank you for sending the steaks last month. They were delicious.”

“I wanted to come and cook them for you myself, but I figured—well. Anyway, I owed you something for everything you did in April. I’m a free man, thanks to you.”

For the first time in public, I found myself capable of talking about what had happened. I said, “It was Julie Huckabee, really, who told the police everything they needed to know. That Vivian shot Kell for his mistreatment of animals.”

“I can’t believe Julie really helped Potty dispose of Kell’s remains and try to fake Penny’s demise.” Lexie shivered. “The poor kid.”

“She was a very mixed-up girl,” I conceded. “Years of verbal abuse at home from her father, and then her strange relationship with Vivian, too. It was only a matter of time before she had a breakdown.”

“How ironic, then,” Lexie said, “that she’s going to inherit everything—Eagle Glen and Devine Pharmaceuticals, too, now that it’s clear Kell was Penny’s son. It’s like the end of a Chekhov play.”

“Julie is Penny Devine’s only living relative. So that made her the sole heir now that Potty and Vivian go to jail.”

“At least the estate will be worth something. The company stock took a terrible dive. Even if they manage to get MaxiMan on the market, it’s going to take a miracle to get Devine Pharmaceuticals back to where it was.”

“I think Julie’s primary concern is keeping the birds happy at Eagle Glen. As for the company—I don’t imagine she cares much.”

“Hm,” said Crewe. He’d been listening to us while studying one of Penny’s dresses—a girlish red pinafore from her younger days in musicals. “Strange that among all those bones the police found at the tiger sanctuary, none of them belonged to Penny.”

Lexie said, “Do you think the tigers ate Penny?”

“I don’t think Vivian was in the habit of feeding anything but roadkill to her tigers,” I said. “But after her final argument with Kell—after she shot him, and Potty hatched his plan—I think it just made perfect sense to Potty to dispose of the body by giving it to the tigers. If the forensics team hadn’t found evidence in the carport where Vivian prepared all their food, I don’t know if anyone would have ever believed such a gruesome ending to that family saga.”

“But,” Crewe said, “is Penny really dead, Nora?”

“Even the police think she’d have come forward by now if she were alive.”

Lexie shook her head. “What a crazy story.”

Without thinking, Crewe put his hand lightly on Lexie’s back. It was an intimate gesture, I thought, and I noted that she didn’t flinch away from him. I wondered if perhaps they were spending more time together than just the occasional social engagement. Lexie seemed downright comfortable with him. Still her prickly self, of course, but comfortable.

Crewe said, “We’re just glad to see you back at work, Nora. The
Intelligencer
didn’t fire you after all?”

“No, they suspended me for a while.” I managed a smile. “But apparently readers missed my column. So this week I’m back full-time. I’ve got to prove myself all over again.”

Lexie gave my hand an encouraging squeeze. “You’ll do it, sweetie.”

“Would you like to come to dinner with us tonight, Nora?” Crewe asked. “We’re headed to Boater’s to try their gazpacho. We were thinking of sitting outside under their umbrellas. What do you say?”

“Do come,” Lexie said. “Otherwise, Crewe will make me order six entrées by myself.”

“Sorry,” I said. “I’ve got to finish up here, and then I have another appointment.”

“Another time,” Lexie said, giving me a kiss.

“Soon,” I promised.

They strolled away, and I went in the opposite direction, admiring the clothes one more time before they were whisked away to be properly preserved. At the end of the line of mannequins, I was surprised to find Ignacio, of all people.

“Iggy,” I said. “I thought all the polo players had moved on to Florida for the season.”

The handsome athlete turned his sunny smile on me. He was still just about the most attractive man I had ever met—so tall and elegant in his fine clothes, but managing to convey a certain Brazilian manliness at the same time that his cheerful innocence shone through. With enthusiasm, he clasped one of my hands in both of his. “Hello!”

“So nice to see you,” I said.

“Hello?”

“Emma’s very well, thank you. I think she misses you.”

“Hello,” he sighed.

“I’ll tell her you said—well, hello.”

He turned to his companion, a matronly woman in a nondescript gray pants suit and a large, unbecoming picture hat. Beside Ignacio, she was so colorless that she might have blended into the woodwork if I hadn’t recognized her face.

“Run along, Ignacio,” she said crisply. “I’ll catch up with you shortly.”

“Hello,” he murmured to me one more time before slipping away.

“He’s so attractive that I don’t mind that he can’t speak English,” Penny Devine said. “I do love having a good-looking young man around.”

I stared into her face, struck dumb by the fact that she was standing in front of me. It was undeniably Penny. Her sparkling eyes and pert face—although coarsened with a little bit of jowl and a few wrinkles—were undimmed by her plain choice of clothing. She wore no jewelry at all. Her new, chunkier figure would not have squeezed into her old wardrobe, but she appeared to be healthy and very much alive.

She took off her hat to give me a shrewd glance. Her hair was white and cut sensibly short, but not styled. She said, “You look fine in that dress, Nora. I had the good sense to give it to the right person. Not that clothes matter, you know. I’ve given up on my looks, you see.”

“Penny,” I gasped at last.

“Keep your voice down,” she snapped. “After all the trouble I’ve gone to for the last year to get myself a new life, I don’t want some hysterical ninny ruining everything.”

“But—but—you’re alive!”

“And I want to keep it that way.”

“I—I don’t know what to say.”

“So shut up and listen,” she said with all the hostility I remembered. “I only stopped by to look at my clothes one last time. Then I’m leaving for good.”

“But—you could have Eagle Glen, take over Devine Pharmaceuticals—”

“And do what with them? Forget it, I have everything I need—a bank account in the Caymans and plenty of young men who don’t mind keeping company with a rich old lady. Ignacio might be the best of the whole string, don’t you think?”

“He’s adorable,” I admitted.

“I wanted to see my granddaughter,” Penny said, still brusque, but with a different tone. “I figure I owe her a little something, but I can’t get into the hospital where they’re keeping her.”

“I’m sorry. She’s still being treated. If you wait a few more weeks—”

“Have you seen her?”

“I visit every few days, yes. Dilly does, too. He’s—well, I think he’s anxious to try to help her, too. The court gave us permission.”

“I tried to see her a few times myself. Without going to Eagle Glen.”

“You did?”

She gave me a cold smile. “You didn’t recognize me, did you? I went to my own funeral—the polo match. I stayed with the horse trailers, did you notice? And I went to the ballet fund-raiser, too. Julie used to take dance lessons, I heard, so I thought maybe that bastard Potty might have treated her that night. I danced with a man who smelled like mothballs. You saw us.”

“Aldo,” I said. “He’s gone now.”

“Gone? Where?”

“He committed a crime and disappeared. A mob hit—that’s what the police call it.” For my part, I wasn’t sure what to call Aldo’s execution of the man who’d tried to kidnap me. Just thinking of it made my stomach roll.

“Too bad. He was a hell of a dancer.” Again, Penny’s expression slipped and I saw something kinder show through. “But Julie. Will she get through everything that’s happened?”

“She’s receiving wonderful care. I have an acquaintance who’s a very good doctor. And Reed, a young friend of mine, is visiting her often. We’re doing everything possible to make sure Julie recovers and learns to live on her own—that’s our goal. We hope she’ll be capable of independently living. But she’s a very disturbed girl.”

After the final ordeal at Eagle Glen, Julie had retreated into a near-catatonic state. Even now, several weeks into her treatment, she could not be unsupervised for more than a few minutes. For hours, she watched the birds that flocked to the feeder Dilly had installed outside her window.

Penny grunted. “She’s a mess, isn’t she? When I get settled, I’ll send you an address where you can reach me if you ever need money for her.”

“Financially, she’ll always be fine.”

“Good. Money can make up for a lot of other losses in life.”

I took a deep breath. “Do you truly believe that?”

“Yes. Yes, I do. I’ve been buying love for a lot of years, and it works. Maybe if my brother and sister had figured that out, they wouldn’t have had so much time to resent me.” She pierced me with another hard look. “You’re one of those softhearted types, aren’t you? Classy and cool on the outside like your grandmother. But with a real heart inside, just like her. I knew it.” Penny collected herself again. “Well, you can’t help everyone in the world—not even your own child sometimes.”

“You’re thinking of Kell,” I said. “Your son. Are you…?”

“Sorry he’s dead?” The aging actress shook her head. “I was the wrong mother for him. I gave him life, didn’t I? I even made sure he grew up with a decent family. My maid took him and did her best, which was a hell of a lot better than I could have done. What he did with himself after that was his business. No matter what you think, young lady, you can’t live your children’s lives for them.”

“But you can give them skills and the emotional stability to cope—”

“Emotional stability?” Penny barked a laugh. “What kind of emotional stability do you think I had? I came of age on a soundstage! The only emotion I ever knew was the kind a director told me to dump on command. My own mother was my boss, not a loving parent. All I knew was hard work, how to get a job done. Lose weight for a role? Okay, I did that when I had to. I made some bad movies along the way, sure. But—” Aware that her train of thought had drifted, she said, “Your grandmother understood all that. She had a practical side under those pretty clothes of hers. She was a good friend to me. Maybe the only friend I ever really had.”

“I’m sure she was fond of you, too, Penny.”

“Too bad she married that stick-up-his-butt Charlie Blackbird. What a drag. He was all wrong for her. She needed someone with fire, and all she got from him was opera tickets and his granddaddy’s silver. You have a man in your life? A real man?”

“No.”

“Well, find one. That’s my advice. Find one who lights your fire and to hell with proprieties. You don’t have kids, either, right?”

“No,” I said. “I don’t.”

“Well, think about it long and hard before you do, that’s all I have to say.”