Accessory to Murder (22 page)

“Then what happened?” Alyce said. “I mean, after you kissed him?”

“I'll never tell,” Josie said.

“But I'm your best friend.”

“Exactly,” Josie said. “That's why I'm in your kitchen at nine in the morning. Mike has an absolutely brilliant idea. I think it could help. We need to talk. Where's Jake?”

“Upstairs,” Alyce said. “He's still asleep. It's the nanny's day off, as you can see. I get to play with Justin.”

“Daddy sleep!” Justin shrieked, and exuberantly squashed a chunk of banana on his high chair.

“Not if you keep yelling like that, big boy,” Alyce said.

“Get book!” he said. “Get Bob!”

“Right. Get your book,” Alyce said, helping him down.

Justin toddled off to find a board book of
Bob the Builder
. He dropped it in a plastic dump truck. “Vrrooom. Vroom.” Justin made truck noises as he drove it back to the kitchen.

“Testosterone takes over long before age two,” Alyce said. “I told myself I wasn't getting him gender-specific toys. I'd let him choose. No matter what I gave him, he made it into a truck. When I found him crashing his Teddy bear into his giraffe, I gave in and got him trucks. Bob the Builder is his idol.”

“There are worse ones,” Josie said. “At least Bob does something useful.”

Justin plopped down and began gnawing on his Bob the Builder board book.

“That's a good book,” Alyce said.

“Meaty plot,” Josie said.

Justin drooled happily.

“He's teething, poor little guy,” Alyce said. “With any luck, he'll gnaw on Bob for a while. He can take it. So what's Mike's brilliant idea? Do you care for any coffee or cheesecake?”

“I'm never eating again,” Josie said. “But I would like some coffee.”

She was sorry as soon as she said the words. Josie waited impatiently while Alyce fussed with her fancy German coffeemaker. She was eager to explain Mike's theory, but she needed Alyce's full attention.

Finally, Josie had a steaming cup in front of her. Justin was still testing the strength and endurance of Bob the Builder. Alyce settled into a chair at the granite island. In the harsh morning light, Josie could see how worn her friend looked. The dark shadows under her eyes were becoming permanent. All the concealer in West County couldn't help her. Alyce needed hope, and lots of it. Josie thought she could give her a good dose.

“This has to be good,” Alyce said. “You're squirming worse than Justin. Tell me what Mike said.”

“Let's suppose that Jake is telling the truth and he didn't have an affair with Halley,” Josie said.

“Of course, he's telling the truth,” Alyce said.

Oops. Josie had wandered into quicksand already. “That's what I mean. I was speaking from the police viewpoint. They think he had the affair with Halley. Jake said he wasn't at the hotel for law firm business, but it was business. That confused me, until I talked with Mike. Does Jake have any money to invest?”

“Well, there's his 401(k) and some stocks, but that's about it. How much are you talking about?”

“At least a hundred thousand, more like half a million.”

“Out of our league,” Alyce said. “We have a mortgage, two cars, country-club dues, the nanny—the usual expenses. And that was before Jake had to get a lawyer.”

“Any savings accounts?” Josie asked.

“A small money market,” Alyce said. “Nothing with that kind of money.”

“I know the police took your financial records, but do you have copies of them?”

“Don't need copies,” Alyce said. “We bank online and we bought a new laptop. We can check them anytime.”

“Have the police asked any further questions about your accounts? Is any money missing?”

“No,” Alyce said.

“Are all the accounts in both your names?”

“Where is this going, Josie?” Alyce looked wary. Her coffee sat untouched on the counter. Justin gnawed quietly on his book.

Suddenly, Josie knew Mike's bright idea was a disaster. She wanted to run out the door. She wanted to take her words back. If only you could hit rewind in real life. Now it was too late.

“Josie?” Alyce said. “What's wrong?”

“Uh, I think I misunderstood something Mike said. I'd better go.”

“Josie Marcus, you're going to stay right here and tell me.” Alyce's gray-blue eyes were cold and hard as slate. “I need to know. Even if it's bad, it's better to know.”

There was nothing to do but go forward. Alyce had the right to know, Josie thought. No matter how painful that knowledge was, ignorance would hurt even more.

“Did you get some money when your parents died?” Josie said.

“More than eight hundred thousand dollars,” Alyce said. “We spent some on the house and a trip, then put the rest in a special account for Justin's education. It was about seven hundred fifty thousand. But I don't consider it our money. It's Justin's. We never touch it. That's why I didn't mention it.”

They'd need every penny of that fund to educate the little guy gnawing on Bob. Justin's primary school would cost ten thousand or more a year, long before he got to college.

“Is the money still there?” Josie said.

“What do you mean, is it still there?” Alyce said.

“Halley needed investors' money for her New York enterprise. Hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

“So?” Alyce said.

“What if Jake was putting together a group of investors for Halley, and he was one of them?”

“You think my husband gambled with our son's future?”

“I'm probably wrong.” I hope I'm wrong, Josie thought. Please, let me be wrong.

Alyce looked panic-stricken. “I haven't looked at that account in months. We left it in my mother's old bank in Pittsburgh. I keep the passbook in my kitchen desk.”

She pulled out
Joy of Cooking
. “It's still here. The police didn't find it. See, with interest, it's seven hundred fifty seven thousand dollars.”

“Who has access to the account?” Josie asked.

“Jake and I. Either one of us can put money in.”

Or take it out, Josie thought.

Alyce must have had the same thought. She ran to the laptop at her kitchen desk and logged on. It wouldn't connect to the Internet fast enough for her.

“Come on,” Alyce wailed, and walloped the computer until she was online. Her fingers pounded the keys, and she was in the bank's Web site. She typed in her password wrong, yelled “Shit!” and typed it again.

The screen blinked, then unscrolled a long list of figures.

“That son of a bitch!” Alyce screamed. “It's gone. It's all gone except for fifty-seven thousand dollars. Jake stole our son's future.”

“You don't know that,” Josie said.

But Alyce was a wild woman, her pale hair flying as she raced up the stairs. She beat on the master bedroom door and shrieked, “Jake, open up.”

Josie caught a glimpse of Jake's face, drawn and unshaven. She heard Alyce cry, “Tell me it isn't true. Tell me you didn't give our child's money to that woman.”

“Shh,” Jake said. “She'll hear you.” He took her hand and drew her into the bedroom. The door slammed.

Josie wanted to leave. She could hear Alyce's screams coming from upstairs and cries of, “You bastard!”

Justin looked at Josie with big, trusting eyes. A little fluff of dark hair stuck straight up. He slobbered happily over Bob the Builder. Josie wanted to burst into wails, but she couldn't. She tried a crooked smile.

Justin smiled back, and showed two new sharp teeth.

“Hey, handsome, you've got what it takes to get the girls,” Josie said.

Justin laughed. Josie wished she could laugh with him. “Want me to read that?”

“Bob the Builder!” Justin said.

She took that as a yes.

Josie was halfway through
We Can Do It!
when Alyce came downstairs, her eyes red and swollen with tears. One look at her friend's tortured face, and Josie knew there were worse betrayals than adultery.

“Let's go, before I'm the one arrested for murder,” Alyce said.

She threw on a coat and bundled Justin for a cold day. In the garage, she transferred his car seat to Josie's Honda. “I don't trust myself to drive,” Alyce said.

“Where do you want to go?” Josie said.

“Nowhere. Anywhere. Away. Just drive. I want to go home and I can't. I wish my mother was alive. I'd take Justin, grab the first plane, and go see her. I miss her every single day.

“Justin's money was special, Josie. Mom knew Jake would make enough to support us. But this was her way to look after her grandson. And now Jake's stupid, cowardly, idiotic—” She slapped the dashboard with every word.

Josie's small car didn't seem big enough to hold Alyce's rage. Josie was afraid it would melt the windows and burn the seats. She looked in the rearview mirror. Justin had stopped gnawing on Bob. His face got that cloudy look little kids have before they burst into tears. Josie tried to head off the oncoming wails.

“Alyce, that won't help. Justin shouldn't hear it.”

Alyce took a deep breath. “You're right. I'm just so angry at Jake. I wish he had screwed her.”

“Daddy!” Justin crowed. He pointed out the window at a farm. “Cow! Cow goes moooooooo.”

“That's right,” Alyce said. “And there's a horsie. What does a horse say?”

Helping Justin with his animal sounds seemed to calm her. Josie drove on the lonely country roads around Alyce's house, past bare woods and dead winter fields.

“This is so peaceful,” Alyce said.

Personally, the woods gave Josie the creeps. She thought they were good places to bury bodies. If Jake was her husband, she'd be digging a deep hole in that stand of maples.

Justin went back to gnawing contentedly on Bob.

“Jake forged my signature,” Alyce said. “It takes both our signatures to take money out.”

“The bank didn't notice it wasn't your signature? Is he that good a forger?” Josie asked.

“Married people forge each other's signatures all the time,” Alyce said. “I can probably sign Jake's name better than he can. But I always tell him. Usually it's something like our income taxes needed to go out right away and Jake's on a trip. I signed his name and sent it off.

“Jake said he got a ‘sure tip' from a client and he put two hundred thousand from Justin's college fund in the stock market. He didn't consult me because he knew it would make us a fortune. He wanted to surprise me. Well, surprise. He lost it. Every last cent. But did that teach him anything? No.”

Alyce leaned back on the headrest and closed her eyes. “Halley convinced him she was the next hot thing. The greeting-card queen Mary Engelbreit is a St. Louisan. Halley told Jake she'd have the same fabulous success. Jake was desperate enough to believe her. He had to get the money back. The more he investigated Halley's prospects, the more he was convinced she would make it big.

“Jake took the rest of our son's money—five hundred thousand dollars. He was one of five investors behind Halley. But Jake wasn't taking any chances. He made the investors buy a keyman policy for five million dollars on Halley.”

“I think I know what that is,” Josie said. “If anything happened to Halley, the investors would get paid a ton of money to cover their loss.”

“Right. The keyman policy was Jake's idea. Now he's telling me not to worry. He says the college fund won't lose any money—in fact it will make money. He was just waiting for the policy payoff to replace it before he told me.

“He's an idiot. He's given the police the perfect motive for murdering Halley. It would take years for Halley's company to make a profit. But if she died now, they'd get rich quick.”

“Do the police know about the keyman policy?” Josie said.

“If they don't, they will,” Alyce said. “The insurance company is going to be looking for reasons not to pay the investors.”

“You didn't know anything about this policy?” Josie said.

“No.” The word came down like a hammer.

“So that conversation the witness heard in the hotel hall was real?” Josie said.

“You mean the one where Halley said, ‘Your wife will find out anyway.' And my stupid husband said, ‘Not if you don't—' and then pushed her inside the suite?”

“Yes, that one. Why was he with her at the hotel that day?”

“She wanted the last fifty thousand out of Justin's account for start-up costs. He wouldn't give it to her, and they had a fight.”