Death of a Dog Whisperer (9780758284570) (21 page)

“Are they still together?” I asked.

“No way. Zane is long gone. He met some guy who said he could introduce him around in L.A. and Zane bought a plane ticket and took off. He never even looked back. I guess he didn't want a wife and kid tying him down anymore.”

“Bastard,” I muttered under my breath.

“You got it.”

“What's your part in all this?” I asked him.

Taran looked at me and shrugged. “Old friend who reminded Anabelle of better days? Occasional baby-sitter and shoulder to cry on? Anabelle and I reconnected when I came up here for a job after college. Mostly I just watched the whole mess unfold from the sidelines. Zane's music scene and his ultra cool buddies? That wasn't my idea of a good time.”

“Tell me about the money,” I said.

“About a year ago, Alexander started having medical problems. It turned out that he needed surgery. Anabelle had insurance but it wasn't enough. She was pretty frantic. Her credit cards are maxed out. The loan officer at the bank just laughed at her. She needed money fast and she had no way to get it.”

“Why didn't she contact her family and ask for help?”

“Her father had told her that she was dead to him.” Taran's voice was hard. “She would have groveled for Alexander's sake, if that's what it took. But she didn't think it would do any good.”

Would Claire's parents have turned their back on a grandchild in need? I wondered. The notion seemed almost incomprehensible to me. But then I couldn't imagine throwing a child out of the house in the first place.

“So I got this bright idea about borrowing the money from Nick. He was living in Connecticut and doing pretty well. His business was starting to take off.”

“And Anabelle agreed to that?”

“No way. She told me absolutely not. She figured Nick was like the rest of her family. That he'd turn his back on her too.”

“And yet he gave her the money she needed,” I said.

“That's right,” Taran told me. “But Anabelle didn't know that because I never told her where I got the money from. At least not at first, anyway. And I didn't tell Nick what I needed the loan for either.”

“You're quite the manipulator,” I said.

Taran shook his head. “You're missing the point. It wasn't about me. It was about making things work. So Alexander had his operation and everything went great. The only problem was, Anabelle didn't have the money to pay me back. Which meant that I couldn't repay Nick.”

“What did you do when he started pressuring you?”

“I stalled for a while. What other choice did I have? Nick was pissed about it, but I just kept putting him off. He and I had been buddies for a long time, and this loan put a big strain on our friendship. Eventually I had to do something, so I confessed to Anabelle about where the money had come from.”

“And when she found out, she called Nick,” I said.

“Well, first she read me the riot act.” Taran smiled ruefully. “And then she got all teary-eyed about the fact that the money to save Alexander had come from a brother she thought had forgotten all about her. But finally, after she pulled herself together, Anabelle said that it wasn't fair for me to be caught in the middle, especially since I'd only been trying to help. So she called Nick and told him where the money had gone.”

“He must have been shocked to hear from her,” I said.

“He was. But also—according to what Anabelle told me—really happy about it too. Nick was thrilled to find out that he had a nephew. He said that he was going to break the news to Claire, and then he wanted to make plans for all of them to get together.”

I exhaled slowly. Hearing about their missed opportunity felt like a punch in the gut. “What a shame that Nick never got to go through with his plan.”

“I know, right? Anabelle was heartbroken. She heard about his death on the news. What a way to find out. She'd finally managed to reconnect with her long-lost family and next thing she knew Nick was dead. It really put her into a tailspin.”

“But she still has Claire,” I said. “Claire is Anabelle's family too. And now that Nick is gone—”

“You don't get it,” said Taran. “That's precisely the problem. Anabelle doesn't want to have anything to do with Claire.”

“Why on earth not?”

“She's gotten this stupid idea in her head that she's bad luck. Nick helped her and now he's dead. She told me she couldn't stand it if something happened to Claire too. Anabelle thinks the best thing she could do for her little sister would be to disappear again.”

“T
hat's crazy!” I said.

“I know.” Taran frowned. “But Anabelle made me promise that I wouldn't tell Claire about her. She intends to stay as far away from her little sister as possible.”

“But Anabelle wasn't responsible for Nick's death.” I peered at Taran across the table. “Was she?”

“Of course not! But you told me the police are looking for her. So they must think she's a suspect.”

“No,” I said. “They just want to talk to her, because they know she was in touch Nick right before he died.”

“If the police want to talk to Anabelle,” said Taran, “they're going to have to find her themselves. I wouldn't wish that guy—what's his name, O'Malley?—on my worst enemy.”

“So you've already met the detective?”

“Oh yeah.” Taran lifted his near-empty mug and drained the dregs. “We had a long chat. Diana sicced him on me. She told him that I had a motive for wanting Nick dead and he agreed. It was just lucky for me that I had an ironclad alibi.”

Taran reached across the table and slid the bowl of peanuts over in front of himself. There were as many empty shells as peanuts left in the bowl now. Idly he sifted through the remains.

“Look,” he said. “Here's where I'm coming from. Anabelle never talks about her family but I know she still misses them. And with Zane out of the picture, she and Alexander are all alone. I promised Anabelle that I wouldn't contact Claire myself. But I didn't say anything about encouraging someone else to get them together.”

“That's the message you spoke about earlier?”

“Could be.” Taran held up his hands palms facing outward, and gazed at me innocently. “It didn't come from me. I just happen to think that somebody . . . you know, some
friend
. . . might want to do something to help.”

I nodded.

“And one more thing.”

Holy moley, there was
more?
I signaled to the waitress and beckoned her over. Taran's tab was definitely on me.

He waited until I had completed the arrangements and then said, “You know how I told you that Diana sent O'Malley after me? I'm thinking she did that to draw the detective's attention away from herself.”

“How come?” I asked.

“I'll let her tell you that.”

Taran stood up and headed for the door. I wasn't ready for our interview to end, but apparently Taran had decided that it was over. I grabbed my purse and hurried after him.

He opened the door and held it for me. We stepped out onto the sidewalk together.

“Ask Diana what she did when she found out that Nick was more involved with one of his clients than he'd let on,” he said.

“Which client?” I called after him as he began to walk away. I had a pretty good guess but I wanted to hear him say the name.

Taran didn't oblige me. He just shrugged and kept on walking.

On the way home, I stopped at Post Pizza and picked up dinner. I figure that if you choose wisely, pizza gives you a shot at all the important food groups. So by the time I'd added a mixed salad and poured the kids a couple glasses of milk, I was feeling positively virtuous about the meal.

After dinner, Bob called to let me know that he and I had an appointment the following afternoon.

“Nice of you to check my schedule first,” I said. “Where are we going?”

“New Canaan,” Bob replied. “And hey, we're all busy. I figured you could find a way to fit this in, especially since you've left me to do all the detective work by myself.”

For a moment, I was utterly stumped. I'd had so much on my mind lately, I had no idea what Bob was talking about. Then the light bulb went on.

“Oh,” I said. “The diamond ring.”

“Of course, the diamond ring. What else would I be calling about?”

“Don't ask.”

“If you say so.”

My ex-husband lives by the credo
Don't borrow trouble
. If I could only figure out a way to adopt the same attitude, it would simply my life enormously.

“You remember the Morrises, right?” he asked.

“Sure. But you said Emily Morris told you the ring wasn't hers.”

“It's not. But today I found out that having seen it, she got interested in its provenance too. She went looking through their old records and made a few calls. Eventually she found her way to a couple in New Canaan named Jim and Susan Bell.”

“And they fit into the story how?”

“The Morrises bought this house from an elderly couple who had lived here since the middle of the last century. Both of them have since passed on. Susan Bell is their granddaughter.”

“It sounds like Emily Morris was the one doing all the detective work,” I mentioned.

“Some of it, sure.” Bob adopted a wounded tone. “But I followed up and convinced the Bells to meet with us.”

“Well done,” I told him.

Just like my Poodles, my ex responds well to positive reinforcement. I let him preen for a few minutes, then suggested that he pick me up after lunch on Sunday so that we could ride to New Canaan together. After we hung up it occurred to me to wonder whether Bob had taken my advice and stashed the ring at a bank—and if he'd done so, whether it had occurred to him that he wouldn't be able to retrieve the ring in the morning.

Not my problem, I thought. As it turned out, I needn't have worried. When Bob showed up, he had the ring with him.

Sam had taken the kids to a matinee so when Bob's dark green Explorer pulled in the driveway the following afternoon, I tucked Augie into his crate, gave the rest of the Poodles a good-bye pat, and ran outside to meet him. As I climbed into the SUV and got settled in the front seat beside him, Bob reached into his pocket, withdrew the small, velvet jewelry pouch, and tossed it onto my lap.

“Hold on to that, would you?”

“I'd be happy to.”

I unknotted the drawstring and tipped the ring out of the bag into the palm of my hand. The diamonds sparkled and glinted in the sun as I rolled the piece from side to side. Unable to resist, I slid the ring on my little finger, then held up my hand to admire the look.

“If we don't find a home for this,” I teased, “I could be convinced to take it off your hands.”

“You'd have to get in line,” Bob muttered. Head swiveled around to look behind us, he backed out of the driveway and onto the road.

“Behind whom?”

Bob waited until he'd straightened out before replying. “Remember that ghost problem I thought I was having?”

I nodded but didn't say a thing. My expression must have revealed what I was thinking, however, because Bob glanced my way and said, “Yeah, I know. You thought it was dumb.”

“I didn't say that.”

“You didn't have to. Even
I
knew that the idea was a little out there.”

“A little?” I laughed.

“Okay, maybe way out. But I got this notion in my head that when I opened up the walls of the house, I was somehow reawakening its past. And yes, I know that sounds a little crazy in the light of day. But in my defense, I was trying to come up with an explanation for the noises I'd been hearing. And now I have. I'm pretty sure that it was James.”

“James . . . ?” I said, then stopped. If you discarded the ghost theory—which I most emphatically did—I supposed that Bob's covetous next-door neighbor had to be the next most likely culprit. Except for one thing. Bob had started hearing noises
before
he found the diamond ring. “You'd better start at the beginning,” I said.

“You know how close together the houses are in that neighborhood?”

“Of course.” I nodded. I'd lived there too.

“Well, the other day James made some offhand comment about things that go bump in the night. I asked him what he meant and it turns out that a couple of times when I'd been working kind of late, he and Amber could hear me banging around when they were trying to sleep.”

“If it bothered them, why didn't he call and tell you to stop?”

Bob shrugged. “I guess he didn't think that would be a neighborly thing to do.”

“But thumping around outside your house
would?
” I asked incredulously.

“Don't ask me to justify it. I can't even begin to make sense of how James's mind works. He still keeps coming over and wanting to help me knock stuff down. He actually seems to believe that we're going to find more hidden jewels.”

“And how exactly would that help him?” I asked.

“Finders keepers?”

“Possession is nine tenths of the law,” I countered. “I hope you're keeping your doors locked now.”

“Believe me, I am. This whole situation has me kind of creeped out. I used to think it was a good thing to be a trusting person. But not anymore. I'm thinking about changing the locks, too.”

“You should,” I agreed.

“When I do, I'll make sure that you and Davey get a new set of keys.”

“Thanks. I'd appreciate that.”

“And speaking of James,” Bob said as he flipped on his blinker and turned the SUV up the ramp onto the parkway. “Here's something else. I told him he needs to go out and find himself a job. Any job. Even if it's not the kind of thing he did before. When I said that, he acted really oddly. Kind of furtive, I guess, but also excited at the same time. He told me he's already working on something, that there's the prospect of a big opportunity coming up.”

“Oh really?” I swiveled in the seat to face my ex. “Let me guess. Is this the same get-rich-quick scheme that he wanted you to invest in before?”

“Apparently so. James offered me the chance again to join him and get in on the ground floor.”

“What a great guy,” I said with a laugh. “The ground floor of what? Did you manage to find out what his plan is this time?”

“Not exactly,” Bob admitted. “But trust me, James isn't nearly as subtle as he thinks he is. A couple of times recently he's sounded me out to see how I feel about the new medical marijuana laws. He's never come right out and said it but I'm guessing that his big opportunity has to do with growing pot.”

“You're kidding.”

“I wish I was. Somehow that doesn't sound like the kind of career move that's going to get James out of my hair.”

“It doesn't sound like any career move at all to me,” I said flatly. “The medical marijuana field is highly regulated. I'm pretty sure that Connecticut has all sorts of strict requirements and qualifications for growers. It's not just some cash crop that you can cultivate in a bin in your basement.”

“I don't think James has a clue about all that.”

“Well, he'd better get one fast. Otherwise what he's planning is illegal. You might try passing that news along.”

“No way. I'm steering clear of the whole mess.” Bob shook his head firmly as we exited the parkway at South Avenue and headed toward downtown New Canaan. “Whatever kind of idiocy James hopes to get himself involved in, I don't want any part of it. As far as I know, things are still in the planning stages. With luck, he'll come to his senses before it goes any further.”

“I certainly hope so,” I said. If not, one of us might need to go have a chat with Detective O'Malley about the neighbor's budding business.

Bob turned down a side street and slowed the car so that we could read the identifying numbers on the mailboxes. On either side of the road were beautifully maintained, classic, older homes on side-by-side half-acre lots. In New Canaan, this was considered a starter neighborhood.

The Bells' house was at the end of the road. A low fence circled the backyard, which contained a swing set and an elaborate bird feeder hanging from a large maple tree. Idly I wondered if the Bells had a dog. That's just the way my mind works.

Susan Bell answered the door with a baby on her hip and a smile on her face. Her husband, Jim, was right behind her. Clearly they'd been anticipating our arrival.

“I can't wait to see Grandma's ring,” Susan said as Bob and I walked inside. Then she stopped and laughed. “I'm sorry. That was horribly rude of me. I guess we should start with introductions.”

So we did. Jim was tall and spare, with a direct gaze and a firm handshake. He worked in a corporate office in downtown Stamford. The baby's name was Franny and she was the Bells' first child. She gurgled and squealed, and when she made a grab for my hair, I laughed with her. Susan was in her early thirties, with sleek brown hair and a spray of freckles across her nose. She was, she confided, newly pregnant with their second child.