Defending Angels (15 page)

Bree sat. Sunshine flooded directly into her eyes. She got up, moved the chair at an angle, and sat down again. Liz’s house was old, built in the Southern Plantation syle with a wraparound porch and gray clapboard. The interior had a hasty look, with an indifference to color and style very much like Liz herself. The bones of the house were good, though, and the view of the Atlantic was superb.

Liz looked even more unkempt than she had when Bree met her at Professor Cianquino’s. Her face was sallow. Her short, graying hair was swept back with a carelessly tied scarf. She wore a baggy pair of trousers and a light pullover top with the sleeves shoved up past her elbows. She paced up and down the length of the sunroom with short, agitated steps and shot a malevolent glance at Bree. “I thought I made it clear that I didn’t want to be bothered with this until you had some results.”

“I’m not going to ask you about ...” Bree hesitated a moment. In for a penny, in for a pound. So she said bluntly, “... the haunting. As far as I can tell, it has nothing to do with the case or what I can do for you.” Unless, she added to herself, you’re crazy as a bedbug and this whole thing’s an exercise in nuttiness. “So let’s set that aside.”

Liz’s shoulders relaxed a little; her restless pacing slowed.

“But I’m going to need some background material before I can go any further. And we can get on a little more efficiently if you wouldn’t mind sitting down.” She smiled. “I’m gettin’ dizzy just watching you wear a path in the carpet.”

Liz looked at her feet with a bewildered air. There was a dun-colored love seat at right angles to Bree; she sat in it abruptly, as if somebody had shoved her.

“Maybe a little coffee would help things along?” Bree suggested. “That nice housekeeper who let me in probably makes a pretty good cup.”

Liz stared at her. A shadowy smile lit her face, and for a moment, Bree caught a glimpse of the pretty woman she must have been twenty years ago. She turned her head over her shoulder and shouted, “Elphine! Coffee!” She ran her hands through her hair and leaned back with a sigh. “Satisfied? Can we get on with it?”

Bree took a yellow pad from her briefcase and prepared to take notes. “Let’s start with some possible business enemies. You’ve been with Mr. Skinner a long time, haven’t you? Were you closely involved in his affairs from the beginning?”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

Bree shrugged. “I won’t know until you tell me. But I’m walking into this absolutely blind, Liz. I’ve been thinking about how to wade into this case. If the police believe Mr. Skinner died of drowning secondary to a heart attack, there’s not going to be a lot of forensic evidence against it. So I’ve sent for the coroner’s report, the autopsy, and the rest, but it’s all going to scream ‘drowning secondary to a heart attack.’ Don’t you think?”

Liz pursed her lips. “Maybe. And maybe there’s been a cover-up. Or just plain incompetence.”

Bree shook her head. “The man’s too well known for a botched investigation. The media’s all over it. And if there’s been a cover-up, the big question is why? The ‘why’ is what I’m after.”

“And you think tramping around in the past is going to turn up a lot of maggots?” She bared her teeth in an unlovely grin. “Well, hell. You could be right.” There was a soft rustling at the lanai doors, and her housekeeper came in with a tray. She was a motherly looking woman in comfortable shoes and a crisp housedress, with shrewd eyes. She handed Bree a cup of coffee and said, “You’re Miss Beaufort?”

Bree smiled up at her. “I am.”

“You know my auntie, I think. Miss Lavinia?” Her eyes, dark, unreadable, looked into Bree’s for a long moment.

Bree wriggled a little under the scrutiny, then nodded, “Yes. I do.”

“She thought maybe you could give me some he’p with a problem of mine. My stepson Rebus. Got himself killed, Rebus did.”

“Of course,” Bree said cordially. She didn’t much like personal injury cases, but she couldn’t turn down a relative of Lavinia’s. She reached into her purse and handed her business card to the housekeeper. “Just call my office and either Mr. Lucheta or Mr. Parchese will set an appointment up for you.”

“Anything else I can help you with?” Liz asked sarcastically. “A couple of new client referrals, maybe?” She looked over her shoulder at her housekeeper. “That’ll do, Elphine.”

Elphine left the sunroom with the same graceful dignity. Bree watched her go thoughtfully, then asked Liz, “She’s been with you awhile? Mrs. Mather, I mean?”

“Who, Elphine? No. As a matter of fact, I signed her on the day before Skinner died. My last housekeeper came down with some damn fool thing and quit. Or did she break a leg? I don’t remember what happened. They all come from an agency. Anyway, the agency sent Elphine when the other one crapped out on me.” She drummed her fingers on the chair arm. “I’ve got a meeting later this afternoon with some possible investors. Can we get on with this?”

“You’d started to tell me about Mr. Skinner’s business enemies. Did you know him well early on?”

“I didn’t start to tell you a damn thing. But there’s no secret to my career, at least. God knows the business magazines have been over it enough. He hired me twenty years ago. I was just out of Wharton, and wanted to make CFO with somebody, anybody, as fast as I could. He was just starting to expand the business overseas, then.” She fell silent, her gaze turned inward. “Skinner,” she said after a long moment, “was not a nice guy. He was a user. He was demanding. And vengeful. If you crossed him, only the devil could help you, because God sure wouldn’t. And he didn’t give a rat’s ass for his wife or kids or anybody else’s.”

“You have a family of your own?” Bree asked.

“Me?” She snorted. “What the hell would I do with a family? Business is all I need. It was all Skinner needed, too.” She shook her head admiringly. “I’ll tell you something, Miss Beaufort. He was one hell of a businessman. Everything he touched turned green. I left Wharton with a hundred thousand dollars in school loans and the clothes on my back. Within five years, I was worth two million. In twenty, I became really rich.” She lifted her hand and held it palm out. “I’ve got a place in Palm Beach, a flat in London ...” She trailed off. “What are you looking at me like that for?” she snapped. “Do you have any idea how much I’m worth? I’ve got ...” She stopped and bit her lip. Then, with a defiant air, “everything I’ve ever wanted out of life.”

Bree looked down at her yellow pad, where she’d absentmindedly doodled a weeping face. She didn’t know if she felt sorry for Liz Overshaw or not. She for sure didn’t like her much. “It’s an impressive achievement, surely.” She took a deep breath. “In all that time, Mr. Skinner must have made a lot of enemies.”

“You know,” Liz said with an air of surprise. “I don’t believe he did. Oh, there were a half dozen people over the years who might have wanted to see him dead. But not many more than that. He was a son of a bitch, but he was an honest son of a bitch. He never shafted anybody, or at least,” she amended, “anybody who didn’t deserve it.”

Bree blinked a little.

“Yeah,” Liz shifted in her chair. “I know what his reputation is. I didn’t say he was nice. He wasn’t. But he wasn’t a crook. And he didn’t tolerate crooks.”

“You said maybe half a dozen sincere enemies over the years. Let’s start with the most recent ones. And the ones who were around Savannah when he passed on.”

“On the theory that the ones in the far past would have knocked him off by now?” Liz shook her head. “You don’t need to look there. I told you where you need to look. Skinner was murdered by one of those four. Fairchild, Montifiore ...”

“Stubblefield and Miss McFarland,” Bree finished for her. She took a deep breath. “Okay, then. What about motive?”

“Beats me.”

“Is there an ongoing connection among the four of them?

“Of course.” Liz frowned with exasperation. “I thought everybody in Savannah knew about it.”

“I’ve only been in town a week or so.” Bree had practiced law in her father’s firm for five years. She’d been exceptionally good at handling difficult clients. She called on those skills now. “So if you could fill me in, I’d appreciate it. Let me guess. I know they were working on a project together?”

“That’s right. Island Dream. It’s a fifteen-story condominium about three miles from here. Beachfront. Fairchild and Skinner bought up the twenty acres surrounding an old fort on the channel quite a while ago. Skinner was thinking about restoring the fort—well, turning it into a family home, anyway. But Lyn died, his wife, and his son wasn’t interested, so Fairchild bought him out. Tore the fort down and built Island Dream. Skinner was livid.”

The Savannah Historical Society was fiercely protective of historic buildings. Bree was surprised that the county had allowed the demolition of the building and said so.

“There was a bit of a stink about it. But Fairchild’s able to twist a lot of arms in town. Or maybe it’s because his family’s been around for ages and he knows where the bodies are buried. Anyhow, he got around the Historical Society. Skinner was bound and determined he wasn’t going to get around him.

“So, Skinner had his knickers in a twist because Fairchild told him he was going to rebuild the fort into six town homes, and the project turned into a hundred and fifteen multimillion-dollar condos. He didn’t have a legal leg to stand on, but he sued Fairchild and Montifiore, the builders, just the same.”

“I didn’t realize Mr. Skinner was fond of old buildings,” Bree said.

Liz snorted. “Not him. He was frantic over the lost profit.” She smiled reminiscently. “That was Ben all over, though. He was worth close to a billion dollars when he was killed and he got hot under the collar over ten million or so.”

“So Montifiore and Fairchild were defendants in the lawsuit,” Bree said. “What about John Stubblefield?”

“He’d drawn up the original contract turning the fort over to Fairchild. His firm represents Skinner, or did, until Skinner sued him for incompetent representation. That firm skates on the thin edge of the wedge anyhow. Skinner swore to put Stubblefield, Marwick out of business for good.”

“Some significant motives here,” Bree observed. “Would you say any of these lawsuits had a legitimate cause of action?”

“Is that a mealymouthed way of asking if these were spite cases? These were spite cases, no question. Part of it was Skinner thought Fairchild had pulled one over on him and part of it was the fact that Fairchild had the pull to get the fort pulled down and Skinner didn’t. So he didn’t need a legitimate reason, as you call it. Not Skinner. He never was one to lie down and let anybody walk over him, much less a bunch of tight-assed, brainless parasites running through their granddaddies’ fortunes.” She smiled—a rather mean smile. Bree’s family knew the Fairchilds, and she had to admit there was some truth to Liz’s malicious assessment.

“Grainger and Jennifer,” she said. “I know they aren’t on your list of suspects ...”

“Skinner’s list. Not mine.”

“Yes,” Bree said noncommittally. “Did he get along with his son?”

“Could have been worse. Skinner expected a lot of the kid. I think he was pretty proud of him when he graduated from medical school. Certainly had no objection to footing the bills to get him set up in his practice in Savannah. Now, he didn’t lavish tons of money on the boy. Grainger has a trust fund, a modest one, considering Skinner’s own net worth. And he won’t get a dime more now that Skinner’s dead. That was all settled years ago. So I wouldn’t say there was any problem on Skinner’s side.”

“That implies Grainger had a problem with his dad.”

“Grainger. Yes. Good old Grainger.” Liz squeezed her eyes shut and opened them again. “You know that Skinner pretty much came from nothing. Dirt-poor Georgia farmer, yada, yada. And Grainger married up.”

“Jennifer Pendergast that was,” Bree said. “Sure. Her family’s been in Georgia since Oglethorpe banned all the lawyers.”

“I suppose you knew her.” Liz smiled that wintry smile. “You debs stick together, huh? Well, Miss Jennifer didn’t quite approve of dear old dad’s country ways. Especially when she discovered Grainger had inherited all he was going to get, and there wasn’t any more where that came from.”

“So she may have had a grudge.”

“
May
have. Ha! I’ll tell you one thing, that young lady was doing her damndest to get Skinner to change his mind about the Skinner Foundation.”

“I’ve heard of the Skinner Foundation,” Bree said. “It subsidizes all those PBS programs.”

“That’s the one. And a lot more besides that. Anyhow, that’s what benefits from Skinner’s death. Miss Jennifer wanted to change all that.”

“Did she?”

Liz shrugged. “Maybe. Why don’t you ask her?”

“I just might.”

Liz rose, yawned, and stretched her arms over her head. “That’s it. God, I’m beat.” She sat down abruptly and ran one hand over her face. “So is your curiosity satisfied? You’re going to get on with finding out who murdered Skinner? Cianquino assured me that you’d get results. Are you going to get results? I’m not real impressed with what you and your firm have accomplished so far.”

Bree tucked her yellow pad back into her briefcase. There was, after all, a limit to how much a lawyer had to indulge a client. She kept her tone as polite as she knew how. “May I ask you something? About this idea Mr. Skinner was murdered?”

Liz scowled.

“Mr. Skinner was on board the
Sea Mew
when he had his heart attack and fell into the ocean. The only two people on board were his son and his daughter-in-law. I know what ... um, Mr. Skinner told you. But what about you? Do you think they killed him and lied to the police? Do you think the two of them are innocent, and that he died of a slow-acting poison somebody slipped into his drink at the country club?” Bree allowed herself a hint of exasperation. “Was somebody else on board invisible to his son and his wife? Not aliens, I hope.”