False Pretenses (15 page)

She looked at the envelope for a moment, then placed it in a drawer of her desk. She locked the drawer.

“First things first,” Laurette said, willing the pain to subside. She despised painkillers. They numbed and slowed her mind. “Henkle,” she said. “Our dear Senator Henkle.”

“It's over,” said Michael.

“I'm beginning to think that Catherine, despite all her wildness, has more guts than you do, Michael, and you, Bradley. Now, you will indeed break off with the fellow in those photographs. No, don't argue with me, Bradley! Break it off. Then you will arrange to see Jenny again.”

“But why, Grandmother? You know as well as I do that Senator Henkle would act.”

“Photographs,” she said very gently, “don't have to be the doing of only one person. No, indeed.” Timothy had taught her that many years before. She couldn't remember the details now, but it had worked. Timothy had laughed and rubbed his hands together, and she had learned that ruthlessness was the key to the game.

Brad stared at her, at first not understanding. When he did, he wanted to puke. “I can't,” he said.

“You will do as you're told,” said Laurette, out of patience with him now. “You will call Jenny and convince her that breaking off with her was a mistake. To convince her of your love, you will take her to a motel that we select in advance. You will make love to her very thoroughly. I trust you will be able to manage that with aplomb. Then we will pay a visit to Senator Henkle. With photos of our own.”

 

A week went by. There was nothing about a breaking of the engagement of Bradley Carleton and Jennifer Henkle.

“I don't understand,” Elizabeth said.

Rod sat back in his huge leather chair, his expression thoughtful. “I don't either, yet.”

They did, that afternoon. Elizabeth withdrew photos from an unmarked envelope. They were of Bradley and Jennifer Henkle, naked, in various positions. Some of them were on a bed, some on the floor. The close-up details were devastating. That poor girl, Elizabeth thought, hating herself in that moment for starting the whole thing. Jennifer Henkle was innocent, and now this.

There was a note enclosed that said only, “If you publish the photos of Bradley Carleton, these will also be published. They will ruin Senator Henkle and his entire family.”

“Hardball, Elizabeth,” Rod said softly.

“That's one to Laurette, isn't it?”

“Unless you want the Henkles on your conscience.”

Elizabeth rose from her chair and unconsciously smoothed down her wool skirt. “No, you know I wouldn't go that far.”

“I wonder what the senator will do,” Adrian said aloud.

 

The wedding date of Bradley Carleton and Jennifer Henkle was announced the following day. Just one month after Rowe Chalmers would be married.

Elizabeth's OBC project died on the spot. “But only until we can come up with something else,” she said. “He'll make a mistake, a big one. Then we'll strike.”

That evening, Christian wondered what was wrong with her. She was withdrawn, silent. He began kissing her, the first time drawing her tightly against him. She did nothing, didn't react one way or the other.

“I've got to do something, Christian,” she said at last when he released her.

Christian sighed inwardly. “Something I can help you with, Elizabeth?”

She wanted to say yes, to pour it all out, but she didn't. Rowe had taught her well, too well. “Forgive me,” she said, trying to soften her words. “It's something quite foolish, really, Christian. Nothing that should concern you. I'm sorry to be such a pain.” She gave him a big smile and hugged him. “You're so important to me,” she whispered against his shoulder.

“Yes,” he said, kissing her hair. “I want to be.” He wondered if she were thinking of Rowen Chalmers, and bit his lower lip in rage. But he couldn't ask her.

 

“I
want to know what
you
want, Catherine. You're twenty-four years old. You graduated from Harvard. I want you to tell me what you want to do with your life.”

Her granddaughter looked thin, the flesh of her face drawn too tightly over the bones. There were dark shadows beneath her expressive eyes, attesting that she wasn't sleeping well. Laurette wondered if perhaps Catherine were still ill. Ill, she thought with a wince at her ridiculous euphemism. Catherine had spent nearly two weeks in a private sanatorium in Vermont, and supposedly had no more addiction to cocaine. But she was still irritable, still nervous, her body flinching at any unexpected sound.

Laurette said softly when Catherine didn't answer her, “I want you to be happy, my dear. But you must be strong now. You must search for your direction.”

Catherine laughed, but it wasn't a healthy sound. “My direction,” she mused aloud, staring away from her grandmother. “I don't know. I really don't know.”

“I remember how well you did in mathematics, my dear. You were the top of your class, remember?”

It seemed a century ago to Catherine. “Yes,” she said, “I remember.”

“I even remember when you wanted to become a wildcatter,” Laurette said, giving Catherine her special smile. “You were five years old and you'd just gotten a kitten. You heard your father talking about oil drilling and announced that that was what you wanted to do if you could find more cats like Marvin.”

Catherine grinned at that. “Goodness, Grandmother, I hadn't thought about that in years! I remember you laughing and kissing me.”

There hadn't been much laughter or kissing of late, Laurette thought. Life had become so complicated. She said gently, coming back to the present, “You did so well in your first three years at Harvard.”

“Yes, until . . .”

“Until you decided to be a flighty, useless rich girl.”

Catherine sucked in her breath, her eyes flying to her grandmother's face. “That's cruel.”

“Perhaps, but it's the truth. You're no longer five years old, Catherine. You're a grown woman. It's time you acted like one. It's time you did something with yourself. A life without goals is a sorry excuse for existence. Do you remember your Great-Aunt Marion? She had face-lifts every couple of years, bought clothes until she had to have more closets built to hold them. But she had no goals, Catherine. She wasn't ever a happy woman.”

“I don't suppose so,” Catherine said. “I remember Father saying she was crazy.”

“No, she was a woman who elected to live her life through other people. Through her husband and perhaps through me, her older sister. All those ghastly rules about women and what they should and shouldn't do. She never got beyond those strictures, never saw herself as free to be what she wished.” Laurette paused. She must be getting old, all these memories, all of them set in concrete now. There was
the present and Catherine and she had to help her. She said abruptly, “Now, my dear, Chad Walters is dead, as is your unfortunate drug habit. It is time to face up to things.”

Catherine didn't reply. That pain, that never-ending elusive pain, continued to gnaw at her. She hadn't loved Chad, but his death had come as such an awful shock. She was tempted to laugh about her drug addiction. But she felt too awful. She needed to buy more coke,
had
to. She said finally, “Look at Jenny Henkle, a woman of the new millennium. She went to a good school, if I remember correctly. She won't do anything except have babies and buy clothes and order servants about. Once she's a Carleton, that is. She's just like Great-Aunt Marion, isn't she?”

“Not really. She has no particular talent or desire to be something beyond what is offered. Do you consider yourself like Jennifer?”

“No, Jenny's so sweet and innocent.”

Laurette pictured those photos of Brad and Jenny in her mind, and winced just a bit. At least Brad had promised no more men.

Catherine rose to her feet, unable to sit still any longer. She loved her grandmother, occasionally feared her, as did every other member of the family. But Laurette couldn't help her with this. God, she needed some coke. She couldn't seem to think about anything else. Her
direction,
for God's sake!

“I'm really very tired, Grandmother. I think I'll go on up to bed now.”

Laurette wanted to shake her, wanted to tell her that all of a sudden she'd wake up and be eighty-four years old and wonder what had become of all those years. She drew on her patience. “Very well, my dear. You do need your sleep. We'll talk again tomorrow.”

An hour later, Catherine had slipped out of her grandmother's house and was on her way to New York City. Her nose was running again. Thank God
her grandmother hadn't noticed. She reached for a Kleenex.

Her hands were gripping the wheel when she finally entered the city. Where to go? Where to buy cocaine? Chad had always provided all she needed, all very high quality. But Chad was dead.

She forced down the tears. Dammit, she hadn't loved him. He was a criminal, after all, and she had paid all the bills. She had to have some coke.

Catherine drove down Broadway very slowly, her eyes on the streets. She cut over at Thirteenth Street to Fifth and continued down to Washington Square. She drove more slowly now, alert to the people on the streets. She was drawing attention, her bright red Porsche the focus of the milling men who lounged in the doorways and on the corners. She saw a tall black man with a well-dressed white man speaking in the recessed doorway of a darkened building. She saw something change hands. Her heart speeded up. She slowed the car. The white man nodded, turned, and walked quickly away. She sniffed and jerked the wheel. The black man looked up, and she could feel him studying her, her car. She started to roll down the window; then she saw his eyes. They were cold, terrifying. He waved at her and started toward the car. It was then she saw another man in the shadows. He lifted his arm and she saw a gun.

“Oh, God,” she whispered. He was close now, and she felt frozen.

His hands reached out for the door handle. Catherine gave a small cry and slammed in the clutch and down on the gas. The Porsche jerked and coughed. She heard a shout from the man, and forced herself to ease more carefully on the clutch.

She looked back, seeing him standing in the street. He gave her an obscene gesture, and shouted something she thankfully couldn't understand. She couldn't see the other man, the one with the gun.

Catherine was trembling. She grabbed a Kleenex and wiped her nose. It was red. Her blood. She was crying and the blood was mixing with her tears. A pale red drop fell to the white of her cashmere sweater.

She finally pulled the Porsche over on a deserted street. She was somewhere on the East Side, in a residential district. She didn't know how she'd gotten here. She leaned her head against the steering wheel and sobbed.

The knock against the window glass nearly made her stop breathing. She jerked about, a scream rising in her throat, to see a cop standing beside the Porsche, looking at her with some concern.

She wanted suddenly to laugh. Should she tell him she was trying to buy cocaine but a man had terrified her? Should she tell him about the other man, the one with the gun? Should she tell him that she couldn't bear herself any longer and she wanted to die?

“Miss? Are you all right?”

Catherine got a hold of herself and tried to swallow her tears. The cop was young, his face fresh. One of New York's finest, and not too long on the beat, she thought. She rolled down the window. “I'm fine, thank you. I just felt dizzy for a moment.”

Dizzy, hell, he wanted to tell her, but he didn't, of course. “I suggest you go home. It's late, and you don't want the crazies to be all over you.”

At least his lecture was short and to the point, Catherine thought. She said yes, and thank you, and watched him walk back to his squad car. He waited. Catherine sighed, started the Porsche, and drove sedately down the street. Yes, she thought, I'm going home. But not back to Long Island. She'd almost reached her apartment when she realized that her grandmother would be worried. She didn't want her to know that she'd taken this insane drive into New York. She turned the Porsche around.

As she drove back to Long Island, she played over
her grandmother's words. What did she want to do with her life? Catherine shuddered. She didn't want her nose to bleed and run until it rotted off. She didn't want to be driven ever again as she had been tonight.
I nearly went to the streets.
But the high, the feeling of absolute superiority . . .

She thought of her father, the famous and infamous Timothy Carleton. He'd loved her, shown her attention until Elizabeth came along and seduced him. Then he'd had no time for her, Catherine. No, no, she didn't want to think of that pain.

Her grandmother was right about another thing. She needed a goal, no more wandering about, doing absolutely nothing. Her last thought was of Elizabeth and her certainty that she had murdered her father. And then she knew what she would do.

 

Laurette heard the muffled sound of a car and knew it was Catherine's. She slept so little now, each spurt of sleep a blessing when it came. But awake, she heard every sound, every noise, and her mind had to identify its source. What to do about Catherine? She would speak to her again soon.

Laurette rose from her bed and walked to the long windows. Slowly she pulled back the drapery and stared out over the moonlit grounds. Oddly enough, she thought of Christian Hunter. How she'd wanted to destroy him for what he'd done. She'd tried to get at the man, but his assets were too diversified, his holdings too solid. His reputation was impeccable. For the first time, she allowed herself to wonder if he had told the truth at the trial.

She turned slowly from the windows, and heard the drapery fall softly back into place. The man had to have lied. There was simply no one else who could have killed Timothy. No one except Elizabeth.

Timothy.

Laurette sighed, and walked to the wall thermostat
and turned it up. She was always so cold these days. Even her very bones felt cold. She felt the heat gush out at her legs through the vent, seep through her old, infinitely comfortable robe. It felt so good. She had lied to Catherine, unfortunately. Timothy had no use at all for women except for sex. Had he lived, he would have continued to treat his young daughter as a bit of useless fluff, a beautiful bauble with no particular value save in marriage. And she would have probably done nothing about it, nothing at all.

He'd told her once, laughing and hugging her after she'd given him a very perceptive bit of analysis on a business deal, “Hell, if you weren't my mother, I'd have married you in a flash. No other woman can touch you.”

Look at what he'd done to Elizabeth. She'd been nothing more than a beautiful bauble, tremendously talented, of course, but that had only been the draw for Timothy. And she'd been ruthless enough to twist him about, to make him change his will. Then she'd killed him.

The blessed heat was warming her blood now, and she was becoming drowsy. She walked back to her bed and slowly lay down, pulling the thick covers over her. But her mind kept wandering back, back to a particularly vicious scene she'd witnessed, but never spoken of.

Timothy, strong, ruthless, mean sometimes. Particularly toward his first wife, Eileen. Gentle, weak Eileen. Of such good family, but of no character at all. No spine. He hadn't struck Eileen until after she'd given him two sons. When the doctors had told him that there could be no more children, he'd turned on his gentle, weak wife.

“What good are you, you stupid cow?”

Eileen, cowering, wincing, trying to escape his vicious words, and Laurette, standing just outside the
door, a dozen red roses in her hands, ready to be placed in the vase in the corridor.

“God, I detest you,” Timothy had shouted. “I'd kill you, you idiot bitch, if I could get away with it!”

No, Laurette thought, closing her eyes, I won't remember, I won't think about it. But the images came on, and the awful words.

“Please, Timmy, I—”

“Timmy! God, you nauseating cow! You're hurting my sons with your mealymouthed stupidity.”

The sound of a hand striking flesh. The awful whimper.

“I want you out, Eileen. I never want to hear your whining voice again. I never want to have to see that face of yours again!”

“But, Timm . . . Timothy, I—”

The striking hand, the scream.

I've got to stop this, Laurette thought. Dear God, I've got to stop him. But she didn't move, for he yelled at that moment, “And one more word out of your stupid mouth about my mother and I'll flay you, do you understand? You're not fit to be in the same house with her.”

Pride flowed through her, making her move away down the corridor now, the roses forgotten. Her son, her defender. He was right. Eileen was a useless, stupid woman. She would let Timothy take care of her.