No Hiding Behind the Potted Palms! A Dance with Danger Mystery #7 (37 page)

“If you’re sure,” she
responded. She slid her tray onto the table and pulled out a
chair.

“Are you enjoying the
cruise?” I inquired, digging into my eggs. “I’m Mariem, by the
way.”

“My name is Mary. The cruise
is fine,” she said. “I’m just not much on having fun these
days.”

“Oh,” I replied, “it sounds
like you’re going through a tough patch.”

Part of me wanted to run for
the hills, but I stopped myself. After all, maybe it would help me
to think about someone else for a change.

“I’m sorry,” the elderly
woman sighed. “I used to take this cruise with my late husband. He
died three months ago.”

“It must be difficult. It
was so recent.”

“We were very happy for
almost fifty years. I still can’t believe he’s gone. It just seems
so unfair.”

“I know,” I agreed. “I’m
also a widow. My husband died a couple of years ago.”

“But you’re still young,”
Mary said. “That’s such a tragedy.”

“Death is no respecter of
age,” I acknowledged.“And it doesn’t get any easier to say goodbye
the longer we know someone. I think sometimes it’s more difficult,
especially if you’ve always been close.”

“That was Bernie and me. He
was a postmaster. I was a librarian. Every year, we took a trip.
When we were young, it was often just a cabin at a campground. As
we got older, we started taking cruises. My Bernie loved to
travel.”

“What was your favorite
trip?” I wondered. She thought for a moment.

“This may sound strange, but
my favorite trip was one we took to Niagara Falls about ten years
ago.”

“What did you enjoy the
most?” I nodded to the waiter as he passed with the coffee pot. He
poured me a fresh cup.

“They were so much bigger
than I expected, even though I knew the falls were enormous. To
hear that roar, it was amazing. We rented a camper and traveled
through the region.”

“It sounds like you and your
husband enjoyed each other’s company.”

“We did. We had a lot of fun
together.”

“Are you traveling with
someone on this cruise,” I asked, hoping she was.

“My son and his wife. What
about you?”

“On my own. I don’t mind. It
was hard at first, after Henri died, but now I’m used to
it.”

“The hardest part for me is
the night. I’m just so used to Bernie being there. Sometimes I wake
up and expect to see his head on the pillow next to me. What about
you?”

“For me?” I took a moment to
think. “It was the not knowing what was coming next. Even after
Henri died, my life continued to spiral downward. Every time I
thought things couldn’t get any worse, they did.”

“That doesn’t sound good,”
Mary said.

“I didn’t really know my
husband,” I admitted. “He was a stranger when we met and in many
ways, he stayed one.”

I looked up to see her eyes
on me, watching me sadly. She tilted her head, composing her
response.

“I suppose not every
marriage is blessed with friendship.”

“No,” I shook my head.
“That’s true. But it must be lovely when you find it.”

“It is,” Mary told me.
“You’re still young, Mariem. Give yourself a little time to heal.
And then go out there and find yourself a Bernie.”

“Thank you for that, Mary. I
enjoyed our conversation,” I said, rising from the table. “Perhaps
we can do it again.”

“I would enjoy that,” she
told me.

I left her to go to go back
to my cabin to change into my bathing suit and grab a paperback. My
intention was to spend some time relaxing by the pool. I didn’t get
very far.

“Mrs. Dufours,” said a tall
bald man in a lime green golf shirt and plaid shorts. He caught up
to me at the elevator. “Can I have a moment of your
time?”

I stopped, afraid to move
forward, but equally hesitant to retreat. He gave me a bright
smile.

“I met you at a fundraiser
for the Himrich Arts Center last year. You exhibited a painting of
the Connecticut shoreline. Steve Kablinski, Greenwich.”

I took a deep breath and let
it out through pursed lips, relief falling over me like a blanket
that I wrapped myself in. Until that moment, I hadn’t understood
how deep my fear went, especially after last night. Putting on a
bright smile, I shook his outstretched hand.

“”
I just wondered if you
ever sold that painting.”

“Yes,” I nodded. “I
did.”

“Too bad. I was going to
offer to buy it if it was still available.”

“That’s very nice of
you.”

“Not at all,” he insisted.
“You’re a very talented artist. I like your work. Maybe you have
other paintings I might be interested in purchasing.”

“My work is represented by
the Talmadge Gallery in Manhattan,” I told him. “They have several
canvases there.”

“Great, I’ll check it out
when I get back to New York.”

“Well, then,” I smiled. “If
you’ll excuse me, I’m off to take a dip in the pool.”

“Of course.” I stepped past
him and pushed the button for the elevator. There was something
about the way he was watching me that made me nervous. As the doors
opened, I stepped into the car and he followed me in. My finger
reached out to touch number eight, but at the last second, I
changed my mind and pushed four. I didn’t really know what was on
the fourth floor. I only knew that I did not want to get off at my
floor or his. He was still watching me when he pushed six. The
doors closed and I stepped back, suddenly conscious of being along
with a stranger who was showing far too much interest in
me.

The car slid silently down
the shaft, stopping gently before the doors parted on six. Steve
Kablinski turned to exit, but changed his mind. As he faced me, he
took a step closer and I recoiled. I saw surprise in his
eyes.

“I just wanted to say it was
nice to see you again. Perhaps we could have a drink together
during the cruise.”

I gave him a tentative nod
and a brief smile. He was still studying me.

“Well, then. Enjoy your
swim.”

“Thanks.”

“Maybe I’ll see you around.”
He paused, waiting for a response from me. I didn’t have one.
Something told me this was not a man to be trusted, and I was not
about to get fooled again.

Chapter Four --

“Meet him.” Bob Ryan had
come to my room as I was changing into my suit, and when I told him
about the conversation with Steve Kablinski, he was adamant. “Just
one drink.”

“But why?”

“Because he’s too interested
in you. He has his pregnant wife and kids on the ship with him. Is
he chasing you because you’re available and his wife is not, or is
he pursuing you because he wants something specific from
you?”

“What do you think he
wants?”

Bob ran a hand through his
dark hair and sat down on the small sofa in my cabin. He looked at
his hands as they rested on his knees, turning them over and
examining his palms. As he rubbed them together, he seemed lost in
thought. The longer he stayed silent, the greater my apprehension
grew.

“Do you recall meeting him
at the Himrich Arts Center?” he finally asked, his dark eyes on me.
I shook my head.

“Honestly? No. I spoke with
a lot of people on the night of the big celebration, but he doesn’t
seem familiar at all.”

“That’s because he’s not
Steve Kablinski of Greenwich, Connecticut. He’s Howard Bloomgarten
of White Plains, New York.”

“He lied? Why would he do
that?”

“It’s why I want you to have
a drink with him, Mariem. He’s a certified public accountant with a
busy practice in Manhattan, but I don’t understand his unusual
interest in you.” Bob Ryan’s eyes never left mine as he dropped
that bombshell.

“Why would a CPA pretend to
be someone he’s not?” I was stunned and confused.

“Why indeed?”

“Henri was in private
banking. Maybe it has something to do with Grenois Financial,” I
suggested, hoping what I would share with the former Treasury agent
would make sense to him. It certainly didn’t to me. “Declan told me
that there was a grand jury about to hear information about Maura
Trelawney’s murder.”

“Who’s Maura Trelawney?” he
wanted to know.

“She was my financial
planner after Henri died. In a matter of months, I lost nearly a
quarter of a million dollars. And almost a year to the day that
Henri died, she was murdered in her office in Manhattan. She worked
for Oracle.”

“Did she ever explain why
you lost so much money?” The talk of finances seemed to bring Bob
to life.

“There was a company she
insisted I put my money in, Prevenue, and it went bankrupt, so I
lost my investment.”

“Hmm...” he
muttered.

“Was anyone ever arrested
for her murder?”

“Someone from a Mexican
cartel.”

“Why would Maura have any
connection to drug traffickers?” Bob wanted to know.

“Honestly?” I sat down on
the edge of one of the beds. Where should I start to explain all
the worries I had about Henri? A part of me wondered if I was being
indiscreet in raising the subject, but another part of me felt safe
with Bob. After all, he understood the world of finance far better
than I. Perhaps he could help me put those ghosts to rest. “There
were things about Henri’s business dealings that bothered
me.”

“Go on.”

“We took a trip to Myanmar.
It should have been to celebrate our anniversary, but instead Henri
had to meet a man, a Wan Liu. It was all so very....” I tried to
find a way to describe the sinister feel of that trip. Henri had
been wound so tight, it only took a word or two to unleash an angry
tirade. That was the first time I actually thought my husband might
contemplate murdering me. I told Bob about it.

“Interesting,” was all he
said in response. Maybe it was the way his fingers kept drumming on
his legs as he sat there. Maybe it was the set of his jaw. I knew
something I told him mattered, but I wasn’t sure what piece of
information it was.

“Maybe this sounds crazy,” I
offered, “but Henri threatened to throw me into the Irrawaddy River
when I defied him. I was wondering if what happened on the deck
last night was connected.”

“How would that be
connected?” Bob didn’t sound like he believed me.

“I don’t know,” I admitted.
“Maybe it’s not. But that was a cruise and this is a
cruise.”

“That’s all you’ve got to go
on? Your late husband talked about dumping you in the river and
someone tried to toss you overboard last night? Mariem, a lot of
guys who get frustrated with their wives often joke about how they
would get rid of them.”

“It was no joke!” I snapped.
“He was serious!”

“Okay. Take a breath. I
wasn’t insulting you or trying to minimize the situation. I’m
trying to get a handle on what happened and whether it’s a factor
in what’s happening to you now. Work with me.”

Through tear-filled eyes, I
looked at the stranger sitting across the room and once again, that
sense of lonely desolation came over me, filling my heart with a
heaviness that was getting harder and harder to lift.

“Mariem,” Bob said, more
gently this time, “all I’m saying is that there may be a different
reason why that incident occurred last night.”

“Like what?” I
demanded.

“I don’t know,” he
acknowledged, standing up. Bob put his hands in his pockets and I
could hear the sound of keys jiggling. He seemed restless, moving
with a long pacing stride that brought him up short as he covered
the confines of the small cabin. “Just think for a moment. Take
your time. Was there ever anything, anything at all, that made you
think Henri was involved in money-laundering
activities?”

“I found out after he died
that the Justice Department was trying to make a deal with
him.”

“Did it go
through?”

“No, not according to
Declan.” Bob’s eyes narrowed as he looked out the window of my
cabin.

“Was there anything
else?”

“He took me to Mexico, back
in 1997, and I spent time with the mistress of a financier my
husband was meeting. She told me she knew a secret. Two hours
later, she was dead. Conchita drowned in the pool. I know she’d
been drinking, but I don’t think it was an accident.” I recounted
the conversation I had with her before I went back to our bedroom
in Jaime’s mansion to change out of my wet bathing suit. Conchita
believed she had seen Jaime’s right-hand man, Victor Golos,
strangle Roberto Morales Rojas, the Mexican congressman, even
though it was all over the news that Congressman Morales died in a
fiery car crash when he lost control of his sports car going round
the La Curva de la Pera, the dangerous bend on the highway from
Mexico City to Cuemavaca.

“Jaime Blandon frightened
me. There was something about him.”