Passion, Betrayal and Killer Highlights (17 page)

We eventually arrived at my door and Anatoly waited as I got my keys out.

“Sophie, the possibility of a third woman is a good sign, but right now it’s still just a possibility. Leah is far from being out of the woods.”

“Are you trying to depress me?”

“I’m trying to prepare you,” he explained. “I don’t want you to be caught off guard if things don’t go the way you want them to.”

I hesitated with my hand on the door. “Thank you for being concerned, but it’s all going to be fine.” I looked up at him. “I won’t allow it to be anything else.” I pushed the door open and left Anatoly on the street. When I got up to my apartment, Mr. Katz was waiting by the door. I obediently made a beeline for the cupboard that held the kibble, but I barely had a chance to pour it before the phone rang.

“Hello?”

“Sophie? It’s Erika. I hope I’m not catching you at a bad time.”

“Not at all. What’s up?”

“The police say they’re done with Bob’s office, and I thought that Leah might want to pick up some of the personal things he kept here. You know, photos and the like.”

I leaned against the bookcase and pulled at a stray thread sticking out of my sleeve. “I’m sure she would, but she’s not home right now. I’ll have her give you a call when—”

“Maybe
you
could stop by and get the stuff? It might be easier for Leah if she doesn’t have to face all the employees here right away. Particularly with all the things they’ve been saying on the news.”

“Good point. Can I stop by tomorrow around lunchtime?”

“Um…okay…or maybe you’d like to come now?”

“I can come now,” I said cautiously. “Shall I just go straight to your desk?”

Erika audibly exhaled. “That would be great. I’ll be waiting for you.”

“Okay, I’ll see you in a bit.” I pressed the hang up button and stared at the receiver. Since when had picking up a bunch of old photographs become a matter of great urgency? I flashed back to my last visit with Erika and her public displays of grief over her boss’s death. No question, the woman had a flair for the dramatic. Maybe that was all there was to it. Or maybe she knew something that could help Leah.

I grabbed my coat and booked it to my Audi.

CHAPTER 8

“When people say a woman is brooding what they really mean is that she’s found a way to make depression look sexy.

—
Words To Die By

I
caught sight of Erika at her desk the minute I stepped off the elevator. She was in the company of a tall woman whose back was to me. I couldn’t hear their conversation, but whatever was being said was not going over well with Erika. I had never seen her look angry before, and yet at that moment the hate in her eyes was visible from thirty feet away. As I approached, the woman pivoted in my direction. I froze. Her auburn hair was pulled up in a French twist, which showcased her handsome features. She wasn’t overweight but her large bone structure made her anything but petite. She fit the description perfectly. This had to be the woman Bob had been seen with at the Gatsby.

I forced a casual smile. “Hi, Erika.” I thrust my hand in front of the other woman. “I’m sorry, I don’t believe we’ve met. I’m Sophie Katz, Bob Miller’s sister-in-law.”

The woman grasped my hand and gave it a solid shake. “Taylor Blake.” She sounded like she had studied at one of those schools that still coached their students to speak with an upper-crust, tight-jawed accent. “I’m familiar with your books.”

My smile broadened. “Oh, are you a fan?”

“My housekeeper is,” she clarified.

Erika stood silently beside her desk and stared at Taylor with what looked to be a mixture of contempt and awe.

“Sophie Katz, what a pleasant surprise!”

I turned to see James Sawyer smiling down at me. He put a friendly hand on Taylor’s shoulder. “Have you met Taylor? She was our last CFO. She had the nerve to leave us for another company a few weeks ago. I’m still trying to muster up enough altruism to forgive her.”

“Nobody’s irreplaceable, James.”

Her smile accentuated her chiseled cheekbones. Everything about her exuded strength and self-assurance. There was no doubt in my mind that most men would find her intimidating.

She turned her attention to me, and her countenance took on a more serious expression. “When I left I thought my position would go to Bob.” She shook her head slowly. “It hardly seems possible that he’s gone.”

I thought I heard Erika suck in a sharp breath, but even I recognized that my imagination was on the active side.

James removed his hand from Taylor’s shoulder and used his other hand to pat Erika on the back. “Erika tells me she’s helping to plan Bob’s memorial service.”

“Yes, I can’t thank her enough.”

“Wonderful, wonderful.” James checked his watch. “Taylor was good enough to agree to walk me through some of the paperwork she and Bob had previously been handling, so we’ll go do that and leave you two to your business.”

He gestured for Taylor to join him and she gracefully excused herself without bothering to glance in Erika’s direction.

Erika waited for them to disappear into the elevator before sitting back down. She ran her palms along her skirt as if trying to wipe the sweat off of them. “You don’t like her, Erika?” I asked as I pulled up a chair.

“Taylor’s not very nice to her employees.” Erika stared at the now-closed doors of the elevator. “Can you believe Mr. Sawyer wants to reassign Bob’s office to someone else already?”

Well, of course he did. Did she think Chalet was going to turn the office into some kind of shrine?

“I’ve been instructed to have it cleared out ASAP. That’s why I wanted you to come in today.”

“I figured it was something like that.” It had never occurred to me that the rush could be attributed to anything so mundane. I tried to squelch my disappointment by reminding myself that Taylor Blake might have made the trip worthwhile. “What did Bob think of Taylor?”

I thought I saw Erika flinch. “They were close.”

“How close?”

“They worked in the same department, so they sort of formed a relationship.” Erika toyed with her tennis bracelet. “Bob had a great deal of admiration for her.”

I got the feeling that Erika thought his admiration was misplaced. I bit my lip and tried to figure out the best way to pry. “Did you ever work with her directly?”

“She and Bob worked together a lot, and since I worked for Bob, there was some crossover.” Erika shrugged. “She was so nice to Bob, I don’t think he really saw her for what she is.”

“And what is that?”

“Just another cutthroat opportunist with a pretty face,” Erika said as she tidied her cubicle. “She expected all of us to bow down to her just because she was the only female upper manager in the company. Then she’d bat her eyes a few times at Bob and he’d instantly become putty in her hands.”

“Taylor doesn’t seem like the batting-eyes type.”

“I’m just saying that she can be manipulative. And Bob’s so susceptible to female manipulations. Just look what that woman from the KKK did to him.”

I considered correcting Erika about the KKK thing, but exposing her as a gullible twit when it was clear that she was already suffering from feelings of professional inferiority regarding Taylor didn’t seem like a kind thing to do. I crossed my legs and leaned back in the chair. “So where’s Bob’s stuff?”

Erika bent down and retrieved a shoe box from under her desk. I peered inside to see a collection of fountain pens, dry cleaning receipts and other miscellaneous trash. I shifted the contents around, hoping that there might be a floppy disk hiding under one of Bob’s outdated parking passes. Nothin’ doin’. I withdrew my hand with a heavy sigh.

“This is it?”

“The police took a lot,” Erika explained. “There’s also this.” She opened the top drawer to her desk and pulled out a framed picture of Bob, Leah and Jack. “I kept it separate from the other things because I know how special that photo was to both Bob and Leah.”

“My God, who picked out this frame?” I asked as I reached for the bright gold frame that was adorned with gaudy silver stars.

“I’m not sure but I suspect the frame was a gift from
her
.”

I wrinkled my nose. “Bianca gave him a framed photo featuring him with his wife and son?”

“I think Bob’s the one who put the picture in.” She tilted her head to the side so she could see the photo in my hand. “It is a good picture. Bob was so incredibly photogenic.”

I examined the photo, and saw none of the “good” Erika pictured. Jack was clearly seconds away from a screaming fit, Bob looked bored out of his mind, and Leah looked like she was suffering from gastric intestinal distress.

“Bob used to keep that photo right on the corner of his desk so he could gaze at it all day long. Maybe Leah could put it in a different frame.”

I wrinkled my nose. “Bob
gazed
at this?”

Erika blinked a few times as if trying to stave off tears. “I’ve really grown to care for Leah, although I haven’t been a very good friend to her. She always treated me like family—like a sister really.”

I put the frame in the box without comment. If Leah really had treated her like a sister, Erika wouldn’t love her so much.

“The night…that horrible night, Leah called me—she left a message saying that she was coming over to see me.”

“I remember. She was at my apartment when she placed the call. She said you weren’t home when she got there.”

“I was house-sitting for Dora, my neighbor—actually I was cat-sitting, since that’s really why she wanted me there. I was just curled up on Dora’s couch drinking her port, trying to lose myself in a Nora Roberts novel, and all the while Leah was waiting in front of my house a few doors down. If I had looked out the front window and seen her car I could have talked to her. Everything could have worked out differently.”

I gritted my teeth. “Leah didn’t kill Bob.”

“I know she didn’t,” Erika said quietly. “The more I think about it the more I know she would never do anything like that. She loved Bob as much as—” Erika flushed and looked away “—Cleopatra loved Anthony.”

“Right,” I said slowly. I made a mental note to keep Leah away from snakes for a while.

“But if I had been there, Leah might not have been the one to…to find him. And I could have vouched for her whereabouts.”

I nodded. “That would have been nice.”

“And Bob.” Erika looked down at her desk. “I miss him horribly. I know he made some mistakes, but he really was—”

“A good person, yeah, you told me.” I tucked the shoe box under one arm and stood up. “If there isn’t anything else, I should get going.”

“No, nothing else.” Erika didn’t leave her seat. She was probably reliving some memory in which Bob lovingly asked her to take dictation. I sighed and left her to her thoughts. What was it that these people had seen in Bob that I hadn’t? It was like me and
The Bachelor,
I suppose. Everyone I knew loved that show, and for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what the big deal was. Maybe I was the weird one. I mean, if even a woman like Taylor Blake could be pulled in by Bob’s charms, then obviously he must have had a few attributes. While in the elevator I once again examined Bob’s expression in the family photo. He looked about as engaged as a swinger at a Tupperware party. If this is what passed for a good catch these days I’d happily stick to my cat.

It wasn’t until I found a parking spot—a mere five blocks away from my apartment—that it occurred to me that Anatoly hadn’t called to tell me about his chat with the police. I tried calling him while strolling home but I was only able to reach his voice mail. I hung up without bothering to leave a message. The SOB was obviously screening his calls. That was it. Going forward I was no longer going to be attracted to him.

When I got home I expected to find Leah and Jack but when I walked in, the first person I saw was Mama. She was sitting on my couch, her nose pressed against Jack’s, who had his tiny hands tangled in her halo of white frizzy hair. I was immediately filled with a familiar mixture of affection and trepidation. “Mama, what are you doing here?”

“This is how you greet the woman who gave birth to you?”

“I’m sorry, it’s been a long couple of days.” I leaned over and gave her a kiss on the cheek. Mama sat back and admired me. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen you I’ve forgotten what you look like,” she said.

I had seen my mother less than two weeks ago but I let the comment pass. “I heard you on the radio the other day,” I said while moving to pet Mr. Katz who was huddled up in the corner. “You gave quite an interview.”

“This man from the station called me up and said he wanted me to be a guest on his show,” Mama said as she gently stopped Jack from ripping her thick gold necklace off of her. Mr. Katz glared at them. He had always liked Mama but I think he was beginning to understand that he was not the favorite grandchild.

“He said I could tell people what a nice girl my Leah is so of course I said I would do it,” Mama continued. “So now I’m a bigshot radio star.” She gave me an exaggerated wink. “You didn’t expect that, did you,
mumala?
”

“Can’t say that I did.” I sat down next to her thus using her as a physical buffer against my nephew. “Where is everybody?”

As if in response to my question there was the distant sound of a toilet flushing. In a moment Mary Ann came out, looking beautiful and fresh as ever. “Hi, Sophie! Isn’t it great that your mom stopped by? We’ve been hanging out for the last hour!” She went into the kitchen and opened the freezer. “I picked up a pint of Häagen-Dazs earlier, want some?”

“What flavor?” I asked.

“Strawberry cheesecake.”

“I’ll pass,” I said, secretly grateful that Mary Ann had chosen the only flavor I could easily resist.

“How ’bout you, Mrs. K.?” Mary Ann was the only one of my friends who called Mama that. Most of my friends subscribed to the Californian philosophy that the only people who should be referred to by their last names were those who had the power to flunk you or incarcerate you. Marcus was one of the few people I knew who took issue with that rule and insisted on calling Mama Mrs. Katz despite being invited to call her Esther; but that was probably because he was from the South. Mama had given up on correcting Marcus but as far as I knew she had never bothered to correct Mary Ann. I think she liked the novelty of the Mrs. K. thing.