Presumed Guilty & Keeper of the Bride (17 page)

“About what?”

“That what happened between you and Richard is still hanging over us.”

“And if it is?”

“Then this is a mistake. You, me. It’s the wrong reason to get involved.”

She looked down, unwilling to reveal, even to the stiffly turned back, the hurt in her eyes. “Then we shouldn’t, should we?” she murmured.

“No.” He turned to face her. She found her gaze drawn, almost against her will, to meet his. “The truth is, Miranda, we have too many reasons not to. What’s happened between us has been…” He shrugged. “It was an attraction, that’s all.”

That’s all.
Nothing, really, in the larger context of life. Not something you risked your heart on.

“Still…” he said.

“Yes?” She looked up with a sudden, insane leap of hope.

“We can’t walk away from each other. Not with all that’s happened. Richard’s death. The fire.” He gestured about the book-strewn room. “And this.”

“You don’t trust me. Yet you want my help?”

“You’re the only one with stakes high enough to see this through.”

She gave a tired laugh. “You got that part right.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “So, what comes next?”

“I’ll go have a talk with Tony Graffam.”

“Shall I come?”

“No. I want to check him out on my own. In the meantime, you can finish up here. There’s still the upstairs.”

Miranda gazed around the room, at the dusty piles of books, the stacks of papers, and she shook her head. “If I just knew what I was looking for. What the burglar was looking for.”

“I have a hunch it’s still here somewhere.”

“Whatever
it
is.”

Turning, Chase pushed open the door. “When you find it, you’ll know.”

Eleven

F
red Nickels had said Tony Graffam was slick and dumb. He was right on both counts. Graffam wore a silk suit, a tie in blinding red paisley and a gold pinkie ring. The office, like the man, was all flash, little substance: plush carpet, spanking new leather chairs, but no secretary, no books on the shelves, no papers on the desk. The wall had only one decoration—a map of the north shore of Shepherd’s Island. It was not labeled as such, but Chase needed only a glance at the broad, curving bay to recognize the coastline.

“I tell you, it’s a witch hunt!” Graffam complained. “First the police, now you.” He stayed behind his desk, refusing to emerge even to shake hands, as though clinging to the polished barrier for protection. In agitation he slid his fingers through his tightly permed hair. “You think I’d go and waste someone? Just like that? And for what, a piece of property? Do I look dumb?”

Chase politely declined to answer that question. He said, “You were pressing an offer for Rose Hill Cottage, weren’t you?”

“Well, of course. It’s the prime lot up there.”

“And my brother refused to sell.”

“Look, I’m sorry about your brother. Tragedy, a real tragedy. Not that he and I were on good terms, you understand. I couldn’t deal with him. He had a closed mind when it came to the project. I mean, he actually went and got hostile. I don’t know why. It’s only business, right?”

“But I was under the impression this wasn’t a business deal, at all. Stone Coast Trust is billed as a conservation project.”

“And that’s exactly what it is. I offered your brother top dollar for that land, more than Nature Conservancy would’ve paid. Plus, he would’ve retained lifetime use of the family cottage. An incredible deal.”

“Incredible.”

“With the addition of Rose Hill, we could extend the park all the way back to the hillside. It would add elevation. Views. Access.”

“Access?”

“For maintenance, of course. You know, for the hiking trails. Decent footpaths, so everyone could enjoy a taste of nature. Even the handicapped. I mean, mobility impaired.”

“You thought of everything.”

Graffam smiled. “Yes. We did.”

“Where does Hemlock Heights come in?”

Graffam paused. “Excuse me?”

“Hemlock Heights. That is, I believe, the name of your planned development.”

“Well, nothing was
planned—
”

“Then why did you apply for rezoning? And how much did you pay to bribe the land commission?”

Graffam’s face had gone rigid. “Let me repeat myself, Mr. Tremain. Stone Coast Trust was formed to protect the north shore. I admit, we might have to develop a parcel here and there, just to maintain the trust. But sometimes we have to compromise. We have to do things we’d rather not.”

“Does that include blackmail?”

Graffam sat up sharply. “What?”

“I’m talking about Fred Nickels. And Homer Sulaway. The names should be familiar to you.”

“Yes, of course. Two of the property owners. They declined my offer.”

“Someone sent them nasty letters, telling them to sell.”

“You think I sent them?”

“Who else? Four people turned you down. Two of them got threatening letters. And a third—my brother—winds up dead.”

“That’s what you’re leading up to, isn’t it? Trying to make it look like I had something to do with his death.”

“Is that what I said?”

“Look, I’ve taken enough heat on this deal. A year of putting up with this—this small-town crap. I’ve turned handsprings to make this project work, but I’m not going to be his fall guy.”

Chase stared at Graffam in confusion. What was the man babbling about? Whose fall guy?

“I was out of state when it happened. I have witnesses who’ll swear to that.”

“Who are you working for?” Chase cut in.

Graffam’s jaw suddenly snapped shut. Slowly he sat back, his expression hardening to stone.

“So you have a backer,” said Chase. “Someone who’s put up the money. Someone who’s doing the dirty work. Who are you fronting for? The mob?”

Graffam said nothing.

“You’re scared, Graffam. I can tell.”

“I don’t have to answer any of your questions.”

Chase pressed the attack. “My brother was set to blow the whistle on Stone Coast, wasn’t he? So you sent him one of your threatening letters. But then you found out he couldn’t be blackmailed. Or bought off. So what did you do? Pay someone to take care of the problem?”

“Meaning murder?” Graffam burst out laughing. “Come on, Tremain. A broad killed him. We both know that. Dangerous creatures, broads. Tick ’em off and they get ideas. They see red, grab a kitchen knife and that’s it. Even the cops agree. It was a broad. She had the motive.”

“And you had a lot of money to lose. So did your backer. Richard already had his hands on your account numbers. He traced your invisible partner. He could have exposed the deal—”

“But he didn’t. He killed the article, remember? I had it on good authority it was gonna stay dead. So why should we go after him?”

Chase fell silent. That’s what Jill had said, that Richard was the one who’d canceled the article, called off the crusade. It was the one detail that didn’t make sense. Why had Richard backed down?

Did
he back down? Or had Jill Vickery lied?

He brooded over that last possibility as he left Graffam’s office and walked to the car. What did he know about Jill, really? Only that she’d been with the
Herald
for five years, that she kept it running smoothly. That she was bright, stylish and underpaid. She could land a better job anywhere on the East Coast. Why had she chosen to stay with this Podunk paper and work for slave wages?

He’d planned to return at once to Rose Hill Cottage. Instead, he drove to the
Herald.

He found the office manned only by a skeleton crew: the summer intern, tapping at a computer keyboard, and the layout tech, stooped over a drawing table. Chase walked past them, into Richard’s office, and went straight to the file cabinet.

He found Jill Vickery’s employment file right where it should be. He sat at the desk and opened the folder.

Inside was a neatly typed résumé, three pages, all the right names and jobs. B.A., Bowdoin, 1977. Masters, Columbia, 1979. Stints on the city desk,
San Francisco Chronicle;
then obits,
San Diego Union;
police beat,
San Jose Times;
op-ed editor,
Portland Press Herald.
A solid résumé.

So why does she end up here?

Something about that résumé bothered him. Something that didn’t seem quite right. It was enough to make him reach for the phone and dial the
Portland Press Herald,
her previous employer. He spoke to the current op-ed editor, a woman who vaguely recalled a Jill Vickery. It had been a while back, though.

Chase next called the
San Jose Times.
This time there was some uncertainty, a lot of yelling around the city room, asking if anyone remembered a reporter named Jill Vickery from seven years before. Someone yelled, wasn’t there a Jill on the police beat years back? That was good enough for Chase. He hung up and considered letting it drop.

Still, that résumé. What was it that bothered him?

The obits.
San Diego Union.
That didn’t make sense. Obits was the coal mine equivalent of the newspaper business. You worked your way up from there. Why had she gone from the city desk in San Francisco to a bottom-of-the-barrel position?

He dialed the
San Diego Union.
No one named Jill Vickery had ever worked there.

Ditto for San Francisco.

Half the résumé was a fraud. Was it just a case of padding a thin work history? And what was she doing during those eight years between college and her job with the
San Jose Times?

Once again he reached for the phone. This time he called Columbia University, Department of Journalism. In any given year, how many students could possibly graduate with a master’s degree? And how many of these students would have the first name Jill?

There was only one in 1979, they told him. But it wasn’t a Jill Vickery who’d graduated. It was a Jill Westcott.

Once again, he called the
San Diego Union.
This time he asked about a Jill Westcott. This time they remembered the name. We’ll fax you the article, they said.

A few minutes later it slid out of the fax machine, sharp and clear.

A photo of Jill Westcott, now named Jill Vickery. And with it was a tale of cold-blooded murder.

Miranda sat in the fading light of day and stared listlessly at her surroundings. She’d spent the afternoon rummaging through the bathroom and two bedrooms. Now she was hot, dusty and discouraged. Nothing of substance had turned up, only innocuous bits of paper—store receipts, a ten-year-old postcard from Spain, another typewritten note from M.

…I am not the weak little nothing I used to be. I can live without you quite nicely, and I intend to do so. I don’t need your pity. I am not like the others, those women with minds the size of walnut shells. What I want to know, what I don’t understand, is what attracts you to creatures like that? Is it the jiggling flesh? The cow-eyed worship? Well, it doesn’t mean a thing. It’s empty devotion. Without your money, you wouldn’t rate a second glance from those bimbos. I’m the only one who doesn’t give a damn how much you have in the bank. And now you’ve lost me.

The bitterness, the pain of that letter seemed to rub off on her own mood. She put it back in the drawer, buried it among the silky underclothes. Another woman’s lingerie. Another woman’s anguish.

By the time she’d straightened up the room again the afternoon had slid toward twilight. She didn’t turn on the lamp. It was soothing, the veil of semidarkness, the chirp of crickets through the open window. From the field came that indefinable scent of evening—the mist from the sea, the cooling grasses. She went to a chair by the window, sat down and leaned her head back to rest. So many doubts, so many worries weighed upon her. Always, looming over every tentative moment of joy, was that threat of prison. There were times, during these past few days of freedom, that she had almost been able to push the thought from mind. But in the moments like this, when the silence was deep and she was alone in her fears, the image of prison bars seemed to close around her.
How many years will they keep me? Ten, twenty, a lifetime?

I would rather die.

She shuddered back to alertness.

Downstairs, the screen door had softly squealed open.

“Chase?” she called. “Is that you?” There was silence. She rose from the chair and went to the top of the stairs. “Chase?”

She heard the screen door softly tap shut, then there was nothing, only the distant chirp of crickets from the fields.

Her first instinct was to reach for the light switch. Just in time she stopped herself. Darkness was her friend. It would hide her, protect her.

She shrank away from the stairs. Trembling, she stood with her back pressed against the wall and listened. No new sounds drifted up from the first floor. All she heard was the hammering of her own heartbeat. Her palms were slick. Every nerve ending was scraped raw with fear.

There it was—a footstep. In the kitchen. An image shot through her mind. The cabinets, the drawers. The knives.

Her breath was coming in tight gasps. She shrank farther from the stairs, her thoughts flying frantically toward escape. Two upstairs bedrooms, plus a bathroom. And screens on all the windows. Could she make it through in time?

From below came more footsteps. The intruder had moved out of the kitchen. He was approaching the stairs.

Miranda fled into the master bedroom. Darkness obscured her path; she collided with a nightstand. A lamp wobbled, fell over. The clatter as it crashed to the floor was all the intruder needed to direct him toward this bedroom.

In panic she dashed to the window. Through the darkness she saw a portion of gently sloping roof. From there it would be a twenty-foot drop to the ground. The sash was already up. Only the screen stood between her and freedom. She shoved at it—and it refused to push free. Only then did she see that the screen had been nailed to the window frame.

Frantic now, she began to kick at the steel mesh, sobbing as each blow met resistance. Again and again she kicked, and each time the wire sagged outward, but held.

A footstep creaked on the stairway.

She aimed a last desperate kick at the mesh.

The window frame splintered, and the whole screen fell away and thudded to the ground. At once she scrambled over the sill and dropped down onto the ledge of roof. There she hesitated, torn between the solid comfort of shingles beneath her feet and the free-fall of escape. She couldn’t see what lay directly below. The rosebushes? She grabbed hold of the roof and lowered her body over the edge. For a few seconds she clung there, steeling herself for the impact.

She let go.

The night air rushed up at her. The fall seemed endless, a hurtling downward through space and darkness.

Her feet slammed into the ground. Instantly her legs buckled, and she fell sprawling to the gravel. For a moment she lay there as the sky whirled overhead like a kaleidoscope of stars. A frantic burst of adrenaline had masked all the sensation of pain. Her legs could be shattered. She wouldn’t have felt it. She knew only that she had to escape, had to run.

She staggered to her feet and began to stumble down the road. She rounded the bend of the driveway—

And was instantly blinded by a pair of headlights leaping at her from the darkness. Instinctively she raised her arms to shield her eyes against the onslaught. She heard the car’s brakes lock, heard gravel fly under the skidding tires. The door swung open.

“Miranda?”

With a sob of joy she stumbled forward into Chase’s arms. “It’s you,” she cried. “Thank God it’s you.”

“What is it?” he whispered, pulling her close against him. “Miranda, what’s happened?”