Tacked to Death (15 page)

"And you think spending the rest of
your days in jail is a better idea?"

"I didn't say that I wasn't going to do
it, but—"

"But nothing, we're in." Joe opened the
door and pulled out two small flashlights. "Here, take this one. We
need to double-duty this. I'll check the front rooms. You find his
bedroom, bathroom, and any other room up those stairs." He flashed
his light toward a flight of stairs off to the right. "We gotta be
quick, too. Not a lot of people out right now, but it's only
eleven, so there may be some night owls coming and going. Lucky
this place faces the way it does. No other residences looking in."
Michaela took the light. Joe placed his hand around hers. "It's
okay. It's gonna be okay. Right?"

"Right." She nodded. Joe had seen her
hands shaking. It was not okay, but she was here, and his rationale
made sense to her for now…if anything could make sense.

She took the flight of stairs and found
what looked to be a guest room/office. Sterling had good taste, or
else a decorator. He'd spared no expense, from little Limoges to
elegant tapestries on the chairs and sofa in the office. The rooms
had a traditional feel to them, all with a kind of horse/hunting
theme. There were pictures of Sterling with just about everyone
from the polo club; photos from his modeling and acting gigs; and
one of him with Tommy and Zach, which had to have been taken last
summer. The three of them were at the beach. It was the same photo
that had been in the newspaper. Michaela took that one off the wall
and shone the light on it. She studied it for a few seconds—three
buddies, hanging out, having fun. Something about it, though. She
knew there was more to the story of last summer than what Camden
had uncovered. She placed the photo on the desk, hearing Joe
downstairs. She ventured into Sterling's tidy bedroom. Sterling had
been a neat freak, or else he had a maid—more likely, it had been
the latter.

Michaela was curious about Sterling's
expenditures. Here was a man who'd been used to living on twenty
grand a month. Then last summer, according to Paige, he'd received
the slap in the face when his allowance had been chopped in half.
Then, he asked Paige for a loan and she'd taken money from her dead
son's life insurance to give to him. Living "rich" meant something
to Sterling. Was that why he had been dating Juliet? He didn't want
to live a life less than he was used to, and Juliet's father was
loaded.

She opened up the drawers on his
nightstand and found a book, The Kama Sutra, as well as a list of
acting jobs available in both Los Angeles and Palm Springs. He'd
checked some off. There was a ticket stub from the club Sinners and
Saints. From what Michaela had heard, this was the new hot spot for
anyone who was anyone in the desert. But no letter.

She headed to a matching nightstand on
the other side. This drawer was more interesting. In it she found a
handful of videotapes. She pocketed them, knowing it was wrong. But
Joe was right: What would Sterling care at this point? She walked
over to his drawers, feeling creepy looking through his boxers and
socks. Really creepy. But nothing was out of the ordinary. Next was
his closet, and she even found herself digging into his pants
pockets, where she found something interesting: an airline ticket.
She looked at the date. Sterling had flown to Santa Barbara only
two weeks earlier. Had he gone there for fun? Inside the folder was
also his information for a rental car. Why hadn't he driven? It was
only a half-day's drive. Had he gone to see his family? That had to
be it. Had he gone to plead his case? And while there, had he
sealed the deal on his fate? The more she dug into Sterling Taber's
life, the more twisted and strange it was becoming. Regardless, she
had to find out why Sterling had gone home and what had happened
there.

Michaela trekked downstairs with her
new goodies. Joe stood at the bottom of the stairs. He waved an
envelope at her. "Here it is. I read it and you should see what it
says."

"Really? You found it?"

He nodded. "Right here in the 'to be
filed' stack." He laughed.

"No kidding. What does it
say?"

Before he could reply, a rustling noise
came from outside the front door. "What was that?" Michaela
whispered.

"I don't know." He grabbed her arm as
they heard what sounded like a key being slid into the lock. "Come
on."

They ran upstairs and into Sterling's
bedroom. "Oh God, what if it's the police?" Michaela
asked.

"I don't know. Let me
think."

They heard the door shut, and then
voices—a man and a woman's. Michaela strained to listen. Was it
Peters and his sidekick, Singer?

Joe walked to the balcony off
Sterling's bedroom. As quietly as he could he slid the door
open.

"What was that?" the woman downstairs
said.

"I don't know. Stay here and I'll check
it out," the man replied.

They heard someone climbing the stairs.
Joe motioned for Michaela to follow him onto the balcony. The area
overlooked the community pool from two stories up. A palm tree
swayed silently in the slight breeze, about two feet away from the
balcony. "Hit it, Mick."

"What?"

"No time for questions. Jump onto the
tree and shinny your ass on down."

"No way." The man on the stairs was
almost to the top, Michaela figured.

"Do it, now."

Michaela knew Joe was right; they had
no choice. Luckily for her she was athletic, so she took the chance
and made the jump, then shinnied down the tree. She felt the pain
in her hands and on her right knee. She leaped off the tree about
five feet from the ground and looked up to see Joe attempting the
jump. She closed her eyes. He might have been one savvy guy, but
athleticism was not one of his attributes. Somehow, he made
it.

They tore out of the parking lot in the
minivan. "Shouldn't have had that burrito," he said. By the time
they cleared the parking lot, they could not help but laugh. They
roared for several minutes. For Michaela, part of the laughter was
caused by the reality that she'd made it out of there without
getting caught—well, basically—and the release of her pent-up
stress.

"Oh my gosh, you should have seen
yourself coming down off that tree," she said, tears streaming down
her face. "I didn't know that you could move that fast,
Joe."

"I didn't either. Yeah, that was
classic."

"That wasn't Peters. Was it?" Michaela
asked, already sure she knew the answer.

"Nope. I'd bet you it was Zach and
Juliet."

"I'd bet you're right."

Joe reached into his back pocket and
pulled out an envelope. She took the crumpled paper and turned on
the overhead light in the minivan. "Do you mind? Will the light
bother you?"

"Nah. I'm cool. Read it."

She read over the words that Juliet had
written:

I know what you did. My father knows
what you did, because I told him and for your sake, I would get out
of town. You are disgusting and horrible and I will never trust you
again. My father is out for blood. You've messed with the wrong
family.

JM

"Whoa," Michaela finally uttered. "No
wonder the two of them wanted the letter. Maybe they didn't murder
Sterling, but what if they are protecting Juliet's dad?"

"Yep. It's a good theory, and we can't
leave out Pepe Sorvino and his daughter."

"What do you think this all means? It's
obvious Juliet wrote it. These are her initials, she and Zach were
talking about it out at the barn, and those two are awfully
friendly with each other these days. And all this stuff about her
and her father knowing what he did…Wait a minute, I just had a
thought about what Juliet might've told her father."

"What's that?"

Michaela quickly told Joe about the
newspaper articles that Camden had found concerning Sterling Taber
and Rebecca Woodson. "Follow me. The letter that Juliet wrote to
Sterling may have to do with this girl."

"It might. But why wouldn't Juliet just
break up with him?" Joe asked. "Why go through the whole deal of
telling her dad and all? Sterling was never convicted of killing
the girl. You said that the papers reported it to be an
accident."

"I don't know. But Rebecca Woodson's
family filed a wrongful death suit. They don't seem to think it was
an accident."

"Okay. Keep talking. Go back to Sunday
at the fashion show. Maybe you missed something."

"Juliet seemed flushed and hurried.
Camden had thought she and Sterling were off together because she
couldn't find either one of them. She offered Juliet a shot of
tequila after she showed up, but she refused and got up on the
stage."

Joe nodded. "But what about Zach? Where
was he during all of this?"

"On the runway," Michaela replied. "I
saw him up there, and then Juliet came rushing through because she
was next. He asked her if she was okay when he saw her stepping up
on the stage as he was getting down. She nodded and the show went
on."

"One thing we know then is that Zach
didn't kill Sterling, so we can cross him off the list, but what we
don't know is if he's protecting Juliet. From the sound of it, he's
protecting her from something. We can also guess they're protecting
her father. Strange, though, I don't think Daddy would go and
advertise to his little girl that he planned to knock off her
boyfriend."

"No. I agree with that. Let's stay with
this train of thought, that the murder has to do with Rebecca
Woodson," Michaela said.

"Okay, we'll see if we can't peel this
back a bit more and give each of them a motive. I know we can only
theorize but it might help. Say Juliet felt threatened by Sterling.
Maybe the dude did kill this Rebecca Woodson. He might have
threatened Juliet for something; maybe she didn't want to see him
anymore for another reason. Who knows if there was a lovers'
quarrel? Say there was. Taber threatens Juliet Mitchell, who tells
Zach, who is their buddy. Now, Juliet is a pretty girl, and Zach
may have had a thing for her. You said they were all kinda
lovey-dovey when you spotted them in the stall area?"

Michaela nodded. "Definitely. I would
even go so far as to say that they looked to be more than
friends."

"Okay. Zach sees an opening where
Sterling screwed up with the girl. He's there for her to lean on
and she tells him that Sterling threatened her. Zach was in Santa
Barbara with Sterling when this Rebecca Woodson died?"

"Yes. And what if Zach knows that her
death wasn't an accident and thinks that Sterling might have killed
her? He decides to protect Juliet, and one or the other goes and
tells her father about Sterling's threat and what happened in Santa
Barbara."

"We're like a regular Holmes and
Watson, girl."

She smiled. "Sort of, huh? Now, Ed
Mitchell hears this and he's not happy. He kills Sterling. Zach and
Juliet assume he did it because they told him about Sterling and
maybe Ed went ballistic. Now Zach and Juliet feel the need to
protect her father."

"Exactly. The kicker is, where does
Pepe Sorvino and his clan come in and what's the deal with the ring
that you saw Mitchell give to Pepe?"

"A payoff?"

Joe clucked his tongue. "Possible. I'm
gonna call around to a few of my cousins and see if the Sorvinos
have any ties with one of the families."

"Mafia?"

Joe shrugged and wheeled the van onto
her property.

"Wouldn't you know that already? With
your connections?"

"You've watched one too many
Sopranos."

She shook her head. They pulled up in
front of her house. Michaela extracted the videotapes from the
backpack she'd taken into Sterling's place. "Wanna watch some
movies?"

Joe looked at his watch. "Can't. What
you got?"

"Compliments of Sterling."

"You little vixen."

"Never know what we might find. I
figured I might as well grab them. We've already broken a hundred
laws tonight."

"Report back. I told Marianne I'd be
back before Conan. We like to watch it together."

"Deal."

Michaela went inside her house. A quiet
staleness that she had never gotten used to since her old lab,
Cocoa, passed away came over her. She sighed. What it must feel
like to come home to a family. Lucky Joe.

She got her video camera out. These
videos hadn't been transferred from the camera-type cassettes. She
would have to put them through her camera to see, and then run it
on her laptop. Maybe she'd make some popcorn for the evening's
entertainment. Probably just shots of high-priced vacations that
he'd taken. She put some popcorn in the microwave, grabbed a bottle
of water, and started watching the first tape while it
popped.

The bag remained in the microwave
before she ever got to it, an hour later. What she saw on the tapes
was not only startling, they also revealed someone who would have
one helluva reason to put Sterling in the ground, where he couldn't
speak a damn word.