The Ex Who Wouldn't Die (7 page)

"
Detective
Jake
Daggett
,
"
he said, his words clipped and no-nonsense.

"
Amanda Randolph,
"
Brian said, nodding in her direction
.
"
H
er father, Judge Caulfield, and I
'
m her attorney, Brian Edwards.
"

The detective
nodded, pushed a hand through his
already- mussed
hair and opened his folder, studying the papers.
"
Mrs. Randolph, sorry about your loss.
"

For an instant,
Amanda
thought he was commiserating with her on the loss of her motorcycle, and for that instant, she liked the man, almost smiled at him.

Then he continued,
"
You were in the middle of a divorce, right?
"

Charley. Of course. That
'
s who they were here to talk about.

"
We
—"
Amanda started to reply, but Brian cut her off.

"
That is correct.
"

Detective Daggett
did not seem to find this act of ventriloquism unusual.
"
You went to his apartment on the day of his death?
" he asked.

"
I advise you not to answer that,
"
Brian
said.

Daggett
sighed and leaned back.
"
You went to his apartment on the day of his death.
"
This time it was a statement, not a question.
"
The neighbors identified you. A lot of neighbors. They
'
d seen you there before. A lot of times.
"

"
They were going through a divorce,
"
Brian
said.
"
Communication was necessary.
"

Amanda met the detective
'
s gaze and shrugged. She didn
'
t see any point in denying what was blatantly true. Judging from what she
'
d seen, most of Charley
'
s neighbors were as gainfully unemployed as he and would, as soon as she appeared outside his door, sidle from their apartments, making no attempt to hide their interest in whatever she and Charley said. Cheap entertainment.
They probably didn't have cable.

"
Loud communication,
"
Daggett
emphasized.
"
The neighbors said the two of you fought a lot,
and
you had a doozy on the day of Mr. Randolph
'
s death. What were you fighting about that day?
"

"
I advise you not to answer,
"
Brian said.

She glanced at her lawyer
. His usually benign, boyish features were set in concrete. This was serious business.
She could be going down for murder!

"
I didn
'
t kill Charley!
" she blurted.

Brian shifted uncomfortably. Amanda
'
s father patted her hand.
"
Nobody
'
s saying you did, sweetheart.
"

Daggett
lifted an eyebrow.
"
Somebody killed him. Any idea who
?
"

Amanda
'
s head jerked in Brian
'
s direction as if she expected him to protest
her answering the question
. He appeared to consider it, but remained silent.

"
Charley had a lot of enemies. He was always scamming somebody.
"

"
For instance?
"

Amanda threw up her hands.
"You think he shared that information with me?
Charley and I haven
'
t been close lately, and even when we lived together, it
'
s not like he brought these people home to dinner and introduced me.
"

"
Any information you can give us would be appreciated.
"

"
I wouldn
'
t count on it. For instance, Jack Scott. A few months before I left Charley, this guy came to the door in the middle of the night. Charley went outside to talk to him. I could hear just enough to know they were arguing about money, and most of the time, it was my money Charley was th
rowing around, so I went out
to join them. Introduced myself. Charley said the man
'
s name was
Jack
Scott
.
"

Daggett
was scribbling in his notebook.
"
Same man was there a couple of weeks later when I got home. Charley introduced him as
Ben
Parker.
"

Daggett
paused in his writing and looked up.

Amanda
shrugged.
"
I asked the man if he knew he had a twin named
Jack
Scott
. He didn
'
t answer. Most of Charley
'
s acquaintances had no sense of humor.
"

Daggett
sighed and leaned back in his chair.
"Okay,
I get the picture, but we
'
re going to need every name you can give us,
whether it's a real name or not,
descriptions of anybody you met,
anything you know about Charley's
business activities, legal or illegal. When you say
scams
, can you be more specific?
"
 

Amanda slid her gaze toward her father. He
'
d worked so hard for so long to hide Charley
'
s activities from the world, but today he only gave her a slight nod.

So. It was okay to have a member of the family involved in nefarious activities if that member was dead.

She exhaled in a long sigh, leaned back and prepared to trash Charley. Somehow this didn
'
t feel as good as when she
'
d complained to friends, telling them
in graphic detail
about the outrageous things Charley ha
d done.

"Nothing huge," she told the detective
.
"
Nothing you
'
d ever hear about on the ten o
'
clock news. But Charley had a certain charisma along with the ability to get into people
'
s heads and figure out their dream, then offer that dream to them.
"
She was only too familiar with that aspect of his personality.

"Go on."

"
He could meet somebody in a bar and next thing you know, Charley has a new best friend. The two of them are going to buy a boat and go to
Alaska
fishing for King Crab or travel to
South America
where Charley, a renowned archeologist, has discovered ancient Mayan treasure. The friend, of course, would make a financial investment in the non-existent boat or the rights to the Mayan treasure or whatever happened to be the victim
'
s dream.
"

"I see."

She shook her head slowly.
"
Sometimes I think Charley actually believed he was going to do these grandiose things.
He was very convincing."

She
'
d believed him
when she first met him, throughout their two-month whirlwind courtship and even for a couple of weeks after their
marriage
. She
'
d wanted to believe. Her parents had hated Charley immediately, so that had gone a long way toward validating him and ensuring that she
'
d marry him.

The motorcycle repair shop he
'
d promised to help her open had happened, though the
"
partnership
"
element had never materialized. He hadn
'
t produced the financial backing or the clientele, but, to give the devil his due, he had helped her find the courage to do it, to quit her most recent default job as a real estate agent.  

Daggett'
s left eyebrow
lifted
again. "So," he said, "the deceased was a small-time con artist. Did he have a day job?"

A small-time con artist.
That made it sound crude and insignificant. "Yes, he was a con artist who never made the big-time,
"
Amanda admitted
.
"
And no, he didn't have a day job. He worked at being a con artist
twenty-four seven
. He was dedicated to his career
."