The Other Woman (12 page)

The book-lined living room, fire crackling in a white-brick fireplace, polished white baby grand piano, dozens of photographs in silver frames, looked as if someone had just plumped all the white-on-white couch pillows and disappeared. A flowered china tea service, delicate and gilt edged, lay jewel-like in the center of a mahogany coffee table. Lemons, pumpkin-glazed cookies, honey. Two diminutive silver spoons.

Jane perched on the edge of a sleekly white club chair.

Moira settled directly opposite her, centered on the pillow-lined couch—so slight, she barely made a dent in the cushions. Her gold wedding ring, with a modestly massive diamond engagement ring above it, glittered in the firelight.

She didn’t say a word.

Jane’s spiral reporter’s notebook was burning a hole in her purse. But now was not the time to get it out. She couldn’t figure this. Maybe Moira was waiting for her to begin?

“So shall we—?” Jane began

“So, Jane,” Mrs. Lassiter spoke at the same time.

“Oh, sorry,” Jane said. Not an auspicious beginning. “Please. Go on.”

But Mrs. Lassiter seemed to be studying her hands. If there were a clock, Jane could have heard it tick. A cinder popped against the fireplace screen. Mrs. Lassiter looked up.

Is she on the verge of tears?

“So, Jane,” Mrs. Lassiter said again. “This is somewhat difficult. But I know I can count on your discretion. I’ve followed your investigative work from the beginning, and I’ve always felt—your heart is in it. You authentically care about doing the right thing. That’s why, even under all the pressure, you protected your source in that prostitution case. Your station was hit with the million-dollar judgment, correct? But you never told. Isn’t that true?”

“Yes, I never—” Jane paused, thought for a second. “I mean no, I never revealed my source.”

“That proves you’re trustworthy,” Mrs. Lassiter went on, nodding. “And that’s why I called you. Because now I—I need your help.”

Jane waited, blinking.
She needs my help?

“Can we be off the record?” Mrs. Lassiter continued. “You don’t use this in the paper until I say you may?”

Just what I need. Kiss of death. I can know something that I can’t use. Of course, if I say no, she won’t tell me, and then I won’t know it. At least it’s not another source thing. Whatever she tells me, at least I can discuss it with Alex. So here we go again.

“All right, Mrs. Lassiter. Off the record. But let’s have an understanding of what that means. I’ll go with the story only if I can confirm it on my own. I won’t do that without letting you know. I won’t connect the source of the information with you. And I’m going to tell my editor. Are you comfortable with that?”

The other woman took a sip from a crystal glass of ice water, carefully put the glass on a coaster. She moved the spoon on the right closer to the one on the left. Moved it back.

“Here’s the problem, Jane,” she said. “I think my husband may be having an affair.”

*   *   *

“Black. Two sugars.” Jake slid across the cracking black wannabe-leather upholstery of the corner booth at Cuppa Joe’s.
Why is the guy behind the counter wearing a—? Oh. Halloween coming up.

DeLuca now had about three minutes before he was late. Why’d he always cut it close? Today wasn’t the day to push it. Sellica Darden’s funeral started in two hours. Jake needed to get there early and grab a parking spot in the front of All Saints so he could check out the arrivals. For whatever that was worth.

The vampire-waiter sloshed a pale cup of coffee in front of him, then pointed with a black-polished fingernail to a crusted container of sugar, kernels of rice sprinkled inside it.
Lucky for him I’m not the health squad, Halloween or no.
Jake tipped a flow of sugar into his coffee, monitoring for rice.

Sellica’s funeral. Did the Bridge Killer attend the funerals of his victims?

Dammit
. Jake stirred so hard, coffee sloshed into the saucer.
There is no Bridge Killer.

Even so. There was no way to know whether the bad guy would show up for the first two victims. Because there had been no funerals yet. Because the cops—his guys—had gotten exactly nowhere, still waiting for ID. The victims were waiting in the morgue. In a couple of days, someone’d have to make a decision.

Jake took an unrewarding sip.

But Sellica, she had ID. Her face. Oh, sure, her purse was gone, like the others. Anyone else, it’d be another investigation to figure out her identity. But Sellica Darden, her fifteen minutes weren’t up. Had the killer realized Sellica didn’t need a driver’s license for her name to be known? Or did he hope she’d be anonymous, too?

“Yo. Harvard.” Paul DeLuca slid into the booth, opposite Jake. DeLuca was all points—nose, elbows, cheekbones, ears. Everything too long, too sharp. His beat-up leather jacket hung on him like a deflated basketball. He examined the bottom of the salt shaker, which dumped a pile of salt on the table. He threw some over one shoulder, swiped the rest onto the floor.

“Yo, dropout.” Jake completed their now-ritual. He let his language slide a bit with DeLuca. Can’t beat ’em, join ’em. They’d been partners two years. “Whatcha got for me?”

“Well, funny you should ask. I got—” DeLuca pulled a tattered spiral notebook from inside his jacket. Thumbed a few pages, then stopped. Gave Jake a look. “Guess.”

“Gimme a break,” Jake said.

“Amaryllis Roldan.”

“What?” Jake looked at his partner. Baffled.

“
Who,
you should say. Amaryllis Roldan is a who.”

“Who what?” Jake said. This was not funny.

“She’s Charlestown, Jake. Bridge Killer number two. The tattoo? Some moke in a Hyde Park shop recognized it. From that, we snagged her address. Outta town, but they knew she’d come to Boston to make it big, whatever. No family connections here. They knew of, at least.”

“You sure? It’s her? Amaryllis—”

“Roldan. Yup. ME’s confirming now. But it’s a sure thing.”

“Motive?”

“Zip.”

“Family?”

“Checking.”

“Job?”

“Yeah,” DeLuca said. “That, we got.”

DeLuca flipped through the pages of his notebook and consulted something. Scratched his nose, as if seeing his notes for the first time. “Clerk at Beacon Markets. The one in Brighton. Started, like, a week before she was killed. How a-friggin’-bout that?”

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah. Good call, Harvard. Second store we hit.”

“Supe know?”

“Yup. He says keep a lid till it’s confirmed. Gotta dig up next of kin. All that.”

Jake paused, processing.
Amaryllis Roldan
. The victim had a name. It was a start. A good start. And she was connected with Arthur Vick. Had to be.

“Harvard?” DeLuca was sliding the salt shaker back and forth, like a hockey puck, between his palms. It scraped across the pockmarked tabletop.

“Yeah?”

“So now what?” He caught the shaker in one hand. “We gonna pick up Arthur Vick?”

19

“Your husband may be having an affair?” For a billion dollars, Jane could not have predicted that Moira would be the one asking
her
about it, not the other way around. Moira Lassiter’s bombshell landed square in her lap, and now she had about zero seconds to figure out what to do with it. But there it was. Even off the record, it couldn’t be unsaid. “Mrs. Lassiter? Ah—I’m so sorry. I’m not quite sure how to respond.”

Moira’s hands seemed steady as she poured steaming golden tea into one delicate cup, then the other. She gestured one of them to Jane. “Sugar?”

“Mrs. Lassiter?” Was Moira—in denial? On medication? Crazy? If she was blurting out stuff like that to strangers, no wonder she was home. Maybe the campaign bigwigs had grounded her. Perhaps not a bad plan.

But what was Jane supposed to do with this? What they don’t teach you in journalism school.

“Please, call me Moira.” The candidate’s wife smiled and reknotted the soft sweater draped around her shoulders. Ignoring her tea, she took another sip of her water. “Now that I’ve given you ‘the scoop.’”

“Well, that’s, ah, an understatement,” Jane said. Questions jockeyed for the front row. Red-coat woman? Someone else? Moira didn’t look nuts. But certainly the biggest question of all was her motive. Why on earth would she divulge such a suspicion? To a reporter? “Might I ask—why would you tell me that?”

“Because—because I’m not sure it’s true. But how am I supposed to find out? It’s not like someone’s sending me photos. I can’t ask Owen, of course. Because true or not, he’d deny it. They always deny it. And the more they deny it, the truer it seems.”

Jane took a sip of tea. Moira had a point.

“I’ve seen those other wives. Hillary. Jenny Sanford. Silda Spitzer. Maria. You can picture them, all those news conferences and awkward interviews,” Moira went on. “My heart went out to them. They’d believed in their husbands. Trusted them. Supported them. Devoted their lives to them. And then, in one headline, or one video clip, it’s all … just over.”

Jane nodded. Kept silent.
Maybe this will make sense in a minute.

“But it always comes out, doesn’t it?” Moira fiddled with her pearl bracelet. “They all think they’re the ones who’ll manage to keep it quiet, manage to have their careers and their women, too. But they can’t. They can’t. If my husband is having an affair, you media people are going to find out sooner or later. And it’s not only Owen’s life that’ll be ruined.
My
life will be ruined, too.”

She narrowed her eyes at Jane.

“After being married almost twenty-two years, giving up my career, being the candidate’s wife and the governor’s wife and then the businessman’s wife and now the candidate’s wife again, and always in the background, my life becomes the footnote. Well. I won’t have it.” She took a sip of her water, seemed to be considering.

“For instance,” she went on. “Where is Owen now? His campaign schedule has him out in Springfield. Until recently, I’d have been there with him. The crowds loved me. Loved our marriage. Loved us together. But oh, somehow, not anymore. Now, according to Mr. Rory Maitland, I’m no longer needed.”

“The campaign consultant? Told you—?”

“Oh yes, in no uncertain terms. Rory told me the polls showed I’m ‘unpopular.’ ‘Too reserved.’” Moira closed her eyes briefly. “He said their internal poll numbers showed I interfered with Owen’s female demos. As Rory so delicately put it, I was ‘in the way’ when it came to women voters. So he told me he’d handle it all, but it would be best if I ‘had the flu.’ Or was ‘tired.’ This is off the record, remember, as we agreed. But that’s ridiculous. He’s lying to me. He’s covering something up.”

“And that’s why you’ve been off the campaign trail? You were told to stay home?”

“Owen and Rory are inseparable,” Moira replied. She stood, picked up her water, edged past the coffee table, and stood in front of the fireplace, arms crossed. Almost a silhouette in the already-darkening afternoon, the fire glowing behind her. “He’s new to the campaign. A hired gun, here for the duration only. And Owen relies on everything he says. I think Rory knows about her. He’s helping Owen hide her. Until
after
they win, of course. Then they’ll go to Washington. What if I wind up as another one of those poor wives, pushing their redemption books on TV talk shows?”

Over my head. I’m in over my head.
Even if Jane ran out of the room with her hands over her ears—
la la la, I can’t hear you
—Moira Lassiter already started the dominoes falling. It’s what Jane suspected all along. What the holy hell was she supposed to do now?

Jane had to ask.

“Who?” she said. “Who is this other woman? Would you know her if you saw her?”

Moira shook her head. “No. But when you called, asking why I wasn’t making campaign appearances, I knew the sh— Well, it was about to hit the fan. As they say.”

“But…”

“Sheila King, the press secretary? Knows Rory is insisting I lie low,” Moira went on. “But I found a phone number in Owen’s jacket pocket. The phone was disconnected. Another time, I found a matchbook from some hotel. I’m putting two and two together. As you would. You weren’t going to let go of your ‘Where’s Moira?’ story, correct? And that’s the problem I had to solve.”

“But I never said—,” Jane tried again.

Moira kept talking. “Erase me from the campaign? No. Rory’s not going to get away with it. Cover-ups don’t work. We have to get in front of this.” Moira jabbed her palm with a finger. “Face it. Handle it. That’s why I need you to find out what’s true. Find her. Stop this.”

Crazy. Nut city. Over the edge. There is no reason—

But there was. A reason that took Moira’s whole unbelievably twisted story and twisted it back the other way.

Jane had to ask.

“Forgive me, Mrs. Lassiter,” Jane said. “But if your husband is having an affair, and it becomes public knowledge, Eleanor Gable’s campaign would instantly cash in on that. It’s likely your husband would lose the election. So I need to ask you. Are you hoping Gable wins? Do you
want
your husband to lose?”

20

“You were so patient with her, Governor Lassiter. Don’t you think so, Rory? No wonder you’re doing so well in the polls.” Kenna Wilkes turned to the candidate, smiling as she closed his office door behind that Hannah person.
Gone at last.
Now it was just the three of them. Hannah’d asked some pretty ridiculous questions in what she called her “interview” for her pitiful neighborhood paper. But all good, actually, since Rory had suggested Hannah interview her as a typical volunteer. Brilliant. He’d taken her picture with the governor, too.

“Always happy to spread the word, Kenna,” Owen said. “And happy you could join us for the interview.” The governor was concentrating on a stack of papers Rory placed in front of him. Not on her. Still, there was time.

Lassiter signed something, closed the folder. “So, Maitland. Weren’t we going to Springfield later this afternoon? It’s what I told that young woman.”

“Still on, Governor, but postponed a bit. Snafus with the hotel, but it’s all fine now.” Rory shot Kenna a look. “In fact, Mrs. Wilkes volunteered to help with the event. To get a feel for the campaign. Right?”