The Wrong Quarry (12 page)

She slipped out of my arms and stood with her back to the fire, which outlined her in an orange glow, making a near silhouette of her as she undid and threw off the red belt and then pulled the black mini up over her head. She wore nothing beneath. The breasts were large, too perfect, clearly the work of some plastic surgeon, and I did not give a good goddamn, because they were mesmerizing as she swayed before me, dancing to some sensual tune in her head, her pubic thatch an echo of her gypsy hair.

Her figure didn’t look bony at all, not in the semi-dark anyway, and when in her dance she turned toward the flames and swayed her dimpled rump at me, I pulled her down on my lap and she giggled and said, “I’ll sit on you, front ways. I like that better. Need me to get you a rubber?”

She may have been promiscuous, but she wasn’t a fool.

“I got one.” I was getting my billfold out.

“Let me put it on for you.”

She took the little package, opened it with her teeth. Knelt before me, undid my belt, pulled my shorts and pants down around my ankles, and then lubricated me with her mouth before her lips expertly rolled the condom down over me. Then she sat facing me on my lap with me up inside her and she moved so rhythmically, I started hearing the music, too. Her passion was contagious and made me drunk with her, and for that small piece of time I felt she loved me, her hands caressing my shoulders, my back, mouth hungrily descending on mine, then moving to my neck, to an ear, moaning, groaning, emanating not just heat but warmth. My hands were full of her rounded ass and my mouth was suckling the hard tip of a swollen breast and my nostrils twitched with the nasty sweet scent of her, and when I came, I jerked as helplessly as a cowboy on a bronc, even if I was the one being ridden.

When we slowed to a stop, she put a hand in my hair and played there. She smiled at me so tenderly that all the barroom hardness disappeared. “Stay the night, Jack, why don’t you?”

“Okay,” I said.

On either side of the double doors of the two-story brown-red brick building with green terra cotta trim, a bronze lion on a pedestal stood guard bearing a shield saying
STOCKWELL BANK
1914. A plaque confirmed the year and gave the architect as Louis Sullivan, a very famous gent, Jenny Stockwell assured me. When a new modern bank came in ten years ago, her father—still president, currently chairman of the board—had shifted another of his businesses, Stockwell Insurance, into this space.

Though the building wasn’t big (this was one of Sullivan’s famous “jewel box” banks, Jenny said), the twenty-foot ceiling gave a sense of vastness, with a skylight and vertical side windows of stained glass letting in plenty of sun. This grand area with its mosaic floor had, however, been subdivided into a dozen or so cubicles for insurance agents. The only real office space was in back, for the executives, which is of course where Lawrence J. Stockwell, President, had his.

Jenny had accompanied me. She was something. If I ever married her, it would be for more than just her money, and not even for the part of her anatomy accurately described as a “snapper” by those who had come before me.

We had slept (under one of her nude self-portraits in a big frame) between crisp clean sheets on a waterbed, a mode of sleep I usually avoid but this was comfortable and heated, and when thanks to her I both slept in and rose early (think about it), I damn near became a convert. Her breakfast of a veggie omelette with hash browns and spice muffins made me want to burn the local Denny’s down. And she had called her brother and gotten us this appointment, and left word for her father for an afternoon meet, as well.

“I think I better go with you,” she’d said at breakfast. “I get along better with my brother these days, and if for some reason he gets a stick up his ass, I might be able to remove it.”

“Better you than me.”

I went on to the Holiday Inn to shower and shave and change for the meeting with Lawrence Stockwell. Gray blazer over a white shirt and dark tie with dark gray jeans seemed about right. Wouldn’t have applied to sell insurance in that, but I was a journalist, so this should cut it.

Jenny met me in the motel lobby about eleven-forty-five and, other than the dark gypsy curls, the Pat Benatar look was M.I.A., replaced by a navy blue pantsuit with a lighter blue turtleneck.

“Well,” I said, “look at you, Ms. Plastic Conservative Businesswoman.”

She laughed and took my arm, walking me out. “I learned long ago, when entering the Stockwell family universe, to humor the management.”

“Probably helps, if you want to stay in the Will.”

“I already have a decent income, thank you, but I can’t touch my trust fund principal till I’m fifty-five. If I live that long.”

“It’s nice to have a goal.”

And maybe that explained why this free spirit had not moved away from stifling Stockwell. Always good to stay close to the money.

We were at her black Firebird in the motel parking lot. “I’m glad you didn’t show up on a Harley,” I said. “It’s humiliating for a man, grabbing a woman from behind and holding on for dear life.”

“Only if he has his clothes on,” she pointed out.

She was something.

We were shown immediately into a moderately spacious cream-walled office dominated by a formidable mahogany desk with phones, blotter and the usual accessories, though no sign of work. Dark-wood file cabinets went well with the desk, as did a round polished wood table with four chairs, for client talks and business conferences.

The only thing really striking about the office were the side walls: one devoted to a dead son, the other to a missing daughter. Though this was the first I’d seen a picture of either, Lawrence Stockwell’s lost children were clearly the subjects of these shrines.

Over by the table was the history of Steven Stockwell, from baby to toddler to grade schooler through junior high and high school, football, basketball, golf, prom, graduation, and at the center a studio portrait of a painfully young Marine lieutenant, with his medals (two Purple Hearts and a Bronze Star) displayed in a separate frame nearby. We’d all been so goddamn young.

The wall opposite Steven’s was a memorial to Candy Stockwell. Her life from pre-school to high school was charted, though her wall was even more extreme than her brother’s—a dozen color photos of various sizes, elaborately framed, charted the teenage years of a blonde who was so cute and sexy she made Barbara Eden look like Miss Hathaway. Cheerleader, musical comedy star, prom queen, with another airbrushed studio portrait center-stage, as unreal as what you see in an open casket.

Why the hell would a father put himself through the torture of surrounding himself with such raw-wound memories? Celebrating the very pursuits she so loved, and he had ultimately discouraged? The late Reed Farrell couldn’t have put the guy through worse.

Taking all that in took a couple of seconds, during which Lawrence Stockwell—tall, slender, in a charcoal suit, black-and-gray striped tie—came quickly around the prop of his mahogany desk to greet his sister. He took both her hands and gave her a kiss on the cheek.

She smiled at him, tugged at an elbow of his fashionably cut loose suit coat. “Very sharp, Larry. Hugo Boss?”

He looked down at her, his smile an echo of hers. “Good eye, Sis,” he said in a warm second tenor. “I only deal with the top clients these days. Gotta look the part.”

He did. He was tan and trim and had the same sharp features that made his sister so striking, including the green eyes. But the black hair had gone mostly white now, trimly cut, like Johnny Carson’s, with sideburns trying to keep up with the times. Though crowding fifty, he might have been sixty, making his youthful look seem a trifle desperate.

“And this is your friend Mr. Quarry,” he said, turning with a smile that creased an already heavily lined face, extending a hand that I took and shook.

His firm handshake had been perfected to just the right pressure and timing over years of doing business.

“I’m pleased to get the chance to talk to you, Mr. Quarry. My sister seems to have a high opinion of you.”

“We kind of hit it off,” I admitted.

He gestured to the client table and we sat, with one of us on his either side. He asked if we’d like coffee or soft drinks and we declined. He leaned back in his chair and folded his arms, an ankle on a knee, so very casual. So very calculated.

“So you’re a reporter with the
St. Louis Sun?”
His smile was that disguise worn by businessmen while they’re assessing you.

“No,” I said, raising a cautionary palm. “I don’t mean to misrepresent myself. I’m strictly a freelancer. I’m still trying to place a story with the Sun.”

Stockwell’s smile continued even as his forehead frowned. “Oh? Jenny gave me to understand—”

“I’m working on a spec story for an editor at the
Sun.
I’ve been pitching ideas and this one generated some real interest.”

I needed to make sure my cover story wouldn’t crumble with a phone call.

Jenny prompted, “Jack, tell him what that idea is.”

“Mr. Stockwell,” I said, sitting forward just a little, “your daughter’s disappearance deserves wider coverage. It garnered some attention early on, but now it’s—”

“Yesterday’s news,” he said. His eyes were moist.

We’d just started and he was having trouble already. A haggardness became obvious. So much for his cool executive’s demeanor.

“Mr. Quarry, I am glad to answer any questions you might have. So very many readers out there could relate. My daughter’s disappearance...actually, I’m afraid, her
death...is
a tragedy that would touch the heart of any parent.”

“I agree. But you say ‘death,’ and I have a feeling you mean ‘murder.’ Sir, I assume you’re referring to the suspicions expressed by your father, in the press, about Roger Vale, your daughter’s dance instructor.”

He nodded slowly. That his eyes were that same clear green as Jenny’s was disconcerting somehow. Clear but bloodshot.

He said, “I’m fairly confident that Dad is right about Vale’s guilt. You know, Candy wrote extensively in her diary about that...that creature. He...this is difficult, Mr. Quarry, but I’ve had to face it. He involved her in sexual activities that were highly inappropriate. Really beyond the pale.”

Jenny leaned forward and touched her brother’s hand. “If that’s true, Larry...that
still
wouldn’t explain him killing her.” She glanced at me. “Candy was seventeen when she disappeared, Jack, and seventeen is the age of consent in Missouri.”

Well, if nothing else, I’d finally gathered that piece of information.

Stockwell, frowning at his sister, in frustration, not anger, said, “Maybe he wouldn’t have gone to jail, but he’d have been exposed as a probable pedophile—he instructs girls as young as
twelve,
you know!”

“I just don’t think,” she said gently, “that you can put much stock in those diary entries. Candy was an artistic girl. You
know
that—music, dance, acting. A creative whirlwind.”

I said to Jenny, “You mean, she had a crush on a gay man, and what she wrote was a fantasy of how she might...change him?”

Jenny nodded. “Why not?”

“I don’t buy that at all,” Stockwell said dismissively, then turned back to me and shifted the subject. “Our father hired the top investigative agencies in the country to search for Candy.”

I asked, “Where have they looked?”

With a glance at his sister, he said, “We all agree that if she
had
run off, Candy would’ve gone somewhere to try getting into theater or some other form of show business. Those detectives have scoured New York and Los Angeles.”

“There are a dozen other cities,” I said, “where she might break in.”

“And they’ve been checked, too. Mr. Quarry, I know my daughter.” He paused, grimaced. “She was a lovely girl, in so many respects, but...after her mother died...she
acted out,
as they say. I may have given her too much freedom. I admit it. And...and I’m sure Jen has already told you this...I may have spoiled her somewhat. She had a very easy life here.”

“Cushy as hell,” Jenny said matter of factly.

“Much as I love her,” he said, “I don’t believe she would last out there, in the cold hard world, for more than forty-eight hours before calling me to wire her a plane ticket. Not a bus ticket, Mr. Quarry. A plane ticket. First Class.”

I nodded. “Then...forgive me, sir, but...you
do
believe she’s dead.”

“I thought I’d made that point.”

“That her body hasn’t turned up doesn’t give you any doubt? Or, on the other hand, hope?”

“No.” He removed a handkerchief from his pocket and dried his eyes. “She’s gone, Mr. Quarry. She’s not out there. I can feel her absence.”

He put a hand over his face for several seconds.

I asked, “Have you given any thought to the possibility that someone besides Vale may be responsible?”

The question seemed to blindside him. “Actually...no. The evidence against him is so strong that—”

“Is
it strong?” I asked, gentle but firm. “Your family rules the roost around here. Meaning no offense, that’s obvious. If there had been any solid evidence against Vale, your local District Attorney would have charged him.”

“I can’t argue with that. Wouldn’t be the first time a shrewd killer got away with murder.”

And I couldn’t argue with that.

I went on: “Vale cooperated with the police. Allowed them to search his dance studio, including his living quarters. And I understand they found nothing.”

Stockwell was shaking his head. “That doesn’t mean anything. Vale could have somewhere he takes his victims. Some other house, some remote place.”

“But
have
there been any other victims? Are any other local girls missing?”

“No,” he sighed. Then he raised a lecturing forefinger. “But suppose, Mr. Quarry, suppose he’s been dallying with other students, underage girls perhaps. And perhaps Candy was having an affair with him, and discovered that, became jealous, and threatened him with exposure. Statutory rape, Mr. Quarry, is no small offense. His career, his life, would be over.”