This Doesn't Happen in the Movies (2 page)

“Who recommended me?” I asked.  The list was surely small.

“A friend at my club.”

“Really?  Who?”

“Paul Burrows.  Do you know him?”

I shook my head.  “Does he know my father?”  I assumed he was someone who’d heard about me helping my father’s friend.

“I don’t know, but Paul said you were good, and that you could use the work.”

She was right about that.  I lived comfortably off an inheritance from my obscenely rich grandparents, plus some smart investments I’d made over the years, so I’d never had a real career.  I had always wanted to work in law enforcement, but my parents had talked me out of that.  Instead, I got a law degree, flitted from job to job, and disappointed my father because I never stuck with anything.  I hoped being a detective would change all that; it was something I’d always wanted to do, but my father still thought I was playing around.  I needed to solve a real case to prove him wrong.

“Are you a fan of old movies?” Amanda asked, noticing the posters for the first time.

I nodded.  “I like old movies, but especially detective film noir.”

“Film noir?”

I pointed to a different poster on another wall of
The Maltese Falcon
, one of Bogie’s most famous movies.  “Movies with hard-boiled detectives, dark themes, and dark characters.”

“And dark women?” Amanda said.

I kept a straight face as I gazed at Lauren Bacall.  “Yeah, that too.”

“I hope you’re as good as Sam Spade,” Amanda said.

I watched her cross one shapely leg over the other, her red wool skirt edging up her thigh.  Trouble.  Just like I’d thought before.  I should have run out of my own office, but I didn’t.  I know what you’re thinking, it’s her beauty.  No, it was what she said next that complicated things immensely.

“I’m prepared to pay whatever it takes.”  Saying that, she pulled a stack of bills from her purse.  I crossed my arms and contemplated her.  This sounded like I’d just be chasing after a philandering husband.  Not exciting at all, even though I had little basis for making that assumption, other than what I’d read in books.  But a voice inside my head said that making money meant it was a real job, right?

I named my daily wage, plus expenses.  It was top dollar, but she didn’t blink.  And I had my first real case.  What would my father say to that?

*****

“Let’s start with you clarifying a couple of things,” I said.  Moments before Amanda had inked her name on a standard contract, officially making her my first client.  “How do you know your husband’s dead and not just missing?”

Amanda sighed.  “Because he would’ve called me, kept in touch, and I haven’t heard a word from him.”

“But if he was out with someone else?”

She shook her head.  “No, he always calls.  He pretends things are normal.  We have our routine and he always follows it.  Only this time he didn’t.”

“But he knew?”

“That I knew?”

I nodded.  She nodded.  “Yes, he knew.”

I resisted the urge to continue the Dr. Seuss rhyme.  “So he hasn’t called you, but what makes you jump to the conclusion that his not calling means he’s dead?”  I leaned back in my chair, tipping it up on two legs.  “What if he wanted to disappear, or he’s fallen in love with someone else and has run off with her?”

Amanda emitted a very unladylike snort.  “Peter’s not capable of love, so it’s impossible for him to leave me.  Not for that reason, anyway.”

“Have you given him another reason to leave?”

She hesitated.  “I was going to kill him.”

We moved out of the realm of boring.  The chair legs hit the floor hard.  “Excuse me?”

“I was going to kill him,” she repeated.  She stared down at her hands and ticked items off on an index finger.  “For the insurance money and the inheritance.  Well over five million.  Besides that, I would get my freedom from the farce of our marriage.”  She spoke matter-of-factly, as if she were detailing a cooking recipe.  “I was trying to figure out a way to do it.  I couldn’t make it look like a suicide, because I’d lose out on the insurance money.  I couldn’t murder him, because I couldn’t guarantee getting away with it, and I might not get any money that way either.  A domestic dispute gone bad was out of the question because Peter wouldn’t hit a rabid dog, let alone his wife.  I was left with creating an accident.  Only I never could figure out what to do.  Help him lose control and drive off a snowy mountain road?  Too much risk for me.  Electric shock of some sort?  But how could I pull that off?  Poison?  But with what, and how to keep it from being discovered?”  Her breasts lifted and sank in a deep sigh.  “I finally gave up,” she said and looked me straight in the eye.  “I didn’t do anything.”

Blurting out her plans like that intrigued me.  Bogie never had it this easy.  “But he’s disappeared,” I came back to the original point.  “How do I know that you didn’t have him killed?”

“Why would I hire you?”

“To make it look like you weren’t involved.”

She smiled.  “I’m afraid that’s impossible.  First of all, I wouldn’t know where to start.  And as I said, I gave up the idea of killing him.”

“Then how do you know he’s dead?  If he knew you wanted him dead, that’s a lot of motivation not to come home.”

“He didn’t know anything about it.”

“But you just said that he might not come home because he knew you were trying to kill him.”

She emitted an exasperated sigh.  “Peter never knew anything,” she said again.

“How do you know?”

She spoke to me like I was the class dunce.  “All Peter knew was that our marriage, and his money, were in jeopardy.  When I was considering what I might do to him, I was less,” she struggled to find the right words, “less than kind to him.  Cold.  Indifferent.  He sensed that.  Then I decided I was being foolish, so I resumed the game.  Things were back to normal, whatever that was.  He didn’t have any reason not to come home.”

I sat back again, feeling like I’d missed the answer to a test question.  “So I’m supposed to find your presumably dead husband, whom you wanted to kill, but deny that you did, and now that he’s gone, you want him back.”

“Yes,” she said, exasperated.

“Fine,” I said.

I should’ve run, right then.  I should’ve, but I didn’t.

CHAPTER TWO

“This is quite a house,” I said as Amanda walked out of her huge three-car garage.  I noticed a black Porsche parked in the far space, and a blue Mercedes in the middle spot, next to Amanda’s sleek gray Lexus.

I had just followed Amanda to her house in Castle Pines, an exclusive gated community of huge, custom-built homes resting in the shadows of the Rocky Mountains near Castle Rock.  The continuing sprawl of suburban Denver threatened smaller towns, but in areas like Castle Pines, between Castle Rock and south Denver, the neighborhoods were still quiet and you had breathtaking views of the mountains thrown in.  I could smell fresh pine carried in an early winter breeze that whipped up dead leaves in the lawn.

“Come on inside,” she said, looking around nervously.  I didn’t know what she had to worry about; the nearest house was at least a hundred feet away and I hadn’t seen anybody out on the meandering road that led to her place.

I suppressed a whistle as we walked across creamy red flagstone steps to a long front porch.  Having grown up in the cradle of wealth, I was not easily impressed, but this came close.  The Ghering house, with its opulent Victorian design, certainly challenged my childhood home in size.  It was painted eggshell white, complemented by black trim and decorative ironwork on the windows, with a huge red brick chimney jutting out from the south side of the house.  Unlit Christmas lights hung from the eave, and from the branches of two large pine trees in the front yard.

“Why did you give up the idea of killing Peter?” I asked as we stepped inside.  A spacious foyer branched off in three directions, to the right a cozy sitting room, to the left a large living room, lavishly decorated, and straight ahead stairs leading to the second floor.  It didn’t take a detective to know that a lot of money had gone into the decor.

“Let me take your coat,” Amanda said, hanging both hers and mine in a closet under the staircase.  “Would you like a drink?”

I hesitated because it was barely lunchtime.  “It’s a bit early for me.  A glass of water would be fine.  And how about an answer to my question.”

She beckoned me to follow her into the living room, where she crossed to a minibar and began preparing drinks, water and ice for me, vodka and a splash of Rose’s lime juice for her.  I curled an eyebrow at her as she swallowed half her drink.  “This whole thing’s got me tied up in knots,” she said, justifying her actions.

I sat down on an expensive leather sofa near a towering Christmas tree adorned with gold ribbons and red lights.  I sipped my glass of water and said nothing, but wondered if she’d already thrown back a drink or two before coming to my office.  It could explain her willingness to talk.

Amanda stared at me as she finished her drink.  “I decided not to kill Peter because he may be unfaithful, but he’s not worth killing.”  She set the empty glass back on the bar and pushed an imaginary hair away from her eyes.  As she talked, I was riveted by those eyes, how piercing they were.  “I assumed the role of the spoiled rich wife, a country club woman,” she continued, toying with an enormous diamond on her left ring finger that reflected the light from a huge bay window.  “I use his money like he uses me.  I’m a side attraction, there when he wants me; I fade into the woodwork when he doesn’t.”

Dressed as she was in another expensive designer outfit, every piece from her earrings to the matching leather heels, she clearly used his money well.  “Tell me about this business trip,” I said, sinking further into the sofa.

“Peter started out in Florida.  He stayed there for a week, then a week in New York, and he was supposed to be in Philadelphia this last week.”

“Supposed to be?  Did he not make it to Philadelphia?”

“No.”

“Are  you sure?”

 Amanda frowned.  “Of course I'm sure.  The last time I heard from Peter was his last night in New York.  He was leaving for Philly the next morning.  The police told me that his ticket from New York to Philly wasn’t used.”

“Could he have changed his mind?  Taken the train instead?”

“I suppose that’s possible.  But it isn’t like Peter.  He’s meticulous to a fault and tied to his routines.  I can’t see him changing his plans like that and not telling me.”

“Okay, so he didn’t use the airline ticket, and you didn’t hear from him this past week.”  I cocked my head to the side.  “But that doesn’t mean he never made it to Philadelphia.  Or that he’s dead.”

“True.”  She thrust a finger in my direction.  “That’s why I hired you, to find out what happened.  I think he’s dead.  Maybe he had an accident, met an angry husband of one of his lovers.  I don’t know, but I’m preparing myself for the worst.”  She was doing a fine job of it, I thought, eyeing the empty glass behind her.

“Then you’d inherit the money and all your problems would be solved.”

Her face twisted into a quick mixture of emotions – sadness, pleasure, fear, then blank.  “I suppose.  Boy, would that make Peter’s parents angry.”

“Why?”

Amanda contemplated the question for a moment, then said, “Peter’s parents never really liked me.  I think they resent the fact that Peter has done well for himself, that we live so well now.  They don’t live as well, but money from Peter’s estate would go a long way for them.”

“You’re sure you would inherit and not his parents?”

“Yes.  I saw a copy of the will after Peter came from the attorney’s office.  His parents have their own money.  Not as much as us, but they have some.  He didn’t see any need to give them any more.”

I pondered her last revelation.  “I can see why you hope he’s dead.”

If it angered her, she didn’t show it.  She stood a bit straighter and gazed at me, unflappable.  We stayed in speculative silence long enough for me to sing the chorus of The Police’s “Murder by Numbers” in my head.

“So,” I finally said.  I set my empty glass on the coffee table and leaned my elbows on my knees.  “Do you have a copy of Peter’s itinerary and who he was working for?”

“Sure.”

“Plane reservations, hotel reservations, any car rental information?”

She nodded.  “All of that should be upstairs in his office.  Peter was self-employed, so everything would be there.”

“Let’s have a look,” I said.

“Right now?”

“Is that okay?” I asked.  I wondered about the slight resistance, but dismissed it.

“No, that’s fine.”  I stood up and followed Amanda as she headed for the stairs, passing a picture in a gold frame sitting on a teak wood end table.  “Is this Peter?” I asked, picking up the photo.

Amanda stopped and turned.  “Yes.  As you can see, he’s easy to fall for.  Tall, six-two; dark brown eyes, quite good-looking,” Amanda said.  I examined the picture and agreed.  Peter Ghering, dressed in white shorts and a dark blue Oxford shirt, stood in front of a long white sailboat, a cocky half-smile on his tanned face.  He kept his hair short, the curls neatly slicked into place.  He pointed at the camera with his sunglasses, seeming relaxed, a man without a care in the world.

“How recent is this?” I asked.

“Taken last summer, but he still looks the same.”

“Six to eight months probably wouldn’t change him much,” I said, memorizing the picture before I put the photo back.  “What kind of a man is Peter?”  I chose my words with care, speaking of him in the present.  No reason to think otherwise.

“A control freak, driven to succeed.  Highly successful, but emotionally he has nothing to give.  He’s charming, at least at times, devastatingly handsome, and great in bed.  That alone kept me going for a long time.”

A Harlequin hero.  “How long have you been married?”

“Fifteen years.”  Amanda gazed out the window, as if she could see her wedding day in the sunshine outside.  “We were young, right out of college.  Peter was going places and I wanted to be right there with him.  He liked the high life, and so did I.  We were going to be Mr. and Mrs. Perfect.”  Her eyes turned back to me.  “But the monotony of marriage set in.  He spent more time on business trips; I spent more time at the country club.  He began to play around.”