by Elaine Viets
“Circumstantial,” Monty said. “There’s no DNA or witnesses placing Kendra at these other fires. There are no security videos or fingerprints. The investigators claim that because Kendra is Mexican American, she has a grudge against the rich people in the Forest.”
“Does she?”
“As I understand it, she was badly hurt by a love affair with a rich young man in the Forest,” Angela said. “She thought he was going to marry her. He thought she was a casual fling.”
“Was his family’s property targeted by the arsonist?” Lin asked.
“He’s Dr. Bunny Hobart, a distant cousin of the Hobarts who had the burned pool house,” Angela said. “But I was told that if Kendra wanted revenge, she’d have gone after Bunny. The investigators say that Kendra had direct access to the three arson sites because of her parents’ businesses—her mother owns a cleaning service, and her father has a lawn-care company.”
“Circumstantial evidence isn’t necessarily bad for Miss Salvato in the arson cases,” Lin said. “Juries expect forensics now, and the prosecution can’t deliver them.”
“Don’t underestimate the fact that Kendra is an outsider,” Angela said. “She’s a brown-skinned woman in a lily-white world. And she’s a home wrecker. She stole the husband of Priscilla Delor, a much-admired Forest matron who’s president of the Chouteau Forest Women’s Club. A jury of Forest wives would give her the needle for that alone.”
“You think the Forest has that kind of lynch-mob mentality?” Lin asked.
“Yes,” Angela said. “I did the death investigation interviews at the scene after the fire where Luther Delor died. That’s when the transformation started. Before the fire, Luther was a dirty old man having an affair with a woman half a century younger than he was. The local good ol’ boys admired him for doing what they didn’t have the nerve to do—break out of their rigid lives and have some fun. The women were disgusted. They refused to invite Luther and Kendra to any of their parties. Luther didn’t care. The women were deeply sympathetic to Luther’s wife, Priscilla.
“When I was interviewing the Forest insiders the night of the fire, people began talking about him differently. They started calling him ‘our Luther’ and dismissing his sexual escapades as endearing foibles. Kendra, fifty years younger than Luther, was a scheming black widow who’d trapped the poor, foolish old man and bled him dry.
“We can’t forget this fact,” Angela said, “because it’s crucial to the Forest: Kendra made off with two million dollars of the old man’s money, and he promised her another two mil—money she wasn’t entitled to by birth or a properly sanctioned marriage. In the Forest, money is blood. She is a poacher, an interloper, and she tried to rise above her place. They want to punish her.”
“They’re already punishing her,” Monty said. “I’m having trouble finding experts to testify, once they know I’m representing Kendra. Suddenly, their calendars are full.”
“Our boss, the Chouteau County medical examiner, blew a gasket when Monty asked the court for a second autopsy,” Katie said.
“Why do you need one?” Lin asked.
“Because Evarts Evans did a half-assed job,” Katie said. “He hates slicing and dicing fire victims. Before he even saw the body, Ray Greiman, the Chouteau Forest detective, said Kendra did it, and that’s all Evarts needed to hear. He rushed through the autopsy so he could get out on the golf course in time for his tee off.”
“Do you think he fudged the evidence?” Lin said.
“No, Evarts, for all his faults, isn’t a liar,” Katie said. “But he did his best to interpret the facts to give the Forest the verdict it wanted. He’s a political animal. I’m convinced a second, more careful autopsy would give us different results. The problem is compounded because the usual experts refuse to question the opinion of their respected colleague. Evarts hates having his opinions questioned—which is why he’ll roast my sweet, rosy—”
Angela tapped her coffee mug with a spoon, and the china rang like a bell. Katie stopped and recalculated her words. “He’ll be absolutely furious if he finds out I’m helping the defense.”
“To be fair, you are conspiring against him,” Lin said.
“Fair is a four-letter word in the Forest,” Katie said.
“You’re having trouble getting a pathologist for a second autopsy,” Lin said.
“Exactly,” Katie said.
“Have you called Carol Berman?”
“The Carol Berman, from Florida?” Katie sounded impressed. “The one who worked on the Howe murder-for-hire arson? You know her?”
“She’s a friend.” Lin tried to look modest. “Carol lives in Delray Beach. If she’s free, she’ll do the autopsy. I’ll make the call for you.” She made a note on her legal pad.
“That would be a real help.” Monty didn’t bother hiding his relief.
“What about expert testimonies from fire investigators?” Lin said. “Do we need them?”
Angela heard that “we.” Lin was ready to come on board.
“At least two,” Monty said.
“Have you contacted Laurie Hartig and Mo Heedles?”
“I know of Laurie Hartig but haven’t contacted her,” Monty said. “Never met this Heedles guy.”
“Mo Heedles is a woman,” Lin said. “I think Mo is short for Maureen. Again, I can get in touch with them for you.”
“Could you? That would make my life much easier,” Monty said.
Lin glanced at her watch, a none-too-subtle reminder that her time was money. “What else? If you think your client is innocent, who set the arson fires? And who killed Luther Delor? Juries want answers. We have to give them the killer.”
“The most likely suspect for Luther’s murder is his wife,” Monty said. “Priscilla is a leader of Forest society, and her husband’s drunken skirt chasing made her a laughingstock. If he was dead, she could play the grieving widow.”
“So you think this Priscilla slipped inside Luther’s house and set fire to her husband?”
“Yes,” Monty said. “People don’t lock their doors in Luther’s gated community. She’s definitely angry enough to kill him. So is his daughter, Eve, for that matter.”
“Then why didn’t Priscilla or Eve pour gasoline on Ms. Salvato?” Lin said. “I can see why Priscilla would want her husband dead, but it would be just as easy to kill Ms. Salvato.”
“Because she wanted to frame Kendra for his murder?” Monty said.
“I hear a question in your voice. Do you have a good investigator?”
“Yes,” Monty said. “I can get him on the case.”
“Did Priscilla set the other arson fires?” Lin asked.
“Of course not,” Monty said. “It could also be that whoever is setting the arson fires killed Luther by accident—the house fire got out of control. I certainly don’t believe Kendra is the arsonist. Some locals blame Toonerville kids—that’s the nickname for the area where the blue-collar families live in the Forest.”
“Any names?”
“No,” Monty said. “The Toonerville kids are the usual suspects. Kendra’s father has also been mentioned.”
“As well as the inevitable black man,” Angela said.
“Two people in the Forest believe that the fires have been set by bored rich kids. They’d have easy access to all the estates.”
“But you have no proof and no suspects,” Lin said.
“If we can find the real Forest arsonists, we can save Kendra,” Angela said.
“And have all the fires tied up in a neat package? I don’t think so,” Lin said. “Monty, I’ll be your lead on this case, but your investigator needs to start looking for the arsonists.”
She stood up, indicating the meeting was over. Monty shook her hand, then said, “May we use this room to discuss a few things? It’s not a good idea for the three of us to be seen together.”
“Of course. I’ll start drafting up an agreement.”
After Lin left, Katie said, “Who’s your investigator?
KJ Lakker?”
“He’s the only one I trust to poke around in the Forest,” Monty said. “I’ll contact him when we’re back home.”
“Call him now,” Katie said. “He can get started today.”
They waited while Monty dialed the number. “Hi, Angie. Monty Bryant. Is KJ available?” A pause. “Montana!” The lawyer sounded as if the investigator had gone to Mars. “Could you tell me when he’ll return?” Another pause, then a shocked “Three more days! Is there any way I can reach him now? Okay, I understand. Please have him call when he returns.”
When he hung up, Katie said, “That didn’t sound good.”
“He’s off on some white-water rafting adventure with no cell phone. I didn’t realize he was like that.”
Monty sounded as if he’d discovered the investigator had a shameful secret.
“Hey, it’s not like he’s running around the woods after Bambi,” Katie said. “We’ve got time. He’ll get rolling as soon as he’s back. What can we do in the meantime?”
“Angela, I need you to go to Killer Cuts and ask Mario what he knows about Kendra and how she really felt about Luther. Right now, she sounds like a heartless gold digger. We need to know more about her.”
“What about me?” Katie said.
“You can stay out of trouble,” he said. “You’ve got the hard job. Angela, while we’re all together, Katie and I wanted to ask you something. There’s a new associate at the Forest law firm of Du Pres, Hanley, and Hampton. Kinkade Rushman. He’s forty-two, sing—”
“No,” Angela said.
“No what?”
“No, I’m not dating this Kinkade.”
“We call him Ken,” Monty said.
“I don’t care if you call him sweetheart.”
“I met him on a case, and we’ve become friends. I told him all about you. He’d really like to meet you, Angela.”
“I really don’t want to meet him. It’s too soon.”
“It’s just lunch,” Katie said. “We’re not asking you to do anything but sit down at a restaurant—anyplace you choose—and have a meal. Think about it, Angela. That’s all we ask.”
“All right. I’ll think about it. But I’m not making any promises.”
“We’re off to dinner,” Monty said. “Thanks for driving here.”
“No problem.” Angela watched them walk hand in hand toward the brightly lit restaurant.
She turned toward the vast, nearly empty parking garage, her footsteps echoing on the cold concrete. On the long drive back to the Forest, Angela wondered how she would face her empty house.
CHAPTER 20
Day seven
Sirens.
Lead-footed Angela heard their haunting wail and checked the Charger’s speedometer. The police are after me, she thought. I can’t get a ticket. The Forest cop let me off with a warning last time, but tonight I’m toast.
Wait! I’m going forty-five, the speed limit. Maybe I slid through a stop sign. As the patrol car’s flashing lights approached, she pulled over. And watched it zoom past.
Angela breathed a sigh of relief as a gust of cold wind slammed her car. She flipped on the heater. The temperature must have dropped thirty degrees since she’d left the Forest this afternoon. In the unpredictable Missouri spring, she could expect anything from cyclones to snowstorms. The streetlights glowed against the preternaturally dark sky.
Up ahead, the cop car turned into Du Barry Circle, a pricey outpost of privilege. Thick, oily black smoke billowed over the treetops.
Fire?
Angela followed the patrol car’s dancing red-and-blue lights to the looping, carefully landscaped road. She passed two mansions guarded by black wrought iron gates. Fire engines and emergency vehicles blocked the drive to Dr. Porter Gravois’s estate. The late Dr. Gravois—the neurologist who’d misdiagnosed her.
The patrol car stopped at the roadblock, and Angela pulled off onto the side. She grabbed an old sweater from the back seat and leaned against her car’s fender to watch the fire. Despite the freezing wind, she couldn’t take her eyes off the scene.
Hell had erupted in this sleek, extravagant neighborhood. Sirens howled like demons in the choking smoke. Yellow-and-orange flames roared through Gravois’s elegant French chateau, shooting through the mansard roof and cracking its fine bones. Angela counted three fire engines, two ladder trucks, the battalion chief’s van, and a hopeless tangle of cop cars and emergency vehicles among the hoses.
As she watched the fire devour her old enemy’s estate, a hot, fierce triumph burned through her. Gravois’s body was rotting in the cemetery overlooking his home. She hoped he was frying in hell as he watched his family home burn.
As if she’d conjured him out of the swirling smoke, the man who’d nearly killed her stood before her in his sleek Savile Row suit. He’d died without dignity. She’d seen his nearly naked body wearing blue boxers and black socks, like a porn-movie reject. Right up until his death, he’d been a respected member of Forest society. Thanks to Gravois’s blue blood and deep pockets, most of his mistakes were either overlooked or cured with a cold cash compress. But he’d misdiagnosed Angela when she’d showed up at SOS with migraines so severe she could barely see. Gravois had sent her home and told her to come back for a PET scan in a couple of days.
Instead, she’d had six strokes—including a hemorrhagic stroke—brain surgery, and a coma. During her three-month recovery in the hospital, Gravois never saw her, much less admitted his near-fatal blunder. When he was murdered last summer, Angela didn’t feel triumphant—she didn’t feel anything at all. She was too sick and numb. She was one of the few who didn’t mourn his death. But she did share the local shock when she learned Gravois was flat broke.
His widow was forced to sell his horses, her jewelry, their summer home in Michigan, their art collection, even their family antiques. Their Forest estate, a fake French chateau with topiary, two pools, and twenty acres of land, was still for sale. The price had been dropped twice in the last year, but there were still no buyers.
Now the fire was taking it.
An icy breeze blew away the swirling, red-tinted smoke, revealing fire investigator Doug Hachette with a camcorder perched on his broad shoulder. He wore a firefighter’s turnout coat, protective clothes and boots, and a hard hat.
“Angela! What are you doing here?”
“Is anyone in that inferno, Doug? I saw the smoke and followed a cop car here, in case I had to start a death investigation.”
“As far as we can tell, the place was empty. Thank God for that.”
“Is this another arson?”
“Incendiary fire,” he corrected her. “Arson is the crime, and this looks like it was deliberately set. I’ll know more when the fire’s out and I can flag, tag, and bag in daylight.”
He means investigate, Angela translated.
“Right now, I’m documenting the conditions, suppression, and progression, and interviewing individual witnesses. I’m looking for two juvenile witnesses. Males, estimated age fifteen to eighteen. Did you see them go by?”
“No, but I just got here. I didn’t see anyone walking along the road when I was driving up Du Barry Circle, and there were no cars in the other direction. Why do you think the fire was set by teen arsonists? Kendra’s in jail—she couldn’t have started this fire.”
“I didn’t say they set the fire. I just saw them when I was taping the observers, but I didn’t recognize them. One was wearing a T-shirt that said . . .” He stopped and looked embarrassed. “It had the F-word. I don’t like four-letter words.”
“I’ve heard them before. I work with Katie.”
“Okay, it said, ‘I Just Came Here to Drink and Fuck.’”
“Sweet.” Doug shifted uncomfortably, and Angela changed the subject. “The Gravois place looks like a total loss. I thought these old homes were solid.”
“They look solid. But like most of the big houses here, the Gravois home was built at the turn of the last century—it’s old-
school balloon-frame construction.”
“What’s that?”
“The worst kind for a fire. In balloon construction, the exterior wooden wall studs extend from the foundation to the roofline. This creates wall cavities from the foundation to the roof. Unless there are fire stops between the studs, these cavities can be an open path for the fire to spread quickly, like smoke up a chimney. Whoever built these houses cut corners and didn’t put in the fire-stops. With balloon construction, the fire travels from the first floor to the attic and spreads through the HVAC system and across the attic.”
Heating, ventilation and air-conditioning, she thought. Typical Forest—a good front hides massive problems.
“The building style, along with many remodels over the years, created interstitial spaces with no fire-stops between the interior and exterior walls and the ceiling and the floor above it. That helps the vertical spread of the fire.”
The way the house was built, along with the Gravois family’s nearly constant home improvement projects, created gaps that fed the fire, she translated, proud that she could keep up with Doug’s professional jargon.
He shook his head in disgust. “Fires in balloon-frame walls destroy the structural integrity, and collapse is a serious threat.”
On cue, there was a doomsday crack and cries of “Get back, get back,” and the roof of the Gravois mansion fell in. Sparks exploded in the night sky as geysers of flame shot up through the ruins.
“Holy shit!” Doug forgot he disliked four-letter words. “Now the whole structure will collapse. We’ll have to bring in heavy equipment to move the debris so we can investigate this fire. I just hope it doesn’t spread to the woods behind the house.”
“Mrs. Gravois will be lucky if she can sell the land. Is Celine here?”
“You mean at the scene? No. She’s not even living in the Forest right now. She’s staying at her mother’s house in Michigan. At least she’s spared the sight of her home going up in flames. That poor woman has had enough sorrow.”
“Did the house have a fire alarm?”
“It’s no secret that Celine Gravois is broke,” Doug said. “She couldn’t afford to pay the security company to monitor the property. She may have had battery-operated smoke detectors, but the house was unoccupied, and no one lived near enough to hear an alarm. A neighbor called it in when she saw the smoke, but by that time the fire was well advanced. The weather conditions don’t help. The high winds are spreading it. Mrs. Gravois stopped using a lawn service, and the dead topiary and trees are feeding the fire.”