NINE
The 12:30 ferry back to Stella Maris was crammed full of reporters. Darius would likely be in jail until Friday morning, and they knew it. But this batch was mostly freelancers. I called Blake.
“How are Nell and Bill doing? Clay?” I asked when he answered.
“They’re fine. I talked Grace into renting me the entire B&B at a municipal discount. I’m going to try to get Darius to stay there incognito.”
“Fraser’s not going to be happy with that plan,” I said. “But that’ll give you just one place to keep an eye on.”
“That, and there’s five less rooms for reporters to sleep in on the island.”
“There’s a ferry full of ’em headed your way.”
“S’not the first. Won’t be the last. A few of ’em are already camping at the park at Devlin’s Point.”
“Good grief. This batch isn’t heavy with cameras and equipment. I take them for mostly independents looking for a feature article, maybe some background. These are the ones who’ll be looking for the Coopers.”
“Roger that, thanks.”
No cars were parked in front of Darius’s house. Did he have personal security people? I hadn’t seen any sign of them yesterday. I put my small lock pick set in the back pocket of my capris, then emptied everything from my crossbody bag and transferred my Sig from my larger bag. My summer outfit wouldn’t conceal a weapon. If I ran into Darius’s security folks, I didn’t want to be toting a gun on my hip like Doc Holliday.
I slipped on a pair of nitrile gloves and took a quick stroll around the perimeter. The windows in the garage doors were too high for me to see inside. I tried the walk-thru door, but it was locked.
The infinity pool and landscaping Darius had put in on the ocean side of the house were breathtaking. A fire pit with eight chairs, multiple tables, two dozen lounge chairs around the pool, an outdoor kitchen with two smokers, a charcoal grill and a gas grill, a sand volleyball court…the whole area looked like it belonged at a high-dollar resort. Darius must entertain in lavish scale.
I climbed the stairs to the back deck and tried the screened porch door. Oddly, it had a handle with a keyed lock as opposed to the hook and eye latch on the inside that was more common in our part of the world. It was locked. I cupped my hands over my eyes and looked through a window. No one was in the kitchen. I was certain he had a security system, but had he thought to arm it?
I walked back around to the front, scanned the area, and jogged up the front steps. The lock on the door was impressive. Just for the heck of it, I tried the handle before pulling out my pick set. It was open. Poor Darius had been in such a state when he left that he hadn’t locked the front door behind him. And I hadn’t even thought to remind him. Good thing Stella Maris was the kind of town where an unlocked front door wouldn’t typically be a problem.
No one was around. “Hello?” I called as I pushed the door open. Somewhere in the house, the alarm panel announced, “Front door.” No alarms went off, at least none that were audible. No one answered me. The house felt empty. I wished Colleen were handy to screen it to be sure.
I walked inside and closed the door behind me. A man with his fingers in as many pies as Darius had must have a home office. When the Devlins lived here, the office had been on the front left side of the house. I poked my head into what appeared to now be a living room, or at least a separate conversation area. The doorway had been widened, the door removed.
A quick survey of downstairs revealed that all of the first floor was now entertaining space, from the completely renovated kitchen and dining area to three different living areas, the largest with a projection TV system. The entire floor was done in gleaming hardwoods, white walls, plantation shutters, gauzy white drapes that pooled on the floor, and mixed tan-toned upholstered furniture with an occasional pop of orange or teal.
Time to see what was upstairs. “Anyone home?” I called as I climbed the steps.
No one answered.
A floor to ceiling window at the first landing looked out over the side yard. No one in sight. I continued up the stairs. The only room to the right on the second floor was Darius’s office. The decorator had done an excellent job in here as well—dark woods and a nautical theme. Most likely what I was looking for was in here, but I decided to finish my tour before digging in.
Past the top of the stairs, an elevator closet and the laundry room were on my left. Across the hall was a short spur leading to the master bedroom. Massive, with a cathedral ceiling, a fireplace, and a wall of windows overlooking the ocean, it could’ve come straight out of Architectural Digest. The bathroom, done in white marble with industrial accents, featured a shower cave, a steam room, a sauna, and a jetted tub I could have floated in. Still no sign of anyone else in the house.
I stepped back out into the hall and checked out the two guest suites. Neither appeared occupied. Then I went back to Darius’s office. I sat down at his desk and surveyed the room. Twin tall file cabinets stood in the corner. But I wanted to see his email first.
I turned on the Mac. What would Darius’s password be? I tried his birthday, 123456, 123456789, and the word “password,” all combinations a disturbing number of people actually used according to something I’d recently read. Then I heard his voice in my head, “I’m Mr. Main Street USA.” Bingo. I was in.
I opened his email and scanned through the most recent subject lines. Then I searched on “Ancestry.” A long list of emails filled the screen. Many were actually from the site. I scrolled past those. Halfway down the list was an email with the subject, “Looking for My Birth Family.” How had he even gotten Darius’s personal email? I opened it and scanned the trail.
His name was Brantley Charles Miller and he’d grown up in Travelers Rest, South Carolina. That was the second time today that quaint town north of Greenville had crossed my radar. I disliked coincidences. It was a long email trail. I scrolled to the beginning.
Brantley had reached out to Darius on the Ancestry site on August 5. The first message had come through their messaging system. Brantley had written:
Hi, I know this sounds crazy, but I think we may be related. I recently had a DNA test done through Family Tree DNA. I uploaded my results to Y-Search. I was tracing my paternal line. It seems we have common ancestors. Would you be interested in discussing our potential common heritage?
Darius had responded in the affirmative, and four messages later he’d given Brantley his personal email address. Because both men had screen names on Ancestry, and living people weren’t shown in Darius’s tree, it appeared that Brantley had no idea he was speaking to a celebrity until after they’d exchanged a couple of emails. And he had not mentioned that he was looking for his birth family at first.
I focused on the most recent exchange, from Friday. Brantley had written:
I swear to you, I had no idea who you were when I contacted you in the beginning. I was just looking for my birth parents, and I knew we were closely related based on DNA testing.
Darius replied:
I’m sure you can understand how this all seems unbelievable to me. I need a few days to process this information. I’ll be in touch soon.
Darius had not revealed Trina Lynn’s name, or even that he planned to speak to Brantley’s supposed mother. At least he hadn’t done that via email. Had they spoken by phone? There was no mention of exchanging numbers.
But had Brantley started investigating Darius when he found out who he was talking to? If he had, the marriage license would have led him to Trina Lynn. Thanks to twenty-four-hour celebrity tracking, everyone who cared to know knew that Darius had just moved home to Stella Maris. And Travelers Rest was only four and a half hours away from Stella Maris—three and a half to Charleston.
I scrolled back to the top of the email trail, then snapped photos of the entire exchange, screen by screen. Then I searched Darius’s email, contacts, and
calendar for Trina Lynn. There was a contact record with a cell phone number and an address in Mt. Pleasant. It appeared to be her condo. The only other mention was the dinner date from Sunday night. How had he gotten her current phone number?
I opened a browser window and navigated to the WCSC website. Two clicks later I was looking at photos of all the staff and links to their Facebook and Twitter accounts. Trina Lynn’s photo had been removed. Had Darius messaged her through Facebook?
Luckily he’d saved his Facebook password, so it was an easy matter to login as him. Interesting. He had a secret profile under the name DeAndre Baker, with a photo of the donkey from Shrek as his profile picture. He had twenty-five friends, one of them his cousin, Clay Cooper. I pulled up Darius’s messages.
There it was. He’d messaged Trina Lynn last Wednesday and asked her to dinner to catch up. She’d heard he was back in town. All very civil. No mention of a love child. Had he sprung that question on her at the restaurant? Is that what they’d really argued about?
“Back door.” The electronic notification from the alarm panel was faint. There must’ve been a second control board in the master bedroom, or I would’ve never heard it. Someone else was in the house.
I closed all the windows and powered down the computer.
Then, I tiptoed to the top of the stairs.
Whoever it was either worked for Darius or they were breaking and entering, like me. Or maybe it was one of the Coopers. Did they have keys? Nell had banged on the door yesterday. If she had a key, she hadn’t used it.
I pulled my Sig 9 from my crossbody bag. Holding the gun in both hands, pointed towards the floor, I eased down the steps. Because the staircase switched back at the landing, I could only see the bottom half of the stairs reflected in the window.
When I was two steps above the landing, the reflection of a familiar blonde appeared in the window, stealthily climbing the stairs.
“Calista?”
“Liz? Is that you?” she whispered.
I relaxed, slid my weapon back into my bag, and continued down the stairs. “What in the world are you doing here? And why are you whispering?”
“I’m not sure,” she said in her signature smoky, breathy voice. Calista was Marilyn Monroe’s doppelgänger. A former client, she was one of my best friends. For a while I’d thought she’d be my sister-in-law. So did she.
Calista laughed. “I mean I’m not sure why I whispered, of course. I brought Darius a casserole. See how Southern I’ve become?”
“How did you get in?”
“Oh. I have a key.” She pulled a golden key out of the pocket of her white capris and held it up.
I scrunched my face at her. “Why do you have a key to Darius Baker’s house?” Calista had only lived on Stella Maris a few years.
“Well,” she said, “we’re friends. Sometimes friends exchange keys you know, for emergencies.” Her tone might have been the teensiest bit defensive.
“Does that key fit the screen door too?”
“Yes, it does. All the doors are keyed alike.”
“How long have you known Darius?”
“We met last Tuesday night at the Pirates’ Den.”
“Do tell? That was what, his second night in town?”
“I think so. Is that important?” Her eyes were wide with curiosity. Calista was an old soul, world-wise in many ways. But she could also be naive. Or she could be messing with me.
“Only in the sense that in some circles, a key exchange after one week is considered rushing things.”
“I see what you mean,” she said.
“Why were you going upstairs? I’m assuming your casserole is in the kitchen?”
“Yes. I put it in the refrigerator for when Darius comes home. It’s chicken tetrazzini.”
“And?”
“Well, I guess he can have a salad with it.”
“Calista.” I tilted my head and raised an eyebrow at her.
“All right, fine.” She rolled her eyes, raised her chin, and looked down her nose at me. “I wanted to leave him a message.”
“Upstairs?”
“That’s right.”
“What kind of message?”
She raised her left hand, which held a creamy envelope with her monogram on the front. “It’s personal in nature.”
“Calista, exactly how well do you know Darius?”
“Quite well, actually.” She lifted her chin another inch.
“Are y’all…involved?”
“I’m not certain why this is your business. And come to think of it, why are you here?”
“And I’d like to know exactly what either one of you are doing here.” The voice came from the kitchen doorway.
Calista raised an eyebrow and cast a look in that direction that would have done Scarlett O’Hara proud.
I spun around
The well-maintained black woman could’ve been a model. Dressed to the nines, she stood with her hands on her hips and a look on her face that said she meant business.
“And you are?” I asked.
“I’m Vivianne Baker.”
Vivianne. Darius’s second wife. The mean one. “Baker?” I squinted at her.
“That’s right. I’m Darius Baker’s wife. Who are you and what are you doing in his house?”
“I am Liz Talbot. I work for Darius. This is my friend, Calista McQueen. I was given to understand that you and Darius divorced more than two years ago. In fact, he’s had another wife and divorced her since then.” I stared her down.
Vivianne flung both hands in the air, fingers splayed. “That cheap tramp. She was just a fling he made the mistake of marrying. And I don’t owe any explanations to the hired help. I think it’s time for both of you to leave.” She eyed Calista.
“And I don’t think that’s your call,” I said. “Exactly how did you get in here?”
She shrugged, looked innocent. “The back door was unlocked. The door was ajar. For all I knew Darius was being robbed. I still don’t know that’s not exactly what’s going on here. I think we’d better call the police.”
“That’s an excellent idea,” said Calista.
Blake would not be happy to be in the middle of this particular domestic matter. He had his hands full. I slid a business card and my PI license from the side pocket of my bag, offered the card to Vivianne, then held up my license. “As I said, I’m Liz Talbot. I’m a private investigator assisting with Darius’s defense. If you’d like, we can call my brother, Blake Talbot, who is the Stella Maris chief of police.”
She took my card, eyed it suspiciously, then scrutinized my license. Something shifted in her face.
I continued. “May I see some ID, please?”
She reached into her Louis Vuitton Bandoulière 25, pulled out a wallet, and flipped through an impressive stack of plastic. She handed me her driver’s license.
“Says here your last name is Whitley,” I said.
She turned her head, looked at something over her left shoulder. “That was a mistake. I was angry at Darius. I should’ve never changed my name back. I go by Vivianne Baker.”
“Is Darius expecting you?” I asked.
“No,” she said. She straightened her spine, looked at me directly. “I heard on the news what had happened. I came to be here for him. You said you worked for him.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, he’s not here right now. So you work for me.”
“Hmmm!” Calista made an indignant noise.
“That’s not how this works,” I said in my calm, easy tone.
“I’m going to tell you how things work,” she said. “Darius Baker did not kill anybody. Least of all some skank he dated in high school. Now I have hired him a top-notch lawyer. And you can tell whatever backwoods attorney you work for that his services will no longer be
needed and he can send a final bill. In the unlikely event that our attorney needs your assistance, I will have him get in touch.” She pointed at me with the card I’d given her.
“I’m sorry Ms. Whitley, but you don’t get to make those decisions for Darius,” I said.
Her eyes got big and her face contorted. “We will see about that. Like I said, it’s time for you to leave.”
I hesitated. Would Darius want her here, or would he want me to toss her out? I had no idea. They were divorced. She had no legal right to be here. But if she stayed here, I’d know where to find her. I needed to speak to my client.
“Come on, Calista,” I said. “Let’s go. I need to speak to Darius.”
“Oh, you do that,” said Vivianne.
Calista said, “I don’t understand why we shouldn’t get Blake to make her leave.”
“Because we don’t know yet if Darius wants her to leave.”
“I know.” Calista eyed Vivianne up and down. “Trust me. He does not want her here.”
Vivianne’s eyes narrowed. “Who were you again?”
“I’m Darius’s girlfriend.”
Vivianne lunged at Calista.
I grabbed Calista’s arm and drug her to the front door.
A primal scream came from deep within Vivianne. She lowered her head and ran towards us. We had the advantage. It was hard to run in Louboutins.
We darted out the front door and bounded down the steps.
Vivianne took off her shoes and charged after us.
We hopped in my car and I pressed the door lock.
Like a woman possessed, Vivianne chased us out of the driveway.
TEN
On the ferry ride back to Isle of Palms I called Blake. “What’s all that noise?” I asked when he answered. It sounded like he was in the middle of a riot.
“Reporters. What’s up?”
I told him about my encounters at Darius’s house.
“You’re going to talk to him? See if he wants us to run her off?”
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