Until Death

by Alicia Rasley

  “But why would he have it open if he went there to try to get Don to settle?”

  Hmmm. I brought up my mental picture of Wanda and replaced her face with a gaunt old farmer’s. “Maybe he brought the settlement papers for Don to sign. Had the pen out, and when Don refused, Murdoch got angry. Dropped the pen. Shoved Don.”

  “Maybe. But you’d need to prove his fingerprints were on the pen.” Mike said. “All we know is that Don was there. And suicide fits the facts, if Don was worried about being ruined.”

  “Don wouldn’t commit suicide,” Wanda said.

  I stared at her. This was not an ally I really wanted. But I said, “I agree.”

  Mike sighed.

  “And don’t even start on Occam’s razor,” I added. “You heard both of us. We knew him. Don wouldn’t do that. So Occam’s got to find another razor.”

  He shook his head, but didn’t argue. “Are you going to take these suspicions to the police?”

  “Ha.” That was, apparently, what passed for Wanda’s denial.

  I groaned, imagining going alone to Detective Martelli, presenting him with yet another suspect for a murder he didn’t believe in. “It won’t do me any good.”

  “Good.” Absently, he reached out and took my iced tea and took a sip. Then he set it down and turned towards Wanda. “What are you going to do?”

  Wanda said, “I told you. Now that I know she—” She cast me a scornful look. “Didn’t do it, I’m going to talk to the attorney about settling. And hire a bodyguard.”

  Automatically, I grabbed my tea and drank. It was some primal need to re-establish ownership, you see, from a legacy of a childhood spent with three brothers who constantly stole food off my plate. Then I realized what I’d done, and turned, face burning, to Wanda, so that I wouldn’t have to look at Mike Warren and acknowledge we had sipped from the same straw. “What about Will? He’s being sued too. Why would he settle?”

  Wanda, oblivious to the whole straw situation, put on a coy expression. “Well, we’ve been talking. We agreed to present a common front. He’ll go along with whatever I decide.”

  Oh, great. So Will would follow wherever she led and give up his land. The farmhouse would be demolished, and a bit of history—my history—would disappear, not to mention the fee that was going to pay for a year’s business expenses. Not to mention that if Olen Murdoch really was the murderer, he’d be getting away with murder. And I needed some evidence to convince the insurance company, if not the police, that there was no suicide. And that wouldn’t happen if everyone just made nice and shook hands.

  I would have to get to Will first. And that felt good. Wanda and me at odds again.

  As we rose to leave, Mike took her mini-recorder. “I’ll just keep this for you.”

  I smiled benevolently at Wanda. Now she would realize that Mike was really on my side. In fact, after she stalked away, he was at my side, with his hand out. “Yours too.”

  With a heavy sigh, I held up my phone. It wasn’t like it had anything as provocative as what Wanda had recorded. “You can delete it if you insist.” After he did it, I said, “Satisfied?”

  “Not at all.” He regarded me with the resignation a probation officer had for his recalcitrant cases. “You’ll get into real trouble now. No more focusing on the innocent widow.”

  I might argue with that characterization, but instead I said, “Our bargain was that I’d tell you if I went after her. So now it’s up, and I’m free.”

  Before he could debate this, I headed towards my car and my redirected investigation.

  A COUPLE OF DAYS later, I went downtown for the initial hearing with the insurance company. I got there early and figured I might as well collect more official data. Now that I suspected Murdoch, I needed to focus on his motive. And the inciting event had to be Don’s acquisition of the land he’d resold to Will. If he’d bought it from Murdoch, Don would have recorded a deed.

  So I headed upstairs to the Recorder’s Office. This time bureaucracy was kinder and more efficient, and promptly provided me with a copy of the deed to the disputed land. I scanned it as I walked to the courtroom, not really knowing what I was looking for. It looked like all quitclaim deeds, with the legal description of the land, and the names of the grantor and the grantee—Murdoch and Don—a blurry notary seal, and the recorder’s date stamp. There was the usual obfuscation about the price: “$1 and other valuable consideration.”

  Murdoch’s signature was right there on the bottom as grantor. Maybe he was going to claim that Don had forged it. But short of that—and Don wouldn’t commit such an easily proved fraud—there didn’t seem to be much here to support a case against him.

  Then I stopped and looked again at that signature. No, it wasn’t Don’s, I could tell that much, and I was surprised at the relief I felt to determine that. But the date by the signature, and by the notary’s mark, was July 1. The recorder’s date was August 31.

  So Murdoch signed the deed over early in the summer. But the property wasn’t transferred for another two months.

  As I entered the courtroom, I slid the deed copy into my bag, disquieted by what I’d just noticed. All those years in real estate, and we’d always done everything on the straight and narrow. We had to, to keep our corporate reputation shiny in a small city. But shed of me and Brad, Don started towards the edges of the allowable. And this deed indicated, well, sharp business dealings at the least. I remembered Brad had pointed out that if Don had foreclosed, there would have been a legal action. And I knew now why we hadn’t heard about that. He’d gotten the deed itself escrowed as security, maybe for a quick development loan. And then all he’d have to do is record the deed if the balloon payment wasn’t met. No lawsuit, no record.

  No wonder Murdoch felt cheated.

  Not that I had a lot of sympathy for him. But apparently others did. I looked around me, surprised at the crowd for what was just a preliminary hearing. But it was, after all, a hearing in a suit against a dead man, and the richest guy in town. Will sat up front, leaning an elbow on the oak rail and whispering to his lawyer. He wore geek business dress—sports jacket and jeans—and seemed no more intimidated by the majesty of the court than by His Majesty of Microsoft.

  Wanda wasn’t there, fortunately. I wasn’t really up for seeing her. But her attorney rose to file his appearance. He was with one of the old-line firms that did a lot of the very private legal business of the founding families, including the Munssens. Wanda must have dismissed Mills and Shumer, the cutting-edge firm Don used. This carefully dressed fellow wouldn’t take Don’s aggressive stance, that avalanche of motions and interrogatories. Wanda was proving a cautious steward of his money. Brad’s influence, probably. He and I were always trying to hold Don back. But I gathered Brad was finding Wanda a more tractable advisee.

  Ha, I thought. She can steal a husband, but can’t fight a lawsuit.

  Conscientiously, I spent a moment putting myself in her place—she was worried about her safety and that of her son. And then, in some relief, I returned to my own place. I wasn’t a party to the lawsuit. And now that I had a notion of Murdoch’s grievance, I kind of understood how attractive a settlement would be.

  But if the lawsuit continued, I could monitor Murdoch. Maybe I could learn something from his official filings that could help me point to him as Don’s killer. And without that evidence, the insurance company’s verdict of suicide would probably stand.

  Oh, and Don’s death would be unavenged. A murderer would be free to kill again.

  My determination to stay inconspicuous led me to the last pew, behind a man scratching notes on a spiral notebook. I was there when Olen Murdoch joined his attorney at the railing.

  He was thin and hard in the way of a man who spent his life baling hay. His hair was iron gray, his suit a heavy blue serge that must have been smothering in the July heat.
He turned to scan the courtroom, and his flat militia-stare paused, resting on me, leaving a chill behind.

  Then I realized he wasn’t looking at me, but at the man taking notes in front of me. I didn’t have time to be relieved, as his attorney was starting his argument for a preliminary injunction to replace the restraining order. As he spoke, I realized I was indeed involved, because the judge was being asked to prohibit any further construction on the disputed property. That would mean the farmhouse project would be halted with the house left in two pieces on a flatbed, just waiting for a tornado to tear it further apart. Will’s attorney rose to argue just this point and followed up with a motion to dismiss his client from the case entirely. Wanda’s attorney didn’t like the implication that his client should take all the liability and added his own motion for dismissal.

  The judge looked bored, and finally, she waved them all to sit down. “I’ll grant the preliminary injunction.”

  “What the hell—” Will said, and the judge banged her gavel.

  “That’s enough. I am conscious of the problems this injunction will create for the defendants, so I will set a hearing on the dismissal motion in ten days, and I suggest you all get together and discuss ways to resolve this before then.”

  She rose and swept out in a swirl of black robe. Murdoch, smiling grimly, moved past me to the door, and the note-taking man in front of me—a reporter, I thought—followed him. I waited until Will started out, and called to him.

  “Hey, Meg.” The anger faded into a smile as he dropped into the seat beside me. “You came to cheer on the home team?”

  “Looks like we’re way behind at halftime.”

  “Yeah, sounds like that. My lawyer says the judge is saying we should settle. I guess it gets ugly if we don’t do what Her Honor wants us to do. But I’m not giving up the land. I bought it in good faith. So it’s up to Wanda to make a deal and get me out of it.”

  “Is she going to do that?”

  “Says she doesn’t have that much money. But I think she’s persuadable.” He grinned, and I wondered whether he thought I approved of his attempt to woo her into doing things his way. But he was right. Wanda had inherited this problem. It wouldn’t be fair if Will had to pay money to settle the case after he’d already shelled out two million for the land.

  “Well, the big farmhouse move Sunday is off.” With a self-conscious laugh, I added, “I’m glad we got some money upfront.”

  “With that expedited hearing, it shouldn’t be too long before we get going again.”

  Will sounded a lot more confident than I felt. “You think he won’t insist on the land?”

  “Did you get a look at him? He’s an old man. And you saw the land. Most of it hasn’t been worked for years. He’s holding out for the land just to extort the best price.”

  “And you’re the one with the deep pockets.” I got up with a sigh. “I’ll make sure that the farmhouse is secured. It would be just our luck to have a tornado come through this week.”

  As we left the courtroom, I saw Murdoch in conversation with the reporter. I decided not to draw Will’s attention to this. He had enough to worry about already.

  When we reached my car, he said, “You want to get dinner?”

  I glanced up at him through the window. He seemed so candid. And yet here he was, playing Wanda. That she was playing him just as assiduously didn’t make it right. “No, thanks.” But I couldn’t quite put an end to the prospect of dating him. “Not tonight.”

  “Is that doctor still hanging around you?”

  “He’s not hanging around. He just turns up sometimes.” I couldn’t explain the whole situation, how I’d involved Mike in this investigation, and he asserted the right to keep on interfering. “Anyway, it’s not like dating. It’s just sort of business.” Will started to reply, but I turned on the engine to drown him out. “I’ll check on the farmhouse and email you. See ya.”

  The next time I saw Will’s face was in the morning newspaper. There on the front page was a photo of him, looking scruffy and animated at some computer fair, captioned “Netmore Chief Cheated Me, Farmer Says.”

  Dread seeped through me as I scanned the dozen paragraphs. The story summarized the arguments I’d read in Murdoch’s filing, that Don and Will had conspired to get the land at bargain basement rates. The reporter made sure to allude to “Don Ross’s death from a fall called ‘accidental’ by police,” which of course made it sound as if he’d chosen to do this rather than face Murdoch in court.

  The cat jumped up and took her regal seat on Will’s picture. I shoved her over and read around her paw. The reporter dutifully noted that he had called Netmore but gotten no comment.

  I glanced through the screen door at the clock, and then I dashed into the house to flip on the TV. The local news was starting, and there was Murdoch, leaning against an incongruously shiny blue pickup, a broken-down trailer behind him. “This is where Olen Murdoch lives now.” There was a cutaway to the rolling golden bluff over the river. “This is where he used to live and farm. Until the wealthiest man in Concord bought it up.” Just in case we didn’t get the point, the reporter intoned, “A family farm. Soon to be yet another faceless office complex.”

  Fade-in to Olen Murdoch’s sun-pitted face. “These rich guys cheated me. They had to make more millions by stealing everything I owned. Stole my land. Stole my dream.” Fade-out.

  It was calculated to appeal to any Midwesterner with a soft spot for the family farm, which was about every Midwesterner who didn’t actually own a family farm. Heck, I felt an instinctive sympathy too. Maybe Don had given Murdoch money for his weirdo fertilizer invention, taking the farm as collateral, and called in the note a short time later. But Will paid market rate for the land, so he didn’t benefit from the fraud. Only Don did, and now Wanda, his heir.

  I cut short this round of Wanda-bashing. This was Don’s operation. He’d made the original contact. He was the one with the insight as to what would make this a prime property, waterfront but still in the floodway. And then, after the sale, not in the floodway.

  Don was beyond reach, but Will had deeper pockets and was here to take the rap.

  “Isn’t that Will? The one with the Diablo?”

  Tommy was hovering in the doorway. How much had he seen? My gaze went to the newspaper, flapping outside on the porch. “Yeah, that’s Will. You ready for driver’s ed?”

  “In a minute.” He opened the refrigerator and pulled out a carton of milk. “What was that about? Him getting sued?”

  I decided to tell him the truth, or as much of it as I had to. “It’s complicated. Your dad sold Will some land. The original owner wants it back. So you might be hearing about the lawsuit.” For the first time, I took some comfort in Wanda’s mercenary attitude. “It looks like it’s going to settle pretty soon. Too bad the press heard about it before then.”

  Tommy fixed a bowl of cereal. “It’s just business, right? I cheat you, you cheat me.”

  I regarded him warily. He sounded like some sixties radical. He sounded like Will talking about Bill Gates. He sounded like me before I started my own business. “Not all business is cheating.”

  “Right, right, only most of it. Doesn’t matter to me. I’m going to fix cars. Or design them. Or maybe program videogames.”

  At least these last two required college. “Sounds good to me. Let me go get my shoes, and I’ll drop you at school on my way to work.”

  When I came downstairs, I saw Tommy on the porch reading the paper. As casually as I could, I called, “Ready to go?”

  “Yep.” He folded the sections and handed the paper to me. “White Sox won. Cubs too.”

  “Great,” I said, relieved that he’d only been reading the sports section. But if he didn’t read the incriminating story himself, some friend would be sure and point it out to him later. Never say anythin
g bad about the other parent—that’s what the divorce books say. But what do you do when the other parent really did something bad? Ignore it? Defend it?

  THE WEATHERMEN promised an end to the month-long drought, detailing storms whipping into Texas and flooding Oklahoma. On Saturday, I took Tommy, Jamie, and Lily waterskiing one more time and announced we were beaching the boat for the prophesied week of rain. The kids rode the boat to the launch in the park while I did my best to maneuver the car’s ball into the trailer hitch. There was cursing and weeping as I backed the trailer down the ramp, and I wanted a man, any man—because everyone knows men all inherited the “backing” gene that is so rare among women. Finally, I got the trailer’s rear wheels into the water, and Tommy drove the boat onto the trailer, and I pulled it up the boat ramp to the cheers of the children.

  I was dealing with the ramifications of postponing the farmhouse move when Mike Warren came to my office. Barb brought him in, her eyes waggling Groucho—like to convey she thought he was cute, and where had I been hiding him, and was he exclusively mine or available for export—she had very eloquent eyebrows. I was glad the doctor was behind her and couldn’t see, because for sure he’d prescribe some muscle relaxant to cure that tic.

  When she left us alone, I emptied the client chair of the model farmhouse and let him sit down. He got right to the point. “Are you still thinking you can prove this is murder?”

  I thought about the deed, and what it might show about Murdoch’s motivation. I shrugged. “Do I have a choice? The insurance company is going to claim suicide. So I’m going to claim murder. The court can sort it out.”

  “This all makes me nervous.”

  “So what else is new? You’ve been against it from the first.”

  “But for a different reason. At first, I thought you were going to make a fool of yourself, or get the second Mrs. Ross arrested. But I figured that was unlikely, at least the arrest part, and that you weren’t really putting yourself in any danger.”