Kiss of Death

by Linda Palmer

I was stunned. “I don’t know what to say … I’d like to repay you—”

  “Don’t even think about that!” His tone was so stern it shocked me. Then it softened. “I wanted to do it. An’ you made me proud.” He beckoned with one big, rough hand. “Come on into the living room.”

  Walter Maysfield’s apartment was a clean and comfortable four-room arrangement at the rear of the building on the ground floor. No view of the lake, but through sliding glass doors his living room opened onto a private patio, complete with a covered barbecue grill and an old-fashioned porch swing.

  He gestured toward several scrapbooks spread out on a wooden coffee table in front of a big, deep sofa. “Take a look,” he said gruffly. “Both of you.”

  Bobby and I sat down on the floor in front of the coffee table, our backs against the sofa. I picked up the first scrapbook, and opened it so that Bobby could see, too.

  Walter Maysfield (or, more likely, his wife) had carefully saved copies of the papers I wrote in English classes, all of my report cards and class pictures, articles and pictures in the school newspaper, including the list of college scholarships awarded in my senior year at St. Claire’s.

  Our host answered my unspoken question. “Ellie—Sister Ellen Elizabeth—gave us all that.”

  The biggest surprise was a small article from the Newark Star-Ledger, dated eleven years earlier, now turning yellow behind the plastic page protector. It was a very brief review of a play I wrote at Columbia—the play that was produced for four nights in a fifty-seat theater upstairs over a bowling alley in New Jersey. The reviewer wasn’t wild about the work, but he called the young student playwright “promising.”

  “We came up to New Jersey to see your play,” Walter Maysfield said. “The last night it was on. We thought it was damn good.”

  I stared at him. “Why didn’t you tell me you were there? I’d have been so happy to see you.”

  He shook his head. “Junie was sick then, with the cancer. She didn’t want you to see her looking so poorly. Was the last trip she made.” He was silent for a moment. I recognized the look of mourning; I’d been in that place.

  He cleared his throat and went on. “When Junie passed away, I decided to get in touch with you, see if you needed anything. Went up to the college. Woman in the office wasn’t gonna tell me anything, so I flashed the badge. Amazing how that works. She opened right up an’ told me you’d just married that photographer fella and gone off to Africa.”

  “I wish you’d come a few days earlier.”

  He smiled, a little shyly, but with unmistakable pride. “I was a pretty good investigator in my day, so I managed to keep track of you a little bit, even though you were half way ’round the globe.”

  I opened another of the scrapbooks, and saw that I’d been right when I guessed that Mrs. Maysfield had put the first ones together. Every item in those books had been artistically arranged. In contrast, these clippings had been put onto the scrapbook pages with an eye toward preservation instead of art.

  Between the heavy, padded covers were copies of some of Ian’s most famous photographs, and articles about him. A few of them mentioned me as his young wife and protégé. Little ink stars had been drawn next to those references. One story included a picture of Ian and me at one of our campsites in Kenya.

  The last scrapbook was filled with articles about Love of My Life, and about me. The most recent ones focused on my involvement in murder cases. I shook my head in wonder at the amount of work represented by these books.

  “Every day since you went off to college, an’ then when I read your husband got killed and you came back to America, I bought the New York City papers,” Maysfield said. “When I turned in the old badge an’ moved down here, first thing I did was find where the out-of-town newspaper place was. The Main Street News—across the bridge in Palm Beach. Every morning, rain or shine, I walk the mile over for my papers, have breakfast at Cucina’s—a nice place couple doors down, an’ walk the mile back. The exercise keeps me in good shape.”

  “Why didn’t you get in touch with me?”

  “You had your own life. I didn’t want to intrude.”

  WALTER—HE INSISTED I call him Walter—grilled hamburgers for us on his patio barbecue. Bobby and I sliced onions and tomatoes, and set the table in the dining alcove at one end of the living room.

  The burgers were delicious. So was the bottle of red wine Walter opened. “To celebrate seeing the little girl again,” he said. “So pretty—an’ famous.”

  “Not famous,” I said. “I just work with people who are famous.”

  Raising his glass, Bobby said, “To friendship.” The three of us clinked glasses.

  During dinner, Walter regaled us with some tales of his days as a West Virginia sheriff.

  “I yanked cable TV out of the jail, until I found out there’s a g-d federal court order that requires cable TV for jails! Can you believe that? Well, bein’ a law-abidin’man, I hooked the cable TV right up again—but made sure it only let in the Disney Channel, and the Weather Channel.”

  “Why the Weather Channel?” I asked.

  He smiled mischievously. “So they’d know how hot it was gonna be if I had to put ’em to work on a chain gang, clearin’ brush out of the drainage canals. When somebody complained, I’d tell ’em, ‘This ain’t the Waldorf Asstoria—you don’ like it here, don’ come back!”

  Later, when I was having a third cup of Walter’s excellent coffee, Bobby brought up the proverbial elephant in the room. The reason we were there.

  “Sheriff, you said you had something—something you’d only show to Morgan.”

  Walter sighed and got up. He crossed the room to a cherrywood cabinet and unlocked it with a small key he took from a chain in his pocket.

  “I kept this, in case we got together—if you ever wanted to look.”

  Even though I was sure I knew the answer, I managed to ask, “What is it?”

  “My police report—about finding you, and … the rest. Before I retired, I made a copy of it.”

  The file was about half an inch thick, tucked inside an old envelope folder that was closed with a frayed brown string.

  “Everything I know is in there. Downsville, West Virginia, wasn’t exactly New York City. We didn’t have computers, or much in the way of technology.” His voice was hard with suppressed anger. “In those days, there was a national registry for missing autos, but not for missing kids. I got some fingerprints in the van, but I wasn’t able to match them then.”

  I heard the word, “then.” Bobby did, too. He leaned forward, alert and eager. “So you did get a match.”

  “Finally. A few years later, I got a name to go with the prints: Ray Wilson.”

  I was gripping the file at both sides. Afraid to know what was in it—and yet desperate to know what was in it.

  Walter said, “Keep the file. I made it for you.”

  I sat there, frozen, holding on to the file as though in a trance. When it was clear that I wasn’t going to open it, Bobby said, “Let me see.” I didn’t resist when he gently took it out of my hands.

  Bobby didn’t open it immediately. Instead, he said, “It’s getting late. Why don’t we go back to the Marriott and get together again tomorrow?”

  I looked at my watch, frowning, reluctant to leave this pleasant room, and the man to whom I was sure I owed my life. At least my life as I knew it.

  Walter seemed to read my mind. “You could stay here tonight,” he said. “Take the bedroom. Many a night I spend out here on the couch anyway—I sleep real good to the TV.”

  “I’d like to do that,” I said.

  Bobby stood up, tucked the file under one arm, and pulled the cell phone out of his jacket. “I’ll have Emilio bring your bag back here, then take me to the Marriott.”

  Before he could dial, the cell phone in my skirt pocket rang. “Damn!” I muttered. This was one evening I didn’t want to be interrupted.

  It was Penny. She was distraught. “Morgan, it’s
terrible!”

  Fear gripped my insides. “What’s happened?”

  “Matt just arrested Nancy—for murder!”

  Chapter 13

  THE RED-EYE TO New York landed in Newark at 5:40 Saturday morning. With no baggage to claim, by 6:35 A.M. I was inserting the key into the lock on the front door of my apartment. I pushed it open—and saw something that made me gasp: Detective Matt Phoenix standing in the hallway outside the kitchen, Magic draped over his shoulder, facing backward, the way he likes to ride. His long black tail swished slightly as it trailed down the front of Matt’s green sports jacket.

  “Matt—why did you arrest Nancy?”

  “For murder.”

  “That’s ridiculous!”

  Magic scrambled down from Matt’s shoulder and galloped toward me. As soon as I knelt down and scooped him up in my arms, he rubbed the top of his silky head along the line of my jaw and started to purr.

  Matt took a key from his jacket pocket and handed it to me. “Here. Nancy gave me your key so I could come over and feed the cat.”

  “Where is she?”

  “In custody.”

  “Locked up?”

  “Of course she is! This isn’t a shoplifting case,” Matt said. But he wasn’t looking at me. His attention was fixed on the broad figure of the man who had come through the door behind me carrying my duffel and his own suitcase. Matt arched his eyebrows quizzically and said, “Hello?” His tone turned the word into a question.

  Walter set the bags down, stepped around me, and offered his hand to Matt. “Walter Maysfield. I’m an old friend of Miss Morgan’s.”

  Matt shook Walter’s hand, but his manner was stiff. “Matt Phoenix.”

  I snapped, “This is the brilliant homicide detective who arrested my best friend.”

  Matt snapped right back. “She was caught leaning over the victim, whose body was still warm!”

  Reacting to our angry tones, Magic struggled out of my arms, jumped down, and loped off down the hallway. I wanted to reassure him, but first I had to find out about Nancy.

  “What victim? Who?”

  “Veronica Rose. Her boyfriend’s wife.”

  “Divorced wife! Nancy couldn’t kill anyone. You’ve got to let her out.”

  “There’s nothing I can do. She’ll have a bail hearing on Monday, then the judge decides …” His voice trailed off, and the fact that he didn’t finish the sentence sent a jolt of alarm through me.

  “Decides? You mean decides how much the bail will be?” He didn’t answer, increasing my alarm. “She will get bail, won’t she? They wouldn’t keep her in jail!”

  “Why don’ we all just take a breath,” Walter said quietly.

  “You’re right,” Matt agreed. He looked at me, and I nodded. Peace was declared, at least temporarily.

  “Where have you been? Nancy said she didn’t know, only that you’d be back Sunday night.”

  “I was in Florida. Thank you for coming over to take care of Magic.” I turned to Walter. “Let me show you where to put your bag.”

  I saw the surprise on Matt’s face when he realized that this stranger was going to be staying with me.

  Walter, too, noted Matt’s expression. With an amused twinkle in his eyes, he answered the question Matt hadn’t asked. “I’m jus’ visiting for a spell.”

  After I showed Walter the den, where I intended to make up the couch into a bed for him, the three of us sat down at the kitchen table. As we drank coffee and ate from the box of apple turnovers Penny had baked and sent over with Matt, Magic came out of hiding to join us. He jumped onto Matt’s lap, coiled himself into a circle, and went to sleep. I frowned at Magic’s closed eyes and twitching whiskers, and thought: little traitor.

  I refilled the coffee mugs and we each took another apple turnover. It must be true that carbohydrates are a natural tranquilizer; as I ate the pastry, I felt calmer.

  “What happened?” I asked. “When Penny telephoned, all she knew was that you’d arrested Nancy. No details.”

  “G. G. and I got a call from a pair of uniforms who’d found a one-twenty-five situation at the Vernon Towers.”

  I knew that 125 was the New York penal code for a violent death. Vernon Towers was one of Manhattan’s newest luxury co-ops, on West Sixty-first Street, within the area of the Twentieth Precinct, Matt’s headquarters. According to Nancy, Arnold had been one of the building’s first residents.

  “Nancy and the dead woman were discovered by Mrs. Rose’s twelve-year-old daughter,” Matt said.

  “Didi … Oh, poor Didi. How awful for her!”

  Matt nodded. “The girl was hysterical. She finally quieted down enough to tell us that she came into the apartment looking for her mother. They hadn’t moved in yet because it was still being decorated. She’d come downstairs from her father’s place, where they were living. Her mother was lying on the floor, head covered with blood. Nancy Cummings was there. A neighbor heard Didi screaming and called 911. When the beat cops saw the situation, they secured the apartment. It was an obvious homicide, so we were called in.”

  “How … how did Veronica Rose die?”

  Matt’s tone, which had been coolly professional, softened. I saw a look of sympathy in his eyes. “Blunt force trauma to the back of the head. She was struck with an unopened five-gallon can of paint. Forensics confirmed that the blood and hair on the can came from the victim.”

  I was trying to swallow the lump in my throat. Walter reached over and patted my hand comfortingly.

  After a moment, I said, “Nancy can’t even kill a spider—she puts them outside on her balcony. She couldn’t murder anyone! She must have told you that.”

  “She said she didn’t do it.” Matt shrugged with an attitude that implied, “That’s what they all say.”

  “Where was Arnold?”

  “Not home. Didi gave me his cell phone number. I reached him in his car. He said he was on his way back from seeing a client.”

  I tried to keep the horror of the situation from clogging my mind. I needed to think. Lawyer! “Nancy needs a lawyer,” I said. “Who’s protecting her rights?”

  “She called someone from the firm where she works.”

  “Better be somebody damn good,” Walter said.

  I shook my head in frustration. “The best criminal lawyer I know is Arnold Rose, but he’s the ex-husband of the victim.”

  “Not so ex, according to the daughter,” Matt said. “She told me her parents had gotten back together. That must have made Nancy angry. Jealousy is a classic motive.”

  My fear for Nancy spiraled up into the red zone.

  “You should prepare yourself for bad news,” Matt said. “According to the daughter, Nancy and her mother had had some nasty fights. With a history of animosity between those two women, I think the D.A. will feel he’s got a strong enough case to charge Nancy with murder. A smart attorney might be able to deal it down to man two. Depending on the charge, Nancy’s probably going to spend anywhere from seven years to the rest of her life in prison.”

  “Stop it!” Even though it was still half full, I removed Matt’s coffee mug from in front of him. He got the hint, said goodbye, and left.

  As soon as I heard the front door close, I crossed to the kitchen wall phone and dialed the Flynn home, hoping that G. G. was there. I was in luck.

  “Hi, G. G.,” I said. “No, this time I don’t need to talk to Brandi—you’re the one. Settle a bet for us. Of all of them that you’ve dealt with, who’s the defense attorney you and Matt absolutely hate the most?”

  He growled a name. I thanked him and hung up before he could ask about the “bet.”

  I felt guilty about tricking G. G., but I pushed the feeling away. Nancy’s life was at stake, and I had to do everything possible to help her.

  Chapter 14

  AFTER SITTING CRAMPED during two plane trips in twenty-three hours, I needed exercise. There was enough time before my appointment to walk from the Dakota down to Fifth Avenue and Twenty-thi
rd Street. I’d given Walter the spare key to the apartment, and he said he’d probably go out to explore the neighborhood while I was gone.

  My destination was an office on the fourteenth floor of the twenty-one-story Flatiron Building. The Flatiron is a majestic limestone wedge, shaped like the hull of a schooner and adorned with Gothic faces and terra cotta flowers. At its narrowest point, it’s only six feet wide. Because it was used in the movies Spider Man and Spider Man 2 as the office of the Daily Bugle newspaper, it’s one of New York City’s most famous landmarks.

  As I approached the entrance, I remembered a bit of its history that I’d learned in an architecture class at Columbia. When it was built in 1902, the prowlike shape was supposed to have created bizarre eddies in the wind, causing women’s skirts to fly up as they walked on Twenty-third Street. The police had to post uniformed officers to chase away the throngs of men who gathered there to watch.

  I took the elevator up to the fourteenth floor. At the far end of the corridor, I found what I was looking for. Fastened to an aged oak door was a brass plate that identified this as the office of B. KENT WAYNE, ATTORNEY-AT-LAW. No partners listed.

  Opening the door, I found myself in a small reception room, sparsely furnished with three club chairs, a coffee table covered with magazines, and a secretary’s desk and chair. The room was empty, but the door beyond the secretary’s desk was open; I heard someone moving around, and papers rustling.

  At the door to the inner office, I paused. A man in shirt-sleeves with his back to me was bending over a two-drawer metal filing cabinet, pulling out manila folders, flipping through them, and tossing them onto a chair already overflowing with papers.

  “Mr. Wayne?”

  At the sound of my voice, the man straightened and turned around. His features were sharp—pointed nose, pointed chin, a mouth that just missed being thin. Blue eyes beneath heavy brows, a head of thick brown hair badly in need of a trim. He was of medium height, with the wiry build of a long-distance runner. The lines etched into his forehead and the twin fissures that ran from his nose to his mouth made me put his age at midforties. He was looking at me—no, he was studying me. I repeated the question. “Mr. Wayne?”