by Jane Heller
“How will I find you?” I asked. “That parking lot is always full, and I don’t know what kind of car you drive.”
“Not a problem,” he said. “I’ll find you.”
At six-twelve, Tom drove up in his white unmarked Chevy Caprice and parked alongside my BMW. He motioned for me to get into his car, so I did.
“What’s up?” he asked.
He was wearing blue jeans and a Hartford Whalers T-shirt. His face bore the hint of a five o’clock shadow, and his coal-black hair had curled up the back of his collar from the summer heat and humidity. He smelled sweaty, manly, sexy. I tried not to notice.
“During our first conversation you mentioned that your father was on the Board of Governors at the Westover Country Club,” I said.
“Right.”
“So he must know the other members at Westover pretty well.”
“Sure.”
“Well, there’s a woman there named June Douglas. A good tennis player. Do you think he might know her?”
“Probably. What’s your point?”
“There’s a rumor going around The Oaks that one of the members, Larkin Vail, may have spiked June Douglas’s sports drink before an interclub tennis tournament last summer.”
“Why would she have done that?”
“To eliminate the competition. This Larkin Vail is a real piece of work. Totally obsessed with winning every tennis match she plays.”
“Yeah, but would she actually drug her opponent? Just to win a tennis match? It sounds pretty far-out to me, even for a country club.”
“Fine. I’m just telling you what I heard. It occurred to me that if Larkin did tamper with June Douglas’s Gatorade, she might also have tampered with Claire Cox’s life. Claire would have beaten Larkin in the club championship tournament this year—if she’d lived.”
“So you want me to consider Larkin Vail a suspect in the case?”
“She was at the July Fourth party at the club, and she had a motive,” I said. “A lame one, I admit. But people have killed for less.”
Tom’s expression turned serious. “You don’t have to tell me,” he said.
“Oh, you mean because you’re a cop?”
“Yeah, and because my wife was killed for no reason. No reason at all.”
“Killed? Your wife? You were married?” I had taken Detective Cunningham for the singles’ bar type.
“Yeah, Sarah and I were married when we were twenty. We were in the city one night. It was our first anniversary, and I’d gotten us tickets to see a show. We were on our way back to the garage around ten-thirty when a guy mugged us at gunpoint. I gave him my wallet, no questions asked, and told Sarah to give him her purse. But she hesitated—just for a half a second—and he shot her. She died in my arms.”
“Tom. How awful.” I was stunned. I had never known anyone who had lost a loved one through violent crime, and I couldn’t imagine enduring such trauma. “Is that what made you become a policeman?”
“I guess you could say that,” he said. “I had planned to go to law school. But after Sarah died, I lost interest in the idea of practicing law. Police work seemed like it would give me more instant gratification. I wanted a hand in keeping scumbags like the guy who shot Sarah off the streets, so others didn’t have to suffer the way I did.”
I nodded.
“That’s one of the reasons why this Claire Cox case is so frustrating,” he went on. “I hate to see women being brutalized. Every time I do, it’s like Sarah dying all over again. I want the guy who killed Claire Cox, Judy.”
“So do I,” I said. “So do I.”
I looked at Tom and saw the hurt in his eyes. It was still there, despite the mischievous grin and tough talk. I felt sorry for him and attracted to him at the same time—a dangerous combination for a married woman.
“Now, getting back to Ms. Vail,” he said.
“Yes, well I thought you might ask your father if he heard anything about the June Douglas incident. Maybe the story about her is just country club gossip, nothing more. On the other hand, if it’s true…”
“There are two things wrong with your little plan.”
“What?”
“First of all, even if your friend did put something in Ms. Douglas’s drink, there’s no way to prove it. Not a year after the fact. There’s no evidence, no substance to analyze, no nothing.”
“What’s the second thing?”
“I don’t speak to my father.”
“You two don’t get along?”
“Nope. Not since I became a cop. He hates the idea.”
“Why? What does he do for a living?”
“He’s in the media. He’s William Cunningham—Wild Bill Cunningham of Pubtel.”
“Bill Cunningham is your father?” I was stunned again. Pubtel was Charlton House’s parent company—a media conglomerate that also owned a record company, a magazine division, and a couple of cable television channels. I’d never met Bill Cunningham but I’d seen him once, at a book convention. Nobody had ever said anything about him having a son who was a police detective in Belford.
“You seem surprised,” said Tom.
“Surprised? I’m floored,” I said.
“Why? Because I’m a cop with a rich father?”
“Frankly, yes,” I admitted. “And because your father runs the company I used to work for—the company that fired me.”
“Really? Small world,” he said.
“Sure is,” I agreed. Then the bitter irony hit me. I had finally networked my way to the head of Pubtel, a man who was Leeza Grummond’s boss’s boss’s boss. But I couldn’t get to him because he and his son were having a family tiff. Talk about a bad break!
“Dad wanted me to be a lawyer,” he explained. “Like he was. But after Sarah died, as I said, I had no appetite for it. I wanted to be a cop and that was that.”
“And your father didn’t understand that?”
“My father doesn’t understand a lot of things,” he said. “But hey, it’s my problem, not yours.”
“Oh, it’s my problem too.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing.”
“Look, Judy. About this Westover thing. I’ll check it out the best I can. Meanwhile, you keep snooping around at The Oaks.”
“Okay. I’m having dinner tonight with two other suspicious characters.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I’ll let you know if I come up with anything.”
I sensed that our meeting was over, but neither of us suggested that I leave.
“Judy?” said Tom after a few seconds of awkward silence.
“Yes?”
“I didn’t mean to dump my problems on you.”
“Don’t be silly.”
“It’s just that you’re easy to talk to, ya know?”
“My husband doesn’t think so.”
Tom looked at me with raised eyebrows. “Want to tell me about it? It’s your turn.”
I shook my head. “Thanks anyway,” I said. “Maybe some other time.”
A perfect exit line. I started to get out of the car, but Tom Cunningham put his hand on my arm.
“Judy?” he said.
“Yes?”
“You’re okay.”
“Did you expect me not to be?”
“Yeah.”
“Because?”
“Because I thought you were one of those snooty Manhattan types that move up to Belford because it’s so cute and quaint and New England-y, then shit all over the locals.”
“That’s not a very nice picture.”
“They’re not very nice people.”
“You shouldn’t generalize. None of us should.”
“Yeah, but cops see people at their worst, day in and day out. After a while, it’s hard not to write everybody off.”
“Well, don’t write me off,” I said. “Not while I’m sticking my neck out, snooping around The Oaks for your murderer.”
“That reminds me,” he said. “You’
re being careful at that club, right?”
“Careful? You mean, am I waiting a half-hour after lunch before going swimming?”
He laughed. “I mean that I don’t want our murderer figuring out what you’re up to.”
“Why would he figure out what I’m up to?”
“I don’t know. Maybe you’re going around asking a lot of questions, meddling in people’s business.”
Now it was my turn to laugh. “You don’t know country clubs, buster. You can’t belong to a club unless you meddle in people’s business. It’s in the bylaws.”
Chapter Ten
The Laughtons were twenty minutes late for dinner, and when they arrived, they seemed very angry with each other. And let me tell you something: if you want a bad case of heartburn, eat dinner with a married couple that’s having problems. Every word is loaded; every gesture is fraught with hostility. The tension is so thick it covers everyone at the table like Alfredo sauce. Here’s an example:
“Have you two seen any good movies lately?” I asked the Laughtons.
“Ducky see a movie?” Nedra scoffed. “He never understands the dialogue. The only movies he can understand are foreign films. They have subtitles.”
“At least I don’t talk during the movies,” said Ducky. “Nedra can’t keep her big mouth shut. Ever.”
“That’s because I’m starved for intelligent conversation,” Nedra sniped. “God knows, I don’t get it at home.”
“You wouldn’t know intelligent conversation if it hit you in the face,” Ducky countered.
“You’d like to, wouldn’t you?” said Nedra.
“Like to what?” said Ducky.
“Hit me in the face,” said Nedra.
And on it went. Even the subject of Claire’s murder provoked bickering between them.
“You knew Claire years ago, right, Ducky?” I asked, knowing the answer but trying to raise the issue gracefully.
“Yes,” he said dejectedly. “At Berkeley.” He seemed to be taking Claire’s death hard. Perhaps that was why Nedra was so angry with him.
“They were lovers,” Nedra snapped. “Ducky was quite the cocksman in those days.”
Ducky sighed. “What Nedra is trying to say is that Claire and I dated in college.”
“Was it serious?” I asked. I was dying to see how Ducky would describe his relationship with Claire, seeing as he’d told her she was his “grand passion.”
“Not really,” he said. “We were campus activists together. We were both vehemently opposed to the Vietnam War. Our relationship was based on politics, not romance.”
Yeah, and I’m a potted plant. The man was lying, but why? To keep his jealous wife from foaming at the mouth? Or was there a more sinister reason?
“I still can’t believe she was murdered,” said Hunt. “Here at The Oaks, of all places.”
“I know,” I said. “Did you see or talk to her the night she was killed, Ducky?”
“Yes,” he said. “We ran into each other on the buffet line and reminisced about the good old days.”
More lies! Claire never made it to the buffet line, according to her friend Sharon. What’s more, Claire didn’t have the slightest interest in reminiscing about the good old days, and she’d told Ducky as much. She hadn’t wanted anything to do with him.
“This must be painful, Ducky, seeing as you and Claire were old friends and all,” I said. “But do you have any guesses as to who may have killed her?”
He thought for a minute. “I hate to say this, but it could have been one of the Neanderthals at The Oaks,” he said. “They were terrified of Claire, terrified that she’d change the club rules.”
“Yes, but she already had changed the rules,” I said. “If they were going to kill her, why didn’t they do it before she became a member?”
“Judy’s right,” said Hunt. “If you ask me, I think an outsider did it. Someone who sneaked into the club and dragged her off to that sand trap. You can’t go anywhere in this country anymore without fearing for your life. Even on a golf course.”
“The police don’t agree,” I said. “They think the killer is probably a member here.”
“How do you know that, Jude?” said Hunt. “The newspapers say the police don’t have any idea who did it.”
Okay, Judy. Get yourself out of this one. “Well…I uh…heard that from the woman who cuts my hair,” I said. “Her husband’s on the Belford Police Force.”
Saved by the bull.
There was more talk of the murder, then the conversation turned to golf. Blah blah blah. I was so bored I agreed to keep Nedra company when she went to the ladies’ room. While we were freshening up, I asked her what was wrong between her and Ducky.
“Nothing that a good fuck won’t cure,” she answered and changed the subject.
The next day Nedra got her curative fuck all right—but it wasn’t with Ducky.
I was playing a set against Bailey Vanderhoff on Court 16, the farthest court from the tennis house, when I hit the ball over the fence, into the woods. Obviously, the tennis lessons I’d taken hadn’t done much for my game.
“I’ll get the ball,” I yelled to Bailey. I wasn’t wild about venturing into the woods, not with all that poison ivy back there, but since I was the one who’d hit the ball, and since Bailey was the one who’d brought the new can of Wilsons, I felt it was my duty to retrieve it.
I was well into the woods, about a foot from where our ball had landed, when I heard moaning. I stopped and listened. The sound was coming from the bushes to my right.
“Oh, baby. Oh, baby. Don’t stop. Don’t stop.”
It was a woman’s voice, and even a straight-arrow like me could tell she wasn’t talking to the mosquitoes.
“Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Oh, yes,” she moaned.
I was frozen to my little spot on the ground, riveted. I chastised myself for being so voyeuristic, but I couldn’t help myself.
“Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.”
It was a man’s voice this time. Men always invoked the name of the Lord during sex.
“Ahhhhhhh,” they cried out in unison.
Boy. This couple must have had some practice, I thought. To pull that off while rolling around in grass and dirt and pine needles takes real concentration.
When I heard Romeo and Juliet getting up, I grabbed the tennis ball and raced back to Court 16.
“What’s the matter?” Bailey asked when she saw me. “You look flushed.”
“Just a little winded,” I said. And disappointed that I hadn’t learned the identity of the lovers. Some sleuth I was.
My disappointment faded about ten minutes later. Bailey and I had finished our match and had walked over to the tennis house for a soda.
“Oh, there’s Nedra,” Bailey said. “Over by the water fountain talking to Rob.”
I turned to look, saw Nedra and Rob, and waved. They waved back. Then they walked away from us, down the stairs toward Rob’s teaching court.
“What did they sit in?” Bailey laughed.
The backs of Nedra and Rob’s tennis whites were grass stained. Seriously grass stained.
So Nedra was having an affair with the assistant pro. The very assistant pro that Claire had tried to fire. How long had the affair been going on? I wondered. Was it Nedra’s way of paying Ducky back for his interest in Claire? Or was Nedra and Ducky’s supposedly torrid sex life a sham, as well as Nedra’s jealousy? Were they one of those couples that couldn’t stand each other but stayed together for the sake of the country club?
A few nights later, I met Hunt in the city so we could have dinner with Arlene and her date, a man whose name was Randy and whose hair was longer and blonder than mine. He and Arlene had been introduced at a romance book convention. Apparently, Randy was a model who posed for romance book covers. Apparently, Randy was in his forties but looked much younger. Apparently, Randy was a former Peace Corps volunteer who’d come to the conclusion that making big money was ultimately more satisfying than saving the worl
d.
“How did you come to work for the Peace Corps?” I asked Randy.
“I was a sixties person,” he said. “Protest marches, sit-ins, demonstrations, you get the picture. Everybody at Berkeley was into the peace-not-war thing.”
“Berkeley? Did you happen to know Claire Cox?” I asked, assuming she and Randy were about the same age.
“Who didn’t?” he said. “She was a star on campus. Very activist. Very charismatic. Very beautiful.”
“Did you know a guy named Ducky Laughton?” I asked. “He was at Berkeley around the same time.”
“Yeah, sure,” said Randy. “He and Claire Cox had a thing going for a while.”
“So I understand,” I said. I was about to pump Randy for more when he volunteered it.
“We were all surprised when he transferred out,” he said. “To U.Va., of all places. Not exactly a hot bed of political activism.”
Hunt and I looked at each other. “Ducky graduated from the University of Virginia?” Hunt asked. He’d known Ducky longer than I had, and he seemed surprised by the information.
“Yup,” said Randy. “He got into trouble at Berkeley at the end of his junior year. When we came back in the fall, he was history. No one knew exactly what happened—it was all kind of hush hush—but the rumor was that his father, a U.Va. man, made some kind of a deal with the dean and Ducky was shipped off to Charlottesville for his senior year.”
“Interesting,” I mused. “That must have put a damper on his romance with Claire.”
“I think they had broken up before that,” said Randy. “She started going with a Russian exchange student.”
I nodded, and tried to look fascinated as Randy, Arlene, and Hunt entered into a heated discussion of Boris Yeltsin’s economic policy, but my mind was stuck on Claire and Ducky and what might have occurred between them twenty-five years ago. According to Randy, who may or may not have been a reliable source, Claire had gone out with Ducky, then dumped him, then he was kicked out of Berkeley and hustled off to his father’s alma mater. Did the trouble he’d gotten into have anything to do with Claire? Was he angry that she dumped him? Had he hung on to his anger all these years? Did seeing Claire again at the club make him even angrier? Was he the one who killed her?