“Well?” I asked. “To what do I owe the honor of this unexpected pastoral visit?”
Isa stepped back, shoving Pablo behind her, obviously uncomfortable. The other two paled a bit. Pablo, like any toddler, made a break for freedom as soon as his mother's hands tried to corral him. He plowed right into Ben’s leg. The other two children, older, stayed close to the younger, fairer of the two women whose names I had already forgotten. Ben scooped him up.
“Hey, Buddy, not so fast. How about we go check out the kitchen? We have dogs, you like dogs?” He nodded at Isa. “Is it okay if I give him a cookie?”
He was already headed off in the direction of the kitchen, Pablo in tow, when Isa's yes reached him. As he went by, he passed me a guilty smile. I had been right. There was something clandestine going on, and it clearly involved Father Matt as well, who now nodded at Isa, shooing her off after Ben’s retreating form.
“Father Matt...” I started, but he held up a quieting hand.
“Ben was good enough to talk with me this afternoon when I came looking for you. You’d already gone over to Ophir, about that murder.”
He made an involuntary sign of the cross. Father Matt did that with great regularity, more than any priest—any Catholic—I had ever known. I asked him about it once, and he said it was to remind him who and whose he was, because his memory was so bad. That might be the purpose, I reflected just now, but the man had a mind like a steel trap and I was about to be caught in it; I could feel it. I could also feel Eoin Connor’s curious eyes on the both of us. Father Matt plowed ahead.
“Now, William,” he said, using the nickname he had given me early on for my short temper, no Jane Wallace, he’d said, definitely a William. It meant he knew he was on thin ice and it meant he was serious. I narrowed my eyes. This could not be good.
“Isa needs a place to live. I put her up in the Victorian Inn, but she needs a more permanent place. She can’t go back to that house she was living in. She's lost her jobs. She needs help. And so do Pilar and Lupe. They live with her at the house in Montrose. They can’t go back. It’s too dangerous. This man Pelirojo, he’s a thug. Dangerous,” he repeated. “They are not safe, and they need a place to live."
My mind fast-forwarded to what he was almost certainly going to ask.
“Oh, no. Not here. No. I can’t put them up here.”
“Why not? This place has six bedrooms and maid's quarters. You have plenty of room. You need the company.”
I saw Ben’s fingerprints all over this.
“I’ll rent an apartment in town.”
“Ridiculous. Isa needs a safe place where she can recover, not some lonely efficiency surrounded by rowdies. She needs Lupe and Pilar for support. Besides, it’s a poor use of your money when you have space here.”
“I can afford it.”
“What you can afford is to take them in.”
“They’re illegal.”
I expected pleading from him but got a derisive laugh.
“Please. First of all, you don’t know that. It’s not like you to jump to conclusions without information, Jane Wallace. More importantly, they are people. Isa’s a person. She’s been raped. You helped her once. Help her again. It’s no skin off your nose. God knows you have enough room and enough money. It would be good for you.”
I was surprised at the edge in his voice. It was too much. I was tired of people, especially my children, treating me as though my widowhood were something to be remedied, something to be cured. They could fill up the house with guests, and John would still be dead. Blue paint and broadsword came out, and I earned my nickname.
“How dare you?” I snapped. “Good for me? How? Another six people underfoot? A bunch of illegal aliens living with me — just the sort of ammunition anyone who wants to come after my law license, or my medical one for that matter, would need. An officer of the court, harboring illegals? I don't need you, or Ben either for that matter, figuring out ways to keep me occupied. I’m fine. I don’t need company and I don't need any more aggravation than I already have.”
I hadn’t noticed that Ben had slipped back into the hall, Pablo on his hip with Ben's favorite chocolate-peanut butter sandwich cookies in each hand. Isa was beside him, with the same “going to Timbuktu” look Ben had perfected set on her face. He touched my arm with his free hand and just said, “Mom?”
I looked from Ben to Pablo, to Isa and back to Father Matt and the other women. The face of the older one, Pilar, was set and hard, an expression earned, I suspected, from many years of suffering indignity. A tear slid down Lupe’s cheek, and she hoisted her younger child onto her hip, holding his hand, drawing him near. I knew when I was defeated, and if the truth be known, I was mortified at my outburst. If nothing else, John would have expected better of me. Time to be a better steward of his memory. My resolve to keep them out of the house crumbled when I saw the obvious pain and disappointment in Isa’s brown eyes.
“I can’t believe this,” I said, but I suspect my voice lacked the sharpness I tried to convey in an attempt to save at least a little face. I sighed. “Ben, show Isa and Pablo and the others upstairs. Let Isa and Pablo have the suite. Let Lupe,” I looked questioningly in the direction of the woman holding the child, and she nodded slightly, “have the big room next to the suite. Put Pilar in the guest room at the end. Make sure there are plenty of towels and that the sheets are clean.”
“Why wouldn’t they be?” Ben said. “No one has stayed there since you moved in. The beds might have a layer of dust, but the sheets are clean. C’mon Buddy, let’s go find your new room.”
Ben grinned, tickled Pablo, and headed up the stairs, edging past Father Matt and then taking the steps two at a time, pausing just long enough to cast a too-long look at Father Matt. I suspected there was more to come, but I had no idea what. As Isa followed, I reached for her arm.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. You are welcome here. It’s just been...difficult.”
She pulled away, then nodded, but her expression didn't change. She hurried up the stairs with the others close behind. Pilar paused at the landing to cast a curious look back at me and then hurried up the stairs and out of sight. I doubted any of them believed me, or felt comfortable, and who could blame them? Could I have been a greater ass? I’d violated the first rule of Southern hospitality. I’d made a visitor feel unwelcome.
Father Matt looked like he wanted to embrace me, but my glare made him take a step back instead.
“Thank you, Sweet William,” he said, taking some of the sting out of the nickname in a tactic he’d never used before.
He was getting too good at finding ways around me, too good at getting under my skin. He glanced back at Ben and his face momentarily clouded. He cleared his throat and his expression at the same time.
“I'll be back in the morning to get Isa and Pablo. The liaison is going to meet with her to see what we can do about regularizing her status.”
There were so many Hispanics in the Telluride area, St. Pat’s had added first one, then two, liaisons for immigrant services. I know. I pay the bill.
“Do that,” I said dryly. “I meant it about the trouble, Father Matt. Make it go away. I can’t afford to risk my job with the state and the feds.”
“Like they care.”
Father Matt looked at me for a long moment as the Seth Thomas ticked the seconds away. This time the silence worked against me. I was unsettled by this turn of events. I wanted control back, and I wasn’t going to get it from Father Matt or even from my son. So I turned to the only remaining possibility: Eoin Connor, who had watched the proceedings with a faint grin. I wondered if he’d use it for color in some future book of his. Ben seemed to know what he was doing in Telluride, or at least what he did elsewhere, but I hadn’t a clue. I decided to ask. I folded my arms and regarded him askance.
“And what do you want from me?” I asked.
*********
What did he want? What he wanted was to snatch those big, round, black, owli
sh glasses off her face and revel in it. She took him completely by surprise, she did. He was expecting some half-aged twit of a woman doctor, all modern and feminist with no use for half the population of the world. She stood there, arms crossed, challenging, of a comfortable age and a womanly shape, and an unsettling confidence, nothing like those walking wraiths that chattered and chased after him, attaching themselves to him as soon as they recognized his face from his latest bestseller nestled among the offerings in the bookseller’s window. This was a woman who would remember the things he remembered, even if she had experienced them half a world away and a few years younger. He liked that thought.
She hadn’t said another word, just stared at him, eye to eye, waiting for his response. He noted with relief that it was an illusion, their equality. If she didn’t have the height of her shoes, he’d have her by an inch or two, and that gave him a curious reassurance.
She wasn’t beautiful, not really even pretty in the conventional sense, but he found her arresting. She had a sunset face, one that would get more interesting with age, not just older, unusual, he thought, in anyone. It was just a bit off, out of the norm for well-off American women obsessed with youth. Her face too long, her forehead high, the nose a bit crooked, and the lines on her face had begun to settle in. He noted with satisfaction that they seemed to be the kind that came from joy, not sorrow. Her hair had once been black but now was shot thoroughly full of silver, much more salt than pepper. Her brows, though, hadn’t yet changed, still dark and wild, and her face was bare of makeup. He noticed her lips were pursed and got on with it.
“You could offer me a wee drink.”
The wild brows lifted on one side. “I could. I haven’t.”
She had a tongue as sharp as a cheese knife, of that he was certain; he’d heard the edge of it when she spoke to the priest and he heard it now. He tried again.
“Surely you’ve got a drink in the interests of hospitality. It wouldn’t hurt you. I need a favor from you, and you’re more likely to grant it if you’ve a bit on board.”
He kept her gaze, but it was hard, distracted as he was by the glasses. He was hoping he’d take her off guard by his comment, and he did.
She didn’t smile, though, just shook her head. “Very well, come in,” and turned on that boot heel to lead him like a spaniel puppy into the parlor. Then, “Have a seat,” as she vanished presumably in search of ice.
There was whiskey in a decanter on the sideboard. He recognized the pattern, Clare, good, expensive, Waterford crystal. It was Fiona’s choice; she had insisted they buy some for the house even when he was too poor to keep the two of them in bed and board. She probably had rafts of it now. Sad that he ever knew it by name. Sadder still that he recognized it after so many years.
The room was surprisingly sterile, more like a hotel than a home, everything in place and matched, its design-book perfection marred only by a motley collection of books, in all shapes and sizes, stacked two deep on the shelves and spilling onto the floor in disordered piles; and by a scattering of photographs. Uncharacteristically, he looked at the photographs first.
He was holding one of the pictures when she returned with the glasses and ice. She was in it, younger, but not much, and sitting on a pier, long legs dangling over the water, surrounded by children, six of them, in various raucous poses. There was a younger version of the likely, red-headed lad who had opened the door, and five others: three boys, two girls, all with brown hair and laughing eyes. He wondered what the father looked like; he’d probably been the one to take the picture. He replaced it on the shelf and took the glass from her, holding it as she covered the ice with lovely, amber liquid, knowing enough not to dilute it no matter how good and clear the water was in these parts. Her left hand was bare, not even a tan line on her ring finger; he wondered why, and then wondered why he noticed.
“You’ve a fine looking family.” It was a good start to conversation. Good for ten minutes of non-stop bragging from most women, and most of the ones he knew only had one or two cubs to talk about. She poured her own.
“I do,” she said, as though it were a matter of simple fact, but he noticed the corners of her mouth turn upward. “I do,” she repeated, satisfied, then turned to him, all business, and all expectant behind those glasses as she asked him again what he wanted.
CHAPTER TEN
JUNE 9, EVENING
I handed Eoin Connor a glass and waited. He sipped it appreciatively. I had never been much of a whiskey drinker until John introduced me to it. A bit of Jameson's before bed, while we reviewed the day and planned for the future, was our ritual. It seemed odd to have offered it to this interloper, but hospitality demanded, and he seemed to appreciate it. He savored the sip for a good while before swallowing, either because he liked it or because he was trying to buy time. He finally swallowed and spoke, keeping his eyes on mine.
“Can I not just sit down?”
This was shaping up to be a real chess game, and I had already demonstrated that my powers were behind a cloud. All I really wanted was to get this man out of my house and go to bed. I sighed. “Of course. Please.” I moved a tapestry pillow and sat down in the green overstuffed chair. My foot hit the stack of books at the side as I crossed my legs, and the pile toppled.
This was my favorite reading chair; it should do for whatever inquisition was to follow.
Eoin Connor sat himself opposite me on the sofa, a big man, broad-shouldered and square- faced. His seated form still hinted of those strong muscles under the cotton shirt open at the collar. He settled himself among the pillows, not bothering to move them. An abundance of pillows had been Kiki Berton’s decorating trademark, and she’d indulged it to the hilt when outfitting this place.
“Comfortable,” he said with some surprise. “Your home is grand.”
Courtesy dictated that I respond with thanks, and I did. I still didn’t think of this as my home, just a place to live, one I had wrested from my former partners in the settlement following John’s death. I valued it more for what it represented than what it was; it made no real difference to me how it was decorated. Had I an interest, I would have thrown out all the matched, nouveau log cabin furniture and furnished it with Victorian antiques.
“You didn't come to see me this evening to discuss my house,” I added. “What can I do for you, Mr. Connor?”
Another sip from the glass, and I saw him regarding me over the rim. He was definitely buying time.
“Right, then. On with it.” He shifted his weight, then shifted it back. I was used to making people uncomfortable, but this surprised me. “I need your help with my latest project. My book. The Putnam murder.”
I was perplexed. “The Putnam murder?”
“I am surprised you don’t know of it. It happened about two years ago. Saul Putnam, the designer, shot at point blank range by his lover. The fellow then holed himself up in Putnam’s house, took some hostages, and held the police at bay for a good long while. The trial was right here in Telluride, a few months later. Quite a production, though there wasn’t any doubt how Putnam was killed and who did it. The lover claimed he’d been driven to it by Putnam's abusive nature. It’s quite a sordid tale, in the end.”
“Lovely.”
I will never understand how people make a living writing about real crime. For that matter, I will never understand how they make a living writing about fake crime, either. There’s enough disaster in everyone’s life without looking for other peoples’ sorrow. Or maybe reading about someone else’s grand tragedy made one's own seem insignificant. Who knew? My own tastes ran to histories and biographies, the odd mystery thrown in, if it were improbable enough that I didn’t bother to spend all my time criticizing it for lack of verisimilitude. Lately, I had even lost the taste for them.
“I’m afraid I wasn’t the M.E. at that time. There’s nothing I can do to help you.”
Though I had to admit, the thought of dealing with a murder that wasn’t mine to solve had a certain appeal t
hese days. Anything to get my mind off the string that was building up in Telluride, more to come if Ben was right.
“I realize that. I've already interviewed the fellow who was coroner here at the time. He told me that there’s a significant file, with a good deal of background information. It would be a great help to me if I could see it. I'm trying to get the context of the murder, the lives it came from.”
I noticed that he’d slipped from his charming Irish talk back into ordinary American. I wondered whether he used his accent for effect. The man definitely had a public persona and a private one, of that I was sure.
He took another sip of whiskey, almost draining the glass. “This is a peculiar sort of place. Not really —”
He searched for the adjective, and I supplied it in my own mind before he found it himself. Real.
“When I put that together with Putnam and his lover, it makes for an interesting tale — or at least so my publisher thinks.”
Not real. It was as direct a description of this place as I had ever heard.
“Telluride does seem to operate in a sort of permanent suspension of the rules that make other places tick,” I said.
Connor finished his drink and set it down on the coffee table.
“It does,” he confirmed. “Anywhere else, this sort of tawdry story wouldn’t be worth a second look. Gay lover kills boyfriend. But here, it takes on a different sort of significance. Putnam was a successful businessman, but he started out as an outcast from his Boston Brahmin family, a remainder-man, living on the leftovers of a trust that he inherited from his great-grandpa. A classic remainder man.”
I started. The second time in a day I had heard that term, not exactly common commerce in everyday conversation. I was intrigued.
“Go on.”
Connor picked up his glass again and tipped it invitingly in my direction. “Will you cover the ice for me?”
Dying For Revenge (The Lady Doc Murders Book 1) Page 12