Shades of Murder (The Mac Faraday Mysteries)

by Lauren Carr

  Neal’s jaw dropped. His eyes grew wide. Grasping the back of a chair, he held himself up while cocking his head in Mac’s direction. Seeming to fear his father was going to fall over, Scott clutched his arm.

  The housekeeper appeared out of nowhere to grab Neal’s other arm, which startled Mac. He thought she had gone back inside after showing them out to the patio.

  Neal was still opening and closing his mouth as if he couldn’t find his voice, when Mac explained, “A collector of stolen art recently died and left it to my mother. He had purchased it from a fence shortly after your wife’s death.”

  Neal rushed forward to grab Mac by the shoulders. “Do you have it with you now? Can we have it back?”

  David explained, “The statute of limitation on the theft has run out. Legally, it belongs to Mac.”

  “What do you want for it?” When he saw Mac’s surprise, Neal said, “I assume that’s why you came to see me. To offer to sell it to me. Well, I want it. Name your price.”

  Mac reminded him, “You don’t even know what condition it’s in.”

  “I don’t care,” he replied. “Ilysa put her heart and soul into her paintings. That painting was her favorite. It was to be her masterpiece.”

  Scott said, “It’s the only self-portrait she’d ever done.”

  “You didn’t see it,” Rachel told her husband. “I didn’t think it was that good.”

  “Still, she painted it for Dad.”

  Neal’s voice deepened. His eyes were still on Mac’s. “Whatever you want, I’ll pay. No haggling.”

  Mac could feel David’s and Bogie’s eyes on him while the determined man ordered him to name his price for something he wanted so badly that money was no object.

  The feeling was surreal.

  “I didn’t come to sell you the painting, Mr. Hathaway,” Mac confessed. “It’s natural that you’d want it. Frankly, I wasn’t thinking about that. I want to help you find out who killed your wife.”

  It was Neal Hathaway’s turn to be shocked. He cleared his throat and blinked several times before saying, “I want that, too. Very much…If I were you, I’d focus on Victor Gruskonov, Ilysa’s agent.”

  Susan added, “He told Ilysa that he was coming that weekend, but none of us saw him.”

  “He got hung up on a business deal and was coming in later,” Neal said. “He was supposed to come in Sunday night, rent a car, and be here to go up to the Inn for breakfast Monday morning. Ilysa was going to let him handle the sale of this painting at the show in Paris, and then that was going to be it. She was retiring.”

  “Retiring?” Mac asked. “To do what?”

  “Be my wife.” Neal choked up. “We were going to start a whole new life together. We were going on a second honeymoon and travel all around the world to visit every country. It was going to be a year-long honeymoon. This was to be her last painting. She wasn’t going to work with Victor anymore…” He took out a handkerchief to dab at his eyes.

  Greta patted his arm.

  “But Ilysa ends up murdered and Victor Gruskonov never shows up.” Mac slowed down when he saw David’s brow furrow. His eyebrows were almost meeting between his eyes.

  Nancy was nodding her head. “I don’t see where the mystery is. Have you people been looking for Victor Gruskonov?”

  “We walked in on him and Ilysa arguing in the kitchen one night a few weeks before she was killed,” Rachel said. “Do you remember that, Scott? It was before you went to Europe.”

  “I do,” Scott said. “Ilysa was furious. She was screaming at Victor that it was his fault. Man, I never saw her so mad. She threw him out. She was mad for days after that.”

  Mac asked, “His fault for what?”

  “No idea.” Scott shook his head. “I asked her and she refused to talk about it.”

  Rachel was hugging herself with her arms folded across her chest. “I felt so bad for her. Whatever it was upset her. After that fight, I never saw him again.” She asked Neal, “Did you ever see him after that?”

  “Only a couple of times,” Neal said, “I know what you’re talking about. Something definitely happened between them to severe their friendship. Things changed. I asked Ilysa, too. She wouldn’t tell me.”

  Bogie reminded Mac, “Unfortunately, we’ve never found Gruskonov to question him.”

  David asked, “What did Victor Gruskonov look like?”

  Peyton scoffed, “You’re asking that now?”

  “He had long hair that he wore in a pony tail and a black goatee. Right?”

  Everyone nodded their heads.

  “But none of you saw him for weeks before the murder?”

  Again, they nodded their heads.

  Mac asked them, “Would any of you have recognized him if he cut his hair and shaved the goatee?”

  The question was met with a mixture of shrugs and nodded heads.

  Bogie told them, “Our BOLO includes a picture of Victor Gruskonov without the beard. We’ve got that covered.”

  The sunny studio bore no resemblance to the crime scene that David and Bogie had investigated eight years earlier. The artist studio had been converted into a fitness center with machines, mats, and brightly colored prints on the walls.

  “We’ve had the studio redecorated,” Rachel said. “Are you going to be able to reconstruct what happened?”

  “We should be able to.” Bogie opened his valise to remove a folder filled with crime scene photos. He crossed the studio to the breakfast bar on which rested a collection of fruits and vegetables in baskets. The counter was home to a juicer, blender, and food processor.

  David turned to Neal and his son. The rest of their guests had followed them into the studio. “I think it would be best if you all waited outside.”

  “But what if he has some questions?” Neal asked.

  Before David could respond, Mac called over to them. “Who was it that found Ms. Ramsay? Mr. Hathaway? I’d like him to stay. Everyone else should leave.”

  With disappointed expressions, everyone left and David closed the door behind them.

  Neal waited with his back against the wall while Mac leaned up against the breakfast bar to read over the reports in the folder that Bogie had brought with him. On the other side of the breakfast bar, Bogie and David went through the crime scene photos one at a time.

  After a long wait in silence, Neal cleared his throat.

  “I haven’t forgotten about you, Mr. Hathaway.” Mac looked up from the report. “Tell me about when you found your wife’s body.”

  Neal glanced from Mac to David and Bogie. After clearing his throat, he began. “It was Labor Day. We were planning to go up to the Spencer Inn for brunch. When I woke up, Ilysa was gone. She liked to come over to the studio at night to paint—when it was quiet. I had assumed she went to bed here when she got tired. So I came looking for her.”

  “Did she do that often?” Mac asked.

  “All the time.”

  “Would she be alone here when she painted?”

  Neal Hathaway stared at him without answering.

  “This is a murder investigation,” Mac pointed out. “I have to ask.”

  “We had the perfect marriage,” he answered in a strong voice.

  “Okay,” Mac said. “So you wake up. Your wife is gone. Everyone is getting ready to go out for breakfast. What time was that?”

  Neal answered without hesitation. “A little after seven o’clock.”

  “Tell me about when you got here. Was the door open?”

  “No, it was shut.”

  “Was it locked?”

  “No. I just opened it and walked in and there she was in the middle of the floor.” He covered his mouth with his hand. His face contorted with emotion. “There was blood everywhere. It was the single worst thing I’d ever seen in my life. You can’t imagine.”

  Envisioning the hundreds of murder cases that he’d worked on during his career, and the effect of loved ones finding the bodies, Mac could imagine. “Was anyone with
you?”

  “I was alone.”

  “What happened then?”

  “I called over to the main house on the intercom and told Greta that Ilysa was dead and to call the police.”

  David asked, “What else happened?”

  “Silence. Greta asked if I was all right. I remember nodding my head because it was hitting me. I said call the police. Then I hung up and everything became a blur.” He looked up from the spot where he had found his wife’s body. “I don’t think I can be much help after that. I think I went into shock.”

  Mac asked in a low voice, “How did Scott and Rachel get along with your wife?”

  Neal stood up straight at the suggestion of disharmony between his son and his wife. “He loved Ilysa. He was best man at our wedding. We were a very happy family.” He warned Mac. “Don’t even think of going there in looking for suspects.”

  Mac shot a grin at David and Bogie over his shoulder. “How about your daughter-in-law?”

  The corner of Neal’s lips curled. “Rachel has issues.”

  David recalled, “Rachel was fighting with your assistant, Susan, when I arrived on the day of the murder.”

  Mac asked, “What was that about?”

  Neal shook his head. “Like I said, Rachel has issues. Susan has a few of her own. When you get the two of them together, they both have issues. Throw in Nancy Kaplan and it becomes a hot tub of issues. Ilysa was smart enough to stay out of it. None of them liked that.”

  Chuckling about Neal’s frank response, Mac asked David, “What were Susan and Rachel fighting about?”

  “They both said it was nothing. Rachel accused Susan of trying to leave. Susan said she was only packing her car for when she was released to go home.”

  Mac asked, “When did you notice that the painting was missing?”

  Neal’s eyes glazed over. “I didn’t. While I was waiting for the police to come, I remember Rachel coming in. She screamed, and then she ran downstairs. There was more screaming, and then an air horn…”

  “Did anyone else come in while you were waiting for the police?” Mac asked.

  After a long silence that seemed to fill the studio with the memory of the death years before, Neal Hathaway shook his head. Tears came to his eyes.

  Bogie recalled, “The Kaplans arrived after our people.”

  Neal found his voice again. “They were staying at the Spencer Inn. When we didn’t show up, Nancy called; and Susan told her about what had happened.”

  Mac stood up from where he had been leaning against the breakfast bar. “You saw the painting the night before?”

  “We all did,” he said. “Ilysa had been working on it all summer. This was supposed to be her masterpiece. It was going to be publicly unveiled at the Lourve the next month.”

  “Everyone was here when she unveiled it?” Mac went over to admire the view.

  Neal nodded. “Sunday night. After dinner. We had dessert and champagne here in the studio to celebrate.”

  Mac moved the standing weight scale from where it was set next to the wall to the middle of the room. “Where was the easel when she did her unveiling?”

  “It was over closer to the window. Between the windows and the breakfast bar.” He coughed. “I didn’t want to convert the studio into a fitness room, but Rachel insisted. She said it was a waste to leave it the way it was, since Ilysa was…”

  Mac sensed Neal’s daughter-in-law permitted only the minimal amount of time for mourning before making a grab for the space—and anything else—for herself.

  “Which way was the easel turned?” Using the weight scale as a substitute for the easel, Mac asked Neal about its placement in the room at the time of the murder.

  “Facing the center of the room.”

  “You said everyone was here?”

  “All of us. Me. Susan. Rachel. The Kaplans were here, too. Victor was supposed to be here.” Neal added in a harsh tone. “I know he did it. He planned it this way.”

  “How did Victor meet Ilysa?” Mac saw David cock his head as if a thought was nagging at his brain.

  Neal’s tone was firm. “They grew up together in the same little village in Scotland. When Ilysa started selling her paintings, Victor swooped in to become her agent. But she told me that she wasn’t happy doing what she was doing, and she was going to quit.”

  “Which would have left Victor where?” Bogie asked. “Sounds like a motive for murder.”

  Neal said loudly, “Exactly!”

  After allowing him to leave, Mac compared the crime scene pictures to the room as it was now. It was difficult. When she had remodeled, Rachel ensured the studio was barely recognizable of its former self.

  “Her body was here.” Bogie gestured at the space on the floor in front of the scale. “Blood splatters started six feet in from the door. We believed her attacker struck the first blow to the back of the head after entering the room.”

  “There was blood in front of the easel and some cast off around the base,” Mac said. “No sign of forced entry. Either the door was unlocked, or she and the killer came in together. But she was in her pajamas and bathrobe.”

  David said, “The last time everyone saw her, she was going to bed. Neal Hathaway says they went to bed together.”

  Bogie added, “But he wasn’t awake when she left. So he couldn’t tell us what time she came to the studio. The time of death was between midnight and one.”

  “She came over here to the studio,” Mac said, “and she gets killed.” He went to the windows looking out on the lake to peer out along the shore to the main house. “The top floors of the mansion look right out here. She could have seen the thief stealing her masterpiece and came to stop him.”

  Bogie said, “That’s what we were thinking. She comes in to confront the thief and he bludgeons her to death with the hammer.”

  “Was the murder weapon hers or his?”

  Bogie answered that the hammer used to kill Ilysa had belonged to her.

  Walking the path from the door to the middle of the room, Mac stopped and pointed across the room to the kitchen counter located on the other side of the breakfast bar. “According to these pictures, her paints were over there, but she painted over here. That’s a long way to go dip a paint brush.”

  David and Bogie glanced at each other.

  “How did I miss that?” Bogie asked.

  Frowning, Mac stood over the spot where Ilysa’s body had been found. “There’s no void in the blood spatters around the easel.” He showed Bogie and David the picture of the body on the floor in front of the bare easel. While they studied that picture, Mac handed them the other pictures of the blood on the floor around the easel. “There’s no blood on the painting, either. I tested it.”

  “That means the canvas wasn’t near the body to catch any of the splatter,” David said.

  Mac pointed out, “But the easel was right next to the body.”

  Bogie said, “If it was on the easel at the time of the murder, there would have been a void in the blood splatter.”

  “And on the painting,” Mac said. “There’s neither.”

  “So where was the painting while Ilysa was being killed?” David turned around as if it may still be in the studio.

  “Gone already?” Bogie asked.

  Mac showed them another picture of the breakfast bar with an industrial sized role of wrapping paper resting on the floor next to it. “She was getting it ready for shipping when she was killed. That’s why Ilysa had put the paints over there—To make room on this counter to wrap up the painting.”

  He went into the center of the room to reconstruct the murder. “The killer comes into the room and strikes the first blow several steps into the room. Ilysa manages to cross the room to here—” He stood over the spot where her body had been found. “—where he beats her down to the floor and kills her.”

  He turned to the kitchenette. “The painting was up here on the counter. It may have already been wrapped up and all the killer had to do
was take it.” He held up his finger. “Or … it was already gone and not in the studio at the time of the murder.”

  Bogie asked, “Which was it? Was the painting stolen before or during the murder?”

  “That’s an important question,” David said. “If the painting had already been stolen, then most likely, it’s not the motive for the murder.”

  “If there’s no blood on the painting, it’s entirely possible that it wasn’t even in the room,” Bogie said. “That sends the case in a whole different direction.”

  David and Bogie turned to Mac, who was staring down at the floor where Ilysa Ramsay’s body had lay lifeless eight years before. Abruptly aware of their questioning gaze on him, he responded, “I’m working on it.”

  Chapter Five

  “Hey, you,” Detective Cameron Gates shouted to Priscilla Garrett, the senior forensics technician in the crime lab, located on the ground floor of the barracks.

  It was time for Priscilla’s lunch break, which she took as soon as the clock struck the hour and not a minute later for fear of going into nicotine withdrawal.

  Cameron’s call across the lab stopped the buxom blond from shedding her lab coat and racing in her high heels out the other exit to the corner of the parking lot reserved for smokers. “What are you doing?” The detective sauntered the length of the lab.

  “Lunch.” As if it were a jar filled with creepy, crawly bugs, Priscilla eyed the brown folder that Cameron had tucked under her arm. “Unless you’re here to offer to buy me a salad and bottled water, it’s going to have to wait.”

  Cameron considered the suggestion. A refusal would be the wrong answer. Priscilla would be gone, and she’d have to come back later, which was not an option. Now that Jane Doe’s murder case was officially taboo, Cameron couldn’t risk talking to her when the lab was in full swing with big-eared forensics officers.

  That morning at staff meeting, Lieutenant Sherry Bixby had made a big deal about no detectives reopening any cold cases without first clearing them through her. Cameron could feel all eyes on her. No one said the words, but the other detectives on the squad knew about which cold case Sherry Bixby was talking.