by Nora Roberts
He set his glass aside before he crossed to her. His hands were gentle as they skimmed up and down her arms. “Tell you what, Jules. We’ll let him work his legal magic. And when it’s all over, we’ll both spit in his eye.”
She wrapped her arms around him, pressing her cheek to his. “I love you.”
“It’s about time you mentioned that again.” He tipped her face up to kiss her, then drew her toward the couch. “Now, sit down while I tell you what I’ve been up to.”
“Up to?” She tried on a smile, wondering if they could possibly have a normal conversation.
“Playing detective. What mystery writer isn’t a frustrated detective? Have you eaten?”
“What? Paul, you’re jumping subjects.”
“I’ve decided we’re going to talk in the kitchen. Over food.” He rose, grabbing her hand and pulling her behind him. “It’s distracting watching you drop pounds while I’m talking. I think Brandon left some peanut butter.”
“I’m going to have a peanut butter sandwich?”
“And jelly,” he told her as he took out a jar of Skippy. “Listen, it’s loaded with protein.”
She didn’t have the heart to tell him she wasn’t hungry. “I’ll fix them.”
“They’re my speciality,” he reminded her. “Sit down. When I’m facing a murder charge, you can pamper me.”
Now she did manage to smile. “It’s a deal.” She watched him slather the bread, wondering if he remembered that first morning he’d met Eve. With a little sigh, she looked past him, to the jade plant on the windowsill. Did he realize that it had been dying when she and Brandon had moved in? A little water, a little plant food, and it was thriving again. It took so very little to sustain life.
She smiled again at the plate he set in front of her. Like peanut butter and jelly, and someone to love.
“You didn’t cut it into triangles.”
He lifted a brow. “Real men don’t eat cut sandwiches. It’s wussy.”
“Thank God you told me, or I might have continued to cut Brandon’s and humiliate him.” When she picked it up, jelly squirted cheerfully out the sides. “So, how have you been playing detective.”
“What we call legwork.” As he sat, he reached over to tuck her hair behind her ear. “I talked to Jack, the pilot. He’ll swear that in his expert opinion, the fuel line was tampered with. It may not be much, but it could prove that something was going on, something outside, threatening you. Maybe Eve as well.”
She made herself eat, made herself hope. “All right. I think it could be very important to convince the police that someone was sending threats—because of the book. The tapes. I don’t understand why if they’ve listened to the tapes they can think I …” She shook her head. “No way to prove anyone but myself and Eve knew what was on them.”
“The phrase is reasonable doubt. That’s all we need. I went to see Travers,” he added. Here, while he wanted to be honest, he also wanted to chose his words with care. “She’s still a wreck, Jules. She’d wrapped her whole life around Eve—what Eve had done for her, for her son.”
“And Travers believes I killed her.”
He stood to get them both something to drink. Chablis was the first that came to hand, and he figured it would go just fine with peanut butter. “At this point she needs to blame someone. She wants that someone to be you. The thing about Travers is that very little could go on in that house without her being aware. The fact that Eve could have kept her illness from everyone, including Travers, is only a testament to Eve’s skill and determination. Someone else was on the estate that day. Someone else was in the guest house. Travers is our best bet for finding out who.”
“I only wish … I wish she could understand that I didn’t mean the things I said that night.” Her voice thickened as she picked up her glass, set it down again without drinking.
“That I never wanted that to be Eve’s last memory of me. Or mine of her. I’ll regret that for the rest of my life, Paul.”
“That would be a mistake.” He put a hand over hers, squeezed it lightly. “She brought you out here so that each of you could get to know the whole person. Not by one incident, a few hot words. Julia, I went to see her doctor.”
“Paul.” She linked her fingers with his. At the moment every touch, every point of contact seemed so precious. “You shouldn’t have done that alone.”
“It was something I wanted to do alone. She was diagnosed right after Thanksgiving last year. At the time, she had told us she wasn’t in the mood for turkey or pumpkin pie and was going off for a week or two to the Golden Door to be pampered and revitalized.” He paused here to battle his own emotions. “She checked into the hospital for the tests. Apparently, she’d been having headaches, blurred vision, mood swings. The tumor was … well, to put it simply, it was too late. They could give her medication to take the edge off the pain. She could go on normally. But they couldn’t cure it.”
His eyes flicked up to hers. In them she could see the dark, depthless well of grief.
“They couldn’t stop it. She was told she had a year at best. She went directly from there to a specialist in Hamburg. More tests, the same result. She must have made her mind up about what she was going to do right away. It was early December when she told Maggie and me about the book. About you. She wanted to finish out her life, and keep those she loved from knowing how little time she had.
Julia looked toward the little jade plant, thriving in its patch of sun. “She didn’t deserve to be robbed of what was left.”
“No.” He drank, a silent toast. Another good-bye. “And she’d be bloody pissed if whoever killed her got away. I’m not going to let that happen.” He touched his glass to Julia’s in a show of partnership that made her throat sting. “Drink your wine,” he told her. “It’s good for the soul. And it’ll relax you so it’s easier for me to seduce you.”
She blinked back the tears. “Peanut butter and jelly, and sex, in one afternoon. I don’t know if I can take it.”
“Let’s check it out,” he said, and pulled her to her feet.
He hoped she would sleep for an hour or two, and left her in the bedroom with the shades drawn against the sun, the ceiling fan spinning away the heat.
Like most storytellers, Paul could formulate a plot anywhere—in the car, waiting in the dentist’s office, at a cocktail party. But he had found over the years that his best structuring was done in his office.
He’d set up the room as he’d set up his home. To suit himself. The airy space on the second floor was where he spent most of his time. One wall was all glass, all sky and sea. Those who didn’t understand the process didn’t believe he could be working when he simply sat, staring out, watching the change in light and shadow, the swoop of laughing gulls.
To compensate for the discomfort of tearing a story out of his head and heart, Paul had made his working space a celebration of comfort. The side walls were lined with books. Some for research, some for pleasure. Twin ficus trees thrived in heavy stone pots. One year Eve had invaded his inner sanctum and had hung tiny red and green balls on their slim branches to remind him that deadline or not, Christmas would come.
He’d embraced the computer age, and worked on a clever little PC. And still scribbled notes on odd scraps of paper he often lost. He’d had a top of the line stereo hooked up, certain he would enjoy composing with a background of Mozart or Gershwin. It had taken him less than a week to admit that he detested the distraction. He kept a small refrigerator stocked with soft drinks and beer. When he was on a roll, it might be eighteen hours before he’d open the door and stumble bleary-eyed out of the office, and into reality.
So it was there he went to think of Julia, and the puzzle of proving her innocence.
He sat in his chair, tipped back, and cleared his mind by staring at the sky.
If he were searching for a plot, an ordinary one, she would be the perfect murderer. Calm, collected, and wrapped much too tightly. Reserved. Repressed. Resistant to chang
e. Eve had come along and exploded the tidy, ordered life she had built for herself. The seething temper had ripped its way through that snug outer layer of control, and in a blind moment of rage and despair, she had struck out.
The prosecution might play it that way, he thought. Tossing in several millions in inheritance for extra incentive. Of course, it would be difficult for them to prove that Julia had known about the will. Yet, it might not be so difficult to convince a jury—if it went to a jury—that Julia had been in Eve’s confidence.
The aging and ailing movie queen searching for a lost past, the love of a child she’d given up. They could cast Eve as the vulnerable victim, facing her illness bravely and alone and desperately seeking to bond with her daughter.
Eve would sneer and call it crap.
Matricide, he mused. A very ugly crime. And he thought the D.A. would settle very happily for murder two.
He lighted a cigar, closed his eyes, and ran through his mind the reason the scene didn’t work.
Julia was incapable of murder. That was, of course, his opinion, and hardly an adequate defense. Better to focus on outside forces and basic facts than his own emotions.
The notes. They were a fact. He had been with Julia when she had received one. There had been no feigning that shock and fear. The prosecution might argue that she was the daughter of an actress, and had once aspired to the stage herself. But he doubted even Eve could have delivered a performance like that cold.
The plane had been tampered with. Could anyone seriously believe she would have risked her life, risked making her child an orphan, just for effect?
The tapes. He had listened to the tapes, and they were volatile. Which secret would have been worth Eve’s life?
There was no doubt in Paul’s mind that she had died to preserve a lie.
Gloria’s abortion. Kincade’s perversions. Torrent’s ambitions. Priest’s greed.
Delrickio. With all his heart Paul wanted to believe Delrickio had been responsible. But he couldn’t make the pieces fit. Could a man who so coolly dealt out death lose control and kill so recklessly?
It had almost certainly been a crime born of the moment. Whoever had done it couldn’t have been sure when Julia would return, or if the gardener might have passed by a window on his way to prune roses.
That didn’t account for the security. No one but the staff had been inside the gates. And yet, someone had come in.
Paul asked himself what he would do if he’d wanted to confront Eve, alone, without anyone knowing. It wouldn’t have been difficult to visit openly, then leave, making a quick trip to shut off the power on the alarms. Double back. Face her down. Lose control.
He liked it. He liked it very much, except for the minor fact that the alarms had been on when the police had checked them.
So he would talk to Travers again, and Nina, and Lyle. And everyone else, down to the lowliest dust chaser on the estate.
He had to prove that someone could have gotten inside. Someone frightened enough to send notes. Someone desperate enough to kill.
On impulse he picked up the phone and dialed. “Nina. It’s Paul.”
“Oh, Paul. Travers said you’d been by. I’m sorry I missed you.” She glanced around her office, at the cardboard boxes she was meticulously packing. “I’m in the process of putting things in order, moving my own things out. I’m renting a house in the Hills until … well, until I can think what to do next.”
“You know you can stay as long as you like.”
“I appreciate that.” She groped in her pocket for a tissue. “I’m worried about Travers, but I can’t bear staying, knowing Miss B. won’t come flying in with some new impossible demand. Oh, God, Paul, why did this have to happen?”
“That’s something we need to figure out. Nina, I know the police have questioned you.”
“Over and over,” she said with a sigh. “And now the D.A. He seems certain I’ll have to testify in court, about the argument. About Julia.”
He heard the way her voice changed, tightened. “You think she did it, don’t you?”
She looked down at the tattered tissue, tossed it away and picked up a fresh one. “I’m sorry, Paul, I understand you have feelings for her. But yes, I don’t see any other explanation. I don’t think she planned it. I don’t even think she meant it. But it happened.”
“Whatever you think, Nina, you may be able to help me. I’m trying out a little theory. Can you tell me who came to see Eve the day she was killed. Even the day before.”
“Oh, God, Paul.”
“I know it’s hard, but it would help.”
“All right then.” Briskly, she dried her eyes, tucked away the tissue, then reached for the date book not yet packed. “Drake was here, and Greenburg. Both Maggie and Victor were by the evening before. Oh, and you, of course. Travers mentioned you’d come to see Eve, so I jotted it down in her book.”
“Always efficient, Nina.” He toyed with another possibility. “Did Eve have anything going with the chauffeur?”
“Lyle?” For the first time in days, Nina really laughed. “No! Miss B. had too much class for his kind. She liked the way he looked with the car. That was it.”
“One more thing. The day it happened. Did you have any trouble with the alarms. Anybody check them?”
“The alarms? No, why should there have been trouble?”
“Just tapping all the bases, Nina. Listen, let me know when you’re settled. And don’t worry about Travers. I’ll look after her.”
“I know. I’ll keep in touch. Paul … I’m sorry,” she said lamely. “Sorry about everything.”
“So am I.” He hung up, still wondering. He made the next call more slowly, more deliberately, then waited to be put through to Frank.
“Only got a minute, Paul. Things are hopping.”
“Julia?”
“Mostly. She’s got some big gun coming in from back east.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Oh, yeah, guess you do. Anyway, he wants every goddamn scrap of paper we’ve got on the case. He casts a pretty big shadow, even out here, so the D.A.’s making sure we’ve got everything all nice and tight. He’s already got some stiff-necked P.I. looking over our shoulders.”
“Hathoway works fast.”
“Yeah.” He lowered his voice. “So the D.A.’s working faster. He wants this one, Paul, bad. It’s got it all—money, power, glitz, scandal. It’s going to give him some great press.”
“Tell me something, Frank. Is there any way you can check if the security system had been turned off that day?”
Frank frowned and pushed through his papers. “It was on when we did our check.”
“But could it have been turned off earlier, then turned on again?”
“Christ, Paul, you’re spitting in the wind.” When he got no response to that, Frank muttered under his breath. “Okay, I’ll talk to a couple of the electronics boys, but I don’t think you’ve got a shot.”
“Then give me another. Are you going to talk to the chauffeur again?”
“Studly Doright? What for?”
“Hunch.”
“Shit, spare me from mystery writers.” But he was already making a note. “Sure, I can give him another shake and rattle.”
“I’d like to tag along when you do.”
“Sure, why the hell not? What do I need a pension for when I can live on good deeds?” “And one more thing.”
“Fire away. You want me to turn over the files to you? Lose some evidence? Badger a witness.”
“I’d appreciate it. While you’re about it, why don’t you check the airlines? See if anyone connected with Eve took a quick trip to London last month. Around the twelfth.”
“No problem. That should only take me, oh, about ten or twenty man-hours. Any particular reason?”
“I’ll let you know. Thanks.”
And now, Paul thought as he hung up the phone, he’d wait for the answers, stir them around and see if he had a workable plot.
> It was a long trip from Philadelphia to L.A. Even flying first class didn’t eliminate jet lag and travel fatigue. But Lincoln Hathoway looked as though he had just stepped out of his tailor’s. His navy gabardine suit with its subtle chalk stripes showed nary a wrinkle. His hand-sewn shoes shone like a mirror. His blond, conservatively cut hair was perfectly in place.
Paul liked to think it was the seamless correctness that had him detesting the man on sight.
“Lincoln Hathoway,” he said, extending a manicured hand. “I’m here to see Julia.”
It pleased Paul that his own palm was gritty with sand. “Paul Winthrop.”
“Yes, I know.” Not that he recognized him from his book jackets. Lincoln didn’t have time to spare on popular fiction. But he’d had his secretary gather every clipping available on Julia from the last six months. He was aware of who Paul was, and his relationship with both victim and accused. “I’m pleased Julia has somewhere discreet to stay until we work this all out.”
“Actually, I’ve been a bit more worried about her peace of mind than discretion.” He gestured Lincoln inside, deciding he would thoroughly enjoy detesting him. “Want a drink?”
“Some mineral water with a twist would be fine, thank you.” Lincoln was a man who formed opinions quickly. It was often necessary to gauge a jury by little more than appearance and body language. He summed Paul up as wealthy, impatient, and suspicious, and wondered how he might use those qualities if the case went to trial. “Mr. Winthrop, how is Julia?”
Suddenly the epitome of the aloof Brit, Paul turned and offered the glass. “Why don’t you ask her yourself?”
She was standing in the doorway, a lean, dark-eyed child tucked protectively under her arm. Ten years, Lincoln thought, had changed her. She no longer radiated enthusiasm and trust, but composure and caution. The fawn-colored hair that had once swung free was now swept back from a face that had fined down and become elegant.