Private Lies (Jane Avery Mysteries Book 1)

by Cynthia St. Aubin

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah. Three hundred bucks for a plate of truffled macaroni and cheese and Wagyu beef hotdogs. Château d’Yquem snow cones and bumper cars made by Maserati. A bunch of rich adults who can pay to be treated like spoiled kids for an afternoon. All in the name of charity, of course.” Valentine’s eye roll went a little sideways.

  “Strange to have that kind of thing smack in the middle of the work week.”

  “Most of the attendees aren’t the kind of people who actually have to work, strictly speaking. Why the sudden interest in our good dean, if I may ask?”

  “His wife’s cause of death being so similar to Carla’s, then Melanie requesting Kristin take on their case. There’s just something . . . off.”

  I would have thought nothing short of a crowbar could have pried Valentine’s hand from his drink. But there he was, voluntarily setting it aside. His features recovering a measure of their abstemious sharpness. “Why didn’t you mention this before?”

  “Because this is the first opportunity I’ve had to talk to you since I learned about her case this morning.”

  Stricken was the only word I could think of to describe Valentine’s face. His skin had gone a bloodless, waxy white. His lips blanched and tight. His eyes were the most disturbing of all. What looked out from behind them was raw, untrammeled dread.

  “What?” I asked. “What is it?”

  He wasn’t looking at me when he answered. Wasn’t looking at anything, really. “I know who the mole is.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  But, to my consternation, Valentine refused to tell me who, insisting he needed to “make some calls” in order to prevent any “catastrophic and undeserved consequences.”

  Bullshit, am I right?

  The only call I was going to make was on the telephone conveniently located in the bathroom I’d have access to for the evening. Between this device and the bathtub located directly across from it, I may have stood for a full minute with my chops dangling somewhere near my bellybutton.

  Valentine called it a soaking tub.

  I insisted it was a wading pool.

  Either way, it belonged to the suite located on the penthouse level of Valentine’s downtown skyscraper, and I immediately decided my ass was going into it as soon as humanly possible.

  Valentine had insisted on parading me through the space in its entirety, pointing out the various features and amenities.

  I did a lot of nodding and not quite as much smiling, mostly managing to keep my composure . . . until we got to the bed.

  I had paused at the end of it wondering how recently Carla Malfi had slept beneath its canopy.

  “We weren’t sleeping together,” Valentine said.

  I gaped at him, wondering if he had picked my thought right out of the air.

  “Hadn’t been for a while. Not since she got sick, anyway.” He gripped one of the wooden bedposts, sagging from the kind of tired you get when a long drunk starts to wear off.

  “It’s none of my business,” I said.

  “No,” he agreed. “It’s not. But that never stopped you before, did it?”

  “What kind of sick was she?”

  “Autoimmune hepatitis. She would stay here on the worst nights.” He stared at the fluffy white comforter, seeing something I couldn’t. “Kind of strange to sit there feeding someone soup in the bed you’d tied them to once upon a time.” It was the most romantic terminal illness/bondage–related thing I had ever heard.

  “It was very kind of you to take care of her like that. She was lucky to have you.”

  Now it was his turn to scoff. “Lucky is one thing the women in my life are not.” His fingers tightened on the bedpost, knuckles whitening before he released it for good. “Sleep well, Jane.”

  He shuffled off then, closing the door behind him.

  I stood alone in the empty, foreign space, wondering how many women had occupied it before me.

  My mother had methods for answering such questions.

  When occasion dictated that we stay in hotels, after she’d duct-taped the windows closed, propped chairs beneath all the door handles, and set an elaborate series of booby traps, my mother had whipped out a portable black light to search for bodily fluids. A practice that saved us from bedding down in more than one fluorescence-spattered comforter.

  Black lights were a bit of a luxury when I didn’t even have a pair of panties to speak of, everything I owned still being located in my abandoned apartment or the safe house I’d fled. Valentine had promised the premises were stocked with everything I might need, but truthfully, the fact that he might actually keep a collection of panties in every size directly contributed to my reticence to go looking.

  I turned a single circle and floated over to the large picture window, grateful for the view after so many nights spent buttoned down behind blackout blinds.

  Beyond the glass, the skyscrapers of downtown Denver stabbed jagged teeth into the night sky. Some of the tallest put there by Valentine, a man who had changed the very shape of the horizon. Standing in the physical confines of his kingdom, I felt his pull on the world around him and the accompanying relief of allowing myself to sink into his orbit.

  His was a force just as big as the fear threatening to swallow my heart.

  Just as that bathtub would swallow my body.

  First I supposed I’d have to find something clean to change into.

  I kicked out of my shoes and plopped down on the bed, deciding the nightstand was as good a place as any to begin my search. I pulled open the drawer, half expecting to find an assortment of vibrators and dildos.

  What I found instead dumped what little adrenaline I had left directly into my veins.

  A gun.

  Not just any gun.

  My gun.

  My gun, in Valentine’s mistress’s apartment.

  I lifted it from the drawer, its weight familiar and welcome in my hand. And that’s when I saw what had been tucked beneath it.

  A creamy linen envelope with Janey crawling across its face in my mom’s distinctive looping script.

  I stared at the letter, wanting and not wanting to touch it. Feeling that the words within it were somehow more dangerous than the firearm in my hand.

  Face-Gravy sank into the cosseting down comforter as I set it aside and reached for the envelope.

  With my heart in my throat, I unfolded the sheaf of papers and read.

  Janey,

  If you’re reading this note, one of two things is true. Either you’ve become Valentine’s mistress (in which case, you are totally grounded for the rest of your life), or I’m gone, and you’ve somehow managed to piece together at least some of what happened. All roads lead to Valentine. I think that’s in the Bible. Somewhere near the back.

  Since I’ve dragged the V-word into the conversation, let’s go ahead and have at it.

  The reasons I didn’t want you to know I’ve been working with him are as complicated and problematic as he is. And believe me, Janey, he is.

  Okay, I literally just felt you get more interested in him.

  What is it about dangerous men, anyway? Oh well. Like mother, like daughter, I suppose.

  A couple of things to remember about Valentine. First, you can always trust him to act in his own best interest, and as long as your staying alive is in his best interest, he’ll probably help that happen. Second, vice is weakness, and Valentine has many. Know them. They will always be a liability in his capacity to protect you.

  Now, about you and me.

  About us.

  I knew there was a possibility when I started down this road that this is where it would end. That one day, either by choice or by consequence, our time together would come to an end despite my best efforts. Since that day has come, I need you to know something.

  Having you, keeping you, was both the best and most selfish thing I ever did. But in choosing to keep you, I chose a difficult life for us both, and I kept on choosing it. Probably longer than
I had any right. And that’s the final irony, I guess. I tried to keep anyone from hurting you, but in the end, I hurt you most of all. And for that, I am sorrier than I’ll ever be able to say.

  I won’t ask for your forgiveness, because I’d do what I did again. I would do it again every day until the end of time just for the chance to see you in that badger costume. To be the one who got to hold you when you woke up scared.

  But my choice had its price, and you’re still paying it every time you lie.

  But here’s the thing about that.

  I don’t care what you tell anyone else. I never have. You can make up any damn story you want and tell it to anyone who will listen. You can lie to the entire damn world for all I care. I only care what you tell yourself.

  You’ll be okay, Janey.

  Your whole life, I’ve been preparing you to have me not in it. The things I taught you. The way you were raised. Unconventional, I’ll grant you, but geared toward your survival. You are stronger and smarter than I ever was. You have everything you need.

  You know who you are.

  You are my daughter.

  I love you.

  —Mom

  PS. Okay, you have to level with me about the Valentine thing. If you’re his mistress, just put an ad in the personals section of the Grapevine on the first Saturday of any month with the words: Intelligent brunette seeks double-jointed billionaire with an oral fetish. I’ll get the point.

  The letter fluttered from my numb fingers to the plush carpet at my feet.

  My body couldn’t decide how to laugh and cry at the same time, so it settled for braying like a donkey through great hiccuping sobs. My chest felt hollow. Scooped out. The emotions within crashing into each other like rocks in a tumbler. Grief. Anger. Sorrow. Love.

  The sum total of all was one immutable fact.

  My mother wasn’t coming back.

  No matter what I did, how hard I tried, or how much I hoped, or bled, or cried, she wasn’t coming back.

  I took the gun to the bathroom but left the letter on the bed. Before stripping, I flicked off the bathroom light, guessing the whole damn place was probably crawling with security cameras. I had no intention of giving Valentine a peep show.

  In the dark, I finished my introduction to the palatial bathroom, feeling my way by sound, scent, and touch.

  Sound: water sluicing from a silver tap. Scent: lavender bathwater. Touch: warm, silky marble.

  I sank down into the fragrant water, anchoring myself with arms on either side of the bath. With my neck pressed against the sloping headrest, my feet didn’t reach the opposite end. It had been built to the proportions of a taller woman. The sort of woman Valentine seemed to prefer.

  Which didn’t even matter a tiny bit, because I was not now, nor would I ever be, placing an ad in the Grapevine. I would not be Valentine’s mistress.

  Reaching into the basket next to the tub, I withdrew a downy washcloth and soaked it in the water, dragging it over my face. Breathed its perfumed steam into my lungs.

  And so, floating in the dark, I made my decision. Mother or no mother, I would see this through to the end.

  Dean Koontz. Valentine. Kristin Flickner. The Beidermeyers.

  Tomorrow, all the players would be in one place.

  And so would I.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Like only the truly wealthy can, the Beidermeyers had procured for themselves a sprawling twelve-acre estate in the center of Denver. Downtown proper may have been only a couple of miles away geographically, but the grounds had definite plans to make you forget it: the white picket fences, immaculate hedges, sprawling green lawns, and tree-lined drive leading up to a circular drive. And at the apex of it, a veritable château looking like it had somehow gotten confused and wandered away from the south of France and straight into Colorado.

  And into this province of pleasant dreams stepped a panda.

  Okay, not a panda.

  A person, in a panda suit.

  Me.

  Valentine and I might’ve had conflicting opinions on the particulars, but this part of my plan we both agreed on: I wouldn’t be in danger if no one knew I was at the party. And no one would know I was at the party because I was in a panda costume.

  Simple, right?

  The red-suited attendant, little more than a boy, almost fell backward when my fuzzy black panda foot popped out of the Uber—a vehicle I was grateful for. By the way Valentine had said he’d arrange “transportation” for me after refusing me entry into his limo, I was a little afraid he might have a human-size kennel in mind.

  “Uh . . . ,” the valet boy stammered.

  I handed him a fiver and walked—fine, waddled—over to the security podium, where a man dressed like a haute couture carnival barker consulted a clipboard of names at my approach.

  His nose looked like it wanted to crawl up his forehead so he could look down it at me from as high as possible.

  “Name, please.”

  I didn’t answer.

  I had decided that for once in my life, a not-talking shtick might just be in my best interest. I did, however, produce the gilt-edged card Valentine had given me before we parted ways.

  In the little space for the name that preceded Guest of Archard Everett Valentine, I had simply written in Panda.

  He took it from my oven mitt–shaped paw and held the invitation by the corner like it might piss on him.

  “Are you part of the entertainment, then?” he asked.

  I nodded my oversize globe of a head.

  Through the filtered screens over my eyes, I watched him decide whether he wanted to call a power higher than himself to weigh in. I put my paws on my rounded hips and tapped my oversize foot, miming impatience.

  He sighed and handed over what looked like an amusement park map. “Hired employees must check in at the entertainers’ tent.” He pointed one tapered fingertip at the illustration of a smaller tent next to the large striped circus tent at the center of the property.

  I aimed my furry thumb skyward and took the map from him, setting off in the direction he’d pointed out. Carnival music floated over to me on breezes scented by popcorn and the burned-sugar smell of cotton candy. I swear to God, it wasn’t just my stomach but the whole rounded, protuberant bear belly that growled.

  I really hoped that what had started as a very simple plan (i.e., dress up as a giant panda so I could sneak into the Beidermeyers’ charity carnival and spy on Dean Koontz) didn’t end with some sort of horror movie twist, like me actually becoming one with the suit.

  From the vantage point of a set of stairs attached to the side of the Beidermeyer manse, I scanned the perimeter, trying—and failing—to spot Dean Koontz’s polished bald pate. Lacking direct visual confirmation, I determined that the best place to wait him out would be at the complex network of buffet tables—the apparent heart of the action.

  Only, on the way there, unaccustomed to my new and somewhat less sleek proportions, I somehow managed to knock the trays from at least two hors d’oeuvres-bearing waiters’ hands.

  I did my best to portray remorse, which looked something like covering my little bear mouth with both paws and shaking my giant head regretfully, but not so regretful as to arrest my progress to the food tables.

  Once there, I made my way down the line, lifting the costume’s nose to shove various comestibles through the little hatch beneath it. Meatballs. Mini funnel cakes. Bites of deep-fried potato and smoked turkey leg.

  After about five failed attempts to angle the contents of a champagne flute into my furry chops, someone handed me a red-and-white-striped straw.

  “Found him yet?”

  Valentine.

  He’d been at the bar already. Even without the glass of scotch in his hand, I would have known by the sultry look in his hooded eyes, the almost sexual flush in his cheeks.

  I shook my head no.

  “You should have just come as my date, like I suggested. Not only would we have given the gos
sip rags something to write about for the next ten centuries, but I could have gotten you right into his lap. I go wherever the fuck I want.”

  I made a fist with my paw and jerked in the general direction of my crotch. The panda equivalent of Good for you, fuckstick.

  The gesture seemed to draw Valentine’s attention in a strange and alarming new way.

  “I’ve never fucked a panda before,” he said.

  And the ASPCA heaves a collective sigh of relief.

  “Want to step behind a tent and mate?” He was only half kidding. Maybe even just a quarter kidding.

  I would have flipped him off, but at the moment, I found myself curiously devoid of fingers. So instead, I put both paws over my belly and pretended to retch.

  “Suit yourself.” He shrugged. “Oh, wait. You already have.” I wondered exactly how soused he’d have to be to snicker at his own joke, and a terrible one at that.

  I had always believed that drunk punning should be an offense right up there with drunk driving. A theory that Valentine did more to confirm than dispel.

  “If you change your mind.” He squeezed the costume’s cushioned butt before wandering off. Luckily my own cheeks lived at an altitude a good deal higher, so he mostly got fluff.

  I had just convinced myself that I might have caught sight of Dean Koontz next to the custom deep-fried macaroni and cheese station when my momentum was arrested by a new and horrifying development.

  A child.

  The kind of pale, bored, sneering little shit who’s used to getting whatever the fuck he wants whenever the fuck he wants it. He stood there staring at me with cotton candy in one fist and a better cell phone than mine in the other.

  “What are you supposed to be?” he asked.

  I gestured from my ears all the way to my round white belly. Which was panda for What the hell does it look like, kid?

  He aimed the cell phone at me and pressed a button. “Do something funny,” he ordered.

  It was as I glared down at him, deciding exactly how I was going to extricate myself from this situation, when I really did spot Dean Koontz making his way toward an opening in the Shining-style maze with a curvy little blonde.