Not a Word

by Stephanie Black

  “Eh, it wasn’t that sordid. I asked for a well-earned bonus. Come on, half that inheritance didn’t belong to her. She stole it through bribery and fraud. Nothing wrong with taking it away from her, right? I deserved a cut after everything I did for your mom. I figured Andrea was a total amateur and had paid Moretti off in a way the cops could trace, so she’d be desperate to keep me happy. Yep, she was. We made our bargain, she paid, and I got what I’d earned. No harm done, right?” He held out his hand. “Give me that.”

  Natalie passed him the wallet and credit card. Andrea had bribed Dante to cut Natalie out.

  Skyler tucked the card into the slot and returned her wallet to her purse. “I gotta fess up. Getting money from Andrea was such a breeze that I couldn’t resist trying it again. Seemed like a small risk for a big payoff.”

  “You blackmailed Dante Moretti.”

  “Tried to. You know how sometimes a great idea bombs? Since Andrea had already admitted to their dirty dealing, I thought he’d give me a quick payoff to keep himself from getting disbarred and worse. Turned out the guy had too much of a conscience. He’d already spent most of Andrea’s money to pay off debts, but guilt was tearing chunks out of him—especially since he’d married Camille and had actually met you, his wife’s friend, so now it was personal, not some stranger he’d cheated out of her inheritance. When I told him to pay up or I’d tip off the cops, he lost it—said go ahead, tell them, he was done with this. Do you have wireless printing?”

  “Yes.”

  “Print out your flight information.”

  Natalie obeyed and heard the printer in her office respond. “When he refused to pay, what did you do?”

  “I made the case that I could ruin his life, but for the bargain price of fifty grand, he could live happily ever after. He said I could kiss the seat of his Armani pants. I said the first person I’d tell would be his wife. He said he’d tell her himself; he was sick of hiding it. He threw me out of his office.”

  “He didn’t tell Camille,” Natalie said.

  “Nope. Because when he was walking home that night, I ran him down.”

  Black horror filled her throat, filled her eyes, choking and blinding her. Camille and Dante? She was supposed to be trained in understanding and reading people, and she’d seen Skyler multiple times a week for the past year—and had always thought he was harmless. Vain, a little self-centered, a little materialistic, but a nice guy.

  “I swear I didn’t want to hurt the guy,” Skyler said. “I honestly didn’t. But the way he’d acted, I didn’t think he was bluffing. I was driving around, trying to figure out how to save my neck and thought, ‘Hey, he took a bribe once before; maybe if I offer to bribe him, he’ll cool down and remember he doesn’t want to go to prison.’ I started toward his neighborhood, and there the guy was, walking home, walking fast—angry body language, right? No way was he going to take my measly bribe. Nobody around—just trees. I hit the gas. It was a panic move, right? I didn’t plan it, and, wow, I did feel like garbage afterward. But come on, the guy was corrupt. Kinda deserved it.”

  He murdered Dante. He murdered Camille. Natalie felt Skyler lift her computer off her lap. He snapped it shut. “Time to pack for your European get-away.”

  “Wade Radcliffe.” Natalie looked at Skyler. “Did you have something to do with his accident?”

  “Yeah, unfortunately. See, I’d gone to MaryLisa’s to get that necklace for Vicki, the one she wore at the Chapman bash. Nice necklace, right? Wade was talking to me—Andrea had been in there a few days earlier and had been a real diva, and I said, ‘Wow, money’s not good for her, huh?’ He said seeing me again got him thinking about what Roxanne had told him when they ran into each other in my waiting room. He told me about Roxanne’s ‘secret’ and asked if she’d ever said anything to me about including you in the will. Caught me off guard. He said he didn’t trust Andrea, and maybe he’d blown it by never telling you or his wife what Roxanne had said and he was going to talk to Felicia and ask her opinion. It was another panic moment, right?”

  “You didn’t want him setting an investigation in motion. What did you tell him?”

  “That informing you of your mom’s shenanigans wouldn’t do any good and would hurt you. But he was going all crabby grandpa, saying he never should have played along with Roxanne and he should have told you two years ago. I didn’t plan to kill him—I was just stalling, wanting time to think of how to persuade him to drop it, so I asked if I could use his restroom. While I was in the back, I spotted his ladder. I knew he’d be on the ladder later that day; when I’d arrived at the store, he’d been talking to another customer about the new inventory he’d be unpacking after business hours. He’d joked about how dumb he’d been to store a heavy box of pottery on the top shelf. Lightbulb moment, right? It was an old ladder. I tinkered with some of the bolts. I didn’t think a fall would kill him—just thought it would hurt him enough to distract him so he’d temporarily drop the idea of spilling Roxanne’s secrets and I could figure out what to do. Oops. Guess he fell the wrong way. Rotten luck.” Skyler poked her in the shoulder with the gun. “Where are the suitcases?”

  She focused on the gun. Skyler’s aim was steady. “Why did you think I was a danger to you?”

  “Wow, Nat. You’re on the hunt for information, you’re learning critical stuff, and you don’t know why I think you’re dangerous? Best case, you’ll keep searching for why that money was in Moretti’s filing cabinet, and that’s bad news for me.”

  “What was the money doing there?”

  “I couldn’t swear to this in court—not that I’ll have to—but my guess is that it was what remained of Andrea’s bribe, that he set it aside for you and planned to add to it. In that letter you never read, he confessed to taking Andrea’s bribe and said how sorry he was and how he needed time to make it up to you. That was back when he was trying to fix things without wrecking his life. Probably hoping you wouldn’t want to send your friend’s husband to prison.”

  “You read the letter?”

  “Catch up. Why do you think I had to kill Camille? I heard you guys talking at the Chapman party. I didn’t know what was in the letter, but the fact that he’d written anything to you sounded like a problem. I bailed on the party—told Vicki I was feeling sick to my stomach. I dropped her off at her apartment and broke into Camille’s house. Did the cliché cut-the-glass burglar thing. I searched but couldn’t find the letter. Then whack-a-doo Felicia Radcliffe walked in the front door, and I had to hide behind the couch—thought I was going to be stuck there all night; I had no idea why she was lurking there. Then Camille came home, and the loony bird accused her of tampering with the ladder—good guess, wrong villain—and Camille tried to talk her down, but it sounded like Felicia had a gun, and Camille finally ended up playing along. At least that part was fun to listen to. Then Felicia left.”

  “Why did you kill Camille? She didn’t know anything dangerous.”

  He sighed. “I was out of options. When the loony bird left, I knew the first thing Camille would do was call the police. If she did, I was going to be stuck behind her couch until they left—maybe get busted if they searched the place. Even if I could sneak away, I wouldn’t have another chance to find that letter before Camille read it and told you what it said. No choice, Nat. I had to do it. I jumped her, knocked her phone away, and demanded the letter. She gave it to me—it was sitting on the kitchen counter, which it hadn’t been when I’d searched, so she’d brought it in with her. She must have had it in her purse or left it in her car at the party. I took the letter, grabbed a scarf that was hanging over the back of a chair, and . . . it wasn’t fun. I really didn’t want to do it. I’m still having nightmares. Maybe I should see a therapist.”

  Natalie interlaced her fingers and squeezed hard to keep herself from punching him. He’d get a bloody nose, and she’d get a bullet in the chest. “But she wasn’t a danger to you until you confronted her. Dante never made it home after you tried to blackmail
him, so he must have written the letter earlier. It couldn’t have mentioned you.”

  “But it mentioned Andrea. Think about it. If Andrea’s bribery came to light, do you think she’d have kept her mouth shut about me?”

  No, she wouldn’t, Natalie thought. She’d have tried to strike a bargain by offering the police information on Skyler’s blackmail, or if that didn’t work, she would have spilled the information anyway, venting her delayed fury at him.

  “The main problem now is we need a fall guy,” Skyler said. “Your sister is panicking since the cops know she paid big bucks to Moretti. I’m panicking because if she goes down, she’ll make sure I get it worse than she does. She told me about her idea of convincing the cops you were a drug addict and how she’d bribed Moretti to keep that secret. It’s not the greatest yarn, but she already gave it to the cops, so I told her I’d run with it and build some evidence against you.”

  Realization made Natalie too numb to move, too numb to blink. “Andrea sent you to kill me.”

  “No, actually, she made me swear I wouldn’t hurt you, and I swore I wouldn’t. See? You’re safe.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “Not about what Andrea said.”

  At least Andrea hadn’t intended to send a hit man. But Natalie doubted she’d object to Natalie’s death if the other option was getting herself arrested. “Why the charade of buying a plane ticket? You’re planning to kill me, not put me on an airplane.”

  He gripped her arm and stood, hauling her to her feet. “Suitcases?”

  “Basement,” she said. Skyler knew she wasn’t naïve enough to think he’d let her live. He was counting on her cooperating in an effort to buy time. For now, she’d keep cooperating; she didn’t want to challenge him until she had a wisp of a chance at escape.

  “Lead the way,” he said, releasing her arm.

  She plodded toward the basement stairs. “You’re making it look like I planned to leave the country. Why am I running away?”

  “Because you know the cops are sniffing you out. They know about that suspicious money in Dante’s filing cabinet and that Camille died right after she told you about Dante’s letter. Andrea told them about your addiction and your under-the-table dealings with Dante. We’ll give them a little more evidence, and you’ll look like a top-of-the-line killer.”

  “If I didn’t want the police to know I was dealing drugs to Dante, why would I have told them about the letter Camille found?”

  “Because you didn’t know who else Camille had told about it, and you didn’t want the police thinking you were hiding things.”

  “Did I kill Dante too?”

  “Nah, that was still an accident, an unsolved hit-and-run. Why would you kill him when he owed you money and you wanted the dough?”

  The unfinished basement was cold concrete and gloomy lighting. The suitcases sat on a shelf at the far end of the room, and she hoped Skyler wouldn’t see them right away. She wanted a moment to scan the basement for anything she could use as a weapon. Skis and ski poles leaned against the wall to her right, a gift from Andrea she’d never used. She drifted in that direction. If she grabbed a pole—

  The gun touched between her shoulder blades, and she halted. “If you try anything, I’ll shoot you. I don’t want to shoot you, and it will be more complicated for me, but if you want plan C—or are we up to plan D?—we can do plan D right now. What’s your vote?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Get a suitcase, the biggest one you have. Don’t touch anything else.”

  She headed for the suitcases, grabbed an empty one, and trekked back up the stairs, the gun periodically tapping her on the back. Skyler varied where the muzzle made contact as though sending the message that there were a multitude of sites into which he could blast a bullet: between her shoulder blades, at the base of her neck, low on her spine, in the middle of her back.

  “We’ll go to your bedroom now,” he said. “Fit everything you can in that suitcase, but don’t make it too organized. Make it looked hurried, like you stuffed everything in there in a panic.”

  At least making it appear that she’d packed in a panic would come naturally. Was there anything in her room she could use for self-defense? No baseball bats or concealed handguns or even a sharp umbrella. Be creative. Think. There has to be something.

  Good luck. It doesn’t matter what you find; nothing will help you while he’s holding a gun against your spine. She needed to put distance between them. Every yard would make it harder for him to hit her with a lethal shot, especially if she could distract him with some chaos, screaming, throwing clothes and shoes, whatever would unnerve him. She doubted Skyler was an expert marksman.

  “Unzip the suitcase, and put it on your bed,” Skyler said.

  She did so. “Sit down and relax,” she said acidly, waving toward the padded bench at the foot of her bed. “It’s going to take me a few minutes to decide how many pairs of heels I’ll need for my life as a fugitive.”

  “Nice try.” Skyler pointed at the closet. He stayed directly behind her as she walked to the closet and slid the door open. “Make any sudden or suspicious moves and I’ll shoot. Startle me and I might pull the trigger even if I don’t mean to. Grab some clothes; don’t be picky about it.”

  Natalie yanked shirts, slacks, and skirts off hangers. Skyler herded her to the suitcase. She heaped the clothes inside. He marched her to the closet for shoes.

  “You haven’t thought this through.” She unloaded an armful of shoes into the suitcase. “Even with me gone, that won’t be enough to keep the police away from Andrea. Like you said, if Andrea goes down, so do you.”

  “Eh, I think it’ll work. Haven’t you wondered why I stopped by earlier tonight, then left and came back?”

  She’d forgotten to wonder about that. She’d been distracted by a gun in her ribs and a double-murder confession. “Why did you?”

  “First time I came, I parked in your driveway, brought you bread, didn’t try to hide that I was here. Second time, trust me, nobody saw me approach. This means later I can tell the cops that I saw you this evening and you were agitated and irrational and babbling about Camille. I’ll testify you were wigging out, Andrea will testify you were wigging out, and the cops will inhale our stories because they’ll be able to stamp Case Closed on Camille’s murder.” He pointed at her dresser. “Pack some socks and underwear, whatever you women need.”

  She walked to the dresser; he followed her. As she gathered underclothes from her drawer, terror darkened the last of her hopes. Soon, she’d finish with his instructions and he’d kill her. She had to do something to disrupt his plans and give herself a chance.

  She shoved underclothes into the suitcase, her gaze flicking around the room in search of ideas. Maybe the suitcase itself was her best weapon. He’d make her carry it—he wouldn’t want to drag its weight while trying to keep the gun trained on her. When she pulled it off the bed, she could swing it to the side, bashing him in the legs—

  No, that wouldn’t work. She’d packed so much into the suitcase that she was going to struggle to lift it, let alone wield it as a quick weapon.

  “Toothbrush and makeup and whatever all you travel with.” He used the gun to nudge her toward the vanity area opposite her closet. She opened the medicine cabinet and began to sort through her makeup.

  “Take it all,” he said. “Hurry.”

  She shoved items into a makeup bag. In the mirror, she could see his face—still placid but colder than before.

  Back at the suitcase, she added her overfull bag of toiletries.

  “Put this in your suitcase too,” he said, reaching around her. In his gloved hand was a prescription-style pill bottle, unlabeled but full. “For your drug addiction.”

  Natalie didn’t bother to investigate what type of pills it contained. She probably wouldn’t recognize them anyway. She threw the bottle into the suitcase.

  He passed her another prescription bottle. “Open this one.”

/>   “Why?”

  “Cravings,” he said. “Open it.”

  She popped the lid off and peered at dozens of blue pills. “What is it?”

  “Swallow two of them. You’re feeling anxious, right? This will help. I don’t want you all stressed and miserable.”

  “No, thanks.” She moved to snap the lid back on the bottle. He dug the muzzle of the gun into her ribs. Bottle in one hand, lid in the other, she stood rigid.

  “Look at it logically,” he said. “Do you want to die peacefully? Or do you want agony and terror and blood and drama?”

  “Do I want to make it simple for you, you mean?”

  “This won’t knock you out. It’ll only relax you.”

  “It’ll fill my bloodstream with drugs for them to find when they do the autopsy. It’ll shore up your lies.”

  “It beats getting ripped apart by bullets, right? C’mon, Nat. Don’t make this nasty.”

  “You strangled Camille. That was nasty.”

  “Yeah, I’m sorry she went through that. If you cooperate, I promise not to let you suffer.”

  She rattled the pill bottle and tipped it from one side to the other, pretending to evaluate her options. She didn’t care what threats he made. She wasn’t swallowing something that would make her less able to fight him. “I can’t take pills without water.”

  “Sure you can. Put them at the back of your tongue and gulp.”

  “I’ll gag on them. My mouth is dry. They’ll get stuck. If you want me taking these, get me some water.”

  “Get it from the sink. I saw you have a glass there.”

  Natalie headed toward the vanity area. Skyler shadowed her. Her legs felt weak enough on their own, but she exaggerated their fragility, letting them wobble, making herself stumble. The gun was no longer touching her, but he was still directly behind her.

  Internally, she steeled herself. If he shot her, he shot her. If he was at the point of forcing her to drug herself, she was finished playing along. She took another shaky step and let herself sway as though losing her balance. The medication bottle spilled, scattering pills across the carpet.