I must be mad to think that redneck cop is going to call the airport in Paris, France.
Maggie watched her phone die in her hands, the screen going slowly to black. She sank back into the stained and lumpy backseat.
Thirty minutes later, she took a place at the back of the line that wrapped around the Information Desk at Charles de Gaulle Airport and glanced at the large clock over the desk. She had a full hour before she needed to go through security and find her gate, and still no word from Atlanta.
Why wasn’t he paging her? My God! I said I’ve discovered the identity of the killer. Is that not strong enough?
Maggie eyed the woman manning the information booth and hoped she spoke English. Should she have left a message naming the killer? Was it safe to do that? She looked at the clock again. It was late afternoon back home. Where were they?
An uncomfortable image came to her mind of Burton crumpling up her message and tossing it away. “Not that Newberry woman again! Why doesn’t she give it a rest? ‘Found the killer,’ she says! Brother!”
A garbled message in French came over the public address system, and Maggie strained to catch some semblance of her name being mentioned. She finally approached the counter. “My name is Margaret Newberry,” she said breathlessly. “I am expecting a page.”
“There have been no pages for you.”
Maggie turned away from the counter, frustrated and defeated. She walked toward a wall of telephones that lined the long corridor leading to Security. She jammed a euro coin into one of the machines and dialed Burton’s number again.
She had been crazy to withhold the name of the killer in her earlier message. She was so sure that Burton would doubt her word that she had wanted to tell him herself so she could outline her evidence.
But apparently not saying the name only seemed to ensure that Burton disregarded her messages. She just had to tell him what she knew and pray he would take it from there.
When the same bored Fulton County desk sergeant came on the line, Maggie was brief. “Look, this is Margaret Newberry again—”
“Detectives Burton and Kazmaroff are not in, Miss Newberry. They have not seen your messages—”
“Look, forget it. I have a new message.”
There was an audible sigh on the other line. “Shoot.”
“Tell Detective Burton this.” Maggie licked her lips and watched the airport’s travelers parade by her. “Tell him the key is Gary Parker. You got that?” Maggie turned away from the stream of airport travelers and faced the phone box. “The murders are all connected to him.”
* * *
A haphazardly taped flap of the box that held every piece of her wedding china began to slowly curl up, as if repelled by its own adhesive powers. Darla watched it from the kitchen table, where she was in the process of packing another box. She carefully placed a ten-inch ceramic Madonna and child, which she and Gary had found on their honeymoon nine years ago, in a nest of tissue and newspaper. The Madonna’s head was cocked as if questioning her. Are you really going through with this?
Darla tried to imagine this box, with its fragile, hidden prize, in the bowels of some rusting tramp steamer making its tedious, laborious way across the Pacific Ocean, past atolls, uninhabited islands, radiation-cooked archipelagos, and ancient shipwrecks to the lonely little apostrophe of a country in the middle of the sea at the bottom of the world.
The house was quiet this afternoon. Although she had been tempted to keep her daughter home for company, Darla had allowed Haley to spend the night with a friend. The weeks were racing away when Haley would still be able to see her friends and Darla couldn’t deny her.
“Your father and I would move without batting an eyelash,” her mother, the stereotypical Army wife, had said earlier in the day when she had called to see how the packing was coming. “Guam, Germany, California...”
“I know, Mom,” Darla had said, “but you and Dad did your moving before we kids were born.”
“So? We certainly didn’t plan it that way. The service won’t let you, you know. You go when and where they tell you to go. And Gary needs to do this for his career.”
Darla had wanted to rip the phone out of the wall. Was everyone ready to see her in a covered wagon, forging ahead to some primitive new land...at the bottom of the world? “He doesn’t even have a job down there. He’s just doing it out of fear.”
“Darla, a wife should support her husband. Not snipe behind his back.”
Darla wanted to weep, and she had already done plenty of that. She shoved another empty box onto the kitchen table and began rummaging around for more newspaper. Some days she thought she could really make it work, could stop fighting with Gary about it and just get in step with him. Other days, she cried.
* * *
Maggie sat with her airline seat tray half open and propped up against her knees, gazing blankly at the flight attendant as he methodically inflated life vests and indicated where to access oxygen masks.
She shook her head, remembering how she had wanted Elise’s death not to have been random, not to have been for nothing. And now she knew it was so much worse than that. It wasn’t at all random.
Except the person who was supposed to have died that day was Maggie.
Tears filled her eyes as she thought of all the days and months of believing the murder somehow had to do with Elise and her lifestyle. She had blamed the police for jumping at the prospect of a random drug dealer as the murderer, but she herself had been little better. She wanted so badly to believe it was Gerard because he was one of Elise’s many bad choices.
It had never occurred to her that Elise might have died as a result of a simple mistake—the mistake of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Elise was killed by someone who wanted Maggie dead. When she’d realized in the cemetery whom the scarf ring belonged to—and so, who had been there at her apartment that afternoon—it all fell into place.
Besotted with Gary, Patti Stump had killed, or tried to kill, every woman close to him.
Maggie tugged on her seatbelt, although it was already fastened and tightened, and glanced at her seatmate. He looked to be a businessman, but she was still surprised that someone would travel transatlantic in a suit and tie. He smiled at her pleasantly and she tried to return the smile.
How many times had Patti seen Gary smile jovially at Deirdre? Or seen him ask her with real animation and pleasure how her weekend was? How many times did Patti watch Gary laugh at one of Deirdre’s silly—usually unintended—jokes, all the while plotting to kill her? Maggie shivered. She had meant to kill Maggie as well.
The AC truck, the burner phone. If what the cops now believed was true, Elise was murdered by a contract killer—a contract killer who got the wrong woman.
A flush of rage seared through Maggie as she tried to remember Stump’s reaction the next day at work after Elise had died. All she could picture was the woman sitting at the conference room table and tapping an impatient fountain pen against her spiral notebook.
It was Patti who had run into Alfie in the apartment hall and ridiculed him. Patti who made the obscene phone call, and then disposed of the phone. Patti who had attacked Maggie that night in the woods.
“You okay?” Her seating companion cocked his head at her and smiled. “Are you a little nervous about the flight?”
Maggie took a deep breath and nodded affirmatively. “Yes, I guess so,” she lied. How else to explain the fact that she couldn’t sit still and wanted to run up to the cockpit and jam her foot on the accelerator lever? Get this crate moving!
“The statistics are in our favor, you know.” He had an English accent and Maggie found herself wondering what his business in America might be. He reminded her of Roger.
“Although I know that’s little comfort where hysteria’s involved.” He raised his hand as if to pat hers and then obviously thought better of it. “We’re quite safe, though, I must say. I shouldn’t worry.”
“Yeah.”
She smiled at him. “Thanks.”
“The drinks cart will put you right,” her companion said affably. Maggie nodded, then turned away.
All this time, sharing office space with the woman who murdered Elise—who would’ve murdered me if she could have. When her next thought hit her, it occurred so abruptly and with such certainty that she jerked upright against her seatbelt and gave a sharp gasp that prompted her seatmate to wrap his hand around her wrist. And although she could hear him making soothing noises to her, Maggie heard nothing of what he said.
My God, she thought, gripping the armrests.
Darla...
30
Jack Burton stared at the blackboard facing his desk. He was tired and edgy and craving a cigarette. This case felt like it was unraveling at his feet, but with nothing at the end of the string.
Kazmaroff hit the door solidly with the palms of both hands as he walked through it and Burton jumped.
“So, you gonna answer her messages?” Kazmaroff asked as he settled himself in his desk chair. He scooted his chair out from behind his desk, the wheels squeaking annoyingly as he did so, until he too was facing the blackboard. “Still nothing, huh?” He nodded at the board.
“Unless you’ve thought of something between here and the can.” Burton sneered. “And no, I am not calling Paris, if that’s what you’re asking.” He tossed the chalk onto the blackboard tray and returned to his desk.
“Well, then. What do you think about her accusing Parker of being the guy?”
“That’s not what she said, Dave. She said he was the key. Big difference.”
“So you think she’s got something?”
“All I know is we don’t.”
“I think she’s crazy,” Kazmaroff said, flicking a blond hair from his burgundy blazer. “I think she’s got some idea that she’s Nancy Drew or something, and she’s pulled together a story in her own mind that takes care of someone at her office she doesn’t get on with.”
“We questioned everyone, Jack, right after the secretary got killed.”
“The secretary didn’t get killed. It was the traffic manager.” Jack watched Kazmaroff closely.
“Yeah, okay, whatever.” Dave jumped up and sorted through the pile of file folders scattered across his desk.
“You don’t even know who you talked to?”
“Listen, I talk to a dozen people a day. Give me a break, okay? Oh, yeah, hey, that’s interesting.”
“What?” Burton forced himself not to go and look over the bastard’s shoulder. “What does it say, man?”
Kazmaroff scrutinized the file folder contents. “I guess we didn’t talk to her.” “Who?”
Kazmaroff cleared his throat and shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. “The media director. She wasn’t available the day we hit most of ‘em at the office, and when we went to the memorial service she said she was too broken up to talk.”
Burton stared at him. “So we never got back to her?”
Kazmaroff scratched his neck and continued to look at the file. “Doesn’t look like it.”
“Whatever.” Burton ran a hand through his hair. There was no way a dumpy forty-five-year-old spinster with six cats was behind these murders. And it only showed how truly desperate he was that they were even thinking of it. The murder at the apartment building had pretty clearly been a hit. That much they now knew.
“Did we get anything on the driver of the truck?” he asked Kazmaroff.
“Looks like he’s disappeared down whatever hole he came out of. He’s not in town at any rate.”
“That’s no big surprise. It’s been six months.”
“Who you calling?”
Dave looked up from the phone.
“Don’t call the media director, Dave. That’s ludicrous. We need to follow the line on the driver. You’re getting as bad as the Newberry woman.”
Kazmaroff hung up the phone and laughed. “Yeah, guess it just makes me feel like I’m doing something.”
Burton stood and wrote the name Gary Parker on the board. Under that he wrote: Victims: Elise Newberry (Maggie’s sister). Deirdre Potts (Agency employee). He tapped his lip lightly with the tip of the chalk stub. “She’s not wrong about one thing though,” he said, looking at the board. “Both victims are connected to Parker.”
* * *
“I’m almost positive they asked us to power down all our—”
“Yes, yes, I know. But this is an emergency,” Maggie said as she dialed Gary’s number into her seatmate’s cellphone. The call went straight to voicemail and a wave of almost unbearable frustration came over her. She hung up and dialed a different number.
“Miss, really. The airlines take these rules painfully seriously as I’m sure you can appreciate. After 9/11—”
Maggie held up a finger asking for silence while she waited for Brownie to answer. Please be home, Brownie. I can’t think of anyone else who can help me now. When the voicemail finally kicked in, she hung up and dialed Gary’s house. This time the phone rang and rang but there was no answer.
She disconnected and sat, holding the phone in front of her, her mind racing to try to think of whom else to call.
“Miss?”
She turned to see a stern-faced flight attendant standing before her. “All electronics must be powered off and trays in their upright position for takeoff, please.”
* * *
Darla turned off the television and tried to savor the stillness of the house. It was no use. She missed her family. Her home felt strange and unfamiliar now, with boxes filling every room, obstructing every hallway. Already-packed pictures and photos left blank walls where reassuring loved ones had once stared down at her.
She pulled her cotton cardigan around her and went into the kitchen and made a bowl of popcorn for dinner. She wondered why Gary hadn’t called yet. She had to admit she hadn’t been acting much like the loving, understanding wife a husband would want to call. She braced herself against the urge to feel sorry for her current loneliness.
Moving away from a job she liked, from a school she was satisfied with for Haley, from friends she’d known since childhood, and from family right around the corner. Moving away from a lifetime of comfort and familiarity to a land at the bottom of the world. A place that saluted a queen and drank tea—but never iced—that revered windsurfing over tennis. A place she had never expected to visit, much less live.
The sound of the bell on the microwave ripped into her mood and she jumped a little. Must be spooked. All the bowls were packed, so she opened the steaming popcorn bag and ate a handful straight from the bag while standing in the kitchen.
What in the world is my life going to be like in Auckland, New Zealand? The dark windows of the kitchen reflected her image back at her. Through them, she could see the bare branches of the trees behind her house as they swayed gently in the blackened windows.
Suddenly, she heard a different sound. Not a quiet creaking sound of the house settling down for the night, or a gentle whistling sound of the wind spinning leaves against the siding. Darla heard a crunching sound that shouldn’t be. A sound of slow furtiveness.
A sound from inside the house.
31
Gary rotated his head slowly, trying to work the strain out of his shoulders. He sat fully clothed, except for his shoes, on his Best Western bed. He’d arrived in Savannah an hour ago and had immediately taken a brief nap—something he rarely did at home. The stress must be getting to me, he thought as he massaged his neck.
He debated calling Darla but had decided against it. The five-hour drive had allowed him a peaceful respite he wasn’t quite willing to relinquish. No sullen stares or recalcitrant answers to perfectly normal, even friendly questions. Just a five-hour stretch of road and radio. He wasn’t willing to stir the numbness of his mind right now with the silent and not-so-silent accusations Darla would certainly feel obliged to dish out if he called.
It would be soon enough to call her after he’d had dinner with the pr
ospective buyer. If all went well, he’d be in a good mood and better armored to endure her unhappiness. He got up from the bed to put on a clean shirt.
* * *
Had these events always been on a collision course? Since when? Since Elise came back? Since Nicole was born? Since Elise was born?
Maggie lifted the gin and tonic to her lips and smiled politely at her seatmate. He’d insisted on buying the drink for her. They were four hours into the trip. Four interminably long, agonizing hours.
She still couldn’t quite process the truth. Elise hadn’t died because of Gerard or because of her drug addiction. She died because of a sickness in her own country. She died because someone had been psychotically jealous of Elise’s less pretty little sister. Oh what a joke that was! That Elise would die because of a rival’s obsession with Maggie.
If it weren’t so heartbreaking, it would be the biggest laugh of all.
And what about Nicole? The damaged little waif who belonged to no one? Maggie thought of her parents experiencing one more loss, one more bone-crushing disappointment, and she took a long gulp of her drink.
“Plenty more where that came from.” Her seatmate smiled over at her.
“You’ve been very nice to me.”
“Ah, well, I’ve had a nervous flight here and there, myself.”
“I’m not really afraid of flying, you know.”
“The thought did occur to me. Want to talk about it?”
“Not really. But thanks.” She pulled out the inflight magazine and flipped through its well-thumbed pages, not seeing the pictures and advertisements. The alcohol was helping to calm her agitation at being entombed in the slowest Boeing 747 on the planet, but it was decidedly unhelpful in avoiding thoughts of Laurent.
Murder in the South of France: Book 1 of the Maggie Newberry Mysteries (The Maggie Newberry Mystery Series) Page 25