Suspicion of Deceit

by Barbara Parker

  "I doubt that's what he intended." Gail dropped her forehead into her palm. "Seth said he was going to go on the air and tell everyone that Reyes was one of Lloyd's customers. Is there anything else, Rebecca? You're sure they don't know each other?"

  "They don't. They're business acquaintances." Rebecca let her head fall back, and her hair swung away from her face. "Oh. I also told the police that I met Seth through the opera. I would appreciate it if you didn't contradict me. Why bring it up. Right?"

  "Bring what up? Nicaragua?"

  The brown eyes turned to Gail. "Reporters like to poke around in your past, especially if you've got money or status. If they find out that Seth and I were members of socialist organizations in college—I can't believe I ever did that. And Anthony—he was a Marxist head to toe. How would that look for any of us, Gail? Not good. And not good for the opera in the present situation. You have to agree."

  Too agitated to sit any longer, Gail got up and paced across her office. She noticed the box of material about political terrorism on her desk and came back a few steps. "Nobody's going to ask about Nicaragua. Why should they?"

  "But if they do, they might ask about the girl who went with us. Her aunt might be alive. What if she contacts an investigative reporter? Oh, my little Emily went to Nicaragua with that woman, and she never came back. Then the reporter asks me, and I say, oh, she fell in love with one of the men in the village, and we couldn't talk her into coming with us." Rebecca smiled. "I used to dream about her when it rained. She would be at my window tapping on the glass. You know. Lightning flashes, and you can see her face sort of rotted away, and her hair hanging in her eyes. Oooooo. Why did you leave me?" Rebecca laughed, but her placid mannequin's expression did not change. "Silly dreams. Gail, please. As a friend, don't say how Seth and I knew each other."

  Still thinking of the dream, Gail struggled not to shudder. "I'll avoid it if I can."

  "Do try. Anthony's name would have to come into it, and neither of you would like that. I'd have to mention Felix Castillo, too. God help us."

  Annoyed, Gail said, "So what if it does come out? It wasn't your fault. Seth said you blame yourself. Rebecca, you should talk to someone who can help you resolve this. All of you were caught in the same nightmare, but it was Pablo who shot her."

  "Pablo?"

  "The rebel leader. The Sandinista." When Rebecca continued to look at her, Gail added, "In Los Pozos."

  "I know who Pablo was, Gail. And you don't know what you think you do."

  "What does that mean?"

  "Nothing. This conversation is so depressing." Rebecca was looking for her sunglasses, finding them on her lap, uncrossing her legs to stand up. She slid the strap of her tasseled black bag over her shoulder. "I have to fly. I'm meeting Jeffrey Hopkins at the opera. I told him I'd help him call all our board members. Keeping busy is the best thing, I suppose. Let's stay in touch." She pressed her cheek to Gail's.

  "Rebecca." Gail stopped her halfway across her office. "I can't lie for you. I won't volunteer any information, but I won't lie to the police."

  "I never asked you to lie." Rebecca's face was obscured by the glasses. "I'm sorry you see it that way. I was not having an affair with Seth Greer. We developed a friendship through our work in the opera, and I'm going to miss him. The last time we spoke—after the meeting last night—was by telephone, when he told me that he planned to go on radio. I advised him against it, but he went ahead, and they shot him." Rebecca made a quick, sad smile, then went out the door.

  The offices of Ferrer and Quintana, civil and criminal practice, were located in Coral Gables, just off a street called Miracle Mile. The building was upscale modern Mediterranean, with a courtyard entrance and a private atrium for each of the partners.

  It was the fountain and ferny rocks that Anthony gazed at while Gail told him about her conversation with Rebecca Dixon. "I thought it was mutual," Gail said, "but Seth was the one in love. Rebecca allowed him to love her because he needed her, and she needed the adoration. Or am I wrong?"

  Anthony continued to stand by the glass door with his arms crossed. "I remember Rebecca could be that way. Manipulative. But a man doesn't allow himself to be used unless he wants it. I think they were trapped in the same dance."

  "How should I handle the police?"

  "You don't handle them, you tell them the truth. I don't want to defend you on charges of perjury." He smiled and reached out to pull her closer. "Don't speculate. Okay? If they ask you to speculate, say you'd rather not. Just answer the questions. If the police choose to follow up with Dixon, that's his problem."

  Gail slid the back of her hand down Anthony's tie, a lustrous gray and burgundy that matched the subtle lines of color in his suit. "I'm more interested in knowing whether Octavio was afraid of what Seth might say. The police think someone was waiting for Seth. That's what they told you, isn't it?"

  "Gail—"

  "Seth told me he was going to talk about Octavio's business relationship with Lloyd Dixon. Rebecca confirmed they knew each other, then later she denied it. What was the nature of this relationship? Was it only that King Furniture used Dixon Air to ship to its customers out of the country?"

  Anthony was looking at her, eyebrows raised enough to create horizontal lines in his forehead. "I will handle this."

  "Meaning you want me to stay out of it."

  "Don't put it that way, Gail. This relates to my family. It's a delicate matter. I will keep you informed. All right?"

  "Okay, fine."

  "Listen to me." Anthony took her shoulders. "If there's anything going on, I will find out. When you speak to the police, I don't want you to mention Octavio and Lloyd Dixon. The police have no reason to think there is a connection, so they won't ask. If they don't ask, don't volunteer."

  "Let's see if I have this," Gail said. "Rebecca doesn't want me to mention how she met Seth or that she was having an affair with him. You don't want me to mention that Seth might have known something about your brother-in-law."

  He gave her a warning look. "I didn't say that. I said don't speculate."

  "Just the facts," she said.

  "Exactly." Anthony put an arm around her. "How are you feeling? Better? Did you get your hand looked at?"

  "I will. Don't fuss."

  "You know what I want to do this weekend? Pick out a ring for you. Look at some more houses. Silvia Sanchez called me with a new list. Can you do that on Saturday?"

  Gail smiled at him. "I would love to."

  "My grandmother called me this morning to find out if you were all right. They were worried. She said Ernesto wants us to come for a visit some evening. What do you think?"

  "Of course we have to go. Are you and your grandfather building some bridges?"

  "I don't know."

  "Well, don't you want to?"

  "Of course I do, but it won't happen until Thomas Nolan leaves town. Not with Octavio stirring it up. What a two-headed snake. If my grandfather were stronger, he would see this. He would never have let Octavio so close to him."

  "Sweetheart, I hate to question your view of Octavio, but he was very nice to me outside the station last night."

  "He had a guilty conscience," Anthony retorted.

  "Are you going to be like this when we visit your grandparents?"

  "I am capable, Gail, of great feats of forbearance." He kissed her quickly and looked at his watch. "I have to be in court at one o'clock. Talk to me while I get ready."

  She followed him to his desk, a black triangle cantilevered out from a base near the wall. The room was all ebony and leather with accents of red and silver, illuminated by tiny halogen lamps suspended on thin wires from the ceiling. Only the law books and case files gave away Anthony Quintana's profession.

  He set a briefcase on the desk and clicked open the latches, then gathered some papers from his credenza. Gail sat in a low-slung leather-and-chrome chair watching him move, gauging her own reactions. The lamps made pools of light that played on his hair, t
urning it a rich mahogany. Under the lawyer costume he had the body of a dancer—slender and hard, with lines of muscle down his back and an ass she could grab onto to pull him tighter. She wanted to lock his office door and unbutton her blouse. Watch his eyes dilate to black.

  Making love with him last night had erased every question she had. There was nothing beyond the immediacy of desire, then the sweet fade into sleep. He had entered her so slowly, watching it happen, holding back until she was there, too. She had needed this, to fall asleep on these thoughts and not on the others. But moonlight through the bedroom window only lasted so long.

  "Anthony, I have a question. If the answer is yes, I don't really care. But I would like to know why you didn't tell me. I think that's what I really want to know."

  Frowning in puzzlement, he looked around from his credenza. "What's the question?"

  "Did you have an affair with Rebecca while she was living with Seth?"

  Anthony selected several files, one at a time, from a stack of them. "Did Rebecca say that?"

  "No. Seth told me last night."

  "I should have guessed, from the way the question was phrased. Betrayal is to be inferred." Anthony dropped the files into his briefcase. "What good would it have done, Gail, if I had told you?"

  "It would have been some kind of assurance that you don't hide things from me."

  "I don't hide anything that you need—need—to know. Some things cause more hurt than illumination."

  "That's rather patronizing."

  "Well, we disagree." He reached into his breast pocket to see if his Mont Blanc was there. He put it back. Opened his center desk drawer. Shifted some things inside.

  "I have another question. It's about Felix Castillo. Was he at the scene when Emily Davis died?"

  Still looking into the drawer, Anthony smiled slightly. "Seth again?"

  "He told me that Felix came with Pablo. Why did you leave that out?"

  The drawer slid shut. Anthony tossed a calculator into his briefcase. "Because it would have colored your judgment of him. Made you think of him in a way that isn't relevant to what he is now."

  "What way is that? Rebecca just told me that Pablo didn't shoot Emily. That leads me to the question, who did? Felix?"

  Not a flicker of reaction. "What did Rebecca say?"

  "No, why don't you just tell me what Felix was doing there?"

  The remoteness in his expression floated across the desk as if someone had opened the door to a freezer. Calmly, clearly, Anthony said, "I don't like to be questioned like this. Not by you. I told you what happened in Los Pozos. I don't care what Seth told you or what Rebecca said. Pablo was responsible for Emily's death. That's all I'm going to say about it. Ever. Don't bring it up again. All right?" He closed the lid of his briefcase and clicked the latches. "I have to go to court."

  In nine years as a lawyer, Gail had questioned witnesses hundreds of times. She had seen other lawyers do it. Witnesses in interviews or under oath in depositions and on the stand. Facing the two City of Miami detectives across her desk, she felt an odd reversal of roles.

  The police, she assumed, had more experience than she in interviewing witnesses who consciously lied. Perhaps they had sensors like bat sonar. Gail knew that she was prepared to be evasive on certain topics, and it made her nervous.

  The detectives were Hispanic, not a surprise in the city police force. Fernandez was forty or so, with prematurely gray hair that touched the collar of his jacket. There was a small diamond in his left earlobe. The other man, Delgado, was older, and spoke with an accent.

  The preliminaries were quick. They asked how she was feeling. She said she was still quite shaky over the incident. Fernandez apologized for putting her through this again, but he wanted her to describe everything that had happened. He gave her a drawing and she pointed out where she and Seth Greer had been standing.

  She repeated their conversation without reference to what Seth might have known about Octavio Reyes. Don't speculate. "Mr. Greer was convinced he could take Mr. Reyes on in a debate. I told him that it would be harmful to the opera, and I think he was on the point of changing his mind when he was killed."

  "Was he in any disagreements with anyone in the opera?"

  "Not that I know of."

  "You know of anyone who might have wanted to harm him?"

  "No, I don't. I'm afraid to ask this, but were there any bullets where I had been standing? I fell down. Maybe that saved my life."

  "I don't think he was after you. Unless you have any enemies?" When Gail shook her head, he went on, "The shooter had good aim, and he was using a laser sight to make sure. You fell, but he had a clear shot, if he'd wanted to take it. Bear in mind you can pick up a laser sight anywhere for about a hundred bucks. It doesn't mean a professional hit was involved here."

  "Did you find any evidence around the other building? I know there were cartridge casings."

  "Five Remington center-fire .223s. Common as dirt."

  "That's it? No footprints? Nothing?" "How I wish."

  Delgado asked how long she had known Mr. Greer.

  "I met him less than two weeks ago. He was on the board of the opera. We didn't know each other well."

  "Why did he call you in particular, before he went over to the station?"

  "I think because earlier in the evening Seth had mentioned doing this, and I advised him against it. I'd gone to his house to discuss possible legal action against the city. They've threatened to pull our permit unless we provide heavy security."

  "Who else was at this meeting?"

  In an instant Gail registered this fact: The police apparently believed that it had been a formal meeting. She replied, "The president of the board, Rebecca Dixon, was also there."

  "What time did you leave?"

  "I'd say around six o'clock. I went home, took my daughter to her soccer game, and then Seth called me on my portable phone around eight-fifteen. I left my daughter with one of the other parents." Gail felt out of breath. "I'm sorry, this has got me so rattled. Do you have any idea who shot him?"

  "We're working on it." Fernandez had been writing in a small notebook propped on his knee. He flipped it shut. Gail followed its progress into the breast pocket of his suit coat. There had been no questions about Rebecca and Seth. None about Lloyd.

  Gail said, "I'd like your opinion. You're aware of the controversy over Thomas Nolan. I have an appointment tomorrow with the city manager, and I need to know whether this murder was likely to have been an act of political terrorism. I need to know if Mr. Nolan is in danger."

  Fernandez looked over at the other detective. "This one's for you. Lieutenant Delgado has been on the anti-terrorist task force for . . . how long, Bill?"

  "Twenty-six years." Delgado laughed. "Long time. Too long. They put me on this case because of questions like yours, Ms. Connor, but we don't think it's a political act."

  "You seem pretty sure."

  "I am sure. First thing, the victim wasn't known. You commit murder to make a statement, it has to be somebody that people know, okay?"

  "Seth was going to go on the air."

  Delgado waved a hand. "He was not important. To his family and friends, sure, but to the Cuban community? No. There's not one incident on record—not one—where a non-Cuban was ever assassinated for speaking his mind. Okay? Second thing. They announced that he'd be on the air forty minutes before he was shot. Not enough time for somebody to say, Hey, I ought to get this guy—and I don't even know who he is—then to load his weapon and get into position. Third. How did the shooter recognize the victim? Greer comes into the parking lot, could be anybody. And the last reason, probably the most important. There has been no communique."

  "What is that?"

  "Communique? There's been no letter delivered to the radio stations, no phone call, nobody saying, Look, we did it because this guy was an enemy of the Cuban people for such and such a reason. Maybe something will come today, but I won't bet on it."

  Gail said
, "Unless you count a phone message, there was no communique after the concrete block went through the glass door at the opera."

  "No, that was probably some kid. It was petty. Not like murder. If they really wanted to make a statement, they'd have used a pipe bomb." Then Delgado laughed, but without much humor. "Pipe bombs are as Cuban as the royal palm tree."

  For a few seconds Gail let this information settle into place. She said, "Do you believe in provocateurs? Or am I asking about the bogeyman?"

  "They exist. Absolutely. A couple of years ago one of the members of Brothers to the Rescue was encouraging the pilots to get a little closer to Cuba on their next flight looking for rafters. Then the Cuban air force shoots down two of the planes, and the man defects back to Cuba. He was a spy. The situation is very complicated."

  Again Gail felt that sliding sense of unease that she had noticed sitting on Felix Castillo's sofa listening to him and Anthony talk casually of spies and of people with indeterminate agendas.

  "What do you think, Lieutenant? Could there be a provocateur here?"

  His hands went palms-up, a substitute for a shrug.

  "I don't know what to tell Thomas Nolan."

  "It's a complicated situation," Delgado said again.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Gail telephoned the opera's general manager, Jeffrey Hopkins, to report on her meeting with the city manager of Miami the day before.

  "This wasn't a meeting, Jeffrey. It was Alberto Estrada playing politician. We go into his office, there are five other people waiting for us—a city commissioner, an assistant city attorney who sat in the back taking notes, and somebody from the permitting department—the same one who told you we needed a hundred off-duty police officers if Tom Nolan remained in the cast. Estrada also invited what he called 'interested parties in the community,' meaning the president of the Cuban municipalities in exile and, finally, the programming manager from WRCL. I suppose Estrada wanted an audience.

  "I wasn't completely outnumbered, because a friend of Seth Greer's from the ACLU heard about the meeting and wanted to sit in. His name is José de la Paz—also a Cuban, which goes to show something or other. He kept rolling his eyes whenever the talk went over the edge."