This was absurd and Sandy knew it. She shook all the Kama Sutra illustrations from her mind and looked at the woman straight on. “I’m fine now. There are a few more questions.” Worth a try.
“You can drop it, sweetie. If you hadn’t almost fainted, when you first saw me, I might have bought your policewoman routine. Who are you in real life?”
“Sandy Reid.”
Claudia’s eyes widened. “Oh, you’re the brilliant Sandy Reid?” She made a long head-to-toe scrutiny. “I’m impressed.” Then she took it all back with a smirk and an obvious roll of her eyes. Deciding Sandy posed no serious challenge in the glamour game; she leaned back, struck a majestic pose in the chair, and crossed her long legs. “Just when you thought you were the center of attention I showed up, huh? Let’s see. Chip told you he saw me, you blazed into a fit of jealousy, and you are here to scratch my eyes out.”
Now, after a second look, she decided the woman was mortal after all. She had a nice, but not stunning shape. Although she came off as more sophisticated than scorching, something in her demeanor and speech signaled this woman was more streetwise than bookwise. If you believed the diary, she was indeed blazing without bounds in the bedroom, an attribute Sandy never cared to develop. She assumed such traits gave Claudia extra points with some men. What it meant to Chip was the question.
“Former girlfriends don‘t bother me,” Sandy answered. “I got over that in the eighth grade.” She wished it were true. “This has nothing to do with Chip.”
“Of course not, that’s why you turned whiter than my lace doilies, when you first got a load of me. Aren’t you quite a bit out of your league?”
They stared eye to eye. Sandy blinked and lost. At any rate, she was beginning to get a grip. Under normal circumstances she’d never be intimidated by such a woman sitting there looking down her nose. She didn’t care how hot or cold Claudia was. Sandy was Sandy and had no desire to be someone else. She didn’t need this woman’s approval and wasn’t going to try to compete with her. Then again, Chip had a part in this and that sort of mixed everything up. She reached down and took a yellow pad from her briefcase to help cover her edginess. “Let’s get to Margo Larena, that’s why I’m here. I’m her attorney.”
Claudia casually flipped one hand in the air. “Poor little Margo. Gee, I hope she’s not in any trouble for murdering my brother in cold blood.”
“Whether she did or not, she’s in big trouble. Are you interested in helping your sister-in-law?”
“Of course, as long as I don’t have to raise my little finger.”
“I still have questions about some of your statements to Detective Jaworski.” Let her believe you know something, Sandy thought, and perhaps she’ll fill in some blanks.
“I’m not doing this, Miss Reid. I’ve already admitted it was my gun.”
Sandy’s mouth dropped open.
The woman continued, “I told the police John must have taken it, when he was over here at some time. I would have lent it to him, if he’d asked. I didn’t notice it missing.”
“Your gun? John was shot with your gun?”
“Funny you don’t look retarded,” Claudia said. “No, someone used my gun to shoot at Margo at the Community Center.”
Sandy tried to recover. “Just thinking out loud. So, they found a gun at the murder scene and traced it to you. But it wasn’t the murder weapon.”
“Excuse me. Are you getting paid for this?”
“I’m just trying to find the truth about what did happen. You said someone used your gun to shoot at Margo. If it was later found at John’s, doesn’t that indicate he was the shooter?”
“I don’t know. I wasn’t there.”
“I know, you were sipping coffee with Chip. When did you last see your brother?”
“I’m not going over this again.” Claudia scooted to the edge of her chair. “As long as you’re here, tell Margo I know she has a key to John’s condo. I want it.”
“Why do you want the key?” Sandy had it in her briefcase but wasn’t about to surrender it.
“Because she shouldn’t have one. They were divorcing. I’m planning a funeral for John, and I need to get to his suits. Also, there are many things at his condo he wanted me to have. I’ll need to settle everything, and then I’m moving in there.” She pointed fiercely at Sandy. “So get me that key.”
“You’re mistaken. Margo will attend to his final arrangements, and she doesn’t want any service. You are not to go near his condo ever again without her permission. All of his property either passes to her outright as surviving spouse or to his estate. I expect to be the executor of his estate. If he owned that condo, it goes to her as well.”
“Over my dead body. I’m his next of kin.”
“You’re only a half-sister, according to Margo, and I’m not sure you can prove even that.”
“I’ll have you know John and I were always very close, like two peas in a pod. We grew up loving each other and nearly shared the same heartbeat. We talked on the phone every day. I was shattered by his death.”
“Whatever. Anyway, under Florida law, Margo is still his spouse.” Sandy wasn’t certain about how the condominium was titled, yet it made sense. She made a mental note to get hopping on whose name was on the deed and his other property.
“You’ll be hearing from my lawyer! I do have the resources to fight you, you know.”
Sandy’s instincts told her to get up and leave, however she wanted more. She wanted proof Chip wasn’t this woman’s partner in the diary. She wanted proof without hearing any details. She didn’t know what to say for a long minute, then, “Why did you arrange to see Chip again? He rejected you once.”
“Those scorching affairs burn too hot to last long.” Her eyes looked upward, pretending to engage in some reverie. “I never took it seriously. I detected some renewed interest in me the other night. Be that as it may, I haven’t decided if I’m interested.” She purposely glanced at Sandy before adding, “I imagine he’s ready for something out of the ordinary.”
Sandy’s hands were beginning to form into fists. She held it in and composed herself; she’d be all right. “It must get lonely up on that pedestal.”
One or two dates Chip had said; this woman acts as though she could pick up the marathon sex where they left off. In any case, Claudia had gone too far. This was getting all too theatrical. She now sounded defensive. Obviously, she was hurt because Chip had rejected her again. Even so, she might still consider herself the big winner, if the rejection didn’t come until after record-setting sex.
Sandy had heard enough, and none of it supported Chip’s easy dismissal of Claudia as being not worth mentioning. Get back to business. “Just give me another minute, and tell me about Margo’s boyfriend.”
Claudia leaned back and resumed her condescending manner. “Oh, I can tell you about Margo. I can tell you she isn’t tied too tightly. She can go days without making sense. And she has no boyfriend. She couldn’t get laid at Mardi Gras.”
“What about Richie Grant?”
“Who? Richie Grant? Are you talking about the reality-show star? Oh, I know who you mean, Margo’s boyfriend. I forgot she had him around. She mentioned him to you? How about that? Good idea. Sure I’ve met him.”
“Where does this Richie live? What’s he look like? What does he do?”
“Don’t actually know where he lives. Don’t see her a lot. Of course, I’ve seen them together now and then. I suppose you’d say he’s skinny and nothing in the looks department. I don’t know where he gets his money.”
“I literally ran into a man meeting that description a few minutes ago in the hall. Billy saw him acting suspiciously at your door. Does Richie Grant have an expensive brown leather jacket?”
“It couldn’t have been Richie,” Claudia said. “I can promise you that.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I just don’t think it was.”
“I think maybe it was, and he didn’t want to be seen ca
lling on you.”
Claudia abruptly stood. Her bored look meant their meeting was over. “Margo can’t be choosy. I like brawny, good-looking men who smell nice in bed.”
Claudia had tossed in that last remark just as a jab. Sandy hadn’t intended to go back to the subject, but just then, facing Chip’s former lover, it seemed more important than any murder. She couldn’t hold back, she blurted out, “You gave away your sexy diary to Chip.”
“Oh, I’m surprised he told you about that. Did you read it together? You should thank me. I bet it fixed you up for the next forty-eight hours.”
Obviously, Claudia was baiting her. Sandy felt her face getting warm. She squeezed her hands into fists again, afraid for a moment she was going to lose it. “No, he threw it away when he brought it home. Never even looked at it—wasn’t interested. I saw it in the trash. You can forget sitting by the phone waiting for his breathless phone call.”
“I believe you, because if he had read it, he wouldn’t have thrown it away, and you’d never have seen it. But you did read it, didn’t you? I can tell, because I have your guts tied in a knot.”
Chapter Ten
Sandy faltered slightly as she walked away from Claudia’s apartment. She turned enough to make an obscene gesture at the closed door. She had not been her usual sassy self; it was unlike her not to have blasted back with clever comebacks. Claudia had unnerved her. Just then, she didn’t know what to think of the woman’s prior relationship with Chip. Until she got that all straight in her mind, no clever put down was going to help.
She had gone there to advance the cause of her client but had let herself be sidetracked; Claudia had turned things around with the thought that she remained interested in Chip and might try to go after him. The woman wasn’t as classy as she thought she was, but she was shrewd. And all her sexuality was right there. Was Chip truly not interested in her?
She was back in her car ready to turn the key, when a newly disclosed piece of information popped back into her mind. John had used a gun belonging to Claudia to shoot at Margo. How about that? No wonder Jaworski had Claudia down at the station for interrogation. A smile came to her lips. She’d dearly love to pin the murder on Claudia. Was it childish to want Claudia to suffer? You bet. Out of her league, was she? The game has just started.
She wasn’t entirely back to normal by the time she returned to the office. Martin was standing in his office doorway waiting for a report. She said, “I just left Claudia Mertens. Maybe I’ll go over to the Windward and get a beer to cry in.”
“You must tell me all about her.” He looked down at a notepad. “But first, here’s the latest buzz around the police station, courtesy of Judy Naegler. They found a .38 caliber revolver in the victim’s condo and traced it to Claudia Mertens. Not the murder weapon, but it was recently fired and had John’s prints on it. Turns out, the bullet fired at Margo over at the Community Center, earlier that night, came from that gun. They had Claudia down at the police station for questioning. She told them she thought her brother took the gun some time ago without asking. He was welcome to it, she just wasn’t aware he had taken it.”
“Okay good. Yes, she told me her gun was used. I don’t see where it implicates her very much though,” she said. “John shoots at Margo, carries the gun home, and puts it away. The murderer comes in with his or her own gun and shoots him. What is she guilty of?”
She stared at her ringing cell, but didn’t answer. She read the text, clicked off, and announced, “Chip.”
“You saw it was him and aren’t going to answer. I’ve never seen that before.”
Martin could sense how her disagreement with Chip was affecting her disposition. He wished he were Cupid and could shoot them both with arrows filled with uncontrollable desire. It occurred to him that if he had that power, he’d have shot one at Sandy on his own behalf long ago. “Did you learn something about him from Claudia that upset you?”
She shrugged.
He nodded. “Could you be overreacting?”
“Of course, I’m overreacting.”
“Come on, Sandy. How is Chip guilty of anything other than being polite to a former girlfriend? You said the purpose of the meeting was to return the poetry book. Did he actually accept the book?”
“He brought it home and threw it in the trash.”
“Then what do you want from him? A dagger through her heart?”
“A dagger would be nice. No, I admit the trash thing was good. Yet, the entire situation is bothering me.”
“Of course it’s bothering you. You mean it’s bothering you more than it should.”
Sharing with Martin was going to be much easier than she first thought. “I know I must discuss my feelings with Chip, but I don’t want to come off as some jealous shrew.”
Martin wanted to take her side, but she was indeed sounding like a shrew. “How do you know this Claudia isn’t just lovelorn, and simply thought she’d give Chip another try to see if he was interested? You can’t kill the girl for trying. It seems normal enough.”
“Something is going on, and it’s not just the way she was talking about him. She’s smart and calculating. I sense something more is happening here that is getting my defenses all riled up.”
“It is weird she comes back on the scene at the same time her brother is killed.”
“Weird doesn’t cover it.”
“Why don’t you use that coincidence as your opening with Chip? You’d be talking with him, not because you are possessed by the green-eyed monster of jealousy, but because you’re a trained investigator, and the coincidence is bothering you.”
“That’s not bad. Thank you oh wise one.” She blew him a kiss. “Chip’s text just now was asking me to dinner.”
****
The ocean side restaurant Chip chose that evening had somehow maintained its old Florida elegance in spite of several hurricanes attempting to move it over to Alabama. Someday, after scoring big on a lawsuit she’d make eating in such classy places routine, and forget takeout in small white cartons with cheap wine.
Chip had just raised his wine glass to her, holding off his first sip, awaiting one of her invariably clever toasts.
She wasn’t in the mood for making clever toasts. “Here’s to you, and here’s to me.” She took a sip and set her glass down.
He kept his glass raised. “Now I have one. May we start communicating a lot better than we have the last few days.”
“That’s why we’re having dinner here tonight?”
“Exactly.”
“Fine with me. You probably don’t deserve my cool attitude. I’ve just never cared much for coincidences.”
He tilted his head and waited.
“Claudia Mertens?”
“Now you’re using her name.”
“I didn’t go hunting for her name. Margo Larena naturally mentioned John’s sister. You weren’t trying to hide her, were you?”
“Get off it, one date doesn’t even create a girlfriend, let alone a lover.”
“You said two or three.”
“I said one or two. Now I’m thinking it was one.”
She clenched her teeth together and glanced around the crowded restaurant.
He said, “And the jealousy all over your face is because...?”
“I interviewed her today as part of the defense of my client. I was, of course, aware of your recent involvement with her, and I detected a continuing interest in you on her part.”
“My recent involvement amounted to an innocent fifteen minutes over a cup of coffee, which I didn’t finish. I dumped her once. I don’t know why she’d think I’d take up with her again. I haven’t encouraged her in any way.”
“You know you might be called as a witness because of that innocent meeting.”
“I know. Not because of the meeting itself, but because the meeting took place the night her brother was murdered,” he said.
“And also the exact time his wife was being shot at.”
“Correc
t. I took the shooting call while we were sitting there.”
“As you were rushing off, did you mention the Community Center location, or who was shot at?”
“Of course not.”
“You said you met only briefly. How long would you have met with her, and how would the evening have ended up, if you hadn’t been interrupted by the emergency call?”
He gave her an exasperating look. “The same way...with me rushing off a few minutes later.”
“I asked her why she gave you that book.”
“I thought I covered that. It was the first I’d ever heard of any book. It had sad memories or something, according to her. Did she contradict that?
“Chip, she gave you the book in the hope you would become interested in her again. If you picked up on that, you certainly have had plenty of time to explain it to me. You made her sound very innocent.” She still didn’t know for certain whether he had looked inside the book.
“I’m not stupid. Of course, that’s what she had in mind. I thought it was obvious. I was trying to not make a big deal out of a bothersome encounter.”
“It would be a big deal, if the romance was a big deal.”
“Never a romance. Never a big deal.”
Her head was throbbing. “I don’t care about your past life between the sheets. But when she’s back in the picture, gunning for you, and I feel you’re being deceptive, it affects my trusting you. According to her description, it appeared to be the hot affair of the century. So part of me wants to applaud you for having had the experience and—.”
“Her description? Wait, wait, wait, she described sexual episodes she had with me? For chrissake, you’re a sicko to sit and listen to something like that.”
“No! I didn’t mean she talked about it.” She now guessed he hadn’t read the diary. He didn’t have a clue what she was referring to. She didn’t want to discuss its existence just yet. “I don’t know what I meant. Nevertheless, you brushed off the whole affair as a couple of dates.”
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