by Nancy Bush
He’d had to put off seeing Coby and he had yet to tell her about the swatch of hair that seemed like it might be Lucas Moore’s. He’d called Clausen with the information and he’d said simply, “Huh,” and that pretty much was how Danner felt, too.
Huh.
Meanwhile, inconsistencies in the Lloyd case had started coming together and the picture that was developing wasn’t pretty. Mrs. Lloyd had been shot in the back of the head in her bedroom, unresisting, while downstairs, shortly thereafter, Mr. Jarvis Lloyd was shot in the arm and smacked hard against the head with what appeared to be the missing 9mm. The daughter, appearing apparently unexpectedly, had taken two bullets as she turned and tried to run out the front door from which she’d arrived. She’d died on the entry floor.
Jarvis Lloyd’s version was that he’d been unconscious at the time of his daughter’s killing and only came to when the house was full of police. When he was told what happened, he broke down and tried to prevent the EMTs from taking his daughter’s body from the house. He’d never been able to do more than weep every time Danner, or Celek, or the officers who’d first arrived at the scene spoke to him.
Police had canvassed the area, asking if anyone heard or saw anything that might give them a clue to the perpetrators. The Lloyd house was on a quiet tree-lined street on Portland’s east side, a neighborhood that was currently going through a gentrification with Victorian and Craftsman style homes being beautifully restored. Most of the residents were young urban professionals and weren’t home at three o’clock in the afternoon. Lloyd was there to take his wife to the doctor for ongoing treatments for breast cancer.
Lloyd said two Hispanic men burst through the door, shouting in Spanish, that one shot at him straight on and the other must have attacked him and knocked him out. He didn’t remember anything past the sound of the shot and burst of pain in his arm. He didn’t know they’d killed his wife, or his daughter, until he was told at the hospital by the police.
Danner had first interviewed the man at the hospital after he’d had surgery on his arm. Jarvis wept and wiped his eyes and said next to nothing, and when Danner remarked, “Your wife must have heard the shot, but she just stayed in the bedroom and let the killer shoot her in the back of the head.”
“She was in her bedroom, getting ready,” Jarvis said. “That’s where she was.”
“But she didn’t run. She didn’t try to come to your aid. It looks like she was seated at her makeup desk and let the killer walk in, get behind her, and shoot her. Looks like she just toppled off the chair.”
“She was getting ready,” he said again, starting to blubber.
Danner didn’t press the issue at that time. Maybe Mrs. Lloyd had just froze at the sound of the shot. Maybe.
Lloyd couldn’t talk about his daughter at all. His lower jaw trembled and his eyes were wild and he cried silently or made hiccupping noises. His grief was real.
Danner had tried to talk through his thoughts with Joshua Celek, but Celek didn’t quite get the process, so he gave up. He’d taken the trip last weekend with Faith to kind of step away from the investigation for a few hours, clear his head, and look how that had turned out.
But then, an unexpected break in the case: the deaf woman who lived catty-corner from the Lloyds had seen someone on the street she didn’t recognize near the time of the killings. She might be deaf, but she was one helluva nosy neighbor and she kept her binoculars up to her eyes at almost all hours, hiding within the third-story bedroom of her house, watching the world go by in a perfect audio void. Had it not been for Mrs. Berney, the killer would not have been seen.
But Mrs. Berney was new to the street. She’d moved into her daughter and son-in-law’s house the previous month and quickly made herself the neighborhood watchdog, albeit a silent one. One of the street cops discovered her by accident when he was interviewing the son-in-law, who hadn’t even bothered to mention that his mother-in-law lived to spy.
She told the officer she’d seen the woman who flew out of the Lloyd house. Had described her black wool coat and boots and baseball cap. A strange choice for a woman who was dressed as nicely as this one, the baseball cap, Mrs. Berney said with a sniff, unless she had something to hide. Mrs. Berney had noted the time and date and written it on the back of an envelope, just in case.
When Danner interviewed the older woman, her daughter took him aside and said that her mother was having mental issues and might be making the whole thing up. She was wont to write notes and squiggles and concoct elaborate plots.
But the crime scene techs had lifted a woman’s boot print from outside the front door that hadn’t matched any of the mother’s or daughter’s footwear, and Danner thought maybe Mrs. Berney was sharper than people gave her credit for. Not that a good defense attorney couldn’t use Mrs. Berney’s suspect mental capacity against her in a court of law, but Danner didn’t intend to go that direction.
He chose to keep interviewing Jarvis Lloyd, whose attitude went into a sharp decline when the police started looking through his personal records. How could they think he could be involved in the death of his beloved Angie? His only child? He loved her more than life itself. If he could, he would trade places with her.
Danner responded that he believed him. But he also felt Jarvis was a first-class bastard who had set up the murder of his wife and then run into problems when his partner in crime, the woman in the baseball hat, killed the wife but then took out the daughter, too, when Angie unexpectedly showed up at home and caught the female killer with her father. Angie turned to run but was shot twice, and then the killer simply stepped over her, walked out the front door, and left.
To be seen by Mrs. Berney.
Lloyd was beside himself. Sobbing and shuddering or silently staring with horror-stretched eyes, as if he had looked into the bowels of hell. Maybe he had. If he was as guilty as Danner believed, he’d killed his wife and his beloved daughter.
Danner had put more pressure on the man this week. Subtly, at first, but closer and closer to the bone as they got nearer to Lloyd giving it all up. Jarvis had a lawyer who was scrambling to keep control, but the man was disintegrating. Sooner, hopefully, than later, he would give up the name of the killer and then the whole thing would be over.
The only progress he’d made on Annette’s murder was to phone Yvette and talk to her. She’d been hostile and unwilling, and pretty much told him to fuck off. She said she’d spoken to Detective Clausen and that’s all she was going to do.
Now Danner wheeled into the lot, checked his watch, ground his teeth, and then hurried hatless through a faint rain to the front door. He let himself in and opened one side of a pair of double doors, then slipped inside the main room and found a place to stand in the back, behind the row of pews.
Pushing the Lloyd murder and Yvette’s objurgation to a corner of his mind, he searched the room for a glimpse of Coby.
The crowd slowly quieted and someone coughed as Coby stared toward the front of the room, her mind full of uncomfortable memories of Annette’s floating body. She wondered vaguely about the necklace, and the envelope with its lock of hair, and why Annette had mentioned Dana in a way that incensed Yvette.
Her attention sharpened as her father walked to the front of the room and up several steps to a raised dais.
“Thank you for coming,” he said. “Annette would have appreciated it.” A long pause and then, sounding almost apologetic, he said, “I did love her. It’s no secret we had a pretty big age gap, but she was . . . a wonderful partner. I’m going to miss her.” He paused a moment, collecting himself, then invited anyone else to come up and say a few words. Jean-Claude took him up on his word and shared stories from Annette’s youth that were funny and touching, but once in front of the group he couldn’t seem to let go of the spotlight.
Coby let herself have a moment of remembrance of her evening eating pizza with Danner, then she reluctantly moved from that to her meeting with Rhys Webber, Nicholette’s unfaithful client with the
myriad girlfriends. Coby had tried to tell the man to settle with his ex-wife, give her what she was asking for because it wasn’t all that much in the larger scheme of things and it would prevent them going to court and him having to air his dirty laundry. But Rhys had practically laughed at her. He wanted to screw his ex-wife financially like he’d screwed every other woman who’d crossed his path. He wouldn’t listen to Coby, so she told him in no uncertain terms that he was making a mistake, which pissed him off big-time. He was into domination over women; he didn’t take it well when one of them talked sense to him.
From Webber she thought about her friend Willa, whom she’d called the previous night. She’d wanted to fill Willa in on everything that had happened, but they had just begun discussing Annette’s murder when one of Willa’s children started wailing as if her life were over. In reality she’d simply been bopped on the head by her sister with a plush toy. The emotional hurt was huge, however, and Willa had needed to play parent. She’d begged off, asking for a rain check, but Coby suspected maybe Willa didn’t really have the time or even interest in her affairs that she’d hoped for.
The one thing Willa did say, however, after she’d explained about overhearing the argument between Yvette and Annette, was, “Why don’t you call this Dana person? See if she can tell you something, since it doesn’t sound like Yvette will talk to you.”
Coby had mulled that over and finally sent Dana an e-mail asking for her current phone number. Dana had responded with a number with a Southern California area code, and last night, when Coby called her, she’d been clearly mystified by Coby’s sudden need to connect.
“I heard about Annette Deneuve,” she said. “Is that why you’re calling me?”
“You heard she was murdered?”
“Dad said so. He’s totally shaken up.”
Coby remembered how white-faced Hank Sainer had looked after Annette’s death. She wondered if she’d looked the same. Easing into the conversation, Coby brought up a few things from high school, but Dana wasn’t in the mood to be coerced.
“Just tell me why you’re calling, really,” she said. “Does this have something to do with the campout?”
“The campout? No. It’s about Annette. She was my stepmother,” Coby reminded her, since Dana had referred to her by her maiden name. “And she was talking to me at her birthday party about secrets. How they needed to be brought to the light, so to speak, so they didn’t have so much power. She gave me the impression she was about to reveal something big. Or at least something she thought was big.”
“Like when I admitted my eating disorders?” Dana suggested coolly.
“A little like that, yeah,” Coby said, not backing down. “But then later I heard Annette arguing with Yvette and she brought up your name. She said, ‘And what about Dana? The truth’s going to come out.’”
“What truth?” Dana asked.
“I guess that’s what I’m asking you. You don’t have a clue what they were talking about?”
“Look, I told you all about my anorexia and bulimia at the campout. I’ve got things kind of under control now and I’ve got my kids and I’m happy, but back then I was in real pain. And all of you gave me this ho-hum attitude, like my problem didn’t even count! That it wasn’t secret enough, or maybe I just wasn’t cool enough for the rest of you. I don’t know what the hell Annette was talking about. Are you sure she mentioned me? I’m in recovery from my eating disorders, and the truth about that was aired long ago, so, no, there’s no other secret about me. Certainly nothing Yvette would care about.”
“It’s just what I heard.”
“Maybe you heard wrong,” Dana stated flatly.
Coby hadn’t been able to learn anything further and shortly afterward Dana found a reason to hang up, which was something of a relief. Coby didn’t believe Annette had been talking about Dana’s eating disorder; it wasn’t even a secret when Dana had thought it was a secret!
Maybe the thing to do was ask Yvette and see if she would tell her anything. Maybe Danner would bring it up when he interviewed her, or maybe he already had, Coby thought with a sudden jolt back to the present. If Danner had mentioned it to Yvette, Yvette could be seething over Coby’s eavesdropping and just waiting, now, for a moment to pounce on her about it.
Well, okay, she told herself. If that happened, she would be prepared, at least, and maybe she could actually learn something. Not that it would be pleasant. Talking to Yvette was never pleasant.
Jean-Claude finally wound down and then Suzette said how much she was already missing her sister and shed a few tears, and then Nicholette and Juliet added a few words, then Genevieve walked to the front. She gazed across the top of their heads and said, “Annette was my friend. We knew each other a little bit in high school, but we really connected later. The last few years she’s really been a help to me, an inspiration. I treasured her friendship, and I want to know what happened to her. We all do.”
With that she found her seat again and Coby shot a sideways glance at Yvette, who sat like a statue while Benedict fidgeted beside her.
When no one else rose to speak, Dave stood and announced that refreshments were now available in the basement and the crowd slowly dispersed and trooped downstairs. There were hors d’oeuvres and wine, and tiny pastries and tea and coffee from the Lovejoy’s tearoom/wine bar. Coby chose coffee and a tea cake and was just leaving the serving table when she saw Danner standing next to one of the bistro tables set up around the room, his gaze on her as Jarrod spoke in his left ear.
Her heart kicked and she lifted her coffee cup in acknowledgment. Then she found a spot at another bistro table opposite the white cloth–covered serving tables laden with food and drink. She’d barely set her cup down when Faith found her and crowded close to her. Before Faith could say more than, “I’m glad that’s over,” Yvette strode up to them, her expression dark.
“You sicced your boyfriend on me,” she said to Coby.
“Um . . . you mean Danner Lockwood?” Coby asked.
“He interviewed me,” Yvette said through a tight jaw. “I don’t care for you meddling in my affairs. You must think you’re some kind of detective, but leave it to the professionals. And I don’t count Danner Lockwood in that. As far as I’m concerned, he’s worse than his brother. Leave me and Benedict alone. We’re grieving, too, y’know. Annette was my sister, and I don’t care that you overheard us arguing! I loved her. I wish she were here right now!” At that she pressed her lips together as if she were afraid she might blurt out more.
Faith said flatly, “Don’t feel so special. The police grilled our dad, too. I imagine we’ll all hear from them eventually, won’t we?”
“Stay away from me,” Yvette warned Coby, then turned abruptly away and joined Benedict near the serving table.
“She’s sure fun, isn’t she?” Faith murmured, stealing Coby’s tea cake and biting into it. “Is Danner really investigating Annette’s murder?”
“He’s helping out,” Coby said. Then, “Dad didn’t tell me he was grilled.”
“I may have overstated that a bit. But they did talk to him. Of course they would. That’s what police do.”
“When he talked to Clausen?”
“That guy from the Tillamook County Sheriff’s Department.” Faith lifted an uncaring shoulder.
“Yeah. Him.”
“I guess so. Ask Dad. I wouldn’t have said anything, but she really bugged me. What a self-serving bitch.” Faith finished off Coby’s tea cake. “So, what argument did you overhear between Annette and the bitch?”
“They were arguing about the truth coming out, and I told Danner. He said he was going to interview Yvette, among others, and he must’ve said something to her and she knew where it came from.”
“She caught you eavesdropping. Shame on you.” Faith grinned. “I wonder what truth she was talking about.”
Danner arrived at their table at that moment. Faith lifted a brow and gave Coby a look that said, Be careful what you say.<
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Ignoring her, Coby told Danner what had just transpired with Yvette, finishing with, “She’s not the most forthcoming.”
“She’s prickly,” he agreed.
Coby added, “Faith said Detective Clausen grilled my dad about Annette’s homicide.”
“It’s usual,” he said.
Faith said dryly, “It’s always the spouse, isn’t it? That’s where you go first.”
“A lot of times,” Danner admitted.
“But not this time,” Coby said in her father’s defense. “Someone else killed Annette. I don’t think Dad was anywhere near that hot tub.”
“That’s the problem, though,” Faith said. “None of us really knows who was where, unless we were with them at the exact moment Annette was drowned, and when was that exact moment?” As if she couldn’t help herself, Faith moved her gaze toward their father, and Coby could practically read her sister’s mind, could sense the niggling doubt inside.
Danner said, “If your father wanted to kill his wife, I’m pretty sure he would have chosen a different scenario rather than a huge party where the chance of getting caught was so big.”
“Good point,” Coby said with relief. “Why would anyone choose the party?”
Danner answered, “Sudden opportunity? Could be a crime of passion. Things happen.”
“That doesn’t help Dad,” Faith said. “I don’t even want to speculate anymore.” With that, she left them and went to join Dave and Jean-Claude, Suzette and Galen, and Nicholette, who were all standing together.
Danner said, “I got the M.E.’s report on Lucas Moore’s death. A small section of his hair had been sheared off.”
Coby looked at him. “What? Hair?” Then, “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“There’s no way of knowing whether Moore’s hair was the lock you saw in the envelope.”