Midnight Baby

by Wendy Hornsby

  Mike sat down then beside me. “You didn’t approve?”

  “I did approve. Most fully. My Hanna had a heart problem, you see. We didn’t expect her to live as long as she did. I give all credit to Randy. He was a man with uncommon determination. He would have done anything humanly possible to make her happy, to give her a life.”

  “Did Hanna want a child?” I asked.

  “Oh, yes.” She raised her sharp chin. “A child of her own was of course impossible. That’s why Randy took on a little ward. Hanna doted on Hillary. And such a pet she was.”

  I looked at Mike. “A pet?”

  “Pretty girl,” Mrs. Sinclair said. “Very sweet. I’m sorry to hear she died.”

  “How old was Hillary when Randy brought her home?”

  “Just school age. Otherwise it would have been impossible for Hanna to manage. An hour or two in the afternoon, stories after dinner. Anything more would have destroyed her.”

  I had finally reached the bottom of the roller-coaster ride, though my insides were still catching up. Virginia Sinclair was a spoiled woman, with the innate coldness that comes from getting one’s way too often. She was the sort who bought their children live bunnies for Easter because they were charming. Then set them out for the coyotes when they crapped on the carpet.

  “Your daughter was beautiful,” I said.

  She smiled with her eyes, very pleased by the compliment. “Yes, she was. Her beauty was far deeper than mere appearance. Hanna had a lovely spirit.”

  “After she died, what happened to Hillary?” Mike asked. She frowned. “The girl was Randy’s ward. She stayed on with him.”

  “Mrs. Sinclair,” Mike said, “are you acquainted with a family by the name of Metrano? George and Leslie and their daughter Amy Elizabeth?”

  “Metrano?” She thought hard for a moment. Then she shook her head slowly, serious, still thinking. “I can’t say.”

  “Amy Elizabeth Metrano,” Mike said again.

  Again she shook her head.

  My bottom had had enough of the hard cushion. And the hardness of Mrs. Sinclair. The old bench creaked when I stood up. The sound seemed to bother Mrs. Sinclair. She gave me a librarian glare. The air in the room was stale, musty. I felt claustrophobic and started to pace to shake it off. She watched me as I moved around the room, looking at the precious ornaments, the pictures on the walls.

  Hanna’s house in Long Beach was open and full of light and air, alive. I wondered whether this room had ever had life. I was reminded again of the museum feel. The Hanna museum.

  Mike was questioning Mrs. Sinclair. “You told us that Hillary’s parents died in a boating accident. What do you know about it? Where did it happen? When did it happen? Maybe you remember their names. Anything you can tell us.”

  “Their names? Ramsdale, I assume. I never met Randy’s family. They all live in the East. As to where, I believe it was in Mexico. I remember Randy went down there and brought the girl home. She was quite ill for a while. Very upset, until she had to be sedated. Of course, it must have been a frightful ordeal for her to lose both her parents. Hanna and Randy sat at her side for weeks, reassuring her, until she recovered.

  “The doctors had long told Hanna that living by the sea would be more healthful for her than living up here. Cooler, you see. And much less smog. When the girl was strong enough, Randy moved them all into a lovely home down at the beach. Had his boat right in front.”

  “When was the last time you heard from Randy?” Mike asked.

  “Christmas Eve. He took me to dinner — our little tradition.”

  “The two of you?” Mike asked. “Or wife and kid, too?”

  “The two of us. It would have been awkward for his wife. You see, Randy is still mourning Hanna’s passing.”

  I had stopped pacing to look up at the portrait. “Did he tell you he planned to divorce his wife?”

  “He did. She was unfaithful.”

  “Divorce can be expensive,” I said, turning to her. “Especially for a rich man.”

  She smiled slyly. “I said Randy likes to play. I did not mean to imply he is mindless. In fact, Randy is deceptively clever. He had prenuptial agreements with both of the wives who followed Hanna. They were entitled to very small settlements should they divorce. And no death benefits if he predeceased them. From a financial standpoint, it was to their advantage to stay married and keep Randy healthy for as long as possible.”

  “He told you this?” Mike asked.

  “Indeed. I would say he even boasted about it. But why ask me? Speak with Randy.”

  Ah, I thought, tensing, time to pay the piper. Mike and I exchanged glances — whose turn this time? I turned back to the portrait, but Hanna told me nothing.

  “Mrs. Sinclair,” Mike said, the professionally bereaved mortician this time, “I am sad to inform you that Randy Ramsdale has passed away.”

  She was wordless for so long that I turned around to see if she was still upright. She was. Stiffly upright. So brittle I thought a quick jerk would snap her in half.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  Her face was dangerously pale. “Was there an accident?”

  “No,” Mike again. “It happened at the hand of another.”

  She grasped her throat. “Murder?”

  “Yes.”

  “Both of them?”

  “Hillary and Randy, yes.”

  I stepped toward her. “Can I get you something? Some water?”

  She shook me off and kept her eyes on Mike. “Is there a will?”

  “I don’t know.” He was taken aback. People in shock do and say odd things. I thought it was a telling first reaction.

  Mrs. Sinclair began to bend finally. She looked around her room with a longing that was ripe with goodbye.

  “You see,” she said, “this all belongs to Randy. This was their house. I am here at his sufferance.”

  “He supported you?” Mike asked.

  She nodded.

  “Are there friends you can call?” I asked. “You shouldn’t be alone.”

  I saw her glance flick toward the portrait. Toward Hanna. “I am not alone,” she said.

  I was spooked. She never got around to asking how and why either Randy or Hillary died. I guess to her those facts weren’t the essentials. Mike got up from the creaky bench and edged toward the door.

  “When you feel up to it, you can call me,” he said. “I’ll try to answer any questions.”

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “Will you be all right?” I tried again.

  “Yes. Please excuse me. I need to lie down.” She rose majestically, the starch returned to her spine, and walked slowly toward the door. As we followed her, I noticed she did not lean on the cane.

  She didn’t open the front door for us, but stood in the center of the round foyer, her narrow feet planted in the hub of the ornate circular pattern in the parquet floor. Rootless like an ornamental tree.

  “Good night,” I said, reaching for Mike’s sleeve as he held the door.

  Virginia Sinclair was staring off into the dark beyond the front steps. When we turned to walk out, I heard her gasp. I thought maybe she was waiting for us to leave before she wept. She cleared her throat.

  “Just a moment,” she said. “What was that name again?”

  “Metrano,” Mike said, going back.

  She shook her head. “No, the first name.”

  “George? Leslie? Amy Elizabeth?”

  “George. I know that was his name. It was some time ago, but I remember him. He worked for Randy, refurbishing a boat. Temporary work. He was quite handy. Randy had him do some repairs around here as well. A nice fellow. A family man down on his luck.”

  “When?” Mike asked.

  “Years ago. I wouldn’t have thought of him except that we were speaking of Hillary and how she came into the family. When Hillary was so sick, the only soul who could comfort her was George.”

  CHAPTER 17

  “Got it?” Mike asked.


  “I think so.” I turned my face into the icy wind that whistled down through a pass in the mountains above Virginia Sinclair’s mansion. A slice of moon slipped out from under the heavy clouds, casting long, moving shadows like lumbering giants on the slope. Coyotes on a crag nearby saw the moon and set up a howl. Had the coyotes scared little Hillary? Or had they scared Amy Elizabeth?

  Mike’s face was in shadow, too, but I knew the expression without seeing it, jaw set, eyes flashing. Controlled rage.

  “The situation has changed,” he said. “My people have to get with the federales in Baja, get them to bring in Elizabeth Ramsdale for a rubber-hose job, have them loosen her up for us. I would like to fly down there to talk to her, but I think we’ll let Ma Bell reach out and touch her. Make that Mamacita Bell. I just hope she’s still there. Right now, I’m going to take you home.”

  “What about George?”

  “If he’s on his boat, the Coast Guard will find him. If he’s with Elizabeth, I will fly down. Him we’ll just shoot, save the state some grief.”

  “You talk tough when you’re upset. But it’s still a good idea.”

  I put my cheek against his chest and squeezed my eyes shut. The air was clear and sweet, but I couldn’t seem to get enough of it past the constriction in my chest. “He sold his daughter.”

  “Looks that way,” Mike said.

  “But did he kill her?” I asked. “Could a father be so depraved?”

  “It happens all the time.”

  We held on to each other as we walked back to the car. After we had left Mrs. Sinclair’s, I had only made it around the first curve in the road before I lost the double-cheese Bingo Burger we had picked up at a drive-through on the way to Pasadena. I had eaten it before I knew that a burger franchise was the going price for kindergarten-age blondes.

  Times had been hard for the Metranos. I had seen where they lived, a lot of little girls packed into tight quarters. A lot of shoes to buy in that family, and food, and doctors, all on the earnings of a coffee-shop waitress. I’m sure there was a sense of desperation. A case could be made for a certain nobility in the gesture of handing over one of the children to a rich family to give her privileges and opportunities her parents could not provide. And giving more to the other four girls as part of the bargain. Grimm’s Fairy Tales stuff again.

  The wicked witch in this story was George Metrano’s affair with a craps table. If it had been me, I would not have been able to swallow the bread a deal like that had put on the family table. Maybe that was why George had this compulsion to lose it all. I’m no Freud. I couldn’t explain what he had done. Even thinking about it had made me ill. If he had any human feeling at all, he must have suffered. I only hoped that every waking moment for the last ten years had given him the same torment his wife had suffered when she lost her child. Her torment times ten.

  Mike’s city car rattled down the hill. The shocks were shot, the torsion bars worn. All the bouncing and swaying did my queasy stomach no good. I rolled down my window and gulped air, my hair blown back away from my face. I didn’t remember closing my eyes, so it was a surprise when I opened them and found myself in the garage of Mike’s condo. He was in my open car door, gently pulling me by the hand.

  “Come on, baby,” he said. “Let’s put you to bed.”

  I got out, shaky when I stood up, still half asleep. We went into the condo through the connecting door between the garage and the kitchen and I walked straight to the answering machine on the counter next to Mr. Espresso for messages.

  Lyle had called. Everything was fine. My grant administrator still wanted a report. Guido had called to say that he had a picture for us and was driving over to deliver it. If we weren’t home, he would stick it in the front door. Before Guido’s message had clicked off, Mike was on his way to the front door.

  I stayed to listen to the rest of the messages. Casey called, bubbling. She had an audition with the Joffrey Ballet. She needed money for new toe shoes.

  When Casey hung up, I heard the deadbolt on the front door clunk a second time and Mike came back waving an envelope with “Love, Guido” scrawled across the front.

  “You ready to see this?” He slit open the envelope with a steak knife and pulled out a single four-by-six color snapshot. He showed me the face of the man who had slashed Mike’s tires. It was almost cartoonish, this computer-manipulated composite, but the face was whole and recognizable. I had only seen George Metrano once, the afternoon in the morgue with Leslie, but I knew him.

  “Son of a bitch,” I said.

  “Afraid so. George Metrano.”

  “At least now you know he’s not in Baja with Elizabeth, not if he was in town this afternoon.”

  “Damn. It’s so much easier to take out an asshole below the border. We’ll just hope he rabbits when we catch him and we’ll shoot him on the fly, huh?”

  “I’ll help you.” My voice sounded thick. “What did he possibly have to gain by killing her?”

  “If. If he killed her. Maybe the question is, what did he stand to lose if he didn’t?” Mike rubbed his face wearily, rasping the whiskers on his chin.

  I touched his face. “If Mrs. Sinclair was correct and Elizabeth inherits nothing, then who is Randy’s heir?”

  “I could make a pretty good guess.”

  “Check it out, will you?” I said.

  “Yes, ma’am.” He chuckled. “Anything else?”

  I looked inside the envelope. “Guido only gave us one print.”

  “One’s all we need. It stays with me. You’re retiring.”

  “Retiring for the night, you mean?”

  “You know what I mean.” He slipped George back into the envelope. “I have to get on the horn and make arrangements. I’ll come tuck you in later.”

  “Wake me if I fall asleep,” I said, yawning. I kissed his cheek and headed for the bedroom. I was tired, but I knew I couldn’t sleep; I had seen the face.

  Mike had unpacked my duffel, hung up my two clean shirts with his, put my dirty clothes in a pillowcase on the closet floor, lined my shoes up next to his. I had never seen my shoes next to his before. Somehow, the sight touched me.

  I fussed a bit, cleared away yesterday’s newspapers from the bed, smoothed the quilt. This would make four nights in a row in the same bed. I liked the number.

  With nothing else to do, I brushed my teeth, stripped off my clothes, and ran a hot shower. I was standing with my head against the tile, steamy water pounding on my spine, when Mike opened the shower door.

  “We’re waiting for the head shed to work its way through diplomatic channels,” he said. “As soon as the connection is made with the federales, I’m going into the office to make the call.”

  “I want to go with you.”

  “You can’t. The boss will be there.”

  “No fair.” I tried to pout, but I had water pouring in my eyes. The best I could do was squint and puff out my lower lip.

  He laughed. “Don’t use all the hot water. I need a shower, too.”

  “You can get in here with me.”

  “I’d like to, but I wouldn’t be able to hear the phone.”

  “Will you scrub my back?”

  “Hand me the soap.”

  I gave him the soap and my back. He started with my shoulders, massaging with strong fingers slippery with lather. I felt the tight muscles release. It was so delicious and so relaxing it was all I could do to stand upright.

  He worked down my back, occasionally letting his hot, soapy hands slip around front, teasing. He circled my waist so his thumbs could work the knots in the small of my back. I was saying bright things like ooh and aah, writhing to direct him. Then he was all of a sudden in the shower with me, in his clothes, his body pressed tight behind me.

  His lips nipped along the base of my neck, giving me goose bumps despite the steam billowing around us. He ran his tongue along the back of my ear, followed the stream of water that sluiced over my collarbone and down my breast, where he
held his hand like a dam.

  I turned around then, and began working on the annoyingly small buttons of his wet shirt. He worked my buttons with amazingly skillful tongue and fingers. I thought suddenly of something Guido had said, about making love to a man as experienced as Mike. I didn’t care where Mike had learned what he knew. As long as he kept doing it. With me.

  Around one, the summons came from headquarters. We were dry by then, napping on top of the quilt when the phone jolted us awake. Elizabeth was being held in a Baja jail as a courtesy, but the federales in Cabo San Lucas wouldn’t hold her for very long.

  While he dressed, I made Mike coffee and a sandwich and then kissed him goodbye. Very Dolly Domestic. And sweet. Until I had a flash of life with Mike, but without Lyle. Leaving Lyle would be like leaving one’s widowed mother alone. My stomach started to rumble again. I sat in the kitchen and stared back at the red light on Mr. Espresso, hoping for some revelation to come.

  At two, when nothing had resolved itself, I slipped into a few more clothes and some shoes and went for a drive, a change of scenery to sort things through.

  In the middle of the night, when there isn’t construction going on, the freeways become free ways. Once I realized where I was headed, I was impatient to get there. I pushed the little rental Toyota up to ninety, slowed to maneuver around a slow drunk, then hit the pedal again.

  I was in Long Beach in under thirty minutes.

  My big regret was that I had never met Randy. Never would. He was the key player in all of this, and I thought it would have been awfully damned interesting to hear what he had to say, an addition to the My Most Memorable Character collection.

  From what people had told me, Randy would go to just about any lengths to get his own way. If sheer force of his considerable charm, stubborn will, and cussed determination didn’t work, he used money. Sometimes he used money for bribery, as I believe he had with George Metrano, as he had tried with Lacy. Sometimes he used the threat of withholding money, as he had with his ex-wives, to maintain control.

  I keep telling Casey that she should be careful what she wishes for, because her wishes might come true. Apparently no one had ever warned Randy. Or maybe he hadn’t listened very carefully, because what he wished for ended up killing him. Poor Randy.