Web of Silence: A Ray Schiller Novel (The Ray Schiller Series Book 4)

by Marjorie Doering

  “It’s just speculation,” she said. “But I don’t think either of them had any enemies.”

  “What about Georgia’s ex-husband?” Ray asked.

  “Frank? Why would he want her killed? She was so good to him.” She cocked her head. “No, I can’t imagine that.” Dahl drew the tissue under her nose and shuddered before continuing. “He’s tight and he can come off as a letch sometimes, like when Rachel called him last weekend, but Frank’s harmless.”

  “Wait a minute. Frank Schwartz came on to your friend Rachel?” Ray asked.

  “Frank just likes to kid around.”

  “Tell us about this phone call,” Waverly said.

  “It’s not important. She just called to see if he knew where Georgia was. He told Rachel he was at his cabin—that he hadn’t seen or spoken to Georgia in more than a week, then he started flirting with her. Typical Frank.”

  “What did that entail?”

  “Rachel didn’t really get into it, Detective Waverly. Anyway, Frank’s all talk.”

  “Unlike Dave Dunn,” Ray said. “From what we’ve been told, he follows through. Any chance you know who he had the affair with while he was married to Elena?”

  Dahl shook her head.

  “Does that mean you don’t know, or you don’t want to say?”

  “I have no idea who it was, Detective Schiller.”

  “Are you protecting someone—Rachel Beatty maybe?”

  Like they had a life of their own, her hands flew to her chest. “Are you kidding me? Where did that come from? Rachel wouldn’t sleep with Elena’s husband any more than I would.”

  “We can’t rule anyone out without looking at potential motives. And Rachel was skulking around outside of Elena’s house on Friday night”

  “Who told you that?”

  “That’s not important,” Ray said. “Any idea what she was doing there?”

  “I wouldn’t know. It’s probably not even true, and if it is, I’m sure she can explain it.”

  Their silence only ratcheted up her level of discomfort. Dahl rose and grabbed her coat. “I have to go. I have things to do.”

  “All right, I guess we can wrap it up here, Ms. Dahl. We appreciate your coming in.”

  She left in haste. They listened to the diminishing sound of her hurried footsteps as they traveled down the hall.

  “You can bet Dahl’s on her cell phone to Rachel Beatty this second, buddy.”

  “There’s nothing we can do about that.”

  Waverly shrugged. “It means we’ve lost the element of surprise. You wanna just call

  Beatty in to talk to us here?”

  “No, but maybe we shouldn’t give her a lot of time to perfect her story. Let’s go pay her a visit right now. We can swing by Dunn Motors on our way back and find out if he’s missing a vehicle from his inventory You can get your car when we’re done.”

  “Multi-tasking,” Waverly said. “I like it.”

  “Let’s go.”

  29

  At Rachel Beatty’s photography studio, the receptionist’s expression transformed at the sight of Ray and Waverly returning. Her eyes widened. Her chin dropped, parting her lips just enough for her to suck in a gasp loud enough to be overheard from several feet away. It occurred to Ray that if the woman ever played poker, she’d lose her shirt.

  She gave them a nervous smile. “Detectives Schiller and Waverly, you’re back.”

  “So it seems,” Ray said.

  Waverly leaned over the front edge of her desk and, in a low voice, said, “You can relax. We’re the good guys.”

  “What?” Her eyelids fluttered nervously. “Oh, yes. I know. I’m just not used to talking to detectives—homicide detectives at that.”

  “You don’t have anything to hide, do you?” Waverly said, only half joking.

  “It’s caffeine jitters, that’s all.”

  “Maybe you oughta switch to decaf,” he said.

  “I probably should.” She took a steadying breath and said, “Is Rachel expecting you?”

  “No,” Ray told her. “This is a spur-of-the-moment visit.”

  “Oh. Right now she’s in back, developing photos.”

  “Tell her we’re here, would you?”

  “Of course, Detective Schiller. Excuse me.” She hustled away looking over her shoulder as though she expected to see them following her.

  Waverly looked at Ray and shook his head. “I’m half tempted to run a background check on that one. I’ve seen felons surrounded by S.W.A.T. teams, who were less nervous than she is.”

  “It must be your overwhelming animal magnetism that’s getting to her.”

  “Yeah, sure. That’s gotta be it.” Waverly rolled his eyes and looked toward the back of the studio. “There’s Beatty.”

  She slipped off a pair of rubber gloves, removed a vinyl bib apron and tossed the items over a chair near the back. She looked Ray and Waverly over with a sullen gaze before approaching. The receptionist followed on her heels.

  “Lorraine said you wanted to see me.”

  “Yes.” Ray dismissed the receptionist with a simple “Thank you, Lorraine.” He saw the whites of Beatty’s eyes were red and wondered if that was the result of the chemicals she’s been using or the aftermath of hearing about Georgia Schwartz.? “Maybe we could use your office again,” he suggested.

  As she led the way, Ray interpreted the accentuated sway of her hips as more swagger than tease. Either way, it was very appealing.

  Beatty dropped into the chair behind her desk and crossed her arms—a virtual en garde in the absence of swords. Ray and Waverly didn’t stand on formality. Without waiting for an invitation, they took the seats they’d occupied two days earlier.

  Crossing an ankle over his knee, Ray said, “Am I sensing some hostility, Ms. Beatty, or am I misreading you?”

  “No, you’re reading me just fine. Did you expect a warm reception when I know why you’re here?”

  “We thought Christine Dahl might call you. Apparently, she did.”

  “Naturally,” she told Ray. “What kind of friend would she be if she hadn’t? She told me about the innuendos you were throwing around about me.”

  Waverly dove in head first. “Then she must’ve told you about Georgia Schwartz, too.”

  Her chin began to quiver. “Yes.” She reached behind her and yanked a tissue from a box. “I haven’t even had a chance to work my mind around that yet and here you are, ready to accuse me of … of I don’t even know what exactly.” She dabbed at the tear trailing down the apple of her cheek.

  “We have a few questions we need to ask, but that’s a far cry from making an accusation, Ms. Beatty,” Ray told her.

  “But you’ll work your way around to it, right?” Her lower lip jutted out in a subtle pout. “The sooner you ask me, the sooner I get to see you leave.”

  “Your attitude surprises me. One of your friends has been killed and another seriously injured. I’d think you’d be anxious to cooperate.”

  “I am,” she said, locking eyes with Ray. “But there’s nothing I know that can help you.”

  “Ms. Beatty, you’d be amazed how much we learn from people who swear they don’t know a thing.”

  “And then you use it against them.”

  “Only if we have good reason,” Waverly told her. “We’re trying to reach the right conclusion, not the quickest.”

  “Fine. Ask your questions.”

  Ray was happy to oblige her. He hadn’t been able to confirm Mrs. Dusek’s account yet, but he took a chance, saying, “A neighbor saw you creeping around outside Elena’s house Friday night. What you were doing there?”

  She re-crossed her arms from left over right to right over left. “First of all, I wasn’t creeping around the house. For the benefit of the Neighborhood Watch people, I stayed in full sight so they’d know I wasn’t up to anything illegal.”

  “Then you admit you were there,” Waverly said.

  “Yes, I was looking in the windows an
d tapping on the glass, hoping to get a response. But it wasn’t Friday night, it was Saturday. Whoever told you that got their days mixed up. And if what you told Christine is true, by that time Georgia was already…” Unable to finish the thought, she snatched another tissue from the box and blew her nose.

  Ray realized Harriet Dusek’s memory might be as faulty as her eyesight, but he didn’t intend to take Beatty’s claim as gospel talking to Dusek’s daughter.

  “If you looked through the windows,” Ray said, “why didn’t you see Georgia Schwartz’s body?”

  She crushed the tissue in a fist. “It was night, and the only light in the house was coming from the TV. Anyway, if I’d gone there to hurt Georgia, by Saturday I’d have been a day too late.” She disposed of the sodden tissue and plucked a fresh one from the box. “Georgia was my friend—a very good friend.” She captured another tear in the tissue.

  Waverly took another turn. “Didn’t it seem odd for the TV to be on if no one was home?”

  “Sometimes Elena leaves it turned on when she’s out. She says it’s more convincing than trying to fool burglars by leaving a couple of lights on.”

  “Why did you go there in the first place?” Ray asked.

  “I was looking for Elena and Georgia. I already told you that the last time you were here. After I literally bumped into you and Detective Waverly at Gluek’s, I drove to Elena’s place.”

  “But you didn’t find either of them,” Waverly said.

  “No. Georgia’s Audi was parked at the curb, but no one answered the door, so I got a little worried and started looking through the windows.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us you saw her car there? We’d have discovered her body days earlier.”

  “I assumed Elena and Georgia had gone off somewhere together using Elena’s car. I didn’t think much of it.”

  “Walk us through everything from the beginning,” Waverly said.

  “Fine. On Saturday morning I texted Elena a couple of times, but she didn’t get back to me. At one point, her mother called to see if I knew where she was. Jeanette was waiting for Elena to take her to an appointment, but she hadn’t shown up. I thought she was probably just avoiding her mom, which would be understandable, so it didn’t worry me.” Beatty bit her lip. “Sorry. I know that probably sounds awfully bitchy, but her mother isn’t one of my favorite people.”

  “I doubt she’s anybody’s favorite person,” Waverly mumbled. “Go on.”

  “I started getting concerned later when I still hadn’t heard from Elena.” She held up a finger. “Wait. Let me find my phone.” She shoved a few papers aside. “Here it is. I can show you the last text I sent to her.” Beatty located the message and handed the cell phone to Waverly. “Look for yourself. You can see I sent the text on Saturday at six thirty-two.”

  Ray leaned closer and he and Waverly read it at the same time. Hi. Can’t reach U or Georgia either. R U 2 bumming around together? Text me, OK?

  Waverly handed the phone back to her. “Obviously she didn’t reply, so then what?”

  “I already told you Georgia and I had made tentative plans for Sunday, but I hadn’t heard back from her about that. I went looking for Georgia and Elena at the bar, thinking I might be able to see both of them. When they weren’t there, I called Frank, Georgia’s ex. I told you about that.”

  “Actually, you didn’t. Frank Schwartz mentioned it, so did your friend Christine,” Ray said. “This is the first time you’ve brought it up. Why is that?”

  “I thought I already had.” She set the cell phone back on her desk. “It wasn’t important anyway. As a last resort, I thought I’d check to see if Frank had any idea where Georgia was.”

  “And?” Waverly said.

  “He didn’t have a clue. Frank told me he hadn’t seen or talked to her in a while.”

  “We heard he propositioned you,” Waverly said. “What’s that about?”

  She closed her eyes and sighed. “Sometimes Christine talks too much. He was only joking.”

  “You’re sure about that?”

  “Yes.” The word came out of her mouth with an aggravated hiss. “Frank told me he was at his cabin, fishing. He kidded about how most of his live bait had sacrificed their lives for nothin and suggested that I come up and join him. He said if I wasn’t into fishing, the two of us could release the surviving minnows back into their natural habitat—sort of an aquatic version of Born Free.”

  “His idea of charm?” Waverly muttered. “What did you tell him?”

  “I told him no, of course. I kept it light and said I wasn’t the outdoorsy type, so he suggested we could come up with some entertaining indoor activities. I said that unless he was talking about board games, I’d have to pass—that he’d have to free the minnows on his own. I wished him a nice trip back to the Cities, and that was it. Now, can you tell me why I would bother to bring that up?”

  Ray looked her in the eye and said, “Is Frank Schwartz a player?”

  She laughed. “The man’s all talk. If anyone ever took him up on his advances, he’d probably have a heart attack.”

  “What can you tell us about the Schwartz’s relationship?” Waverly asked.

  She fidgeted. “Frankly, I don’t feel comfortable talking about my friends. First you wanted details about Dave and Elena, and today you’re prying into Frank and Georgia’s personal business.”

  “Look, Ms. Beatty,” Ray said, “Elena Dunn is in a coma and Georgia Schwartz is in the morgue. It could be Frank Schwartz who put them there. Do you really think either of them would object to you cooperating with us?”

  She pressed the tissue to the corners of her eyes. “All right, I’ll tell you what I can, but I think you’re wasting your time. Their marriage seemed to get off to a good start, but Frank pulled a bait-and-switch routine on her later. He stopped wining and dining her and pulled the reins in hard. That didn’t go over well.”

  “So she was a gold digger,” Waverly said.

  Her eyes widened. “No. No, no, no. Most people leap to that conclusion, but that wasn’t Georgia at all.”

  “What was?” Ray asked.

  She moved forward in her seat and rested her forearms on the desk between them. “Georgia grew up poor. She married young—at seventeen or eighteen, I think she said. Apparently her husband wasn’t much better off than she was, but at some point, he received a small inheritance from some relative.. He used the money to start his own business and wound up making a fortune. He died of an aneurysm a few years later and left everything to Georgia.

  She married him before the money ever came into the picture. Most people assume it was the other way around.”

  “What about her second husband?” Waverly asked.

  “Thanks to the inheritance from her first husband, she was well-off before she met the second. He was wealthy in his own right.”

  “What happened to him?” Ray asked.

  “She left him.” A smile flitted across Beatty’s face. “Georgia was a great kidder. She told me she couldn’t stand him looking better in her clothes than she did.”

  “He was a cross dresser?” Waverly asked.

  Beatty nodded. “Surprise! She said he moved out of the country and got remarried— probably to someone who didn’t mind him sharing her lingerie.”

  “And then,” Waverly surmised, “Frank Schwartz came along, and she decided to try a third time.”

  “Actually, Georgia wasn’t anxious to do that. She kept Frank at arm’s length for quite a while, but he wouldn’t let up. She was vulnerable at the time, and I think he took advantage of that. He finally wore her down. Again, it wasn’t about the money… not for her.” Beatty shrugged. “I think Georgia could’ve been happy living in a hut, if it came to that. That’s just how she was.”

  “Wait a second,” Waverly said. “If she wasn’t all about the money to her, what difference did it make that Frank turned off the cash spigot when she had plenty of loot herself?”

  “Georgia gave most of he
r cash to him.”

  Waverly narrowed his eyes. “What?”

  “Frank was scrambling, trying to keep his business afloat. Georgia stepped up, got him out of debt and helped turn things around. It took almost everything she had to do it, but once the money started coming into Frank’s business again, he took the stance that it was his, and he didn’t want Georgia spending it.”

  “How’d she handle that?” Ray asked.

  “She divorced him… not so much over the money itself, but because he wasn’t the man she thought she’d married.”

  The room fell silent for several moments.

  “Let’s go back,” Ray said. “You were telling us about Saturday. After you talked with Frank by phone, then what?”

  “Like I said, that’s when I drove over to Elena’s to see if she came home. Georgia’s car when I got there, but no one answered the door.”

  “So that’s when you went snooping around, looking through the windows,” Waverly said.

  “You know,” she told him, “your choice of words could use some work. I wasn’t creeping around the house and I wasn’t snooping either. By that time, after not hearing from either of them, I was getting a little worried, but when I didn’t see either of them, I assumed the two of them drove off somewhere in Elena’s car.”

  “And you didn’t see Georgia’s body lying on the floor?”

  “Detective Waverly, I’ve already explained that. It was dark out and the only light inside was from the TV. How much would you expect me to be able to see? Anyway, Dave called me as I was about to leave.”

  “Dave Dunn?” Ray asked.

  “Yes.”

  “What did he want?”

  “He was upset. He said Elena and Nathan hadn’t been at home when he went to get him that morning. She hadn’t answered any of his messages, and he’d been trying to contact her all day. He hoped I’d know where she was.”

  Calling Rachel Beatty could have been a good way to create a cover story for himself and Ray dog-eared that possibility in his head. “What else did he say?”

  “That he was going to file a parental abduction report. That took me by complete surprise. I told him that, given a little more time, Elena was bound to show up with a reasonable explanation. I finally got him to agree to wait until the next day. On Sunday after he filed the report, he called to tell me what he’d found out about Elena and Nathan. Now Georgia is…” She stopped and raised the tissue to her eyes. “I don’t understand any of this.”