“Ms. Davidson.” She held out her hand. “My name is Monica Dean. I’m Teresa Yost’s sister.”
“Ms. Dean.” I took her hand. All the emotions of a woman with a missing sister were present and accounted for. She was scared and grief-stricken and sick with worry. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“I’m sorry.” She pushed her sunglasses up nervously. “My brother said not to talk to you.”
“Yeah, I don’t think he appreciated my visit yesterday. Can you come in?” I gestured toward the back of Dad’s bar. The wind bit through my jacket, nipping at me like an elderly Chihuahua.
“Of course,” she said, pulling her coat tighter. “And my brother doesn’t know what to think of your visit. He was quite taken with you.”
“Really?” I started for the bar. “I got the feeling he wanted to put me in a choke hold and insist I say uncle repeatedly.” That’s it! A professional wrestler! “I’m so sorry about your sister,” I added, steering my thoughts back around. But seriously, I would rock as a wrestler. I’d have to get a tan, though. And maybe veiny muscles.
“Thank you.”
Health insurance would be good, too.
I turned on lights as we entered the back of Dad’s establishment, though the illuminated kitchen told me Sammy was already in prepping for the dinner crowd. My dad’s bar was a cross between an Irish pub and a Victorian brothel. The main room had a cathedral ceiling with dark woods and hundred-year-old ironwork that crested the walls like ancient crown molding. It spiraled around and lured the eye to the west wall, where a glorious wrought-iron elevator loomed tall and proud. The kind you see only in movies and very old hotels. The kind with all its mechanisms and pulleys open for its audience to enjoy. The kind that took from here to eternity to get its occupants to the second floor. Framed pictures, medals, and banners from various law enforcement events covered every available surface with the original mahogany bar to the right of us.
“Want some coffee?” I asked, gesturing for her to sit at one of the corner booths. Monica looked half-starved, her hands shaking with grief and fatigue. I figured if we sat down here, we could get Sammy to whip us up something. “I was just about to have breakfast if you’d like to join me.”
The back door crashed open, and a very unhappy man named Luther Dean stormed inside. “You can’t be serious,” he said, glaring at his sister.
She took a seat and blew out a long breath, expelling such a deep, abysmal sadness when she did so that I felt consumed by it. I filled my lungs to ease the weight and ducked behind the bar for coffee.
“I’ve done my research,” she said to her brother. “She’s very good at her job.”
He glanced over a massive shoulder toward me. “She doesn’t look very good at it. She has a black eye.”
“I beg your pardon,” I said, feigning offense. He was funny.
“Luther, sit down.” Monica took off her sunglasses and offered him a glower of annoyance when he didn’t comply. “I told you, she can help us. So, either behave yourself or leave. It’s your decision.”
He jerked a chair out from a nearby table and sat down. “She called me an asshole.”
“You are an asshole.”
I grinned and brought over three coffee cups, realizing how much fun this conversation was going to be. Thirty minutes later, we were polishing off an amazing rendition of huevos rancheros with green chile enchiladas on the side. God I loved Sammy. I’d considered marrying him, but his wife got upset when I asked for his hand.
“What makes you so trustworthy?” Luther asked, his icy-blue glare particularly brutal. He took skeptic to a whole new level. “I mean, you’re working for Nathan. Why should we believe anything you have to say?”
“Actually, I’m not,” I said, hoping they’d believe anything I had so say, “and why don’t you trust your sister’s husband?” We had yet to actually talk about the case. I decided to lull them into a false sense of security, which would have gone over better had I not stolen the last bite off Luther’s plate. He was very touchy about his food.
Still, I could tell he was coming around. They exchanged glances.
With a sigh of resignation, Monica admitted, “No reason whatsoever.” She shrugged. “He’s perfect. The perfect husband. The perfect brother-in-law. He’s just…”
“Too perfect?” I offered.
“Exactly,” Luther said. “And there were things, instances, that just didn’t quite make sense.”
“Like?”
He glanced at his sister, getting her approval before explaining. “Teresa invited us out to eat one night a couple of months ago when Nathan was out of town, just the three of us.”
“She seemed concerned about something,” Monica said, and I could’ve sworn I felt a pang of guilt assault her. “She told us she took out a huge life insurance policy on both her and Nathan, and that if anything were to happen to her, anything at all, we would get it all.”
“So she took it out?” I asked. “Not Nathan?”
I felt it again. A quiver, a tremble of guilt emanating from Monica as she replied, “Exactly. I’m not even sure Nathan knows about it.”
“She wanted us to know where the policy was,” Luther added. “She made sure of it.”
Monica produced a key. “She even put us down as her beneficiaries on her bank account so we would have access to her safety deposit box where she kept it.”
“That does sound odd,” I said, fighting to ignore the bells going off in my head. Was she afraid of her husband? Did she think her life was in danger? “How big was the policy?”
“Two million dollars,” Luther said. “Each.”
“Holy mother of crap.” I was ever the wordsmith. “Is that even possible?”
“Apparently,” Monica said.
Luther crossed his arms over his chest. “The policy was his idea. It had to be. Why would Teresa take out such a big policy? He had her do it to make himself look good.”
“We don’t know that,” Monica said.
“Please.” He scooted back in his chair, irritated. “Everything that man does is to make himself look good. That’s what he’s all about. Looking good. Presenting the perfect picture for his hordes of fans.”
I had to agree with him, from what I’d seen so far anyway. “Anything else?” I asked.
“Nothing I can think of.” Monica wiped the wetness from her eyes, and that was when I noticed the odd coloring around them, the unnatural puffiness and the yellowish tint lining her mouth. The mystery of her sister’s whereabouts was overwhelming for her, the not knowing, and … the guilt. “She did mention that Nathan was spending more and more time at home with her, refusing to go to conferences and getting furious if he was called to the hospital in the evenings. I think she felt smothered.”
“Did she say that to you?”
“Not in so many words,” she said, shaking her head. “But she said he did strange things.”
“Like what?” Luther asked. “She never told me that.”
“Because she couldn’t.” Monica offered him a frown. “You fly off the handle for the most ridiculous reasons, we can’t tell you anything.”
Luther’s jaw muscles flexed in reaction, and I could feel guilt assault him as well, but his stemmed from shame. Monica’s was deeper and full of regret. And she said we. We can’t tell you anything.
He seemed to force himself to calm down, then asked, “What did she say?”
Monica appraised her coffee cup as she thought back. “She said he would do strange things like wake her up in the middle of the night, scaring her on purpose, and then just laugh. And one time he said her dog got run over by a car. She cried for two days. Then, out of the blue, he showed up with it. Said he’d been picked up by the pound. But she’d checked the pound. They never picked him up.” She looked at me and shrugged. “He just did odd stuff like that all the time.”
Everything he did was a form of manipulation. Simply put, he was an extreme control freak, a very unhealthy habit.
Still, I needed to get Monica alone. Clearly there were things she couldn’t say in front of her brother. I freshened their coffees, mentally calculating how much java his bladder could hold. He was a big guy, but hopefully he’d need a potty break soon.
“Nathan never was the sharpest scalpel on the instrument tray,” he said. “He passed medical school with a C average. Would you want a surgeon who scraped by medical school with a C average?”
“Not hardly.” Though I doubted the legitimacy of such a claim, the thought was admittedly terrifying. I turned to Monica. “Can I ask why you were here yesterday morning? I hadn’t even talked to Nathan yet.”
She lowered her head, embarrassed. “I didn’t realize you saw me.” She drew in a ragged breath. “I’ve been following him. He was in front of the bar, talking on the phone when you walked past.”
“So you didn’t know who I was?”
“No, not at first. When he told me he’d hired a private detective, I looked you up.”
Luther tapped an index finger on the table. “And he hired you to make himself look good, I’m telling you.”
The guy was clearly smarter than he appeared. “He told me you two don’t really get along with Teresa.”
Monica’s jaw fell open. “He said that?” She was appalled.
“See,” Luther said. “See what he’s doing?”
I watched as tears shimmered in Monica’s eyes again, but now she was angry. She leaned into me, the spitfire in her surfacing. “He’s tried to keep us apart for the last two years. He’s so jealous of us, it’s unreal. We’re sisters, for God’s sake.”
Luther nodded. “Chalk that up to one of those strange things Monica told you about. He says things, makes up shit, does everything in his power to keep us away from Teresa.”
“He’s so controlling,” Monica agreed. “That fact alone raised a red flag when they began dating, but Teresa just wouldn’t listen.”
“The more we talked, the less she listened.”
“I can imagine,” I said. “I have a sister, too.”
“And then,” Monica said, her head tilting to the side in befuddlement, “he’ll be so sweet to her. He buys her gifts all the time, brings her flowers, makes sure her favorite sparkling water is on hand at all times. Citrus flavored.”
“In other words, he smothers her,” I said, coming back around to Monica’s original assessment.
“Exactly.” She nodded. “I think it all really bothers Teresa. She doesn’t even drink the water anymore. Hasn’t for months. But she doesn’t tell him, because I drink it.” She grinned then, her smile soft and sincere. “He gets so jealous of our time together, so we meet secretly every weekday and walk through the mountains, supposedly exercising. But really we just talk.” She chuckled to herself then. “And drink his stupid flavored water.”
“So, she doesn’t work?” I asked.
“Oh, no,” she answered as though what I’d asked was ludicrous. “He wouldn’t have it.”
“See?” Luther’s hands curled into fists. “Nuts. I promise, if he did anything to her, he’s a dead man.”
Between the insurance and the bizarre behavior, I was surprised the good doctor was still alive with a brother-in-law like Luther. And Yost knew that. He would know better than to implicate himself in any way. He would’ve known he’d never make it to trial if there was any suspicion of his guilt, so whatever he did, he did it well. He’d have to make it look like an accident, but Teresa’s car was still at the house. And a kidnapping was only as good as the ransom it demanded. With no demand, an abduction would be only slightly less suspicious than a knife in her chest and blood on his hands.
But right now, I needed both Luther and Monica off his back. If he knew they were watching, he would never revisit the crime scene. “Give me a dollar,” I said to him.
He wrinkled his brows. “Why?”
I rethought my demand. “That’s a good question. You’re loaded. Give me a twenty.”
He exhaled, then fished a twenty out of his wallet.
“Now I’m working for you.”
“You’re cheap.”
“This is a retainer,” I said, showing him the twenty he just handed me. “Add a few zeros, and you have my daily rate. You’ll get a bill. It will be large.” I had to pay for my wrestling career somehow.
“I already have a guy on Yost. He won’t leave his side, and I promise you, Yost won’t know.” I wasn’t about to tell them he was a departed teenage gangbanger. “If the doctor does anything suspicious, my guy will let me know. And I have my assistant looking into his background as we speak. If there’s anything that doesn’t fit, we’ll find it.”
“So, you were already investigating him?” Luther asked, surprised.
“I told you, I’m out to find your sister, and since spouses are almost always the main suspects in disappearances, then yes, I’m already investigating him.” I leaned in and added, “Like I would be you if you were a suspect.”
Monica asked, “Are the cops looking in the same direction you are? Does the FBI consider him a suspect?”
“Hon, the FBI considers everyone a suspect,” I said, answering her question without actually giving her any information. I had to admit, with a brother-in-law like Luther Dean, I was a little surprised the doctor would pull something like this. Maybe, for some reason, he was desperate. And again, desperate men did desperate things. Which did not bode well for Teresa Yost.
The spark of hope that ignited inside Monica humbled me. She seemed to have a lot of faith in my abilities.
“There a restroom in this place?” Luther asked at last, glancing around the bar.
“Right through there.” I pointed to the men’s room and watched as he strolled in that direction. A little because I wanted to make sure he was out of hearing range when I asked Monica my next question, but mostly because he had a nice ass.
When he pushed past the door, I turned to her. “Okay, we only have a few seconds. What are you not telling me?”
Her eyes widened in surprise. “I don’t understand.”
“Tick-tock,” I said, glancing back at the men’s room. With any luck, Luther practiced basic hygiene, but one just never knew with guys. Offering Monica a sympathetic gaze, I said, “I can see the burden of guilt you carry.” When she blinked and lowered her head, I added, “I won’t say a word, Monica. Whatever it is. I just need to know all the angles of this case.”
Her mouth thinned into a sad line, and she said reluctantly, “Luther doesn’t know this, but I’m sick.”
I thought she might be. Her skin had a yellowish, unhealthy tint as did her nails with the exception of the white lines spanning them in horizontal rows. But I wasn’t sure why that would conjure the guilt I’d been picking up on. “I’m sorry, but—”
She shook her head. “No, Luther doesn’t know for a reason. When our mother died…” She stopped to touch a tissue to her eyes before planting her gaze back on me. “He took it very hard, Charley. She was sick for a long time, and when she passed…”
After a moment, I placed a hand over hers, encouraging her to continue.
She turned it over and laced her fingers into mine gratefully, then leaned into me and whispered, “He tried to kill himself.”
To say I was shocked would be an understatement of the highest form. My jaw dropped before I could catch it, and Monica saw.
“I know. We were all surprised. He just took her death so hard.”
I glanced once again toward the bathroom. With the coast clear, I asked, “Is he getting help?”
“Yes. Well, he was. He’s doing so much better.”
“I’m so glad. May I ask what you have?”
“You can ask all you want,” she said, a sad smile sliding across her face. “The doctors don’t know. I’ve been diagnosed with everything from chronic fatigue syndrome to Hutchinson’s disease, and nothing ever pans out. I just keep getting sicker and nobody knows why.”
Luther was headed back toward us when I asked one mo
re question, “Monica, why would your being sick make you feel guilty about Teresa’s disappearance?”
She pressed her mouth together as guilt washed over her again. “The insurance. There was a clinic in Sweden Teresa was looking into, lots of breakthroughs. I think she took out the insurance for me, so I could go to Sweden.” As Luther neared, she leaned into me and said quickly, “He can’t know that I’m sick.”
I gave her hand a quick squeeze before we broke apart. As Luther sat back down, my dad strolled in through the front door, and I had to hustle to put my sunglasses back on.
“Hey, Dad,” I said with a big smile. “These are my clients, Monica and Luther.”
“Nice to meet you.” His voice and posture were nice enough, but his innards were not the happy camper type. They were more like a disgruntled bear who tried to eat the happy camper only to find the happy camper was a champion sprinter. He bent down to kiss my cheek. “Have you given any thought to what we talked about earlier?”
“Do elephants glow in the dark?”
“You can take off your glasses,” he said, a look of disappointment lining his weathered face. “Your uncle Bob already told me.”
I gasped. “Uncle Bob ratted me out?”
“I’d like to talk to you later, if you have a minute.”
“I’m pretty booked today,” I said, sunglasses still on my smiling face, “but I can try to come down in a bit.”
“I’d appreciate that. I’ll leave you to your business.” He nodded to Luther and Monica, then strode away to his office.
After questioning the Deans a little while longer, I said good-bye and took the stairs up to the office two at a time, excited to share the latest with Cookie. Was this an insurance scam? Surely Dr. Yost found out about the policy his wife took out. Maybe he saw it as an opportunity. I needed his financial records. But for that I needed a subpoena. No, I needed Agent Carson.
I started across the balcony that looked down into the bar. My office was just past the elaborate iron elevator, but the little girl with the knife stood blocking the way. I stepped around her and inside my office.
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