by Kylie Logan
The convoluted logic made my head spin, and I shook it and gave the detective a look.
“So, you think I’m that coldhearted person?”
Even here in the morgue, Gus had a toothpick in his mouth. He rolled it from one side of his mouth to the other. “I doubt it, but I’ve seen stranger things. Though now that we know Ms. Cohan was in town with Ms. Kellogg here—”
“You think I killed her?” Corrine spit out the words. “Why would I . . . ? How could I . . . ?” Still blubbering, she pushed out the door and went into the hallway.
Gus rocked back on his heels. “Did I accuse her of anything?”
“Being told you might be a murderer tends to make people feel a little testy,” I reminded him.
He had the good grace to look sheepish. Which for Gus with his wide nose, his heavy brows, and his flapping jowls, is no easy thing. “You know I have to cover all my bases,” he said. “So let’s get something else out of the way. You say you saw Ms. Cohan in the restaurant sometime Friday evening.”
“That’s right.”
“So she either left and came back. Or she hid somewhere and stayed in the restaurant until after the rest of you were gone. So let’s look at possibility number one. If she did come back, how did Ms. Cohan get into the Terminal?”
I slanted him a look. “There were no signs of a forced entry, were there?” I already knew the answer but it doesn’t hurt to get official confirmation. “So that leaves possibility number two. She could have—”
“Hidden somewhere and waited until the rest of you were gone for the night?” His lips pursed, Gus nodded. “Exactly what I was thinking.”
“We have the rooms upstairs we use for storage,” I said to no one in particular since Declan and Gus both knew about the upstairs rooms where we kept things like extra paper products and clean linens. “She could have snuck up there when no one was looking.”
All the while we talked, we’d slowly been making our way to the door and once we stepped out into the hallway, I looked at Corrine where she was leaning against the wall, my voice and my look oh so casual. “Did Meghan say anything to you, Corrine? When she called you Friday night?”
“She called you Friday night?” This was news to Gus, and exactly why I mentioned it. “Are you withholding evidence, Ms. Kellogg?”
In spite of her swollen eyes and her red nose, Corrine looked as pale as death. “Evidence? Me? I don’t know a thing. Yes, she called. Meghan called. She told me she’d be back at the hotel in a couple hours and she expected me to have a hot bath run for her and a hot cup of tea made for her and she said she’d let me know when she was on her way.”
“Only she never called and told you she was on her way,” Declan pointed out.
Corrine nodded.
“And you didn’t think that was odd?” I asked her.
“You know Meghan!” She lifted her chin. “I imagined she’d stopped at some dive bar, met some guy. I figured she’d show up sooner or later.”
“Only she didn’t.” Leave it to Gus to point out the obvious.
“No, she didn’t.” Corrine’s shoulders slumped. “Only none of that is evidence, is it? And none of it is important. None of it tells you who killed Meghan so . . . so it’s not exactly like I’ve been withholding evidence because there was nothing to withhold.” When she looked up at Gus, her eyes were pleading. “Right?”
Before Gus ever had a chance to respond, a sound rolled our way from the direction of the lobby, where we’d left all those reporters. It wasn’t a hum exactly. It was more of a buzz, like the noise made by a swarm of agitated bees.
It didn’t start out quiet and gain in intensity. It was loud from the start and soon, it was punctuated by the sound of first one voice, then another, raised to be heard above the din.
Questions.
One after another, the reporters called out questions, and what with all the commotion, I couldn’t tell if those questions were getting answered or not.
The next second, the double doors that separated us from all those reporters flew open and a man strode into the hallway with each and every one of those reporters right on his heels. He was dressed in slim-fitting jeans that made the most of his trim body. His golf shirt was as blindingly white as his teeth. The shirt was open at the neck to reveal a shock of inky chest hair and a glint of the gold chain he wore around his neck. He had thick, rugged features, hair that was darker even than Declan’s, and a gleam in his eye that would have fulfilled any casting director’s dreams if that person happened to be looking for someone to play the part of a handsome Italian race-car driver.
Benito Gallo’s gaze swung around touching on Gus and Declan and moving to Corrine. In the one second he kept it there, I heard her breath catch, but he didn’t give her a chance to say a word. His gaze moved right on and his eyes landed on me. He threw his hands in the air and his voice rang through the hallway.
“Ciao, bella!”
* * *
• • •
THE DOORS WERE still wide open and all those reporters were looking at us and all those cameras were aimed at us when Ben rushed forward and kissed both my cheeks.
“You are here! I am so . . . happy, it is not the word. Relieved. Yes, yes. I am so relieved!” Just for good measure—or to make sure the paparazzi got his best side—he gave my right cheek another kiss. “I am so . . . how do you say it? . . . comforted. I am so comforted knowing you, Laurel, are here at Meghan’s side at this difficult moment.”
It took a second for me to make my head stop spinning and, believe me, it had nothing to do with Ben Gallo’s kisses. Oh sure, he was gorgeous, successful, and a household name, at least in those households that knew anything about auto racing. But he’d also lived in the good ol’ USA for as long as anyone could remember.
Since when had Ben Gallo suddenly become so downright Italian?
The answer hit, and in spite of the time and the place and the reason we were standing outside the door of the morgue, I couldn’t help but grin at the audacity of the man. According to the reports in all the tabloids and on all the news channels, Ben had just recently married Italian countess Adalina Crocetti, jet-setting fashionista with a family lineage that went back to the Caesars and a bank account that made even Meghan’s look puny.
In his own way, Ben was as much a publicity hound as Meghan ever was. Now that he had an official attachment to Italian aristocracy—not to mention the prestige, the estates, the vineyards, and the fortune—he was going to play up being Italian for all he was worth.
As if to prove what I was thinking, he looped an arm around my shoulders, pasted a sad expression on his face, and posed for one more picture.
That is, before he instructed the deputy to shut the door on the drooling paparazzi.
Once that was done, Ben breathed a sigh of relief.
“I can’t believe it. Can somebody explain to me what is going on here? Because I heard the news and I just do not . . . I cannot . . .” He hauled in a breath. “It cannot be true.”
“It is, Ben.” Corrine stepped forward and touched a hand to his arm. “Meghan, she’s . . . it’s true. She’s dead.”
He put a hand over his eyes and his shoulders heaved.
“You’re Ben Gallo.” Gus spoke the words like he was afraid someone was going to accuse him of being wrong and when Ben looked over at him and nodded, it was Gus’s turn to breathe a sigh of relief. “We’re going to need to talk to you.”
“Of course.” Ben slipped his arm off my shoulders and stepped back. “And me, I know what you are going to ask. What am I doing here? I heard, of course. About Meghan. It is all over the news. You must be with the polizia.” Ben said this last bit to Declan and I wasn’t surprised. Even in his jeans and with a plaid button-down open over a dark T-shirt, Declan looked more like a representative of law enforcement than Gus in his ill-fitting beige spor
t coat, his brown pants, and a cream-colored shirt with gravy stains on it.
Declan pointed a finger at Gus.
Ben didn’t apologize. But then, like Meghan, Ben never apologized for anything. “I know you are going to ask about my relationship with Meghan,” he said to Gus. “We had our . . . help me out here, Laurel, how do I say this? Differences? Yes, we had our differences.” He didn’t give me a chance to say that was an understatement to anyone who ever read the tabloids and especially to me, who over the years had seen Ben and Meghan interact with each other. “But she is the mother of my only child.”
“Spencer.” Corrine filled in the details.
“Then that’s how you know Mr. Gallo.” It wasn’t really a question, but I couldn’t blame Declan for trying to make sense of the situation. He wasn’t used to the complexities of Hollywood marriages, Hollywood relationships, Hollywood divorces.
“Ben and Meghan were divorced long before I started working for Meghan,” I told him. “But we’ve met.”
Ben nodded.
“He used to come to visit Spencer,” I said. “So naturally we know each other.”
“And you were what . . . just around the corner when you heard about Ms. Cohan’s murder?” Gus asked.
Ben’s smile was dazzling. “Racing,” he said. “Near Pittsburgh, so I was not so very far away. What happened to Meghan, it is una cosa orribile, no? When I saw the news on the televisione this morning, I could not stay away. I had to be here. I had to know this was real. And if you need someone to identify the body . . .”
“Ms. Inwood and Ms. Kellogg have already taken care of that,” Gus told him. “But if you’d like to see Ms. Cohan . . .”
Ben’s shoulders rose and fell. “No. No. I do not think so. I had to make the offer, yes? But I am relieved you do not need me. Me, I would rather remember Meghan as she was last time I saw her, so beautiful. So talented. So full of life. What happens . . . what happens now?”
“Well, that all depends on Ms. Cohan’s will,” Gus said. He looked from Ben to Corrine. “Do either of you know anything about that?”
“Not me.” Like someone just yelled, Stick ’em up! Ben put his hands in the air.
“It has been many years, Detective, sir, since Meghan shared information of that kind with me.”
“She had a will.” Corrine stepped forward. “There are copies at home, of course, and Meghan’s attorney will have one as well. I can provide you with his information.”
“Let’s make the call to that attorney now.” Gus went down the hallway and stepped into the coroner’s office.
Which left me and Declan with Ben.
“So . . .” I knew Ben well enough to know that while he was about as unsubtle as a tornado, he didn’t respond well when other people acted the same way. Still, I had to take a chance. “You just happened to be within driving distance when Meghan was murdered?”
He blinked. Pulled back his shoulders. Gave me a careful look.
“What you are saying to me, Laurel?”
I rolled my eyes. “Cut the Italian act! There aren’t any reporters around right now and lucky for you, Gus isn’t here, either. Would you rather have him ask the question? He’s going to, you know. It’s his job. You might as well practice your answer on me. So, tell me, did you have any reason to kill Meghan?”
Ben looked as flash-frozen as Meghan had when I found her body that morning.
Well, except for the fact that his jaw flapped open.
“Why would I kill her? We’ve been divorced since just after Spencer was born, and that was sixteen years ago.”
“But once upon a time, you were in love and then you weren’t. That kind of closeness breeds plenty of emotions and emotions can turn ugly.”
“Don’t be so naive, Laurel.” Ben’s laugh wasn’t as pleasant as it was cynical. “You act like Meghan and I are the only two people in the world who’ve ever gotten divorced. Hey, we were married, and what happens to every marriage? We were crazy in love for a while, we had Spencer. But then she got that role that turned her into a star, and she got wrapped up with her career, and I got busy with mine, and . . .” His shrug pretty much said it all. “We got divorced. End of story.”
“But you still keep in touch with your son?”
“Of course.” Offended by Declan’s question, Ben shot him a look. “Spencer’s got some problems. Sure. Everyone knows that. But deep down, he’s a great kid. And I’ve got a good relationship with him. He’s my son. I had a great relationship with Meghan, too, just in case you’re wondering.”
He must have forgotten who he was talking to.
I cleared my throat, the better to get his attention. “That’s not exactly how I remember things. The last time I saw you two together in Maui, you fought like you’d been divorced ten minutes, not ten years.”
“That was what . . . more than a year ago.” Like a magician who could make it disappear, Ben dismissed my observation with a wave of one hand. “You’ve been out of Meghan’s life for a while now, Laurel. You don’t know what happened between us since then. We realized we’ve got Spencer to worry about. He’s more important than our squabbling. Ask anyone. Meghan and I, we’ve been getting along pretty well these days. Ask what’s her name, Corrine, she’ll tell you.”
I couldn’t help but remember the backbiting and the bitter fights. Every time Ben showed up to visit Spencer (which actually wasn’t all that often), things between Meghan and Ben went from bad to worse—fast. “I’ve seen you two together. It’s pretty hard to believe.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t say we were best friends. I said we realized we had to work together if we were going to help Spencer. Truth be told . . .” Again, he looked toward the double doors. They were still closed. “The truth is, it didn’t take me and Meghan long after we were married to realize we didn’t like each other very much. Meghan was self-centered, egotistical, mean, and stingy.”
“You hated her.” I knew my observation hit the mark when Ben winced, so I pressed it further.
“Did you hate her enough to kill her?” I asked.
Ben sucked in a breath, then erupted like Vesuvius. Color washed over his cheeks. His hands curled into fists. “How dare you?” he demanded.
Right before he stormed out of the building, muttering in Italian just as he got to those double doors.
Chapter 8
I had a lot to think about.
Corrine.
Ben.
Meghan, of course.
And the fact that though Gus admitted that he didn’t really think I’d killed her, it was a very real possibility and he couldn’t ignore it completely.
Obviously, my brain should have been working overtime.
It was.
Only not on the mystery.
All that evening back at the Terminal, all I could think about was what Ben had said at the coroner’s office.
“And what happens to every marriage? We were crazy in love for a while . . . We got divorced. End of story.”
Was that really how love and marriage worked?
I, obviously, was not the one to answer the question, no matter how often or how persistently it pounded through my head. Throughout my time in foster care, I’d been moved from family to family and home to home, and I’d seen it all—squabbles and fights, cold shoulders and hot tempers, resentment and cruelty and greed. I’d never once seen the crazy-in-love part.
Maybe that’s because it doesn’t exist.
“You look preoccupied.” I hadn’t heard the door to the Terminal office open, and when Declan walked in, I sat up like a shot and pressed a hand to my heart.
“Sorry.” He put a hand on my shoulder. “I should have knocked. Sophie told me you were in here, but I should have known you’d be deep in thought. It’s the murder, right? I know, it’s got me baffled, too.”
Since he had
given me the perfect out, it would have been rude of me to point out that Meghan’s murder had been the last thing on my mind.
“None of it makes any sense,” I told him instead. And who knows, maybe I was still talking about love and marriage!
Declan sat in the guest chair. “You think Ben had anything to do with it?”
Before I’d fallen into a deep reverie about love and marriage, I actually had been thinking about the case, and I touched a hand to the computer keyboard, and the webpage I’d been looking at popped up on the screen.
“Meghan’s home page,” I said. There was still no announcement of Meghan’s death on it, just a picture of her on the red carpet at last year’s Academy Awards. She was dressed in gold lace, her hair was perfect, and her smile was dazzling.
She looked nothing at all like the frozen corpse I’d found that morning.
Just thinking about it caused me to shiver, and I wrapped my arms around myself. “It’s all the usual PR hype. It does mention that she was once married to Ben, and it mentions Spencer, too. But the rest of it . . .” I made a face. “Not very helpful.”
“How about her early life?” Declan leaned closer to get a better look at the computer screen. “Does it say anything about where she was born or where she went to school?”
I went back to the page and scanned it. “All it talks about is a prestigious New York acting school and how she went from there to her first big break in None Are Waiting.”
Declan’s top lip curled. “I never liked that movie.”
“I’ve never seen it,” I admitted, and as long as I was in confession mode, I added, “I’ve never seen any of Meghan’s movies.”
“Really?” He cocked his head and studied me. “How did you get away with that?”
“I saw her every day, in person. In my book, that was enough. Oh, I’ve seen bits and pieces, you know a clip on a news show, or a scene before she was interviewed by Oprah or somebody like that. But never a whole movie, never on the big screen.” I tapped the keyboard and exited out of the page, then sat back. “This is getting us nowhere.”