by J. A. Jance
“You can’t go home,” Officer Ramsey interjected. “It’s a crime scene.”
“Crime scene?” April repeated. “My home is a crime scene? What are you talking about?”
“One of our forensics teams is going over it right now. We think it’s possible that what happened to your mother is actually a case of attempted homicide.”
“But they told me she fell,” April objected.
“She may have been pushed. Until we complete our investigation, that house is off-limits and no one goes there.”
“What am I going to do then?” April wailed. “Where do I go?”
“Call your hotel, Ali,” Victor ordered, taking charge. “See if they have a room available where she can stay.” Then he rounded on Officer Ramsey. “As far as asking questions of Ms. Gaddis? Right now that’s off the table. She’s in no condition to be interviewed by anyone. She’s pregnant, her fiancé has been murdered, and her mother is undergoing emergency surgery. If you ask her even one question, buddy-boy, I’ll have you and your partner up on charges of police brutality so fast it’ll make your head swim.”
Officer Ramsey seemed ready to object, but Oliveras silenced him with a single but definitive shake of her head. “All right,” she said. “We can talk to her later. Just call and let us know where she ends up.”
The cops disappeared shortly thereafter. Their departure removed a lot of the drama from the room. With their attention lagging, the other occupants turned to their own, more pressing physical ailments and bodily concerns.
Ali and company made the return trip to their hotel room in much the same way they had exited hours before—through the back door and, with the help of the bell captain, up the service elevator. An hour later April was wrapped in a thick terry-cloth robe and tucked into a bed in the darkened bedroom of a two-room suite—the only room available on that floor—just down the hall from the one Ali was sharing with her mother. Once April was settled in, Ali went out into the living room, closing the bedroom door behind her.
“Is she asleep?” Victor asked.
“Resting,” Ali said. “Not asleep. She asked the hospital to call my cell once her mother’s in the recovery room. Then we’ll take April back to the hospital.”
Victor Angeleri was seated at the desk in the corner, staring morosely at the telephone. He nodded absently.
“You were talking to someone on the phone?” Ali asked.
He nodded again.
“Did you find out why those cops are so interested in talking to me?”
“Unfortunately, yes. Somebody’s leaked the contents of Grayson’s will to the press,” Victor replied. “That means that now the whole world knows that despite your marital difficulties, you’re still your husband’s primary beneficiary. As far as John Q. Public is concerned, that makes you a prime suspect in Paul Grayson’s murder. And the cops are going to be operating on that same wavelength. I expect we’ll be hearing from Detectives Sims and Taylor again real soon.”
“How can information about the will be out in public?” Ali demanded. “The will hasn’t been filed in court, so it isn’t a matter of public record. Who would have leaked it?”
“Good question. Presumably one of my erstwhile colleagues from this morning’s meeting. I think I can make a fairly educated guess as to which one.”
“But isn’t that illegal?” Ali objected. “Doesn’t it violate attorney-client privilege?”
“Of course it does,” Victor returned. “And once I figure out who’s responsible, you can bet I’ll have his cojones, but for right now we have to live with the consequences of those revelations and with the fact that you’re now a suspect in two incidents rather than just the one.”
“Two?” Ali asked.
“One homicide and one attempted homicide.”
“So now I’m supposedly responsible for what happened to Monique Ragsdale, too? How come? I barely know the woman.”
“By showing up this morning armed with that cockamamie postmortem divorce attorney, Monique Ragsdale as good as declared war on you. That’s certainly how it’s going to look—as though the two of you were in some kind of a turf dispute. I can see exactly how it’ll play out in court, a David and Goliath routine. Monique will be portrayed as a sympathetic character, selflessly trying to protect the welfare of her daughter and her unborn grandchild. You’ll be depicted as the greedy ex-wife defending her territory and her pocketbook by taking the bothersome grandma out of the picture.”
“But Monique fell down the stairs,” Ali objected. “That’s not my fault.”
“What if she was pushed?” Victor returned. “I know how cops think. You’re already on their radar as a suspect in Paul’s death. They’re going to operate on the premise that if you’re good for one homicide, you’re good for another.”
“But I have an ironclad alibi,” Ali objected. “I left the house at the same time you did. You and Helga brought me back here to the hotel. I was here in my room all afternoon, first with my mother and later with Dave Holman. How could I possibly be responsible?”
Victor shrugged. “The cops have already decided that at least two people were involved in what happened to your husband. If you had an accomplice in that case, you’d be likely to have an accomplice for this one as well.”
“But I didn’t do it,” Ali insisted. “Mom, Dave, and I went to the house together. That’s when we found her.”
“Do you know how many people who ‘discover’ bodies end up being the doers?” Victor asked. “And tell me this. If you went to the house and no one was home, how did you get inside?”
“Through the front door. I rang the bell, but no one answered. Then, since the door was open, we went in.”
“Didn’t that strike you as unusual, that the door would be left open like that?”
“I didn’t think about it at the time because I thought April was home. With all the people involved in the shoot, there had been people coming and going all day long.”
“Do you still have keys to the house?”
“Probably,” Ali answered. “Back home in Sedona somewhere, but I certainly didn’t bring them along, and I doubt they’d work anyway. I expect Paul would have changed the locks as soon as I moved out. I’m sure I would have.”
“All right,” Victor said. “Now tell me about the telephone.”
“What telephone?” Ali asked.
“Come on. Don’t play dumb. Monique’s cell phone—the one you lifted from the crime scene. That’s called evidence tampering. When the cops find out about it—if they find out about it—they’re going to go nuts.”
“The EMTs were busy hauling Monique off to the hospital when I noticed the phone was lying there on the floor,” Ali explained. “By then I knew April wasn’t home. I needed to reach her so I could let her know what was happening. I was sure her cell phone number would be in her mother’s call records, and it was. How else was I supposed to find her number?”
“You could have called Ted Grantham back,” Victor pointed out. “But you didn’t. For right now the cops haven’t noticed the phone issue. If they end up figuring out you took it, then we’ll have to decide how to handle it. Now, what’s the deal with Dave Holman?”
“What about him?”
“Are you an item or what?”
“Dave’s good friends with my parents, and he’s a friend of mine, too—a homicide detective for Yavapai County over in Arizona. But we aren’t an ‘item.’”
“What’s he doing here then?”
“He drove over from Lake Havasu to help out.”
“He should go home,” Victor said simply. “So should your mother. I have my own team of investigators working on this case. What I don’t need is a bunch of people—amateurs or otherwise—blundering around and muddying the waters. Having your mother and Dave here is going to be more of a hindrance than a help. Anything you say to them is going to be fair game for whatever detectives are doing follow-up on either one of these two cases. They’ll ask Dave or your mo
ther what you’ve said, and they’ll end up being required to answer truthfully. So you can’t confide in them—not at all. Understand?”
“It’s too late,” Ali said bleakly. “I already did.”
And for the first time in all this, she actually felt afraid.
{ CHAPTER 9 }
Victor finally left. For a long time afterward, Ali sat alone in the living room area of April’s suite mulling her situation. What if Monique Ragsdale didn’t survive? Would Ali really be a suspect in her death as well? Could the cops turn Monique’s mere threat of litigation into a motive for murder?
From what Ali had seen, Monique’s fall had looked like an accident, but was it really? And speaking of accidents, what about the Sumo Sudoku boulder that had come flying in Ali’s own direction? That, too, had appeared to be nothing more than an accident caused by an overloaded wheelbarrow, but what if it wasn’t?
Pushing away that worrisome thought, Ali decided to track down how much of the story had surfaced in the media. Rather than switching on the television and possibly waking April, Ali did as she had so often done in the months since she had fled L.A., her former job, and her foundering marriage—she turned to her computer and to her blog and to the cyber support network from cutlooseblog.com that had sustained her through some pretty dark times.
Dear Ali, or I suppose I should say, Dear Babe, When they booted you off the air months ago, I always knew you’d be back on TV here in L.A. eventually. I just didn’t think it would be like this.
I saw what they showed on the news the other night when you were leaving the coroner’s office in Indio. That young woman they replaced you with was so damned smug as she was reading the story. I wanted to slap her. She didn’t come right out and mention you by name and say you were a suspect in whatever had happened to your ex, but people recognized you. I recognized you, even though you weren’t wearing makeup or anything. And that big guy, Victor, was there with you. Anybody who follows criminal cases in Southern California knows what he’s all about. Why would you need a big-time defense attorney if you weren’t a defendant?
All I’m trying to say is there are lots of us out here who are still real fans of yours and who think you’re being sold down the river. Again. So be strong. Know that people—people you don’t even know—are praying for you every day. I’m one of them.
CRYSTAL RYAN, SHERMAN OAKS, CA
She didn’t post Crystal’s note, but wanting to say something in reply—something that wouldn’t get her in trouble with Victor Angeleri—Ali penned a simple response that said nothing yet covered all the bases.
Dear Crystal,
Thank you for your support.
ALI REYNOLDS
Dear Babe,
Have you called my nephew yet? From what they’re saying on the news, I think you’d better. It sounds like things are getting more complicated all the time.
VELMA T IN LAGUNA
Yes, Ali thought. Things are getting more complicated. No, I haven’t called your nephew, and I probably won’t.
She sent Velma the same note she had sent to Crystal. That was Ali’s best bet for the moment—respond but do not engage. Keep a low profile.
Dear Ms. Reynolds,
After what happened to you, I can’t believe you’d do the same thing to my uncle. You should be ashamed.
ANDREA MORALES
Ali studied that one for a very long time. She had no idea who Andrea Morales was, much less who the woman’s uncle might be or what Ali could possibly have done to him. In the end, she felt she had to defend herself by sending a response.
Dear Andrea,
I’m sorry, but I’m unaware of who your uncle is or what it is you believe I may have done to him. If it’s something for which I should offer an apology, please let me know. I would appreciate it if you could supply some additional information which would allow me to be more knowledgeable about this situation.
Thank you.
ALISON REYNOLDS
The next one, unsigned, was even more disturbing.
Hmmmm. Let me get this straight. Your soon-to-be-ex-husband died unexpectedly without having a chance to unload you by slipping loose from that little gold tie that binds? Too bad somebody didn’t warn the poor guy about black widows. I think he was married to one. RIP, Fang. You deserved better. As for you, “Babe”? I hope you get what you deserve.
LANCE-A-LOT
Black widow, Ali thought. Thanks-a-lot. Let’s hope this one doesn’t hit the blogosphere. If it does, it’ll go like wildfire.
She didn’t reply to that one.
Ali’s cell phone rang just then. She hurried to answer it, thinking it would be the hospital. It wasn’t.
“Aunt Ali?”
She recognized the voice of ten-year-old Matt Bernard. Months earlier, Matt’s mother, Ali’s childhood friend Reenie Bernard, had been murdered. In the messy aftermath of Reenie’s death, her husband, a professor at Northern Arizona University, had taken off on sabbatical with a new wife in tow and had left his two children, Matt and his younger sister, Julie, in the care of their maternal grandparents in Cottonwood. Ali had stayed in touch with Reenie’s two kids as much as possible. Thanks to their grandfather’s pet allergies, Ali was also looking after their cat, the plug-ugly, one-eared, sixteen-pound wonder, Samantha.
“Hi, Matt.”
“How’s Sam?”
“Sam’s fine,” Ali said. She didn’t know that with absolute certainty, but she felt confident in saying so.
“Grandpa and Grandma are driving to Sedona tomorrow afternoon after church,” Matt went on. “I was wondering if Julie and I could come by your house for a while to visit and play with Sam.”
That was the weird thing about cell phones. Callers dial numbers with a complete mental image of where the other person is and what he or she is doing. No doubt Matt was envisioning Ali in her spacious mobile home in Sedona, curled up on her living room sofa with Sam right there beside her. Instead, Ali was several hundred miles away, sitting in a hotel room, and embroiled in a set of circumstances that might well keep her from returning to Sedona for some time. Ali didn’t want to go into any of those messy details with Matthew Bernard right then. Or ever.
“Oh, Matt,” she said. “I’m so sorry. I’ve been called out of town. I won’t be there tomorrow.”
“Who’s taking care of Sam then?” he asked.
“My dad,” Ali said. “He loves cats, and they love him. If you’re coming up in the afternoon, after the Sugar Loaf is closed for the day, maybe you could visit with Sam at my parents’ house.”
Matt sounded dubious. “Wouldn’t your father mind?”
Ali thought about Bob Larson, a man who adored animals and little kids. “As long as it’s after hours, I’m sure he’d be thrilled to have you, but why don’t you call him and ask?”
“I think that would be weird.” Suddenly Matt seemed stricken with an uncharacteristic case of shyness. “I mean, I don’t really know him.”
“By the time you and Julie spend Sunday afternoon with him, you will know him,” Ali countered. “He may be my father, but he’s also a really nice guy.”
The call waiting signal beeped in Ali’s ear. She glanced at the readout—Chris’s cell phone. As soon as she saw the number, she felt guilty. She hadn’t called her son—deliberately hadn’t called him—when things started going bad. She had considered the mess to be her problem. With Chris starting a new job and a new life, she hadn’t wanted to embroil him in her difficulties. But then, she hadn’t much wanted Edie Larson and Dave Holman to be dragged into the situation, either.
Ali ended the call with Matt as soon as possible, but by then, Chris had left an irate voice-mail message: “Mom. What the hell is going on out there? Call me.”
“I knew you were busy,” she said, once she had Chris on the phone. “I didn’t want you to worry. How much have you heard?”
“I just got off the phone with Gramps, who had talked to Grandma. I know Paul is dead. I know April’s mother f
ell down a flight of stairs and could very well die, and that the cops think you’re a suspect in both cases.”
“That just about covers it then,” Ali said as lightly as she could manage. “Sounds like you’re completely up to date.”
“Mother!” Chris exclaimed accusingly.
Chris hardly ever called her “Mother.” It usually meant that the two of them were on the outs. And the reverse was true when Ali called him Christopher. This time she was the one who had crossed their invisible line.
“Tell me now,” Chris ordered. “I want to hear it from you.”
And so Ali did—she told him everything.
“I’m guessing April’s mom is the one who came up with the idea of pushing for a postmortem divorce,” Chris said when she finished.
“Either she did or her lawyer did,” Ali said. “I’m not sure which.”
“If anybody would know the ins and outs of divorce, Monique Ragsdale would probably be it,” Chris said.
“What do you mean?”
“Monique’s had several,” Chris replied. “Divorces, that is. Scott Dumphey, one of the guys I used to play basketball with in college, is good friends with Jason Ragsdale, April’s stepbrother. That’s how I found out about Paul and April in the first place—through Scott.”
The comment made it clear to Ali that there was a whole lot she didn’t know about April Gaddis’s family situation.
“April has a stepbrother?” Ali asked.
“‘Had’ is the operative word,” Chris corrected. “Jason is a former stepbrother. From what I remember of the story, Jason’s dad was a widower, an optometrist with a fairly decent nest egg, when April’s mother arrived on the scene with April in tow. When Monique dumped the poor guy a couple of years later, his nest egg was a whole lot smaller.”
Ali had no way of knowing if any of this information would prove useful or not. Nonetheless, she used a piece of hotel notepaper to jot down all the relevant names.
“What about April’s dad?” Ali asked.