by Dianne Emley
She put her hand in her pocket and drew out Alwin’s pearl-and-garnet necklace, still flecked with dried blood. It was identical to hers except for the gem. The death stone.
By the time she’d gotten around to opening the envelope labeled “Pearl Necklace,” Donahue was on his cell phone, mentally on his Mexican fishing trip. He’d been cowed by the story of the murder attempt on her. He’d played right into her hands.
With the evidence box shielding her, she’d gathered Alwin’s necklace and shoved it into her jacket pocket, taking out a strand of cheap pearls she’d bought at Target before she’d left. She put that necklace inside the evidence envelope.
Donahue had done a cursory check of the contents before putting the lid on the box. She had bet that he wouldn’t reopen the evidence envelopes and he hadn’t.
She’d gone to Tucson intending to break the law to get Alwin’s necklace. A photo was not enough. She had to possess it. It was more than just proof. She couldn’t take the chance of it disappearing. T. B. Mann wouldn’t. To get him, she had to think like him. She’d crossed a line, and there was no going back.
She crushed the necklace in her palm.
TWENTY-FOUR
It took Scoville nearly two hours to reach the dusty town past San Bernardino. He was born and raised in Southern California but rarely ventured to what locals called the Inland Empire. For him, it was the place where smog went to die, trapped against the mountains. He pulled into the parking lot of Wrangler’s Outpost, a sprawling rustic steakhouse that looked as if it had been putting out the feedbag and rye for buckaroos for decades, holding its own as urban sprawl encroached from all sides. A flashing neon sign portrayed a cowboy astride a bucking horse, twirling a lasso.
The interior was dim, lit by ersatz oil lamps on the walls and chandeliers made of wagon wheels hanging from the ceiling. A large sign announced the restaurant’s no-necktie policy, and the walls and ceiling were covered with ties severed by scissor-wielding waitresses from men who had dared to enter sporting one. Waitresses wore off-the-shoulder gingham dresses with frilly petticoats beneath short skirts, and waiters wore gingham shirts and blue jeans. The place was loud and crass and the kind of theme restaurant Scoville had never considered fun, just phony. As a former restaurateur, he haughtily deplored the mountains of mediocre food they dispensed with the goal of making their non-discerning patrons feel they were receiving good value.
Scoville pushed through the bar, which seemed crowded with every guy in town who made his living with tools and the women who loved them. Televisions tuned to different sporting events were suspended from each end of the bar and every corner. He had money on some of the games, but he had bigger issues.
The floor crunched beneath his feet, and he realized it was covered with peanut shells that were making a mess of his Bruno Magli shoes. People were scooping roasted salted peanuts by the double handfuls from a large barrel. He found an empty stool and brushed peanut husks, damp from cocktail glasses, from the bar. A bratwurst-eating contest was being broadcast on one of the ESPN stations.
A bartender mopped the bar with a towel. He had a silver handlebar mustache and a full head of wavy silver hair of which he appeared proud, given the care paid to styling. He looked like the kind of guy who called women “doll.”
“They call that a sport?” Scoville pointed at the TV.
The bartender barely looked at it. “Who knows anymore? What can I get ya, pardner?”
“Sierra Nevada if you have it.”
Scoville wanted something stronger, but he had to keep his wits about him. He’d nearly blown it with those Pasadena detectives. The way they’d descended on him had been nothing less than an ambush. And that bitch Vining … the needling. The way she twisted words, trying to trap him, trying to mess him up. Dena had pulled that crap on him too. Vining and Dena must have learned their techniques from a canned course on interrogation. The tactics were so clunky, he could almost see the gears turning. The only reason Vining had nearly trapped him was because he’d been overwrought. He wouldn’t let that happen again. He had to keep his head clear.
He’d reported the details as best as he could recall them to Leland Declues, his attorney, who was livid he hadn’t immediately thrown the detectives out.
“Don’t talk to the police about anything. They can’t force you to talk to them, even if they wave warrants at you or arrest you. Especially if they arrest you.”
Scoville knew that. He hated cops. He’d always hated cops. They had that smug attitude of every bully he’d ever come across, and he’d seen his share. He’d been a target of bullies since he was a kid. He could buy and sell each one of them twenty times over, but that didn’t matter. Bullies had an innate sense for weakness, for that putty in his soul. He’d fired a couple of Marquis employees who had that smirking, condescending attitude. Fired them just because he could. They had been hired by his father, who liked that cockiness in people. Anyone who had worked for the old man had to be bold. Old Ludlow’s abrasiveness could sear the skin off more-fragile mortals.
His attorney didn’t feel any harm had been done. The detectives were fishing, and Scoville had nothing to hide.
“Right,” he’d replied. “I’ve got nothing to hide.” Maybe if he said it often enough, he’d believe it.
He looked at his watch and rubbed his five o’clock shadow. Draining the last of his beer, he caught sight of himself in a mirror behind the bar. He looked gaunt, and had dark circles around his eyes. His life continued to unravel, the pace picking up, the ball of yarn growing smaller. The seed had been planted when he’d let his father lure him into the family business. He should have left well enough alone. Before that, he and Dena had had their problems but they’d been happy. Luddy was small and Dahlia was merely a handful, not a terror. And Dena … Dena …
He plastered his hands against his eyes, trying to block out the scene with her and Bowie Crowley.
It had been years since she’d responded that way to him. Had she ever? Unbridled passion hadn’t just been evident on her face; it had sent tremors through her entire body. Her wonderful, perfect body … He couldn’t remember the last time they’d had sex. His birthday last December: a mercy fuck.
And Crowley, with his movie-star looks and hairless, muscled torso, thrusting harder than Scoville physically could. His performance demonstrated he was better hung than Scoville.
Scoville used to take care of himself, going to the gym with Dena. He rarely went shirtless, embarrassed by the excessive body hair that covered his chest and back. He joked that he was the missing link. Dena used to tell him she found his hair sexy. He had never believed her. Now he knew what she found sexy. The truth had come out. It always does, like a body that eventually bobs to the surface.
If he’d had a gun, he would have shot them both dead right then. He swore he would have.
“ ’Nother one?”
Scoville pulled his hands from his face and looked at the bartender. He thought he detected pity in his eyes. Rightfully so. He was a pitiful mother. A schlub. All show, no go. He could no more shoot Dena and Crowley than he could take the life of his own son.
The seed of his undoing hadn’t been planted when he’d joined his father at Marquis, it was planted at his birth. Some guys, the Bowie Crowleys of the world, were born to raise hell. Others, like himself, were born to lap up what the tough guys dished out. Suck it up when the tough guys held their heads in the toilet bowl and flushed.
“Make it Grey Goose rocks.”
The bartender swept away the empty beer bottle and glass and grabbed the vodka.
Out of the corner of his eye, Scoville saw a woman take the stool next to him. He couldn’t be bothered to look, preferring the view of clear liquid and ice in the glass he cradled between both hands. She, however, had other plans.
“Buy me a drink?”
Thinking she couldn’t possibly be talking to him, he ignored her.
She flirtatiously leaned into him, her perfume bold, and
her voice husky. “I’m talking to you, cutie-pie.”
Scoville slowly moved his eyes from his glass toward the woman, but didn’t get past her hands. They were manicured but huge and masculine. On her ring finger she wore a USC class ring that looked jarringly like one Mercer used to wear.
His eyes trailed up wiry muscular arms and incongruous bouncy auburn hair to her face. The jolt made him splash his drink onto his hands.
“Hi, Mark. How’s it hangin’?”
Scoville gaped at the well-made-up man with an expression of bewilderment and disgust. “Jack?”
“So how about that drink?” He tossed his hair over one shoulder with a flick of his hand when the bartender came by. “I’ll have a stinger, honey.”
Scoville looked horrified. “You’re Jack Jenkins, aren’t you?”
“Just call me Jill and get that ugly, demeaning look off your face.”
“Why are you dressed like that?”
“Why not?”
Scoville thought the answer was obvious.
“Do you find me attractive?” A carefully drawn perimeter and two shades of lipstick did little to enhance Jenkins’s thin lips. His heavily made-up eyes, however, did draw attention away from his hooked nose.
Scoville hesitated a beat too long, giving his upper lip time to waver.
“For your information, two very attractive men made passes at me as I walked over here.”
“You weren’t dressed like this at—”
“Small-claims court that day? No. I had to drive my mother, and she refuses to be seen with Jill. She’s a pain in the rear, but she’s my dear old mom.”
Scoville’s eyes were drawn to Jenkins’s cleavage. He winced, trying to make sense of it.
“They’re prosthetics, Mark, but they’re real to me, so don’t get any ideas.”
Dazed, Scoville turned away and raised his drink to his lips. Spilled booze dripped from the glass onto the bar.
“Thank you, sweetie.” Jenkins winked at the bartender, who smoothed his silver mustache with his fingers, hiding his smirk. “Mark, let’s get that booth over there.”
Scoville settled the bar bill while Jenkins minced across the floor, gingerly navigating the discarded peanut shells on his stiletto heels. He slid onto the wooden bench, gathering the skirt of his dress.
A waitress who was well past the age when gingham and petticoats might have had a prayer of being attractive arrived as soon as they had sat down.
“I see you already have drinks. Would you like an appetizer? How about our hot artichoke dip with pita chips or an order of jalapeño poppers?”
Scoville wasn’t hungry but figured he should eat something. He pulled over the laminated paper triangle on the table that listed the bar menu.
“You want anything, Ja … ah, Jill?”
“Hot wings …” the waitress continued to chant. “Fried mozzarella sticks, fried zucchini strips, our famous garlic fries, appetizer portion of our famous baby back ribs …”
“Get what you want and I’ll just pick.” Jenkins patted his flat midsection and said to the waitress, who chuckled gamely, “If us girls don’t watch our figures, no one else will.”
When Scoville frowned at the menu as if it was a calculus equation, Jenkins tugged it from between his fingers. “An order of hot wings and one of jalapeño poppers.”
Scoville raised his eyes from where the menu had been, stopping at Jenkins’s torso. He gaped at the tattoos covering his lean bare arms. His spare muscular frame in the strappy floral print sundress looked like a jackhammer dropped into a flowerbed.
Jenkins smiled at Scoville with a demonic and almost triumphant leer. His teeth were long and prominent. Dark eyes sparkled beneath plucked and painted eyebrows that looked like twin carets. A dusting of red paint and a pair of horns and he would have looked like a caricature of the devil.
“You look like you could use a good night’s sleep, Mark. I hope I’m not being too bold.”
Scoville felt dazed and disoriented. He felt as if he no longer even knew who he was. He had wanted to set Jenkins straight, but now he saw that by agreeing to meet him, he was only digging himself into a deeper hole. He glanced around. The people in the bar were too preoccupied with their fun to eavesdrop. The din made it impossible anyway.
“How could you have done that to them?”
“Done what to who, Mark?”
“You think this is a joke? The police showed me the photos.”
“They would pull that tired trick out of the bag. But you were shocked, right? And disgusted. You had to turn away. Couldn’t even look. So it was perfect. Just how I’d planned it. I did a Charlie Manson on them just for you.”
Scoville sputtered, “For me? Why on earth would you have done that for me?”
“So that the police would never suspect you. Read my lips, Mark. I’ll speak slowly. No offense, but you don’t look like the kind of guy who has the balls to pull off something like that. It blows any theory about it being a hired hit because no professional would take the time for such bullshit. I know. I’ve done a few hits in my day. Not everything that’s come my way, mind you. I’m selective. Wish I could get my hands on pictures of my work that night. It was downright artistic.”
The waitress brought platters laden with saucy, greasy food. She set them on the table, a thick slab of wood. Shiny coins were embedded in the heavy varnish.
Jenkins plucked a jalapeño popper from the pile and bit it in half, retracting his lips to avoid smearing his lipstick. “Good, but hot. Temperature-hot. Careful.”
Scoville shoved the platters toward Jenkins, who shoved them back.
“You’d better eat, pal. You need to keep up your strength. You’ve got work to do.” He tossed the remaining half popper into his mouth. “You getting cold feet, frat boy? A deal’s a deal, my friend.”
“There was no deal. I was drunk. I was even drinking from a flask outside the courthouse while I was on the phone with my partner. You must have seen that.”
“You were lit, all right, but you weren’t too drunk to stand up in court and plead your case.” Jenkins gave him a sardonic grin. “And lose.”
“That’s my point.” Scoville flung his hands toward Jenkins. “I should have won. I barely remember standing in front of the judge, much less what I said.”
“We shook hands, Mark. You gave me your business card.”
“If you say so. But so what? I give it out all the time. I’m a businessman.”
“You wrote your cell phone number on it.”
“I’m always giving out my cell phone number.”
“Why do you think I called you a couple of days later?”
Scoville rubbed his chin as he thought. “You called me?”
“I talked to you about putting up a billboard on some property near the Van Nuys courthouse. I asked questions about your business situation and specifically your business partner. What his background was. Where he lived.”
“That was you?”
“Who the hell else did you think it was, Mark?”
“Someone who wanted to install a billboard on their property.”
“Near the Van Nuys courthouse? That was a clue, Mark.”
“How about telling me who you were and where we met? That would have been a clue.”
“I didn’t know who might be listening.”
“I remember that phone call, but I swear I didn’t know it was you.”
Jenkins pursed his lips and arched an eyebrow at Scoville. “Mark, you knew it was me and why I was calling. Why else would a potential customer ask all those questions about your business partner and where he lives? And why would you answer?”
“I don’t know. I thought you were trying to evaluate Marquis versus our competitors.”
“Your argument is specious, Mark.”
The erudite word coming out of Jenkins’s mouth gave Scoville pause. He recovered and continued his rant. “That proves my point. That day at small-claims court, on top of being drunk, I
was angry. I was under stress. I wasn’t thinking clearly. Hell, I even forgot to pick up my son from school. How was I going to remember a stupid conversation with a stranger? I didn’t even remember talking to you until the police started asking me questions. Then it flew into my head, this crazy conversation I had with some guy. You tell me it was you but, I’m not positive it was you.”
“It was me. I had on a little foundation and mascara and simple clothes. My mother … Anyway, the point is, we shook hands, Mark. Where I come from, that’s as good as a contract.”
“All I remember was sitting there all morning waiting for the judge to call my case. Oliver kept text messaging me. By the time they cut us loose for lunch and I was able to call him back, I was plenty hot. I went outside, around the corner, found a bench, and Oliver and I got into it on the phone. I remember some guy—you, I guess—sitting there. You might have been smoking.”
“I was smoking.”
“Okay, so it was you.”
“Thank you,” Jenkins said with a bow.
“I vaguely remember ranting about Oliver.”
“You offered me a drink. I would have taken it if I hadn’t been driving my mother.”
“I needed to vent, and you were a convenient ear. I was crazy mad. I guess I might have said my life would be easier if Oliver wasn’t around.”
“You were stronger than that. You said you wanted him dead. You wondered how someone went about hiring someone to do a job like that.”
“I did not. I would never say that, drunk or sober.”
“You do remember saying you wanted your partner dead.”
Scoville raised a shoulder. “Maybe. So what? I used to say that half the time I got off the phone with Oliver at the end. Come on, Jack. Everyone’s had some person some time that they wanted to see dead.”
Jenkins darted a polished fingernail at him. “True words.”
“When the lunch break was over, we went back into the courtroom. They called my case. I lost and I went home. That’s all I remember about that day.”