by Louise Clark
Quinn found the leather jacket he wanted and pulled it out of the closet. He shrugged it on, then headed downstairs. He found his father and Trevor sitting together on the sofa in the living room. Between them, as he'd suspected, squatted the cat. Trevor was absently stroking its back while his father rubbed the spot just above its tail. Stormy's eyes were half-shut slits and his tail was arched. Quinn raised his brows. "The lap of luxury," he said.
Trevor laughed. Quinn wasn't sure if it was because of what he'd said, or if the cat had made some sarcastic comment. Trevor cocked a brow. "You look like you've dressed to impress. Going somewhere special tonight?"
Quinn put his hands in his pockets and leaned against the newel post. "I have an appointment to interview Cara LaLonde."
His father's brows snapped together into a frown. "Who's she?"
"One of Aaron DeBolt's babes." He remembered her vividly from the night of the IHTF gala when he'd let his temper push DeBolt against a wall because the bastard had insulted Christy. Cara LaLonde had been the dark-haired beauty who'd rubbed against him as she slithered past. She'd shot him a look promised sex and said she was ready when he was. He'd used that invitation to persuade her to meet him this afternoon. "I want to see what she remembers from the night Frank was killed."
Trevor's hand stilled. "Be careful with that, Quinn."
He pushed away from the post. "What do you mean?"
"We all know that Brittany Day gave false testimony when she provided Aaron DeBolt with an alibi."
Clearly Frank had been filling Trevor in on the details of his case. Great. "So what's wrong with proving that to the satisfaction of the police?"
"Because it will look like Brittany's death is directly related to Frank's murder and Aaron's alibi. That will focus police attention on Ellen Jamieson. She's already a suspect because of where Brittany's body was found. Tying Brittany's death to her nephew's murder will only make the cops suspect Ellen more strongly. Our best hope is to shed light on other parts of Brittany's life and show that Ellen wasn't the only one with a motive to kill her."
The purpose of a good defense lawyer wasn't to prove innocence, but to force the prosecution to establish guilt beyond a shadow of a doubt, Quinn thought. And Trevor McCullagh the Third had been one of the best. "Unfortunately, I'm not the only one who will be talking to Cara LaLonde about Brittany's alibi. I'm sure the cops are already on it." He shook his head as the cat rolled over on its back, all four feet in the air, begging to have its stomach rubbed. Roy chuckled at something Frank said and Trevor started to rub the cat's belly.
Quinn shrugged and went on his way to the front door. He'd been dismissed.
Cara LaLonde was as he remembered her: great body, long beautiful hair, sharp pretty features, eyes that were cold and calculating. He'd invited her to meet him for a drink at the bar of one of the better hotels; a public place he assumed would have the ambience to impress her.
He was right.
He arrived ten minutes before the arranged time and found a table with a view of the doors. She was late and made an entrance, pausing just inside the entry, apparently to look around for him, in reality to allow every male eye to observe her.
And they did. Quinn was amused to see two guys at the bar wearing business suits, ties loosened, slouching at the end of the day, straighten in an encouraging way the minute they saw her. Another group shifted to let Cara see the empty chair at their table.
Her gaze swept the room, flicked over the group at the table, lingered on the men at the bar, then came to rest on Quinn. She smiled a slow seductive smile that had the rest of her audience glaring at Quinn as she sashayed his way. She was on the hunt and he'd been singled out.
He stood as she neared and held a chair for her.
She smiled slowly. Approvingly. "Mr. Armstrong. Quinn. I can call you Quinn, can't I?"
"Sure."
Her smile warmed. Her voice was sultry. "Quinn. I'm glad you called." She observed him from beneath her thick, artificially enhanced, lashes. "You said you were working on an article about Aaron's part in Frank Jamieson's death."
He nodded. "You must miss him now that he's in jail awaiting trial."
She pouted. Prettily. "Poor Aaron! That awful Detective Patterson has been hounding me about him! First to find out if I knew what he was doing the night Frank Jamieson disappeared. Then she wants to know what poor Brittany Day was up to that night."
The waitress came to take their order. Quinn chose Scotch, neat. Brittany requested a crantini.
"I understand Brittany provided Aaron with an alibi for that evening," Quinn said. He grimaced, playing up to her assumptions. "If Aaron wasn't in that alley with Jamieson, I'm going to have to rework my whole piece."
"Poor you!" Cara said. She didn't sound sympathetic.
Quinn pretended she did and let her think she was snowing him. "I'm hoping you will be able to clarify what went on that night."
The drinks came, giving Cara time to construct her answer. As Quinn paid the tab, he watched her features from the corner of his eye and he thought she was considering exactly what she planned to say. He decided he should be ready for evasions and outright fabrications.
She sipped her cranberry martini, watching him over the edge of the glass, making play with her eyes. He smiled at her as if he was bowled over by a beautiful, sexy woman and when she put her glass back down, she leaned toward him, ever so slightly, implying intimacy but not really supplying it. "I met Brittany and Aaron at the club around nine o'clock. Aaron was supposed to meet Frank Jamieson about then, but Frank was late and Aaron was annoyed. He took Brittany off to a corner to have sex while he waited."
That wasn't what Quinn expected to hear. He raised his brows. "You saw them do it?"
Cara shot him a flirtatious look that was half pout, half amused. "Of course not! But I knew Brittany and I know Aaron. He gets off on doing it in risky places. I suspect he found some quiet corner where they were likely to be interrupted and teased her into letting him screw her."
Quinn frowned. "My editor has had me looking into Brittany's murder. I talked to her advisor out at EBU and to some of the students she worked with. She didn't come across as a mindless sex toy."
Cara sipped her drink. This time when she set it down, her look was knowing. "Once upon a time, Brittany Day was a sweet little girl from the ranchlands of Alberta with a bright future in the grad program she came to Vancouver to attend." Cara shrugged. "Then she met Aaron and everything changed."
Quinn drank some scotch. Her timing was right. From all they'd discovered so far, Brittany's grades had started to suffer about the same time she became one of Aaron's babes. "You aren't very complimentary."
Cara contemplated her rapidly dwindling drink, twirling the glass and watching the liquid slide up and down the sides. When she looked back at Quinn she said briskly, "Aaron seduced Brittany because I wouldn't play his games. I don't like sex in corners, not even with the enticement of free coke. He got Brittany hooked on drugs, then he convinced her that the only way he'd supply her was for sex. Anywhere. On demand." Her face twisted, showing contempt and compassion. "Poor stupid, silly little cowgirl. She had no idea what she was getting into when she met Aaron."
She raised the glass and downed the remainder of the martini. Quinn signaled their waiter for a refill. "I understand Brittany's father is a power in the oil industry. I'd have thought that she was prepared to handle rich playboys like Aaron DeBolt."
"She thought she was, but Aaron is in a class by himself."
The second martini arrived. Quinn paid for it, then looked thoughtfully at Cara LaLonde. "So Brittany disappears and you think that means she was with Aaron somewhere having sex."
She ate the dried cranberries that garnished the drink, sliding them off the cocktail spear with lips and teeth. Once the fruit was in her mouth she licked her top lip with the tip of her tongue. "Oh, yes." The words were little more than a low, sultry breath of sound.
Quinn watched, more amused
than intrigued. She was playing him. But were the seductive techniques simply her regular behavior with an available male? Or was she trying to distract him, so he'd swallow her Brittany and Aaron story whole?
Call him cynical, but he'd put odds on the distraction motive.
He sat back in his chair, one hand on his drink, the other in his pocket. He smiled at Cara, waited until she smiled back, then pounced. "Frank Jamieson was murdered over six months ago. Why is it you remember that night so clearly?"
Cara frowned, her first unguarded look of the evening. "What do you mean?" She sounded wary.
He shrugged. "At the time there would have been nothing to fix the night in your mind. Frank went out to the alley, apparently to buy drugs, but that was nothing new. From what you said, Aaron taking Brittany off to a corner to have public sex was nothing new either. People remember incidents that are different, or important to them. What made that night stick in your mind so clearly?"
She had stiffened as he spoke. Now she relaxed and her sultry smile was in evidence again as she said, "It was Frank's disappearance, of course. The papers were full of how he'd stolen a bundle and taken off to Mexico."
"That information didn't come out until later. The details about the night in the club are pretty specific. It's hard to believe that you'd remember one night of many so clearly."
Her mouth tightened and her eyes smoldered. "I do."
Quinn leaned forward. He put his elbows on the table and smiled at her. "Okay. Every minute of that night is etched in your memory. How long were Aaron and Brittany gone?"
"Gone?"
"Yeah, off into the corner having public sex."
She colored. "I don't know."
Quinn raised his brows. "Then it's possible that Aaron met Frank after having sex with Brittany, then took him out to the alley and pushed him into the trunk of the car that was used to transport him to his death."
"No!" Cara pushed back her chair and stood in one fluid, frightened movement. "Aaron was busy with Brittany that night. He couldn't have harmed Frank Jamieson."
Quinn rose too. "You've corroborated Brittany's alibi for Aaron, haven't you, Cara?"
"Of course I have, because it's true." She tossed her hair.
"That makes you party to Brittany's lies. She's dead now, but if Aaron goes to trial, you will have to testify. It will be you who is charged with perjury, not Brittany. Are you prepared to do some jail time?"
"It will never come to that," she said tightly. "Aaron is innocent." She turned away.
"How much are you being paid to do this?" he said to her retreating back.
Her steps faltered, but she didn't reply. Her back very straight, she slipped through the tables, ignoring the interested glances of the men drinking there.
Very un-Cara like, Quinn thought as he sat down again to finish his drink and consider what he'd learned.
Brittany Day had supplied Aaron DeBolt with an alibi for the night of Frank Jamieson's disappearance and death. Cara LaLonde was willing to corroborate Brittany's statement, adding substance and making it more likely that the police would drop the charges against him and release him from jail. Quinn knew that both Brittany's and Cara's statements were false. Was there anything Cara had said this afternoon that could be trusted?
Yes. Her statement that Aaron had started seeing Brittany to punish her for refusing him. Cara hadn't liked sharing Aaron, though. Now that Brittany was no longer around, she would have him all to herself once he was released. It was in her best interests to make sure Brittany's alibi stood and Aaron was freed.
His last question, accusing her of accepting a bribe to exonerate Aaron, had been a shot into the mist. He hadn't expected it to draw a reaction and he wasn't sure it had. Sure, she'd hesitated, but maybe she'd just wanted to defend herself against the slur. Or maybe she actually had been paid. If she had, then by who?
He didn't think Cara was involved in Frank's death, or in Brittany's. But she was covering for Aaron. Quinn knew that Aaron set up Frank in the alley that night. The trouble was, unless they proved Brittany had lied, Aaron would walk. And with Brittany dead and Cara LaLonde verifying the alibi Brittany had given Aaron, that wasn't going to be easy.
Chapter 10
"Homework in your backpack?" Christy said, running through the usual morning checklist with her daughter.
Noelle nodded.
"Any forms for me to sign that got missed last night?"
Noelle shook her head.
"Teeth brushed?"
Noelle's expression turned woebegone and she looked at her feet as she shook her head, no.
"Okay then," Christy said, "Do them quick before we go." As Noelle turned to scamper away, she added, "Oh, and tell Aunt Ellen that we'll be leaving in five minutes. If she wants to walk over with us she'll need to be ready."
Noelle took off, pounding up the stairs with a good deal of exuberant noise. As she loaded the dishwasher Christy heard the sound of water running in the bathroom.
The cat wandered into the kitchen and sat beside his bowl, his forelegs perfectly aligned in front of his body, his tail neatly curled around them. What's for breakfast, babe? Oh, by the way, Ellen's not likely to walk over to the school this morning. She's still wearing that gauzy thing she calls a dressing gown.
Christy opened a can of mystery meat cat food, then dumped it into the bowl. The cat stood up, inspected it with a disdainful sniff, then sat down again, his expression disapproving.
That's it?
"I have to go grocery shopping today. Those are our emergency rations. Take it or leave it."
"Are you talking to that cat again?" As Ellen drifted into the kitchen dressed in the peignoir set she had bought in Paris on her last trip there, her voice was as disapproving as the cat's expression.
Christy knew when and where the garments had been purchased because Ellen had taken great care to tell her. Not that she cared what Ellen wore as she wandered around the house in the morning. "Noelle told you we'd be leaving for school in a couple of minutes?" she said, carefully avoiding a discussion on the merits of talking to animals.
"Yes." Ellen sat down at the kitchen table and looked hopefully toward the coffeemaker. "I was awake half the night worrying. I don't have the energy to commit to any activities this morning."
It was a good thing Ellen wasn't a mother, then, Christy thought. Annoyance made her pivot sharply on her still-healing knee and it twinged, as if to remind her that moms didn't have luxury of moaning about a tough night or low energy. Or even about real health problems. They got on with life, which was what she was going to do right now. "Noelle! Time to go."
With one last, disappointed sniff, the cat turned away from his bowl, leaving his mystery meat untouched. Maybe I'll walk over to the school with you.
"I'm going to the grocery store after I drop off Noelle. I'll be another hour or so."
Ellen, assuming the comment was meant for her, sighed extravagantly. "Tell me again how to work that coffeemaker?"
"Easy," Christy said. She headed out, forcing Ellen to trail along behind to get the instructions. "Fill your cup with water then pour it into the top of the machine and put the empty cup on the heating pad. Place the coffee pod in the slot. Seal the compartment shut to punch a hole in the pod, then press the start button." Since she'd provided the same set of instructions for the last three days, she ran through them quickly as she went down the stairs to the front door.
She was slipping on her shoes when Ellen said in a defeated way, "I suppose I can manage it."
"Of course you can," Christy said heartily. She had eight years of mom training and she knew when she was being conned. Ellen was perfectly capable of brewing her own coffee. She just didn't want to.
Just like she wouldn't want to make her own breakfast.
Well, as far as Christy was concerned, Ellen could pick up a cereal box and shake the contents into a bowl, then pour in some milk all by herself. Like the cat, she might want something more exotic, but if she was
starving the basics would do. "Noelle, hurry up! We're la—"
Noelle leapt down the stairs, taking them two at a time, and landed in a breathless leap on the landing. "I'm here, Mom!"
"Where's your backpack?"
That necessitated an energetic race up the stairs to retrieve the backpack from where it was stowed by the table in the kitchen, and another leaping descent to the front door. Ellen had disappeared into the kitchen to work the coffeemaker before she forgot the instructions, but Christy could still hear her tsk-tsks over Noelle's unladylike behavior. She hustled her daughter out of the house, holding the door open for the cat, and they were off to school.
She spent an hour in the grocery store, wandering up and down aisles containing goods she didn't want and would never consider buying. The store was almost empty and the quiet was bliss after the hustle to get Noelle going in the morning and the stress of Ellen's expectation that she should be waited on as long as she was staying in Burnaby. Christy didn't want to go home and talk, but talk she would, because Ellen never seemed to stop. For a woman who lived alone, Ellen was very social.
And probably lonely, Christy thought, feeling guilty. She headed for the sole open cash desk. She shouldn't be so uncharitable.
Who was she kidding? She was thinking about Ellen Jamieson here, the aunt Frank had hated. The trustee who had never failed to criticize her behavior.
People change, Christy told herself, wanting to be positive. Ellen could change. Maybe she already had.
Ellen wouldn't make her own breakfast.
Christy paid for her groceries and headed home.
As she was unloading them from the trunk, Quinn came out of his front door. She left the grocery bags on the ground and went over to see him.
He greeted her with a kiss that had her twining her arms around his neck and pressing her body against his. "Good morning," he murmured, smiling as he raised his head after a long, delightful, couple of minutes.
She smiled back and made no attempt to pull away. "Good morning."
"You've been shopping." His voice was husky, charging the simple statement with potent sexual promise.