“Oh.” It was the only thing I could think of to say. Time for a change of subject. “So where are we headed now? To confront Akin? Do you think he did it?”
“I think it’s very possible. I’d like to find out if he knew that Julia told Rick about the highway deal. Eventually we’ll talk to him, but right now I thought we might spend Sunday afternoon with the family.”
I turned to look at him in shock and horror. “You want to go to my parents’ house? Are you sure?”
“Wrong family. I’m talking about Rick’s family.”
I sat back. “Okay, I guess I’m up for that. Are you going to tell them Rick’s alive?”
“No.”
“You told Hamilton.”
“We don’t have to worry about Hamilton telling anybody. Right now he’s so guilt-ridden about his possible involvement in a death that he’s going to have bad dreams for a month. He’s really too sensitive for that job.”
“If Marissa’s the one who tried to kill Rick and we tell her that he’s still alive, she might try again.”
“Pull in your fangs and stop smiling at that idea.”
I sighed and watched the scenery roll slowly by for a few minutes. “Can we stop by my house and get my camera first so I can take pictures of the devastation at Rick’s house?”
“Use your phone.”
“My camera has higher resolution. It’ll provide Rick with a better image of all the gruesome details.”
“Our goal is not to get pictures of all the gruesome details. Our goal is to figure out who tried to kill Rick so he’ll sign your divorce papers.”
“You’re right. For a moment I lost sight of that goal in the anticipation of seeing Rick’s house wrecked.”
“There’s no reason you shouldn’t enjoy the journey to your goal.”
“So we can go by for the camera?”
“No. We don’t want to arrive too late.”
“Then drive faster.”
He didn’t.
*~*~*
Rick’s yard was decorated with bright orange, gold and red plastic toys. I was sure the neighbors Rick was always trying to impress would be duly impressed with that.
Marissa answered the door. She looked less than perfect, a little frazzled, but she managed a big phony smile. “Lindsay, how nice to see you again. And Mr. Sommers. I wasn’t expecting you.”
“Sorry we didn’t call first.” Fred gave her an equally phony smile. “Lindsay just wanted to see if you were settling in okay, finding everything.”
A crash sounded from somewhere behind Marissa. She whirled around and headed back inside. “What has that damn kid broken now?”
Fred indicated the open door. “After you.”
I crossed the foyer into the living room.
Rickie stood in the middle of the living room looking down at Rick’s marble chess pieces and the remnants of what used to be a very ugly but very expensive vase. The champagne beige carpet was now more mud and other unknown substances than champagne. One drape sagged from a bent rod, and the other had been ripped halfway across. The fireplace tongs lay in two pieces on the hearth, and the corner of one of the stones on that hearth had been broken off. The Pueblo Suede paint on the walls had proven to be a suitable background for several crayon scrawls. I took out my cell phone and snapped a couple of pictures to share with Rick.
“It wasn’t my fault!” Rickie whined. “It was an accident!”
“You little monster!” Marissa shrieked, seizing the child by one arm.
“Leave him alone!” Grace charged up and grabbed Marissa’s arm.
Marissa turned her attention to her attacker. “That brat has wrecked this place! Don’t you have any control over him?”
“You mean the kind of control you have over your sons? You want me to slap him around like you do Mike and Dan? You think that’s the right way to raise a child? You think it’s right to send them upstairs to their rooms at their age?”
“After what they did yesterday, I believe the punishment was justified. You notice they did what I told them to do. My sons are a lot better behaved than yours!” Marissa leaned forward, getting in Grace’s face. “But what chance did that demon child have anyway with Kenneth Reardon for a father?”
Grace slapped Marissa.
Marissa grabbed a handful of Grace’s hair and yanked.
Rickie moved to one side of the room and picked up Rick’s crystal wine decanter. Apparently fascinated with the rainbow refractions, he moved it around in the late afternoon sunlight streaming through the window past the torn drapes.
Grace and Marissa scratched, punched, pulled and cursed.
I took pictures.
“I guess we’d better stop them.” Fred took a step in the direction of the fight.
I put out an arm to halt him. “Do we have to?”
“If we want to talk to them.”
“Fine, go ahead. But I was really hoping to see a little blood.”
“Ladies…” Fred pushed the women apart and held them firmly. “I feel certain we can resolve this without resorting to physical violence.”
“How dare you say that about Kenneth being Rickie’s daddy right in front of him?” Grace demanded, struggling to free herself from Fred’s grip. “How can you hurt your own grandson like that, you bitch?”
“Because that little demon is not my grandson! Okay, Kenneth may not be his father. I have no idea how many other men you slept with, and you probably don’t either! But I know one thing for certain, my son did not father that brat!”
The sound of breaking glass interrupted the insult fest. Rickie stood beside the fireplace looking down at the shattered decanter on the stone hearth. “I didn’t mean to do it,” he whined.
Grace raced over to him. “Be careful you don’t cut yourself.”
“He’s going to destroy everything in this house!” Marissa shouted.
Grace wrapped an arm around Rickie’s thin shoulders and glared at Marissa. “So what if he does? It’s his house!”
At that moment I would have liked to tell them Rick was still alive and neither one of them was getting a penny, but I held my tongue and kept taking pictures. I could do some sort of a collage for Rick. He’d so enjoy it. Okay, maybe he wouldn’t enjoy it, but I’d enjoy watching him not enjoy it.
“Ladies, can we sit down and talk for a few minutes?” Fred actually appeared a little frazzled. “There are some things about Rick’s estate that we need to discuss.”
Marissa jabbed a hand through the air toward Grace. “Talk to her while she cleans up the messes her brat made. I’ve got to get dressed. Bryan’s coming to take me to dinner.”
“That’s disgusting!” Grace said. “He’s young enough to be your son.”
Marissa smiled and arched a perfect eyebrow. “But he’s not my son. Jealous because you can’t even find an old man who wants you?”
Grace stooped and began picking up the larger pieces of broken crystal. Rickie turned on the big screen television. “Bryan doesn’t want you,” Grace snapped. “He just wants the property he thinks you’re going to own.”
“And he’s willing to pay me a lot of money for the property I’m going to own as soon as my son’s estate is settled. Will you turn that television down? Are you deaf?”
Rickie changed the channel but made no move to turn down the volume.
“How much money is he going to pay you?” Fred asked, flinching from the loud commercial.
Marissa’s smile widened as she quoted the figure. “We’ve already signed an Intent to Sell, so he has no reason to take me to dinner except that he likes my company.”
“What about the shopping center?” I asked. “Wouldn’t you make more money on that if you kept the property?”
She gave an indolent shrug. “Why be greedy? Besides, I don’t know the first thing about putting together a shopping center. I plan to sell all those properties.”
“What happens to those properties will be up to Rick’s son! I’ll bet Bryan would
n’t be hanging around you so much if he knew that!” Grace charged over to where Fred and Marissa stood.
“Have you forgotten you tried to tell him that, and he didn’t believe you? When that DNA test comes back, you’re going to look pretty stupid.”
Grace tossed the crystal remnants at Marissa. One barely missed Fred’s cheek as he ducked. “You can take your DNA test and stick it! I’m not putting my son through something like that!” She grabbed Rickie’s arm and stomped out of the room.
Marissa glared at their departing backs. “I’ll be so glad when this is all over and that little bitch goes back to Crappie Creek where she belongs.” She looked over at me. “When is that DNA test going to be finished?”
I looked at Fred, and she caught the direction of my gaze. She smiled up at Fred. “Any idea when this is going to be settled? When will we hear about the results of the DNA test?”
“Another day or two.”
Marissa nodded. Now that I knew about the vasectomies, I realized why she was so confident Rickie was not Rick’s son. “Have they caught my son’s killer?” She batted her eyelashes at Fred.
“Not yet, but soon. They’ve got some strong leads.”
“Good. Can you show yourselves out? I need to change.” She started from the room.
“They know about the fight you and Rick had on his front porch,” I said.
She stopped and turned back to look at me, her eyes narrowed. “How would anybody know about private discussions my son and I had?”
“Not so private when you’re outside shouting. People saw, people heard, people told me.”
“And I suppose you told that cop you’re dating.”
I shrugged. Obviously I was no longer her darling Lindsay. “You can suppose anything you want. Just be prepared when they come to question you.”
She shot me a final glare and disappeared up the stairs.
Fred and I went out the door.
A dark blue Jaguar pulled into the driveway as we crossed the porch. Oh, yay. We were going to get to talk to Bryan again. Be still, my heart.
He got out of the car…smiling, of course. “Lindsay and Fred. Nice to see you again. Have you been visiting with Marissa?”
“Marissa and Grace and, of course, Rick’s son,” I said. “I understand you have an agreement with Marissa, but have you talked to Rickie about getting your parents’ property back? Intestate dead person, half to the spouse and half to the lineal descendants, per stirpes. That means his only lineal descendant, Rickie.”
He was so hot to get that property back, willing to pay an outrageous price for it, I just thought I’d rattle his chain, see what he’d do if he wasn’t so sure the property was going to belong to Marissa. Okay, I was trying to stir up trouble. That smarmy man and those two women inside deserved some trouble.
Bryan’s smile didn’t falter as he climbed the steps to the porch. “Marissa assures me that boy is not Rick’s son. The DNA test will prove it.”
“Yes, the DNA will prove one way or the other if he’s Rick’s son.” Fred and I started down the steps, then I stopped and looked back. “I was married to Rick. I know the truth about that boy’s parentage.”
Bryan’s smile was still locked in place, but it looked pretty tight. Oh, yeah, there’d be trouble in Kansas City tonight.
Fred and I walked down the stairs and out to his car.
“That was clever,” he said, pulling out onto the street. “It will be interesting to see what Bryan does if he’s no longer so certain he’s going to get that property. The more stressed he is the more likely he is to slip up, make a mistake.”
I nodded and decided not to tell him I did it just for fun, to provoke another cat fight.
“Let’s stop and pick up some burgers and onion rings on the way home,” I said.
“We’re not going home just yet. We have one more stop. I want to see what Bryan’s parents think about this situation with their flour mill.”
Chapter Twenty
We drove across town to a neighborhood of well-tended lawns with trees mature enough to suggest the houses had been there for twenty or thirty years. We parked down the street from a tidy gray home with tidy white trim and a tidy yard marred by “For Sale” and “Open House” signs linked together by a string of colorful flags.
“Is that where they live?” I asked.
“That is the residence of Walter and Alice Kollar, parents of Bryan Kollar.”
“And we’re going to go in there and tell those poor old people we’re interested in buying their home, right?”
“I wouldn’t refer to them as poor old people, but, yes, we’re potential home buyers, Jim and Penny Richards.”
“Where do you come up with these names? Did you write a special software program to create them?”
“Jim and Penny Richards are friends of mine, and they don’t have a problem with my using their names.”
“More friends? Are these real friends or just virtual people you’ve created on the computer?”
“Jim and Penny are real.” I noticed he skirted around the possibility of some of his friends being virtual.
“Can I meet these people?”
“If we ever go to Las Vegas, yes, you can.” He reached inside his pocket and withdrew a gold ring etched with strange characters. “Put this on.”
I took the ring and looked at it curiously. “What does it say? What’s that language?”
“It’s the Black Speech of Mordor.”
I almost dropped the ring. “This is the One Ring from Lord of the Rings?”
Fred sighed. “It’s not the real thing. Put it on. You won’t become invisible or be under its spell.”
“I know that,” I said. “I’m just surprised you have something so fanciful, though you do bear some resemblance to a younger, better groomed Gandalf.”
I slid the ring onto my finger then held my breath for a few seconds, waiting to see if I might disappear or develop an unnatural attachment to the ring. Considering who gave it to me, it actually could have been the real thing. With Fred, you just never knew.
Nothing happened. I knew it wouldn’t. Well, I was pretty sure it wouldn’t.
A man and woman in shorts and tank tops jogged down the street and turned into the Open House. A strange way to preview houses. Perhaps an impulse look.
“What are we waiting for?” I asked, impatient to get on with things.
Fred checked his watch. “In a minute.”
A woman wearing a dark suit and a badge that I felt sure identified her as a real estate agent emerged from the house followed by the joggers. They shook hands, and the agent took down the “Open House” sign along with the string of flags, got into the four door mid-sized car parked in the driveway and left. The joggers went back inside. Bryan’s brother or sister?
“We’re up.” Fred opened his car door and got out.
“Who were those joggers? Are they caretakers for the Kollars?”
He was already out of the car and heading for my side to open the door. I got out and followed him up the street.
The male jogger came to the door, still flushed from his run. Up close I could see that he had a few gray hairs, but he was in terrific shape…wiry and slim without an ounce of fat. “If you’re here to see the house, our real estate agent just left.”
“Darn,” Fred said. Darn? Who knew that benign word was even in Fred’s vocabulary? “We got stuck in traffic and just couldn’t get here in time.”
“And we were so anxious to see the place,” I said, holding up my end of the story even though the last time I did, my contribution wasn’t properly appreciated. “We just love this neighborhood.”
The man smiled, shrugged and stepped back, opening the door. “Come on in. You don’t look like serial killers.”
“Walter?” The female jogger came in from the kitchen holding two bottles of water. Up close she too had a few gray hairs in her pony tail, but I’d have killed to have a body with abs like hers.
“A
couple of late arrivals to look at the house,” the man said, turning to the woman.
“Jim and Penny Richards.” Fred held out his hand.
The man took Fred’s hand in a solid grip. “Walter and Alice Kollar.”
What had Bryan said about his parents? Elderly? Senile?
Alice stepped forward, smiling. “Can I get you something to drink?”
“No, thanks,” Fred said, declining for us both. Good grief. We’d only been married ten minutes and already he was speaking for me. I wouldn’t have said no to a cold Coke. “We’d really appreciate a quick tour of the house, but we don’t want to take up too much of your time.”
“Don’t be silly,” Alice said, handing one of the bottles of water to her husband. “We just finished a five mile run, and we’re in for the evening. You’ll have to go through our real estate agent for any negotiations, but we’ll be happy to show you our home. This, as you no doubt noticed, is the living room with wood-burning fireplace.”
“We’ve burned a lot of wood in there,” Walter said, glancing toward the stone structure. “I have the chimney cleaned every year. Never had a problem with it drawing properly, though I have to tell you, it doesn’t do a thing to heat the place!” He chuckled at his own comment.
“But it looks nice,” Alice said with a smile. “That’s all modern fireplaces are supposed to do.”
“It is beautiful,” I agreed.
“Have you lived here long?” Fred asked as we strolled into the kitchen.
“Almost thirty years. We built the place,” Walter said. “So we can assure you it’s solid. Steel I-beams in the basement, no foundation problems.”
“The cabinets are oak,” Alice said, waving a hand about the spacious, airy kitchen. “All these appliances have been replaced at least once over the years, some a couple of times.”
Fred opened cabinet doors and pretended to be interested. “This is a very nice home. Why are you selling?”
“We’re retiring and plan to do a lot of traveling,” Walter said.
Sally Berneathy - Death by Chocolate 03 - The Great Chocolate Scam Page 13