Murder at Spirit Falls
Page 15
Cate was already up. A fire crackled in the newly repaired fireplace.
“Your idiot dog just gave me a footbath and was about to wash my face,” Robin croaked.
Cate patted his head. “Good boy!”
With one wag of his tail, Cate’s empty coffee mug was airborne.
Muttering, Robin picked up the broken pieces and tossed them into the trash before taking a quick shower and getting dressed. When she returned, Cate stood near the door, purse and tote over her shoulder.
“Last chance,” Cate said. “Are you coming back with me or is Grover staying here?”
Robin groaned. “Can’t you take him with you to the nursing home? They’d love him.”
Grover wagged his tail, basking in the attention.
Cate didn’t even have to consider it. The animals she brought to a handful of senior facilities were all friendly, but also mellow and well mannered. “Not an option. You saw what he did to George. Can you picture him knocking down someone with osteoporosis?”
Robin had to give her that.
“Besides, as long as you’re here, he’s going to protect you.”
Almost as soon as she saw Cate drive off in a cloud of dust, Robin found herself reassured by the dog’s presence. When he whined and pranced at the door, she put him on a leash, flung open the door, and soon found herself being tugged toward George’s trailer.
George, wearing stiff new jeans and a sleeveless undershirt, kept the screen door shut. “Yeah, I cut down one of your trees last week along with some dead ones over on Johnson’s property,” he told her as soon as she asked. “I didn’t think you’d mind. See, Johnson said it was damaged and he was afraid it would fall across the road and hurt somebody. I piled the whole mess at his place like he asked.”
17
From George’s trailer, Grover led Robin along the road for a bit, then veered off to walk up the long drive to Ross Johnson’s cabin. Apparently, she was just along for the ride.
No vehicles were in the driveway and nobody answered her knock, so they descended the stairs, rounded the house and there, as she’d remembered, was Ross’s woodpile, covered by a trio of blue tarpaulins. Grover walked along the length of the woodpile, sniffing as he went.
“You lift your leg on that wood, and I’ll take you to the pound.”
Grover whined.
“What is it, boy?” She scratched behind his ears. “Who’s protecting who, here? Or whom, if you care to be grammatical.”
He stuck his nose under the center tarp.
She lifted it and saw immediately what she’d hoped to see. Since her oak tree had been alive when George had cut it down, its logs were clearly distinguishable from more weathered birch and oak. Unfortunately, it comprised the bottom half of a four-foot pile. She sighed and chucked a couple of logs behind her. “You might as well lie down,” she said to Grover. “This is going to take a while.”
With a huge yawn, he stretched and collapsed, front end first, with his head resting on his paws. His eyes never left her. Robin found him almost endearing.
The sun was hot, but she worked until she had unearthed a log that still bore smears of creamy beige paint, just as she’d remembered. She tucked it at the side of the garage so she wouldn’t accidentally add it to the stack, and then began the arduous task of rebuilding the woodpile.
Overheated as she was, her hands and arms scratched and grimy, she replaced the tarps. When she knelt to take a drink from the outdoor spigot, Grover barked. She scooped water up in her hands and splashed it on her face.
“It’s okay, boy, you’ll get your turn.”
He nudged her with his great head. She sat back on her heels so he could get at the faucet, but instead of taking a drink, he barked again and faced the road. Only then did she hear the car coming up the drive.
A quick glance at the woodpile told her she’d put everything to rights. A glance at her arms told her to stick them under the faucet, where she was able to rub off the dirt. There was nothing she could do about the torn fingernails.
She recognized the Cadillac Escalade. “I think we’re busted, Grover.” She snapped her fingers and he followed her to the driveway.
Ross stepped out, wearing jeans and work boots and a couple of days’ worth of stubble.
Grover rumbled, low in his throat.
“Robin Bentley, what a surprise!” Ross’s eyebrows lifted behind his sunglasses. “What,” he asked, pointing his chin in Grover’s direction, “is that?”
To Robin’s surprise, the dog’s hackles were raised. “He’s just a puppy, not even full-grown yet,” she said, with a smile that was downright coy.
He looked as though he believed her. “Since when did you have a dog?”
She instructed Grover to sit and was surprised when he obeyed. “He’s just on loan. We were out for a walk and he dragged me up here. You know, I haven’t talked to you in ages.”
“It has been a while.” As Ross began to grin, his eyes came to rest on her chest. “You’re looking good. You’re all back to normal now?”
What the hell did that mean? “Good as ever,” she said, feeling her jaws clench.
“Can I invite you in for a drink or something?” He edged closer and Grover growled again.
“I’ll take a rain check. Actually,” she said, looking up at him sheepishly, “we just helped ourselves to water from your faucet. I hope you don’t mind.”
Ross ducked his head in a way she used to find charming. “I’ve got some good French brandy.”
She paused as if considering the offer. “I’d love to,” she lied, “but I need to get back and take something out of the oven. Sorry. Maybe another time.”
She felt his eyes on her as she walked back down the drive, and realized she was shaking. Turning to give him a parting wave, she saw his arrogant thumbs-in-pocket stance, and hoped her feeble explanation had sufficed.
By the time she reached the road, she let out her breath and bent to pet Grover. “Good boy! Great dog!” she gushed. “You just might come in handy after all.”
After a second rejuvenating shower, Robin settled into a lounge chair to file her ragged nails.
The phone rang. It was Lee Ann Almquist, originally a friend of Grace’s, and a one-time member of the book club. Her irregular attendance caused her to drop out. They all held out hope she would return. As a longtime flight attendant for Northwest, now Delta, she could pretty much bid her schedule to suit her, but much of the time she wasn’t in the air, she was involved in a seemingly endless list of charitable activities. If she wasn’t organizing a fundraiser or working at a women’s shelter, she was helping Louise at an estate sale or packing blankets, computers, medical supplies—the list went on—to be taken by volunteer flight attendants to foreign countries in need of those supplies.
This time, Lee Ann was calling on her cell phone, not from some exotic place, but from a farm in Wisconsin, where she and her on-again, off-again boyfriend were attending his family reunion. “They’re really sweet people,” she said of John’s parents and siblings, “but I think we’ve talked about weather for ten of the twenty-four hours since we got here, and his father insists on telling jokes in which the flight attendants, uh, stewardesses, to him, are incredibly stupid or nymphomaniacs or both.”
When Robin started to commiserate, Lee Ann interrupted to ask, “Listen, I really want an excuse to get out of here. Would it be okay if I came to Spirit Falls for a couple hours? John’s offered to give hayrides to all his nieces and nephews and assorted relatives, and his mother won’t let me help with the food. She said, and I quote, ‘You don’t want to spoil your pretty salon nails.’ I truly can’t imagine they’d miss me.”
Robin checked her watch. “Of course. Spend the night if you want.”
“I’m on my way,” she said without hesitation.
Robin heard a car come up the driveway, sooner than she’d expected. With a chuckle, she thought how desperate Lee Ann must have been to escape the family reunion.
He sauntered toward her, a bottle dangling from one hand, and with the other he peeled off his sunglasses in a motion that made her think of runway models.
Robin, her heart beating hard, grabbed Grover’s collar. “Stay with me, okay, Grove?”
Ross had shaved and changed into linen slacks and a golf shirt. The smell of antiseptic mouthwash mingled with the stench of cigar. “Aren’t you going to invite me in?” he asked.
Still holding onto the dog’s collar, she opened the door.
“I didn’t interrupt anything, did I?”
Before she could answer, he pushed past her into the kitchen and threw open a cupboard door. “I don’t suppose Brad is with you.” He opened another cupboard and removed two wine goblets. “I guess these will do.” He poured out two brandies, and as he stepped toward her, Grover put his bulk between them.
Ross’s gaze was intense. She couldn’t read his expression.
Had he figured out the real reason she was at his cabin, she wondered. And why in God’s name had she gone to his place, anyway?
She took a deep breath. First I suspect George and now Ross. Get a grip!
She and Brad had known Ross and his wife, Sandy—make that ex-wife—for years. They’d always been on friendly terms. Early on—Robin was embarrassed to admit, even to herself—she’d been flattered by his attentions. Heck, she may as well admit it, she’d flirted back until Brad had suggested, rather unkindly, that she was embarrassing him and making a fool of herself.
Truth was, they’d all changed over the years, and no one more than Ross, whose roguish appeal had become something more reckless. She swirled the brandy around in her glass, feeling queasy. How many mysteries had she read in which the murderer puts sedative or poison in a glass of wine? She set it down, untouched, hoping her smile would disarm him. “It’s too early to drink, but thanks.”
Ross shrugged and threw his head back for a large gulp, coughed, and wiped his nose against the back of his hand. “I’ve been wondering when you might come by. When the four of us used to get together, I always thought you and I hit it off. I mean, there I was stuck with the poster girl from the Reach Out and Nag Someone campaign, and frankly, I just never saw any sizzle between you and Brad. Good guy, but bo-o-oring.” He sang the last word like a schoolyard taunt, and swayed closer.
Grover stood, rumbling deep in his chest. Then he yipped once, turning his attention to the door. They all looked.
Walking along the paving stones to the front door was Lee Ann, wearing a spaghetti-strapped silk top, white capris and strappy sandals, not exactly the attire for a hayride. Her broad smile faltered when she saw Ross.
Introductions were made, and though his annoyance was palpable, Ross assumed the part of host, offering Lee Ann a drink.
Once they were all seated on the front porch, Grover never left Robin’s side. In fact he lay with his head on her feet.
For her part, Lee Ann seemed fascinated by Ross, hardly taking her eyes off him as he downed Robin’s rejected drink. “Have I met you before?” she asked innocently, dipping her finger in the brandy and licking it off.
He followed the motion with his eyes. “I don’t think so. I think I’d remember.” The palm he ran across his forehead came away wet.
It was clear from the brief look Lee Ann gave Robin that she was trying to communicate something of import.
What? Robin’s look asked.
Lee Ann tilted her eyes toward the door.
Ross talked, his words clipped and rapid, not slurred the way a person who’d drunk half a bottle of brandy would be expected to talk. “So, you never did tell me why you came up to see me today.” He reached for Robin’s hand.
She quickly withdrew it.
Lee Ann’s eyes widened.
Ross, way too comfortable in the wicker chair, stretched his arms out, addressing both women. “But here I am, ready, willing and, from what I hear, able.”
Robin ran through her mental list of responses. They all seemed improbable now. Stifling a gag reflex, she said, “I guess I’ve just been nervous being up here alone ever since they found that poor woman. You know they brought George in for questioning?”
He nodded.
“You don’t think he had anything to do with her death, do you?”
Ross frowned. “From what I heard, it sounds more like an accident. That’s what everybody’s saying, anyway. I think they’re just rattling George’s cage for sport. He’s a harmless little bugger.”
“I hope so.”
He turned his attention again to Lee Ann. “So, what brings you out this way?”
She gave Robin a furtive, pleading look. “I have a problem I need to discuss with my friend. A personal problem.” She tipped her glass, drained it and said, “Thank you for the drink. It was nice meeting you.” To Robin, she said, “Don’t get up. I’ll see Ross to the door.”
With a look of irritation, Ross set down his glass, snatched up his bottle of brandy and left.
“Damn, you’re smooth,” Robin said when Lee Ann returned.
“Thank God! I thought I’d lost it. It’s been a while since I had to fend off a man.” Her smile was pure sugar. “Now, I know it’s none of my business, but what on earth was he doing here?”
After Robin’s abbreviated account of her afternoon’s activities, Lee Ann said, “Remember when I told you about that jerk on my flight a couple weeks ago?”
Robin had a vague recollection. “You’ll have to refresh my memory. I always love a good jerk story.”
“Okay, on my last New York turnaround, I had to fly with Captain Innuendo again, a walking jerk story if there ever was one. I don’t know what he’d do if someone took him up on his endless suggestions.”
Robin made a face. “All yack and no shack, as Louise would say.”
Lee Ann laughed. “I like that,” she said. “But he wasn’t the problem that day, if you remember.”
This was obviously a memory test Robin was not going to pass. “Keep talking. I’m sure it’ll come back to me.”
“Well, the trouble began shortly before we started our descent into Chicago. One of my first-class passengers started buzzing me and pulling at his shirt, saying he was having chest pains, so I asked him all the right questions while I took his pulse, which was racing. But then he started to calm down. I followed procedure and reported it to the second officer, and he called it in.”
Now it was beginning to come back to her.
“So I went back and told the guy he’d be met at the gate and he said forget it, false alarm. By then we were on the ground, and the captain says he wants the airport doc to check him over anyway.”
“Can they do that against his will?”
“I don’t know, Grace, but that’s what they said.” Lee Ann fingered her beaded necklace like a rosary. “Anyway, the captain said since there were only about forty people deplaning at O’Hare, they could get off while we waited for the emergency medical people. We told the guy to just stay put, but when I turned around, he’d disappeared. Poof! Gone.” She gestured with her hands.
“Why would he leave if he thought he was having a heart attack?” Robin asked. Before Lee Ann could answer, Robin said, “But I guess people are in denial when they’re having a heart attack. It’s the whole ‘embarrassed to death,’ thing.”
“Or the whole macho thing,” countered Lee Ann.
“Or maybe he didn’t want to be late for a meeting.”
Lee Ann leaned forward. “Or maybe he had something to hide.” She shook her head and continued. “We checked the baggage area, but he never responded. He hadn’t checked luggage and he’d paid cash.”
Robin, who had been caught up in the story, thought she knew where this was headed.
“They even paged him and you’d think even if he wasn’t there, there’d be another Johnson in an airport the size of O’Hare. I
mean, around here every fourth person is named Johnson,” Lee Ann said. “Even the name Ross Johnson wouldn’t be that uncommon.”
“What are the odds?” Robin muttered.
“One of the gals thought he was high, probably cocaine, she said.”
Robin thought about it, slowly moving her head up and down. “It fits,” she said. She patted Grover’s head, grateful for his presence. Could she ever feel safe here alone again? she wondered. For years Spirit Falls had been her haven, a place to relax and recharge her batteries, and now …
“Are you okay?” Lee Ann asked, and Robin realized she’d been talking to her.
“I’m fine. Sorry. What were you saying?”
“I just asked you if you really went to see that man earlier today.”
Robin puffed out her cheeks. “Not really.” And then she explained about going over there to search his woodpile when he was gone.
“So where’s the log with the paint on it, and what does it mean?” Lee Ann asked.
“It’s by his garage, and I’ve no idea how it fits in. Want to go for a little stroll after dark?”
18
It was time to get out. José could sense it in the very air around him. He was nothing but a small time player in a game that was no longer his to control. It had started as a favor for a couple friends, but he’d never intended to be a drug smuggler. The life had seduced him—more specifically, Ross Johnson had seduced him into it, offering ever-increasing money and favor in exchange for an ever-increasing habit. And now he found himself not only running a dating service for the stupid cokehead, but in a bizarre game of blackmail, it would seem, with the man who’d become so dependent on him.
He looked around his small, but richly decorated condo. He had a view of the Mississippi. He could see the boats coming through the locks and dams, and from his balcony, he had decent view of the Stone Arch Bridge. Opening the largest of his suitcases, he began emptying his closet. He might as well leave the heavy sweaters and the winter coats—he wouldn’t be needing them where he was going. Come to think of it, there was no point in holding onto most of his possessions.