Hot Money

by Sherryl Woods

  “What about Tessa? Did she go to college?”

  Josie looked perplexed by the question. “Now, why would she need to do that? She had her path in life all cut out for her. She had plenty of money to see that she made the right kind of marriage. Wasn’t no need for her to get some fancy education that would just be wasted.”

  “Is that what her father said?” Molly asked, beginning to get the picture.

  “Told her that time and again,” Josie confirmed.

  “So she wanted to go to college?”

  “Had some crazy fool notion about becoming a business tycoon. She wanted to run her daddy’s company someday, but everybody knew her brother was going to do that, so what was the point? If you ask me, she should have been satisfied with the way things were.”

  Maybe so, Molly thought as she drove off a short time later. Maybe Tessa should have played by the rules of the day and been satisfied, but obviously that niche envisioned by her shortsighted father hadn’t been enough for her. No wonder she’d constantly sought the approval of powerful, successful men. She’d wanted to prove she could hold her own with any one of them.

  For the first time since the investigation had begun, Molly began to feel desperately sorry for the pathetic life Tessa had led in her ill-fated quest for proof that she was somebody important. She couldn’t help wondering if that same quest wasn’t in some obscure way responsible for her murder.

  CHAPTER

  FIFTEEN

  Molly was so intent on learning all she could about Tessa’s need for approval and yearning for business success, she didn’t notice at first that Vince had finally wandered back to the office.

  “Where have you been?” her boss demanded, glancing pointedly at the oversized clock on the wall. The look was mostly for effect. The clock hadn’t been right for months now.

  “You’re in a charming mood,” she observed. “What happened? Did you double bogey on the eighteenth hole?”

  “The game isn’t everything,” he shot back, scowling ferociously. “I conduct business on the golf course. I was trying to close a deal out there.”

  “Oh?”

  “I might have done it if I’d been able to reach anyone in this office for some information. Instead, all I got was a recording. Why the hell should I have a staff, if no one’s ever here?”

  Molly took the attack in stride. Naturally, now that Vince was off the golf course, he wanted everyone to be as miserable and put-upon as he was. It was Vincent Gates’s nature to present a long-suffering facade to the world. He thought it would keep his job secure if his superiors thought he was dreadfully overburdened with work.

  “What information did you need?” she inquired sweetly. “I’ll be happy to get it and follow up with a phone call to the producer.”

  “Never mind,” he grumbled, clearly happy sulking. “I’ve taken care of it. Where’s Jeannette?” He gave a furtive glance around as if to assure himself she wasn’t lurking in the vicinity ready to cast some evil spell over him.

  “On location. When are you going to admit that she’s the best clerk we’ve ever had in here and put in for a promotion for her?”

  “Don’t start on me again.”

  “You’re hoping she’ll just give up and go away, aren’t you? I’ve told her she ought to do just that. She’s overqualified for this job. Any other boss would appreciate her.”

  “I do appreciate her. She just makes me nervous. You’ve seen the way she looks at me.”

  Molly bit back a grin. Jeannette’s cool, superior looks embodied disdain, not malevolence, but Vince would never believe that. It was probably best not to explain either. He was already regarding her suspiciously.

  “I suppose you were on location, too?”

  “Nope. I had some personal business to take care of.”

  Vince didn’t have to ponder that more than a heartbeat before he caught on. He rolled his eyes in exasperation. “Not again. Tell me you were not out snooping around on that murder investigation.”

  She remained stoically silent.

  He watched her intently. “You were, weren’t you? That’s exactly what you were doing. When will you ever learn?” He held up his hands in a gesture of resignation. “I give up. The next time I get called on the carpet by some county official because you can’t stay out of things that are none of your concern, you are out of here. Adios. Good-bye. Is that clear?”

  Molly nodded obediently, which usually made Vince feel powerful again. “Must have been a triple bogey,” she muttered under her breath as she returned to her desk.

  “I heard that,” he shouted after her.

  Hopefully he wouldn’t hear her conversation with Jason Jeffries, she thought as she dialed the philanthropist’s office. She had to check out this one last thing while it was on her mind. Then she vowed to get busy and actually do some film office business. It would pacify Vince if he ended the day with a stack of folders on prospective productions sitting on his desk. He could complain to his date all evening about how backed up he was at work.

  “What sort of information are you after this time, young lady?” the old man said, an affectionate note behind the cranky question.

  “I want to talk about Tessa a minute.”

  “What about her?”

  “Josie …”

  “Her housekeeper? I didn’t even know she was still alive. She must be a hundred, if she’s a day.”

  “She says she’s seventy. She also told me that Tessa had some crazy notion of becoming a business tycoon and that her father thwarted her because he didn’t see any need to educate a woman.”

  “Never heard it told quite that way, but I suppose it’s true enough,” he conceded. “Tessa envied that brother of hers. She resented the fact that he was destined to inherit the business, while all she got was some trust fund. She’d been daddy’s little darling all her life until the time came to divvy up the estate. Then he put her in her place. Wasn’t all that unusual given the way things worked in those days.”

  “Could she have run the business?”

  Jason gave a snort of derision. “I told you about the books on those fund-raisers. Does that sound like the kind of woman who could manage a big corporation? Tessa had grandiose ideas, but not an ounce of sense when it came to carrying them out. If you ask me, her daddy knew exactly what he was doing. Hell, I doled out her alimony payments a little at a time, because I knew damned well she’d throw it all away and come begging for more if I didn’t.”

  “Thanks,” Molly said, unwilling to get into a debate over whether Tessa might have learned to handle money if she’d been given a little responsibility and education. It was too late for such a discussion to do the woman a bit of good, and she doubted if Jason was likely to change his sexist ways at this late date either.

  Unless Liza could turn him around. The thought of the struggle brought a smile to her lips.

  “I don’t know why any of that’s important, but you’re welcome,” he said. His tone sobered. “You watch where you go sniffing around, young lady. Whoever killed Tessa might see a need to get rid of you, too, if you start getting too close to the truth.”

  Coming from any of the other principal suspects, Molly might have considered that a mild threat. Coming from Jason Jeffries, it seemed no more than a friendly, concerned warning. She took it to heart.

  That didn’t stop her from trying to add things up one more time. What if Tessa, in her zeal to prove that she was capable of handling business as well as any man, had gotten herself in over her head? They’d assumed all along that Roger was responsible for whatever financial difficulties he was having, but what if it had been Tessa’s foolish decisions that had been their downfall?

  Perhaps that had been the one thing Roger couldn’t forgive, despite Josie’s faith that he would tolerate any of Tessa’s myriad sins. Not all that long ago there had been stories in Japan about wives who’d lost the family savings in the stock market and were so terrified of their husbands’ wrath that they committ
ed suicide or begged their brokers to hide the truth. Maybe Tessa had suffered a similar humiliation and had infuriated Roger in the process.

  Molly decided she needed to see all the suspects together if she was ever going to fully understand the dynamics of the group. For that, she needed Liza’s help. If Vince’s menacing scowl was anything to go by, however, she figured she’d better wait to ask her.

  • • •

  “Liza, why don’t you organize that emergency coalition meeting you’ve been talking about?” Molly suggested later that night after concluding a reasonably productive afternoon at the office under Vince’s watchful eye. “I suppose we could wait for the memorial service, but I heard it’s been delayed until late next week. I don’t want to put this off that long. I think it would be fascinating to see what the primary topic of conversation is about now, don’t you?”

  Liza regarded her doubtfully. “You don’t honestly expect the killer to confess sometime between the reading of the minutes and old business, do you?”

  “I’m not even sure I expect him or her to show up.”

  “Meaning?”

  “We’re not dealing with a professional killer here. Whoever murdered Tessa probably did it on the spur of the moment. Unless he or she has absolutely no conscience, the person who tossed Tessa into the bay might find it incredibly awkward to be surrounded by all of her dearest friends.”

  “Friends?”

  “You know what I mean. Who’s on the coalition board?”

  “Patrice, Mary Ann Willoughby, Helen Whorton, Jason Jeffries, Hernando Viera, and Clark Dupree are on the executive board. The overall committee is much larger. Which group do you want?”

  “I’d say the executive board covers the key people. Can you meet in closed session?”

  “Not really. We take the Sunshine Law to heart. All our meetings are open.”

  “I suppose it doesn’t really matter. What about Roger? Can you lure him there?”

  Liza considered the question, her expression thoughtful. “I suppose I could ask him so we can make the official announcement of Tessa’s memorial fund.”

  Molly nodded. “Perfect.”

  Liza shook her head. “Why do I think that instead of inviting them to a meeting, I should simply announce ‘let the games begin’?”

  “An interesting alternative,” Molly concurred. “But this is no game. Whoever killed Tessa obviously had a lot more than we know at stake and I want to know what that was.”

  CHAPTER

  SIXTEEN

  Molly wouldn’t have believed the viciousness if she hadn’t been seeing it with her own eyes. A half dozen of the best-known names in Miami’s philanthropic circles—male and female—were engaged in cutthroat politics that made Republican and Democratic rivalries look like kid stuff.

  Observers from several organizations had learned of the meeting of the coalition’s executive board and had shown up to stick in their two cents. Michael O’Hara and Detective Abrams, after casting pleased looks at their suspect, just back from London, were lurking in the back of the room, trying to look unobtrusive. They weren’t succeeding, but their presence definitely wasn’t hampering the discussion or Patrice MacDonald’s glares in their direction.

  In the absence of a chairman, Liza explained that she had called the group together to discuss the future of the consortium of environmental activists. Their common interests should have assured a certain unanimity.

  Instead, the supporters of the Everglades were casting venomous glances at the bird people, who in turn were scowling at those in support of the manatees. The representatives of one of the nation’s most active environmental preservation organizations were regarding Florida Keys protectionists with visible disdain.

  Helen Whorton, Tessa’s most outspoken rival, was surveying the scene with satisfaction. From the sidelines where Molly had determinedly planted herself despite Liza’s request that she sit around the conference table, Molly guessed Helen was just waiting for the right opportunity to leap graciously into the leadership breach. She was shooting daggers at Liza because she hadn’t gotten out of the way.

  Jason Jeffries, clearly an independent thinker and a member of every organization represented, winked at Liza. “Go get ‘em,” he said in what was no doubt meant to be an undertone but which boomed to the back of the room. Startled glances turned in his direction.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Liza said so softly that those present had to quiet down or risk missing something they might find irritating. “If we continue to focus on our divided loyalties, rather than the unified mission we need so desperately to complete, we will have no chance at all.”

  “Well said,” Jeffries commented, waving his cigar approvingly. It was unlit in deference to Molly. “I’ll nominate you to chair this group. Who’ll second it?”

  “Now wait just one minute, Jason Jeffries!” Helen Whorton glared at him. “You won’t go ramroding your opinion down our throats this time.”

  “That’s right,” Mary Ann Willoughby chimed in, then looked startled that she’d found herself on the same side as Tessa’s most vociferous enemy.

  “There is a motion on the floor,” Liza said firmly. “It requires a second before we can have this discussion.”

  “I’ll second,” said a timid voice belonging to a woman who looked as if she ought to be traipsing the trails of the Everglades with a pair of binoculars in her hands. To get Liza’s attention, she allowed her fingers to flutter in the air for no more than an instant before demurely folding her hands in her lap again.

  “Thank you,” Liza said, giving her an appreciative smile. “Now, Helen, what were you saying?”

  “I was saying that I will not allow that man to push this through.”

  “Oh, for goodness’ sake, Helen, sit down and shut up,” said a tall string bean of a man who was gray from head to toe—hair, suit, socks, shoes, even his complexion had an unhealthy gray pallor. Since he’d said the first sensible thing in the past few minutes, Molly hoped he didn’t pass out before they could take a vote.

  “You know perfectly well that Liza is the only one here who’s actually put her money and her time into this,” he declared with annoyance. “She’s been to the rain forests. She’s protested the haphazard forestry in Washington and Oregon. She’s been to Capitol Hill to speak out. She’s prepared position papers and lobbied Congress. What the dickens have you ever done besides yammer about it?”

  Helen’s eyes widened with shock. “How dare you, Lincoln Granview? My name alone counts for plenty and I have given generous donations to these causes besides.”

  “When it suited your purposes,” he countered. “You want the social power. I saw you scrambling to get in one of those pictures for the society pages in the morning paper. Plunked yourself right in there next to Tessa, even though everyone knows you hated her guts. You want to appear politically correct. But you obviously don’t give a damn about the environment or you wouldn’t have allowed your husband to strip that land in the Keys bare before he built on it.”

  An outraged murmur built in the room until Molly had visions of a lynch mob being formed. Given the passion with which these people regarded their individual causes, it didn’t require a giant leap of faith to accept the possibility that one of them might have murdered Tessa if they felt she’d betrayed them. Molly could hardly wait to question Liza about how each of the attendees had interacted with the recently departed chairwoman, about how much faith they’d had in her dedication to the cause.

  “That’s enough,” Liza said, quieting things down again. “The floor is open to additional nominations.” She glanced pointedly at her most vocal critic. “Helen?”

  “I suppose there’s no point in my going against the majority.” She scowled first at Liza, then at Lincoln Granview, finally settling her gaze on Jason Jeffries. “You will get yours one of these days. If not here on earth, then I’m certain there’s a special hell waiting for you.”

  That said, she pulled herself to her
feet and stalked from the room.

  “Good riddance,” Jeffries muttered. “Now let’s get on with business. Call for a vote, Liza.”

  Liza frowned at him. “Jason, if you don’t stop giving me orders, people here might begin to wonder if Helen wasn’t right to object to my nomination.”

  He beamed back at her approvingly. “Well said. You’ll do just fine, girl.”

  Just then Ted Ryan slipped into the room and made his way straight to Molly’s side. Michael shot her a wry look as he observed the maneuver.

  “What did I miss?” the journalist asked, pulling out his pocket tape recorder and a notebook.

  “Liza has been nominated to chair the group. They’re about to vote.”

  “Where’s the old battle-ax?” he inquired, glancing around.

  Molly regarded him with feigned innocence. “Who?”

  “Old lady Whorton.”

  “I believe she had another pressing engagement,” Molly said, deciding that the less said in the media about today’s squabble, the better for all concerned. If Helen wanted to make a fool of herself in print, let her call Ted herself and fill him in.

  With Liza’s election approved by the majority in a vote taken by secret ballot at Mary Ann’s insistence, Molly sat back and waited for the routine business of the group to be concluded.

  Several mundane reports were given regarding the status of various projects. To her disappointment, none struck Molly as being particularly controversial.

  Liza called for new business. When no one spoke out, she said, “We do have two things I’d like to mention. First, I would like to formally express the board’s condolences to Roger Lafferty.”

  Sympathetic glances were cast in his direction. He acknowledged them with a nod.

  “As many of you know, Roger graciously determined to open a memorial fund in Tessa’s honor. Hernando, I understand we have a first check for the coalition from that fund,” Liza said.

  The banker stood and gave a courtly half bow in Liza’s direction. If his gaze lingered appreciatively an instant longer than necessary, Molly figured she was the only one who noticed. Caroline had planted the idea of Hernando’s interest in Liza in her head. Liza seemed oblivious.