Kickout Clause (Savannah Martin Mystery)

by Bennett, Jenna

  It looked like a compound, surrounded as it was by an eight feet tall brick wall and sturdy wrought iron gates that probably only opened at the touch of a keypad, from someone who knew the proper digits to input. I had no hope of being able to snoop.

  I drove slowly down the road to the next corner, turned around, and drove back. This time, coming from the other direction, I caught sight of a dark SUV parked halfway out of sight on the east side of the complex.

  It was difficult to be sure from where I was, down on the road, a half mile away, but it looked like Bradley’s car.

  So this was why he hadn’t come to work yet today. He’d gone to his meeting with Mrs. Vandervinder.

  That could prove to be a problem. When he went back to the office, Carolyn would surely mention that Mrs. Vandervinder’s assistant had called to inquire why he wasn’t there. She had said she would, and from what I knew about her, she was nothing if not efficient. No copies of Cosmo or Marie Claire in Carolyn Wilkins’s desk drawer.

  Bradley would tell her he’d been here, that there must be some mistake, and if I was very unlucky, Carolyn might mention that the woman who called sounded a lot like his ex-wife. Bradley would remember seeing me two days ago, and then the manure would hit the fan.

  There was nothing at all I could do about it, though. I could deny it, sure, but that likely wouldn’t make an iota of difference to what Bradley believed.

  A car came up the road behind me, and I pulled over to the side and put my blinkers on to show the driver that he should go around me. He signaled to pull out and rolled by, a BMW. The profile of the driver looked familiar, and with a jolt of surprise, I recognized Nathan Ferncliff.

  What on earth was he doing here? Checking up on Bradley? Suspicious that Bradley had something going on the side with Mrs. Vandervinder?

  Or had Carolyn told him about my phone call, and he had driven all the way down here to make sure Bradley wasn’t ignoring the company’s no doubt wealthy client?

  Nathan’s BMW disappeared down the hill and didn’t come back. There was nothing to see, so I put my own car in gear and rolled off, as well, returning in my thoughts to where I’d been when the appearance of Nathan’s car had derailed me.

  I could tell Bradley the truth, that Shelby had been worried about him and had enlisted my help in trying to figure out what was going on. Or I could lie, and come up with some other reason I was trying to get in touch with him.

  Something to do with a law question, maybe? I could probably come up with some story, maybe of an embarrassing nature, to make him believe that I hadn’t wanted Carolyn to realize who I was. It would take some quick thinking, since I’d obviously compounded that offense by claiming I was someone specific, someone I was not, and I’m far and away the worst liar in the world. And he might wonder why I didn’t just ask one of my family members, most of whom are also lawyers.

  But if, say, I told him I’d gotten pregnant, out of wedlock, and I was afraid my on-again, off-again, no-good boyfriend would refuse to take responsibility so I needed a DNA test to force him to take action, he might believe that. Paternity testing is part of what family lawyers do, and I could make him believe that I didn’t want to ask my traditional, overbearing, Southern family for help. Bradley had even encountered Rafe once, at his domineering, possessive, dangerous best, so he’d probably buy it.

  As I rolled off down the road away from the Vandervinder spread, I admitted to myself that I didn’t like having to lie about it, though. Not about being pregnant when I wasn’t, and not about Rafe being an on-again, off-again, no-good boyfriend who’d refuse to take responsibility. The lie would cut a little too close for comfort, honestly, since that was exactly what I’d believed the one time I had been pregnant with Rafe’s baby. That he hadn’t signed on for fatherhood and wouldn’t want to have a baby with me.

  As for the other thing, we’d been together every day—and every night—for more than two and a half months now, and I still wasn’t pregnant again. We weren’t really trying, true. But we weren’t not trying, either. I wasn’t on the pill, and we didn’t use condoms. I had confidently believed I’d be pregnant again by now. I wanted to be pregnant again. It was surprising and a bit disconcerting that I wasn’t. The first time had been beyond easy. So easy it had been unplanned. I’d never even considered the possibility. I’d fallen into temptation once, and spent the night with him, and had woken up pregnant.

  Yet here I was, sharing my bed with the guy. Having sex with him almost every night. Still not pregnant.

  It was enough to make me concerned. To make me go from worry about another miscarriage in the event I did get pregnant again, to worry that I couldn’t get pregnant even if I wanted to.

  Was it possible that something had gone wrong during that last miscarriage in November? Something inside?

  It was a sobering thought. I’d never been someone who’d desperate wanted children, but I’d always assumed I’d end up with one or two. Most of the people I knew did. Catherine had three, Dix had two, my best friend from high school, Charlotte, had a couple. I hadn’t ever considered that I might end up without any.

  Although there was always adoption, I guess. A very nice couple named Sam and Ginny Flannery had adopted Rafe’s son David when he was an infant, many years before Rafe found out he had a son, and I don’t think they could have loved David any more if Ginny had given birth to him.

  I really wanted to have Rafe’s baby, though. Our baby. I’d gone through hell over my last pregnancy, trying to decide whether to keep the baby or not, and when I finally decided—and lost it anyway—it had been devastating. I wanted—I needed—to get pregnant again, and this time have the outcome be different.

  I should probably schedule an appointment with a gynecologist, just to make sure everything was A-OK. Someone other than my previous OB/GYN, who was currently serving twenty to life in Maury County for murder and adoption fraud.

  Maybe Shelby would give me the name of her doctor. It would give me an excuse to call her, too, now that I knew she and Bradley weren’t in bed together.

  I dialed and waited, while maneuvering the car up Franklin Road in the direction of Old Hickory Boulevard.

  There was no answer, and I didn’t want to leave a message, just in case Bradley got his hands on Shelby’s phone and realized I’d called. Much better not to invite trouble. Instead, I just tucked the phone away and concentrated on driving.

  Chapter Nine

  The way from Brentwood to Green Hills lies through Oak Hill. Oak Hill happens to be where Walker Lamont’s old spread is located.

  Or maybe I shouldn’t call it his old spread, since he was now out of prison, hopefully only temporarily, and it was sort of his current spread.

  Not that he was there, of course. Tamara Grimaldi had told me the house had been checked out and was empty, so I fell into temptation and drove by, just because I was so close anyway.

  It was actually just a few weeks since I’d been here. Tim had the key, and had been holed up at Walker’s place while the police were trying to arrest him for murder back in February. I’d realized he might be here, and had stopped by for a chat.

  Everything looked just the way it had then. The grass was a little greener and there were a few tentative buds on the trees, but apart from that, nothing had changed.

  I pulled around the back of the house and parked in the spot where I’d parked last time I was here, with the nose of the car against a low stone wall separating the parking pad from one of the many flower beds surrounding the house. All that was in the bed right now were a few spindly sticks, and beyond was the back patio where a gas grill used to be. I’d attended a barbeque here last summer, shortly after getting my real estate license and signing on with what was then Walker Lamont Realty. Back before Walker started killing people, or at least before he started killing people I knew.

  I got out of the car and stood for a moment, looking around.

  There was nothing at all to see. Things were quiet. It’s
a settled neighborhood with large, well-maintained houses on enormous, parklike lots. The closest neighbor was a football field away, and didn’t seem to be the kind who blasted music at earpopping decibels in the middle of the day. A demure off-white Chrysler was parked in their driveway.

  The neighbor on the other side was even farther away, and out of sight behind a wall of bushes. I couldn’t hear anything from that direction, either. Meanwhile, Walker’s house backed up to the nature preserve surrounding Radnor Lake, so there were no neighbors in the back, just trees and brush.

  I turned my attention to the house. It too looked deserted. The garage was empty. Walker’s ranch house was low to the ground, and there was a window in the side wall of the garage I could reach. I peered through into the darkness, and saw nothing but wheelbarrows, garden hoses, and picks and shovels. Walker might not have seen the sense—or had the need—to put his house on the market when he went to prison, but he had probably sold his car. A house can sit for a while without anyone living in it, but a car needs to be driven.

  It would have been fun to look through the big floor to ceiling window in the living room, but I would be safer in the back, where no one could see me. The last thing I needed was for one of the neighbors to notice me sneaking around, and call the police. The last time I’d been here—looking for Tim—officers Spicer and Truman had caught Rafe and me breaking and entering. I wasn’t eager for a repeat. Spicer and Truman had let us go, but I didn’t think I could count on being that lucky again.

  So I went around to the back, and past the door into the mudroom—locked—to the kitchen windows. They were high off the ground, and try as I might, I couldn’t see anything but a wedge of the ceiling.

  There were double doors, though, from the patio into the family room, but they were locked too. But at least I got a good look into the kitchen. It looked neat and clean. I moved on, across the patio.

  Beyond the family room was what looked like a bathroom: another small window, high off the ground. Nothing to see there either; just a section of ceiling and half a ceiling light.

  Next came a room that Walker must have been using for a home office. It was set up with a couple of desks, bookshelves, filing cabinets, etc. One of the file drawers hung open, which was interesting. Nothing looked out of place, though, so maybe it was just a front-loaded drawer that had slid out on its own.

  I was past the patio by now, picking my way across the damp ground along the back of the house to the master bedroom on the far corner.

  When I’d been here for the cookout last summer, I hadn’t done much snooping. I was new in the office, and I didn’t want to get off on the wrong foot with my boss. And in February, I’d stayed in the kitchen with Tim. As a result, I had never seen Walker’s bedroom.

  It was a big room, with a huge bed. Easily as wide as it was long. It faced a fireplace, with an elegant white surround and glazed porcelain tiles. On the wall opposite the window were a couple of double doors, probably closets. And a single open door through which I could see the tiled floor of the master bath.

  The bed was rumpled. And not just rumpled as if a cat or small dog had jumped up on it. Rumpled as if someone had slept here and had gotten up, tossing the blankets and sheets aside.

  There was the indentation of a head in the pillow nearest the window.

  I stepped back, and almost twisted my ankle on the high heeled pump I had put on.

  Three weeks ago, after Tim left, there had been no sign that he’d ever been here. All the beds had been made, and pristine. The only anomaly was a wet shower curtain I overlooked, that only Rafe noticed.

  Sometime since then, someone had spent the night in Walker’s bed.

  I dialed Grimaldi’s number. “When you sent people to Walker’s house yesterday, did they check the bedrooms?”

  “Nice to hear from you, too,” Grimaldi said mildly. “What do you need to know?”

  “Whether any of the beds looked like they’d been slept in.”

  I heard the riffling of pages. “No,” Grimaldi said. “Why do you ask?”

  “I’m here now. Looking through the windows. And someone’s definitely been using the bed in the master bedroom. The covers are upset and there’s the imprint of someone’s head on the pillow.”

  There was a beat. “What are you doing?” Grimaldi asked. I opened my mouth to answer, but before I could, she’d added, “Get out of there. Now.”

  “There’s no one here—”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “You told me no one was here.”

  “That was before I knew the bed had been slept in,” Grimaldi said. “Get out of there, Ms. Martin. Now!”

  “I’m getting, I’m getting.” I made my way back toward the car. I didn’t think anyone was inside the house, but it was easier to do what she said than to argue. Especially since she was back to calling me by my last name. “You’ll send someone down here, right? To see whether it was Walker or someone else?” To take fingerprints or gather hair samples or whatnot.

  “Oh, yes.” She sounded grim. “I’ll have a CSI crew out there in twenty minutes. By then, I want you long gone.”

  “I will be.” I was in the car by then, cranking the key in the ignition. “No sign of the car yet? Or the guard?”

  “None. And I have a murder to solve, so if you’ll excuse me...?”

  “Of course.” I put the car in reverse and started the process of turning around so I wouldn’t have to back down the roughly quarter mile long driveway. “Will you let me know what you find out?”

  “I’ll do what I can,” Grimaldi said, and hung up.

  I continued on my way to Green Hills and Shelby with my head buzzing.

  So a day or two ago, the police had checked Walker’s house and it had appeared empty and unused. This morning, it appeared as if someone had been in it and had spent the night. Unless Tim was up to something—and I couldn’t imagine what—it was probably Walker himself. And that meant my comfortable assumption had been wrong. He wasn’t three states away by now. He was still in Nashville.

  But why?

  I still couldn’t believe it had to do with me. There was no point in his killing me, and Walker’s other murders hadn’t been pointless. He’d always killed to protect himself, his lifestyle, his reputation, his company... and I wasn’t a threat to any of that. His reputation, lifestyle and company were out of his reach as a fugitive, and I certainly wasn’t a threat to his life.

  There must be something here in Nashville he needed or wanted. Something he was waiting for. Maybe he was simply waiting for interest in his escape to die down before he hightailed it out of town, but really, it would have been safer to make tracks immediately. Now all the cops were on high alert.

  Had he been looking for something in the house? His passport, maybe? Or bank account information? A safety deposit box key?

  If so, he was probably gone for real this time and I could stop worrying.

  Maybe he had taken his car and left.

  I had assumed Tim would have sold it after Walker went to prison, but maybe not.

  I picked up the phone again and dialed Tim’s number as I maneuvered my own car up Hillsboro Road toward Green Hills. He didn’t answer, so I tried the main office number instead, just in case he was on the cell phone with someone else. “It’s Savannah,” I told Brittany. “Is Tim around?”

  “Just a minute.” Brittany went away, and then the phone clicked and buzzed. After just a second, Tim picked up and introduced himself.

  “It’s Savannah,” I said, a little curious as to why he hadn’t picked up my previous call when he obviously wasn’t on the other line.

  He didn’t answer, and I can’t swear to it, but I felt like I could hear—or sense—chagrin or guilt or something of that nature coming down the line toward me.

  I added, “Is everything OK?”

  “Fine,” Tim said, but he didn’t sound it. He sounded like he wished I hadn’t called. “What can I do for you?”

&n
bsp; “I just had a question.”

  “About real estate?”

  That would be the logical assumption. I was a real estate agent and he was my broker. What was interesting, was that he thought he had to ask.

  “I was wondering whether you remember whether Walker’s car was in his garage three weeks ago, when you were camping out at his house.”

  “Sheesh!” Tim hissed. “Talk a little louder, why don’t you? I’m not sure everyone heard you.”

  I glanced around. I was alone in the car, so who’d hear me? “I’m sorry. I assumed you were alone. Aren’t you in your office? Did you put me on speaker?”

  “No,” Tim said. “The car wasn’t there three weeks ago. I sold it for him in August. He wasn’t going to need it for a while.”

  “But he kept the house.”

  “A house and a car are different,” Tim said, as if I didn’t already know that. “As long as the house is maintained, it’ll be fine for years.”

  “Have you been down there lately?”

  “To Walker’s house?”

  I waited for him to elaborate, because yes, it was obvious that I was asking him about Walker’s house. When he didn’t say any more, I spelled it out. “Yes. To Walker’s house. Have you been there since you were squatting there last month?”

  “No,” Tim said, and I could tell from the tone of his voice that he was bristling.

  “So you didn’t spend the night in the master bedroom last night.”

  “Have you lost your mind?”

  “Just checking,” I said.

  Tim sniffed. “Walker and I didn’t have that kind of relationship.”

  Sure. Whatever. “I appreciate it.”

  I made to hang up, and Tim squealed. “Wait. Wait!”

  “What?”

  “Why do you want to know?”

  “I was just down there. The bed had been slept in.”

  “What were you doing there?”