I tuned out the introductory, lawyerspeak of the will, but my ears perked up when I heard, “I hereby leave my dear friend, Mr. Carter Roche, my entire interest in Cityscapes Inc. To my lovely, ex-wife, Leong, I leave all my other investments and accounts.” Sanderson held up his hand like a traffic policeman when whispers broke out around the table.
He continued. “I cannot leave out my beloved Gemma, who’s been like a daughter to me since the first day she walked into Cityscapes. To her, I leave my house and all its contents, including the manuscript of my novel, which I feel certain she’ll have the fortitude to get published.”
The attorney handed me a sealed envelope bearing my name. “Ms. Rosenthal, Mr. Teschler asked me to give you this letter.”
He passed similar missives to Carter and Leong and then turned to me. “Ms. Rosenthal, you are unfortunately left with the unpleasant task of sorting out the circumstances of Mr. Teschler’s property. The house, however, was well insured. I’m at your disposal to help you work through any of the details; you only have to give me a call anytime you have questions or feel the need for an intermediary. I’m happy to put myself and my services at your disposal.”
Suspicious of men’s intentions, I studied the lawyer for any sign of lechery in his offer, but he appeared sincere. “Thank you. Does this mean I’ll have to deal with all the legalities surrounding the fire?”
“Until the formal transfer of the property into your name, our firm will be handling the details with the authorities. I’ll keep you apprised as everything progresses. Call me later this week, and I will inform you where we are in the process.”
The irony of it struck me as I left Sanderson’s office. Norman had left me his most treasured possessions, his home and his manuscript.
Now they were both gone.
I worked from home after the meeting, preferring not to risk running into Carter again if I went to the office. The work—designing book covers—allowed me to use my creative skills in addition to stretching my marketing prowess establishing the business. I hoped to make that my sole source of income once I became established.
Norman’s letter, instead of giving me a clue to what had happened to him, had merely thanked me for our years of friendship and explained he was leaving me his house because he had always thought of me as a daughter. Very touching, but not helpful in solving the mystery of his death.
By six, satisfied with my work, I walked into downtown Wauwatosa, fondly called Tosa by the natives. The area, a square mile at most, had what the locals described as “character.” A few exclusive shops were surrounded by antique stores, a bank, a general store, restaurants, and a coffee shop. I ate supper at the Chancery in a small booth facing the street, where I enjoyed watching the people who walked by and tried to imagine their backgrounds.
My phone chimed just as I was about to leave. It was Carter. I should have known I would have to deal with him before he returned to Singapore.
“Gemma, you left before we could talk,” he said, his tone accusatory.
“It’s all been said, Carter.” I’d spoken without thinking; he easily could have wanted to discuss Norman or the business, not something personal.
I heard him exhale as I stepped outside the restaurant with my phone.
“We can at least be cordial to one another, can’t we, Gemma? I know you must be as upset about Norman’s death as I am.”
Carter could be a very persuasive man; he convinced me I needed someone to talk to about Norman’s death. As an employee of Cityscapes and as Carter’s wife, my life before our divorce had been too busy to establish friendships outside our business circle. I agreed to wait for him in the bar of the restaurant I’d just left. After I went back inside, I changed my mind. If I were going to socialize with Carter, it would be safer not to do so in a dark bar and under the influence of alcohol.
I waited for him near the entrance and watched him walk toward me when he arrived. Immaculately dressed as always, he wore a pair of pale khaki slacks and a navy golf shirt, the shirt complementing his slate-blue eyes. Absent, however, was that little tingle of inner joy I used to feel at seeing him.
“I changed my mind about having a drink. It’s such a nice evening. I thought we could walk a bit instead.”
His wide smile dimmed at the change in plans. “Sure, we can do that.”
The silence as we walked didn’t feel like one of those comfortable ones. After a while, Carter asked, “What made you decide to become a homeowner?”
“Norman kept telling me how much he loved living here. He called me when a small place across from him was taken over by the bank and told me it would be available at auction for a steal. He convinced me to look at it, and when I did, it just felt like home. There’s something peaceful about the house; everything about it suits me. I did get a good price, but it’s a desirable area, so it still wasn’t what you’d call inexpensive.”
“What will you do now?” Carter asked.
“Now?”
“Will you build on Norman’s lot?”
Build. On Norman’s lot. It hadn’t occurred to me in the few hours since I found out I owned it. I had only been living in my own house for eleven months. “I haven’t had time to think about it. Everything is happening too fast.”
“You could sell it, you know. Sell both properties and come to Singapore. I know you love it there.”
Even sooner than I had expected, he’d turned the conversation into what I had been dreading. I did love Singapore, but only as a place to visit. “I don’t think so, Carter. This is my home. I would never want to live in another country permanently.”
He stopped walking and held my arm. I noticed how brightly his dark hair with its silver highlights shone in the light from the setting sun. I smelled his familiar cologne, felt his nearness, and for a split second, I remembered another time, another reaction to Carter Roche.
“Gemma, I miss you. Can’t you give us another chance?”
There was no putting it off. I had danced around his pleas in the few phone calls he had gotten through to me from Singapore. “I’m sorry, Carter. We can’t go back and change what happened.”
His mouth tightened. “You didn’t give me enough time, Gemma. I would have gotten past it.” I recognized his anger building as he turned from me and began walking.
We were married nearly two years when it happened. During a play, we went out to the lobby at intermission for a glass of wine. While I waited for Carter among the milling crowd, a man I had gone out with in my escort days recognized me and stopped to talk. It isn’t as if a scene developed; I introduced them when Carter returned, and the three of us exchanged a few pleasantries before the man moved on. But Carter quickly asked how I knew him. We had promised to always be open with each other and, foolishly, I admitted I had dated him through the escort service.
My mother couldn’t afford to keep me in college after my father died. I had just started at Marquette University and couldn’t bear to give up my dream. I wanted a job in advertising, a tough field to get into under any circumstances but impossible without a good education. I became an escort when I met a student who told me there was a service right there at school who was hiring. It was run by coeds just like me who needed the money to support their schooling. Most people wouldn’t believe an escort service really existed in which the employees didn’t have sex with its clients. Ours had been the exception. We were strictly companions, not call girls.
But between the job and my studies, I had no time for a social life, so occasionally, if I had a client I found attractive, I spent the night with him. I never asked for money, either for the regular service—the office collected it from credit cards—or the times I gave clients more than an evening’s companionship.
Carter had known my background long before we married, but actually meeting one of the men from my past changed everything. It plagued him that I didn�
��t beg forgiveness, apologize, or give him the benefit of admitting I had never slept with the man we ran into at the theater. As far as he knew, I never slept with clients.
Weeks passed without lovemaking. My husband’s passion for me evaporated. When I’d had enough, I moved out. What else could I do? Carter wouldn’t touch me or discuss what was eating at him.
Now, I said, “Carter, it’s been too long. We live worlds apart and I’m happy with my life as it is. I’m sorry, but I can’t go back.”
“I’m not asking you to go back. I’d like a chance to start over.”
Carter had no power to hurt me anymore, but our conversation was a bitter reminder that I would never have a normal relationship. How could I have a normal relationship when even the man who married me while knowing all about my past couldn’t live with it?
Our walk had taken us close enough to my house that I realized asking him to walk with me hadn’t been wise; now he would expect to be invited inside.
Suddenly he stopped walking and held me back with an arm at my waist. “Did you hear that?”
I opened my mouth to ask, “Hear what?” when I heard a scream. A teenaged girl burst from the front door of the house we were passing, her long black hair streaming out behind her.
She rushed over to us. Hands shaking, she pressed her cell phone into my hand.
“Please, call 9-1-1! She’s hurt. Madison’s hurt and I think she might be dead.”
Chapter 9
TJ fastened JR into his car seat and got behind the wheel of her Mini Cooper. Richard had been after her to get a larger car now that she transported JR, but the car was dear to her; they had been through a lot together. When she had JR with her in the Mini, they usually never went very far from home. She could keep it and get another, but the garage only held two cars, and she wanted Richard to be able to use the other slot when he stayed. She had thought about having a cement apron added next to the garage so she would have room for a third car. It was probably time to get some estimates.
The Wauwatosa Fire Inspector’s office, housed in a renovated old building on North Avenue, wasn’t far from their house. They could have walked over, but she had no idea if the man would be in or if he would even be willing to answer her questions.
With JR in a small stroller she had managed to stuff in the small car, she found admittance an easy task. A woman with a small child generated interest and smiles and they were oohed and aahed forward to the inspector’s second-floor office.
Sitting behind an old oak desk, Fire Inspector Dennis Penestorf had a military haircut and muscular arms displayed by a short-sleeved shirt. He turned when he heard her enter his small office and grinned at the sight of JR, who was decked out in a Milwaukee Brewers’ onesy.
“And who do we have here?”
“My son, JR,” TJ explained and showed him her PI license. She held out her hand. “TJ Peacock, sir.” It never hurt to act as respectfully as possible.
He shook her hand and then bent over, making the usual baby noises and faces at JR, who never got enough of such silliness, even though he had his first birthday a week ago. “What can I do for you, Ms. Peacock?”
“We live off State. I was home when that house exploded last week. Just curious, I guess. Wonderin’ if it was an accident. I’d hate to think there were any gas-leak problems in the neighborhood.” She wouldn’t tell him her real purpose unless she had to.
“I’m sorry, but until the final report goes out, I can’t share any information with you. But I can tell you a final determination may be difficult. The damage is extensive.”
“Any chance it was arson?”
“I have to give you the same answer. You could ask the police. They’re investigating that angle too, although I’m not sure they could tell you much either.” He pulled a lollipop from his desk drawer and offered it to JR, who giggled at the sight.
TJ didn’t think he was shining her on, but he didn’t seem overly concerned about the case. It could be that he didn’t have results back from forensics, or he had them and the results were inconclusive, which as he mentioned happened all too often with suspicious fires.
“Can you tell me how long it’ll be before the official report comes out?”
He chuckled. “Don’t give up, do you? Sorry, I really can’t say. It all depends on what they find. It could be a week. It could even be months.”
Detective Brian Haymaker had to keep reminding himself to be grateful he had been assigned to a significant case, one that was a possible murder. Madison Chapman, who remained unconscious, was still in the ICU and not expected to pull through. He couldn’t begrudge the opportunity just because he had only gotten the case when the other detectives realized it might be linked to the dirty-sheet cases. He refused to use the “cum case” moniker the other detectives used. Not that he was prudish when it came to profanity, he just didn’t think the vulgar term for semen should be linked to an actual case.
When the techs were going through the Chapman house after finding Madison Chapman at the foot of the stairs, they had discovered an open bed with stained sheets exposed in the guest room on the first floor. The Chapmans hadn’t left it that way. Madison’s friend insisted that Madison had been sick the night of the party and definitely hadn’t gone home to hook up with a guy.
The lead detective, a surly, fifty-something man toying with early retirement, had been visibly disappointed when Haymaker told him that he had been assigned as Brian’s second-in-command. Detective Francis Lukaszewski, Franco to his cronies, had a large, slightly overweight frame and a face with a carnivorous grin that faded to a scowl when he heard the news that he would be playing subordinate to Haymaker.
Too damn bad, Brian thought. He was as good a detective as any of the others, even if they had a few years on him. He intended to make the most of the new assignment. The camaraderie he felt the day he delivered his partner’s baby on the conference room table had been short-lived and led to a coarse discussion of who had gotten the best view of her lower half. Between her screams and her swearing, Tasha had threatened death to anyone who ogled her “stuff.” As far as Brian was concerned, his partner had no “stuff.”
Earlier in the day, he and Lukaszewski questioned the friend who had found Madison Chapman at the bottom of the stairs. Cassie Cantwell hadn’t been able to tell them much. Madison left the party she and Cassie had been at the night before because she was coming down with the flu. Cantwell was adamant that Madison hadn’t been drinking, which test results had proven true. They would have to wait longer for the tox-screen results to find out if there were drugs in her system.
Madison didn’t have a boyfriend, but on the night of the party she was waiting for Rodney Johnstone, a boy she had been hoping to hook up with. According to Cantwell, the guy had been invited to the party, but he never showed. They hadn’t located Johnstone yet; he lived at home and was a student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Between his classes and his part-time job, his mother told them, he was often hard to locate. She gave them his schedule so they could catch him at the campus as he left his last class.
The Johnstones lived across the street and three houses down from where Norman Teschler’s house had exploded. An irrelevant connection? Probably, but Haymaker planned on going back to the neighborhood and asking new questions.
Lukaszewski had dumped the paperwork on him and then left to get a sandwich. Brian usually brought a lunch, opting to save money and eat healthier than the junk food so readily available near the station.
“Detective Haymaker?”
He looked up into the most beautiful eyes he had ever seen. A vivid blue, or were they purple? Either way, they were exotic eyes on a slim woman with high cheekbones and skin the color of a Florida suntan. “That’s me,” he answered. “And you are?”
“TJ Peacock,” she replied and flipped open a wallet to show him a private investigator�
�s license.
Her eyes went steely the minute she exposed her creds. Brian had an ominous feeling when he shook her small but surprisingly strong hand; there was more to TJ Peacock than an intriguing pair of eyes.
Chapter 10
Madison Chapman died the next morning from her injuries. Unless her autopsy proved otherwise, her death would be reported as accidental. The medical examiner’s official report wouldn’t be in until the next day.
Detectives Haymaker and Lukaszewski easily identified the Johnstone kid when he walked out of his last class of the day. Rodney Johnstone carried himself with a large load of self-esteem and was well built, with blond hair in one of those peaky styles like fresh whipped cream. His clothes were as casual as all the other students rushing from the room. They stopped him, flashed their IDs, and led him to the side of the corridor.
“What’s going on?” Johnstone asked, looking from one to the other.
Lukaszewski took the lead. “We’re here to ask you about Madison Chapman. I understand you were supposed to meet her at a party two nights ago at the home of Jared Kellar.”
“She invited me, yeah. I told her I might come just to get her to let up on me. She had a thing for me, but I wasn’t interested. Too young.”
Too young. Brian figured Johnstone was at the most three years older than the girl. “So you were never at the party?”
“Ask anyone who was there. I never showed. I had a date that night. What’s this about, anyway?”
“Madison fell down the stairs in her house the night of the party. Her injuries were fatal,” Lukaszewski said.
The kid lost his arrogance. He dropped his backpack on the floor and slumped against the wall for support. “You think someone pushed her?”
Brian found Johnstone’s question interesting, but it could simply be a reaction based on the police showing up to question him.
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