Finally Anthony set both hands on the arms of his chair and announced that he was finished. Did Ms. Connor have any questions? Ms. Connor said she did not.
Gail looked at her watch and was astonished to find that nearly two hours had passed.
They walked Bobby to the door. Anthony said, "I'm helping you as a favor to Ms. Connor, but you should know that my first duty is to Nathan Harris. If there is any conflict between the two of you, you're on your own. It has to be that way. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir, I do."
He wrote a number on the back of a business card. "Call me if you have any questions. In the unlikely event that you can't reach me through my service, try my pager. It's always on."
"Thanks. You too, Ms. Connor." Bobby shook their hands.
Anthony gave him two twenties and sent him in search of a taxi back to the beach.
Gail closed the front door. "Well. Who do we go after now? Jack Pascoe or Sean's father?"
"We can hand them both over. Not yet, but soon, I think. Yes. Did you hear what he said about Nikki?"
"You may be right after all," Gail admitted.
Anthony replied with a slight shrug.
"You were very good with Bobby. He likes you. He didn't want to, but he does, and he'll tell Angela how you saved him from the police interrogation squad, and how smart you are. 'Mamita, I'm so surprised. He's not a monster. Why are you giving your papi such a hard time?' "
Allowing a smile, Anthony said, "Well, it's not so bad, then."
"And you didn't have that in the back of your mind, when you burned rubber all the way to the station?"
"I am doing this against my will. I should make him pay for it."
"Good luck." Gail laughed over her shoulder as she went back into her office. "Bobby gave me a hundred dollars. I'll split it with you. Oh, I plan to cash in when all the donors at the ballet find out what a great lawyer I am. I just hope nobody expects me to handle a criminal case. My God, if you hadn't been here."
"You would have managed."
"Oh, sure. After this, I'm sticking with civil practice."
They both stood at the edge of her desk. The moment went on, neither of them speaking. His eyes were still warm from his smile. Gail turned to flip a page in her desk diary.
"What about Judge Harris? When can I talk to him? My schedule is fairly open this week."
"I already asked him," Anthony said. "Wednesday afternoon around five o'clock at my office. Is that good?"
"Yes, fine.” She wrote it in the book, wondering what kind of gossip would start flying in the halls of Ferrer & Quintana when she walked through the door. She jammed her pen toward a can that Karen had decorated and got it in on the second try. He was standing a little too close, and the scent of his cologne entered her head. His hand rested on the desk, and he was drumming his fingers on its surface. Cheerily she said, "I'll write up my notes in the morning and bring them over. Remember what he said about Ted Stamos? It didn't match what Stamos said to you, did it?"
"Let me take you to lunch. Bring your notes. You know, we have a lot to decide with this case. Who talks to whom, what to do first—"
"I promised Karen I'd be home."
"An hour. You have to eat somewhere, no?"
"Oh, I can't. She's packing a picnic basket for the beach. If I'm late, she'll have a fit. It's our last day before she starts school tomorrow."
Acknowledging this with a nod, he said, "Of course. You should be with your daughter." When she reached for her purse, he put a hand lightly on her arm. "Gail, wait. There is something I need to ask you."
"I really have to get home," she said.
"This won't take long." He was looking at her in that same strangely intense way that had set her nerves jittering before. "Are you pregnant?"
Her mouth opened, but her brain refused to accept that he had asked this.
"I said, are you pregnant?" Same words, same soft intonation.
Impossibilities flashed in her mind. Her mother had called him. A friend had betrayed her. A soundless laugh finally came out. "That is ridiculous."
"Are you?"
"No. My God. Of course I'm not." She could feel the blood coursing into her face. "Anthony, that's .. . impossible. Birth control? Remember?"
"Sometimes it fails. So I've heard." His eyes shifted back and forth on hers, then narrowed slightly. "Look at me and tell me again. No, right here." He bent slightly to see directly into her face. "Gail? Are you going to have a child?"
"No! Anthony, stop it." She turned her head.
His fingers tightened on her upper arms. "Jesucristo, es verdad." She felt the words as a breath on her cheek. "You didn't tell me. Why?" He held her more tightly when she tried to twist away. "My child, and you didn't tell me? Why not?"
She closed her eyes, unable to speak.
"Last night I said to myself, no, that's crazy, she can't be pregnant. But what if she is? Why didn't she tell me? I didn't believe you, when you said you were going to live with your ex-husband. Maybe it's true. And maybe you didn't tell me because this isn't my child. Is it?" He grasped her face and turned it so he could see her. Color burned along his cheekbones, and his lips were tight against his teeth. "I asked you a question. Is it mine?"
How quickly rage ignited, incendiary and explosive. Her right palm connected before any conscious thought.
"Cara'o." He touched his fingers to his upper lip.
Trembling, Gail shook her hair out of her eyes. "Go ahead. Call me a whore like you did last time."
"I never called you a whore."
"You did. A lying whore. 'Get out of my life, you lying whore.'" Her voice broke. "Puta mentirosa. What is that?"
He stared at her. "Gail—I don't remember, I swear to you—"
'"You thought I'd been sleeping with my ex-husband. Engaged to you. In love with you—fool that I was— and sleeping with Dave? How dare you?"
"I was wrong." He reached for her, and she pushed him away.
"You ruined a man whose only crime was trying to be a good father. Destroyed his business, and sent him to work in a second-rate resort at the other end of the Caribbean!"
"Gail, I offered to give him whatever he wanted, and you refused. I offered to bring him back. I'll still do it. Is that what you want?"
"Never a thought what it would do to Karen."
"I'm willing to start over, to do anything. Gail, a child! How can you turn your back? This changes everything—"
"You had to control me, to lock me into your little kingdom, a petty tyrant like your grandfather, never mind who it hurt—"
"Did you tell me what you felt? Never. You drove me crazy with your lies and half-truths. What did you expect me to think?"
"You wanted me out of your life. Fine. I'm gone."
"Stop! Enough. Go ahead. Hit me again. Get it out of your system—"
She hit him again, more fist than palm.
"Cono. iQue me haces?" He put a hand to his eye. "Do you hate me that much? I have a forty-five pistol in my car. You want to shoot me? No, this is better." He grabbed a letter opener out of the can on her desk, sending pens clattering and rolling across the surface. "Do it with this, why don't you? Stab me in the heart. I've been accused and found guilty. Now the execution." He held the point at his chest, handle toward her. "Take it. Go ahead. Mdtame, Cut my heart out. Would that make you happy?"
She fell onto the sofa weeping.
"What do you want from me? What? iMe quieres mandar pa'l carajo? Ya estoy ahi." The letter opener clanged against the wall. "No tienes corazon. You are heartless. A cold and unforgiving woman. I pray to God you don't turn the child—my child—into the same piece of stone."
She heard his footsteps moving away. A few seconds later the outer door slammed.
Bobby called Sean's cell phone and found out he was over on the beach. Mustang just out of the shop, had a friend from school and a couple of girls with him. Bobby told him he had some coke and a few Roofies he could let go cheap because he
needed to raise some cash. He told Sean to get rid of his friends and meet him back of the tire store on Miami Ave. Five minutes, straight over the causeway.
Bobby parked his car and sat on the front fender. Brothers from his street watching his back. Trees blocking the houses. Enough light to see the chain-link fence. Glass sparkling on the ground like stars. Bobby hadn't felt like this in a long time. No fear. His body running on some force outside itself.
He heard the Mustang before he saw it. A rumble, a throb in the air. Then it went off, and the car came around the corner, glinting under the streetlight before coming into the shadows.
Driver's door opened, shut. Sean doing the homeboy strut. Big shirt with horizontal stripes, baggy shorts to his knees. Silver ring shining on his eyebrow.
Bobby slid off the fender. The knife was behind his back, stuck in his belt.
"Yo, dog." Bobby held his hand up, and Sean slapped it.
"Whassup?" Sean said, "Sorry about the alibi, bro. Cops were leaning on me bad. Your woman can back you up, yo?"
"No doubt." Two silhouettes moving in behind Sean.
Sean said, "You want to go out?"
"No, I gotta hang here."
"Where's the stuff?"
"In the trunk.” Sean came with him, running his mouth, already high on something. Bobby could see how it would go before he made the first move. Sean outweighed him fifty pounds, and he came crashing down in slo-mo. Hair bouncing on his forehead, and the leaves coming up, then falling back, and the elongated grunt. Then Bobby had him on his stomach, a knee in his back, arm pulled up tight.
He let Sean see the knife snap open. There was enough light for that.
"Oh, Jesus. Oh, shit, man, what are you—" Pressure on the arm made him whimper.
"I could cut you and leave you here. Rich white boy doing a deal, should've known better."
"Get the fuck off." Sean jerked. Bobby leaned his knee into Sean's back and stuck the point of the blade through the little ring in his eyebrow. He started crying. "Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. Bobby, I'm sorry, man. Don't. Please. Please don't kill me. Please. Take the money. Take it all. There's more in the car."
"That's not what I want." He leaned close to Sean's face. Sean was sweating, and leaves and sand were stuck to his cheek. His eye rolled. The stink of shit came from Sean's pants.
"You know that three hundred dollars you loaned me, bro? Where'd you get it?"
Chapter 19
The school bus from Biscayne Academy made stops in Irene's neighborhood, and Gail could have put Karen on it, but they had a ritual at the start of every new year: Mom and Dad would drive her there and stand outside watching while Karen ran into the building with her friends. Last year, Gail and Dave had gone through the divorce, and he'd been sailing near Puerto Rico, but he'd sent a postcard. Gail had told him he'd better show up this time, or Karen would be horribly disappointed. He wouldn't be flying back to St. John till next week, so there was no excuse. He promised to be at Irene's house by 7:30.
Gail looked at her watch, then shouted into the hall, "Karen! We're leaving in ten minutes!" With a guilty smile at Irene, she said, "It used to be so peaceful here, didn't it? Just you and the cats."
"I love having you girls around. Did you eat? Gail, you can't have just coffee." She opened the refrigerator. "What about some fruit yogurt? Eat something or I'll worry." Irene shoved a carton of peach and a spoon into Gail's hands.
Grasping the spoon to keep from dropping it, Gail winced. She had not known that hitting someone in the face could be so painful. She sat down at the table and scooted the gray cat away from her ankles. It was a struggle not to slump in the chair. She had hardly slept last night. The sound of a slamming door had replayed over and over in her mind. Anthony walking out. Telling her she was a piece of stone and then walking out. Several times over the past few weeks Gail had played with thoughts of what he might do if he found out she was pregnant. In her imagination he had usually done the same thing he had done yesterday—walk out—but always, before the door slammed, there had been that one glimmer of hope that he might turn around and rush back to her, saying he was sorry, that he loved her, that he could never leave her, or some other equally improbable shit. All Gail wanted now was to be rid of this damned case so they could deal with each other at a distance again.
"Mother? I need a favor. I'd like to meet Claire Cresswell. Could you introduce me? Is there a board meeting at the ballet you plan to go to this week?"
Irene dropped the last of Karen's breakfast dishes into the dishwasher. "I believe so. I'm not on the board, but we could find some excuse. Do you think I should hang out a sign? Irene Connor, Private Investigations. I'll buy a trench coat."
Gail smiled at her mother's pink slacks and flower-printed top. "Here's another mission. I found out that Claire's daughter, Maggie, attempted suicide at age fifteen. It's been over twenty years, but I'd like to know what happened."
Irene turned around. "Oh, my. I heard she was a problem as a child, but not this. What did she do?"
"Tried to hang herself from the rod in her bedroom closet. They sent her to a mental hospital somewhere in Central Florida, then in Vermont, and she didn't come home for years. There was a gallery exhibition of her works here in Miami, and she met Judge Harris. Everyone says they were happily married. But she overdosed on pills in a cottage not fifty yards from where her brother was shot to death last month."
The telephone on the wall rang as Irene was saying, "Yes, of course, I'll find out what I can, but it won't be easy. Twenty years—" She picked up the phone. "Hello . . . Oh, hi, Dave, how are you? . . . Sure, just a second." She held it out to Gail. A look between the two of them asked the same question: Was he coming?
He wasn't. He and his friends had come back late from their fishing trip. A broken motor. He had forgotten to set the alarm. It would take him half an hour to get there.
"Dave, how could you? Karen was counting on this, especially since you missed last year. You promised . . . Being sorry doesn't help. . . . Okay, fine, never mind. Go back to sleep.... No, you explain it to her." Gail hung up and stared at the phone until her temper cooled. Such a stone-hearted bitch.
She found Karen sitting on the edge of the single bed in her room, buckling her shoes. This year Biscayne Academy had gone to uniforms—plaid skirts and white tops. Gail stared down at a pair of screaming green socks.
"Your dad called."
"I heard." "
"Did you? Sorry. He said he'd call you tonight. Their motor broke, and he got in late." Gail sat on the edge of the bed. "You want to ask Gramma to come along?"
"Sure, she can come." Karen leaned down to do the other buckle, and her honey-brown hair fell over her shoulders. "Dad is like that, you know. I mean, I love him a lot, but you can't count on him. You sort of have to make plans for yourself."
"Oh, sweetie. I don't want you to grow up cynical and disappointed."
"I'm not." Flipping her hair back, Karen sat up. Her brows were sun-blond over bright blue eyes. "Who was that girl who tried to kill herself?"
"Do you eavesdrop on everything? That was a long time ago. The daughter of a friend of your gramma's." Gail put an arm around Karen and pulled her close. "She was unhappy and thought life had no meaning. But it does." Gail kissed the top of Karen's head. "Don't ever forget how sweet and precious it is, and how much I love you."
"Mom? Could we discuss this in the car? Please. I don't want to be late my first day." Karen got up and slung her book bag over her shoulder. She kissed Gail lightly on the cheek. "Really, Mom, you shouldn't worry so much."
Charlene Marks said, "You know what would show some real growth in this man? If he actually believed it was Dave's baby, and he could say, and mean it, "Gail, I understand why you turned to Dave. I was such a jerk. This isn't my child, but I still love you, and I will pay loads of money to help you raise it. And I'll stay out of your life until you call me.’ "
"Not under threat of death would Anthony say such a thing."
"Oh, please."
"Here's a happy marriage. You're in bed on your honeymoon, and a 747 crashes through the roof and kills both of you. But my profession as a divorce lawyer has jaded me to some extent. Okay, what can I do for you?"
"I need to find Nikki Cresswell. I assume Anthony's investigator has a work address, but I don't want to call his office and ask. Did you write anything in the file besides 'ad agency'?"
Charlene led her into a storage room on the other side of the suite. She found the right file cabinet and pulled open a drawer, walking her fingers through the folders. "Cresswell, Cresswell . . . What are you going to do, ask her if she shot her husband?"
"A little more subtlety, I think."
"But why? According to Roger, she has the brain of a Barbie doll." Charlene opened a file. "Oh. Too bad. All I wrote was 'ad agency, Coconut Grove.’ Well, how many can there be?"
There were six in the Yellow Pages. Gail got a hit on the second one, Bader-Miranda Advertising on Tigertail Avenue. Nikki wasn't in yet, but they expected her any minute. Leaving Miriam to reschedule the ten o'clock client for after lunch, Gail drove the six miles to the agency and found out that Nikki wouldn't be in till after eleven. She was having a pedicure at Biaggi.
The salon was a block away at the Mayfair Shops. Gail opened the door. The place had shiny wood floors, suspended halogen lights, silver walls, hairdressers in black, and a waiting area with red leather chairs, all occupied by women flipping through fashion magazines or chatting on cell phones.
Latin jazz played on hidden speakers. At the front desk a woman in leopard print tights was passing out espresso, blocking the receptionist's view. Gail slipped past the desk and around a frosted glass divider. Her nose was filled with the smells of coconuts and almond, hair conditioner and coloring, and the medicinal ping of nail polish remover. In the back a red-haired woman was reading a copy of People magazine. She was wrapped in a black salon robe, and her feet were in a vibrating foot bath scented with eucalyptus.
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