Woof. She scampered over, licked my ankles and let me pat her head. But when I bent down to pick her up, Miss Queen-of-the-Cuddle dashed out of reach and darted behind the hedge.
“You want to show me what you found? That it? Okay, but I hope it isn’t gruesome.” Feeling slightly apprehensive about encountering a mangled bird or something, I chased after her.
At the far end of the enclosure, the pool sparkled, beautiful and blue in the morning sunshine, and there she was by the deep end, her front paws on the very edge of the tiled apron.
Heavens, could she swim? If anything happened to Charlotte, James would die. A good thing I’d come to investigate.
For fear she’d run away, or worse, fall in, I didn’t approach any nearer.
“Come on. Come on, girl,” I coaxed.
No dice. She ignored me and stood her ground, her gaze riveted on the water.
What was so fascinating?
Curious, I stepped in closer and looked down into the pool. A scream ripped out of my throat. Then another. And another.
Submerged in eight feet of water, a woman was floating facedown, the stars on her bikini pointing to the bottom of the pool, the stripes to the sky.
Coming on the run, Tom reached me in no time, followed by an ashen-faced Eileen.
“It’s Kay Hawkins,” I said. “Call 9-l-l. Hurry.”
Tom felt his pockets. “I don’t have my cell with me.”
Eileen grabbed Charlotte and ran up the slope toward the house. I kicked off my shoes, dove down and grasped Kay’s lifeless body. When I raised her to the pool’s edge, Tom grasped her under the shoulders, and together we lifted her out of the water and laid her on the tiled apron, her cold cheek pressed to the concrete.
“We have to resuscitate her,” I said, but one look at Tom told me he was ready to pass out. Okay, I’d do it. Hiking the sodden shift up to my thighs, I straddled Kay and pressed on her back with both hands. Again and again, I pressed and let up. Pressed and let up. But she didn’t move, or sigh, or flutter an eyelash.
Distraught, I asked, “Tom, can you do CPR?”
He shook his head, obviously alarmed at the suggestion.
I never had, either, but I’d seen it done. What was keeping the EMS?
“Help me turn her over. I’m going to try.”
We rolled Kay onto her back, and kneeling beside her, I squeezed her cheeks until her lips parted. My face against hers, I blew air from my lungs into her mouth. I lifted off and breathed again. Off and on. Off and on. Over and over, I tried until a firm hand touched my back.
“That’s enough, ma’am,” someone said. “We’ll take it from here.”
The rescue squad. I hadn’t even heard them arrive. With a sense of utter failure, I huddled by the pool in my wet dress while they struggled over Kay.
After a handful of minutes that felt like a lifetime, the medic said, “Sorry, ma’am. We did our best, but there was no pulse or heartbeat. She was gone before we got here.”
I nodded and glanced over at Kay lying there so beautiful and cold in her stunning flag bikini. Then for the first time, I noticed the bruises on her neck.
Chapter Thirty-Five
The living room sliders slammed open, and heavy footfalls pounded down the stone stairs.
“Where is she?” Stew yelled. “Where is she?” He careened around the hedge, took one look at Kay and howled, “Omigod, noooooh!”
With a few long strides, he reached her and fell to his knees beside her. Big and strong and tough as nails—and as gentle as a mother with a child—he lifted her lifeless form to his chest and held her against him. Sobbing, he rocked her back and forth, keening in a hopeless, frenzied rhythm.
“I’m so sorry, Stew,” I said.
Caught in a web of anguish, he didn’t respond.
“Don’t leave me, Kay. Don’t leave me. There’s never been anyone but you. There never will be. Never.” He brushed her wet hair back from her forehead and kissed her cheek. “Say something, sweetheart. Talk to me. Say something. Anything. Give me hell like you used to. I miss that. I miss you. Please. I’m begging here, Kay. I’m begging.”
Shivering in my wet clothes despite the relentless sun, I wanted to run from the scene or at least cover my ears and block out Stew’s pain, but at that moment, I didn’t have the energy to move a muscle.
More footsteps sounded on the terrace stairs, and the two medics reappeared with a gurney. The older of the two, the one with Matt embroidered on his shirt pocket, approached Stew.
“You can let go now, sir. We’ll take care of her.”
But Stew wasn’t ready to relinquish Kay’s body. Tears running down his face, he glanced up at Matt with dead eyes. “I’m her husband. Who the hell are you?”
“I’m part of the EMS team, sir. You can give her to us now.”
Stew shook his head, sending tears flying off his face. “No, I can’t.” He clutched Kay tighter. “She’s mine, not yours.” He upped his chin. “Not his, either. She was never his.”
She was never whose?
Startled, the medics and I swiveled around to see who Stew was glaring at. James Stahlman stood inside the hedge by the pool’s shallow end, his face a rigid mask of disbelief. As though cast in stone, he remained motionless, staring in shock at what lay before him.
“What happened?” he asked Matt in a small whisper of a voice.
“It looks like a drowning, sir. We’ve notified the police. Are you Mr. Stahlman?”
James nodded.
“Can you identify the deceased?”
“Yes, she’s my fiancée, Kay Hawkins.” Spitting out “Hawkins” like an epithet, he pointed a trembling finger at Stew. “I want that man’s hands off her body, and I want him off my property.”
Matt swiveled his attention to Stew. “You heard the gentleman. Under the circumstances, would you please comply?”
“Gentleman, hah! He’s just a stiff in a pair of linen pants. She’s my wife, and I’m not letting her go. Not for the likes of him,” he sneered. “She used to laugh at you, you know that, Stahlman? Said you were the most boring guy she ever met. Used to joke about what you’d be like in bed.”
As if he’d been struck, James shrank back against the shrubbery but didn’t reply. He wouldn’t, not to a vulgar jibe like that, but he paled, alarmingly so. Matt glanced over at the other medic, Bill, according to his pocket. “A chair for the man. Quick.”
James waved Bill off with an impatient flick of his wrist and strode over to where Stew sat cradling Kay’s body. “Let her go,” he said quietly.
“Like hell. I’m taking her with me. You’ve got no claim on her.”
“We’re engaged to be married. You’re the one without a claim. You divorced her.”
“That was the worst mistake of my life. Look what happened.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Matt talking into his cell phone. Asking the police to hurry, no doubt.
His chin trembling, James gazed down at Kay’s inert form. “I loved her, and she loved me.”
“You liar. You killed her!” Slowly, his every move deliberate, Stew laid Kay on the pool apron and, jumping to his feet, came at James with both fists up.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” James said, disdain clear in his patrician voice. Ignoring Stew, he gazed at Kay, tears welling in his eyes. “She said she was going for a swim...I kissed her goodbye. That was the last...” He bent down as if he, too, were about to kneel by her side and cradle her in his arms one final time.
Stew’s beefy fist shot out. The right hook caught James on the jaw. The blow knocked him off his feet and sent him reeling. He swayed, shaking his head like a shaggy dog. A trickle of blood ran down his neck. He touched it with a finger, staring at the blood in disbelief. For a moment he stood stark still as if he didn’t
know what to do next. Not surprising. His careful code of behavior hadn’t prepared him for a sock on the jaw.
A siren wailed in the distance. From the corner of my eye, I saw Matt run up the slope with Tom chasing after him.
“Come on, gentlemen,” Bill pleaded. “The police are here. This is no way to act.”
Whether James and Stew heard a thing—the police siren, the medic’s warning or anything else—was doubtful. They hadn’t taken their eyes off each other.
Then suddenly, his arms shooting out of his sleeves, his fists pumping, Stew lowered his head and roared at James like an enraged bull.
Legs apart, his bleeding jaw jutting forward, slender, elegant James watched him approach, and with a lightning fist sent a right hook slamming into his belly.
“Oof!” Stew clutched his gut. Stunned, he staggered away, recovered, and rushed forward. An upper cut caught him under the chin, setting him back on his heels. He teetered on the edge of the pool, flailing at the air for a second, then lost his balance and fell like a stone into the deep end.
As James flexed his bloody knuckles, the water closed over Stew’s head.
Loud voices came from the direction of the terrace, and a moment later, my old friend Officer Batano rounded the boxwoods, followed by Matt and Tom.
“What’s going on here?” Batano asked.
“Help, I can’t swim!” Stew had bobbed up like a Halloween apple in a barrel, but as we watched, horrified, he sank below the surface again.
Since nobody made a move to rescue him, and I was wet anyway, I dove in. He had drifted to the bottom, his feet resting on one of the golden rings. I pulled on his shirt, hoping a strong scissor kick would buoy us both to the surface.
But at the pressure of my hand on his back, he twisted around and grasped me, pinning my arms to my sides in the mother of all bear hugs. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t do anything to save either one of us. Unless someone jumped in soon, we would both drown.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Stroking through the turquoise water, a man in white pants and a Hawaiian shirt swam straight for us. In slow motion, like an old 1920s movie, he raised his right arm and smacked Stew on the jaw.
At the impact, Stew let go and groped for his chin. The instant he released me, Rossi thrust an arm around my waist and pulled me toward the surface. We shot up to the air and filled our starved lungs. Then, turning turtle, Rossi dove back down.
“Help!” I screamed. “They’ll drown.”
“It’s okay, Deva,” Tom yelled. “He’s got him.”
Treading water like mad, I glanced across the pool. With Stew splashing and panting and spitting all the way, Rossi towed him over to the shallow end. Dazed, Stew stood in water up to his knees, clutching the tiled apron with both hands. I had a feeling he’d just developed a mortal fear of bathtubs.
Rossi heaved himself up over the edge and stared down at him. “You all right?”
“Yeah. That was a close call. Thanks, Lieutenant.” He choked out a wheezy cough and spit into the pool.
“Don’t mention it.”
Dripping water, Rossi strode over to James and said something I couldn’t hear. Then he raised the sheet off Kay’s body and studied her. I wondered if he noticed the bruises on her neck. Though little escaped Rossi, I’d be sure to mention them to him, just in case.
His examination finished, he lowered the sheet. The medics pushed the gurney up the slope and James followed. Stew, eyes lowered, made no attempt to stop them.
Rossi strode along the apron toward the deep end where I was alternating between paddling and floating.
“You staying in all day?”
Actually, now that I was out of danger, the water felt wonderful, but I extended a hand. Rossi helped me up and out, the sodden shift clinging to my body like a second skin.
He eyed me, head to toe. “You make quite a mermaid.”
“Thank you, and thanks for rescuing me. You’re my barefoot hero.”
He looked down at his feet and smiled. Tom, standing to one side, shaken and pale, held Rossi’s gun upside down in one hand and his loafers in the other.
“Too bad I forgot about the tape recorder,” Rossi said, removing the ruined device from a pocket. He shrugged. “Oh well. Let’s get up to the house. I have work to do.”
He took the gun and his shoes from Tom and glanced over at Stew, who was still standing in the pool. “Help Mr. Hawkins out of there, will you, Tom? We don’t need another drowning here today.”
I retrieved my pumps, and together Rossi and I started up the slope. As soon as I had him alone, I whispered, “Kay didn’t drown. She was murdered. Didn’t you notice the bruises on her neck?”
He nodded. “I did, but that doesn’t necessarily mean she was murdered.”
I stopped mid-stride, arms akimbo, the stiletto heels in my hands jutting out left and right. “Why do you always do that, Rossi?”
His brow furrowing like a country road, he said, “Do what?”
“Tell me my tips are no good.”
“I don’t do that.” He paused. “Not every time.”
“Of course you do. Remember when I found the Monet everyone thought was lost forever? And what about the drug stash I discovered, and how that led you directly to the killer? And then there was the—”
“Stop,” he said, using his no-nonsense cop voice. “You know the house we’re building?”
“Yes, but what’s that got to do with this?”
“I want, ah...orange...that’s it, orange shag rugs in all the rooms, purple walls and a lime-green lounge chair, the kind with the footrest that goes up when you press a button.”
“Those are lousy suggestions, and you know it. On the other hand, my tip is right on target.”
“Only partly so.” He resumed his trek up the slope. “What isn’t on target is the conclusion that you—as usual—jumped to.”
“But—”
“End of story, Deva. You’re the decorator—”
“Designer.”
“And I’m the detective.”
I heaved a sigh and lowered the stilettos. No point in arguing further. The morning had been stressful, to say the least. James and Stew had suffered a tragic loss, and Rossi, in sopping wet clothes, had a crime to solve, whether he wanted to admit it to me or not.
We had nearly reached the top of the slope when Teresa came rushing past us. I glanced over a shoulder as she whizzed by. Moving slowly, with Tom following him, Stew trudged toward the house. Teresa ran to his side and put a hand on his arm. He shrugged it off and continued on alone, ignoring her as she fell into step behind him.
What Stew was going through at the moment, Teresa couldn’t share. From her expression, she knew it and hung back without making another attempt to touch him. His reaction to Kay’s death sure was a far cry from the detached emotion he’d shown when poor little Connie Rae died. Then what he’d seemed most upset about was the possibility that he’d be blamed for her death. This time he appeared to be genuinely grieving. Though appearances, I reminded myself, could be deceiving...
As we stepped onto the terrace, Eileen hurried over to me. “Would you like to get out of that wet dress? I have a dry uniform you can borrow.”
Anxious to ditch the clammy shift, I accepted gratefully. In the powder room, I peeled off the shift and donned the uniform over my damp underwear. Not good, but better.
Rossi settled for a large beach towel, knotting it around his waist over his wet clothes, most likely hoping it would soak up most of the moisture from his wet pants.
Outside, slumped in a deck chair, Stew dripped pool water onto the terrace pavers. Alert to his every move, Teresa stood at attention behind him, but without the happy diamond-glow of earlier in the day.
While a fatigued-looking T
om sprawled on the top step and gazed toward the boxwoods, Eileen hovered near the sliders, wringing her hands on her apron.
“Would you please ask Mr. Stahlman to join us?” Rossi asked her.
“Yes, sir,” she said and hurried inside.
A demoralized group, we waited for several tense minutes until, finally, James came out, holding Charlotte as if she were a lifeline. Which I guessed she well might have been. Avoiding eye contact with Stew, he sat as far across the terrace from him as possible, stroking Charlotte nonstop, his expression as controlled and rigid as ice. His quiet suffering was difficult to watch, and I longed for Rossi to finish his questioning so I could leave. How I could ever transform this house into a cheerful home with an air of carefree elegance loomed over my head like Mission: Impossible.
With his tape recorder rendered useless, Rossi asked Eileen for a pen and a pad of paper. When she brought them to him, he said, “Would everyone please write down your name, address and a number where you can be reached. Also I need to know where you were and what you were doing for the past few hours.”
As the pad circulated among us, Rossi, with the towel still wrapped around his waist, glanced over at Stew. “How did you know your former wife had drowned?” He asked the question abruptly, hoping no doubt to catch him off guard.
His eyes lifeless, Stew raised his chin off his chest. “I saw the ambulance and was afraid something had happened to her. So I ran over here and one of the medics told me a woman had drowned. Who else would it be? The maid?” He cast a glance at plump, middle-aged Eileen in her white uniform and sensible oxfords. “I’ve seen you coming and going, ma’am, and you didn’t look like you’d skinny-dip during your workday.” He shook his head. “No, I knew it was Kay.” His voice faltered. “I knew.”
“Yeah, he knew,” Teresa said, a hint of sarcasm coloring her tone. “I did too, that’s why I came after him.” She finished writing and passed the notepad to Tom. “Can we leave now? Stew needs to get out of those wet clothes before he gets sick.”
“You’re both free to go.”
As if Stew were an invalid, Teresa took him by the arm and helped him out of his seat. She was behaving like a wife. Though this morning the odds seemed stacked against her ever becoming the next Mrs. Hawkins, the situation had changed since then, drastically so. Now that Stew had lost the woman he claimed was the love of his life, he might well turn to Teresa for consolation.
The Design Is Murder (Murders By Design) Page 16