To Have and to Kill

by Mary Jane Clark

  Phillip knew he should be glad that the man who aimed to be Susannah’s stepfather was the sort that seemed to enjoy spending time with his daughter, doing such wholesome and educational things. But all Phillip could feel was jealousy and resentment and anger.

  Casey Walden was stealing his life.

  Reaching the newsstand, Phillip picked up the newspaper and stared at the glaring image of Travis York lying on the stage floor, his mouth gaping open, his eyes bulging. He noticed that a photo credit was given to Martha Killeen. As Phillip studied the picture further, he was surprised at how little emotion he felt. Once he had been so jealous of Travis that he couldn’t sleep at night. He had been tortured by thoughts of Travis and Glenna being together. He had been certain that, despite Glenna’s denials, Travis had played a big part in the dissolution of their marriage. Phillip had been consumed by his hatred for the man.

  Now all Phillip felt was a sense of satisfaction. Travis York had deserved what he had gotten. Coveting another man’s wife was a sin.

  Now, at least, half of Phillip’s competition was out of the way.

  Chapter 24

  Her blond hair fanned out on the pillow, Piper awoke to the smell of coffee drifting up from the kitchen and Emmett licking her face. She stretched and took in a deep breath, staring at the bubble-gum-pink walls and wishing she had gotten involved in picking this paint color. Then she remembered. Travis York had died last night. Even worse, there was a good chance he might have been murdered.

  Instinctively reaching for her BlackBerry, Piper scrolled around, looking for the latest news. She read, paying close attention to every word. There was nothing in any of the stories about Travis York’s death that she hadn’t known last night when she left the auction. But the police were scheduled to hold a news conference later in the day.

  This was one morning she didn’t have to rack her brain for something to post. Piper began pecking at her handheld’s keyboard, typing an entry for all those following her on Twitter, careful not to exceed the 140-character limit.

  I WAS AMONG THE VERY LAST PEOPLE WHO SAW TRAVIS YORK ALIVE. HE WAS SO TALENTED. ALWAYS KIND TO ME. HE WILL BE SORELY MISSED BY 1000S OF FANS.

  Laying the BlackBerry on the bedside table, Piper went to the bathroom and brushed her teeth. She turned on the water in the shower, waited for it to spray hot, and then stepped into the stall. She let the water run over her body, soothing the tension she felt. Her hair was full of shampoo lather when her phone buzzed.

  Jack Lombardi waited impatiently for Piper to answer. After four rings, voice mail sprang into action. Frustrated, Jack left his message.

  “Pipe? It’s me. I just read your tweet. If you told me you were going to be at that auction, I’d forgotten. I want to talk to you, Pipe. To make sure you’re okay and to eat some humble pie. I was sure that Glenna’s letter was from a harmless crank. But now that I hear that Glenna could have just as easily taken a drink from that pitcher, I’m thinking maybe someone really has it in for her and that the letter could be a strong clue.

  “Oh, yeah, they were able to determine that there was cyanide in the water. They suspected cyanide and checked specifically for that right away. But that’s not for publication yet. Anyway, that letter has to make its way to the police.”

  As she went down to the kitchen to pour herself a glass of orange juice, Piper heard the familiar banging coming from the basement. The sound of her father’s tinkering was oddly soothing to her. It had always been this way.

  Piper remembered coming home after a Friday night out with friends in high school. While she had never admitted it, Piper was nervous when she was in a car with a friend who drove too fast or at a party where people drank themselves into blackouts.

  Even though she knew he was still up just to make sure she was home by her curfew, the sound of her father at his workbench never failed to remind her that she was safe. That she was home.

  Sense memory at its best.

  She carried her drink with her downstairs. She found her father rummaging through an old applesauce jar containing odd nails and screws. He put it down immediately when he heard her.

  “Hi, Dad.”

  “What time did you finally get home last night?”

  “I don’t know. I guess it was after one.”

  “It was after two. I heard you.”

  “Then why are you asking me?”

  Vin shrugged. “Force of habit, I guess. I left you a message and you didn’t call me back.”

  “By the time I noticed it, I was afraid you’d be asleep and I didn’t want to wake you.”

  Vin seemed to accept the explanation. “All right. Tell me about what you saw.”

  Piper closed her eyes. “It was a horror show, Dad.”

  “Death by poison usually is,” said Vin, “if that’s what it turns out to be.”

  “It was poison,” said Piper. “Cyanide. Jack Lombardi just left me a message about it.”

  “The FBI kid?”

  Piper nodded. “Somehow I don’t think Jack would appreciate being referred to as ‘the FBI kid.’ ”

  “He’s a kid to me,” said Vin.

  “Whatever.”

  “Actually, I’m not surprised the detectives suspected cyanide. It’s a great poison,” Vin continued. “It looks like sugar, can be dissolved in water or hidden in food or medications. Except for the smell of bitter almonds, there’s really nothing that warns you until it’s too late. And I read somewhere that being able to detect the almond scent is a genetic thing. Some people can, some people can’t.”

  Piper sank into the worn sofa. “Cyanide. It’s so dramatic. It’s like Masterpiece Theatre on Fifth Avenue.”

  “It’s not really all that exotic, Piper,” said Vin as he found the nail he wanted. “We had a couple of cyanide poisoning cases while I was on the force. All three involved somebody who was ticked off with a husband, wife, or former lover. And, of course, there were those famous cases in the early eighties when some idiot was going around lacing extra-strength Tylenol capsules with cyanide. If I remember correctly, seven people were killed by that animal.”

  “Did they ever find out who did it?” asked Piper.

  “They’ve had a couple of suspects but they’ve never had enough evidence to charge any of them with murder.” Vin began vigorously hitting the nail with his hammer.

  “Where do you even get cyanide?” asked Piper when there was a pause in the pounding.

  “It’s not all that hard to buy, lovey,” said Vin as he took out his measuring tape. “It’s available for commercial use and mainly produced for mining gold and silver. It’s used in electroplating and cleaning metal. Labs use it as a reducing agent and it’s also used as an insecticide. I remember in one of our cases, the killer’s hobby was collecting bugs. He used potassium cyanide to euthanize his insects . . . and then his wife.”

  Piper winced. “Wow. There’s a winner.”

  “And here’s another reason not to smoke. Cyanide has been found in cigarettes.”

  “Lovely.”

  Chapter 25

  The decision was made not to hold classes at the Metropolitan School for Girls the day following the auction. Parents were alerted by robo-call. However, teachers were expected to attend a morning meeting where a psychologist would address them on how to handle the subject of Travis York’s death with the students when they came back to school on Monday.

  Jessie Terhune sat amid her colleagues and listened, seemingly absorbed in what the psychologist was saying. But she was distracted. Casey Walden was sitting in the row in front of her. Jessie had to concentrate to keep her eyes on the speaker when all she really wanted to do was look at Casey.

  She still loved him. It was torture to know that he loved somebody else.

  After the psychologist answered questions from the audience
, Michele Cox, the headmistress, came up to the stage and thanked him. Then Mrs. Cox addressed the teachers herself.

  “I just thought that you should also know that, thanks to Travis York, the auction was a huge success. Before he was stricken, our auctioneer cajoled over a million dollars from our audience. And this morning, we have been getting calls and e-mails from people all around the country who would like to donate to a fund benefiting our school drama department in his memory.”

  So it had worked, thought Jessie, determined to keep her facial expression solemn. Speaking to the reporters in front of the school last night had done just what she had hoped it would. Suggesting that Travis York supported her drama department was spurring on his fans. Who knew how many people would donate because they wanted to pay tribute to Travis!

  Casey turned around and gave her a sad smile. Jessie tried to read it. Was he happy that her department was going to reap a windfall but appropriately melancholy because of the circumstances? Or was his face expressing pity for her because he knew that she still loved him?

  Suddenly, Jessie felt self-conscious, aware that she had more than a few gray hairs, her lipstick had worn off, and her boxy suit jacket was four years old.

  How frumpy I must look to him, in comparison to Glenna.

  But Jessie smiled back, determined not to give him the satisfaction of thinking that she cared about him at all. Let him think that she had moved on, that she was focused on her beloved work. Wait until he saw the dynamic direction her drama department would take now.

  Nothing is over yet, Casey, she thought, holding on to a hope that they might still have some future together. You can never tell what’s going to happen next. It could have just as easily been your precious Glenna as Travis York last night.

  Life was unpredictable.

  Chapter 26

  Everyone was clearly shaken. There were tears and blank expressions and faces contorted in grief as the actors and crew arrived on the set of A Little Rain Must Fall. Despite Travis’s death, the show was going on. There was a taping schedule that had to be met.

  Quent gathered the staff together in a rehearsal hall. As he waited for everyone to find a place to sit, he took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes and the bridge of his nose. He cleared his throat and replaced his glasses before starting to speak.

  “First of all, I want to thank all of you for coming at what is, for all of us, a terribly sad and absolutely horrific time. Travis’s death is a profound loss. He was an incredibly talented actor with a charismatic personality. He was a treasured colleague and friend to all of us.

  “Just a few minutes ago, I took a call from the police, a courtesy call really, with news that they will reveal later in the day. They have ascertained that the water Travis drank was laced with cyanide.”

  Some gasped, some mumbled to those sitting beside them, all of them shook their heads as they struggled to comprehend the idea that the man who had been with them, taping a scene not even twenty-four hours before, had been murdered.

  Quent paused and scanned his audience. After several moments, he continued speaking.

  “Distasteful as it may be, we have to figure out how Travis’s death will impact the show. The writers and I will gather as soon as we finish here to figure out what to do with the scripts. Once it’s decided how we’ll explain what happened to Travis’s character, we’ll figure out what previously taped scenes have to be amended and what new scenes will be needed to advance our story line. In the meantime, there are some scenes that have nothing to do with Travis’s character that can still be taped as scheduled. So, everyone, let’s take one day at a time and do the best we can. Let’s do Travis proud.”

  Quent looked appropriately somber as he finished speaking. Of course, he hadn’t expressed all of his thoughts and feelings.

  From a business point of view, it would have been better if Glenna had been the one to die. A Little Rain Must Fall was losing her anyway. But, then again, even Travis’s dying was incredible publicity.

  Chapter 27

  Arthur Walden and his wife, Laura, sat in tufted leather wing chairs in the office on the top floor of the Madison Avenue building that housed Walden’s Jewelers. They watched the story about the soap opera star’s death on Channel 2’s News at Noon. There were two sound bites from the police press conference in the piece, one declaring that Travis York had died of cyanide poisoning, the other asking that anyone with information pertinent to the case come forward and assist the investigation.

  At the conclusion of the story, Arthur clicked off the television and turned to his wife.

  “It could have just as easily gone the other way,” he said. “This tragedy could have struck much closer to home. It could have been Glenna.”

  Laura rested her head on the back of the chair and closed her eyes. “I know,” she said. “Thank God it wasn’t. Can you imagine how Casey would have taken that?”

  “He would have been devastated,” said Arthur as he stood up. “But it wasn’t Glenna. Casey can go on with his plans.”

  Laura’s head snapped forward at the change in tone of her husband’s voice. She glared at him. “You know you could sound happier about it, Arthur. Casey is your brother and he’s been single all his life. You should be glad that he’s finally found someone he wants to settle down with.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want Casey to be happy, Laura,” said Arthur. “What I can’t stand is the fact that all of a sudden he wants to stick his nose in the business. I’m not used to that and I don’t want it.”

  “You’ve been spoiled, Arthur,” said Laura. “We’ve been spoiled. Never having to answer to anyone, Casey accepting whatever you told him, whatever yearly dividend you sent him. It was naive to think it could go on forever like that. The business was left to the both of you.”

  “But I’ve done all the work,” said Arthur.

  “And you’ve compensated yourself well for it.”

  Arthur began to speak, but thought better of it. Not even Laura knew how well he had paid himself. And if his brother ever found out and demanded that he make restitution—or, worse, filed criminal charges—Arthur would be ruined.

  Chapter 28

  The outside air was cold, the gusting winds made trees and bushes sway, and the forecast was for snow—but Piper was dressed in sandals and wore spandex shorts under her sweatpants as she drove her parents’ car toward the center of town. She was cutting it close. If she was late, the door would be locked and she wouldn’t be able to take her class.

  As Piper pulled into a parking space in front of the yoga studio, her BlackBerry sounded. Before answering, she glanced to see who was calling. She hoped that it was someone who could wait. But when she saw it was her agent, she pushed the ACCEPT key.

  “Hey, Gabe. What’s up?”

  “I’m fine, Piper. How are you?” He was being sarcastic.

  “Sorry about that,” said Piper. Whenever Gabe called, Piper hoped it would be good news, but today all she wanted was for him to be brief. This was the latest yoga class, and Piper was dying for the workout. Thankfully, he didn’t take long.

  “A Little Rain Must Fall, Monday. You can phone in for your call time. It should be posted by now. Do you still have the number?”

  “Yeah, I do. What about the script? Can they e-mail it to me, or do I have to go to the studio to pick it up?”

  “It’s in flux, Piper. The writers are going to be working all weekend trying to figure out how to adapt to losing Travis. They’ll send the lines as soon as they have them.”

  The first thing that struck Piper was the familiar stench. It was pungent and unpleasant. Still, it smelled a lot better than the place she frequented in New York.

  Any Bikram yoga studio she had ever visited had a bad odor. A group of people exercising in a room heated to 105 degrees Fahrenheit, with the humidity at 40 pe
rcent, produced gallons of sweat. The idea was to keep the body warm and sweating profusely. It helped get rid of toxins and allowed the body to be more flexible.

  Some yogis didn’t like Bikram, because it didn’t stress the meditation aspect of yoga. It was primarily a workout. That was precisely why Piper was a loyal fan. She tried to go four or even five times a week, and she always made it to at least three sessions—unlike her karate refresher classes, which she only took from time to time. Her father insisted she keep up the skills she had begun acquiring when she was eleven years old—also at his insistence. Vin Donovan wanted his daughter to be able to defend herself.

  Fluorescent lights blazed from the ceiling. Piper tried to keep her eyes open and focused on the image of herself in the mirror, not looking at the other students, listening only to the commands of the instructor. But Piper was distracted. The murder, her return to the soap, even the realization that there were only two weeks until Glenna and Casey’s wedding, kept her mind spinning. She had no definite plans about what the wedding cake should be, but Piper knew two things: it had to make Glenna happy and it had to make Piper look good.

  After an hour and a half in the hot room, twisting into cobra, locust, tree, eagle, and camel postures, Piper’s body glistened with perspiration. She wiped herself with a towel, rolled up her yoga mat, pulled on her sweats, and hurried out to the car in the cold. On the way home, she stopped at the CVS in downtown Hillwood, ignoring the stares of other customers as they watched the young woman with a red face and sweat-soaked hair that was practically still steaming. Piper headed for the magazine racks and pulled off copies of Brides and Martha Stewart Weddings.