Pretend You Don't See Her

by Mary Higgins Clark

  Abbott’s eyes crinkled as he bent down and kissed her cheek. “Absolutely nothing.” He signaled to the captain hovering nearby. “You know the brandy Ms. Robbins enjoys.”

  “There go the profits,” Calla Robbins said, laughing. “Thanks, Steve. You know how to treat a lady.”

  “I try.” He smiled.

  “I hear the new casino will knock everyone dead,” chimed in Robbins’s escort, a prominent businessman.

  “You heard right,” Steve agreed. “It’s an amazing place.”

  “The word is that Jimmy is planning to get you to run it,” the man added.

  “The word is this,” Steve said decisively. “Jimmy’s principal owner. Jimmy’s the boss. That’s the way it is, and that’s the way it’s going to be. And don’t you forget it. He sure doesn’t let me forget it.”

  From the corner of his eye he saw Jimmy enter the restaurant. He waved him over.

  Jimmy joined them, his face wreathed in a big smile for Calla.

  “Who is boss in Atlantic City, Jimmy?” she asked. “Steve says you are.”

  “Steve has it right,” Jimmy said, smiling. “That’s why we get along so good.”

  As Jimmy and Steve moved away from Robbins’s table, Landi asked, “Did you set up a dinner with that Farrell woman for me?”

  Abbott shrugged. “Can’t reach her, Jimmy. She’s left her job, and her home phone is disconnected. I guess she’s off on some kind of vacation.”

  Jimmy’s face darkened. “She can’t have gone too far. She’s a witness. She can identify Isabelle’s killer when they find him. That detective who took my copy of Heather’s journal has to know where she is.”

  “Want me to talk to him?”

  “No, I’ll do it. Well, look who’s here.”

  The formidable figure of Richard J. Parker was coming through the restaurant doors.

  “It’s his wife’s birthday,” Steve explained. “They have a reservation for three. That’s why R. J.’s wife is with him for a change.”

  And that punk son of his completes the happy family, Jimmy thought, as he hurried across to the foyer to welcome them with a warm smile.

  The elder Parker regularly brought his real estate clients there for dinner, which was the only reason Jimmy hadn’t banned his son, Rick Parker, from the restaurant ages ago. Last month he had gotten drunk and noisy at the bar and had had to be escorted to a cab. A few times when he had come in for dinner, it was obvious to Jimmy that Rick was high on drugs.

  R. J. Parker returned Jimmy Landi’s hearty handshake. “What more festive place to bring Priscilla than Landi’s, right, Jimmy?”

  Priscilla Parker gave Landi a timid smile, then looked anxiously at her husband for approval.

  Jimmy knew that R. J. not only cheated on his wife, but that he bullied her unmercifully as well.

  Rick Parker nodded nonchalantly. “Hi, Jimmy,” he said with a slight smirk.

  The aristocrat condescending to greet the peasant inn-keeper, Jimmy thought. Well, without his father’s clout that jerk couldn’t get a job cleaning toilets.

  Smiling broadly, Jimmy personally escorted them to their table.

  As Priscilla Parker sat down, she looked around. “This is such a pretty room, Jimmy,” she said. “But there’s something different. What is it? Oh, I see,” she said, “the paintings of Heather are gone.”

  “I thought it was time to remove them,” Jimmy said gruffly.

  He turned abruptly and left, so he did not see R. J. Parker’s angry glance at his son, nor the way Rick Parker stared at the mural of the Bridge of Sighs, from which the painting of Heather as a young woman was now missing.

  It was just as well.

  22

  IT HAD BEEN NEARLY FOUR MONTHS SINCE LACEY HAD HAD a reason to get dressed up. And I didn’t bring dress-up clothes, she thought, as she looked in the closet for something that would be appropriate for a festive evening out.

  I didn’t bring many of my things because I thought that by now Caldwell, or whatever his real name is, would have been caught and made a deal to turn state’s evidence, and I’d be out of the loop and back to real life.

  That’s the kind of thinking that gets me in trouble, she reminded herself as she reached for the long black wool skirt and evening sweater she had bought at an end-of-season closeout sale at Saks Fifth Avenue last spring, neither of which she’d had a chance to wear in New York.

  “You look okay, Alice,” she said aloud when she studied herself in the mirror a few minutes later. Even on sale the skirt and sweater had been an extravagance. But it was worth it, she decided. The effect of understated elegance gave a lift to her spirits.

  And I certainly need a lift, Lacey thought as she fished in her jewelry box for earrings and her grandmother’s pearls.

  Promptly at six-thirty, Tom Lynch called on the intercom from the lobby. She was waiting with the apartment door open when he stepped out of the elevator and walked down the hall.

  The obvious admiration in his face as he approached was flattering. “Alice, you look lovely,” he said.

  “Thanks. You’re pretty fancy yourself. Come—”

  She never finished saying come in. The door to the elevator was opening again. Had someone followed Tom up? Grabbing his arm, she propelled him into the apartment and bolted the door.

  “Alice, is anything wrong?”

  She tried to laugh, but knew the effort sounded false and shrill. “I’m so foolish,” she stammered. “There was a... a deliveryman who rang the bell a couple of hours ago. He honestly was on the wrong floor, but my apartment was burglarized last year... in Hartford,” she added hastily. “Then the elevator door opened again behind you... and... and I guess I’m just still jumpy,” she finished lamely.

  There was no deliveryman, she thought. And my apartment was burglarized, but it wasn’t in Hartford. I’m not just jumpy. I’m terrified that whenever an elevator door opens I’ll see Caldwell standing there.

  “I can understand why you’d be nervous,” Tom said, his tone serious. “I went to Amherst and used to visit friends in Hartford occasionally. Where did you live, Alice?”

  “On Lakewood Drive.” Lacey conjured up the pictures of a large apartment complex she had studied as part of her preparation in the safe site, praying that Tom Lynch wouldn’t say his friends lived there too.

  “Don’t know it,” he said, slowly shaking his head. Then, as he looked around the room, he added, “I like what you’ve done here.”

  The apartment had taken on a mellow, comfortable look, she had to admit. Lacey had painted the walls a soft ivory and then painstakingly ragged them to give them texture. The rug she had picked up at a garage sale was a machine-made copy of a Chelsea carpet, and it was old enough to have acquired a soft patina. The dark blue velvet couch and matching love seat were well worn, but still handsome and comfortable. The coffee table, which had cost her twenty dollars, had a scarred leather top and Regency legs. It was a duplicate of the one she had grown up with, and it gave her a sense of comfort. The shelves next to the television were filled with books and knickknacks, all things she had bought at garage sales.

  Lacey started to comment on how much she enjoyed shopping at garage sales, but stopped herself. Most people wouldn’t be completely furnishing an apartment with garage-sale items. No, she thought, most people who relocate move their furniture as well. She settled for thanking Tom for his compliment and was glad when he suggested they get started.

  He’s different tonight, she thought as an hour later they sat companionably sipping wine and eating pizza. In the gym he had been cordial but reserved whenever they passed each other, and she assumed it had been a last-minute impulse that made him invite her to go with him to the opening tonight.

  But now, being with him had taken on the feeling of an enjoyable and interesting date. For the first time since the night Isabelle died, Lacey realized, she was actually enjoying herself. Tom Lynch responded freely to the questions she asked him. “I was raised in Nor
th Dakota,” he said. “I told you that. But I never lived there again after I went to college. When I graduated, I moved to New York, fully expecting to set the broadcast industry on fire. It didn’t happen, of course, and a very wise man told me that the best way to make it was to start out in a smaller broadcast area, make a name for yourself there, then gradually work your way up to larger markets. So in the last nine years I’ve been in Des Moines, Seattle, St. Louis, and now here.”

  “Always radio?” Lacey asked.

  Lynch smiled. “The eternal question. Why not go for television? I wanted to do my own thing, develop a program format, have the chance to see what works and what doesn’t work. I know I’ve learned a lot, and recently I’ve had some inquiries from a good cable station in New York, but I think it’s too soon to make that kind of move.”

  “Larry King went from radio to television,” Lacey said. “He certainly made the transition fine.”

  “Hey, that’s me, the next Larry King.” They had shared one small pizza. Lynch eyed the last piece then started to put it on her plate.

  “You take it,” Lacey protested.

  “I don’t really want—”

  “You’re salivating for it.”

  They laughed together and a few minutes later when they left the restaurant and crossed the street to the theater, he put his hand under her elbow.

  “You have to be careful,” he said. “There are patches of black ice everywhere around here.”

  If only you knew, Lacey thought. My life is a sheet of black ice.

  It was the third time she had seen a production of The King and I. The last time had been when she was a freshman in college. That had been on Broadway, and her father had been in the orchestra pit. Wish you were playing in this one tonight, Jack Farrell, she thought. As the overture began, she felt tears welling in her eyes and forced them back.

  “You okay, Alice?” Tom asked quietly.

  “I’m fine.” How did Tom sense that she was distressed? she wondered. Maybe he’s psychic, she thought. I hope not.

  Tom’s cousin, Kate Knowles, was playing the role of Tuptim, the slave girl who tries to escape from the king’s palace. She was a good actress with an exceptional voice. About my age, Lacey thought, maybe a little younger. She praised her enthusiastically to Tom during intermission, then asked, “Will she be riding with us to the party?”

  “No. She’s going over with the cast. She’ll meet us there.”

  I’ll be lucky to get any time with her, Lacey worried.

  Kate and the other leads in the play were not the only “stars” at the party, Lacey realized. Tom Lynch was constantly surrounded by people. She slipped away from him to trade her wine for a Perrier, but then did not rejoin him when she saw he was with an attractive young woman from the cast. Obviously impressed by him, she was talking animatedly.

  I don’t blame her, Lacey thought. He’s good-looking, he’s smart, and he’s nice. Heather Landi apparently had been attracted to him, although the second time she wrote about him in her journal there was the suggestion that one of them was involved with someone else.

  Sipping the Perrier, she walked over to a window. The party was in a mansion in Wayzata, a decidedly upscale suburb twenty minutes from downtown Minneapolis. The well-lighted property bordered on Lake Minnetonka, and standing at the window, Lacey could see that beyond the snow-covered lawn the lake was frozen solid.

  She realized that the real estate agent in her was absorbing the details of the place—the fabulous location, the fine appointments in the eighty-year-old house. There were details in the design and construction you just don’t come by anymore—at any price—in new homes, she thought as she turned to study the living room, where nearly one hundred people were gathered without even making the room seem crowded.

  For a moment she thought longingly of her office in New York, of getting new listings, matching buyer to property, the thrill of closing a sale. I want to go home, she thought.

  Wendell Woods, the host of the party, came over to her. “It’s Miss Carroll, isn’t it?”

  He was an imposing man of about sixty with steel gray hair.

  He’s going to ask me where I’m from, Lacey thought.

  He did, and she hoped she sounded credible when she gave the well-rehearsed version of her background in Hartford. “And now I’m settled in and ready to start job hunting,” she told him.

  “What kind of job?” he asked.

  “Well, I don’t want to go back to work in a doctor’s office,” she said. “I’ve always had an idea I’d like to try my hand at real estate.”

  “That’s mostly commission income, you know. Plus you’d have to learn the area,” he said.

  “I understand that, Mr. Woods,” Lacey said. Then she smiled. “I’m a quick study.”

  He’s going to put me in touch with someone, she thought. I know he is.

  Woods took out a pen and his own business card. “Give me your phone number,” he said. “I’m going to pass it on to one of my depositors. Millicent Royce has a small agency in Edina; her assistant just left to have a baby. Maybe you two can get together.”

  Lacey gladly gave the number to him. I’m being recommended by the president of a bank and I’m supposedly new to the real estate field, she thought. If Millicent Royce is interested in meeting me, she may not bother to check references.

  When Woods turned to speak to another guest, Lacey glanced about the room. Seeing that Kate Knowles was momentarily alone, she quickly made her way to her. “You were wonderful,” she said. “I’ve seen three different productions of The King and I, and your interpretation of Tuptim was great.”

  “I see you two have gotten together.”

  Tom Lynch had joined them. “Alice, I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I got waylaid. I didn’t mean to leave you on your own so long.”

  “Don’t worry, it worked out fine,” she told him. You don’t know how fine, she thought.

  “Tom, I wanted a chance to visit with you,” his cousin said. “I’ve had enough of this party. Let’s take off and have a cup of coffee somewhere.” Kate Knowles smiled at Lacey. “Your friend was just telling me how good I was. I want to hear more.”

  Lacey glanced at her watch. It was one-thirty. Not wanting to stay up all night, she suggested having coffee at her place. On the drive back into Minneapolis, she insisted that Kate sit in the front seat with Tom. She was sure they wouldn’t stay long in the apartment, and at least they were getting some of the family gossip out of the way.

  How can I bring up Heather Landi’s name without seeming too abrupt? she wondered, reminding herself that Kate was only in town for a week.

  * * *

  “I made these cookies this morning,” Lacey said as she set a plate on the coffee table. “Try them at your own risk. I haven’t baked since high school.”

  After she poured the coffee, she tried to steer the conversation around so that she could introduce Heather’s name. In her journal, Heather had written about meeting Tom Lynch after a performance. But if I say that I saw the show, chances are I would have remembered if I’d seen Kate in it, Lacey thought. She said, “I went down to New York about a year and a half ago and saw a revival of The Boy Friend. I read in your bio in the program tonight that you were in it, but I’m sure I’d remember if I’d seen you.”

  “You must have gone the week I was out with the flu,” Kate said. “Those were the only performances I missed.”

  Lacey tried to sound offhand. “I do remember that there was a young actress with a really fine voice in the lead. I’m trying to think of her name.”

  “Heather Landi,” Kate Knowles said promptly, turning to her cousin. “Tom, you remember her. She had a crush on you. Heather was killed in a car accident,” she said, shaking her head. “It was such a damn shame.”

  “What happened?” Lacey asked.

  “Oh, she was driving home from a ski lodge in Stowe and went off the road. Her mother, poor thing, couldn’t accept it. She came around
to the theater, talking to all of us, searching for some reason behind the accident. She said that Heather had been upset about something shortly before that weekend and wanted to know if we had any idea what it was about.”

  “Did you?” Tom asked.

  Kate Knowles shrugged. “I told her that I had noticed that Heather was terribly quiet the last week before she died, and I agreed that she was worried about something. I suggested that Heather may not have been concentrating on driving when she went into the skid.”

  It’s a dead end, Lacey thought. Kate doesn’t know anything I don’t already know.

  Kate Knowles put down her coffee cup. “That was great, Alice, but it’s very late, and I’ve got to be on my way.” She stood, then turned back to Lacey. “It’s funny that Heather Landi’s name should come up; I’d just been thinking about her. A letter her mother had written to me, asking that I try again to remember anything I could that might give her a reason for Heather’s behavior that weekend, finally caught up with me. It had been forwarded to two other cities before reaching me here.” She paused, then shook her head. “There is one thing I might write her about, although it’s probably not significant. A guy I’ve dated some—Bill Merrill, you met him, Tom—knew Heather too. Her name came up, and he mentioned that he had seen her the afternoon before she died, in the après-ski bar at the lodge. Bill had gone there with a bunch of guys, including a jerk named Rick Parker who’s in real estate in New York and apparently had pulled something on Heather when she first came to the city. Bill said that when Heather spotted Parker she practically ran out of the lodge. It’s probably nothing, but Heather’s mom is so anxious for any information about that weekend that she’d surely want to know. I think I’ll write her first thing tomorrow.”

  The sound of Lacey’s coffee cup shattering on the floor broke the trancelike state she had entered when she heard Kate’s mention of Isabelle’s letter and then of Rick Parker’s name. Quickly covering her confusion, and refusing their help, she busied herself with cleaning up the mess while calling out her good nights to Kate and Tom as they headed for the door.