Coached in the Act

by Victoria Laurie

  “I like that plan,” Gilley said. “He might know more about Sunny’s case by then too.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’ll be back here to collect you for lunch with Julia in a few hours, okay?”

  Gilley saluted me smartly, clicking his heels, while I rolled my eyes and shut the door.

  * * *

  Three hours later we were on our way to Amagansett, but I took a slight detour south to the charity I planned to make a very large donation to.

  Gilley was busy playing a game on his phone and didn’t look up to see where we were headed until I pulled into the parking lot.

  He gasped when he saw the building. “You’re making a donation here?”

  “I am,” I said. “It’s the least I can do to help support the place responsible for bringing Spooks into our lives.”

  Gilley’s eyes welled up. “Oh, Cat. Thank you.”

  I squeezed his arm and pulled the check out of my purse. “Be right back,” I sang.

  “I’m coming with you!” Gilley said, and he scrambled out of the car.

  We went inside and inquired about where to drop off a donation. The manager of the shelter came out of her office, and when I handed her the check, she, too, began to cry. Then she hugged me fiercely and thanked me over and over.

  I was so moved by her reaction that I vowed to make a similar donation every year.

  Once we were back in the car, Gilley said, “You are a good person, Catherine Cooper.”

  I grinned. “I try,” I said. “It’s such a deserving charity. Spooks is such a lovely boy, and all the dogs we looked at were obviously well fed and well taken care of.”

  We chatted a bit on our way to Julia’s, mostly about mundane things, but then I realized that I’d never gotten the lowdown on any of the suspects that Gilley had questioned.

  When I asked him about it, he said, “Ugh. They were a merry bunch.”

  “I detect a hint of sarcasm.”

  He nodded. “And none of them had any love lost for Yelena.”

  I looked at him sharply. “The same with my three,” I said. “Especially Vivace. He scowled from the time I mentioned her name to the end of our dance together. He didn’t reveal a lot verbally, but his body language and expression spoke for his true feelings. He didn’t seem to be sorry at all that she was dead.”

  “But why does any of it matter now?” Gilley asked. “Sunny already confessed to the crime.”

  “I’m not sure I trust her memory, Gil. She was in a semiconscious state at the time she confronted Yelena, and for all we know, she could’ve walked in on the murderer, and a struggle ensued, where somehow Sunny got away, or she could’ve come in right after Yelena was stabbed to death, and tried to bring her friend back to life. In both of those scenarios her clothing would’ve gotten stained with Yelena’s blood.”

  “Then our suspects are still suspects?”

  I nodded. “The thing that keeps sticking out to me is Mark Purdy’s murder. I just know there’s a connection, but I can’t figure out how.”

  “Have you talked to Shepherd about any of this?”

  “A bit. He’s certain he’ll have to swap out Yelena’s case for Purdy’s.”

  “The whole situation must be impossible for him,” Gilley said.

  “Yeah. I’d say that it is.”

  At that moment we arrived at Julia’s grand estate. I pulled into a spot next to the Rolls Royce she and Marcus had ridden in the night before, and we approached the door.

  After climbing the steps, Gilley rang the bell, which gonged like a church bell, and the door was opened by Julia’s dour-faced personal assistant, Nancy.

  “Ms. Cooper,” she said, with the slightest nod to me. “Mr. Gillespie,” she added, acknowledging Gilley.

  I offered her a grimacing smile, but Gilley took her cold greeting as a personal challenge. “Nancy!” he exclaimed, placing both hands on her shoulders and adopting a look of pure joy. “You look marvelous! Have you done something with your hair? It’s stunning! And look at this figure, woman! I can see that you’ve trimmed down a bit since last time, hmm? Try not to lose too much weight, or you’ll blow away at the slightest breeze!”

  Nancy blinked rapidly, and I suspected she badly wanted to take a step backward, but with Gilley firmly gripping her shoulders, what could she do?

  “Ahh, it’s been too long,” Gilley said when she continued to blink in alarm. “We really should catch up soon, m’kay?”

  Nancy’s head began to bobble a bit. I had to press my lips together to avoid bursting into laughter at her shock at being accosted by Gilley’s enthusiasm and joie de vivre.

  “Is Julia in?” I asked, stepping up to the threshold so that Gilley was forced to let go of Nancy’s shoulders. “She invited us for lunch.”

  Once free of Gilley’s grip, Nancy did take a step back. And then another. And a final third, just to be sure she had enough of a head start should Gilley come at her again. “She’s seated on the back terrace. This way, please.”

  She then swiveled on her heel and began to walk quickly away. We closed the door and hustled after her.

  The walk was long. And it made me appreciate just how enormous the estate house was. I guessed it was anywhere from twenty to thirty thousand square feet, as evidenced by the sheer depth of the place and the number of massive rooms—each exquisitely decorated—that we passed on the way to the back terrace.

  At last, we came through a set of French doors, to appear in front of a covered terrace, with a pool to the far right and a small lake with a fountain spraying water into the air on the left.

  A gorgeous teakwood table was also off to the left, and at its head was seated our favorite octogenarian, Julia herself, looking resplendent in a thick burgundy angora sweater with an overly large cowl-neck, which gave a bit more girth to her small frame.

  She pressed her palms to the table at the sight of us and, with shaking arms, pushed herself out of her chair to welcome us to the table. “Hello, my darlings!”

  We quickened our step, moving around Nancy, to take turns gently hugging Julia. Gilley allowed me the first hug, and Julia held Gilley’s hand after he’d bent to hug her, too, and pulled on his arm to bring him around to the other side of the table, next to her on the left. I took up the chair on her right, which also had a place setting, and we all sat down, smiling broadly like old friends who hadn’t seen each other in a long while, rather than friends who’d been together the night before.

  “Julia,” I began, “can I first simply say that I’m so sorry your birthday celebration turned into such a fiasco?”

  “My dear, Catherine,” Julia replied, “please do not feel sorry for an old woman who’s had more than her fair share of birthday celebrations. Besides, last night’s party was one for the ages! I mean, a parade of suspects all in view was stupendously thrilling. Although, poor Sunny, I feel so terrible for her.”

  “We do too. She’s a dear friend,” Gilley said.

  “She’s the sister to Detective Shepherd,” I added.

  “His sister? Oh, my, Catherine, I’m so sorry! That would make her practically family.”

  I was surprised that Julia seemed to remember that Shepherd and I were a couple.

  “Sunny is such a gentle, loving, kind person,” Gilley said, and I was surprised to see his eyes misting. “I can’t imagine that she, of all people, could take the life of a friend. Especially one as close to her as Yelena.”

  “Oh?” Julia said, just as plates of Caesar salad and fresh, steaming-hot sourdough baguettes with pads of butter arrived and were served silently by a woman in a grey uniform with a white apron.

  “She is truly a gentle person,” I said. “Neither Gilley nor I think that she actually murdered Yelena.”

  “But she confessed, no?” Julia said.

  “She did,” I said with a sigh. “Which is the problem. She took an Ambien earlier in the day, and it has a history of putting her in an apparent wakeful state, but she’s actually asleep and doesn’
t remember what she did during that time.”

  “Oh, dear,” Julia said. “It’s all so tragic.”

  I nodded in agreement. “Still, my gut says she didn’t do it. Gil and I think either she walked in while Yelena was being attacked, and tried to stop it, or she walked into her dressing room right after and tried to do CPR or something.”

  Julia tsked a few times and shook her head. “If she didn’t kill Yelena, who did?”

  “That’s what we’d like to know,” I said.

  “I take it you two are still investigating, then?”

  “We are,” I confirmed.

  “Good,” she said. “I’ll help.”

  “How?” Gilley asked.

  “I’ve set up two lunch dates with Mr. Football and Mr. Full of Himself.”

  Gilley’s brow furrowed.

  “Brad Bosch and Ike Chipperfield,” I said.

  “Ahhh,” Gilley said. “Well done, Julia.”

  “I don’t want you to probe them for clues alone, though,” I said. “Is it all right with you if I ask Marcus to tag along?”

  “Of course!” she said. “I so enjoyed his company last night.”

  “Great. And, on that note, Julia, do you think you could arrange a meeting with another suspect?”

  “Who?”

  “A woman named June Murdock. She didn’t show up last night even though she sent an RSVP.”

  Julia pursed her lips distastefully. “June,” she said.

  “Do you know her?” Gilley asked.

  “We’re acquainted,” she told him in a clipped tone.

  Gilley and I exchanged a look, and I could tell we were both trying to decide whether or not to press the issue. “It doesn’t sound like you think much of her,” Gilley finally said, much to my relief.

  “True,” Julia said, and she began to poke at her salad like she was spearing fish.

  Gilley and I again exchanged a look. He shrugged subtly, like he didn’t know what else to say to get her to open up.

  I was just about to try to prod Julia gently when she set down her fork, sighed heavily, and said, “June had an affair with my husband.”

  I gasped, and Gilley dropped his fork. It clattered against his china lunch plate. “Sorry,” he said, wincing.

  Julia’s mouth worked from angry pursed lips to a sad frown and back again. At last, she said, “Richard was a good husband for over fifty years. He had one slip the whole time we were married. I knew immediately when it happened. I also knew that June had targeted my husband specifically, because of his friendship with her brother, Gene.”

  My eyes widened as Gilley asked, “Why would your husband’s friendship with Gene Bosworth provoke June to target your husband?”

  Julia snorted derisively. “To make Gene jealous, of course.”

  I bit my lip to prevent a bubble of excitement from leaking out of me. “So, it’s true,” I said. “Gene and his sister were . . .” I didn’t think I could even finish the sentence, their illicit relationship so disgusted me.

  “Involved in an incestuous relationship?” Julia said. “Yes. Yes, they were.”

  Again, Gilley and I traded looks of eager excitment. “Julia,” I said, treading as carefully as I could. “We believe that Gene was Lover Number Eight in Yelena’s show, and that June was paying off Yelena to keep her quiet about her true relationship with her brother.”

  “Doesn’t surprise me,” Julia said. “After June got married and began to refuse her brother, he tried to get even with her by courting the most glamorous loose young women who would have him. Yelena would’ve fit that profile perfectly.

  “Tell me,” she said, placing her elbows on the table and leaning in toward me. “What does June’s payoff to Yelena have to do with her murder?”

  “We’re not sure,” I said. “But a man named Mark Purdy was wearing a ladies’ size-ten raincoat—Yelena’s size—lined with two hundred thousand dollars when he was found dead in the alley behind the coffee shop down the street from the theater. We suspect there was a professional relationship between Purdy and June, and we also believe that the money lining Purdy’s raincoat came from her.”

  “And this Mr. Purdy was murdered the same night as Yelena?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  Julia sat back in her seat and subtly shook her head. “My, my,” she said. “What a tangled web.”

  “Agreed,” I said.

  “Was the weapon used to kill Yelena also used to murder Mr. Purdy?”

  “No,” I said. “The method of death for him was exsanguination. From a piano wire across Mr. Purdy’s neck.”

  Julia’s eyes again widened, and Gilley made a slashing motion across his neck. A bit macabre for the moment, but that was Gilley.

  “That’s horrible,” Julia whispered.

  “It is. And it’s the second reason that we don’t believe that Sunny murdered Yelena. It’s unfathomable to us that she’d be able to commit not one, but two murders back-to-back. And one by way of piano wire?” I shook my head. “I’m not buying it.”

  “You’re right,” Julia said. “Sunny appeared far too fragile to have overpowered a man.”

  “So, you see why we’re trying so hard to find an alternative theory,” Gilley said. “One that checks all the boxes.”

  “Indeed,” Julia said, and I could tell she was trying to put the pieces together herself by the faraway gaze she held while looking down the length of the table. And then her eyes came back into focus, and she said, “It’s a mystery within a mystery. Sunny D’Angelo’s confession and the bloody clothes really throw a monkey wrench into things, don’t they?”

  “In a huge way,” Gilley said.

  “Gilley,” Julia said. “Tell me again which of Yelena’s lovers you questioned last night?”

  “One, Four, and Five,” he said.

  “Tucker McAllen, the real estate developer; Joel Goldberg, whom you’ve met; and Vice Admiral Liam Leahy,” I reminded her.

  “What did you learn from them?” she asked Gilley.

  “Not much, other than they seemed to feel no remorse for Yelena’s passing.”

  “That’s curious,” Julia said, tapping her chin.

  “None of the men on my list cared much about her, either,” I said.

  Julia sighed. “Which means that any one of them could’ve been her murderer.”

  “It does,” I agreed.

  “Is there anyone on the list you haven’t identified?”

  “Lover Number Two, Lover Number Ten, and Lover Number Twelve,” Gilley said.

  “Are you completely stumped on their identities, or do you suspect who they might be?”

  “We suspect a few things about them,” I said. “Lover Number Two, we believe, is a congressman. Lover Number Ten, we think, is a race-car driver, and Lover Number Twelve is the son of a queen, a lazy playboy, a commitment-phobe.”

  “That’s an interesting crowd,” she said. “Twelve sounds like someone connected to royalty.”

  “It’s not Aaron Nassau,” I said quickly. “He’s Lover Number Eleven.”

  “Could she have repeated herself?”

  “You mean, could she have used the same man twice in the script?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  I looked at Gilley. He shrugged. He didn’t know. “I suppose anything is possible,” I said.

  “But you don’t think she did, correct?”

  “No,” I said. “Aaron is neither a playboy nor a commitment-phobe. He is wealthy, but he’s not the son of a queen. I mean, you know him, Julia. He’s what, sixteenth in line to the Danish crown?”

  Julia nodded. “Something like that. But to your point, yes, that description does sound significantly different than who I know Aaron to be.”

  “Until we can identify the three remaining suspects, we’re stuck with only probing the other eight,” I said.

  “Not Aaron?” she asked, and I could tell she was playing devil’s advocate in asking me that.

  I shook my head. “Of everyone w
e’ve talked to so far, he’s the only one who showed remorse upon hearing about her passing. What’s more, he wouldn’t admit that Yelena tried to extort him, and he said that the reason his letter opener was discovered in her dressing room and used as the method to kill her was that he allowed her to take it.”

  “And you don’t believe that he allowed her to take it?”

  I shook my head. “The letter opener is worth at least fifty thousand dollars. It’s inlaid with precious gemstones and made of fourteen-karat gold.”

  Julia sat back in her chair as if she was satisfied. “All right,” she said. “I trust your judgment and my own regarding Aaron. I’ll do my best to ferret out any information from Mr. Bosch and Mr. Chipperfield, and perhaps I’ll even pay Mr. Goldberg a visit. Now that I’ve purchased something rare and expensive from him, he might be inclined toward some small talk.”

  “Gilley?” I said. He looked at me expectantly. “Are the other two on your list worth investigating any further?”

  Again, Gilley shrugged. “I don’t know, Cat. They clearly weren’t sad that Yelena was dead, but I didn’t really get a murder vibe off of them. Especially the vice admiral. He struck me as a very by-the-book kind of guy. You know, like Shepherd.”

  “Huh,” I said. “If he’s like Shepherd, no way is he the killer.”

  “McAllen would have far too much to lose,” Julia said. “He’s an absolute pig of a man, but I don’t see him doing something so irrational that could jeopardize his future. Not when he’s at the peak of his power.”

  “Good point,” I said. “So, really that just leaves Bosch, Chipperfield, and Goldberg to focus on.”

  Julia reached out to pat my hand. “You let me worry about them. The two of you should focus on discovering the identities of Two, Ten, and Twelve.”

  Gilley and I both nodded, and Julia took the napkin from her lap and stood up carefully.

  “Now, shall we walk the grounds and plan my grandson’s wedding reception?”

  “We shall,” I said, getting up along with Gilley.

  “This will be fun!” he said, clearly excited.

  And we set off on an afternoon of party planning.