Full Frontal Murder (18 page)

Rita asked, “What's going to happen?”

“Right now we're going to look for your purse. Then we're taking you downtown, where you'll be charged with first-degree murder. Your lawyer will be there shortly.”

O'Toole left on his assignments. Marian and the captain started asking the bluesuits about the purse. The Crime Scene Unit had it; they'd found it under the conference table in the room where Rita had shot Hugh. The contents had all been bagged and itemized; Murtaugh held the plastic envelope by the edges while he and Marian read the letter that had sent Rita Galloway off to kill her husband. The letter said exactly what she'd told them it said.

“Ten to one Rita Galloway's lawyer knows nothing about all this,” Murtaugh said, discouraged.

“No bet,” Marian responded in the same tone. “Dorian Yates is just another patsy that's been offered up to us. Our killer wouldn't write a letter saying ‘I hired Julia Ortega'—that's tantamount to a confession of murder. We need to ask Rita Galloway about those other envelopes Ortega is supposed to have sent.”

“Maybe she did send some of them.” Murtaugh was scowling. “But either using Ortega or acting on his own, the killer kept sending envelopes to Rita until he finally hit on the one thing that would prod her into action. A threat to Bobby's well-being.”

“Yep. Makes you wonder how much of the trouble between Rita and Hugh was real and how much was fabricated by the killer.”

The captain looked at her. “That's a thought.” He considered for a moment. “Does Rita have a lover?”

Marian shrugged. “Hugh said she slept around.”

“But Hugh can't be considered a reliable source of information as far as his estranged wife is concerned. We know the killer is male, though, so unless Hugh swung both ways, it would have to be
her
lover. A jealous lover—yes, that would fit. A lover who got in over his head with his machinations. A lover who had to resort to murder when things got out of hand.”

“And kidnapping Bobby—that was just one more way to fan the flames? Could be. Okay, we'll get on it.” Marian checked her watch. “Would you take Rita in and book her? I want to get to Walter Galloway before the news breaks. Oh yeah, that's another thing … what do we tell the news people downstairs?”

“You
tell them there'll be no statement until the next of kin is notified. Then say there'll be a media announcement at … make it six-thirty.”

“Oh gawd.”

“Part of the job. Go ahead—I'll take care of Rita.”

At Sutton Place, Marian was told Mr. Walter Galloway was taking a nap and was not to be disturbed. She had to threaten the manservant with arrest before he'd go wake the old man up.

Galloway was out of sorts at having his sleep interrupted. Marian had been left waiting in the entrance hallway; the old man came up to her smoothing down his hair with one hand and leaning on a cane with the other. “What is it, Lieutenant? I already told Detective Dowd everything I know about that ridiculous list of
suspects.”
He made the last word into a joke.

“It's not about that, Mr. Galloway. Is there someplace we could sit down?”

“If we sit down, you'll stay longer. What do you want?”

All right, then
. “It's bad news, I'm afraid,” she said.

The old man paled. “Bobby. Something's happened to Bobby.”

“No, Bobby's fine. It's Hugh. I'm sorry to have to tell you—but your son is dead.”

He stared at her wordlessly, his mouth open. Then he began to sway; the cane slipped from his grasp and clattered to the floor. Marian stepped over quickly and caught him before he could fall. She half carried him into the first room that opened off the hallway and got him seated on a small divan. “Can I get you something? A drink?”

He shook his head. “How did he die?”

Marian braced herself. “Rita shot him.”

Walter Galloway's shock instantly turned into rage. “That
evil
woman! That vampire! She sucks Hugh's blood until she can get no more out of him and then she kills him! And you let it happen!”

“Mr. Galloway—”

“You were told what she was! You sat in that room across the hall and listened to Hugh telling you how dangerous she was. And you did nothing! Nothing! That's what comes of putting a woman in charge—you sided with Rita all along, I know you did.”

“I didn't side with either of them, Mr.—”

“I should have made some phone calls the minute you walked into this house! You're in over your head, girlie, and now my son is dead because
you
waffled and dillydallied and didn't take action when there was still time to stop her. Well, you're going to pay for this …
Lieutenant.”
He sneered the word. “You can count on that!”

Don't shoot the messenger
. “I'm sorry for your loss.”

“You're
sorry?
Get out of my house. Get out!”

Marian knew there was no reaching him before his rage had spent itself. She went looking for the manservant who'd let her in and sent him to the room where she'd left Galloway.

She was on her way to the front door when the old man's voice called out, “Wait!”

Marian went back to see what he wanted.

“Where's Bobby now?”

“He's with his uncle.”

Galloway growled. “Him! That picture taker's not going to raise
my
grandson! Go on—get out.”

She left.

Whew
. Galloway's accusation that she'd waffled and dillydallied until it was too late—Marian knew it wasn't true; the law did require evidence before she could make an arrest. But it still hurt.

She wondered if Alex Fairchild had finished taking his pictures in Central Park; the light was still good. Marian checked her notebook and dialed first his home number and then his business number; the same answering service took both calls.
Mr. Fairchild is on a shoot
.

Marian turned the car uptown and entered the park at East Seventy-second. The first thing she saw at the boathouse was Bobby playing on the dock with two little girls, all three of them watched over by Bobby's bodyguard and the girls' mother. But the shoot was more than just Fairchild and a camera looking for interesting faces; he'd brought a couple of assistants and heavy batteries and extra lights to get rid of shadows where he didn't want them. It looked like some sort of commercial job; a small group of onlookers had gathered, willing to be entertained by whatever they came across.

But not one professional model was in sight; Marian remembered Fairchild's mentioning his aversion to working with models. As she watched, he drew a pair of teenagers out from the small crowd watching and put them in the picture. He ran off a series of shots of the girl laughing good-naturedly at the boy's awkwardness as he climbed into a rowboat. The final picture would be natural and charming, a far cry from the photographer's usual street scenes.

“Marian!” He'd spotted her, and motioned her to come over.

She went up to where he was changing cameras on a tripod. “What's all this?”

“All this is paying the bills, that's what all this is. The Parks Commission wants some ‘people-oriented' shots of fun things to do, for next year's tourism brochures. They got special funding from somewhere, so the money's good. And this kind of thing is a nice change of pace once in a while.”

“Mr. Fairchild, I need to speak to you privately.”

An exaggerated sigh. “What do I have to do to get you to call me Alex?”

“All right, Alex. I need to talk to you.”

“Okay, I'm almost finished with this setup and—”

“Now. It's urgent.”

This time he heard her. He called out some instructions to one of his assistants and led her around the boathouse out of earshot. “What's wrong?”

As gently as she could, she told him what his sister had done.

Fairchild turned into a zombie, plodding a few steps one way, a few steps back, stunned with disbelief. Marian turned away, to give him a little privacy.

Eventually he regained enough control to croak out a question. “Where is she now?”

Marian turned back to face him. “Right now she's at Midtown South, being charged. We're bringing her lawyer in. Then she'll go to Riker's Island to wait for trial.”

“But why? Why'd she go after Hugh now? I thought they'd reached a kind of temporary truce.” His head snapped up. “Bobby. Oh my god, how am I going to tell Bobby? Both his parents gone—oh god.”

“Does he understand about death?”

“He knows things die. I'm not sure he understands that also happens to people he loves. Maybe he does.”

“Then tell him the truth. Tell him his father is dead and his mother has to go away for a while. Don't tell him the why of it yet.”

He was nodding. “Yes, I'd better not lie to him. Oh, he's so very young! It looks as if I'm going to be mother and father both.”

Marian hesitated. “Walter Galloway is going to claim Bobby. He doesn't want you to have him.”

Fairchild's jaw set. “Well, we'll just see about that. I'll not let Bobby be brought up by servants—that's what would happen in that old buzzard's house.”

She followed when Fairchild went back to where his assistants were waiting with his equipment. He told them to pack everything up; they were finished for the day. Then he rented a rowboat and called to Bobby to come for a ride.

Marian stood on the dock and watched as they rowed out onto the lake. When they were a little way out, Fairchild shipped the oars and started speaking to his nephew. After a moment, Bobby's thin wail carried across the water, and the boy started flailing at his uncle with his small fists. Fairchild gathered him into his arms and held him.

From where she was standing Marian couldn't be sure, but it looked as if they both were crying.

18

“So the two duelists took each other out of the game,” Captain Murtaugh said, “and now the seconds are taking up the fight?”

“Looks like it,” Marian replied. “Neither Walter Galloway nor Alex Fairchild wants the other to raise Bobby. They're Bobby's only remaining relatives—the courts are going to have to settle this one. Rita will get out of prison eventually, but Bobby will be grown by then.”

They were in the cubicle adjoining an interrogation room, watching through the one-way glass as Perlmutter and O'Toole questioned Rita Galloway. “The wisdom of Solomon,” Murtaugh murmured.

“What?”

“The story of the two women who came to Solomon, both claiming to be the mother of the same baby? Solomon suggested cutting the baby in two and giving half to each woman. The false mother agreed, but the real mother gave up her claim rather than let the baby be harmed. Didn't Rita Galloway just do something like that? Give up her baby to protect him?”

“Hmm, I always thought that Solomon story sounded a bit phony myself, but I see what you're getting at. But I don't know whether Rita was making a noble sacrifice or just acting on impulse. If she'd stopped to think, she'd have hired a hit man to get Hugh instead of letting a roomful of people watch her pull the trigger.”

Murtaugh looked at his watch. “It's six twenty-five.”

“Shit.” Marian hurried to the ladies' room where she gave her face a good dusting with powder to take away the shine but didn't bother with anything else. Then she went to face the cameras and the reporters.

She told them that artist Rita Galloway had been arrested for the fatal shooting of her estranged husband, Hugh Galloway, president and CEO of Galloway Industries. There was no question as to her guilt, as the shooting was done in full view of seven witnesses. The charge was murder one, as Mrs. Galloway had demonstrated intent by bringing a loaded weapon with her.

As for motive, Mrs. Galloway was acting on false information that made her think Mr. Galloway was a threat to the safety of their son. But the case was not closed. The police were currently seeking the person who provided her with the false information—the same person who was responsible for the deaths of Nick Atlay and Julia Ortega.

That last statement triggered an explosion of questions, all of the reporters yelling at once. Marian ducked the question of whether they had a suspect or not and said instead that they were pursuing several lines of inquiry. She gave no more details than those in her original statement; and when the reporters started repeating themselves, she ended it and left.

Captain Murtaugh was gone from the cubicle adjoining the interrogation room by the time Marian got back. Once Rita Galloway fully understood that someone had been pulling her strings and that she had made a dreadful mistake in shooting Hugh, she'd gone into a blue funk that she still hadn't pulled out of. But she was cooperating, waiving her right to have an attorney present during questioning and trying to answer every query put to her.

Yes, she'd had a lover, last year, a man who'd moved to Seattle seven or eight months ago and whom she hadn't seen since. No, there'd been no one else since him … or before him, as a matter of fact. And yes, Hugh had found out about it. As to Hugh's charge that she slept with everything that wore trousers, she said tiredly that was just Hugh's bruised ego talking. If he could turn her into a tramp, then he wouldn't feel
personally
betrayed.

The door to the cubicle opened and Dowd stepped inside. “This Dorian Yates don't know nothing, Lieutenant,” he said without preamble. “Me and Walker think he was set up.” The two detectives had been questioning Rita's attorney, the one the police were now supposed to think had hired Julia Ortega.

“You're sure he's not just a good actor?” Marian asked.

“Naw, this guy's scared shitless. He says he never heard of Nick Atlay or Julia Ortega before he read their names in the paper, and he didn't know who Hector Vargas was. We believe him, Lieutenant. The guy's a rabbit. He'd never have the nerve to plan a homicide, much less carry it through. Besides, Yates just came back from Boston today, got in around noon. Didn't Rita Galloway say the envelope was delivered shortly after lunch? That's cuttin' it pretty close.”