Kane, Andrea (24 page)

"If you say so." Whitman put away her pen. "Except
for one thing—you don't happen to own a gun, do you?"

"No," he bit out.

Stan waited until the detectives had gone. Then, he shut the door
behind them, crossing over to drop into his plush leather chair. He propped his
elbows on his desk, put his head in his hands. He should feel relieved. He
didn't. He was far from out of the woods. Any one of several people could tip
the scales against him. Starting with his ex-wives. If Whitman and Barton
talked to either Lily or Diane, it was highly possible something would be said
to raise their antennae.

And then there was Ferguson. He was the biggest potential
liability of all. If he caved under pressure, or got scared enough, he might
slip. One wrong word and Dick and Jane Tracy would come rushing back over here.
Then what would he say? How could he explain the situation without making it
look as seedy as it was? And how could he keep the detectives from making the
assumption that, if he'd gone this far, he'd have the motive and the incentive
to go the rest of the way?

Yanking open his drawer, Stan shoved aside a copy of the memo from
Pruet calling an emergency meeting in Paris, and pulled out the bottle that
contained his ulcer medication. His insides were on fire. They hadn't stopped
burning since Monday. He popped a pill in his mouth, then went over to his
office's fully stocked bar, pouring himself a glass of mineral water. He threw
back his head, swallowed his medication in two hard gulps.

Talk about paying for his mistakes in spades. He was doing that.
Every day of his life.

7:40 P.M.

Plaza Athen
é
e

Gloria Radcliffe arrived at the hotel in time to check into her
room, freshen up, and go downstairs for a cocktail. She needed one.

The visit with her parents had gone pretty much as expected. They
were angry, shocked, worried, and a few other choice adjectives they'd tossed
her way.

She was weary. She was also worried. She'd reached Sabrina by cell
phone when her plane landed. Her daughter had visited Carson Brooks twice that
day. She'd then been whisked away by limo to a business meeting in Englewood
Cliffs, and was now on her way back to Manhattan. Riding with her was
Ruisseau's COO and its corporate counsel—Dylan Newport, the man who'd brought
Sabrina to New York in the first place. Sabrina had asked Gloria to meet her at
the hotel around nine o'clock for a late dinner, at which time she'd fill her
in.

Well, that left an hour and twenty minutes. Gloria could spend it
agonizing over things she couldn't change and wasn't privy to, or she could
take a proactive step that had to be taken sooner or later.

Sooner was better for the psyche than later.

She turned on her cell phone, punched in the number the operator
provided.

Two rings, and an answer. "Midtown North."

7:45 P.M.

Midtown North Precinct

Jeannie leaned across Frank's desk and drew a line through Claude
Phelps's name. "That's another one down," she pronounced. "He
might be a twitching nut job, but he's got ninety witnesses who were with him
and his wife at his thirty-fifth wedding anniversary celebration at the
Marriott Marquis on Monday evening." She tossed down her pen. "So
that leaves us with one less suspect."

Frank munched on a cucumber slice. "Maybe I'm getting soft
because I'm such a nut job myself these days, but I felt sorry for the guy when
we questioned him. He obviously knew we'd heard horror stories about him twenty
times over. That made him even more neurotic. I think he was half-expecting us
to read him his rights on the spot."

"Yeah, I felt the same way. Funny thing is, nut job or not,
I'm not surprised he has an alibi. Or a family who loves him, for that matter.
There's something endearing about Claude Phelps, hyper though he is."

"As opposed to Stan Hager." Frank polished off another
cucumber slice. "He's a wreck, too, but he's a hell of a lot smoother
about it than Phelps is."

Jeannie nodded. "Hager gave us quite a runaround. He
desperately wanted to keep the spotlight off himself. Now the question is, why?
Is it because he's afraid of looking bad—to Brooks, to the company, maybe even
to the industry as a whole if some nosy business reporters start speculating—or
is it because he really has something to hide?"

"I'm on the fence on that one," Frank replied with a
shrug. "The whole staff of Ruisseau speaks highly of him. That includes
the handful of employees in their European operations. Hager commands a great
deal of respect everywhere. And his loyalty to Brooks, and to the company, is
undisputed by anyone—across the board. Still, just in case we decide to dig
deeper, I made a couple of calls, got us the scoop on Hager's exes. Wife number
one—Lily—remarried a dozen years ago. She lives on Long Island, with her
husband and their ten-year-old son. Wife number two—Diane—decided her huge
alimony checks were the only permanent fixtures she needed in her life. She's
cruising the Greek Isles now, with her latest lover. She's due back in New York
next week."

"A woman after my own heart," Jeannie noted wryly.
"I kind of guessed that would be your reaction." Frank reseated the
remaining cucumber slices in their Ziploc. "Which is why we both know the
way this should play out, if we go the route of talking to the ex-wives."

"Sure do." A corner of Jeannie's mouth lifted.
"You'll take the lead with Lily and I'll do the same with Diane. That
gives you the family man angle, and me the woman-to-woman thing—two liberated
divorcers living high on the hog." Jeannie grimaced. "Except in my
case, it's minus the high on the hog. I knew I should have married for money.
Then, when the marriage ended, I'd be set for life." She dug in her pocket,
plucked out the Milky Way bar she'd shoved away earlier, and frowned as she saw
it looked rather the worse for wear. "Great. Instead, I get squashed candy
and a cranky partner."

"You want sympathy? Go somewhere else." Frank was
studying the list of suspects.
"Any
candy— squashed, stale, even
moldy—beats cucumber slices. As for your partner, I've been a puppy dog since
you ripped into me this morning. So eat your Milky Way and count your
blessings."

Frank's forehead creased in concentration. "We've eliminated
most of the employees at Ruisseau's competition. As for Susan Lane, she's
clean. Not only was she on her way to the U.S. Open when the shooting took
place, she's got no motive. I've checked and double-checked. Brooks wasn't
cheating on her. Hager was right about that. As for monetary gain and social
status, the only way she'd continue enjoying those is with Brooks alive. She
gets to attend all high-profile events on his arm. He's the single largest
contributor to her YouthOp charity. And she's not named in his will."

"Right. So if inheriting was her goal, she'd be better off
keeping him around long enough to make her Mrs. Carson Brooks,
then
bumping
him off." Jeannie chewed her candy thoughtfully. "The other big
question mark is Gloria Radcliffe. I tried reaching her. No answer. I left a
message on her voice mail. I'm sure my call won't come as a surprise. Her
daughter must have given her a heads-up about the direction our questions took.
I can't wait to hear her answers."

The phone on Jeannie's desk rang, and she plucked it from the
receiver. "Whitman."

"Stick?"

"Yeah, Parsons, it's me. What's up?"

"I've got a call for you. I think you'll want me to patch it
through."

"Who is it?"

Getting her answer, Jeannie sat up straighter, covering the
mouthpiece with her hand. "Speak of the devil," she hissed at Frank.

"Gloria Radcliffe?" he mouthed.

A hard nod. "Absolutely, put her through," she
instructed. A pause. "Ms. Radcliffe, hello. I assume you got my
message." She frowned. "That's odd. I left it this afternoon. Have
you checked your voice mail?" A pause, and Jeannie's brows shot up a
notch. "In Manhattan? Your daughter didn't mention you were here. Oh, I
see. So where are you now? Yes, that's close by. The precinct is on West 54th.
If you go south on Fifth Avenue..." Jeannie broke off, abandoning the idea
of direction-giving. A quick glance at her watch, and an equally quick
decision. "My partner and I were just heading out. Stay put. We'll meet
you in the hotel lounge. We can talk there. Right. We're on our way."

Jeannie was scrambling to her feet even as she put the phone back
in its cradle. "She's at the Plaza Athenée. Apparently, she flew in a
couple of hours ago to be with her daughter. She's waiting to have dinner with
her. Sabrina's still at the hospital. She's meeting her mother in the hotel
lounge at nine. That gives us over an hour. Let's get moving. If we want a shot
at the truth, or at catching Gloria Radcliffe in a he, we'll do better if her
daughter's not there. No moral support. No chance to embellish on a story to
downplay guilt. I want to talk to Gloria Radcliffe alone."

8:10 P.M.

Joe's Pizza, South Street Seaport

Russ Clark took his two slices of pepperoni pizza and his
medium-size Coke and slumped into a booth. He'd been walking for over an hour
trying to clear his head. It hadn't helped.

He'd been an intern at Ruisseau for almost two years now.

If anyone had asked, he'd say the sun rose and set on Carson
Brooks. Thanks to him, Russ was off the streets. Not only that, he was a high
school grad—one who'd gone on to Queens College, and was working his way toward
the journalism degree he'd always dreamed of.

Mr. Brooks had met with him personally a month or two after he'd
started working in Ruisseau's mail room. He'd told Russ what a fine job he was
doing, then said he'd been reviewing Russ's application and noticed that he'd
written a gripe column for his school newspaper—at least until his gripes
became too raunchy to print.

Russ had steeled himself for a lecture, or worse. Instead, Mr.
Brooks had asked him if he liked writing, or just griping. When Russ finished
hemming and hawing, and finally spit out what he wanted his future to be, Mr.
Brooks had moved him to the publicity department.

At first, Russ had been a gofer, but now he was actually helping
write copy. It wasn't the same as investigative reporting, but it did teach him
how to gather information and present it clearly and concisely. It was cool, it
was something to put on his resume when he graduated,
and
he got paid
for it.

Finally, things for him were looking up.

Last month everything had changed.

It started on the day he overheard that conversation, and gotten
wind of what was going on. It made him furious. So, to appease himself, to hone
his skills as a reporter and, most of all, to look out for Mr. Brooks, he'd
started poking around.

Tonight he'd hit pay dirt. Only he wished to hell he hadn't.

Because now he had to do something with it.

Polishing off his pizza and downing his remaining Coke, Russ
chucked out the paper plate and cup. Then, he headed toward the subway.

8:15 P.M.

West 73rd Street

Sabrina was bone-weary and mind-numb.

Talk about being bombarded with stimuli. After the emotional
meeting with Carson, an afternoon of follow-up calls to CCTL, and an
early-evening check-in at the hospital to see how Carson was doing, she'd been
herded into the limo with Dylan and Stan, driven out to tour the R&D
facility, then driven back to Manhattan. During the return trip, she'd been
sucked into an impromptu meeting. No surprise who'd orchestrated the tour and
the meeting, straight from his hospital bed, no less. Carson was intent on
immersing Sabrina in Ruisseau and in defining her roles there—both her official
and her unofficial ones—as soon as possible, so that Dylan could finalize the
paperwork, Stan could orchestrate a nine A.M. meeting to introduce her, and
both men could give her a rundown on the "who's who" and the
"what's what" in advance.

Using Carson's limo for the meeting made sense. It was large,
cushy, and, most of all, private. Stan began by giving her a procedural summary
of what she could expect the next morning, while Dylan scribbled snippets of
amendments on whatever legal documents he'd already banged out. Next, Stan
piled a ton of documents in her lap—from Ruisseau's latest financial
statements, to its fourth quarter projections, to the current marketing
campaign for C'est Moi—advising her to familiarize herself with them as quickly
as possible. He'd also given her a company directory, complete with titles,
departments, and telephone extensions, suggesting she get a feel for the staff.
Finally, he'd tossed her the keys to an apartment Carson had talked her into
accepting, flourished a business card with his home phone number written on it,
and waited while their driver pulled over and stopped on Riverside Drive. Then,
he jumped out of the limo.