Murder Take Two (11 page)

He still didn't know what she wanted from him; he still didn't know how much he was willing to give. He didn't know what Susan would do either, about him being here since she'd told him to keep clear.

“Laurie.” Putting both hands on her shoulders, he looked at her. With a thumb, he rubbed tears from her cheek. “Just talk to me. Okay?”

She stared back, blue eyes, wide and full of emotions he couldn't guess at. After a second that stretched thin, she nodded. In confusion, she looked around, then went into the bedroom and came back with a handful of tissues.

“This is hard for me too.” She stood in front of him.

“Yeah.”

“What would you like to drink? Wine? I don't know what kind they might have. Scotch? You still drink that?”

He got up, took her elbow, and steered her to the chairs at a small round table. “Sit,” he said.

Somewhat to his surprise, she did so without comment, protest, or struggle. He sat opposite her. “Now,” he said.

“Maybe somebody does want to kill me.” Her voice was low but matter-of-fact, with no overtones of great drama.

“Who?”

She got up, went to the bedroom again, and returned with a burgundy briefcase that she placed on the table, snapped open, and took out two newspapers.

With a raised eyebrow, he picked up the top one. It was a copy of the
Hampstead Herald,
dated two weeks ago. Page one had a photo of her getting out of a limo in front of the hotel. With a red ballpoint pen somebody had circled her name in the caption. The second paper also had her photo on the front page, but this time the focus was on Nick Logan, sitting at a picnic table near the old barn where they were shooting. Laura's back was toward the camera. In the same red ink, a circle had been drawn on her back.

“How long have you had these?”

“The dates are on them. The first one the day after I arrived. The second one a few days later.”

“You handled them?”

“Of course I handled them. I looked through to see if there was anything else in them.”

“Was there?”

“No.”

“Where did you get them?”

“I always get the local paper on location. I told the person at the desk when I got here. He said it would be at my door every evening. I didn't know whether I should be worried or not when I saw the first one. I mean it could be a fan. I do have fans, you know.”

“Yes.”

“And then the second one and it's not exactly—I mean, it's creepy.”

“Who have you told about this?”

“I don't know. Nick. I guess my hairdresser. The makeup girl. Mostly it's letters, you know? This kind of thing, it's part of the game. I guess any celebrity—some are nice and some are not so nice. This feels threatening. Then—” She took a white envelope from the briefcase and slid it across the table.

He handled it carefully. Plain white, drugstore variety; Laura's name and room number. Inside a piece of cheap typing paper with a crudely sketched gun and, in block letters, BANG.

“When did you get this?”

“This evening.”

“Anything else?”

“No. And now after Kay—” Laura shivered, crossed her arms, and clutched her elbows. “What can you do?”

“They aren't clearly threats.” He watched her like a snake after a rabbit. She could be doing it herself, the papers, the note. Like the chief said, Laura could have arranged the accident that killed the stuntwoman. Laura should have been on the railing, Laura wasn't. Kay Bender was. This might be reinforcement. But he didn't know why she would.

“Ben, you're not going to do anything?” She grabbed at his arm. “You do believe—”

“Calm down. I'm going to take care of this.” He took her hands and looked at her steadily. “I need to ask some questions. They're going to sound like cop questions because they are cop questions. Understand? Just the facts, ma'am.”

She nodded.

“Have you hurt anybody?” He forestalled her protests. “I don't mean minor hurt feelings. I'm talking about serious injury. The kind that could destroy someone's life.”

“Oh, God, I hope not. Hurt feelings and irritations and that kind of thing. You know, the sort of ‘I hate her' thing. There must be lots of those. I've had my share of both sides.”

“Not minor grievances, people who are just pissed. Normal people get over it after a while. The exception is a nutcase. Some guy you wouldn't go out with, or an actor who feels he didn't get a part because you didn't like him. This type can put in three, four years plotting out revenge.”

“How could I know if it was something like that?”

“They don't usually keep it to themselves. They send hate mail, make threatening phone calls.”

“Nothing but this. It feels threatening.”

Yes, it did.

She started to put her hand on the papers and he stopped her. “Don't touch it.”

Startled, she jerked her hand back. “It's so scary out there. You know? All those people and some of them—you never know what they are. You never know what's coming or who's going to jump out at you with acid or a knife.”

Yeah. A stalker who'd fastened on her. He hoped not. The thought of a psycho who mixed fantasy and reality and fed both through a sick mind scared the shit out of him. “They usually send mail too. Or try to see you.” And often the creeps believed the victim had a romantic interest in them.

“Anybody who always shows up when you're filming? Tries to get close? Tries to talk to you? Touch you? Get past barriers? Anything like that?”

“I don't know. I don't pay close attention to the crowds. I need to focus on what's coming up, otherwise my performance would be—on a level with that of Ms. Lloyd.”

Laura wasn't so frightened that she could pass up an opportunity to throw a dig at the other actress. “Why didn't you mention this stuff this afternoon?”

She looked at him, then got up and stalked to the bedroom. When she came back, she smacked the box of tissues on the table. “It knocked me out, if you must know. The accident—Kay and—and then seeing you and—I just—I didn't expect it to hit me so hard and there was that other police person.”

“Yancy?”

“No. The woman.”

“The chief.”

“Anyway, you were so hard. Like you always were when you were mad. I mean, you came in angry.”

With a sour smile, he acknowledged the truth of her assessment. Old memories and old responses had come over him. He'd felt she was going to shove him into the stew pot.

“And I wanted to talk to you without all those other people. Just you.” She rested her forearms on the table and clasped her hands together. She fell silent, looking at him with wonder, then tilted her head. “We were so young.”

“Yes.”

“Oh, Ben, I've missed you.”

“Don't get carried away,” he said dryly.

She laughed. The laugh roused memories; it was the same delighted, life-is-so-interesting laugh she'd had when they were married. For reasons he couldn't figure, it made him sad. Lost youth maybe, lost promises, lost chances.

It also said that underneath all the Hollywood glitz was the girl he'd married. Pretty little girl who looked up at him with curiosity and interest, made him feel like maybe he was worth something after all.

Suddenly he was aware of exactly where they were. Hotel suite. Just through that doorway was a bed.

Laura, eyes alight with impish malice, said in a velvet voice. “For old times' sake?”

9

Serena, sitting at the table, busily dunked a tea bag in a cup of hot water and barely gave Yancy a glance when he came in. “Well, you certainly took care of that, didn't you?”

“What do you expect?”

“Right. You're the only one with feelings.” She threw the tea bag at him. He ducked and it landed with a splat on the floor.

“You think I want to toss my crazy sick mother out of her home?”

“Serena—”

She shoved the chair back, got up for the tea bag, and dropped it in the trash, then wiped up the floor with a paper towel. “You want something serious to happen? Maybe even fatal?” She plopped herself back in the chair. “How would you feel then?”

“She doesn't want to leave here.”

“You keep refusing to look at the point. She needs to be safe, Peter. Sometimes she's perfectly all right. Sometimes she isn't. I don't know about you, but it scares me silly to come home and find her on fire. What if I'd been fifteen minutes later? Or an hour?”

To get away from her demanding gaze, he went to the refrigerator and reached in for the carton of orange juice. He shook it, then poured a glass and took a sip. “I told you, I'll think of something.”

“You'd better hurry because time's running out.”

“Oh, hell, Serena. She doesn't want to leave here. It'd be different if she was totally out of it, didn't recognize us, didn't know what was going on. She loves this place. She loves the flowers. She loves the trees. She loves—”

“Maybe we can find a place with flowers and trees.”

“And a place that will let her have Elmo?”

“That's something else we'll have to do something about.”

He gave her a startled look. “You want to do away with Elmo?”

“No, you jerk. One of us will need to keep him.”

Yancy's beeper went off, saving him from having to respond. This beeper was something that came with his assignment to the movie bunch. If they needed anything, wanted anything, got bored, lonely, or wanted another hand for poker, he got beeped.

“Don't answer it,” Serena said.

He didn't much want to; a fourteen-hour day ought to be enough. He downed the orange juice and set the glass on the counter. “I have to.” She might not like his job, but it was the only one he had and he wanted to keep it.

He'd be the one in trouble if he didn't respond, and if he got fired, they'd really be in the shit. Who'd pay for the old folk's home then? He rubbed his face. Damn it, damn it.

In the living room, he dropped into the old green easy chair by the front window. A rectangle of light spilled in from the kitchen. Night had closed in while he'd been talking with Serena. Fireflies blinked on and off in the soft black air. After a second, he picked up the receiver and punched in the number.

“Hi, buddy. How's it going?” It was Mac, his Hollywood teamster friend. “I have a mind to get something to munch on. How about you and me go out and find us some barbecued ribs? You folks know how to barbecue ribs around here?”

“Yes, sir, we do. If you'll give me”—he held up his arm to catch the light from the kitchen and squinted at his watch—“twenty minutes, I'll take you to a place with barbecue sauce hot enough to blow off the top of your head.”

“That a promise?”

“No, sir, that's a threat.”

Mac chuckled and hung up.

Yancy leaned back and closed his eyes. His mother often sat here in the dark. She watched the moon rise and the small animals come out with the night, the foxes and possums and skunks, the occasional coyote. Sometimes she talked to them. No big deal.

Sometimes they talked back. That was a little different. She listened.

He didn't feel like being with movie people anymore today. Aw hell, Mac wasn't really movie people. If Yancy wanted to ask about the lieutenant being near the barn around noon, now was the time to start.

Get a move on then.

Serena was still drinking tea. He rested a hand on the table and leaned down to look into her face. “I've got to go.”

“You always do.”

“We'll talk about this later.” He kissed her forehead and left, told Dallas, still in the hammock, that maybe Serena needed him, and got in the Cherokee.

The stars lost some of their brilliance as he got into town. He drove through on Fifteenth Street, took Crescent Road past campus, and then turned west on Mississippi. In the driveway at the side of the old Victorian house, he parked under the maple tree and fished keys from his pocket. Alice Blakeley, the owner, divorced and struggling to keep afloat, lived downstairs. In addition to tutoring students in math, she gave piano lessons and rented the upper half of the house to Yancy.

Outside stairs went up to the second story. Stephanie, his landlady's daughter, sat on the bottom step. At thirteen, mother and daughter didn't always see eye to eye.

“Hey, Steph, what are you up to?”

“Writing.”

“Isn't it a little dark?”

“I'm just making notes. Have you solved the murder yet?”

He sat beside her. “Not yet.”

“Would you like a clue?”

“Do you have one?”

“You're just like my mother, you treat me like a child.”

“I'm sorry.” This was his evening for apologizing to irate females.

“No, you're not. You just say that. I'm making character studies. You're one of them,” she added darkly.

That was a little daunting. “How come you never let me read what you write?”

“Maybe I will sometime.”

“Tell me your clue.”

“Those eyes the greenest of things blue,

The bluest of things gray.”

“What does that mean?”

“Nothing, but it sounds great, doesn't it?”

“Yeah.” He patted her knee and took the stairs two at a time to prove he wasn't tired. Just as he stuck the key in the lock the phone rang. He rushed in and grabbed the phone.

A breathy voice cooed in his ear. If he didn't know females didn't go in for that kind of thing, he'd have thought he had a heavy breather.

“Hello, Officer Yancy.”

“Ms. Lloyd. What can I do for you?”

“You recognized my voice.”

“Couldn't miss it.” Nobody else he knew sounded like a seduction scene.

“So businesslike,” she pouted. Even over the phone he could hear the pout. “And here I was trying to work up the courage to ask you a favor.”