Read To Have and to Kill Online
Authors: Mary Jane Clark
H
is wife had long since gone up to bed, ever aware that she had to get up very early in the morning to get to the bakery. Vin Donovan watched the Knicks game in his basement lair while having a couple of beers. When the game was over, he switched to his favorite local news station.
On the television screen, a pretty young woman bundled in a down coat stood on the sidewalk in front of an elegant old building. She held a microphone to her lips with a gloved hand.
“A fund-raising auction at the Metropolitan School for Girls here on Fifth Avenue became the scene of tragedy when actor Travis York collapsed on the stage while he acted as auctioneer. He was later pronounced dead at Lenox Hill Hospital.
“People who attended the auction were stunned and shaken as they left the school tonight, struggling to make sense of what they had witnessed.”
Video of a well-dressed couple appeared on the screen. The woman was clinging to the man’s arm. Both their facial expressions were grim.
“One minute he was standing there,” said the man, “making jokes with the audience, trying to jack up the prices, and the next minute he was coughing and gasping for air. His face was beet-red, almost purple. I could see it from the middle of the room where we were sitting. After he fell to the floor, it looked like he was having a seizure or convulsions or something. He was shaking and jerking around uncontrollably.”
Another man appeared and spoke. “I’m still not sure exactly what happened. About halfway through the auction, he coughed a little bit and then he took a drink of water. After that, all hell broke loose.”
Vin heard the reporter’s voice again. She was talking over a professional head shot of Travis York’s handsome face, which smiled from the screen.
“Travis York is known to millions as Drake Darrington on the popular soap opera
A Little Rain Must Fall
. He had volunteered to be the auctioneer tonight at the request of his costar Glenna Brooks, whose daughter attends the school.”
Now a woman appeared. The words marching across the bottom of the screen identified her as Jessie Terhune, School Drama Teacher.
“This is just such a horrible, senseless thing,” she said. “The man was doing a good deed. The proceeds of the auction are meant to go to the drama department. Travis York, as an actor, knew how important our program is to the girls. Before he collapsed, over a million dollars had already been raised and that is a tribute to him and will be part of his legacy.”
The reporter appeared on screen one last time. “An autopsy will be performed. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner investigates all unexpected, violent, or suspicious deaths in New York City.”
Vin lowered the volume on the TV and reached for the phone. He listened in frustration at the repeated ringing before the call was finally transferred to voice mail.
“Piper? It’s me. Dad. Are you all right, honey? Call me back as soon as you get this. And whatever you do, don’t go near the water that Travis York drank.”
Sitting on the old couch, Vin waited anxiously and thought about the news report. The symptoms that the onlookers described reminded him of a couple of cases he’d worked on. Those cases involved cyanide poisoning.
T
he police asked for a list of names of those who had attended the auction and questioned all the people remaining in the ballroom. Every single person described the reaction Travis York had after he drank the water. The crime scene investigators confiscated the glass, the pitcher, and the remaining contents for testing.
Glenna was somber as she joined her fiancé and friend after the police had finished interviewing her.
“I still can’t believe all this,” she said as she sank down in the ballroom chair beside Piper. “I can’t believe that Travis is dead.” Glenna tilted her head back and closed her eyes.
“I know,” said Casey, taking her hand and bringing it to his lips. “But what I can’t believe is how close it came to being you, Glenna. You almost drank that water instead of Travis.”
“Casey’s right,” said Piper. “Thank God that didn’t happen.”
“I do thank him,” said Glenna. “But we don’t know for certain that it was something in that water that killed Travis.”
“I overheard one of the cops talking,” said Piper. “That’s what they’re thinking.”
Glenna straightened in her chair. “So somebody poisoned Travis?” she asked incredulously. “Why in the world would anyone do that?”
“I don’t know,” said Piper, shaking her head. “But here’s the thing, Glenna: if it does turn out that the water was poisoned, what if it was really meant for you?”
Glenna looked at Piper with skepticism. “No way,” she said.
“It could have been,” said Piper. “And maybe it has something to do with that letter you got.”
“What letter?” asked Casey.
Glenna shook her head. “I didn’t even want to tell you about it. Nonsense, that’s all it was. I burned it.”
“You’ve got to tell Casey about it, Glenna,” said Piper. “And now you have to tell the police about it, too.”
M
artha Killeen had followed the paramedics out onto Fifth Avenue, taking pictures until the body of Travis York was loaded into the back of the ambulance. Then she hailed a cab and directed the driver to take her downtown to her studio. As she sat in the back of the taxi, Martha scrolled through the photos that appeared in the playback viewer of her camera.
The pictures were powerful and graphic. Martha was well aware of the fact that, because she had taken them, they were more valuable. Even if somebody had taken some pictures with their cell phones, they weren’t going to be in any way comparable to hers in terms of clarity, composition, and pedigree. The photographs she had taken tonight were worth a fortune.
The appetite for the pictures was going to be tremendous. Once word got out that she had them, broadcast and Internet news agencies would be after her like voracious hounds. She had to decide how she was going to handle things.
Martha ran her fingers through her short, layered hair as she considered her options. She could sell the whole series of pictures to a single buyer, an exclusive arrangement that would net one enormous sum of money. She could sell to multiple buyers and possibly make even more. Or she could let the pictures out one or two at a time and try to stretch things out, choosing buyers based on their offers for a particular picture.
But she also had the police to consider. Once they learned of the pictures she had taken, they might confiscate them as part of their investigation. Then she’d have nothing.
She had to act quickly.
The cab pulled up in front of her building. Martha paid the fare, got out, and stood on the sidewalk in front of the old three-story warehouse that she had so passionately renovated into her 13,000-square-foot studio and living space. Just Martha and her six-year-old daughter, Ella, shared five bedrooms, five baths, three fireplaces, and an indoor lap pool. Outside, at the back of the building, there were another 2,000 square feet of multilevel terraces and gardens. With her studio on the first floor, Martha literally lived over the store, and was available for Ella whenever needed.
A place like hers was almost nonexistent in Manhattan—though it really wasn’t hers at all. Three different banks held mortgages on it now. Still, the thought of losing it sickened her. It was the only home Ella had ever known—except, of course, for the Chinese orphanage. Ella was doing so well here and Martha didn’t want to disrupt that. Her daughter had already been through enough in her short life.
Some people would argue that she didn’t need to live so lavishly, that Ella didn’t need to go to a private school. But Martha was determined to give her child the best of everything.
As she straightened the wreath on the front door, Martha made her decision.
Friday, December 10 . . . Fourteen days until the wedding
B
efore he drank his morning coffee or turned on his computer to monitor what the overseas financial markets had done overnight, Phillip Brooks bundled up for the three-block walk to the nearest newsstand. He didn’t have a subscription to the
New York Post
, but he suspected that the paper would have the most gripping coverage of what had happened last night. If there were pictures to be had, the
Post
would use them liberally, splashing them across the front page and throughout the tabloid. Going to the Internet was no substitute for holding a newspaper in your own hands.
He locked the door of his junior one-bedroom apartment and took the elevator down three floors to the small reception area where the building’s residents picked up their mail from the metal boxes set into the wall. As Phillip reached to open the heavy glass door that led out to the street, he was nostalgic for the days when he took a doorman for granted, the days when he and Glenna had lived together in the luxurious “classic eight,” the apartment that Glenna lived in now with Susannah. It sickened him that, soon, Casey Walden would live there, too.
It was all he could do to nod and keep a pleasant expression on his face when Susannah mentioned things that she did with her mother and future stepfather. Every other weekend, Phillip had to listen to Susannah’s account of the latest excursion she had gone on with Glenna and Casey. The guy was a regular tour guide, taking them to the Museum of Natural History, the Bronx Zoo, the New York Aquarium, and always finding other interesting outings. A walking tour of Greenwich Village, where Casey told her about the many writers and artists who had lived there over the decades; a picnic on the grounds of the Cloisters, where he expounded on the highlights of medieval art; a boat ride out to Ellis Island, where Susannah was able to find the listing for her maternal great-great-grandparents who had arrived in the United States after a miserable ocean voyage from Ireland.
Phillip knew he should be glad that the man who aimed to be Susannah’s stepfather was the sort that seemed to enjoy spending time with his daughter, doing such wholesome and educational things. But all Phillip could feel was jealousy and resentment and anger.
Casey Walden was stealing his life.
Reaching the newsstand, Phillip picked up the newspaper and stared at the glaring image of Travis York lying on the stage floor, his mouth gaping open, his eyes bulging. He noticed that a photo credit was given to Martha Killeen. As Phillip studied the picture further, he was surprised at how little emotion he felt. Once he had been so jealous of Travis that he couldn’t sleep at night. He had been tortured by thoughts of Travis and Glenna being together. He had been certain that, despite Glenna’s denials, Travis had played a big part in the dissolution of their marriage. Phillip had been consumed by his hatred for the man.
Now all Phillip felt was a sense of satisfaction. Travis York had deserved what he had gotten. Coveting another man’s wife was a sin.
Now, at least, half of Phillip’s competition was out of the way.
H
er blond hair fanned out on the pillow, Piper awoke to the smell of coffee drifting up from the kitchen and Emmett licking her face. She stretched and took in a deep breath, staring at the bubble-gum-pink walls and wishing she had gotten involved in picking this paint color. Then she remembered. Travis York had died last night. Even worse, there was a good chance he might have been murdered.
Instinctively reaching for her BlackBerry, Piper scrolled around, looking for the latest news. She read, paying close attention to every word. There was nothing in any of the stories about Travis York’s death that she hadn’t known last night when she left the auction. But the police were scheduled to hold a news conference later in the day.
This was one morning she didn’t have to rack her brain for something to post. Piper began pecking at her handheld’s keyboard, typing an entry for all those following her on Twitter, careful not to exceed the 140-character limit.
I WAS AMONG THE VERY LAST PEOPLE WHO SAW TRAVIS YORK ALIVE. HE WAS SO TALENTED. ALWAYS KIND TO ME. HE WILL BE SORELY MISSED BY 1000S OF FANS.
Laying the BlackBerry on the bedside table, Piper went to the bathroom and brushed her teeth. She turned on the water in the shower, waited for it to spray hot, and then stepped into the stall. She let the water run over her body, soothing the tension she felt. Her hair was full of shampoo lather when her phone buzzed.
J
ack Lombardi waited impatiently for Piper to answer. After four rings, voice mail sprang into action. Frustrated, Jack left his message.
“Pipe? It’s me. I just read your tweet. If you told me you were going to be at that auction, I’d forgotten. I want to talk to you, Pipe. To make sure you’re okay and to eat some humble pie. I was sure that Glenna’s letter was from a harmless crank. But now that I hear that Glenna could have just as easily taken a drink from that pitcher, I’m thinking maybe someone really has it in for her and that the letter could be a strong clue.
“Oh, yeah, they were able to determine that there was cyanide in the water. They suspected cyanide and checked specifically for that right away. But that’s not for publication yet. Anyway, that letter has to make its way to the police.”
A
s she went down to the kitchen to pour herself a glass of orange juice, Piper heard the familiar banging coming from the basement. The sound of her father’s tinkering was oddly soothing to her. It had always been this way.
Piper remembered coming home after a Friday night out with friends in high school. While she had never admitted it, Piper was nervous when she was in a car with a friend who drove too fast or at a party where people drank themselves into blackouts.
Even though she knew he was still up just to make sure she was home by her curfew, the sound of her father at his workbench never failed to remind her that she was safe. That she was home.
Sense memory at its best.
She carried her drink with her downstairs. She found her father rummaging through an old applesauce jar containing odd nails and screws. He put it down immediately when he heard her.
“Hi, Dad.”
“What time did you finally get home last night?”
“I don’t know. I guess it was after one.”
“It was after two. I heard you.”
“Then why are you asking me?”
Vin shrugged. “Force of habit, I guess. I left you a message and you didn’t call me back.”
“By the time I noticed it, I was afraid you’d be asleep and I didn’t want to wake you.”
Vin seemed to accept the explanation. “All right. Tell me about what you saw.”
Piper closed her eyes. “It was a horror show, Dad.”
“Death by poison usually is,” said Vin, “if that’s what it turns out to be.”
“It
was
poison,” said Piper. “Cyanide. Jack Lombardi just left me a message about it.”
“The FBI kid?”
Piper nodded. “Somehow I don’t think Jack would appreciate being referred to as ‘the FBI kid.’ ”
“He’s a kid to me,” said Vin.
“Whatever.”
“Actually, I’m not surprised the detectives suspected cyanide. It’s a great poison,” Vin continued. “It looks like sugar, can be dissolved in water or hidden in food or medications. Except for the smell of bitter almonds, there’s really nothing that warns you until it’s too late. And I read somewhere that being able to detect the almond scent is a genetic thing. Some people can, some people can’t.”
Piper sank into the worn sofa. “Cyanide. It’s so dramatic. It’s like
Masterpiece Theatre
on Fifth Avenue.”
“It’s not really all that exotic, Piper,” said Vin as he found the nail he wanted. “We had a couple of cyanide poisoning cases while I was on the force. All three involved somebody who was ticked off with a husband, wife, or former lover. And, of course, there were those famous cases in the early eighties when some idiot was going around lacing extra-strength Tylenol capsules with cyanide. If I remember correctly, seven people were killed by that animal.”
“Did they ever find out who did it?” asked Piper.
“They’ve had a couple of suspects but they’ve never had enough evidence to charge any of them with murder.” Vin began vigorously hitting the nail with his hammer.
“Where do you even
get
cyanide?” asked Piper when there was a pause in the pounding.
“It’s not all that hard to buy, lovey,” said Vin as he took out his measuring tape. “It’s available for commercial use and mainly produced for mining gold and silver. It’s used in electroplating and cleaning metal. Labs use it as a reducing agent and it’s also used as an insecticide. I remember in one of our cases, the killer’s hobby was collecting bugs. He used potassium cyanide to euthanize his insects . . . and then his wife.”
Piper winced. “Wow. There’s a winner.”
“And here’s another reason not to smoke. Cyanide has been found in cigarettes.”
“Lovely.”