Authors: Laura DiSilverio
11
Sunday morning, I showed up at the Embassy Suites hotel for a meeting I hadn’t known
about with Heather-Anne. She had called my cell last night and left a voice mail,
but I’d dropped into bed early after a day of shuttling Kendall to skating practice
and convincing Dexter to work on his biology project. Spiders, and I’d even helped
him catch some in the basement—ugh! I’d also had to move money from my shrinking savings
account to pay the utilities bill, which was twice as large as usual due to my leaving
the gas grill on accidentally after barbecuing on an unusually nice day in mid-January.
I dreamed about being on a Mexican beach, probably because Albertine had suggested
we go there when we were giggling about the ideal man for a postdivorce fling after
our third margaritatini Friday night. I was holding out for George Clooney, but Albertine
insisted Jimmy Smits was sexier. Albertine thought maybe having a fling would be easier
if we headed to Cabo or Acapulco over spring break, but my checking account wasn’t
up to that, even though a girls’ weekend with Albertine would’ve been fun. Sun, sea,
shopping, tropical drinks with little umbrellas. It sounded divine.
I hadn’t checked my messages until morning, and Heather-Anne hadn’t answered when
I called back, so I was running late when I arrived at the Embassy Suites. They were
hosting a huge art sale, promising “Original Works of Art for Under $99,” and I saw
several paintings I liked as I wove through the clumps of people looking at stacked
canvases. How was I ever going to find Heather-Anne in this crowd? I craned my neck,
looking over the heads of the shoppers, and saw a four-foot-square painting of sunflowers
in yellows, oranges, and bright blues that would have looked wonderful on the wall
above my sofa. I moved toward it before remembering my mission. Maybe Heather-Anne
meant for me to meet her in her room? I listened to the message again.
“I heard from Les. We need to talk. My hotel, nine
A.M.
tomorrow.”
Since it was already ten past nine, I headed toward her room. The crowd noise petered
out as I walked down the hall. A maid passed me, pushing a vacuum cleaner, and an
elderly couple blocked my path as they hauled six or eight bags out of their room
on a luggage dolly. I helped them get it pointed down the hall. “They’re so awkward
to maneuver, aren’t they?” I asked, and the old man agreed with a nod, trying to press
a tip into my hand.
By the time I made it to Heather-Anne’s room, it was almost nine twenty, and I was
worried that she’d be mad I was so late. The door was resting against the jamb, like
someone hadn’t closed it firmly. I left hotel doors like that when I went to fetch
ice. Did Heather-Anne expect me to just walk in? I couldn’t do that. I tapped on the
door. No response.
“Heather-Anne,” I called softly. “It’s me, Gigi.” I shifted from foot to foot. My
Joan and David boots pinched. When the door still didn’t open, I knocked louder, then
leaned my head toward it to see if I could hear anything. Faint voices sounded from
within. Had Les shown up? I pressed my ear against the door, trying to hear what they
were saying. Scrunching my toes in the boots, I lost my balance and banged against
the door, which popped open. I fell into the room with a thud.
I lay flat on the floor for a few seconds, winded, before pushing to my knees. This
was more embarrassing than the time my bathing suit top came untied at the Fassendilbers’
pool party. “I am so sorry, Heather-Anne, I didn’t mean—” I stopped as I straightened
up and realized no one was in the sitting room area. An old
Quincy
rerun played softly on the television.
“Heather-Anne?” I inched farther into the room. “The door was open, so I—” I wasn’t
about to go into the bedroom. What if Les really was here and they were…? I sidestepped
to my left so I could see through the open door. I squeaked.
Heather-Anne Pawlusik lay on the floor, her head by the door, a spangly scarf pulled
so tightly around her throat that her face was blotchy and swollen. Her eyes, her
tongue … The gruesome details hit me like someone was driving nails into my eyes and
I screamed.
An answering scream sounded from just behind me, and I whirled, screaming again when
I came face-to-face with a round-cheeked maid holding a pile of towels. She shrieked
again and crossed herself awkwardly around the towels. We took turns screaming for
another couple of seconds before the maid looked past me and screamed louder. “
Está muerta. Asesina!
”
I didn’t speak Spanish—well, not more than it took to ask for the
baño
—but her expression made me think she’d just called me an assassin. Which was plain
silly because—
“You keeled her!” she clarified, stabbing a finger toward Heather-Anne. “Dead!”
“Yes, she’s— No! I didn’t—” The maid turned and fled, dropping the towels, before
I could tell her I hadn’t killed Heather-Anne.
* * *
“Why did you tell Ms. Herrera that you killed Ms. Pawlusik if you didn’t?” the detective
asked. She was tall, skinny, and skeptical in a blue-gray suit that flattered her
pale complexion and reddish hair. We were in an unoccupied suite at the hotel, four
doors away from Heather-Anne’s room, and herds of police and hotel officials were
coming and going. They’d made me sit in this room by myself for more than an hour
with a cop watching me from one of the dinette chairs. I was tired and scared and
had already cried so many times I knew I must have a mascara trail down to my chin.
Poor Heather-Anne!
“I didn’t tell her that,” I insisted, rubbing my feet together. I wished I could take
off the painful boots, but I couldn’t imagine being interrogated by the police in
my stocking feet. “I just agreed with her that Heather-Anne was dead.”
Detective Lorrimore cocked an eyebrow and I got the feeling she didn’t believe me.
“‘Heather-Anne?’ So you had a relationship with the victim?”
“I knew her, if that’s what you mean,” I said. “She was a client.”
“A client?”
“I’m a private investigator.”
“Really?” Disbelief sent her eyebrows soaring.
I couldn’t much blame her for that reaction; I’m sure most PIs don’t dissolve into
puddles of tears when they find a dead body. “Yes. She hired us to find her—” How
did I describe her relationship to Les? “Her boyfriend,” I said.
At the mention of a possibly estranged boyfriend, the detective perked up and readied
her pen over her notepad. “His name?”
“Lester Goldman.”
Detective Lorrimore started to write, then stopped, staring at me from under her brows.
“Didn’t you say your name was Goldman?”
Her eyes narrowed in suspicion, and I knew where she was going. I felt like I was
sinking in quicksand. “Do you know Detective Connor Montgomery?” I asked in desperation.
He was a homicide detective who was a friend of Charlie’s, and I’d met him several
times.
“Montgomery? Wait a minute … Do you work for Charlie Swift?”
“We’re partners.”
“You’re the one that set fire to the Buff Burgers last year, right? And blew up the
meth lab?”
“I didn’t—” Before I could explain what really happened in both those cases, she was
gesturing to a uniformed cop and whispering something to him. They both laughed. Keeping
her eyes on me, Lorrimore dialed a number on her cell. “Montgomery. Get your ass down
to the Embassy Suites. Your girlfriend’s partner turned up in a hotel room with a
homicide victim.” She flipped her phone closed, leaned her shoulders against the wall,
and folded her arms across her chest. “Oh, this is going to be good.”
Her smile made me uneasy. I couldn’t decide whether to worry about ending up in jail
for the second time in two days or what Charlie would say if she heard someone refer
to her as Montgomery’s girlfriend.
12
“‘Girlfriend’ is a revolting term,” Charlie said some hours later, pointing the business
end of her grout trowel at Detective Connor Montgomery to emphasize her point. “It’s
Barbie and Ken. Middle school.” She slapped more grout onto the tile and smoothed
it with rapid, angry strokes.
“Would you rather I referred to you as my lover?” He was behind her, but she could
hear the lazy smile in his voice.
“But I’m not.”
“Yet.”
His certainty sent tingly warmth from her midsection to her extremities, and she had
to re-grip the trowel after a moment’s pause. “Don’t count your chickens,” she recommended.
He laughed. Glad that the hair falling around her face hid her expression, Charlie
pretended to concentrate on her tiling, deliberately not looking up to see how his
lean face lit up when he laughed, how his brown eyes warmed. With his dark hair and
tall, athletic body, he reminded her of the actor Clive Owen, only with a better sense
of humor.
When he spoke again, his voice was serious. “It’s not looking good for Gigi.”
Charlie swiveled her head to stare at him. “You can’t seriously believe that Gigi
would—could—plan and carry off a murder.”
Montgomery helped himself to a beer from the fridge; surprisingly, Charlie didn’t
resent his familiarity. Her lack of resentment worried her.
“Plan? Probably not. Strangle her in the heat of the moment … The woman stole Gigi’s
husband, Charlie. That sounds like a pretty good motive to me. Gigi’s a large woman,
strong; she could have overpowered Pawlusik physically.”
“I don’t think it’s Pawlusik,” Charlie said, standing, rubbing her ass absently, and
crossing to the sink to wash grout off her hands. When Montgomery arched his eyebrows,
she explained how she’d tried to check out Heather-Anne’s background and come up with
a blank. “When I called her on it—”
“Why am I not surprised?” The hiss of air escaping the bottle as he twisted the cap
accompanied his comment.
“—she said her name was really Lucinda Cheney and she was on the run from an abusive
husband. She wouldn’t give me his name or tell me where she’d been living, although
she mentioned traveling through the South. My guess? Cheney isn’t her real name, either.”
“Lorrimore will track down her real identity through fingerprints,” he said. At Charlie’s
questioning look, he said, “It’s not my case. Conflict of interest. Everyone knows
you and I are—” Charlie’s baleful look made him reconsider his word choice—“whatever
we are. Gigi works for you—with you—so I’m out of the loop.”
“You must still know—”
“Uh-uh. It’s strictly by the book on this one, Charlie. I can’t give you anything.
No lab results, no autopsy findings, no hints about what Lorrimore’s thinking. She’s
a good cop. She’ll get to the truth without your help.”
He gave the final word an ironic twist, and Charlie stuck out her tongue. His hand
flashed out, snagged her around the waist, and pulled her hard against the length
of him. Before she could even think about breaking free, he’d pressed a hard kiss
on her lips. When he would have pulled back, she stopped him with her hands on his
face, and the kiss deepened. It was several minutes before they broke apart, both
breathing heavily. Montgomery’s gaze fell to Charlie’s swollen lips, and his eyes
glittered. “We could—”
“Uh-uh.” She turned away, trying to regain her composure as she tucked her T-shirt
back into her painter’s overalls. “There’s work to do.”
“You don’t even have a case anymore,” Montgomery said, coming up behind her and wrapping
his arms around her. “Your client’s dead.”
“That may be,” Charlie said, disentangling herself reluctantly, “but she paid us in
advance to find Les, and if Lorrimore suspects Gigi had a hand in Heather-Anne’s death,
Les may be the only one who can prove otherwise.”
“How?” Montgomery accepted defeat, let his arms drop, and returned to his beer.
“He can testify that Heather-Anne had a deranged husband after her. Reasonable doubt.
He can explain why he decamped from Costa Rica and ended up in Aspen. You know”—she
paused, furrowing her brow—“we don’t even know for sure that Heather-Anne was the
intended victim.”
“What, someone mistook her for someone else? Come on, Charlie.”
“No. She said one of the men Les cheated threatened to hurt his kids. Maybe Heather-Anne’s
murder is a message to Les.”
“Thin.”
Charlie rounded on him. “My partner’s a murder suspect. I’m going to do what it takes
to clear her.” Her own vehemence and concern for Gigi startled her. She hadn’t wanted
Gigi as a partner, but the woman was growing on her. Damn it. “Because it reflects
badly on Swift Investigations, of course, to have one of the partners on trial,” she
added loftily. “It’s bad for business.”
“Of course.”
The amused understanding in Montgomery’s voice made her want to hit him. Or kiss him.
Or … She shooed him out the door, beer bottle in hand, so she could get to work.
13
I wasn’t under arrest. That happy thought bounced through my brain as I drove home
from the Embassy Suites Sunday afternoon. That didn’t mean the police wouldn’t change
their minds and nab me any minute. Detective Lorrimore had talked to me for what seemed
like hours, going over the same questions again and again, like I was going to change
my story the eighteenth time I told it. I knew she wanted to put me in jail and throw
away the key. I’d been relieved when Charlie’s friend, Detective Montgomery, had stopped
by and dragged Lorrimore into the hall for a few minutes. I’d tiptoed to the door,
hoping to overhear something, and been embarrassed when a uniformed cop came through
the door while I had my ear pressed against it. The officer almost knocked me on my
fanny, and the door bruised my forehead. Looking in the rearview mirror, I tried to
arrange my hair to cover the bruise. A horn blared beside me, and I jerked the Hummer’s
wheel so I ended up back in my own lane, giving the scowling woman an apologetic smile.
Passing the exit for Fillmore, I suddenly realized I didn’t want to go home. I wanted
to talk to Charlie. Whipping the Hummer toward the exit, I waved guiltily at the two
lanes’ worth of people honking at me. A quick left on Fillmore and another left into
the merge lane had me headed north on I-25 again within minutes. I got off at Woodmen
and worked my way back toward Charlie’s house. A couple of police cars and a few news
vans sat outside the Embassy Suites, and I ducked down in the seat as I passed it.