Notorious (10 page)

That was ten minutes before she returned to her room.

“The caller didn’t want to leave a voice mail, but asked that I take down this message. He said, ‘The Ames case is closed. The family doesn’t want you or anyone else reopening that can of worms. Go back to New York.’” Devon hesitated, then added, “He refused to give me his name. I’m sorry, Ms. Revere, but I have a standing order to give you all messages, even anonymous.”

She always had that policy when she traveled because many people she interviewed felt uncomfortable sharing information, even their name and phone number. Many high-end hotels wouldn’t forward an anonymous message.

“Thank you, Devon.” She hung up.

The family doesn’t want you …

Who’d called in the message? Detective Beck? Max didn’t think so, even though he’d said almost the same thing to her at the funeral. He’d had no problem getting in her face before, he would have left a belligerent voice mail, or used his name with the threat of tossing her in prison. That it had come in not more than an hour after she left Olivia Langstrom Ward’s house made Max wonder who Olivia called after she left. Was she still close to the Ames family? Or had Max been followed?

Or it could have been Andy. He’d been so … odd … last night when he crashed her dinner. He hadn’t taken well her threat to stir things up.

Someone was speaking for the Ames family. Generally, Max avoided the immediate family during an investigation unless they had invited her in—until she got to the point of needing to talk to them. This time, however, she would make an exception. Though Gerald and Kimberly Ames would never get over Lindy’s death—Max had rarely found a parent who found any true peace after their child was murdered—enough time had passed that Max didn’t feel like she’d be intruding.

She wanted to know if the family told someone to send her out of town. If they simply didn’t want to be reminded of the tragedy, Max could assuage their concern about what she was going to do—which, right now, was nothing but uncovering the truth. She had no intention of writing an article or a book on Lindy Ames’s murder. But if either Gerald or Kimberly Ames was hiding something—information or evidence that pointed to a motive or killer—then Max wanted to make sure they knew she would find out exactly what they didn’t want to get out. She might want to talk to them separately. She’d have better luck with Gerald than Kimberly—Kimberly had never particularly liked Max, but she truly hated her after Kevin’s arrest. In many ways, Max couldn’t blame her for that. If she was a mother, she might have felt the same way.

She left quickly, not wanting to be late to dinner, but needing to make a stop. Since she had decided to review Lindy’s case, and everyone thought that’s why she was here anyway, why be discreet? She’d find out who had left that message before the night was over.

Max did not take well to threats, subtle or otherwise.

She drove into the town of Atherton, nostalgia taking her by surprise.

Her childhood had not been all bad disappeared during spring break, tt like . And honestly, most people who didn’t know her would think she was a fool to even think she had it rough. Certainly, she’d never wanted for necessities, at least from the time she was left with her grandparents. A beautiful home, a high-quality education, never any fear that she wouldn’t be able to go to college for lack of money. She’d been given a car on her sixteenth birthday, and had traveled around the world before she was eighteen.

Sometimes, growing up, she’d felt guilty for wanting more. For wanting to know why her mother left her. Wanting to know who her father was—and why her mother had lied to her about him. Why the birthday cards stopped after she turned sixteen. Why her uncle Brooks hated her so much he could barely look at her. Before she’d exposed his adultery. Before she’d been given one-fifth of her great-grandmother’s estate. He’d hated her from the minute Martha Revere showed up on Thanksgiving and surprised the family with Max.

She drove past the elementary school she’d attended through eighth grade, a small private school that fed into Atherton Prep. ACP was one of the most expensive but rigorous schools on the West Coast. Two decades before Max started, it had been an all-boys school that included boarding, but that had all changed. It had grown in size to more than five hundred students, but still graduated overachievers who went on to study at Stanford, Harvard, USC, MIT, and more. Lawyers, doctors, businesspeople, inventors, investors, authors, professors.

There were subtle differences between East Coast old money and West Coast old money that Max had never appreciated until she moved to New York City. One key difference was household staff—in the west, particularly the old money of Atherton, families didn’t have full-time, live-in help. Max’s great-grandmother Genie was the only person she knew who had two live-in household staff, but her stately mansion—where her uncle Brooks now lived with his much-younger second wife and five-year-old daughter—needed full-time maintenance. Max hadn’t been there since the family, who controlled the Sterling family trust, voted to allow Brooks to live there. She’d been the sole dissenting vote—and Brooks thought it was because she didn’t respect him.

She supposed that was part of it.

Max wouldn’t have had to stay at a hotel if Brooks wasn’t given Genie’s home, even if temporarily. Genie had always wanted the grounds to be for the family—there were twenty-two rooms in the main house, a guesthouse with three bedrooms, an apartment over the garage, and the small two-bedroom caretaker’s house. Now Brooks treated it as if it were his property and Max dreaded seeing what he and his wife had done to it.

She was still trying to find a legal way to remove him from the house.

She couldn’t bear to pass the Sterling property, so she drove the long way around until she reached the Ames spread on the far east side of town. There were no sidewalks in Atherton, but horse trails paralleled many of the streets, the yards of the spacious lots kept trim and tidy.

Marriage. Why get married when you lied and screwed around and manipulated? Max had no desire to get married. There was a blind trust involved that made her nervous. Not to mention she liked her freedom, independence, and opinions. Who was she supposed to marry, anyway? Marco? Certainly, the sex was amazing and she loved their heated arguments, but they drove each other crazy and he hated her career. Was she supposed to give up her career for him? For any man? France, Italy, and Ireland.

Or should she consider Andy, her first love, her first lover, whom she could no longer trust? They both knew it was over thirteen years ago, after Lindy was murdered, even if they pretended when they saw each other that the feelings were still there. Or maybe one of her occasional lovers who never seemed to rise to her expectations? Maybe her expectations were high, but why settle when settling would make her miserable? She wasn’t unhappy being single.

Max pulled down the long, circular driveway to the front entrance of the Ameses’ house. She stopped and got out. The house hadn’t changed over the years. It was a two-story contemporary style that looked smaller on the outside than it was inside. Trees blended in with the home to make it almost appear to be a tree house. It was one of the nicest and largest parcels of land in a town that had primarily one- and two-acre lots. As kids, Max and Lindy had enjoyed exploring the grounds, most of which were landscaped with hidden nooks, pathways, and retreats. Lindy’s three-story playhouse that had its own heat, air and electricity with a minikitchen and reading nook. Once it had been filled with little girl things, but as a teenager it had been Lindy’s refuge.

Max was probably one of the few people who understood Lindy’s need to escape her family, even within the bounds of a nine-thousand-square-foot house.

The Ames family had once owned 10 percent of Atherton. They’d sold some land and gifted other plots, including a hundred acres that made up the grounds for Atherton Prep, which adjoined the Ames property on the east.

Max rang the bell and waited for someone to answer.

Kimberly Ames had aged well, Max noted, when Lindy’s mother opened the door. Immediately, Mrs. Ames recognized Max.

“What are you doing here, Maxine?”

Her voice was as cold as her expression. Max wasn’t surprised.

“I’d like to speak with Gerald, please.”

Thirteen years ago, Max would never have called Mr. Ames “Gerald.” She’d always addressed her elders properly unless she deliberately wanted to get under their skin; it was the way her grandmother had raised her—both tactics, of knowing how to be polite and how to manipulate. Eleanor Revere was the queen of manipulation.

“I’m certain he will not see you.”

“Please tell him I’m here.”

Mrs. Ames hesitated, realizing that she’d already slipped and let on that he was in the house.

“I’ll wait,” Max said.

Mrs. Ames recovered and held her head up, her haughty chin out. It had a sharp enough point to cause serious damage. “No, you will not. Neither of us want you here. You take pleasure in people’s pain and suffering. You nearly ruined my marriage, you turned your back on your best friend, and you defended my daughter’s killer. Leave. Now.”

Max battled her natural inclination to verbally lash out at the woman who twisted the truth. She probably believed every word she said.

But Max wasn’t here to rehash ancient history, she needed to know whether Gerald Ames had called her hotel.

“I received a message at my hotel from someone claiming to be speaking for Gerald. I think he should know about that.”

A cloud crossed her face. Had she asked someone to leave the message? Disguised her voice to sound masculine? Maybe Gerald knew nothing about it. had nothing to do. f

“Just tell him I’m here,” Max said, “if he doesn’t want to talk to me, I’ll simply make a note that he has no comment. Maybe you do?”

“You have audacity to show up here after everything, Maxine.”

Max couldn’t let Lindy’s mother get to her. She stood still, kept her mouth closed.

Mrs. Ames closed the door without further comment and Max stood, waiting. Was Kimberly talking to Gerald? Trying to decide what to tell her? Whether to talk to her? Trying to figure out what she wanted?

Several minutes passed and Max grew annoyed. She rang the bell again, but no one came to the door. She became even more irritated when an Atherton police department car turned down the drive and parked behind Max’s rental.

Kimberly Ames had called the cops.

Two uniformed officers, one male and one female, exited the patrol car. The male officer started up the stairs. “Ma’am, if you could please come off the porch.”

“I’m waiting for Gerald Ames. Kimberly said she would tell him I was here.” She hadn’t. It was implied.

This comment seemed to surprise the officer, but he still asked her to step off the porch.

Max obliged. This wasn’t the time to pick a battle with the police.

The female officer, D. Sherman per her nameplate, said, “We had a complaint of trespassing and harassment.”

“Officer Sherman, I can assure you that I was neither trespassing nor harassing anyone.”

“You’re on the Ames property even though you were asked to leave,” Sherman said.

The male officer, G. Grant, said, “Identification, please.”

Max pulled her wallet from her purse and flipped it open to show her New York State driver’s license as well as her press credentials. She didn’t say anything.

“Please remove the license from the wallet.”

Max complied, suddenly realizing that the two cops were named Sherman and Grant. She let out a short laugh, but didn’t comment.

Grant took her license and walked back to his vehicle. He got on the radio.

Max stared at Sherman. She didn’t find the need to make small talk or explain herself. They asked, Max told them she wasn’t trespassing, and that should be the end.

Except this was Atherton, and rules were oddly enforced.

Chapter Nine

Eleanor Revere, Max’s grandmother, lived only a mile from the Ames family, at the end of a long, meandering cul-de-sac. Eleanor had always liked modern, contemporary architecture, but a sign of the times when she and Max’s grandfather designed the house more than forty years ago was the influence of Frank Lloyd Wright—both modern and nostalgic. The smooth, linear style of Wright also appealed to Max. Guests often asked if Wright himself had designed the house, and Eleanor was always pleased. “No,” she’d say, “but we asked the architect to adapt Wright’s style to our unique landscape and the original frame of the house.” She’d also doubled the footprint of the single-story house, though it was impossible tell from the outside how large the home truly was.

Max could practically hear Eleanor lecture: We don’t flaunt our wealth; it’s uncouth.

When Max rang the bell, it was William who answered the door. He looked relieved.

“Did you think I would bail?” She kissed him on the cheek.

“Of course not,” he said.

“Then don’t look so concerned.”

In a low voice, William said, “The chief of police just got off the phone with my dad. Why were you at Gerald Ames’s house?”

“The rumor mill is working double-time.” Max wasn’t surprised that Chief Clarkson called Brooks; she just thought she’d have more than fifteen minutes to figure out what to say to her family.

The large, tiled foyer flowed seamlessly into a lowered gathering room that, weather permitting, opened onto a rose garden surrounding a fountain and a large koi pond. Max had always loved the fountain, the sound of running water was soothing. She’d spent many hours on the bench behind the fountain, where she couldn’t be seen from the house. Reading, thinking, crying when her mother forgot her birthday. Again.

The Reveres had lived here for more than fifty years. Her mother had been raised in this house. It was a spacious one-story, not a grand mansion with sweeping staircases, but quietly appointed with lots of glass, pinpoint lighting, polishe disappeared during spring break, u questions.”d floors, hand-crafted rugs, and every piece of furniture picked and placed for that exact spot.