“Getting my money’s worth out of that ad lately,” Ethan remarked.
“We need to talk,” Forrest declared.
“Is this the part where you try to buy me off?”
Forrest was silent for a few seconds. Studying his adversary. Ethan got the impression that he might be adjusting his previous opinion just a shade.
“I think we can come to terms,” Forrest said. “My objectives are simple. I want Sara sent back to Candle Lake Manor where she belongs. I also want to be certain that her block of shares are voted in the best interests of Cleland Cage.”
“Her name is Zoe,” Ethan said. “Zoe Truax.”
“She can call herself whatever she damn well pleases. But in case you haven’t figured it out yet, Truax, she is not well.”
“She looks healthy to me.”
“She hears voices in the walls,” Forrest said grimly. “She claims those voices told her that I murdered my cousin, Preston.”
“Did you?”
“No, I did not.”
“Just asking. Someone sure did.”
“If you did any research at all before you got involved in this situation, you’d know that the authorities concluded that Preston was shot by an intruder who was after cash and valuables.”
“A burglar who then dumped flowers all over the place and deliberately smashed an expensive camera rather than try to fence it?”
Forrest went still. “She told you about the smashed camera and the flowers?”
“Yeah.”
Forrest got slowly to his feet and went to stand at the window, looking down into the street.
“Did she also tell you that she was the one who found Preston’s body?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Forrest glanced at him over his shoulder. “You’re a private detective, Truax. You must realize that there is another possible explanation for my cousin’s murder. One that accounts for the apparent rage that was exhibited at the scene—the smashed camera and the crushed flowers.”
“Are you trying to hint that Zoe might be the murderer?”
“The police considered the possibility and rejected it and that’s fine by me. But the truth is her alibi for the day Preston was killed is shaky.”
“How’s that?”
“She was supposedly attending a three-day conference put on by a private art foundation in San Francisco. It was a big event. It would have been very possible for her to slip away unnoticed.”
“Got a handy motive?”
Forrest turned back to the view from the window. He clasped his hands behind his back. “The oldest one of all. Jealousy.”
“Was Preston having an affair?”
Forrest hesitated. “Maybe.”
“This is getting a little vague, Cleland.”
“I don’t know the answer for certain. But the possibility exists.”
“Got any proof?”
“No,” Forrest said quietly. He turned around again. “And I’d just as soon not find out.”
“Because it might raise doubts about Zoe?”
“I’d rather not discover that my cousin was shot dead by his wife in a fit of jealous rage.”
“You don’t want her to go to prison, is that it? You’d rather have her locked up in Candle Lake Manor.”
“It’s the best place for her,” Forrest said quietly. “Dr. Harper will cooperate.”
“I’m sure you make it worth his while to be cooperative.”
“I would prefer that she be in a hospital where she can be properly treated rather than in prison, yes.”
“So much easier to control her shares if she’s in Candle Lake than it would be if she went to prison, isn’t it? Prisoners have more rights than folks who have been involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital.”
“Let’s get to the bottom line.” Forrest came back to stand in front of the desk. “I know why you married Sara.”
“Zoe.”
“Zoe. You married her because she’s the key to a great deal of money.” Forrest gave the office a laconic survey. “Probably a hell of lot more money than you’ve ever seen in one place at one time.”
“You don’t think we’re talking true love here?”
Forrest’s mouth curled humorlessly. “No, Truax, I don’t think so. I did some checking on you before I came here. Seems this is your fourth marriage. A year ago you lost your business. By the time you paid off the creditors and your third ex-wife, you were flat broke. You’re barely keeping your head above water financially. I think the day you met Zoe, or whatever you call her, you saw a way to recover in a hurry and you jumped at it.”
“Going to make me an offer?”
“Yes.”
“Thought so.” It was always gratifying to have it figured right, Ethan thought.
“If you’re smart, you’ll take it,” Forrest said. “I admit you would get more if the merger goes through, but I’m going to fight it every inch of the way. If I do manage to hold Cleland Cage together, you’ll be looking at two to five years downstream before you can cash out. And you’ve got the added complication of having to stay married to a crazy woman for that whole time.”
“I get the picture.”
“Take my offer now and all you have to do is help me put Zoe back where she belongs. Then you file for divorce. I give you your money, and you’re free.”
Zoe lowered her camera and stared at Ethan, appalled.
“He offered you how much money?” she whispered.
“You heard me.”
They were standing near the top of the trail that wound down into the shallow canyon below Nightwinds. The sun was low in the sky. The onset of twilight was streaking the desert with mauve and purple shadows.
Ethan had picked her up at her office a few minutes ago, telling her he needed to talk to her, but he had said little until they had come here.
She had known that, whatever he intended to tell her, it would not be good news. Maybe that was why she had taken out her camera and started snapping off shots of cactus. It had given her something to do with her hands while she waited for him to start talking.
“Yes,” she said. “I heard you.” She swallowed. “That’s a lot of cash.”
“Nah, it’s a so-so amount, not a lot.”
She looked at him. He was in some remote, centered place deep inside himself, she thought. It was probably the same place he went when he was seeking patterns and searching for answers.
“It is a lot,” she said dryly, “given your present financial situation.”
“Okay, relatively speaking, it’s a lot.”
There was a slight breeze blowing across the canyon, ruffling her blouse. Absently she raised a hand to hold her hair out of her eyes. “Cleland Cage is the most important thing in the world to him.”
“I could see that.”
“You did say he would probably try to buy you off.”
“Cleland didn’t just make me an offer. He said a couple of other things, too.”
She watched him, worried by the too-even tone of his voice. “What things?”
“He implied that there was a possibility that Preston was involved in an affair at the time of his death.”
For an instant, she was so shocked she could not speak.
“No,” she said.
“I tried to pin him down, but he refused to get specific.”
“Of course, he refused. That’s because there was nothing to be specific about. Preston was not having an affair.”
“You’re sure of that?”
Her stomach clenched. “Absolutely positive. Preston would never have cheated on me.”
“What if he did?” Ethan asked, quiet and relentless now.
It dawned on her that he was interrogating her. This was probably the way he dealt with suspects and anyone else when he wanted answers. She did not like being the target.
“I don’t understand,” she said stiffly. “Where are you trying to go with this?”
“Forrest implied that
Preston’s involvement with another woman might constitute a motive for murder.”
Her insides turned to ice water. “He told you that I shot Preston, didn’t he?”
“He didn’t come right out and say it. Just sort of let the possibility hang in midair.”
She swung around, anger evaporating the chill that had seized her. “But that’s not what happened. I didn’t kill Preston. I couldn’t have shot him.”
“Even if you’d discovered that he’d been sleeping with another woman?”
“Even if I found out he’d cheated on me.” She felt steadier now that she was on sure and certain ground. “You have to understand that Preston was a gentle man. What we had together, our love, was a very gentle thing.”
“Gentle.”
She struggled to find the words to explain. “Even if one of us had found out that the other had cheated, the response would have been sadness and disappointment. Maybe grief. But not rage and certainly not violence.”
“What would you have done?”
“You’re not going to let this go, are you?”
“I can’t,” he said. “I have to find out where it leads.”
She searched his implacable face. “Yes, I can see that. Okay, hypothetically speaking, if I had discovered that Preston had been unfaithful, I would have cried for a while and then I would have set him free. You can’t force love. You know that.”
“Sure. After four marriages, I know that.”
She felt herself turn red. She wondered if he thought she’d deliberately thrown his extensive experience of marriage in his face. That was not what she had intended. It was his own fault if he took it personally, she thought. After all, he was the one who had pushed her into this corner.
“How about marriage counseling?” he asked.
“Counseling?” Startled out of her reverie, she frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Would you have suggested counseling if you had found out that Preston was having an affair?” he asked patiently.
“Oh, no, I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
She suppressed the urge to tell him what he could do with his questions and struggled to dredge up more answers.
“I read somewhere that every marriage is based on certain unwritten ground rules,” she said carefully. “Those rules are private, usually unspoken, and understood only by the people involved. For some, an affair would be hurtful but not a complete deal-breaker, if you see what I mean.”
“Because faithfulness was not one of the bedrock rules of that marriage?”
“Yes. Maybe there are other factors that are more crucial in that particular relationship. Emotional dependency or financial security or social status or a strong religious belief. A person might have a great fear of failure or a dread of being alone. Any number of solid, reasonable things might be more fundamentally important in that marriage than faithfulness.”
“But for you, faithfulness would be one of the unbreakable ground rules, is that it?”
“Yes,” she said quietly. “For me, trust has to be at the heart of a relationship. Without that, none of the rest of it matters.” She paused. “Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
The quiet conviction in the single word reassured her as nothing else could have done in that moment. She gave him a tremulous smile.
“Because trust is one of your nonnegotiable rules in a relationship, too, isn’t it?” she said.
“Figure you gotta be able to count on something or what the hell’s the point of getting married?”
“Yes. Well, the point here is that I did trust Preston. I can’t believe that he was cheating on me. But if he had been involved with someone else, I would not have killed him. I would have filed for divorce.”
“Understood,” he said.
“What’s this all about?” she asked. “Did you really think that I might have been the killer?”
“No.”
For some reason, that simple answer incensed her. “Then why the third degree?”
“It occurred to me that if Preston was seeing someone else and tried to break it off, that other person might have had a motive to kill him.”
She contemplated that for a moment.
“You’re thinking about a romantic triangle like the one you’re constructing for the murder of Camelia Foote, aren’t you?” she said. “I can see the logic, but that doesn’t work in this case. Preston was not sleeping with another woman. Trust me. I would have known.”
“Okay. Sorry about the inquisition. But I had to be sure.”
She looked at him standing there, silhouetted against a dying sun, booted feet braced slightly apart. He reminded her of an oncoming train. You might be able to kill a man like this if you tried really hard and if you were fast enough and lucky enough, she thought, but that was the only way you could stop him.
“I know,” she said softly.
She raised her camera and took the picture. Going for the little glimpse of his soul that she saw in that moment.
The photo would give her something of him to keep when this was all over.
Preston was a gentle man . . . our love was a very gentle thing. . . .
Ethan was wide awake, looking up at the shadows of the ceiling and he knew that he was not going to go back to sleep. He was familiar with this brand of insomnia. It was job-related. It happened a lot when he was closing in on answers.
He had a choice. He could either lie here and brood or he could get up and go into another room and brood.
Beside him, Zoe slept peacefully. He did not sense any of the restlessness that he had come to expect whenever she was having one of her bad nights.
He eased himself away from the warmth of her body, pushed aside the covers, and rose from the winged bed. He found his trousers in the darkness, pulled them on, and padded barefoot out into the dark hall.
There was enough moonlight coming through the windows to illuminate his path. He made his way into the kitchen and turned on a light.
Inside the refrigerator, he found a plastic bowl full of leftover cheese ravioli. Zoe had cooked dinner this evening. She had doused the ravioli in very expensive olive oil and freshly grated Parmesan. He peeled off the lid and helped himself to a sample bite.
As he had suspected, it was just as good cold as it had been hot. Was he a trained detective or what?
He dumped a little habanero-laced hot sauce on the pile of ravioli, located a fork, and carried his treasure to the kitchen table. One of the pads of paper he kept handy in every room of the house was on the windowsill together with a pen.
He sat down, ate some of the ravioli, and opened the notepad.
But the first word he wrote was not what he had planned to jot down.
Gentle.
Well, shit. This was not going to be a very productive night if he didn’t get past the gentle thing.
He crossed it out very deliberately and tried again.
People with reasons to kill Leon Grady and Preston Cleland.
“What are you doing?” Zoe said from the doorway.
He put down the pen and looked at her. She was swathed in a white robe and a pair of slippers. Her hair was mussed from the pillows and their earlier bout of passion. His wife.
He was startled by the heated rush of hunger and need that shot through him.
“Are you okay?” Zoe came toward him, concern darkening her mysterious eyes.
“Couldn’t sleep. Thought I’d do some work.” He indicated the plastic bowl. “Want some cold ravioli?”
“Sure.”
She changed direction, opened a drawer, found a fork, and sat down across from him. Leaning across the table, she speared two ravioli and simultaneously craned her head to read his notes.
“What did you cross out?” She sat back and popped the ravioli between her lips. “A bad conclusion?”
“Yeah.” He watched her eat for a moment, thinking that this would be a good time to keep his mouth shut. But for some reason,
he could not seem to manage that simple feat tonight.
“I’m not like Preston, am I?”
She blinked, stopped chewing, and swallowed hurriedly. Then she cleared her throat.
“No,” she said. “No, you are very different.”
“You don’t see me as a very gentle man, do you?”
She hesitated. “Gentle is not the first word that comes to mind, no.”
“And our relationship,” he said, unable to turn aside now, even though he sensed that disaster was bearing down on him. “You probably would not describe it as a very gentle thing.”
“Uh, no. Probably not.” She reached across the table to fork up more ravioli. “Mind if I ask what this is all about? Why the focus on our relationship here? It’s not like we’re really married.”
“Yeah, we are really married.” He realized his jaw had gone rigid. Always a bad sign.
She flushed. “You know what I mean. Our marriage is just a device. Part of your strategy for dealing with my case.”
“And the fact that we’re sleeping together? How do you account for that?”
Her cheeks turned a deeper shade of pink, but her gaze did not waver. “We’re sleeping together because we’re attracted to each other. Not because we’ve got a piece of paper that says we’re married.”
“Does that sound a little complicated to you? It sure as hell does to me.”
“We seem to be coping.”
“Cleland assumes I married you because you hold the key to that block of shares.”
“Forrest judges everyone by his own standards and motivations,” she said. “He wouldn’t understand a man like you in a million years.”
“You think you understand me?”
“Not completely. Parts of you are pretty deep and you don’t go out of your way to reveal them. But I know you well enough to be sure that you didn’t marry me for those shares.”
“What makes you so damn certain of that?” he asked.
She paused with the fork full of ravioli halfway to her mouth. “If I say intuition, you’ll do that thing with your eyes.”
“What thing?”
“You can make them appear amused and scornful and sort of steely all at the same time. Something to do with the way you narrow them, I think. You do a squint that would have looked good on Wyatt Earp.”