I was NOT, for example, wondering about Jack or why he hadn’t called back or where he was or what he was eating for brunch or with whom or hoping that it was either Costume Sunday or freezing cold in Los Angeles so they would be wearing a lot of clothing, for example those wool face masks popular with bank robbers and kidnappers, unsightly wax lips, and gorilla suits.
(ATTENTION ALL TOTALLY HOT GIRL–BAND MEMBERS: This would be a very fetching outfit to wear to brunch.)
(Also, fake scars.)
(FYI.)
(Love, your friend Jas.)
In between RadioJas broadcasts, I picked up snippets from the general conversation:
LUCIEN: It was four years before I reintroduced the boat neck that Ned Neal and I met. That must be—my God, twenty-six years go. And it was right in this house.
ALYSON: I look good in boat necks.
VERONIQUE: You look better in halters.
ROXY: Did Mr. Neal ever participate in any secret missions to pillage priceless gems from sacred temples, for example, the large ruby eye from an Incan idol?
BEATRICE: No.
VERONIQUE: Is Incan Idol like American Idol for Incans?
TOM: Yes, it is.
LUCIEN: The place was being restored for a foundation and they ran a scholarship program—more like a chain gang for starving young artists yearning to breathe. They impressed us into service cleaning the old frescos and things in the house.
ALYSON: I look good in both halters and boat necks.
ROXY: Did Mr. Neal ever have a butler? Perhaps one with a nubile young daughter?
BEATRICE: There was a housekeeper, Mrs. Lyons, but she had two sons. Why?
LUCIEN: I’ve never spent so many dreary days in my life. Couldn’t stand the house from the start, personally—hated it almost as much as that stirrup pant trend—but Ned was crazy for the place.
ALYSON: I have a pair of stirrup pants! They’re totally Visa with my ankle boots.
ROXY: Did you ever notice Mr. Neal engaging in surreptitious robe-wearing?
BEATRICE: I’m not sure I understand. Surreptitious? If he was sick he would sometimes wear his robe at breakfast.
ROXY: No, I mean like if he was sneaking out to attend meetings of a blood cult? Or villainous secret brotherhood?
BEATRICE: Absolutely not.
LUCIEN: Ned swore he’d live in this house someday. I don’t believe he meant to die here, though. And thus, to paraphrase the poet Burns, the best-laid plans of mice and men go oft awry.
VERONIQUE: I read about that book. Of Mice and Men. There was a quote from it in Rabbits for Dummies.
ROXY: What about the Russian Mafia? Did he have any dealings with—
BEATRICE: No.
Things kind of picked up for me after dinner. That’s when Literary Critic Veronique and Fashion Jet-setter Alyson convinced Bobby to take them on a tour of the house and Polly, Tom, and Roxy got confidential with Lucien. I was just trying to figure out the best approach to get into NN’s office when Beatrice leaned over and, as though she’d been reading my mind, asked if I’d like to see it.
To say I leaped like a leapfrog from my seat would be to understate things. I leaped so much that I bashed into Beatrice and knocked over a chair. And some small (piece of china, crystal goblet) items from the table.
But we had it cleaned up in no time, and then we were off.32
We went up a flight of stairs that had entwined Ns cut into the railing and down a stone corridor to a large wood door set into a marble frame. It had a huge old-fashioned round handle right in the center, but the lock on the side was modern, one of those electric, plastic key kinds.
“This registers whenever anyone goes in or out,” Beatrice explained. “That’s how we know no one entered the night Mr. Neal died. Although”—she pointed at nicks in the wood around it—“this isn’t the one that was here that night because we had to break it off to get in. It took Signore Pagano, the handyman, fifteen hits with the sledgehammer to smash it.”
I mentally checked the NO box next to “someone could have picked the lock.”
Beatrice used a key card and there was a click and the door opened.
Chapter Twenty-four
I’d sort of imagined billionaires did Big Important Things at Big Important Desks in Big Offices Filled with Important Furniture. But the room I walked into was small and spare, like something on a boat. There was dark wood paneling three-quarters of the way up each wall and a thick rug on the floor. In the middle of the rug stood a desk with four spindly legs. A leather desk chair stood behind it. Along one wall were three small file cabinets and back by the window was a globe that was actually a bar. That was it.
Which meant a NO for the “someone could have been concealed in the office amongst the furnishings to hide in wait for his prey and gotten in that way” check box as well.
The one large window overlooked the Grand Canal and had massive bars on it; definitive NO to “someone snuck in through the window.”
The desk had a (monogrammed) leather blotter on it and a (monogrammed) leather-covered pencil cup with a bunch of pens identical to the one Arabella had left in the ballerina box. I rifled through them to see if any of them looked weaponized, but they didn’t. In a (monogrammed) frame there was a photo of Arabella, Bobby, Beatrice, and Mr. Neal all wearing wetsuits in front of a blue sky and palm trees.
Beatrice stood on the threshold with her hand on the big knob as I explored, like she was afraid to enter or it was some kind of sacred space. She was staring at the rug between the desk and the door.
“That’s where we found him,” she told me. “Lying there. Nothing’s been moved since then.”
There was no sign now that there had ever been a body there now, but from the expression on her face and the way her knuckles on the knob went white, she was still seeing it.
“He’d gotten up from his desk and was trying to get to the door when he died. If only—” she said, and half stifled a sob. Between her reaction and the photo on the desk I realized that her relationship with Ned Neal wasn’t a simple employer–employee one. He’d been old enough to be her father but my father was old enough to be Sherri!’s father (if he’d had her at a very young age) and I had to wonder if maybe—
Little Life Lesson 38: Some things are better left in NotWonderland.
I said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to make this harder for you.”
She waved my apology away. “No. I wanted you to see for yourself that there was no way he could have been murdered. It’s impossible.”
“Or maybe we’re dealing with an exceptionally brilliant and cunning killer,” I said.
She looked at me for a long time. “You’re still not convinced.”
“No. I think Arabella was murdered for getting too close to the truth about her father’s death. If her father wasn’t murdered, then no one would have had a reason to kill her for what she found out. And that would mean she committed suicide. And she didn’t. I know all the evidence seems conclusive, but it just doesn’t make sense.”
“I agree,” she said.
I was so startled I dropped the (monogrammed) pen I’d inadvertently taken out of the pen cup. “You do?” She was the first person to agree with me.
She stared down at the floor for a long time and I thought maybe that was the end of it but then she said, “I do. I don’t know if it’s just because I want to, but you’re right, it doesn’t make sense. Not now. There was a time when it wouldn’t have surprised me. Arabella had been engaged but she and her fiancé parted ways and she was very low.”
“Here you are, we’ve been looking for you,” Bobby said, suddenly among us. I hadn’t heard him approach but he pushed past Beatrice through the door with his Evil Hench Posse. “And that’s a laugh about parting ways. Dad broke the engagement off and you know it.” His voice was loud and slightly slurred, like he’d had a few drinks.
Beatrice had jumped and turned a color I’d seen on a lipstick called “Pink Morn” when Bobby appe
ared. Her voice was higher as she started to say, “Bobby, that’s not—” but he interrupted her.
“Don’t let Beatrice fool you with all her Saint Ned Neal talk. My father didn’t want anyone else having what he had. Look at this place, covered with his initials. Even the damn toilet paper has his monogram on it. Had to have custom-made clothes, custom water to drink, custom ink in his pens, custom cologne to douse himself in. Not exactly a big sharer, my pops. And the one thing he really didn’t want to share was his little girl. He didn’t like Arabella being in love with anyone but him, and he would do anything he could to prevent it.”
“It’s true that your father had very particular tastes, but you’re wrong about Arabella,” Beatrice told him in a tight voice. “It was just that she was only eighteen and he had strong opinions on the advisability of falling in love when one was too young.”
I looked from one to the other of them. “Why?”
“I always figured he got caught up with some floozie when he was younger,” Bobby said. I glanced over at Beatrice who had gone from “Pink Morn” to “Deep Rose.”
Bobby, however, was O to the BLIVIOUS and went right on: “Got his heart broken, never recovered. Made us pay for his mistakes, decreeing that no one could know what they wanted before they were at least thirty just because he didn’t. You won’t break my heart, will you, girls?” he asked the Evil Henches, all man-about-town now. They giggled and I felt like I was watching a really bad sitcom. The kind that should come with a weapon you could aim at the TV that would make annoying characters’ heads go Splat! in a satisfying manner. Maybe Roxy could invent one.
The way the vein was pulsing in her throat, Beatrice looked like she might be a good customer. She ripped her gaze from the Bobby–Hench combine and said to me, “Mr. Neal felt that Arabella was too young to be engaged, and that it would be better if she broke it off, so he—”
“Offered George a hundred grand to go away. He should have taken it.”
“He didn’t?” I asked.
“Nope,” Bobby said, tickling Alyson’s ear. SPLAT! “I think he was holding out for more. Didn’t work, Arabella broke the thing off, anyway, to please Daddy Dearest.”
“Bobby, I really don’t think—”
“Oh, get stuffed, Beatrice. They’re both dead and I’m in charge now and I say we start telling the truth. Dad was a sneak, Arabella was a pushover. I haven’t figured out what you are yet.”
He didn’t use his Nice Voice to say it and Beatrice quickly ran through a spectrum of other shades from “Deep Rose” to “Xtreme Red.” She swallowed. “In any event, Arabella was very depressed after it happened. She was still in the London apartment she and George shared, and I went over that night to make sure she was okay—I didn’t like how she was talking. While I was there, George came by. He was as distraught as she was and they started fighting. I pretty much locked myself in the kitchen. But after an hour Arabella came in and told me everything was fine, that I could go. She was calling a taxi for George when I left.”
“Didn’t go, though, did he?” Bobby interjected.
“No, he didn’t.” Beatrice stopped then, like that was the last thing she was going to say, and suddenly got very interested in a blue string on the floor near her toe.
“What happened?” I asked. “Did they keep fighting?”
Beatrice shook her head. “Arabella told me afterward that they’d decided to get back together and elope. They went to bed together and she got up early and ran out to get things to make him pancakes. She thought they’d never been happier. When she got back, he was dead.”
“Dumped an entire bottle of sleeping pills in his orange juice, gulped it, sat down at the dining room table, and died. That’s the one thing that gets me, him letting her walk in and find him. If I ever see him again, I’ll kill him for that,” Bobby snarled.
“Yes, well, the chances of that are remote, aren’t they?” Beatrice said. Her color was back to normal but her voice was still pinched. She moved her eyes to me. “Arabella was devastated by his death. That’s what makes this so strange to me. Because she knew firsthand how hard it was to have someone you care about take their own life. How you are always looking for answers. I still sometimes get calls from George’s brother—”
“That crazy bastard?” Bobby interjected. “The one who harassed Arabella and Dad? Said he wanted to make them pay? Heavy stuff, right? Not that I can blame him. He was right, it was Dad’s fault his brother croaked.”
“He just wanted to know what George’s last days were like,” she said patiently. “Arabella couldn’t talk to him anymore because she felt so awful. That’s why I just can’t—I just don’t want—to imagine she would have chosen the same thing.”
“It was her Behind the Music moment,” Veronique said solemnly. And since that was kind of a conversation stopper, we all got really silent and stared at our nails like we were trying to be best friends with them. Hello, tiny pals! Look at you putting the CUTE in CUTICLE!
Even that kind of delirious fun can only hold you so long. Bobby gave a big yawn and said, “Now that story time is over, we’re going up to the roof to look at the stars. Want to join us, Jasmine?”
“She doesn’t,” Alyson assured him, assuring me at the same time by hitting me with a blast of HaterGaze.
“Too bad, we’ll miss you,” Bobby told me, and for a second he looked like he might mean it. “Very well, come along, baggage,” he said, pulling an Evil Hench on each side, “I guess it’s just us.”
Beatrice and I watched them go in silence. “He didn’t hate his father,” she said softly. “He’s just upset and wants attention. He’s not really like that.” And the hint of desperation under her words showed me I’d been wrong. She hadn’t been in love with Ned Neal.
She was in love with Bobby.
And she was in agony about it, having to stand by and watch while he had brunch—or in this case, sexy good times—with other girls.
It was like we were sisters under the skin! Brothers from another mother! Only not brothers! Or really in any way related. Except for the very-possibly-having-our-hearts-broken way.
She’d been really nice to me and I knew just how she felt, so I wanted to try to make her feel better.
“Of course he’s not. This is a hard time for everyone,” I assured her. That didn’t seem to do much so I tried changing the subject. I pointed to the photo on the desk. “It seems like you were really part of the family. Bobby told me you’ve been the glue holding them together for the past year.”
“And look what a good job I’ve done,” she said with a brittle smile.
“You can’t blame yourself for what happened.”
“Perhaps.”
“You can’t. Someone did this. Someone artful and clever and ingenious.”
She smiled at me now, almost for real. “Thank you, Jasmine. I appreciate what you are trying to do. Is there anything else you wanted to see?”
I took that as a cue that my Cheer Up People Skills were not fully functioning so I fell back on my Trying to Find a Killer Skills. “Did the police give you a list of the things they found on Arabella’s body? I’d like to take a look at that.”
“Certainly. I’ve got it in my office down the corridor.”
Her office opened with a plain, old-fashioned key. I checked out the room from the corridor when she went in. It was smaller than Mr. Neal’s office with a smaller window that overlooked the side of the house, not the main canal, and a lot more filing cabinets and equipment. But it was also homier, with a mirror on one wall and a poster of Belize on the other.
As I waited, Bobby and the Evil Henches came back. “Beatrice is really showing you all the sights,” he said too close to my ear. He had his shirt unbuttoned and seemed to have had a few more drinks. He was gripping my arm a little too hard, and I tried to pull away but couldn’t.
That’s how we were standing when Beatrice came out of the office. She flinched slightly but had herself under control and said,
“It’s getting rather late, isn’t it?”
Bobby patted her on the shoulder. “Speak for yourself, Bea. I’m just getting started. Jasmine, do you play poker? The goddesses and I were just about to go into the game room to deal a few—”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Beatrice said, her tone icy.
“Man, Bea, you sound just like Dad when you say that. Even look like him. You’ll have to work on that if you want to get anywhere with me.”
“You’re drunk. You should go to bed.”
“So says you.” He let go of me and took a step forward, staggering slightly. “I know what you want, Bea. But you’re going to have to do some pretty fancy stuff to get it.”
She said, “Bobby, you’re disgracing yourself.”
“Now, I wouldn’t want to do that. Disgrace the fine Neal name. Such a joke.” His expression flashed from bitter to jovial. “Oh come on, don’t look so glum, Bea. You’re right, as always, and I’m being an oaf. I should go to bed. Good night, Jasmine. Good night, kittens.” He planted sloppy kisses on the cheeks of each of the Evil Henches. Then he turned to Beatrice and with a sweet smile said, “Good night, Dad.”
She slapped him.
He laughed.
I decided that was our cue to leave. It’s totally fun to watch these happy family moments, but you don’t want to overdose. I corralled Polly, Roxy, and Tom from the dining room where Polly and Lucien were talking and Roxy and Tom were playing Scary Monster Charades, declined the offer of going back on the boat, took the envelope with the police list from Beatrice, thanked her, and followed her to the street door. Lucien Wilder came with us. As we were leaving, I remembered the one thing I’d forgotten to ask.