Thrill Me to Death

  She closed her eyes, her heart as sick as her stomach.

  “Please tell me where Breezy is,” she whispered again.

  He jabbed his knee into her ribs. “Where’s the palm tree?”

  She looked up at him, plans formulating and dying in her head. As soon as Max called her, the minute that phone rang, she lost her bargaining chip. She needed to get off this boat. At least then she had a chance.

  “It’s…it’s in my house. I hid it in the safe room.”

  “Good.” He gave her a smug smile. “That’s exactly where we’re headed.”

  They were headed somewhere? But the boat wasn’t moving now; they were still.

  Before she could answer, she heard one piercing tone, then the familiar digital melody that now sounded like a death knell instead of a Broadway tune.

  “Well, hello dolly.” The voice came from the doorway. “Lookee what I found.”

  Cori looked past Swen into the face of her best friend.

  Breezy held the statuette above her head, a wild and victorious light in her eyes. “I’d like to thank the Academy.” She grinned at Swen. “My incredible lover, Swen.” She shifted her gaze to Cori, and her expression turned hard and cold. “And most of all, my dearest friend, Corinne Peyton.”

  This wasn’t the face of her best friend. This was the face of a stranger. A liar. A killer.

  “I’m so sorry Cori couldn’t be here tonight.” Breezy wrapped both hands around the golden palm tree and hugged it to her chest. “But she had to join her husband at the bottom of Biscayne Bay.”

  Chapter

  Twenty-four

  G ifford leaned forward straining the seat belt and squinting through rain that had nearly stopped. “I can almost see again.”

  Max floored the Mercedes as he hit the highway, holding his cell phone to his ear with his shoulder and listening to the fourth ring. Where the hell was she?

  He swore silently when the line clicked to voice mail and a sultry smoker’s laugh greeted him.

  “Hey hey hey, it’s Breezy Jones. You can leave a message or not. If I like you, I might call you back.”

  He threw the phone on the console and tossed a disgusted look at Jones. What kind of a fool would marry a woman like that? “So she knew you were stealing money? Do I understand this right?”

  Jones squirmed in his seat. “That’s what she told me tonight. She told me…” He paused. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Yes, it does.”

  “Look, I’ll come clean and I’ll pay the price for taking the money from Peyton Enterprises. But leave Breezy out of it. All she’s done is…what any normal woman would do if she had a husband like me.”

  “You still don’t get it, do you?” Max practically banged on the steering wheel, frustrated at the red light and the moron next to him.

  “It’s not just about my going blind,” Jones insisted. “I have other problems. Personal problems.”

  Max ran the light. “And you don’t think it’s all related? You don’t think this sudden onset of blindness and personal problems might be the result of something you’re taking—”

  “I’m not taking—”

  “Or being given.”

  That shut him up. Max barreled down the highway and slid into his turn at damn near a forty-five-degree angle. He grabbed the phone again and hit a speed dial. “Where are you?” he barked.

  “On my way,” Dan said. “Did you talk to Cori?”

  “No. She’s not answering the phone.”

  “Are you sure she has it with her?”

  He wasn’t sure of anything. “She should.”

  “I’ll call Raquel. She can institute a satellite search for the location of the phone. What’s the number?”

  Max gave it to him and rolled through a stop sign. He’d welcome Miami PD at this point; they could run all the lights for him. When he hung up on Dan, he stole a glance at his passenger, whose jaw was slack with realization.

  “She put it in my Scotch.”

  Ya think?

  “Every single time I had a headache, or lost my vision, or…anything…I’d had a Scotch that Breezy made.”

  “You can thank Helsinki’s finest herbalist for the mixer, pal.”

  Max practically ran the gate at Cocoplum, grabbing Jones’s collar and jerking him forward so the guard could recognize him. The gate opened and Max whipped toward the house that remained lit up like a night game. “Why all the lights?” Max asked as he screeched into the driveway.

  “I was trying to see.”

  To his credit, Jones kept pace with Max as they jogged to the front, through the house, into the kitchen, and out to the yard.

  The rain had stopped but the grass was wet and muddy. Max bolted to the empty gazebo, but found nothing but a half-dozen cigarette butts on the ground. He looked around, a foreign sense of helplessness tugging at his chest.

  Cori. Something punched his throat and stung his eyes. Something? How about destitution? Emptiness? Devastation? I can’t lose her again.

  He clenched his fists, squinting into the shadows, staring at the house, willing her to appear. All he wanted to do was howl.

  Helpless and furious, he punched his phone again, hoping to hear it ring and find her nearby. But he heard nothing. She was gone, along with the phone and a woman he knew not to trust.

  “The gate to the water is open,” Jones said, running toward the marina. Max followed him to the cement dock, his gaze flitting over the fifty or so boats tethered to wooden docks.

  “Our boat’s here,” Jones said, jogging down a dock and standing in front of a thirty-foot Sea Ray made for cruising. “So they didn’t take it out.”

  Max grabbed his cell phone the second it vibrated and read the ID. “Raquel?”

  “Dan’s stuck at a drawbridge.” The familiar New Jersey accent of Lucy’s right-hand girl echoed in his ear. “But I have info for you on the phone location. You’re not going to like it.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Not far from where you are, in Biscayne Bay. Moving very slowly, if at all. Looks like they might be headed northeast, but the progress is slow.”

  Max’s fingers closed around Cori’s key chain in his pocket and he frowned. She was on Peyton’s Place with two people who’d murdered at least once and wouldn’t hesitate to do it again. The horizon was invisible in the predawn, and only a smattering of red and green running lights dotted the water where pleasure craft anchored for the night.

  Was Cori on one of them?

  “Should I contact the Coast Guard?” Raquel asked.

  Max thought about that. An approaching Coast Guard boat or helicopter could scare them into doing something very stupid. And stupid, scared people were the most dangerous kind.

  “Get them on alert, but don’t move in.” Jones’s Sea Ray could get him there quickly, but not quietly. His gaze moved to the row of tenders and dinghies lined up on a smaller dock, and he asked Jones if one was his.

  “That one.” He pointed to a sizeable Zodiac.

  Max peered at the plastic hull and miniature console. He could take the Sea Ray close enough to row the Zodiac the last couple hundred feet and surprise them. “Do you have precise coordinates?” he asked Raquel.

  “To the square inch, Max.”

  “I’ll be in touch.” Max flipped the phone closed and looked at Jones. “Your wife have a gun, Giff?”

  “Yes, of course. And she’s taken shooting lessons.” His expression shifted to a sickening realization.

  “One of those compact nine millimeters that women like, right?”

  “Yes, a Smith and Wesson.”

  The ballistics report had come in while he was in California, and that was exactly what had been shot into Cori’s cabana.

  If he didn’t get there, fast and silent, Cori would be dead. If she wasn’t already.

  “Get back up there and watch the depth finder,” Swen barked at Breezy.

  “I don’t like to drive in the dark.” Breezy leaned agai
nst the bulkhead, the hard glint in her eyes matching that of the mysterious palm tree she held. “I can’t remember if the red buoy lights are supposed to be on the right or the left.”

  Cori managed to lift herself up on her elbows since Swen had eased the pressure on the knee jutting into her ribs.

  “Breezy,” she gasped, still fighting for a breath, “what are you doing?”

  “I’m covering my well-toned tush, my dearest.” Her smile was as wide as it was phony.

  “Covering…for what?” But then she knew. The betrayal hit her with a fistful of pain to the gut. “How could you?”

  Breezy looked at her as if she’d asked an inane question. “Very cleverly, that’s how.”

  Swen straightened, releasing Cori, but she was too stunned to move. “We’ve got to get over the deepest part of the channel, then get this boat back to her house. We don’t have time for a girl chat.”

  But that was what Cori wanted. She might die tonight, and she damned well wanted to know why.

  Breezy brandished the palm tree. “Darling, do I really have to give this up? It’s so ingenious.”

  “It’s incriminating evidence.”

  She made an unhappy face at Cori. “It’s engraved with my special initial.” She held it upside down to show the letter and the circle of love. “He calls me Mariah—like wind, get it? And see?” She fingered the windswept fronds. “Swen’s the tree that can bend, but never break, in the breeze. Isn’t that downright poetic? I thought I’d cry when he gave it to me.”

  Not a gift to William. Not evidence of his infidelity. How could she have doubted him?

  The cell phone rang “Hello, Dolly” again, this time from the tight jeans pocket where Breezy had tucked it.

  That had to be Max.

  “And see?” Breezy twisted the tree top and separated it from the base, revealing a cuplike dish at the bottom. “A secret hiding place. How cool is that?”

  Then she turned the tree over and put the palm leaves inside the statuette base. “And look at this,” she said coyly. “A mortar and pestle. Specially made for crushing herbs, and spices, and…other stuff.”

  “Give it to me,” Swen barked and reached for the tree, but Breezy swiped it back with a chiding tsk.

  “I’m showing it to Cori, if you don’t mind.”

  Was Breezy going to act like nothing was wrong? Like this was a pleasure cruise, and they were about to pop champagne and gossip about Lulu Garrey’s divorce settlement?

  She managed one word. “William?”

  Breezy sighed, shaking her head. “Bad timing, babe. We were onboard to spike the Scotch Giff would drink the next day. Then he’d keel over miles offshore. But William was so upset with us, he drank it instead.”

  Cori closed her eyes, the heartache of mourning fresh again.

  Swen pushed off the bed. “I’m going up to the helm. Give me that.” This time, he succeeded in relieving Breezy of the palm tree. “I’ll make our guest a drink.”

  As he walked out, he and Breezy shared a knowing look. The room suddenly seemed too close and small, but Cori held herself steady, her eyes on Breezy.

  “God, we had so much to clean up that night,” Breezy continued, moving through the stateroom like it was a stage for her soliloquy. “The whole freaking boat had our fingerprints all over it, and Swen said William wouldn’t make it to morning—if he even made it up to your room. We couldn’t find the palm tree and we knew that was evidence. William had hidden it while we were in the back.”

  He’d come upstairs from the boat and never told her that Breezy and Swen were onboard. Why in God’s name not? He’d just said, “It wasn’t meant for me,” and “Be careful, cara.”

  “I thought we’d actually gotten away with it—even though it cost me a small fortune to get the little half-Jap doctor to go along. But then you started dropping hints and I knew you were suspicious of how he died. That’s why I sent him your picture with the note to send you the autopsy next. If the report showed up, it would look like you were hiding it.”

  Every piece that snapped into place took a bigger chunk out of her heart. “You did all that?”

  Breezy choked back a bitter laugh. “Oh, please. I’ve been working overtime to keep you out of this. I tried to get you to focus on that Foundation, and to worry about Billy and make it look like he was after you. I tried to keep your nose out of Sonoma so you wouldn’t find the missing money. I tried to remind you, daily, that your husband died of natural causes.” She punctuated each statement she’d made with a dramatic extension of a fingertip, enumerating her efforts.

  “The attack in the spa?”

  “Swen’s idea. But you were just on a tear to figure this out, weren’t you? And I still had to unload Giff, but I couldn’t get rid of him the same way.” She set a hand on her hip. “I mean, how obvious would that be?”

  “Breezy,” Cori rasped, pushing herself up from her elbows. “Did you do this…for money?”

  “The money started me thinking,” she said, as calmly as if they were discussing the cost of a new pair of shoes. “When I caught Giff’s whole embezzling thing a while ago, it got me going. I mean, there he was stockpiling millions for some twit who isn’t his kid. That pissed me off, you know?” She meandered to the dresser, studying herself in the mirror. “He gave me carte blanche to his accounts, thinking I wasn’t smart enough to figure out how to move his money around. But I was and I did. And now he thinks he spent it all.”

  How could she have not seen this in Breezy? “If you needed ten million dollars, I would have given it to you.”

  That earned her a disgusted look. “Of course you would, Saint Cori. You’d do anything for anyone. You’re perfect.”

  Cori ignored the sarcasm. “And Swen? Do you…”

  Breezy pulled her hair off her face and made a model’s pout into the mirror, as if she were checking out her lip liner. “He’s smokin’ good in bed, and he has that to-die-for BlackBerry full of the most interesting and valuable people. He’s pretty smart, too. I knew Giff was going to figure out what I did with the money, so Swen came up with this concoction that can cause heart attacks. But then William…I couldn’t kill Giff—not yet, anyway.” She looked at her watch. “Hopefully he’s done that himself by now. After all, what’s the best way to keep someone from seeing something under their nose?” She glanced at Cori in the mirror with an expectant look. “Make them go blind. My idea, but Swen knew how. And he added a little extra something to make sure I was only getting “it” from him and not Giff.”

  Cori fought a retch in her stomach. “Stop, Breezy.”

  “How could I? Now, I was smart enough to send that doctor to Japan but when he wanted more money, Swen got rid of him with one phone call. So, all in all, he’s a good guy to have around.”

  Cori fell back on the bed, unable to look at her anymore. “What did you use to kill William?”

  “Oleander. Right from your own backyard, doll.”

  Rage forced Cori up again. “You stood by me at that funeral, Breezy. You slept in my bed the night after he—”

  Breezy made her disgusted face. “I can’t believe you didn’t get a whole new bed after he died in it.”

  “Breezy, listen to you!”

  “I’m sorry, Cor, but he really shouldn’t have barged in on us. Though I guess if we hadn’t decided to test the bed after we doctored the Scotch, the whole mess could have been avoided.” She pointed to the bed. “But he walked right in on us while we were…You should have seen the look on his face.”

  She had seen it. Just before he died. Under her, Cori felt the boat engines rumble to life, but her mind had gone back to that night. Of course William hadn’t told her that he’d caught Breezy having an affair. He’d have known how that would hurt, that she’d be disappointed in her friend.

  “I didn’t care that he saw me fucking Swen. I wouldn’t have killed him for that,” Breezy said, her tone defensive. “He just shouldn’t have helped himself to Giff’s Scotch afterward wh
ile we were getting dressed and stashing our stuff.”

  Like condoms. In William’s toiletry kit.

  “Why, Breezy? If not for love or money, why did you do this?”

  Breezy put her hands on the sides of her breasts, turning left to right and checking out her curves and cleavage like she did anytime she was in front of a mirror. “You know, I don’t think you’ve been listening to me.”

  “I have been, Breezy. But I just can’t believe—”

  “Not tonight. For the past five years. What have I been telling you?”

  Cori searched her brain.

  “What do I say?” Breezy prompted, spinning around to peer at Cori like a teacher demanding the right answer, propping her breasts as high as they could go. “What do I tell you all the time, day after day, night after night? I say…”

  “ ‘ I hate you, Cori Peyton.’ ” Cori whispered the words she’d heard Breezy say so many times, they’d become a meaningless, teasing phrase.

  “And I do.” Breezy dropped her pretenses, her pouty face, her puffy bosom. She leaned closer to Cori, her eyes tapered with evil and envy. “You got the whole package, didn’t you? With no compromises. The über-rich man, not the corporate lawyer who makes a few million. Real beauty, not bought from a plastic surgeon. Real class, real brains, real style—and real love.”

  Breezy was jealous of her? “That’s crazy, Breezy. You have so much. Giff loves you.”

  “Trust me, Giff never loved me the way William loved you. Our deal was a marketing merger.” Breezy shook her head. “That’s what really rankled me. You really weren’t a trophy wife.” Breezy reached behind her and pulled out a sleek silver gun. “And you weren’t a merry widow.”

  The sting of betrayal dissolved into horror as Cori looked at the gun. “Breezy, Marta knows the boat was taken. Max will figure this out in no time. You’ll never get away with it.”

  “The former hooker can be bought or gotten rid of. And no one will figure this out, because I’ve covered all my tracks.” She pointed the gun right between Cori’s eyes. “And to celebrate, Swen whipped up a special cocktail just for you. Come and drink it, and then you can go swimming. That’s why we’re sitting here at the deepest point of the Bay. It will be a long, long time before they find your body.”