Chapter Forty
Jane drove over Walden Street toward Irma’s house. From the back seat Phyllis regaled Helen with the story of how she had discovered Ralph Pilchner and delivered the case of his affectionately alienated cat to Jane. Jane listened with half her attention, keeping her eyes on the other Massachusetts drivers ahead of her as they turned without signaling, rushed in multicar formations through lights no longer yellow, and honked at everything and everyone. The usual.
She didn’t make it through the light at Walden and Garden Street on the first cycle. Why were all these people driving around in the middle of the day? Why weren’t they at work? Jane pulled to the front of the line of cars and stopped. She looked idly over at the parking lot of Clark Kinnon Homes. She’d passed it so many times, but now that she’d been inside she stared at the building, deeply curious.
A black SUV with Massachusetts plates was parked in front. From across the street, Jane couldn’t read its logo or the name of the make, which was written in stylized metal. Was it a Cadillac? A shiver shot through her. Calm down, she told herself. Black SUVs were a dime a dozen. But the Escalade was so enormous, so crazy and impractical for Cambridge with its narrow streets and tiny parking spaces. How many could there be? Did she remember it parked in the torn-up driveway next door while the house was being renovated? She thought perhaps she did.
The light changed at last. Jane stepped on the gas, only to get caught on the other side in a line of cars waiting at the next light. Progress was agonizingly slow. Finally they turned onto Irma’s block of two-family houses facing a park. Irma was on her front porch. When she saw them she waved and came down the steps.
“Where are we headed?” she asked when she got in the car.
“Cambridge Common. Great burgers, great salads, and there’s parking,” Phyllis pronounced.
After much maneuvering around the dividing island of Mass Ave, they pulled up at the restaurant. As the others opened their doors to get out, Jane said, “I forgot something at home. You go ahead and order. I’ll be right back.”
“It will take you half an hour to get home and get back,” Phyllis responded. “Whatever it is, forget about it.”
“Get started with the gossip portion,” Jane said. “I’ll be here before you know it.”
She didn’t rush to Clark Kinnon Homes, because rushing wasn’t possible, but she was more aggressive than she’d been on the way over, skittling through a light formerly yellow, not caring if she blocked an intersection. Now she was the jerk.
When she approached Kinnon’s building going the other way, she didn’t get stopped by the light. Cars were right on her tail, so she had to keep going. The big SUV was still there, but she was driving too fast to read the logo or the word in script on the back. She had to go around the block, which in Cambridge meant going around five blocks. From somewhere deep in her pocketbook her cell phone rang. She didn’t take the time to fish it out. At last, she approached the building and pulled into the parking lot. She drove slowly up behind the car. Escalade, the script read. Bingo. Jane parked and went inside.
Gloria Zinn was at her place behind the reception desk. “Yes?”
“I’m here to see Clark,” Jane announced.
“Do you have an appointment? Whom shall I say is inquiring?”
“You know who I am, and you know I don’t have an appointment.”
“I’ll have to check to see if he’s in.”
“He’s in,” Jane said. “His car’s out front.” It was an educated guess. She didn’t know for sure it was Clark’s car. What if it was Ms. Zinn’s and she was the one stalking Megan? What kind of convoluted story would that be?
Ms. Zinn disappeared down the hall without an argument, so one of the cars in the parking lot for sure was Clark’s. She came back looking mildly surprised. “He says for you to go on in.”
Jane walked down the dark hallway. The lights were off like the last time she’d been there. What’s up with this, she wondered once again.
He sat behind his desk, staring at his computer monitor. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t get up.”
“Yes, certainly, I’ll excuse you. For that.”
He turned his attention to her. “What can I do for you, Mrs. Darrowfield?”
Jane remained standing. “I’m here to talk about Megan Larsen.”
He half laughed, half snorted. “She’s a nice lady I sold a house to once. I explained that to you.”
“And that’s all you know about her? I don’t believe you.”
He shrugged his square shoulders. “That’s all I know for a fact. A number of my fellow developers use Bookerman, Digby, and Eade as their law firm. There’s been a lot of talk, speculation, and rumors.”
“What sort of rumors?” Jane hadn’t meant her tone to be so sharp.
“You know. She ran away, she killed herself, she was kidnapped, she was abducted by aliens. Nothing based in any sort of fact.”
“Have the police spoken to you?” Jane asked
“I had a call from a detective yesterday in the late afternoon. He asked me the same thing you did. Did I have any of the codes for Ms. Larsen’s house? I told him the same thing I told you. I had the codes to enter the house, which I did frequently during interior construction. I have no idea if she changed them. I haven’t attempted to use them any time since.”
Jane shifted from foot to foot. This was where the rubber met the road. “So you did tell me. But since we last talked, I’ve learned that after Megan’s house was sold, your car has been seen parked on Old Deer Path on a regular basis.”
Kinnon’s face flushed. His mouth opened as if he was about to yell. But then he thought better of it. Instead he jumped to his feet and closed his office door, looking out into the hallway before he did so. Turning back to Jane he said, “Look, I don’t know who you really are or what you think you’re up to, but if my car was parked on Old Deer Path, as you allege, I can assure you the reason had nothing to do with Megan Larsen.”
“You can assure me all you like, and then you can assure the police when they come around and ask the same questions.”
That slowed him down. “Why would they?”
Jane sat perfectly still. “Because I sent them a photo of your car in situ.”
“You what?! Why in the name of heaven would you do that?”
“Because Megan Larsen is missing. Prior to going missing, she was being harassed via her home security system. You have the codes to that system, and your car has been frequently parked perfectly positioned to watch her house. The question, I think, is why wouldn’t the police talk to you?”
The effect of this speech on Kinnon was immediate and visible. His face, which had paled from its peak color, flushed again. His mouth opened and closed several times. “Who are you, and why is it your goal to harass me? Did my wife send you?”
An unexpected response. “Your wife?” When Kinnon didn’t answer, Jane said, “Mr. Kinnon, I assure you I’ve never met your wife. If you were doing something you’d rather she didn’t know about, you’re better off telling the police about it now. It’s better to be suspected of infidelity than abduction or murder. Were you having an affair with Megan Larsen?”
“Good grief, no! I told you, I barely knew the woman. She bought a house from my company. We sell a lot of houses.”
Jane’s cell phone rattled in her bag. She ignored it. “Then what were you doing parked on Old Deer Path?”
Kinnon grimaced and stared at the floor. “It is what you think.” His voice was low. “I am involved with a woman in your neighborhood, but I assure you, she is not Megan Larsen.”
“Is this woman, this other woman, willing to tell the police why you’re parked on a street with a direct line of sight to Megan’s house?”
His eyebrows flew up his forehead. “Do you think that will be necessary?”
“I do.”
The eyebrows came down. “You see, my friend is married too, and this could be most . . . inconvenient.”
“I’m sure the police will be discreet. Unless you took Megan Larsen, in which case they won’t be.”
“I’ve told you, nothing like that. As a matter of fact, I did meet my friend when I was renovating the house on Birchwood Lane. I was there frequently to check on progress, and she was often outside tending her garden.”
Jane’s mind traveled, picturing the immediate neighbors on her street. She eliminated one house because of its scruffy front garden. No one would have been outside tending it. Then she eliminated a much older couple, both at home, and two working couples, never home, who used professional landscapers. Next was one of the empty houses, occupied only by the children of Saudi royalty during the school holidays. Through this process of elimination it was easy to figure out who Kinnon’s paramour must be.
“We got to talking,” Kinnon continued. “There was a spark, an undeniable spark. One thing led to another.”
Was he telling the truth? He was clearly embarrassed. Not you-caught-me-in-a-crime embarrassed, but you-caught-me-committing-adultery embarrassed. When she’d worked, Jane had always been astonished by coworkers who had affairs. Where do they find the time? But Kinnon was the master of his own schedule, out and about frequently checking on projects. And the neighbor Jane imagined was having the affair with him was home alone all the time while her husband kept them in that expensive house.
Jane stood. “Mr. Kinnon, what you do in your personal life is none of my business, as you say. But Megan Larsen is my business, and if you can help clear up anything related to her disappearance, I suggest you speak to the police again before they contact you. And before you call them, spend some time thinking about anything you might have observed during all that time you spent in the neighborhood.” She paused. “I’ll see myself out.”