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THEY RODE IN SILENCE to the Kapp house. It was twenty minutes out to Paso Querido, and off the main highway, a few miles up Querido Valley Drive, then the road crested the summit and wound down into the canyon. The Kapp house was in the “Birdland” development, surrounded by scrub brush and ironwood trees. As soon as they crossed the border into Birdland, it was lush and green, something rarely seen in this part of California after the recent years of drought. Most properties in the county kept their grounds full of plants needing little water, as well as sturdy trees, cleared back from the main buildings to provide no fuel during fire season.
But the Birdland properties were different, with vibrant shades of green. As they turned onto Whippoorwill Terrace, long grasses like verdant waterfalls cascaded down steps made of naturally occurring brown and gray stones. Dez’s Impala rounded a turn and the Kapp house came into view.
The large plot of land—perhaps an acre and a half—was beautifully designed, as one might expect to find at the residence of a landscape architect. The house itself, however, was far less like Nathaniel Ferris’s house than Fenway had pictured. While her father’s mansion was an exercise in overstatement and opulence, the Kapp residence was less ostentatious and significantly smaller than Fenway expected.
It was still a large house—if she had to estimate, perhaps four thousand square feet. Looking to her left, there was a four-car detached garage with a covered breezeway connecting to the main house. The long driveway meandered around a large oak tree, and Dez left the Impala on the driveway, under its shade.
The front door opened, and the young, handsome face of Donovan Kapp peered out. The acne on his forehead had cleared. “Coroner?” he asked, a little taken aback.
“Hey, Donovan,” Fenway said. “Can we come in?”
“Uh, sure, I guess so.” He stepped back from the door and it opened wide. Fenway stepped into the entryway, followed by Dez.
“I guess you can sit down in there.” Donovan motioned to the great room. The large space was separated into two areas: one with a sofa and a love seat, and behind the sofa, three glass-topped display cases; the other area had two leather recliners facing a large flat-screen television mounted on the wall.
Donovan put his hands in his pockets, and then seemed to remember his manners. “Oh, you want anything to drink? Water or something?”
“You have any coffee?” asked Fenway. She walked around the display cases. The first housed several dozen old-looking coins, all in matching settings. The second, the largest of the three, had a fencing epée and two antique revolvers.
“Uh... I don’t think so. Not unless there’s still some in the pot from this morning.”
“These are nice,” Fenway said, looking down at the weapon display. “This is a .44, right?”
Donovan screwed up his mouth and walked over next to her. “I don’t know. That sounds right, I guess. My dad started collecting these when we moved here.”
Fenway squinted. “Unless I’m mistaken, that’s a Colt Single Action .44 Special.”
“I guess.”
Fenway moved on to the coin collection. “Some of these coins look expensive.”
“I guess.”
Fenway walked to the sofa and took a seat. “Your mom here?”
“No,” Donovan said. “She went to see a friend in Santa Barbara.”
“Oh. When will she be back?”
“Late tonight, I think. She’s got an appointment with the funeral director tomorrow morning around ten.”
“Ah,” Dez said. She was still standing next to the love seat. “I guess we should have called first. Of course, it’s almost never a convenient time right before a funeral.”
“I saw the news tonight,” Donovan said, a little carelessly. “I guess you let your stepmother go.”
“Yeah,” Fenway said. “Turns out she’s got a pretty airtight alibi. Video footage and everything. She couldn’t have done it.”
“Oh,” Donovan said.
“You sound disappointed. You were hoping Charlotte was guilty?”
“Uh...no, it’s not that.” Donovan paused and walked to the love seat. “I thought you had my dad’s killer. It was, uh, a little easier to sleep at night, I guess.”
“I see.”
“I’m sure surprised you didn’t keep her longer.” Donovan sat down on the arm of the love seat.
“Hah. I wasn’t even on the case,” Fenway said.
Donovan cocked his head to the side. “You weren’t even on the case?”
“I got kicked off as soon as my stepmother’s gun was found at the crime scene. Conflict of interest.”
“Oh,” Donovan said. “I guess that makes sense.”
“You wanted me on the case?”
Donovan folded his arms. “Well, yeah.”
“Why’s that?”
“You caught the mayor’s killer a few months ago, didn’t you? And he was some super-rich guy with a lot of big-time connections. And the old coroner’s murder before that. I thought you make sure rich people with powerful friends don’t get away with it.”
“You think Charlotte got away with something?”
Donovan shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Just because she’s rich and powerful doesn’t mean she did anything.”
Donovan barked laughter. “That’s a good one. Let me tell you—she did something, for sure.”
“What do you mean?”
“Something. Rich people lie and cheat and steal as a way of life.”
“Even you? You’re rich.”
Donovan smiled. “My dad was rich. It’s not the same thing.” He paused thoughtfully. “I guess if Charlotte has an alibi, she didn’t kill my father. But she could have hired someone, right?”
Fenway looked at Dez. “We’ll make sure to look into all the angles, Donovan.”
Dez said, “Is your sister home?”
Donovan shook his head. “She went down to L.A. to visit Jasper.”
“So soon after your father was killed?”
Donovan shrugged.
“Will she be back tomorrow too?”
Donovan shrugged again.
“So you’re holding down the fort.”
“I guess.”
“While I have you here, then,” Fenway said, “let me ask you a couple of questions.”
Donovan’s eyes flitted from Fenway to Dez. “Sure, I guess so.”
“You said when I talked to you a couple of days ago your mom’s dealer was here Thursday night.”
“Yeah.”
“You still say he was here for a couple of hours?”
“Yeah. I didn’t look at the clock though.”
“Because he has a thing for her.”
Donovan shrugged. “He sure seemed like he was into her. Trying to get her alone, being all cutesy with her.”
“I spoke to him. He says he was only here for ten minutes.”
Donovan shifted his weight from foot to foot. “That doesn’t surprise me. His girlfriend gets crazy jealous. He’d probably deny the whole thing.”
“His girlfriend? How do you know her?
Donovan smiled. “I don’t. That’s what the dealer says to my mom. ‘We better be careful. My girlfriend gets crazy jealous.’”
“You heard the dealer say that?”
“Sure.”
“Even though your door was closed?” Dez asked.
“They’re loud.”
“Zoso says he didn’t see either you or your sister that night,” Fenway said.
“He didn’t even notice, he was so busy trying to get in Mom’s pants.”
“Your mom says she doesn’t remember anything.”
“Yeah, well, she was pretty out of it. She tries to hide it from us, but we know.”
“Okay. A couple more things, if you don’t mind.”
Donovan opened his mouth to speak, and then shut it again. He shuffled his feet, and looked at Fenway. “I don’t know,” he said. “I’m a minor, right? My mom probably wouldn’t want me talking to you without her here.”
“I just have a couple of tiny things I want to clear up.”
“No, Fenway,” Dez interrupted. “It’s true. He’s a minor. We can’t talk to him without his parent or guardian present.” Dez handed Donovan her business card. “Have your mom give me a call as soon as she gets back.”
Donovan nodded. Fenway and Dez left the house, Donovan closing the door quickly behind them, and they walked back to the Impala.
“What do we do now, Dez?” Fenway said. “I think we’ve got to talk to Cricket Kapp. Should we go down to Santa Barbara and try to find her?”
“No, I don’t think so.” Dez was quiet for a moment, unlocking the car. “Did you think Donovan acted strange?”
“Sure I did,” Fenway replied, sliding into the passenger seat. “I think we need to consider him a suspect too, just like his mom.”
“He’s hiding something,” Dez mused. “His evasiveness. He kept touching his face. He seemed to be fine when he opened the door to see us, but by the time we left, he was sweating. Not a great liar.”
“He could be covering for his mom. He seemed to have an alibi all laid out for her.”
“What about the daughter?” Dez asked.
“I guess he could be covering for her too. Let’s see what she has to say when she gets back from L.A.”
“Maybe she’s not in L.A. Maybe she fled the country.”
“We should check,” Fenway admitted.
“Or maybe he’s covering for himself,” Dez said.
Fenway thought for a minute. “He’s the one who said Zoso was there until two in the morning. Why would he lie if it’s something so easily disproven?”
“Maybe he didn’t think we’d believe a drug dealer.”
“Maybe. Or maybe Zoso is lying and covering to keep his girlfriend from knowing where he was. He protested a little too much when I talked about being hot and bothered for Cricket.”
“If Zoso was there for two hours, wouldn’t Cricket say something? I read McVie’s interview notes. Cricket Kapp said she had no recollection of seeing Zoso at all. So Donovan might be lying.”
“Or Cricket might have been so high she doesn’t remember.”
Dez tapped the steering wheel. “We might have results from those emails and doctored photos in the next two or three days. It might tell us the type of laser printer or inkjet ink that was used.”
“Or the type of paper.”
“Don’t hold your breath on that one, rookie. Ten to one that paper is generic and cheap.”
“You never know. It might get us closer.”
Dez turned onto the freeway, going back to Estancia. They rode in silence for a few minutes.
“Two or three days?”
“If we’re lucky.”
Fenway thought for a moment. “Dez, how much of the footage from my father’s security cameras did you get?”
“Just from Thursday night,” Dez replied.
“You know the Kapps had dinner over at my father’s house the week before, right?”
“That’s how Charlotte’s name first came up, isn’t it? That your father was one of Jeremy Kapp’s clients, and he had a thing for sleeping with his rich clients’ wives.”
“I wonder,” Fenway said.
“What do you wonder?”
“I wonder if Cricket Kapp stole Charlotte’s gun while she was over at my father’s house the other night.”
“Or Donovan.”
“Right. Or Donovan. Or Blair, for that matter.”
“You think it would be on the security footage?”
Fenway shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”
Dez watched the road, twitching her lips back and forth. “You think your father’s going to be okay handing over those security tapes to us?”
“Ordinarily, probably not,” Fenway conceded. “But since his only daughter just got his loving wife out of jail, maybe he’ll consider it.” She took the phone out of her purse and called her father.
• • •
“HI, DAD,” FENWAY SAID, stepping into the mansion.
Her father, barefoot in a track suit, eyed her warily. “Hi, Fenway.” Even dressed as casually as he was, Ferris looked better than he had the night before; the distracted, lost look was gone from his eyes.
“You know Sergeant Roubideux, right?”
“Call me Dez, please,” she said, leaning around Fenway and shaking Nathaniel Ferris’s hand. “Your dad and I have met several times before, Fenway. Good to see you again, Mr. Ferris.”
“Listen,” Ferris said, holding his hands out in front of him, “I’ve had a hell of a day. Charlotte just got home this afternoon. This isn’t going to take too long, is it?”
“I don’t think so,” Fenway said. Dez followed her in and Ferris closed the door behind them. “I need to see the footage from the night the Kapps came over for dinner.”
Ferris shook his head. “I don’t know what you’d need that for,” he said. “It was about a week and a half before Jer was killed.” He set his jaw and looked at Fenway. “Listen, we already went over the footage proving Charlotte and I were here all night. We came in, and we didn’t go out again.”
“I know,” Fenway said. “But you know Charlotte’s gun ended up in the murderer’s hands.”
“I’ve already told the police we don’t know how. We’ve already asked Sandrita. Roderick, too. In fact, we asked everyone who works for us. Do you want to interview them? I’ll make them available. Sandrita’s cleaning up from dinner.”
Fenway shot a look at Dez. “Yes, that would be excellent. And we won’t have to have them come down to the station house. Dez?”
Dez looked sideways at Fenway, but nodded. “Sure. I can ask them questions about Charlotte’s gun.”
“And I can look at the video footage.”
Ferris looked between Dez and Fenway. “Okay,” he said.
“Should I go into the kitchen, then?”
“Sure,” Ferris said, a bit preoccupied. Dez walked through the foyer and into a butler’s door to the kitchen.
“Okay,” Fenway said. “The footage.”
“Right,” Ferris said, nodding. “The cameras record everything but it’s sent via a live feed to the security company—well, the footage is stored in the cloud, but the security company has all the access privileges. I can review the footage whenever I want.”
“Is there a monitor somewhere?”
“I usually view it on my phone,” Ferris said. “I mean, I hardly ever have a reason to, but that’s how I found the footage from Thursday night.”
“So can you find the footage of when the Kapps were here?”
Ferris stroked his chin. “I’m trying to remember.”
“Maybe Charlotte knows.”
“She’s upstairs right now. I don’t want to bother her. I can find it. Here—let’s go into the study.”
Ferris’s study was a masterpiece of set design for what one would think a rich person’s library should be. Three walls were lined with books, mostly leather-bound tomes Fenway doubted Ferris ever opened. There was a freestanding dark wood stand about five feet in front of the desk, whose spherical basket contained a massive globe in grays and sepias.
The desk itself was mahogany, with thoughtfully arranged sets of items: expensive-looking pens and pencils, a leather desk blotter, and perched on the corner of the desk, a little precariously, was the latest Mac laptop, with a single wire disappearing under the lip of the desk.
“You’ve been in the study before, right?”
“Not for a long time,” Fenway said. She hadn’t been in the study on her infrequent visits to the house since she moved back, but she vaguely remembered this room from her childhood. She stepped closer to the shelves. The titles of the rows of leather-wrapped books came more fully into focus: some of the classic books, from Don Quixote to the collected works of Plato, but she also saw some Ralph Ellison and Toni Morrison among the Shakespeare and Swift. A smaller title, both in height and thickness, revealed itself as Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko upon closer inspection. Fenway wondered if her father hadn’t read all of these books—these titles seemed strangely curated. Perhaps some of it had been her mother’s influence.
“Now, listen,” Ferris said, “I don’t have this available to you to go putting it into evidence. I talked to Charlotte’s lawyer this afternoon, and she doesn’t want us handing anything over without talking with her.”
“But you’ll let me see the footage.”
Ferris shifted his weight from foot to foot. “I don’t think her lawyer would like it, but yes. But you have to promise you won’t use any footage in court.”
“Without a warrant or a subpoena.”
Ferris shrugged. “Fine.”
“Dad, I’m on your side. If I find someone taking the gun, it’ll help Charlotte out.”
“I said it was okay, Fenway,” Ferris said. He picked up the laptop and opened it. He balanced it with one hand and typed and clicked the trackpad with the other. Fenway went around the back of the desk and sat down in the leather armchair. It sank, satisfyingly, under her weight, but made a squeaking noise, like the leather chairs in Dr. Tassajera’s office. Fenway wondered how much the sound of the leather chairs in the therapist’s office reminded her father of his study—and how much that had to do with her father’s decision to use him as their therapist.
“Okay,” Ferris said, setting the laptop down in front of her, “it was two Saturdays ago. You can see their SUV pulling into the driveway right here—a couple of minutes after five o’clock.” He pointed to the screen. “You’ve got all four cameras: front entry, driveway, and then long views of the front and back of the house.”
“Anything by the garage?”
Ferris shook his head.
“Are all your cameras outside, or do you have anything inside?”
Ferris scoffed. “What, and risk someone selling videos of Charlotte on the dark web?”
Fenway flinched. Had her father made an insensitive reference to her Russian Lit professor? She set her jaw. “I take it someone had a visit from the Bellingham police force.”
“Yeah. He was a wiry-looking black guy with a big Barry White-type voice,” Ferris said absently.
Fenway sighed. “Detective Ridley.”
“Oh, so he’s talked to you, too?”
“Yep.”
Ferris shook his head. “I don’t know why he made the trip. He was here when we got back from picking Charlotte up.”
“We?”
“Roderick was driving me, Fenway.”
She nodded. “Sorry.”
“Anyway, Ridley sat right out on my sofa, made himself comfortable, and started asking all kinds of questions about the professor. I told him it wasn’t a good time, but he said he had flown all the way from Seattle. As if a two-hour flight is something to write home about. Boo hoo.”
“Yeah, he talked to me too. Last night.”
Ferris shrugged. “I didn’t even know the professor was dead. Did you know before he talked to you?”
“Yes.”
“When did you find out?”
“A couple of days after—uh... after I told you. About what he did.” She swallowed. “To me.”
Ferris pursed his lips. “And you didn’t mention it.”
“Well, no.”
“Did the cops up there call you to tell you?”
“I read an article online about it.”
Ferris nodded. “How come you didn’t mention it to me?”
Fenway looked back at the laptop screen and shrugged.
“Because you thought I had something to do with it,” Ferris said evenly.
“I don’t know, Dad. I guess I thought the timing was a little weird.”
“You think I’d kill somebody?”
“No, you were here when he died. I knew you weren’t the one to do it.”
“Then what?”
Fenway was quiet.
“Oh,” Ferris said, and Fenway could almost hear the gears in his head clicking into place. “You think I hired someone to do it.”
Fenway shrugged. “I don’t think anything, Dad.”
Ferris was quiet, and Fenway looked at the footage of the Kapp family arriving. There was no sound, and her father’s even, deliberate breathing put her on edge.
“I guess if you saw your professor was killed right after I found out what he did to you, it would explain why you thought I might have something to do with Jeremy’s death,” Ferris said softly.
“I try to go where the evidence leads,” Fenway replied.
On the screen, the SUV parked without incident. All the Kapps, including Blair and Donovan, got out of the vehicle. Cricket Kapp almost lost her footing on the driveway and Donovan grabbed her arm to prevent her from falling.
They all walked toward the front door, Cricket leaning heavily on Donovan.
Jeremy Kapp was in an aloha shirt, untucked, and khakis, with sandals on. Cricket and Blair were both in loose print dresses, Blair’s with cap sleeves with orange flowers, and Cricket’s with wide shoulder straps and no sleeves, with a blue and lime green design. They both carried white purses, Cricket’s a little larger than Blair’s. Donovan brought up the rear, with a dark polo shirt, a little large for him, tucked into his faded jeans, with a hole ripped artfully at the knee.
Jeremy Kapp was in front to ring the bell, and when Nathaniel Ferris answered the door, they shook hands and smiled. Fenway didn’t see Charlotte, and all four Kapps entered the house, Donovan steering his mother inside.
“Where was Charlotte?” Fenway asked.
“She had just gotten in the shower.”
“Seriously? So close to the time your guests were coming over?”
A rakish grin slowly spread over Ferris’s face. “We might have lost track of time.”
“Ugh.” Fenway rolled her eyes and turned back to the screen, fast-forwarding the video. About twenty minutes later, Jeremy and Ferris exited the house through the back door, and walked down a rocky path out of view of the camera.
Something was out of place, nagging at the back of Fenway’s mind. “What’s back there? The pool?”
“No,” Ferris said. “The pool’s around the other side. Jeremy did such a good job with the fountain, I wanted him to work on the garden. We’re walking to the area I wanted to have Jeremy working on next. It’s overgrown right now. Charlotte wanted to put a vegetable garden in there, but I’m afraid we didn’t have time to take care of it. Kind of a fire hazard.”
“And Charlotte was still in the shower when you and Kapp left the house?”
Ferris nodded. “Yes.”
Fenway thought for a moment. “Dad, did you know Charlotte said one of your recent dinner guests walked in on her when she got out of the shower?”
“What?”
Fenway shrugged. “That’s what she told me.”
“She didn’t tell me.”
“Maybe she didn’t think it was a big deal.” Fenway paused. “Who else have you had over for dinner lately?”
Ferris shook his head. “The Kapps are the only ones recently. In fact, they’re the only ones since you and the sheriff and, uh, Everett Michaels came over a couple of months ago.”
“Are you sure? I thought you two were social butterflies.”
“I’ve been busy. A lot of late nights with the board of directors up my ass.”
Then it clicked into place. “Wait—she didn’t say ‘walked in on me,’ she said, ‘sneaked a peek.’”
Ferris looked at Fenway. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“That’s the turn of phrase you’d use if your friend’s sixteen-year-old son walked in.”
“What?”
Fenway searched her memory. “She also called him ‘the little pervert.’ That’s a phrase you’d use on a teenager, too.”
“Fenway, what are you talking about?”
“You left Cricket and the two kids in the house while Charlotte was in the shower, and you and Jeremy Kapp took a little stroll.”
“Sure. Sandrita was serving drinks. Dinner was almost ready. Why not take a walk?”
“Someone took Charlotte’s gun, and I want to find out who.”
“And you think it was one of the Kapps?”
“Maybe it was Donovan.”
“You’re saying he walked in on Charlotte, and then stole her gun?”
“Or maybe he sneaked into the room to steal the gun, and got caught on the way out and had to act like he was trying to see her naked.”
“I’m not sure I believe that.”
Fenway shrugged. “Maybe not. Charlotte came back downstairs and no one was guarding the room, right? So it could have been Cricket, or even the daughter. You guys didn’t have it in a safe or anything, right? It lived in Charlotte’s bedside table?”
“It makes her feel more secure.”
“You don’t have to defend it to me, Dad, I’m just saying the drawer wasn’t protected. Anyone with access to the room could have gotten it.” Fenway paused. “When did you see it last? Before that Saturday or afterward?”
“I have no idea. It’s Charlotte’s gun. Probably about four weeks ago, for me. I went to put away something of Charlotte’s and opened that drawer. The gun was in there then. Charlotte would have seen it much more recently.”
“Okay. I’ll have to ask her.”
“And you think it’s Sandrita. Or maybe Roderick.”
“If Charlotte didn’t do it, and you didn’t do it, it was somebody else—someone who took the gun from the drawer. If the last time either of you saw the gun was a month ago, we’ve got to look closely at everyone who came to the house.” She pointed at Blair walking outside the front door, talking on the phone—to her boyfriend Jasper, Fenway was sure. “That’s why I’m looking at these three people.”
Blair didn’t have her purse with her—she must have left it inside. And she was much more interested in her conversation than anything else. Fenway looked closely, but she didn’t think it was possible for Blair to have the gun. Not during her phone call anyway.
She fast-forwarded to when Jeremy and Ferris came back from the garden. Nothing strange. She fast-forwarded again; the sun went down and the Halloween decorations lit up. Her father and his wife had gone with tasteful gourds and pumpkins more appropriate for the background of a clothing catalog than for any actual Halloween purposes. No ghosts, no spiderwebs, no witches, and nothing humorous or playful.
Finally, around ten o’clock, the Kapp family departed. Jeremy came out first, followed by Blair and Donovan, with Charlotte stepping out with them. Jeremy hugged Charlotte, perhaps holding it for a little too long. Cricket came out, her purse over her shoulder, and Jeremy broke from the embrace. Cricket had a worried look on her face.
Fenway zoomed in on Cricket’s purse, looking for a telltale bulge or the glint of the stock of the gun, anything to give the game away. She found nothing.
“Was Cricket drunk or high or something?” she asked.
“She seemed a little out of it,” Ferris said. “She kept insisting she was fine. Honestly, Jeremy seemed a little embarrassed.”
“I wonder how good an actor Cricket is.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, she was stumbling all over herself when she gets to your house. But when she leaves, she can definitely put one foot in front of the other.”
Ferris shook his head. “She had quite a bit to drink at the house. She was there for a few hours, so I guess it could have worn off, but I had to open a new bottle of vodka for her Cape Cods.”
“Interesting,” Fenway said, under her breath.
Next, she rewound the video and zoomed in on Blair’s purse. She didn’t see anything that looked like a gun, even after viewing it again.
She did the same with Donovan. He might have been carrying the gun in his waistband, but she didn’t see it. The polo shirt was long and draped almost to the midway point of his hips, but he didn’t walk strangely.
“Do you see anything?”
Fenway shook her head. “No. Dammit. I thought for sure there’d be something here.”
Sandrita appeared at the door of the study, “I’m sorry, Mister Nathaniel,” she said, “but Miss Charlotte wants to see you.”
“Sorry, Fenway,” he said. “I’ll be back down in a minute.”
“I’ll finish up,” Fenway said.
He left the room, followed by Sandrita, and Fenway fished the USB drive out of her purse. She looked at the laptop and realized that her father, of course, had one of the fancy Mac laptops that didn’t have a regular USB port. Cursing silently, she pulled a drawer open, then another, and found the right cable when she lifted up a pair of expensive headphones.
She quickly plugged the drive in, went back to the desktop, and copied the video files over to the USB drive. It took a few minutes, through which Fenway could hear nothing but her heart pounding in her ears, but finally it finished. Fenway had the cable back in the drawer and the USB drive back in her purse as she heard her father’s footfalls on the stairs.
“I asked Charlotte about the gun,” Ferris said, coming into the study. “She went to the shooting range about three weeks ago and ran into Jeremy and Donovan. She invited them for dinner. She doesn’t remember what day it was, but she had the gun cleaned and prepped after her target practice. So—it was definitely taken in the last three weeks.”
Fenway nodded, trying to get her heart to calm down. She had only taken footage from her father, after all, not stolen money.
“Okay,” Fenway said, “I’m done here.”
“And Sergeant Roubideaux finished her interviews as well,” he said.
Fenway stood and they walked to the foyer, where Dez was waiting for them.
“One more thing, Dad,” she said.
“Yes?”
“Have you ever heard of a company called Global Advantage Executive Consulting?”
“Global Advantage? No. We use a leadership training organization, but that’s not their name—unless it’s some big umbrella company I don’t know about.”
“Maybe GAEC?”
Ferris furrowed his brow and shook his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell. Why do you ask?”
“I wondered specifically if you knew anything about payments to or from that organization.”
“Never heard of them, and I certainly never got a payment from them.”
“You sure?”
“Of course I’m sure.”
The three of them stood there in the foyer, not speaking for several awkward moments.
“Okay,” Fenway finally said. “Election Day tomorrow. Millicent is going to want me to be pretty visible. You voting?”
“Mailed it in last week,” Ferris said. “I figured out who I was voting for pretty early on.” He winked.
“You doing okay?”
“Sure. You know.” Ferris shrugged. “I’m glad Charlotte’s home.” He paused.
“All right,” Fenway said, opening the door.
“Wait,” Ferris said. “I just—thank you, Fenway. I know you got kicked off the case, and you didn’t have to do anything to try to get Charlotte out. I know you and Charlotte haven’t gotten along, and I know it would have been easy for you to keep her in there.”
“No, Dad,” Fenway said. “It wouldn’t have been easy. She wasn’t guilty. I knew she wasn’t guilty.”
“I’m trying to tell you I appreciate the extra work you did to get Charlotte home to me,” he said, and his eyes were watery. “Just accept the damn thank you and I’ll call you up tomorrow to congratulate you.”
“Oh, Dad, don’t jinx it,” Fenway said. “But—uh, you’re welcome.”
“All right.”
For a moment, Fenway turned over the thought in her mind of asking about seeing another therapist—maybe one of the doctors who had been on her short list—but simply nodded and turned to leave. Dez followed her out and opened the Impala for them.
“Where to now?”
“Just drop me at home, Dez.”
“Yeah. It’s late. And you’ve got a couple of final campaign appearances tomorrow, right?”
“Don’t remind me. I wish I didn’t have to dress up to go vote.”
“Aw, rookie, you look so precious in a pantsuit.” Dez cackled. “And think of how the photo will look, blown up life-size on the wall of your office for everyone to see.”
“I’m not getting a life-size picture of myself.”
“Oh, you might not be paying for it, but Christmas is right around the corner.”
Fenway rolled her eyes. “Hey—did you find out anything from Sandrita or Roderick?”
Dez shook her head. “They don’t know anything, I’m sure of it. The driver didn’t know Charlotte had a gun, much less where she kept it.”
“What about the housekeeper?”
“She doesn’t open drawers.”
“A housekeeper who doesn’t open drawers?”
“I got the feeling she was put off by something she found once. I didn’t want to ask a lot of, uh, probing questions.”
Fenway made a face.
“My sentiments exactly,” said Dez.
• • •
AS SOON AS FENWAY WALKED in the door, she got a call on her phone from a number she didn’t recognize. She thought it might be another call about the evidence against Charlotte. She swore lightly—she hadn’t downloaded a phone call recording app—but she thought if she could talk to the person, she might be able to figure out who it was.
“Fenway Stevenson.”
“This is the Hanford Women’s Facility calling Fenway Stevenson,” a crackly voice on the other end said. “I have Lana Cassidy on the line.”
Lana. “I’ll take the call.”
“Miss Stevenson?”
“Hi, Lana. I didn’t expect to hear from you so soon.”
“Oh.” Her voice was heavy with disappointment. “I guess that means you haven’t started looking into Carl’s death.”
“On the contrary,” Fenway said. “It seems like it’s wrapped up in a lot of complicated matters.”
“With Ferris Energy?”
“Yes.” Fenway coughed. “The investigation is just starting, but it seems like it might be big. I wish I could say more. I’m in the middle of another murder investigation right now, but I promise, Lana, this is one of my top priorities.”
“Okay,” Lana said. She hesitated. “I don’t get a lot of mail. It might be nice if you could keep me up to speed. These phone calls cost me a lot of money.”
“I understand. I’ll do whatever I can as long as it doesn’t jeopardize the investigation.” Even as the words were coming out of Fenway’s mouth, she doubted she’d write a single letter to Lana Cassidy.
They said quick goodbyes, and Fenway felt a burst of adrenaline from the conversation. She had trouble winding down after that, but with a few episodes of some stupid television shows and a glass of red wine with the delivery of penne arrabiata from Zorro’s, she calmed down enough to go to bed. It wasn’t even ten o’clock yet, but the week had taken a lot out of her, and she had a busy Election Day ahead.
She wondered if Piper would be able to assess anything on the footage she had on the USB stick, or if the lab had analyzed the paper or ink from the printers yet. She was sure it would lead to Cricket, or Donovan, or Blair. And there would be enough evidence for not only an arrest, but a conviction—even if the Kapps could afford a high-priced criminal lawyer.
She walked around her bedroom with her toothbrush sticking out of her mouth. Her phone buzzed on her bedside table. She glanced at it; the message was from McVie.
It’s me
The doorbell rang.
Fenway looked down at herself; the night was chilly, and her light blue flannel pajamas, while comfortable, weren’t exactly flattering. She went into the bathroom to spit out the toothpaste, and grabbed a long robe from her closet, before deciding it looked even worse than her pajamas.
She opened the door. McVie was there, in a white shirt, navy blue tie, and gray slacks.
“You just come from a campaign event?”
McVie nodded.
Fenway’s eyes raked over McVie’s body. “You clean up pretty good, Craig.”
“I’m down by five points in the latest poll.”
“What? That’s crazy.”
“And I don’t care,” McVie said, and he stepped inside, wrapping his arms around her.
Fenway turned into him and put her hand behind his head, running her fingers through his hair, and then pulled him into her, kissing him fiercely, melting into the emotions she had to put on pause the last three months. He put his arm around her back, pulling her closer.
Fenway’s other hand started to loosen his tie.
McVie’s other hand closed the apartment door solidly behind them.
They kissed, both of them feeling the weight of the last few months leaving their shoulders, their muscles, their hands as they intertwined. Fenway broke from the kiss so she could pull McVie’s tie over his head. McVie’s hands started unbuttoning her pajama top.
They fell together onto the sofa, and forgot about the election for a while.
