An hour later, Drayco was plunged into his second dreaded meeting of the day, a luncheon. He hated luncheons. Lame jokes from clueless speakers, presentations that looked as if they were crafted by a second-grader—no, a second-grader could probably do better. And everyone was always so afraid to offend anyone else, even handshakes were tactical.
He’d wanted to talk with Rena Quentin again, so she’d arranged this particular time and place. What she neglected to tell him was that she was an honored guest at this soirée, seated upfront, and that she was using him as her “date.”
The male half of the couple who was supposed to join them at their table was a doctor called away to an emergency and neither the doctor nor wife were present. It was just Drayco and Rena. He looked at the place card in front of him. It read “Mr. Quentin.”
Rena patted her hair, pulled up into a chignon. “People will call me a cougar. I love it.”
She did remind Drayco of a cougar and not in a good way. He felt a little like growling, himself.
With a smile, she added, “They’ll think I’ve gone to the other end of the spectrum, since my late husband was twenty years older than I. God bless him. And his generous divorce settlement, of course.”
Drayco pulled out his wallet and opened it to show the lack of big bills. “I doubt I’d make a tasty meal for a rich cougar.”
She put her hand on his arm. “Ah, but there are other ways in which I think I’d find you quite tasty.”
Before he could change the subject, and he really wanted to change the subject, she added, “You know, I underestimated you. Thought you were just another one of those dumb cop types. And believe me I’ve worked with a lot of them. Of course, some dicks are better than others.”
Subject change, commencing now. “Edwin Zamorra was arrested yesterday. He ran a drug-tampering scheme. Watered-down drugs or used counterfeits, then pocketed the difference.”
He’d waited to tell her in person rather than over the phone, because he wanted to see her reaction. He was surprised. After an initial look of shock, she laughed and shook her head.
“I’m glad you find the news amusing.”
“It’s just I never imagined Edwin could do such a thing. Always strait-laced and dull. As I mentioned before, a prude.”
“You saw no signs whatsoever?”
“Not a one.” Rena re-arranged the salt and pepper shakers on the table until they were perfectly parallel. “Poverty can do funny things to people. I saw it first-hand—I was raised in poverty by my grandmother, and I like to think that’s why she beat me. Some say poverty is society’s cancer, but I say it’s more like an ugly birthmark you want to keep covered up.”
“Edwin wasn’t exactly rich, but he wasn’t poor, either.”
Rena frowned. “How horrible this must be for Ashley. Her mother and father dead, her uncle in jail. I would say I’m glad she has that young Asian boyfriend of hers ...”
“You don’t like Gogo Cheng, I take it?”
“I got a funny feeling about him the one time I met him. Guess it comes from my years of being a suspicious TSA sort. I’m probably just being paranoid.” She hesitated. “He reminds me of a guy we put on our watchlist.”
Rena wasn’t exactly batting her lashes, but she switched easily into her cougar role, scanning his body with her eyes. “You clean up real nice, Scott Drayco. That blue-violet shirt matches your amazing eyes.”
Nelia Tyler said something similar to him once when he wore the same shirt. He made a mental note to stop wearing it. “You didn’t see any signs of Edwin’s crimes. And you also didn’t know about Jerold’s gambling. What about a lottery scam aimed at elderly women?”
“Like brother, like brother? Well that’s disappointing, I must say. Despite my differences with Jerold, I can’t imagine the circumstances that would lead him to get involved in something so mean-spirited.”
“It’s possible they were in on it together.”
“And your mother? What was her role?”
“She may have been right in the middle. We don’t know yet.”
Rena picked at her fish and turned it over, wrinkling her nose in disgust at the silvery skin on the bottom. “If I were in charge of this shindig, there’d be no fish. Chicken is neater. And who in their right mind would pair yellow squash with pearl onions?”
She took a dainty sip of her coffee. “I hope they have crème brulée for dessert. Or something caramel.”
“Did you know Edwin and Ophelia had an affair?”
Rena looked at him over her coffee cup. “You don’t pull any punches, do you? Next you’ll be telling me Ashley is Edwin’s love child.”
When he didn’t respond, she slowly put her cup down. “You aren’t serious?”
“We’re a little short on proof—for that and for other odd behavior from the Zamorra clan.”
“Like that lottery thing you were telling me about?”
He nodded.
“You don’t suppose the entire Zamorra family was involved in this? Ashley and Gogo included?”
That was pretty much the same comment Sarg had made about a “scamily.” Drayco replied, “That would make Ophelia the wild card.”
“Oh, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown.” Rena twirled her fork on her plate, then put it down, giving up on the fish.
“Shakespeare’s Hamlet?”
She smiled. “The poor, mad Ophelia.”
“Some Shakespeare scholars claim Ophelia was murdered. That Hamlet’s mother Gertrude witnessed Ophelia fall into the brook and did nothing to save her. Or even helped break the branch Ophelia was standing on when she fell and drowned.”
“Of course you would know that.” She laughed briefly. “Although it’s funny you should mention it.”
“Why?”
“Because I had a similar conversation with Jerold once. Before his wife was killed. And he said pretty much the same thing.”
“I didn’t know Jerold was a Shakespeare expert.”
“He wasn’t. His idea of a good read was Zane Grey. But he knew a lot about Hamlet and Ophelia.”
The waiters in their white shirts, gold ties, and maroon vests buzzed around the various tables like a hive of bees in Washington Redskin uniforms, with plates appearing and disappearing at a quietly frantic pace. As the remains of the ill-fated salmon were whisked away, Rena’s eyes lit up when a ramekin of golden crème brulée took its place.
The top of the dessert reminded Drayco of burned skin. That thought segued to his evidentiary hearing and the reason for it. He pushed his untouched crème brulée over to Rena. “Why would Jerold compare his wife Ophelia to the character in Hamlet? Both were doomed loves? Or both were collateral damage?”
Rena finished the second crème brulée in record time and licked the spoon clean. “Maybe it was that affair you alluded to. Between Ophelia and Edwin. It’s also possible she started showing signs of mental illness, but Jerold never mentioned it other than the Shakespeare thing—the mad Ophelia and all. Does it matter now?”
That was the question. Everyone had written off Ophelia’s death as a random act of violence, being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe Ashley was right and Jerold did kill her mother, yet another love triangle gone awry. Nothing to do with Jerold, Edwin, Maura, or any fraud scheme.
But one detail kept hammering Drayco over and over, the thing that made the least sense. Why was that ATM card crammed down Ophelia’s throat?