part0031

Will wonders never cease, I found several reasons to be grateful to Carter O’Connell as I stood up to depart. I thanked my host for the tea, the hospitality, and his idea to save Mars Covington from unemployment.

“Don’t forget risking life and limb in the basement last night,” he added. Those spiders were huge, Jessie.”

Okay, so I also thanked him for suffering the heebie jeebies and may have even smiled. “Mr. O’Connell,” I said, “you do, on occasion, occasionally, in some circumstances, have your uses.”

He smiled back. “I’m growing on you.”

“Don’t push it,” I said, but lo and behold, he offered to do me yet another favor. He planned on fetching Candy home from Tate’s so that I could be moving along to the lake.

“I can’t believe she still has two more days of the Extravaganza Sale,” he said. “I didn’t know there were that many bras on earth.”

By this point I realized he was escorting me up the stairs. “This is most gallant of you,” I told him, “but I can make it to my condo on my own.”

“Don’t you have to get your cats to your car?”

Good point. And the task is never easy.

I suggested we coordinate our efforts. “You distract them,” I whispered when we reached my door. “I’ll get their carriers, and then—”

And then the elevator bell rang, and Peter Harrison popped out. “A murder?” he sobbed. “Why didn’t you warn me, Jessie?”

Because I had honestly forgotten. I scurried over and apologized for my negligence. “You saw the press conference?”

“This is such bad news,” he whined. “These people are capable of murder. Karen could be—”

“Don’t say it!” Carter and I spoke in unison and guided our elderly neighbor into my condo and onto the couch. We took seats on either side, and I reached for Peter’s hand .

“I promise to do a better job keeping you posted,” I said. “But right now I need to be moving along.” I explained where I was headed, and Peter kept crying. I explained further. “Staying at the lake will keep Wilson closer to Pierpont’s. That’s a good thing, right?”

I shot Carter a glance. “Optimism,” he said firmly. “Wilson is going to solve this murder and find Karen.”

“Soon,” I added, and Peter looked up.

“Safe and sound?” he asked.

“Safe and sound.” Carter nodded and stood up. “The cats,” he reminded me, and somehow we three humans managed to outwit the three cats. We got them into their allotted cat carriers with minimal hassle, chasing, or cajoling. Bernice gets a carrier all to herself since she simply wouldn’t fit otherwise, but Snowflake and Wally actually prefer being confined together.

Carter grabbed the two-cat carrier, I tossed my laptop into my purse and gave a heave-ho to Bernice, and prepared to follow Carter.

“What can I carry?” Peter asked.

All our delays, and the cats and I still beat Wilson to the shack-slash-cottage. We settled ourselves onto the worn chintz-covered couch with The Rigby Estate: Then and Now . Bernice commenced snoring, but Wally and Snowflake crowded in to see what was so fascinating.

Perhaps the copyright date? I hadn’t noticed earlier, but this book was almost as outdated as the reference books in the Clarence library. But how could the publication date matter? Yes, Karen had been modernizing the plumbing and electricity, and all the priceless art and antiques had likely had become even more priceless in the past two decades, but I doubted much else had changed between the Then and the Now .

“Is there anything useful here?” I asked .

Wally pawed at something toward the back, and I flipped to Appendix C—pages and pages of floor plans—the east wing, west wing, upstairs, downstairs, below stairs, staircases. The whole nine yards, or in this case, the whole 150,000 square feet.

Recollecting the board game Clue my brother Danny and I played as children, I studied the layout. “Who was where when?” I asked the cats. “On Wednesday,” I clarified.

We located the west wing bathroom where Karen had worked that day, flipped to the diagrams of the east wing, and found the bedrooms where Abigail and her ‘girls’ had been busy with their feather dusters. And blueprints of the lower levels included the wine cellar where Gerald had conducted his inventory. The wine cellar, I observed, stood adjacent to the infamous fourth pantry.

“But some people weren’t even home that day.” I mentioned Coco’s jaunt to Charlotte, and Piers and Mallory flying up to New York. And of course some members of the staff had been outside when Karen was taken.

I flipped to the centerfold aerial shot of the entire estate. Number one—the Cupid and the front gardens where Caesar and his crew had been weeding on Wednesday. And number seven—the stable where Wayne Stasson would have been when Karen was kidnapped.

“Or maybe not.” I found Appendix C again, and Karen’s west wing bathroom. “Maybe Wayne was there,” I told the cats. “Was he, or was he not, one of the kidnappers?”

Several meows failed to answer my question. “Where was everyone this morning?” I persisted. “When Wayne got shot.”

I found the chapter on the stable—the scene of the crime—and for some reason became engrossed with the photographs of the Rigby horses. No Nell or Badger back then, but a Luna and Bailey. “Oh, and Maybelline!” I said with far more delight than I might have expected.

Snowflake was far less enthusiastic. She pawed anxiously at her side of the book, and I flipped to the chapter on the drawing room and studied those photographs. The grandfather clock, I learned from the caption, was a rare Bavarian specimen, renowned for its particularly loud chime.

I shook my head and directed my attention to the photo of Great Uncle Oscar’s gun collection. Every member of that household knew the whereabouts of the display case, and thanks to the annual house tours, so did everyone in Clarence.

“But look.” I pointed as something else struck me—the gun case sat right next to the doors leading to the patio. “Easy access to the outside,” I said, and the cats and I were flipping to the chapter on the library, home of the Hemingway bookcase and the bullet-storage desk, when we heard Wilson’s truck in the driveway.

“Whatcha looking at,” he asked as he stepped inside.

“Sesame.” I tapped the photo in question. “I’m still wondering if there’s a secret to opening Sesame and getting behind that bookcase.”

He grinned. “And I’m still wondering about your sanity. What’s for dinner?”

“Didn’t Pierpont feed you?” I asked as we took the three steps to the kitchen. “He’s usually such a gracious host.”

“No time.” Wilson rifled around in the freezer, found a package of his fantastic homemade lasagna, and set it in the microwave. “I take it you ate your usual salad?”

I shrugged. “I didn’t eat at all.”

“Not even rabbit food?”

“I feel guilty eating when—”

He shook his head and pulled out two plates and two forks. “Your starving won’t help Karen, Jessie.”

I shrugged again and found a bottle of Korbel in the fridge. “Why are you so late?” I asked as I poured. “I thought you’d beat me here.”

He would have, but right after the media packed up and departed, Coco Rigby had “waltzed in” with Mallory Fleet at her heel. “Ms. Fleet refused to go back to her own apartment,” Wilson said.

“Because she’s no dummy,” I said. “She must realize Karen’s kidnapping and Wayne’s murder are related, and she’s scared. ”

“Yep.” Wilson hit another minute on the microwave and surprised me and the cats by flailing his hands in the air. “My Mallory Fleet impression,” he told us. “‘I know I sound like a kid, Mr. P, but I’m scared!’” He kept waving. “‘I’m sorry Mr. P, but no one’s heard from Karen in days. I’m sorry, Mr. P, but Karen could be—”’

“Don’t say it!”

He put his arms down and informed me it had taken the combined efforts of himself, Al, Pierpont, Coco, and the Witherspoons to calm her down.

“She has a right be scared,” I said.

“And there’s plenty of room at the inn,” Wilson agreed. “Abigail put her in a room next to one of the maids.”

“Probably Vicki,” I said. “She and Mallory are friends.”

He looked up from serving our dinner. “You know that how? You’re right, by the way.”

“I am always right.”

“Says the woman who believes in secret passageways behind the Steinbeck bookcase.”

“Hemingway,” I corrected, and as we sat down at the table, I asked if Caesar Newland had moved into the mansion also.

The answer was a decided no, even though Wilson, Al, and Piers had all wandered out to the employee apartments to invite him. “’I’ve never slept in the big house, and I don’t intend to start now!’” Wilson banged his fist on the table. “My Caesar Newland impression.”

I chuckled, but he put down his fork and frowned.

“Is something troubling you, Dearheart?”

“You. What the hell were you doing inviting this guy to our roof?”

“You did give him permission, Wilson?”

More frowning. “I couldn’t very well say no, could I? Tell the guy flat out he can’t visit you because he might kidnap you or kill you?”

I winked at Snowflake. “It’s a go.”

“Oh, for the love of—. You do remember what happened last time you were on the roof with a murderer?”

“Oh, please. We don’t know Caesar’s the murderer. ”

“Do you ever listen to yourself? Last time I found you dangling from your fingernails over the ledge.”

For the record, it had been my toenails. But why quibble?

“I’ll give you my permission on one condition,” he said.

For the record, I hadn’t asked permission, but I again chose not to quibble, and listened all cooperative-like as my husband the cop insisted I have someone else up there with me.

“Other than Snowflake.” He glanced down. “No offense,” he told her, “but you weren’t much of a bodyguard the last time she needed you.”

Snowflake meowed in protest while I considered other bodyguard possibilities. Candy would be at Tate’s, and Carter would also be working. “Therefore, it will have to be Peter Harrison,” I said.

“Oh, for the love of—” Wilson took a deep breath. “He’s as old as Caesar.”

“But he wants to help,” I insisted. “And he’ll be an excellent witness if Caesar really does try to toss me overboard.”

Wilson blinked twice. “Nope,” he said. “You definitely don’t listen to yourself.”

I smirked and got up to find more champagne.

“I know I’ll regret asking this, but why all the interest in Caesar?”

“His love life.” I refilled our glasses and listened politely to Wilson’s usual complaint that I always assume a love-life angle.

“This have anything to do with your lunch date today?” he asked, and I almost dropped the bottle.

“Lunch date?” I squeaked.

“With Mrs. Marachini.” He reached up and tugged the sleeve of my blouse. “Nice touch, Darlin.’ Love the polka dots.”

An annoying fact regarding Captain Wilson Rye—nothing slips past him. So yes, he had recognized Belinda Marachini at restaurant. And no, they’ve never met. But he reminded me that anyone who knows Candy Poppe, knows about her best customer, the polka dot bra lady.

“And I’m not blind,” he added. “I saw Candy’s outfit.”

“We took Belinda Marachini to lunch in honor of her birthday,” I said.

“No. You took her to lunch because she’s related to Piers.”

I shrugged. “Either way, it was very enlightening. Mrs. Marachini point blank implied that once upon a time Caesar and Pierpont’s mother had an affair.”

“Point blank implied?”

“Pierpont’s father called them soil mates. Do you get it?”

A groan indicated he did. He waited to catch my eye. “How did it go with Amanda and Ian?”

I jumped. “You know about that, too?” I asked, but before the question even escaped my lips, I knew the answer. Wilson had put two and two together when he recognized Mrs. Marachini at the Juniper Seed Bistro.

“I know about the Rigby-Marachini-Fister family connection,” he said. “And I know you.”“So you knew I was planning to visit my ex when we were talking under the Cupid this afternoon.” I got up to do the dishes. “That’s why you told me to be careful.”

“Safety first,” he mumbled and handed me the plates.

“I can handle Ian,” I said, and Wilson actually agreed that if anyone can handle my lowdown, no-good, conniving, cheating, and altogether despicable ex-husband and his equally no-good wife, it’s me.

I thanked him for the vote of confidence, and as we got ready for bed, reported what I had learned from Pierpont’s Aunt Belinda and cousin Amanda.

“They think he’s naïve,” I said. But as we climbed up the narrow stairs to our loft and crawled—literally crawled—into bed, I also insisted Belinda Marachini was proud of her nephew. “She praised him for protecting Coco.

“How about Amanda?”

“She is not so fond of Piers. ”

“Amanda’s not fond of anyone,” Wilson reminded me, and I suggested we add extreme jealousy to her list of charms. He leaned over and caught my eye in the dark. “Jealous of who?”

“Whom,” I said. “How about everyone? Amanda claims Piers throws his money at Karen, at his staff, at his servants. Like I said, she’s jealous.”

Wilson asked how jealous, but my answer was not jealous enough to kidnap or kill anyone. “She’s simply isn’t smart enough to pull off a major crime,” I said. “And much as I dislike her, she’s not violent.”

“Think again,” Wilson told me. “You remember the bridal shower that got out of hand a few years back?”

I gasped and mumbled a four-letter word.

“Yep, you remember.”

The bridal shower we were so busy recollecting involved several members of Mrs. Marachini’s extended family. Which meant it also involved Pierpont Rigby’s family, and Amanda Fister’s. Things had indeed gotten out of hand when the bride-to-be unwrapped a set of heirloom wine glasses. A dispute over who had the right to give that gift, and who had the right to receive it, had ensued. The stemware was broken, push came to shove, literally, and the police were called out to restore order.

Ludicrous, yes, but keep in mind the Fisters were involved.

“As I recall, no one was seriously injured in the kerfluffle,” I said.

“Luckily,” Wilson said. “But that kerfuffle proves the Rigby-Marachini-Fister clan isn’t immune to violence.”

I braced myself and asked if Piers had been there. “One assumes you checked the police records this afternoon?”

No, but Russell Densmore had. Evidently Piers had not attended the bridal shower from Hell. “But Coco was there,” Wilson told me, “and Piers used his money and influence to keep the story out of the news.”

Which explained why I hadn’t found anything about the incident during my own research into the Rigbys. “Piers is protective,” I said. I stared at the low ceiling and thought about it. “He certainly handled Jimmy Beak well. Carter and I both noticed that.”

Wilson skipped a beat. “Did you just say Carter? As in Carter O’Connell?”

“We watched the press conference together. He’s moved into our building.”

“With Candy?” Wilson sat up and hit his head on the ceiling. “That’s their big surprise?”

“Close.” I explained the new living arrangements, and he lay back down.

“Sounds like they’re being cautious before diving into marriage, Jessie. Sounds wise to me.”

I shrugged noncommittally and mentioned Carter’s theory. “He has some bright idea that Wayne Stasson was in on the kidnapping.”

“It is a bright idea.”

“You mean, you agree?” I related my own assumption—that Wayne was a good guy who had gotten himself killed when he discovered the kidnapper. “Anytime I’ve been in danger, it was because I identified the bad guy.”

“Don’t remind me.”

“So the dreaded Carter is actually right about this? Wayne was a bad guy?”

“We think so,” Wilson said. “Stasson got killed because of a disagreement between the kidnappers.”

“About the ransom, must be.”

“That, or he might have argued against kill—”

“Don’t say it!” I said.

He hugged me tight. “Jessie,” he said quietly. “You know I’m hoping for the best, but you need to prepare yourself.”