Monday morning, Shelly was waiting with Carol and Maggie as I came down the hill for our morning walk.
Boot whined with excitement, her furry behind and stub of a tail wriggling with joy. It wasn’t that he was so fond of Shelly, but she had his good buddy, Buster the chocolate lab, with her. I clamped my jaw to keep down a grin, but decided not to fight it. Joy, hope…I think everything I was feeling showed in my face, because all three women burst out laughing.
“Gee. Ellie,” Maggie choked, “tell us how you really feel.”
I checked myself enough not to reach out and hug Shelly. She must have been feeling the same thing, because she clasped her hands behind her.
“Did you really think,” she said, with a trace of her old mischief, “I was going to just walk away from what happened on Saturday? I mean, seriously? I bet the Lake Abrams Association thinks twice before letting you use the clubhouse again.”
We fell into our old pace. “I know. I have a bad enough reputation around here. I bet that Mary Rose has already started a petition to keep me out of all public buildings.”
“She’s probably more upset that she wasn’t invited in the first place,” Maggie said, running in tiny circles around the rest of us. It wasn’t just that she was younger than the rest of us; this was her natural frenzied energy level.
“Go on,” Carol urged, “tell us.”
So I did, as we walked up and down familiar hills, past houses that I’d seen every day for the past almost twenty years. But they looked different, sharper, brighter. Shelly was back walking next to me, and however small a step that was in rebuilding our friendship, I would gladly take it.
“So this Enza woman,” Shelly said at last. “She seems like a real character.”
“She is,” I said. We were coming up to the clubhouse. The entrance was blocked with sawhorses and yellow crime scene tape. A lone police car was parked up on the grass by the porch. We stood and stared for a few minutes, but there was no movement, so we went on, following the path around the lake.
“I like, her,” I said. “Enza. We…clicked.”
“She certainly seemed to click with all the men,” Carol murmured.
Maggie laughed. “Well, she can’t help it that she’s built like Jessica Rabbit.”
“She did a great job with the party,” Carol said. “Except for the dead body, of course.”
“I won’t mention that when I give my review on Yelp,” I said.
Shelly elbowed me gently. “But what’s the real scoop?” she asked. “I mean, with that poor Connie. What does Sam say?”
I shrugged. “Sam is not involved. At all. But the killer was probably either someone from The Manor, or someone who knew Connie in her old life. Whoever it was, Connie must have known something…”
“What?” Maggie asked.
“This all lies in Connie’s past,” I said, half to myself. I hadn’t really been thinking about the murder. I’d spent yesterday with Ted and Cal. We’d gone into New York City, walking around, talking and eating before the two of them headed out to Newark Airport for the flight back to Chicago. When I’d gotten home, I had been too tired to think about anything but a good night’s sleep.
“Well, just Google Dominick,” Maggie suggested.
“I will,” I said. I watched as Boot dug furiously under a fallen log. “But, there’s something else…” I tugged on the leash. “It will come to me.”
We finished our walk without further murder talk. There was plenty else to gossip about, with the Garden Club gearing up for it’s yearly election, and a clearly bloody battle between Mary Rose Reed, reigning do-gooder in Mt. Abrams, and Lynn Fahey, a younger upstart champing to take the lead.
I headed back to the house with two major objectives—finding out everything I could about Dominick Tolino, and not immediately texting Shelly asking her to stop by for a drink when she got back from work. Baby steps there.
I headed upstairs to my office to start looking around on my computer for anything about Dominick. There was nothing. For a man easily in his seventies, he apparently had no past. No work history, no involvement in civil or social organizations. His name did not appear in any high school yearbooks, except for a 1976 yearbook from a middle school in Sacramento, California. Obviously, not the same Dominick Tolino.
I had real work to do, so I put on my editor’s hat and buckled down. But Dominick was like a tiny, drip, drip, drip in my ear.
Maybe I needed to visit Mom. You know, just to make sure she was feeling okay.
The mood at The Fairview Manor was subdued. I arrived just after lunch, and there was none of the usual chatter and laughter. I found Mom quickly, in her familiar post-luncheon huddle in the back living room, sitting with Peggy. As I approached, I felt a familiar pang. Would she know me?
She did, and her face lit up. “Ellie, I’m so glad you’re here. Did you hear? Poor Connie. She died. Isn’t that just awful?”
I sat beside her and reached for her hand. “Yes, Mom, I did hear. I’m so sorry.”
She leaned in and dropped her voice to a whisper. “Dominick.”
“Oh?” I looked into her eyes. They were clear and focused, but I had learned not to put too much faith in that. “What about Dominick?”
“The police questioned him for a long time. It’s not his real name, you know. He’s here under false pretenses.”
“Well, Mom, there’s really nothing illegal about changing your name. But what did the police have to say? Do you know? After all, he was sitting with you all the whole time. He has the same alibi as the rest of you.”
Peggy pulled her chair in closer. “That’s the thing, Ellie. He took a phone call right after we moved into that other room. He got up and left. He was gone for a while. At the same time that Connie was gone.”
“Oh?” I stared at her, but my mind was back at the clubhouse on Saturday, when I saw Dominick pacing back and forth in the faded, grand foyer, talking on his phone. And Connie, walking by, tottering on her outrageous shoes.
Peggy nudged me back to the present. “Roberta is devastated. I think she really cares for him, and he’s been lying to her this whole time.”
I looked around the room. The devastated Roberta was sitting alone, by the window, reading a magazine. “I’ll be right back,” I told them.
I crossed over to Roberta and made a noise. She looked up, and in a second her face softened. “Ellie? Hello.”
“Hi, Roberta. Do you mind if I sit down?”
She nodded, and I sat on the ottoman across from her. “Listen, are you okay? I know that, well, on Saturday—”
“Yes, dear, I’m fine. Thank you for being so concerned. It was such a lovely party, too.” She set her magazine down in her lap and brushed a hair off her cheek. “The police were very polite. Your mother’s little, well, fantasy was cleared up right away. Dominick was…” She dropped her eyes and her fingers played with the magazine pages. “Apparently Dom is not who he says he is. Which is a disappointment. He’s leaving. In fact, he’s out right now, looking at another facility.”
“I’m sorry.”
She flashed a sad smile. “Don’t be. It’s not your fault he…has a past.”
I stood. “Well, I’ll see you later, Roberta.” I walked quickly back to Mom, my brain racing. Dominick was gone. Was his room unlocked?
I crouched down in front of my mother. “Hey, Mom, could you do me a favor?”
She frowned. “Of course, dear. You look very serious. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. But let me take you up to your room, please? And I’ll ask you on the way.”
She stood, and so did Peggy.
“I’ll come with you,” Peggy said. “I’m ready for my nap.”
It was a little slow going up the stairs. There was a small elevator, but Peggy insisted on following us up, the thump of her cane loud on the wooden staircase. As we got to the second floor landing, I looked around, and realized that my plan was probably going to fall flat.
The Fairview Manor was originally a great mansion, and the whole second floor was a warren of high-ceilinged bedrooms with small half baths built into odd corners. But there had been a new wing attached just after Mom had moved in. If Dominick’s room was one of the newer ones, I’d have a much harder time finding it, and getting in might be impossible. The older rooms could be locked by residents, but usually weren’t. The newer suites had much better security.
“Mom, um, do you happen to know where Dominick’s room is?”
My mother looked confused, but Peggy smiled knowingly.
“I know. In fact, I’ll take you. Leona, go on off, honey. Ellie and I will be there in a second.”
My mother nodded and headed down the hallway. Peggy jerked her head in the opposite direction, and I followed her down the back hall.
Peggy whispered into my ear. “I’ll keep watch.”
I grinned. “Peggy, I wouldn’t have thought you’d be so daring.”
We stopped in front of a tall doorway, with the number 6 on it, and tacked beneath the number, a simple card that read D. Tolino. I turned the knob, and Dominick’s door opened.
It was a very masculine room, with a double bed covered in a dark, plaid bedspread, a few leather chairs, and a large-screen television. I headed for the desk, right beside the bed. The drawers held papers, receipts, and recent bills, all with the name of Dominick Tolino. No gun, no old FBI wanted posters, nothing to indicate a past filled with crime and regret.
His dresser drawers held socks, underwear, and polo shirts in every color imaginable. I looked under the bed. I looked under the dresser.
Finally, I opened the closet.
He was something of a clotheshorse, with at least a dozen beautifully cut suits and crisply laundered white dress shirts. He had several pair of obviously Italian-made shoes, and a Burberry raincoat. On the top shelf of the closet were hatboxes. In the first hatbox was a black fedora, very Godfather-esque. In the second was a newsboy cap, brown tweed. In the third lay small revolver and a box of bullets.
I stared, pulled my phone from my pocket, and took a picture. I put the hatbox away, closed the closet door, and took a last look around the room It didn’t look disturbed at all. I went back into the hallway.
Peggy thumped her way back to my mother’s room. “Anything?”
“Nope,” I lied. “Not a thing.”
“Shoot,” Peggy said. “And we were all so sure he was some sort of retired gangster.”
We were walking past the stairs, heading for Mom’s room, when Dominick appeared. He stopped at the top of the stairs and dipped his head in greeting.
“Dominick,” I said, somewhat breathlessly. “Hello. Did everything go okay on Saturday? I’m so sorry about what happened.”
He held up a hand. “My dear Ellie, please. It was a wonderful party and a tribute to your mother. The tragic business with poor Connie… and your mother’s insistence that I, well…a misunderstanding. Everything has been straightened out.”
“Yes. Good.” I smiled at him. He smiled back, then an odd look flickered across his face.
“Where were you, may I ask?” His voice was perfectly polite, but his eyes had turned cold. “Isn’t your mother’s room that way?” He nodded his head in the direction we were going, but certainly not the direction we had just come from.
I opened my mouth, found nothing of use to say, and closed it.
Peggy thumped her cane. “She was helping me.” The words were a bit abrupt, but did the job.
“Peggy,” Dominick said, “you know you can always ask me for assistance.”
Peggy thumped her cane again. “Thanks. Next time I will.” She wobbled past the stairs toward my mother’s room, and I followed gratefully.
My mom looked up as we entered. She frowned, staring hard at my face.
“You’re new here, aren’t you?” she asked. “Are you here to take me home?”
Peggy turned me around, and pushed me gently back out of the room. “I’ll sit with her,” she whispered to me, and shut the door
I drove to the police station.
I’d been a frequent visitor, so I no longer needed to be escorted past the lobby. I waved to a few familiar faces, looking around. I spotted John Monroe, standing at a desk, leaning over to look at something on a computer screen. As I approached, he looked up and smiled.
“Ellie, hi. Sam isn’t around right now,” he said.
“That’s okay,” I said. “You’re the one I want to talk to.”
The person at the desk was Miranda Beaumont. She looked up at me and, surprisingly, did not seem overjoyed to see me. “Can I be of help?” she asked.
“Yes, as a matter of fact,” I said. “I know you interviewed Dominick Tolino, and even though he was out of sight during the time Connie was killed, I guess you gave him a pass. But he really does have a gun in his room at Fairview Manor.”
She and John exchanged a look. John cleared his throat.
“And you know this how?” he asked.
“Well…” What could I say? “He didn’t lock his door.”
John shook his head and ran his fingers through his hair. “Ellie, you can’t go breaking into people’s rooms.”
“It was unlocked.” I found my phone, pulled up the photo of the gun and showed it to him. “And Dominick Tolino is not his real name.”
“We know that,” Miranda said. “Of course we know that.”
“Do you know his real name?” I asked.
“Yes, Ellie, but we really can’t share that with you.” John looked apologetic. “You know that, right?”
I glanced around and leaned in. “Is he, like, in the system?” I asked.
John chuckled. “Ellie, I know you’re close to this case, but really, you need to go home and stop that imagination of yours from running wild, okay?”
I looked hard at Miranda. “Enza and I broke open this case for you,” I told her.
She rolled her eyes. “Ms. Rocca, you may think that, but believe me, we would have somehow managed without you.”
“But—”
“Listen, Ellie, this is turning out to be way more complicated than we first thought. You need to back away and stay away. Go home,” John said. “I won’t tell Sam you were here.”
I turned and marched out, fuming. I knew that John was doing me a favor in not telling Sam about my visit, but I couldn’t help but feel frustrated. As I sat in my car, trying to figure out what to do next, I got a ping on my phone. A text from Enza.
Whatcha doin? If not busy can you stop by?
I texted back.
On my way
The offices of Luxe were on a quiet side street in Morristown in an old-fashioned row house. I hadn’t been there before. I parked on the street and crossed a pretty brick courtyard to a set of tall, narrow doors, painted the same blue as the Luxe logo on the sign in the front window. I knocked once and opened the door.
The wide, bright hallway smelled like apple and spice. To the right was a large room with a long table and several comfortable-looking chairs.
Enza came in from the back, grabbed my arm, and steered me farther back into the house.
Her office was an absolute mess, stacks of papers and binders on every horizontal surface. She moved a pile of folders from a chair.
“Sit. You will not believe what I found.”
I pulled out my phone. “Me too,” I said, and showed her the picture of the gun.
“Is that Nicky-boy’s?” she asked. “Figures. Look at this.
She turned her laptop toward me. There, filling the screen, was an old newspaper front page. The headline was about the arrest of noted Las Vegas crime figure, Nicholas Molinaro. The face on the page was a younger Dominick Tolino.
“How on earth did you find this?” I asked.
She laughed, a deep, throaty sound. “Technology is amazing. I Googled Nick and organized crime.”
“So, he really is a mafia guy?” I asked.
She nodded. “Yep. But get this. He turned state’s evidence. Then, he completely dropped out of sight. I’m betting he went into the Witness Protection Program.”
We stared at the screen together.
“How long ago was that?” I asked.
“Twenty-three years,” Enza answered.
“And all this time he’s been, what?”
“He could have been anywhere. Doing anything. And he finally decided to retire in the same place as your mom.” She shut her laptop. “So now what?”
“First of all, Dominick did not spend all his time sitting with the in crowd after the party. He took a phone call, left the group, and was gone for a while. I saw him myself, in the foyer on the phone. At the same time Connie wandered by.”
“So he saw her and followed her, killed her, then slipped back to be with everyone else?”
“Maybe.”
She shook her head. “No. It was raining.”
I looked at her. “Enza, he could have killed her in the rain.”
“I know, but if he’d slipped out the back and come around to the front again, he would have been muddy. His shoes, there would have been tracks…”
“Good point. Okay, so maybe he’s out. I just spoke to John and Miranda,” I told her. “Obviously, they knew about the alias. I assume they knew who he really was. They let him go. And he’s leaving The Manor, finding a new place to live.”
“So, the police don’t think he killed her?” Enza asked.
I shook me head. “I don’t think so. John said this case was more complicated.”
Enza sat, chewing the lipstick off her lower lip. She opened up the laptop again and typed.
I sat back and looked around her office. File cabinets were against one wall, and a pale pink curtain covered the single window.
“Is this someone’s house?” I asked, looking around.
She nodded, looking at the screen and typing again. “Yep. I live on the top two floors. We made the basement over into a commercial kitchen for Phyllis, so she does all the cooking on site. It saves us a bundle.”
“What’s she cooking now?” I asked. My stomach rumbled lightly. I was hungry and whatever was baking downstairs smelled amazing.
“We have a retirement thing tonight,” Enza said. “Apple crisp. Holy moly beans, would you look at this?”
She turned the laptop toward me again, and I read.
Another front-page article. The police in Nutley, New Jersey, were looking into the strangulation of a middle-aged woman, found behind her closed dress shop. One of her earrings had been ripped out of her ear.
“When was this?” I asked
“Six years ago. Let me look some more. I’ll just Google murder missing earring—”
She did. We spent the next forty minutes reading about eight other women, all found strangled, in five different but neighboring New Jersey counties. The oldest case dated back to 1963. They all had one missing earring.
She printed out all the articles, and we passed them back and forth, reading. My stomach rumbled again.
“Honey, you hungry? Why didn’t you say something?” She gathered up the papers. “We can read these downstairs.” She turned off her computer and checked her image in a small mirror hanging on the wall. She fluffed her hair, reapplied lipstick, and brushed a fleck of something off her shoulder before she left her desk.
I followed her. Downstairs was a massive cavern of stainless steel and bright lights. Phyllis was hovering over aluminum pans filled with food, and when she saw us, she grinned.
“Just in time! I made so much this time that I actually have a little extra,” she said.
She reached and took two white plates off an open shelf and spooned a concoction of chicken, peppers, and mushrooms onto each.
“Here. You both look hungry.” Then she turned and went back to work.
Enza and I stood at the end of the long worktable and ate and read. The chicken was delicious, but I felt increasingly sick as I read the articles.
“So,” Enza said at last. “A serial killer?”
“It looks like it. But the killings are spread so far apart, time wise, that they probably didn’t find the connection until recently. But where does Dominick fit in? He was in Vegas during most of this, no?”
Enza went to a large walk-in fridge, came out with two bottles of water, handed me one, and drank. Her lipstick left a bright red ring on the clear plastic. “Yeah, he was. In fact, he was born and spent most of his time on the West Coast. Until twenty-some years ago.”
“And the murders started way before that. So, it’s not him?”
“I can’t see a connection, can you?”
“Maybe we need to find out if Connie spent any time in Las Vegas,” I said. “You didn’t know her, but I sorta did. Being a Vegas showgirl in her younger days is not that far-fetched an idea.”
Enza was twisting and untwisting the cap on her water bottle. “Here’s the thing. If he knew her from his Vegas days, and she knew something about him, why wait until your mom’s party?”
“It’s looking more and more like he’s not the guy,” I said. “So, who?”
She finished her water and shook her head. “We need more information. Listen, I got this thing tonight, and a friggin’ teen makeup party tomorrow afternoon, but we’re quiet for the rest of the week. Maybe we can have a drink or something and try to sort this out?”
I nodded, and we gathered up all the printouts. She gave them to me to keep, and I headed back to Mt. Abrams.
Tessa had become a cheerleader, which meant she took the late bus home every afternoon. It gave me an extra hour and a half alone, and I found it useful at first. Editing required focus, and just knowing she was in the house was enough of a distraction that my workday ended when she came home, whether I wanted it to or not. But lately I’d find myself distracted in another way, wondering about what she was doing, wondering about what Caitlyn was going to do with the rest of her life, wondering what kind of future Sam and I had together.
Just wondering in general. Every afternoon.
I either needed more work or a better life plan.
Returning from the office of Luxe, I found myself wondering even more. Was Dominick a killer? A serial killer? Who commuted between Las Vegas and New Jersey? Or was he totally innocent except for being a former gangster now in hiding?
I called Sam and left a message, inviting him for dinner. By the time he called back, Tessa and I were almost done with our meatloaf, but he mentioned how he hadn’t eaten all day, so I kept things warm until he finally showed, tired and grumpy and hungry. We sat out on the porch as he ate. It was a bit too cool for my taste, but Sam loved cold weather, so I huddled under an old quilt, sipped hot tea, and watched him eat.
When he was finally done, he took a deep, happy breath and looked out at the lake.
“I love this,” he said. “Watching the sun set on the water. It’s so peaceful.”
I sipped and nodded, trying to judge when would be the best time to start asking questions.
Sam, however, knew me too well by now. “What?” he asked.
“I went by the station today,” I began.
“Oh? And I assume John and Miranda were not very forthcoming with information?”
I made a noise. It may have been a snort. “They weren’t even forthcoming with the weather. But…listen, Sam, is there anything going around about, maybe, oh, I don’t know…a serial killer?”
He threw back his head and laughed. “Oh, Ellie, what kind of snooping have you been up to?”
“Well, it’s wasn’t just me,” I said. “Enza and I were talking. Actually, I went over to her office.”
“I don’t think that you and Enza are a very safe combination.” He looked sideways at me. “What did you find out?”
“That women have been strangled and their earrings have been missing since the sixties. We think there’s a serial killer at work. But since Dominick was out west when the killings started, and him being in the Witness Protection Program and all—“
“What?” he practically yelped. I think I’d actually surprised him. “He’s what?”
“Well, we found a really old article, and his name was different, of course, but he’d turned state’s evidence. So we figured the feds took him.”
“Is that what you figured?”
“Yes. So, unless Connie knew him from Vegas, and he just happened to kill her the exact same way those other women were murdered, he’s not the killer. And then, there’s the mud.”
“Mud?”
“Yeah. If Dominick killed Connie, went out the back exit, walked around to the front of the house and gone back in, he would have had mud all over his shoes. And maybe even have tracked it in.”
“Very astute.”
“Enza worked that out. So we’ve ruled him out.” I frowned as I heard the words leave my mouth. “At least, I think that’s what we decided. Do you know if Connie was a Vegas showgirl when she was younger? Or maybe even a hooker?”
He laughed again, softer this time, shaking his head. “Ellie, I can say, with certainty, that Connie was never in Las Vegas. Not even on vacation. We did find out that much. Dominick is not a suspect. And he has a license for that gun.” He looked at me sternly, but his lips twitched. “You know, the one you found when you illegally entered his room?”
“John is a rat.”
“John is my friend and coworker.”
“The door was unlocked.”
“I’m sure.”
“So…is there another suspect?”
He grinned. “Yes, as a matter of fact. John and Miranda are very interested in one of the guests. And if you ask me any more questions, I may get violent.”
I grinned back. “Yeah. Right.”
He put his arm around my shoulder, and we sat in silence until Boot suddenly raised her head and whined. She got up, her butt waggling, and she started her happy bark.
I looked down the street.
Shelly was walking toward us in the fading light.
She looked nervous as she came up the walk. Boot hurled herself at Shelly’s feet, and the tension cracked a bit as Shelly bent down to scratch Boot’s ears. I sat up so suddenly that the quilt slipped off my shoulders, and I felt the sudden chill of the spring night air.
“I hope I’m not interrupting?” she asked as she came up on to the porch.
Sam stood. “Hello, Shelly. Would you like me to go inside?”
She shook her head and crossed her arms against her chest. “No, Sam. In fact, I’m glad you’re here.” She cleared her throat. “Have you found out anything about what happened to that poor woman?”
Sam sat back down slowly. “As a matter of fact, Ellie and I were just, ah, discussing a few of the finer points.”
She leaned forward. “And?”
“And Ellie needs to mind her own business,” Sam said calmly.
Shelly flashed a smile. “Come on, Sam. This was her mother’s birthday. Right here, in Mt. Abrams. Do you really think she’s going to just sit back and let someone else figure this out?”
Sam sighed dramatically. “Why do you defend her? She is an editor of mysteries. She’d not a real detective. You do know that, right?”
“I’m right here,” I said loudly, and both Shelly and Sam laughed.
“I’ll fill you in tomorrow morning,” I promised Shelly.
She tightened her lips as she nodded several times. “I just spoke to James,” she said.
My heart jumped into my throat. James Fergus, the man she had fallen in love with, left her husband for, and was probably going to lose her sons over, had been on the run since he had killed Beth Riley weeks before.
I glanced at Sam. He hadn’t moved.
“Go on,” he said.
“He’s in Tennessee. Staying with the son of his college roommate. He wants to come in. I told him you’d help.” She was looking at Sam, and in the fading light I could see the tears glittering in her eyes. “Will you help him? Please?”
He stood slowly, crossed the porch, and took her in his arms. She began to cry, big, gulping, ugly sounds, and through my own tears, I could see her fingers gripping the back of his shirt.
Boot tried to crawl into my lap, and I put my forehead against her warm, furry neck. I heard steps, looked up, and Sam and Shelly were walking into the house. I wiped my face, kissed the top of Boot’s head, and followed them inside.