Clubbed to Death (15 page)

Helen knew valuable information was hidden in that file folder. She had to find it. She read and reread each page until the words blurred.

Then, in “spouse information,” she found it: Winderstine was a dull corporate type, but he’d married an heiress. Sonny Hamptin Winderstine wouldn’t inherit major money until Daddy died, but in the meantime, he’d given her three Early American paintings by Jared Poole.

Sonny had loaned them to the club for its Art of the Americas exhibit last September. The paintings were valued at between five and six hundred thousand dollars each. The exhibit was not open to the public or covered in the newspapers. Club members didn’t want their art exposed to the risk of theft. The club was a safe place to show off their possessions.

More than a million and a half dollars’ worth of art was in a starter mansion at Light house Point. The Winderstines spent one month each year in Paris. The date varied. Sonny Winderstine had sent a note on thick cream Crane’s stationery to customer care, asking that any club correspondence be forwarded to the Paris address for the month of February.

That information was definitely worth money to the right people—or the wrong ones. The Winderstines would be out of the way for a whole month. Helen was pretty sure they didn’t have live-in help. Most houses in that neighborhood weren’t big enough. The property would be unguarded, except maybe for a burglar alarm—and any decent burglar could get around one of those.

Gotcha! Helen thought.

She surveyed Brenda’s ice-white office and those silly pink slip-covered golf clubs leaning against the wall. After tomorrow, this room would be empty. Blythe St. Ives would have to find herself another golf partner.

Helen checked her watch. Yikes! It was five forty-five. She had to finish up and clock out by six or security would be on her doorstep.

Her office phone had stopped ringing, but the message light was on.

Helen knew who it was. Mrs. Buchmann wanted a guest pass. She always wanted one right before closing. Helen checked the message and there she was. “I don’t know why I can’t get anyone in this office,” Mrs. B whined.

Helen typed up Mrs. Buchmann’s guest pass and saw she was running low on the right forms. She rummaged in the supply cabinet for more guest passes, but they were gone from their usual spot. Damn Brenda. She must have moved them during her last crazed cleaning.

Well, the terror cleanings would come to an end, too.

Helen uploaded the computer files, then closed the office curtains and clocked out at precisely six. She turned off the lights, shut the office door and waved good night to Julio, the weekend valet parker.

She was halfway to her car when she wondered if she’d locked the office door. She thought she did. She could picture herself turning the key in the lock. But was that a memory of another night, or did she lock the door this time? She knew she’d torment herself if she didn’t go back and check.

She ran past the splashing fountains and velvety green lawns of the Superior Club. Even when she was in a hurry, she was struck by its beauty. If only it didn’t have such ugly members.

Julio was at his valet stand, a fit coffee-skinned man who ran to retrieve members’ cars as if it were an Olympic competition.

“Back so soon?” Julio asked. She liked his soft island accent.

“Couldn’t stay away,” Helen said. “I’m checking to see if I locked the door.”

“Of course you did,” Julio said. “You are not careless. But go put your mind at ease.”

Helen jiggled the door handle. The office was definitely locked.

“Was I not right?” Julio said, when she walked past him again.

“Yes,” Helen said and waved good night again. On the walk to the car, she saw a fat round raccoon washing its food in a marble fountain.

Even the animals here lived a superior life, Helen thought.

Her life in customer care was about to improve. Brenda, the woman who delighted in disrupting and tormenting the staff, would be gone.

Helen couldn’t wait to spring her surprise tomorrow. They would be free of Brenda at last. Helen would be a hero.

She steered the rumbling Toad homeward, singing, “Freedom!

Freedom!” all the way up I-95. She did a little dance on the sidewalk at the Coronado. Thumbs greeted her at the door and she gave him an ear scratch.

“How about a can of tuna, old buddy?” she asked. “You should celebrate, too.”

Phil, bless him, had made the bed and washed the coffee cups. He left a note propped on the pillow, next to her teddy bear, Chocolate:

“Out by the pool with Margery, Peggy and Fat Bastard. Come join us when you get in.”

She changed into the new white shorts and flirty sandals she bought as a present to herself when she got this job. It was time to celebrate her victory with her friends. Later, she and Phil could have a private celebration back here.

She was still smiling when she reached the pool. Margery, Phil, Peggy and Pete were stretched out on chaise lounges. Damn, her man looked good. Peggy was pale and weary. Pete was nuzzling her neck protectively. Margery looked like a grape Popsicle in her purple clam diggers. She was surrounded by her usual cloud of smoke.

“What got into you?” Margery said.

“I’m about to get rid of half my problems at the Superior Club.”

Helen kissed Phil, poured herself a glass of wine, pulled over another chaise, and told them she’d found the missing Winderstine file—and the information inside was explosive.

“Isn’t that stuff in the computer?” Margery said.

“I checked. There were only brief notes on the drunken incident at the bar and the sixty-day past-due notice,” Helen said. “There was also a comment about the change of address during February. But I wouldn’t have understood what it meant unless I’d seen that information about Sonny’s art collection in the file folder.

“That was the crucial part: There’s expensive—and relatively unguarded—art in the Winderstine home. That’s the kind of information Rob would buy.

“Rob really needed someone combing the files for full documentation. Those paper files have incredibly damaging information: whose lover is banned from the club for selling drugs, which members started drunken fights in the bar, whose children destroyed club property.

“I’ve seen letters of reprimand and revocation of privileges. There are copies of court orders when ex-boyfriends stalk club members—or in one sad case, ran off with a lover’s jewelry. I’ve seen death certificates, divorce decrees and child custody agreements.”

“Don’t you think someone might want to know that this Winderstine person got behind paying his bills?” Peggy asked.

“It was only eight hundred dollars,” Helen said.

“It would take me more than a year to pay off a credit card debt that big,” Peggy said.

“Me, too,” Helen said. “But that’s pocket change for the club members. They often forget to pay their bills when they switch banks or go on a long trip. That’s what Mr. Winderstine said happened to him.”

“What did you do with the file?” Margery asked.

“I left it where I found it, hidden under Brenda’s desk pad. Kitty needs to see it in place. I’ll show it to her first thing tomorrow. She’ll go ballistic. You can’t believe what we’ve had to listen to. Solange has been demanding that file for days and Brenda’s been hanging on to it all that time. It will be the end of one rotten assistant manager.”

“How are you going to explain you were snooping through Brenda’s desk?” Margery asked.

“I wasn’t snooping,” Helen said. “I’ll say I was looking for the missing guest pass forms. Brenda rearranged the supply cabinet again and I couldn’t find them. I still haven’t.”

Phil had been silent until now. He’d listened carefully while Helen told her story and Margery and Peggy peppered her with questions.

When he finally spoke, he said exactly what Helen thought he would.

“Helen, aren’t you moving a little fast here? You found that file hidden on Brenda’s desk, but she might have another reason for it to be there. She’s devious. She doesn’t think like you. She could even have a legitimate reason. Maybe you’d better wait until you know more. You have to be careful before you attack an ambitious boss.”

“The only other reason she would have that file would be to make trouble for our department—and she did that already with her memo to Mr. Ironton,” Helen said. “She has to be Rob’s source, Phil. She’s been selling him the information in the files. She kept this file because she was waiting for his call. Except he never called. That’s more proof Rob is dead. No wonder Brenda was so eager to report my fight with Rob to security. She has to find Rob to get her bribe money. Nailing me is a bonus.”

“Is she in debt?” Margery said.

“I know she’s had a lot of expensive cosmetic surgery that’s not covered by our medical insurance. She has to need money,” Helen said. “I got her, fair and square. I can’t prove to Solange that she’s been selling club secrets, but this will be good enough for Marcella. And no matter what, once Solange finds out that file was hidden under Brenda’s desk pad, she’ll be fired for sure. Solange has been looking for an excuse for a long time.”

“Well, if you’re really sure,” Phil said. He didn’t sound sure. But Helen was.

“You know, without Brenda stirring up trouble,” she said, “I think I could handle the nasty members. I could learn to like this job.

“Tomorrow, Brenda will be gone for good. My whole life will be different. I’m right. You’ll see.”

Helen raised her wineglass in a triumphant salute to herself.

She was absolutely right. Her life would be different. It would be a whole lot worse.

CHAPTER 14

Monday morning, the sun was shining. The birds were singing. And so was Helen. Today she would nail Brenda.

Helen leaped out of bed with a few choruses of “Freedom! Freedom! Freeeeeeedom!” Too bad those were the only words she knew. After she exhausted the song’s artistic possibilities, she switched to Meat Loaf ’s “Paradise by the Dashboard Light.” Helen knew all the words to that song.

By the time she’d reached I-95, Helen was wailing Steppenwolf ’s “Born to Be Wild.” The words, as mangled by Helen, were a good accompaniment to the Toad on the road, especially the line, “I like smoke and thunder.” The Toad was smoking and thundering. Also rattling and shaking.

Helen was supposed to open the customer care office at eight this morning. She wanted to get there early for half an hour of off- the-clock snooping, but a small red Pontiac derailed that plan. It slid into a blue minivan near Ives Dairy Road and blocked three lanes of traffic.

Helen’s song died on her lips, replaced by cajoling curses. The Toad rumbled along at high speeds, but stalled in slow traffic. “Come on, you stupid car,” she said to the bucking, belching Toad. “Don’t die on me now. It’s not fair. I haven’t paid off the last repairs.”

She alternately pumped the gas and slammed on the brakes as the traffic slowed and stopped, slowed and stopped. She prayed the worthless rust bucket wouldn’t die and block the last open lane.

Finally, the highway opened up and Helen zigzagged in and out of traffic, trying to make up for lost time. She wasn’t late after all. Helen waved to the guard at the employee gate. Seven forty-five. Still time to do a second quick search of the office.

The path to customer care was like her own private nature walk.

Long-legged white egrets waded delicately in the reflecting pool. Fat black ducks with red beaks paddled in the golf course pond. Mourning doves cooed softly in the shrubbery. There was the comfortable drone of a mower on a distant lawn.

Helen pulled out her key, but the office wasn’t locked. Odd. She’d checked that door last night. Double-checked. Helen knew she’d locked it. She remembered her conversation with Julio, the weekend valet.

Maybe Cameron came in early to work off the time he’d spent on his condo closing.

Then she remembered. The golf course opened at seven. Brenda had a game with Blythe St. Ives. But that wasn’t until eleven, was it?

She wouldn’t come in this early. Did Brenda have to practice to lose those games with Blythe?

Helen hoped not. It would ruin her search plans.

Then she had a horrible thought: What if the missing file wasn’t on Brenda’s desk this morning? What if the proof against Brenda was gone? It would be just like the treacherous assistant manager to come in early and hide the Winderstine file somewhere else—or even put it back where it belonged.

Damn, Helen thought. I should have called Kitty at home last night and told her what I’d found. But no, I had to savor my triumph. I had to hold on to it like a miser. Now I’ve lost it.

The office door swung open at Helen’s touch. The lights were on.

Helen knew she’d turned them off yesterday.

“Hello?” she said.

Silence.

The curtains were still closed. Her co-workers’ desks were undisturbed. Cam wasn’t in yet.

“Hello?” Helen said again.

She looked in Solange’s office, then Kitty’s. Their offices had the heavy stillness of busy rooms before the day’s work began. Kitty still had Mr. Giles’s dying roses on her desk. One petal had fallen on her teddy bear.

Kitty and Solange weren’t in yet. It had to be Brenda. She’d come in early and discovered someone had searched her desk.

I’m a dead woman if she finds out it was me, Helen thought. She will, too. One look at the schedule and she’ll know I was here alone Sunday.

Helen checked Brenda’s office. Her desk seemed untouched, but there was a pile of clothes tossed on the floor. A white blouse and a black suit. She saw the Superior Club crest on the jacket: a customer care uniform. There was something else. A white hand.

No. That couldn’t be right.

Helen moved around the desk for a closer look. A half-naked Brenda lay on the floor behind the desk. She was wearing only a pink golf skirt. Her skinny stick arms were splayed. Her new breasts were obscenely perky. There was a bloody golf club next to her head and red arcs and spatters on the ice-white walls.

Brenda had been beaten to death with her own seven iron.

She wasn’t alone. Brenda was lying next to the philandering plastic surgeon. The hirsute Dr. Rodelle Dell was fully clothed in his golfing togs. Helen wouldn’t be caught dead in that yellow-and-green plaid.