Hidden Riches (10 page)

“Yeah.” He wished violently for the cigarettes he’d left upstairs. “That’s it.”

D
ora had brandy. Jed drank coffee. Cop, she thought nastily. After all, they didn’t drink on duty—at least on TV. Wanting to ignore him as completely as he was ignoring her, she curled herself onto the couch and studied the cheerful lights of her Christmas tree.

She liked Jed’s pal, though. Lieutenant Brent Chapman, with his wrinkled slacks, stained tie and easy grin. He’d come in smelling of sausage and cinnamon, his heavy horn-rims magnifying mild brown eyes. His manner was so reassuring that Dora found herself making coffee and setting out cookies as though she were entertaining unexpected guests rather than being involved in a police investigation of shots fired.

Brent’s questions were slow and thoughtful and very nearly relaxing.

No, there was nothing missing as far as she could tell.

No, there was nothing in the files of any monetary value.

Yes, the shop had been crowded the past couple of weeks, but no, she couldn’t remember anyone acting suspicious or asking unusual questions.

Enemies? This brought on a quick laugh. No, not unless you counted Marjorie Bowers.

“Bowers?” Brent’s ears perked up. He kept his pencil hovering over his dog-eared notepad.

“We were both up for the lead in the school play. Junior year. It was a production of
West Side Story.
I creamed her in the auditions, so she started this rumor that I was pregnant.”

“I don’t really think—”

“With my reputation at stake, I had no choice,” Dora went on. “I ambushed her after school.” She flicked a glance over to Jed, who was busy frowning at the bull’s-head cheese dish on her breakfront.

“That’s very interesting. But I don’t think it applies here.”

“Well, she really hated me.” Dora picked up her snifter again, shrugged. “Then again, that was in Toledo. No, I’m wrong. Junior year must have been in Milwaukee. We moved around a lot in those days.”

Brent smiled. He’d taken a liking to Jed’s landlord. A great many people who’d been through a break-in and gunfire didn’t retain any sense of humor. “We’re looking for something a bit more recent.”

“Tell him about the bean counter,” Jed ordered.

“For heaven’s sake. Andrew wouldn’t—”

“Dawd,” Jed interrupted. “Andrew Dawd. He was Dora’s accountant until a couple of days ago. He put some moves on her, so she gave him a black eye and his walking papers.” He smiled nastily in Dora’s direction. “And kicked his ass.”

“I see.” Brent tucked his tongue in his cheek as he scribbled the name in his book. He would have liked to
have smiled, but the gleam in Dora’s eye warned him to keep a sober countenance. “Did he, ah, threaten any reprisals?”

“Certainly not. Give me a cigarette, Skimmerhorn.”

He lighted one for her. “Annoyed or stressed?” he asked when he offered it.

“You be the judge.” She snatched it from him, took a quick puff. “The most violent thing Andrew would have done was to go home and whine to his mother.”

“It wouldn’t hurt to talk with him,” Brent pointed out gently. “Where can we reach him?”

Dora shot Jed a look of intense dislike. “Dawd, Dawd and Goldstein, an accounting firm on Sixth and Market.”

Brent nodded and picked up one of the cookies she’d spread on a pretty fluted dish at his elbow. “Hell of a way to spend Christmas Eve, huh?”

“I did have other plans.” Dora drummed up a smile. “I’m sorry you had to leave your family.”

“Just part of the job. Great cookies.”

“Thanks. Why don’t I give you some to take home? You’ve got kids, don’t you?”

“Three.” In a knee-jerk reaction, Brent reached for his wallet to show off pictures. While Jed rolled his eyes and paced away, Dora rose to admire the children’s snapshots. There were two girls and a boy, all spit and polish for school pictures.

“The oldest girl looks like you,” Dora commented.

“Yeah, she does. That’s Carly. She’s ten.”

“I have a niece who just turned ten. Fifth grade.”

“Carly’s in the fifth, too. Over at Bester Elementary in Landsdowne.”

“Missy goes to Bester.” While Jed looked on, his partner and his landlord beamed at each other. “I bet they know each other.”

“That wouldn’t be Missy Bradshaw, would it? She has a younger brother named Richie, who’s a real . . .”

“Terror, yes, that’s right.”

“She’s been over to the house a dozen times. They only live a block over. Missy’s parents and my wife and I are in the same car pool.”

“Would you two like to be alone?” Jed asked.

They both spared Jed a pitying glance. “Tell me, Brent, is he always so crabby?”

“Pretty much.” He tucked his wallet away and rose. There were cookie crumbs dusting his shirt and finger smudges on his glasses. Dora found him charming. “But he was the best cop I ever worked with, so you can feel safe having him across the hall.”

“Thanks. I’m going to get you those cookies.” Pointedly ignoring Jed, she walked into the kitchen.

“Some landlord,” Brent commented, and wiggled his eyebrows.

“Get a grip. How soon will you have anything on the slugs you dug out of the plaster?”

“Jesus, Jed, it’s Christmas. Give the lab boys a few days. We’ll check out the prints, too, but that’s pretty much a waste of time.”

“If he’s pro enough to use a silencer, he’s pro enough to wear gloves.”

“You got it.”

“What do you figure—” Jed broke off when Dora walked back, carrying a paper plate covered with aluminum foil.

“Thanks, Miss Conroy.”

“Dora. You will let me know if you find out anything?”

“Count on it. You just relax. Jed’ll keep an eye on things.”

“Well.” She sent Jed a long, cool glance. “I can sleep easy now.”

“There you go. Merry Christmas.”

“I’ll walk you out.” Jed nodded to Dora. “I’ll be back.”

As they walked down the hall, Brent snuck another cookie from under the foil. “You’ve been here what, about a week?”

“Almost.”

“How’d you piss her off already?”

“It’s a gift. Look, why do you figure a pro would break into a junk shop and rifle a bunch of paperwork?”

“That’s the sixty-four-dollar question.” Brent walked through the rear door, sucking in his breath at the slap of wind. “There’s a lot of valuable stuff in there.”

“But he didn’t go for the valuable stuff, did he?”

“Hadn’t gotten around to it. You interrupted him.”

“He sees lights on upstairs, he cuts the phone wires. He whacks the security system. But he doesn’t go for the Daum Nancy.”

“The what?”

“Never mind,” Jed snapped, annoyed with himself. “He goes right for the files.”

“Because he’s looking for something.”

“Yeah.” Jed pulled out a cigarette. “But did he get it? And what would anyone look for in the files of a junk shop?”

“Receipts?” Brent offered as he opened his car door.

“Inventory lists, names, addresses.”

“You can take the boy off the force, but you can’t take the force out of the boy.”

“I take a personal interest when somebody shoots at me.”

“Can’t blame you for that. We miss you downtown, Captain.”

Something flickered in Jed’s eyes that might have been grief, then was quickly gone. “The city seems to be hobbling along without me.”

“Listen, Jed—”

“Save it.” He wasn’t in the mood for a lecture, or a pep talk, or a guilt trip. “Let me know what comes through.”

“You’ll be the first.” Brent climbed into the car, rolled down the window. “Oh, and watch your butt, pal. I believe that lady could kick it.”

Jed’s response was a snort. He headed back inside. He wanted to make certain Dora was locked up for the night before he went back downstairs for another look.

Just as an interested civilian, he told himself.

“They’ve cleared out,” he told her when he breezed through her open door. “You can count on Brent. He’s a good detail man.”

“Terrific. Sit down.”

“I’ve got stuff to do. Lock your door.”

“Sit down,” she repeated, and pointed to a chair. “I’m going to clean up that cut.”

“I can do it myself.”

“Don’t you know anything, Skimmerhorn? When you’re wounded defending a woman, she’s honor bound to whip out the antiseptic. If I was wearing a petticoat, I’d have to rip it into bandages.”

Jed skimmed one more look over the glitter of her jumpsuit. “What are you wearing under that?”

“Excellent muscle tone.” Because she was looking forward to it, Dora dragged him over to the chair. “Now you’re supposed to say, ‘Shucks, ma’am, it’s only a scratch.’ ”

“It is.” He smiled thinly. “But it could have been worse.”

“Undoubtedly.” With a whisper of silk, she knelt beside the chair and dabbed at the cut with one of the cotton balls she’d set out. “My sister would say you could have put out your eye. With Lea, everything’s a potential eye poker. She inherited our mother’s worry genes.” Dora soaked another cotton ball and said brightly, “This may sting a bit.”

As the shallow scratch erupted with fire, Jed snagged her wrist. “Goddamn it, what is that?”

“Alcohol.” She fluttered her lashes. “It’ll clean out any grit.”

“Right down to the bone,” Jed muttered.

“Don’t be a baby, Skimmerhorn. Hold still.”

He grimaced as she dabbed again. “You called me by my first name when you were clattering down the steps, screaming hysterically.”

“I never scream hysterically.”

“You did this time.” He grinned wickedly. “ ‘Jed! Jed! Oh, Jed!’ ”

Dora dropped the cotton ball into a shallow enamel bowl. “At the time I thought you were about to be murdered. Unfortunately, I was wrong.” She put a thumb to his chin to push his head to the side, examining the cut. “Do you want a Band-Aid?”

“No.” His eyes gleamed. “Aren’t you going to kiss it?”

“No.” She rose then, started to pick up the bowl, set it down again. “Listen, I’ve got to ask. I know what you’ll say. You’ll say not to worry, that it was just one of those freak things that happen. But I have to ask anyway. Do you think he’ll be back?”

Jed studied her face. There was a strain in her eyes she’d done a good job of hiding up until now. There was little he could, or would, do to alleviate it.

“I don’t know,” he said flatly.

“Great.” Dora closed her eyes, drew a deep breath. “I should have known better than to ask. If you can’t figure out what he was doing here in the first place, how can you tell if he’ll be back or not?”

“Something like that.” He could have lied, Jed told himself, uneasy that her cheeks were pale again. It wouldn’t have been so hard to offer a phony reassurance to give her a peaceful night. Her eyes, when she opened them, were very dark, very tired.

“Look.” He rose, and surprised them both by reaching out to tuck her hair behind her ear before snatching his hand back and stuffing it in his pocket. “Look,” he said again. “I don’t think you’ve got anything to worry about tonight. What you need to do is go to bed, tune out. Let the cops do their job.”

“Yeah.” It was on the tip of her tongue to ask him to stay, and only part of the reason was fear of being alone. She shook her head, rubbed her hands up and down her arms to warm them. “I’ll be out most of tomorrow—at my sister’s. I’ll leave you the number in case . . . just in case,” she finished.

“Fine. Lock up behind me. Okay?”

“You bet.” She had her hand on the knob when he stepped into the hall. “You too. Lock up, I mean.”

“Sure.” He waited until she’d closed the door, turned the bolts. His lips quirked when he heard the unmistakable sound of a chair scraping across the floor, the rattle of the knob as it was wedged under it. Good thinking, Conroy, he decided, then went down to take another look at the storeroom.

In a pretty Federal townhouse shaded by stately oaks, a well-to-do matron was enjoying a glass of sherry and a showing of Bing Crosby’s
White Christmas
on her big-screen TV.

At the sound of a quiet footstep behind her, Mrs. Lyle smiled and held up a hand. “Come watch, Muriel,” she invited, addressing her longtime housekeeper. “This is my favorite number.”

She didn’t cry out when the blow came. The delicate crystal shattered against the edge of the coffee table, splattering the Aubusson rug with blood-red sherry.

Somewhere through the haze of pain that left her paralyzed, she heard the crashing of glass and a furious male voice demanding over and over, “Where is the dog? Where is the fucking dog?”

Then she heard nothing at all.

It was midnight when DiCarlo rode the elevator up to his apartment in Manhattan. His arms were laden with boxes he’d copped from the back of a liquor store.

He’d been lucky to find the receipt for the stupid dog, he told himself, and wondered idly if the bullets he’d sprayed up the stairs of the antique shop had hit anything. Or anyone.

Not to worry, he thought. The gun was untraceable. And he was making progress.

He hefted the boxes more comfortably as he walked out of the elevator into the hallway. He had the bronze eagle,
the plaster Statue of Liberty, the china dog.

And a partridge in a pear tree, he thought, and chuckled to himself.

“So . . .” Dora snacked on a raw carrot while Lea checked the Christmas goose. “Jed goes racing out after the guy, waving this big gun while I stand there like your typical Hollywood heroine, with my hands clutched at my breasts. You got any dip for these veggies?”

“In the fridge. Thank God you weren’t hurt.” Harassed by the number of pots simmering on the stove, the sound of her children wreaking havoc in the family room and the very real fear that her mother would invade the kitchen at any moment, Lea shuddered. “I’ve been worried for years about your shop being burglarized. I’m the one who convinced you to put in that security system, remember?”

“A lot of good it did me, too.” Dora dunked a spear of broccoli into sour-cream-and-chive dip, then leaned on Lea’s cheery breakfast bar as she nibbled. “Jed said it was Mickey Mouse.”

“Well, really.” Lea paused in her stirring to be indignant. “John’s cousin Ned said it was state-of-the-art.”

“John’s cousin Ned is a jerk. Great dip.” She tried it with cauliflower. “Anyway, the cops came and did all this cop stuff—Dad would have loved the staging—and asked all these questions.” Dora had purposely left out the part about the bullets. It didn’t seem like Christmas conversation. “And it turns out that Jed’s ex-partner is a neighbor of yours.”