Suspicion of Betrayal (32 page)

Gail stepped on the bottom rail and leaned out as far as she dared, and the wind whipped the hem of her shirt and tossed her hair. The clouds that towered over the eastern horizon reflected orange and pink from the west.

She felt Harry's hand on the back of her shirt, holding on. "I'm sure gonna miss this view," he said.

At the house on Clematis Street, Anthony was in the study downstairs working. Gail had used it as a storeroom, but when Anthony moved in, he had turned it into a small office, pushing the boxes against one wall, adding shelves and a desk.

The sky past the window was gray, and he had turned on the lamp. The papers on the desk were not pleadings in a criminal case but financial statements, most likely another project for his grandfather.

She bent down to kiss him. "Did you eat already?"

"No, I was waiting for you and Karen." He turned toward her. "Your mission of mercy went well? How is your client?"

"Not good. We'll talk about it later. I'm starving, aren't you?"

At the door Karen said, "Mom, I forgot to bring Missy inside, and I called her, and she won't come."

"She will. Call her again."

From the desk Anthony smiled at her. "Hi, Karen. How was your day?"

"Fine." She looked back at Gail. "What if she's lost?"

"She's not lost. Cats like to explore. Put some food out, she'll come home." Gail turned Karen toward the door. "Why don't you set the table? We'll be right there." When Karen's running footsteps had faded— she rarely walked—Gail held out her hand toward Anthony. "Dinner is served."

"In a minute. Close the door."

Smiling, she clicked it shut and went over to him. Anthony put a hand on her waist and tugged twice at the belt loop of her slacks. "And how was your day— aside from the Sweet case?"

Gail could sense something but didn't know what it was. "I didn't really learn anything new from the police. I took them the list. And they showed me the other photograph of Karen." His tie was loose, and Gail untied it. "I'm going to talk to her tonight. She needs to know—not everything, but enough."

"Yes. She should know. Nobody likes to be in the dark." Anthony pulled his tie out of his collar and folded it. "So what else happened? Anything of interest?" He raised his eyes.

"Not really. Why?"

He put his tie on the desk. "I asked Hector Mesa to go by Karen's school to see if he noticed anyone with a camera. Today he saw you with Dave. Could you tell me about that?"

Stunned into silence for a moment, Gail finally said, "So Hector was looking for someone with a camera. I don't believe that. Did you ask him to follow me?"

"I asked him to go by Karen's school." Anthony's words were like sharp pebbles, tossed one after the other. "I suggested that it would be a good idea to watch for anyone suspicious, and to make sure Karen was all right, and for the past three days Hector has been there. Today he saw Dave and you, together, and I would like to know, if you don't mind, what you were doing."

"Why didn't you ask me that when I came in?" Her cheeks burned. "Oh, let's see if Gail tells me on her own. I mean, if she doesn't tell me herself, then she is obviously guilty. Guilty of
something."

His head turned to follow her across the room. With his back to the light, his face was in shadow.

"And what did Hector say? I can imagine how he embellished it. What did he say, Anthony? I would like to know."

Anthony's palm lifted from the desk. "That he had his arms around you. That he kissed you."

"Too bad Hector didn't have a directional microphone. He could have heard Dave telling me that he dropped the custody case. It was emotional, and I'm not going to apologize." Gail looked steadily at Anthony. She would not tell him the rest of it. The loan. How Dave had begged for her help.

Anthony reached for her. "Forgive me." He put his head on her stomach.
"Discúlpame, cielo.
I was going crazy sitting here, waiting."

"You have to stop this." Gail wound Anthony's hair around her finger, then stroked his temple. A few silvery strands glistened in the rich brown. "I love you. Nobody else."

They both heard the scream, then the footsteps coming nearer. They looked toward the door, which flew open. Karen hurtled across the room, her mouth open in a high-pitched wail of terror.

Gail caught her and stumbled backward.

"No! Mommy, no! Mommy mommy mommy—" Karen was hanging off Gail's arms, jumping up and down at the same time. "Maaaaaaaaaa—" Her legs went out from under her, and she fell to the floor, still clinging.

"Karen! Karen! Oh, my God!"

Kneeling, Anthony pulled her around, touching her quickly. "Is she hurt? I don't see anything."

"Karen! What happened? Sweetie, please!"

"M-M-Missy is killed! She's dead!"

"Dead?"
Gail looked at Anthony.

"Where?
Dime, mamita.
Where is she?"

Still the awful keening went on, punctuated by ragged gasps for breath.

Gail wiped her sweaty bangs off her face. "Karen, tell us. Maybe she's all right."

"She's not, she's not."

"Where is she?" Gail rocked her. "Where, baby?"

"The—the swings."

Anthony held her shoulders. "Karen, listen to me. Is anyone out there? Did you see anyone?"

"No." She gulped in a breath. Her eyes opened, reddened and swollen.

He looked at Gail, then stood up.

With her arm around Karen, Gail followed Anthony through the house. The kitchen door was open, and a flashlight lay on the floor, where Karen must have dropped it. She had been out looking for her kitten.

He picked up the flashlight and flipped a switch on the wall. Light flooded the terrace, illuminating the metal railing down the steps, then gradually fading to darkness. The tubular frame of the swing set was barely visible.

Holding Karen tightly, Gail stood inside the screen door, watching Anthony's white shirt as he walked quickly toward the dim outline of the swings. Gail pushed open the door a few inches. "Shhh, Karen. We're not going out." Karen had stopped crying, but stood with her arms wrapped around Gail's waist, her face pressed against her shoulder.

Anthony was following the pool of light along the stepping stones, and where they ended came a quick flare of green. The light moved over the grass for a few yards before reaching the swing set. It swept over the ground under the three seats, found nothing, then climbed the frame, moving across the top bar, then quickly backing up.

There was a rope thrown over the bar between two of the swings. The circle of light slid down the rope and stopped. Anthony's hand appeared in the light, turning the rope, and a shape at the bottom moved with it. His hand jerked back, and the thing spun slowly. There was a dim flash of white, then black, then white . . . The beam suddenly flew out into the yard, swerving wildly before once again appearing on the grass to light Anthony's way back to the house.

In those few seconds Gail had seen what Karen must have seen—the limp body of a small cat suspended by its rear legs, and the hideous pink of severed flesh. Its head was gone. She pulled Karen away from the door.

As Anthony came in, she could see the revulsion on his face. He blew out a breath, composing himself, then came over to speak to Karen. He crouched beside her.

"Karen. Listen to me. Missy is dead. I don't know who did that to her or why. Someone very sick. A coward, maybe someone doing this for fun. There are people like that in the world, but he won't hurt you. He won't hurt you or your mother, and I promise you, he won't come here again. Don't worry. Okay? Karen?"

Her eyes came open. "Yes."

"Good. The police will come here and talk to you, so you help them as much as you can. All right?"

"Okay."

He kissed her as tears continued to stream down her face.

When he stood up, he said quietly to Gail, "Take her upstairs. ITI call the police. And I want to call my family's doctor to see about her, if that's all right with you."

Gail nodded. "Thank you."

Upstairs, she laid Karen in the big bed in the master bedroom and curled up beside her, murmuring softly and stroking her face. She told her that everything was going to be all right, even though she knew it could get even worse.

SEVENTEEN

The doctor who came that night gave Karen something to help her sleep. He took a look at Gail and prescribed the same for her. The next morning, Anthony suggested that they move to his grandparents' house for a few days. It was nearby, it was familiar, and he had already spoken with Ernesto and Digna, who would welcome them. The swing set would be removed and new sod laid so that when they moved back, no trace would remain.

Seeing the wisdom of this, Gail asked Irene to take Karen for the rest of the day, and she and Anthony moved what clothes and personal items they needed to the house on Malagueña Avenue. Gail felt unsettled, uprooted, but believed this would pass as soon as they were home again and Karen had recovered.

She returned to work on Friday, and just after ten o'clock Dave came to pick up his money.

Gail had found time yesterday to call the attorney hired by Marriott to handle the deal. Jeff Barlow remembered her, but hadn't known she was Metzger's former wife. Small world, he had said. Coming into work early, Gail drew up an agreement for Dave to sign and faxed the draft to Barlow for his approval. He made a joke about wishing his ex-wife was so generous, then told Gail that after the final papers were signed at two o'clock on Monday, he would disburse a check to Gail A. Connor, P.A., in the amount of $125,000.

Lynn and Miriam came in to witness Dave's signature and went out again. Gail had told them nothing of this transaction.

She took her desk-size checkbook out of her credenza and wrote out a check to David Metzger, the top cheek in a row of three, and added the notation OLD ISLAND CLUB. She signed it, tore it neatly out of the book, and slid it across the desk.

Dave looked at it for a while before picking it up. "I've had Karen so much on my mind, this doesn't seem that important anymore." He folded it and put it into his wallet. "Have the police come up with anything since we talked?"

She had called him that same night, not wanting him to hear about it on the news. TV reporters, alerted by God-only-knew-what telepathy, had descended on the house with their video cameras. The details were compelling: a quiet neighborhood in the Grove, a devastated child, a decapitated kitten, the missing head. Cameras panned over the street, the house, then focused on the door. There were shots of the empty swing set until Anthony ordered them out of the yard. He requested the Miami Police not to mention the other incidents, and so far they had complied.

Miriam and Lynn had filtered calls to the office, many from friends. Others had been pranks. One elderly voice offered to pray for Karen, and another accused her of Satan worship. Still another suggested a
santero
to cleanse the property of evil spirits.

Gail told Dave, "The police are going to follow up with a couple of people. The kid across the street, which should endear me to his parents, and a handyman who was fixing the air conditioner. His name is Charlie Jenkins. His background is a little spotty, but I don't think he would have killed a pet at the same house where he'd just been working. That wouldn't be smart."

"Sickos don't have to be smart," Dave pointed out. "Listen, I've been thinking. What about taking Karen to my folks' place for the rest of the summer?"

His folks' place was a condominium in Delray Beach, fifty miles up the coast. Gail said she thought that this was an overreaction. "Karen is perfectly safe with the Pedrosas."

"For how long? You plan to go back to your house, don't you? She's not safe here, Gail, not in Miami. Mom and Dad would love to have her. You know she loves them, and they don't see her as much since we got divorced. There's a summer camp down the street and kids in the neighborhood. The building has a pool and a rec room."

"Anthony's going to hire a security guard. There is no way Bozo can get close."

"Bozo. How about . . . Dark Angel of Death?" Dave got up, too nervous to sit. "You don't want to let her go. You want to decide what happens. It's the same damn crap all over again."

"That's not true!" Gail followed him across the office. "Bozo—whoever—he could get to her easier in a small town."

"Not if he didn't know where she was!"

Gail opened her mouth, then said, "I'd be sick with worry."

Dave looked at her, then reached out and hooked an arm around her neck. "I know. I don't want to send her away, either, but it's not like she's going to Alaska. You can get there in an hour. We could drive together."

She laughed a little. "I don't think so." She let herself lean against Dave for a moment, then said, "Let's wait. We'll see what happens."

"Wait? Wait till he does the same thing to her that he—"

"Don't!" Gail turned away. She took a breath. "I try not to think about that. The only reason I don't dream about it is that Ernesto Pedrosa's doctor has very kindly given me some sweetdreams potion. Otherwise, I would probably go out of my mind."

Dave put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed gently. "We'll wait, then. Not too long, okay?"

She nodded.

He went over to her desk for his copy of the agreement, which Gail had put into an envelope. "Thank you for this," he said. "I told Karen that we'd go to every one of the Old Island Clubs as they open. She asked me if I was going to be rich." Dave smiled. "I said, Princess, your daddy is already rich if he has you. But you and me, we're going to have ourselves a whole lot of fun."

Gail smiled back at him. "I'm happy I could help. Honestly."

"You should have believed in me a long time ago." He kissed her quickly on the lips before she could pull away. "See you on Monday, okay? I'll call you right after the closing and bring you the check myself." He saluted with the envelope and opened the door to her office.

Gail walked him out. In a good mood, he paused to say hello to Miriam, whom he had not seen in a year, and to smile at Lynn, warning her not to let Gail work her too hard.