Tacked to Death (11 page)

Fourteen

Lunchtime: about time to locate one
Lucia Sorvino. Michaela was suddenly famous, but not with the kind
of fame that anyone cares to have. As she walked down the steps
into Sorvino's, all eyes fell on her. The women with their glasses
of white wine, rows of pearls across their necks, and fine designer
wear scowled at her. The men, on the other hand, seemed to be
looking at her with a sort of awe. She wanted to scream, "I didn't
kill him!" but decided that would garner even more attention, and
the last thing she wanted was any more of that. This was either the
ballsiest thing she'd ever done or one of the stupidest. But
dammit, she was innocent.

Sorvino's at the polo lounge had a
classic Italian feel, with crystal chandeliers, hunter green and
cream décor, and photos from a bygone era of Palm Springs and the
surrounding desert. It was kind of Frank Sinatra-ish, which fit,
since Frank liked to hang out thirty minutes away in Palm Springs
back in the Rat Pack days.

Michaela asked a busboy where Lucia
Sorvino might be. He told her in the office. She asked him to show
her the way. He did, also wearing that expression of awe.
Michaela's stomach clenched. The busboy tapped on the
door.

"Who's there?" a woman's voice
asked.

"Uh, Miss Sorvino, there is someone
here to see you."

"Yeah? Who?"

Michaela held a finger to her lips and
shook her head, then shooed the busboy away. His eyes grew wide, as
if she scared the hell out of him.

"Gino? Who is it?" Lucia demanded and
swung open the door. She gasped when she saw who stood on the other
side. Michaela quickly shoved her foot in the door and held her
hand out to prevent Lucia from shutting it. It didn't stop her from
trying, and they played push and shove for a few seconds until
Michaela's strength won out and she was able to open the door all
the way, storm inside the small office, and shut it behind
her.

"I'm gonna scream!" Lucia said. "You
better get out of here now, or I'll scream."

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
Michaela took a threatening step toward her. "You lied about me and
I want to know why."

"Get out! Get out!"

"Why did you tell the police that I was
sleeping with Sterling? That's a bald-faced lie."

"You killed Sterling. Everyone knows
you did it. You need to get outta here because my papa will come in
here and have a heart attack if he sees you."

Michaela took another step forward.
"Spare me the drama. Someone told you to say that. You're just a
stupid kid, and if I had to guess, I'd say you were sleeping with
Sterling and you don't want your papa to find out about it. What do
you think your brother would say? Or wait, maybe they already knew
and killed him themselves for tainting you! You know that I didn't
kill Sterling. What I want to know is why did you tell the police
that I was sleeping with him?"

"Get the hell out of here, you
screwed-up bitch!"

Michaela was getting right under the
girl's skin. She could see panic in her eyes and felt pretty sure
she was on the right track as far as something going on between her
and Sterling.

"I'm only curious as to what a
twenty-six-year-old hotshot polo player has in common with a what,
twenty-year-old chef's daughter? Wait, maybe Sterling started to
feel the same way and blew you off, so you killed him. Now you're
trying to cover your tracks by making up stories about me. Maybe
you're not as dumb as you look. You got into my office, you used my
mallet, and now you can tell everyone I was sleeping with him. I
think you need to start talking."

"Get out! I told you to get the hell
out of here! Papa! Mario!" she screamed.

"The cops may be fooled by your big
green eyes and crazy lies, but I'm no fool. And when your family
sees you for who you are…well, I think you've got yourself in some
hot water."

The door flew open and Pepe Sorvino
thundered into the office, nearly knocking Michaela over. "You get
outta here. We don't want you here."

"Thank you, Papa, she was harassing me.
She scared me."

"Harassing you? Oh my God. You are one
lying little—" Michaela blurted.

"Out!" Pepe screamed.

"Fine. I'll leave, but I am going to
find out why you're lying about me, Lucia. And if it's what I think
the reason is, your life will be turned upside down like you've
done to mine."

"Go!"

"I will find out what you're hiding."
Michaela turned on her heel, nearly running into Mario
Sorvino.

Mario followed Michaela to the front
door until she turned to him and said, "I'm leaving."

"Hey, between you and me, that prick
deserved what he got."

"What?"

"Yeah. Taber. Man was nothing but
trouble," Mario said.

"Really? And you knew him?" Her hands
shook.

"Who didn't know him? Hotshot dude,
come in here and never pay his tab. I wasn't surprised that someone
killed him." Mario crossed his arms. "I want to give you some
advice. You may want to be careful around my sister and my father.
They got hot tempers. I'm only letting you know."

"Mario!" Pepe approached the front
door.

He winked at her and retreated into the
restaurant. "Be careful, Michaela. It's that simple. Be
careful."

She got back into her truck feeling as
if the Sorvino family had more ties to Sterling Taber than just
Lucia Sorvino being his friend, and that Mario Sorvino was more
than making small talk with her. If she was right, Mario had subtly
threatened her with the "stay away from my father and sister" line.
And he'd already warned her about making threats toward his family.
She couldn't help wondering how Mario Sorvino tied into this and if
she was spot-on when she'd told Lucia that maybe her big brother
had done away with Sterling to protect her. He seemed the type to
do something like that. And how about running into him right after
finding Sterling dead on the office floor? He was on the kitchen
staff. He had had the opportunity.

Did he also have motive?

Fifteen

Why would Pepe’s son even come after
Michaela? What was his point? She would have to see what Joe might
find out about the Sorvinos' ties with Sterling, but right now she
had another stop to make. Her stomach sank as she parked her truck
next to the stalls at the polo fields. This was not a conversation
she wanted to have, but it was necessary. She had every intention
to fess up to reading the invoice that had caught her eye and
confront Robert Nightingale about it. This was her life she was
dealing with and there were some obvious issues between him and
Sterling.

She tapped on the office door, which
swung open almost immediately. To Michaela's surprise Paige,
Robert's sweet but eccentric wife, answered the door. Her eyes
looked red, as if she'd been crying. Michaela noticed that the back
of her hand had a smudge of black, likely from mascara that she'd
wiped off her tearstained face. Paige tried to smile, her brown
eyes taking Michaela in. She had cropped blonde hair, which framed
her round face. She was on the heavy side and tended to wear
drapey, flowy kinds of clothing. Today she had on a purple billowy
blouse and black pants.

"Oh, Michaela, hello. Did you come for
a lesson?"

Had Paige been the only one to not hear
that Michaela was a murder suspect? "No. I wanted to talk to
Robert. About Sterling."

"He's not here." She sniffled. "I don't
know where he is or when he'll be back. I don't know if he's coming
back." She started to cry. "Oh yes, Sterling. Oh dear, I'm sorry
that you're having so many troubles over his murder. Goodness knows
you would never do such a thing. It's just so horrible. An
outrage."

Michaela took a step back. Whoa, this
was unexpected. "I'm okay. I'm sure that this will all work out and
the police will get to the bottom of it."

"It's not that. It's not
you."

Now Michaela was really confused. "Oh,
okay. Um…"

"Oh no, I don't mean to sound
insensitive, but of course the police will exonerate you, it's not
that, it's…" She wiped her tears and sat down on the sofa.
"Nothing. Nothing at all. How selfish of me to carry on when you're
obviously having problems of your own. Forgive me."

"You don't need to apologize, Paige.
What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Nothing." Paige looked up at
her, the tears starting again.

"People don't cry over nothing."
Michaela reached into her purse and dug through it. She knew she
had tissues somewhere in her bag. She found a packet and handed one
to Paige.

The woman blew her nose. "Robert is
leaving me. Actually, he's left me."

"What?"

Paige shrugged. "I don't know. I really
don't know."

Michaela sat down next to her. "Do you
want to talk?" She didn't know Paige all that well, but she
couldn't leave her here like this.

Paige put her face in her hands. "I've
lost so much in the last few years. First Justin, and now this with
Robert, and of course Sterling."

"Sterling? You were close with him?"
Michaela now felt certain by the way Paige was talking that it had
been her who'd hurried away from the polo field grounds after
getting out of Sterling's car.

"Oh, yes. He was Justin's best
friend."

"Justin? I'm sorry, Paige; I don't know
what you're talking about."

"We don't talk about it much. Only
people in our small circle ever even whisper about it. I hear them
sometimes and see the looks on their faces. The ones that say they
feel sorry for me."

Michaela suddenly understood. Paige was
talking about her son, who'd been killed in a car accident. She'd
never known his name, but she'd heard about the tragedy.

Paige blew her nose. "Justin was our
son. I'm sure you know that he died five years ago in a
drunk-driving accident after a party. He'd had too much to drink
and hit a tree. He was twenty."

"Oh, I am so sorry. I had heard, but I
knew it wasn't something to ever discuss with you."

"I know, dear. It's kind of an unspoken
rule that no one talks about it, but it's not my rule. Robert won't
talk about it. People tiptoe around him all the time. I think he's
lost it. He left me a note this morning that said we were through
and he was leaving."

"And you don't know why?"

"I have an idea. It has to do with
Sterling." She started to cry again.

Michaela waited patiently for a few
seconds and then asked her, "What about Sterling?"

"Robert found out that I have been
giving him money."

She would have to be careful here.
Paige was giving Sterling money? Odd. From everything that she had
ascertained about the man, he appeared to have plenty of money of
his own and he was doing just fine with that, along with the money
he earned with his modeling gigs. "Um, I hate to pry, but why would
you give Sterling money?"

Paige smiled, her eyes reflecting
nothing but sadness. "I told you that Sterling had been Justin's
best friend. It was how Sterling started riding polo. Justin got
him into it. And yes, he does come from a wealthy family in Santa
Barbara, but they recently stopped providing him with money. Not
the kind of money he needed to live on, anyway. I think he'd gotten
himself into debt by overextending. He had been receiving twenty
thousand dollars a month from his family and then they cut that in
half. You can imagine how difficult that would be if you're used to
having more."

How much did he need? Ten thousand
dollars a month for a single guy sure sounded like plenty. "Why did
the family decide to do that? Do you know?"

Paige shook her head. "He wouldn't talk
about it. He said that it was too painful. All I know is that last
summer he went back home, then he returned, and within a few months
his family had sort of disowned him. And, because he was a link to
my son, I didn't want him to suffer."

"You became a mother to
him."

"Yes. He filled the gap in my heart
that was missing my son…and now they're both gone!"

"Robert didn't feel the same way about
Sterling as you did?" Michaela assumed this.

"No. He liked Sterling fine, but I
think he might've blamed him for Justin's death. They were at the
party together and Robert feels that Sterling should have stopped
him from driving home that night. But Sterling was with a date and
claims he didn't realize that Justin was intoxicated."

"Did Robert tell you that he blamed
Sterling?"

"No."

"Oh. So you were giving Sterling money?
I assume that Robert didn't know about it?"

"Not until Sterling told
him."

"He told him?"

"Yes. Sterling was not paying Robert
for the training and boarding bills here. I went to talk with him
about it. I explained that the money I'd been giving him was from
an insurance policy that we had on Justin and that he needed to use
the money to pay Robert, and for his rent and
education."