The Death of an Ambitious Woman (10 page)

“By the time I joined the firm, the handwriting was on the wall. Dad’s friends and customers were dying off. Their sons, my generation, didn’t need a suburban brokerage office. Nobody had time for cigars on Saturday morning. And the widows—forget tying up their money in trusts. They were on the Internet wheeling and dealing on their own.” Holden paused, frowning slightly. He continued to focus on Ruth, not glancing at Moscone.

“Still, I’d worked with Dad long enough to understand what he had—autonomy, conviviality, convenience, an enviable quality of life, as we would say now. I wanted the same things for myself. But how to make it pay? I came up with a plan to sell a few of our sizable remaining family trusts on a mutual fund, run by me and using their initial investment as leverage to get the fund up and running.

“When Tracey arrived, I knew I could make my dream come true. She was the inside person I’d been looking for. She really knew her stocks. I made her an offer she couldn’t refuse, and the rest, as they say, is history.”

Ruth noted that Jack Holden’s history of the firm’s glory days was shaded differently from Ellie Berger’s. Ellie had placed Tracey Kendall at center stage in the rebirth of Fiske & Holden. For Jack, Tracey was a player in his master plan.

“What was Tracey like around the office?”

“I used to call her the Queen Bee, all the little drones buzzing around her. You won’t get an objective opinion about her from anybody in the place. Dad loved her, couldn’t be around her enough. One of the things I’m proudest of is that Dad lived to see our success.” Holden gestured to the wall behind him, which was covered with framed testimonials and articles. “The Hottest Couple in Funds,” one headline proclaimed over a photograph of a beaming Tracey and Jack.

“I provided my father with a place to go to work every day until he died three years ago at the age of eighty-six,” Holden continued. “After he passed away, I sold the little building downtown, and we moved up here. We were crammed in like sardines by then, and nobody walks to the office anymore. We needed the parking.”

“Did you see Mrs. Kendall’s accident?” Moscone asked, nodding toward the windows.

Holden’s eyes didn’t follow Moscone’s gaze. His only acknowledgment of the question was to stop talking, as though a noisy jet had passed overhead. The two men sat stony-faced for a few seconds.

“Detective Moscone wants to know if you saw the accident,” Ruth repeated, since Holden didn’t seem to see or hear Moscone.

“Me? No. I was here eating at my desk and reading the
Wall Street Journal
when siren after siren went by outside. Then most of my employees came running in here like lemmings.” He paused. “We didn’t know it was Tracey, of course. It’s too far away to see.” Holden continued to face Ruth.

Ruth asked, “Did Al Pace ever work on your car?” “No.” “Do you know him?”

Holden shrugged his large shoulders elaborately. “We all know him, so to speak. He’s in and out of the office all the time.”

“Can you think of any reason Al Pace would have for deliberately killing Tracey Kendall?”

Holden shrugged again. “No.” He hesitated a few seconds, then added, “The news reports implied Tracey had some sort of relationship with him.”

“Did she?”

“I don’t know. I was her business partner, not her baby-sitter.”

“So you think it’s possible?”

“I suppose anything is possible.”

“Was Tracey happily married?”

“That was my impression, but you never really know, do you?”

“What happens to the business if a partner dies?” Ruth asked. It wasn’t clear how long Holden would remain in this cooperative mood and she wanted to get right to it.

Holden cleared his throat. “Well, the partnership agreement states that should either Tracey or I die or become permanently disabled, the remaining partner selects a successor who must be approved by our clients, who are in reality limited partners.”

“Kevin Chun told us the limited partners can remove their funds if there’s a change in management.”

“I don’t see how that’s relevant, but it’s true.”

“I understand Stephen Kendall was here yesterday.”

Jack Holden smiled and scowled simultaneously. “Poor Ellie,” he said. “She’s well-meaning, but her judgment is less than desirable sometimes. Imagine letting Stephen Kendall walk off with whatever he wanted.”

“So, you don’t know what he walked off with?”

“That’s just it. I was in Boston, or it never would have happened. Nobody checked his boxes. Ellie thought it would be quote, rude, unquote. I tried to explain to Ellie that most of the materials in Tracey’s office belong to the partnership and are not personal effects in any sense. Ellie doesn’t know what’s what, and Kendall’s a goddamned artiste. I can’t imagine how he could make the distinction.”

“Have you looked through Mrs. Kendall’s office to discover what was taken?”

“Briefly. I really couldn’t say—clothes, photographs, her paintings, things like that. I don’t know for sure, and I won’t until I’ve really had a chance to look. Speaking about Tracey’s personal effects, do you people still have her briefcase?”

Moscone spoke up, a glutton for punishment. “It’s in the property room at the station.”

Holden didn’t even look his way. “But why?” he asked Ruth. “What do you need it for?”

“The briefcase was in the car at the time of the accident,” Ruth answered. “It may be evidence.”

“Evidence? What kind of evidence? How long will you keep it? There are things in there we need.”

“After we find Mr. Pace, we’ll determine whether it’s material.”

“Well, be sure to give it back to me and not Kendall.” Hold-en’s voice grew louder. “That’s Fiske & Holden property.”

The friendly, nostalgic Jack Holden was gone, the angry twin from yesterday back in his place. The telephone rang on the desk behind him and he turned to answer it.

On the phone, Holden’s voice was abrupt, “No, Ellie, you were right to interrupt. Hold on just a second. I’ll find out if I can take it.”

Ruth gestured for him to go ahead and take the call. Nothing more productive was going to happen with Jack Holden today, and nothing would be gained by antagonizing him. He would undoubtedly be on the phone to Baines as soon as they left. She rose and held out her hand. “That’s all for now, I think.We’ll be back.”

“Fine, fine, any time.” Holden waved toward the door. “You know the way.” He returned to his call.

Moscone fell into step with Ruth as they exited across the parking lot. “Well, that was pointless. What a jerk. And that smell!”

“I didn’t notice any smell.”

“Are you kidding? He smells like he sleeps at the bus station. And he never acknowledged me. Never made eye contact or answered my questions.”

“He figured I had the power in the room and he didn’t want to waste time with you. I’ve seen it before.” Though the last time she’d seen it, she hadn’t been the one in the power position. She’d been in Moscone’s shoes.

“Jerk,” Moscone reiterated.

“Pretty full of himself,” Ruth agreed.

“Full of himself and without any feelings for his partner of twelve years, recently deceased.”

“Maybe. He has a lot of responsibility, to the clients, the employees. He may just be trying to keep it all together.”

“Yeah, sure. He wouldn’t confirm the affair, either.”

“I don’t think Tracey was the type to make a confidant of anyone at work.”

Moscone turned around to face the ugly office building. “If anyone in there knows about Tracey Kendall and Al Pace, it’s Brenda O’Reilly. Receptionists know everything. We need to get her out of the office where Holden and Berger won’t be watching her and she’ll be more relaxed. I’m going to go back in and ask her to have lunch with me.”

“Lunch?” Ruth asked aloud to Moscone’s retreating back. “Do you really think that’s a good idea?”

Moscone emerged from the building a few minutes later. “She doesn’t want to be seen leaving with me. Drop me at the Suds ’n’ Spuds up on the corner. She’s meeting me there in ten minutes.”

Ruth dropped Moscone off as requested, then turned around and drove back down Willow Road toward the Fiske & Holden building. She was surprised Brenda had agreed to lunch so easily, though she guessed Moscone’s handsome face, lean body, and well-cut suit might have something to do with it.

A lone figure walked along the side of the road, tall and thin, his head hunched forward. Adam Bender, Fiske & Holden’s trader, returning from his daily pilgrimage to the Deli-Cater. Ruth pulled alongside him. Despite the warm spring weather, he wore both his suit jacket and a dark raincoat. He clutched his bag lunch in his hand. Ruth opened her window and stuck out her badge. “Adam Bender? I’d like to talk to you.”

“Here?” He pressed his glasses to his nose. She gestured to the Fiske & Holden parking lot. Adam Bender went to his car and waited, setting his lunch on its trunk. Ruth parked her car and got out.

“Sorry we missed you the other day.” Ruth offered her hand. “We’ve met everyone else at Fiske & Holden.” Bender returned the handshake mutely. Ruth continued, “You’re one of the people who used Al Pace’s services?”

“Yes. I had an appointment with him that day, the day Tracey, er…”

“Was your car actually serviced?”

“No. It was the oddest thing. On my way to lunch, I found my keys sitting next to Brenda O’Reilly’s on the trunk of her car.”

“What did you do then?”

“I put them in my pocket.”

“Both sets?”

Bender looked baffled. “No, just mine.”

“Did you tell Ms. O’Reilly that her keys were out in the parking lot in plain view?”

“Oh, I see what you mean. No. I must have forgotten by the time I got back.”

“What time did you find the keys?”

Bender cast his eyes heavenward, then pressed his glasses to his nose again. “Around twelve-thirty.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Bender,” Ruth went on, “but were you going to get lunch or returning at twelve-thirty? Ellie Berger told us you left at noon on the dot every day.”

“I normally do. I live in an uncontrollable universe. It goes up, it goes down, it’s a slow day, it’s a heavy day,” he said, evidently referring to the stock market. “There’s not one thing I can do about it. So I keep the rest of my life as regular as possible. Eat at the same time, same bedtime, regular exercise. I don’t like my routine to be thrown off.”

“But your routine was disturbed on the day Tracey Kendall died,” Ruth prompted.

“Yes. I got an e-mail from Tracey. She wanted to talk about a buy and asked me to wait.”

“Was that unusual?”

“Ellie already told you. I go to lunch at—”

“No, I meant were e-mails like that unusual?”

“Well, no. Generally, I prefer written communication. That’s how I’m used to working.”

“Eventually, you went to lunch.”

“Yes. I waited about twenty-five minutes. Then I went and found Brenda O’Reilly in the lunch room. She said Tracey had already left. So I left.”

“Was the e-mail from Tracey’s computer?”

Both of Adam Bender’s hands fidgeted toward his face, where they pushed back his glasses one more time. “Well,” he said, “you can’t tell if it’s from her machine.You only know it’s from her mailbox. Anybody could call up Tracey’s mailbox on any machine. If they knew her password.”

Moscone smelled Brenda O’Reilly before he saw her. A hint of “Obsession” wafted over the top of one of Suds ’n’ Spuds’ high-backed booths and then she came into view.

They made small talk through the ordering process. He realized she was excited, happy to be unshackled from the phone console. Lunch out was a rare treat for her. He watched her from across the booth as she chattered. She had clear, clean skin with an attractive sprinkle of freckles across the nose, dark brown hair, and blue-green eyes. It was an arresting combination.

Their waitress deposited lunch in front of them—a plate of greasy, cheesy potato skins topped with bacon and sour cream for her, a mineral water and undressed salad for him.

Brenda gave Moscone her best, professional receptionist smile. “So what do you want to know?” she asked.

Moscone hesitated for a moment, then returned her grin. “Well, Ms. O’Reilly—”

“Brenda.”

“Brenda, in my experience, receptionists, particularly receptionists like you who screen every incoming call, know more about what goes on in an office than anybody. Am I right?”

Brenda nodded. “You’re right.”

“That must be interesting.”

“I think so.”

“Brenda, I’m going to ask you questions about Tracey Kendall and Fiske & Holden. Please be completely frank. The important thing is finding out what happened to Mrs. Kendall, not protecting reputations. Are you with me?”

Brenda’s eyes widened. “Shoot.”

“You saw Al Pace in the parking lot on the day Mrs. Kendall died.”

“In the parking lot and in our offices. He was there.”

“Did you talk to him?”

“Of course. He’s scheduled to come by every month. There’s a sign-up sheet in our break room. I post the date he’s coming a couple of weeks in advance and the employees who want service leave their names. On the day Al’s scheduled to come in, the employees leave their keys with me. That way, they don’t have to worry about being interrupted during a meeting or conference call. When Al arrives, he picks up the keys and gets to work.”

“How did Al seem the day Tracey died?”

Brenda gazed at the faux Victorian lamp above the booth. “Nervous.”

“Nervous?”

“I’ve thought and thought about it.” Brenda squinted into the lamp’s light. “I keep worrying I’m imagining it, because Tracey died that day. But I’m not. He was nervous.”

“Did he say anything unusual?”

“No, but he was rushed. Jumpy.” She turned her palms upward. “Nervous.”

“Brenda, did you actually see Al Pace working on Mrs. Kendall’s car?”

“Not exactly. Al’s truck was in the first slot, the one marked ‘Visitor’. His truck blocked my view of Tracey’s car, which was in her usual slot next to it.”

“You have assigned parking spaces?”

“Well, no. But there are, were, only seven of us. We use the same spaces every day.You know, like you always sit at the same place at the dinner table when you go back to your parents’ house?” Moscone nodded to indicate he understood. “Anyway, I saw Al come out from between his truck and Tracey’s car wiping his hands.”

“So he might not have been under Tracey’s car. He could have been coming from his truck?”

“He could have been, but I don’t think so.”

Moscone groaned inwardly. McGrath was right. This case would be hell to prosecute. There was no evidence in what was left of the car and now no witness to place Pace under it. “You said he wasn’t scheduled to work on Tracey’s car. Whose car was he supposed to work on?”

“Mine,” Brenda answered, “and Adam Bender’s.”

“What was he doing for you?”

“Changing the oil.”

“Did he do it?”

Brenda shook her head. “I don’t think so. That day got so crazy, to tell the truth, I completely forgot about it. But when I left, my keys were sitting on my trunk. He hadn’t updated my oil sticker or put an invoice on my dash. So I assume he didn’t change it.”

“Where was your car?”

“At the far end of the lot. Last space facing the road.”

“How often did Mr. Pace service Mrs. Kendall’s car?”

“There were two cars, Tracey’s SUV and Stephen’s sports car. The Kendalls were pretty meticulous about oil changes, things like that. So, I’d say at least every other month for the two cars, one car every four months.”

Brenda applied herself to the congealing potato skins. Moscone gave her a moment to eat before he asked the next question. “Did you ever see any indication there were problems in Mrs. Kendall’s marriage?”

Brenda thought for a long time. “Detective—what should I call you?”

“Carl is fine.”

“Carl, Tracey wasn’t the type to tell you stuff like that. She’s the last person in the world who’d walk into the office and say, ‘You’ll never believe what the moron said last night.’ But I do remember one time when things must have been bad. Tracey was in the office and Stephen kept calling, which was odd by itself. He hardly ever calls. They always used e-mail for routine stuff and there was something peculiar in his voice. It was shaky. Each time I tried to put him through, Tracey dodged him. ‘Tell him I went to lunch.’ ‘Tell him I’m in a meeting.’ This went on for two days. Finally, she got really exasperated. ‘Tell him to go to hell!’ she said. Of course, I didn’t. I told him she was in the bathroom.”

Moscone asked, “Was this recent?”

“A while ago.” Brenda shook her head. “You get used to lying in this job. I don’t even think of it as lying anymore, more as acting, with me saying my lines in the great business drama that is Fiske & Holden.” She smiled and took a breath. “I see all kinds of stuff between people, but this thing between Tracey and her husband was a one-time thing. Tracey always took calls from home. In fact, I had orders to track her down whenever Stephen or Hannah called, because Tracey always wanted to know if something happened to Carson.”

“You know Hannah Whiteside?” It had never occurred to Moscone that she would.

“Sure. Hannah’s one of my phone buddies. I have lots of them, people that I’ve never seen, but talk to almost every day. If Hannah called and Tracey couldn’t take it right away, Hannah and I would chat.” Brenda put one hand over her eyes. “Let me guess. I’m pretty good at this. Wheat blond hair. Pretty face. Big boobs. Figure flaw: kind of a broad back.”

“Amazing.”

Brenda beamed.

“What did Hannah say to you during these conversations?”

“She was bored, stuck up there with just a kid and Tracey’s husband. She had a boyfriend, but she didn’t want Tracey to know. She complained he wasn’t around enough. Of course, you can ask her yourself.” Brenda looked concerned for the first time. “What does this have to do with Tracey’s car?”

“Nothing, just interested. This fight between Mr. and Mrs. Kendall, when was that?”

“I don’t know.” Brenda still looked worried. “Wintertime.”

“February?”

“Earlier. December, I think. I remember because Tracey had bandages on her leg. She had a terrible accident on the escalator at the mall while she was Christmas shopping. The fight with Stephen came right after.”

Moscone looked up sharply. “Mrs. Kendall had an earlier accident?”

Brenda nodded, missing his meaning. “Uh-huh. She was embarrassed about it. Her arms were full of parcels and she slipped. Her leg was chewed up pretty badly.”

Moscone made a mental note to look into the accident. If it were real, there would be insurance documents, a mall cop report, a safety report to the state. He looked at the remnants of the salad on his plate and then glanced at his watch.

Brenda noticed the watch-glancing. “Do we have time for dessert?” she asked. “I hardly ever get out. I always just put the phone on forward and scuttle into the break room. Ellie’s covering for me today. I want to stretch this out as long as possible.”

When the waitress returned to their table, Brenda ordered a gooey, chocolaty confection.
How in the world can she eat like that,
Moscone wondered,
and still keep that beautiful complexion?
He smiled at her. “Were Tracey Kendall and Al Pace having an affair?”

Brenda didn’t seem shocked or angered as Ellie Berger and Jane Parker had been. She narrowed her eyes as if thinking back through conversations or scenes that might change meaning if viewed with a different set of assumptions. “I never thought of an affair, though I know you asked Ellie and Jane about it,” she finally said. “I thought they were pals. He’d been ripped off when he bought his business. She was helping him out. He’d call her up sometimes, like when the bank harassed him, and ask her advice.” Brenda hesitated, trying to say something in just the right way. “I never thought of Tracey and Al as a couple, but something about Tracey was hidden. Not just that she was reserved, didn’t disclose personal details. It was like she had a secret.”

“Was she always like that?”

“To some degree, but I sensed it more recently.” Brenda sighed. “I do know one secret she had.”

“What was that?”

“She disappeared one time. I’m the only one who knows. She told the office she was on vacation, and she told home she was on a business trip. She called the office every day to check on her messages, saying what a great time she was having. She called home every night to say good night to Carson. At least that’s what Hannah told me. That’s how I figured it out. Hannah called to chat while Tracey was away and mentioned Tracey being on a business trip.”

“So she could have been off with a man?”

Brenda shrugged. “I guess.”

Moscone wasn’t all that excited by the information. It was hard to imagine what excuse Al Pace could have given for going off for a few days, and Karen Pace claimed he had come home every night, until now. “Was this around the time of Tracey’s fight with her husband?”

“No, later. Just after the holidays, early January.”

“Did Mrs. Kendall fight with anyone else recently, besides this thing with her husband?”

Brenda spooned the melting dessert onto her tongue and closed her eyes with pleasure. When she opened them, she said, “Oh yeah. Tracey had a doozey with that horrible Ms. Gleason.”

“Susan Gleason?”

“I guess so. She didn’t call often, but she was always all snotty. ‘Inform Mrs. Kendall that Ms. Gleason is on the line.’ Some of the people who have money in our fund are richer than God, but they don’t talk to me like that Gleason woman did. Anyway, this time she just said, ‘I don’t care what she’s doing, I need to speak to her right now!’ So Tracey left an important meeting and went into her office and there was lots of yelling.”

“Did you happen to hear what was said?”

“Not much, but Tracey’s voice was kind of loud. I remember she said, ‘Absolutely we can, legally,’ and ‘Susan this doesn’t have anything to do with the past. This is about the future.’ ”

“When was this?”

“Maybe late January?”

“Did they talk after that?”

“Several times, but no yelling.” Brenda scraped the last of the chocolate from the parfait glass.

“Did Fran Powell call the office often?” Moscone continued.

“Never heard of her.”

“She told us she was Tracey’s best friend.”

Brenda pushed the glass away. “Maybe. I couldn’t say she wasn’t, but Tracey wasn’t one to get personal calls at the office beyond Stephen and Hannah.”

Moscone thought back through their conversation. Had he asked her everything? He didn’t want to pull out his notebook, because it would spoil the illusion of an informal lunch, but he didn’t want to forget anything either. “Brenda,” he said, “here’s a challenge. Tell me something about Fiske & Holden that will truly surprise me.”

Brenda closed her eyes and squinted, concentrating. “Okay, I’ve been dying to tell someone, but you have to absolutely swear not to tell anyone else.”

“I swear.”

“Jane Parker is madly in love with Kevin Chun, and Kevin Chun is madly in love with Jane Parker, and neither one will do a single thing about it! He won’t ask her out because he’s too shy, and he doesn’t believe she likes him. She won’t make a move on him because she thinks its ‘inappropriate’ to be involved with someone you work with. Isn’t that stupid? His lack of courage and her silly scruples are standing in the way of their major happiness. So they sit in that back office. Some days you can cut the sexual tension with a knife.”

“Really?” Moscone didn’t see what this could remotely have to do with Tracey Kendall’s death, but as he thought about the time he and the chief had spent with Parker and Chun, Brenda’s revelation resonated. There had been something heated and tense in that room. Moscone laughed.

“Yeah, isn’t it funny?” Brenda O’Reilly stood to go. “Funny and sad.”