Blood Hollow

27

Cork found Jo in her office.

“Well?” he asked.

“I filed the motion. Everything goes public now.”

Cork sat down. “I just talked with Arne Soderberg. He as much as admitted the affair with Charlotte, but he insists he didn’t kill her.”

“Do you believe him?”

“It appears that he has an alibi. And, yeah, I guess I do believe him.”

Jo picked up a paper clip from her desk and turned it round and round between her fingers. “I’ve been thinking.”

“Don’t hurt yourself.”

He smiled; she didn’t.

“Thinking what?”

“I don’t like it, but I’m thinking maybe Arne isn’t the only Soderberg we should be looking at.”

Cork considered the implication and leaned forward, resting his arms on her desk. “Lyla?”

Jo shrugged. “She left the Lipinski party early. And if she knew about the affair, she had motive.”

“Marion Griswold said she dropped her off around midnight. I suppose there was enough time for her to drive to Valhalla before Charlotte was killed.”

In fiddling with the paper clip, Jo had bent it all out of shape. Cork saw that it now resembled a figure eight. Or the symbol for infinity.

“We should probably talk to Lyla. But…” She hesitated. “I don’t know. If she’s innocent, if she really didn’t know about the affair, it seems cruel to badger her.”

“A few questions judiciously phrased and we might be able to put everything to rest quickly.”

Jo looked up from the paper clip. “What does your gut tell you about this one?”

“That it will feel better after I’ve fed it a few answers.”

“The truth is, mine will, too.”

She tossed the paper clip into the wastebasket beside her desk.

When Cork pulled into the drive of the Soderberg home, he saw that Arne’s BMW wasn’t there, nor was Lyla’s PT Cruiser. But a little red Miata was. Tiffany was washing it. She wore jean shorts and a purple Viking football jersey. A bucket of sudsy water sat on the drive. The water hose snaked out from a spigot on the side of the house. The end was capped with a brass spray nozzle, closed at the moment. Tiffany bent over the car with a big yellow sponge in her hand and worked at lathering the hood. When she spotted Cork and Jo, she actually smiled. It was a better reception from her than Cork had experienced… ever.

“Nice,” he said. He put a hand on the sporty little car.

She beamed. “My graduation present.”

“Congratulations,” Jo said.

“Thanks.”

“Is your mom home?”

“No.”

“Any idea where we might find her?”

“She went to the gallery.” Her eyes drifted lovingly back to her Miata.

“It’s Wednesday,” Cork said. “The gallery’s closed.”

“I’m just telling you what she told me.”

“Thanks.” Cork started away, then turned back and asked casually, “Have you seen your father lately?”

“No. He’s probably at work.”

“Sure.”

After they got back into the Bronco, Jo took a long look at the young woman. “God, I feel so bad for her. She has no idea.”

“I don’t know,” Cork said. “It could be that when the shit hits the fan, she won’t be much surprised.”

At the West Wind Gallery, Lyla’s car was parked next to Marion Griswold’s mud-spattered Jeep Wagoneer. Cork eased his Bronco beside the other two vehicles. Jo tried the gallery door and found it locked. They walked to the house and stepped onto the porch. Cork knocked at the front door, waited, knocked again.

Then the scream came.

It came from the south, from beyond a thick stand of red pine. Cork leaped from the porch and began to run in that direction with Jo at his heels. He could see a narrow, well-worn path through the trees and he made for it. He hit the stand of pine just as another scream cracked the morning air.

Where the path ended a hundred yards through the pines, Cork could see a sparkle of blue he knew to be Little Otter Lake. It was a small body of water, but Griswold owned the land all around it and had the lake to herself. He ran hard, not knowing what he was heading into, feeling the rush of adrenaline. He wished he were carrying his revolver and wished, too, that he’d warned Jo to stay back. God only knew what awaited them.

He pulled up quickly before he broke from the cover of the trees. He could see an old wooden dock thrust out from the shoreline into the lake. At the end of the dock stood a naked woman, beautiful and slender and so deeply tanned her skin was the color of deer hide.

There was splashing in the lake, a froth of white water a few yards away from the dock. In a moment, a head bobbed to the surface, and from the mouth of that head a little stream of water shot into the air.

Jo stood next to Cork, and they both watched as Lyla Soderberg climbed onto the dock, naked and laughing. She embraced Marion Griswold and they kissed. But only briefly before Lyla shoved Marion off the dock. As the woman hit the water with a big splash, Lyla let out a scream of delight.

Cork and Jo walked back to the house. They stood on the porch where the geraniums hung in pots, and for a while they didn’t say anything.

“I think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard Lyla laugh,” Cork finally said.

“It’s the first time I can remember her looking happy.” Jo tapped a geranium pot and it swung idly, casting a shadow that cut back and forth across her own.

“Do you want to leave?” Cork asked.

“No.”

In a little less than half an hour, the two women came walking up the path through the pines. They were fully dressed, but hadn’t dried themselves completely so there were places where Lyla’s white silk blouse clung to her, showing pink skin beneath.

Lyla hesitated when she saw Cork and Jo, but Marion came ahead smiling.

“Been here long?” she asked.

“A while,” Jo said. “How was the water?”

“Purely refreshing.” Marion arched a dark eyebrow. “Maybe you should take the plunge sometime.”

Lyla stopped at the bottom of the porch stairs and looked up. All the laughter was gone from her. “What do you want?”

“Just to ask a couple of questions,” Jo said.

“I’m not in the mood to answer.”

“New Year’s Eve,” Jo said. “When you and Marion left the Lipinskis’ party together, where did you go?”

Marion said, “I already told Cork. She came here.”

Jo said, “Is that right, Lyla?”

“That’s right.”

“Can you prove it? Either of you?”

“Now, why would we have to prove anything?” Marion asked.

“Lyla’s name has been mentioned in connection with Charlotte Kane’s murder,” Jo said.

“My name? That’s ridiculous. Why?”

Jo glanced at Cork. He nodded.

“Because your husband was having an affair with her,” Jo said.

“That… that girl? I don’t believe it.”

“He pretty much admitted it,” Cork said.

Marion gave a wicked little laugh. “She really was quite a lovely young thing. Bully for him.”

“So you see, it’s not so ridiculous,” Jo said. “Killing your husband’s lover, that’s a pretty sound motive.”

“Only if you love your husband,” Marion said. “Lyla, tell these folks how you feel about old Arne. And maybe, while you’re at it, how you feel about me.”

Lyla shot her a look of horror.

“Relax, sweetheart. These people are not stupid.” Marion mounted the stairs and sat in one of the wood rockers in the porch shade. “Like I already told you, Cork, we were here. A private New Year’s Eve celebration. Just the two of us.”

“You told me you took Lyla home a little after midnight.”

Marion gave Cork a smile that was all innocence. “I’m afraid I told you a little white lie. Didn’t want to raise any eyebrows. It was really three A.M. And I’ll swear to that in court.”

“Is that true, Lyla?” Jo said.

Lyla’s gaze drifted from Marion to Jo. She gave a silent nod.

Jo said, “All right.”

Lyla’s legs seemed to go weak, and she sat down suddenly on the steps. She looked away from them all, looked past the hanging geraniums, looked toward the pines that hid the little lake where she’d been laughing.

“Charlotte Kane and Arne,” she said to herself.

She wasn’t laughing anymore.