Dead By Midnight

Chapter Five

Max lined up his putt. He bent his knees, steadied the club. The phone rang. He glanced at the clock. A quarter to four. He would not be a happy man if actual work raised its hairy head when he was ready to call the day done, retrieve Annie, and maybe go to the beach.

His secretary poked her head inside his office. Today Barb’s bouffant hairdo was a brilliant red, shades of Reba McEntire. Was it a coincidence that she’d been belting out “I Keep On Lovin’ You” while whipping up a chocolate cherry cake in the small back kitchen that doubled as a storeroom? “Annie on the line.”

Max tapped the ball too quickly and it wobbled off the synthetic green and sped across the wood floor. On the way to his desk, he scooped it up with his putter. He bounced the ball in his hand as he sat on the edge of his desk and picked up the receiver. He’d put off calling Annie because he knew she would be disappointed. He settled behind his desk and listened. He pulled a green folder close, flipped it open. “I have a file on the firm, but, Annie, there’s nothing there. Pat didn’t have access to anything confidential. I talked to Glen’s secretary. I don’t think there’s any link to the law firm.” His shoulders lifted and fell. “Sure, I’ll talk to Glen if you want. I will leave no stone unturned.” He hung up, popped to his feet, sheathed the putter.

On his way out of the office, he turned a thumbs-up to another stanza of “I Keep On Lovin’ You.” “Check it in for the day, Barb. Go to the beach and take a wave for me.” The surf was usually mild on Broward’s Rock unless a storm was coming, but this afternoon the tide would be high, so there might be some decent waves. Maybe he and Annie could take a picnic to the beach. Mmmm, Annie in a gold bikini, smooth soft skin glistening with SPF coconut oil, the best of both worlds, protection married to scent. He walked faster.

Elaine Jamison was fair like her brother with the same deep-set blue eyes and high-bridged nose and pointed chin. She welcomed Annie warmly, though there was sadness in her eyes. “You’re wonderful to set up a memorial for Pat. I should have thought of it but I haven’t been myself.” Her voice trailed away as she led the way into the small living room of the cottage. The room was cheerful with a red upholstered sofa and easy chair and red curtains at the windows. A tall pottery vase on a side table held fresh red hollyhocks.

Elaine gestured at the easy chair. “I’m so glad you’ve come. Would you like iced tea? It’s fresh.”

In a moment, they sat opposite each other, a low stone coffee table between them. Annie squeezed lemon into the tumbler, enjoyed the scent of fresh mint. “I know Pat’s death has been a shock. She hadn’t been working at Death on Demand long but we liked her and I wanted to make a contribution in her name to the Red Cross. I understand she went down to Florida to be a volunteer after that last hurricane.”

“Of course I’ll help.” Elaine rose and went to a small desk in the corner. She quickly wrote a check and brought it back to Annie. “Thank you for remembering me.” She picked up her glass, then set it down without drinking. “I know it’s silly, but I think it’s even harder for me because I talked to her Friday evening. She called to ask if I found my present on my front porch. My birthday’s next week. She had dropped off a Doreen Tovey book. Pat had been after me to get a new cat. Bongo died two months ago and I didn’t think I was ready to get a new cat. But the Tovey books reminded me how much I love Siamese even though they are always impossible. Bongo”—she smiled and gestured at a strip of carpet installed on the wall next to a window—“spent most of his time climbing up to rest on the valance.” Her smile faded. “Pat sounded upbeat, kind of excited. We planned on having lunch the next day. I settled in with the book and laughed and laughed. I had such a happy evening, thanks to Pat. I laughed and Pat was dying.” Tears streamed down her face. “Excuse me.” She jumped up and left the room for a moment, then came back, scrubbing her face. “I’m sorry.”

Annie reached out, touched her arm. “She would be happy to know the book made you laugh.” She looked inquiring. “Pat sounded excited? Do you know why?”

“She was going to take an Alaska cruise. She went on and on about how wonderful the cruise was going to be. I’m glad she was happy that last night.” Elaine’s voice was subdued. She reached for the pitcher. “Would you like more tea?”

“No, thank you.” Annie opened her purse, dropped Elaine’s check in a side pocket. “Pat would appreciate your remembering her. You’d been friends for a long time.”

“She was a rock after Maddy died. Pat could be prickly, but she was loyal and kind. I think that’s why she was so upset after Glen fired her.” Elaine’s eyes looked stricken. “I don’t know how he could have done it. Oh well.” Her tone was bitter. “I do know. It’s that woman he married. She causes trouble for everyone, but Glen won’t hear a word against her. Now his home is a cold and angry place. He’s at odds with the children. Laura can’t help it that she lost her job. Everybody’s been getting fired. Unemployment’s awful. All kinds of people with college degrees don’t have jobs. Of course, Laura came home. Would Glen want her out on the street? That’s where she’d be if Cleo had her way. Sure, Laura’s unhappy. It’s humiliating to lose your job and not be able to find one. She’s sent out résumés everywhere. It doesn’t help matters that she and Kirk Brewster were getting to be friends. Of course, he’s stopped coming around now. Glen knew about them. That makes booting out Kirk even worse. So Laura’s mad and Kirk is mad and Kit is mad, too. I’m just sick about Kit. Going to Africa means everything to her, but Cleo has poisoned Glen’s mind, said Kit should have to pay her own way. If Kit can’t turn in the money by next week, she’ll lose the chance for the internship. Maybe it’s worst of all about Tommy. He shouldn’t have to go away to school. Everybody knows how boys can be hazed at military academies. He’s on the high school football team and so excited about their chances next fall. Maddy would be heartbroken. When I try to talk to him, Glen looks beaten down. He won’t meet my eyes. It reminds me of when he was little. Our dad was . . . stern. When Glen got in trouble, he’d promise anything to keep Dad from getting mad. Glen”—she looked at Annie with a plea in her eyes—“wants to do the right thing. He really does. But Cleo—” Elaine pressed the tips of long thin fingers against her temples. “Oh, I’m sorry. Please forgive me, Annie. You didn’t come to hear all my troubles. I didn’t mean to get started about the family, but everything’s been difficult lately. And to have Pat die so unexpectedly is awful.” Her eyes filled with tears. “I can’t bear the thought that she killed herself because she lost her job. Glen’s really upset.”

Annie took an instant to answer. Billy hadn’t enjoined her and Henny to silence. If Billy learned that Annie was saying Pat had been murdered, well, so be it. “I understand the question of how she died isn’t settled. There’s reason to think she didn’t commit suicide.”

Elaine clasped her hands together. “I’m relieved to hear that and Glen will be, too. I heard she died from a drug overdose. Was it an accident?”

Annie was firm. “That doesn’t seem likely either.”

Elaine looked puzzled. “What happened?”

Annie picked her words carefully. “Someone may have had coffee with her the night she died and put the drug in Pat’s cup.”

Elaine drew in a sharp breath. Her eyes widened. “On purpose?” Her voice was hushed. “Are you saying that Pat was murdered?”

“Yes.”

Incredulity warred with shock. “That can’t be true. Pat didn’t have an enemy in the world.”

“Mr. Darling.” The pretty, dark-haired girl gave him a bright smile. “Mr. Jamison can see you now.” She held open the swinging gate to the inner office and started to turn.

“Thanks. I know the way.” Max moved past her and into a corridor. The law firm of Jamison, Jamison, and Brewster was quartered in a one-story building shaped like a T, the reception area in the crossbar, the offices and conference rooms in the vertical bar. He walked up the hall to the third door on the left, tapped, and pushed the door in.

Glen Jamison came around his desk, hand outstretched. His face, always pale, looked weary with bluish shadows beneath his eyes. Max wondered if he had been ill.

They shook hands and Glen waved Max toward a comfortable brown leather chair.

Glen dropped onto a matching couch. “Hell of a thing about Pat. She was always game for everything. I missed having her around. I hear she died from a drug overdose. Somebody told Cleo they thought it was suicide.”

Max shook his head. “It turns out that was a mistake. I’ve heard the investigation is focused on murder.”

Glen’s eyes widened, his lips parted. He looked utterly stunned. “Pat murdered? That’s crazy.” His voice was shocked. “Why would anyone murder Pat?”

Why, indeed? Max thought. “I’m hoping to find out more for the family.” There were, as Max well knew, many ways to tell the truth. Certainly he would be happy to share whatever he learned with Pat’s sister in California. If Glen mistakenly assumed Max was working for the family, the interpretation was Glen’s, not Max’s. “I thought you were the best person to tell me about Pat’s last few weeks.”

Glen’s aristocratic face drooped in unhappy lines. “Yeah. Well, I don’t suppose you knew, but we had to let Pat go a couple of weeks ago.”

Max kept his face interested and uncritical.

Glen’s gaze slid away, fastened on a print of the Acropolis hanging on a sidewall. “Cleo was thinking about redecorating the office, make it more gray and chrome like the big-city firms. I’m afraid Pat wasn’t very tactful. Anyway, Cleo said we should have a young, eager receptionist.” He avoided looking at Max. “So I let her go. I’m afraid she got pretty upset with me. That’s why when we heard she committed suicide, I felt really bad. But Cleo said people make their own choices.”

Max could hear the voice of Glen’s second wife, smooth and satisfied, as he spoke.

“Murder . . .” Glen sagged back against the couch. “God, I’m glad it wasn’t suicide.”

“Do you know anyone who was angry with Pat? Or anyone who feared her?”

Glen looked startled, eyes widening, lips parting. “Not that I ever knew about. It doesn’t seem possible. I guess there’s something we didn’t know about Pat. But”—he looked at Max with a suddenly relieved expression—“I’m sure glad she didn’t kill herself.”

Annie always took pleasure in their back porch. Green wicker chairs with cream-colored cushions offered comfort and a gorgeous view of the garden. She plopped into a chair on one side of the wicker table, bright with daisy-yellow place mats and settings for breakfast. She took a deep breath of the sweet scent of pittosporum blooms. Hydrangeas, butterfly bushes, jessamine lantana, roses, and bougainvillea created a patchwork of colors. In the early-morning quiet, the caw of crows sounded cheerful. Glossy magnolia leaves rattled in a light breeze.

The screen door opened and Max stepped out of the kitchen, carrying a plate. His hair was still damp from the shower. “Hot, moist, and ready to devour.”

Annie grinned. “You or the Danishes?”

Max laughed. Despite the shower, his face was still flushed from their prebreakfast jog. “Both. And the same to you, Mrs. Darling.”

After an early-morning jog and shower, Annie enjoyed cooling down on the back porch. It was a lovely beginning to a lovely day except for her nagging sense of a task left undone. She took a sip of orange juice, frowned, and opened her mouth.

Before she could speak, Max broke off a piece of a raspberry Danish and popped it in her mouth. “You look like the Selkirk Rex.”

The sweet roll was flaky with just the right amount of buttery richness. She reached up to touch her damp tangled hair. Surely she wasn’t that frizzy, though it was flattering to be compared to the elegant long-haired cat with soft, plush, curly ringlets and amber eyes. The Selkirk Rex on Laurel’s Cat Truth poster had its mouth agape: Hey, listen to me.

Annie grabbed her coffee mug. “I wish somebody would listen to me.”

Dorothy L darted after a butterfly, then jumped onto the tabletop. Annie gently removed her. “Not during breakfast.” She took a moment to smooth Dorothy L’s fluffy fur, but she wasn’t distracted from her worry. “Pat walked to the Jamison house. That has to mean something.”

Max settled in the opposite chair, poured coffee into their red pottery mugs. He speared a piece of papaya. “Sometimes what you see is what you get. She walked to the Jamison house. Maybe that’s all there was to it. I’m not saying she committed suicide. Maybe somebody dropped OxyContin in her coffee, but,” and he flipped up one finger after another for emphasis, “we can’t find any hint anywhere that anyone had any reason to kill her. At the law firm, a competent, hard-nosed legal secretary made it clear Pat knew nothing about the inner workings of the firm, plus Glen Jamison was pitifully glad to hear she didn’t kill herself. Henny Brawley knows everybody on the island, but Henny can’t come up with anything out of the ordinary about Pat. You talked to Elaine Jamison and she said Pat didn’t have an enemy in the world.”

Annie felt as isolated as if she were marooned on a desert island. “She had an enemy. And I think it was someone who lives in the Jamison house.”

Annie enjoyed the quiet at Death on Demand before it opened. She’d left Max murmuring into his newspaper that people who went to work at eight-thirty when they didn’t have to be there until nine were seriously deranged and in need of recreational counseling. She’d kissed the back of his neck, which caught his attention big-time, but she’d not been deflected from her departure. She was still smiling as she unlocked the door. She would catch up with paperwork, and though she hadn’t told Max, she would continue to worry at the problem of Pat Merridew. There would only be a few early shoppers. Readers looking for hammock books would begin to drift in after lunch as the June day heated up.

Instead of heading straight to her office, she wandered aimlessly around the coffee area. Finding out what happened to Pat was like tugging at a ball of snarled yarn. She felt sure if she tugged at the right string, she would find some proof of her conviction that Pat had been murdered and that her murder was linked to the Jamisons.

She glanced at the Cat Truth poster with the gorgeous, wide-mouthed Selkirk Rex. “You tell ’em, honey.” But her smile slipped away. Annie had told everyone, most especially Billy Cameron, and he wasn’t listening. She reached down to straighten a poster hanging crookedly beside the fireplace. A red-brown Abyssinian, tail high, stepped through dew damp grass: Come with me to the Casbah. Shades of Casablanca, one of Laurel’s favorite films. Annie imagined the muscular cat with a Humphrey Bogart face. Bogie never gave up. He was the quintessential American private eye in The Maltese Falcon. Annie didn’t fancy herself as an incarnation of Sam Spade, but she could follow Spade’s mantra: nothing and nobody kept him from finding out the truth.

Annie whirled and marched to the coffee bar, plucked the receiver from the phone, punched a number. Max claimed no one had found anything out of the ordinary during Pat’s final days. That wasn’t true. At least one night Pat’s lights were on late and she was seen returning from the forest. Okay, what was in the forest? A path that led to the Jamison house. Billy could claim Annie was reaching too far to insist that Pat saw something at the Jamison house that caused her death. Maybe so. But there was no denying Pat’s lights had continued to shine late at night. That was odd fact one. Odd fact two was Pat’s trip to the travel agency on Friday, the very day she died. She’d taken travel brochures with her. Annie could imagine those brochures lying on the table and a guest picking them up. Or perhaps Pat handed a brochure to her guest, saying something lightly about a trip of a lifetime—if only she had the money.

When Billy Cameron came on the line, Annie plunged right to her point. “Have you found the travel brochures?”

“I’m sending Officer Harrison to the Merridew house to look for them.” He sounded patient. “Since you are convinced the brochures are important, why don’t you meet her there? Maybe you will have some good ideas. Be there in fifteen minutes.”

The phone clicked off.

Annie would have been pleased, but she knew her presence was just another way of saying sayonara.

Officer Hyla Harrison had relocated to Broward’s Rock after her patrol partner was gunned down in a Miami alley. She always moved fast, her narrow face often drawn in a frown of concentration. She was serious, responsible, and humorless. She took murder very seriously indeed and initially had found the idea of a mystery bookstore offensive. “There’s nothing funny about murder,” she’d told Annie not long after they first met. When Annie agreed and explained that murder is never funny, people are funny, Hyla reconsidered. Now she was a devoted reader of Tana French and Ed McBain.

Annie watched as the patrol car turned precisely into Pat Merridew’s driveway. Perhaps only Officer Harrison could make the turn of a car appear as skillfully executed as a scalpel marking an incision.

Hyla, as always, looked crisp and fresh in her khaki uniform, her auburn hair drawn back into a sleek bun. She walked swiftly to the front steps, carrying a black case. Unsmiling, she looked up at Annie. “The chief said you were here to observe me.” She jerked her head and marched past Annie to pull open the screen and unlock the door.

Annie hurried to catch up. “Hyla—”

The trim patrol woman turned. “Officer Harrison.”

Annie reached out a hand in appeal. She wasn’t going to lose the trust she’d slowly, very slowly, earned with Hyla if she could help it. “The chief knows I have great respect for you. You are careful and thorough and this is a situation that needs that kind of attention to detail. That’s why he sent you. He knows you won’t miss anything. He gave me permission to be here because I think Pat Merridew was murdered.” Because she believed what she was saying, her tone was genuine.

Hyla’s stiff shoulders relaxed. A slight frown tugged at her brows. “He told me you suggested the check for fingerprints in the china cabinet.” She tilted her head to study Annie. “Why did you think of that?”

Quickly Annie described Pat’s attitude toward the suicide in Towards Zero. “. . . so if she didn’t commit suicide and it couldn’t be an accident, that left murder. The drug was found in Pat’s crystal coffee mug. It seemed to me the only answer was someone else sitting across from her and dropping the drug in her coffee. But—”

Hyla swung the door open, held it for Annie.

“—only the one mug was found”—Annie pointed at the coffee table—“so we looked for the other.” She pointed toward the breakfront.

Hyla nodded. “Crystal.”

Annie knew Hyla understood. Sitting alone in the evening for a cup of coffee, Pat would drink from her everyday pottery, not use crystal. Annie’s eyes met Hyla’s and saw a gleam of agreement.

“Okay.” Hyla was crisp. “The victim picked up travel brochures the day she died.”

Annie felt as if she’d climbed a steep cliff and emerged on top. To Hyla, Pat Merridew was now a victim.

Hyla’s eyes narrowed. “So she was excited about the trip she wanted to take. She gets the brochures. She probably put them in her purse. She comes home after work.” Hyla surveyed the small living room. “Let’s check the purse first.”

The slender patrol officer put down the case on the coffee table, flipped up the lid, pulled out two pairs of latex gloves, and handed one set to Annie. She picked up the purse, a nylon summer tote bag with a design of blue sailboats against a cream background. She opened the bag and, using pincers from the case, carefully lifted out the contents: lip gloss, compact, hand sanitizer, aspirin bottle, box of mints, hairbrush, comb, case with sunglasses, BlackBerry, small notebook, three ballpoint pens, crumpled bingo card, small packet of Kleenex, billfold, checkbook, change purse, car keys, package of red licorice. She shook her head and returned the items as carefully as she had removed them.

Annie moved slowly around the perimeter of the living room. Pat had been a tidy housekeeper. There were no papers or magazines tucked in the bookcase. She edged open the TV console. The remote lay atop the previous Sunday’s TV guide.

Hyla jerked a thumb. “Let’s try the kitchen. Maybe she wanted to study them while she ate dinner.”

Once in the kitchen, Annie was struck by the supper dishes now bone-dry, the dog’s empty water bowl. She looked at the kitchen table, empty except for one place mat and a pottery sugar bowl and salt and pepper shakers.

Hyla stepped to the white plastic wastebasket, used the foot press to lift the lid.

Annie moved near. “Billy said they found an empty pill bottle right on top of the trash.”

Hyla spread a black plastic bag on the kitchen floor and painstakingly removed the contents of the wastebasket: an empty egg carton, used tea bags, rinsed-out cans, cellophane wrappers, assorted boxes and bags.

No travel brochures.

Annie was emphatic. “They should be here. She’d have no reason to hide them.”

“We’ll continue to look.” Hyla sounded patient.

At the end of a half hour, they stood again in the small living room. Hyla shook her head.

Annie pointed at the coffee table. “Like I told Billy, I think someone else was here Friday night. Pat used her crystal for a guest, made her favorite specialty coffee drink. Pat handed the brochures to her visitor. Later, when Pat was dying, the murderer took the brochures away because the brochures held fingerprints.”

Hyla Harrison looked at the empty chairs and the coffee table. “I don’t know about that. I know there aren’t any brochures in this house.” Her glance at Annie was commiserating. “I get where you’re coming from. But it’s awfully hard to prove anything with nothing.” She peeled off the gloves and started to turn toward the door then stopped. “I wonder . . .” She pulled the gloves back on and walked to the purse. Again she used the pincer, this time to retrieve the phone. She glanced at it in mild surprise. “I’d have thought the chief would have already retrieved it. Pirelli probably checked it out, didn’t see any unusual calls or messages.” Hyla held it carefully at the edges, opened it, tapped her finger. “No recent text messages.” She moved her finger again. “Got some pix.” She looked at the images. “Nice one of the raven. Guess she wanted to show somebody that the place where she worked had this molty-looking bird on a shelf.”

Annie was touched that Pat had taken a photo at the store.

Abruptly, Hyla frowned. “Odd one here.”

Annie moved to look over her thin shoulder. In a small circle of light bounded by darkness, a lumpy towel lay on wood. “A wooden bench?”

“Maybe.” Hyla looked intent. “Taken at night obviously.” She moved her thumb; the photo was followed by six more in quick succession. Several featured the dachshund. All were straightforward photographs of people or places. “There’s only the one of the towel.” Hyla returned to the photograph. She tapped Properties. “Taken at twelve-oh-nine A.M. June thirteenth. I’d guess Pirelli didn’t know the time might matter.”

Annie was excited. “Pat took the picture late at night in the dark. It was late at night when she walked through the woods to the Jamison house.” Quickly Annie described her conclusions about Pat’s late-night excursions.

“I get you. Of course, Pirelli didn’t know all that when he checked the phone.” Hyla was calm. “However, there’s no proof this picture was taken anywhere near the Jamison house. Or that the pix has anything to do with Merridew dying five days later. But”—she reached for a plastic bag in the tech case, dropped the BlackBerry inside, made a notation—“it sure isn’t your everyday photo.”