Death In Duplicate

THIRTY

“ONLY THE GOOD DIE YOUNG.”

“Donald is neither good nor young, and he is going to live.”

“Would you like some more champagne?”

“I would love some more champagne.” Susan offered her glass for her husband to fill.

“Mother, we don’t drink alcoholic beverages in front of the babies!” Chrissy protested, apparently shocked by her family’s behavior.

“Then perhaps you and Shannon should take them up to their nursery, honey, because your mother and I and our guests are planning on opening another bottle,” Jed said gently.

“I… well, we’ll do just that.” Chrissy gathered her daughter to her breast as if to protect her from the sight of her grandparents’ corruption and left the room.

Shannon picked up Ethan and started to leave, too. “I’d better take this little guy up as well.”

“Once the babies are asleep, you could come back down and join us,” Susan said.

Shannon smiled. “I might do that. I’m really curious to know what happened today,” she added as she left the room.

“As are we,” Kathleen spoke up.

Her husband and Jed nodded their agreement.

“Brett knows more than I do and he’s going to be here in a bit,” Susan said.

“Well, we have lots of champagne,” Jed said. “And I’d like to thank Brett for saving your life.”

“I’m not sure Sophie would have shot me-”

Jerry held up his hands. “Susan, I know you’re going to think I’m dense and I swear that I hang on my wife’s every word so I thought I’d been keeping up with your investigation into your neighbor’s death, but, damn it, I can’t remember anyone named Sophie.” He glanced over at the pile of canines sprawled in front of the fireplace. “Unless she’s one of Clue’s new friends.”

“The mastiffs are named Rock and Roll,” Kathleen informed her husband.

“And Sophie is Sophie Kincaid. She was one of Donald and Nadine’s neighbors before they moved to Hancock. She was also involved with Donald romantically… well, sexually. She didn’t strike me as a very romantic person to tell you the truth.” Susan paused to sip from her flute. “She was involved in his business as well as his personal life.”

“She worked for him? What did she do?” Kathleen asked.

“Paid killer?” Jerry suggested.

“I don’t think she was paid for anything she did. Not directly at least,” Susan added, remembering Sophie’s reference to gifts. “And she didn’t have an official job, but she looked for properties for Donald to develop and, I suspect, one of the ways she benefited was by ending up with a premier property in those developments.”

“So she had something do with Donald’s Perry Island project?” Jed asked.

“No, she didn’t. And I think that’s the reason she came to Woodwinds with a gun. After all, she had killed Blaine Baines. She probably thought she should benefit from her death at least as much as her son planned to do.”

“You’ve lost me,” Kathleen admitted.

“Me too, but we’ve been married so long that I’m used to it,” Jed said.

Jerry just reached for the champagne, refilled his flute, and sat back to listen.

“Donald and his mother-” Susan began.

“You are starting at the beginning, aren’t you?” Jed asked.

“Yes. So stop interrupting and I’ll explain.

“As I was saying, Donald and his mother were in the same business-real estate. For Blaine it was a case of being in the right place at the right time. She started out selling homes on Perry Island in the winter and tapping into the lucrative rental market in the summer. Not that Perry Island is the Hamptons, but real estate has been an excellent investment for the past three decades and that’s how long Blaine ’s been involved. She’s probably made a very, very nice income and certainly has become one of the largest real estate agents in Connecticut. She was smart, hardworking, and ambitious, and her business expanded from Perry Island to some of the most expensive suburbs in the country.”

“And Donald followed in her footsteps,” Kathleen added.

“As much as she allowed him to,” Susan said. “At least that’s my guess.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, think about it. Donald always worked in a branch office in an area not quite as prestigious as where his mother’s office was located. She kept the best properties, the most expensive properties, the most profitable properties for herself.”

“That must have been hard on him,” Jerry said.

“Emasculating,” his wife suggested.

“Probably both, but Donald is his mother’s son and he figured out a way to get some of the big money for himself. He kept selling houses, but he also began developing properties-buying up big chunks of land, subdividing, and then building lots of homes. He did it in the town he lived in before this and he was going to do it again on Perry Island.”

“By shutting down the nursing home and building there, right?” Kathleen asked.

“Yes, but Blaine had her own plan for Perry Island,” Susan said. “She was going to build matching developments on either side of the Sound, one where P.I.C.C. is located and one where Woodwinds is now. Which is where the problems began that led to all the murders. You see, Donald had his own plans for the same properties.”

“So they were in competition,” Jed said.

“I don’t think they were at the beginning. I think they were in agreement when it came to shutting down P.I.C.C. and developing that plot of land. They probably both bear the guilt for the deaths out there.”

“Which of them killed those elderly people?” Jed asked.

“Probably neither of them directly. But I’m sure they caused the deaths to happen. Let’s ignore that for a moment because Brett will know more about it and he can tell us when he gets here.”

“So go ahead,” Jerry said.

“Well, Donald and Blaine didn’t have the same vision. Blaine was interested in building large homes.”

“Executive homes and estates, her ads call them.”

Susan nodded to her husband. “Right. But Donald had done that and was interested in mixed-use developments-hotels and conference centers surrounded by those executive homes and estates.”

“And then?”

“And then his mother bought Woodwinds. Donald, of course, saw immediately that its location made it perfect for an extension of their development on Perry Island. And that fact probably made him furious.”

“Why?”

“She bought it in her own name and she was going to develop it her way. She had even drawn up plans for the project-plans Donald made sure no one would find after her death.”

“How did he manage to do that?” Jerry asked.

“He went to her office after her body was found. He claimed to want to notify her staff in person, but, in fact, he was there to steal her plans. He took them right off her desk in front of all her employees and I was the only person in the room to notice. Donald,” Susan concluded, “was not going to let his mother stand in the way of the plans he had made.”

“So he killed her,” Jerry said, sounding like a man who had just caught on.

“I don’t think so actually,” Susan answered. “Although he may have helped move her body.”

“Then who?” Jed asked.

“Sophie,” Kathleen guessed.

Susan nodded. “Yes. At least it makes sense.”

“Sophie-this woman he was having an affair with and who helped him find properties to develop-she killed Nadine and his mother and shot Donald?” Jed asked.

“No. I mean yes, she did shoot at Donald and she probably killed his mother, but I think his mother killed Nadine,” Susan answered.

“Susan, you tell the story any way you want to. I promise not to interrupt again, but please don’t stop now,” Jerry said.

“Okay. My guess is that Nadine was killed by Donald’s mother. You see, they had moved and Nadine had been forced to pay a bit more attention to Donald and his business and his mother’s business than she had before. In fact, she told me as much although I wasn’t really listening at the time. Blaine Baines wasn’t going to let anyone, not even her daughter-in-law, interfere in a big business deal so-and this is just a guess-she went over to their house to explain this to Nadine and ended up killing her.”

“Did Donald know?” Jed asked.

“He must have. He provided his mother with an alibi. At the time I thought it was the other way around, that she was lying to protect him. But Donald was lying to protect his mother. And to protect the many real estate deals that they had together. And I doubt if he really cared about Nadine. Their marriage had become one of convenience. She managed to convey the image of a happy wife to the world, which was important to him, but they certainly were no longer close. In fact, his work made it impossible for them to be together a lot.”

Susan paused for a minute. “I didn’t like her, but what a terrible way to die.”

“You said it yourself-Blaine Baines was ruthless,” Kathleen said.

“Yes, she was. But not quite as ruthless as her son turned out to be.” A deep male voice came from the doorway and everyone in the room turned to find Brett Fortesque standing there. “I knocked, but apparently no one heard me so I let myself in. I can’t say much for your security system.” He walked into the room and looked down at the pile of canines lying on the floor. “You must have the three laziest dogs in the world living with you.”

“You should see them when they’re awake,” Susan said.

Jed poured another glass of champagne and passed it to Brett.

“I’m still on duty, but, just this once I’m going to ignore that fact,” Brett said, saluting them and then taking a sip.

“Did Sophie Kincaid confess?” Susan asked.

“No. She claims to be completely innocent. And her husband has hired one of the hottest defense attorneys in the country. But it’s going to be real hard not to get a conviction. After all, you and I both saw her shoot Donald Baines. And he’s not exactly feeling kindly toward her at the moment so I think he’ll be happy to make a statement to the police about just who killed his mother.”

“She did do it, then,” Susan said.

“She did indeed. Donald lost a lot of blood and he’s not feeling too well, but he did manage to tell us that much. And he also claimed that Sophie thought it would be a good idea if his mother was found dead in the same place his wife was. So he helped her to move the body from her car into his house.”

“Good Lord. He is a cold-blooded bastard,” Jerry said.

“And a great real estate agent. He said discovering a body in a house would bring down its resale value and there was no reason to devalue two properties,” Brett explained.

“I don’t understand. Why did this Sophie kill Blaine Baines?” Jed asked.

“She helped Donald get what he wanted and he wanted the land that Woodwinds is on, but I think it may be more than that. I think Sophie probably isn’t as independent a woman as she claims to be. Her husband may have found the best defense team money can buy, but he was never around. Her only child is at boarding school. She needed something in her life. Developing property probably became that something.”

“Sounds like Donald was involved with some pretty sleazy women,” Jerry said.

“Please, no one is as manipulative and directed as Donald himself,” Susan said. “He’s been jerking me around like a puppet ever since Nadine was killed. He said he wanted me to speak at Nadine’s memorial service so that I would go to his office. Then he left the messages from his mother on his desk knowing I would see them.”

“Why?”

“They weren’t real. I’ll bet his mother was already dead at that point. He was setting up his own alibi.”

“But you used that as an opportunity to check out their old neighbors,” Kathleen said. “You wouldn’t have even met Sophie Kincaid if he hadn’t asked you to do that.”

“That’s true,” Susan said. “And that turned out to be his big mistake.”

“That and moving next door to you,” Jed said. “Anyone who is planning to be involved in committing a murder should avoid living near Susan Henshaw.”

“That’s an interesting point,” Brett said with a gleam in his eye. “I was going to mention one other thing. Donald told one of my officers that he got a bargain on his house because you were involved in investigating so many murders. Seems living next door to someone who stumbles over dead bodies is not exactly a selling point for a home in a nice neighborhood.”