Tuesday’s Child

Chapter 23

KALA AULANI SLAPPED THE REPORTS SHE’D JUST READ DOWN ON her cluttered desk. She looked at the messy work space and wondered how it had gotten that way. She was retired, for God’s sake. She felt like she was driving on a superhighway and boxed in by four eighteen-wheelers. She massaged her temples, hoping to ward off a headache she knew would sprout any minute. The urge to bang her head on the cluttered desk was so strong, Kala gave the cracked-leather chair she was sitting in a push. She slid backward.

She’d always been good at analyzing things, and people told her she had a keen analytical mind. Not that she was patting herself on the back. But, if that assessment was true, why couldn’t she figure out this mess that was in front of her?

Ryan Spenser had been the surprise of a lifetime. A good one. She had never been one to judge a person quickly, and it had taken years to form the negative opinion she had in regard to Spenser. But just within the last few hours, she’d seen the real Ryan Spenser. A man whose ass was on the line. A man who no longer cared about his reputation and only wanted to help. All he wanted now was a life of his own choosing. And to help in whatever way he could. He was a strong ally. With the two of them on the same side, surely they could bring this whole sorry mess to a resolution.

He had guts-she had to give him that. For him to throw away his career, flip his father the bird, and stand tall with her was something she had never imagined he could or would do.

Kala pushed her chair forward, closer to the desk, the urge to bang her head gone. So was the throbbing in her temples. She picked up the report on Audrey Star and glared at it. She put it down and picked up the report on Adam. There wasn’t all that much in Adam’s report. Adam was a successful investment banker with the potential to move up the ladder. He was solvent, owned his own home and high-end car. Dressed well, had various relationships, none lasting longer than three or four months. Took a vacation twice a year. Nothing exciting there. He had a more than decent portfolio, was considered a good tipper. Kala yawned as she flipped the pages, hoping to find something that would leap out at her, but nothing did. Everything she was reading, she’d read in the report on his wife.

Kala squeezed her eyes shut. She wasn’t buying Adam’s confession, and Spenser hadn’t bought it either. So, what did that mean? She and Spenser had both agreed that a boatload of guilt over Audrey’s crippling accident was on the man’s shoulders. But… and there was always a but, Spenser hadn’t seen Patty’s report on Audrey Star. Why didn’t the prosecution go into Audrey’s background ten years ago? More to the point, why hadn’t she herself gone into it?

Kala turned her mind back in time. The best she could come up with was they had tried and were either stonewalled, or they decided the investigation was too costly since she was trying the case pro bono. But the prosecution had virtually unlimited resources; they should have done it. Were they stonewalled, too, by the Star flotilla of lawyers?

Even if either side had known, it wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the trial. She was almost certain of that, but she was going to have to talk to Ryan again, and very soon, perhaps before the day was over. Her team had deposed Dr. Rosenberg, who had said nothing like what she’d just read in the report. Then again, Audrey Star wasn’t on trial. Sophie Lee had been on trial. Still, leave no stone unturned unless it cost too much money to turn over said stone.

Kala pressed a button on the phone console. “Ask Jay to come to my office. Linda, too.”

Jay bounded into the room, followed by his wife. He grumbled the whole time about Kala’s being retired and still showing up to work and screwing things up. Linda rolled her eyes, until Kala said, “Enough already! Tell me your best recollection as to why we never delved into Audrey Star’s background ten years ago at trial.”

“Because she was the victim. We did go into her background. She was a socialite, spent money like she printed it herself, partied around the globe, slept all day, and partied all night. She was addicted to manicures, pedicures, facials, massages, and loved to be pampered. She was engaged six times, kept the flashy baubles when said engagements were broken. She gave away her globe-trotting stilettos when she met and married Adam Clements. It was a happy union. Then she died by someone’s hand. We said not by Sophie Lee’s. Spenser said yes to Sophie Lee. End of story. And there you have my photographic mind at work.”

“Jay is right. That’s exactly how it happened. In his closing statement, Spenser gave a touching eulogy of Audrey Star, and the jury bought it,” Linda said.

Kala blinked. “Well, then, read this report. Right now! I’ll go get us some fresh coffee.”

When Kala returned to her office fifteen minutes later, Jay was trying to argue with his wife, who was refusing to be baited. Kala set the tray down, poured out three cups of coffee, then took her seat. “Arguing is for fools,” she said pointedly. “We need to have a discussion.”

“I hope you aren’t saying or thinking we screwed up-because we didn’t. Rosenberg wasn’t talking back then. And even if he had been, what difference would it have made? Sophie Lee was on trial, not Audrey Star.” Jay’s tone was so belligerent, Kala reared back.

“Well, it might have given us some more insight into Adam. We might have been more aggressive with him.”

“And the judge would have slapped you down in a nanosecond. I remember the all-nighter we pulled back then, trying to decide how far we would get if we tried something like that. You, Kala, made the decision not to pursue it. We also had a money problem at that time.”

Kala did remember that all-nighter. And Jay was absolutely right. She said so, gently, so as not to irk him even more. “I’ll be out of your hair shortly, so stop complaining. Then you’re going to really miss me, and you’ll start calling me all hours of the day and night just to hear my voice. And guess what, Jay Brighton? I will not take your calls. So there!”

“That’s not it at all, and you know it. You’re forgiven. Did you call Sophie yet to tell her the check was deposited? And when are you going to tell us what happened with Ryan Spenser?”

“How about right now? I’ll call Sophie later. She’s probably still sleeping or just about to get up.”

Linda settled herself more comfortably, and said, “Well, I for one am all ears. Shoot!”

“Yeah, tell us what the Great White Prosecutor had to say that took almost two hours. I can hardly wait to hear this,” Jay said through clenched teeth.

Kala leaned back in the cracked-leather chair and brought the tips of her fingers together to make a steeple. “Remember how I always say nothing is exactly what it seems? Well, this, my dears, is a case in point.”

“Yeah, well, I have one other point to make,” Jay continued to grumble. “We should have all gone to the Star mansion with Patty and Nick. Five sets of eyes are better than two.”

“Then who would run this very busy, thriving office?” Kala snapped back. “Relax, if there’s anything to find there, those two will find it. Trust me on that, partners.”

Two hours later Patty sat down on the floor Indian style. “There’s nothing here, Nick. This place is a nightmare. Any minute now, I’m expecting Merlin the Wizard to pop out and wave his wand. Can you imagine actually living here in this… this…?”

Nick leaned up against a wall. “I think the word you’re looking for is nightmare. And, no, you couldn’t pay me to live in a house whose walls and ceilings are painted dark blue with gold stars. On top of all that, the furniture is covered with sheets. It’s ghostly, to say the least. I guess the staff took care of everything before they closed up the house. I think you said this house is eight thousand square feet, and we’ve covered four thousand feet so far and found nothing. I’m game to continue, but I don’t think we’re going to find anything.”

Patty shrugged. “You never know. They say if you want to hide something, hide it in plain view. This is the library, and I say this only because I peeked under the sheets draping the bookshelves and saw all those books. Adam must have been a reader, or else Audrey’s parents were readers. Then again, they could have bought all those books from some vendor just to fill up the shelves. People do that, you know. They want to appear intellectual to their friends. We actually did a human-interest story on that a few years ago when I was at the AJC. The bottom line”-Patty giggled-“was if you gave any of those people a quiz on the books, they couldn’t tell you a thing about them. It was stupid.”

“Journals are books, aren’t they?”

“Damn straight they’re books,” Patty said, leaping to her feet. A second later, the sheets were lying on the floor. “Well now, lookie here! And there’s even a library ladder. I’ll do the climbing, Nick.”

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to fight you for that honor. Are they listed in alphabetical order by author or title?”

“Looks like by author. Lots of first editions here. I see Huckleberry Finn, six different editions. The Great Gatsby, three editions. Gone With the Wind, three editions. Someone must have been a collector. Rare books are worth a fortune. Wonder if Adam read them to Audrey. Forget I said that. It was a stupid comment. The report said Audrey liked Adam to read her political thrillers. The spines haven’t even been broken on most of these books.”

Nick peered up at the top shelf. “If I remember correctly, Huckleberry Finn was written by Mark Twain, which was his pen name. His real name was Samuel L. Clemens. Those editions say Samuel L. Clemens. Don’t you find that a little strange, my little reporter?” Nick grinned. “Think about Adam’s last name. Isn’t it Clemens?”

Patty was already on the ladder. “I think there’s a T in his last name. But I get your point. I’ll drop them one at a time, and you catch them, okay? Wow! Someone paid out a lot of money to have these bound in this luxurious leather, and the letters are all gold embossed. Nothing chintzy going on here, that’s for sure.”

“For sure,” Nick muttered as he opened the first book. “And what we have here are Audrey Star’s missing journals! Are we a team or what? You have to admit, this is pretty damn clever on someone’s part, and my money is on Adam. I bet he did this for his wife as a gift or something. Maybe after her accident to perk her up or something,” Nick said, pointing to the six books on the floor.

Patty nodded, beyond excited. “You take those three, and I’ll take these three. From what I remember of the report, Audrey probably started writing journals around the age of sixteen, maybe earlier, can’t be sure. Let’s just find the earliest date and go on from there. What we’re really looking for, though, is the last one, dated ten years ago, the year of her death.”

They worked in silence, riffling through the pages, and finding a lot of the entries nothing more than chicken scratches. “She really couldn’t write,” Nick blurted. “This is like some pidgin English. But look how beautifully she writes her name. It doesn’t compute.”

“Rosenberg said she could sign her name for everything, which is what she did. I guess she had a lot of practice. I feel terrible pawing through this and talking about her like she was some dummy. She was a real person with limited abilities. This is really sad. What do you suppose was the attraction for Audrey and Adam? And don’t say money.”

“Maybe he wanted to help her, save her from herself. You said yourself there was never any scandal about the two of them until her car accident, and that wasn’t a scandal. It was just a tragic accident that had its run of a week in the AJC. Fifteen minutes in the spotlight, then it’s all forgotten by everyone except the parties involved, who are left to pick up the pieces.”

“I guess that makes sense,” Patty said, stacking the leather-bound books into a neat pile. Now what?”

“We keep searching until we see if there’s anything else to uncover. This might just be the tip of the iceberg. Let’s take another look at these books. Adam hid the journals in plain sight, so he might have hidden other things here as well.”

Patty scanned the shelves until she came to the Js, then said, “You know what, Nick? You are an absolute genius. Look at this! Four books, bound in the same leather as the journals and written by someone named J. J. Jewel. Thick books, too, from the size of their spines. Bigger than your traditional hardcover book. More the size of a reference book. And look at this-they’re hollowed out. Jewelry! Oh, this is some really gorgeous stuff! Look at the sparkle on these diamonds! Do we take them or leave them? I don’t know much about costly jewelry since I never had any, but I don’t think we should leave them since the house is empty, alarm system or not. What do you think, Nick?”

“I say we take them. Do you think Sophie will wear all this stuff?” Nick asked anxiously.

Patty glared at Nick. “Never in a million years. Sophie had a string of fake pearls and a bracelet she bought herself and, of course, her most treasured necklace, the locket you gave her. She never took it off until she was arrested. I have it to give back to her, and I bet that’s the first thing she asks about.”

Patty tried to hide her smile at Nick’s sigh of relief.

“I think we can leave now. We found pretty much what we were looking for, the diaries and the jewelry. If Kala wants us to, we can always come back. I hate this place,” Patty said, looking around. “I wonder why Adam never redid it after his wife died. Hey, wait a minute, I want to see the room where Audrey died before we leave, and no, I am not being morbid. I just need to see the layout. You want to come with me or wait here with our loot?”

Nick looked out the door at the stairway and shook his head. “I’ll wait here. I can start taking all this out to the car if you like.”

“Okay, good idea. Be back in a flash.”

Upstairs, Patty walked down the hallway till she came to a suite of rooms that obviously belonged to Audrey. Minus the dark blue walls and all the stars, it would have been a beautiful luxurious suite. Patty thought she could probably fit her entire little house into just those two rooms.

Patty stood in the doorway and winced at the sight of the hospital bed. Adam had left it just as it was, right down to the rumpled sheets and light blanket on the bed. It looked to her like he had just closed the door and walked away. There was dust everywhere, the sheer curtains were gray and limp looking. A vase of what had once been flowers, which had petrified, sat on one of the night tables. She’d seen pictures of this very room at the trial, but seeing it in person was altogether different somehow. The pictures in court were of the furnishings and didn’t show the bizarre walls and ceilings, with all the gilt stars of all shapes and sizes.

Was this room a shrine? Did Adam come in here and… do what? Stare at the bed? Did he close his eyes and see his wife propped up on the pillows wearing a pretty nightgown? Sophie had told her once that she had to change Audrey three times a day so that when her husband came to visit, she always had on a gown that was freshly ironed and scented with her favorite perfume.

Patty turned to look around the huge room. An ugly wheelchair sat in one corner. An artificial tree or plant of some kind partially hid the chair. The plant was thick with dust, almost obliterating the green color of the silk leaves.

A tear formed in the corner of Patty’s eye. How sad all this was.

Patty walked around one more time, into the sitting room, the dressing room, the giant bathroom that was bigger than most people’s living rooms, hoping to see something that would be of significance. There was nothing to see. Her shoulders slumped.

“Rest in peace, Audrey Star,” Patty murmured as she closed the door behind her.

Out in the hallway Patty called Kala to report in. “Depending on traffic, we’ll be back at the office in thirty minutes, forty-five if we hit the wrong lights. Have Bobby meet us in the garage with a dolly. The books are really heavy, and Nick can’t lift them except one at a time. Saves us a bunch of trips if he can meet us.”

Kala said she was excited with the news, and Bobby would be waiting in the parking garage. As always, she warned Patty, or in this case, Nick, to drive carefully.