Broken Serenade (39 page)

    S
oon, Vivien remarked that the back door that opened into the veranda had been left cracked open. She approached it and knocked.

    “Mr. Logan!” she called a few times.

    She pushed the door open and discovered another dozen of statues in the middle of the room that was otherwise empty. Fueled by curiosity, Vivien stepped inside. Even the pictures on the walls had been removed. On the places where they had been, she could distinguish the initial color of the wall paint quite easily now. A nauseating reek of cigarettes smoke and alcohol hang in the room. 

    “Is anybody home?” she asked again. As she expected, nobody answered her call.

    She lingered a while around the statues, touching and studying them and marveling at their beauty and perfection. Then she entered the other two rooms and the kitchen. Boxes full of clothes, shoes, dishes, and things that are or are not useful in a house lay everywhere. All doors to rooms and closets were wide open. With one exception. The door of a closet. Vivien tried its knob. It was locked. She quickly remembered Mr. Logan’s favorite place to keep the keys – up on the frame above. As a child, she had seen Mademoiselle Lili taking a key from a place like that so many times. She stood on the tips of her toes and reached on top of the dusty wooden frame.
Got it,
she whispered satisfied, touching the cold piece of metal.
What do keep in here, Mr. Logan? Pornographic statues? With whom did you coupled Tee?
Emotion ridden, her palms damp with perspiration, she unlocked that closet and opened its door. She gasped. The discovery flash-froze the blood in her veins.

*                                            *                                             *

    Frowning, Art Leonard studied the map of the last unusual events in his area of action.

    “Alberman,” h
e yelled all of a sudden. “Have you found all Logan’s addresses?”

    “Yeah, I was just getting them from my desk,” the police officer answered
, as he approached with the list of addresses. “Man, this old guy moved like crazy lately,” he pointed out.  

    Detective Leonard took th
e list and started to pin miniature red flags on his map on the places of each of Logan’s addresses. 

    “I’ll be damned if this isn’t fishy!” he muttered anxiously.

    “What’s up, boss?” Alberman came quickly to his side.

    “Look at this! The yellow ones are the addresses of Arlene, Igor, Carol Hopkins,
the deceased construction engineers of Miss Lauren’s mansion, Miss Hopkins… The red ones are Logan’s addresses. Suspiciously close by, don’t you think so? If I go back in time… like fifteen years ago, I find him on the street of that murdered plastic surgeon from Woodside. You said he was moving right now again. Where to?”

    “Yes, he was movi
ng his furniture this morning to 1213 Palms Street in Menlo Park. In fact, he’s relocating on a parallel street with the one he lived on as Miss Hopkins’ neighbor.” 

    “He’
s moving uncomfortably close to the house of Timothy Leigh, Vivien’s fiancée and the architect of Miss Lauren’s mansion,” detective Leonard concluded, dropping the red pen that he had been nervously spinning between his fingers all morning long. “Let’s go! We’ve got to have a
tête-à-tête
with talented Mr. Logan,” he told Alberman, as he collected his jacket and mobile phone and walked out of his office.   

CHAPTER 34

  
 
T
he expensive floral scent that came from that closet was enough to set the speed of her pulse dangerously high and to raise gooseflesh all over her body. Vivien leaned closer and swiftly sniffed the man suit neatly arranged on a fancy green hanger.
Obsession
, the scent that was never missing from Mademoiselle Lili’s perfume collection. She remembered how she loved to play with Lili’s perfumes, as a child. She had tried them all. Terrified, she connected the dots now. She had detected the same unusual floral fragrance around Arlene’s dead body.  

    Vivien pulled the small drawer of that antic vanity table, and the mirror on top of it
trembled evil-bodingly, ready to drop. Startled, she instinctively held it in place with the other hand. Then she looked inside the drawer, and the discovery turned into a horrifying nightmare. A white manly wig, a few sets of black eyebrows, a couple of man’s handkerchiefs, plastic gloves, a glass make-up jar, a small bottle containing a dubious liquid, and a bistoury were neatly arranged in that old worm-eaten wooden container. An unexpected sensation of nausea made her back up a couple of steps. That very moment she detected the cadenced sound of high heels and a familiar metallic clinking that accompanied it. She regretfully concluded that she had decided to retreat way too late.

    “Curio
sity killed the cat, my dear!” A well-known voice reverberated ominously in the room. “You’ve probably heard that many times, didn’t you Vivien? You must’ve, child. With your unusual hobby, you must’ve.”

    Vivien did not turn. The surpri
se had paralyzed her. She didn’t want to see her face. Not yet. Finally, she inspired deeply and gathered her courage. Then, she turned around and faced her enemy.

    “Did you come to pick up your…
instruments,
so you can…
play
again? Do you really think you’re smart, Lili? Do you really think that you can kill and get away with it forever?” Vivien gave a short, mocking laugh.

    “Until now, I’ve done
it successfully,” Lili boasted, full of confidence. “I’m not really what you call a hands-on. Doctor Evans used to do it wonderfully. In the past, that is. Lately, he had become… How should I put it? Sloppy would be the right word. The old age is to blame, I suppose.”  

    “You killed Arlene, didn’t you?
” Vivien asked nauseated. “Why? What could a silly girl like Arlene do to you? She couldn’t even be taken seriously.”

    “First of all
, she was a spy. And a lousy one, you should know that. Clark must’ve been quite desperate to trust her. In all my brief encounters with Arlene, I’ve always felt like talking to a brainless combination of a mini-skirt and a push-up bra. Secondly, she helped one of my girls run away with her child, a child that was very important to the organization. But what actually enraged me, it was her circus at the nightclub. That exotic dance… wrapped up only in a yellow scarf… The yellow silk scarf
I
gave her! How dared she make fun of
my Amazons
? She was still wet behind the ears…”     

    “Exactly! That i
sn’t a reason to take someone’s life!” Vivien pointed out in a revolted tone. 

    “Well, not really,” Lili admitted. “Actually, Arlene was a victim. My intention was to
eliminate Andrew Evans. That’s why I placed his DNA at the crime scene. You see, Vivien, this man had become an insufferable
cochon
. He was waiting for me to offer him my darling little girls. He was lurking around my youngsters like a hyena, craving, watching them with hunger as they grew up and ripped. I couldn’t stand it anymore. Those disgusting thoughts in his head, I could actually read them every day in his eyes. I couldn’t allow him something like that, even though I had been forced to promise it years ago.” She paused and took a deep breath. “Well, what could I do? The shrink likes to meditate. He will have plenty of time for that in the prison. It never occurred to me that he had killed my Nadine,” she hissed, and her eyes flashed with hatred. “My decision would’ve been different, I’m quite sure of it. But at that time, I didn’t know about it, and I wasn’t so cruel as to do him in after all he had done for me. I have a heart, you know!”  

    “Seriously!” Vivien mocked her. “Do you really expect me to believe that you have
a heart, Mademoiselle Lili? Or maybe I should call you Miss Lauren, or
The Queen
? What do you prefer?”

    “What if you tried…
mother
?” Lili suggested with blatant audacity.

    “Only the thought makes me vomit,” Vivien replied. “So Arlene is your only
hands-on victim?”

    “Why do you ask?”

    “You said it earlier: curiosity!”

    “Rob
ert Kane,” Lili said shortly. “Actually, his death was premature. An accident like the one that happened to the construction engineer before him wouldn’t have raised suspicion at all. But so far so good, and believe me, my dear Vivien, everything happened so fast, I had to improvise!”

    “Spare me the morbid details, Mademoiselle Lili. Why the construction engineers? If
you’re not happy with their work, the logical solution is to replace them, find somebody else. Well, of course, to reach such a conclusion you need a healthy mind. Something you painfully lack.”

    “Dear, dear,” Lili laughed evilly. “
You do have a sharp tongue. Not really the mousy young lady I expected.”

    “Others made the same mistake.
It looks like my reputation always travels ahead of me. Unfortunately, it gets quite distorted by untrue rumors,” Vivien retorted.

    For a brief moment, Lili just
watched her daughter, fascinated. Vivien insisted.

   
“So you developed a fixation on construction engineers.”

    “Believe it or not, Vivien, I gave t
his matter a lot of thought. I don’t kill for pleasure. I always have at least one serious reason. The bottom line was that my house should be mine only. I don’t want anybody else to know it entirely, as I know it. Do you imagine how many secret entrances and exits that mansion has? I have to be the only one who knows them all. The only one,” she repeated.

    Vivien turned pale.

    “That means that Tee…”

    “Exactly. Timothy was next in line. Right after Robert Kane,” Lili said sharply. “And he’s still there, as far as I’m concerned.”

    Vivien felt the need to hurt her. She attacked her verbally
, with unrestrained vengeance.

    “As much as I adored and loved you as a child, Mademoiselle Lili, lately
, I have this strange experience whenever I think of you. I get the same feelings one gets when one thinks of a snake. You don’t want that disgusting creature to cross your path ever, but if it does, you feel the urge to crush its head to death. I’m so ashamed you are my natural parent.”

    Her angry words reached deep and caused the intended damage. Lili’s face became livid.

    “Well, Vivien, you’ll have to live with that, child,” she told her, shaking. “Funny, but as much as I like you now, and I’m obsessed with you, I never wanted to have you either. You were an accident.”

    Vivien ignored her
disturbing confession.

    “
So you wanted Tee dead for a totally different reason. A pettier, menial, narcissistic, and absolutely debasing reason. And that entire circus about your so-called revenge for Nadine’s death, you only staged it to convince me that Tee was guilty of killing her.”      

    “Partially. I’
ve never been sure whether he or Igor has done it. I allowed Igor to grow up and become a man. I did it for Nadine’s sake. She was so fond of him. I supported Igor. Financially. I studied him. In time, the balance tipped to his favor. Timothy appeared to be the guilty party. In fact, I wanted him to be guilty. I’ve always hated Timothy. He’s so… fucking perfect! Excuse my French! But he’s always been like that. He could’ve twisted any woman or girl’s mind. Hell no! He had to choose my Nadine! And now, you! Timothy is like a curse that I can’t escape,” she said viciously. “He follows me through my life, stealing my happiness, my joy, leaving me alone, and vetoing my love completeness. Whenever I love someone, voilà! There he comes; ready to take that woman away from me. He’s my nemesis.”    

    She
managed to produce a false smile that hurried to adorn her lips too early and rather distorted her face in a repugnant grimace. As she approached Vivien, her green, cat-like eyes were still displaying her savage and unjustified hatred against Timothy.   

    “All of that is less important
right now, Vivien. Because now, I want
you
! I need you. The Amazons need you. You are beautiful, you are smart, and you have everything it takes to be a leader. We’ll be unbeatable together. Mother and daughter… hmmm, wonderful!” she exclaimed, excited. “All I want from you is to forget Timothy and come and live with me. And I promise you that I will also forget everything about him.”

    “You amaze me!
You’re so vain, so self-centered, and so out of touch with reality! You think the world revolves around you,” Vivien said calmly. “I hate to think that I live in the same city, the same country with you. But to live under the same roof with you? That’s hell on earth for me! Can’t you see how much I despise you?” she asked surprised. “I have no intention of hiding it.” Then, Vivien spoke slowly and very clearly. “I love Tee. There is nothing you can change about that. Neither you, nor anybody else in this world. I love him ever since I can remember. I have the most beautiful feelings for him. I love him as a friend, as a lover, as a wife. For Tee, I’ve got feelings you’ll never even dream of experiencing. Ever! And for that, I feel sorry for you.”