Unknown Means (20 page)

“That’s what I want.” Where the hell did that come from, on one-third of a beer? I want to settle down, and no one believes me.

Minus the kids part. Evelyn and I are a little past that stage.

Joey didn’t pursue his confession. She remained lost in her own history, not even commenting when David had her glass refilled. “If I don’t get it, I’ll go back to getting by on what I can make waiting tables, but what’s so bad about a little proactivity? Hell, William did the same thing. He comes from only a rung or two above me on the social ladder. Grace carried both of us, is the truth.”

“Did Grace seem to resent that?”

“Nah. Never. I think she thought carrying people came along with the money. Like cocaine to rock stars, a given.”

“Had anything strange happened to Grace lately? A weird phone call, a letter? When you two went clubbing, did anyone pay more attention to her than she wanted?”

Joey snorted. “Clubbing with the beautiful people isn’t like hanging with the college students at Shooters. Grace didn’t even drink. She quit a few months ago, said it gave her a headache.”

When she became pregnant, David thought, wondering again why she hadn’t chosen to share that particular piece of information.

“We didn’t have to fend off drunk losers. Everyone in our groups belonged there.”

“Okay, how about someone who did belong? Did Grace have any admirers? Even a sympathetic ear, a friend who didn’t care for how William treated her?”

“William came with us sometimes. He wants to see and be seen as much as anybody. But I don’t remember Grace ever having a problem like that, ever saying that this guy gave her the creeps or she wished that guy would get lost. She didn’t have a care in the world—except for William’s piece on the side, of course, and half the time she’d convince herself that the bimbo didn’t exist.” Joey’s eyes grew wet. “A rotten way to treat a woman.”

“Yes, it is. Can you go back a week or so, tell me everywhere you two went?” It took a while to note. Joey had a prodigious memory for the places they went, the people they met, even what she and Grace wore. David jotted that information as well; it would help the restaurant and bar staff members recall the two women. If Joey and Grace had had an argument . . . The killer had to be a man, but Joey could have hired someone. And if anyone had ample opportunity to observe Grace’s elevator code, Joey had.

A half hour later, with an empty beer glass and a full notebook, he said, “Thanks for your time.”

“Mmm.” Now on her third drink, she swept him with a look.

“Just a government salary, huh?”

“Nothing but.”

“Well. Have a nice evening.” She turned to scan the room for the pharmaceuticals man.

C H A P T E R

17

THE LOBBY INTERCOM AT THE QUAY 55 BUILDING HAD

been made with sufficient quality to convey the irritation in William Markham’s voice loud and clear. “What the hell are you bothering me at home for?”

“I’m investigating the murder of your wife, sir,” David said, clearly and distinctly, noting with satisfaction the way the four tenants passing him in the air lock stopped to listen. It wouldn’t take any skin off his nose if they figured out what a first-class bastard they now had for a neighbor. “I didn’t think it would be such a bother. If you’d prefer, you can come down to the station in the morning—”

“All right, all right.” The buzzer sounded, though David simply followed the other tenants through the heavy glass doors. Quay 55

did not have Riviere-level security, only glossy hardwood floors throughout and a view of Lake Erie from both sides of the building.

The other tenants gave him plenty of space during the elevator ride upward, darting glances at one another while avoiding his.

A redhead opened the door, a striking woman with high cheekbones and an eagle’s glare. She took a moment to size him up, but not as Joey Eames had. A debate took place behind her eyes, as if she were trying to decide how much of a threat he represented. Without any obvious conclusion, she stood back to let him in.

“I’m Barbara Quinn. I’m sure you’ve heard about me.”

“Yes. You’re the piece on the side.” Let’s get her on the defensive, see what she does.

“To Grace’s friends, that would be me, yes,” she stated with neither relish nor shame. He followed her into an airy, modern space with a huge flat-screen TV and a fireplace. Tall, abstract wood sculptures placed here and there accented the floor, almost like in Frances Duarte’s apartment, though these seemed more like artwork than travel souvenirs. Barbara Quinn planted her slim body in its flowing pantsuit in an armchair and motioned for him to have a seat.

“To William’s friends, I have saved him from a life of misery. I’m the woman he’s not marrying for the money.”

David kept his voice neutral, matching her frankness. “But he doesn’t need to now, does he? He has Grace’s estate.”

“He already knows he doesn’t need it, and it’s not worth the price. Grace was a nice person, and we’re sorry she’s dead. William married her for her money, but she married him to have a baby. It was not a happy marriage.”

“Perhaps so, but Grace didn’t want it to end. Did you know she planned to hire a private investigator?”

“But she didn’t, did she?” Barbara pointed out, crossing one long leg over the other. “Grace didn’t really want to know. You forget, this is a woman who covered wars in the Middle East. If she wanted proof, she could have simply followed William to work in her own car with her own collection of telephoto lenses. But no, she ignored all the signs, then got agitated enough to confront him. A child could tell he lied, but she chose not to see it. As I said, I’m sorry she’s dead, but beyond that I don’t have a lot of sympathy for her. She made her own decisions.”

“Why didn’t William tell her the truth, then?”

“Ask him yourself.”

The man in question appeared, dressed in a thick terry-cloth bathrobe, which seemed a strange way to attend an interrogation.

Apparently Markham truly did not care what people thought of him. Of course, David thought, now he can afford not to.

“I married Grace for her money,” William Markham admitted without a shred of self-consciousness as he threw himself into the leather upholstery. “I’m going to marry Barbara for her strength. Believe it or not, I really do want the people around me to be happy. I get uncomfortable when they’re not. I planned to keep Grace as happy as possible until after the baby came, and then tell her. I didn’t kill her, though only Barbara and I seem to know that. The papers are acting like I’m the next Sam Sheppard.”

“So she did not know for sure that Barbara existed?”

“No.”

“Or her name, address, nothing like that so far as you knew?”

“Of course not. That’s what I just said.”

“As Ms. Quinn pointed out, Grace was a resourceful woman.”

David looked at the redhead, now sipping an amber-colored liquid from a snifter. “She never contacted you?”

She shook her head, framing her face with curls. “Never.”

David tried to recall the surveillance video, if a woman matching Barbara Quinn’s description had entered the elevator with a man. She could easily have gotten the code from Markham, and she had the second-best motive after his. But David would have noticed a woman like her on the video. She looked something like Evelyn, but skinnier and much harder.

She could have hired a killer, of course. He wondered if he could get a warrant for her financial records and check for large, recent withdrawals. Probably not. Motive, no matter how blatant, did not by itself constitute probable cause. Not in this legal age.

“Did Grace babysit?” He mixed around his questions to keep both of them off guard—if Barbara Quinn ever got off guard.

Markham seemed baffled. “Babysit? Like, children?”

“Yes. Her friends’ children, that sort of thing.”

“Never. Lots of our friends have kids, of course, but they’re not

usually at the types of events we go to, and I couldn’t have stood little kids running around my penthouse.” He gave a tiny shudder.

David pictured the white walls, white carpeting, and glass coffee table. “I just ask because you have a child’s drawing hanging on the refrigerator. I wondered where it came from.”

Barbara drummed long fingers on the side of her glass while Markham looked blank. “I have no idea. I never noticed it.”

“It’s a picture, done in crayon on buff paper. Do you know how long it’s been hanging there?”

“No. It could have been there for the past two months for all I know. Grace never kept much in the refrigerator, so I sort of ignored it.”

“Yeah.” David wondered if William Markham knew anything about his wife other than her society connections and her bank account. “We noticed your fridge didn’t seem too stocked. Did you and Grace eat out a lot?”

“Just about every night. Grace didn’t cook.”

“Did you get food delivered often?”

“Yeah, all the time.”

“How did the delivery person get to your apartment? Did you give them your code?”

“Hardly. Barbara doesn’t even know our code—I mean, she didn’t need it.”

Her eyes skewered him over the rim of her glass. “I know what you meant, dear.”

“We’d meet the kid in the lobby.”

“They wouldn’t come up to the apartment?”

“Penthouse. No.”

“It doesn’t matter if it’s an apartment or a penthouse, dear,” Barbara pointed out. To David, she explained, “Old habits die hard.”

“They do indeed,” he said, wondering how Barbara Quinn, whose father’s wealth still meandered through probate, could afford a loft at Quay 55. Perhaps she had received a generous severance

package from the firm of Markham & Johnson. “You were engaged before you married Grace, weren’t you, Mr. Markham?”

“Yes.”

“Who were you engaged to?”

“Girl named Kelly. A very wealthy girl named Kelly.” He scowled a bit. Having reformed his gold-digger ways did not ease the sting of past failures. “Her family owns the salt mines.”

“Kelly Alexander?”

“Yes. You’ve heard of her?”

Joey could have translated Markham’s look—that an average schmo like David would never have had occasion to meet the rich salt mine heiress. “Yes. When were you engaged to Ms. Alexander?”

“About eight years ago. We were too young, only about twenty-one. We met at Princeton.”

“And Kelly had a little more on the ball than Grace,” Barbara said, swirling her liquor.

“Okay, Kelly figured my interest lay more in her portfolio than in her. Is that what you want me to say?”

“Honesty is our policy now, darling.”

He let out a harsh breath of air, but his irritation dissipated with it. “Kelly tossed me like last week’s milk, and about a year later I met Grace.”

David made a casual note, wondering how to phrase his next questions, not even sure where they were headed. “You both move in the same social circles. It must have been awkward when you and Grace ran into her.”

“No, not at all. Kelly and I parted on good terms, no hard feelings. She married a few years later, for love, apparently. At least on her part. The guy is this geeky little geologist who works at her dad’s salt mine—tell me he didn’t get a good deal.”

“Grace didn’t mind socializing with her after you two got together?”

“Mind? They were friends. Their families had known each other

since they were kids—that’s how Grace and I met, really. I’d still see Kelly now and then and ran into Grace at one of the Alexanders’

soirees. Kelly threw us an engagement dinner.”

“Did Grace invest with Kelly?”

“Invest?”

“When Kelly Alexander began her project to open the new salt mine, she had several investors. Did Grace buy any shares?”

“Oh, that. No way. Here I am trying to keep some semblance of nightlife in the Flats alive and Kelly puts a damn factory at the mouth of the river. I don’t know who she bribed to get the permits, after the city spent years forcing out the stone and material-handling companies.”

“You’re sure Grace didn’t buy in.”

“Grace knew how I felt about it, and we always discussed the finances.”

Barbara stirred. “As you might expect, that was the one aspect of the marriage William took a great interest in.”

“I gave her the damn baby, didn’t I?”

She sipped without expression.

He swallowed his anger quickly and, it seemed, easily. “I had to pay attention to the money. Grace had stocks and bonds and funds out the wazoo, and rarely kept up on what they were doing. I know she hadn’t invested in anything new since the last millennium. We hardly ever saw Kelly anymore.”

“Why not?”

“She’s too much of a party girl, even after she married that geek.

Grace didn’t want much to do with that.”

“Yet Grace went clubbing with Joey Eames.”

“Yeah, but not often. They did more shopping and charity dinners and stuff like that. Kelly takes fifty of her closest friends to Aruba for the weekend, attends the Olympics, never misses Cannes.”

“It’s surprising Joey didn’t angle for an invitation to Kelly’s.”

David prodded the man’s antagonism, hoping for an unguarded

disclosure—but everything William Markham said seemed unguarded. The imperturbable Barbara would have made a more interesting sparring partner.

“She has. But Kelly would cut Joey down to size with two words and a nod. She’s not softhearted, like Grace.”

“Did you or Grace know Frances Duarte?”

“Kind of a dowdy woman. I think she came to Grace’s wedding shower, something like that.”

Barbara perked up. “That woman that was killed in Lakewood?”

“You must move in the same circles,” David said.

“You think the same man killed both Grace and this Frances Duarte?” Barbara seemed, in her elegant way, even more excited than Markham—and why not? It would clear her intended from any suspicion in Grace’s murder. A wandering psycho with a resentment for rich women would be the answer to Barbara Quinn’s prayers.