All Fall Down (8 page)

“No!” Blaine jerked awake, drenched in cold perspiration. Ashley had jumped up on the bed and was licking her face. “I’m all right, girl,” she mumbled, stroking the dog and sitting up. During the weeks at Caitlin’s house the frequency of the dream had lessened, and she’d hoped it would soon disappear. But she’d had the dream three nights in a row, ever since she’d come home, and she knew the trauma of that awful day in May was too firmly embedded in her subconscious to fade so quickly.

Shaking, she threw back the covers and glanced at the clock on the bedside table. One-thirty. The house was deadly quiet. And cold.

She climbed out of bed and shrugged into a light silk robe that did nothing to ward off the chill. Somewhere under the bed were the delicate slippers she seldom wore, but tonight the polished oak floors chilled her bare feet, so she found them and slipped them on. Then she flipped on the bedside light, but there was nothing. So her sensation of cold wasn’t only from the familiar dream. The electricity had gone off, which wasn’t unusual. According to Martin, they’d had electrical problems in this house for years.

She crept into Robin’s room, tripping over Ashley, who kept stopping in front of her, assuming a listening stance. “It’s okay, Ash. The house is just creaking because of the sudden drop in temperature,” she whispered. Robin was sound asleep, but she was uncovered. Blaine pulled the down comforter up to her chin and tiptoed from the room.

“Flashlight,” she said to Ashley. “It’s in the kitchen.”

They stumbled down the long hall and through the living room and dining room. When they reached the kitchen, Blaine automatically flipped the light switch, but the room remained in darkness. “Great,” she muttered. “Forty degrees on a pitch-black night, and we don’t have heat or light.” She felt her way over to the drawer beside the stove and withdrew a flashlight. The battery was weak, and it gave out only a faint light. “Oh, no,” she moaned. How many times had Martin warned her about keeping fresh batteries in the flashlights? How often had he advised keeping candles handy? All his good advice had gone unheeded. And it was so
cold
. At this rate, she and Robin would both have sniffles in the morning.

Then she had a thought. What if the problem lay with the circuit-breaker box? One time not long after she and Martin had married, the electricity had gone off, and when it came on, the surge flipped half the breakers. Maybe the same thing had happened. It was worth checking out.

“Downstairs to the breaker box,” she told Ashley. The dog whined and cocked her head. “Well, if you’re scared, you can stay up here.”

As if sensing the challenge, Ashley raised her head and trotted to the basement door. She stood at it firmly, though, staring back at Blaine with what seemed like defiance. The dog had always been frightened of the basement and usually could be coaxed only about halfway down the steps. Martin had been amused by Ashley’s stubborn, irrational aversion, but tonight it was getting on Blaine’s nerves. She sighed. “Look, Ash, I don’t like the basement, either, but I have to go down.” She took hold of Ashley’s collar and tugged. “Now
move
.”

She opened the door. Ashley barked twice. “I’m not going to argue with you.” Blaine knew how silly she sounded, but she’d always talked to the dog as if it were human. Sometimes she thought it was. Partly. Like now, when Ashley reluctantly turned around and, to Blaine’s amazement, led the way down.

Martin had just completed plans for converting the large, bare basement into a game room two weeks before his accident. Afterward, Blaine didn’t have the heart to proceed with the project, and Robin didn’t seem interested, so it remained empty except for boxes and discarded furniture. Even the washer and dryer were off the kitchen in a separate laundry room.

Although the basement wasn’t damp, it seemed deathly cold to Blaine in her thin robe. Ashley stopped at the foot of the wooden stairs leading to the big main room, gazing into the darkness. Then she made a couple of huffing sounds in her throat. Blaine almost tripped over her again, and for an instant she felt the same creeping sense of dread she had at the creek bank. Her hand shook slightly, and she had an impulse to run back upstairs and lock the door. But apparently Ashley, for all of her caution, decided nothing was wrong, because she finally stepped off the stairs and looked back at Blaine.

“Now you’ve frightened me, Ash,” Blaine said shakily. “You’ve got me thinking about finding another dead body. But there can’t be anything down here. After all, the outside door to the basement is locked. The whole
house
has been locked for weeks.”

Nevertheless, Blaine hurried as she crossed a dark corner of the basement, then turned off into a smaller room housing the furnace, water heater, and circuit-breaker box. She opened the box and quickly found the thrown breakers. She snapped them back to the On position. The ceiling light Blaine had automatically turned on when she entered the room blazed.

“What are you doing down here?”

Blaine jumped and turned to see Robin standing in the doorway. “The electricity went off. I came down to check for thrown breakers.”

“Judging by the arctic temperature, the one controlling the furnace is a guilty party.”

“Is that what woke you? The cold?”

“I heard noises. Must have been you and Ashley.”

“Well, everything should be okay in a minute.” Right on cue, the furnace hummed to life. “Thank goodness that was so easy. We’d never get anyone out here at this time of night. Let’s go back upstairs,” Blaine said. But neither Robin nor Ashley was listening. Ashley was sniffing something on the far side of the furnace, growling low in her throat.

Robin started, and Blaine felt a dark wing of fear flutter inside her. “It’s probably a dead mouse.”

“We’ve never had mice in this house.”

“I don’t believe that. This house is fifty years old,” Blaine argued.

She was suddenly overcome with panic. She felt perspiration popping out on her hands, and when neither the girl nor the dog moved, she said shrilly, “Robin, let’s get out of here.”

Robin ignored her and went over to stand beside the dog. Her forehead puckered; then she said in a small, frightened voice, “Blaine, come here.”

Blaine hesitated, then forced herself closer to the dog and Robin and peered behind the furnace. After taking a sharp, startled breath, she bent and drew out a tan suede jacket, a small brown purse, and a navy blue suitcase. Gingerly she lifted the suitcase’s identification tag and read aloud, “Rosalind Van Zandt.” She raised her eyes to Robin’s. “My God, this stuff is Rosie’s, and it’s been hidden.”

1

For the second time in less than two days, Blaine called the county sheriff’s office. Twenty minutes later, when Logan Quint pulled into the driveway, she was already in a jogging suit and had turned on every light in the house.

“It’s you!” she said, opening the door before Logan had a chance to ring the bell. “I expected a deputy. Do you work twenty-four hours a day?”

“Sometimes.” Blaine noted he was wearing ancient jeans, a sweatshirt, and a pair of scuffed boots. His sleepy eyes and sloppy clothes said he’d been awakened by a call and had dressed in a hurry. “Actually, I left orders that I was to be informed of any developments in the Van Zandt case, no matter what the time. Show me what you’ve found.”

Would it kill you to smile just to make Robin and me feel a little calmer? Blaine thought angrily, but he looked aloof, almost taciturn. Annoyed, she led the way to the basement, where Robin waited as if she thought the suitcase might vanish if it wasn’t watched.

“How did you happen to come across this stuff?” Logan asked.

“Ashley, once again. The electricity went off and I went downstairs to check the breakers. The breaker box is in the furnace room. Ash found the stuff almost at once, behind the furnace.”

“What makes you so sure these items belong to Rosalind?” he asked as they descended the stairs.

“The identification tag is on the suitcase. And Robin and I have seen Rosie carry that purse and wear the jacket.”

When they entered the small furnace room, Logan paused to look at Rosie’s things sitting in front of the furnace; then he drew on thin rubber gloves he’d carried in his back pocket. “I don’t want to disturb any fingerprints,” he explained. “Of course, I’ll make allowances for yours, since obviously you’ve touched the stuff.”

“We shouldn’t have,” Blaine said.

“It’s a natural reaction.” He looked at the suitcase. “I’d like you two to stay while I go through this. I may need some information.”

Blaine looked at her stepdaughter. “Robin?”

“I want to stay. I knew more about Rosie’s things than anyone except her aunt.”

Logan knelt and pulled the suitcase to him. “I’ll dust for fingerprints after we’ve searched it,” he said.

“Why are you so concerned about fingerprints?” Blaine asked suspiciously. “I thought you said she committed suicide.”

“I said that’s what it looked like.” He snapped open the lid. Inside, everything was neatly folded and compartmentalized. How like Rosie, Blaine thought with a catch in her throat. She was always so neat.

A pair of black wool slacks and a white silk blouse—not quite as trendy as the clothes some of the girls wore, but expensive and definitely Rosie’s style. Panty hose. A pink, lace-trimmed Christian Dior nightshirt and matching robe. Three pairs of underpants. An underwire bra, a silk slip. A blow dryer and a curling iron. In one side compartment a box of Allerest, a travel bottle of Revlon shampoo, a toothbrush, toothpaste, mascara, blusher, and gray eyeshadow; in the other, white Isotoner house slippers.

“You recognize all of this, Robin?” Logan asked.

“Yes, aside from the toiletries. The makeup is Estée Lauder, though. That’s the brand she always wore because they don’t do animal testing.”

Logan moved on to the purse. Brush, compact, lipstick in a pink tone, a ballpoint pen, and a roll of cherry Lifesavers lying in the bottom of the purse; driver’s license, Social Security card, library card, and three one-hundred-dollar bills in her billfold. Logan raised his eyebrows at the money. Four keys on her pewter sea horse key chain. And one key tucked away in a zipper compartment of the purse.

“House key, locker key, and car key,” he said thoughtfully, holding up the key chain.

Robin nodded. “And that fourth key on the chain is the Peytons’ garage key. I’ve seen her use it.”

“I see.” He lifted the fifth key, which had been concealed. “And this? Another key to the Peyton house?”

Robin frowned. “I don’t think so,” she said slowly. “It seems to me Rosie had only one key to the house. That always bothered her. Her aunt waited up for her when she was out, you see, and Rosie had to come in the through the front door, so Miss Peyton could see her from the living room.”

“That sounds pretty quaint.”

“I told you Rosie was overprotected.”

“Maybe Joan Peyton would know what that key belonged to,” Blaine suggested.

Logan studied the key. “I have a feeling she wouldn’t.”

Blaine looked at him. “What do you mean?”

Logan gazed at the key as if it were a crystal ball, his narrow, strong-boned face looking even more angular in the light from the stark overhead bulb, his dark eyes more hooded. If I were a romance writer, I’d describe those eyes as enigmatic, Blaine thought irrelevantly. But right now her inability to read Logan’s expression was more unnerving than intriguing. Suddenly he seemed severe and relentless, just the way he had last night when he’d driven her home after they located Rosie’s body.

“Logan, what is going on?” Blaine asked when he didn’t answer the first question. He stared fixedly at the floor for a moment, as if carrying on an internal debate, then raised his head.

“I’m going to tell you some things we don’t want generally known yet,” he said abruptly. “We just found out this information late this afternoon, and Rosie’s aunt was informed a few hours ago, but you might know more about this than she does.”

Blaine and Robin stared at him. “Go ahead,” Robin said in a voice that sounded dry and far away.

“We sent Rosie’s body to the state medical examiner’s lab in Charleston for an autopsy, and they did a rush job, partly because of the nature of her death and partly because of her family’s clout in this state. Anyway, she’d been dead forty to forty-eight hours when you found her, although she hadn’t been in the water that long. I found a place a few feet up from the willow where the bank had collapsed. I think she must have been lying there and fell into the creek during the storm Saturday. She hadn’t exsanguinated from her slashed wrists, in spite of her time in the creek, probably because the water was so cold. The blood analysis revealed the presence of an opiate. Unless they know what they’re looking for, though, they can’t identify specific products. Anyway, because of the great amount of blood she’d lost, they couldn’t say how much of the drug she’d ingested, but it was a hell of a lot. It was administered intramuscularly. Those kinds of injections require longer needles, which sometimes break off. Part of the needle was still embedded in the muscle of Rosalind’s left arm. I found a syringe with a broken needle out in the woods this morning.”

Blaine swallowed. “Her grandmother is on medication for a broken hip. Could Rosie have taken some of Mrs. Peyton’s medicine?”

“No. They tested for those drugs. Nothing matched.” Logan paused, looking at Robin intently. “The autopsy also revealed that Rosalind was carrying a two-month-old fetus.”

Blaine’s jaw sagged. “Rosie was
pregnant?
Did Joan know?”

Logan didn’t take his eyes off Robin. “She says she doesn’t believe it—that there must have been a mistake in the autopsy. But there was no mistake. That’s why I’m asking you, Robin. Do you know who the father was?”

Robin shook her head mutely.

“My God,” Blaine breathed.

“Wait a minute,” Robin said slowly. “You said the needle was in her
left
arm?” Logan nodded. “Rosie was left-handed.”

“That’s what the medical examiner said, based on the bump raised on her left middle finger from holding a pen.” Logan finally raised his eyes. “It doesn’t imply she administered the injection herself, does it? Besides, a few things looked odd even before the autopsy. The night we pulled her out of the creek, I found a lot of bruising on her arms, and one of her pierced earrings had been ripped from her earlobe.”

“What about the fish and the birds that had been at her?” Robin asked. “Could they have done the damage?”

“They bite. They don’t hit, especially on the temple. The M.E. found massive bruising there. A concussion.”

Blaine stared at him, knowing where he was heading. Robin said, “She’d been in a struggle.”

Logan nodded. “Another odd thing was that even the next morning I couldn’t find the knife that had slashed her wrists. It could have gone into the creek, of course, but it seems more likely it would have been near the syringe.”

“And you didn’t find her suitcase, purse, and jacket,” Blaine said faintly.

Logan’s eyes bore into hers. “Exactly when did you move back here?”

“Saturday morning, around ten o’clock. I’d planned on staying with Cait until Sunday, but I decided the extra day would give me more time to get ready to go back to school.”

“When you came back, did you discover any signs of someone having been in the house?”

“No.”

“Nothing was out of place?”

“Not that I remember. Of course, I hadn’t been in the house for several weeks, but Robin came out every few days to practice her piano, and Kirk, my brother-in-law, came here once a week to check on things.” Blaine took a deep breath. “Logan, there’s something I haven’t told you. I was here Friday night.”

“I thought so.”

Blaine was so surprised she drew back. “You
thought
so?”

“Yes. Your car was spotted heading in this direction.”

“Who saw me?”

“Abel Stroud. I live on Prescott Road, too, about a mile south of you, toward town. He was dropping by to bring me something, and he saw you driving from this direction around eight-thirty. There aren’t too many white Mercedeses in this area, you know. You’re kind of conspicuous.”

“Why didn’t you mention it?”

“I was waiting for you to.”

“I’d forgotten it until Sunday night, after we’d found Rosie’s body and I learned she’d left home Friday.”

“Did you come into the house?”

“Yes, but only for a few minutes to turn up the heat, since I was planning to move back the next morning, and to put away a few groceries.”

“Did you see anything unusual?”

“Nothing. No lights in the house. And no cars.”

“Any car parked back on the access road where Rosie’s was couldn’t be seen from Prescott Road or your driveway.”

“No, I guess not.” Blaine realized her hands were shaking. She’d been terrified to tell Logan about that night. But he’d already known and hadn’t even questioned her about it. So why did she still feel so uneasy?

Logan turned to Robin. “Are you sure you didn’t know about Rosalind seeing anyone but Tony Jarvis?”

“I’m sure. I mean, I’m not sure she wasn’t, but if she was,
I
didn’t know it.”

“And that relationship was casual.”

“Yes. Her aunt wouldn’t let her date him, just let them be friends at school. Besides, he saw other girls. I don’t think Rosie would date a guy who was going out with other girls, do you?”

“I didn’t know her, Robin.”

“Well, she wouldn’t.”

“Are you sure?”

Blaine felt that Logan was badgering Robin, who was looking paler by the moment. Angered, she forced down her uneasiness and said, “Can you forget the exact nature of Rosie and Tony’s relationship for a minute and answer the big question for me? Except for Robin’s and Kirk’s visits to this house, it’s been locked up for weeks. So how did the things Rosie took with her on Friday afternoon get in here?”

Logan stood. “Come upstairs with me.”

Blaine and Robin exchanged a quick, apprehensive glance, but they followed quietly. Even Ashley trailed along. When they reached the front door, Logan opened it, locked it, then inserted the key he had found in Rosalind’s purse. The lock snapped open.

“Good heavens,” Blaine gasped.

Logan looked at Robin. “Did you ever give Rosalind a key to this house?”

Robin shook her head. “No.”

“Are you sure?”

“That’s not the kind of thing I’d forget.”

“I know.”

Robin looked at Logan levelly. “Then you’re insinuating that I’m lying. Well, let me tell you something—I
don’t
lie.”

“Even to cover up for a friend?”

“No, not even to cover up for a friend.” She hesitated, uncertainty flickering in her eyes. “But there is something,” she said slowly. “I never gave Rosie a key of her own. But there was a time, after Blaine collapsed at school with pneumonia, when Rosie had my key to this house. I was at the hospital, and Rosie offered to come out here to get a robe and some toiletries for Blaine. I gave her the key then so she could get in.”

“And she returned it?” Logan asked.

“Yes, but she could have had a duplicate key made. It wouldn’t take very long at the hardware store. It’s near the hospital.”

Logan held up the key. “You might be right. This is a fairly new key.”

“But why?” Blaine asked. “Why would Rosie do such a thing?”

“Because she needed a rendezvous spot. You and Robin weren’t going to be living here for a while, and it’s isolated, so she didn’t need to worry about prying eyes.”

Blaine stared at him. “Of course. It was the perfect place for an affair.”

Logan nodded. “It was also the perfect place for a murder.”

2

“Joan! Joan Ma-
rie!
”

Joan Peyton opened heavy eyes and peered at the man-tailored watch she wore even when she slept. Two-ten. She hadn’t gotten to sleep until after twelve, and she hadn’t slept at all the night before. “Joan!”

“Coming, Mother,” she called, tossing off the sheet and padding on bare feet to the bedroom across the hall. “What is it?”

The withered figure raised itself up slightly in bed. “Come closer. I can’t see you.”

Joan stepped closer. “Would you like me to turn on the lamp?”

“No! It’s too bright.” The voice that had once ordered servants around with a rich contralto imperiousness was now high and sandpapery. But it was still imperious. “I’m cold.”

“Cold! The thermostat is turned up to seventy-five. I can’t even stand a blanket, and you have two over you.”

At that moment Bernice Litchfield walked in, her stocky figure wrapped in a robe splashed with huge, vivid pink flowers, her faded blond hair bristling with brush rollers.