Blackbird 02 - Dead Girls Don't Wear Diamonds (18 page)

I said, "Are you following me?"

He didn't respond, so eventually, I said, "I didn't learn anything pertinent from Tempeste."

"Try me."

"She likes watching other people in sexual situations."

"You mean X-rated videos?"

I cleared my throat. "That kind of thing, yes."

"Think Laura Cooper was mixed up in something like that?"

I had learned several things about Laura. She'd had an affair with Yale Bailey. She and Flan were having some money trouble. She wanted to be as respected in Philadelphia as her family had been in Charleston, South Carolina. And she stole jewelry. I couldn't figure out why she stole, but Laura had probably given it to Sidney Gutnick to sell. But X-rated videos? No way. "I sincerely doubt it."

"Me too."

"She was caught in a compromising position at the Cooper party, though. Had you heard that?"

"Who was she with?"

"A man who runs a casino in Atlantic City. Yale Bailey."

"Is he one of the Red Barons, by any chance?"

"Yes. His plane was at the Cooper house during the party. I was in it myself."

"You were? What did you notice about the plane?"

I frowned. "That it was very tacky inside. Not at all what a corporate jet usually looks like. Very Austin Powers."

"Besides bad interior decorating, anything?"

"I don't think so."

Sounding as though he had a checklist in his head, Bloom said, "Okay, then. I need to know about the Red Barons. They flew to a restaurant after the party, around midnight, I hear. Who went?"

"Are you guessing that someone took Laura and murdered her elsewhere? And brought her back by plane?"

"It's possible."

But unlikely, I knew. The Red Barons were a social bunch who radioed each other during flights and lit
cigars upon landing. Camaraderie was important. And lots of airport people were around, too. It would be hard to smuggle a dead body past all the friends and hangers-on.

"Chaz Cooper, Yale Bailey, Jamie Scaithe." I listed a few more Red Barons I knew, then added, "Their wives or dates, too, I suppose. But Flan didn't go that night. He'd been drinking."

"Maybe Laura went without him."

"She was at the estate, drowning, remember?"

"The Red Barons left around midnight. She died later."

Guessing where he'd gotten his theory, I said, "You saw the autopsy report, didn't you?"

Without answering my question, he said, "She may have had time to fly somewhere before she turned up in the pool."

"Was drowning the cause of death?"

"Yes. But she'd been pretty banged up, too."

"The bruise on her wrist," I remembered. "And on her face. I saw those at the party."

"The ME said those were old injuries. What about her neck?"

"I didn't see any bruises on her neck." I closed my eyes and tried to remember what Laura had worn. "No, I think her neck was fine."

"She was found with rope burns on her neck," Bloom said. "Bad ones, not self-inflicted. From the same rope used to tie the concrete statue around her legs. It was a thick twine used to bundle up some cornstalks that had been delivered to the estate earlier."

I nodded. "Doe had decorated the garden for Halloween with cornstalks. What else can you tell me about the autopsy?"

"Nothing."

"Detective Bloom, I could be a lot more useful if I had something to go on."

We listened to each other decide for a minute, and I wondered where he was. I continued to hear the whirring noise behind him, so he wasn't at his desk. Was he calling me from a car? From his home, wherever that might be? From his own bathtub, maybe? I began to wonder what a police detective looked like in a tub full of warm bubbles.

Eventually, he said, "The water in Laura's lungs didn't have any chlorine in it."

"No chlorine," I repeated. "That means she drowned someplace besides the pool. No wonder you're asking about the Red Barons."

"You get a gold star," said Bloom. "We're checking water samples now. Why don't you see what you can find out from some of your friends?"

"Who do you think I should I ask first?"

"Pick a Red Baron," he suggested. "Any Red Baron."

"All right. I'll see what I can do."

Another moment passed before he said, "I never got the impression you wanted small talk."

"What?"

"You said we never have small talk."

Aha. This was a change of pace. I said, "Well, we don't. You're always busy fighting crime, I suppose."

"And you go to parties. Why aren't you at a party right now, in fact?"

"I get a night off now and then."

"Oh," he said. "I get a night off now and then, myself."

I waited a while, but he reverted to being younger than I was, so I gave in to curiosity and asked, "Where are you right now?"

"Now? I'm on the treadmill."

"The treadmill."

"I'm at the gym."

I tried to decide if a call from a treadmill was anything to get excited about. Or insulted about. I didn't know why I was flirting with Bloom.

I was experimenting, perhaps.

Experimenting to see how it felt to be with a man who wasn't Todd and wasn't Michael. A man who was on the right side of the law, for once.

"You okay?" Bloom asked

"No," I said lightly. "But what else is new?"

We said good night and I got out of the tub.

While I wrapped myself in a towel, the phone rang again.

I picked up immediately. "Small talk requires a topic—something from which we can digress."

Michael said, "You mean like the weather, or can we talk about what's gone wrong between us?"

"It's you." I dropped my towel and hastily bent to grab it. "I thought you'd given up on me."

He said, "I've been busy. And you've been playing detective again."

I wrapped the towel around myself. "You talked to Emma."

"She says you don't think the asshole killed his wife."

"He's not an—" My relaxed mood evaporated fast. "Look, he has problems, but that's not who he is."

"I know who he is." Michael sounded more surly with every passing sentence. "And believe me, the idea that you slept with him has pissed me off for days."

"That was years ago."

"Maybe for you. Not for him."

"How's your father?" I asked, as long as we were pushing each other's buttons.

For a second I thought he'd hung up on me.

But then he said, "How's your investigation?"

I discovered I was hugging the towel so tightly around me that my arms had begun to cramp. I tracked wet footprints into my bedroom and sat on the bed. My heartbeat steadied. Reaching for the bottle of lotion I kept on the nightstand, I said, "I think I need to speak to a man by the name of Yale Bailey. He runs a casino in Atlantic City."

"Why him?"

"Because he's one of the Red Barons." I pinned the phone against my chin and squirted lotion into my palm. "And he had a connection to Laura Cooper."

"What kind of connection?"

"An intimate one, as a matter of fact."

"The dead lady was sleeping with Bailey?"

"Yes."

"So much for marriage vows."

"Yes."

Michael was silent while I massaged lotion onto my legs, so I said, "I'm not in love with him, you know. He's an old friend who asked for my help."

Heavily, he said, "Well, you're loyal. I'll give you that. Thing is, you don't know when to cut your losses. Or," he added, "maybe you do now."

My heart twisted. "I'm not ready to cut you out of my life, Michael."

He kept that awful silence for another long moment. Then, "When were you planning to talk to Bailey?"

"As soon as I can."

"At the casino?"

"I
suppose so."

"What's your plan?"

"Do I need a plan?"

He laughed. But he didn't sound amused. Then he
stopped laughing, and I wondered if he was allowing the felonious side of his mind to ponder a plan. Sometimes it made me nervous that he had such a different perspective on crime than I had, but at other times it was very useful.

Then he said, "Listen, Nora, I need some help understanding this whole Tackett thing—the old house I bought. I know I don't get it. What I call a simple business deal, for you is some kind of Holy Grail— a way of objectifying your family or—"

"Who have you been talking to?"

"What?"

"Objectifying," I said. "Good heavens, are you in therapy?"

"No!" Then he admitted, "I have this friend, a psychologist friend, who thinks you and I ought to talk rationally about this before things go completely bad. I don't," he said, gaining momentum, "I don't want to lose you, Nora. I mean that. We've got some real chemistry going, and God knows I want to take you to bed more than breathe, but I feel like we've got a shot at riding into the sunset together, too. This is a first for me, and I don't want to screw it up. So can you just help me out here? Tell me what to do?"

I felt my head give a dizzy little spin. "I can't tell you what to do."

"Just give me a sentence with a verb in it. I'll do whatever it takes."

I couldn't help smiling. "You'll figure something out."

"How about a clue, at least? Just a hint?"

"Let's talk rationally," I said. "That sounds like a good start."

"You mean it?"

"Of course."

"Okay, let's go to Atlantic City."

"What?"

He said, "I'll pick you up in twenty minutes."

He did hang up on me that time.

In nineteen minutes, I was miraculously dressed, combed and smelling fabulous, if I do say so myself. He arrived wearing a leather sport coat over dark trousers and a crisp white shirt, open two buttons. I nearly asked if he'd father a child for me then and there.

I had rushed into a French-made lace camisole that weighed almost as much as a Kleenex and put on a fitted, low-cut Calvin Klein jacket along with very snug slacks that made no secret of my behind, so I skipped the underwear.

He came into the house, looked me up and down and said a very rude phrase in a prayerful tone. Then he backed me against the refrigerator and kissed me until my insides did something that usually happens on a trapeze.

While he'd explored my mouth and unbuttoned my jacket to touch me, I ran my fingertips across places I had only thought about in bed. Things had simmered too long and needed only to come to a quick boil for us both to feel much better. And things were definitely near boiling. I could hardly breathe for the fierce slamming of my heart against his.

"Wait," I managed to gasp with my head thrown back in a position only possible on the covers of romance novels. "I thought you were taking me to Atlantic City."

His voice was husky. "Can we get a room there?"

"We're not going to bed for the first time in an Altantic City hotel room."

He kissed my throat again with melting heat. "It could be a very nice room."

"We're not going to do that."

He stopped trying to undress me and looked into my eyes. "We're going to make an occasion out of it, huh?"

"Oh, yes. Somewhere romantic."

"Okay."

"Somewhere memorable."

"Okay."

"And very sexy."

"No problem there."

He kissed me more gently for a while longer, then released me slowly. "I'll think over some options and get back to you."

In the car and sounding surprised, he said, "You know, that really cheered me up."

"I'm sorry you've been upset."

He shook his head. "It's not just you. The phone's been driving me crazy. Everybody wants to know about Big Frankie, how he's doing and what's going to happen. But I don't want to talk about it tonight, okay?"

"All right."

Instead, we talked all the way to Atlantic City about everything we'd done during the two months we'd been apart over the summer. I told him that society editor Kitty Keough threw fits if I went to the office, so I was still e-mailing my stories to the editor. Lily Pendergast had taken over running the
Intelligencer,
much to the dismay of the staff. Michael told me that Rory Pendergast's will had forgiven all of Michael's debt to him, which turned out to be a considerable windfall. Michael had decided to use some of his newly found spending money for a fishing expedition in Scotland. He planned to travel with three friends—his lawyer, a fishing magazine-writer buddy and a male relative who baked bread. They all sounded like better company than his usual crew.

The car was one of Michael's old behemoths with a very large front seat and lots of silver chrome. He seemed very pleased to be driving it, and it rode as smoothly as a magic carpet.