Blackbird 02 - Dead Girls Don't Wear Diamonds (20 page)

He smiled again, showing lots of teeth.

I felt my insides curdle.

Over his shoulder, I caught another glimpse of the shark tank. The beast inside cruised past again, tail sashaying slowly.

Suddenly I wondered if the opening in the tank was large enough for Laura Cooper to fit through. Had she been drowned here and returned by plane to the Cooper estate, then left in the pool? If Yale could feed helpless goldfish to his shark, was he capable of drowning Laura?

"Besides," Yale said, "I'm in a one-on-one relationship now."

"Oh."

"It's the real thing," he assured me. "I'm a lucky man. I'm going to marry her."

"How nice."

"And you know the lady, too."

Okay, I have a terrible prejudice against men who call the women in their lives "The Lady." Either they want to be sure you know she's above all moral reproach or it's the name of their childhood dog that they want to perpetuate or something. I couldn't even plaster a small smile on my face. "Really?"

"Sure. Lexie Paine."

I stood very still and hoped my expression didn't look as horrified as I felt.

But I had no time to find out more.

We were interrupted by the tall young woman.

"Yale," she said, from the shadows, "we need your attention."

"Excuse me, Nora."

While I gathered my thoughts, they murmured together and were joined by another man in a maroon jacket with a casino logo printed on the breast pocket. They conferred seriously. Yale nodded and turned back to me.

"Nora, I'm sorry, but there's someone I need to take care of. I have a thousand employees, but all the real dirty work falls to me."

"Of course. I've kept you too long."

"Not at all. There's just somebody I need to escort off the property. We can't be too careful. Our business is highly regulated, and we have to police our guests or risk losing our license. Shall I ride down with you?"

The four of us got into the elevator and were joined on a lower floor by two more large men in snug-fitting maroon jackets. Before we arrived at the lobby level, I knew who they were kicking off the premises.

"Hey, Yale," said Michael, smiling broadly as he stood in the lobby in the company of all those maroon-jacketed security guards. "You want rid of me?"

"Hey, Mick." Yale looked far from worried as he returned Michael's handshake. "Sorry about this. But you understand, right? I can't have anybody thinking Big Frankie's operation is moving in here, you know?"

Michael didn't mind being thrown out of the casino. But I wished he'd stayed long enough to bring down whatever legal entity policed the gambling industry. I wanted nothing more than to see Yale Bailey out of a job, flopping on the sand as helplessly as a beached goldfish.

Chapter 11

I called Lexie and ordered her to have dinner with me the following night.

She agreed, on the condition that Michael join us at her current favorite, a new Japanese restaurant near Rittenhouse Square, my old neighborhood.

I arrived late. The two of them were already at the table, talking about the stock market and drinking rice wine.

Lexie was saying, "Darling, I understand the need for liquidity, but really. Get out from behind the vegetable cart and into the stock market. And no mutual funds! You're much more the hands-on type."

They both got up to kiss me hello. Michael looked amused.

"Sweetie, you look absolutely fabu," Lexie cried. She was wearing at least four thousand dollars's worth of very simple Armani with a Wilma Flintstone-style necklace made of green stones that looked like kryptonite. Her gleaming black hair was pulled straight back from her flawless face in a cheerleader's ponytail. People from the sushi bar were craning to get a glimpse of her, probably because she looked as if she were worth tens of millions, which she was. "Fabu," she declared.

I smiled. "Are you comparing portfolios?"

"No, no, dearest. I'm just trying to woo your beau into giving me a peek at his assets. He could probably
take us both to Paris with his pocket change, so I think it's high time he did something interesting with his dough."

"Paris," said Michael. "Now that's an idea."

"I'm sorry," I told him. "I used to go there with my husband."

"I'll keep thinking."

He excused himself. To go look for some pretzels, he said, but it was to leave me alone with my friend for a few minutes.

We sat down and Lexie grabbed my arm. "Sweetie, that man has made every woman in the room go positively gooey. Why don't you hibernate with him for the winter? See how the bad girls live, for once?"

"Because I'm trying to prevent Flan Cooper from going to jail. My second reason is keeping myself out, too."

"Darling," said Lexie, looking alarmed, "tell all."

I gave her the short version, asking halfway through, "Have you ever had any jewelry stolen while you were around Laura?"

"I lost a bracelet at a benefit once. My great grandmother's pearl thingy with the double clasp. The whole Cooper clan was seated at my table, but I never thought for a second that one of them could have—" Lexie frowned. "Well, it's possible, I suppose. Good heavens."

I continued the story and finally got to my trip to Yale Bailey's lair. I slowed down and filled her in completely on what Yale had told me himself. But she couldn't let me finish.

"That devious little social-climbing shit!" she said, loud enough to turn heads.

"Well, that's a relief," I said. "I was afraid you'd gone insane."

"That—that—bastard!" she sputtered with anger.

"What does he think I am? I had drinks with him once and sat with him at—what presumption!"

"I didn't think you'd fall for him."

"Of course not! How many times has that rat been engaged in this town?"

"Lindsay Fiske last year."

"And Westie Cunningham before that! He's given trinkets to every heiress in town by now, all in a laughably obvious effort to marry himself a meal ticket!"

"It was no trinket he was getting ready for you."

"What?"

I told her about my visit to Sidney Gutnick's shop and the stupendous ring he'd been readying for Yale Bailey.

"Oh," she said, blinking. "Well, I do love a nice piece of jewelry."

"Which any fool could figure out, Lex, so it was part of his plan, I'm sure."

"But why me?" she demanded. "Isn't there some stupid young millionairess climbing out of a finishing-school window in search of a husband?"

"Why choose a young millionairess when you're richer than Madonna?"

"Because I'm just not his type, dear. He maneuvers a girl into bed first, and everybody knows I'm more interested in cash than copulation. There's a lot to be said for abstinence, you know."

"You are preaching to the choir."

"Oh, heavens, yes, sorry, darling."

"Lex, did Yale ever—?"

She read my mind. "He gave me the creeps, yes."

"He was physically rough," I guessed.

Lexie raised her elegant brows in acknowledgement. "I had a feeling he leaned that way. My radar, you know. My God, did he go after you?"

"No. Why should he? I'm poor and gun-shy."

"Gun-shy, indeed. With every reason, sweetie." Lexie lifted her glass to me and we clinked rims. Then she knocked back the last of her rice wine without a blink. "No wonder you stayed away from Yale. All you need is another man with bad habits. You were such a Sherpa for Todd, Nora. Tell me. Are you in over your head with this new beau, too? Are you in love with another dangerous man?"

One of the best things about having good girlfriends is cutting to the chase. I'd known Lexie half my life, and she'd been through it all with me. She moved in with me after Todd died and understood things I didn't share with my own sisters. I knew about the cousin who broke her collarbone when she was eleven and raped her when she was thirteen. We'd been known to discuss life and death over cartons of Cherry Garcia ice cream on dormitory fire escapes and the deck of her mother's yacht.

"He's not dangerous." I said. "Not the way Todd was, at least. In love with him?" I couldn't stop my smile. "It's a slippery slope, Lex."

"Does he make you cry?"

"Heavens, no."

"Well, then, he has my vote." Lexie pushed aside her glass to focus on me. "Sweetie, nobody's happier than I am to see you getting your sparkle back. I don't care if it is your beau or your job. After those horrible years with Todd, it's wonderful to see you laugh again. But have you gone to the other extreme? You protected Todd like a lioness. A misguided lioness, maybe, but you did it. Is that what your knight-in-tarnished-armor is doing for you now? Protecting you?"

"Maybe so," I admitted. "And it's a nice change, frankly."

"But is it an equal partnership? And I'm not talking about
The Kama Sutra."

"It's not a partnership," I conceded. "Not yet."

She sighed. "Well, life can be a roller coaster or a train wreck. Just keep your seat belt fastened, okay?"

The waiter came with more rice wine, but it hasn't been very good so we waved him away politely.

"Lex, will you promise not to scream if I ask you something really corny?"

My friend smiled with affection. "Cross my heart, sweetie."

"What's your thinking on the whole baby issue?"

"Oh, God, are we talking about Libby now?"

"No, not Libby."

She stared at me. "Good grief. Your beau really has you in the spin cycle."

"It's not him that's got me thinking. Maybe I'm needy for some unconditional love right now. Or I'm looking to create a stable family for myself. That, along with the usual hormonal insanity. But I don't think that's all. I look at my life and wonder where everything went, Lex."

"Up Todd's nose."

I laughed again, unsteadily this time.

"Sweetie, if all you needed was unconditional love, you'd have six cocker spaniels. No, you Blackbirds have big families. It's part of who you are." She sat forward. "You told me after Todd's funeral that you needed to get yourself back on the right path. And for you, that path always included having a passel of kids."

"Emma says I can't get married again."

Lexie grinned. "You believe in that widow curse?"

"I can't ignore it," I said. "Can I? Then there's the whole issue of being broke."

Lexie waved off my poverty. "You can count on
me for extravagant baby gifts, darling. And who needs a husband in these days of growth stocks, not to mention turkey basters? Meantime, why don't you give me a few dollars and I'll try to make a nest egg for you?"

"First I have to fix the roof."

"Put a bucket under the leak," Lexie advised. "Now, here comes your beau. See how everybody watches? He's so yummy. Michael, darling, Nora tells me you know that snake Yale Bailey."

Michael slid into the chair opposite mine. He had found a bottle of wine at the bar and brought us clean glasses, too. "He's not a snake. Well, not a poisonous one."

"No? He seems to be slithering into our crowd. Oh, God, I sound like a snob, don't I? Well, he's been known to hit women, so that makes him a snake in my book."

Michael stopped opening the wine with the corkscrew attachment on his pocket knife. He looked at me. "And I left you alone with him?"

"Don't worry about Nora, dear. She can take care of herself." Lexie patted his hand. "How do you know our Mr. Bailey? From Princeton?"

Michael laughed and pulled the cork. "The closest I ever got to Princeton was scalping tickets outside a football stadium. We bumped into each other when he—well, when he got started in the gambling industry."

"Oh? How interesting." Lexie leaned forward on her elbow. "Can you tell me more? Or must you plead the fifth?"

Michael smiled at her and poured the wine into our glasses. "Don't start quoting mafia movies next, okay? It'll give me indigestion."

"Sorry, sweetie."

He put down the bottle and said, "Bailey's an accountant at heart. If he smacks women, that just confirms it. No guts."

I tasted Michael's wine selection. A crisp white, very dry. "Yale had something more than accounting going with Laura Cooper. When he broke it off, apparently to put the moves on Lexie, Laura turned up dead."

Michael eyed Lexie. "He put the moves on you?"

"I didn't notice," said Lexie. "What a nice little wine."

To Michael, I said, "You don't think he's a poisonous snake? You don't think he could have killed Laura?"

He shrugged. "If he hurts women, he's more into preliminaries. Killing her would have spoiled his fun."

Faintly, Lexie said, "Oh, goodness."

Unless he had a reason for wanting her dead, I thought.

But it was Flan who had the stronger motive. Killing his own wife to inherit her trust fund might ease his current financial problems. I immediately wondered whether Laura's entire inheritance would go to Flan or revert to her own family now that she was dead. It was customary for the current payout of a trust fund to go to the surviving spouse, but the rest of her share of the Hayfoot fortune might, also.