Death on Demand (27 page)

“Jeff Farley couldn’t afford to let Elliot Morgan live,” Annie began.

Emma Clyde leaned forward, her eyes intent on Jeff’s face. The others sat as quietly as mice when a cat nears.

“Jeff is sick.” Her voice shook a little, because this wasn’t nice. It wasn’t fun to peel away the protective layers to a wounded core. “He hurts Janice. Elliot knew this, and, if he put it in a book, it would be the end of everything for Jeff as a writer.”

Farley stumbled to his feet, the chair clattering to the floor behind him.

“Jeff, no. No!” Janis’s voice rose in a desperate cry.

Capt. Mac was across the brief space in two strides, pinning Jeff’s arms to his side. Without a struggle, Farley sagged against the stronger man.

“Sit down, and don’t move again.” Capt. Mac gently pressed the younger man back into his seat, then turned toward Annie, his face rock hard. “Don’t you think this is a little much? Let’s leave the investigating to the cops.”

“Only the murderer should object,” she said steadily.

“People don’t like having their dirty laundry spread out in public.”

“This isn’t public. We were all here Sunday night.” She looked from face to face. “We are all under suspicion until we find the murderer.”

“That’s quite true,” Kelly said mildly.

“Go for it,” Hal joined in.

Capt. Mac, his face tight with disapproval, shrugged and returned to his table.

Annie knew she didn’t have a friend in the house.

“Emma.”

The square-faced, sharp-eyed woman nodded curtly. “Here.” She took a deliberate sip of coffee. “Good brew. As we used to say, the atmosphere is stimulating. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”

“You don’t miss much, do you?” Annie demanded. “You know, if you aren’t the murderer, I’ll bet you know who did it.”

Those keen blue eyes regarded Annie without a quiver. But Annie knew she’d hit the truth. “What do you know, Emma? Why don’t you tell us?”

Again, Emma sipped her coffee, taking her time. She smiled, but it was as artificial as a potted plastic plant at a gas station. “I know one thing.”

They all turned toward Emma and waited expectantly: Jeff Farley, his hands balled in fists, his face still flushed; Janis Farley, her eyes enormous, her arms crossed tightly over her chest; Kelly Rizzoli, her dark red hair falling softly around her face, her green eyes not the feast bit dreamy; Hal Douglas, his pudgy face closed and empty; Capt. Mac, his dark eyes watchful, alert.

“I know a fishing expedition when I see one,” Emma said caustically. “You don’t know a damned thing, Annie.”

Annie eyed her adversary. “But you know a lot of tricks, Emma. You’re the smartest one in the room. You know the best defense is a good offense—and you know damned well you pushed your husband over the side of your yacht.”

Something moved in those calculating, observant eyes. “I know I can afford a slander suit. One more crack out of you, and I’ll call my lawyer.”

Annie ignored her and leaned her elbows back against the coffee bar.

“Murder will out, whether it’s ever proved or not. Nobody can prove it, but there are some people in L.A. who know Fritz Hemphill blew away his best friend in a so-called hunting accident so he could inherit some property in Carmel.”

As usual, Fritz looked the part of a Broward’s Rock islander: pale pink cotton broadcloth shirt, a blue ribbed pullover, gray stacks. So civilized. Except for those dark, hot eyes.

Annie met that gaze boldly. “How many cops have you ever known to have an accident with a gun, Fritz?”

When he made no answer, she nodded slowly. “Elliot knew. He knew about Jeff and Janis, Emma, and Fritz. And he knew about Kelly and Hal.”

That ideal couple watched her unblinkingly.

“Kelly keeps her sister a prisoner. She claims the girl is mentally ill. I wonder what the truth is? Maybe somebody should talk to her sister. As for Hal, nobody’s ever seen his
wife since she disappeared from their cabin at Lake Tahoe. He didn’t like the way she ran around with other men.”

Hal looked like he’d been jabbed in the throat. His head swung toward Kelly. Her face was as placid as a tidal pond, and she reached out to touch his hand.

Capt. Mac slammed his palm hard against the table where he sat alone. Harriet had been his companion Sunday evening. Coffee slopped out of his mug and ran in a slow trickle across the table. He ignored it. “Goddammit, you’ve gone too far. And I’m not going to sit here like a schoolboy waiting to be scolded.” His face, dark with anger, turned toward the others: “I’m next. What did Elliot have on me? A paternity suit, if any of you give a damn.” He rose and faced Annie. “I’ve tried to be helpful to you. I don’t think you killed Elliot or Harriet. Or Jill Kearney. But I do think you’ve let your so-called mystery expertise go to your head, young woman, and I’ve had enough of it.”

He snatched up his soft cap and started down the central aisle. Other chairs scraped. Everyone was leaving.

Her denouement was collapsing like an overcooked soufflé. Now was the time—if she were Hercule Poirot or Nero Wolfe or Asey Mayo or Miss Marple or Miss Silver—when she would raise her hand and point at the guilty party, and the curtain would ring down.

There was one small problem.

She didn’t know who in the
hell
the murderer was.

Her suspects were moving with stiff alacrity up the central aisle, and nobody was saying what a good time they’d had.

Emma Clyde paused at the head of the pack, looked back, and taunted, “I assure you, Annie, Marigold Rembrandt would have done it better.”

That was the last straw.

Dammit, one of them was a three-time—no—four-time murderer, counting Uncle Ambrose.

“All right,” she called out angrily. “You can all laugh now. But I’ll have the last laugh tomorrow when I give Chief Saulter a photograph of the murderer.”

The exodus stopped.

“Where in the hell did you get a picture of the murderer?” Emma demanded.

“The murderer’s not so damned smart. Did it ever
occur to any of you that Harriet had a clear view of Elliot’s house? And she was up in her widow’s walk Monday afternoon—with her camera.”

M
ax tapped a Scott Joplin intro with his fingers on the glass counter and watched the clock. In another five minutes, he’d know what Harriet had captured in her film. Would it be Annie? And someone else?

That reminded him of his list of questions. Elliot had collected information about the Sunday Night Regulars, and he had intended to blab everything he knew. When Annie pretended she knew about Elliot’s information, Emma immediately suspected her of blackmail. That suggested she’d been blackmailed before. But Carmen insisted her ex-husband wasn’t a blackmailer—Max stood up straight. Blackmail. Why did people blackmail? He thought about it with growing excitement, and he thought about everyone who’d been at Death On Demand Sunday night and the traditional reason for blackmail.

“Your pictures, mister.” The clerk shoved the package across the counter with exquisite boredom.

Max grabbed them. There was Annie, climbing in the kitchen window of Elliot Morgan’s house. And there—by God. It was the face he expected.

“Can I use your phone?” he yelled at the startled clerk.

He made a long distance call, using his Sprint number, but the line at Death On Demand rang busy.

It was very quiet in Death On Demand. So quiet Annie could hear the click of Agatha’s claws as she glided up the
central aisle to see why her mistress stood by the front door.

“Agatha, I may have blown it.”

Curious bright yellow eyes stared at her unblinkingly.

“Emma made me mad.” She spoke conversationally. Max had always warned that her temper was going to land her in deep trouble someday. Just because Emma had taunted her with that crack about Marigold Rembrandt was no excuse to have let slip about the film.

Her face furrowed in concentration. But no matter how hard she thought, it didn’t change the truth of the matter. She’d told them about Harriet’s camera—and she’d said she’d turn the film over to the chief tomorrow.

The bookstore was quieter than a graveyard at midnight. She swallowed, lunged across the few feet of space, and shoved home the deadbolt.

She gulped some air, then jumped to one side, her heart racketing in her chest as she stared wildly down to see what had touched her leg.

Agatha lifted a dainty paw and swiped again at her shin, thoroughly enjoying this new and active game.

God. A murderer somewhere outside and a cat with busy timing inside.

Annie moved precipitously again, dashing to the cash desk and pulling open the drawer. Agatha flowed up to the counter and crouched, purring deeply. Annie scrabbled through the drawer. A fetter opener. Wonderful to slice butter. Rubber bands. Band-Aids. Aspirin. Paper clips. A new package of golf balls. She ripped open the package and stuffed the three hard balls into the pocket of her slacks. It wasn’t much, but they hadn’t called her Dead-Eye on the softball team for nothing. She would at the very least go down firing.

Okay. She had some ammunition in case the killer broke in this minute, and now she’d call the chief. He
had
to listen this time.

She reached for the phone and realized her hand was shaking. She’d always felt absolute disdain for the wumpety conduct that landed gothic heroines in a pickle up to the top of their lace nighties. She had always been confident that she would never be guilty of repairing to the second
tombstone at midnight in the company of a man with a mustache. Not she.

And here she was, trying to breathe silently so she could listen for the telltale noises that would signal the murderer’s approach.

Her hand rested on the receiver. A faint frown touched her face.

Why wasn’t the killer poking a rifle through a window and blowing her away? Or unleashing another poisoned dart? Or wielding a handy cosh?

Indeed, why was it as quiet as the proverbial graveyard?

Nobody was trying to break in.

Was someone lying in wait for her outside?

She lifted her hand from the telephone and rubbed her knuckles thoughtfully against her cheek.

Let him—or her—lie. She wouldn’t stir a step until Max came, and nobody could handle the two of them.

She breathed more easily, and checked her watch. Max and Parotti might be boarding the ferry this minute. It wouldn’t be long, and when he got back, they’d take the pictures straight to Saulter.

But if nobody were reacting to her startling revelation about Harriet’s camera—it meant nobody but Annie was pictured in those films. That’s why the doors remained closed. No one knocked. No one called.

“Dammit.”

Agatha stopped purring.

“Not you, sweetheart.” Annie stroked the silky for, but Agatha twisted away and dropped to the floor.

If she alone were pictured in the films, she and Max were back to Square One.

The whole evening was a fiasco. Perhaps the only solution was to look at everything with a fresh eye. Start at the beginning—with the murder of Uncle Ambrose. She paced down the central aisle, her eyes scanning the bright jackets to her right and left with disappointment. Her books had let her down. She
should
have been able to turn and dramatically unveil the villain, but her denouement had fizzled like day-old champagne. She passed the espionage/thrillers section and noted an Ambler title,
The Light of Day
, She felt just about as competent as Arthur Abdel Simpson.

She tucked her hand in her pocket and gripped the first golf ball. Maybe she should retire as a mystery bookseller and concentrate on her golf.

Reaching the coffee area, she stared up at the five watercolors, without experiencing the usual spurt of pleasure in them.

The old lady with faded blue eyes stared at approaching death without surprise as the heavy car hurtled closer in watercolor number one. The ancient servant strained to see in the second painting. The third pictured an active man’s closet full of trophies and sports equipment. The young man exhibited disgust as he handed the letter to his sister in the fourth picture, and guests watched as their host raised a glass in a toast in the fifth.

What good did it do to know all about murder and murderers and be caught wanting when it mattered?

She knew these stories backward and forward. The sporting man who opened his library window on a snowy evening to someone he trusted—

Someone he trusted.

Annie stood very still and stared up at the third painting.

Trust.

Uncle Ambrose’s murder.

Uncle Ambrose himself.

She stared at the painting and could see her uncle, his thoughtful, intelligent face. He had been smart, savvy, tough, perhaps a little cynical from his years as a prosecuting attorney in Fort Worth. He knew just how bad people could be. He knew that murderers were dangerous predators.

He was researching
murders.
He would never have turned his back on someone he suspected of being a killer.

Uncle Ambrose was nobody’s fool.

So he had been killed by someone he trusted, just as was the man whose closet was pictured.