False Premises (19 page)

The artwork needed to be light in tone and texture. A watercolor above the sofa in blues and greens. On the short wall to the kitchen, a mirror in a simple, elegant frame. Opposite wall, a print of some kind—maybe a study in purples—a painting of violets, even. That would really pop against these too-typical ivory-colored walls.

After a minute or two of painting mental before-and-after pictures, I realized that I’d forgotten to locate John. I climbed the stairs and called his name again. He must have dashed off someplace with a coworker, because the company pickup truck that he normally drove was parked in the driveway. Even so, I wasn’t sure it’d be all right for me to wander around the house by myself.

I went outside again to make sure that the pickup was really his, in which case I would simply wait in the living room for him to find me. I spotted something near the front tire of his truck. I knelt to get a closer look, my mind racing to deny what my eyes were seeing.

A scarf. Silk. Cream-colored, with rose highlights. The shimmery fabric to one side of the knot had been cut clear through. The same scarf that Laura had been wearing the last time I’d seen her alive.

There was dried blood on the fabric.

Chapter 13

I got to my feet unsteadily, my heart pounding, my thoughts whirling. The killer must have placed Laura’s scarf here to frighten me off his or her trail. Which meant the killer knew I would recognize Laura’s scarf and that I would see it on this particular driveway.

The killer must have followed my van; that was the only reasonable explanation. The other possibility—that John was a homicidal maniac and had set up a macabre and chilling warning to me—was
not
reasonable.

I gasped at the sound of the screen door creaking open behind me, and whirled around. John stood there, grinning at me. Suddenly his smile didn’t seem quite so attractive.

“Erin. You’re here.”

In spite of myself, I flinched when he drew near. “Where were you just now?” My voice sounded distant to my own ear. “I called your name a couple of times. . . .”

He frowned, staring into my eyes. “I was in the garage, unpacking some furniture. What’s wrong, Erin?”

“I found this.” I stepped aside and pointed at the scarf by my feet. “It’s Laura’s. She was wearing it on the day she died. The killer had taken it . . . sliced it off her throat.”

“Jesus!” John exclaimed. His fingers bit into my arm. “Erin. Who’d you tell that you were coming here today?”

“Nobody. I didn’t tell anyone at all.”

“Was it here when you first arrived?” He seemed to be every bit as stunned as I was.

I pulled my arm free, struggling to keep myself from panicking. “I don’t think so. But it’s possible I walked right past it. I’m not positive.”

John snatched his cell phone out of a pocket in his khakis. “I’m calling the police.” He scanned the deserted street and grabbed my arm again. “Let’s get you inside. Someone must have followed you here.” He softened his tone. “Everything’s going to be fine, darling. Don’t worry.”

Though I despised it when someone told me not to worry about deeply upsetting things, I let him usher me inside. He kissed me gently on my temple and murmured some reassuring words.
This is nuts; I trust John. I’m not
going to allow myself to get suspicious of everyone, like
Sullivan is, damn it!

To my severe disappointment, Linda Delgardio wasn’t
on duty yet. A uniformed male officer arrived, collected and bagged the scarf, and asked me predictable questions about the precise timing of my arrival and my discovery, and if I’d noticed any cars behind mine. He asked John the same questions, then explained ominously that the Crestview police department was working in tandem with the Northridge police on the homicide investigation, and that I “shouldn’t be surprised” if they wanted me to come down to Northridge to answer some questions.

Afterward, I felt too agitated to discuss room designs with John and grudgingly agreed to take a long lunch at a quiet restaurant. We wound up in a booth at some Italian bistro on the eastern outskirts of Crestview. The décor was wonderfully old-family Italian—yellowed posters on the walls, red-and-white-checkered tablecloths, a partially melted candle in an empty wine bottle on every table.

We struggled to find topics of conversation. It was obvious that neither of us wanted to talk about my finding that scarf, yet anything else sounded trivial. As we picked at our entrées, John scanned our surroundings and asked, “Why do so many restaurants use red interiors?”

I peered at him. “You’re humoring me, right?”

“No, I’m truly curious.”

“Red’s a complementary color for food . . . supposedly stimulating to appetities . . . and it’s flattering to diners’ complexions.”

“Aha,” he muttered.

“You honestly didn’t know that? It’s one of the first lessons on color selection in design schools.”

“I got into the business through the construction side of things. Remember?”

“Oh, that’s right.” I sighed. “I’m sorry. I’m not being much of a conversationalist today. I’m still too distracted.” Just then, there was a clatter behind me, and I gasped and spun around in my chair. A waiter had dropped a dish while trying to clear a table.

“You’re downright jumpy, too,” John observed as I turned back.

I was tempted to snap that anyone in my shoes would be equally “jumpy,” but that remark didn’t seem quite fair; only yesterday I’d found it suspicious that Hannah Garrison had been so easily startled by me when I went to Paprika’s to ask about Jerry Stone.

Despite his tame assurances otherwise, Stone had
stalked Laura: I’d also caught him in the act of following
Hannah. Maybe he had killed Laura and was now stalking
me, leaving her bloody scarf where I’d find it.

“Erin?” John said. “Maybe it’d help to talk about all of this.”

Our eyes met. Once again there was something not so very attractive about his expression; a certain haughtiness, maybe? Surely I was just being paranoid. “I . . . went to talk to George Wong the night before last.”

John squared his shoulders and glared at me. “You went to see Wong in person? Why? That guy’s bad news! Didn’t I
tell
you that? If I thought you’d do something so foolhardy, I never would have given you his name in the first place!”

Though annoyed mostly at myself—after all, I’d already paid for my mistake, with Wong’s late-night visit—I snapped, “Where was the danger in just talking to him about Laura’s furniture? It wasn’t like I went storming into his office accusing him of murder . . . threatening that I was going to bring him down single-handedly. I’m not an idiot, John.”

“I didn’t say you were. I just think you took a foolish, unnecessary risk.” He tried to put his hand atop mine on the table, but I pulled away.

So he didn’t think I was a fool, just that I’d done a really,
really stupid thing. Yippee! He’d made my ego soar like a
neon-colored wind sock.

“You can’t possibly argue the point, Erin. I mean, look what’s happened. Someone’s tailing you now . . . obviously trying to mess with your head.”

“Speaking of messing with my head,” I replied evenly, “Mr. Wong said to say hello to you. When I asked how he knew that I knew you, he said you’d mentioned me when you saw him last, which he claimed was clear back in January.”

“You and I didn’t know each other in January.”

“Yes, I realize that. That’s my point.”
Was it just me, just
John, or were men forever pointing out the obvious to
women?

“That was a crazy thing for him to say. I saw him just three, four weeks ago. I must have mentioned your name then. In fact, I’m sure I did. He’d asked me about interior designers in Crestview . . . said it would help him to collect a list of business contacts.”

“And you gave him my name?”

“Along with Steve’s. Yeah.”

“Yet you just said that the guy was ‘bad news.’ ”

“Well, hey. I wouldn’t want to run into him in a dark alley. He’s great at what he does, though. You give Wong the dimensions and description of a shelf unit you want built, and he’ll make it to your precise specifications.”

I paused, trying to form a mental timeline. “When you last saw him, were you ordering furniture for today’s showcase home, by any chance?”

John froze. Widening his eyes, he answered, “My God, you’re right. I ordered an entertainment center. He shipped it just yesterday. So he knew
I’d
be there today. In fact, he’s the only person who knew someone connected to Laura would be at that house. Maybe George Wong is the murderer!”

“But how could Wong have known that
you
knew Laura?”

He stared at me for a long moment, blinked, then said, “Good point. He
couldn’t
have. Even so, I’m going to tell the police about how Wong delivered furniture to that address just yesterday.”

I mulled over telling John about Wong’s unnerving visit to my home last night, but kept quiet. What good would another I-told-you-so tongue-lashing do for me? But I
would
tell Linda Delgardio about it.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think that someone was trying to frame
me,
” John said. “First I find the murder weapon and get my fingerprints on the knife in the process. Then suddenly the scarf that Laura was wearing last is lying out in the open, right next to my truck. Not to mention having someone I barely know, George Wong, say ‘tell John I said hello.’ ”

I averted my eyes, pretending to study my bland linguine. “You have a couple of weird coincidences going against you, all right.”

“You can say that again.” He chuckled and wiggled his eyebrows at me, leaning closer. “No wonder you’re jumpy. You’re having lunch with a prime suspect in a killing.”

Offended, I fired back, “Laura was a friend of mine. Or at least, I thought she was. In any case, her death is not a joking matter.”

His smile promptly faded. “Right. Sorry.”

Everything I said to him from then on was like using expensive fabric to re-cover a chair that had a defective frame. John paid for our meals and we left, and he seemed lost in thought as he drove us back to the model home, where my van was still parked. He pulled into the driveway, set the parking brake, and asked, “Erin: Are you afraid of me?”

“Of course not!”

He held my gaze, as if trying to gauge my sincerity.

I sighed. “John, this has all been a nightmare, ever since Laura and I went to Audrey’s presentation on Monday night. The truth is, I’m not feeling very good about
anything
just now. All I want is for her killer to get arrested so I can stop feeling like I need to be looking over my shoulder. Ironically, if I
had
been watching through my rearview mirror more diligently today, maybe I’d have spotted the killer.”

He glowered at me. “What if all of this had happened to Steve Sullivan instead of me? If
Steve
had found the knife in the table, if Wong had told you to say hello to Sullivan, and you’d found the scarf on the property of one of
Steve’s
clients? Would you have acted this skittish around
him
?”

I hesitated. Then I said firmly, “Yes.”

“I’m not sure that’s true. And I’ve got to tell you honestly, Erin, it’s a bit crowded in this relationship.”

“I don’t know what to say to that, John.”

He got out of the truck. “Why don’t you just say ‘thanks for lunch’?” He slammed the door and let himself inside the house. I stayed seated for a minute or two, thinking. He might have made an excellent point just now, or he might have put up a subterfuge, deliberately distracting me by waving my unresolved feelings for Sullivan in front of me. Miserable, but unwilling to leave things this way between us, I followed him into the house.

John was pacing in the chef-style kitchen. In my sour mood, the upscale surroundings struck me as one more example of artifice. All the newer, fancier homes seemed to have these vast, mega-equipped kitchens nowadays, even though supposedly fewer and fewer homeowners were actually cooking. “I’m sorry I snapped at you, John.”

He shrugged.

The wisest thing for us to do was probably to cool it for a couple of weeks, but he might only take that to mean I really believed he was guilty of this horrid crime. On the other hand, maybe I did believe that. Gently, I said, “I’m starting to get the feeling that the world is conspiring against us. Know what I mean?”

“I wish you’d met me first, instead of Steve.” John refused to meet my gaze. “I doubt we’d be having this conversation today if we’d met sooner. Instead, you’d be telling me how suspicious Steve looks, with the woman who broke his heart and destroyed his life suddenly dying the very same night he finds out she’s back in town.”

“John, I’m not comfortable discussing Sullivan like this. It sounds like you’re saying you suspect him. But he’d been with me for hours that night,
including
the period of time when the building was set on fire.”

Now he stared into my eyes. “But you don’t know how long Laura’s body was lying there before the fire was set, do you?”

“No, but . . . Come on, John. This is Steve Sullivan we’re talking about. You and he are good friends!”

“I’m just saying that it goes both ways. The other day he implied he didn’t trust me when I said I might have touched the knife blade. Now he’s obviously turned you against me.”

“That’s not true!”
Or was it?
My head ached. Was there anyone I trusted these days? “I have to go. I’m late for an appointment.”

“Meeting Steve?”

“For work. Yes. Later this afternoon. We’ve got a batch of accessories to return. Thanks to Henry Toben’s switcharoos, my living room purchases now clash.”

My explanation was probably gibberish to him. I hadn’t told him about Henry, but he nodded. “I’ll call you soon.”

He sounded sad, but then, he had a right to be; I was depressed, too. “Good. I’d like that. Take care, John.” I let myself out. I could feel his eyes on me as I walked away, but I didn’t look back.