Gimme an O! (13 page)

Anthony decided to use his key to gain access to the house. What was the point in ringing the doorbell? If Ginger was inside, that would just give her the opportunity to take off before he had a chance to talk to her.

The door unlocked, Anthony swung it open—then felt as though he’d been tackled from behind. He swallowed a shaky breath as his gaze swept the foyer. A pile of broken glass littered the foot of the stairs beneath the landing, as did a dozen white roses and baby’s breath. The vase and flowers from the foyer table had clearly been knocked to the ground.

But while that was disturbing, it wasn’t the worst thing. Ginger’s Louis Vuitton handbag—the one she never left home without—lay on the tiled floor, its contents strewn across the vast area.

“Aw, hell.”

Anthony rushed toward the handbag. He dropped to his knees and scooped it up, but he spotted her wallet about ten feet away before he even opened the purse. It was the wallet he wanted to see. Two seconds later he had it in his hands. Opening it, he found it full of her credit cards. Ginger
wouldn’t leave home without her credit cards. “Damn, this isn’t good.”

“Tony, I don’t think you should touch anything.”

He whipped his head around to look up at Lecia. “I can’t believe it. Something
has
happened to her.”

“Then we need to call the police.”

Anthony’s head was pounding. “The police?”

“Yes, the police. Who else do you call in a situation like this?”

“I can’t call the police,” Anthony told her, rising. “Look at this place. If they come over here, what do you think they’re gonna say? They’ll take one look around and label me suspect number one.”

“I came here with you. I know this is how you found the place.”

“Yeah, but I could have stashed Ginger’s body before I brought you over here.”

“Don’t…don’t even joke about that.”

“Who’s joking? It’s a compelling reason why I can’t call the police. I’m also Ginger’s husband.”

“You think that automatically makes you a suspect?”

“Ginger told friends that she was meeting me yesterday morning, and she hasn’t been seen since. She’s told half the media in Southern California that she’s afraid of me—which is a lie. She damn well knows I’d never hurt her.”

“My God.” Lecia’s eyes filled with horror. “I can’t believe you came here.”

“I had to come here. I had to find out if it was true. If she was really missing.” He needed to think. Needed to figure out what to do. Realistically, he knew the cops had to be called. And he’d have to go through rigorous questioning.

What was wrong with him? He was actually moaning
about a few questions when he needed to find out what happened to his wife.

“Maybe you’re right and I ought to just call the police,” he said after a moment. “Like you said, you came here with me. You saw how I found this place. I can only hope they believe me. Because I swear, I haven’t seen Ginger in ages, much less yesterday morning.”

Lecia’s expression grew pensive. Anthony eyed her with interest. “What is it? You know something?”

“When did you say she went missing?”

“Yesterday morning. At least that’s what some big, burly dude said on the news last night. Said no one had seen her since she was supposed to meet me early yesterday.”

“Well, I know that’s not true.”

“Thanks, Doc. It’s good to know you believe me.”

“I do believe you—but not for the reason you think. I saw Ginger yesterday. Well after the morning. Probably around four-fifteen, four-thirty.”

“What?”

“I saw her at a restaurant in Beverly Hills. When you mentioned a big guy, that triggered my memory.”

“You saw Ginger?”

“Yeah, and she was with a couple of men. A white guy, and a big black guy.”

“Wait a minute,” Anthony said. “I saw a burly black guy on the news talking about Ginger, saying he was a friend of hers. He said Ginger told him she was meeting with me the morning she disappeared. Was this guy you saw bald?”

“He was.”

“Damn,” Anthony cursed. “And you saw Ginger at four-thirty?”

“Around then. I went out for dinner with my sister, so I’m
sure about the time. In fact, I’d wanted to go to Johnny Rockets, but my sister made reservations at The Farm of Beverly Hills. Otherwise I wouldn’t have seen her.”

“Two guys,” Anthony said, more to himself. He clenched a fist.

“I’m guessing you don’t know the guy you saw on the news,” Lecia said.

“I didn’t even know Ginger had any male friends in L.A. She never told me about any of them.”

“None?”

“No. She said she moved here and found the men too aggressive so really didn’t date. Said all they were interested in were her…her breasts.”

“You get ’em enhanced, you’ve got to expect guys to look.”

Anthony shrugged, and Lecia was happy enough to let the subject drop. “Does the timeline help you out?” she asked.

“I’m trying to make sense of it.”

“All right, I’ll let you think.”

“So if you saw her late afternoon, that means…” Anthony paused, his thoughts trailing. From what he could tell—although he hadn’t done an extensive search of the house—there were no signs of forced entry. But that didn’t mean that a friend or lover couldn’t have entered the house with Ginger and then attacked her. “Either she went missing after her dinner at that restaurant, or…” He barely wanted to voice what was going through his mind. “Or this is all a setup?”

Lecia shrugged. “You know Ginger better than I do.”

That was the problem. He was beginning to wonder if he knew her at all. Based on the smear campaign she’d executed against him in the media, he had to wonder if faking a kidnapping was beyond her.

Would she have been cunning enough to stage this scene, knowing how this could affect his life?

“What are you thinking?” Lecia asked him.

“I don’t know what I’m thinking. No, I’m thinking that I need to go through her things. Get a clue as to where she may have gone.”

“You’re pretty much ruling out an abduction, then?”

“Right now, a lot of things don’t make much sense. Maybe if I go through her things, I’ll get a better understanding of what’s going on. Who knows? Maybe there’ll be a receipt for a plane ticket to Hawaii. Or something else. I don’t know.”

Lecia crossed her arms over her chest. “All right. So you don’t need me. If it’s easier, I can call a cab—”

“No, I’m gonna need you.”

“But Ginger’s not here.”

“I still need your help.”

Lecia hesitated before speaking. “Quite frankly, I don’t feel comfortable standing around in what could be the middle of a crime scene.”

“You’re a doctor,” Anthony quickly replied. “If I find something suspicious, you can tell me what it means.”

A look of total disbelief crossed Lecia’s face. “Something like what?”

“Something like…like what if her shoes are in some sort of bizarre order or something.”

“
What?
”

“I don’t know,” Anthony hedged, knowing that sounded like a crock of shit. “Aren’t therapists able to figure out weird things? Look at a scene and tell if someone is crazy?”

Lecia gave him a deadpan look. “Ah. I hear you.”

“Good. So you understand.”

“Oh, yeah. I understand. And guess what I just figured
out?” she asked, her voice filling with excitement. “You’re a crack head.”

Anthony reeled backward as if he’d been slapped. Her insult hurt. “I don’t do drugs. My body is my temple.”

“Your body may be your temple, but your brain is messed up. Tony, you sound like a complete nut. I’m not a cop. I’m not a crime scene investigator. I can’t help you in any way except to tell you to call the police and report what you’ve seen.”

“You don’t date much with that razor-sharp tongue of yours, do you?”

“Oh, now we’re making this about me?”

“Just help me go through Ginger’s stuff.” The truth was, he didn’t want Lecia leaving him yet, even if her tongue was liable to scar him. “Forget all that bullshit I said. I just want you here with me.”

Lecia’s expression softened. There was a flash of confusion in her eyes, then something else Anthony couldn’t quite read.

“Okay,” she all but whispered. “Where do you want me to start?”

The first thing Lecia saw when she walked past the French doors with beveled glass into the master bedroom suite was the four-poster bed. It was in the middle of a room so large, it even had a lounge area. The suite was beautiful, as was the rest of the house. But it was lacking something.

Heart?

Yes, that was it. The house was large, filled with expensive things, but it didn’t have a homey feeling. You’d never know anyone lived here, much less a married couple.

Lecia ventured farther into the large space. There were his and her bathrooms at either end of the room, and beside both were double doors that stood open, revealing enormous walk-
in closets—the first sign that anyone lived here. The one closest to the main door was unmistakably Anthony’s—filled with suits, shirts, jerseys. It was large, but from first glance, Ginger’s was at least twice the size. Filled to capacity with designer outfits and shoes, Ginger’s closet could easily have been another bedroom.

“Wow, that’s a big closet,” Lecia said, for lack of anything better to say. “Your wife could open a shop.”

“Ginger complains that it’s not big enough.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Nope.”

Lecia gaped at Anthony. Every item of clothes she owned fit in a closet a fraction the size. “To each her own, I guess. At first glance, can you tell if anything’s missing?”

“I haven’t a clue.”

“Have you ever been through Ginger’s stuff?”

“Never, so I’d have no way of knowing if anything
was
missing.”

“There’s a lot of crap in here.
Designer
crap, mind you,” she added, giving Anthony a syrupy grin. “Ginger quite obviously has expensive taste.”

“Yeah, she does. But this is Beverly Hills.” Anthony shrugged as if to say, What could one expect?

“All right, what do you want me to look for?” Lecia asked.

“Phone records. Receipts. Anything. If there are boxes, go through them. Jacket and pants’ pockets, too. Anywhere she might have a scrap of paper.”

Lecia’s gaze swept over the massive closet. Lord, this was going to be one huge task. At least she didn’t have to go back to the office. Her next appointment had canceled, and she had booked an afternoon online counseling session. “This could take a while.”

“I know. And I appreciate you helping me do this.”

Lecia met Anthony’s gaze. “Do you think she’s really hurt?”

“I hope to hell not. I don’t want to lose her to divorce as it is. I can’t imagine losing her to anything else.”

Lecia understood firsthand the pain of divorce. How it ripped a hole in your heart so big, you never knew if it could ever be filled.

“For your sake, I hope she’s okay, and that you two work things out.” The words sounded sincere, but saying them made her feel a little odd. Like there was a small part of her that didn’t agree.

“Yeah, so do I.”

Lecia planted her hands on her hips and started for the closet. She stopped before she reached it, turning to say, “By the way, I’m supposed to be doing an online counseling session in a little over an hour.”

“No problem. You can do it here.”

“Do my session here?”

“Why not? I’ve got high-speed Internet. I’m assuming you only have to go to your website and sign on with a password, right?”

“Well, yeah.”

“Then sure. Do it here.”

It was a feasible suggestion. So why did the reality of doing her session here make her feel a twinge of unease?

Because the last thing she wanted to do was counsel women about their sexuality with Anthony standing over her shoulder.

“Let’s just hope we find what you’re looking for before that,” Lecia finally said.

After a tedious forty-five minutes, Lecia dropped the umpteenth shoe box at her side and crawled over to the closet door. She peeked her head out. Anthony sat on the edge of his bed, a pile of letters and papers in his hands.

He saw her and asked, “Have you gone through all the boxes?”

“I wish. I’ve never known anyone to have so much stuff.” Lecia slowly adjusted herself so she was sitting on her butt. “Can you pass me my purse, please?”

Anthony lifted Lecia’s purse from one corner of the bed and tossed it to her. It was such a good throw, the purse actually landed in her palms.

“Thanks,” she said, then dug the Ventolin out of her purse and inhaled two puffs.

“You okay?”

Lecia held her breath for as long as she could before speaking. “Just because I take my inhaler doesn’t mean I’m dying. Certain things trigger it, like dust. But I take a puff, and in moments I’m fine.”

“Sorry about the dust. Ginger wasn’t exactly a homemaker. And I don’t think the housekeeper—”

Anthony stopped talking. His eyes lit up at the same time the thought came into Lecia’s mind.

“Housekeeper?” she asked.

Anthony jumped off the bed. “What’s the matter with me? Why didn’t I think to call her as soon as I came in? Claudia should have been working yesterday, the same day Ginger supposedly went missing. She’s gotta be able to give me information.”

Anthony’s excitement was contagious. Lecia scurried over to him and stood behind his massive back as he punched in a number.

“Hey, Claudia. This is Anthony Beals…I’m okay, thanks. Listen, I have a question. You were here yesterday, right?…What time did you leave?…Really?…Oh. Well, okay. Thanks…No, nothing’s wrong…Tomorrow? Um, I’m not sure. You know what—why don’t you take the rest of the week off. Actually, I’ll call you when I need you, okay?…Great.”

“Well?” Lecia asked the moment Anthony replaced the receiver.

“My housekeeper came in for work yesterday, but Ginger sent her home early. Ginger apparently told her I’d be stopping by and that we’d want privacy.”

“Oh, no.”

“I wish to hell I knew what was going on.” Anthony dragged a hand across the back of his neck. He stared in the direction of the bay window for several seconds before sinking onto the softness of the mattress.

Lecia watched him, an unusual feeling taking root. She wanted to do something to make him feel better, but the only
thing she could think of was to wrap her arms around him. Yet that would be entirely inappropriate.

Anthony turned toward her. “I totally forgot. You need to use the computer, right?”

Lecia half nodded, half shrugged. “Maybe I’ll just sign on and let people know that today’s session will be canceled.” She hated to do it, but she didn’t want to take a break from going through Ginger’s things until they were finished. And the plot was thickening. She wanted to know what was going on with Ginger as much as Anthony did. “You know what? Forget it. People will figure out pretty quickly that I’m not showing up.” She groaned, slapping a cheek. “I can’t believe I just said that. I’m never one to shirk my responsibilities.”

“I don’t have a problem with you using my computer.”

Lecia waved a dismissive hand. “It’s fine, really. Sometimes I do an actual online counseling session if people can’t make it into the office to see me, or if people want to talk to me from across the country. It’s always a tricky situation, though, because without seeing a patient, it’s hard to ascertain exactly what’s wrong. Today’s session was simply going to be an informal chat, where people could sign on and ask questions. I’ll e-mail the moderator and tell her that something has come up and I can’t do the session.”

“You’re sure?”

“Uh-huh. It’s not a big deal.”

Anthony got to his feet. His knees cracked as he did. Lecia watched him walk away, noting his firm butt and strong legs. Her breath actually snagged in her throat.

She wrenched her gaze away. She was lusting after another woman’s husband.

Lecia followed Anthony out of the bedroom and down the hall. He opened the last door on the right and entered. It was
bright, filled with natural sunlight. She couldn’t help thinking,
what a great place it would be to write.

“It’s already on,” Anthony said, gesturing to a state-of-the-art computer that stood on a desk along the side wall. “Do your thing.”

“I’ll only be a couple minutes.”

She went to her website, then signed in to access her e-mail. She was in the middle of typing a message to her moderator when she heard, “So, what kinds of questions do people ask you? How to masturbate?”

Spinning around in the swivel chair, Lecia gaped at him. “Tell me you didn’t just say that.”

A playful grin danced on his delicious-looking lips. “I’m curious.”

“Go away.”

“No, really. I’m curious.”

“Oh, I’ll bet. I’ve met plenty of guys like you. Curious in a perverted way.” Most of the men she met didn’t understand that sex therapy was serious business. They wanted to know the titillating details of her work, as if it might turn them on. Worse, practically all the men she had dated expected her to put out after the first date, and thought because she was a sex therapist that gave them the right to talk dirty to her at every opportunity. It disappointed her that Anthony seemed to be cut from the same cloth.

“Why is that perverted?”

Lecia finished typing her simple message, then sent it to the moderator. She logged off her website and got out of the chair. “I’m finished,” she announced.

“Don’t you think it’s natural to be curious about certain things?” Anthony went on. “You drive along the highway and
see an accident. It may be morbid, but you stop to take a look.”

“I don’t.”

“You’re the exception to the rule, then.”

“I guess I am.”

It seemed that Anthony was content to stay in the office and chat, so Lecia left the room. He quickly caught up with her, his proximity filling her senses. He wore no cologne, yet his unique, alluring scent called out to her in the most primitive way. She could easily imagine him wrapping her in his big arms, imagine her teeth nipping at his jaw—

“Doc, what’s with the look?”

Lecia shook her head, hoping to toss the disturbing images from her mind. She had to snap out of whatever spell she was under. She was
not
attracted to Anthony Beals. But she knew all about scent, how it could drive a person wild.

If only she had a cold…

“Doc?”

“Um.”
Get a hold of yourself!
“I was thinking…why don’t you just call Ginger’s family?”

Anthony paused in his bedroom doorway. “If I knew how to reach her family, believe me, I already would have called them.”

Lecia let what he’d said sink in for a full five seconds. Then she said, “I thought you hadn’t called them because you figured she wouldn’t go there. But you’re saying—”

“I’m saying I have no clue where they are.”

Lecia could hardly believe her ears. “I thought you said this woman was your wife.”

“Very funny.”

“How well do you know her?”

“Well enough.”

“Well enough that you don’t know where her family is? You at least have to know who they are, right? What state they live in.”

“Ginger wasn’t in touch with her family.”

“You know
nothing
about them?”

Anthony shook his head.

“Oh my God.”

“Her mother was the only one she was close to,” he explained, “and after she died, she pretty much cut off ties with the rest of them. She has a sister somewhere she doesn’t talk to. New Orleans, I think. An alcoholic father. From what she told me, I can’t say I blame her.”

“I don’t believe this. How on earth do you expect to track her down?”

Anthony paused, scratched his goatee. “Luck?”

“You are—”

“Crazy. You’ve already told me. But wherever Ginger is, I need to find her. I know it won’t be easy.”

“Impossible is more like it.”

“I figure there’s got to be a name stuffed in a pocket, a phone number. Something that will give me an idea of where she lived before she came to L.A.”

Anthony returned to the bed and the pile of papers he had retrieved from Ginger’s drawer. So far, they were all receipts for the marathon amount of shopping she had done in the short time they were married. He picked them up again, although he didn’t expect to find any clue in that pile. The truth was, he didn’t want to see the look of disillusionment on Lecia’s face.

He had explained his marrying Ginger to his family, and he didn’t feel like doing it again. His mother hadn’t approved,
calling their wedding hasty. But she had attended the ceremony out of respect for him. Anthony had hoped that at least one member from Ginger’s family would attend, but none had.

“Did Ginger ever speak to her family on the phone?”

Anthony turned to face Lecia again. Clearly, she wasn’t going to let the matter drop. Not that he could blame her. She was a therapist, trying to make sense of what now seemed a not so sound marriage.

If he’d had to do it over again, he wouldn’t have married Ginger so quickly. But at the time, he thought he knew her. Or rather, he liked what he’d gotten to know. Liked it enough to believe it could be the foundation for a lasting marriage.

Ginger had been easy to talk to, and surprisingly positive, considering the crap she’d been through in her life. She hadn’t been like the other women he’d dated—women who were totally into themselves and into his money. Nor did she seem brainless, like the females his father preferred. Ginger had been…well, she had seemed more like his mother, even with the enhanced Barbie doll body. A stand-by-your-man type of girl who was sweet and homey and simply wanted a good man.

“Ginger didn’t talk to her family,” he said. “And if she ever called them without my knowing, I’d be very surprised. She told me she had a very bad childhood. Her father was an alcoholic who’d abused her mother so badly, he left her a paraplegic. The bastard then bailed on Ginger’s mother, taking her younger brother with him. Ginger took care of her mother until she died. Like I said, she also mentioned a sister. Apparently much older. Got away from the family and the abusive father before he paralyzed the mother. She married some rich doctor someplace but never helped them out.”

“That sounds like a story line from
All Our Days.
”

“Tragic shit, I know.”

“No, I mean that really sounds like a story line from
All Our Days.
About a year and a half ago. The girl’s name was Linda, the brother’s name was Chad. The older sister who married the doctor was Emily, if memory serves me correctly.”

Anthony had a sinking feeling in his gut. “You’re trying to mess with me, right?”

“I swear to God.” Lecia made a sign of the cross over her heart. “I got hooked on the show when I was writing my book. During my lunch break, I’d watch it.”

“Are you saying Ginger…that she made up that stuff about her family?”

“All I know is that exact scenario you just mentioned took place on a soap opera over a year ago. If Ginger’s family truly went through that, then what can I say? Stranger things have happened, I guess. But right now—”

“Hell, no.” Anthony slapped a fist against his palm. “If that bitch played me—”

“Tony, calm down.”

“Why?” he challenged. “Because you’re afraid I’m gonna lose control? Turn into the monster that Ginger’s been painting me out to be?”

Lecia didn’t like the anger in his words, but she heard the utter pain beneath them. Everything he’d believed was turning out to be a lie.

She replied, “You need to calm down because anger won’t solve anything.”

“Thanks, Doc, but I didn’t ask for any psychobabble.”

“Excuse me for offering an opinion,” Lecia retorted.

“I’m sorry.” Anthony drew in a deep breath and released it slowly. “I thought I knew her. I thought what we had…Ah, what the hell does it matter?”

The exasperation in his voice—the defeat—touched her deep in her soul. Lecia knew what it was to discover that the person you loved wasn’t the person you thought them to be. It was one of the worst blows someone could ever be dealt.

“I’m sorry, Tony.”

“Yeah. Whatever.”

“I wish there was something more I could do.” Some people threw words like that out without meaning them, but Lecia was sincere. Clearly, Anthony cared for his wife. She knew that in Hollywood people often married for recreation, but she got the sense that Anthony hadn’t. For him, marriage was about commitment. Ginger, however, hadn’t struck Lecia as the type who cared much about sticking to her word once she’d promised “I do.” She couldn’t stake her career on it, but it was the vibe the woman had given her in those brief minutes outside the bar.

“I just need to find her,” Anthony said. “And she’s got a helluva lot of explaining to do.”

“You didn’t find any cell phone bills?” Lecia asked. Surely there had to be
something.

“Naw.” Anthony paused. “But…”

He turned with lightning speed and started to walk out of the room. Lecia hustled to keep up behind him. “But what?”

“But maybe, just maybe, something new came in the mail. Claudia always piles the stack in the office. And Ginger wasn’t only lazy when it came to housework. Sometimes she’d leave the mail sitting there for a week.”

Lecia’s stomach fluttered with nervous energy. Maybe she was insane, but she was taken up in this drama.

“Oh, baby,” Anthony said after sifting through the mail. His face lit up like a Christmas tree.

Lecia’s heart pounded. “You found something?”

He spun around, facing her. “There is a God.” He held up a number ten envelope. “This, Dr. Love, is Ginger’s cell phone bill.”