Good Little Wives (16 page)

Upon leaving the restaurant, Dana decided
that as soon as she arrived home she'd go directly into the family room and remove each giant Post-it that covered the walls. She would stack them in a pile, gently fold them over. If Sam wanted to refer to them for his research paper, that would be fine. But the public exhibition was going to be closed.

Soon this whole mess might be over.

But first Dana was going to Kitty's. Maybe Kitty knew how long Vincent had been replacing an income in futures trading with tax-free blackmail. Maybe Kitty knew more than she'd revealed.

Dana passed through the same traffic light on the road to Tarrytown where she'd seen Vincent's Jaguar and Yolanda's
custom paint job. Dana didn't doubt that the young woman had loved him. As a bona fide salesman at some point in his life, Vincent could be persuasive.

In the end, maybe he'd chosen the wrong
man
instead of woman to try to persuade.

Over crème brûlée (one serving, four forks), the women had decided to confront their husbands.

Then they promised they'd be honest with one another about it, no matter if Jack or Bob or Randall did the deed. (No matter that Bridget's “confession” had not included anything about Aimée belonging to Luc, not to Randall, but Dana was willing to allow that sin of omission, because at least she'd admitted she'd been being blackmailed.)

Steven, of course, was off the ladies' hook, because Dana had no secrets, or none that Vincent had apparently known. So while the other women grilled their husbands, Dana would grill Kitty. Between them, they might cook up the answer to who had murdered Vincent. Which would be pretty ironic for women who preferred not to spend much time in their kitchens.

Half an hour later, pulling into Kitty's less than humble apartment complex, Dana wondered how Sam could have known she'd go there straight from lunch. It sure looked like his Wrangler in the lot.

 

“Admit it,” Lauren said as she sat on the edge of the bed, Bob bleary from an after-golf, after-lunch nap, Lauren terse and resigned and determined. “You had Vincent killed, didn't you?”

Bob rubbed his eyes. “Use your head, Lauren. Why would
I have him killed? The more he banged you, the more you'd stay off my back.”

It had been months since she'd suggested Viagra. It had been months (years?) since Lauren had tried talking to Bob about his wilted penis and their displaced sex life. Displaced. Misplaced. Way
laid
.

Leave it to a man to make this about sex and not about the fact he had failed as a spouse.

She jumped up from the bed because she couldn't stand being so close to him. “He was blackmailing me,” she said.

“For chrissakes, Lauren, I knew that. I knew about the two of you from day one, not to mention that when you withdrew two hundred thousand dollars from your trust fund, your attorney was on me like DeLano on your tits.”

He'd set up the trust fund supposedly as hers; she hadn't known it was being monitored.

Her eyes stung. She stood at the window seat, too angry to sit. “I'm going to Nantucket for a while.”

“After the gala, I presume. You can't expect me to attend that alone.” His words carried an air of deservedness.

“I can't imagine why you want to go,” Lauren said. “Everyone in town now knows I loved Vincent.”

Bob laughed.

He rolled out of bed, straightened his boxers, and shambled over to her. He quickly grasped her wrist. “You loved Vincent?” he asked with a sarcastic whine. “How about this? You used to love this.” He shoved her hand down to his crotch, to a small bulge that had formed at the fly. Then he grabbed her thin shoulders, pushed her against the window seat, ripped off her skirt and panties, and crammed his fingers into her.

“Did DeLano do this? Did DeLano like to play rough?”

His hot breath was on her. She tried to scream, but she was too stunned by this sudden monster and by the penis that was somehow erect, straight-standing, angry.

“Stop!” she cried. “You're hurting me.”

He didn't stop. Then, just as he tried to shove himself inside her, he let out a mournful wail. His milky white nothing trickled onto her thigh.

He panted, spent. She pushed him away.

“You disgust me,” she said, her hands quivering, her heart racing. “You disgust me like no other person has ever disgusted me.” She ran from the room and down the hall, grabbing her new spring handbag on the way out.

 

Sam must have had a brilliant idea and couldn't wait for Dana to come home before he shared it with Kitty.

Dana knocked on Kitty's door, wishing he hadn't come there without her. Not while Kitty was still under suspicion. Then she smiled. Sam was a big boy, he'd reminded her. He could take care of himself.

The door didn't open. She must have been too quiet.

She knocked again. “Kitty,” she called. “It's Dana.”

There was no reply.

Dana frowned. She looked back to the Jeep, then back to the front door, then back to the Jeep.

“Good grief,” she muttered with a scowl. It must not be Sam's Wrangler after all. And Kitty must be out.

Slipping her hands into her jacket pockets, Dana went down the stairs and headed toward her car. She might have gotten into her Volvo and driven away if a car hadn't pulled into
the lot at that moment. As she turned to see if Kitty might be in it, which she was not, the Jeep caught Dana's eye again. That's when she noticed the small sticker attached to the back bumper.

Dana crept toward it. As she feared, the sticker read,
Dartmouth
.

Oh my God,
she thought. Her heart started to pound. If this was Sam's Jeep, where the heck was he?
Where was her son?

She twirled around and looked up at Kitty's door.

Had Kitty hurt him?

Kicking off her heels, Dana sprinted forward, raced toward the building, zoomed up the stairs.

Bang! Bang! Bang!
She two-fisted the door.

“Kitty! Open up! Open up or I'll call the police!”

Three seconds elapsed. Then four. Then five.

Dana yanked open her purse, fumbled for her cell phone.

Then she heard “Don't,” from the other side of the door. Suddenly it opened and there stood Sam. “Don't call the cops, Mom. Everything is okay.”

Clearly, however, that wasn't the case, because Sam's hair was tousled and he did not have on a shirt, and Kitty sauntered up behind him, tying the tie of her old, threadbare robe.

 

When Caroline arrived home after lunch, Jack wasn't there. She couldn't recall if he'd mentioned any meetings in the city, she paid so little attention to him these days.

She ignored the yellow
POLICE DO NOT CROSS
tape visible from the front windows and went into the study. There, the velveteen-covered plywood sheets waited in repose, the template of tables neatly arranged on the top, the miniature name
cards precariously placed like mah-jongg tiles at a championship match.

Even if her husband had been there, she had no intention of interrogating him as to whether he'd killed Vincent.

What would be the point?

She doubted he would have gone to such lengths if he'd learned her secret. Besides, so what? Whoever killed Vincent deserved a big thank-you. Their worlds were safer now, their secrets were protected, with him dead and gone. She wished she'd realized that before giving Paul Tobin the retainer to handle Kitty's case. On his own, Tobin had little-to-no power.

Leafing through the phone messages that sat on her desk, Caroline knew none would be important. Anyone who mattered would have called her cell.

Still, there was a noteworthy collection: the caterer, the florist, the linen supplier. She'd ordered light yellow linens this year and giant yellow tulips in crystal-clear vases. Even the china would be the palest butter color. Yellow was Elise's favorite color. When it came to anything “Elise,” Caroline had been a weakling.

She began to turn away from the desk and the messages when one caught her eye:
Yolanda DeLano
.

Caroline snatched up the paper, checked the message:
Please be sure her tickets are waiting at the reception desk at the gala.

With a grim smile, Caroline thought,
So Yolanda will be coming after all.
She wondered what the other women would think about that.

“Mom, please. I knew you'd overreact.”
“Overreact?
Why would I overreact when my son is sleeping with one of my friends who might have murdered her husband? Why would I do that, Samuel? Answer me!” She thought she was doing well not to shout,
Wait till your father gets home!
which wouldn't have worked anyway, because his mother was barely speaking to his father. She rubbed her fingers up and down her seat belt. When reality had registered, she'd run back to her car and Sam had run after her and Kitty, for all Dana knew, was still standing in the doorway, laughing at her.

God, she thought. Elise with Caroline. Sam with Kitty. Was none of the children safe anymore?

“I didn't expect this of you, Sam,” she said, her voice dropping a level because the pain of shouting was too great. She did not add that she might have expected it of his twin brother, Ben.

He sat in the passenger seat, drumming his fingers on the dashboard, staring out the window. She wished he'd put his shirt back on.

“It's no big deal, Mom. It's only happened a few times.”

“A few times?
You haven't been home a week…” He was so vulnerable. So caring and so damn vulnerable.

He shook his head. “Over Christmas. Remember when I went to pick up coleslaw for your party?”

She didn't remember, not exactly. But she did remember the Christmas Eve open house that she and Steven threw each year. And she knew the New Falls Deli made the best, to-die-for coleslaw. “What about it?” Dana asked.

“I saw Mrs. DeLano at the deli. She asked if I was home on semester break, and if I was helping with the party. I asked if she was coming. Geez, Mom, how was I supposed to know you and Dad didn't invite her? She'd been at every party I could ever remember.”

Dana could explain that she couldn't have invited Kitty because Kitty was divorced, single, not a fitting position for a party. “I didn't invite Vincent and Yolanda, either.” Her voice quieted, her heartstrings inevitably tugged by his innocence.

“Well, it was Christmas Eve. And she was all alone.”

His skin was far too thin to live in New Falls, New York. “And so you slept with her?”

Sam winced. “No,” he said. “Not then.”

“But later. Before you went back to school.”

“Well,” he said. “Yes.”

“Do your brothers know about this?”

“Sort of.”

“And your father?”

“No.”

He was twenty-one years old. What was she supposed to say? That he'd be better off with Chloe? Or Elise? Ha! So it had not been Elise who'd attracted him.

“Honey,” she said, the word slipping out, “is this why you didn't go to Cozumel? Is this why you've been so intent on finding Vincent's killer?”

He shrugged. “It's not like an affair, Mom. But I feel sorry for her. Her husband dumped her. Her kids are never around. Her mother's sick. She has
no one
, Mom. Can you imagine what that's like?”

As a matter of fact, Dana could imagine. She could go him one better by imagining what it was like to still be a teenager, to learn of your mother's death from your father who was in jail. Yes, Dana Kimball Fulton knew all too well what it was like to have no one.

“Sam,” she said, her spine stiffening, “this is neither the time nor place to talk about this. Go back upstairs and put on your shirt.” Her voice broke; she hoped he didn't notice. “I can't tell you what to do, but I sincerely hope you say good-bye to Kitty once and for all. The woman is vile. She has taken advantage of you, and for all we both know she's a killer.”

He paused a brief second before opening the door. And Dana closed her eyes because she could not stand to watch him leave.

 

Bridget sat in the living room, waiting for Randall to come home, holding a note that Aimée had stuck under the four-inch letter “A” magnet that hung on the refrigerator door.

The house was quiet: It was Friday, so Lorraine was not there, either, which gave Bridget the chance to reread the note several times.

It was the last sentence, of course, that smarted the most.

He told me to tell you good-bye.

Short. Abrupt. Definitive.

Good-bye.

She half wondered if she should have asked him more about the man who'd gone to France asking questions. Would Luc have had as much motive to kill Vincent as Randall or Bob or Jack? Was he physically capable of flying here, killing Vincent, then returning to France to come back with Aimée? But, if so, where would he get a gun in this country?

She was still sorting those thoughts an hour later when Randall came into the room.

“Bridget?” he asked. “What are you doing here, sitting all alone in the near dark?”

He sat down beside her, he took her hand. His toupee looked a little off-kilter today, but his fingers felt warm threaded through hers.

“Oh, Randall,” she quietly said. “We have to talk about Vincent DeLano. I must tell you what he did to me. Then you must tell me if you killed him.”

And because Randall was Randall, so kind and so caring, he sat and he listened while she told him about growing up in the Camargue, about her mother and her father and the young cowboy named Luc and the wreath of flowers he once made for her hair. Then she told him that they were married and that they had a son. She told him how bright and adorable her
petit
Alain was, and how he filled their lives with so much love.

She told him about Luc's accident and about Alain's death, and all through her talking, Randall patiently listened without interrupting, without letting go of her hand.

She did not, of course, deserve his love.

When she was finished, Bridget said, “Do you want me to continue?”

Randall shook his head. If he wondered if Aimée was Luc's daughter, not his, it seemed he did not want to know. Perhaps some old doors were better left closed.

“Vincent found out about my past,” she continued. “I paid him so he wouldn't tell you.” She didn't add that the money had come from the pile of cash she'd amassed over the years from the generous allowance Randall had afforded her. It had been money she'd intended to use when she left Randall and moved back to France, back to Luc, if only Luc had said he wanted her back.

“I wish you'd told me these things earlier,” Randall said. “But it was a long time ago, Bridget. We have a good life here, don't we? We've made a good home for each other in spite of it all?”

Perhaps he did know about Aimée, she thought. Perhaps he had known from the beginning when she returned from her father's funeral with a new glow of pregnancy. “
Oui
, Randall,” she said, and reached up and touched his loving, trusting face. “We have made a good home.” Then she leaned against him because she finally knew she was safe, that this was where she really did belong. “And you did not kill Vincent?”

Randall let out a small chuckle. “
Non, ma chérie
, I did not kill Vincent. The truth is, I was afraid you were going to say that you had.”

They sat there, holding on to each other, until the sun set and Aimée came in with Krissie and said, “Oh, gross, my parents are hugging,” and the girls giggled and Bridget could not believe how full and happy she finally felt.