Kiss Them Goodbye (27 page)

“Floor plans of well-known local houses,” Ellie said. “It was published years ago by someone who lived in these parts. Left open on the table. And a county map. I ran to get Bill and see what he thought. I was lucky to catch him when he was leaving. It was his idea for me to ask you what to do, since I didn’t want to make a fool of myself with Spike.”

Cyrus kept the thought that there was probably nothing mysterious about any of this to himself. “Spike always says he wishes people would speak up when something doesn’t sit right. Reckons it would save a lot of trouble down the road.”

Ellie reached into the tote she’d been carrying and pulled out an oversized paperback book. “I guess this was what shook me.” She set it on the table facing Madge and Cyrus. “And I’m only foolin’ myself if I keep pretending I’m not scared. I never like much attention, but this is different again.”

He read the title aloud: “
Tender Weapons, Living by the Knife.
”

Ellie took a picture of herself from her pocket. “This was between the pages,” she said. “On top of an open page. There’s a picture of an autopsy on a woman there. She was stabbed to death.”

Ellie had been photographed by a lake and wearing a swimsuit. She smiled into the sunlight. And in the shadowy soft cleavage at the inner margin of her left breast, a hole had been made.

If Cyrus had to guess, he’d say that hole was made by the tip of a very sharp, very pointed knife. Someone had pushed it through the paper and turned it—around and around.

“And you thought
this
was somethin’ you could ignore?” Cyrus said.

C
harlotte and Vivian sat in Joe Gable’s comfortable leather-and-brass waiting room. The only thing missing from the men’s-club atmosphere was the smell of cigars.

Vivian felt anything but comfortable, and her mother looked ready for flight.

“I can’t imagine why we’re here, Mama,” Vivian said, “but we don’t have a thing to be awkward about.”

“Of course you’re right. I kind of wonder if there could be something Louis had of Guy’s that he wanted to make sure we got back. They were close.”

“Maybe.”

Joe Gable’s assistant had a desk right outside Joe’s office door. Probably in her fifties, the lady had the kind of manner that put people at ease, or would put them at ease if that were possible. She smiled in their direction again and Vivian smiled back.

“We shouldn’t have got here so early,” Charlotte whispered. “Makes it look like we’re eager or something.”

Secretly, Vivian agreed, but there was no point in leaving and coming back at this point. “Settle down, Mama.
There’s only fifteen minutes to go. The others are bound to be here soon.”

“You think Joe’s already in his office?” Charlotte said.

“Joe’s in,” the assistant said before Vivian could try to give an answer she didn’t know. “He’s one of those early birds. Looks like someone else is coming now.”

Spike passed the window, opened the door and came in. He looked only at Vivian.

Her heart bounced, and her stomach turned, and her legs wouldn’t hold her if she tried to stand up, of that she was sure.

“Morning, ladies,” he said. “Guess we’re all here for the same purpose.”

“These are for you, Spike,” the woman at the desk said, and gave him a brown sack with handles. “Ellie gave them to Joe.”

“Books for the store,” Spike said. “Thanks. I can’t keep ’em in stock.”

He sat beside Vivian on a low couch covered with soft, saddle-colored leather. “How are you,
cher
?”

She inclined her head ever so slightly in her mother’s direction and shot him a warning stare. “I’m just fine, thank you, Spike. How’re you?”

Spike made short, meaningful work of looking her over before staring into her eyes as if they were the only two people in the room. He slid sideways toward her and if he thought he was being subtle, he was so wrong. “Darlin’,” he murmured into her ear, “if you don’t think your mama knows about us, you are tellin’ yourself stories. Or is it that you don’t want to acknowledge there’s anything between us?”

She rested her fingertips on his mouth, couldn’t stop herself, and watched his lips part a fraction. “I hadn’t thought about it,” she told him. “I should have. Yes, I’m proud to have people know we’re real good friends.”

He wiggled his eyebrows and his so-blue eyes twinkled. “Real good friends, huh?”

“Hush,” she told him, pretending to frown.

Charlotte said, “Mmm, mmm, this is one of those times when I’d like to scrunch up my nose and be somewhere else. Of course, you two have different feelings. You don’t mind bein’ here, but you’d probably as soon be somewhere private, together.”

One of Spike’s long, blunt fingers stroked up Vivian’s cheekbone and tucked her hair behind her ear. His grin was far too satisfied. Vivian looked at her hands in her lap. “D’you think something terrible might happen here?” she asked him. “It isn’t usual to have a member of the law present at these times.”

“Nothing terrible is going to happen.” His smile had disappeared. “I’ll make sure of that.”

The door opened again. Slammed open would be closer to the truth. “Friggin’ hick towns,” George Martin said to his brother Edward as they blew in. Beautifully cut dark suits had replaced the light ones they’d worn the last time Vivian saw them. “Did you see the greasy overalls on the guy at the hotel? Servin’ breakfast in dirty work duds and wearin’ a friggin’ baseball cap.”

Vivian couldn’t imagine this duo staying at the Majestic, but she recognized Gator’s description so they had obviously been there.

“Mornin’, gentlemen,” Spike said, getting to his feet. “Not the best of times.”

George and Edward smiled at each other. Edward said, “Could be. Our father wouldn’t want any mopin’ around. He was all business and so are we. Sooner this is dealt with and we’re on our way back to N’awlins, the better.” Both of them ignored the hand Spike offered and didn’t as much as acknowledge the presence of Charlotte and Vivian.

Vivian said “Good morning” anyway and earned herself grunts.

George Martin addressed Spike. “We don’t know why someone like you would be here and you’re not wanted. Clear out.” His broken nose bone whitened.

Vivian was ready to defend and almost on her feet when Spike landed her back on the sofa and said, “I’m here at your late father’s request. End of subject.”

George came a step closer and opened his mouth to say more to Spike, but changed his mind and turned to Joe’s assistant instead. “Mr. Gable in his office?” he asked.

“Yes, sir.” The lady at the desk sounded cool.

“We’ll go on in, then,” he said. “My brother and I, bein’ the deceased’s only kin, would like a word with his lawyer first.”

Vivian thought,
I just bet you would.

“Mr. Gable has his ways of doing things. Promptly at ten he’ll be ready to start. He won’t see anyone first.”

“Did you hear what I said to you?” George asked, looming over the woman. “We are the deceased’s sons, his only living kin, and we want some words with his lawyer—alone and before the rest of these people go in there. Not that we know what they’re doin’ here anyways.”

“Ditto,” Vivian heard her mother mutter under her breath.

“So,” Edward said to the woman. “We suggest you get your…Just trot in there and be quick about it.”

“Hold it right there,” Spike said, going to stand between the Martin twins and their victim. “I’ve got instructions on how this will go. Why not sit down quietly until we’re told we can go in?”

Vivian could tell how much his restraint cost him.

“When we start taking orders from some small-town—”

“Mornin’.” Gary Legrain came in with a pretty woman who could be Creole. Her features were fine and her skin
the palest of polished gold. “I had to wait for Mrs. Angelica Doby to get here. I hope we haven’t kept you waiting.” Angelica might be in her late thirties but not a line showed on her face. Louis Martin could pick out beautiful women.

A chorus of “Mornin’” went up but the Martins didn’t say a word. They only had eyes for the newcomer. Dressed in conservatively cut black clothes, she remained standing at Gary’s side.

“You’ve got some explainin’ to do, Legrain,” Edward Martin said. “You never said a word about the will being anywhere but in our own offices.”

“Wouldn’t have been appropriate,” Gary said, still looking tired. “And I didn’t know where it was until Mr. Gable contacted me to be present today.”

“Louis told you he had a will somewhere else and you didn’t tell us?” Edward said.

“He was my boss,” Gary said. “And he instructed me not to discuss his arrangements, not with anyone. He named you specifically. What would you have done?”

“Let it go for now,” George said to Edward. “We’ll take up the loyalty issue later.”

Vivian said to Charlotte, very quietly, “Agatha Christie, eat your heart out. Maybe we could work all this into a new board game.”

Charlotte didn’t move a facial muscle when she muttered, “I’ve got the name already.
Who Gets The Money
?”

Vivian laughed and got herself center stage with an audience which, apart from Spike, looked irritated.

Joe opened his door. He was still shrugging into his dark suit jacket and looked up at them with his almost painfully blue eyes. “Good morning. Come on in. I think we’ve got plenty of seats.” His curly black hair just touched the collar of his white shirt. Joe Gable was…noticeable. Noticeable was an understatement.

Joe looked past all of them as they gathered in front
of him. “Hey, Cyrus.” He grinned and Vivian had the thought that some lucky woman would make it easy for him to catch her one day—when he was ready.

“I’ll be making myself comfortable out here,” Cyrus said. He wore his collar and his hair looked as if he’d been using it to exercise his fingers. The result was another “wow.” The man and the mystery. Temptation out of reach maybe?

“Why the fuck is a priest here?” George Martin said. Even the appalled silence that followed didn’t stop him. “There’s nothing for you here. No weeping, sentimental survivors for you to comfort. No handouts in the offing. So why not run along?”

Cyrus’s face lost all expression but the color along his cheekbones rose.

”
Pig
,” Vivian said, shocking herself. “Well, you are a pig, George Martin. You don’t get it that there isn’t anyone here who gives a darn about you and your brother and what you think. Apologize to Father Payne now.”

“Vivian,” Cyrus said quietly. “People are all different. There’s only one like you, that’s for sure. Let it go. We’ll talk later.”

“Like myself,” Spike said with a cold fury he didn’t try to hide, “Father Payne was asked to come along today.”

Joe, as if trying to maintain his professional position but sensing he could have a big problem on his hands—like a fight—said, “Take your seats in my office, please. Thanks for coming, Cyrus. Joan will pour you some coffee.”

The Martins strode past Joe, followed by Gary and Mrs. Doby. Vivian put a hand on her mother’s shoulder and made to follow but Angelica Doby turned back. “Father,” she said, her husky voice quite clear, “I’d surely appreciate it if you’d come along and sit with me. It would be a comfort.”

“Christ!” Edward Martin spun around, his eyes rolling. “Does this have to turn into a melodrama? You heard what we said, lady, no
priests.
”

Vivian looked at Spike who shook his head slowly.

“If Mrs. Doby would like Father present, he’ll be present,” Joe said. “Louis Martin provided for that eventuality, the same way he asked for a law officer to be here.”

Angelica Doby went to Cyrus and tucked her hand under his arm.

“God,” Edward Martin said, “let’s get this three-ring circus on the road. We need to get back to the Quarter and sanity.”

Charlotte and Vivian chuckled at the ridiculousness of the statement, but composed themselves quickly and moved forward to sit in Joe’s cherry-paneled office.

As soon as Joe had closed the door and taken his place behind his desk Edward Martin said, “My brother and I request that we hear our father’s will on our own. Our privacy should be put first. Whatever these people need to hear can be dealt with at another time.”

Joe’s lips parted a fraction. His face let everyone know he either didn’t understand or didn’t believe the request.

“You’ll have folks warnin’ off our prospective clients,” Gary said to Edward. “They’ll think you didn’t go to law school after all. The deceased makes the rules here.”

“We won’t forget this,” Edward said to him, leaning forward. “Changes will have to be made.”

Gary shrugged. He looked like a man who no longer cared about much.

Reading from an open file on his desk, Joe started into the standard preliminaries. The room grew still.

“Now, to the details,” Joe said. “To Gary Legrain, the man I wish had been my son, I leave fifty-one percent of my corporation.”

Vivian caught Gary’s blank, shocked reaction, and the venom in the Martins’ eyes.

“To my son, Edward Martin, I leave fifteen percent of my corporation. To my son, George Martin, I leave fifteen percent of my corporation.”

Not a soul breathed in that room until George, his nose a bone-white ridge now, said, “Over my dead body, Legrain,” and stood up, his fists balled.

Spike said, “Sit down, please, sir.”

“Best let me get through this,” Joe told the man. “So, going on. To Angelica Doby who nursed my wife as if she were her own kin and who has continued to keep my home and life running smoothly, I bequeath my New Orleans house and its furnishings.”

“My God,” George shouted. “That house is worth a fortune. And I hope ‘furnishings’ doesn’t include artwork—not that we won’t fight this and win. The old man couldn’t have been in his right mind.” He stared at Mrs. Doby. “Housekeeper? I bet. Never saw her before in my life.”

Edward had a restraining hand on his brother’s arm when Gary said, “Mrs. Doby worked for your parents for ten years. How many of the household staff can you name, or would even recognize?”

“Shee-it,” George said. “We got bettah things to do than hang around the folks. You grow and you move on.”

“But you still expect to be taken care of,” Gary said.

Angelica Doby was the one whose reaction interested Spike most. She bowed her head but he could see tears falling steadily onto the skirt of her dress. Cyrus rubbed her back and bent over her, talking softly.

“Touchin’,” George said. “You nursed the wife, then moved on to lookin’ after the husband. Disgustin’.”

The woman raised her face and said with dignity, “You, sir, are disgustin’. I am a married woman and I love my husband. I loved Mr. Martin, too, but in a different way, because he appreciated everything a person did for
him and never treated people who worked for him badly. Oh, he had his temper and he may have cared a bit too much about money, but that didn’t matter to me.”

“Mrs. Doby’s disabled husband has lived with her at Louis Martin’s house for years,” Cyrus said.

“Moving right along,” Joe said, rustling a sheet of Louis’s will. “$500,000 goes to Vivian Patin. I owe her.”

Vivian frowned. She flushed and Spike saw her trying to figure out why Louis had thought he owed her something. For himself, Spike felt queasy. The figure was big and knowing Vivian, she’d build on it, build herself into a rich woman. And she’d take her mother with her. Rosebank would get off the ground very nicely.

With Charlotte’s hand in hers, Vivian looked at her and a spark of cautious expectation passed between them.

“What did he owe you for?” Edward asked her nastily.

“There are a number of bequests to individuals and charities,” Joe said, sounding like a man gasping toward the finish line. “I’ve made copies of these so you can all follow along.”