Last to Know (15 page)

She went back to her MacBook and Googled Jordan. There he was, a simple one-liner, if you wanted any more go to his Facebook. She couldn’t do that, couldn’t just sign on to his Facebook, then he’d know she was into him. Sighing, she typed in “Havnel.” There were a lot of Havnels listed and she typed in “Lacey.” To her surprise there she was. Or rather an obituary. No picture, just a short bio … a seemingly blameless life, apart, that is, from three dead husbands and no children. And that she had died several years ago.

What!

Jemima went quickly to another search engine and came up with the same result. Oh my God. If Lacey Havnel was dead and had no children, then who was the Bea Havnel who claimed to be her daughter? In fact, who was the dead woman, burned up in the fire, who claimed to be Lacey Havnel?

Her cell phone was lying on the coffee table. Detective Jordan had put his number in there the other night. “Just in case you need to call about Divon,” he’d said. They had looked at each other for a few seconds. Jemima had been embarrassed because she’d half hoped he would ask to see her again, if only for supper at Ruby’s, but he had not, so she’d said a quick goodnight and turned and hurried away.

“Wait,” he had called after her. She’d spun on her heel, smiling hopefully. But “I’ll get a squad car to drop you off,” was all he had said.

She had forgotten that was the way she had arrived, in the back of a squad car. “My mother would have a fit if she saw me in a police car,” she’d told him. “I’ll call a cab.” And that had been that. But now … she pushed Harry’s number. “Jordan.”

He answered on the first ring, taking Jemima by surprise; in her bravado at making the call she’d hardly given herself time to think what she was going to say, and now she stumbled over her words. “Er, er, it’s something important.”

“You just can’t remember what. Is that it? Fact is, Jemima Puddleduck, I was just about to call you.” Harry wanted to ask her a few questions.

She sank down onto the hated mousey shag rug. “Was it … I mean I guess it was something important, about the Havnel woman and the daughter.”

“Actually,” Harry said, “I was going to ask you if you felt like meeting for a drink. I thought at least if I asked you out you wouldn’t think I was about to arrest you as an accessory to a murder,” he added. But Jemima did not laugh.

“Lacey Havnel might not be who you think she is,” she said quickly, without stopping to think.

Silence hung for seconds between them. Then Harry said, “I’ll pick you up in ten. Okay?”

Jemima ran a hand over the old cashmere sweater she was wearing, the one she’d had since she was seventeen and would never, ever throw away, and the baggy black pants she wore when she was alone because they were comfortable.

“Okay?” Harry said again.

“I’ll be downstairs waiting,” she promised, already grabbing her newest skinny jeans from the floor where she had stepped out of them earlier, a clean white tee, the black leather jacket—it was what she always wore … he’d seen her in it before, the only other time he had seen her, she remembered. Two minutes later she was in the jeans though how she ever got her legs into them, they were so narrow, she couldn’t imagine; the white tee; jacket slung casually over her shoulders, high suede ankle boots, a quick spray of Gaultier Femme; the Dior ruby lipstick that had somehow become her trademark. She took a step back from the mirror, eyeing herself critically, combing her long red bangs with her fingers where they fell into her pale blue eyes causing foggy vision but it looked good. Jewelry? Keep it simple, she told herself, fastening pearl studs in her ears. A pearl necklace, one strand, medium sized … where on earth had she gotten them? They struck just the right note between the ruby-lipped black leather hedonist and a lady. A deep breath. Oh my God she had a date with Harry Jordan. Well—almost a date.

She was downstairs waiting when he drove up in his classic dark green Jag with the goddamn dog with its head sticking out the window. She waited while Harry got out. He went and opened the door for the dog then sent it to sit in the back. He turned to smile at Jemima.

“You’ll have to hope Squeeze forgives you for that,” he said. “The front seat is his place.”

“Old dog, new tricks,” she said, inserting herself into the low car.

Harry closed her door then went round and got behind the wheel. “Any objection to Blake’s?” he asked.

“You can take me anywhere you like,” Jemima replied. And she meant it.

25

I
did not hear about Detective Jordan’s intriguing little encounter at Blake’s with the Jemima he calls Puddleduck until later and then I thought it might—only might—as they say, “put a spanner in the works.” I do not need this woman snooping around—doing her amateur “investigative reporting.” My stage is getting a little crowded. I need no one. Of course I could shrug this girl off. (I call any woman under the age of thirty a girl and I know she’s twenty-eight—in fact I know everything about her, I made it my business to find out because of her acquaintance with Harry Jordan.)

Anyhow, the detective might as well forget her sexual appeal, after all he already has a couple of female interests, to say nothing of the fiancée, the famous Mal Malone, TV star incarnate, who absconded to Paris ne’er to be seen again. Or will she?

Still, I’ll take care of Miss Nosey Parker, my potential “spanner in the works.” Curiosity can lead to confrontation and to my being exposed. You cannot allow that. It’s time to get closer to my objective, the sweet sympathetic Rose and her family, who I’d hate with all my heart if I had one. Yes, I know, I confessed earlier to having a real heart, but you see it’s not like yours.

Mine is a killer’s heart, it guides me differently, sends me on devious paths. If you met me you would never know it, but my whole being is concentrated on killing. With the Osbornes it’s a kind of revenge. I want the whole family to suffer as they make me suffer, admittedly indirectly, but suffering is suffering. If others have to fall by the wayside in pursuit of my goal of destroying the Osbornes, then so be it. What did they do to make me feel this vengeful? You might well ask.

You see, I never had a “family.” I was always the outsider. All my life I never counted. The thing that makes a child a bully is what made me a killer, that instinct to go for the weak spot, the chink in the armor. At first you do it to save yourself from those bullies, those killers-in-the-making, then you become them. It’s that simple.

And you start to like it. You enjoy it. It’s the ultimate power.

First though, you have to get yourself into the power position. I never had trouble with that so of course it made my life easier, and I always got what I wanted. Which was? As well as the power, you could add money to the list. With power and money you can have anything you want, people will rush to do your bidding. Even without a lot of money I managed to charm, wheedle, frighten, if you will, people into doing my bidding. Sounds old-fashioned, in this fast electronic world we live in, but let me tell you when it gets down to it basics are just basics. Same old same it’s always been. Fear. Power. Money. Sex. Life. Death.

Being attractive and knowing how to use sex is part of the deal, part of learning the trade of a novice killer. You have to want the pleasure of killing more than the pleasure of the sex, or it won’t work. You’ll get involved and then where would you be? Broke and alone, I’d bet on that.

26

Jemima and Harry sat, side by side, on a plastic banquette in a dim little local bar and grill where he was obviously well known, since they’d greeted him by name. Harry had a bottle of Perrier in front of him, Jemima a vodka martini. She felt badly now about ordering liquor when he was not drinking, but she’d thought she would look foolish changing at the last minute. True to his name, the dog squeezed under the small table leaving his rear end sticking out under Jemima’s feet. She decided she’d better not move or he would have her ankle.

“He doesn’t bite,” Harry said.

She turned her head to look at him. “How did you know what I was thinking?”

“It’s what everybody thinks when they first meet Squeeze. Truth is he’s a softy. Unless he’s provoked of course.”

Jemima surely hoped she didn’t provoke him. “Well,” she said, suddenly not certain she had got her facts about the Havnels right. Online information was not always to be trusted. “How do you know the burned woman was Lacey Havnel?” she asked.

“We don’t, not for sure, until we trace the dental records.”

“What about the daughter?”

Harry raised his brows. “I don’t know that I should be discussing this with you.”

“What if I told you Lacey Havnel died ten years ago and that she had no children. That there was no daughter.”

There was the slightest pause before Harry said, “And how, exactly, would you know that?”

“You mean, if the police don’t know, how do I?” Jemima shrugged. “I don’t, not for sure, only what I found online. It’s quite simple you know, you can access almost anyone you want, get their personal information, know about their private lives, their past as well as their present.”

Harry stared intently at her. “And why would you want to know that?”

Jemima shifted uncomfortably under his gaze. “Okay, truth is, I was thinking about you, which led me to think about the fire at the lake and the burned woman and the poor young daughter … I was just wondering.” She let her words hang in the air. “I mean, like, I thought it would help.”

“Jemima,” Harry said, sighing, “you get under my skin, y’know that? And I’m asking myself why the fuck—excuse me—why I didn’t think of that? Or why Rossetti didn’t think of that? Or anyone else for that matter.”

“Why would you?” Jemima said practically. “I mean it’s only that I’m a computer freak and have a terminal case of curiosity.”

“Nosiness.”

“That would be about right.”

Harry swigged his Perrier. She sipped her martini. Under the table the dog rested his big head on her foot. Justin Timberlake was singing something in the background. She glanced sideways at Harry again. He was staring straight in front of him, at nothing—or at his inner thoughts anyway. Certainly nothing to do with her. She heard his phone buzz. He took it from the pocket of his jacket.

“Rossetti,” he answered.

Jemima tried hard to appear as though she were not listening. She looked down at the dog instead of at Harry. Squeeze looked steadily back up at her. She could swear the goddamn dog knew what she was thinking. It was unnerving. Anyway, what was she thinking? Only that she—Jemima Puddleduck—had told the big detective something he had not known, something he had not “detected.”

“I’ll meet you at the lake house,” Harry was saying, already on his feet. The dog was up in an instant, next to him. “Sorry, gotta go, something came up,” he said to Jemima. He waved goodnight to the guy behind the bar, and, with his hand on Jemima’s back, walked her quickly outside, where he turned to look at her.

Jemima hoped the harsh light from the flickering bar sign had not changed her skin to green and her hair orange.

“Come on,” Harry said abruptly, his mind obviously elsewhere. “I’ll take you home.”

It was, Jemima decidedly gloomily, a dud end to a dud date. Though of course it had not really been a date anyway.

A few minutes later they were outside her place. Harry jumped hastily out of the car to open the door for her, but she beat him to it.

“Thanks,” she said icily. “I hope I was of help.”

Harry was really looking at her now. “Your eyes are the same color as Squeeze’s,” he said.

Jemima rolled her pale blue eyes back at him. “Thanks.”

“No, thank you. You gave me valuable information. I appreciate it.”

“And you didn’t even have to arrest me,” she said.

“There’s always a next time. I’ll have the cuffs ready.”

Suddenly clutched with guilt, Jemima remembered Divon. “He didn’t do it, you know,” she said. “I’ll swear to it.”

“I know. In court.”

“And I don’t believe that woman is the real Lacey Havnel from Miami, who was dead anyway.”

Harry gave her a long, intense look. “You know what, Jemima. Nor do I.” Then he waved goodbye, climbed back into his car, and was gone. Squeeze hung his head out the window, gazing back at her until the car rounded the corner.

That dog must be in love with her, Jemima decided. Misquoting the Meatloaf song, she thought, oh well, one out of two ain’t bad.

She wondered why Harry was going to the lake house. Curiosity had always been her downfall and in her new role as investigator, she thought she should find out. She thought about the story she would put on her Facebook. The decision took only seconds, then she went to get her car and took off for the lake.

27

There was one immediate way to stab Rose Osborne in the heart, though to prolong the torture I had chosen a circuitous route. Diz of course was the obvious solution. The last born, the “baby” of the family, the child who made Rose feel still young, kept her laughing in the tough times. Rose is the faithful sort, the kind of woman who never so much as looks at another man. At least not wondering how he might be naked. I don’t believe Rose is a prude, it’s simply years of indoctrination by men.

So. How to get to Rose via Diz. A plan must be made. Should he be killed? The body found at the foot of a cliff? Down some gulch? Floating, green and bloated in the lake? Perhaps he should quite simply disappear? Kidnapped, they would think. But who would kidnap him? A predator. A pedophile. A nut. Kids disappear from their bedrooms all the time, through open windows, without a trace. Mostly, they are never seen again. But I need Diz to be seen. Dead or alive? “That,” as it was for Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, “is the question.” I should decide the answer later.

28

Rose thought the dinner party was going as well as could be expected, considering the tension between her and Wally. She didn’t believe in placement, preferring to let her guests choose to sit where they wanted. She did not fail to notice, though, that Wally went and sat at the far end of the table, about as far from her as he could get. And next to him, surprisingly, was Bea, looking like a sad angel, her long straight blond hair falling over her eyes as she picked delicately at the plate of prosciutto and melon, artfully arranged by Madison. Roman was on her other side. They looked, Rose thought, admiringly, like the perfect young couple.