Murder One (45 page)

I
T WAS TAKING HER
an inordinate amount of time to answer the door, Ben thought, as he paced back and forth in the narrow hallway. He knew she was home; he could hear noises inside. So why wasn’t she answering? The delay was only increasing his tension level. Because, of course, deep down, he didn’t really want that door to open. He dreaded the conversation he knew would follow. But there was no avoiding it.

At last the apartment door opened, and a patch of disheveled platinum blond hair became visible through the opening. “Ben?”

Ben peered through the chained gap, not sure what to say first. “I need to talk with you, Keri.”

Keri licked her lips, then forced a smile. “Sure, honey. I want to see you, too. It’s just—I told you to call first. I want to look my best for you. Could you come back—”

“We need to talk now.”

“Couldn’t it wait until I’ve had a chance—”

“No. Now.”

With obvious reluctance, Keri slid the chain out of the lock and opened the door. Ben stepped inside. She was barely dressed, wearing only a T-shirt and panties, and the shirt was on backwards. Her near perfect figure was on display and impossible not to notice, but Ben tried to put it out of his mind.

Ben glanced around the apartment, which was a mess. Books were off shelves, tables were cleared. Large cardboard boxes cluttered the room. “You’re moving.”

The rise and fall of her chest did magnificent things to her near-transparent white T-shirt. “Yes, Ben, I am. You know this place is a dump. Now that the trial is over, I wanted someplace a little nicer—”

“You’re leaving town, aren’t you?”

She sighed. “Yes, Ben. For a while, anyway. I need to make a fresh start. Someplace where everyone doesn’t think of me as a former murder defendant.”

“Were you planning to tell me?”

“How can you say that? Of course I was. You know how … how I feel about you.” She reached out and twined her fingers around his. “Actually, I was hoping you might come with me.”

Ben slapped her hand away. “Stop that.”

Keri recoiled, staring deep into his eyes. “Ben, what’s wrong? Has something happened?”

“You could say that.”

“Something about the case?” Deep creases crossed her brow. “They’re not going to try me again, are they?”

“No, you’re off once and for all this time. Never in a million years could the D.A. get the appeals court to set aside an acquittal twice. Especially not after the case has gone to the jury.”

“Then what?”

Ben turned away. This was hard enough to do without having to stare at that magnificent figure, beautiful hair, deep blue eyes. “The police found the place where your brother was holed up. After he left here.”

“I know.” She paused. “And?”

“And I’ve been there.”

“Ben … is there more to this? ’Cause I’m not really getting it …”

“I had a lovely opportunity to sort through all his personal belongings. Everything he left behind.” He stopped and, unable to resist, he turned to face her. “Including his exercise equipment.”

Keri’s eyebrows rose. “His …?”

“You heard me. What is that, a Stairmaster or something? Whatever. The point is, Kirk had it. But you know what I think? I think it used to be in your apartment. You said in court you didn’t own anything like that and it was probably true—because it was Kirk’s. And he took it with him when he left. But it used to be in your apartment. It was there when you had the knock-down-drag-out with Andrea McNaughton. She fell back and hurt herself on it. Just like she said in court. Right?”

Keri did not immediately answer.

Ben’s teeth clenched tighter together. “Am I right?”

She still did not reply.

“I thought so. But what I don’t get is, why did Andrea ‘confess’ that she had invented that detail when I called her back to the stand? That was a critical moment in her testimony. After I showed she had lied once, it was all a downward spiral. The jury never believed her again. But it was true! You really did have exercise equipment in your apartment.”

Keri’s eyes slowly rose to meet his. “It’s true, Ben. My parents bought that thing for Kirk, back when they were still in our hair. I think they saw it on some infomercial and thought it would be good for him.”

“So why did Andrea lie about it?”

Keri hesitated.

Another voice shattered the silence. “I can explain that.”

Ben whirled around. His lips parted, stunned.

Andrea McNaughton was standing in the rear of the apartment.

“So,” Andrea said, “Encyclopedia Brown finally figured a thing or two out, huh?” She crossed the room, passing Ben nonchalantly, and positioned herself on the lumpy couch. “Very impressive.”

Keri glared at her. “Shut up, Andrea.”

“Don’t talk to me that way.”

“I said, shut up!”

“Keri—”

“Listen to me!” Veins became visible on Keri’s porcelain white neck. “I’m still his client. Anything I say to him is protected by that privilege deal. He can’t repeat it, and even if he did, the cops couldn’t use it. But you’re not his client. Anything you say he can repeat all over town. So keep your lip zipped.”

Ben stared at them both, his face transfixed by the dawning horror. “You did it together.” He backed away from them. “You were both in on it together.”

Keri rolled her eyes. “Took you long enough, didn’t it?”

“I—I should’ve seen—”

“Yeah, you should’ve. But you didn’t. Like most men, your mind was somewhere else whenever I was around.” Keri laughed shrill and brittle. “You probably said a million times, one petite nineteen-year-old girl wouldn’t have enough strength to pull off this crime. And you were right. But two women working together—that’s another thing altogether.”

“But you two hate each other.”

“Do we?” Keri smiled and then, touching her fingers to her lips, blew Andrea a kiss. “Men are so easily deceived.”

“But, all those fights—I saw them—”

“Staged. That time Andrea came to your office because she supposedly wanted to tell Christina something? Wrong. She came to stage a fight. For your benefit.”

“That can’t be.” Ben struggled to make sense of it all. “I saw the way you two went at each other. That was real.”

“Sure it was, Ben. Just like professional wrestling.” She laughed, then leaned toward Andrea. “The truth of the matter is, we’re very close, aren’t we, dear?” Andrea pressed close to her, and the two women locked lips for a deep and passionate kiss.

Ben braced himself against the wall. The room seemed to be moving, revolving around him. “But—
why?
”

Keri broke off the kiss and started to answer, but Andrea threw a sofa pillow at her. “Keep those pert little lips closed.”

“He can’t do anything about it, Andrea. He’s sworn to secrecy. Besides the case is over. I can’t be retried, and the cops will never admit they made a mistake and go after someone else. Right, Ben?” She grinned. “It’s over.”

“I asked you a question,” Ben said, his voice hollow. “Why?”

“I’m afraid the answer to that question is all too pedestrian. Money. Joe had a lot of it, remember?”

“But Andrea was already married to him.”

“He wasn’t sharing.”

“She could divorce him. By law, the money would be half hers.”

“Actually, no. The money was in a trust fund from his grandparents, remember? And Joe was the beneficiary. So the money went to him and him alone. In the event of a divorce, she would get nothing. There was a time when Joe shared the loot with his beloved, but after things got frosty between them, he stopped. So what could she do? Divorce wouldn’t help her get her hands on the goodies. But if Joe died, and Andrea was the beneficiary of his will, which she was, the proceeds of the trust fund would go to her. So he had to die.”

“And you helped?”

“Strange world, isn’t it? Who would’ve ever thought the two of us would get together? When Andrea came to my apartment that night, she was ready to tear my eyes out, just like she said. We had a bit of a tussle. Not quite as violent as she described it, but it was still a major league turn-on. Rolling around on the floor, our bodies pressed together. I thought she was hot, and I guess she felt the same way about me. Ten minutes after she arrived, we were making out like nobody’s business. And when that was finished, we talked. To make a long story short, we realized we had a lot in common. Like for instance, that we’d both be better off if Joe McNaughton was dead.”

“But—you weren’t a beneficiary.”

“No. But since Joe was going to break it off with me, I was out in the cold. Until Andrea offered me a slice of the pie for my assistance. Which I gladly gave.”

“You helped her murder her husband?”

“Hey, I was the mastermind. I came up with the ideas. When Joe returned to my apartment on that fateful night, we were both waiting for him. I did most of the knife work. But Andrea was a big help with the chains and moving the body and such, weren’t you, dear?” She quickly pointed a finger. “Don’t answer that.”

“Joe was a strong man—”

“Yes, a strong man with a strong taste for sadomasochistic sex. You may have noticed in those photos, he’s always the one on his knees in the dog collar, and I’m always the one wielding the whip. That was the way he liked it. Actually, that was the way I liked it, too. And on that fateful night, when he came home, stripped off his clothes, got down on his knees, and asked Mommy to punish him—I did, with Andrea’s assistance. Big time.”

“Even if you had to kill him, why hang his body out in such a hideously public way?”

“To confuse and distract, of course. That was the plan, anyway. If he just turned up dead, Andrea knew she’d be the top suspect. But if he turned up chained in Bartlett Square, well, a whole new world of possibilities opened up.”

“But why the mutilation?”

“Are you really surprised? Hell, Ben, you heard my shrink rattle on for more than an hour about my violent tendencies. How I fantasized about killing Joe. When the time finally came, I made the most of it.”

Ben felt a choking in his throat.

“Andrea wasn’t very happy about that part. Then she got this brilliant idea. She knew about Joe’s investigation of Antonio Catrona. She thought that if we made it look like a mob rubout, that would confuse matters even further. And she was right. You used that red herring like a pro at trial, Ben.”

“You—you planned out the whole thing!”

A light shone behind Keri’s eyes, transforming those vivid blue eyes into something fiery and sinister. “What can I say, Ben? You take what the gene pool gives you. My mom was cruel and crazy, as I told you, and Kirk was seriously whacked, which you also knew. Is it a big surprise that my blood runs the same way? We Dalcantons, we’re nothing if not consistent. Sexual flexibility and a serious taste for violence, that’s like the family motto. Hell, even Matthews tried to tell you how violent I was when he came to my apartment. But would you listen? No—you were too busy sneaking peeks at my Wonderbra.” She laughed. “I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I enjoyed it, Ben. I snuck up behind Joe and clubbed him on the head so he couldn’t resist—I guess that’s when he got the concussion. I ripped his clothes off. Must’ve scattered his wallet and badge in the process. And then I took my little knife and tore his guts out.” She licked her lips hungrily. “I savored each and every stroke of the knife. And I especially liked labeling the creep for what he was.
Faithless
.”

Andrea couldn’t contain herself. “You shouldn’t have done that!”

“I told you to be quiet!” Keri shouted. The harshness of her voice sent chills down Ben’s spine. “Andrea didn’t like that touch,” she explained, her voice suddenly eerily calm. “Didn’t really fit with the mob-hit motif. And true enough, after that touch, it was inevitable that the cops would come sniffing around my panties. But I couldn’t resist. He
was
faithless. He deserved it.”

“My God—Matthews was right. He was right all along. He really was working to find some semblance of justice. And I—I—”

“Truth sucks, don’t it?” Keri giggled. “The truly amazing thing is, we put it all together that one night. Granted, we made some mistakes. We shouldn’t have used my knife, and we shouldn’t have used my chains. But time was short; Joe was here before we had a chance to run out for supplies. We had to use what we had at hand.” She paused reflectively. “Those two errors in judgment came back to haunt me, though. Although we successfully distracted the police from Andrea, we attracted them to me. But Andrea is nothing if not loyal. When the police came after me, she promised she’d find a way to get me off. And she did, too.”

“How?”

“Well, first of all, by sending me to you. She knew you were a whiz in the courtroom, that you had a soft heart that would naturally go out to me when I told you about my boo-hoo childhood and hard-knock life. She also suggested that if there was a little romance in the air, you would become particularly attached and unlikely to be suspicious. And boy was she right about that.”

Ben’s face twisted, a mixture of shock and humiliation. “Then … all we did—you were just pretending. Just putting on another show.”

“Sad to say, I was. I’m not proud of it. But it was necessary. Not that I minded or anything,” she added hastily. “You’re a regular guy, Ben. But a little too straight for me.” A large belly laugh erupted from the base of her throat. “Way too straight for me, actually.”

“You incriminated your brother. You made him your fall guy.”

“Well, he deserved it, wouldn’t you say, dear?”

Andrea nodded mutely.

“He’s the one who screwed up our plan in the first place,” Keri explained, and for the first time, a trace of bitterness crept into her voice. “He came in just after we polished off Joe. And he freaked. Totally out-of-his-head freaked. See, everything I said in court about Kirk was basically true. He had serious emotional problems. He had low self-esteem, sexual confusion, a violent temper. Religious obsessions. And he was fond of his sister. Quite fond of his sister.” She paused, running her fingers slowly through the strands of her silky hair. “We were very close. If you know what I mean.”

Ben felt the gorge rising in his stomach. It took all his strength to suppress his urge to be ill.