Quiet as the Grave (5 page)

He didn't answer. He sank onto the Louis XIV chair beside the piano and put his face in his hands. The morning sunlight found a few black strands remaining in his silver hair, but it was like the echo of something sad. You knew it was already dying away even as you listened.

She let herself out the front door, her heart heavy.

When she heard footsteps, at first she thought it might be the gardener, and she took a deep breath, ready to breathe fire if he dared to get smarmy.

But, as she rounded the pillar to the portico, she saw a woman walking toward her. About forty, maybe. Pretty in a completely unglamorous way, but a nice face.

“Hi,” the woman said. “Is Mr. Millner in there?”

“He's in there, but he seems a little distraught at the moment.”

“Oh.” The woman looked toward the house, looking concerned. “He asked me to come see him at noon, but I can't. I wondered if he could maybe make it earlier.”

Suzie hesitated. She should leave, but…

“Do you know why he wants to see you?”

The woman shook her head. “Not exactly.” She held out her hand. “I'm Judy Stott. My husband and I live next door. I got the impression Mr. Millner wanted…well, that he was wondering if we might have…seen anything. You know, the night his daughter disappeared.”

Suzie's jaw felt tight. “Did you?”

Judy Stott looked a little wary. After all, she didn't know who Suzie was, and she probably wondered how much she should say.

“Never mind,” Suzie said. She beeped open the
door to her Honda, and said a prayer that it would start. She couldn't wait to get out of this place.

“Just promise me you won't lie for him.”

Judy Stott smiled uncertainly. “Lie for him? I can't imagine he'd ask me to.”

Suzie climbed in her car. She rolled down the window and poked out her head.

“Still. Promise me,” she said. “He's not right in the head. Two wrongs don't make a right, you know. And they damn sure won't bring Justine back.”

Judy Stott backed away, clearly uncomfortable.

Hell, Suzie thought. She was acting as crazy as Millner. Besides, nothing was going to stop him. Even if this Judy Stott person had enough character to tell him no, he'd just move on to the next person.

What about that trashy gardener? He looked as if he'd tell a few lies for the right number of zeroes.

She turned the key to her car, which started up with a nice thrum, as if it understood that they were now on a mission.

She knew exactly where she had to go next.

 

M
IKE AND
G
AVIN
were playing paintball in the big empty Tuxedo Lake lot that he'd bought four years ago, intending someday to build a house. With one thing and another, someday had never come. He and Gavin were still living in the boathouse.

But the wooded lot made a great paintball field.

Today was the first time in two weeks that Gavin had expressed any interest in playing paintball—or anything else, either. When Justine's body had been found, Gavin had simply shut down. He must have known Justine was dead. God knows Mike had talked to him about it often enough.

But “knowing” it and
knowing
it were two different things.

So when Gavin had suggested they play a little paintball, no matter how odd the choice sounded, Mike had said yes with enthusiasm. Maybe they could both work off some of this pain and anger.

Mike stood sideways behind a fifty-year-old hemlock and tried to peek around the trunk without getting nailed by a yellow paintball. Gavin's aim was lethal. He'd hit Mike in the kneecap ten minutes ago, and those suckers hurt.

His mask didn't fit quite right, and he considered taking it off, but he darn sure didn't want a paintball in the eye. He could never be a bank robber. He didn't like being all bundled up. He liked the sun on his skin and the wind in his face.

Maybe he'd ask Gavin if he wanted to move to Malibu and they'd become a couple of beach bums. As soon as the police would let him move anywhere, that is. Murder suspects weren't allowed much mobility, as he'd learned over the past two years.

“I see you!”

He heard Gavin's footsteps running toward him. He lunged out from behind the hemlock and, dropping to a squat to provide a smaller target, he pointed his gun in the direction of the sounds.

But the body he pointed at didn't belong to his son. It belonged to Mrs. Cready, his ninety-year-old neighbor who had put her house up for sale the day they found Justine's body. She told everyone who'd listen that she had no intention of living next door to a murderer.

Mike had considered warning her that comments like that wouldn't exactly help her find a buyer, but
then he thought, to hell with it. She'd treated him like a leper ever since Justine disappeared. If she liked the adrenaline rush of believing the guy next door was a murderer, who was he to spoil her fun?

She must be loving this, standing here at gunpoint. She let out a shrill “eeek” and threw her hands into the air, a move she learned on television, no doubt.

He lifted his mask and propped it on his forehead.

“Hello, Mrs. Cready,” he said. “You can put your hands down. I'm not worried that you might go for your six-guns.”

She frowned. “You're the one with the gun.
I
don't have any guns.”

He smiled wryly. “I think that's my point.”

Slowly she lowered her hands, but she still looked terrified.

He wiggled his gun. “It's not real, Mrs. Cready. It's a toy. Gavin and I are playing paintball.”

She drew herself up, and her scowl deepened, as if the fact that it wasn't real was somehow an insult. “A fine thing to be teaching your son.” She ended with a sniff.

He sighed. Was there some law that said a man's next-door neighbor had to be an old bat?

“Well, anyway,” she said haughtily, “I wouldn't have come down here at all, except that you have a visitor. A woman. She's trying to find your house and got confused. Perhaps because
you don't have one
.”

Yeah, that had always ticked Mrs. Cready off, too. Clearly, she thought, only a hopeless degenerate would live in a boathouse. She didn't seem to think it mattered that, at 2,100 square feet, the boathouse was as big as most regular houses.

Not the Tuxedo Lake houses, of course. And that's
what snobs like Mrs. Cready considered the standard of respectability.

“Okay, thanks, just send her on down.” Mike would have asked who it was, but he didn't really care. It was probably a reporter, or maybe a lawyer looking for business, or maybe even a plainclothes police officer.

Mrs. Cready sniffed again and walked away, her back as erect as a pylon. Mike called Gavin and explained that the game was over. They began pulling off equipment.

When he again heard footsteps and looked up, he saw a young brunette walking toward him. An eye-catching woman, who moved with a natural, unaffected grace. She wore a simple blue skirt and brown hemp sandals. Her glossy brown hair bounced on her shoulders.

Not a policewoman. Way too feminine, in spite of her thin, boyish figure. Her body language too open and free to be a cop. Too casually dressed for a lawyer, too outdoorsy for a reporter.

Still…he had a fleeting sense that he knew this woman, but before he could catch it the wispy image was gone.

He stared at her as she picked her way across tree roots and fallen branches. He realized suddenly that the perfect paintball field might actually look kind of scruffy as a lawn.

But she didn't seem to mind. She didn't tiptoe in exaggerated horror and scrunch up her nose, as Justine would have done.

Who
was
it? Even when she got close enough to see her features, he had no idea. Whoever she was, he decided he liked her. She had great cheekbones, a jaw that said she didn't take any shit, and a mouth that knew how to laugh.

Finally, when she got close enough for him to see her eyes, he knew.

It was impossible. This graceful, good-looking woman was…

Mike's heart began to race, and then it skidded in his chest, as if he were trying to throw on the brakes. He didn't want this pretty woman to be Suzie. He wanted Suzie to stay geeky and smart-mouthed and purple…and permanently pissed at the world.

He needed her to stay the same. Something in this godforsaken world ought to.

Gavin didn't have any such ambivalence. He threw down his paintball gun and began to run toward the woman, laughing.

“Suzie,” he said. “It's me, Gavin. Do you remember me?”

Mike watched as the woman bent over and hugged his son. He waited until she lifted her gaze over Gavin's head and met his eyes.

“Hi, Suzie. It's me, Mike.” He tilted his head. “Remember me?”

“Yeah, I think I do,” she said, laughing, and when her eyes crinkled like that his heart stopped thumping quite so hard. It was still Suzie. In spite of the long, glossy hair, the contact lenses and the mind-boggling sexiness, the old Suzie, the real Suzie, was still in there.

She'd been a good friend to him once. Maybe she still could be.

He smiled. “How can you be so sure it's me? You've changed. Haven't I?”

“Not a bit,” she said. “You're still the only dork dumb enough to be roaming around at a time like this holding a goddamn
gun
.”

She whisked her hands up over Gavin's ears. “Ooops. Sorry.”

Mike laughed out loud.

“Don't be,” he said. “I'm not. Come on, let's go inside. I think I'm about ten years overdue for a good Suzie Strickland thrashing.”

S
HE KNEW IT WAS CONSIDERED
bad form to speak ill of the dead, but Suzie had always thought Justine Millner was trash, and she hadn't ever disliked her as much as she did right now.

Look what Justine had done to Mike. Suzie didn't know whether it was marrying Justine or losing Justine that had done it, but Mike Frome was a different man.

Ten years ago, he'd been one of the most infuriatingly smug boys in their high school. He'd also been one of the most attractive. Just being around him had been like chugging caffeine. He gave off this exciting
zing
of vitality that was addictive, even for Suzie, who ordinarily avoided the preppy crowd like poison.

The zing was gone.

Of course, he was still too handsome for his own good, she thought as he politely led her on a tour of his boathouse. On the outside, it was charming, white trim over dark wood, with dormers that overlooked the lake. Inside, it was large and surprisingly homey for a bachelor pad.

Following behind him, she realized that he still had the sexiest back she'd ever seen, though now she looked at it purely with an artist's eye. If she were to paint it, she'd start with a long triangle—she always reduced a face or body to its underlying geometric
basics first. Then she'd add finely cut, fluid musculature, no artificial steroid bulk here, just a genetically blessed body that worked for a living.

“That's about it. The bedrooms are on the second floor, well, third floor if you count the boat slips beneath, but they're both too disgusting to show anyone right now.” Mike lifted one eyebrow. “I think we're going to have to fire the upstairs maid.”

He winked at his son, who grimaced back. Must be a running joke.

They had made it to the kitchen, an efficient space, not too big, but somehow airy and comfortable. Suzie caught Mike looking at her speculatively as she admired the cabinets. Under his polite exterior, he must be wondering what the heck she was doing here, after all these years.

She smiled back and cut a subtle glance toward Gavin. She couldn't explain herself until they were alone.

She didn't know whether he actually got the message, or if it was just a coincidence, but Mike immediately turned to his son.

“I'm going to show Suzie the porch. Any chance you could toss in a load of towels and fold the ones in the dryer? We're just about out.”

Gavin looked as if he'd like to complain, but he didn't. “Okay,” he said. He turned to Suzie. “You won't leave right away?”

“I'll be here a few more minutes,” she said. “If you're not back when I've got to go, I'll come say goodbye.”

Gavin grinned, and for the first time Suzie could see Mike in the boy. “Well, better not actually come into the laundry room,” he said. “Our downstairs maid isn't all that great, either.”

Mike dismissed Gavin with a shooing motion. He grabbed a plastic container of store-bought cookies from the counter, and then he led Suzie through a pair of large, glass-paned French doors.

As she stepped out onto the porch, she caught her breath. It was absolutely gorgeous, a wraparound deal with an amazing view. Out here, with water on three sides, you were intensely aware that this house was actually built right on the lake.

Mike held out one of two white wicker armchairs, and she took it, appreciating its soft old cushions, and the companionable creak when she leaned back.

Mike sat, too, and for a minute they were silent, just watching the afternoon sunlight play on the water. It bounced off and danced against the walls of the porch, too. It would be a challenge, she thought, to capture this living light on a canvas.

It probably had been a happy place, once. Mike and Gavin had probably spent hours out here, watching the breeze ripple the blue lake. But it was clear that they had pretty much forgotten what happiness tasted like.

God only knew what they saw when they looked out at the water now. Somewhere on the other side of that lake was Justine's mansion. And the muddy spot where her body had been buried.

She glanced at Mike, and she realized he was smiling at her, a hint of that old smile. She couldn't quite meet it. It was still strong stuff, and even after all this time she wasn't completely immune.

“God, Suzie-freaka, it's good to see you. It's been a long, long time.”

His voice, and his smile, were strangely unsettling, like haunted echoes from the past, from way back
when she hated herself almost as much as she hated him. Suddenly the air felt tight, even though the breeze was cool and fresh, fingering her hair and ruffling the sleeves of her dress.

She was irked with herself for reacting like this. The past wasn't the issue, damn it. She wasn't here to reminisce about the bad old days. She was only here out of common humanity. She was here to give an old friend—no, an old
acquaintance—
a heads-up.

Mike held out the cookies. “So, want to tell me what's happening?” He pulled in one corner of his mouth, creating that annoyingly attractive dimple. “Somehow I don't think you just woke up this morning and said, ‘hey, I wonder how that obnoxious boy I hated in high school is doing?'”

The boy she hated in high school
… He must have read her mind. But was that all he was? Maybe. She had definitely hated him. Even when she…didn't.

“No,” she said, waving away the cookies, which were hard and sandy, typical grocery store pseudo food. “It's something more serious, I'm afraid. It's about Justine. Well, about Justine's father, anyhow.”

Mike set the container down slowly. “What about him?”

“He asked me to visit him this morning, at Justine's house.”

She watched Mike's face, wondering how he could stay so impassive. Where had all those quicksilver emotions gone? The easy laughter, the twitching frown, the worried squint, the sarcastic eyebrow? The restless, young-animal body.

The
zing
.

He was so still now. So controlled. It was like looking at a picture of Mike instead of the real thing.

“Oh, yeah?” Mike flipped a cookie between his fingers, keeping his eyes on the water. “What did he want?”

She took a breath. This was it.

“He wants me to help him pin Justine's murder on you.”

That got his attention. But it didn't completely surprise him. As he slowly faced Suzie, she saw anger but not shock behind his dark brown eyes.

“
Pin it
…how would you be able to do that?”

“He hoped I might have seen something while I was painting Gavin's portrait. Something between you and Justine. An argument, maybe.”

“But you couldn't have. I was never at the house when you were there.”

“I know.” She chewed on her lower lip, wishing she could stop herself from asking the next question but knowing she probably couldn't. She'd never had very good impulse control. “I always thought I might run into you, but I never did. Was that deliberate? Were you avoiding me on purpose?”

“Yes.”

She frowned. “Well, that's a hell of a note,” she said. “Just ‘yes'?”

“Well, what do you want me to say? Yes, it was deliberate. Yes, I was avoiding you on purpose.”

“Why?”

He shrugged, and it, too, held the echo of the old days. He always did have a large, infuriating repertoire of smug-jock mannerisms. “I thought you'd prefer it that way.”

“You thought I…” She frowned for a few seconds, feeling herself heating up, though she wasn't sure why. Mike Frome had always been able to confuse her in
world-record time, which inevitably ticked her off. “Why?”

“I thought seeing me might make you…” He seemed to search for a word. “Uncomfortable.”

Uncomfortable? Her temperature rose even higher. What the heck was that a euphemism for? Did he think she was still a geeky, untouched virgin who would blush at the memory of the night he'd copped a feel?

“Know what, Frome? That's BS, and you know it. I haven't got anything to be
uncomfortable
about where you're concerned. Sixteen seconds of touchy-feely ten years ago doesn't exactly require me to wear the scarlet letter for the rest of my life.”

He shook his head. “I didn't mean that. I meant that seeing me might make you unhappy. You know, you might—”

Unhappy? Oh, this was even worse. Did he think she'd actually spent the past ten years carrying a torch for Mr. Most-Likely-To-Succeed?
Oh, brother
.

“Might what? Might turn to stone just from looking at your irresistible bod? Sorry, but that's baloney, too. You may have been the king of the sandbox in Firefly Glen, but it's a pretty small sandbox. Out in the
real
world, where I've been living for the past ten years—”

To her surprise, Mike began to laugh. He reached out and grabbed her hand. “Easy, Fang. You're getting it all wrong.”

She forced herself to take a deep breath. Man, was she regressing. She didn't do this anymore, didn't fly off the handle, didn't read insults into perfectly innocent comments. Her tendency toward irrational ferocity had disappeared the minute she left Firefly Glen, which in her opinion proved that Mike Frome must have been the problem all along.

However, there was such a thing as protesting too much. She inhaled one more time, just for good measure.

“Or maybe,” he said, “I'm
putting
it all wrong.”

“Probably both,” she said tightly. “We never did really communicate all that well. But, look, we're getting off topic. This is serious. I'm trying to tell you that your ex-father-in-law wants to see you spend the rest of your life in jail.”

“Okay.” He gazed at her, the poker face returning. “So what did you tell him?”

“I told him I hadn't laid eyes on you in ten years. That frustrated him, but it didn't really slow him down much. He made it clear that if I'd just
say
I saw you shove Justine around or something he'd make it worth my while.”

The smile remained on Mike's lips, but it was as if he'd simply forgotten to put it away. He still had hold of her hand, so she knew how tight his fingers were.

“And what did you say to his offer?”

She pulled her hand away. “What do you
think
I said?”

“I don't know.” He shook his head slowly. “I think you said no. I hope you said no.”

“But you're not sure?”

He stared at her a moment, and then, his body stiff, he rose from his wicker chair. He leaned against the railing, his back to the sunshine, which threw his face into shadow.

“How can I be sure? The Suzie I used to know—she would have told Alton to take his money and stuff it up his hairy ass. But I haven't seen you in ten years. I don't know you anymore. Not really.”

“You think ten years is enough to turn me into a liar?”

He hesitated again. “Ten years can do a lot of rotten
things to people, Suzie. If you don't know that yet, I'm happy for you.”

She stood up. “Let me get this straight. You think it could turn me into a woman who would send a man to the gas chamber for something he didn't do?”

“Perhaps not.” He lifted one hand. The effort to look suave, indifferent, world-weary failed miserably. He was just plain tired. “But am I sure? No. To tell you the truth, I'm not sure of anything anymore.”

Her annoyance faded slightly in the face of his exhaustion.

“Well, you can be sure of this. Millner is going to try to frame you for this, Mike. He's going to do any dirty thing he can to see that you pay for what happened to Justine.”

“I know.” He glanced toward the French doors, obviously wondering if Gavin was within earshot. “But frankly, Suzie, Alton Millner isn't the only vulture out to get me. He isn't even the most dangerous one. The D.A. has a bead on me, too. I guess it's pretty standard for the cops, even if it feels outrageous to me. They always look at the husband first.”

She felt an upwelling of incredulous indignation. Was everyone around here insane? Mike Frome couldn't kill anyone. Heck, Suzie herself was a more likely candidate. She'd hated Justine, and she was, after all, the one they called “Fang.”

But neither of them had done it. They just weren't that kind of people.

“That's the dumbest thing I ever heard,” she said. “Jeez. Shouldn't you be a better judge of people than that if you're going to be the D.A.?”

Mike almost smiled. “You're so sure he's wrong, then?”

Suzie rolled her eyes. “I've known you since you were about six, Frome. You can be a horse's ass, and you do have an irritating tendency to think you're God's gift. But kill somebody? No way. Kill your own child's mother? Not in a bazillion, trillion years.”

“Damn.” His half smile turned into a grin. “Why couldn't
you
have been the D.A.?”

She shrugged, but she felt herself smiling, too. “Couldn't have handled law school. Problems with authority, you know.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I know.”

Man, this was getting weird. A minute ago she'd wanted to punch him out, and now she had this stupid impulse to go over and hug him. She felt a disgustingly maternal urge—perhaps the first in her whole life—to help him hang on to that smile.

But she forced herself to stay where she was. “Well,” she began. “That's all I had to say, so I guess I should—”

“Suzie.”

She frowned, just on principle. “What?”

“Thanks for coming by to warn me. It was very—very sweet.”

“Wow.” She found herself smiling again, and she made a few adjustments to make sure it was a sarcastic smile. Behind her, she heard footsteps approaching. Gavin must be coming back. “You've used a lot of words to describe me through the years, but I don't think you ever used that one.”

Mike was still looking at her in that soft way that made her feel like squirming.