Читать книгу Getting Off On Frank Sinatra - Megan Edwards - Страница 13

Marilyn Weaver’s house was in San Ramon, a gated community just east of Las Vegas Boulevard. I followed Sean through the main gate, which swung open magically in front of his BMW. The houses inside the enclave were all large, and many of them were huge. Each one occupied its own oasis of manicured landscaping. I followed Sean around a traffic island and pulled up next to him in a wide driveway in front of a three-car garage.

I slung my backpack over my shoulder and grabbed my gym bag. Crossing the front yard, an artful collage of lawn, gravel, and exotic-looking shrubs, I joined Sean at the ornate front door. He was staring at a blinking light on a panel just inside.

“We’re lucky,” he said. “They didn’t set the alarm when they left. I know the code, but I’m always afraid I’ll call the police instead of disarming it.”

“Brrr,” I said as he shut the front door behind us. “This is serious air conditioning.”

“Marilyn likes to freeze,” Sean said. “I’ll turn the thermostat up.”

I followed him through the entry hall into an enormous high-ceilinged living room with an entire wall of plate glass windows. The hardwood floors were covered with oriental carpets, and floor-to-ceiling bookcases flanked a carved stone fireplace. Leather furniture and plenty of mahogany made the room sumptuous, but it was also warm and inviting.

“Want something to drink?” Sean asked as we headed through a spacious dining room to the kitchen. “I only wish I had picked up some absinthe.”

I laughed. “I’ve got to drive. Water would be nice.”

“Sure I can’t tempt you with some champagne?” Sean said, pulling a bottle of Mumm out of the refrigerator. “Goes great with pizza.”

I declined, and Sean didn’t push. I looked around the kitchen while he filled a glass with ice water for me and opened himself a beer. Like the living room, the kitchen was huge and opulent but also pleasant and homey.

“I love this house,” I said, hoping the Nash place might be just a little like it.

“Curtis and Marilyn bought it ten or so years ago when they got married,” Sean said. “I love it when they’re gone.”

After Sean showed me the family room and introduced me to Frank Lloyd the cockatiel, he opened a glass door that led outside. Soon we were standing on the edge of a long rectangular swimming pool with a fountain and waterfall at one end. The whole yard looked particularly inviting in the raking rays of sunset.

“Why don’t you change into your suit while I order a pizza?” Sean said, and I had to admit it was an enticing idea. I followed him back inside, where he led me to the bedroom wing.

“Here you go,” he said, opening the door to a large bathroom tiled in pale peach. “Towels in the cabinet.”

He shut the door behind him, and I surveyed the room. It was messier than I expected after what I’d seen in the rest of the house. The countertop next to one of the sinks was littered with hairbrushes, a couple of cosmetic bags, and a clutter of hair clips, jars, tubes, and bottles. Some were tipped over. I pushed enough of the jumble aside to set my bags down. While I was extracting my bathing suit and beach towel, I noticed a wet washcloth in the sink. She must have been in a hurry, I thought, which would also explain the half-open drawer in the vanity and the towel on the floor next to the shower stall.

Another door across the room from where I had entered stood ajar. It must lead to the master bedroom, I guessed, and an irresistible nosiness seized me. Was there any reason not to take a quick look?

I pulled the door open further and peeked inside. Like the living room, the bedroom had an entire wall of glass looking out onto a forest of palm trees, shrubs, and flowers.

My eyes fell on something I couldn’t make sense of. Was it a pole? I pushed the door even further open, letting more light into the room.

It wasn’t a pole. It was a thick braided cord, stretched taut from the leg of the king-size four-poster bed. My eyes followed the cord to the top edge of a door that stood ajar on the other side of the room. Curious, I stepped into the room and crossed the carpet. I stumbled twice, first over an open suitcase and then on a high-heeled shoe. I think I knew before I laid my hand on the closet door that something was terribly wrong.

Hanging from the other side of the door, her neck cinched in a loop of cord and her face bloody, was Marilyn Weaver. Her legs were buckled under her, and one was sticking out at an odd angle, the foot shoeless. Something made of metal jutted from Marilyn’s mouth. What was it? My mind struggled to make sense of it, though it hardly mattered.

How long I stared at her, I don’t know. My heart crashing against my rib cage, I gasped for breath. A big part of me wanted to run away, but some other force—shock, maybe, or disbelief?—kept me glued in place.

I should touch her, I told myself. She looks dead, but what if she isn’t? My heart still thudding, I forced myself to lay a couple of fingers on her arm. Cool but not stone cold. What if she could be revived? It looked impossible, but—

“Sean!” I screamed, hoping he’d hear me. “Sean! Oh, my God! Come here!”

I kept staring at Marilyn for the eternity—or was it five seconds?—that it took Sean to join me. Blood from her face had puddled on the floor, but it looked as though it had begun to dry. I couldn’t bear to look at the scene for another moment, and I also couldn’t tear my eyes away. Suddenly I recognized the object in Marilyn’s mouth. It was a slide bolt—the sort of thing you see on an old shed—

“Copper! What’s the—?”

Sean emerged from the bathroom to join me at the closet door. He gasped as the horrible scene in the closet came into his view, but he didn’t say anything. I clutched his arm and looked at him. His face had turned paper white, and his eyes were riveted on Marilyn’s body.

“Do you think there’s a chance she’s still alive?” I said. “Shouldn’t we do something?”

“She’s dead,” Sean said. “There’s nothing you can do about dead.”

Even though he was obviously right, his words shocked me. I stared at him, but he still didn’t return my gaze.

911, was all I could think. We’ve got to call 911. Releasing my hold on Sean’s arm, I turned to look for a telephone by the bed. I couldn’t see one on either nightstand, so I raced back into the bathroom and dumped out my backpack on the counter. I grabbed my phone out of the heap. I sucked air as I unlocked the screen.

In an instant, Sean was at my side. He snatched the phone from my hand.

“What are you doing?” I said, gaping at him stupidly. As he moved away from me a barrage of terrifying thoughts rushed into my head. Why was he preventing me from calling 911? Had he killed his mother and brought me here to find her? Was he going to kill me, too?

“Hold on a second, Copper.”

“What?”

“You don’t have to be part of this.”

Our eyes met.

“What do you mean?” I said. “We’ve got to call.”

“She’s dead,” Sean said. “There’s no rush.”

“Sean, please,” I said. I looked toward the door to the hall. There had to be a phone out there somewhere.

“Take your stuff and go,” Sean said. “After you leave, I’ll call the cops. You can forget this ever happened.”

“What? I can’t do that.”

“You can’t do it after you call, that’s for sure. It’s an option you have only right now.”

I stared at him, my mind whirling with conflicting thoughts. Was he really trying to spare me the stress of dealing with a murder investigation? Or did he have some other, less altruistic motive? All I could be sure of was that I couldn’t undo what had just happened. I couldn’t drive away and play dumb for the rest of my life, even if I could get away with it.

“I’m staying, Sean,” I said, surprised at the calm conviction in my voice, “and if you don’t call 911 right this second, I’ll go find a way to do it myself.”

“Okay, Copper, okay,” Sean said, shaking his head. “I just wish—I mean I’m just sorry I got you into this.”

“Call 911,” I said. “Now.”