Dashing Through the Snow (24 page)

When Lily sat back, lips firmly closed, and
looked at him. Smith scowled. “What the fuck, Lil? I know you don’t
plan on just stopping there.”

“I don’t know. I’m thinking about it,” was
all she said.

Smith stared at her in disbelief. He snatched
at her laptop, but wasn’t quick enough. She pressed the off button
and he watched in dismay as the screen slowly faded to black.

He lifted a gaze full of consternation to her
face. “Aw, now what’d you go and do that for, Lily-bud?”

Lily bit her lip and muffled her laughter.
“Well, my birthday’s next Friday.”

“I’m well aware of that. If you tell me that
you won’t tell me the rest of the story unless I buy you something
ridiculously expensive I’ll have to hurt you.”

Lily snorted. “Please. Don’t insult me. I pay
my own way. I don’t force anybody to buy me ridiculously expensive
things.”

“No? What about the time you made me buy you
all that Godiva chocolate?”

Lily rolled her eyes. “I was twelve and it
was a lousy five dollars worth! God, will you never forget the one
regrettable mistake of my entire life?”

“No, I won’t. I’m forever scarred by that
incident. It was my last five bucks and even worse, you managed to
turn a lovely and tender moment into something sordid.”

Lily sputtered with laughter. “You felt up
Jocelyn Ketchum and got caught doing it. Get over it!”

“Yeah, caught by an always-skulking brat who
threatened me with blackmail. You were going to tell my mother --
the woman who gave birth to me
. Like I said: scarred.”

Still laughing, Lily went to cup his chin in
her hand, only to have him push it away. Bent over double with
laughter now, she said, “I’m sorry. I was sorry then and I’m sorry
now. I didn’t realize that the mere mention of your mom would be an
instant turn-off.”

“You might as well have stuck me under a cold
shower. I was never able to look at Jocelyn as the --”

“Potential piece of ass you originally saw
her as?”

Smith’s grin gave him away, but he managed
with mock insult to say, “I was going to say lovely partner in
love.”

Lily guffawed now. “Whatever, Smith. Anyway,
like I was saying. My birthday is coming up next Friday and I want
something special from you.”

“Meaning…” he said cautiously.

“Meaning I want you to do the thing.”

Smith frowned, looking at her in confusion.
“What thing?”

You know,
thee
thing.

Smith was immediately out of his chair and
pacing away in protest. “Oh, no. No way in hell.”

Lily begged him with her eyes. “Come on,
Smith, please. It’s been ages since you did it for me!”

“I only did it that one time and that’s only
because you were seven and sick and I was nine and a pushover and
wanted to cheer you up. We’re not kids, anymore and I’m not doing
it.”

Lily shrugged. “Fine, then I won’t tell you
the rest of the Folly’s history and you’ll probably want to hear it
before we go to the museum tomorrow.”

“I’ll just go down to the hotel’s business
center and look it up.”

Lily’s gaze darted to the clock on the wall.
“It closes at ten. It’s ten thirty.”

Smith just stared at her. Finally, “Don’t do
this to me, Lily. Ask me for anything else and it’s yours -- even
something from that criminally expensive designer you like so
much.”

Lily brightened. “Escada? Really?” She was
quiet for a moment, but then shook her head. “I’m tempted, but no.
I want the thing.”

He studied her quietly. Sighing, he said,
“All right, fine. When?”

“On my birthday.”

Smith dropped in the chair closest to him.
“Fine. Now finish the story. Start with ‘cold, dead hand’ and don’t
shut up until you’ve finished the entire history.”

“All right. Well, it was later found out that
Juan’s son, twenty-two year old Juan, Jr. had not only killed her,
but he’d also been having an affair with Chrissie -- all out of
love for his mother. He’d begun the affair hoping to steal her from
his father and when that didn’t work, he killed her. He literally
just picked her up and threw her over the balcony when she refused
to give up the diamond and stop seeing Juan, Sr. Juan, Jr.
confessed it all within a couple hours of the murder.

“And actually, the diamond wasn’t in her
hand, it was still in the safe. I only said that to make you more
anxious to hear the rest of the story.”

Looking completely unsurprised, Smith only
nodded.

“After Juan, Jr. was arrested and jailed, his
mother began divorce proceedings, which proved to be unnecessary
since Juan, Sr. died of a heart attack. Mrs. Chambliss sold
everything, including the penthouse, the car and the diamond -- all
things that had gone back to Juan, Sr. after Chrissie died. The
diamond went to an electronics magnate from Japan. He had it
mounted as a broach for his wife who happened to be twenty years
younger than he. One night in 1975 they were leaving the theater
when someone tried to rob them. They were both shot in the
exchange. She died and he ended up paralyzed, and seeing the Folly
as the cause of his misery, Mr. Yakamuto decided to sell it.”

“But she was already married to her husband
and Japanese culture is completely different than ours,” Smith
objected. “Who’s to say she married him for his money? It could
have been an arranged marriage for all we know.”

“Exactly, and people have argued that for
decades, but given that Mrs. Yakamuto was so much younger than her
husband and the facts of the Chrissie Tawnee case, the Golddigger
name persists. At any rate, a Field Museum board member who fancied
himself an amateur gemologist purchased the Folly. He wasn’t
married, but he did have a mistress. He didn’t give her the Folly,
but he would let her wear it on occasion. Within a year, she was
diagnosed with lung cancer, dying soon after. The board member
gifted the Field with the diamond upon his death. The Field has
never had it on exhibition.”

“Jesus, such a bunch of nonsense, but I will
admit that the diamond seems a lot like some sort of bad-luck
talisman.”

“Yes, but I’d really love to see it.”

Smith shrugged. “Maybe you will tomorrow if
Grandma Carstairs can get us in with someone.”

Lily smiled. “That would be awesome.”

“I guess, but if Landry has somehow stolen
it, then it’s a whole new ballgame.”

“True,” Lily said as she got up to retrieve
her cell phone from the bedroom where she’d had it charging. She
came back out punching in numbers as she walked. “But won’t it be
cool if we can see it?” she asked Smith as she opened his folded
arms and slid into his lap, bending her knees and resting her head
on his shoulder.

Smith automatically made adjustments so that
she was lying more firmly across his lap and they were both
comfortable. “I suppose it would be at that. Has Grandma Carstairs
ever seen it?”

Lily nodded before slipping a hand beneath
his sweater and T-shirt and sliding it along his skin. She began to
press kisses on the side of his neck. “Only once as far as I know.
It was right when Aunt Amelia first joined the board.” She was
whispering now and curling her body seductively into his. “Did I
mention how much I love your smell?”

Smith smiled and growled softly as he rubbed
her backside from thigh to butt. “You certainly have, but tell me
some more.”

She pressed a soft kiss to his mouth, her
eyes making him promises as she spoke her greeting into the
phone.

Chapter Twenty-one

“It looks like something out of ancient
Greece,” Smith told Lily the next morning as they approached the
Field Museum of Natural History.

Lily laughed, her breath coming out in white
puffs in the cold morning air. “That’s what you said the last time
we were here,” she reminded Smith. “But it is beautiful,” she said
as she stared at the white marbled building. She’d always loved the
look of it with its columns and triple-layered look, as she
referred to the way the front of the building, which looked like a
Grecian temple, jutted out from a second building, which was
connected and to the side and behind it, followed by a third
building connected to the second building. “It was modeled after
the Pantheon in Rome and a couple of other places.”

“And that’s exactly what Grandma Carstairs
said the last time we were here.”

Chuckling, Lily took his hand as they climbed
the first set of stairs. “I remember you running up both set of
stairs faster than the rest of us and once at the top, humming the
Rocky
theme and bouncing around on your toes with your arms
raised in the air.”

“Yeah, it was definitely a moment,” Smith
commented as they finally reached the top. He opened the door for
her. For a moment, they both stood inside and looked down at the
three hundred foot great hall. Even with its gleaming marble arches
and columns and its vaulted ceilings, Lily was less than impressed
with Stanley Field Hall because it always seemed so chaotic. The
installations of the huge stuffed African elephants, the totem
poles and of Sue, the largest T-rex fossil ever found, seemed
wildly out of place amidst such grandeur.

They walked down the stairs and into the long
line for entry. Reaching the front, Smith paid for his ticket first
and waited for Lily. “Hey, hang on,” he protested. “Why did you
only have to pay thirteen dollars and I had to pay fifteen?”

Lily grabbed his arm and began to drag him
away. “The discounted rate is for city residents,” she whispered,
her eyes darting around nervously

“You’re not a city resi -- ”

“My driver’s license says I am,” her whisper
was even more desperate now. “I haven’t had a chance to change it
yet.”

Smith stopped dead in his tracks. He looked
at her. She didn’t meet his gaze and when her cheeks turned red, he
broke up laughing. “Oh, my God, you did it on purpose, didn’t you?
You deliberately left your Chicago address on your license
specifically for this purpose. And I’ll bet other museums have the
same policy, don’t they? That big fancy art museum does,
right?”

Lily could feel herself squirming under his
amused gaze. She met his stare, but quickly looked away. “But there
are so many places that will give you a discount if you’re a city
resident,” she told him, her voice pleading for understanding.
“Plus, there’s the Hirsch Collection and other libraries, the Art
Institute -- ”

“Shame on you, Lily Elise Carstairs, you’re a
scofflaw!”

Lily felt herself reddening even more. “Fine,
I’ll pay the extra two dollars, if you’ll just shut up about
it.”

“Well, now, sweetness,” Smith said with way
too much enjoyment as he rocked back on his heels, “technically,
the two dollars wouldn’t be extra for you, would they? ‘Cause
you’re not a resident, but, hey,” here he threw up his hands,
“that’s between you and your conscience. Far be it for me to
judge.”

“Oh, shut up,” Lily told him and went back to
pay her fair share.

“Isn’t it gorgeous?” Lily sighed over a fat
diamond as she looked at it through the glass. “I can practically
feel the weight of it in my hand.”

Smith looked impatiently at his watch. “Come
on, Lil, we’ve got to go. We came early so you could go through the
gem exhibit, which you’ve done several times. It’s time to go meet
the guy.”

Lily sighed and looked longingly around the
darkened room of the Grainger Hall of Gems. The low lights set off
the sparkle of the gems spectacularly. “But they’re all just so
beautiful, Smith. Oh,” she said dreamily, “I wish I could stay here
all day.”

“Yeah, well, you can’t and I’m not buying you
any ice cream,” Smith said and taking her arm, began to lead her
from the hall. “So let’s just go.”

“We’ve got time,” Lily protested. “We don’t
have to meet Mr. Ramirez for another fifteen whole minutes.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, Lily, this
place is massive. I want to give us plenty of time to find
him.”

“I know where the Corner Bakery is, and it’s
not going to take us that long to get there, but if it will make
you feel better, we’ll leave now.”

“It would, thanks.”

“All right, but I want to come back through
here on our way out. You don’t have to come,” she told him when he
opened his mouth to object. “There are plenty of other exhibits.
We’ll pick a time to meet at the entrance.”

“Agreed. At least I’ll feel like I’ve gotten
my fifteen dollars worth.”

They walked to the main level and found the
restaurant. Lily bought a bottle of water and Smith coffee while
they waited for their expert. “So, if Landers stole the diamond,
then what?”

“Well, then it becomes a different case.
We’ll know that he’s most likely okay and is on the run. We’ll
report it to Mrs. Landers and see where she wants to go from
there.”

“Yeah, I guess so. Wouldn’t that be wild? I
really do believe that he’s stolen it and that Mr. Tam is a part of
it and maybe that loser manager back home. What’s his name?” She
went grabbed her purse and started digging for her notebook.

“Winscoff,” Smith said. “You think so, huh?
Who else are you considering as a suspect?”

“I think maybe one or both of Landry’s
friends from the club back home. It just seems too convenient that
they’re away and unavailable. Plus, Winscoff was so smug about that
fact. You have any suspects?”

“I think Winscoff is a good bet, and of
course Tam, but I also think Kip Beech makes a pretty good suspect
as well.”

Lily’s mouth dropped open. “No way. Why? He’s
always been such a nice, harmless sort of guy.”

Smith nodded in agreement. “Yes, but people
change and I just got the feeling he was hiding something. He’s an
unhappy man who is on the outside looking in. Maybe he feels like
it’s his turn to be on the inside.”

“He did intimate that his wife is a social
climber and that she pushes him.”