Death at a Premium (18 page)

“I didn’t know he was married more than once,” Josie said.

“Are you working with the trophy wife then?” Betty asked.

“She seems a little old to be a trophy wife,” Josie answered.

“How old is she?” Betty asked.

“It’s not how old she is that makes her a trophy wife, it’s the difference in their ages,” Gert explained. “And trophy wife or no, the second Mrs. Higgins has had that title for well over three decades. I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting Seymour or Tilly but they’re forever appearing in photographs in the paper at various charity dos and benefits.”

“So this isn’t the story of a rich older man and a beautiful younger wife,” Josie said.

“Not at all,” Gert said. “In fact, the present Mrs. Higgins is at least as wealthy as her husband. Her family was in insurance—one of the big companies located up in Hartford. They were loaded and she was an only child. And she raised Seymour’s children as though they were her own. I think there were four: one boy and three girls. Maud Higgins is his son’s daughter. The two youngest girls bought their wedding gowns from me decades ago, as have their daughters.”

“What about the third daughter?” Josie asked.

“Bergdorf’s,” Gert answered dismissively. “The marriage only lasted a few years. She took off with another man and moved to California.”

Josie got the impression that Gert didn’t think this would have happened if the bride had more carefully chosen her shopping venue.

“What happened to Maud’s biological grandmother? To Doris? Did she die?” Betty asked.

Gert walked over to a manikin and straightened the lace hem of the gown on display as she answered. “I seem to remember that she fell in love with another man and ran away from her family. And then she died under unusual circumstances. I can’t say I remember the details, if I ever knew them. It was all something of a mystery.” She removed the veil and, cradling the yards of lace and silk in her arms, disappeared into the dressing room.

“That’s odd, isn’t it?” Betty asked Josie.

“What’s odd?”

“A bride vanishing like that. It’s sort of like the story of the Bride’s Secret Bed and Breakfast come to life.”

“If she had four children before leaving, she wasn’t exactly a bride,” Josie mused. “It is odd, though. But that’s not what interests me.”

“What is?”

“Tilly and Seymour knew the Bride’s Secret when they were young—before he was married to his first wife.”

“So?”

“So it’s interesting that they ended up buying it together decades later, isn’t it?”

“Do you think it has anything to do with the murder?”

“Probably not.”

“Could the body you found be his first wife?” Betty asked.

“Not unless his first wife was a man,” Josie reminded her.

Betty laughed before asking another question. “And there’s no reason to connect the murder with anyone in the Higgins family, right?”

“Just that they own the house where it happened.”

“And no one has identified him?”

“No. Fingerprints were taken and I suppose someone somewhere is trying to find a match, but I haven’t heard anything.” Josie paused. “Did I tell you that Leslie Coyne—he’s the electrician on the crew this summer— that his papers were found on the body?”

“What sort of papers?”

“His driver’s license.”

“Weird. How did he explain that?”

“He had no idea how it happened—at least that’s what he says.”

“How did you end up hiring a male electrician? Is he from Island Electric?”

“No. Island Electric went out of business and I’m trying not to subcontract these days—cuts too much into my profits. Besides, Leslie is also a carpenter. He does pretty much everything.”

“How did you find this gem?”

“I didn’t,” Josie answered, and then explained how Nic had found the crew for her.

“Sounds like you were surprised when a man showed up on the job.”

“Yes, but you know Island Contracting has no policy against hiring men. And Vicki, Leslie’s fiancée, is working for me this summer as well.”

“So how long has Leslie been missing his identification?”

“He says he lost his license awhile ago, and when he realized it, he applied for a replacement. He’s been carrying the replacement ever since then. He claims to have no idea how his original license ended up on the body. In fact, he claims to have lost his license more than once and didn’t even know it.”

“Isn’t that odd? How could you lose your driver’s license?”

Josie considered. “You know me. I’m always losing things. My driver’s license could vanish and I might not realize it—not unless I was stopped by the police and asked to produce it.”

Betty grinned. “If you were stopped on the island, the Rodneys wouldn’t bother to ask for your license. They know who you are.”

“Only too well,” Josie agreed.

Gert reappeared, a big smile on her face. “So, which one will it be?”

“Which what?” Josie began before realizing what she was being asked. “Oh, the dress. Can you give me a few days to think about it?”

“You’re being married on Labor Day?”

“Yes.”

“I can give you two weeks. I can put a rush on any gown you pick as a favor to dear Carol, but it will still take a month to make it.”

“That’s great!”

“But two weeks is the absolute limit, my dear. You be sure to come back in before then.”

“I . . . do I need to come back in?”

“Of course you do. For your fitting.”

“You can’t do it long distance? I run a business on the shore. I don’t know if I can get away again.”

Gert pursed her lips. “I don’t see how . . .”

“What if you measure Josie right now?” Betty asked.

“I can do that, of course, but each dress is completely individual. Once you pick out your gown, there will still be questions. Of course, if you decide now . . .”

Josie hadn’t run her own business for years without learning that there were times when her only option was to make a quick decision and stick with it. “The sheath with the bolero,” she said.

Betty jumped up and hugged her friend. “Oh, you’re going to have a formal wedding!”

“And it’s a decision you’ll never regret, my dear. Now take off your clothes. Let’s get busy and get those measurements.”

Josie stripped down to her bra and underpants. Gert was wrong—she already regretted her decision.

One of the many mistakes the Rodneys had made was to arrest Betty for murder years before. That mistake had led to her meeting and, in time, marrying Jon Jacobs. Jon and Sam, both attorneys, had known each other in New York City, where they had been on the opposite sides of many cases when Sam worked as a city prosecutor and Jon was a lawyer hired by the defense. Even now, years after Sam’s move to the island, they spoke on the phone regularly. But Jon had become something of a wine expert and their conversations these days, as far as Josie could tell, were frequently more about wine than law. Now, sitting in Betty’s beautifully decorated living room in her prewar co-op, Josie was trying to figure out how to convince Jon to help her without talking to Sam about it.

They had demolished a feast of Thai food before Betty and Jon had disappeared to put JJ to bed. So far their talk had been about the baby and the wedding. Now Jon, his shirtfront a bit damp from helping with his son’s bath, reappeared and sat down across from his guest. “More wine?” he asked, picking up the bottle of Riesling they had enjoyed with dinner.

“I think I’m fine, thanks. Does Betty need any help with JJ?”

“No. The truth is, she’s better off putting him to sleep by herself. JJ hates to sleep when he thinks something else is going on. We turn off all the lights and close the curtains—sort of bore him to sleep,” Jon explained, pouring the last of the wine into his glass and sipping. “This actually goes very well with the spiciness of Thai food, don’t you think?”

She knew nothing about wine, but she was used to agreeing with the experts. “Excellent. How are things going at work?”

“Oh, you know. Same old, same old. How’s Island Contracting? Betty says you have another murder on your hands.”

“Oh, I don’t think the body has anything to do with us,” Josie answered. “But I do have a problem that you might be able to help me with . . .”

“Anything. You know that, Josie. But if it’s a legal problem, why not ask Sam?”

Josie took a deep breath and repeated the lie she had come up with during dinner. “It’s not exactly a legal problem. See, I’m trying to make sure everything— absolutely everything—having to do with Island Contracting is organized and on my computer before the wedding.” She paused. “You know how organized Sam is . . .”

“And you’re not?” Jon guessed.

Josie was fairly sure that Sam had complained about this very thing to Jon, probably more than once, so she thought he wouldn’t question her next words. “Not at all, and things have gotten into a terrible mess. To tell you the truth, I don’t want Sam to realize how messy everything is.”

Jon nodded. “So how can I help you?”

Josie had just finished explaining what she needed when Betty returned to the room. They opened another bottle of wine and were still talking when JJ woke up at two A.M.

TWENTY-TWO

J
OSIE WAS TIRED and just a bit hungover on her drive back to the island. But she had accomplished more in her short time in the city than she would have thought possible in her most optimistic moment.

The connection between Betty and Maud Higgins might or might not reveal something useful. Betty had promised to talk to Maud about her grandparents right away. “Probably today,” she had added, waving JJ’s hand in the air as Josie started her truck and pulled out into the speeding traffic. Driving in New York City was as different from driving at home as it was possible to get. Josie had panicked until Sam pointed out that each driver was responsible only for his own front fender. It didn’t make a lot of sense, but it always worked, and Josie made it to the Garden State Parkway without incident.

Once out of the city, traffic was light and Josie allowed herself to think of something other than the road. She reviewed her conversation with Jon. After admitting she was sometimes unsure how long she had to keep legal documents pertaining to her business—and relating an incident concerning the Internal Revenue Service and a lost contract—she had mentioned health insurance. With crews changing from year to year, and sometimes from month to month, Josie had a fair number of insignificant questions she could ask without exposing the dire situation she found her company in.

It was Jon who brought up what happened to companies when they were denied health insurance. He had worked on a case the year before—some sort of lawsuit that his firm had handled—where an uninsured employee had sued his employer for medical costs and damages when he was taken ill and needed surgery, two months of hospitalization, and a year of physical therapy. Josie didn’t remember all the details, but she did remember Jon’s point: you can’t sign away your rights. What this meant to Josie and Island Contracting was that even if she asked Leslie to put in writing his acceptance of working uninsured, he would still be able to sue at a later date. It had not been encouraging.

But his most interesting statement had been something like, “Of course, it might have been different if the company hadn’t been able to get insurance—in this instance, their insurance carrier had raised their premiums, and the company had refused to pay them. You see, the responsibility had landed right in the employer’s lap.”

Josie realized a few things at that moment: that Leslie’s situation was unique and didn’t have anything to do with the rest of her crew, that she was glad she had decided to pay the higher premiums regardless of the increased cost, and that her decision to keep this bit of information from Sam had been a good one. Sam was personally and professionally cautious and would insist that she fire Leslie.

So she would spend the summer lying to the man she loved while planning a large formal wedding that she didn’t want as she remodeled a house with an uninsured worker—and for minimal profit if she decided to replenish her nest egg. And that was ignoring the murder. Praying the police wouldn’t have set up a speed trap this early, she slammed the accelerator to the floor. Time to get on with her life.

Unfortunately, there was a speed trap and Josie got on with her life over an hour later than she had planned. But her late arrival didn’t explain the frown on Mary Ann’s face or the tears on Vicki’s cheeks. Leslie’s arrest did.

Vicki was crying too hard to speak coherently, but Mary Ann explained that the police had arrived with a warrant for Leslie’s arrest a few hours before. Nic had gone to the police station to find out what, if anything, could be done to release him.

“I wanted to go, but they thought Nic would be better,” Vicki sobbed.

Josie agreed with that. “Did either of the Rodneys explain why he was being arrested? Do they have any new information connecting Leslie to the dead man?”

“We don’t know. The three of them appeared soon after we all got here this morning.”

“The three of them? Trish Petric was here too?”

“Yeah.”

“They put handcuffs on him and led him out the door like a common criminal,” Vicki said.

“We tried to keep working after Leslie left, but . . .” Mary Ann shrugged and looked over at Vicki.

Josie frowned. “I guess I should go down to the station.”

“Oh no, please, please don’t do that!” Vicki cried.

“Why not?”

“The younger officer . . .”

“Mike Rodney?” Josie asked.

“Yes, I guess. He said for you to keep out of their investigation if you knew what was good for you—and for Leslie.”

“I told her that you didn’t have to listen to anything like that,” Mary Ann said to Josie.

“But you’re not going to go there, are you? Please don’t!”

“No, I’ll stay here—but we have to get some work done,” Josie ended firmly.

“The windows for the top floor were delivered yesterday afternoon while you were in the city,” Mary Ann said. “We were planning to start replacing the old ones today and surprise you when you returned. I guess that’s out now, but they’re the smallest windows in the house— the three of us can manage easily.”