Deception (10 page)

“Yes,” she said’ astounded at the sudden clarity of certain details—details she hadn’t thought about earlier. “I do remember certain things.”

“Go ahead.”

“He had to be in fairly good shape because he wasn’t breathing nearly as hard as I was. When he ran away, he ran well, and fast.”

“Was he a big man?”

“Not big in the sense of bulk, but he was strong. I don’t remember a fragrance, and I can’t remember anything about his features. He had too much goop on his face.”

“That’s okay. You’re doing good. Now tell me what you know about Simon’s death—the facts first’ as you know them, then your own feelings and the reason you feel that way.”

With as many details as she could, she told him about her father’s odd behavior the last few days before his death and the gun-permit request she’d found in his desk.

Dan didn’t interrupt her. She had expected him to pull out a notebook and start taking notes the way the two uniformed officers had done the other night, or stop her and ask her to backtrack.

He did neither.

“Do you have any idea who would want to kill your father?” he asked when she was finished.

Jill slowly shook her head. “I must have asked myself that same question a hundred times, and I still can’t come up with an answer. People adored him. He was kind’ generous, enthusiastic about his work, and the work of others. Oh, he had his share of enemies. We all do, I suppose. But I doubt any of them would want to kill him.”

“Can you be specific? About his enemies, I mean.,”

“That was only a figure of speech-”

“Think, Jill. We could be talking about a disgruntled former employee, a rival architect, a client.”

Once again, she was surprised at the way he was able to draw information from her. “Well.. there’s Pete Mulligan.”

“The building contractor?”

Jill nodded. “He hated my father. He wanted to go into a joint venture with B&A in the worst way but was never able to.”

“Why not?”

“His bids were always too high, and my father never liked him, anyway. Six months ago, Mulligan accused my father of manipulating the bids and keeping him out of the bidding process.

My father was furious and threw him out of his office.”

Dan made a mental note to check on Pete Mulligan. “Who else didn’t get along with your father?”

“My cousin Olivia. She’s always resented him for taking me under his wing years ago and for placing me in a position of power later on. Professionally, she fought with him all the time.”

“About what?”

“Money matters, management matters. You know Olivia, she always has something to say. More recently, she was upset because my father turned down a buy out offer from a big conglomerate. She thinks that merging with a large international company could help our bottom line.”

Dan’s expression turned curious. “Is B&A in financial trouble, Jill?”

“No. That’s why my father wouldn’t sell.” Her voice tightened. “It’s different now, though. Clients are deserting us, afraid that without my father the company is doomed.”

“Tell me about the other board members.”

“You know them all.”

“It’s been a while, Jill. Refresh my memory.”

“Well, beside Olivia, there’s my uncle Cyrus. He’s now the company president and I’m his vice president. The other two members are Paul Scoffield and Philip Van Horn.”

Dan remembered both men well. Scoffield was the company’s financial officer and Van Horn headed B&A’s legal department. “Anything I should know about them?” he asked. “Money problems? Disagreements with your father?”

“Now that you mention it, Paul did have money problems. He made some bad investments after his wife died and almost lost his home. When my father found out, he loaned him enough money to get back on his feet.”

Dan wasn’t surprised at Simon’s generosity. Jill’s father had always been a great believer of spreading the wealth around. “Did Paul pay him back?”

For the most part. I don’t think Daddy was too worried about it.”

What about Philip?”

“No problems there. He and my father made a great team.” er voice lost some of its crispness. “Poor Philip—a tragedy of his own not too long ago.” She looked at Dan. “His daughter committed suicide.”

Blair?”

“Awful, isn’t it? Such a happy, well-adjusted young woman.

“What happened?”

“She was attending law school at University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and one night she jumped off the Ben Franklin Bridge. The following day, they found her body floating in the Delaware River.”

“Christ.”

“I know. Philip was devastated. All he found later was a note from Blair, but she didn’t give an explanation. The note was to her father and all it said was “Forgive me.”

The two of you were good friends, weren’t you?”

“I was seven years older so she was more like my baby sister than a friend. After Philip and his wife divorced and Blair and her mother moved to Oklahoma, we sort of lost touch with each other, but I loved her very much.”

“What about the rest of the staff?” Dan asked after a while.

“My father had no problem with anyone at B&A.” A smile played on her lips. “I doubt very much you’re going to find a murderer in our midst, Dan.”

“Yet, someone at B&A eavesdropped on your conversation with your mother yesterday. And you said you felt as if you knew your attacker.”

“It wasn’t someone I work with.”

Dan was thoughtful for a few minutes. Despite Jill’s trust in her co-workers, he hadn’t ruled out the possibility of an internal conflict. He put down his mug and, when she pointed at the coffeepot, he shook his head. “How are the shares of the company divided?” he asked.

“Before his death, my father had fifty-one shares, I had fifteen, Uncle Cyrus had nineteen. Olivia, Philip Van Horn and Paul Scoffield each had five. When my father died, my uncle inherited twenty of Daddy’s shares and I the other thirty-one.”

“Nothing for your mother?”

“Daddy wanted his shares to go to Uncle Cy and me because we were involved in the business. Mom inherited everything else.” Jill watched him for a moment. “What do you think? Is it as hopeless as it seems?”

“Intriguing maybe, but not hopeless.”

“Where will you begin?”

“At the crash scene. I’ll talk to Wally and get some specifics.” He took his empty mug to the sink.

“Thanks for the brew, Red.” He winked. “When did you learn to make such good coffee?”

“This cop I knew showed me how. I was married to him and had lots of time to practice while he was working.”

The stab hit him hard. “I know I’ve said it before, Jill, but I’m sorry. About everything.”

She shrugged. “Forget it. I have.”

His gaze moved over her face, slowly, taking in every inch, lingering more than he should have on her lips. The effect was so unsettling she felt herself blush. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Because I can’t believe I let you go.”

He was close enough for her to smell his aftershave, a woodsy scent that suited him perfectly. Easy girL Don’t let him get to you. One heartbreak was enough.

Jill squared her shoulders. “Don’t get any ideas, Santini. What we once had is over. Finito. You do understand that word, don’t you?”

“Oh, I understand it.” As she started to turn away, he took her chin between two fingers and turned her head back. For a wild moment, she thought he was going to kiss her. The sensation was so powerful, she could almost feel his mouth on hers. “Whether or not I believe it is another matter.”

It was a while until she was able to regain her composure. When she did, she brushed his hand away. “Believe it.”

Nine

“Oh, Jill, how could you?” Amanda waited until the couple seated at the next table had left before giving her daughter a long, reproachful look. “How could you ask a stranger to investigate your father’s death, to pry into our lives, question us like.. criminals.”

Because Lutece was always crowded at lunch hour and private conversations were seldom private, Jill leaned over the table and kept her voice low. “First of all, Dan is not going to treat you and the rest of the family like criminals. He’s quite aware that you’re grieving. Second, he’s hardly a stranger. He was part of our family for an entire year.”

Her duck terrine forgotten, Amanda’s expression went from angry to startled. “Well, haven’t you made a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree turnaround. I thought you hated the man’s guts.”

Jill held back a smile. The phrase, which sounded out of place coming from her mother, was one she had used herself many times following her separation from Dan. Looking back, she wasn’t sure if she had said it to convince her parents she hated him or to convince herself. “Hate is a worthless emotion,” she stated with a shrug.

“Dear God, don’t tell me you’re falling in love with him again. Oh, Jill, that wouldn’t be wise at all. You two are worlds apart. You’ve always been. And he’s hurt you so much.”

“I hurt him, too, Mom.”

Looking totally dismayed, Amanda leaned back against her chair. “You have fallen in love with him again!”

“No,” Jill said in a fierce whisper. “I have not. If you want to know the truth, I wish Ashley had minded her own business and not called him. But she did call him, and, by God, I’m going to make the most of it. And after he’s finished with this investigation, we’ll both go our separate ways and I’ll probably never see him again.”

“If you had to bring in an investigator, why did it have to be him?”

“Because he’s good at what he does.” Jill paused. “And because I trust him.”

Amanda let out a small, resigned sigh. “Since it’s obvious I can’t change your mind, I guess I might as well agree to talk to him. What exactly does he want to know?”

“He wants to reconstruct Daddy’s last forty-eight hours. if that’s not enough, he’ll have to go back further.”

Her mouth still set in a tight, disapproving line, Amanda nodded. “All right, then. Tell him to come to the town house tomorrow morning at about ten. The sooner we do this the sooner you’ll realize how wrong you are.”

“Thanks, Mom. I knew you’d come through for me.” Withdrawing her hand, Jill took a bite of her own terrine. “Now eat your lunch.” Her eyes filled with mischief “I don’t mind taking you out to one of the most expensive restaurants in town, but you have to eat the food.”

Amanda’s lips quivered slightly as if she was trying not to smile. “That’s what I used to tell you.”

“I know. Isn’t it fun reversing roles once in a while?” Amanda picked up her fork. “Just don’t get used to it. I’m still your mother.”

Jill smiled. “Yes, Mom.”

Although Amanda Bennett had agreed to see Dan and answer his questions, her demeanor on Sunday morning was exactly as Dan had predicted-polite, cool and cautiously distant.

Unlike Simon, she had been against Jill marrying Dan from the start-not because of the young couple’s social differences, but because she didn’t think her impetuous daughter had the temperament to become a policeman’s wife. And in that respect, she had been right.

Fortunately, Dan’s visit to the Bennetts’ town house hadn’t been a total waste of time. Oddly enough, it wasn’t what Amanda had told him that he’d found intriguing, but what she had not told him.

As he drove back to Brooklyn, the nagging feeling that she had been hiding something kept coming back, yet her account of Simon’s last forty-eight hours was perfectly believable. On Saturday, he had gone to the office for a few hours, then had come home for an early dinner. Later he had retreated to his study, as he often did at night.

On Sunday, they and another couple had gone to the Plaza Hotel for brunch. Afterward, Amanda had gone home to write her Christmas cards and Simon had driven to Livingston Manor, by himself. It was no secret that Amanda didn’t share her husband’s passion for the outdoors, especially in the winter.

So what could she have possibly not told Dan?

The question stayed with him until he reached his mother’s house where the entire Santini clan had gathered for a big Sunday dinner. As his two nephews met him at the door with a football, challenging him to a quick game before dinner, he forgot about Amanda Bennett and headed for the backyard.

With a few strokes of her pencil, Jill put the finishing touches to her Church Hill sketch and pulled back from her drawing board for a look at what six weeks of intense work had accomplished.

The design of the sixty-four-story luxury-apartment complex had changed dramatically since she had first presented her idea to the Maitland Group two months ago. She’d replaced the angles, which she had thought too harsh, with gentle curves, and she’d added an additional wing to the structure, giving it a cloverleaf effect.

Because the new design was as unique and exciting as anything she had ever done, Jill had taken a gamble, hoping that Ben Maitland, a man who had a flair for the unusual, would like it. Now, as a serious case of jitters began to set in, she grew more and more fearful. What if she had misjudged him? What if Maitland hated the new design?

“May I come in?”

Recognizing the deep, baritone voice of Philip Van

Horn, Jill swung around in her chair, already smiling. “Of course.”

Just under six foot and slender, Philip Van Horn was an attractive man with dark hair that was beginning to gray and probing, intelligent brown eyes. Except for a mild setback shortly after his daughter’s death, he hadn’t allowed his grief to interfere with his work. Under his leadership, B&A’s legal department was running as smoothly as ever.

“I thought I’d stop by to wish you luck in Richmond,” he said. Standing beside Jill, he let his gaze skim the sketches and he shook his head in wonder. “I’m not an architect but I can see why Cyrus insisted I take a look at these.”

Jill beamed with pride. “You really like them?”

“Like them? Jill, this is a fabulous concept. One look at this building and Ben Maitland won’t be able to turn it down.”

“Thank you, Philip.” Jill started rolling up the drawings. “To tell you the truth, I’m a little nervous. So much rests on this presentation.”

“You’ll do fine,” Philip said with a confidence that restored some of her own. “When will you be back?”