Irked, Daniella shot back, “You just can’t face him because Mittenberger cut you off and all that time’s been wasted for nothing.”
Jerrilyn raked her with a cold glare. “You’re all deluded. This is nothing but a joke.”
She slammed out of the house. Daniella ran forward to peer through the front windows, half-expecting Jerrilyn to steal one of their cars, but she stopped at the edge of the street and whipped out a cell phone, not one of the ones Andre had gotten for them. One of her own.
She’s been planning this
, Daniella realized with a start. On the heels of that, she felt jubilant. “Good riddance,” she muttered.
She turned to see Naomi standing in the doorway to Jerrilyn’s room, still in her prayer robe. Daniella could tell she was furious, though she didn’t say anything as she strode in the direction of the prayer room. Daniella followed after her, curious, her gaze lingering momentarily on Andre’s closed door. What were they supposed to do now?
Clarice reappeared a few moments later, but she stayed far away from Daniella, as if afraid she would probe with more questions. Well, she would, if she thought Clarice might actually tell her something.
And then Andre came out of his bedroom, but not in his robe. He was wearing a pair of slacks, a loose white shirt, and suede boots. “It’s time,” he said, looking faintly regretful as he noticed them all standing in the prayer room.
“You’re going out?” Daniella asked, disappointed.
He gave her that
look,
the one he bestowed on them whenever they questioned him. “There’s work to be done.”
“Jerrilyn just left,” Naomi said in a voice that could have cut ice. “She’s not coming back.”
“She never fit in,” Andre said.
His casual dismissal caused Daniella to look from Naomi to Clarice and back again. They all were confused.
“You don’t want to . . . go after her?” Clarice asked.
“I have to be somewhere tonight. In the meantime, just stay here and wait for me to call.”
“What about our jobs?” Naomi asked. “I thought I was going to Laguna Beach to pick up where Teresa left off.”
Andre nodded. “Yes, yes, of course,” he said, as if he’d totally forgotten the directive.
“And I’m supposed to have lunch with Todd Bridgewater tomorrow,” Clarice said reluctantly.
Staying true to form,
Daniella thought with disgust. All Clarice wanted was Andre.
Kind of like you?
her inner bitch pointed out.
“When will you be back?” Naomi asked.
Another no-no, and one Naomi never did. Daniella held her breath, waiting, hoping Andre would chastise her. Maybe shake her like a rag doll until her stupid head snapped and rolled around on her neck.
But he just headed for the door, saying, “I’m taking the Xterra. You’ve got the Malibu and the Civic.”
“How long will you be gone? What about money?” Daniella blurted out, unable to stop herself though she might earn another trip to the attic. But there were still bills to pay and they had to eat.
“I left the safe open,” he said. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.”
The safe was
open?
“What if Lumpkin comes back?” Daniella asked.
Andre hesitated, turning back to them. She watched as he looked from Clarice, to Naomi, to Daniella, a small smile playing on his lips. “Well, I’ll be gone now, won’t I? If he sees Clarice or Naomi, just tell him they’re your friends and they don’t live here. Just keep on doing what you’re supposed to,” he added. “Everything’s come down to this and we’re all going to be fine.”
The door slammed behind him and Daniella suppressed a full-body shiver. Immediately she ran to his room and checked the safe. Inside she saw about three hundred dollars. She pulled out the money, worried at the small sum that wouldn’t last long. As she turned away, she caught the dull, golden glow of one of the ankhs, lying on the floor. He’d been in such a rush he hadn’t noticed it had dropped to the ground.
Was it Teresa’s?
she wondered. He’d never given one to anyone else that she knew of. Before the others could find it, she slipped it over her head and under her robe, warmed by its coldness against her skin.
She had a feeling Andre wasn’t coming back.
Gary Merritt, Victoria’s lawyer, was the one who finally called West to tell him everything was set for him to bring Tucker back to the States. It was six
P.M.
and he was seated at the hotel bar, just finishing the Bakoua’s take on a chicken salad sandwich served with mango, pineapple, and papaya when he got the call. Merritt assured him that Aimee had already been told and that he and Tucker were booked on the last flight out, the same one Teresa had planned to take.
He signed the meal to his room and was just leaving when he saw Talia Laughlin crossing toward him. He stopped short. Their relationship, such as it was, had always been an uneasy one; she didn’t really want to deal with her husband’s bastard son.
“There you are,” she said.
He held up his phone. “I just got a call from Gary Merritt, Victoria’s lawyer.”
“I just spoke to him too. Looks like everything’s set, but I just got here. Let’s go tomorrow.”
West looked at the slim, raven-haired woman with the sharp features. He remembered Talia from when he was a kid and invited to the ranch by his father. He’d been aware then that she was watching him like a hawk, though he hadn’t understood all the ins and outs of what had transpired. To her credit, she’d never been outwardly awful to him, though he was pretty sure she and his mother had had words.
On his first trip to meet with Victoria to discuss finding Teresa, he’d been reintroduced to her. She’d been civil enough and had professed to being as interested in having Tucker back as Victoria was, though he’d since come to realize maybe she wasn’t quite as eager as she’d have him believe.
West wasn’t exactly sure how Tucker’s guardianship was all going to play out, but he was determined to have Callie be at the ranch. Tucker needed someone completely on his side.
“It’s best to get Tucker away from Aimee as fast as possible,” West told Talia now.
“What’s her stake in all this?”
“Money.”
“Well, of course.” Her lips tightened, then she shook her head. “Well, fine. I haven’t even really unpacked, so I’ll be ready. When are you planning to pick Tucker up?”
“Now.”
“Oh, dear. I hope you know I’m going with you, but I really need to get something to eat first,” she said.
“You can order at the bar,” he said.
“Oh, can I?” She lifted her brows at his proprietary manner.
“Or you can go somewhere else and Tucker and I will meet you at the airport.”
“You’re just a joy to get along with, aren’t you?”
West shrugged, and she said, “Fine,” sat down at the bar, and ordered the exact same sandwich West had just finished.
An hour later they were on their way. The taxi driver double-parked outside the apartment building but assured them he would find a spot and stay for as long as they needed. He and West exchanged numbers, then West led Talia into the dark hallway outside Aimee’s apartment. Before he even had a chance to knock, Aimee swept open the door and stared at him coldly. “I know,” she bit out, stepping back to allow them entry. She and Talia, both slim and dark, looked each other up and down warily.
“Talia, this is Aimee Thomas,” West introduced. “Aimee . . . Talia Laughlin. And here’s Tucker,” he added when the boy charged into the room, but came to a skidding stop near Aimee.
“Where is Callee?” he asked West.
“She’s back home in Los Angeles. That’s where we’re going.” He pointed to himself and then Tucker.
“I want Callee,” he whispered, looking down at the floor.
Talia stepped forward and said, “You’re going to go to a ranch with cattle and horses and cowboys.”
Aimee’s face was a thundercloud. She tried to put an arm around Tucker but he slid sideways, out of her reach. Warily, he came closer to West. “Michel go too?” he asked.
“No, Michel’s not going!” Aimee snapped. She stalked across the room and swept up a small suitcase that looked as if it had been purchased new. Then she grabbed an envelope from a side table and held it up. “His passport. Still good.” She moved forward and slapped it into West’s palm, then stood back and crossed her arms.
“You’ve been evasive about Teresa. You had to have talked to her during her last trip here,” West said.
“You want answers, talk to the gendarmerie.”
“I want answers,” he agreed.
“Not my problem,” she said coolly.
West would have liked to interrogate her some more, but this clearly wasn’t the time and the place, and it was more important to tiptoe away with Tucker than antagonize her. He pulled a thick envelope from inside his coat pocket and exchanged it for the one she held out to him. She took the money without saying anything. It was a generous amount, but if it was enough to keep her from trying to gum up the works, that was fine with both him and Victoria.
“I’m sure you’ve taken good care of him,” Talia put in a bit desperately. West could tell she was worried he was going to somehow screw things up.
“How are you related?” Aimee demanded of her.
“I’m Tucker’s grandmother,” she said. “He’s my son’s son.”
Hearing that, Tucker pressed himself into West’s leg, as Aimee silently assessed Talia. “I stay with you and Callee?” Tucker whispered to West.
“Yes, but first we’ve got to fly on an airplane to where she is,” West said firmly when Talia opened her mouth to apparently argue the point. He grabbed up Tucker’s suitcase and asked, “This all?” Aimee nodded curtly, and then he herded both Tucker and Talia out the door ahead of him.
Andre drove carefully, aware that something wasn’t quite right inside his head. If he thought about it, it worried him a little, but most of the time he ignored it. Naomi was always jabbering about a doctor she knew whom she wanted him to see, but he wouldn’t trust any one of the handmaidens to choose anything for him.
He’d had an epiphany, of sorts, about Teresa. He was pretty sure which one of the women had killed her, though he wasn’t certain it was a true memory or something his brain had manufactured. The way the handmaidens had all acted on the trip, as if it were some vacation that he was just paying for, had really sent him into a dark funk.
But now, as he drove to Laughlin Ranch, his ranch, he had a glimmering of what had happened.
His cell phone rang and he stared at the screen. His mouth curved into a feral smile, and he answered, “Miss me already?”
“It’s laughable, the way everyone thinks I’m someone else. I should get an Academy Award,” the caller said.
“Teresa was good at that too,” he reminded her, knowing he was purposely goading her.
“She certainly thought so,” was her cool response.
“I have to go. I don’t want to be pulled over because I’m talking to you on a cell phone.”
“Have you got everything ready for me? Everything I need?” she asked.
He thought briefly of the prayer room, the robes, rites, and sex, and had a moment of melancholy, realizing he wouldn’t be able to pick among the handmaidens any longer. But were they really worth it, anyway? There was so much bickering, backstabbing, and disruption, and his head couldn’t handle the noise of it all. Besides, he was moving into a new phase, the place he’d been driving toward for most of his life. He was almost there.
“The rest of them will have to be gotten rid of,” she reminded him. “Isn’t that what you said?”
He grunted his agreement, though her high-handed manner annoyed him. She should know better than to test him. “Whose boat did you use to take Teresa out?” he asked.
A hesitation. “You really want to know all the details?”
So, it was her. He’d thought so. “No.”
“It’ll be just you and me, right?” she questioned.
No . . . it could never be just one woman. Maybe he could have been faithful to Teresa, but not to anyone else. But she didn’t have to know that. “Just you and me,” he told her.
“I’m thinking about what I want you to do to me,” she said suggestively. “Where I want it . . .
how
I want it. You get me?”
That woke up his slumbering dick. “I get you.”
She trilled with laughter. “Just as long as you’re okay,” she said as she hung up.
The reminder of his health sent his cock into a quick downswing. Damn her. Damn them all.
It was definitely time to move on.
Callie awoke in the middle of the night, trying to capture the stray thought that had been circling around her fragmented dreams. She reached for her cell phone, the smartphone she’d left in LA when she’d taken off for Martinique, and reread West’s last text, which had come in around ten
P.M.
, her time. He was spending the night in Miami with Tucker. They’d missed a connecting red-eye flight to Los Angeles, and were staying at an airport hotel. Tucker had been asleep on his feet and West was getting him settled. They were scheduled to leave the next morning and would arrive on the West Coast around noon. Reading between the lines, Callie thought Tucker had to be discombobulated over leaving everything he’d ever known. She wanted to call West, but figured it was best to let him call her.
Climbing out of bed, she walked into the kitchen, flipping on the under-cabinet lights. A Keurig machine sat on the counter, something Jonathan had purchased and she’d thought she’d never use. Now she pulled down a mug from the cupboard and set it under the machine’s spigot. She selected a tiny bucket of decaf coffee, dropped it into its cylindrical, fitted slot, shut the top, and pressed the button for the size of cup she wanted. Immediately, a stream of hot coffee began pouring into her mug.
Jonathan . .
. she thought. That’s what she’d been thinking about.
As soon as the brown liquid slowed to a stop, she picked up the mug and carried it with her into the den, switching on the desk lamp, which offered a circle of soft light on the mahogany desktop.
Instead of seating herself in his chair again, she walked over to the credenza and slid back one of the doors. Inside was a small box that held Jonathan’s keys, his wallet, the Mercedes’s registration, their proof of automobile insurance, a number of pens, change, and other small items: the personal detritus left from the accident that she’d collected and never put back in its proper spots. Callie had paid no attention to any of it, but now she picked up the ring of Jonathan’s keys, wondering what they all went to. That’s what she’d been thinking about. Secret places where he could hide money, or papers, or who knew what. Derek and Diane were sure there was a cache of something somewhere.