Skeleton Key (30 page)

Kayla Anson was dead? And also Faye Dallmer's friend, what's-her-name, Zara Anne Somebody. Eve rubbed the side of her face and tried to think.

In the world in which Eve Wachinsky had grown up, people like Kayla Anson and Zara Anne Somebody did not get murdered. Gang girls got murdered, and old ladies who lived in bad neighborhoods in Waterbury and had to walk to the bank and the grocery store. Women like Eve herself got murdered, too, if they were married and their husbands got liquored up. Eve had once gotten a black eye from a boyfriend who had snorted three lines of cocaine after drinking half a bottle of vodka and then decided that he
didn't like the smirk on her face. That was the boyfriend before the last one. Part of her was really happy that she hadn't had more boyfriends than she had had.

She took another long gulp of chicken broth and finished the cup. She reached for the other cup and got the lid off this time without difficulty. Grace beamed at her as if she had done something very clever.

“So,” Grace said, “let me fill you in. Let me tell you all about the murder and all the rest of it. Really, it's the most interesting thing that's happened around here in the last century.”

It was Stacey Spratz's idea that they should do something about lunch that was “convenient.” It took Gregor Demarkian a whlle to realize that Stacey wanted to go out for fast food—wanted it, in fact, as ardently as Bennis Hannaford ever wanted Godiva chocolates, or Tibor wanted an evening at La Vie Boheme, where they made perfect flaming orange chicken. There was a Burger King on Main Street in Watertown, and a McDonald's on Straits Turnpike near the Middlebury town line. If you wanted something more esoteric—Taco Bell, say, or Arby's—you had to go into Waterbury, or out to the new mall. Stacey Spratz did not want anything esoteric. He wanted a Big Mac Extra Value Meal with a Barq's root beer. He was willing to settle for a Whopper if Gregor had strong preferences in the direction of Burger King. Gregor didn't think he had eaten in a fast-food restaurant of any kind since he'd been reassigned off kidnap detail, and that was—what? Thirty years ago? McDonald's had only just been starting up then. They'd sold hamburgers for fifteen cents.

“Go to McDonald's,” Gregor said, thinking that one place would be as awful as another as far as the food was concerned. “But stop at the inn first. I want to run up to my room and check on some things.”

“It's not exactly on the way,” Stacey Spratz said.

“Make a detour. I want to check my messages. And I want to check on Bennis. I've left her flat for the past two days.”

“The real problem up in the Hills is that there isn't anything, you know what I mean?” Stacey Spratz said. “There's trees and scenery and lots of old New England, but you have to drive for an hour before you can get a decent hamburger. Or do any shopping that isn't going to
cost you like you were John D. Rockefeller. Do you think the Rockefellers have as much money as Bill Gates?”

“I doubt it,” Gregor said. Sometimes he thought Stacey must have one of those learning disorders—attention deficit disorder, one of those things—because it seemed like the only explanation for why he jumped from subject to subject the way he did.

Stacey pulled into the parking lot of the inn. Gregor tidied his stack of notes into a pile and put them up behind the sun visor on the passenger side of the car.

“You can come in if you like,” Gregor told him.

“I'll wait in the car,” Stacey told him. “If you don't mind. I mean, I don't want you to feel hurried or anything like that. But you did say you wouldn't be long. So I thought—”

“I won't be long,” Gregor promised. “You can wait in the car.”

He got out into the crisp cold air as quickly as he could, if only to forestall the need to listen to Stacey going through yet another stream-of-consciousness philosophy. He walked across the parking lot to the inn's front entrance. He thought it had to be the height of the lunch hour. The parking lot was full of vehicles, when it was usually at least a third empty. Women were coming and going in groups of three and four. The working women wore shirtwaist dresses and little heels. The wives wore shorts and tennis shoes and white socks. It was as if everybody was in uniform.

Gregor stopped at the front desk and found that no messages had been left for him. Then he went upstairs and walked down the long hall to his and Bennis's room. The hall was dark as always, but dark in the way that the halls in the homes of very rich people are dark—dark because of its length and height, not because of was cramped or without ventilation. It was incredible, the way he worried at the whole concept of rich and poor now that he was here. In spite of the fact that nobody ever talked about it—that nobody even mentioned the odd extremes of wealth and poverty that seemed to be as much a part of the landscape
of this place as maple trees and swiftly flowing streams—it was on his mind all the time.

He opened the door to his own room and stepped in. He called out Bennis's name and got no response. It occurred to him that he should have checked for her car in the parking lot. It was an unusual car. He usually had a hard time missing it.

He went into the small bathroom and washed his face. He went to the bedroom and found his good hairbrush. He was feeling ragged and filthy. That was what came of riding around in cars all day. He was feeling reluctant to go back to Stacey Spratz, and the car, and the prospect of McDonald's. He was going to have to get over that

The phone rang while he was in the bedroom. He went to the small table at the side of the bed and picked it up.

“Bennis?” he said.

“No,” a familiar voice said. “Donna. I'm glad I got you. Where's Bennis?”

“Out driving around, I'd guess. How are you?”

“If Bennis is out driving around, does that mean you're stuck in the hotel?”

“It's an inn, and I'm not stuck. I'm being driven around by a police officer. Who's expecting me downstairs at any moment. Are you all right? Is something wrong?”

“Not exactiy. I'm glad I got you. I talked to Bennis earlier.”

“And?”

“And I thought of something. With Peter, you know.”

“Peter.”

“Peter Desarian. You know Peter. Peter is Tommy's father.”

“Yes, yes,” Gregor said. “It's just that there's a Peter involved in this mess up here. He was Kayla Anson's boyfriend.”

“Well, Peter Desarian would love to be the boyfriend of some woman with two hundred million dollars. He'd probably even marry her. At the moment, however, he's trying
to stop Russ from adopting Tommy, and that means that I've got to do something.”

“I remember,” Gregor said. He sat down on the edge of the bed. What was it that Donna had said?

“Anyway, I talked to Bennis about this,” Donna said, “and she said that if you even heard about it you'd have a fit, but I thought I'd ask. It couldn't hurt to ask. And I want to know
why
you'd have a fit.”

“Why I'd have a fit about what?”

“I was thinking that the best thing to do would be to charge Peter with child abuse. The next time he comes to see Tommy, which is practically never, but now with all this stuff going on in court he wants to come up and take Tommy out for the day. And you can just guess how Tommy feels about that. This is not good just to begin with. And I thought that after Peter brought Tommy back I could say—”

“Don't even think about it.”

“That's what Bennis said. But why not?” Donna demanded. “It's not like I'd be doing any real injustice to Peter Desarian, is it? He'd deserve the trouble he got into. He deserves more than that right this minute.”

“Do you think you could get Tommy to he?” Gregor asked. “Do you think you could get him to lie consistently enough so that nobody would ever find out that he'd lied?”

“I don't know what you mean.”

“I mean child abuse charges have to be substantiated. If you made a charge against Peter, the court would be required to bring in psychologists, pediatricians, whole rafts of people to see if you'd made it all up. And they'd be assuming that you
had
made it all up.”

“Why?”

“Because you aren't the first person who's ever thought of this. In the past ten years or so there have been a raft of these cases, and judges are fairly fed up. Fed up enough so that the first thing that would happen is that the judge wouldn't believe you. And the next thing that would happen—assuming Tommy couldn't keep himself from telling
the truth, which is probably the case—is that the court would reject your bid to terminate Peter's parental rights.”

“They're going to do that anyway. You said that yourself.”

“Yes, I did,” Gregor said. “And it's probably true. But that's all they'll do with things as they are now. If they think you're engaged in some kind of vendetta—that you've become emotionally unstable and are unable to provide Tommy with a positive image of his father—they might end up handing custody over to Peter.”

There was a long silence on the other end of the wire.

“Peter wouldn't take it,” Donna said finally. Her voice was very unsteady.

Gregor sighed. “Peter wouldn't take it, but that harridan mother of his might. Do you really want to jeopardize Tommy's future this way? Is it really necessary?”

“I want Russ to be able to adopt Tommy.”

“I know you do.”

“I want Tommy to have a father, Gregor. A real honest-to-goodness father.”

“He's already got a father, in Russ, even without the adoption. The adoption is a legal construct, that's all. It would be better if it went through. Life wouldn't end if it didn't go through. Your marriage wouldn't end. Tommy's relationship with Russ wouldn't end. There's no need for a scorched earth policy to deal with Peter Desarian at this time.”

There was another long pause on the phone. Gregor wondered where Donna was—in the living room of the apartment above his own, in the living room of the new townhouse down the block, sitting on the steps of Lida Arkmanian's townhouse with a cell phone in her hand. He wondered if Donna was trying to keep this secret, or if she'd decided that there was no hope of that in any case.

“I think a scorched earth policy is the only way to deal with Peter Desarian,” Donna said. “If that had been my policy from the beginning, I would have ended up in far less trouble.”

“You would have ended up without Tommy. On this one, Tibor's right. Don't regret what gave you the best thing you have.”

“Well, Gregor, let me tell you. Don't blame me if I wish the whole thing had happened by artificial insemination. How long are you and Bennis going to be out in Connecticut?”

“I don't know.”

“Well, the papers are full of you up here. You wouldn't believe it. Do you know who did it yet?”

“No.”

“Too bad. I used to think you always knew, right from the start. You just looked over the suspects and you could tell. Tell Bennis to call me when she comes in.”

“I'll leave her a note.”

“There really does have to be something I can do about Peter Desarian, Gregor. There really does. I'm not going to just sit back and let him get away with this.”

“Don't do anything without the advice of your attorney,” Gregor said.

“Very funny. But I mean it. I'm sick of being a football. I'm sick of that idiot just tearing my life up every time he gets bored. And I don't believe for a second that he cares one way or the other if Russ adopts Tommy. He's just trying to spoil things. It's what he
does.”

“Don't do anything stupid,” Gregor said again.

“I do stupid things every day. I don't seem to be able to help myself. I won't charge Peter with child abuse.”

“Good.”

“I won't even have a fit when he comes to spend his day with Tommy.”

“Also good.”

“But that doesn't mean I'm going to like it. I've got to get out of here, Gregor. I've got to help Lida Arkmanian make pastry. If you come back fast enough, you may get a chance at some pretty good food. Father Tibor has decided that the street ought to hold an Armenian festival.”

“What?” Gregor said.

“I've got to go,” Donna said.

The phone went to dial tone in his ear. Gregor held it back and looked at it. An Armenian festival? What kind of an Armenian festival? And when? In some ways, he hated to be away from Cavanaugh Street. As soon as he got out of touch, people in the neighborhood started
doing
things.

He put the receiver back in its cradle and stood up. He would leave a note for Bennis and then he would go back down to Stacey Spratz. He just really wished that he could remember what Donna had said that had caught him up so short.

There was another advantage to being back on Cavanaugh Street. His mind worked better there. He didn't forget things he should remember.

He went to the little desk in the corner of the room and started looking through it for notepaper.

The most difficult thing about any case of murder, Gregor had always thought, is getting used to the fact that everybody is going to lie to you. And he did mean
everybody.
Even people who could not possibly be suspects in the case, who had iron-clad alibis, who had been in labor at the time the murder happened or who were too close to blind to be able to fire a fatal shot—even those people lied, and lied often, when presented with the police in search of an explanation for why a dead body had ended up dead. The truth of it was, of course, that people simply lied all the time. Even he lied. Nobody wanted to present themselves to the world in the full reality of what they were in the privacy of their own minds. Nobody was the person he wanted himself to be, or even the person he thought he ought to be. Nobody was without some corner of his life that embarrassed or shamed him.