Authors: Stephanie Bond
and Tracey Tul y, along with Tracey’s socialite buds. She
didn’t see Peter, and wasn’t sure if that was good or bad,
but her heart raced to see Dennis Lagerfeld a few rows
ahead of her, with his arm draped loosely around the
shoulders of a gorgeous blonde. Since he was wearing his
wedding ring again, she assumed the woman was his wife.
He glanced back and when he caught Carlotta’s eye, panic
darted across his face. Then he jerked his attention back to
the front of the room where the minister was giving a
eulogy. Carlotta smirked, thinking she’d probably seen her
last commission from the big man on campus.
But was Dennis Lagerfeld there out of compassion for a
slain neighbor, or out of a compulsion to revisit his crime?
Carlotta listened to Lisa Bolton’s life story while continuing
to scan the audience. Her gaze stopped on a familiar
profile—Dr. Suarez.
How many doctors felt close enough to their Botox
patients to take time out of a busy schedule to attend their
memorial service?
A few rows away, another familiar face stopped her—D.A.
Kelvin Lucas. Carlotta’s eyes narrowed. Was he there for
professional reasons, or personal?
The warmth and weight of a person settling in next to her
distracted her. She turned her head to see Detective Terry
wiping his forehead with a handkerchief—it made her
think of the one that he’d loaned to her on the day of
Wesley’s arraignment and to wonder digressively how
many men these days carried a handkerchief. He ignored
her while he, too, methodically scanned the attendees, his
rocky profile grim. After a couple of minutes, he shifted his
weight closer.
“We need to talk.”
“Can’t it wait?” she whispered.
“No.” He jerked his thumb toward the door and stood up.
Her stomach churned at his urgency, but she fol owed him
out into the entryway where it was quiet. Coop’s uncle
was gone, presumably outside to welcome other
latecomers.
“What’s so important that you had to drag me out of a
funeral?” she asked.
“Some new information about the case has come to
light—actually, from your brother.”
Alarm seized her heart. “What does Wesley have to do
with this?”
The detective looked over his shoulder as if to ensure they
were alone. “He called me a few minutes ago, said that a
friend of his identified Angela Ashford from a picture in
the paper as a hooker he knew as Kay.”
Horror and disbelief washed over her. “Hooker?”
He nodded curtly. “Which would explain why Peter
Ashford would destroy his wife’s things.”
Incredulous, she touched her hand to her head. “You
mean you think that Peter found out and that’s why he
might have…hurt Angela?”
The detective shrugged. “Or he might have known and
gone along with it.”
She shook her head. “Never.”
His mouth became a thin line. “It’s possible that Lisa
Bolton was also prostituting herself.”
“But that’s ridiculous,” Carlotta said. “Why would two
wealthy women with everything going for them become
prostitutes?”
“Like I said before, who knows why people do the things
they do? I came here looking for Peter Ashford. His DNA
has been subpoenaed to check against the fetus that Lisa
Bolton was carrying. Do you know where he is?”
She was stil trying to absorb the awful allegations that the
detective had made, thinking Wesley’s whoremonger
friend was no doubt that loathsome Chance Hol ander.
“No. Why would I know where Peter is?”
“Because he seems to have disappeared. He hasn’t been
to work, and he’s not at his home or in any hotel in the
city.”
Bile rose to the back of her throat. Why would Peter
disappear if he had nothing to hide? “Wel , I have no idea
where he is.”
The detective crossed his arms. “Just like you haven’t
heard from your parents lately?”
She gritted her teeth. “I don’t know where Peter is, but
both Dr. Suarez and Dennis Lagerfeld are sitting in there,”
she said, pointing toward the room where the memorial
service was being held. “Don’t you find that odd?”
“Yes, but thanks to you, we have their DNA, and they’ve
already been ruled out as the father of the child.” He
smiled. “You keep leading us to Peter Ashford. If he calls
you, promise me you’l let me know.”
She pressed her lips together. “Peter didn’t do this.”
The detective’s mouth tightened and he made a derisive
noise in his throat. “I’d like to know how this man has such
a hold over you that you can’t see what’s right in front of
you, how he can invoke so much loyalty from a woman like
you, who’s ten times his worth.” Then he shook his head
and straightened. “Then again, maybe I don’t want to
know.”
His cel phone rang and he yanked it out of its holder, then
turned his back to answer it.
Shel -shocked by his words, Carlotta stood there feeling
the way she’d felt when she’d realized that her parents
had abandoned her and Wesley. Everything she’d known
for a certainty had been obliterated, replaced by a gaping
hole of chaos.
If Peter had kil ed those women, she’d never again trust
her feelings for another human being.
The detective closed his phone, then turned, his
expression one of bewilderment. “That was Ashford’s
lawyer. Peter just confessed to kil ing Angela.”
Carlotta shouted the word no but no sound came out of
her mouth. Her last thought was that Detective Terry’s
black shoes were very, very shiny as they rose to meet her.
37
Wesley walked into the town house, glad for a little peace
and quiet for a few hours. Coop had a funeral this
afternoon, so they wouldn’t be on call until later. He put a
frozen pizza in the oven and flopped down on his bed with
a Playboy magazine—the Racy Redheads issue. It wasn’t a
stretch to realize why all of a sudden redheads had
captured his imagination.
He’d just turned to the centerfold when the doorbel rang.
He rol ed his eyes. He pushed to his feet, tossed the
magazine on his bed and made his way to the door, trying
to pul his T-shirt over the erection straining his zipper.
Some people had the worst timing.
He opened the door, then blinked in surprise to see E.
Jones standing there, wearing jeans and a black jacket
over a T-shirt that molded her breasts. “Hi, Wesley.”
Her gaze went to the bulge in his jeans, which he covered
by crossing both of his hands in front of him. “Hi. I…wasn’t
expecting you.”
She smiled and stepped forward to push on the door.
“That’s the idea. I came by for an in-home visit.”
He stepped aside as she walked in, then closed the door.
“What does that mean?”
“That means that I’m making sure you’re not breaking the
terms of your probation—you know, using drugs, firearms,
and, in your case, computer equipment.”
He swallowed hard. “I don’t use drugs.”
She picked up his arm and pointed to the fresh needle
mark in the crook of his arm, a pinpoint of dried blood.
“Real y?”
“It’s not what you think.”
“Then clear it up for me, Wesley.”
“I gave plasma this morning,” he said, embarrassed. “I
needed the cash to get my cel -phone service turned back
on.”
She considered him thoughtful y. “You can prove it?”
“I have the slip they gave me at the blood center when I
left.”
“I’l need to see it,” she said more gently, then released his
arm.
Call him a masochist, but he hadn’t minded being grabbed.
“Why don’t you show me around the house,” she
suggested, already studying the living room. She walked
over to the desk and opened and closed the drawers.
He frowned and crossed his arms. “This is the living room.
The kitchen is right through there.”
She walked to the couch and felt behind the cushions. “So
it’s just you and your sister living here?” she asked,
walking into the kitchen.
He fol owed. “Yeah, just me and Carlotta.”
“Pretty name,” she said, then walked over to the fridge
and looked inside. She checked out the freezer, too, and
all four canisters sitting on the counter, plus the cookie jar.
She stole a chocolate-chip cookie from the batch he’d
made a few days ago. “Mmm, this is good,” she said,
stooping to look beneath the table. “Does your sister have
a boyfriend who hangs around or lives here?”
“No,” he said. “Carlotta doesn’t date much.”
“What does she do?”
“Works at Neiman’s at the Lenox Mall.”
She smiled. “Real y? Nice. Do you have a girlfriend?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
He shrugged. “No reason.” Then he panicked. “I’m not gay
or anything.”
She looked at him and laughed. “I didn’t think you were.
What’s out there?” she asked, pointing to the back door.
“A deck.” He unlocked the door and held it open while she
walked out onto the weathered structure.
She gestured to the weedy backyard, leading to a patch of
trees. “Nice,” she said, munching her cookie.
“Not really,” he said, shoving his hands into his pockets,
nudging an abandoned flowerpot with his toe.
“It could be,” she said, lifting the lid of the rusty gril for a
quick look before walking back inside. Wesley waved at
Mrs. Winningham who was in her gazebo, craning her neck
for a good look. Then he fol owed E. back inside.
“Where’s your bedroom?” she asked.
In any other situation, he would have given his spleen to
hear her say those words, but he was sure they had two
entirely different activities in mind once they reached their
destination.
He led the way and when he opened the door, he realized
with a wince that the Racy Redheads Playboy was lying on
his bed. She lifted her eyebrows but didn’t make any
remarks. Wesley turned the magazine facedown and tried
to wil away his returning erection. The sight of E. near his
bed, touching his bed, made him grind his teeth to rein in
his fantasies.
She felt under his pil ows, then under his mattress. She
pul ed out more porn mags, a triple X–rated DVD movie
and a pair of pink panties that some girl at one of Chance’s
parties had given him. A hot flush climbed his neck. It
seemed so juvenile now.
E. barely glanced at the items before putting them back,
then she straightened and moved around the room,
checking under his lamp, even squeezing the hems of his
curtains, finding a hundred-dol ar bil he didn’t know he
had.
She removed various books from his bookshelf, running
her fingers along the spines. “Nice col ection,” she
murmured, pausing at The Catcher in the Rye before
taking it down and flipping through the pages. “One of my
favorites.”
“Mine, too,” he said, annoyed that his voice came out
sounding squeaky and adolescent.
Across the room, Einstein moved in his enclosure. He
expected E. to freak, like most women, but instead she
walked over, smiling. “An axanthic ball python?”
Wesley blinked. “Yeah.”
“From the size, I guess it’s a male.”
“Right. His name is Einstein.”
“Is he friendly?” she asked.
He nodded, but was unprepared for her to unlock the
enclosure, then reach in and remove Einstein like a pro.
“You’re a big boy,” she said, as if she were talking to a dog,
then she handed him to Wesley and lifted the driftwood
decoration. Wesley almost dropped Einstein. Shit. He’d
forgotten about the gun.
She removed the base of the decoration, and a dozen lies
leaped to his tongue to explain away the presence of the
.38 special. Instead, Wesley gaped to see it empty.
What the hel had happened to his gun?
“Nice hiding place,” she observed.
“I…yeah,” he said, stil reeling. He remembered the day
he’d arrived home and thought someone had broken in.
Had the intruder braved Einstein and taken his gun? But
who would have guessed it was even there? He looked at
Einstein, suddenly fearful—had his pet somehow
swallowed the gun? He pivoted his head and realized that
the live mouse was gone from its container. How had that
happened? Carlotta would freak out if the mouse
somehow made it into her bedroom.
He returned Einstein to the aquarium and replaced the
locking pin as E. went into his bathroom and, from the
sound of it, looked in his hamper and medicine cabinet. He
grimaced, wondering if she’d noticed the ful unopened
box of Trojans on the shelf.
“Condoms have an expiration date,” she said matter-of-
factly when she emerged. “Can you show me the rest of
the house?”
Wesley led her across the hal . “This is my sister’s room.”
E. peeked inside, but didn’t go in. Instead, she pointed to
the room at the end of the hall. “Where does that door
lead?”
He hesitated. “It’s my parents’ room.”
Her expression softened slightly. “May I see it?”
With mixed feelings, he led the way to the door, turned
the knob and pushed it open. The room was frozen in the