day he died.”
“Claudia wants Poochie to see a doctor.”
“As do I. Poochie hasn’t had a checkup in years. But do you nuke the entire family in order to force her hand? You do not, as I’ve told Claudia again and again.” Glynis climbed in and started the engine, rolling down her window. “I’ve also told her that if she chooses to pursue this she’ll have to retain another attorney. Poochie is my client.”
Glynis put the minivan in gear and took off down the drive. The three of them stood there in the courtyard watching her go, the setting sun casting a golden reflection off of her back window.
“We should be bearing in mind that Pete was ten years younger than Poochie,” Des said quietly.
Soave furrowed his brow at her. “Meaning what?”
“That our Can Man stood a better than decent chance of coming into this whole place. Or I should say his trust fund did-with Glynis Fairchild-Forniaux running the show.”
“You’ve got your eye on her, is that it?”
“She’s a lawyer, Rico, and therefore has to be considered not above reproach.”
“Me, I keep chewing on the Gullwing. So what if it was stolen to provide cover for the murder? It’s still the key. If we find our thieves, we find our killers.”
“Could be that somebody local hired a pair of outsiders to jack it while they killed Pete themselves,” Yolie pointed out. “Even so, I’m with you. We nail our jackers they’ll give us the killers.”
“Your money’s on Claudia, am I right?” Soave asked Des. “You think Claudia’s got a full-blown case of the grabbies.”
“It sure does play,” Yolie agreed. “Only, who’s in on it with her?”
“She and Eric don’t get along,” Des said. “She doesn’t get along with her husband, Mark, either.”
“What about Guy Tolliver?” Soave asked.
“Him she can’t stand.”
“No, I mean, is there any chance he’s behind it?”
“Rico, I honestly don’t see why he’d bother.”
“What if the old lady asked him to?”
Des studied him intently. “Are you just spitballing or what?”
“Or what. We know that Poochie took her recyclables down to the road right around the time of Pete’s death. Where was Tolliver?”
“Asleep in bed. Or so he claims.”
“What if he wasn’t? What if they killed Pete? Christ, you want to talk motive? She inherits eighteen mil. How do we know that batty old lady didn’t hire somebody-say, the Kershaw brothers-to steal her very own car? How do we know she hasn’t engineered this whole thing herself? How do we know she isn’t crazy like a fox?”
“We don’t, Rico,” Des answered, shivering. The sun had fallen behind the bluffs over Essex, and she suddenly felt cold without her jacket. She popped her trunk and grabbed it and put it on, burying her hands deep in her pockets. “We don’t know anything.”
“Seems to me,” Yolie said slowly, “Milo Kershaw’s hatred for this family runs way deep. Could be he feels entitled to get in on some of their riches. Are you with?”
“With,” Des said, nodding. “We can’t ignore that all of this went down as soon as Stevie and Donnie got home from Enfield. We also can’t overlook that Pete’s haul somehow turned up at the foot of their drive. What we don’t know is what it means. Were those two bad boys waiting behind bars all of this time for another go at the Vickers? Or was someone else just waiting for them to get out so they could pin it on them? Also, let’s not forget that their sister, Justine, is seriously involved with Poochie’s grandson, Bement.”
Soave considered that for a moment. “You have any idea how they-?”
“Rico, please don’t ask me how their romance factors into this. Because I really, really don’t know.”
He looked at her in surprise. “Are you okay, Des?”
“No, I’m not okay. I’m pissed as hell. This is my place, Rico. I don’t like it that somebody has been moving me around like a fool. I don’t like it at all. Whoever the hell they are, they are going down. Because nobody punks me in my own home, understand? Nobody.”
CHAPTER 17
During boating season, boisterous young sun-kissed singles crammed their way into the Mucky Duck’s narrow barroom to drink up and hook up. There were forty-five different kinds of beer, at least a dozen on draft. There were dartboards. The sound system blared good time rock ’n’ roll.
On a chilly weeknight in March, the dockside pub was still home to a singles crowd, but nobody rocked and absolutely nothing rolled. These regulars were older and gloomier, not to mention exclusively male. By unwritten accord, this was Dorset’s designated haven for divorced men. It was their place. Night after night, they parked their tartan-slacked selves at the bar and drank their martinis and watched the business news wrap-up on CNBC, eyes hollow, shoulders slumped. Most were professional men between forty-five and sixty. Most knew each other. But they didn’t converse. And they didn’t go home. Those belonged to their ex-wives now. So they came here and they sat at the bar and they drank, night after night.
There was a name in Dorset for these men. They were called Mucky Duckers.
Mitch had to pass through the bar to reach the dining room. During the summer, this could be something of a battle. Tonight, hardly anyone blocked his path. Just one rather pouchy man in an Izod shirt and rumpled khakis who was paying his tab at the cash register. It was Mark Widdifield. Mitch only knew him from around town to smile and say hello to.
In response, Mark instantly turned bright red and fled for the door. The man just took off. It wasn’t quite so extreme a rejection as the one that Mitch had received from the late Pete Mosher. But it wasn’t exactly a warm fuzzy either.
The Mucky Duck’s dining room served burgers, fish and chips, a pretty decent clam chowder. It was a small room, no more than twenty tables. Only two couples were eating in there. Seated at a table in the corner, over a nearly empty glass of red wine, was Danielle Vickers. She’d called his house ten minutes ago and asked him if he could meet her there. She’d sounded quite frantic.
As Mitch sat down across from her, he sensed that something serious was up. Danielle looked rattled. Not to mention tousled. Her hair and clothing seemed unusually disheveled. And she smelled sweaty. Behind those smudged, unflattering wire-framed glasses, her eyes seemed puffy. To Mitch, she came off like a guilt-wracked married woman who’d just had a furtive tumble upstairs on the office sofa with her lover. This would certainly explain the way Mark had bolted out of there.
“Are you okay, Danielle?”
“W-Why, yes,” she stammered, tongue flicking at her lips nervously. “I just… needed to talk. Hope I didn’t drag you away from Des.”
“No, she needed to spend some alone time in her studio. This case is getting to her. What about Eric?”
“Tonight’s his night to watch pro hockey on TV with Rut,” replied Danielle, glancing up anxiously as the waitress approached.
Mitch had already hoovered up two immense bowls of his world famous American chop suey, so he settled for a Double Diamond on draft. Danielle asked for another red wine. When the waitress left he said, “Danielle, I just bumped into Mark in the bar. He was not happy to see me.”
She lowered her eyes, swallowing uncomfortably. “You have some ideas about us, haven’t you?”
“I don’t, but Eric does. He asked me if you were mixed up with someone. I got the feeling he actually thought it might be me.”
“Is that so hard to imagine?” Danielle squinted across the table at him, her gaze slightly unfocused. She was quite tipsy, he now realized. “Do you find me that unattractive?”
“I wasn’t suggesting that. I just meant that you and I know we’re not involved.”
“We know that, but Eric doesn’t,” she said, gripping the wine glass in her work-roughened hands. “And it so happens he’s insanely jealous. He’s so upbeat and positive. Hates negativity of any kind. And yet he’s prone to
