False Premises (7 page)

“Honestly, Erin! Do you think that Hildi is the only one around this joint with a little healthy curiosity?” She gestured for me to get going by drawing circles in the air with her poppy-patterned oven mitt. “Now, start at the beginning, and carry on from there.”

Chapter 5

A little after eight P.M., I found a parking space on “the Hill,” the typical college-town business area near the CU campus. Linda Delgardio had arranged to meet me at a local dive there. She was working a four-to-midnight shift all this month, so this was her dinner break. An hour earlier, I’d called Steve Sullivan’s cell phone and tried to convince him to join us, but he remained intent on keeping watch over Laura’s house, certain she was going to skip town, just as she had last year.

Linda was just finishing her burger and fries when I arrived at the noisy, greasy-smelling sandwich joint; I ordered a glass of water. Linda was having a bad day; her partner had called in sick, and Linda looked more than a little under the weather herself. Her nose was red, and her normally sparkling dark eyes were dull. Her long black hair was pinned up as usual whenever she was on duty, a failed attempt—even despite her head-cold symptoms— to make her nondescript within her masculine uniform. We wasted little time with small talk before I asked, “Do you know if there were any undercover police officers at Paprika’s last night?”

“I doubt it. Usually we just use undercover cops for things like drug trafficking . . . a kitchenware store hardly qualifies as a hot spot for drug deals.”

“But maybe, since Audrey Munroe’s a local celebrity and was speaking, the police could have sent someone to keep an eye out, in case someone wanted to harass her.”

Linda shook her head. “We’d just send a uniformed officer. It’s possible a narc was there as part of some ongoing investigation, I suppose, but he’d have kept a low profile. You wouldn’t have even known he was there. Why? What’s up?”

To the best of my ability, I related every detail of the events of last night at Paprika’s and my visit this morning to Laura’s home, as well as Sullivan’s heated conversation with Laura on her front porch. “My suspicion is that she’s either swindling Dave Holland out of his money or she’s setting up a big insurance fraud—planning to set the house on fire and collect on the
lost
possessions . . . which won’t actually be lost at all.”

“Sounds that way,” Linda replied. She sneezed and blew her nose. “You want me to question her?”

“As soon as possible.”

“Okay. If nothing else, I want to ask her myself about Evan Cambridge’s whereabouts. That’s bound to make her think twice about trying to pull another scam anytime soon. I’ll let you know how it goes.” She grabbed her pen and notepad. “What’s the address?”

I hesitated. I didn’t want to be cut out of the picture, and I was painfully aware of how important this whole thing was to Sullivan. “Actually, Steve Sullivan’s already there, watching the house from a car down the street for fear she’ll take off again. So . . . I was kind of hoping you’d let me come with you. Would that be possible?”

She raised an eyebrow and peered at me. “You want to ride out there and swear out a complaint against this woman in person?” She leaned back in her chair and added sarcastically, “Will you at least allow me to drive the squad car myself?”

I grinned in spite of myself. “Okay, point taken.”

“Are things really that slow in the interior design business that you’re desperate to go on police ride-alongs? Even if I
wanted
to take you with me tonight, Erin, I couldn’t. Not till the proper paperwork’s filed that says you won’t sue us if you get shot, maimed . . . the usual drill.”

“But if Steve and I happen to be waiting outside her house when you arrive, and Laura’s willing to let us all in,
that
would be all right, wouldn’t it?”

She rubbed her forehead and frowned.

I took a sip of water, feeling uncomfortable, hoping that I wouldn’t have to explain myself. “This is important to me, Linda.”

She regarded me for a moment. “Aren’t you dating someone right now? Are you
more
than friends with this Sullivan character?”

I shook my head. “
Less
than friends. It’s just that . . . I keep remembering how he shouted at Laura that he wants his life back. I get the feeling he means that almost literally . . . that she derailed him that completely. What she did to him was just so unfair, and so far she’s gotten off scot-free. Sullivan was supportive when I blundered into that hideous ordeal back in December and needed help. I can’t just turn my back on him now, when
he’s
in need. It’ll bug me forever.”

“Some guy you’re ‘less than friends’ with is going to haunt you forever?” She held my gaze.

I sighed. Linda seemed to be in investigating-officer mode. I wasn’t sure myself how I felt about Sullivan. It was impossible to explain something that was purely emotional and not rational; all I knew was that, at the very least, I needed to balance things out with Sullivan—to know that he was back on an even keel in terms of his professional and his personal life—or I would never truly be able to give my relationship with his good friend John Norton a real chance. I chose to express none of that to Linda. Instead, I answered, “It sounds a little crazy, I know, because it
is
crazy, but . . . yes. I have to help Sullivan out, or everything will seem forever out of balance between us.”

Linda blew her nose again. Although clearly none too happy, she grumbled, “Fine. I’ll meet you there. Sarge will bust my butt if he finds out about this, though.”

“Thanks, Linda. Can we go right away?”

She shook her head. “My schedule’s already jam-packed. You or your ‘less than a friend’ can always just call this in . . . make a verbal complaint against her. But then the duty sergeant might assign someone else. Otherwise, I’ll get there as soon as I can. Probably within the next hour or two, unless something urgent comes up in the meantime.”

“I’d rather wait two hours and have
you
be the one who talks to her.”

She shoved aside her pack of tissues and picked up her pen again. “So what’s her address?”

If I hadn’t known precisely where to look for Sullivan,
I’d have driven right past the dark-colored sedan that he’d told me he’d borrowed. He was parked along a dead-end road in the mountainous subdivision, adjacent to Laura’s cul-de-sac but a little farther down the main drag. Laura would be forced to drive past this intersection as she left the neighborhood. I parked my van several car lengths behind his, trotted to his car, waved, and waited for him to unlock my door, then slid into the passenger seat.

The interior reeked of old cigarette smoke. The ashtray was brimming with cigarette butts. The cheap plaid upholstery of my seat was ripped, and the plastic dashboard was cracked. “Nice wheels,” I teased.

“Best I could do on such short notice. Belongs to a buddy of mine.”

“Good thinking. Following Laura in a van marked ‘Sullivan Designs’ would have been something of a giveaway. It’d be like James Bond driving around in his tricked-up BMW with a big sign on the roof that read: ‘Surveillance by Bond.
James
Bond.’ ”

Steve didn’t even crack a smile. He continued to glower out the windshield as if his anger was necessary to maintain his vigilance. “No sign of her yet. Or of Holland. Just wish it hadn’t taken me so long to borrow a car. She had more than two hours to clear out between the time we left her house and I got back up here. In retrospect, it would have been better to stick with the Sullivan Designs van and let her know full well that I was tailing her.”

I held my tongue. In his mood, this was going to be a long wait, indeed. I reached for the dial of the radio to switch it on. “Radio’s busted,” Steve muttered.

“Perfect,” I replied.

The time passed slowly. Sullivan was about as talkative as a sullen teenager. Mercifully, at ten after ten, Linda’s squad car drove past us. Steve promptly followed it as far as the base of the driveway, parking on the street, and we walked the rest of the way. Linda waited for us by her black-and-white car. I gave her and Steve a cursory introduction but decided not to provoke her by saying much of anything else. Even so, she glared at me, her mood apparently having worsened since our meeting at the café.

“Like I said earlier, Erin, this totally goes against standard police procedure. I won’t do anything to stop you two if you follow me to the front door, but I strongly suggest you let me do all the talking.”

“No problem,” Sullivan said. “Not a word from either of us.”

Linda glanced at me, and I nodded, so she walked ahead of us toward the house. “Makes me nervous to have civilians trailing me like this.” I resisted replying that it made
me
nervous to trail an armed police officer like this. She continued up the sandstone porch steps and rang the doorbell. She stepped to one side of the door, as if in habitual anticipation of a shotgun-blast greeting. Sullivan and I remained on the top step. If we
were
greeted with a shotgun blast, the two of us were dead ducks.

Dave opened the door, once again wearing his sunglasses. Linda introduced herself as Officer Delgardio and asked if he was Dave Holland.

He nodded grimly. “Is there some kind of trouble, Officer?” His face was red and damp with perspiration, and he seemed out of breath.

“I’d just like to ask Laura Smith some questions. Is she here?”

“ ’Fraid not.”

“She
isn’t
?” Sullivan asked, bristling with alarm. “Are you
sure
about that?”

Dave retorted, “Check the garage if you don’t believe me! Car’s gone. Closet’s cleared out . . . suitcases gone. Same as last time. I figured she was with
you
,” he snarled at Sullivan.

“No way. I told you: I was just another of her patsies. If I were you, dude, I’d check the balance on all my savings and credit accounts.”

“She wouldn’t do that to me! After you
threatened
her this afternoon, she probably just got scared and ran. She’ll be back, though. I’m sure of it.”

“Did she leave a note?” Linda asked. There was a glint of annoyance in her voice, no doubt intended for Sullivan, who’d immediately broken his vow of silence.

“No, she just up and left.”

“Right after Erin and I talked to her?” Sullivan again interjected.

“Sometime around then, yeah.” Dave gave an angry shrug. “Like I said, you scared her. She must have panicked.”

“Let me guess,” Sullivan persisted nastily. “She sent you out on some dumb errand shortly after Erin and I left your place this afternoon, and she was gone by the time you got back.”

In an obvious grudging consent that Sullivan’s scenario was precisely what had occurred, Dave clenched his jaw and remained stubbornly silent. Linda asked, “Is there a reason you’re wearing your sunglasses indoors at night, Mr. Holland?”

“Yeah. They’re prescription. And I lost my glasses.”

“Would you mind taking them off for me?” Her officious tone of voice made her words sound more like a direct order than a request.

He hesitated. “I’d rather not.”

“Why?”

He frowned and didn’t answer. When she continued to look at him without moving a muscle, he sighed and removed his glasses. I fought back a gasp of surprise. He was sporting a black eye.

“Were you in a fistfight recently, Mr. Holland?” Linda asked.

“No. Nothing like that.” He touched his cheek gingerly, winced, then put on his sunglasses again. “I tripped on that stupid antique iron Ms. Gilbert got for us that Laura’s been using as a doorstop.” He touched his face a second time. “Clobbered myself right in the eye with the doorknob.”

I said, “That ‘antique iron’ is now probably a fake, just like the rest of your furnishings, Dave.”

Dave’s jaw dropped. “Come again?”

“The antiques in your front room have been replaced with imitations. I noticed that this morning when I came here to speak with Laura.”

“That’s . . . not possible. That’s the mirror you picked out for us, right there.”

“It’s a fake. Laura claimed that you were going to sell the antiques for a profit in a couple of years, and that you were keeping them safe in storage in the meantime.”

“Mind if we come in?” Linda asked.

Dave ignored her. He went over to his faked twenty-thousand-dollar original Louis XV mirror, stammering, “But this is . . .” He lowered his sunglasses, then put them back in place, all the while studying in horror the bogus frame of the mirror. “There’s no way. . . . This has to be some sort of mistake.”

“That frame’s only recently manufactured,” Steve said as we stepped inside, taking advantage of Dave’s confusion. “The carvings were made with power tools—you can see the marks where the bits were moved—and it’s obviously been spray-painted gold.”

In a total state of shock, Dave staggered through the doorway and into the front room. We followed. “Look at the drawer of the writing desk,” I suggested. “The bottom piece was attached with staples. And the back piece was nailed.”

He yanked the drawer all the way out, letting the papers inside flutter to the floor. “Jesus! Is everything in the whole house a fake?”

“I’ve only been in the foyer and front room,” I replied, though I didn’t have any doubts that the answer was yes.

Dave raised the drawer as if to hurl it to the floor, but then stopped himself as he looked in Linda’s direction. He jammed the drawer back into place.

“Have you been out of town recently, Mr. Holland?” Linda asked.

“Yeah. For four weeks. Business trip. My technology company makes . . .” He shook his head. “Not important. Anyway, I just got back from Atlanta. Last night. I was supposed to be gone another week yet, but things went really well, and we finished up early.” He grabbed his head with both hands, pressing on his temples with the heels of his hands as he added in a stunned voice, “Got in late last night. And my glasses suddenly disappeared this morning.”

“Do you have any idea at all where Miss Smith could have gone?” Linda asked.