Not Safe After Dark (32 page)

Mitch followed her into the high-ceilinged hallway, watching the way her hips swayed under the mourning dress.

He was in. All right! He almost executed a little jig on the parquet floor.

•

The house was an enormous heap of stone overlooking the ravine. It had always reminded Mitch of an English vicarage, or what he assumed an English vicarage looked like from
watching PBS. Inside, though, it was bright and spacious and filled with modern furniture – not an anti-macassar in sight. The paintings that hung on the white walls were all contemporary
abstracts and geometric designs, no doubt originals and worth a small fortune in themselves. The stereo equipment was state-of-the-art, as were the large screen TV, VCR and DVD player.

Laura McVie sat on a white sofa and crossed her legs. The dress she wore was rather short for mourning, Mitch thought, though he wasn’t likely to complain about the four or five inches of
smooth thigh it revealed. Especially as the lower part was sheathed in black silk stockings and the upper was bare and white.

She took a cigarette from a carved wooden box on the coffee table and lit it with a lighter that looked like a baseball. Mitch declined the offer to join her.

‘I hope you don’t mind,’ she said, lowering her eyes. ‘It’s my only vice.’

‘Of course not.’ Mitch cleared his throat. ‘I just wanted to come and tell you how sorry I was to hear about the . . . the tragic accident. Your husband was—’

‘It wasn’t an accident, Mr Mitchell,’ she said calmly. ‘My husband was murdered. I believe we should face the truth clearly and not hide behind euphemisms, don’t
you?’

‘Well, if you put it like that . . .’

She nodded. ‘You were saying about my husband?’

‘Well, I didn’t know him well, but I
have
done some legal work for him – specifically his will – and I am aware of his circumstances.’

‘My husband was very rich, Mr Mitchell.’

‘Exactly. I thought . . . well . . . there are some unscrupulous people out there, Mrs McVie.’

‘Please, call me Laura.’

‘Laura. There are some unscrupulous people out there, and I thought if there was anything I could do to help, perhaps give advice, take the burden off your hands . . .?’

‘What burden would that be, Mr Mitchell?’

Mitch sat forward and clasped his hands on his knees. ‘When someone dies, Mrs – Laura – there are always problems, legal wrangling and the like. Your husband’s affairs
seem to be in good order, judging from his will, but that was made two years ago. I’d hate to see someone come and take advantage of you.’

‘Thank you,’ Laura said. ‘You’re so sweet. And why shouldn’t you handle the estate? Someone has to do it. I can’t.’

Mitch had the strangest feeling that something was going awry here. Laura McVie didn’t seem at all the person to be taken advantage of, yet she seemed to be swallowing his line of patter.
That could only be, he decided, because it suited her, too. And why not? It
would
take a load off her mind.

‘That wasn’t the main reason I came, though,’ Mitch pressed on, feeling an irrational desire to explain himself. ‘I genuinely wanted to see if I could help in any
way.’

‘Why?’ she asked, blue eyes open wide. ‘Why should you? Mr Mitchell, I’ve come to learn that people do things for selfish motives. Self-interest rules. Always. I
don’t believe in altruism. Nor did my husband. At least we were agreed on that.’ She turned aside, flicked some ash at the ashtray and missed. In contrast to everything else in the
place, the tin ashtray looked as if it had been stolen from a lowlife bar. ‘So you want to help me?’ she said. ‘For a fee, of course.’

Mitch felt embarrassed and uncomfortable. The part of him that had desperately wanted to make amends for his part in Charles McVie’s death was being thwarted by the frankness and openness
of the widow. Yes, he could use the money – of course he could – but that really
wasn’t
his only reason for being there, and he wanted her to know that. How could he
explain that he really wasn’t such a bad guy?

‘There are expenses involved in settling an estate,’ Mitch went on. ‘Disbursements. Of course, there are. But I’m not here to cheat you.’

She smiled at him indulgently. ‘Of course not.’

Which definitely came across as, ‘
As if you could
.’

‘But if you’ll allow me to—’

She shifted her legs, showing more thigh. ‘Mr Mitchell,’ she said, ‘I’m getting the feeling that you really do have another reason for coming to see me. If it’s not
that you’re after my husband’s money, then what are you after?’

Mitch swallowed. ‘I . . . I feel. You see, I—’

‘Come on, Mr Mitchell. You can tell me. You’ll feel better.’

The voice that had seemed so submissive when Mitch first heard it now became hypnotic, so warm, so trustworthy, so easy to answer. And he had to tell someone.

‘I feel partly responsible for your husband’s death,’ he said, looking into her eyes. ‘Oh, I’m not the burglar, I’m not the killer. But I think I
inadvertently supplied the gun.’

Laura McVie looked puzzled. Now he had begun, Mitch saw no point in stopping. If he could only tell this woman the full story, he thought, then she would understand. Perhaps she would even be
sympathetic towards him. Forgive him. So he told her.

When he had finished, Laura stood up abruptly and walked over to the picture-window with its view of a back garden as big as Central Park. Mitch sat where he was and looked at her from behind.
Her legs were close together and her arms were crossed. She seemed to be turned in on herself. He couldn’t tell whether she was crying or not, but her shoulders seemed to be moving.

‘Well?’ he asked, after a while. ‘What do you think?’

She let the silence stretch a moment, then dropped her arms and turned around slowly. Her eyes did look moist with tears. ‘What do I think?’ she said. ‘I don’t know. I
don’t know what to think. I think that maybe if you’d reported the gun stolen the police would have searched for it and my husband wouldn’t have been murdered.’

‘But I would have been charged, disbarred.’

‘Mr Mitchell, surely that’s a small price to pay for someone’s life? I’m sorry. I think you’d better go. I can’t think straight right now.’

‘But I—’

‘Please, Mr Mitchell. Leave.’ She turned back to the window again and folded her arms, shaking.

Mitch got up off the sofa and headed for the door. He felt defeated, as if he had left something important unfinished, but there was nothing he could do about it. Only slink off with his tail
between his legs feeling worse than when he had come. Why hadn’t he just told her he was after handling McVie’s estate. Money, pure and simple. Self-interest like that she would have
understood.

•

Two days later, and still no developments reported in the McVie investigation, Laura phoned.

‘Mr Mitchell?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m sorry about my behaviour the other day. I was upset, as you can imagine.’

‘I can understand that,’ Mitch said. ‘I don’t blame you. I don’t even know why I told you.’

‘I’m glad you did. I’ve had time to think about it since then, and I’m beginning to realize how terrible you must feel. I want you to understand that I don’t blame
you. It’s not the gun that commits the crime, after all, is it? It’s the person who pulls the trigger. I’m sure if the burglar hadn’t got that one, he’d have got one
somewhere else. Look, this is very awkward over the telephone, do you think you could come to the house?’

‘When?’

‘How about this evening. For dinner?’

‘Fine,’ said Mitch. ‘I’m really glad you can find it in your heart to forgive me.’

‘Eight o’clock?’

‘Eight it is.’

When he put down the phone, Mitch jumped to his feet, punched the air, shouted, ‘Yes!’

•

‘Dinner’ was catered by a local Italian restaurant, Laura McVie not being, in her own words, ‘much of a cook’. Two waiters delivered the food, served it
discreetly, and took away the dirty dishes.

Mostly, Mitch and Laura made small talk in the candlelight over the pasta and wine, and it wasn’t until the waiters had left and they were alone, relaxing on the sofa, each cradling a
snifter of Courvoisier XO cognac, with mellow jazz playing in the background, that the conversation became more intimate.

Laura was still funereally clad, but tonight her dress, made of semi-transparent layers of black chiffon – more than enough for decency – fell well below knee height. There was still
no disguising the curves, and the rustling sounds as she crossed her legs made Mitch more than a little hot under the collar.

Laura puckered her lips to light a cigarette. When she had blown the smoke out, she asked, ‘Are you married?’

Mitch shook his head.

‘Ever been?’

‘Nope.’

‘Just didn’t meet the right girl, is that it?’

‘Something like that.’

‘You’re not gay are you?’

He laughed. ‘What on earth made you think that?’

She rested her free hand on his and smiled. ‘Don’t worry. Nothing made me think it. Nothing in particular. Just checking, that’s all.’

‘No,’ Mitch said. ‘I’m not gay.’

‘More cognac?’

‘Sure.’ Mitch was already feeling a little tipsy, but he didn’t want to spoil the mood.

She fetched the bottle and poured them each a generous measure. ‘I didn’t really
love
Charles, you know,’ she said when she had settled down and smoothed her dress
again. ‘I mean, I respected him, I even liked him, I just didn’t love him.’

‘Why did you marry him?’

Laura shrugged. ‘I don’t know really. He asked me. He was rich and seemed to live an exciting life. Travel. Parties. I got to meet all kinds of celebrities. We’d only been
married two years, you know. And we’d only known one another a few weeks before we got married. We hadn’t even . . . you know. Anyway, I’m sorry he’s dead . . . in a
way.’

‘What do you mean?’

Laura leaned forward and stubbed out her cigarette. Then she brushed back a long blonde tress and took another sip of cognac before answering. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘now that
he’s dead, it’s all mine, isn’t it? I’d be a hypocrite and a fool if I said that didn’t appeal to me. All this wealth and no strings attached. No
responsibilities.’

‘What responsibilities were there before?’

The left corner of her lips twitched in a smile. ‘Oh, you know. The usual wifely kind. Charles was never, well . . . let’s say he wasn’t a very passionate lover. He wanted me
more as a showpiece than anything else. A trophy. Something to hang on his arm that looked good. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t mind. It was a small price to pay. And then we were forever
having to entertain the most boring people. Business acquaintances. You know the sort of thing. Well, now that Charles is gone, I won’t have to do that any more, will I? I’ll be able to
do what I want. Exactly what I want.’

Almost without Mitch knowing it, Laura had edged nearer towards him as she was speaking, and now she was so close he could smell the warm, acrid smoke and the cognac on her breath. He found it
curiously intoxicating. Soon she was close enough to kiss.

She took hold of his hand and rested it on her breast. ‘It’s been a week since the funeral,’ she said. ‘Don’t you think it’s time I took off my widow’s
weeds?’

•

When Mitch left Laura McVie’s house the following morning, he was beginning to think he might be on to a good thing. Why stop at being estate executor? he asked himself.
He already knew that, under the terms of the will, Laura got everything – McVie had no children or other living relatives – and
everything
was somewhere in the region of five
million dollars.

Even if he didn’t love her – and how could you tell if you loved someone after just one night? – he certainly felt passionately drawn to her. They got on well together, thought
alike, and she was a wonderful lover. Mitch was no slouch, either. He could certainly make up for her late husband in that department.

He mustn’t rush it, though. Take things easy, see what develops . . . Maybe they could go away together for a while. Somewhere warm. And then . . . well . . . five million dollars.

Such were his thoughts as he turned the corner, just before the heavy hand settled on his shoulder and a deep voice whispered in his ear, ‘Detective Greg Hollins, Mr Mitchell. Homicide. I
think it’s about time you and I had a long talk.’

•

Relieved to be let off with little more than a warning in exchange for cooperating with the police, Mitch turned up at Laura’s the next evening as arranged. This time they
skipped the dinner and drinks preliminaries and headed straight for her bedroom.

Afterwards she lay with her head resting on his shoulder, smoking a cigarette.

‘My God,’ she said. ‘I missed this when I was married to Charles.’

‘Didn’t you have any lovers?’ Mitch asked.

‘Of course I didn’t.’

‘Oh, come on. I won’t be jealous. I promise. Tell me.’

She jerked away, stubbed out the cigarette on the bedside ashtray, and said, ‘You’re just like the police. Do you know that? You’ve got a filthy mind.’

‘Hey,’ said Mitch. ‘It’s me. Mitch. OK?’

‘Still . . . They think I did it, you know.’

‘Did what?’

‘Killed Charles.’

‘I thought you had an alibi.’

‘I do, idiot. They think the burglary was just a cover. They think I hired someone to kill him.’

‘Did you?’

‘See what I mean? Just like the cops, with your filthy, suspicious mind.’

‘What makes you think they suspect you?’

‘The way they talked, the way they questioned me. I think they’re watching me.’

‘You’re just being paranoid, Laura. You’re upset. They always suspect someone in the family at first. It’s routine. Most killings are family affairs. You’ll see,
pretty soon they’ll drop it.’

‘Do you really think so?’

‘Sure I do. Just you wait and see.’

And moments later they were making love again.

•

Laura seemed a little distracted when she let him in the next night. At first he thought she had something on the stove, but then he remembered she didn’t cook.