Obsessed With You (14 page)

“
How do you feel now that
you’ve been away from it for a while?” Lindy asked.

“
I’m still mad he left me to
play golf,” she said. “But we could’ve worked through that,
possibly. But I’m starting to realize that he was telling me the
truth about everything. Someone was trying to hurt him, but I have no
idea who.”

“
What if you did know?” Lindy
said. “Would you go back to him?”

“
I think it’s too late for
that now,” Cathy said. “The damage has been done.”

“
Do you have any idea who would
have wanted to hurt him like that? It just seems so crazy. Like some
kind of fatal attraction or something.”

“
It could have been a business
associate, a male one,” Cathy said. “Trying to make it look like
a fatal attraction.”

“
Would a male business
associate know about his spotted dick?” Lindy asked, then burst out
laughing.

“
I’m sorry, Cathy,” she
said trying to get her giggles under control.

Cathy gave her a stern look
before she started laughing herself, so strongly that she surprised
herself. Hee hawing, she managed to croak out, “I hope not!”
Which caused them to laugh even harder. They both wiped tears from
their eyes as they tried to regain control.

“
Isn’t that some sort of
English dish? The spotted dick?” Cathy asked.

“
Yeah, I saw it on a cooking
show one day,” Lindy said. “It’s a pudding with raisins in it.
But not a gooey pudding. It’s hard.”

They looked at each other and
started laughing again.

“
But seriously, Cathy,” Lindy
said, a last little laugh escaping from her. “Haven’t you thought
about who might have done it?”

“
Yes, but I can’t think who,”
Cathy said. “It would have to be someone who knew about the
birthmark and the tie. I guess I keep thinking it’s an old
girlfriend of his.”

“
I’m getting us some wine,”
Lindy said standing up. “We need to be able to think creatively.”

Cathy glanced around the crowded
shop while Lindy got the wine. Shelves full of knick-knacks and
dishes lined the walls. Lindy had set up little vignettes of
furniture with decorative pieces in various places in the shop.
People were welcome to sit down and munch on cookies and tea during
their visit. It was a colorful and cozy place, and Cathy felt at home
there.

Lindy returned to the table with
a bottle of chardonnay and two wine glasses, which she filled nearly
to the rim. “Be careful and don’t spill it on yourself,” Lindy
said as she handed her a glass. “I’ll be right back.”

Cathy had taken a couple of sips
of the chilled dry wine when Lindy came back with her laptop.

“
We’re going to do some
investigating,” she said, setting the laptop up on the table. “I
just love a mystery.” She practically squealed with delight. Cathy
wished she could be so happy about it.

“
Now, what about that client of
his, Mrs. Whatshername?” Lindy said.

“
Mrs. Davis. Aaron took her to
lunch at least once a week. Sometimes, he escorted her to evening
events, like an opening at the museum. Things like that.”

“
And you didn’t go?” Lindy
asked, arching her eyebrow at Cathy.

“
Sometimes, I did. Mrs. Davis
always asked for me to attend. But I was so tired after work, I just
wanted to watch TV. I usually didn’t go. In fact, I hadn’t been
to one of those for months when everything happened.”

“
What’s her first name?”
Lindy asked, fingers poised over the keyboard.

“
Adelle,” Cathy said.

Lindy punched on the keyboard.

“
Damn, there’s a lot of stuff
here,” she said. “She’s loaded. I see a bunch of links for a
Frank and Adelle Davis Foundation.”

“
They were big supporters of
the arts,” Cathy said. “She still is, through the foundation.
They were loaded, but I always got the feeling she loved him
completely. He was over twenty years older than her when they
married. His kids gave her a hard time after he died, but he left
them plenty of money.”

Lindy made a few more punches on
the keyboard. “Shit, she’s gorgeous!” she said. She turned the
laptop so Cathy could see the photos. Mrs. Davis was very attractive;
she had always known that. She knew the woman! Had spent time in her
company.

“
Yes,” Cathy said. “But
she’s so much more than what you’re seeing in those photos. She’s
elegant and classy. She never looks down on anyone ever.”

“
Hmmm,” Lindy said.

“
Actually, she reminds me a lot
of Aaron now that I think about it.” Cathy said. She’d never
thought about that before, but now it was glaringly obvious. They
were two of a kind. “She’s graceful and kind. Charismatic. Like
Aaron is.”

Lindy scrolled down through the
images.

“
Woo hoo!” Lindy said. “She’s
got a hottie in this one.” She turned the laptop so Cathy could
see.

A jolt went through her as she
looked at the effervescent, half-smiling Aaron next to Adelle Davis.
He was wearing the tie she had given him, the tie that had been their
undoing. And dammit if the photo wasn’t from her own city magazine,
shot at a gallery opening of new realist painters.

“
That’s Aaron,” Cathy said,
her voice trembling.

“
Damn, girl! Are you kidding
me?” Lindy practically screamed. “He’s hot!”

“
That’s the tie I gave him,”
Cathy said. Tears gushed out of her eyes as suddenly as the laughter
a few minutes before. She put her head on the table and sobbed.

Lindy was beside her instantly
with her hand around her shoulder.

“
I’m sorry, honey,” she
said in her honey voice. “We’ll put the computer up now.”

“
No!” Cathy said sharply,
pulling her head up from the table. “I want to keep going. I need
to try to get some answers.”

“
Okay,” Lindy said
uncertainly. She sat back down and ran her fingers across the
keyboard.

“
She’s got a website and
Facebook page for the foundation. It looks like all business.”

“
That doesn’t surprise me,”
Cathy said. “She loves that foundation.”

Lindy mashed the keys again, then
sat staring at the laptop.

“
You know, Aaron looks kind of
familiar to me. It’s driving me crazy.”

“
Mrs. Davis said one night that
he looks like that actor on Mad Men. Have you ever seen that show?”

“
That’s it!” Lindy said.
“He looks like Jon Hamm. I love love love love that show. It’s
pure vintage, you know. I’ve even got a Mad Men vignette set up in
here.” She pointed to an area in the front corner of the shop.
Cathy went over to it and sat down on the yellow sixties modern sofa.
A tall glass lamp with molten colors of blue and green sat on a sleek
angular table beside the couch. The coffee table was also angular and
modern, almost Swedish in feel. A framed photo of Don Draper from Mad
Men in his modern office sat front and center on the coffee table.
Just in case the clientele didn’t get it.

Lindy sat in a modern chair next
to the sofa. She had brought the laptop with her.

“
Okay, do you think it’s
possible it could be Mrs. Davis?” she asked.

“
No,” Cathy said instantly.
“She is much too self-possessed to resort to something like that.”

“
You sure?” Lindy asked.

“
I feel almost one hundred
percent sure,” Cathy said.

“
That leaves a little wiggle
room, almost one hundred percent,” Lindy said. “What about people
he works with? Any crazy women there?”

“
He works with a lot of women.
Financial consultants and traders. And secretaries, of course.”

“
Of course,” Lindy said
ruefully. “Would they have known about the tie?”

“
Probably,” Cathy said. “He
wore it a lot. He seemed very proud of it, and I was so happy I had
given him something he liked. He could buy anything he wanted, but he
loved that tie.”

“
Who was closest to him in his
office?” Lindy asked, breaking through Cathy’s reminiscence about
when she gave Aaron the tie.

“
His secretary, Marsha.”

“
Is she the type that wears
snug suits and stilettos?” Lindy asked.

“
Did you get that from Mad
Men?” Cathy asked with a laugh. “No, she’s quite plump,
actually. I’ve only met her one time, at the annual Fourth of July
party the firm president has every year at his house. I probably
exchanged three sentences with her.”

“
What’s her name?”

“
I told you. It’s Marsha.”

“
What’s her last name?”

Cathy thought for a moment. She
could not pull Marsha’s last name up.

“
I’m not sure I ever knew
it,” she finally said. “Aaron just called her Marsha.”

“
What about when you met her
that time. Didn’t Aaron tell you her last name then?”

Cathy took herself back to that
Fourth of July party. She envisioned Aaron introducing her to Marsha.
‘This is my secretary, Marsha.’ He had said. ‘Marsha Gardner.’”

“
Gardner!” Cathy said sitting
up straighter. “Her last name is Gardner!”

“
Okay, calm down, honey,”
Lindy said with a laugh.

She turned to the laptop and
began to hit the keys.

“
Do you have any idea how many
Marsha Gardners there are on Facebook?” Lindy said.

“
Put the city in,” Cathy
said.

“
Aha,” Lindy said after a few
seconds. “There are three Marsha Gardners in Atlanta.” She sat on
the couch beside Cathy and showed her the screen.

“
Any of these look like her?”
Lindy asked.

Cathy glanced at the choices. One
had a photo of an Asian woman as a profile picture, another had a
little dog, and the last one showed a bunch of flowers. Lindy clicked
on the flowers. It seemed to be a woman who was married and at home
with three kids, if the many photos of the family were any judge. It
was not Marsha.

Lindy clicked on the dog photo
next, then the photo albums. Marsha’s plump face looked out at
them. Her little terrier was in her arms as she smiled at the camera.
She had other photos of what looked like family-type parties with a
lot of people of all ages. She even had posted photos from office
parties. There were Christmas party photos spanning four Christmases
and Fourth of July photos from at least three different years.

Cathy studied the office photos.
There was nothing remarkable about them. Marsha had put captions on
some of them, usually just a name and date. There was a photo of
Aaron in one of them, from a Christmas party before Cathy knew Aaron.
In the photo, Aaron was leaning against the bar talking to someone.
He didn’t seem aware that his photo was being taken because he
wasn’t even looking at the camera. It was captioned simply, “My
boss, Christmas 2011.”

“
She’s got a gazillion photos
of her dog,” Lindy said. “What is that, a shih tzu?” They both
started laughing again.

“
I think it’s a Yorkshire
terrier,” Cathy said between laughs.

“
Her name’s Delilah,” Lindy
screeched. “That is hilarious!”

After another laughing fit that
lasted at least a full minute, Lindy and Cathy sobered up.

“
I don’t think we’ve
learned much today,” Cathy said. “I really think it must be an
old girlfriend. But that would mean he would have seen her while he
was wearing the tie. He never mentioned running into anyone, but I
guess that doesn’t mean anything. What sane man would mention
running into an old girlfriend?”

“
What about her voice?” Lindy
asked.

“
Whose voice?” Cathy asked.

“
The one on the phone call!”
Lindy said, exasperated. “Did it sound at all familiar to you?”

“
No. I had no idea who it was,”
Cathy said.

“
What about his sister? Didn’t
you say Aaron had a sister? Could she have had it in for you?”

“
I don’t even want to go
there,” Cathy said. “That would mean his sister would know about
his personal body, and that makes me crazy to think about.”

“
Sorry,” Lindy said. “Just
trying to think.”

“
His sister loves me,” Cathy
said. “Or at least she acted like she did. I thought she did.”

“
Maybe she’s trying to
protect the family fortune from interlopers,” Lindy suggested.

“
That’s funny,” Cathy said.
“Aaron and his sister grew up on a farm. I don’t think there’s
a fortune there.”

“
I’m just thinking outside
the box,” Lindy said. “That’s where the answer is sometimes,
you know.”

“
You’re right. Thank you for
thinking about all of this for me. I think I’m too emotionally
involved to make sense of anything, even if it’s right there in
front of my face.”

Lindy closed her laptop. “What
are you going to do?” she asked Cathy.