One Hot Mess (22 page)

He scowled as if quite put upon. Death—ever inconvenient. “There was a young woman from Austin.”

God help me. “What was her name?”

He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was imbued with a surreal kind of wistfulness. “Cynthia Larson.”

“How young?”

He pursed his lips. “I don't believe age—”

I was getting tired. Perhaps it's epidemic around politicians. “How young?”

“She was well over the legal limitations.”

“How well?”

“Age—” he began again. He sounded as if he were warming up for a lecture, so I shoved the album into his lap and rose to my feet.

“It's been a long day,” I said. I was a little worried the ploy might be aging, but he sighed, then motioned toward my just-unoccupied seat. I sat back down with some misgivings.

“I believe she was twenty-three,” he said solemnly.

In my defense, I'd like to say that I did not throw the remainder of my fizzy water in his face and stomp on his head, so let's hear it for me. On the other hand, I did call him a couple of rather uncomplimentary names in the solitude of my brain. “Who knew about her?” I asked. My voice might have sounded a little schoolmarmish.

He set his jaw, perhaps taking umbrage at my tone.

“Your wife?” I asked.

“Lord, no!” Said with some feeling, I noted. It was good to know Rosita could still put the fear of God into him.

I scowled. “Who, then?”

He drew a sad breath through his nose and looked regretful. “The young man with whom she was involved may have become aware.”

I refrained from spitting at him. “What was
his
name?”

“It was many years ago.” He shook his head. “In truth, I do not remember.”

I wondered vaguely if he had ruined so many lives that he no longer recalled all the debris scattered in his wake. “Was Cynthia involved in your senatorial campaign?”

“No. Long ago. When my aspirations were simpler.”

I waited, knowing him well enough to realize he'd expound given time and an unattended ear.

“In 1984 I became mayor of San Andres, a humble village in Texas. It was not so very far from where I was born.”

I started, surprised. “I thought you were born in Mexico.”

He stared at me for a second, then smiled. “I could hardly hope to be president of this great country if that were the case, could I, Christina? No.” He sobered, a little like a scholar tutoring his unschooled pupil. “Mama gave birth to me in a dusty little town just south of Laredo. My parents were very poor. Migrant workers.” He paused, nodded, looking back. “But jobs were scarce. When I was not yet a year of age, they returned to the bosom of their families.”

My mind scrambled around a bit. “And later you reentered the United States, took up politics, and lived the American dream.”

He laughed. “Perhaps that is an oversimplification, but, yes, I suppose that is the case.”

“And Cynthia…” I shook my head, misplacing her last name.

“Larson,” he supplied.

“Cynthia Larson helped you, but you no longer remember the name of the only other person who knew of your involvement with her.”

He frowned.

“Did I leave something out?”

“Teddy.”

“Teddy…”

Another sigh. “Theodore Altove also knew.”

I scowled.

“I believe you met his daughter some days past at Caring Hands. Thea,” he added. “Named after her adoring father.”

I lifted my brows. “Thea? The supermodel with hair?”

My choice of words didn't seem to make him any happier. I vaguely wondered why. I mean, what man wouldn't want to be associated with a supermodel with hair?

“Her father and I were very close,” he said.

“What happened?”

“Between him and me?” He shook his head. “Nothing unfavorable. I have known him since the early days. He was a brilliant strategist, quite instrumental in my mayoral campaign and later in my first race for senator. But Thea was growing up and Teddy was a man of great devotion. He did not think Los Angeles offered the proper environment for raising a child.”

“So he disapproved of your affair with Ms.—”

“It was not an affair.”

“What was it, then?”

He flipped his hand at me. “A slip. Nothing more.”

“Did she think so?”

“I am not certain.” He raised his chin. “But I could not, in good conscience, see her again.”

“So you dumped her.”

“She was young. Beautiful. Full of possibilities. I doubt she gave it a second thought.”

“How many thoughts do you think her nameless boyfriend gave it?”

“I do not deny that I have made mistakes, Christina.”

I kind of wanted to continue my line of questioning, but I've made a few mistakes myself. Seventy-seven and
counting, in fact. And that's just in the dating department. “Do you know where she is now?”

“I have not thought of her in more than a decade.”

Probably because of all those other twenty-three-year-olds he'd … Damn, I was running out of words for sex. “Is that a no?”

“Yes.”

I nodded, thinking back.

“How did Teddy find out about it?”

He sighed, deep and heavy. “I told him.”

Gotta tell you, I was surprised. “Seriously?”

“He …” He shook his head. “I believe he had his suspicions beforehand. He said he was worried for my soul.”

“And your campaign,” I supposed.

“He was a fine consultant,” he said, and stared silently at the album. A sandy-haired man in his early thirties stared up at him from a grainy photograph. Fair-skinned and somber, he had his arm wrapped around a solidly built woman with horn-rimmed glasses and a highcheekboned, no-nonsense face.

“Who's that?” I asked, but the senator was deep in his own thoughts.

“I was not without blame,” he said softly, as if this were some little-known secret he was sharing with me alone.

I resisted mocking. “Are these the Altoves?”

“Teddy,” he said, and nodded.

I took the album. The photo looked as if it might have been a Polaroid. Humankind's most useful invention next to, say, Jiffy Pop. The picture had been taken in the desert. Altoves hair was thinning, pushing back past the curve of his scalp, and it looked as if he might have been hiding under a desk somewhere when the great Whodunnit had
handed out smiles, but he was not an unattractive man. I couldn't be quite so charitable with his wife. She had a face that reminded me somehow of a cement mixer. And Thea had come from this union. I wasn't really surprised. My brothers, to a man, thought there was something inherently funny about dead vermin showing up in unlikely places. Genetics. Go figure.

“Who did
he
tell?” I asked.

“What's that?” The senator seemed to draw himself back from an uncertain past.

“Mr. Altove,” I said, and tapped the picture. “With whom did he share your secret?”

“No one.”

I tilted my head.

“He is my friend,” he said. “My true friend.”

“Did he work for you during your last campaign?”

“I called him now and again for advice, but he had other politicians with whom to concern himself. Teller of Nebraska would not be a congressman today without him.” He nodded to himself. “Teddy enjoys the Midwest.” He gazed into the distance again, then saw me watching him. “I feel blessed indeed to have a chance to work with his lovely daughter after all this time.”

I stared at him, remembering the graceful figure, the luminous hair, how her eyes shone when she looked at him. “I bet.”

His expression went dark. He drew himself up, pulling the photo album from my lap and setting it carefully beside him on the couch before rising to his full height. “I would never, under threat of death, lay a hand on her,” he said.

“Yes, well…” I stood up beside him. “Excuse my skepticism, Senator, but—”

“Not so much as a finger,” he said. “If you do not believe that, then I would prefer that you leave my house this instant.”

I stood there, speechless and flabbergasted for a moment, then: “I'm sorry,” I said. “I didn't mean to offend you.”

For a moment I thought he might toss me out on my ear, but finally he shook his head. “No, it is I who should be sorry. Of course I deserve your disdain.”

“I don't disdain you.” Not exactly. “You're a well-respected man. Intelligent, educated …” He was still staring at me. I swept my hand sideways, encompassing the three hats that waited on the antlers. “Well dressed …”

He sighed wearily and closed his eyes for a moment. “I have had my successes, I suppose, but where family is concerned …” He looked older suddenly, worn. “My wife cannot hear my name without cursing. Gerald will barely speak to me.”

I shrugged. I had the same problem. “Your son can be difficult,” I said. “He has his own demons to fight.”

He smiled slowly and took my hand between his. “And you are caught in the battle.”

I raised a brow.

“Between Gerald and his demons. Between me and mine.” He stroked my knuckles and gazed deeply into my eyes. A little shiver skittered along my veins. It traveled up my arm, zipped past my elbow, and shimmied across my nipples like a cool bolt of lightning.

I stood in frozen horror. “Well…” The word was breathless, stupid, stunned. I couldn't be attracted to this
man. Absolutely could not, but the shiver was scattering downward. “I should be going.”

“So soon?” he asked, and stroked my fingers.

“Yes,” I croaked, and, snatching my hand from his, sprinted out of the house, slamming the door behind me.

It's entirely possible that I have demons of my own. I rushed home to discuss the continuing confrontation between intellect and instinct with François.

HE DRIVE HOME was uneventful—except for what was going on in my head. It was racing like a rabbit-happy greyhound.

So there had been problems among Riveras staff. That was hardly surprising. Especially since the problems seemed fairly insignificant. A spat regarding the Sabbath, a minor affair that no one knew about.

But maybe Rivera was understating everything. It would be interesting to get another perspective. But whose? His acquaintances seemed to be mostly dead.

I would look into Cynthia Larson's whereabouts, but I had little hope of actually finding her. She had probably
been married four times and undergone two sex changes by now.

But perhaps Mr. Altove was a possibility.

I parked my Saturn in its usual spot by the curb but didn't exit immediately. Instead, I took the Mace out of my purse, laced my fingers between my keys, and said a prayer to good old Dymphna, patron saint of hapless morons. I then glanced up and down the street. Sometimes I'm not notably bright, but given enough attempts on my life, I can learn. Unlocking the car doors finally, I stepped out and hurried toward my house.

The single bulb was burning dutifully above my front door. After scanning the darkened yard like an osprey I shoved my key into my lock. It turned easily. I stepped inside, and that's when I knew…

Someone was inside my house. I could feel it tingling in the soles of my feet, rasping in the very air I breathed, lifting the hairs at the back of my neck. Nothing was out of place. The door had been locked, my security light was blinking properly from its place on the hall wall, but there was something wrong.

The memory of a man's dead, staring eyes burned into my mind. He'd died in my front yard, blood seeping into the dirt. Maniacal laughter whispered through my mind. My joints felt wooden. My scalp prickled. I backed toward the door, heart thumping, lungs laboring.

A shadow loomed suddenly from the kitchen.

I jerked my Mace shoulder high and shrieked. “Stay back. I've got a gun.”

The silence reverberated, then: “Mac?” Laney said.

It took a couple of lumbering attempts for my mind to register that it was really her, but she was shaking her
head and looking concerned about my sanity, so it probably was. Harlequin loped in. He looked loopy and ecstatic. Next to Lucky Duck and Rivera, Laney was his favorite plaything.

“Are you taking your lion's mane like you promised?”

All the blood had rushed to my toes. I dropped the Mace to my side.

“Lion's mane?” My voice sounded pale and watery.

“Mushrooms,” she said. “To ward off dementia.”

“Mushrooms?” My arms felt limp. “Holy crap, Laney, I could have killed you.”

She flipped the foyer light on, set her glass of whatever juice on the little table by my door, and examined the Mace. “You don't even have the trigger on.”

I felt wobbly and a little nauseous. “What are you doing here?”

“You didn't get my message?”

I shook my head, weak and disoriented. “Did the message say anything about you scaring the crap out of me?”

“I may have neglected that part.”

I wobbled into the kitchen and plopped into the nearest chair. “At least you could have turned on a light.”

“Environmental responsibility. You don't even have fluorescent bulbs,” she said, and, arming my security system, took the chair beside mine. “I'm sorry, Mac. They say a good fright's good for your system, though. Like low-voltage electrical shock.”