Skies of Ash (30 page)

Colin opened his mouth to respond.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Melissa continued, “but it wasn’t like I was in
love
with Christopher. I never pulled any of that ‘if I can’t have him, you can’t have him either’ bullshit. My hands are clean.” And she washed her hands with imaginary soap and showed them to us. Clean, except for the schmutz on her left thumb.

“Ms. Kemper,” I said, “we—”

“You gotta understand,” she continued, “I had just moved here with my kid. I didn’t know my neighbors. I didn’t know anybody. I was lonely and a little depressed and not thinking right. And I thought Christopher could introduce me to some important people here so that—”

“How would he be able to do that?” I asked. “Introduce you to people, I mean.”

“Because of his position at the university.”

“His
position
?” Colin asked.

“Over at UNLV. He’s a visiting economics professor. I thought by being with
him
, I’d get to schmooze with some nice bankers or attorneys.”

Melissa searched my expression for some judgmental gesture, like a smirk or a cocked eyebrow. But she only found a poker-faced pro. “It was nothing,” she explained. “I’m talking about the relationship with Christopher and me. There wasn’t anything romantic. I wanted something more, and he knew better, and… I took care of him. Bought him suits and shoes. It was nice taking care of a man again, even if he didn’t want me in
that
way. I didn’t need another future ex-husband. And Christopher knew that. Besides, he loved Juliet.”

She shook her head. “And Juliet. Talk about
difficult
, and I’m being
very
nice when I say that.
Very
nice. She was incredibly demanding and stuck up and… She acted like she wasn’t from Mississippi.”

“If you weren’t having an affair, why did you send her this?” I handed her the PDF of her note to Juliet.
Dear Juliet, you need to know some things. I don’t want to bring it up in a letter—you’ve ignored my other ones so far—so please stop ignoring me and pick up the phone and CALL ME. It’s a matter of life and death!!!

“That?” Melissa said. “Acting like a yenta. But she never called me back.”

“What were you planning to do if she’d called back?”

She shrugged. “Yank her out of the freakin’ Matrix.”

“The neighbors say that Juliet and Christopher were happy together,” Colin said.

“And Mr. Chatman has only spoken positively of his wife,” I added.

Melissa rolled her eyes. “He’s saying good things
now
because she’s
dead.
Everybody’s a saint when they’re
dead
. The woman was cheating on him, but now she’s Mother Teresa? Are you
kidding
me?”

“Who was Juliet cheating with?” Colin asked with more calm than I could’ve mustered.

Melissa waggled her head. “What’s-his-face, her personal trainer, the guido with the Jersey Shore eyebrows. And if I’m called on the stand, I’ll
prove
that Saint Juliet was boppin’ everybody except her husband, even when said husband was undergoing chemo.”

“
Chemo
?” I said.

“Oh, so your little investigation hasn’t turned that up?” Melissa scoffed. “Christopher was diagnosed with cancer back in August and just finished treatment a few weeks ago.”

On my notepad, I scribbled, “cancer, wtf?” next to “professor at unlv, wtf?” And was this the reason his bosses at the firm couldn’t fire him? “Did he say where he got treatment?” I asked.

“I think he said…” She narrowed her eyes as she tried to remember. “He said MSK. Don’t know what that means, though.”

I recalled hospitals in Southern California. None were abbreviated MSK, and I jotted, “What is MSK?” on my to-do list.

“She was planning to leave him,” Melissa claimed. “But he got sick, and so she couldn’t.”

“I don’t understand,” I said. “Are you saying that Juliet was planning to leave Christopher so she could be with Jersey Shore Eyebrows?”

“I don’t know
what
she was planning to do,” Melissa said. “She stopped talking to me and started confiding in Ben, who is such a dog, and I hope his
dick
falls off. And I hope you’re questioning him like this.”

“We are,” Colin said, throwing me a glance.

“Because Ben, that son of a bitch, thinks he’s above it all,” Melissa ranted. “He thinks that no one knows who he really is. But I know him. Asshole.”

“And who is he?” I asked.

She turned her head in defiance, and the cords in her neck stood out.

“I can wait,” I said. “The trial will be an incredible time for sharing and discovering.”

But she couldn’t stand my feigned indifference—she knew so effin’ much. “He’s a liar and a cheat. Got kicked out of the state bar once and… and… Just ask him about the paralegal and about Martha’s Vineyard 2003. Shady asshole through and through.
Anyway
, Juliet thought Christopher was a schmuck. Can you believe that? This smart, accomplished man a
schmuck
? We’d go to lunch together, Juliet and me, and she’d always complain: Christopher’s touching me, Christopher’s talking to me, Christopher’s
whine-whine-whining
me. Honey, you want some cheese with that whine?”

The Dachshund darted to the dining room, stuck its butt near the wine rack, and took a dump.

“Snowy, I’m gonna spank your little tuches.” Melissa made a face, but she didn’t move to clean up Snowy’s poop.

And now the stink of dog crap rode atop the tobacco and fried-bologna fumes.

“When did Christopher pull back from your friendship?” I asked,
this close
to vomiting.

“About a month ago,” she said. “He told me that he wasn’t ready for a relationship, that
I
wasn’t ready for a relationship. My ex has totally made me crazy. I mean,
look
at me. Look at all these stupid boxes of crap I don’t need. Look at this
house
.” She motioned to the air. “Ron has totally destroyed me. Ruined my life. Sapped me of my strength.”

I’d never let Greg destroy so much of my motivation that I’d let dog shit stay on the carpet. I was
not
a member of
that
Traveling Pants Sisterhood.

“Christopher was totally heartbroken over Juliet’s betrayal. He pleaded with her on the phone right out there.” She pointed to the front door. “And he told her that he needed her, that being with her would help him survive the worst moment of his life.”

The smile on her face faded. “I was so pissed off because
look
at him. The man’s a living god. And after she rejected him yet again, he drove back to the Bellagio and swallowed a handful of pills.”

Ice filled my veins. “Pills? Like to…
kill
himself?”

Melissa nodded solemnly and whispered, “He wrote a note and everything.”

“You see the note?” Colin asked.

“No, I didn’t see the note,” Melissa spat, all
how could you ask such a thing?

“Who told you there was a note?” he said.

“Christopher did,” she said. “And obviously it didn’t take. The suicide, I mean. He said it was fate, that he was meant to live. He told me how he never wanted to leave his wife and kids. I hate to talk bad about the dead, but Juliet was such a
dragon
.”

I turned a page in the notebook. “Let’s talk about the money. On the phone this morning, you claimed it was a gift.”

Melissa offered a sheepish grin. “Not exactly.”

“Okay.
How
exactly?”

She scratched her freckled forearm. “I came into some money through an investment made by Ron and me. We’re partners in a sports bar that kept opening and closing. Permit issues. Anyway, it took four years for the bar to make a profit—by then, Ron had forgotten about it. So when Shamrock’s got in the black, we finally got a check from our business manager. Ron and I, we were going through the divorce at the time, and I didn’t want him to know about the money because he’d want half. So I gave the money to Christopher, and he set up an account that didn’t have my name attached to it.”

“How much are we talking about?” Colin asked.

“About a hundred thousand dollars,” Melissa said.

The deposit Colin had discovered while reviewing the Chatmans’ banking records: $100,000.

“It’s my play money,” Melissa continued, dabbing at her glistening forehead. “And it would come in handy right now. The plumbing in this piece-of-shit house is atrocious. The roof leaks. The garage floods when it rains and—”

“You haven’t bugged Mr. Chatman for the money?” I asked.

“Yes, I’ve asked him,” she said. “I’m not scared of him, not that he’s that type anyway. I’ve left him a million messages since last week. At first, he wouldn’t call me back, but I told him I would come to LA and ask for it in person if he kept ignoring me.”

“I’m bettin’ he called you back,” Colin said.

She nodded. “On Monday. And then the fire happened, and I haven’t had a chance to bring it up again. The man’s family just died, you know?”

“When on Monday did you two talk?” I asked.

“Around noon. I recorded part of our conversation.”

Colin and I glanced at each other.

She blinked rapidly. “Perfectly legal. There’s an app for that.”

“Why did you record the call?” I asked.

Those green eyes of hers darkened. “In case I needed… backup. You wanna hear it?”

Colin and I nodded.

She reached beneath the nest of napkins on the coffee table and produced a cell phone. She scrolled through something on the screen, then set the phone back among the trash. Her recorded, nasally voice filled the room.

Melissa:
“I need about fifty thousand dollars. My toilets won’t flush.”

Christoper Chatman:
“When do you need it by?”

Melissa:
“Sooner rather than later. I’ve been calling you and calling you.”

Christopher Chatman:
“I know, and I’m sorry for not getting back to you.”

Melissa:
“Where have you been?”

Christopher Chatman:
“At the hospital, trying to get healthy.”

Melissa:
“Back east?”

Christopher Chatman:
“Yeah.”

Melissa:
[gasp] “The cancer’s back? Oh no.”

Christopher Chatman:
[chuckle] “No, it’s not back. Just one last checkup. And I forgot my phone at home, and when I got back to LA, I couldn’t find it.” [chuckle] “Cody put it in the microwave.”

Melissa:
[sigh] “I’m sorry.”

Christopher Chatman:
“No, I’m sorry. About everything.”

Melissa:
“If I were insecure, I’d think you were tryin’ to avoid me.”

Christopher Chatman:
“Never. You mean too much to me.”

Melissa:
“Go away with me. Just for a few days. We won’t have to do anything. We’ll just… be. I still have the cabin in Tahoe.”

Christopher Chatman:
“My sick leave is ending, and I’m supposed to go back to work the first week in January. Hey, let me call you back.”

Dial tone—he had ended the call.

“And the rest is history,” Melissa said with a sad shake of her head.

“What did you do about the plumbing?” Colin asked.

“Had Ron pay for it,” Melissa said. “Is he okay? Christopher, I mean.”

“He’s managing,” I said, my voice hard. “What, with his family dead and everything.”

“So let’s talk about
this
.” Colin slipped a witness statement on the coffee table.

Melissa glanced at the form and her shoulders slumped. “Should I attend the funeral? Does that seem kosher? Mourning the wife of the man I…?” Her bloodshot eyes begged for an answer, for direction.

I pointed to the form. “We’d really appreciate it if you could fill this out.”

She blinked at me, and a teardrop tumbled down her rouged cheek.

Hard for me to feel sorry for her. In my own life, there had been too many Melissa Kempers driving up to virtual Tahoe with my husband, women who thought that I was a dragon, frigid and angry and not to be mourned.

Screw ’em.

And screw Melissa Kemper.

ONCE MELISSA HAD SIGNED HER WITNESS STATEMENT, COLIN AND I RUSHED OUT OF
that crap-trap and into the fresh, dry air with its normal city-desert smells of dust, pig farms, and spilled beer. I wanted to shower and then change into a fresh set of clothes. Colin wanted to wander off the road a bit and onto the Strip to play a few hands of blackjack, then grab a prime-rib dinner and a burlesque show at the Tropicana.

“I can enjoy the ladies,” he said, slipping behind the Kia’s steering wheel, “and you can holler at those Australian strippers.”

“Thunder from Down Under?” I checked my phone: two text messages.

Greg:
Umm. We supposed to go to dinner before Lena’s thing?

Lena:
Where RU????? U still coming????

I tapped my response to Greg:
Just finished. Will be home soon.
To Lena, I sent a simple
yep.

“Well?” Colin asked, bright-eyed.

“As tempting as gorging myself on meat and men sounds, we need to get back to LA. We have festivities tonight, or have you forgotten?”

“Never been to a pole-dancing recital,” Colin said as he drove toward the entry gates.

I punched the air-conditioner button all the way to “roar.” “Won’t be as memorable as our meeting with Melissa Kemper. Suicide attempt at the Bellagio? And I guess cancer is the illness Stacy the receptionist was talking about?”

“But what about the teaching gig at UNL—?” He tapped the car’s brakes. “Hey—”

“Good idea,” I said. “Head south on the fifteen.”

So we wandered off the road. Twenty minutes later, Colin and I crowded the frigid office of Moses Sokolski, the dean of the economics department at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Sokolski, a white-haired goblin of a man, had more pressing matters at hand, and as he spoke
at
us, he did not look away from his computer monitor. “There are no Christopher Chatmans in this program. Visiting, adjunct, or tenured. I should know: I’ve taught here for twenty years.”