Tonight You're Mine (8 page)

“Did he seem concerned enough to see a doctor?”

“If he saw one, he never told me. Then one day I went in his office and found him asleep in his chair. I was so glad he was getting a little rest. I was being quiet as a mouse, looking for an invoice, when suddenly he started mumbling. I couldn't make out any words except ‘shouldn't' and ‘Nikki' in a frightened voice. Then he jerked awake. He came to himself quickly and acted embarrassed. Brushed it off as a little catnap. I didn't say a word about him talking in his sleep.”

“About a month later, it happened again,” Kay continued. “It could have been happening every day, but once again I just happened to be there. Well, this time he wasn't muttering. He
shouted
, ‘Nikki! Could've been killed, the bastards!' ”

“It was the rape,” Nicole said softly. “He was dreaming about my rape.”

Phyllis had always insisted that if Nicole's experience must be mentioned at all, it was to be referred to as “the attack.” She noticed Kay's face pinkening at the word “rape,” but Nicole had rarely been one to use euphemisms.

“Yes, I do believe that's what he was dreaming about.”

“Do you have any idea what could have triggered all this?” Nicole asked.

“I've wondered if he were ill. Maybe there was something seriously wrong with him and he wasn't thinking so clearly anymore. He did seem to dwell on the past more than he ever had. Even before he became so depressed lately he left the church. He said your mother was very unhappy about it.”

“Yes.”

“After that he gradually lost interest in the business. Not completely, you understand, but he just wasn't on
top
of things anymore. That's another thing that made me think he was seriously ill.”

Nicole stood and began walking around the store. “Now that you mention all this, I realize I was vaguely aware of it. But only vaguely. I was so wrapped up in myself—the move back to San Antonio, my new job, Roger leaving.” She hit her fist on the top of a piano. “Why didn't I pay more attention?”

“Don't blame yourself, Nikki. The changes were subtle, and I'm sure he always put on a good show for you. Your mother, too.”

“But not you?”

Kay flushed. “I was around him all day, every day. It would have been hard to hide something from me. Besides, he wasn't as worried about my feelings as yours and your mother's.”

But you were worried about his, Nicole thought. You've been in love with him for years. I always sensed it. I wonder if Mother did? I wonder if
he
did?

Knowing that Kay had loved her father made her both happy and sad—happy because Phyllis was so difficult, so critical; sad because Kay had devoted herself to a man who, even if he returned her love, would never have left his wife and daughter, would never even have had an affair. At least she didn't think he would have had an affair. She wasn't sure she had known her father at all.

“Kay, was there anything else?” she asked, trying to steer her mind away from what might have been between Kay and Clifton.

Kay clasped her hands. “Yes. And this is what's most disturbing. I sorted the mail and I should have noticed
long
before I did, but there's so
much
mail. Anyway, now that I think back on it, about the time your father started having the nightmares, letters came for him marked ‘Personal.' ”

“Just regular-looking letters?”

“No. They were large clasp envelopes, always heavily taped as if it were very important they stay sealed.”

“Was there a return address?”

“No. And the postmark was local. Then, on Tuesday…” Her voice thickened and tears welled in her eyes. “Last Tuesday another envelope came. It was padded—the kind you send photographs in—but it was marked ‘Personal.' I took the mail in to your father as usual and he spotted it right away.” She pulled a tissue from her pocket and dabbed at her eyes. “The color drained from his face. He said, ‘Thank you, Kay,' in a strained voice. I hovered around a moment. He said sharply, ‘Did you need anything else?' I said ‘No' and left. Then he did something he'd never done before—locked his office door in midday.”

She took a deep shuddery breath. “About ten minutes later, I thought I heard a noise back in the office. Something like a groan. I had a bad feeling, but I didn't do anything. Nikki, I didn't
do
anything!”

“Calm down, Kay,” Nicole said, although her own heart was pounding. “What could you have done besides beat on the door and demand to know what was going on? Dad would have hated that. He was a very private man.”

“Yes, but I feel so guilty. Anyway, minutes later I smelled smoke coming from the office. This time I
did
knock on the door. Your father didn't answer. I tried the door and it was still locked. I pounded on it, ready to phone the fire department, when he finally opened the door. He looked ten years older, Nikki. Ten years older and devastated, but he tried to act normal. He said the fire was in the wastebasket. He said he'd tossed an ashtray in and a cigarette stub was still burning and it set some papers on fire.” She turned pain-filled eyes on Nicole. “But your father
never
emptied an ashtray into a wastebasket during the day. Ashtrays were only emptied in the mornings, when he came in, so a fire couldn't start during the night.”

“It was the same at home.” Nicole bit her lip. “Could he have been distracted and done it by accident?”

“I'd say that was a possibility except that the fire was still burning. He ignored it. When I tried to push past him to reach the pitcher of water on his desk, he blocked me. And Nikki, his
eyes
! If someone had just called and said you were dead, they couldn't have looked more awful. He set that fire himself!

“And what did I do?” Kay cried. “Nothing. I should have stood right up to him and said, ‘Clifton Sloan, I've been your friend for thirty years. You tell me what's wrong or I'm calling a doctor!' But did I? No. I just stood there, blithering like my mother always said, not enough nerve or presence of mind to be any help at all.”

Nicole empathized with Kay's frustration with herself. There had been a thousand times when she wished she'd handled situations differently. But now she was more interested in what her father had said and done, not what Kay hadn't. Trying to hide her impatience with the woman's detours into self-flagellation, she prodded determinedly.

“Kay, what did Dad say after giving you that excuse about the wastebasket?”

“Nothing! He shut the door in my face. He'd
never
been so rude. I was astonished. No, that's not the right word.
Appalled
, that's it. Over the whole scene, you understand, not just his shutting the door on me. Afterward, all was quiet in the office for about half an hour, then your father came out, told me he wasn't feeling well, and left. He said he was going home.” Her mouth trembled. “I never saw him alive again. That very night he came back to the office and…” Kay choked back a sob.

Nicole put her hand on Kay's bony shoulder. “Don't think about that part now.”

Kay wiped her nose, wadded her tissue, and stuffed it in her pocket. “Your father left the office about half an hour later and locked his office, but I was worried that maybe the fire in the wastebasket wasn't out completely.” She looked down at the floor. “That's not completely true. I was curious,” she said meekly.

“Anyone would have been.”

“I used my own key and opened the office. The fire was out and almost everything in the wastebasket was ashes.
Almost
everything.”

Nicole's interest quickened. “What was left?”

“It's in the office file cabinet. I understand that you don't want to go in there, so I'll get it—”

“I'll go with you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. I can't stay out of there forever, especially if Mother keeps the store. I was just feeling a little queasy earlier.”

Nicole followed Kay into the spacious office carpeted in pale gray. Her father's large mahogany desk was unnaturally neat, an expensive gold pen-and-pencil set sitting close to an oversized turquoise ashtray on one side, photos of her, Shelley, and Phyllis forming an arc in gold frames on the other. The blotter was missing. Of course, Nicole thought, her stomach clenching. The blotter had been covered with blood.

Nicole quickly switched her attention to Kay, who was unlocking one of the file drawers. She withdrew a white legal-sized envelope. Gingerly she lifted a small piece of paper and held it toward Nicole. “I found this still smoldering under the padded envelope.” Her face colored and she looked miserably self-conscious. “I didn't show it to the police. I didn't want to stir things up again.”

“Stir up what things again?” Nicole asked, accepting a piece of charred paper.

“Well…just things best left in the past.”

Baffled, Nicole stepped closer to the window behind the desk, tripping over an oriental rug. It flipped back, exposing a rusty stain. Nicole gasped. Kay clutched her throat. “Oh, Nikki, I'm sorry. The walls cleaned up beautifully, but the carpet is so pale they just couldn't get out all the—”

“Blood,” Nicole said briskly. “It's all right.” She flipped back the rug with her foot, her stomach tightening as she fought nausea. Focus on what's in your hand, she thought sternly.

Light streamed in the window. She held up the piece of paper. It was a photograph, but at first she couldn't make out what she was seeing. It was upside down. She turned the fragment around until it took recognizable form.

She felt as if everything inside her wrenched into a painful knot. Shining black hair, a hazel eye, an arched eyebrow, a high cheekbone, a fragment of a straight, chiseled nose, the corner of a full, sensual mouth.

She was looking at the burned remains of a photo of Paul Dominic.

1

Nicole felt as if she were in a trance as she drove from the store to her mother's. Kay had asked if Nicole thought she should give the fragment of the photo of Paul Dominic to the police and tell them about the letters.

“No,” Nicole had answered sharply, realizing she sounded like her mother, wanting to keep everything quiet, desiring as little interference from outsiders as possible. But something told her now was not the time to reveal the letters to anyone. “Let's keep this between us for now, Kay.” Kay had agreed, looking relieved.

When Nicole pulled up in front of her parents' French Provincial house, she saw another car in the driveway, a blue Cadillac. One of her mother's friends. Maybe today's visit hadn't been necessary at all, but she hadn't even spoken to her mother on the phone since yesterday.

She opened the front door without knocking and heard the chatter of voices from the living room. Before she got the door closed, Phyllis had come to greet her. She wore slim black slacks and a white silk blouse, every hair of her white French twist in place, a slender necklace of real pearls—the last Christmas gift from her husband—around her neck. The only signs of her grief were faint mauve shadows beneath her eyes.

“Nicole, how nice to see you,” she said, aiming a kiss at Nicole's cheek and just missing. This was the way her mother had always kissed her. “The No-Smear Kiss,” Nicole had come to call it, referring to Phyllis's concern that her lipstick always look perfect. “I called earlier, but no one was home.”

“Roger took Shelley to Sea World, and I took a drive.” That wasn't really a lie, she told herself. She
had
driven. “I see you have company.”

“Mildred Loomis is here.” She steered Nicole into the living room where a plump middle-aged woman with daffodil-yellow bleached hair, bright blue frosted eye shadow, and a vivid pink suit with red poppy appliqués on the jacket sat on the couch. “You remember Mrs. Loomis, don't you?”

“Yes, of course.” Now that
was
a lie, Nicole scolded herself, but the woman was beaming at her, obviously remembering
her
. “It's been a long time, Mrs. Loomis.”

“I'll say it has,” the woman agreed. “And please call me Mildred. Why, honey, I haven't seen you since you recited that poem you wrote to your mother's reading circle.”

No wonder Nicole hadn't remembered her. She hadn't seen her for nineteen years. Now she recalled that even all those years ago, she'd wondered why the woman looked so blowzy despite her husband's wealth. Certainly all that money could have improved her hair and makeup, if not her weight. “Oh, that dreadful poem,” Nicole groaned.

Mildred beamed again. “Why, I thought it was precious.” At the time, Nicole had thought it terribly profound. “It rhymed so nice,” Mildred continued. “I just hate poems that don't rhyme. I don't think they should even be called poems if they don't rhyme, do you?”

“Well—”

Obviously Phyllis saw that Nicole was about to argue and cut her off. “Mildred and her husband just got back from New York last night. That's why they didn't come to your father's funeral.”

Mildred's beaming face immediately fell into a mask of woe. “Oh, Nicole, I am
so
sorry. What an
awful
thing. I was just tellin' my husband, Willard, this morning, ‘What an
awful
thing! What would make a man who has everything want to stick a gun in his mouth—' ”

“I suppose we'll never know,” Phyllis interrupted sharply. “Nicole and I have decided not to speculate. It's too upsetting.”

Sufficiently quelled, Mildred lapsed into a nodding, doleful silence. Phyllis looked at Nicole. “Would you care for some tea?”

Why did everyone keep offering her tea? she wondered. Especially her mother, who knew she couldn't stand tea. “I think I'll pass, Mom.”

“I could make coffee. We have a delicious pound cake that Mildred brought.”

“No, thank you.” She smiled at Mildred, who was slicing off a piece of the cake. Nicole was certain it wasn't her first. “I'm really not hungry now, Mom, and since you have someone to keep you company for a while, I wonder if you'd mind if I went upstairs and looked for something in my old room.”

Phyllis allowed herself a small frown. “Look for what?”

“My school yearbooks.” Lie number three, she thought. A lot of good mass did this morning. “Shelley was interested in seeing what her mother looked like in high school.”

“Pretty as a picture,” Mildred managed around a mouth half-full of pound cake. “I always told Willard you were the prettiest girl I ever saw. You've only improved with age.”

“Thank you,” Nicole said.

“Your mama tells me you're gettin' a divorce. Our boy W. J.'s divorced, too.” She pronounced
W
as
dub ya
. “He's only a couple of years older than you and a fine figure of a man, if I do say so myself. Maybe you two could go out to dinner or to the movies or somethin'.”

“That sounds very nice,” Nicole said woodenly, suddenly remembering W. J. Loomis as an oxlike creature whose claim to fame in high school was dropping water balloons out of second-floor windows on the heads of passing girls.

“I could give him your phone number,” Mildred continued hopefully.

“Well…”

“You run on upstairs,” Phyllis said quickly, rescuing her. “Mildred and I are having a very nice conversation. We won't even miss you, will we, Mildred?”

Mildred, stuffing another piece of cake in her mouth, waved a puffy hand in dismissal. Phyllis gave Nicole an unexpected wink, and Nicole felt like hugging her. Her mother rarely came to her rescue.

Nicole hurried up the stairs before Mildred could ask for her phone number. Nicole knew the woman couldn't pry the number out of her mother, but that didn't mean W. J. couldn't get it from Directory Assistance. Maybe I should get an answering machine so I can screen calls, Nicole thought.

Her bedroom looked almost as it had when she moved away fifteen years ago. The thick pale green carpet seemed like new. The ultramodern white lacquer furniture was spotless, just like the snowy white bedspread adorned with decorative pillows in mint, forest, and ivy-green. The heavy pale green draperies hung over snowy sheers. A large framed print of “Idle Hours” by J. Alden Weir graced one wall. The only ornaments on the dresser and chest of drawers were framed photos of a four-year-old grinning Nicole wearing a bunny outfit at a dance recital, and her formal high school graduation picture.

She shut the door to her bedroom and went to the walk-in closet. One side was for clothes, the other lined with built-in shelves for books. Garment bags hung on a rod. Nicole knew they held Easter dresses and prom gowns from her youth.

But she wasn't interested in clothes. She turned to the shelves. Books stood rigidly in place, so many she'd read over and over as a teenager such as
Wuthering Heights
and
Jane Eyre
. A few schoolbooks stood among the crowd. At the end of one shelf were her school yearbooks and two photo albums.

Nicole gathered up the yearbooks and albums and placed them on the floor by her bed. Then she went back to the closet.

When they had moved into the house, she'd been delighted to find a small cabinet built into the base of the shelves. She called it her hiding place, but it wasn't safe enough for her
really
private things like her diary and valentines she received from boys, so when she was twelve, she bought a padlock. Phyllis had been outraged, and even Clifton had complained. “What kind of secrets could my baby girl have that even her daddy can't know?”

Nicole had ignored both of them, though, tucking away what she considered top secret property and keeping the key to the padlock with her at all times. Until she moved away seven months after the rape, that is. Then she'd left the contents of her hiding place
and
the padlock key behind. Now she picked up her graduation picture and slid the photo from behind the glass. On the cardboard backing was taped the short, thin key. She'd never liked the picture, but it had been good for something.

Nicole untaped the key and rushed back to the closet. The lock was stiff and at first she thought she'd have to sneak back with lubricating oil, but at last the lock clicked open. The hinges creaked as she swung open the storage-cabinet door.

Sitting on the floor, she withdrew five diaries. “All full of torrid secrets, no doubt,” she mumbled, noticing they only covered her years between twelve and seventeen.

At the bottom of the cabinet was a photo album. This was what she'd been looking for, although it wasn't a traditional album. Her hands trembled slightly as she pulled it from the cabinet. Her hands had also trembled when she'd put it together.

She dusted it off and sat down on the bed. Are you sure you want to dredge all of this up? she wondered. No, but after what Kay told her, she must.

She opened the cover. On the first page beneath a plastic protector was a yellowed newspaper clipping. The headline blared, “Daughter of Local Businessman Assaulted in Basin Park.” The story went on to describe how Nicole Marie Sloan, nineteen, a sophomore at Trinity University, had been raped and brutally beaten by two men. A male passerby had scared off the men with a handgun. Sloan's rescuer had not seen the men's faces, but Sloan had identified her attackers. Their names were being withheld until arrests were made. Nicole Sloan was in serious but stable condition.

Nicole took a deep breath and moved on to the next page. Here was the story of the arrest of Ritchie Zand, lead singer of the local rock band The Zanti Misfits, and one of the band's roadies, Luis Magaro. Magaro, thirty-two, had a previous record of assault. Zand, twenty-three, had been arrested three years ago for statutory rape, but the charges were dropped. Magaro and Zand had been positively identified by Nicole Sloan.

A light tap sounded at the door. Nicole jumped and almost dropped the album, knowing that if her mother saw it, she would jerk it from her hands and immediately destroy it. Instead, the door opened and Carmen stepped in. “What's going on? Hiding from Mrs. Loomis?”

Nicole let out her breath. “Partly.”

Carmen's curly dark hair framed her face. She wore jeans and a long-sleeved peach-colored shirt. Except for the weight she'd gained lately, she looked almost exactly the same as when they were teenagers. “When I couldn't reach you at home, I figured you were here. I thought you might need a friend today.”

“Thanks. I do.”

“What are you looking at?”

“Memories. Close the door and come on in.”

Carmen joined her on the bed. Her smile disappeared when she saw the clippings in the scrapbook. “You kept all this stuff?”

“Yes. The album's been hidden in this room since I moved away. I've never taken it home because I didn't want Shelley to find it.”

“My God, Nicole. I had no idea. Why are you looking at it now?”

“I'm not sure. I heard something today…” Carmen's dark eyebrows rose and reluctantly Nicole began telling her Kay's story, knowing Carmen would never repeat it.

When she finished, Carmen looked at her quizzically. “Why would someone send your father a picture of Paul Dominic?”

“I have no idea. But I know that he started acting strange when those damned letters began coming. And because of what he mumbled in his nightmares, I'm sure the letters had something to do with what happened to me.”

Carmen tapped a long peach-polished nail against her perfect teeth. “That sounds logical, although I still can't imagine what in those letters could have upset your father so much. The picture of Paul hints that it was something about your assault and the murders, but it's not as if your dad didn't know exactly what had happened to you and everything that took place afterward.”

“I know. I'm not even sure why I'm looking at this. Maybe it's because of Dad. Maybe it's because I want to see if I've really put it behind me. I thought I had—until lately.”

“Until you thought you saw Paul at the cemetery.” Nicole nodded. “You were exhausted and emotionally drained. I agree that the guy looked like Paul. But it wasn't.”

“Probably not, but I still want to go over this stuff. Will you stay with me?”

Carmen smiled. “Sure. But we'd better keep a sharp ear for your mother. If she sees this—”

“We're dead meat,” Nicole said melodramatically.

Carmen smothered a laugh. “You're still a big goof, do you know that?”

“Thank you. Only you and my daughter seem to appreciate my sense of humor.”

“Okay, if you're determined to do this, turn the page. I don't know how much more cake Mrs. Loomis can hold, and as soon as she leaves, your mother will be right up the stairs to see what we're doing.”

Nicole obeyed. The next page displayed an article dated two days after Zand's and Magaro's arrests. A picture showed a triumphant Zand waving to a crowd. And why wouldn't he be looking triumphant? Nicole thought. Suddenly Magaro and Zand had alibis. According to two sons of a prominent San Antonio family, at the time of Nicole Sloan's assault, Magaro and Zand had been with them. The brothers had gone to Mexico the day after the attack and had only just returned to San Antonio. Otherwise, they could have cleared Zand and Magaro immediately. “Yeah, sure,” Nicole said aloud. “In other words, it just took a while to find a couple of suitable guys willing to lie for them. Probably die-hard fans of Ritchie's band. Either that, or Magaro was their drug supplier.”

“Are you sure you should go on with this?” Carmen said tentatively. “It only gets worse.”

“Yes.” Nicole noticed the steely edge in her voice. “I'm sure.”

She turned the page and the headline seemed to scream: “Two Men Found Murdered in Basin Park.” Nicole scanned the article, although she knew the details by heart. Ritchie Zand and Luis Magaro, who only four weeks earlier were arrested then released for sexual assault and battery, had each been found shot in the head. The bodies were hanging from trees near the Interstate 281 overpass. The weapon was a .44 magnum. Both men had died instantly from the gunshot wounds. In a bizarre touch, black hoods had been placed over their heads. Some speculation existed that the men had been the victims of a ritual execution.