Murder 101 Part 16

"Klein's a great lawyer, but I don't know if he can keep me out of jail." He paused. "Or get me my job back at St. Thomas when I'm exonerated."

"What have they got on you, Ray?"

"My fingerprints were all over your car, for one."

"Of course they were. You used to drive it all the time."

"And Kathy's fingerprints were all over my car." He looked down at the table when he said this.

That was a discomforting thought but one that made sense. When he looked up again, I studied his face, but if there was one thing I knew about Ray, it was that he was the best liar in the world as well as the worst husband. I didn't know if that combination equaled his being a murderer, though.

"And there are a bunch of e-mails between me and Kathy." He paused. "In one of them, I said I would kill her if she told her parents about us."

I sighed. "That was bright."

"But I meant it in a funny way, like I'll kill you," he said, shaking his fist. "Too bad that didn't translate in the e-mail."

What an idiot. "You should have taken my cla.s.s on 'Tone.'" I picked up my fork and started pushing pasta around on the plate. "Did you kill her, Ray?" I asked quietly.

"No," he said emphatically. He stood up. "Anyway, thank you for helping me out. I'm sorry I called you the other day and yelled at you about not getting in touch. That was immature."

The counseling must have had some effect on him.

He pointed to the door again. "Is something going on there?"

I a.s.sumed he meant to ask if Crawford and I were involved, but he couldn't bring himself to say the words. "We're friends, Ray."

"Is he nice to you?" Implicit in that was "nicer than I was to you?"

I nodded. "He's very nice to me." I knocked my knuckles against the wooden table. "So far." I don't know why I said it, but just being in Ray's duplicitous presence cast a cloud of doubt over everyone.

He looked a little forlorn. "That's good." He started for the door. "I can't say that he and I are on great terms, but that doesn't really matter, does it?" he asked, and laughed.

I walked him to the door.

"I'm sorry, Al. About everything," he said, putting his hand on the k.n.o.b. "I really am." I used to cry when he said things like that, but this time I just stood there. I had become impervious to his penitence.

He stood there a few more minutes, looking as if he wanted to say something else. Finally, he spoke. "I'm thinking about leaving St. Thomas next semester. Regardless of what happens." He let out a rueful laugh. "Well, I guess that's obvious. If I go to jail, I'll really have to leave. But if I get out of this, I'm think I'm going to go out West for the fall semester. I need to think. Then I'll decide whether or not to come back."

I couldn't disagree with that. It was on the tip of my tongue to say, "If you need anything, just call," but I didn't. I didn't want him calling. Or asking for anything.

Ray hooked a finger toward the door, motioning to Crawford. "Your friend there is a bit intimidating in the interrogation room."

"So I've heard."

Crawford was sitting on the front steps and stood up when the door opened. He put his hand out. "Dr. Stark."

They shook, and Ray went down the sidewalk to his car. We stood on the stoop and watched him as he drove away.

Crawford came back inside and went into the kitchen. "I'm not going to ask you what you talked about."

"Good. Because all he wanted to do was apologize."

He looked at me, eyebrows raised.

"For calling and yelling at me the other day. At the beach."

"Oh."

"He also wanted to know about us. If you're nice to me."

He continued looking at me. "And what did you say?"

"I said that despite your erectile dysfunction, we were trying to make it work."

He blanched, and his mouth hung open. When he figured out that I was kidding, he chuckled slightly. "What did you really say?"

"I said that you were nice to me." I left out the "so far" part; I didn't want to seem insecure and paranoid. Even though I was.

He looked at his watch. "I'll help you clean all of this up and then I have to go. I'm taking my girls to dinner tonight."

I picked up a couple of dishes. "I'll take care of it." I walked over to the sink and put the dishes in, running water over them. I handed him his wallet, keys, badge, phone, and beeper. He had a lot of equipment. "Is that it? You didn't forget anything?"

He looked around. "That's it." He put his hand to his head. "Wait. There is one thing. When I see you tomorrow, I'm going to bag all of the papers in your office. It's been bugging me since last night that Vince was asking for 'the papers.' Have you ever had him in cla.s.s?"

I shook my head. "I only knew him from around campus, but I never had him in cla.s.s."

Crawford thought for another minute. "Where are those papers you were supposed to correct last night?"

I continued washing the dishes. "What are you thinking?"

He chewed on the inside of his mouth, lost in thought. "The only thing I can come up with has to do with Ecstasy. Ecstasy is huge with Vince's demographic and at Joliet, in particular. He was a smalltime dealer, but Narcotics had been watching him for months." He explained to me how Ecstasy could be printed on a special paper that someone like me couldn't recognize, but that someone who was acquainted with drugs could. "It's possible that one of the papers that you have was printed on Ecstasy paper, meaning that Vince was out thousands of dollars and maybe, in deep with the dealer above him. That would be one explanation as to why Vince-if he was the break in-left an 'X' here and in your office." He looked at me, and I stared back at blankly; he had lost me at "Ecstasy papers."

"I know. It's crazy. But it's all I've got. I think I should take the papers and have them tested."

My briefcase was still inside the front door, so I dried my hands and went down the hall to get it. I pulled out the Shakespeare papers and brought them back into the kitchen. I handed them to him. "Do me a favor, though."

He took them and riffled through them. "What?"

"Test these first. These are the only ones that need to be corrected and handed back."

He nodded. "OK. I'll get them back to you as soon as I can."

I looked up at him and paused for a minute. "Are we OK?"

He sighed. "Yes." He put his arms around me. "Just don't pull a stunt like that ever again. I'll have to take you to the precinct in the cruiser." His voice was serious, but his eyes twinkled.

"It's not a cruiser," I intoned solemnly.

He put one hand behind my head and bent down to kiss me. Things got out of control quickly, and I ended up sitting on the counter, my legs wrapped around him and him half on top of me. I pulled away, a little flushed and a lot disheveled. "Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?" I asked.

He laughed out loud. "You have been dying to say that, haven't you?"

I pulled a dirty fork out from under my a.s.s and waved it at him. "You've got to go. Right now."

He looked at his watch. "You're right. I do." He walked down the hallway and stopped, halfway to the door. "I've been thinking."

"Uh-oh. More thinking. Where's my fire extinguisher?"

He smirked. "I think we should have dinner. Out. In a restaurant. Without my questioning you. What do you think?"

"But the case isn't over yet," I reminded him.

"So, we'll do it around here. I don't know anyone in Dobbs Ferry."

I thought it over. "When did you have in mind?"

"Tomorrow?" he asked. "I'm driving my girls home at five and then I'll head down here. Pick you up at seven?"

I had an honor society awards ceremony from five to seven. "I can do seven. But you'll have to pick me up at my office or in the Blue Room. If you get there early, you can have a drink and listen to my scintillating speech on the history of Lambda Iota Tau."

He smiled. "Mmmm . . . Greek . . . s.e.xy." He thought for a moment. "The timing sounds good. I'll go straight to school on my way back." He opened the door. "I'll see you then." He gave me a peck on the forehead and started down the sidewalk. I heard him mutter, "Erectile dysfunction, my a.s.s."

Despite being full of good Italian food, my stomach rumbled and did a little flip.

Twenty-one.

After an eventful and exciting start to the day, I now had many hours of solitude facing me. I still wasn't completely comfortable on my own, but the last few weeks had been so action-packed that it hadn't seemed to matter. I had plenty of things going on and a lot to think about. Now, after spending the night (sort of) with Crawford and feeling those initial tinglings of hope that someone would be in my life again, I was back to square one-alone in my house with nothing to do. The relationship that seemed to be beginning was a little strange to me; he seemed perfect. What was the catch? After being with Ray for so long, I couldn't help but look for the catch. I had had a great-looking, smart husband, but he had a fatal flaw-he didn't really love me, and he liked to have s.e.x with other women. But I tried to push the thought of Crawford's potential fatal flaw from my mind and continued cleaning up the kitchen.

After I had put all the food away and tidied up the room, I went into the living room and lay down on the couch; I was still exhausted from the night before and the aching in my bones was getting more acute as the day wore on. I stretched out, putting my feet up on the pillows and blanket that Crawford had neatly folded and left at the end of the couch.

I put an arm behind my head and thought about Vince. If he didn't kill Kathy, what had him so spooked that he felt like he had to kidnap me? What was my connection to all of this besides the fact that my car was Kathy's final resting place? What was the feeling that I had about Vince that had gripped me at the funeral? Was his connection to the drug world the connection to the papers? None of it made sense to me.

I must have fallen asleep. About an hour into my snooze the phone rang, disturbing a very peaceful, dreamless nap. I jumped up from the couch and picked up the phone on the end table. I winced as I rolled over to get the phone and felt a sharp twinge in my shoulder, a painful reminder of what had happened the night before. It was Max. She started talking before I could even manage to get a "h.e.l.lo" out.

"So, I find myself with a free night, thanks to being stood up by my date. What are you doing tonight?" she asked. As usual, it sounded like she was doing a million other things while she was talking to me, the sound of drawers being opened and slammed shut in the background.

It took me a minute to focus and get my head around what she was asking. "I have no plans."

"Come into the City," she commanded. "I have reservations at n.o.bu and I'm not giving them up because some schmuck got Knicks tickets at the last minute and canceled on me." She paused for a second. "Good in bed or not."

"What time?" I asked, looking at the clock hanging in the dining room. It was four-thirty.

"Do you think you can get yourself together and into Manhattan by seven?" She paused for a moment. "You sound like you're sleeping."

"I was taking a nap. I had a rough night." I thought for a moment, trying to rid my mind of the many cobwebs encasing it. "I think I can make it by seven."

"Rough in a good way or rough in a bad way?" When I didn't respond, she kept going. "Never mind. I know you. You probably had one martini too many and have been spending the entire day chastising yourself for it."

"Not quite, Max."

"Then what?"

I recounted my story about being kidnapped by Vince and the subsequent car wreck but left out the part about Crawford. Nothing says "loser" than being in the same bed with an attractive man and just sleeping. I would never live it down. I continued with my story. "And then Ray, the philanderer, showed up." If I thought of him as part of a d.i.c.kens tale and gave him a stupid name, I could almost think about him without becoming nauseous.

"He's collecting stamps now?" she asked, completely serious.

It took me a minute before I figured out what she was talking about. "That's a philatelist, Max. A philanderer is someone who is unfaithful."

"Oh, right," she said, the light dawning. "What did he want?"

"To apologize. For being a jerk the other day." I recounted our phone conversation after he got out of jail. "I think we have finally reached detente."

Max has always been onto me and knew that there was more to the story. "What else? You're holding back."

"No, I'm not." I think I doth protest too much.

"Forget it," she said. "I'll get it out of you tonight. Seven o'clock. Don't be late." I thought she was done, but I heard her whisper, "I'm glad you're all right," before she hung up.

I got up and went up to my bedroom. I went through my closet and found a sleeveless black turtleneck sweater and a pair of black pants that could be ironed and made presentable. I would be walking to the train, so I dug out a pair of black boots with a heel that wasn't too high.

It took me about an hour to get my pants ironed, my hair combed, and my makeup on. After waking from the nap, it seemed like every muscle in my body had seized up; everything ached. I went downstairs and took the things that I needed out of my briefcase: my phone, wallet, keys, and train schedule. I almost knew the schedule by heart now, but since it was the weekend, it would be different and I wanted the schedule with me so that I didn't have to stand around Grand Central Station at midnight or later waiting for the last train out.

I went out the front door and down the walk. Jackson was at the end of his driveway with Trixie, his golden retriever, helping a young boy ride a bike. He looked up when Trixie pulled on the leash and attempted to come my way. He let go of the leash and the dog bounded over to me. She immediately planted her nose in my crotch, and I pushed her snout away, grabbing her leash so that I could return her to her owner.

I said h.e.l.lo to Jackson, handing him the end of the leash. I tried not to look as uncomfortable as I felt, now that I knew what Terri and Ray had been up to. Try as I might, I also couldn't come up with the kid's name. "Learning to ride a bike?" I said, leaving out any proper names.

"He's doing great, isn't he?" Jackson asked, looking at the child proudly as he did figure eights on his tricycle. "This is our nephew, Hayden. We're babysitting. Learning the ropes, so to speak, before taking the plunge ourselves," he said, giving me a little wink.

Holy multiple metaphors, Batman. "His parents better start saving for a Harley Davidson."

Jackson laughed. "Don't even say that." He continued watching the boy, a cute little blond who looked a lot like Jackson's wife, whom I now thought of as "that s.l.u.t Terri." Must be her side of the family, I thought. "Terri said that she saw you yesterday."

I nodded and immediately felt embarra.s.sment for both of us, the cuckolded spouses. "Yes."

"She told me about this whole business with Ray," he said, shaking his head. "Shame."

"It certainly is," I agreed, sure that she hadn't told him the "whole business"; she might have left out the part where they spent hours s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g.

"Terri always liked Ray a lot," he said, oozing pity for me as the poor wife. He crossed his arms over his chest.

"Hmmm," I said. More than you know, you pompous a.s.s.