RoxannesPirate Page 17

  “Go on.”

  “I heard voices. Men. They seemed to be searching the rooms. They opened the closet door. I hid behind golf clubs. They didn’t see me. One said, ‘All clear.’

  “I was terrified. I huddled in that closet and waited for them to go away. I thought it had something to do about a drug deal. I heard Spencer’s voice.” She put her hands over her eyes and let out a soft moan. She was silent for a moment. She dropped her hands; her eyes open once more and fixed on the ceiling.

  Roxanne reached for one of Elspeth’s hands and held it.

  “I heard Spencer yelling. I couldn’t understand most of what he was saying, but I heard him say he had done everything he had been asked to do. I heard him say, ‘What more do you want from me, John?’ I heard him crying. Pleading. Begging this John to help him. And I heard a man laugh.”

  Roxanne shuddered. She could hear Murkley laugh, delighting in the ruin he’d made of Spencer Marshall.

  “I didn’t dare move. Then it sounded like Spencer was pacing up and down, talking. He was telling the story of everything that had happened. I didn’t know who he was talking to. For a few seconds I thought he knew I was there and he wanted me to know. He said Rivera had started it. He’d promised Spencer that Murkley could help him. Spencer paid lots of money to get the approvals he needed. Bribes. Blackmail. Extortion. He didn’t know what Murkley would do but it would be done. Rivera promised. Murkley promised. Spencer would have his fabulous resort. And Murkley gave him drugs. When Spencer’s money dried up, Murkley’s company gave him money as loans and Spencer took that money and paid Murkley. It was drug money. Spencer knew that. ”

  “Money laundering.”

  “Then Spencer started singing. He had a deep voice. He sang in an acapella group in college. That’s where the money’s gone. He sang that over and over. It’s gone to Murkley. All gone. I wanted him to stop. I put my hands over my ears and prayed he would stop. And then he did. I stayed in that closet until I couldn’t hear anything move. Nothing but my own breathing. It might have been hours. I don’t know. When I came out, Spencer was lying on the floor.”

  Roxanne’s mouth was dry. “Was he alive?”

  “I don’t know. He wasn’t moving. There was yellowish foam around his mouth. He had a pen in his hand.” A sharp intake of breath. “I ran out the door. I got in my car and drove to the airport and took the first flight home. The next day, I heard he’d died.”

  “Elspeth…”

  “Don’t tell me I should have done something, called someone. I was terrified. Now every night he comes to me in my dreams. I thought it might stop if I told Carlos. I made the chart. I flew to New York and mailed it. I thought Carlos might suspect that I sent it, but he didn’t call me.”

  “I’m sorry,” Roxanne said. “I’m sorry you had to go through this awful ordeal. I know what it’s like to be haunted by ghosts.”

  Elspeth grabbed Roxanne’s hands. Her eyes seemed to glow. “You tell Carlos what I said.”

  “I will. I promise. But it would be better for you to go to the police. This is a criminal case.”

  “I can’t do that!” Elspeth pulled away from Roxanne. “I won’t do that. Tell Carlos to get this man. Tell him to make him pay.”

  “I really don’t think Carlos is in a position to…”

  “Tell him! He’s the only one!”

  Elspeth stood. She wobbled. “I have to go. I have a plane to catch.”

  “It isn’t good to keep secrets. It will eat you alive. You have to tell.”

  “I have told! I told you!”

  “That’s not…”

  “That’s all I can do!” Elspeth’s eyes seemed to bulge from her head.

  Roxanne let out a breath. She would not push any further. She followed Elspeth back to the chairs they’d vacated. She was shocked when Elspeth picked up the glass of wine from the table and took a drink.

  Roxanne took the glass from her hand. “Don’t.”

  “I need to go to my gate. It’s time for me to go home.”

  “I’ll walk with you.”

  “No.” Elspeth shrank from Roxanne’s reach. “I’ll be fine.” She picked up her handbag and the handle of her carryon. “You tell him.”

  Elspeth’s walk was unsteady, but she made it to her gate without collapsing, Roxanne following at a slight distance. Elspeth did not acknowledge her, but when she took a seat near her gate, she turned slightly and her glance met Roxanne’s. Elspeth picked up a magazine and held it to her face. Even from a distance, Roxanne could see that Elspeth held the magazine upside down.

  It was almost nine o’clock at night when Roxanne finally made it home. There was a foot of snow on the ground. She was shivering as she opened her condo door. The air had a stale, unused odor. She unpacked her bag. She buried her nose in Carlos’ shirt. His scent, so strong that morning in Miami, was faint in this cold New Jersey night. She tucked it under her pillow. The tissue with his hair she put in her nightstand.

  She had sent him a text from the Miami airport telling him about her flight delay and another when she arrived in Newark. She had not told him about Elspeth. She could not leave that news in a voice mail or email. She sent him another text now. Home. Miss you. Call me.

  She opened her laptop and the document file she’d created. She had typed up her recollection of her conversation with Elspeth. She read it over again. Her initial pity for Elspeth had mutated into something close to disgust. Spencer might have been alive when Elspeth found him on the floor. Could Elspeth have saved his life? All she had to do was call an ambulance. What would Carlos think of Elspeth when he heard how she’d left Spencer lying there alone?

  Roxanne shut the laptop and for a moment leaned her forehead on the plastic case. Another thought grew in her mind, one that made her feel as if she had a sharp chunk of ice in her belly. If Roxanne had done what her father had asked her to do years ago, Spencer Marshall would never have met John Murkley. Wasn’t it partly Roxanne’s fault Spencer was dead? If Roxanne felt disgust for Elspeth’s behavior, what should she feel about her own?

  Chapter Eighteen

  Roxanne was bone-tired when she went to bed Monday night. She expected to have trouble sleeping, but when her alarm sounded Tuesday morning, she woke from a deep and apparently dreamless sleep. As soon as she stretched and yawned, a tight band of anxiety knotted around her chest. She reached for her BlackBerry. There were no messages from Carlos.

  She dressed for work in a black cashmere turtleneck sweater and a gray wool skirt. She added tights and black leather boots and a long pink scarf she looped around her neck. The temperature outside was a frigid twenty degrees. She shivered in her wool coat, glad for the heated seat in her car.

  The morning light reflected off the bright snow and lit the sky to a brilliant blue. The traffic moved along smoothly. Roxanne found a parking space near the entrance to her office building. There was a short line for coffee in the first floor cafeteria and a basket filled with Roxanne’s favorite oatmeal muffins. The muffins were warm. All signs indicated it was going to be a good day. There was nothing to worry about. Carlos was going to call her soon and she would tell him about Elspeth. He would go with her to the police and they would bring John Murkley to justice.

  Roxanne she sat at her desk and reviewed the documents she had drafted for the Bigelow Foundation. She had everything in order. She wrote a memorandum explaining what she had done and sent the memo with the attached documents to Ariadne and Cecily Bigelow. There was a knock on her office door.

  “Got a minute?” Annelise Brown, her supervisor, stood in the doorway.

  “Sure.” For a moment, Roxanne was afraid that Annelise was going to ask her about her long weekend in Florida. Roxanne was not prepared to tell Annelise that she’d been with the man who had so infamously done her wrong.

  “Have you heard the news? The firm just got hit with a sexual harassment suit filed by three paralegals in the litigation department in the Manhattan office. Guess who’s the big
bad wolf.”

  Roxanne had no doubts. “Bardon Collins?”

  “Bingo!” Annelise grinned. “He is in such deep shit. Seems the paralegals he brought with him to Las Vegas felt pressured to do more than review documents for him. Couldn’t happen to a more deserving guy. Did I ever tell you about the time he tried to corner me in the library? He actually said to me, ‘Let me show you my motion, baby.’”

  For the remainder of the morning Roxanne was pulled into offices and cubicles and asked to pass judgment on Bardon and the firm’s strategy for handling this potentially damaging lawsuit. Many of the female attorneys and support staff had Bardon stories to tell, if not one they knew firsthand, one they’d heard from former employees. Roxzanne’s initial amusement at Bardon’s plight faded. She avoided going out to lunch with Annelise and some of the other attorneys for what she knew would be a “bash Bardon” fest. It was not because she was sympathetic to the guy, but all the talk about him had stirred questions in her mind the way a strong breeze stirred up autumn leaves. Did Bardon know about Rivera’s connection to John Murkley? Was it possible Bardon had a connection to Murkley? Did Bardon know about Murkley’s money laundering schemes?

  You’re suffering from paranoid delusions. To bring some order to her messy thoughts, Roxanne opted for lunch at her desk. She bought a container of vegetable soup and a roll from the cafeteria. While she ate, she caught up on her personal emails. She sent a message to her mother that she had put the ceremony honoring her father on her calendar but could not promise to attend as work had her very busy. She did not want to provoke her mother or her brothers by an outright refusal to attend. She sent an email to her friend Jill Blake confirming their date and got back an immediate reply. Jill was abjectly apologetic, but she’d forgotten that she had a doctor’s appointment. Could Roxanne make it next Tuesday? And was it true that Bardon Collins was being sued?

  She exchanged several more emails with Jill and told Jill all she knew about the suit. Jill added a postscript to her last message. BTW Evan told me to tell you to dump Sexy Man and go back to Paul. Forgive him. He’s a very loyal friend but he doesn’t understand romance. How are things with Sexy Man?

  Roxanne told Jill things were fine. She and Jill finalized their plans for lunch.

  The Bardon chatter continued after lunch. Roxanne ignored it and drafted a trust plan for a new client. She scrolled through her recently opened documents on her laptop and clicked on a trust document but accidentally clicked on the memo she’d written about her conversation with Elspeth. For the hundredth time, Roxanne wondered if Spencer had been alive when Elspeth fled. And there was another question bothering her—if Elspeth had not called the police, who had notified them about Spencer’s death? On impulse, Roxanne searched the web. One article reported that the police had come to Spencer’s apartment as the result of a phone call, but there were no details provided. She found another newspaper article stating that the medical examiner had released a report on Spencer’s death, ascribing it to a heroin overdose and noting traces of heroin in the deceased’s urine.

  She stared at the photographs of Spencer Marshall that accompanied the article. How sad, Roxanne thought, looking at his handsome, smiling face. This man who had been so fleetingly beautiful to Elspeth Perry had met such a pathetic end. Her cell phone rang and she answered it, her eyes still fixed on Spencer’s face.

  “Hello, Roxanne,” Carlos said.

  She gasped.

  “You make such wonderful noises.” He chuckled. “I’ll be at your house at seven. I hope you’ll be able to join me. I have a present for you.”

  “Where are you?”

  “On my way to you.”

  “Oh Carlos!”

  “Are you pleased?” His voice was husky.

  “Yes! Very surprised and very pleased.”

  She started to ask a question, but he had hung up.

  * * * * *

  At a few minutes after seven, Roxanne’s doorbell rang. She hurried to the door. Carlos stood outside, wearing a black cashmere coat and a crimson cashmere scarf. He carried a large black gift bag in one gloved hand.

  “I’m so glad to see you,” she said, and stood on tiptoe to kiss him.

  He dropped the bag and crushed her against his body. He filled her mouth with his tongue and his own intoxicating flavor.

  “I’ve missed you,” he said. He drew the scarf from his neck. “One night away from you and I ache for you as though it’s been weeks.”

  He kissed her again. She felt his hunger, his need, and her body arched against him in response, but she thought of Spencer and Elspeth and pulled back. “I’ve missed you too.” She brushed his hair from his face.

  “You’ve missed me, but…” His dark eyes narrowed slightly. “What is it?”

  “We have to talk about something.” She reached for his hands and brought them to her face. They were cold.

  “Can’t it wait?”

  She shook her head.

  He sighed.

  “If we have to talk now, I’d like a drink. It’s been a long day.”

  She smiled. “You know where to find what you want.”

  She took his coat and hung it in her closet. From the kitchen she heard ice clinking in a glass. He had filled two glasses with scotch. He handed her one.

  “Cheers,” he said, and clinked his glass against hers.

  Roxanne took a deep breath. “I saw Elspeth Perry in the Miami Airport. She’d been drinking. She was distraught about Spencer Marshall’s death. She loved him.”

  He snorted. “Spare us from love like that.”

  “She told me about Spencer’s death.”

  He was suddenly more alert.

  “She was there. She heard what happened. I typed up what she told me.”

  His face was composed but there was a slight movement in his cheek muscles.

  He followed her into her living room. She pulled her laptop from her briefcase and set it on the round table. She found the document she’d created and opened it. Carlos pulled a chair away from the table and sat down. She put the open laptop in front of him.

  She watched his face as he read. He rested his left elbow on the table and stroked two fingers across his forehead. His forefinger stroked his moustache then. His jaw clenched. He shook his head. He sat up, shut the laptop and pushed it away. He reached for his glass and took a drink.

  Roxanne realized she’d been holding her breath. She exhaled. “What are you going to do?” she asked.

  “Do? What is there for me to do?”

  “Go to the police or the FBI. Take this to Evan Blake and tell him what you know about John Murkley and Spencer.”

  “You think Elspeth Perry is going to be the prosecution’s star witness?” He shook his head and scowled. “She made it clear she won’t risk her marriage to help catch Spencer’s killer. Even if she were willing to come forward, she’ll make a lousy witness. She didn’t see Murkley, she’s only heard this rambling story from Spencer. She’s hardly a stable person. What kind of woman leaves her lover on the floor to die? What kind of woman doesn’t even stop to call an ambulance?” His voice was shaking. He took a gulp of whiskey as if to deaden his pain. “A good defense lawyer would destroy her in a second.”

  “We can’t worry about a trial. There must be others who would testify against Murkley once you get the police or the FBI to start an investigation.” How could she convince him that he had to take action? “You can’t ignore this, Carlos!” Her voice was shrill.

  He pushed his chair back and stood. “Spencer was my friend. It pains me beyond telling to read about his death. It pains me to read about Elspeth’s betrayal. But why does getting Murkley matter to you?”

  “I know John Murkley. My father did business with him.”

  Carlos’ eyes widened.

  “Surprised?” Her voice was tight. “I can understand, given my father’s golden reputation.” She turned her head from him and looked at the window. The seemingly black glass reflected her pale
face, but she focused beyond this reflection to the white snow illuminated by a streetlamp.

  “I found out about him the summer after my second year of law school. I was a summer associate at a Newark law firm. On day there was a bomb scare in the building. I was sent home early. My boyfriend picked me up and took me home. I knew my parents’ house would be empty. My mother was a hospital administrator. My father would be at the courthouse.” She glanced at Carlos. He was watching her. “My parents couldn’t stand my boyfriend. He had an earring and a motorcycle and was a musician. We lived at the crest of a hill. Halfway up the hill to the house, his motorcycle broke down. He told me to leave him alone so he could fix it. I walked home. I was wondering if I should break up with him. If maybe my parents were right about him after all.”

  She turned back to the window. Though her eyes registered the dark glass and the white snow, her mind saw her parents’ yard as it looked that summer day. “I realized I didn’t have my key. I went around the back of the house. My parents kept a spare key under a flowerpot. I heard voices. My father’s and another voice I didn’t know. My father’s study had French doors that opened to a patio so he could work in his study and see and smell his roses. The roses were in full bloom that day. My father’s study doors were open. I could see him and his guest inside.”

  Roxanne touched the window glass with the tip of her finger. It was cold. She laid her palm against the cold glass. “I knew something was wrong. And then I heard the words the stranger was saying. He was telling my father that my father had every reason to benefit from his line of work. Why shouldn’t my father make a little something extra? I waited for my father to laugh. I waited for him to send this man away. But he didn’t. The man kept talking. Telling my father that he expected a good return for his investment. He had a smooth voice.”