Storm Season

“Apparently,” I said with too much sarcasm, “or I’d have some clue what the hell is going on. You said Trish is back. Exactly where is she?”

The pained expression returned to Bill’s face, but he raised his chin and looked me in the eye. “She’s living in our house.”

CHAPTER 3

“What?” I shook my head, thinking I’d heard wrong.

“I left her there until I could talk with you.”

“You left your ex-wife in our house?” I couldn’t believe it. The entire exchange sounded like the script for a bad soap opera. “Why?”

“Harvey dumped her for a younger model.”

“So she’s come running back to you?” Insecurity gripped me. Bill had loved Trish, she was the mother of his only child, and now she wasn’t just a distant memory three thousand miles away. She was right here in Pelican Bay.

In our house.

“She called late last night, hysterical,” he explained. “Not only did Harvey leave her for a younger woman, but he’d planned every detail of his escape before Trish had a hint that anything was wrong. The creep cleaned out their joint accounts and canceled her credit cards. The deed to their house was already in Harvey’s name only, and he demanded that she move out. What could I do? Trish had nowhere to go.”

“She has a daughter.”

Bill pushed his fingers through his hair and frowned. “Trish called Melanie, but Melanie sided with Harvey. Said if Trish had been a better wife, Harvey wouldn’t have left her. Trish asked Melanie if she could stay with her until she can get back on her feet, but Melanie told her that in her present emotional state, Trish would upset the children.”

Years ago, Bill and I had often discussed how Trish had spoiled Melanie, as if trying to make up to her daughter for the divorce. Now Melanie’s resulting self-centeredness was coming back to bite her mother.

“Trish was desperate, or she wouldn’t have called me,” Bill said. “And she is the mother of my only child. What else could I do?” he repeated.

He could have hung up on her, I thought, like I would have. But Bill was a better person than I’d ever be, another of the reasons I loved him so much.

“I wired her money for a plane ticket,” he continued, “picked her up at the Tampa Airport at noon and left her at the house until I could talk to you.”

“You could have taken her to a motel.”

“I tried, but Labor Day weekend’s coming up. Every decent motel or hotel in the area is booked solid.”

“How long do you intend for her to stay at our place?” I tried but couldn’t keep the hostility from my voice.

Bill rose from his chair, crossed the cabin, sat next to me, and took both my hands in his. “I love you, Margaret. Whatever there was between Trish and me is over and done. Dead. I’m not the same man I was all those years ago.”

But he’d loved Trish before, a nagging little voice in my head insisted. And if he’s around her long enough, he might love her again.

“If you don’t want her in our house,” he said, “say the word. I’ll find someplace else, even if I have to rent Abe Mackley’s guest room.”

Abe, now retired, had been a detective with us in Tampa. I doubted his wife wanted Trish around any more than I did.

“What’s your plan?” I knew Bill wouldn’t have brought Trish all the way across the country without some thought of what to do with her once she arrived.

“First, find her another place to stay. Our house is only temporary until she can locate an apartment. I’ll loan her some funds until she can get a job and pay me back.”

“What kind of job?” Breaking into the workforce at sixty was no easy feat.

“Trish was a secretary in a law firm before we married,” Bill said.

“Typewriters ruled in those days.” I shook my head. “She’ll need training, unless she’s already learned computer skills and the necessary programs.”

“Then she can sign up for courses at the Clearwater campus of St. Petersburg College.”

Knowing Bill, he’d pay for that, too. Here I was, figuratively rubbing my hands with glee over what-goes-around-comes-around, while he, the person Trish had hurt the most, was bending over backward to bail her out of deep doo-doo. I should have been ashamed.

But I wasn’t.

“It’s up to you, Margaret,” he said.

“Why me? She’s your ex-wife.”

“Because you’re the most important person in my life, and I won’t do anything that would hurt you or make you uncomfortable.”

Great. All I had to do was say the word. Bill would leave Trish to fend for herself, and I’d spend the rest of my days feeling like the world’s most selfish bitch.

I tried to shove emotion aside and let reason reign. What harm would it do to let Trish stay in our house a few days until she could find her own place? Bill and I hadn’t planned to move in for a few more weeks. And just because Trish had been heartless all those years ago didn’t mean I had to follow her example. If Bill could forgive her and show compassion, so could I.

“You’re right,” I said, feeling magnanimous. “We’d be cruel not to help her.”

He enveloped me in his arms, and his lips brushed my ear. “I knew you’d understand. You’re a good woman, and I’m a damned lucky man to have you. It’ll all work out, you’ll see.”

I wished I shared his optimism. I saw potential disaster no matter what decision I made, and I wouldn’t rest easy until the glamorous Trish was once again out of our lives and, preferably, at least three thousand miles away again.

Bill released me. “We’ll take Trish to dinner tonight to try to cheer her up.”

I stifled a groan. Talk about a rock and a hard place. I didn’t want to socialize with Bill’s ex, but I didn’t want him alone with her, either. I was mulling over which was the lesser of two evils when Bill’s cell phone rang.

He answered and handed it to me. “It’s Darcy.”

“I’ve got a hysterical woman on the other line,” Darcy said.

My first thought was that Trish had called the office.

“She says somebody’s trying to kill her,” Darcy added.

“Tell her to call 9-1-1.”

“I already did. She claims she’s talked to the police and there’s nothing they can do. She wants to talk to you.”

“Make her an appointment for first thing in the morning.”

“Tried that. She wants to see you now. Says she needs a bodyguard.” Darcy paused. “She’s either a total weirdo or really scared out of her mind, Maggie. I can’t tell which over the phone.”

“Give me her address,” I said with a sigh. One dilemma, at least, was solved. If I was interviewing Darcy’s caller, I wouldn’t have to go to dinner with Bill and Trish.

“Her name’s Kimberly Ross,” Darcy said, “and she lives in the penthouse at Sun and Sea condos on Sand Key.”

“Tell Ms. Ross I’m on my way.” I pushed End and gave Bill his phone and a summary of Darcy’s message. “I’ll have to pass on dinner. Can you take care of Roger? I don’t know how long this will take.”

“Of course.” He grasped my chin and tipped my face to look into my eyes. “You sure you’re okay with this Trish thing?”

“No,” I answered honestly, “and I need time to think about it. But the woman has to eat, so I have no objection to your taking her to dinner.”

Okay, so that second part wasn’t so honest, but with Trish back in the picture, the last thing I wanted was to come across as an insensitive jerk or rabidly jealous. I’d wait, assess the situation and then, if I thought Trish posed the slightest threat to our relationship, I’d scratch her gorgeous green eyes out.

“You’re the best, Margaret.” Bill kissed me to back up his words.

Leaving Roger with Bill and heading for my car, I could only hope, with Trish back in town, that I maintained that ranking.

GOING-HOME TRAFFIC was heavy on Edgewater Drive all the way through downtown Clearwater and across the arching bridge that led to the causeway and the beach. I crossed the causeway, navigated the roundabout and headed south on Gulf Boulevard. Beach real estate was in a state of flux. Where mom-and-pop motels and restaurants had once stood, land had been cleared for multistory luxury condos. In the coming years, families that now swarmed the area for a last fling before going back to school would find no affordable places to vacation. Only the rich and richer would be able to afford living on the beach. That famous white sugar sand might as well be gold dust.

I crossed the Clearwater Pass Bridge onto Sand Key and watched for the sign for Sun and Sea among the towers of condos on the Gulf side. I found the complex south of the Sheraton and turned into the drive. When I pulled up to the entrance, yellow crime scene tape flapped in the onshore breeze just inside the gate.

Although I’d never been here, the parking lot seemed vaguely familiar. Then recognition clicked.

No wonder the woman who’d called the office was scared. Sun and Sea had been the location of the shooting Darcy and I had seen reported on the noon news. I waited while the security guard buzzed Ms. Ross for permission to admit me, drove through after he opened the gate and searched for a parking place.

A Clearwater police cruiser was parked in front of the visitor spaces and a uniformed officer stood outside his car, leaning against the hood. I recognized Rudy Beaton, a former Pelican Bay cop, and rolled down my window.

“How about moving that heap of junk so a lady can park?” I called to him.

“Maggie? Is that you?” Beaton pushed away from his vehicle and approached mine.

“I’m here to call on a client,” I said. “Good to see you. How’s the job treating you?”

He grinned. “You know how it is. I’m counting the days till retirement.”

I jerked my thumb toward the yellow tape. “Did you respond to the shooting?”

Beaton shook his head. “That was before my shift. I’m here to keep an eye on the scene until CSU has finished up.”

I glanced around. “Looks like they’ve already left.”

He pointed to a hotel south of the condo. “They’re processing a room over there. Fifth floor.”

“That’s where the sniper fired from?”

“Doc Cline and Adler are working that theory,” Beaton said.

Doc Cline was the medical examiner. She and Adler must have calculated the trajectory of the bullet that killed the woman earlier today.

“Did the vic live here?” I asked.

Beaton shook his head. “She was from out of town, here to visit relatives for the weekend.”

I looked from the hotel window to the parking lot where the woman had died. “Guess that put a crimp in their holiday plans.”

“You ever see any of the guys from Pelican Bay…” he asked with a hint of nostalgia “…other than Adler and Darcy?”

“Not lately. Seems as if they’ve scattered to the four winds.” Political maneuvering under the guise of saving money had shut down the Pelican Bay Police Department earlier in the year and had left everyone from uniformed officers and detectives to support personnel scrambling for new jobs.

“Me, either. Except for Adler.” Beaton’s face reflected the sadness I felt over the breakup, like a family that had suffered through a nasty divorce. “I’ll move my cruiser,” he said, “so you can park.”

Rudy returned to his car, drove it away from the visitor parking and I pulled into a space.

Within minutes, I was exiting the condo’s elevator onto the penthouse floor, twenty stories above the narrow strip of beach that edged the Gulf of Mexico.

At my knock, a woman with frizzy blond hair, wide gray eyes, stylish gold-framed glasses and tear-splotched cheeks, opened the door.

“Thank God you’re here,” she said. “I’ve been going out of my mind.”

“You told my secretary someone’s trying to kill you?” I glanced past her into the spacious living area and saw no other occupants. “Is everything okay here?”

As a former cop, I’d made my share of calls to sort out domestic disputes, and I didn’t want to be surprised by a Mr. Kimberly Ross jumping out of the woodwork with blood in his eyes.

“No, everything isn’t okay.” Her voice shook with emotion. “The woman who was killed in the parking lot this morning wasn’t the real target. That was supposed to be me.”

CHAPTER 4

Kimberly Ross appeared to be in her early forties, but with her face puffy from crying, I couldn’t accurately judge. She wore designer jeans that revealed her tendency toward pudginess and a gauzy tunic top. Her feet were bare. If she’d applied makeup earlier, her tears had obliterated every trace. Her square jaw and wide brow gave her a somewhat masculine appearance and, under different circumstances, her face could have been pleasant, but fear contorted her features and rolled off her in palpable waves.

“I came as fast as I could,” I assured her in my most soothing tone, hoping to help the woman pull herself together before she lost it completely, because she was teetering on the edge of hysteria. “Why don’t you fill me in on the details?”

“Come in.” Kimberly stepped aside in the marble foyer for me to enter.

I followed her into the expansive living room with a soaring vaulted ceiling and was blown away by the view. Her condo filled the twentieth story, and floor-to-ceiling glass on both ends of the living area presented endless views of the Gulf on the west and a panorama of Clearwater Harbor on the east. The walls and plush carpet were pale lavender, the same tone as the modern upholstered furniture. Throw pillows in pastel pinks, yellows and blues and an oversize oil painting in matching hues above the pink marble fireplace were the only visual relief from the unrelenting lavender. I felt as if I had stepped into a gigantic Easter basket. The only things missing were fake grass and chocolate bunnies.

Kimberly waved me to a chair and curled into the corner of the sofa nearest me. My presence must have eased some of her fears, because she’d calmed somewhat, even though her hands still trembled. “Thank you for coming so quickly.”

I nodded. “You want to tell me what this is about?”

“Detective Adler recommended you.”

“You spoke with him?”

“I didn’t know about the murder in the parking lot until he knocked at my door. He said they were questioning everyone in the building, but I hadn’t seen or heard anything.”

“Did you know the victim?”

The muscles of her face flinched, and her lower lip quivered, threatening fresh tears. She nodded. “Sister Mary Theresa, such a sweet woman.”

“Somebody shot a nun?”

Kimberly nodded again and hooked strands of kinky hair behind her ears. “Her parents, Dennis and Eileen Moynihan, live on the second floor. Their daughter was here from Boston for her annual visit. Now they’ll be taking her back to Massachusetts to bury her.”

If Doc Cline and Adler’s theory was correct, the killer had waited in a hotel room next door for his victim. The shooting appeared planned, not random.

“Who’d want to kill a nun?” I asked.

“Nobody. They wanted to kill me, but poor Mary Theresa died instead.”

Hoping to nip her waterworks in the bud, I asked, “Why are you so certain you were the target?”

Kimberly took a deep, shuddering breath. “Mary Theresa and I look enough alike to be twins. Dennis and Eileen were struck by the resemblance the first time I met them when I moved in three years ago. In fact, they call me their other daughter and fuss over me as if we really are related. And, like you said, who’d want to kill a nun?”

“The better question, then, is who would want to kill you?”

She unfolded her legs from beneath her and stood. “Come with me.”

I followed her through the lavender and pastel haze to a set of frosted-glass double doors. She threw them open and motioned me inside the large but windowless room, illuminated by a huge skylight. A customized maple workstation curved around one corner and was topped by a computer, fax machine, printer, scanner and multiline telephone. Bulletin boards above the work area bristled with papers and notes of every size and color, held in place by pushpins. A set of ceiling-high shelves, crammed with books, filled the opposite wall, and tall file cabinets flanked both sides of the workstation.

I was the detective, but I didn’t have a clue. “Someone wants to kill you because you work at home?”

Kimberly brushed past me, picked up a newspaper clipping from the desktop and handed it to me. It was the latest copy of “Ask Wynona Wisdom,” a syndicated advice column that ran in newspapers all over the country. More than simply advice to the lovelorn, the column fielded questions on every aspect of life, from decorating and pet problems to etiquette and family relationships. Wynona Wisdom was an expert on everything, and the reading public had devoured her opinions for more than fifteen years. I’d felt moved on several occasions to write to her concerning my overbearing mother but, so far, had resisted the temptation. A few words on a page couldn’t do justice to the complexity of my maternal parent, a travel agent for guilt trips.

I glanced at the column again, and Wynona’s picture, a thumb-sized cut, stared back at me.

“That’s you,” I said.

“I’m Wynona,” she admitted. “And along with hundreds of letters every day asking for advice, I also receive death threats. I bet Sister Mary Theresa never had a death threat. Hell, she probably never had anyone raise a voice to her. So which one of us do you think is the likeliest candidate to be murdered?”

The woman had a point. “Did you explain all this to Detective Adler?”

Kimberly nodded. “And I told him I needed round-the-clock protection. That’s when he suggested I call you. As soon as the media get hold of Mary Theresa’s identity, the killer will know he missed his target and will come back after me.”

She left her office, closed the doors, and I followed her into the living room. By now the sun was dipping lower in the west, casting blinding light straight through the penthouse. Kimberly pressed a remote control on the table beside the sofa, and sheer lavender draperies swished closed against the glare.

I returned to my chair. “You can’t rule out completely that the nun was the target. Or that the killing was random. Remember the snipers in the Maryland area a few years back? Or, more recently, in Phoenix? They didn’t know their victims. They just shot whoever was handy for the sheer terror it caused.”

“I know.” Kimberly plopped onto the sofa. “But while the police are sorting this out, I don’t want to take a chance.”

“Understood,” I said. “Our firm can arrange to have someone with you 24-7.”

With other clients, I would have mentioned how costly that level of protection would be, but judging from Kimberly’s lucrative profession and lavish penthouse, I figured she could afford it.

“Starting now?” she asked.

“Starting now. Can I use your phone?”

She pointed toward her office. “It’s in there.”

FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER after completing my calls, I found Kimberly in the kitchen.

“You hungry?” she asked.

“Sure.”

Mainly I was being sociable. Thinking about Bill and Trish heading out to dinner together right about now had taken the edge off my appetite. I only hoped he wasn’t planning on sitting with his ex-wife in our special booth at the Dock of the Bay. It was bad enough that the woman was living in our house.

I’d called Darcy and asked her to go by my condo and pack me a bag. She had a key for emergencies such as this and, happy to log in the overtime, would deliver the clothes and toiletries I’d requested to the penthouse later. I’d also instructed her to tell Bill where I was and that I’d be here overnight. I could have called Bill myself but hadn’t wanted to interrupt his dinner plans with Trish. Call me crazy, but I’d rather not know where they were and what they were doing.

I climbed onto a high stool at the breakfast bar and watched Kimberly remove food from the refrigerator and pantry. She piled cold cuts onto thick slices of bread, smeared them with mayonnaise, heaped the plates high with chips and pickles and opened a bag of chocolate chip cookies and another of oatmeal-raisin.

She set one of the gargantuan sandwiches and potato chip mountains in front of me. “Iced tea or soda?”

“Diet Coke or water’s fine.”

She must have seen me eyeing the feast that would have fed four linebackers.

“When I’m anxious, I eat,” she explained.

“I’d be the same way, but there’s usually no food in my house. I hate to shop.”

She sat across the bar from me and dug into her sandwich. If how much she consumed was a true sign of anxiety, Kimberly was almost ready for the psych ward. Between bites, she asked, “Do you carry a gun?”

I nodded.

“Where is it?”

“In the holster at the back of my waist. Don’t worry. I can reach it in a hurry if I need it. But you have three levels of protection before anyone can get to me: the security officer at the gate, the private elevator that needs your personal code to activate it and the double deadlocks on your front doors. Unless some guy swoops onto your balcony from a helicopter, I won’t be needing my weapon.”

Her faced paled. She set her sandwich down and gazed toward the windows, covered with lavender fabric, as if she expected an assassin to crash through the glass sliders at any moment.

“Relax,” I said. “Helicopter assaults happen only in the movies. Unless Bruce Willis or Steven Seagal is your hit man, you’re perfectly safe.”

I couldn’t tell if my witty assurances made her feel more secure, since she returned to eating with renewed gusto.

I slid off the bar stool.

“Where are you going?” she asked in a panic. “You’re not leaving?”

“I’m checking the locks.”

I’d already stated how unlikely an attack was at twenty stories up, but she’d hired me for protection, so I went through the motions, if for no other reason than to make her feel better. After securing every glass slider and double-checking the dead bolts on the double front doors, I returned to the breakfast bar and my sandwich.

I didn’t mention that, if her assailant had formerly served in special forces, twenty stories would be no deterrent, but how many SEALs, recon Marines or Army rangers had time to read “Ask Wynona Wisdom,” much less work themselves into a killing lather over her advice?

My sweep of the room apparently reassured Kimberly, because she visibly relaxed. The only residual sign of anxiety was the rapidly disappearing cache of cookies.

She finished off an oatmeal-raisin in two bites. “I’ve never met a private eye before. Your job must be exciting.”

“It’s mostly paperwork. Background checks, tracking down lost relatives.” After finally calming her down, I didn’t want to ruin the result by sharing some of my more harrowing cases.

“Was this job, being an investigator, something you always wanted to do?”

At the rate she was paying me, talk wasn’t cheap, but if conversation kept her mind off her worries, I’d humor her. “I started out as a librarian.”

“Really? Why the major shift in careers?”

The passing years had eased the pain to a dull ache, so I could talk about Greg without feeling as if someone had ripped out my heart. “After I graduated from college and started working at the library, my fiancé, a doctor, was killed in the E.R. by a crack addict.”

“How awful.” My story momentarily distracted Kimberly from the cookies.

I nodded. “I was so angry about such a senseless waste, I had to do something, so I quit my library job and entered the police academy.”

“You were a cop?”

“For over twenty-three years. Detective Adler was my last partner before I retired from the Pelican Bay Department. Then Bill Malcolm and I opened our agency earlier this year. What about you?”

“Me?”

“How did you become Wynona Wisdom?”

She made a face, as if the memories were unpleasant. “I got my PhD in psychology and opened my own counseling practice. But I couldn’t stand the continual misery, day after day of listening to people pour out their problems. Guess you and I are alike in that sense. People don’t come to counselors or cops unless they’re in trouble.”