Another Word for Murder Read online

  “Seven Mercedes, twelve BMWs, two Porsches, and a Bentley.”

  “Yeah, well, you can forget about any chop-shops, bucko. The boys and girls in robbery say wheels like those go straight out of the country. The crooks probably drove them right onto a boat at pier six and were in Argentina before the owners finished their limoncellos and cappuccinos.”

  Rosco shrugged. “Maybe. But I’ve checked around; there seems to be a strong market for BMW and Mercedes parts, especially down in Connecticut.”

  The pair came to a stop in front of the green sedan. Rosco nodded in recognition. “My mom has a Subaru,” he said.

  Lever placed his foot on the bumper and lit another cigarette. “They’re good cars…. All-wheel drive. Great in snow and ice. Good gas mileage. You can’t go wrong with a Subaru.”

  “My mom has one.”

  “What? Just because your mother drives a Subaru, that means you can’t?”

  “What does your mother drive?”

  “That’s not the point. We’re not talking about my mother, we’re trying to get you a decent set of wheels.”

  “What’s she drive?”

  “A Cadillac, okay?”

  “And what do you drive?”

  “That’s not the point. I just don’t happen to like Cadillacs. It has nothing to to with the fact that my mother drives one. I’m not that immature, Poly—Crates.”

  “Uh-huh.” Rosco walked to the rear of the Subaru, and Lever followed. “Nope. Looks too much like my mom’s car.”

  “Okay, fine, no Subarus for Mrs. Poly—Crates’s little boy.”

  They walked by two pickup trucks, and came to a dark blue Audi coupe. The bright sky reflected brilliantly in the freshly waxed hood, fenders, and roof. It appeared to be brand new.

  “This is it,” Lever said. “Look at this baby. Can’t you see yourself cruising around Newcastle in this? I mean, is this class, or what? And with an Audi you get your all-wheel drive, too. You’re set for winter.” He looked at the sticker. “Look at this—less than three thousand miles…. This is your car, Poly—Crates. This is you.”

  Rosco shook his head. “My sister Zoe drives an Audi.”

  “Why do I even bother talking to you?”

  CHAPTER 3

  Dan Tacete pulled into his driveway that evening at six forty-five. The slow-sinking sun bathed his spacious home in a rosy glow, giving its many west-facing windows such a pink and vivid hue they looked like hammered sheets of gold and copper. Dan paid no heed to this spectacular sight.

  Instead, he sat staring numbly through the windshield, his hands clenching the steering wheel, and his square, all-American jaw worried and tight. His neatly trimmed mustache stood out from his upper lip like a wire brush. By rights, what was worrying him should never have been happening. After all, he told himself, he was driving his least conspicuous car, the two-year-old white Ford Explorer that he kept precisely for the kind of work he did every Tuesday afternoon: the pro bono examinations, routine fillings, and other general dental care he provided for the Bay Clinic located a few blocks from the St. Augustine Mission for Men.

  Despite every attempt at being low-key, despite the nondescript wardrobe, his customary Rolex and Guccis replaced with an inexpensive black plastic sports watch and running shoes, Dan had the sensation that someone had tried to follow him home. Several times, he’d noticed a gray Toyota four-door sedan in his rear-view mirror. It was an old car with numerous dents on the side doors, and it was not the type of vehicle ordinarily spotted in a tony place like Halcyon Estates. The fact that the driver’s route coincided with his own was both odd and profoundly disquieting.

  Before removing the key from the Explorer’s ignition, Dan glanced into the rear-view mirror one last time. But his search revealed only the familiar: a semicircular drive opening into a tree-lined cul-de-sac. Every car in his sight-line was one he recognized as belonging to a neighbor or a neighbor’s live-in household help; and all were parked and empty. Then he turned in the seat to survey the rest of the street, his broad, athlete’s shoulders and frame fought against the shoulder harness until he impatiently stabbed at the clasp and released it.

  There was no inkling of suspicious activity on any side. In fact, the road and sidewalks were remarkably devoid of people. No kids tossing frisbees, no skateboards, none of the other dads arriving home from work. But then it was six forty-five on a weekday. Everyone would have been inside enjoying their supper. By seven thirty or eight, the kids would be back outdoors—especially on a warm evening like this.

  Dan opened the Explorer’s door, stepped out, then beeped the car’s automatic lock as he began walking toward the house. He turned once to look behind him, but the scene remained almost eerily empty.

  “Karen? Lily-bet?” he called the moment he stepped in. “Where’s my baby girl?” He shut and locked the door behind him and threw the dead bolt; something he only did the last thing at night.

  Bear and Lily hurtled toward him, both canine and child making as much noise as possible. The foyer’s marble tiles echoed and pinged while the cathedral ceiling heightened rather than lessened the sound. “Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!” Lily screamed. Bear barked and jumped up on Dan, and the dog’s weight and forward momentum nearly knocked him over.

  “Down! Bad dog. Get down, Bear!” he said. His tone was far more forceful than was necessary; the stress of a long day coloring each of his words.

  Watching the dog suddenly sink into an unhappy crouch, Lily began to cry.

  “Tough day?” Karen appeared from the living room. She was wearing an apron; in her hand was a wooden stirring spoon coated with chocolate icing. She gazed lovingly at Lily. “And, did someone here forget to eat the chocolate frosting she was helping me put on the cake?” Mother bent down to daughter, who continued to weep. Lily made no further move toward her father.

  “Daddy’s cross … cross words.”

  “He’s not cross with you, sweetheart. He’s trying to teach Bear not to jump. Bear’s too big a fellow to be jumping on people. If that had been you … well, your daddy and I don’t want to see you get hurt, now, do we?”

  But Lily would not be consoled. Instead, she eyed Dan with a child’s pout while Karen cocked her head and gave her husband a complicitous glance.

  “Someone’s a little T-I-R-E-D,” she spelled out. “I’ll get her to bed and then you and I can have a leisurely, grown-up dinner. I’m experimenting with a new veal recipe.”

  “Sounds wonderful …” Dan paused, then squatted down to Lily’s level.

  “Daddy’s sorry, baby. He’s not mad a you—”

  “Bear’s a good bear,” Lily insisted.

  “He’s a good bear when he doesn’t jump. Mommy and I don’t want him knocking you down … or your friends.”

  Lily sniffled once, but made no further reply.

  “You get ready for bed, and then Daddy will come in and read you a story, okay?”

  “Okay,” Lily said, but the sound was still hesitant. Then she took her mother’s hand and began trundling up the wide circular staircase that served as the foyer’s focal point. As they reached the second step, Dan called to his wife.

  “Karen …?”

  His wife turned; the difference in their physical stature made her eye level only slightly higher than Dan’s. “Mm hm?”

  “You haven’t … you haven’t noticed anything odd, have you? I mean, no one’s tried to follow you home or anything? Tried to approach you?”

  Karen smiled. “Mothers with four-year-olds don’t usually impress the guys-trying-to-make-a-pass-at-pretty-ladies crowd.”

  “I don’t mean men coming on to you …”

  Karen looked at her husband. Her amused expression began to fade. “Why do you ask?”

  “It felt like someone was following me when I left the clinic…. It could have been a coincidence, I know, but … well, there are some weird people out there … and we … we don’t live in a house or community that’s exactly low-profile.”

/>   Karen didn’t respond. It wasn’t just the house, she thought, but the number and caliber of the cars Dan owned that gave away their wealth; three in the garage and three more left to rest resplendently on the drive.

  “I don’t know what I’m saying, Karen…. I guess, just be careful, that’s all.”

  “I always am, Dan.”

  “With Lily, too …”

  “She’s my daughter, Dan. Of course, I’m going to be careful with her.”

  “That’s not what I meant.” He drew in a long and heavy breath. “You’re right. I am tired, and I’m probably overreacting…. Working at the clinic isn’t easy. The equipment’s less than adequate … and heck, the guys themselves are no walk in the park.”

  “You don’t have to do it, Dan. Jack doesn’t bother to donate any of his time—”

  “Don’t get me started. If Jack Wagner had his way, none of my indigent cases would ever walk through the doors of our practice, no matter how much they needed the services I provide at the Bay Clinic. Unless, of course, Jacko could figure out a way to bilk the system … sign ’em up for implants and make the government pay. He can’t wait for the day Medicare gets a dental clause.”

  Karen kept silent.

  “I’m sorry, hon, I didn’t mean to go off on a tirade. Lily’s right. ‘Cross words.’” He smiled at his wife and daughter. “Look, I’ll grab a quick shower. You get her nibs tucked in, and then—”

  But Karen interrupted, her pretty face serious and searching. “Look … Dan … if you think someone was really following you … maybe you should do something about it. Tell the police.”

  “The cops? I can’t call the cops. What would I tell them? ‘It felt like I was being tailed?’ I can only guess what they’d say to that. Somehow I think the words ‘too much money and Gen-X paranoia’ would be the first ones out of their mouths.”

  “Okay … how about a private detective …? Someone you hire to—”

  “We don’t need a bodyguard, honey. Besides, private eyes are all a bunch of sleazy characters—”

  “Rosco isn’t.”

  “Who on earth is that?”

  But the question was overruled by Lily’s shrill “Rock and Cookie and the park.”

  “Are those names of dogs or people?” Dan asked with a forced chuckle.

  “You know ‘Cookie’ as Belle Graham—well, you don’t really know her since you two haven’t met yet. ‘Rock’ is her husband, Rosco Polycrates. He’s a private investigator, and from what people in the dog park say, he sounds like a pretty good one.”

  Dan shook his head. “I don’t know, Karen…. I don’t want to get into a ‘fortress’ mentality. I probably just imagined that someone was following me…. ” He bent down to his daughter’s height. “Okay, Lily-white, you let Mommy help you take a bath and get in your p.j.’s and then we’ll read a story.”

  “The one about the elephants with the funny ears.” Lily was finally smiling.

  “Whatever you want.”

  As mother and daughter proceeded up the stairs, the phone rang.

  “That’s probably my altruistic partner right now, calling to see how many gold fillings I gave away today.” Dan walked into the living room.

  “Hello?” Karen heard him say, “Hello? Hello? Who is this?” She then heard the angry sound of the receiver being slammed down into its base.

  CHAPTER 4

  “Okay …,” Belle muttered to herself as she hunched over her desk, a sheet of graph paper spread before her, a pencil poised in her fingers, and a plethora of research books including her beloved Oxford English Dictionary, the O.E.D., lying within her reach. The other hand held a licorice whip, which she nibbled at distractedly—licorice being one of her major food groups and the other being deviled eggs laced with capers. At the moment though, Belle was far too deep in thought to take much notice of what she was eating. “A plant theme for spring …”

  She blocked HOLLY into the crossword’s Down line, then stared at it. “And the clue could be either Actress Hunter or —— Golightly…. And then there’s MAGNOLIAS, which can cross the ‘L’ in HOLLY, and the clue can be Steel——, meaning that I can reference the clue with another that might be a shrub with BLUE flowers…. Maybe a hydrangea …?”

  Hoping for inspiration from her garden, Belle looked up and out the windows of her home office, a converted rear porch whose decor positively shouted crossword: the wood floor painted in bold black-and-white squares, curtains hand-blocked with giant puzzle grids and clues, ditto lamp shades, and a pair of captain’s chairs with mix-and-match black-and-white canvas covers, as well as numerous ceramic plates and bowls displaying the tell-tale design. Any visitor not addicted to crosswords would have decided the person who’d chosen this singular theme was loony, indeed. Belle, however, loved it. “I guess I’m just a black-and-white person,” she liked to joke. “Gray areas aren’t high on my list—unless it’s the stuff that makes brains tick.”

  She rose, walked to the open rear door, and gazed at the serene morning scene, at the birds hopping in and out of the trees, or taking quick flight skyward while the occasional seagull lofted raucously overhead. Hearing Belle move from her desk brought both dogs to her side in a trice. “It’s not even ten o’clock yet, girls,” she said with a smile. “You know you don’t have another walk till noon.” But Kit and Gabby heard the ambivalence of the tone and remained expectantly close with their faces staring through the screen door at the patch of greenery that spread behind the old house on Newcastle’s historic Captain’s Walk.

  Belle laughed. “How am I going to finish this puzzle and then get back to editing the submissions for next year’s crossword collection if we play hooky?”

  Neither animal stirred.

  “On the other hand, maybe doing some yard work will prove inspirational…. Perhaps my puzzle could involve a riff on plants and the emotional qualities connected with them: pure as a lily, sweet as a rose … and ‘daisy,’ which, as we all know, is an old slang term for something that’s positively ‘peachy.’ What do you think, girls?”

  The “girls” said nothing, of course, but Gabby, the younger, smaller, and more terrier determined, quivered while her wet, black nose sniffed the air with rabbitlike intensity.

  “Okay, okay …,” Belle chuckled. “I can take a hint.” She pushed open the screen door; and the three, according to their physical and emotional characteristics, either leapt or stepped into the abundant sunshine. There was a pleasing hum of bees, a perfumy scent of lilac, the tangy aroma of growing grass, and spring’s fresh earth. The city garden, and the others adjoining it, were bursting with life and energy.

  “This was definitely a good idea,” Belle said. “While I get the rake, you two can start picking up fallen twigs.”

  Kit and Gabby were already concentrating on this task, although “picking up” seemed to involve more chewing and playing tug-of-war than actual gathering.

  “Now, there’s something to consider …,” Belle mused as she returned from the shed that held the manual lawn mower, a collection of flower pots in various stages of repair and a resident spider whose offspring took over the building on a yearly basis before blowing off toward other locales. “‘Rake,’ as in this gardening implement in my hands; ‘rake’ when applied to an angle; and ‘rake,’ the abbreviation of ‘rakehell,’ or libertine…. Hmmm, maybe this is the beginning of a home-improvement crossword—for all the ‘rakes’ out there who favor low-slung tool belts—”

  Her speech was interrupted by the front doorbell, which set in motion a series of outraged yips from Gabby and a couple of bossy woofs from Kit. “Girls! Stop! We go through this every day at the same time. You know it’s only Artie bringing the mail.”

  Accompanied by her bodyguards, Belle walked inside, passing back through her office and into the living room with its eclectic thrift shop “finds.” Through the beveled glass panes flanking the front door she could see the postman, his heavy, blue-gray bag hanging on its shoulder strap, his bull
dog-thick frame bending to one side to accommodate the burden. Artie always rang the bell or knocked on the door, rather than simply leaving the mail and departing in silence. He was a man who liked to talk.

  “Hiya, Belle. Hiya, poochies.” He held up a flat, cardboard-padded envelope. “A submission for your new puzzle collection…. Says so right here.”

  Belle frowned slightly as she took it. “Constructors are supposed to send them to my office at the Crier.”

  “Yeah, that’s how I thought you usually handled things. Can’t be too careful these days.”

  “It’s really for copyright reasons, Artie. The Crier mail room keeps a log of everything that comes into my box. Not that I’m planning on stealing another person’s creation, but the editor-in-chief is a firm believer in legally protecting all parties.”

  “Speaking of protection, it’s not such a swell notion that some of these crossword kooks have access to your home address. Like I said, can’t be too careful.”

  Belle shrugged. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way, Artie.” She studied the envelope. “A post office box in Newcastle … hmmm … but not a name I recognize—W. H. Everts? No Mr. or Ms. or Mrs., either.”

  “Maybe that’s a good thing? Possibly another word game junkie has moved into town? But, hey, if you want to know where this Everts lives, you just let me know. All that stuff’s on record downtown. Everts’s gotta have filled out an address card in order to get a box.” Artie shifted his large mail satchel from one shoulder to the other. “So, how’s everything going with the hubby? Any hot new cases he’s working on?”

  Belle smiled. “You always ask me that, Artie, and you know I can’t answer…. There are things Rosco won’t even tell me.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “It’s true!” Belle laughed. “Well, thanks for this—”

  But Artie wasn’t yet finished gabbing. “Dynamite day, isn’t it?”

  “Gorgeous … but I’d better get back to work if I don’t want my editor grousing at me.”

  “Sure thing. Me, too. Can’t stand around all day yakking…. Make haste while the sun shines, or however that saying goes.”