The Trophy Wife Page 10

  The phone on the conference room table buzzed and Helen picked it up. “Restivo, here.”

  It was Andrew Hogan’s voice. “How’s our ransom note doing?”

  “Just beautifully,” she said. “We’re chatting right now.”

  “Well, stop chatting,” Andrew said, “and meet me out at the Childs house. I got your lab report and I think we may have found the one in the sneakers.”

  “One of the kidnappers?”

  “I would assume so, because I don’t figure that Emily could have been taking a tennis lesson while she was wrapped in a shower curtain.”

  Billy Leary was giving a tennis clinic, stealing nervous glances at the man and woman who had just taken seats in the small grandstand. They looked like cops, which could only mean they knew about his activities in the Childs house. For a second, he considered chasing a ball toward one of the exits and just disappearing from the building. Instead, he decided to talk his way out of it. He did his best to focus on his students, but found himself repeating his last instruction. It was easier to arrange the women into two step-in groups and let them practice with each other.

  As soon as he picked up his towel the two visitors stood up and started toward him. He pretended not to notice and made his way to the men’s locker room. He wasn’t completely surprised when the door opened behind him and the man followed him in. But he couldn’t help the double take at the woman who followed right at the man’s heels.

  “Hey, lady. You can’t come in here.”

  Hogan flashed his badge, which had absolutely no police authority but generally fooled people who were expecting the police. “Would you rather talk outside in front of all your students?”

  Billy didn’t answer, so Helen turned the lock in the door.

  “Anything you want to tell us about Emily Childs?” Andrew began.

  “She’s a member. She plays tennis.”

  “We’re thinking specifically about Monday, when you went slopping through her bedroom leaving fingerprints all over the door jambs and wet sneaker prints on the rug.”

  Billy turned away and opened his locker. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “We’re talking about a capital crime. Kidnapping, and maybe murder.”

  He dropped the racquet. “What … ?” He looked stunned.

  “You’re saying you don’t know about it?”

  “Jesus, no! Kidnapping? Murd—” He couldn’t get the word out. “I thought …” he tried again. Then he decided, “I think maybe I ought to get a lawyer … before I say anything.”

  “Right now,” Helen said, “you have a free shot.” She held up her hands. “No notebooks. No tape recorders. No one is going to read you your rights. It’s Mrs. Childs that we’re interested in.”

  Billy seemed to be trying to make up his mind.

  “We know you were in her bedroom,” Andrew Hogan announced. “And we know you were there while the bathroom floor was still wet. What we need to know is why you were there, what you did, and what you saw.”

  “Am I under arrest?” Billy said, his eyes widening with fear.

  “That depends on what you tell us,” Hogan lied, keeping up the pretence of being with the police department. “Like the lady says, this one time you get to talk off the record.”

  Billy slumped onto the bench. “I figured it was her husband. I figured he found out.”

  “Found out what?”

  Billy actually blushed. “You know …”

  “Not unless you tell us,” Helen jumped in, trying to sound totally sympathetic.

  “Mrs. Childs and I were … more than … it wasn’t just tennis.”

  Hogan tried to be patient. “How much more than tennis was it?”

  “We were very close friends,” Leary tried.

  “You were banging her,” Hogan corrected.

  Billy looked shocked at the thought. Then he nodded.

  “So what happened? Things get a little out of hand?”

  He realized that Hogan thought he had been in bed with Emily on Monday. “Oh, no. I just went over there to give her a few pointers. She had been in a match and wanted some extra help.”

  “That would explain why your footprints would be on her tennis court, which they weren’t. But it doesn’t explain why they would be in her bedroom, which they were. Unless you give your tennis lessons back and forth over the bed.”

  Leary writhed at the confusion. “When I got there, her car wasn’t in the garage. The kitchen door was open.”

  “So you walked in and went up to her bedroom. Pretty pushy for a tennis lesson.”

  He dropped the pretence. “There was no lesson. I went there to … be with her. She was expecting me and I couldn’t figure out why no one was home. I called her name, went outside to look for her around the grounds. Then I figured something might have happened to her. I went back inside and up to her bedroom …” He ran out of steam and silently shook his head.

  “She wasn’t there?” Helen provided.

  “The room looked like a war zone,” Bill Leary went on. “Her clothes were scattered like they had been pulled off. There was water all over the bedroom floor and water leaking out of the bathroom door. The bathroom was torn apart. The shower curtain had been ripped off. One of the towel bars was broken. And there was a puddle of bloody water leaking slowly down the drain.”

  “What did you think had happened?” Andrew asked as soon as the narrative paused.

  “I figured her husband found out about us. Like maybe she told him that I was coming over. Or maybe she told someone else and he overheard. I figured he had knocked her around a bit and that probably she had run away.”

  “Did she ever tell you that her husband was in the habit of knocking her around?”

  “No. She sort of made it sound like he did his thing and she did hers.”

  Helen tried a question. “Did she ever mention that she was going to divorce her husband?”

  He smirked. “No. Rich ladies never leave home unless they get to take the house with them.”

  “I’ll bet that pissed you off,” Hogan said. “You were hoping to get together with a rich divorcee, and all she wanted was a quickie every now and then. Makes you real mad to have all the ladies paying you stud fees, doesn’t it?”

  “She was a nice lady. Her husband was cheating on her.”

  “Was. Is there something you’re not telling us, Mr. Leary?”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Billy shouted. “But if anything happened to her, he’s the guy you should be talking to. Her death would save him a lot of money and a lot of headaches.”

  They left Leary in the locker room, advising him to keep himself available.

  “What do you think?” Hogan asked Helen as they walked toward their cars.

  “I think he knew Emily a lot better than he’s letting on. And I think he pretty much had free run of the house.”

  “You think Walter Childs knows about Billy Leary?”

  “No,” Helen said quite positively. “If he did, he wouldn’t be blaming Mitchell Price. He’d get the lover.”

  Hogan nodded. “Why don’t you follow me over to the Childs house. There’s something I want to show you.” The two cars left the tennis club in a procession.

  “It’s for making voice recordings,” Andrew said, handing Helen a software package that contained a CD and an instruction book. “You set it up, type in a message, and then load it into a PC that has a sound card and speakers. Here, let me play one for you.”

  He keyed the mouse. Almost instantly, a computerized voice began to speak, announcing the opportunity to earn $10,000. It told the listener which telephone keys to press on a telephone to proceed with the deal and indicate agreement. A smile spread across Helen’s face as she listened. “It’s pretty incriminating,” she said as soon as the message had played itself out. “Whose is it?”

  “Mine,” Andrew said. “I made it when I was here yesterday. At the time, I thought it put a noose around Walter Chi
lds’s neck. But then I found out you can buy the software in any computer store for fifty bucks.”

  “So anyone could have done it.”

  Andrew nodded. Then he added, “Do you think you can find out whether our tennis coach has a copy? Because if he does, given the fact that he was at the crime scene …”

  “Who in hell are you?”

  They both wheeled toward the voice, with Helen’s hand reaching instinctively under her jacket. They were confronting a young woman, perhaps twenty, who was looking at them as if they were bugs she had found in her breakfast.

  “And what are you doing here?” She stepped angrily into the room, totally unconcerned that she might be calling out a pair of serial killers.

  Hogan did his badge trick. “We’re police officers. And just who the hell are you and what are you doing here?”

  “I live here,” die young woman said, playing her ace card. “Now, would you mind telling me why I need the police?”

  She was of medium height and slightly built, wearing the tank top and jeans that were college campus uniform. Her features were attractive and her figure was noticeable but certainly not outstanding. What set her apart was her hair, which was shaved close to her scalp on die back and sides, but which stood up in a long crewcut at the top. The crewcut was pure white in contrast to the brunette shade of the fuzz. As she came closer, Helen noticed the rhinestone stud that was fixed to one side of her nose.

  “You’re … Amanda?” Hogan tried.

  “Good guess, Detective,” she mocked. “If I live here and I’m not Emily, then I’m probably Amanda. Obviously, there’s no fooling you. But that still doesn’t tell me why I need police protection.”

  “Your father called us in,” Walter said.

  “Why? Are you supposed to arrest me and brainwash me?”

  Helen eased closer to her. “You might want to sit down.”

  “I’ll stand,” she fired back, “so I can show you two to the door.”

  Helen nodded and then told her the news. “Your mother has been kidnapped. We’re trying to find her.”

  The sophistication drained instantly and Amanda’s eyes widened with fear. “Kidnapped … how … when?” She settled into the chair that Helen had been offering.

  “She was taken out of the house Monday morning by two or three people. She was drugged. It looks as if they were very careful not to hurt her.”

  “Then she’s all right and we’re going to get her back.”

  “We certainly think so,” Hogan answered.

  “Why? What do they want?”

  Andrew and Helen exchanged glances. Helen answered, “I think you ought to talk to your father. He can explain.”

  “He’s going to give them whatever they want, isn’t he?”

  Another exchanged glance and then Andrew said, “Why don’t you talk to your father.”

  Amanda’s expression turned angry. “Talk to my father? That’s a laugh. Nobody talks to my father. All you do is listen.”

  “He’s going through hell right now,” Andrew said. “This might be a good time to cut him some slack.”

  “Sure, like all the slack he cuts for me.”

  “He doesn’t approve of …” He gestured to her face.

  Amanda jumped to her feet. “That, and my friends, and my course selection, and my apartment … and Wayne …” She kept up the litany as she walked out of the room. “I’ll call him. He’ll be thrilled to hear from me.”

  They both stared through the doorway as if an exotic animal had passed through the room.

  “Daddy’s little girl,” Andrew finally offered.

  “The nuclear family,” Helen added. “Daddy gets it in the office, Mother gets it at the tennis club, and little Amanda gets it at college.” She turned to Andrew. “Am I the only one who isn’t getting any?”

  He smiled. “We could go back to my place.”

  She stood quickly and picked up the software package she was supposed to investigate. “Been there, done that,” she said as she left the house.

  Emily prayed it wouldn’t be him when she heard the door latch. But then came the footsteps on the stairs, with a sharp knock of heavy leather heels. She pulled the blanket up to her chin and buried her face against die arm that was shackled to the headboard. The footsteps came toward her and then stopped dead at the foot of the bed. Then she felt the blanket being pulled slowly off her.

  She sat up abruptly, catching the top of the blanket and dragging it back over her.

  “Pretendin’ to be asleep,” his mocking voice said. “Next thing you’ll be tellin’ me you’ve got a headache. What’s the matter, baby? Don’t you want to get it on with me?” He looked down at her with his openmouth smile. She couldn’t stand the obscene leer that danced in his eyes, but when she looked down she saw something even more frightening. He was holding a pair of scissors in one hand and carrying a boom box in the other.

  “What are you going to do?” There was no disguising the fear in her voice.

  “Not me, baby. Us! You and me together. It takes two to tango.”

  He set down the portable stereo. “We’re going to make a record that we can send to your old man. But first, I need to know his address. We wouldn’t want to deliver it to the wrong house.”

  He took a folded paper out of his shirt pocket. “Here! You better rehearse the words.” Emily read the note that was thrust in front of her face.

  Dear__________________,

  Do what this man tells you. He’s treating me very nice.

  If you pay him, he will let me go. If you don’t, his friends will kill me. Don’t talk to anyone, and don’t call the cops or you will never see me again. I love you.

  She tried to sound defiant. “You can’t do this. He’ll never believe you.”

  He laughed. “Well, now, that would be a real bummer. Because if he doesn’t, then you’ll never get outta here alive, will you?”

  Emily tried to fight back the panic. “But you’re just supposed to keep me. Someone else is asking for ransom.”

  Another big, self-satisfied smile. “Someone else will have to make his own deal. I’m gettin’ mine now and I’m countin’ on you to make it work. So don’t let me down.”

  “I won’t do it,” Emily snapped. She tried to sound determined.

  “Okay,” he said, sounding overly pleasant. “Whatever you say.”

  His hand moved like lightning, snatching the edge of the cover and tearing it out of her grip. She though she might scream, but the voice caught in her throat. He sat on the edge of the bed. Then he began fingering the hem of the nightgown, which lay just below her knees. He lifted the scissors and snapped the blades open and closed. Then he put the scissors to the hem and slowly began to cut the cloth. “I’m going to just keep cuttin’, all the way to the top. Whenever you want me to stop, you just tell me the address where we should send our recordin’.”

  “Please, don’t!” The defiance was gone. She was begging.

  He snipped again, this time cutting farther up, above her knees. “What did you say?” he demanded.

  “Stop, I’ll give you the address.” She recited it slowly, while he wrote it on the back of the paper.

  “Now, you ready to record?”

  Emily nodded and took back the paper. She scanned the words. Mike adjusted the dials on the boom box and set it on the bed with the microphone port in front of her face. “Anytime you’re ready,” he told her, and he pushed the record button. Emily could see the tape begin to turn through the small, smoke glass window on the front of the machine.

  “Dear Walter,” she began, filling in the blank. She tried not to mind his big hand, which was resting on her knee, or the scissors that still held her gown locked in their grip.

  When she finished recording the message, he punched at he controls until Emily’s voice played through the speaker. She sounded breathless with fright, an emotion that came through clearly and made Mike smile broadly. Her husband would be able to picture the groping ha
nds sliding over her body. He would certainly imagine a garrote cutting into her throat, or maybe a silencer pressing into the hollow under her chin. The poor son of a bitch would pay up in a hurry. He shut the machine off.

  “You were terrific. Ever think of becomin’ an actress?”

  “No,” she said angrily.

  “No problem,” he snickered, as he picked up his things. “With me, you’re never goin’ to have to act. You won’t have to fake anything!”

  He ran up the stairs and slammed the door behind him. Emily heard the dead bolt slide back into place. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to blot out the images of the past few minutes.

  She had to get out. No matter what the risks, she had to abandon any thought of remaining a prisoner, waiting to be rescued. That had seemed a safe course, but now everything had changed. Rita was obviously sympathetic and was apparently following the rules of the game. But this leering jerk, whoever he was, had invented a role for himself in the affair, and that changed everything. He could screw up the ransom exchange, which would certainly ruin her chances of rescue. Even more dangerous, the pervert was excited by the presence of a captive woman. He could rape her, or even kill her as a punishment when his brainless scheme backfired on him. He certainly wouldn’t hesitate to eliminate her and the risk that might be involved in setting her free.

  First, she had to break the shackle that held her in the bed. She couldn’t free her wrist. She had tried several times to slip her hand through the loop, even soaping her wrist when the woman unlocked her and let her use the bathroom. But the bracelet was squeezed too tight.

  The headboard held more promise. It was a gently curved crossbar supported by a series of vertical rungs that disappeared behind the mattress and were supported by the bed frame. The overall impression was that of a bridge truss connecting the two corner posts that rose up from the floor. The chain from her wrist connected to another cuff that was locked around the crossbar in the middle of the vertical posts. It wouldn’t be enough for her to force the crossbar out of one of the corner posts, because she still wouldn’t be able to slide the locked cuff to the end. What she needed to do was figure out a way of detaching the crossbar completely, not just from the corner posts, but from all the vertical bars, as well. It would take hours of work. Rita, and probably her houseboy, would be coming down at least a few times while she was working. So she had to take the headboard apart without letting a single cut or break show. If they caught on to what she was doing, they could simply tie her to the bed frame.