Justin breathed a sight of relief. Jesus Christ, he thought, she'd had enough alcohol and drugs to put down an elephant. The youth of today. They were made of better stuff than he was.
He didn't have to search for her key ring. She'd tossed it on a table as soon as she'd managed to unlock her door. There were too many keys on the ring for him to figure out which one belonged to Ellis St. John's apartment. He figured Ellis's key had to be on the ring. She'd keep it there since she'd been going to feed the cats every day. He stuck the entire ring of keys in his pocket, decided he'd worry later about getting them back to her.
He looked down at the figure on the couch.
All part of the job, he thought. Taking advantage of a lonely, drunk girl.
She'd be hungover and depressed the next day. He knew the feeling, so he tried to think of something he could do that might make her feel a little better. Couldn't really come up with anything. Finally, he searched for and found a piece of paper. On it he wrote, Don't worry. Will feed the cats and give them enough for the morning. Will leave your keys with your doorman. He put the note down on her coffee table, then picked it back up, scribbled: P.S. Thanks for a nice evening.
He didn't think she'd really believe the P.S. On the other hand, she was the kind of girl who could and probably would convince herself of just about anything. At least temporarily.
On his way down the elevator, he decided he was sorry he hadn't seen her remove her shoes. He really was curious to see how long it would've taken.
26
Seeing Ellis St. John's apartment broke the roll that Justin thought he was on. It was nothing like he suspected it would be.
Justin had expected sleek and modern all the way: lots of shiny glass and black marble, something cold and impersonal and hard-edged. But the Rockworth and Williams employee lived in a prewar twelve-story building overlooking Gramercy Park. The building was elegant and not at all flashy. And St. John's apartment was equally elegant and subdued, filled with a combination of antiques-American painted furniture, mostly of the colonial era and in muted colonial colors-and well-crafted, comfortable, contemporary furniture. The four rooms-living room, master bedroom, a second bedroom that doubled as a den, and a small space off the living room used as a dining area-were furnished sparsely and tastefully. The kitchen was the only thing that broke with the rest of the decor-it was all new, top-of-the-line, stainless-steel appliances, with expensive knives and utilitarian tools displayed on hooks and magnetic holders. St. John was not a man who decorated for show or convenience. The apartment obviously was done to cater to his own taste; his own comfort; and, judging by the well-used chopping blocks on the kitchen counter and the oiled cast iron pans, to his own skill level. As Justin began to poke around, the setting struck a chord: it reminded him of somewhere else, another apartment, another house, but he couldn't put his finger on it. He stopped for a moment, closed his eyes to concentrate and focus. Then he realized what it was: Ellis St. John's apartment looked a lot like Abby and Evan Harmon's home. It was furnished in much the same style, although probably not as expensively. Yes, he thought, surveying the scene, there are definite similarities. Same style of antiques, same kinds of chairs and sofas, same color scheme.
Justin took his time going through the apartment. He didn't know exactly what he was looking for, he just wanted to look. The only thing he was certain of was that Ellis St. John was not off embroiled in a family emergency, as Belinda Lambert had been told. If St. John was involved in the murder of Evan Harmon, Justin was now convinced that so too were some of his superiors at Rockworth and Williams. At the very least, Daniel French and his bosses were involved in some sort of cover-up, protecting St. John. Or protecting the firm's good name.
It's all about self-preservation, he thought again. Survival and safety of the corporate structure.
Having surveyed the overall layout of the apartment, Justin headed into the master bedroom to poke and probe more closely. The closets there were meticulously organized. Ellis's shirts were perfectly and evenly spaced so no sleeve touched another sleeve, and they were organized by color, going from white to gray to black to blue to green. That was the extent of the color range. If it was a patterned shirt, the dominant color was what dictated its placement. Ellis St. John had eight sport jackets, all solid-four of them black, two gray, and two blue. His ten suits were all pin-striped except for one light-gray summer suit and a dark-gray flannel winter one. The most daring of the pinstripes had a touch of wine red running through the black-on-black stripes. All shoes were highly polished and perfectly aligned on metal shoe racks, wooden shoe trees firmly in place. Justin couldn't be sure, but he'd be willing to bet a lot of money that each pair of shoes was separated by exactly half an inch of space. The guy was definitely compulsive and obsessive. There was not a speck of dust to be found. And there wasn't one single thing in the room that was not put in an exact and orderly spot. Justin turned from the closet, then stopped. He turned back, frowning. Something in there, an image, had jarred his memory in some way. An image tried to fight its way into his brain, but the image was diffuse, fractured, not connected to anything that Justin could come up with. Then the brief flash was gone almost as instantly as it had come into his head. And it didn't come back. He shrugged. He knew he couldn't dredge it back up. That's not the way these things worked. It would either be there or it wouldn't.
He moved on. There was a rack with luggage on it, in the farthest closet to the right in the bedroom. Ellis, of course, had a matching set, all made of light-green canvas and brown leather. There was room for four bags. The largest-a normal suitcase size and shape-was on the left, then a medium-size duffel bag. Then there was an empty space-large enough for an overnight bag-and then there was a matching briefcase with a shoulder strap. Justin stared at the space for the missing overnight bag. Ellis had been gone for four days now. Why had he taken only such a small bag? Planning on coming back-but something had suddenly come up? Like murder? Or had he left in that much of a hurry, knowing he had to travel light and move quickly?
Justin exhaled deeply, moved on to an antique tiger maple chest of drawers. As Justin was going through the drawers, he came upon a photo album. It was clearly not meant for public viewing, tucked as it was under a slew of men's underwear-briefs that matched his suits and jackets. Justin pulled the album out and began flipping through the pages. Nothing but photographs of Evan Harmon. Some were candid shots, in and out of an office. Some were newspaper and magazine clippings covering the last decade. Some were prints of Evan in his Hamptons house-and studying the background of those photos, Justin could now see how closely this apartment really did mirror the way Evan had lived. It was a disturbing selection of shots. Ellis St. John was not just obsessed with neatness and order, he was obsessed with Evan Harmon. The question was: Was he obsessed enough to kill him? Justin was now more certain than ever that St. John was mixed up in all this. But he still didn't have a clue how or, more important, why.
Was it jealousy? He realized that there wasn't one photo of Abby in the book. As Justin looked through it again, he saw that in some instances she had to have been cut out of particular pictures. Deeply sick. It was as if Ellis couldn't stand the thought of Evan with another partner, having intimate contact with anyone else. But Evan had been married the entire time he'd known Ellis St. John. The jealousy couldn't have been anything new. But could it have reached new heights? Could Evan have possibly begun an affair with Ellis? If he had, Justin thought, well, that would certainly spark something.