Some checks had cleared — ones written every week for thousands of dollars, payable to Vickie and marked “expenses.”
Only we’d given Vickie no expense account privilege.
Ten minutes later, I found a large manila envelope stuffed in the back of the bottom drawer of a file cabinet; it contained the bills and checks that she’d never mailed.
It’s hard to describe how I felt that moment, but anyone who’s ever been betrayed by someone they trust knows. The range of emotions was incredible: shock, disbelief, sadness.
Rage.
I don’t remember getting my gun out of the safe in my office, but I must have, because I had it in my hand as I stood outside Vickie’s apartment on Hickman Road, using the butt of it to bang on her door as I called her bad names.
I knew she was home because her car was in the lot. So when she didn’t answer I shot wildly at the wooden door, the third bullet taking the knob off, then shouldered it open.
She was sprawled on the floor by the front door, face down, wearing the same blue suit she’d had on at work; a puddle of blood spread out from her chest like a red fan, soaking the beige carpet. She must have been coming to answer the door, I realized, when she was struck by one of my bullets.
Behind me, in the hallway, I heard alarmed voices. Someone yelled to call 911. My legs felt rubbery and I stepped into the apartment and eased myself into a chair by the front door to wait for the police to come. I felt detached, strangely cold — an out of body experience.
The room was in disarray, with papers and magazines strewn about and cardboard boxes sitting half-filled. On a coffee table lay Vickie’s purse, open, its contents dumped out. And next to the table were two large black suitcases, ready to go.
I remember thinking that it wasn’t very nice of Vickie to leave the apartment in such a mess.
It just wasn’t very nice at all.
The only thing harder than seeing my little girl sitting in that prison was leaving her there. But if I’d stayed any longer, she’d have got wind of how scared I was.
The Chief of Police had tracked me down the night before at Barney’s Pub where I was watching ESPN on a big screen, pretending an O’Doul’s was a real beer (I’m a recovering alcoholic). At first I thought he was joking about the trouble Becky was in, because she’s so straight it’s embarrassing, and the Chief has a sense of humor like a rash.
But there was too much sadness in those rheumy eyes.
I know my daughter’s got a temper — you can blame my gene pool — because I’ve seen it once or twice, and it’s not a pretty thing. But I never thought she’d get mad enough to kill somebody.
Especially her close friend Vickie.
I never liked that girl, from the first time she and Becky hooked up as kids; especially since that time I caught her reading Becky’s diary. But I didn’t let on. Becky seemed happy being around her, and as long as they weren’t getting into trouble (none that I knew of, anyway), who was I to tell Becky who her friends should be. Most of mine, at the time, were fellow boozehounds.
But I’ll tell you, I didn’t like the way Becky behaved after spending time with Vickie, which was snotty and disrespectful.
So what was wrong with Vickie? She was smart, charming and pretty. Usually a good combination. Yet there was something phony about her. When she came over to the house, I felt like I was Ward Cleaver and she was Eddie Haskell in a short skirt.
And she used Becky. Used her homework, her clothes, her meager allowance, all the while playing the grateful friend. Which kept Becky giving her more.
Then there was the time Vickie stayed over when she was fourteen. In the middle of the night, I felt something soft and warm in my bed. She’d crawled under the covers and was crying about having a nightmare. I wasn’t too sympathetic, though, thinking about another nightmare that might unfold if I didn’t get her out of there. For years I believed it was just my dirty old man’s mind that thought the worst of her... until three weeks ago.
She showed up on the stoop of my bungalow a little toasty, looking mighty fetching in a tight, low-cut red dress. She had a wicker basket and in it was a bottle of wine and two glasses.
“Well,” I said as I stood in the doorway, in a white undershirt and wrinkled trousers; I’d been watching a boxing match on the tube. “This is quite a surprise.”
She smiled seductively, looking up at me through veiled blue eyes. “Aren’t you going to ask me in?”
I smiled back a little. “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” I said.
“What’s the matter?” she teased. “I won’t bite.”
She had the basket, so why did I feel like Little Red Riding Hood and she was the Big Bad Wolf?
She shifted the basket in front of herself, holding it with both hands, swinging it from side to side as she twisted her body back and forth like Baby Snooks in an old Warner Brothers picture. “Besides,” she said slyly, “I’m a little older than fourteen now. You don’t have to be afraid.”
I dropped my smile, feeling heat spreading across my cheeks, which doesn’t happen very often. “I don’t sleep with employees,” I told her. “Clients, maybe — but never employees.”
The sweet, seductive look on her face turned savage. “You son of a bitch!” she spat. “Why I thought to waste a good bottle of wine on an old dinosaur like you, I’ll never know.”
I did. “Maybe I’m the one thing of Becky’s you never got your mitts on,” I said.
And I shut the door in her face.
It wasn’t easy sending her packing. But nobody likes being had, even in the most pleasant of ways.
I could have been wrong. Maybe it was possible for a thirty-year-old woman with an angel’s face and a hell of a body to be attracted to a sixty-year-old man with a potbelly and a butch haircut.
And maybe one little drink wouldn’t hurt, anyway. But I wasn’t about to partake of either.
Night was settling in over the city as I wheeled my three-year-old Escort into the underground parking lot of 801 Grand, the deco marble tombstone of a building where we had our offices. I took the elevator up to the main lobby, which was deserted on this Saturday evening, and switched elevators up to the twenty-first floor.
A couple of things had been bothering me about the body and crime scene, which Chief Coderoni was kind enough to let me in to see. First, the blood left in Vickie’s body, that which hadn’t spilled out on the carpet, anyway, had just begun to discolor the skin and settle, which told me death was a little further along than it should be. I was willing to bet ballistics would find that the bullet didn’t come from Becky’s gun.
Second, while it made sense Vickie was in a hurry to vacate the apartment, the place just didn’t look right. Drawers and cabinets hung open, but nothing seemed to have been removed. And the only time I’d ever seen my wife (rest her soul) dump the contents of her purse out, was when she was frustratedly looking for something. Whoever killed Vickie hadn’t found what he — or she — was looking for.
Maybe that person was now looking elsewhere. The bronze elevator doors slid open and I stepped out into the hallway and followed the carpeted corridor around to the right, to the double glass doors of our office. I dug out my security card and used it to enter.
The reception area was dark, but the door leading into the back yawned open; I went quietly through it and into the bullpen area, which was awash in streetlight and neon. Down a hallway to the right was my office, and Becky’s. To the left was Vickie’s, the door shut, but light streamed from under it. And I doubted Vickie was in there.