We entered the cool of the house and hurried upstairs to Tinkie’s room. Chablis and Sweetie trotted with us, flopping on the floor as we spread the house plans on her bed.
“See, here’s the space in your room,” Tinkie pointed out.
Sure enough, there was enough space between the walls for a person to stand. Entry was gained from the hallway, a panel that slid to the side.
My initial shock gave way to anger. The idea that someone had been spying on me, in my most intimate moments, made me furious.
“Calm down,” Tinkie said. “You don’t know for certain anyone has used that hidden area.”
She was right. Just because Estelle had appeared in my room unannounced didn’t mean she was spying on me. The hidey-hole wasn’t an entrance to my room.
“But why would Estoban Gonzalez build a room to spy on his daughter and her new husband?” That was sick. So sick I didn’t even want to think about it.
“Is it possible he feared for Carlita?” Tinkie posed the question softly.
“As in he thought Federico would harm her?” That hadn’t occurred to me.
Tinkie kicked off her heels and flopped on her stomach, her feet crossed in the air behind her. I couldn’t help but notice her perfectly manicured toenails, a pretty pastel mango. Tinkie had color coordination down to a science.
“Either that, or perhaps he thought she might harm herself.” Tinkie arched one eyebrow. “With all of that anorexia, he might have been worried about depression or something. I mean, is it possible that Carlita suffered from her eating disorders before she married Federico?”
“So why not tell Federico and let him take care of his wife?”
“Federico had a career. I’m sure he wasn’t home all the time. Perhaps Estoban only wanted to make certain she wasn’t harming herself.”
Tinkie was putting the kindest possible spin on the situation. I settled on the bed, realizing for the first time how tired I was. It had been a long night and a hard morning. I needed a nap.
Tinkie shifted the documents until she had the kitchen in front of her. “Look! There’s a passageway from the pantry up a flight of stairs to the second floor!”
This was a big discovery and could easily explain how someone had frightened Jovan, broken a dish, and then escaped with all the doors and windows locked.
I studied the prints in earnest, following Tinkie’s pointer finger as she flipped to the page that showed the second floor. Right at the top of the stairs was another false panel. Someone could take the kitchen pantry passage up to the second floor and escape. Or they could wait in the passage until the house was empty enough for them to make a getaway.
“What about the third floor?”
Tinkie flipped the sheets until we had the floor plan for the ballroom and the locked rooms. The ballroom was the heart of this floor, but there was something off about the room at the end of the hall. I leaned closer to try to figure it out.
“It’s a dumbwaiter,” Tinkie said, her breath coming out in a rush. “It could work just like a passage. A person could sit on it and be moved up or down, like an escalator.”
“Where does it come out?”
We found the second-floor plans, and Tinkie looked at me. “In the linen closet in your bathroom.”
“And the first floor?”
The blueprints made a crisp sound as we flipped to that page.
“Behind the kitchen cabinets,” I whispered. I remembered that on the morning Jovan was attacked, Sweetie had been nosing there, trying to tell me. So there were two ways to exit the kitchen secretly.
Tinkie rolled to her back and then sat up with the ease of a sixteen-year-old. “That tells me there is no ghost, just someone trying to scare us.”
“And trying to hurt us.” Jovan could have been killed in her fall. I’d come close to drowning. “This is a dangerous person, Tinkie.”
“Dangerous, desperate, and perhaps deranged. A deadly combination.”
When my cell phone rang, I made a little squeak of surprise. The caller ID showed the sheriff’s office in California. Now that was a shocker. I couldn’t imagine Sheriff King was calling to ask how the filming was going.
“What can I do for you, Sheriff King?” I asked.
“Are you certain Estelle Marquez came back to the States?”
Though Cece had used all of her many charms at the airport in Petaluma, she’d been unable to confirm that Estelle had actually boarded a plane to the States. King had the legal authority to find out for sure, though. “That’s what her roommate said, but you’re the man with the badge and subpoena power.”
“Somehow Costa Rica doesn’t give my badge a lot of weight. LAX has no record of her landing here, and there’s no sign of Ms. Marquez at her place. This morning, we got a call from the neighbors. Her house has been ransacked.”
That got my attention. “Any idea who did it?”
“The crime-scene guys are still there. There wasn’t evidence of forced entry that we could find. I’ll know more later.” He sighed. “I’m worried. The neighbors said she was fragile and prone to depression. Is it possible that Estelle Marquez is so disturbed that she killed Suzy Dutton?”
I thought about the “apparition” that had attacked Jovan. It was possible that Estelle was building herself an alibi in the States. “I can’t answer that question, but there’s a chance she’s still here in Petaluma, Sheriff. Some strange things are happening on the set.”
“You think Marquez’s daughter is the source of the curse?”
“I don’t have any solid evidence, but I’ll call you when I find something.” I hung up fast and turned the phone off in case he tried to call back.
Graf wanted to take the house plans to Federico and talk to him, but Tinkie and I persuaded Graf that it would be better to wait until we’d had time to examine the secret passageways we’d discovered. Federico looked haggard, and there seemed to be tension between him and Jovan. Besides, we had to tell him that it was possible that Estelle was missing.
Of course, I was elected to do that.
I found Federico and Jovan sitting in the falling dusk, sipping red wine, on the patio outside the kitchen. I’d showered and changed, and later Graf and Tinkie and I were going into town for one last dinner. Tinkie had to get back to Zinnia. She couldn’t delay any longer. Oscar was going crazy without her. He’d even begged to speak to Chablis over the phone.
I could hear Jovan’s low-pitched voice, and she sounded serious. As much as I hated to interrupt, I had to.
“Federico, I need to speak to you about Estelle,” I said.
Jovan leaned forward. “Is something wrong?”
I’d hoped to talk to the director alone, but I could see that wasn’t going to happen. “She’s not in Malibu, and there’s no evidence she left Costa Rica.”
Federico sighed. “This is one of her stupid games.”
“She’s done this before?”
“Even when she was a child. She’d disappear in the house and Carlita and I would hunt for her for hours. Then she’d reappear. It was frustrating.”
I could see where that would make parents nuts. “I’m worried, Federico. She told her roommate she was going to Malibu, but she isn’t there, and the sheriff told me someone ransacked her home.”
Concern swept over his face. If the gossip was true and Estelle was not his daughter, he seemed to care about her regardless. “Is there any indication that she was injured?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No, there’s no trace of her at all.”
“She’s probably still here, in Petaluma. She’s hiding out to punish me and try another tactic to ruin my film.”
“Federico, she’s your daughter,” Jovan said. “She wouldn’t-”