“No, thank you. I’m surprised you’re not hungover. You were well into your cups last night.”
“But not so drunk that I didn’t appreciate the full impact of your performance. My God, Rosie.” He raised his glass in a mock salute. “You made me proud. Standing up to Chris, with past and present lovers hanging on every accusatory word. And the museum mucketymucks, looking on with their mouths agape. It was too, too much. Honestly, I didn’t know you had it in you.” He winked. “Makes me wonder what else you’re capable of.”
“Shut up, Peter,” she snapped.
He grinned at her over the rim of his highball glass as he sipped from it. “Will the cheating bastard be joining us for drinks?”
“I wouldn’t count on it.”
Peter laughed. “What did he have to say for himself today, now that his sins have been exposed? Has he repented? Brought you flowers? An expensive piece of jewelry?”
“I haven’t seen him today.”
Peter set his glass on the table and leaned forward. “Really?”
“He… he didn’t come home last night.”
“Hmm. Interesting. I wouldn’t peg him as the tuck-tail type.” Peter looked at her archly. “Of course, who could really blame him for staying away after the public dressing-down you gave him? I suppose he’s playing the injured party.”
“Which would be like him, wouldn’t it?”
Peter reached for his drink again and sipped it while watching her thoughtfully. “It’s unlike you to speak ill of Chris. Even knowing what a fornicating, lying, opportunistic bastard he is, you’ve always defended him. Until now. Why the switch?”
“He asked me for a divorce.” The secret was out. Everyone had heard her; there was no point in hiding it now. “He insisted on a divorce.”
“And you lost it. Or so I gather by last night’s scene.”
“Maybe I will have a drink.” She poured herself a glass of white wine and sipped from it, aware of her brother’s amused gaze. She wondered if he noticed that her hands were trembling.
“Imagine Chris showing up at the museum this morning,” he said around a chuckle. “How did he face the staff? Your friend Tony Olsen looked ready to kill him. He’s probably called an emergency meeting of the board of directors, but I’ll bet he was there to greet Chris-”
“Chris didn’t go to work today. At least he wasn’t there this morning.” She told Peter about the call she’d received.
“Where do you suppose he spent the day?”
“Honestly, I don’t care.”
“Bunking with one of his lovers?”
Rosemary acted as though she hadn’t heard.
“Perhaps making cozy with the beautiful Justine?”
Justine. Rosemary’s blood turned hot when she thought of Chris’s latest conquest. Everyone at the museum knew he had taken Justine on his most recent trip to France. She was the latest in a long line of pretty curators singled out for special attention by him.
Peter continued with his speculation. “Or maybe he’s with that redheaded bitch, the one with the long fingernails who was draping herself over him last night when you made your move?”
“They deserve each other,” Rosemary mumbled. Then, rousing herself, she said, “I don’t know where he is, only that I haven’t seen him since I left the museum last night.”
“As for the state of your marriage…?”
Tears filled her eyes. “My children,” she said hoarsely. “This will be awful for them.”
Peter linked his hands and turned them inside out high above his head, stretching luxuriantly. “Ah, well,” he said on a sigh, “maybe you won’t have to worry about the messiness of a divorce. Maybe Chris’s other sins have also caught up with him.”
She wiped her eyes. “What other sins?”
“Come now, Rosemary. You can’t be that naïve. If he breaks his wedding vows, do you really believe he would be true blue to other covenants?”
“What are you talking about?”
Peter brushed a nonexistent piece of lint off the leg of his trousers. “It’s not for me to say. Maybe you should ask Stan.”
Stan Ballard, their lawyer and estate manager.
“What would he know that I don’t?”
Rosemary could tell by her brother’s sly grin that he was itching to tell. “Remember Chris’s recently broken finger?”
She nodded.
“He didn’t get it by slamming the car door on it as he claimed.” Peter’s gaze wandered to the Golden Gate Bridge, which was shrouded in fog. He smirked. “If Chris doesn’t turn up soon, maybe someone should drag the bay for his body.”
At the San Francisco Police Department, Detective Jon Nunn’s cell phone rang. It was Tony Olsen.
“Mr. Olsen. What-”
“I thought we were past that ‘Mr. Olsen’ business.”
They’d known each other for a few years now, but for some reason Jon Nunn could only think of Tony Olsen as Mr. Olsen. But he humored him now. “All right, Tony. It’s been a while. What’s up?”
“Do you remember the McFall Art Museum?”
“Of course,” Nunn said, remembering all too well the awkward hours he’d spent there like a fish out of water. Olsen had enlisted Nunn and his wife, Sarah, for a charity event at the McFall-the museum’s feeble attempt to give back to the community by establishing summer programs to keep kids likely to commit crimes off the streets. Olsen said the exposure would be great PR for Nunn’s career, and he felt safer having Nunn and a couple of other cops in attendance while inviting a shady element indoors. Sarah jumped at the chance and enjoyed every minute of it.
“Well, you know I’m on the museum’s board. Chairman in fact.” Olsen paused. “Something’s come up that I was hoping you could help me with.”
“Sure, Tony.” Nunn was thinking the theft of a valuable painting, vandalism maybe.
“It concerns Christopher Thomas, one of our curators.”
Nunn remembered the name-how could he forget with the way Thomas had ogled his wife and every other attractive woman at the fund-raiser.
“He hasn’t been seen in a week. It seems he’s gone missing.”
Recognizing the seriousness in the older man’s voice, Nunn stepped into his cubicle to help block out the ambient noise in the Violent Crimes Unit, where detectives who weren’t actively detecting were talking on their phones or bullshitting with each other.
Nunn listened as Tony Olsen described an ugly scene that had taken place between Christopher and Rosemary Thomas at a black-tie museum function a week earlier.
“According to the staff, he didn’t report to work the following day, which was understandable,” Olsen said. “Everyone in the hall had overheard the confrontation. It was believed he was embarrassed and needed some time to sort things out with Rosemary.”
“That’s the wife?”
“Yes. She’s a dear friend of mine. She also works at the museum. A valued employee, a very knowledgeable woman.”
“But they had issues.”
“Well, his affairs have been no secret,” Olsen said scornfully. “He’s not a particularly nice guy, Jon. He and I have had our differences.”
“Then why are you concerned?”
“He’s disappeared. He hasn’t been seen since that night. Rosemary had her say, then ran from the hall. Chris excused himself and followed her out. That’s the last anyone saw of him.”
Nunn thought a moment. “Has she reported him missing?”
“She’s gone to Mexico.”
“What?”
“No, it’s not what you’re thinking. She went on behalf of the museum. There’s an exhibit in Mexico City, Spanish armaments from the conquest. She oversees the Arms and Armor department of the museum, so she went to check it out.”
“Just like that?”
“She’s been in conversation with the museum down there for some time. But, yes, her decision to go seemed rather sudden, though I encouraged it. She was still very upset over what she called ‘making a fool of myself at the Pollock event.’ If you ask me, the SOB had it coming to him, and more, for a long time. I told her a few days away would do her good.”