This was a murder investigation, after all.
And there had been tension, anger and hatred in the eyes of both Billy and Ned as they’d fought. It didn’t take a trained private eye to come to that conclusion. But why would Ned keep Billy around if they got along so poorly? And oh, wait a minute, didn’t I recall at the house when Jennifer’s body was found, Ned and Jeremy Poole discussing calling Billy? Yes, they had.
Oh, man, I was missing something here.
Plus there was the information Mrs. Presley had provided about Billy’s frequent trips to the Underhill Motel. Granted, that could be unrelated, but I was betting it wasn’t.
Actually, I was betting my ass it wasn’t.
Literally.
Suite 2002, Mr. William T. Star, Vice President.
His door was closed, but I doubted it was locked.
Slowly, quietly, I turned the doorknob right as far as it would go before I pushed the door open just enough to peek inside. I was hoping to catch a quick look at Billy Star before he noticed me, before his guard went up. I wanted an honest look at his emotions. An honest reaction.
I lucked out.
Now the scary thing about catching peeks at people is that you never know what you’re going to catch peeks of. I’ve seen more guys surfing the net for porn that one could shake a … okay, a stick at (no pun intended). I’ve caught more than a few people picking their noses and digging out their ears with their pens (these top my list of things I’d just as soon forget). I’ve overheard telephone conversations that would make a sailor blush. And certainly, I’ve caught people in all sorts of compromising positions. Hell, I’ve caught them in positions I didn’t even know were physically possible. But the sight of Billy Star sitting at his desk without the knowledge that I was watching him is one sight that I will never forget.
He sat hunched over his desk with his head in his hands, crying softly. He made very little noise, and his shoulders shook with the effort of containing it. For such a big, powerful man, he looked very vulnerable to me then. As if a feather falling onto his shoulder would just break him.
“Billy Star?” I dropped the fake voice. “We need to talk.”
Billy’s head shot up as I walked into the office, and closed the door behind me. “I don’t know who you think you are. But get the hell out of here right now.”
“That’s not possible, Billy,” I said. I ripped off my fake mustache, slowly. Not for sake of drama, but because I’d used too much damn glue and it hurt like hell.
He looked at me incredulously. “What the — who are you?”
“Dix Dodd.”
“And what the hell are you doing here, Dix Dodd?” He stood, all hulking muscle.
I braced myself as he started toward me, possibly to throttle me.
“I’m investigating the murder of Jennifer Weatherby,” I said in a rush. “And I’m damn determined to find out who’s responsible.”
He stopped in his tracks. “Who hired you?”
I fought the urge to preface my comments with Okay, here’s where it gets tricky. “Jennifer.”
He blinked. “Jennifer hired you to find out who killed her before she was killed? Are you nuts? Are you … you….” He looked me up and down. “What the hell are you, anyway?”
“In answer to your last question, I told you, I’m a PI. In answer to your other query, yes, I probably am nuts.”
“I’m calling security.” Billy picked up his phone and stabbed the first button.
I had to talk quickly. “Jennifer hired me to find out who was having an affair with her husband. She was sure Ned was cheating on her, and I think her curiosity got her killed. And the only way I’m going to catch who killed her, is if you help me figure things out.” I drew a shaky breath. “And dammit, I’m the only one who can figure this mess out. But not unless you help me, Billy.”
Billy sat down heavily into his chair. “Jesus Christ.” He put the phone back in the cradle, and shook his head. “Poor Jennifer. Poor, sweet Jennifer.”
He cried. Big Billy Star was a broken man.
Okay, I’ve never been good with the right words, unless of course the right words were ‘Aha, caught you!’ But somehow I doubted those would fit this particular situation. It was clear that Billy was heartbroken over Jennifer. Clear that he’d loved her, which didn’t come as a surprise to me. Because I was pretty damn sure which blonde he had been hanging out with at the Underhill Motel and pretty sure why Jennifer had missed so many appointments at the Bombay Spa.
I didn’t sit; that didn’t feel right. But I did walk closer to Billy, deeper into the office. It was large, as offices go. Billy sat behind a beautiful mahogany desk. Above him hung a huge picture of Billy and Ned Weatherby shaking hands. Happier days, when each of them was twenty pounds lighter and a few gray hairs shorter. Days before the buyout, no doubt.
“I … I can’t believe Jennifer hired you,” Billy said. He sat up straight and wiped a hand long over his face. “She had her suspicions of Ned, of course. Lots of suspicions over the years. And some of them, I know for a fact, were well founded. But….” He shook his head again. “I can’t believe it would matter to her anymore.”
“Why’s that?”
Billy hesitated. “Why should I tell you anything?”
“Because I think that you and I have the same interest here, Billy. We both want to find out who killed Jennifer.”
He sighed long and shakily. “I saw you at the Weatherby house the night … the night Jennifer was killed. Jesus Christ, I couldn’t believe it when Ned’s lawyer called me. What’s his name…?”
“Jeremy Poole,” I supplied.
“Jeremy Fool if you ask me. That guy hangs off Ned like white on rice, or….”
“Flies on crap?” I offered. Yes, I was truly starting to have a most negative opinion of the young lawyer, but my eloquent metaphor was an attempt to bring Billy more over to my side. Hopefully, it let Billy feel that I was a kindred spirit in his time of need. Hopefully, we’d semi-bond in our trashing of the lawyer.
He snorted a halfhearted laugh.
I drew a breath, and took the lead. “How long have you been sleeping with Jennifer Weatherby?” I asked with an authority I hoped to soon have.
He didn’t hesitate a heartbeat. “A year, six months, twelve days.”
“Continuously?”
His eyebrows knit. “I appreciate the vote of confidence, Ms. Dodd, but not even I can keep it up that long.”
“I mean, were you having an affair the whole year, six months and twelve days, or did you have a hiatus in there?”
The look he gave me affirmed my suspicions that there had been a break, or at least an attempted break, by one of them. And if it was Jennifer, I could very well be sitting with her killer.
“Why do you ask?”
“Confirmation,” I lied. “Just confirmation of what I already know.”
“We … cooled things down for a while. It was all part of the plan.”
“What plan?”
His eyes misted over, and though I’m sure he realized he was still talking to me, it was as if he thought Jennifer could hear him herself. “I really loved that woman. With all my heart. And we were planning on making it happen. Planning on making a life together. Jennifer was the best thing that ever happened to me.”
“And she loved you?”
He stirred in his seat. And paused for just one telltale heartbeat. “She did.”
“Then why do you think she hired me, Billy?”
“You see,” he said, clearly rattled, “that’s what I don’t understand. Why Jennifer would give a rat’s ass about whether or not Ned was fooling around when we were planning on running away together.”