Serena frowned. “His parents told me Gavin preferred the criminal work to his old corporate law practice.”
“All I can tell you is what Chelsey said,” Toni replied. “But we all tell our parents what they want to hear, right? Trust me, I don’t exactly brag to my folks about how I pay the tuition.”
“And their marriage?”
“Strained,” Toni said.
“Did Chelsey know about the gambling? About Gavin losing money at Broadway’s poker games?”
Toni swept some of her blond hair away from her eyes. “I told you, I don’t talk about Broadway.”
“For now, I don’t care about him. This is about Gavin and Chelsey.”
The girl took a long time to answer. “Yeah. Chelsey knew.”
“How did she find out?”
“Someone saw Gavin at the games and told her about it.”
“Who?”
Toni shook her head. “I don’t know. She didn’t say. But she found out how deep in the hole he was, and she was furious. That was money they didn’t have. They had a hell of an argument over it.”
“Why not divorce him?”
“Who knows? Love’s a weird thing.”
“She still loved him?”
“That’s what she told me.”
“What about Gavin? Did he love her?”
“I guess that’s the million-dollar question.”
“Did Gavin ever talk to you about his wife?” Serena asked.
“No. He wouldn’t do that. He knew I saw Chelsey for massages all the time. I’m sure he figured anything he said would go straight back to her.”
“Did Chelsey talk about the inheritance?”
“Yeah, for a while, she was pretty upbeat about it. She thought it would finally change things for them. And it did. But not the way she was expecting.”
“How so?”
“Well, she noticed that Gavin was very careful about keeping the money he got from his sister in a separate bank account. His name only. That way, Chelsey couldn’t see how he was spending it. She worried that he’d gamble a lot of it away. Plus, she was afraid he was thinking about dumping her and taking all the money. If you inherit stuff, apparently it’s yours, and your spouse can’t do shit about it. So Chelsey thought he might be looking to get rid of her.”
“She said that? Those words?”
“Yup.”
“When did she tell you all this?” Serena asked.
“Not long ago. A few weeks. There was definitely trouble in paradise.”
“What else did she say?”
“Sex was a problem, too,” Toni said. “I mean, she even asked me if I’d ever fucked Gavin.”
“Had you?”
“No, but the fact that she asked told me she thought he was cheating on her. She said he was getting weird in bed, too. He’d gotten a daily Cialis prescription, and she said it was definitely not like he needed boner pills every day for their love life. She also said he’d been pressuring her to try stuff.”
“Stuff?”
“Like X. He said he’d heard it would heighten her arousal, and he knew where to get some.”
“Where?” Serena asked.
Toni rolled her eyes. “I’m not talking about that.”
“Broadway?”
“I’m not talking about that,” the girl repeated.
“And this happened recently?”
“Very.”
Serena frowned. She tapped the side of her thigh, and Elton immediately scrambled off the bed and ran to her. She stroked the dog’s fur as she contemplated what Toni had told her.
“Did Chelsey ever tell you that she feared for her safety?” Serena asked.
Toni hesitated. “Not in so many words.”
“In what words?”
The girl played with the cowl on her dress. “Well, it’s just that — I don’t know whether Gavin was cheating on Chelsey, but I’m pretty sure that Chelsey was cheating on him.”
“She told you that?”
“Kind of. I was giving her a massage, and I noticed — well, I noticed what looked like a bite mark on her ass. I made a joke about Gavin being a vampire, and she went white as a sheet. She swore and asked me how noticeable it was. I said it was pretty obvious.”
“So you got the idea that it wasn’t Gavin who gave it to her?”
“Bingo.”
“Do you have any idea who it could have been? Did Chelsey ever say something to give you a clue?”
“No.”
“When was this?”
“A while ago. Maybe a year? It may have been the first time I gave her a massage. So it was long before they had any of the money from his sister.”
“Did Gavin know?” Serena asked.
“I don’t think so. Chelsey looked panicked about the bite mark. She said Gavin had a temper. If he thought she was cheating on him, she wasn’t sure what he would do to her.”
14
Reporters were gathered outside Gavin Webster’s house when Stride arrived. It was almost noon, and the TV journalists were getting ready to go on the air for the midday news. He squeezed through them without answering questions or making a statement. But he noticed that the tenor of the questions had changed from the previous day, when the kidnapping was first announced to the press. Yesterday they were asking whether the police had any hope of finding Chelsey Webster alive.
Today they were asking whether her husband was a suspect in her disappearance.
Stride walked up the driveway and knocked on the lower-level door. The lawyer answered a few seconds later with a mug of coffee in one hand. As he invited Stride inside, he looked at the reporters clustered at the end of the driveway.
“I see the vultures are out in force,” Gavin said.
“Yes, they are.”
“Do you think I should talk to them? Make a personal plea to the kidnappers?”
“That’s up to you,” Stride replied, “but I don’t think kidnappers tend to be swayed by sentiment.”
Gavin stroked his unshaved chin and shook his head. “Unfortunately, I agree with you. Plus, whenever I see a victim make a public plea, I usually say to myself, ‘Yeah, he did it.’”
Stride made no comment.
“Apparently you think so, too,” Gavin added.
He led him upstairs to the main level of the house. Stride noted the front door, which still showed the aftereffects of the break-in. He followed Gavin to the rear of the house, where an open-air deck looked down the hillside toward the lake. The clouds and rain of the previous day had given way to cool sunshine. The view was magnificent, the city buildings sharp and clear, the blue lake water glinting. They both sat in wicker chairs, and Gavin shifted his chair so he was facing Stride directly. His curly hair was messy, and he wore a dirty sweatshirt and sweatpants. His blue eyes were tired and red, his face pale.
“I honestly didn’t expect you to be the one grilling me, Stride. I thought you were done with this.”
“We’re shorthanded. I’m helping out.”
“Well, I’m glad to have you involved in finding Chelsey. You’re the A team, as far as I’m concerned. Plus, you and I go back a long way.”
That was true.
Stride had worked with Gavin Webster since the man’s early days in criminal defense law, and they’d been on opposite sides of interview tables and courtroom witness boxes several times. Maggie disliked all defense lawyers, but Stride viewed them as one of the cogs in the machine that made the system work. He expected them to exploit any loophole that would advantage their clients, and to Stride, that just made him work harder. He’d actually had more ethical troubles with prosecutors over the years than he’d ever had with defense lawyers.