“F-Found the man leaning on the w-wall outside the Deadline Bar and G-Grill.” Darren reached down and hefted Dale by an utterly limp arm. “Staring at his c-car like he c-couldn’t make up his m-mind.”
Marcus moved to Dale’s other side. Up close the man smelled of sour mash and other people’s smoke. “If you’re going to be sick, I’d rather you do it out here.”
Dale struggled to raise his head and draw Marcus into focus. “Don’t be angry with me.”
Even with the two of them helping, Dale made hard going of the front stairs. Marcus used his foot to push open the screen door. “Let’s take him straight upstairs.”
“S-stand aside.” Darren gripped Dale so hard the air huffed from his lungs, and hustled up the steps.
“First door on the right.”
Darren pushed into the guest bedroom and eased the man down. Dale’s fumbling would have cast the side table and lamp to the floor, had Marcus not been there to catch them. Dale’s gaze roved with the unwilling fervor of lost control. “So afraid.”
“The bathroom is through the door straight ahead of you.” Marcus positioned the trash can by the side of the bed, then laid a towel by Dale’s head. “Don’t worry. Their case is full of holes.”
Confusion writhed across his features. “What’re you talking about?”
“Prison. This afternoon. New York. Remember?”
Dale laughed with drunken contempt. “Couldn’t care less about all that.”
Marcus stared down at the rumpled man.
“Where is my baby, Marcus?”
He motioned Darren toward the door. “Sleep it off. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
As he flipped off the light and closed the door, a voice crushed by a mountain of pain moaned, “Where is my daughter?”
Sleep, night’s intimate companion, bid Marcus a jarring farewell. He dressed and stood in the upstairs hallway, listening to the house. A sonorous snoring came from the guest bedroom. Marcus tread quietly down the stairs, grateful for the isolation.
He made a coffee and took his mug and the cordless phone out onto his front porch. His thoughts shifted in time to the pungent predawn breeze. Strands of honeysuckle and bougainvillea climbed trellises to either side of the porch, offering aromatic alms to the day ahead. The previous autumn he had planted a stand of fruit trees beside his office, replacing the huge elm burned by New Horizons lackeys sent to destroy his home. The day was so young and the sky so clear the saplings and neighboring pines stood as Chinese etchings upon a gold-embossed sky. Between him and the road, magnolia blossoms cupped the first glimmer of light in scented white hands.
The night’s final dream lingered like half-heard whispers. He had been seated in this very same spot, rocking away and watching his little corner of the world. Fay had appeared and spoken to him. In the dream he could not make out her words, but he heard the wisdom of hard-fought years and knew the woman’s message. He waited through his second cup, then dialed the New York hotel’s number from memory.
Kirsten answered with the soft breathiness of one still asleep.
“It’s me.”
“Marcus, hi.” The voice was so intimate he tasted the words as he would love’s caress. “I was at dinner when you called. When I got back I was so sleepy I just fell into bed. I’ve still got on half my clothes.”
He forced himself to push that thought away. “It’s early, but I couldn’t wait. We’ve got to talk.”
“Why, what’s wrong?”
“Kirsten, I need your help.”
There was a moment’s pause, then, “Wait just a second.”
The first birds of dawn chirped a welcome as he waited. She returned equipped with a totally different tone. “All right, I’m back.”
He took it slow, giving her the full details. Walking her through the three court appearances, the way opposing counsel had constantly stayed ahead of him, the news yesterday, the journey, the confrontations. Then, because it had tasted so good the first time, he finished as he had started. “I know I’m missing something. I just can’t seem to see this clearly.”
“Someone else is involved here.”
Fifteen minutes on the phone and she had the answer. Marcus found it difficult not to scoff. “Kirsten, who on earth could possibly have such a strong interest in this baby they’d go to all this trouble?”
“That’s our problem.” She remained as soft-spoken as always, but there was no doubt to her response. “We’ve been hitting our heads on a question we can’t answer. Let’s look at it another way.”
He stared at the gathering light. “What other way is there?”
“We need to discover,” Kirsten answered, “who else could be pulling Hamper Caisse’s string.”
“But what would they want?”
“That’s exactly the issue we have to work out.”
The impulse to play the lawyer and pick away at her certainty was so potent it forced him out of his chair and across the dew-flecked lawn. “You’re saying we look first for motive, then the person.”
“Erin had a secret. We know that much. We’ve assumed it was nothing more than a desire to avoid bad publicity. What if it was something else?”
“I’m not sure I follow you.”
“We’ve got to start looking for answers where she cared the most.” She pondered a moment. “I need an introduction at the Met. That was her obsession, right? It’s as good a place to start as any. But I need a contact.”
He shrugged in silent bafflement to reasoning he could not fathom. “Let me make a call.”
CHAPTER 38
Reiner Klatz was a man undone.
He sat locked inside Erin Brandt’s front room. Goscha the maid was upstairs somewhere, packing Erin’s belongings. Her wailing drifted through the ceiling overhead as though Erin’s specter had already arrived to take up ghoulish residence. Newspapers were spread about the table and sofa and floor in devastating array. The tabloids had used police photographs for their front covers. They and the headlines were fists that beat him almost senseless.
Erin’s word, her mood, her every thought had been so tightly woven into the fabric of his day that he now had neither direction nor purpose. His mind hunted like a frantic little animal for the familiar, finding empty solace in meaningless memories.
He recalled the thrill he had felt at discovering Erin’s pure sound was not based upon perfect pitch, which was a source of false pride for many divas. Instead, Erin had the much rarer quality of perfect relative pitch. Perfect pitch meant the ability to remember a note and hit it perfectly, first time, every time. But some of the world’s greatest orchestras held to the centuries-old tradition of tuning a quarter note low or high. This meant the diva was forced to perform in what was for her slightly off-pitch. Erin, on the other hand, took her pitch from the oboe used to tune the instruments. Right first time, every time. So rare a quality it was seldom even discussed.
His mind scampered further, recalling her pattern before every performance. She liked to arrive at the concert hall very early and give the music a final study. Dinner prior to an evening performance was an apple and a few sips of champagne. An iced bucket was always there in her dressing room. Always. She rarely drank more than a single glass, but she insisted on a full bottle. She considered such touches her due. Her voice coach arrived then and together they did a major warm-up. Then she was fitted into the opera’s first costume, assisted only by one trusted dresser, for it was during this period that she also moved into character. Then the final warm-up, another few sips of champagne, and up to the stage. No calming exercises for Erin. This was time for energy and excitement. Reiner sat and recalled what it was like to move alongside Erin Brandt as she headed for the stage. Her focus was so tight that the rest of the world faded into meaningless shadows. She saw nothing, heard nothing, felt nothing. Her world was ahead of her, her life, her entire existence. The only reality she ever cared about waited just beyond where the stage manager stood and smiled the welcome she did not see, his hand timed to open the curtain on the conductor’s downbeat. Then she could step forward, and drink in the lights and the music and the adoration. Then she knew the rapture of being worshiped.