Social Graces
Social Graces
Dixie Browning
John MacBride would do anything to keep his stepbrother from being thrown into jail for a crime he didn't commit. Which is how he ended up in the Outer Banks, posing as a handyman for the young socialite who could clear his stepbrother's name.As a marine archaeologist, Mac was used to digging deep for clues, but nothing had prepared him for the gorgeous woman he suspected of wrongdoing. Only Val Bonnard wasn't the spoiled heiress he'd been expecting. She seemed gentle and caring–and one look at the dazzling beauty had Mac regretting his promise to play detective, especially when it involved being her live-in Mr. Fix It! Because one way or another he'd get what he wanted–until he realized that what he wanted more than anything was the woman herself….
Whether Or Not She Was Ready To Admit It, She’d Been As Turned On By That Hot, Sweet-Salty Kiss As He Was.
It occurred to him that he might have set his mission back a few days.
Or maybe not. Maybe now that he’d defused this crazy physical attraction, he could concentrate on doing what he’d come down here to do.
So there was some electricity sizzling between them. Roughly enough to light up Shea Stadium. It might help if he could take her to bed and make love until he was cross-eyed, but that wasn’t going to happen.
It might also help if he could find whatever he was looking for and get the hell out—put a few hundred miles between them. But somewhere along the line, that idea had lost its appeal.
Dear Reader,
Thanks for choosing Silhouette Desire, where we bring you the ultimate in powerful, passionate and provocative love stories. Our immensely popular series DYNASTIES: THE BARONES comes to a rollicking conclusion this month with Metsy Hingle’s Passionately Ever After. But don’t worry, another wonderful family saga is on the horizon. Come back next month when Barbara McCauley launches DYNASTIES: THE DANFORTHS. Full of Southern charm—and sultry scandals—this is a series not to be missed!
The wonderful Dixie Browning is back with an immersing tale in Social Graces. And Brenda Jackson treats readers to another unforgettable—and unbelievably hot!—hero in Thorn’s Challenge. Kathie DeNosky continues her trilogy about hard-to-tame men with the fabulous Lonetree Ranchers: Colt.
Also this month is another exciting installment in the TEXAS CATTLEMAN’S CLUB: THE STOLEN BABY series. Laura Wright pens a powerful story with Locked Up With a Lawman—I think the title says it all. And welcome back author Susan Crosby who kicks off her brand-new series, BEHIND CLOSED DOORS, with the compelling Christmas Bonus, Strings Attached.
With wishes for a happy, healthy holiday season,
Melissa Jeglinski
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
Social Graces
Dixie Browning
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
DIXIE BROWNING
is an award-winning painter and writer, mother and grandmother who has written nearly eighty contemporary romances. Dixie and her sister, Mary Williams, also write historical romances as Bronwyn Williams. Contact Dixie at www.dixiebrowning.com, or at P.O. Box 1389, Buxton, NC 27920.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Epilogue
One
Standing in the middle of the bedroom, dangling a pair of Chanel slingbacks by the stiletto heels, with a sleeveless black Donna Karan slung over her shoulder, Val Bonnard stared at the partially open closet and listened for the scratching noise to come again. Shivering in the chill air, she glanced quickly at the window. With the wind howling a gale, it might be only a branch scraping the eaves. What else could it be? She was alone in the house, wasn’t she?
She was alone, period.
Swallowing the lump that threatened to lodge permanently in her throat, she glared at the closet door. It was ajar because there wasn’t a level surface in the entire house. All the doors swung open, and all the windows leaked cold air. The temperature outside hovered in the low forties, which wasn’t particularly cold for Carolina in the middle of January, but it felt colder because of the wind. And the dampness.
And the aloneness.
She was still glaring when the mouse emerged, tipped her a glance, twitched its ears, then calmly proceeded to follow the baseboard to a postage-stamp-sized hole near the corner of the room.
It was the last straw in a haystack of last straws. Grief, anger and helplessness clotted around her and she dropped onto the edge of the sagging iron-framed bed and let the tears come.
A few minutes later she sniffed and felt in the pocket of her leather jeans for a tissue. As if pockets designed to display starbursts of rhinestones could possibly harbor anything so practical.
Sniffing again, she thought, it’s not going to work. What on earth had she expected? That by driving for two days to reach a quaint, half remembered house on a half remembered barrier island she would not only escape from crank calls, but magically exchange grief for perspective? That a lightbulb would suddenly appear above her head and she would instantly know who was responsible for Bonnard Financial Consultants’ downfall, her father’s disgrace, his arrest and his untimely death?
Time and distance lent perspective. She’d read that somewhere, probably on a greeting card. She’d had more than two and a half months. Time hadn’t helped.
As for distance, she had run as far away as she could run, to the only place she had left. Now she was here with as many of her possessions as she could cram into her new, cheap, gas-guzzling secondhand car, in a village so small it lacked so much as a single stoplight. She had even escaped from those irritating calls, as there wasn’t a working phone in the house. Her cell phone with its caller ID didn’t seem to work here.
There wasn’t a dry cleaner on the island either, and half her wardrobe required dry-cleaning, most of it special handling. “Why not whine about it, wimp?” she muttered.
At least focusing on trivia helped stave off other thoughts—thoughts that swept her too close to the edge.
It had taken all her energy since her father had died to settle his affairs and dispose of the contents of the gabled, slate-roofed Tudor house that had been home for most of her life. Although stunned to learn that it was so heavily mortgaged, she’d actually been relieved when the bank had taken over the sale.
The rest had gone quickly—the disposal of the contents. Belinda and Charlie had helped enormously before they’d moved to take on new positions. She and Belinda had shared more than a few tears, and even stoic old Charlie had been red-eyed a few times.
In the end, all she’d brought south with her was her hand luggage, three garment bags and three banana boxes, one filled with personal mementos, one with linens, and another with the files she’d retrieved from her father’s study.
In retrospect, everything about the past eleven weeks had been unreal in the truest sense of the word. There’d been a bottle of special vintage Moët Chandon in the industrial-sized, stainless-steel refrigerator, waiting for her birthday celebration. Her father had bought it the day before he’d been arrested. “Belinda has orders to prepare all your favorite dishes,” he’d told her the night before, looking almost cheerful for a change. The old lines and shadows had been there, but at least there’d been some color in his face.
She’d asked several times before if anything was worrying him. Each time he’d brushed off her question. “Stock market’s down,” he’d said the last time, then he’d brightened. “Cholesterol’s down, too, though. Can’t have everything, can we?”
She’d chided him for spending too much time downtown and been relieved when he’d promised to take her advice and start spending more time at home, even though she knew very well he would spend most of it closed up in his study with Forbes and the Wall Street Journal.
For her birthday she had deliberately arranged to have dinner at home with only her dad instead of the usual bash at the club. She had planned to mellow him with the champagne and find out exactly what had been eating at him. But early on the morning of her thirtieth birthday a pair of strangers who turned out to be police officers had shown up at the door and invited her father to accompany them downtown.
She’d seen the whole thing from the top of the stairs. Barefoot and wearing only a robe and nightgown, she had hurried downstairs, demanding to know what was happening.
The spokesman for the pair had been stiffly polite. “Just a few questions, miss, that’s all.” But obviously that hadn’t been all. Her father had been ashen. Alarmed, she’d called first his physician, then his lawyer.
The next few hours had swept past like a kaleidoscope. She didn’t recall having gotten dressed—she certainly hadn’t taken time to shower, much less to arrange her hair before racing outside. Belinda had called after her and told her to take her father’s medicine to the police station, so she’d dashed back and snatched the pill bottle from the housekeeper’s hand.
They’d had only brief minutes to speak privately when the officer in the room with him had gone to get him a cup of water. Speaking quietly, as if he were afraid of being overheard, Frank Bonnard had instructed her to remove all unlabeled paper files from the file cabinet in his study and store them in her bedroom.
Confused and frightened, she had wanted to ask more, but just then the officer had returned. Her father had nodded, swallowed his pills and said, “Go home. I’ll be there as soon as I get through here.”
That was the last time she’d seen him alive. Before he could even be bonded out, he’d suffered a fatal coronary.
Now, peeling a paper towel from the roll on the old oak dresser, Val blew her nose, mopped her eyes and sighed. She’d been doing entirely too much of that lately. Great, gasping sighs, as if she were starved for oxygen.
What she was starved for were answers. Now that it was too late, she wondered if it had been a mistake to leave Greenwich. She could have rented a room, possibly even an apartment. If there were any answers to be found, they would hardly be found halfway down the East Coast in a tiny village her father had visited only once in his entire life.
On the other hand, the auditors, the men from the Financial Crimes Unit, plus those from all the various government agencies involved, were convinced they already had their man—their scapegoat—even though they’d made another token arrest. And even if she were to unravel the mess and prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that her father was innocent, it was too late to bring him back. The best she could hope to do was to restore his reputation.
Light from the setting sun, filtered by ancient, moss-draped live oaks, turned the dusty windows opaque. So many things on the island had changed since she’d last seen this old house, she would never have found it without the real estate agent’s explicit instruction.
Just over a week ago she had called the agency that managed the property she’d inherited from her great-grandmother, Achsah Dozier. A few hours ago, following the agent’s instructions, she had located Seaview Realty. While the office was scarcely larger than a walk-in closet, the woman seated behind a desk cluttered with brochures, boxes of Girl Scout cookies and what appeared to be tax forms, seemed friendly, if somewhat harried.
“Marian Kuvarky.” The woman nodded toward the nameplate on her desk. “Glad you made it before I had to close up,” she said, handing over a set of keys. “I’d better warn you, though—I still haven’t found anyone to give the place a good going-over since the people who were renting it moved out. You might want to check into a motel for a few days.”
Val had come too far to be put off another moment. Besides, she couldn’t afford a motel. Even in the dead of winter, beach prices would seriously erode her dwindling funds. “I can take care of a little dirt, just tell me how to find my house.” She was hardly helpless. She had looked after a three-room apartment with only a weekly maid before she’d moved back home to Connecticut.
Ms. Kuvarky, a youngish blonde with tired eyes and an engaging smile said, “Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. Take a left once you leave here and turn off onto the Back Road.”
“What’s the name of it?”
“Of what?”
“The road.”
“Back Road. It’s named that. I had the power turned on after you called. I forgot if I told you or not, but the last renters left owing for two months. I would have had it ready to rent out again once I found somebody to do a few minor repairs, but like I said over the phone, my cleaner’s out on maternity leave. She says she’ll be back, but you know how that goes. I’m sort of coasting for now, trying to get through the slack season. I cleaned two places myself last weekend.”
Val had been too tired to involve herself in the agent’s problems. Her stomach hadn’t stood the trip well, as she’d nibbled constantly on junk food, more from nerves than from hunger. “I brought linens. You said the house was furnished,” she reminded Ms. Kuvarky.
The agent had nodded. “Pretty much all you’ll need, I guess, but it’s sort of a mishmash. I wrote to your father about the repairs—those are extra—but I never heard back. Anyway, there’s so much construction going on these days, even between seasons, it’s hard to find dependable help.”
Ms. Kuvarky had promised to call around. Val remembered thinking that if the place had a roof and a bed, everything else could wait.
Now she wasn’t quite so sure.
The last thing the rental agent had said as Val had stood in the doorway, trying to get her bearings in a village that had nothing even faintly resembling city blocks or even village squares, was “By the way, if you happen to be looking for work and know one end of a broom from the other, you’re hired.”
She’d been joking, of course. It might even come to that, Val told herself now, but at the moment she had other priorities. Starting with getting rid of her resident mouse.
The power was on, that was the good part. The bad part was that there was no phone. Or maybe that was the good part, too. A few crank calls had even managed to get through call-blocking before she’d left Greenwich, but they could hardly follow her to a place where she didn’t have a working phone.
There was no central heat, only an oil heater in the living room and an assortment of small space heaters scattered in the other rooms. She’d managed to turn the oil heater on. The thing hadn’t exploded, so she assumed she’d pushed the right button.
The water heater was another matter. She let the hot water faucet run for five minutes, but luke was as warm as it got. That’s when she’d discovered that her cell phone didn’t work. She’d tried to call Ms. Kuvarky, and the darned thing blanked out on her. No signal.
All right, so she would think of herself as a pioneer woman. At least she had a bed to sleep in instead of a covered wagon somewhere in the middle of the wilderness. She was thirty years old, with a degree from an excellent college—and although she was somewhat out of her element at the moment, she’d never been accused of being a slow learner. However, repairing major household appliances just might stretch her capability close to the breaking point. Sooner or later—probably sooner—she would have to look for a paying job in order to hire someone to do the things she couldn’t figure out how to do herself.
One thing she definitely could do was clean her house. That accomplished, she could start going through her father’s files, looking for whatever he’d wanted her to find that would enable his lawyer to reopen his case posthumously and clear his name.
There had to be something there. Otherwise, why had he made that strange, hurried request? He could’ve had no way of knowing that he’d be dead within hours of being arrested.
Bitter? Yes, she was bitter. But grief and bitterness weren’t going to solve any problems, either those facing her here or those she’d left behind.
She stood, crossed the small room and kicked at the baseboard. “All right, Mickey, your time is up. Sorry, but I’m not in a sharing mood, so pack up your acorns or whatever and move out.”
By no standards was the house she’d inherited from Achsah Dozier comparable to the one she’d left behind. The original structure might have been modernized at some point since she’d last seen it, but the white paint was peeling rather badly and a few of the faded green shutters dangled from single hinges.
At least the gingerbread trim on the front eaves was intact. She remembered thinking in terms of a fairy tale when she’d been told as a child that the fancy trim was called gingerbread. The fact that her great-grandmother had actually baked gingerbread that day, the spicy scent greeting them at the front door, had only enhanced the illusion.
Marian Kuvarky had mentioned that a few years before she’d died, Achsah Dozier had had part of the old back porch turned into another bedroom and bare-bones bath with its own separate entrance, in case she needed live-in help. Since her death, it had occasionally been rented separately. Val briefly considered the possibility and decided that she wasn’t cut out to play landlady.
On the other hand, unearned income was not to be sneezed at.
Dropping the shoes and dress she’d been clutching, she headed downstairs in search of cleaning materials. Before she could even consider sleeping in the room, she had to do something about the mice-and-mildew smell, either air it out or scrub it out. It was too cold to air it out.
It occurred to her that if Ms. Kuvarky had any idea of just how little she knew about the domestic arts, she would never have offered her a job cleaning houses, even as a joke.
Later that evening Val stepped out of the rust-stained, claw-footed upstairs bathtub onto a monogrammed hand towel. She hadn’t bothered to pack such things as tablecloths, dresser scarves or bath mats, knowing that short of renting a trailer, she had to draw the line somewhere.
She had augmented the lukewarm water with a kettle of boiling water brought up from the kitchen. One kettle wasn’t enough, but by the time she’d heated another one, the first would be cold, so she’d settled for lukewarm and quick.
Now, covered in goose bumps, she swaddled her damp body in a huge bath towel. Aside from being grimy and smelly, the house was also drafty. There was a space heater between the tub and the lavatory that helped as long as she didn’t move more than a foot away from the glowing element. At least with all the drafts, carbon monoxide wouldn’t be a problem. As for the danger of an electrical fire, that was another matter.
Note: have the water heater repaired.
Note: have the wiring checked.
Which reminded her—what about insurance?
“Welcome to the real world, Ms. Bonnard,” she whispered a few minutes later, flipping an 800-count Egyptian-cotton king-sized bottom sheet over the sagging double-bed mattress.
She’d pulled on a pair of navy satin pajamas, a Peruvian hand-knit sweater jacket and a pair of slipper socks. January or not, wasn’t this supposed to be the sunny south?
Fortunately, she’d crammed two down-filled duvets in around her suitcases, one of which she’d immediately tossed over the ugly brown plaid sofa downstairs. The other one was miles too large for the double bed, but its familiar paisley cover was comforting. That done, she collected a pen and notepad and settled down for some serious list making, ignoring the reminder from her stomach that except for pretzels, popcorn and two candy bars, she hadn’t eaten since breakfast. Starting early tomorrow she had a million things to do to make this place even marginally livable before she could concentrate on searching her father’s files for evidence of his innocence.
Nibbling the white-tipped cap of her Mont Blanc, she reread the shopping list. Table cloth—one had standards, after all. Mattress cover—she definitely didn’t like the looks of that mattress, even after she’d flipped it. Oh, and a bath mat. She’d have to ask where to buy linens here on the island.
On to the next list. Tea, bagels, other foods, preferably already prepared. Wrinkling her nose, she added mousetraps to the list. And cleaning supplies.
A clean house was something she’d always taken for granted. After graduating from college she’d lived in small apartments, first in Chicago, then in Manhattan—always in upscale neighborhoods. She had moved back to her father’s house after he’d suffered his first small stroke, and soon after that she’d gotten involved with a few of the local charities. It was what she did best, after all—manage fund-raisers for worthy causes. She had frequently acted as her father’s hostess, although most of his business entertaining had been done at the club.
Looking back, it had been a comfortable way to coast through life. Not particularly exciting—no major achievements—but certainly comfortable.
“Definitely room for improvement,” she murmured, her voice echoing hollowly in the old house.
Tired, hungry, but oddly energized, she surveyed her surroundings. Gone were the familiar French wallpaper in her old bedroom, the mismatched but well-cared-for semi-antique furniture, the faded oriental rug and her eclectic art collection. Here she was confronted by gritty bare floors, dark with layers of varnish—naked, white-painted walls, dusty windows, and the lingering aroma of mouse spoor.
Okay. She could handle that. The sand, she’d quickly discovered, hid in the cracks between the floorboards so that each time she went over it with a broom, more appeared. She could live with a little sand. This was the beach, after all. Even if she couldn’t see the ocean from here, she could hear it.
She added window spray and bathroom cleaner to the list, hoping there would be directions on the bottles in case she got into trouble. More paper towels. Sponges. Rubber gloves, although she probably wouldn’t be able to wear them without her hands breaking out. Her skin was inclined to be sensitive.
Note: take down the for rent sign on the front lawn.
The lawn itself was a mess, but once she was through scrubbing the entire house, maybe she could paint the front door a bright color to deflect attention from that and the rest of the peeling paint until she could afford to landscape and repaint the entire house. There was nothing wrong with old, but she preferred old and charming to old and neglected.
One more note: find position that pays in advance.
Leaning back on the two down-filled pillows, she closed her eyes. “Dad, what am I going to do?” she whispered. “Charlie, Belinda—Miss Mitty, where are you when I need you?”
The only sound was the plaintive honking of a flock of wild geese flying overhead. It was barely nine o’clock. She never went to bed before eleven, often not until the small hours of the morning.
Her last memory before sleep claimed her was of her father being led outside to an unmarked car while she stood in the doorway, too stunned even to protest. One of the officers pressed her father’s head down and urged him into the back seat.
It had been Sunday, the morning of her birthday. Belinda had made blueberry pancakes for breakfast. Frank Bonnard, an early riser, had evidently been in his study. He’d been dressed in flannels, an open-necked white shirt and a navy Shetland sweater when Charlie had answered the door. Val remembered thinking much later that if the ghouls could have stuffed him into a pair of orange coveralls before marching him out in front of the single reporter who had probably tuned in on the police radio and followed them to the Belle Haven address, they’d have done it.
That had been only the beginning. Within hours, the press had swarmed like locusts. Shortly after that the phone calls had started. Despite all the blocking devices, a few people managed to get through with variations ranging from “Where’s my money?” to “Frank Bonnard owes me my pension, dammit. Where is it? What am I supposed to do now?”
The calls had ended when the police had put taps on all three phone lines. Not until recently had she wondered why they’d ceased. How could the callers have known their calls could be traced?
The calls had stopped, but not the nightmares. Both asleep and awake, she had replayed the scene that morning back in late September a thousand times. A pale, stiff-faced Charlie stepping back from the wide front door to allow the two men inside. Her father emerging from his study and carefully closing the door behind him. Belinda, one plump hand covering her mouth as she stood in the dining-room doorway.
In less than twelve hours her father had been dead. Pestered by reporters, auditors and men in bad suits who seemed to think they had every right to invade her home, Val had tried desperately to cram her emotions deep inside her and lock the door. When confronted, she’d quickly learned to answer with one of several replies that included, “I don’t know,” “No comment,” and “My father is innocent.”
A part of her was still in hiding, but she had to know the truth, even in the unlikely event that the truth turned out to be not what she wanted to hear. Back in Greenwich she’d been too close for any real objectivity. Here, once she settled down to it, she would be able to think clearly. Then at least the callers who wanted to know where their money was would have an answer, even if it was one that wouldn’t do them any good.
Valerie Bonnard slept heavily that night. Sometime before daybreak she awoke, thinking about the mouse she’d seen and all the others she’d heard and smelled. Were mice carnivorous? They were grain-eaters, weren’t they?
Oh, God…now she’d never get back to sleep.
Eyes scrunched tightly shut, she rolled over onto her stomach. On her own firm, pillow-top mattress, prone had been her favorite sleeping position, never mind that her face would be a mass of wrinkles by the time she reached forty. On a mattress that sagged like a hammock, it was a toss-up as to which she’d succumb to first—strangulation or a broken back.
Grax, if this was your bed, no wonder your back was rounded, she thought guiltily. Her great-grandmother’s given name had been Achsah, pronounced Axa. As a child, Val had shortened it to Grax. From her one brief visit, she remembered the old woman with the laughing blue eyes and short white hair. Wearing a duckbill cap, a cotton print dress and tennis shoes, she’d been working in the yard when they’d driven up. On their way to Hilton Head, her parents had taken a detour along the Outer Banks so that Lola, Val’s mother, could introduce them to her grandmother.
To a child of seven, the trip had seemed endless. Her parents had bickered constantly in the front seat. Odd that she should remember that now. Looking back, it seemed as if it had been her mother who was reluctant to take the time, not her father.
They’d spent the night at a motel, but they’d eaten dinner in the small white house in the woods. She remembered thinking even before she’d smelled the gingerbread that it looked like Aunty Em’s house in the Wizard of Oz.
Grax had served boiled fish—she’d called it drum—mixed with mashed potatoes, raw onions and bits of crisp fried salt pork. As strange as it sounded, it had turned out to be an interesting mixture of flavors and textures.
Her mother hadn’t touched it. Her father had sampled a few forkfuls. Val, for reasons she could no longer recall, had cleaned off her plate and bragged excessively. She’d eaten two squares of the gingerbread with lemon sauce that had followed.
That had been both the first and the last time she’d seen her great-grandmother. Two years later her parents had separated. Her father had been given custody—had her mother even asked? At any rate, Lola Bonnard had chosen to live abroad for the next few years, so visitation had been out of the question. Val had gone through the usual stages of wondering if the split had been her fault and scheming to bring her parents together again.
She would like to think her mother had attended Grax’s funeral but she really didn’t know that, either. Her relationship with Lola Bonnard had never been close, even before the divorce. Since then it had dwindled to an exchange of Christmas cards and the occasional birthday card. It had been her father’s lawyer who’d handled Grax’s bequest, arranging for someone to manage the house as a rental. At the time, Val had been living in Chicago working for a private foundation that funded shelters and basic health services for runaway girls.
“I’m sorry, Grax,” she whispered now, burdened with a belated sense of guilt. “I’m embarrassed and sorry and I hope you had lots and lots of friends so that you didn’t really miss us.”
No wonder the house felt so cold and empty. How many strangers had lived here since Grax had died? There was nothing of Achsah Dozier left, no echoes of the old woman’s island brogue that had fascinated Val at the time. No hint of the flowers she’d brought inside from the Cape jasmine bushes that had once bloomed in her yard. Lola had complained about the cloying scent and without a word, Grax had got up and set the vase on the back porch.
Val made a silent promise that as soon as she got the house cleaned and repaired, she would see what could be done with the yard.
But first she had to go through those files, discover what it was her father had wanted her to find there, and clear his name. Frank Bonnard had been a good man, an honest man, if something of an impractical dreamer. He didn’t deserve what had happened to him.
Two
John Leo MacBride studied the encrusted mass of plates and cutlery that had been brought up from one of the Nazi submarines sunk during the Second World War off the New England coast. He considered leaving a few as he’d found them instead of soaking them all in an acid solution, prying them apart and cleaning them up. The before-and-after contrast would make a far more interesting display at the small museum that had commissioned the dives.
He glanced at the clock on the wall of his stepbrother’s garage where he’d set up a temporary workspace a couple of months ago when Will had called, asking for help. So far, about all he’d been able to do was to keep Macy, Will’s wife, from making matters worse. That and stay on the heels of his lawyer, who might as well be back chasing ambulances for all the good he’d done his client.
Mac had been standing by chiefly to offer moral support, which was more than Macy was doing. Instead, she seemed almost to be enjoying her role as the wife of a man who was currently awaiting trial for embezzlement. She’d had her hair highlighted two days after Will had made bail, and since then had managed to get a fair amount of facetime with the media.
Bonnard’s daughter, by contrast, had avoided the worst of the feeding frenzy. He could think of a couple of reasons why she might have managed to avoid the spotlight, but social clout didn’t mean her old man wasn’t guilty as sin.
Will’s only crime, Mac was convinced of it, was being too trusting. Less than a year after being given a partnership, Will had gone down in the corporate shipwreck along with Frank Bonnard, founder and CEO of the privately held financial consulting firm. Bonnard had paid for his sins by dying of a massive heart attack almost before the investigation got underway.
Will had hired an inept lawyer—an old law-school classmate. A lawyer himself, as well as a CPA, he’d been planning to present his own defense when Mac had talked him out of it. He was sorry now that he had.
But the money was still missing, and after nearly three months, the trail was murkier than ever. Current thinking was that funds had been bled off gradually over a period of years rather than months, probably funneled from one offshore account to another until it was impossible to trace either the source or the destination.
No one was talking. Bonnard because he was dead, Will because he was clueless, his lawyer because if the jerk had ever passed a bar, it wasn’t a bar that served drinks. The guy was a lush.
Mac had tried his own brand of logic on the case, running down the short list of suspects. The Chief Financial Officer, Sam Hutchinson, had apparently been cleared. Currently on an extended leave of absence to be with his terminally ill wife, he’d been the logical suspect. His computers, his files—everything that bore his fingerprints, had been impounded. He’d come through it all clean. Will liked the guy. Only hours before he’d died, Bonnard himself had vouched for him.
As for Bonnard, late founder and CEO of Bonnard Financial Consultants, not even death had offered protection. Once the flock of outside auditors dug in, both he and Will had been swept up in the dragnet.
It was shortly after that that Mac had moved his base of operations from an apartment in Mystic, near the aquarium, to Will’s Greenwich home. He was currently living in the small apartment over the garage, finishing up a few tasks from his last commissioned dive.
BFC was a small regional firm, nothing like some of the big outfits that had hit the reef over the past few years. Not that the impact on the victims was any less devastating, as BFC had specialized in handling retirement funds for a number of small area businesses.
To give him credit, back when the economy had taken a dive a few years ago, Bonnard had borrowed heavily against his fancy house and pumped the funds back into the company, a fact that had quickly come to light. It didn’t exactly fit the profile of a high-level embezzler to Mac’s way of thinking, unless at the same time he’d been shoring up the business with one hand to allay suspicions, he’d been bleeding off profits with the other. Slick trick, if you could pull it off.
Bonnard’s only heir was a daughter. The feds had run her through the washer just as a precaution, but so far as anyone knew she had never been involved in any way with her father’s business. Will was convinced she wasn’t a player.
Will’s wife, Macy, wasn’t so generous, but then, Macy was inclined to be jealous of any attractive woman, especially one who’d been born with the proverbial silver spoon. Even Mac had to wonder if the investigators had gone easy on the daughter because of her looks and her social position. He wasn’t sure how big a part sympathy played in such a case, but the fact that her father had died on his daughter’s thirtieth birthday might have had an effect. The press had made it a big deal. He remembered seeing that same pale, stricken face—flawless cheekbones, haunted gray eyes—replayed over and over on every recount during the week immediately after Bonnard’s arrest—an arrest that had been followed almost immediately by his death.
Ironic to think that Bonnard might have got clean away if it hadn’t been for a junior accountant who had mistakenly mailed out 1099s for a tax-free municipal fund to a number of clients and been forced to do amended forms. Evidently the matter had landed on the desk of a snarky IRS agent. One question had led to another; an outside auditor had been called in, and the whole house of cards had come crashing down. Bonnard had gone to his dubious reward, leaving his junior partner to take the fall.
That’s when the scavenger hunt had shifted into high gear, drawing in the FBI, the Financial Crimes Unit, the state auditor’s department and the IRS, not to mention a bunch of media types with Woodward and Bernstein complexes. But with all that manpower, they were no closer after nearly three months to locating the missing money, much less tracing it back to its source.
Which damn well wasn’t Will Jordan.
Mac’s single bag was packed, the Land Cruiser’s tank topped off. He was ready to head south the minute Shirley, his hacker friend, gave the word. Not that hacking was even needed in this case, as public records were open to everyone who knew, geographically speaking, where to look. But when he needed information in a hurry, it helped to know someone who could make a computer sit up and sing the “Star Spangled Banner.”
Valerie Bonnard’s only asset of record at this moment was a modest trust fund that wouldn’t kick in for another five years, and a small property she’d inherited in a place called Buxton, on North Carolina’s Outer Banks. Mac was generally familiar with the area—what marine archeologist wasn’t familiar with the notorious Graveyard of the Atlantic? There was even a new museum by that name on the island. From what he’d been able to find on the Internet, most of the island that hadn’t been taken over by Park Service or National Wildlife had been developed over the past few decades.
Ms. Bonnard, using a dummy corporation, could have been investing steadily in some high-dollar real estate down there. Shirley hadn’t been able to tie her to anything specific, but it would have been a smart move on the part of La Bonnard, especially considering the erratic stock market. Whether or not she’d socked away the missing funds in investment-grade real estate, it was as good a place to start as any.
One of the perks of being a freelance marine archeologist was large chunks of unregulated time. Unlike Will’s, Mac’s lifestyle was both portable and low maintenance, although Will’s was probably about to change even more drastically in the near future. Mac had a feeling that once this nightmare was over, his stepbrother might have lost more than a junior partnership, an upscale house and a few club memberships. Macy was looking restless now that the publicity had died down. She just might walk, which would be no great loss in Mac’s estimation.
The drive took two days, allowing for frequent breaks, in his fourteen-year-old, rebuilt Land Cruiser. Mac spent the first night in the Norfolk region. Late in the afternoon of the second day, having spent a few hours in one of the area’s maritime museums, he pulled into a motel in Buxton and booked a room, intending to spend the first half hour flexing various muscles under a hot shower.
At age thirty-seven he was beginning to realize that stick shifts were hell on left knees. A friend had warned him, but he wasn’t about to trade in his customized vehicle, with the locked compartments designed specifically to hold his diving gear and the ergonomic seats that helped minimize fatigue. It might take him a bit longer to bounce back after a long drive, but normally he looked on the bounce-back time as a chance to catch up on his reading. He’d even tossed in a few books at the last minute, in case he had any down time. Not that he planned to hang around any longer than it took to uncover a lead that would shift the focus off Will.
If Mac had a weakness—actually, he admitted to several—it was books. Aside from diving gear, books were his favorite indulgence. Mostly history. The stuff fascinated him, always had. But reading could wait until he’d pinned the Bonnard woman down and got the information he needed.
A fleeting image of him pinning La Bonnard down on a big, soft bed drifted across his field of vision. He blinked it away before it could take root.
The desk clerk was young and inclined to be chatty. It took Mac all of two minutes to get the location of the residence of the late Achsah Dozier, as this wasn’t the kind of place where street addresses did much good.
“I didn’t really know her, I’ve only been here a few years,” the young woman said. She’d looked him over and touched her hair when he’d walked into the lobby, but evidently decided on closer examination that he wasn’t that interesting.
Not altogether surprising. He still had all his hair and teeth, and he’d been asked more than once if he worked out at a gym. He didn’t. The type of work he did tended to develop the legs and upper body while it pared down the waist and hips. On the other hand, his face had once been compared to a rock-slide.
Besides, he had a couple of decades on the bubblegum-chewing kid, who was saying, “I think Miss Achsah used to live on the Back Road.”
In certain pockets of population, he’d learned, Miss was an honorary title given to women over a certain age, regardless of marital status. When the first name was used, it generally indicated that there were a number of women with the same surname.
“You go out the door and turn left—” The young clerk continued to talk while Mac mentally recorded the data. “I heard her house was rented out after she died, but I don’t think there’s anybody living there now. Marian Kuvarky over at Seaview Realty could tell you.”
Something—call it a hunter’s instinct—told him that the Bonnard woman was holed up in her great-grandmother’s house, probably keeping a low profile until things cooled down. If she had a brain under all that glossy black hair she had to know she was probably still considered “of interest” by certain authorities, even if they hadn’t found anything to hold her on.
The smart thing would have been to go someplace where she had no ties and wait until the heat died down. After say, six months—a year would be even better—with what she had stashed away in an offshore account, she could settle anywhere in the world.
With what she allegedly had stashed away, he corrected himself reluctantly. So far, he was the only one doing the alleging, but then, he had a personal stake. Will hadn’t embezzled a damned thing. In the first place, his stepbrother couldn’t lie worth crap, and in the second place, if he could’ve got his hands on that kind of money, his wife would’ve already spent it. Macy could easily qualify for the world shopping playoffs.
Mac was good at extrapolations. As a marine archeologist, it was what he did best. Study the evidence—the written records, plus any prevailing conditions, political or weatherwise, that might affect where a ship had reportedly gone down. Not until he had thoroughly examined all available data and given his instincts time to mull it over was he ready to home in on his target.
In this case the field had officially narrowed to two suspects: Bonnard and Will. Eliminate Will and that left only Bonnard—or in this case, Bonnard’s heir. The auditors were still digging halfheartedly, but the case had been shoved to the back burner as new and bigger cases had intervened in the meantime. Which left poor Will dangling in the wind, his next hearing not even on the docket yet.
Mac made up his mind to wait until morning to scope out the house. He even might wait another day before making contact, but no longer than that. He needed answers. Will wasn’t holding up well. He’d lost weight, he had circles under his eyes the size of hubcaps, and his marriage was falling apart.
Timing was crucial. He didn’t want to spook her, but neither could he afford to wait too long. The feds hadn’t been able to find anything to hold her on, not even as a witness, but to Mac, the logic was inescapable. That damned money hadn’t just gone up in smoke. Someone close to Bonnard held the key. The man had been divorced more than twenty years; he’d never remarried. So far as anyone knew, he’d never even had a mistress. A few brief liaisons, but none that had lasted more than a few months. The press had gone after the ex-wife, now reportedly in the process of shedding husband number three. There was no love lost between her and Bonnard, so if she’d known anything it would probably have come out. Another dead end.
By process of elimination, it had to be the daughter. Millions of bucks didn’t just slip through a crack in the floor like yellow dust in a gold-rush saloon. Someone was waiting for the heat to die down to claim it. And he knew who the most logical someone was.
Valerie Stevens Bonnard, Mac mused. He knew what she looked like, even knew what make car she drove. He’d seen her around town a couple of times when he’d been in the area visiting Will last spring. Cool, flawless—sexy in a touch-me-not way. Talk about your oxymorons.
He’d even spoken to her once. Will had gone to some BFC function at the country club while Mac was spending a few days in Greenwich on his way back from DC last summer. He’d forgotten his prescription sunglasses and called to asked Mac to drop them off.
Mac had been changing the fluid in his transmission when he’d answered the phone and hadn’t bothered to change clothes, intending to leave the sunglasses with an attendant. Driving the same weathered Land Cruiser, he had just squeezed into a parking place between a Lexus and an Escalade when Ms. Bonnard drove up in Mercedes convertible. Evidently she’d mistaken him for one of the groundskeepers, because she’d informed him politely that service parking was in the rear. She’d even smiled, her big gray-green eyes about as warm as your average glacier.
So yeah, he knew what she looked like. There was no chance she would recognize him now though. She’d summed him up and dismissed him in less than two seconds flat.
Val was good at any number of things, among them organizing intimate dinner parties for fifty people and overseeing thousand-dollar-a-plate fund-raisers. She excelled at tennis, skiing and hanging art shows. She’d been drilled in what was expected of someone with her privileged background from the time she could walk.
Now, faced with an oven that was lined with three inches of burned-on gunk she burst into tears, only because cursing was not yet among her talents.
She wiped her eyes, smearing a streak of grime across her cheek and glared at the rattling kitchen window. There had to be a way to keep the wind from whipping in through the frames. How had the previous tenants managed to stay warm?
They hadn’t, of course. Probably why they’d moved out, leaving the place in such a mess. Three of the rooms had air-conditioner units hanging out the windows. No one had bothered to remove or even to cover them, much less plug all the cracks around them. She had stuffed the cracks with the plastic bags from her first shopping foray, for all the good it did.
Neither the space heaters nor the ugly brown oil heater were a match for the damp chill that seemed to creep through the very walls. Hadn’t anyone in the South ever heard of insulation?
She added a roll of clear plastic and a staple gun to the growing shopping list that included more of the sudsy cleanser, another six-pack of paper towels and a few more mousetraps. The plastic would have to serve until she could afford storm windows.
After hours spent scrubbing, most of the downstairs rooms plus her bedroom and the upstairs bath smelled of pine cleanser instead of mice and mildew. She’d ended up buying live traps instead of wire traps, even though they’d cost more, because while she refused to share her new home with rodents, she wasn’t into killing. Spiders, roaches and mosquitoes, perhaps, but nothing larger.
Her new lifestyle, she was rapidly discovering, called for a drastically new mindset. Belinda and Charlie, her father’s housekeeper and man-of-all-work, had spoiled her, she’d be the first to admit. Now, instead of taking her comfort for granted, she was forced to acquire a whole battery of new skills. In the process she was also acquiring an impressive array of bruises, splinters and broken fingernails, not to mention a rash on her left hand from the rubber gloves she’d tried to wear. French manicures and sleek hairstyles were definitely things of the past. After the second day, she hadn’t bothered to apply makeup, only a quick splash of moisturizer and, when she remembered it, lip balm. Instead of her usual chignon, she wore her hair in a single braid that, by day’s end, was usually frazzled and laced with cobwebs—or worse.
On the plus side, she was too busy to waste time crying. Hard work was turning out to be a fair remedy for grief. Somewhat surprisingly she was even making a few friends. Marian Kuvarky at the real estate office, the clerk at the hardware store who had advised her on mousetraps, and the friendly woman at the post office where she’d rented a mailbox. She’d asked questions of all of them, everything from where to find what on the island to what kind of weather to expect.
“Expect the unexpected, I guess,” the postal worker had said, “This time of year we might get seventy-five degrees one day and thirty-five the next. Not much snow, but lawsy, the winds’ll sandblast your windshield before you know it. By the way, did I tell you that you have to come here to collect your mail? None of the villages on the island has home delivery.”
Which reminded her—she needed to get started mailing change-of-address notices now that she had an official address.
But first she had to finish scrubbing the tops of the kitchen cabinets. She’d given up on the oven for now—didn’t know how to use the darned thing, anyway. But sooner or later she was going to defeat that thick black crust if she had to resort to dynamite.
Once she finished the kitchen she would tackle the back bedroom and bath in case she got desperate enough to look for a tenant. Meanwhile she needed to take down that half-hidden sign in the front yard. Or maybe just cover it for the time being. While she hated the idea of compromising her privacy, it might be a way of bringing in an income until she could look for work. Marian’s offer of a job cleaning houses had been a joke…hadn’t it?
Standing on the next-to-the-top step of the rickety stepladder she’d retrieved from a shed in the backyard, Val steadied herself by draping one arm over an open cabinet door while she wiped off the last section of cabinet top, wincing as her shoulder muscles protested. Hard to believe that only a few months ago she’d thought nothing of dancing all night, playing tennis all morning and spending the afternoon hanging a benefit art exhibit.
At least she no longer had trouble sleeping. A fast warm shower, a couple of acetominaphen caplets and she was out like a light. Over the past few months she’d lost count of all the nights she had lain awake, tunneling through endless caverns in search of answers that continued to elude her. Answers to questions such as, who could possibly have embezzled so much money without anyone’s noticing in a small firm that was bristling with accountants? Oh, she’d heard all about the fancy shell games—most of them actually legal—that were played by some of the largest accounting firms. The fact remained, why hadn’t anyone noticed until it was too late? What had happened to the money?
And why on earth hadn’t she gone for an MBA instead of wasting her time on folk music, literature and art history?
Although, not even a Harvard MBA had kept her father from being taken in. But then, Frank Bonnard’s strength had been pulling ideas out of the blue, working out an overall plan and counting on a select team to carry out the details. The team in this case had consisted of Sam Hutchinson, who’d been gone practically the whole year, and therefore couldn’t have been involved, and the administrative assistant whom she’d never met before the woman had been asked to leave. Val had a feeling Miss Mitty might have engineered that, as evidently the newcomer had encroached on territory the older woman considered hers alone.
And of course, there was Will Jordan, the new junior partner who’d been indicted along with her father. He was probably guilty. The prosecutors must have thought so, as he was still out on bond.
To be fair she had to include Miss Mitty, longtime family friend and her father’s efficient and insightful, if unofficial assistant. Not that she was in any way a suspect, but Mitty Stoddard had been there from the beginning. If she hadn’t retired back in August she’d have known precisely where to start digging. While she might not have a college degree, much less a title, the woman was smarter than any of the younger members of the team gave her credit for being, Val was convinced of it.
Val made a mental note to try again to reach her. She’d dialed the number she’d been given countless times over the past several weeks, always with the same results. Not a single one of the messages she’d left had produced results. At first she’d been too distracted to wonder about it, but now she was beginning to be seriously concerned. If Miss Mitty was ill, it might explain why she had suddenly announced her retirement and moved to Georgia to be close to a newly widowed niece. She hadn’t wanted anyone to worry about her.
Come to think of it, Miss Mitty had never really trusted Will Jordan. As a rule, people whom she didn’t trust rarely remained at BFC very long. Jordan was an exception. If Mitty Stoddard didn’t trust a person there was usually a sound reason, even if it wasn’t apparent at the time. Val was sure she had voiced her reservations where it would do the most good, but for once in their long association, Frank Bonnard must have disagreed with her.
Val sighed. She desperately needed someone to bounce her ideas off, and Miss Mitty would be perfect. Under all that lavender hair lurked a surprisingly keen mind. Darn it, it wasn’t like her not to return a call. The last thing she’d said before boarding the plane to Atlanta when Val had driven her to the airport was, “You call me now, you hear? You know how I feel about your young man.” Val had been engaged at the time. “But then, you won’t listen to an old woman. I guess I can’t blame you.” She’d laughed, wattles swaying above the navy suit and lacy white blouse with the tiny gold bar pin fastening the high collar. “Once you set the date, you let me know and I’ll make plans to come back. Belinda and Charlie are getting along in years—the last thing they need is a big, fancy wedding.”
Belinda was two years younger than Mitty Stoddard, and no one knew Charlie’s exact age. As it turned out, Miss Mitty had been absolutely right about Tripp Ailes, but that wasn’t the reason Val was so desperate to get in touch with her now. Was she even aware of all that had happened since she’d moved to Georgia? The collapse of BFC had been big news in the northeast for a few weeks—the Wall Street Journal had covered it, with updates for the first week or so. But it had probably been worth only a few lines in the business section of the Atlanta Constitution, or whatever newspaper Miss Mitty read now.
She would keep on trying, but in the meantime she had work to do before she could settle down with those blasted files. If there was a method in her father’s filing system, she had yet to discover it. Brilliant, Frank Bonnard had undoubtedly been; organized, he was not.
Absently, she scratched her chin, leaving another smear of dirt. After waiting this long, the files could wait another day or two. She was making inroads on years of dirt and neglect—the pungent aroma of pine cleanser now replaced other less-pleasant smells, but it was still a far cry from the fragrance of gingerbread and Cape jasmine she remembered from so long ago.
“Up and at ’em, lady.”
She didn’t budge from the chair. She could think of several things she’d rather be doing than scrubbing down another wall. Shagging golf balls barefoot in a bed of snake-infested poison ivy, for instance.
Okay, so she was procrastinating. Scowling at the heap of filthy paper towels on the floor, she admitted that sooner or later the house would be as clean as she could get it and then—then—she would focus all her attention on going through her father’s files with a fine-tooth comb.
Not even to herself would Val admit the smallest possibility of finding evidence of her father’s guilt.
Three
A few hours later, with both the furniture and the downstairs windows sparkling—on the inside, at least—Val collapsed onto one of the freshly scrubbed kitchen chairs. She kicked off her Cole Haans and sipped on a glass of chilled vegetable juice, hoping that that and peanut butter constituted a balanced diet.
The ugly green refrigerator probably dated from the sixties. It was noisy and showing signs of rust, but at least it was now clean, inside and out. And if it wasn’t exactly energy efficient, neither was she at the moment.
Marian had relayed the promise that her phone would be hooked up sometime today, which was a big relief. New number equaled no crank calls. She’d had to go outside and stand near the road to get even an erratic signal on her cell phone. After today, though, she could hook up her laptop, deal with her e-mail and check out the Greenwich newspapers to see if there’d been any new developments since she’d left town.
That done, she’d better start composing a résumé. Unfortunately, the only kind of work in which she had any experience was the kind that paid off more in satisfaction than in wages.
“Ha. How the mighty have fallen,” she said, dolefully amused.
How much would a private investigator charge to dig into her father’s records? The same records that had been turned inside out by swarms of experts?
Too much, probably. Anything was too much, given her present circumstances. Besides, even if she could have afforded to hire an investigator, she wasn’t sure she could trust him with her father’s personal files. Was there some code of ethics that said a private investigator had to turn over any incriminating evidence he might find?
“Dad, I’m out of my element here, you’re going to have to give me a hint,” she whispered now. Will Jordan might be still under investigation, but Val had a feeling he was going to find some way to pin the whole thing on Frank Bonnard. Why not? Her poor father was in no position to defend himself.
Val was feeling more inadequate with every day that passed. If she got lucky and found evidence that would vindicate her father, then she could be charged with concealing that same evidence. Couldn’t win for losing. Classic case, she thought ruefully.
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Dixie Browning
John MacBride would do anything to keep his stepbrother from being thrown into jail for a crime he didn't commit. Which is how he ended up in the Outer Banks, posing as a handyman for the young socialite who could clear his stepbrother's name.As a marine archaeologist, Mac was used to digging deep for clues, but nothing had prepared him for the gorgeous woman he suspected of wrongdoing. Only Val Bonnard wasn't the spoiled heiress he'd been expecting. She seemed gentle and caring–and one look at the dazzling beauty had Mac regretting his promise to play detective, especially when it involved being her live-in Mr. Fix It! Because one way or another he'd get what he wanted–until he realized that what he wanted more than anything was the woman herself….
Whether Or Not She Was Ready To Admit It, She’d Been As Turned On By That Hot, Sweet-Salty Kiss As He Was.
It occurred to him that he might have set his mission back a few days.
Or maybe not. Maybe now that he’d defused this crazy physical attraction, he could concentrate on doing what he’d come down here to do.
So there was some electricity sizzling between them. Roughly enough to light up Shea Stadium. It might help if he could take her to bed and make love until he was cross-eyed, but that wasn’t going to happen.
It might also help if he could find whatever he was looking for and get the hell out—put a few hundred miles between them. But somewhere along the line, that idea had lost its appeal.
Dear Reader,
Thanks for choosing Silhouette Desire, where we bring you the ultimate in powerful, passionate and provocative love stories. Our immensely popular series DYNASTIES: THE BARONES comes to a rollicking conclusion this month with Metsy Hingle’s Passionately Ever After. But don’t worry, another wonderful family saga is on the horizon. Come back next month when Barbara McCauley launches DYNASTIES: THE DANFORTHS. Full of Southern charm—and sultry scandals—this is a series not to be missed!
The wonderful Dixie Browning is back with an immersing tale in Social Graces. And Brenda Jackson treats readers to another unforgettable—and unbelievably hot!—hero in Thorn’s Challenge. Kathie DeNosky continues her trilogy about hard-to-tame men with the fabulous Lonetree Ranchers: Colt.
Also this month is another exciting installment in the TEXAS CATTLEMAN’S CLUB: THE STOLEN BABY series. Laura Wright pens a powerful story with Locked Up With a Lawman—I think the title says it all. And welcome back author Susan Crosby who kicks off her brand-new series, BEHIND CLOSED DOORS, with the compelling Christmas Bonus, Strings Attached.
With wishes for a happy, healthy holiday season,
Melissa Jeglinski
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
Social Graces
Dixie Browning
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
DIXIE BROWNING
is an award-winning painter and writer, mother and grandmother who has written nearly eighty contemporary romances. Dixie and her sister, Mary Williams, also write historical romances as Bronwyn Williams. Contact Dixie at www.dixiebrowning.com, or at P.O. Box 1389, Buxton, NC 27920.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Epilogue
One
Standing in the middle of the bedroom, dangling a pair of Chanel slingbacks by the stiletto heels, with a sleeveless black Donna Karan slung over her shoulder, Val Bonnard stared at the partially open closet and listened for the scratching noise to come again. Shivering in the chill air, she glanced quickly at the window. With the wind howling a gale, it might be only a branch scraping the eaves. What else could it be? She was alone in the house, wasn’t she?
She was alone, period.
Swallowing the lump that threatened to lodge permanently in her throat, she glared at the closet door. It was ajar because there wasn’t a level surface in the entire house. All the doors swung open, and all the windows leaked cold air. The temperature outside hovered in the low forties, which wasn’t particularly cold for Carolina in the middle of January, but it felt colder because of the wind. And the dampness.
And the aloneness.
She was still glaring when the mouse emerged, tipped her a glance, twitched its ears, then calmly proceeded to follow the baseboard to a postage-stamp-sized hole near the corner of the room.
It was the last straw in a haystack of last straws. Grief, anger and helplessness clotted around her and she dropped onto the edge of the sagging iron-framed bed and let the tears come.
A few minutes later she sniffed and felt in the pocket of her leather jeans for a tissue. As if pockets designed to display starbursts of rhinestones could possibly harbor anything so practical.
Sniffing again, she thought, it’s not going to work. What on earth had she expected? That by driving for two days to reach a quaint, half remembered house on a half remembered barrier island she would not only escape from crank calls, but magically exchange grief for perspective? That a lightbulb would suddenly appear above her head and she would instantly know who was responsible for Bonnard Financial Consultants’ downfall, her father’s disgrace, his arrest and his untimely death?
Time and distance lent perspective. She’d read that somewhere, probably on a greeting card. She’d had more than two and a half months. Time hadn’t helped.
As for distance, she had run as far away as she could run, to the only place she had left. Now she was here with as many of her possessions as she could cram into her new, cheap, gas-guzzling secondhand car, in a village so small it lacked so much as a single stoplight. She had even escaped from those irritating calls, as there wasn’t a working phone in the house. Her cell phone with its caller ID didn’t seem to work here.
There wasn’t a dry cleaner on the island either, and half her wardrobe required dry-cleaning, most of it special handling. “Why not whine about it, wimp?” she muttered.
At least focusing on trivia helped stave off other thoughts—thoughts that swept her too close to the edge.
It had taken all her energy since her father had died to settle his affairs and dispose of the contents of the gabled, slate-roofed Tudor house that had been home for most of her life. Although stunned to learn that it was so heavily mortgaged, she’d actually been relieved when the bank had taken over the sale.
The rest had gone quickly—the disposal of the contents. Belinda and Charlie had helped enormously before they’d moved to take on new positions. She and Belinda had shared more than a few tears, and even stoic old Charlie had been red-eyed a few times.
In the end, all she’d brought south with her was her hand luggage, three garment bags and three banana boxes, one filled with personal mementos, one with linens, and another with the files she’d retrieved from her father’s study.
In retrospect, everything about the past eleven weeks had been unreal in the truest sense of the word. There’d been a bottle of special vintage Moët Chandon in the industrial-sized, stainless-steel refrigerator, waiting for her birthday celebration. Her father had bought it the day before he’d been arrested. “Belinda has orders to prepare all your favorite dishes,” he’d told her the night before, looking almost cheerful for a change. The old lines and shadows had been there, but at least there’d been some color in his face.
She’d asked several times before if anything was worrying him. Each time he’d brushed off her question. “Stock market’s down,” he’d said the last time, then he’d brightened. “Cholesterol’s down, too, though. Can’t have everything, can we?”
She’d chided him for spending too much time downtown and been relieved when he’d promised to take her advice and start spending more time at home, even though she knew very well he would spend most of it closed up in his study with Forbes and the Wall Street Journal.
For her birthday she had deliberately arranged to have dinner at home with only her dad instead of the usual bash at the club. She had planned to mellow him with the champagne and find out exactly what had been eating at him. But early on the morning of her thirtieth birthday a pair of strangers who turned out to be police officers had shown up at the door and invited her father to accompany them downtown.
She’d seen the whole thing from the top of the stairs. Barefoot and wearing only a robe and nightgown, she had hurried downstairs, demanding to know what was happening.
The spokesman for the pair had been stiffly polite. “Just a few questions, miss, that’s all.” But obviously that hadn’t been all. Her father had been ashen. Alarmed, she’d called first his physician, then his lawyer.
The next few hours had swept past like a kaleidoscope. She didn’t recall having gotten dressed—she certainly hadn’t taken time to shower, much less to arrange her hair before racing outside. Belinda had called after her and told her to take her father’s medicine to the police station, so she’d dashed back and snatched the pill bottle from the housekeeper’s hand.
They’d had only brief minutes to speak privately when the officer in the room with him had gone to get him a cup of water. Speaking quietly, as if he were afraid of being overheard, Frank Bonnard had instructed her to remove all unlabeled paper files from the file cabinet in his study and store them in her bedroom.
Confused and frightened, she had wanted to ask more, but just then the officer had returned. Her father had nodded, swallowed his pills and said, “Go home. I’ll be there as soon as I get through here.”
That was the last time she’d seen him alive. Before he could even be bonded out, he’d suffered a fatal coronary.
Now, peeling a paper towel from the roll on the old oak dresser, Val blew her nose, mopped her eyes and sighed. She’d been doing entirely too much of that lately. Great, gasping sighs, as if she were starved for oxygen.
What she was starved for were answers. Now that it was too late, she wondered if it had been a mistake to leave Greenwich. She could have rented a room, possibly even an apartment. If there were any answers to be found, they would hardly be found halfway down the East Coast in a tiny village her father had visited only once in his entire life.
On the other hand, the auditors, the men from the Financial Crimes Unit, plus those from all the various government agencies involved, were convinced they already had their man—their scapegoat—even though they’d made another token arrest. And even if she were to unravel the mess and prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that her father was innocent, it was too late to bring him back. The best she could hope to do was to restore his reputation.
Light from the setting sun, filtered by ancient, moss-draped live oaks, turned the dusty windows opaque. So many things on the island had changed since she’d last seen this old house, she would never have found it without the real estate agent’s explicit instruction.
Just over a week ago she had called the agency that managed the property she’d inherited from her great-grandmother, Achsah Dozier. A few hours ago, following the agent’s instructions, she had located Seaview Realty. While the office was scarcely larger than a walk-in closet, the woman seated behind a desk cluttered with brochures, boxes of Girl Scout cookies and what appeared to be tax forms, seemed friendly, if somewhat harried.
“Marian Kuvarky.” The woman nodded toward the nameplate on her desk. “Glad you made it before I had to close up,” she said, handing over a set of keys. “I’d better warn you, though—I still haven’t found anyone to give the place a good going-over since the people who were renting it moved out. You might want to check into a motel for a few days.”
Val had come too far to be put off another moment. Besides, she couldn’t afford a motel. Even in the dead of winter, beach prices would seriously erode her dwindling funds. “I can take care of a little dirt, just tell me how to find my house.” She was hardly helpless. She had looked after a three-room apartment with only a weekly maid before she’d moved back home to Connecticut.
Ms. Kuvarky, a youngish blonde with tired eyes and an engaging smile said, “Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. Take a left once you leave here and turn off onto the Back Road.”
“What’s the name of it?”
“Of what?”
“The road.”
“Back Road. It’s named that. I had the power turned on after you called. I forgot if I told you or not, but the last renters left owing for two months. I would have had it ready to rent out again once I found somebody to do a few minor repairs, but like I said over the phone, my cleaner’s out on maternity leave. She says she’ll be back, but you know how that goes. I’m sort of coasting for now, trying to get through the slack season. I cleaned two places myself last weekend.”
Val had been too tired to involve herself in the agent’s problems. Her stomach hadn’t stood the trip well, as she’d nibbled constantly on junk food, more from nerves than from hunger. “I brought linens. You said the house was furnished,” she reminded Ms. Kuvarky.
The agent had nodded. “Pretty much all you’ll need, I guess, but it’s sort of a mishmash. I wrote to your father about the repairs—those are extra—but I never heard back. Anyway, there’s so much construction going on these days, even between seasons, it’s hard to find dependable help.”
Ms. Kuvarky had promised to call around. Val remembered thinking that if the place had a roof and a bed, everything else could wait.
Now she wasn’t quite so sure.
The last thing the rental agent had said as Val had stood in the doorway, trying to get her bearings in a village that had nothing even faintly resembling city blocks or even village squares, was “By the way, if you happen to be looking for work and know one end of a broom from the other, you’re hired.”
She’d been joking, of course. It might even come to that, Val told herself now, but at the moment she had other priorities. Starting with getting rid of her resident mouse.
The power was on, that was the good part. The bad part was that there was no phone. Or maybe that was the good part, too. A few crank calls had even managed to get through call-blocking before she’d left Greenwich, but they could hardly follow her to a place where she didn’t have a working phone.
There was no central heat, only an oil heater in the living room and an assortment of small space heaters scattered in the other rooms. She’d managed to turn the oil heater on. The thing hadn’t exploded, so she assumed she’d pushed the right button.
The water heater was another matter. She let the hot water faucet run for five minutes, but luke was as warm as it got. That’s when she’d discovered that her cell phone didn’t work. She’d tried to call Ms. Kuvarky, and the darned thing blanked out on her. No signal.
All right, so she would think of herself as a pioneer woman. At least she had a bed to sleep in instead of a covered wagon somewhere in the middle of the wilderness. She was thirty years old, with a degree from an excellent college—and although she was somewhat out of her element at the moment, she’d never been accused of being a slow learner. However, repairing major household appliances just might stretch her capability close to the breaking point. Sooner or later—probably sooner—she would have to look for a paying job in order to hire someone to do the things she couldn’t figure out how to do herself.
One thing she definitely could do was clean her house. That accomplished, she could start going through her father’s files, looking for whatever he’d wanted her to find that would enable his lawyer to reopen his case posthumously and clear his name.
There had to be something there. Otherwise, why had he made that strange, hurried request? He could’ve had no way of knowing that he’d be dead within hours of being arrested.
Bitter? Yes, she was bitter. But grief and bitterness weren’t going to solve any problems, either those facing her here or those she’d left behind.
She stood, crossed the small room and kicked at the baseboard. “All right, Mickey, your time is up. Sorry, but I’m not in a sharing mood, so pack up your acorns or whatever and move out.”
By no standards was the house she’d inherited from Achsah Dozier comparable to the one she’d left behind. The original structure might have been modernized at some point since she’d last seen it, but the white paint was peeling rather badly and a few of the faded green shutters dangled from single hinges.
At least the gingerbread trim on the front eaves was intact. She remembered thinking in terms of a fairy tale when she’d been told as a child that the fancy trim was called gingerbread. The fact that her great-grandmother had actually baked gingerbread that day, the spicy scent greeting them at the front door, had only enhanced the illusion.
Marian Kuvarky had mentioned that a few years before she’d died, Achsah Dozier had had part of the old back porch turned into another bedroom and bare-bones bath with its own separate entrance, in case she needed live-in help. Since her death, it had occasionally been rented separately. Val briefly considered the possibility and decided that she wasn’t cut out to play landlady.
On the other hand, unearned income was not to be sneezed at.
Dropping the shoes and dress she’d been clutching, she headed downstairs in search of cleaning materials. Before she could even consider sleeping in the room, she had to do something about the mice-and-mildew smell, either air it out or scrub it out. It was too cold to air it out.
It occurred to her that if Ms. Kuvarky had any idea of just how little she knew about the domestic arts, she would never have offered her a job cleaning houses, even as a joke.
Later that evening Val stepped out of the rust-stained, claw-footed upstairs bathtub onto a monogrammed hand towel. She hadn’t bothered to pack such things as tablecloths, dresser scarves or bath mats, knowing that short of renting a trailer, she had to draw the line somewhere.
She had augmented the lukewarm water with a kettle of boiling water brought up from the kitchen. One kettle wasn’t enough, but by the time she’d heated another one, the first would be cold, so she’d settled for lukewarm and quick.
Now, covered in goose bumps, she swaddled her damp body in a huge bath towel. Aside from being grimy and smelly, the house was also drafty. There was a space heater between the tub and the lavatory that helped as long as she didn’t move more than a foot away from the glowing element. At least with all the drafts, carbon monoxide wouldn’t be a problem. As for the danger of an electrical fire, that was another matter.
Note: have the water heater repaired.
Note: have the wiring checked.
Which reminded her—what about insurance?
“Welcome to the real world, Ms. Bonnard,” she whispered a few minutes later, flipping an 800-count Egyptian-cotton king-sized bottom sheet over the sagging double-bed mattress.
She’d pulled on a pair of navy satin pajamas, a Peruvian hand-knit sweater jacket and a pair of slipper socks. January or not, wasn’t this supposed to be the sunny south?
Fortunately, she’d crammed two down-filled duvets in around her suitcases, one of which she’d immediately tossed over the ugly brown plaid sofa downstairs. The other one was miles too large for the double bed, but its familiar paisley cover was comforting. That done, she collected a pen and notepad and settled down for some serious list making, ignoring the reminder from her stomach that except for pretzels, popcorn and two candy bars, she hadn’t eaten since breakfast. Starting early tomorrow she had a million things to do to make this place even marginally livable before she could concentrate on searching her father’s files for evidence of his innocence.
Nibbling the white-tipped cap of her Mont Blanc, she reread the shopping list. Table cloth—one had standards, after all. Mattress cover—she definitely didn’t like the looks of that mattress, even after she’d flipped it. Oh, and a bath mat. She’d have to ask where to buy linens here on the island.
On to the next list. Tea, bagels, other foods, preferably already prepared. Wrinkling her nose, she added mousetraps to the list. And cleaning supplies.
A clean house was something she’d always taken for granted. After graduating from college she’d lived in small apartments, first in Chicago, then in Manhattan—always in upscale neighborhoods. She had moved back to her father’s house after he’d suffered his first small stroke, and soon after that she’d gotten involved with a few of the local charities. It was what she did best, after all—manage fund-raisers for worthy causes. She had frequently acted as her father’s hostess, although most of his business entertaining had been done at the club.
Looking back, it had been a comfortable way to coast through life. Not particularly exciting—no major achievements—but certainly comfortable.
“Definitely room for improvement,” she murmured, her voice echoing hollowly in the old house.
Tired, hungry, but oddly energized, she surveyed her surroundings. Gone were the familiar French wallpaper in her old bedroom, the mismatched but well-cared-for semi-antique furniture, the faded oriental rug and her eclectic art collection. Here she was confronted by gritty bare floors, dark with layers of varnish—naked, white-painted walls, dusty windows, and the lingering aroma of mouse spoor.
Okay. She could handle that. The sand, she’d quickly discovered, hid in the cracks between the floorboards so that each time she went over it with a broom, more appeared. She could live with a little sand. This was the beach, after all. Even if she couldn’t see the ocean from here, she could hear it.
She added window spray and bathroom cleaner to the list, hoping there would be directions on the bottles in case she got into trouble. More paper towels. Sponges. Rubber gloves, although she probably wouldn’t be able to wear them without her hands breaking out. Her skin was inclined to be sensitive.
Note: take down the for rent sign on the front lawn.
The lawn itself was a mess, but once she was through scrubbing the entire house, maybe she could paint the front door a bright color to deflect attention from that and the rest of the peeling paint until she could afford to landscape and repaint the entire house. There was nothing wrong with old, but she preferred old and charming to old and neglected.
One more note: find position that pays in advance.
Leaning back on the two down-filled pillows, she closed her eyes. “Dad, what am I going to do?” she whispered. “Charlie, Belinda—Miss Mitty, where are you when I need you?”
The only sound was the plaintive honking of a flock of wild geese flying overhead. It was barely nine o’clock. She never went to bed before eleven, often not until the small hours of the morning.
Her last memory before sleep claimed her was of her father being led outside to an unmarked car while she stood in the doorway, too stunned even to protest. One of the officers pressed her father’s head down and urged him into the back seat.
It had been Sunday, the morning of her birthday. Belinda had made blueberry pancakes for breakfast. Frank Bonnard, an early riser, had evidently been in his study. He’d been dressed in flannels, an open-necked white shirt and a navy Shetland sweater when Charlie had answered the door. Val remembered thinking much later that if the ghouls could have stuffed him into a pair of orange coveralls before marching him out in front of the single reporter who had probably tuned in on the police radio and followed them to the Belle Haven address, they’d have done it.
That had been only the beginning. Within hours, the press had swarmed like locusts. Shortly after that the phone calls had started. Despite all the blocking devices, a few people managed to get through with variations ranging from “Where’s my money?” to “Frank Bonnard owes me my pension, dammit. Where is it? What am I supposed to do now?”
The calls had ended when the police had put taps on all three phone lines. Not until recently had she wondered why they’d ceased. How could the callers have known their calls could be traced?
The calls had stopped, but not the nightmares. Both asleep and awake, she had replayed the scene that morning back in late September a thousand times. A pale, stiff-faced Charlie stepping back from the wide front door to allow the two men inside. Her father emerging from his study and carefully closing the door behind him. Belinda, one plump hand covering her mouth as she stood in the dining-room doorway.
In less than twelve hours her father had been dead. Pestered by reporters, auditors and men in bad suits who seemed to think they had every right to invade her home, Val had tried desperately to cram her emotions deep inside her and lock the door. When confronted, she’d quickly learned to answer with one of several replies that included, “I don’t know,” “No comment,” and “My father is innocent.”
A part of her was still in hiding, but she had to know the truth, even in the unlikely event that the truth turned out to be not what she wanted to hear. Back in Greenwich she’d been too close for any real objectivity. Here, once she settled down to it, she would be able to think clearly. Then at least the callers who wanted to know where their money was would have an answer, even if it was one that wouldn’t do them any good.
Valerie Bonnard slept heavily that night. Sometime before daybreak she awoke, thinking about the mouse she’d seen and all the others she’d heard and smelled. Were mice carnivorous? They were grain-eaters, weren’t they?
Oh, God…now she’d never get back to sleep.
Eyes scrunched tightly shut, she rolled over onto her stomach. On her own firm, pillow-top mattress, prone had been her favorite sleeping position, never mind that her face would be a mass of wrinkles by the time she reached forty. On a mattress that sagged like a hammock, it was a toss-up as to which she’d succumb to first—strangulation or a broken back.
Grax, if this was your bed, no wonder your back was rounded, she thought guiltily. Her great-grandmother’s given name had been Achsah, pronounced Axa. As a child, Val had shortened it to Grax. From her one brief visit, she remembered the old woman with the laughing blue eyes and short white hair. Wearing a duckbill cap, a cotton print dress and tennis shoes, she’d been working in the yard when they’d driven up. On their way to Hilton Head, her parents had taken a detour along the Outer Banks so that Lola, Val’s mother, could introduce them to her grandmother.
To a child of seven, the trip had seemed endless. Her parents had bickered constantly in the front seat. Odd that she should remember that now. Looking back, it seemed as if it had been her mother who was reluctant to take the time, not her father.
They’d spent the night at a motel, but they’d eaten dinner in the small white house in the woods. She remembered thinking even before she’d smelled the gingerbread that it looked like Aunty Em’s house in the Wizard of Oz.
Grax had served boiled fish—she’d called it drum—mixed with mashed potatoes, raw onions and bits of crisp fried salt pork. As strange as it sounded, it had turned out to be an interesting mixture of flavors and textures.
Her mother hadn’t touched it. Her father had sampled a few forkfuls. Val, for reasons she could no longer recall, had cleaned off her plate and bragged excessively. She’d eaten two squares of the gingerbread with lemon sauce that had followed.
That had been both the first and the last time she’d seen her great-grandmother. Two years later her parents had separated. Her father had been given custody—had her mother even asked? At any rate, Lola Bonnard had chosen to live abroad for the next few years, so visitation had been out of the question. Val had gone through the usual stages of wondering if the split had been her fault and scheming to bring her parents together again.
She would like to think her mother had attended Grax’s funeral but she really didn’t know that, either. Her relationship with Lola Bonnard had never been close, even before the divorce. Since then it had dwindled to an exchange of Christmas cards and the occasional birthday card. It had been her father’s lawyer who’d handled Grax’s bequest, arranging for someone to manage the house as a rental. At the time, Val had been living in Chicago working for a private foundation that funded shelters and basic health services for runaway girls.
“I’m sorry, Grax,” she whispered now, burdened with a belated sense of guilt. “I’m embarrassed and sorry and I hope you had lots and lots of friends so that you didn’t really miss us.”
No wonder the house felt so cold and empty. How many strangers had lived here since Grax had died? There was nothing of Achsah Dozier left, no echoes of the old woman’s island brogue that had fascinated Val at the time. No hint of the flowers she’d brought inside from the Cape jasmine bushes that had once bloomed in her yard. Lola had complained about the cloying scent and without a word, Grax had got up and set the vase on the back porch.
Val made a silent promise that as soon as she got the house cleaned and repaired, she would see what could be done with the yard.
But first she had to go through those files, discover what it was her father had wanted her to find there, and clear his name. Frank Bonnard had been a good man, an honest man, if something of an impractical dreamer. He didn’t deserve what had happened to him.
Two
John Leo MacBride studied the encrusted mass of plates and cutlery that had been brought up from one of the Nazi submarines sunk during the Second World War off the New England coast. He considered leaving a few as he’d found them instead of soaking them all in an acid solution, prying them apart and cleaning them up. The before-and-after contrast would make a far more interesting display at the small museum that had commissioned the dives.
He glanced at the clock on the wall of his stepbrother’s garage where he’d set up a temporary workspace a couple of months ago when Will had called, asking for help. So far, about all he’d been able to do was to keep Macy, Will’s wife, from making matters worse. That and stay on the heels of his lawyer, who might as well be back chasing ambulances for all the good he’d done his client.
Mac had been standing by chiefly to offer moral support, which was more than Macy was doing. Instead, she seemed almost to be enjoying her role as the wife of a man who was currently awaiting trial for embezzlement. She’d had her hair highlighted two days after Will had made bail, and since then had managed to get a fair amount of facetime with the media.
Bonnard’s daughter, by contrast, had avoided the worst of the feeding frenzy. He could think of a couple of reasons why she might have managed to avoid the spotlight, but social clout didn’t mean her old man wasn’t guilty as sin.
Will’s only crime, Mac was convinced of it, was being too trusting. Less than a year after being given a partnership, Will had gone down in the corporate shipwreck along with Frank Bonnard, founder and CEO of the privately held financial consulting firm. Bonnard had paid for his sins by dying of a massive heart attack almost before the investigation got underway.
Will had hired an inept lawyer—an old law-school classmate. A lawyer himself, as well as a CPA, he’d been planning to present his own defense when Mac had talked him out of it. He was sorry now that he had.
But the money was still missing, and after nearly three months, the trail was murkier than ever. Current thinking was that funds had been bled off gradually over a period of years rather than months, probably funneled from one offshore account to another until it was impossible to trace either the source or the destination.
No one was talking. Bonnard because he was dead, Will because he was clueless, his lawyer because if the jerk had ever passed a bar, it wasn’t a bar that served drinks. The guy was a lush.
Mac had tried his own brand of logic on the case, running down the short list of suspects. The Chief Financial Officer, Sam Hutchinson, had apparently been cleared. Currently on an extended leave of absence to be with his terminally ill wife, he’d been the logical suspect. His computers, his files—everything that bore his fingerprints, had been impounded. He’d come through it all clean. Will liked the guy. Only hours before he’d died, Bonnard himself had vouched for him.
As for Bonnard, late founder and CEO of Bonnard Financial Consultants, not even death had offered protection. Once the flock of outside auditors dug in, both he and Will had been swept up in the dragnet.
It was shortly after that that Mac had moved his base of operations from an apartment in Mystic, near the aquarium, to Will’s Greenwich home. He was currently living in the small apartment over the garage, finishing up a few tasks from his last commissioned dive.
BFC was a small regional firm, nothing like some of the big outfits that had hit the reef over the past few years. Not that the impact on the victims was any less devastating, as BFC had specialized in handling retirement funds for a number of small area businesses.
To give him credit, back when the economy had taken a dive a few years ago, Bonnard had borrowed heavily against his fancy house and pumped the funds back into the company, a fact that had quickly come to light. It didn’t exactly fit the profile of a high-level embezzler to Mac’s way of thinking, unless at the same time he’d been shoring up the business with one hand to allay suspicions, he’d been bleeding off profits with the other. Slick trick, if you could pull it off.
Bonnard’s only heir was a daughter. The feds had run her through the washer just as a precaution, but so far as anyone knew she had never been involved in any way with her father’s business. Will was convinced she wasn’t a player.
Will’s wife, Macy, wasn’t so generous, but then, Macy was inclined to be jealous of any attractive woman, especially one who’d been born with the proverbial silver spoon. Even Mac had to wonder if the investigators had gone easy on the daughter because of her looks and her social position. He wasn’t sure how big a part sympathy played in such a case, but the fact that her father had died on his daughter’s thirtieth birthday might have had an effect. The press had made it a big deal. He remembered seeing that same pale, stricken face—flawless cheekbones, haunted gray eyes—replayed over and over on every recount during the week immediately after Bonnard’s arrest—an arrest that had been followed almost immediately by his death.
Ironic to think that Bonnard might have got clean away if it hadn’t been for a junior accountant who had mistakenly mailed out 1099s for a tax-free municipal fund to a number of clients and been forced to do amended forms. Evidently the matter had landed on the desk of a snarky IRS agent. One question had led to another; an outside auditor had been called in, and the whole house of cards had come crashing down. Bonnard had gone to his dubious reward, leaving his junior partner to take the fall.
That’s when the scavenger hunt had shifted into high gear, drawing in the FBI, the Financial Crimes Unit, the state auditor’s department and the IRS, not to mention a bunch of media types with Woodward and Bernstein complexes. But with all that manpower, they were no closer after nearly three months to locating the missing money, much less tracing it back to its source.
Which damn well wasn’t Will Jordan.
Mac’s single bag was packed, the Land Cruiser’s tank topped off. He was ready to head south the minute Shirley, his hacker friend, gave the word. Not that hacking was even needed in this case, as public records were open to everyone who knew, geographically speaking, where to look. But when he needed information in a hurry, it helped to know someone who could make a computer sit up and sing the “Star Spangled Banner.”
Valerie Bonnard’s only asset of record at this moment was a modest trust fund that wouldn’t kick in for another five years, and a small property she’d inherited in a place called Buxton, on North Carolina’s Outer Banks. Mac was generally familiar with the area—what marine archeologist wasn’t familiar with the notorious Graveyard of the Atlantic? There was even a new museum by that name on the island. From what he’d been able to find on the Internet, most of the island that hadn’t been taken over by Park Service or National Wildlife had been developed over the past few decades.
Ms. Bonnard, using a dummy corporation, could have been investing steadily in some high-dollar real estate down there. Shirley hadn’t been able to tie her to anything specific, but it would have been a smart move on the part of La Bonnard, especially considering the erratic stock market. Whether or not she’d socked away the missing funds in investment-grade real estate, it was as good a place to start as any.
One of the perks of being a freelance marine archeologist was large chunks of unregulated time. Unlike Will’s, Mac’s lifestyle was both portable and low maintenance, although Will’s was probably about to change even more drastically in the near future. Mac had a feeling that once this nightmare was over, his stepbrother might have lost more than a junior partnership, an upscale house and a few club memberships. Macy was looking restless now that the publicity had died down. She just might walk, which would be no great loss in Mac’s estimation.
The drive took two days, allowing for frequent breaks, in his fourteen-year-old, rebuilt Land Cruiser. Mac spent the first night in the Norfolk region. Late in the afternoon of the second day, having spent a few hours in one of the area’s maritime museums, he pulled into a motel in Buxton and booked a room, intending to spend the first half hour flexing various muscles under a hot shower.
At age thirty-seven he was beginning to realize that stick shifts were hell on left knees. A friend had warned him, but he wasn’t about to trade in his customized vehicle, with the locked compartments designed specifically to hold his diving gear and the ergonomic seats that helped minimize fatigue. It might take him a bit longer to bounce back after a long drive, but normally he looked on the bounce-back time as a chance to catch up on his reading. He’d even tossed in a few books at the last minute, in case he had any down time. Not that he planned to hang around any longer than it took to uncover a lead that would shift the focus off Will.
If Mac had a weakness—actually, he admitted to several—it was books. Aside from diving gear, books were his favorite indulgence. Mostly history. The stuff fascinated him, always had. But reading could wait until he’d pinned the Bonnard woman down and got the information he needed.
A fleeting image of him pinning La Bonnard down on a big, soft bed drifted across his field of vision. He blinked it away before it could take root.
The desk clerk was young and inclined to be chatty. It took Mac all of two minutes to get the location of the residence of the late Achsah Dozier, as this wasn’t the kind of place where street addresses did much good.
“I didn’t really know her, I’ve only been here a few years,” the young woman said. She’d looked him over and touched her hair when he’d walked into the lobby, but evidently decided on closer examination that he wasn’t that interesting.
Not altogether surprising. He still had all his hair and teeth, and he’d been asked more than once if he worked out at a gym. He didn’t. The type of work he did tended to develop the legs and upper body while it pared down the waist and hips. On the other hand, his face had once been compared to a rock-slide.
Besides, he had a couple of decades on the bubblegum-chewing kid, who was saying, “I think Miss Achsah used to live on the Back Road.”
In certain pockets of population, he’d learned, Miss was an honorary title given to women over a certain age, regardless of marital status. When the first name was used, it generally indicated that there were a number of women with the same surname.
“You go out the door and turn left—” The young clerk continued to talk while Mac mentally recorded the data. “I heard her house was rented out after she died, but I don’t think there’s anybody living there now. Marian Kuvarky over at Seaview Realty could tell you.”
Something—call it a hunter’s instinct—told him that the Bonnard woman was holed up in her great-grandmother’s house, probably keeping a low profile until things cooled down. If she had a brain under all that glossy black hair she had to know she was probably still considered “of interest” by certain authorities, even if they hadn’t found anything to hold her on.
The smart thing would have been to go someplace where she had no ties and wait until the heat died down. After say, six months—a year would be even better—with what she had stashed away in an offshore account, she could settle anywhere in the world.
With what she allegedly had stashed away, he corrected himself reluctantly. So far, he was the only one doing the alleging, but then, he had a personal stake. Will hadn’t embezzled a damned thing. In the first place, his stepbrother couldn’t lie worth crap, and in the second place, if he could’ve got his hands on that kind of money, his wife would’ve already spent it. Macy could easily qualify for the world shopping playoffs.
Mac was good at extrapolations. As a marine archeologist, it was what he did best. Study the evidence—the written records, plus any prevailing conditions, political or weatherwise, that might affect where a ship had reportedly gone down. Not until he had thoroughly examined all available data and given his instincts time to mull it over was he ready to home in on his target.
In this case the field had officially narrowed to two suspects: Bonnard and Will. Eliminate Will and that left only Bonnard—or in this case, Bonnard’s heir. The auditors were still digging halfheartedly, but the case had been shoved to the back burner as new and bigger cases had intervened in the meantime. Which left poor Will dangling in the wind, his next hearing not even on the docket yet.
Mac made up his mind to wait until morning to scope out the house. He even might wait another day before making contact, but no longer than that. He needed answers. Will wasn’t holding up well. He’d lost weight, he had circles under his eyes the size of hubcaps, and his marriage was falling apart.
Timing was crucial. He didn’t want to spook her, but neither could he afford to wait too long. The feds hadn’t been able to find anything to hold her on, not even as a witness, but to Mac, the logic was inescapable. That damned money hadn’t just gone up in smoke. Someone close to Bonnard held the key. The man had been divorced more than twenty years; he’d never remarried. So far as anyone knew, he’d never even had a mistress. A few brief liaisons, but none that had lasted more than a few months. The press had gone after the ex-wife, now reportedly in the process of shedding husband number three. There was no love lost between her and Bonnard, so if she’d known anything it would probably have come out. Another dead end.
By process of elimination, it had to be the daughter. Millions of bucks didn’t just slip through a crack in the floor like yellow dust in a gold-rush saloon. Someone was waiting for the heat to die down to claim it. And he knew who the most logical someone was.
Valerie Stevens Bonnard, Mac mused. He knew what she looked like, even knew what make car she drove. He’d seen her around town a couple of times when he’d been in the area visiting Will last spring. Cool, flawless—sexy in a touch-me-not way. Talk about your oxymorons.
He’d even spoken to her once. Will had gone to some BFC function at the country club while Mac was spending a few days in Greenwich on his way back from DC last summer. He’d forgotten his prescription sunglasses and called to asked Mac to drop them off.
Mac had been changing the fluid in his transmission when he’d answered the phone and hadn’t bothered to change clothes, intending to leave the sunglasses with an attendant. Driving the same weathered Land Cruiser, he had just squeezed into a parking place between a Lexus and an Escalade when Ms. Bonnard drove up in Mercedes convertible. Evidently she’d mistaken him for one of the groundskeepers, because she’d informed him politely that service parking was in the rear. She’d even smiled, her big gray-green eyes about as warm as your average glacier.
So yeah, he knew what she looked like. There was no chance she would recognize him now though. She’d summed him up and dismissed him in less than two seconds flat.
Val was good at any number of things, among them organizing intimate dinner parties for fifty people and overseeing thousand-dollar-a-plate fund-raisers. She excelled at tennis, skiing and hanging art shows. She’d been drilled in what was expected of someone with her privileged background from the time she could walk.
Now, faced with an oven that was lined with three inches of burned-on gunk she burst into tears, only because cursing was not yet among her talents.
She wiped her eyes, smearing a streak of grime across her cheek and glared at the rattling kitchen window. There had to be a way to keep the wind from whipping in through the frames. How had the previous tenants managed to stay warm?
They hadn’t, of course. Probably why they’d moved out, leaving the place in such a mess. Three of the rooms had air-conditioner units hanging out the windows. No one had bothered to remove or even to cover them, much less plug all the cracks around them. She had stuffed the cracks with the plastic bags from her first shopping foray, for all the good it did.
Neither the space heaters nor the ugly brown oil heater were a match for the damp chill that seemed to creep through the very walls. Hadn’t anyone in the South ever heard of insulation?
She added a roll of clear plastic and a staple gun to the growing shopping list that included more of the sudsy cleanser, another six-pack of paper towels and a few more mousetraps. The plastic would have to serve until she could afford storm windows.
After hours spent scrubbing, most of the downstairs rooms plus her bedroom and the upstairs bath smelled of pine cleanser instead of mice and mildew. She’d ended up buying live traps instead of wire traps, even though they’d cost more, because while she refused to share her new home with rodents, she wasn’t into killing. Spiders, roaches and mosquitoes, perhaps, but nothing larger.
Her new lifestyle, she was rapidly discovering, called for a drastically new mindset. Belinda and Charlie, her father’s housekeeper and man-of-all-work, had spoiled her, she’d be the first to admit. Now, instead of taking her comfort for granted, she was forced to acquire a whole battery of new skills. In the process she was also acquiring an impressive array of bruises, splinters and broken fingernails, not to mention a rash on her left hand from the rubber gloves she’d tried to wear. French manicures and sleek hairstyles were definitely things of the past. After the second day, she hadn’t bothered to apply makeup, only a quick splash of moisturizer and, when she remembered it, lip balm. Instead of her usual chignon, she wore her hair in a single braid that, by day’s end, was usually frazzled and laced with cobwebs—or worse.
On the plus side, she was too busy to waste time crying. Hard work was turning out to be a fair remedy for grief. Somewhat surprisingly she was even making a few friends. Marian Kuvarky at the real estate office, the clerk at the hardware store who had advised her on mousetraps, and the friendly woman at the post office where she’d rented a mailbox. She’d asked questions of all of them, everything from where to find what on the island to what kind of weather to expect.
“Expect the unexpected, I guess,” the postal worker had said, “This time of year we might get seventy-five degrees one day and thirty-five the next. Not much snow, but lawsy, the winds’ll sandblast your windshield before you know it. By the way, did I tell you that you have to come here to collect your mail? None of the villages on the island has home delivery.”
Which reminded her—she needed to get started mailing change-of-address notices now that she had an official address.
But first she had to finish scrubbing the tops of the kitchen cabinets. She’d given up on the oven for now—didn’t know how to use the darned thing, anyway. But sooner or later she was going to defeat that thick black crust if she had to resort to dynamite.
Once she finished the kitchen she would tackle the back bedroom and bath in case she got desperate enough to look for a tenant. Meanwhile she needed to take down that half-hidden sign in the front yard. Or maybe just cover it for the time being. While she hated the idea of compromising her privacy, it might be a way of bringing in an income until she could look for work. Marian’s offer of a job cleaning houses had been a joke…hadn’t it?
Standing on the next-to-the-top step of the rickety stepladder she’d retrieved from a shed in the backyard, Val steadied herself by draping one arm over an open cabinet door while she wiped off the last section of cabinet top, wincing as her shoulder muscles protested. Hard to believe that only a few months ago she’d thought nothing of dancing all night, playing tennis all morning and spending the afternoon hanging a benefit art exhibit.
At least she no longer had trouble sleeping. A fast warm shower, a couple of acetominaphen caplets and she was out like a light. Over the past few months she’d lost count of all the nights she had lain awake, tunneling through endless caverns in search of answers that continued to elude her. Answers to questions such as, who could possibly have embezzled so much money without anyone’s noticing in a small firm that was bristling with accountants? Oh, she’d heard all about the fancy shell games—most of them actually legal—that were played by some of the largest accounting firms. The fact remained, why hadn’t anyone noticed until it was too late? What had happened to the money?
And why on earth hadn’t she gone for an MBA instead of wasting her time on folk music, literature and art history?
Although, not even a Harvard MBA had kept her father from being taken in. But then, Frank Bonnard’s strength had been pulling ideas out of the blue, working out an overall plan and counting on a select team to carry out the details. The team in this case had consisted of Sam Hutchinson, who’d been gone practically the whole year, and therefore couldn’t have been involved, and the administrative assistant whom she’d never met before the woman had been asked to leave. Val had a feeling Miss Mitty might have engineered that, as evidently the newcomer had encroached on territory the older woman considered hers alone.
And of course, there was Will Jordan, the new junior partner who’d been indicted along with her father. He was probably guilty. The prosecutors must have thought so, as he was still out on bond.
To be fair she had to include Miss Mitty, longtime family friend and her father’s efficient and insightful, if unofficial assistant. Not that she was in any way a suspect, but Mitty Stoddard had been there from the beginning. If she hadn’t retired back in August she’d have known precisely where to start digging. While she might not have a college degree, much less a title, the woman was smarter than any of the younger members of the team gave her credit for being, Val was convinced of it.
Val made a mental note to try again to reach her. She’d dialed the number she’d been given countless times over the past several weeks, always with the same results. Not a single one of the messages she’d left had produced results. At first she’d been too distracted to wonder about it, but now she was beginning to be seriously concerned. If Miss Mitty was ill, it might explain why she had suddenly announced her retirement and moved to Georgia to be close to a newly widowed niece. She hadn’t wanted anyone to worry about her.
Come to think of it, Miss Mitty had never really trusted Will Jordan. As a rule, people whom she didn’t trust rarely remained at BFC very long. Jordan was an exception. If Mitty Stoddard didn’t trust a person there was usually a sound reason, even if it wasn’t apparent at the time. Val was sure she had voiced her reservations where it would do the most good, but for once in their long association, Frank Bonnard must have disagreed with her.
Val sighed. She desperately needed someone to bounce her ideas off, and Miss Mitty would be perfect. Under all that lavender hair lurked a surprisingly keen mind. Darn it, it wasn’t like her not to return a call. The last thing she’d said before boarding the plane to Atlanta when Val had driven her to the airport was, “You call me now, you hear? You know how I feel about your young man.” Val had been engaged at the time. “But then, you won’t listen to an old woman. I guess I can’t blame you.” She’d laughed, wattles swaying above the navy suit and lacy white blouse with the tiny gold bar pin fastening the high collar. “Once you set the date, you let me know and I’ll make plans to come back. Belinda and Charlie are getting along in years—the last thing they need is a big, fancy wedding.”
Belinda was two years younger than Mitty Stoddard, and no one knew Charlie’s exact age. As it turned out, Miss Mitty had been absolutely right about Tripp Ailes, but that wasn’t the reason Val was so desperate to get in touch with her now. Was she even aware of all that had happened since she’d moved to Georgia? The collapse of BFC had been big news in the northeast for a few weeks—the Wall Street Journal had covered it, with updates for the first week or so. But it had probably been worth only a few lines in the business section of the Atlanta Constitution, or whatever newspaper Miss Mitty read now.
She would keep on trying, but in the meantime she had work to do before she could settle down with those blasted files. If there was a method in her father’s filing system, she had yet to discover it. Brilliant, Frank Bonnard had undoubtedly been; organized, he was not.
Absently, she scratched her chin, leaving another smear of dirt. After waiting this long, the files could wait another day or two. She was making inroads on years of dirt and neglect—the pungent aroma of pine cleanser now replaced other less-pleasant smells, but it was still a far cry from the fragrance of gingerbread and Cape jasmine she remembered from so long ago.
“Up and at ’em, lady.”
She didn’t budge from the chair. She could think of several things she’d rather be doing than scrubbing down another wall. Shagging golf balls barefoot in a bed of snake-infested poison ivy, for instance.
Okay, so she was procrastinating. Scowling at the heap of filthy paper towels on the floor, she admitted that sooner or later the house would be as clean as she could get it and then—then—she would focus all her attention on going through her father’s files with a fine-tooth comb.
Not even to herself would Val admit the smallest possibility of finding evidence of her father’s guilt.
Three
A few hours later, with both the furniture and the downstairs windows sparkling—on the inside, at least—Val collapsed onto one of the freshly scrubbed kitchen chairs. She kicked off her Cole Haans and sipped on a glass of chilled vegetable juice, hoping that that and peanut butter constituted a balanced diet.
The ugly green refrigerator probably dated from the sixties. It was noisy and showing signs of rust, but at least it was now clean, inside and out. And if it wasn’t exactly energy efficient, neither was she at the moment.
Marian had relayed the promise that her phone would be hooked up sometime today, which was a big relief. New number equaled no crank calls. She’d had to go outside and stand near the road to get even an erratic signal on her cell phone. After today, though, she could hook up her laptop, deal with her e-mail and check out the Greenwich newspapers to see if there’d been any new developments since she’d left town.
That done, she’d better start composing a résumé. Unfortunately, the only kind of work in which she had any experience was the kind that paid off more in satisfaction than in wages.
“Ha. How the mighty have fallen,” she said, dolefully amused.
How much would a private investigator charge to dig into her father’s records? The same records that had been turned inside out by swarms of experts?
Too much, probably. Anything was too much, given her present circumstances. Besides, even if she could have afforded to hire an investigator, she wasn’t sure she could trust him with her father’s personal files. Was there some code of ethics that said a private investigator had to turn over any incriminating evidence he might find?
“Dad, I’m out of my element here, you’re going to have to give me a hint,” she whispered now. Will Jordan might be still under investigation, but Val had a feeling he was going to find some way to pin the whole thing on Frank Bonnard. Why not? Her poor father was in no position to defend himself.
Val was feeling more inadequate with every day that passed. If she got lucky and found evidence that would vindicate her father, then she could be charged with concealing that same evidence. Couldn’t win for losing. Classic case, she thought ruefully.
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Dixie Browning
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: John MacBride would do anything to keep his stepbrother from being thrown into jail for a crime he didn′t commit. Which is how he ended up in the Outer Banks, posing as a handyman for the young socialite who could clear his stepbrother′s name.As a marine archaeologist, Mac was used to digging deep for clues, but nothing had prepared him for the gorgeous woman he suspected of wrongdoing. Only Val Bonnard wasn′t the spoiled heiress he′d been expecting. She seemed gentle and caring–and one look at the dazzling beauty had Mac regretting his promise to play detective, especially when it involved being her live-in Mr. Fix It! Because one way or another he′d get what he wanted–until he realized that what he wanted more than anything was the woman herself….