Three Women Disappear Read online

  “You know who it is, don’t you?” I said. “Give me a name.”

  She laughed. Her laugh was as fake as the rest of her.

  “I’m not a rat, hon. But then I’m guessing you don’t really need me to tell you.”

  It was a good guess.

  “So what is it?” she asked. “Death threats? A pipe bomb through the bay window?”

  “No,” I said. “Anthony’s already dead.”

  I’d like to say I told her the truth because I thought she should know, but the even bigger truth is I got a kick out of watching her face turn colors beneath all that rouge.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “He was stabbed to death. I found him this morning in our kitchen. I’m no expert, but it looked like a crime of passion. I’m sure those dirty cops will come knocking at your door any minute.”

  She picked up the knife she’d been using to cut lemons and pointed it at the door.

  “You bring this shit to me?” she said. “Get the hell out or I swear to God I’ll do you the way they did Anthony.”

  “Vicki, I—”

  “You think I’m stupid? You’re here asking questions because you know it’s you they’re coming for next. You’ve got ‘Loose End’ tattooed across your forehead. And now I’ve got to worry about your deathbed confession: ‘I didn’t know anything about anything until Victoria spilled her guts.’ You’re lucky we’re standing in a room full of witnesses.”

  On cue, the drunks stumbled off their stools and gathered around. The poor dears thought they were really quite threatening; I could have knocked any one of them over with my little finger. I took a last look at Vicki and told myself it was better to be the widow than the ex.

  Chapter 17

  I DAMN near wore out those rubber clogs walking the seedier streets of East Tampa, looking for some hole to crawl into. I had a hundred dollars cash in my wallet, enough to rent a motel room for a night—maybe two if the room came with a mirror on the ceiling and an hourly rate. There was a surprising shortage of choices, and I wasn’t about to stop one of the locals and ask for a rec. Not without backup.

  And that was the thing: I had no more backup. Anthony and I had more than our share of problems, but I always knew that if any man so much as laid a finger on me he’d end up trampled by an army of Costellos. At least that was true yesterday. Now that same army was hunting me. For the first time in a long while, I understood what it meant to be alone.

  My Fitbit logged twenty thousand steps before I came across the Jackalope Inn, a circa-1970 structure with teetering breezeways and rusted-out railings—the kind of establishment that feels incomplete without a SWAT team huddled in the parking lot. Perfect, I thought. Even I wouldn’t think to look for me here.

  Inside, the man behind the bulletproof glass told me it would be forty bucks for the night. I spent another five bucks at the vending machines, coming away with a Diet Coke and a bag of almond Mars bars—my first meal of the day. The room was more or less what I’d expected: a sagging twin bed, flea market paintings, peeling wallpaper, a carpet I’d make sure never to touch with my bare feet. What I hadn’t anticipated was the odor. It was as if somebody had sprayed every inch of the place with synthetic fruit punch. Whatever stench they were covering up didn’t stand a chance.

  I switched on the TV in hopes that the voices might calm me. Big mistake. The Jackalope Inn only offered local channels, and at the ten o’clock hour they were all showing the nightly news. Anywhere I flipped, there he was: a full-screen headshot of my recently deceased husband. I didn’t want to watch, but I couldn’t look away. So I sat there chomping on Mars bars (almond my ass—not one lousy nut in the whole bag) and listening to the pundits make uninformed guesses about who whacked Vincent Costello’s portly nephew. Surprise, surprise: my name came up. Some ace reporter had already managed to obtain from an anonymous source a “firsthand account” of the knock-down-drag-out Anthony and I had at his uncle’s party—the one where I threatened to kill Anthony in his sleep.

  Of course, there were other suspects. Anthony did work for the mob, after all. It was perfectly plausible that I’d been framed, in which case I was either lying at the bottom of a swamp or locked in a closet somewhere with duct tape over my mouth.

  Listening to that crap was giving me a full-blown panic attack. I pictured Vincent sitting on the edge of his overstuffed recliner, watching the same program, growing more and more convinced that it was my turn to die. I switched off the TV, but the sounds of bellowing drunks and blaring sirens didn’t do much to calm me down. Someone was walking back and forth along the breezeway outside. Defoe, I told myself. It had to be. The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that I wouldn’t survive the night.

  Which is why I picked up the motel phone and made the call. The only call I could think to make.

  “Nine one one, what’s your emergency?” the operator asked.

  I hemmed and hawed, gave her something less than the full story.

  “You stay put now,” she said in the kind of soothing voice that truly anxious people find maddening. “Help is on the way.”

  She didn’t say what kind of help. I went to the window, pulled back the heavy curtain just far enough to peer outside. The Jackalope faced the kind of cityscape that sends urban dwellers running for the country. Busted streetlamps, heavily graffitied storefronts, potholes you could climb down into, delinquents gathered on every corner. But no Defoe. No Broch. Still, my legs were trembling, and I had to fight to keep down all that chocolate and syrup.

  I was expecting either a squad car or a sedan, so at first a Jeep pulling into the lot below didn’t register. Then I saw who stepped out of it: Detective Sean Walsh, Anthony’s friend on the force. The man Anthony had tried to convince me was nothing more than a golf buddy who owed him a few favors. The man Vicki wouldn’t name. Was he here on behalf of the Tampa PD or the Costello family? Or had he come, as Vicki had suggested, to tie up one last loose end?

  I didn’t stick around to find out. Just like in the movies, I shimmied out of the narrow bathroom window, grabbed on to a tree branch, and lowered myself down. The back of the motel faced an abandoned lot. I started across at a full gallop, tripping over rubble, scraping my palms as I pushed myself back up. I didn’t know where I was headed or what I’d find on the other side, and I didn’t care. All I wanted was to put distance between me and Sean.

  Which is exactly what I failed to do. Sean wasn’t gimpy like Defoe or bulky like Broch. He was the type to count calories and measure his body fat after his morning run. He came up on me out of nowhere, had me pinned to the ground before I knew I was in a fight.

  “Hi there, Anna.” He grinned.

  I didn’t hesitate to scream my head off. Sean let go of one of my wrists, clamped a hand over my mouth. I clawed for his eyes but couldn’t find them.

  “Easy now,” he said. “You called us, remember?”

  Us. Was it possible that even the 911 operator moonlighted for the Costellos? Or had she unwittingly forwarded the call to one of Anthony’s blackmail victims? Or to Sean himself?

  “Yeah,” I said, once he took his hand from my mouth. “It was a false alarm. So sorry to waste your time.”

  He lifted me to my feet but didn’t cuff me. He didn’t Mirandize me, either. There was nothing at all coplike about his behavior, which made me halfway certain I was headed for a pair of concrete boots.

  I tried sweet-talking him as he led me back to the Jeep.

  “Listen,” I said, “I don’t snitch. I won’t tell anyone anything about anything. I don’t know anything. Anthony kept me in the dark. Whatever secrets the two of you had died with him. I promise you, Sean. All I want now is to get as far from this tropical shithole as possible. There’s money in it if you help me. You don’t have to do this.”

  “Do what?” he asked.

  I didn’t say anything. He waited a beat, then burst out laughing.

  “You think I’m here to…what? Whack y
ou? You’ve got it all wrong, Anna. I’m here to help. Like you said, Anthony kept you in the dark. You’re new to this kind of thing. I figure you might need a little coaching.”

  I leaned across the table until Detective Haagen and I were sitting eyeball to eyeball.

  “And that’s what he did,” I told her. “He coached me. All the way to the station. He told me all about you. Sorry, but he isn’t a fan. He said if I wanted to stay out of prison I should dodge your questions, claim I found the body and panicked. Nothing more to it. Meanwhile, he’d get Vincent off my back, hand him the real killer.”

  “Detective Sean Walsh said all of that?”

  “Yes. But then if I believed him, I wouldn’t be sharing it with you right now, would I?”

  I watched her think it over. For a cop, her poker face was downright lousy. I could see she wanted to believe me. She wanted to believe I was giving her testimony that would end her ex-partner’s career. At the same time, she was afraid of being duped by a mob widow who might very well be lying through her teeth to save her own hide. In the end, she stalled.

  “I’ll have to talk to the DA,” she said.

  “Fine,” I told her. “Meanwhile, can I go? I’ve told you everything I know. Everything from the moment I found Anthony to right now. I’m tired as hell, and I need about three showers.”

  She looked confused.

  “But where would you go?” she asked. “Back to the Jackalope? Wouldn’t a cell be the safest place for you? If what you say about Sean is true, we might be able to work something out.”

  I gave her a trademark Costello sneer.

  “You mean witness protection?” I said. “Detective, you’ve been inside my home. Hell, at this point you probably know it better than I do. You really think a bungalow in Tempe is gonna cut it?”

  Now she looked worried, and I knew damn well what she was worried about: dead women tell no tales, and they sure as hell don’t show up to testify in court.

  “Don’t sweat it,” I told her. “I’m the three Rs: resourceful, resilient, and rich. I won’t make any more mistakes.”

  She shrugged.

  “I can’t hold you. But I do need you to keep close.”

  “Fine by me,” I said, standing.

  Of course, legally speaking, I could have shut down that interview any time the mood struck me. Haagen was right to be cautious. I hadn’t lied to her, but the truth I’d shared was purely by design.

  Chapter 18

  Detective Sean Walsh

  LUCKY FOR me, the lovebirds paused in Símon’s doorway for a long, loud kiss. It gave me just enough time to duck out onto the balcony.

  If Símon had lived on the second floor, I might have jumped. At most I’d have sprained an ankle or tweaked a knee. Nothing a frozen steak couldn’t fix. But that third flight would land me in the hospital. There’d be a report. Heidi would hear about it. She’d figure out soon enough that Símon and Serena were siblings, and then she’d come hard after my badge. I couldn’t risk that. My only option was to hunker down and wait it out.

  I watched Símon and his date through a small gap in the curtains covering the French doors. They’d decided to take their nightcap at home. Símon, it seemed, wanted to showcase his stainless steel martini mixer. Either he was a little drunk already or he didn’t spend much time in his kitchen. It took a lot of opening and closing of cabinets before he had the gin and the vermouth and the olives lined up on the counter.

  Meanwhile, my mind was running scenarios, none of them very pleasant.

  My biggest fear was that Símon and his lady friend would choose to sip their cocktails under the stars. In that case, the best I could do would be to hide my face and shoulder my way past them. Símon had pounds on me, but I had sobriety and surprise on my side. I slipped out of my blazer, prepared to hold it like a cape in front of my head.

  But the evening didn’t take that particular turn. These were working people with early start times. They could only fit so much into an evening. Once Símon found a pair of tiny plastic swords for the olives, they carried their martinis straight to the bedroom. I quit holding my breath, let out what felt like enough air for four people. Then I waited some more just in case Símon came back in search of snacks.

  That was when I saw it, lying there on the small wrought iron table. A bright blue workbook called English on Your Lunch Break. I remembered when Sarah bought it. She took the title literally, had visions of tutoring Serena over grilled-tomato sandwiches and sun-brewed iced tea. The two of them were close—almost like sisters. Together, they made life under Anthony’s thumb bearable.

  Seeing the book here now, my pulse turned electric. I scanned the rest of the balcony, spotted a small, tan duffel bag hidden behind a potted ficus tree. I walked over, opened it, found a stash of women’s clothes and toiletries. Things were looking up. So much so that I almost forgot I was on the verge of getting busted for B and E.

  Priorities, I told myself. Time to get the hell out of here.

  I opened the French doors just wide enough to slip through, then walked heel to toe across the living room. There was a jazz record playing somewhere in the recesses of the apartment. Símon was pulling out all the stops. Part of me felt jealous: Sarah and I hadn’t been on anything like a date in as long as I could remember, and lately our bedroom was strictly for sleep.

  Back at the Jeep, I pulled out a flask from under the spare tire and did some drinking of my own. Then I spent an hour circling the block until a spot opened up directly across from Símon’s building. Serena had been there. She’d been staying there. Date night or not, there was a chance she might come back. The fact that she’d hidden her belongings behind a tree on the balcony only confirmed she was on the run. Whether she’d done something or was afraid of being blamed for something remained to be seen.

  Unlike most cops, I love a good stakeout. There’s an adrenaline rush that comes with putting yourself in a position to see what nobody wants you to see. The adrenaline helps me think. And I had a hell of a lot to think about, starting with how I’d play it when Serena made her appearance. I couldn’t, despite direct orders, turn her over to Vincent. I’d be disposing of the person most likely to swear up and down that Sarah was no killer.

  The more I thought about it, the more I became convinced I could pin it on the brother—whether he’d done it or not. All I needed was a little time to build the case. Meanwhile, I had to get word to Heidi’s three main suspects. Apart from the fact that they ran, Heidi had nothing on them. Nothing concrete. All they had to do was point the finger at each other, keep my ex-partner turning in circles. I’d tell them exactly what to say. Have Sarah implicate Serena, Anna implicate Sarah, Serena implicate Anna. Or maybe have each of them implicate the other two. Heidi would be blinded with reasonable doubt. Sarah would remain free.

  A plan was starting to take shape. I worked it out one piece at a time. The siblings were my ticket back to a humdrum life. First, find Serena and put in a call to the tip line; second, hand Símon over to Vincent with a note that read “He killed your nephew.” It would be awfully damn convenient to have Símon disappear while Serena was in the box with Heidi. He’d look like a man who knew his sister was about to flip. And when Heidi’s team searched Símon’s condo, they’d find a few of Anthony’s prized possessions sitting on the top shelf of his bedroom closet.

  Little by little, the lights went out in the buildings around me. I found myself kicking around the same question into the wee hours: did the fact that Serena was staying with Símon make it more or less likely that he killed Anthony? I mean actually killed Anthony. And if not him, then who? It wasn’t one of Vincent’s men. The killing was too personal, too sloppy. A pro wouldn’t stab him twenty-seven times, then leave the body behind. Who else had the motive and strength? Maybe Serena found herself a boyfriend. Maybe Anna had taken a lover. Maybe Sarah had, for that matter: I’d have been too checked out to notice.

  But why dwell on maybes when there was a flesh-and-blood brot
her tailor-made for the part? The truth didn’t matter at all next to what I could prove. And if I could just find Serena, I was pretty sure I could prove that my wife hadn’t killed Anthony Costello.

  Chapter 19

  Sarah Roberts-Walsh

  October 15

  8:30 a.m.

  Interview Room C

  I DROVE out of Aunt Lindsey’s little township before sunup, bleary from lack of sleep and feeling as though my calf might combust at any moment. I had nothing with me but Anna’s collection. Not even a change of clothes. I’d thought about leaving Aunt Linds a diamond or a sapphire, but if Sean or his cronies came back with a warrant, they’d lock her up for receiving stolen property. They’d do it just to draw me out. And it would work. I’m not brave or strong or fierce or healthy, but no way could I let my aunt spend even one night in jail.

  First things first: I needed to convert those jewels into cash. A week ago that would have been easy. Anthony knew people. Sean knew people. A half million dollars’ worth of jewels would have fetched a half million dollars in bills.

  But now everything had changed. I’d have to take whatever a pawnshop was willing to give me.

  There’s a long string of cash-for-goods joints on Hillsborough Avenue, mixed in with the liquor stores and tattoo parlors, but unfortunately pawnbrokers don’t tend to be early risers. Not as early as Aunt Lindsey, anyway. The best I could find was an 8:00 a.m. open. That left me with two hours to kill. Two hours is a long time when you can’t be seen in public.

  I bought a latte and two slices of lemon pound cake at the drive-in window of a Starbucks, then sat in the parking lot sipping and nibbling. The sugar and caffeine made me queasy, but at least there’d be no chance of my drifting off. I wouldn’t let myself sleep again until I found a bed in a town or city where I knew nobody, and where nobody who knew me would think to look.