Jean Harrington - The Monet Murders

I had to get out of there. The killer could be lurking in the house. The phone dropped out of my hand again and clunked against a cabinet.

I pushed open the swinging doors to the butler’s pantry and raced through to the hall, glancing up at the staircase as I ran. No one. Nothing.

Hurry.

My heel slipped, my ankle gave way, and I fell, striking my head on the foyer wall.

I came to with a start, right into the glare of Lieutenant Victor Rossi’s deep-set, penetrating eyes.

Uh-oh, déjà vu.

“You okay, Mrs. D?” he asked, kneeling beside me, rubbing one of my hands between his own. His blunt fingers were firm and warm, caressing. Someone moaned. That couldn’t have been me, could it?

“You hit your head pretty hard,” he said. “You’ve been out for a while.”

The room swam back into focus. “How long?”

“I don’t know. You were out when Officer Batano got here. I was in the neighborhood so I came right over. Not to worry. The doc’s on his way. He’ll take a look at that lump.”

“ The coroner? No thanks.”

Rossi frowned and blew out a breath.

I waved a hand in front of my face. “You been eating garlic?”

He reached into a pocket, took out a mint and popped it. “Think you can sit up?”

Fingering the lump on my head, I eased into a sitting position against the wall. Three months earlier, Lieutenant Rossi of the Naples PD had investigated the murder of Treasure Kozlowski, my neighbor at Surfside Condominiums. Looked like he’d be on this case, too. I’d been scared of him then, but not this time. This time…oh God…this time…

“Maria’s dead, isn’t she?”

He nodded. “The woman in the kitchen? I’m afraid so.”

“I hoped I’d imagined it.”

“No, it looks like a homicide. You need to tell me what happened. Why you’re here. What you saw.”

I struggled to my feet and must have stood up too fast. The room turned fuzzy, but Rossi grabbed me before I landed back on my head. It was the first time he had ever put his arms around me, and his embrace was amazingly strong and comforting.

“Let’s get you a seat,” he said.

Resisting the urge to cling to him, I pulled free and, a little shaky, walked into the living room ahead of him and sank onto a sofa.

Rossi peered at me with what looked like concern on his face. “You feel up to answering a few questions?”

“Of course.”

He reached into a pocket of the pink Hawaiian shirt he wore loose, hanging over his white slacks. With his wall-to-wall shoulders, the casual outfit looked as intimidating as a military uniform. Using a gesture I remembered all too well, he removed a notepad and a pencil stub.

Like death and taxes, there was no way out, so I told him everything I knew, which was next to nothing. He kept the pencil going as if he were whipping out a bestseller. Except when I asked, “Why did the thief only take one Monet? Why not both?”

That wasn’t an idle question. I really was puzzled. Why steal the larger of the two paintings and leave the smaller one? Was the missing one more valuable? To me, both were equally beautiful, equally precious.

He stopped writing for a second. “There’s a reason for everything, Mrs. D.” He jabbed his pencil stub in the direction of the dining room. “That’s what I’m here for, to uncover the reasons why a masterpiece has gone missing. And why a woman is dead.” He held the stub over the notebook again. “You notice anything else gone?”

“No, but I didn’t have a chance to look.”

A fleshy police officer barged into the room. “The cook’s husband is here,” he told Rossi. “A Jesus Cardoza. Batano’s got him on the terrace with the gardener. And the doc’s outside.”

“Tell Batano I’ll be right there. You can send in the doc.” Rossi flipped his notebook closed. “You sure you don’t want him to take a look at you?” he asked me.

I shook my head and regretted it. The room swayed then slowly steadied.

Rossi reached back into his shirt pocket, withdrew a business card and held it out to me.

“I have one, Lieutenant, and I remember the drill. If I think of anything else I’ll call you. Ditto if I leave town in the next few days.” My recital over, I asked, “Now may I leave?”

He tucked the card back in his pocket and gave me a sweeping head-to-toe glance. “You’re looking pale, Mrs. D. How about you go to the ER? Get that lump checked out? I’ll have one of the officers drive you.”

“Thanks, but no thanks. I’m feeling fine now. I’ll just get my handbag and go home.”

He huffed out a sigh. “I could insist.”

“No, you couldn’t. I’m not under arrest.”

He shrugged. “Feel free to leave.”

On my way home, I did intend to go to the ER at the Naples Community Hospital, but I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it by pulling up in a squad car.

I was halfway to the door when he said, “You know something, Mrs. D?”

Exasperated, I turned around. “What?”

“We’ve gotta stop meeting like this.” He grinned. Right in the middle of a murder scene.

How crass. Not a word about the victim, or the missing Monet, or my clients’ loss. I shook my head. A big mistake. I couldn’t take another step until the room stopped spinning.

“One more thing,” he said, as I reached the door. “You’ll need to come to the station tomorrow and sign a witness statement.” He frowned and added, “I know tomorrow will be a tough day for you, but I have to ask.”

I nodded then hurried away before the tears blinded me.

Tomorrow. He had remembered.

Maybe he wasn’t so crass after all.

The next day, my spirits lower than the price of a garage-sale rug, I opened my shop, Deva Dunne Interiors, promptly at nine as usual. Though the MRI hadn’t shown signs of trauma, my head pounded anyway. It had every right to.

This was December fifteenth, the one-year anniversary of my husband Jack’s death, and as Rossi had guessed, a day I’d been dreading. But no whining allowed. I intended to meet it dry-eyed and chin up, as Jack would have wanted. No sobbing. No groaning or carrying on about how much I missed him. How much I’d lost. How much I wanted him back in the circle of my arms, so I could reach up and sink my fingers in his thick Irish thatch, and warm myself in the sparkle of his eyes and his smile. No moaning about how every cell in my body would come alive each time he said he loved me…in a lilt more enchanting than music, more wonderful than…

I glanced out the display window. No, not again! What a nerve! I jumped up and yanked open the shop door. I’d had it with being dumped on.

“Hey, you! Dreadlocks!”

In his early twenties, with latte skin and dozens of loosely wound braids to his shoulders, the guy turned and pointed a finger at his chest. “Me?”

“Yes, you. I saw you through my window. I want you to quit that.”

He stared at me, a baffled look on his face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, lady.”

“Stop dumping your empties in my planters. I’ve been finding them there all week.”

He shrugged. “That’s what they’re for.”

“Like hell they are.”

I stepped outside. Plucking a dead soda can out of an English boxwood next to the entrance, I held it up. “The planters are for decoration. For customers. This is for you.” I threw the can at him. It bounced off his foot. “No more Cokes. No more Buds. Got that?”

In the distance, traffic pulsed along Fifth Avenue, Naples’s version of Rodeo Drive, but no one ventured down the alley. Dreadlocks and I were alone. Over six feet tall, with pecs like Arnold, he could easily have knocked me down, but I stood my ground. I was struggling to create a little bit of beauty in the world and wasn’t about to tolerate any trashing. Not today of all days.