Wendy Hornsby - Midnight Baby

“On my way out?” Greg asked, gazing at her with a hangdog longing. “I just got here.”

She pressed his arm. “I said, this is serious.”

As he sloped away, dejected, I had a feeling Regina had already been served a few by Sammy. She was certainly willing to talk.

I turned my smile on her. “It’s wicked what you do to that man.”

“I know,” she purred. “And after all these years. It’s the ultimate power, you know, to hold a man’s balls in the palm of your hand that way.”

The blonde snorted. I guffawed.

Regina grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me down beside her. “Maggie, meet Cynthia.”

“Hello,” I said.

“Nice to meet you.” Cynthia sounded as highbrow as she looked, very long vowels, very Vassar. The grubby child on her lap didn’t quite suit the stereotype. But he suited her. “What nature of trouble is Hillary in?”

I took out the stills of Pisces again, and silently asking the girl for forgiveness, handed them to Regina. This wasn’t the same as showing them to Leslie Metrano. Hillary would have been mortified if either of these women had seen her on the street.

Regina held the prints so that Cynthia could look on and leafed through them twice.

“Do you know this girl?” I asked.

“It’s Hillary Ramsdale.” Regina grimaced. “Do they dress this badly on the Continent, or were these taken on Halloween? She looks like a little whore.”

“That was her intention,” I said. “I filmed her in Los Angeles just a few days ago.”

“Ah-ha.” Cynthia raised a slender hand. “Now I have it. Maggie MacGowen. Aged and Alone. We showed your film at a Junior League seminar about the sandwich generation. You know, adults raising children and caring for elderly parents at the same time. You remember, Regina.”

Regina still seemed confused. She held up one of the pictures. “Hilly was in makeup for a film?”

“No,” I said. “That’s how I found her. Hillary was a working girl.”

The frozen horror on Regina’s face melted to mortified tears as she leafed again through the stills. She turned the stack facedown on the table before she wiped her nose on the sleeve of her sweater. The valentine poutiness was gone from the gaze she turned on me.

“You said ‘was,’ ” she said.

“Hillary is dead.”

“An accident?”

“No. She was murdered.”

“No.” Cynthia drew the sleeping toddler tight and buried her face against him. Regina reached out and grasped the child’s hand. The gesture was very tender, but the green in her eyes sparked with her wrath. It was the right reaction. It showed genuine concern. I liked her even more. Why hadn’t Hillary turned to people like these when she was in trouble?

Sammy came over with champagne and tall flutes and began pouring. Glasses were passed from hand to hand in just the way Kool-Aid was being passed among a group of youngsters down at the pool. As long as Sammy was present, no one said a word.

Sammy draped a white towel around the neck of the half-full bottle and went away.

“To all the bastards.” Regina tipped her glass toward mine.

“Hear, hear,” Cynthia intoned. She arched her long neck back and took a hefty slug from her glass. The price of Moet being what it is, I figured her intake to be about a dollar-fifty per swallow.

“Where is Hillary now?” Regina asked.

“County morgue,” I said.

“All alone?” Regina seethed. She reached for the bottle. “That goddam fucking son of a bitch Randy.”

“What did he do?” I asked.

“All his brains are in his prick. He all but abandoned Hilly. When Elizabeth caught him screwing his latest bimbo, she tossed him out. Literally. Dumped all his shit into the canal. The neighbors watched her do it. Then he took right off, left the country, and left Hilly behind.”

“Left her with her mother,” I said.

Cynthia sneered. “Elizabeth is not her mother. By my count, she’s wife number three.”

“Then where is her mother?”

“She died.” Regina turned to Cynthia. “Was it five or six years ago?”

Cynthia shrugged. “I’m not sure. Five or six years and two wives ago, anyway. It was a terrible shame. Hilly’s mother was such a lovely person. You can see her influence in Hilly.”

“Hold the phone,” Regina snapped, draining the bottle into her glass. “Hilly ended up a streetwalker. How lovely is that?”

Cynthia looked down her narrow nose. “You know what I mean. Mother and daughter were both gracious and well-spoken. They kept a bit to themselves, but they were very charming. If Hilly ended up on the streets I would look to Elizabeth before I placed blame on Hanna.”

“Why?” I asked.

Regina summoned me closer so she could whisper. “Because Elizabeth is a tramp. Any idiot could see right from the beginning what she wanted from Randy. Everyone except Randy.”

“And what did she want?”

“This.” Regina’s gesture swept the room. “And the Virginia Country Club membership, a house in Naples. For a little waitress who grew up in Northtown, she did all right for herself.”

“Nasty Reggie,” Cynthia reproved.

“But it’s true.” She sat back. “Randy must have a thing for waitresses. Look at his latest conquest. What’s her name? Lacy? Apparently he likes them young and deft at juggling hot dishes.”

“Richard likes Lacy.” Cynthia was beginning to slur her words. “He says Lacy’s awfully intelligent. More like Randy’s first wife than Elizabeth. She’s working on a teaching credential at State. And she’s good with Hilly. He thinks maybe Randy is beginning to pull himself back together.”

“Who is Richard?” I asked her.

“My husband,” Cynthia said as if any idiot should have known.

Listening to them, I was beginning to feel like a spectator at a tennis match. The wine and bouncing back and forth between them was making my head buzz.

“Wait a minute,” I said, holding up my hands. “Where can I find Elizabeth?”

“Haven’t seen her for a while. Have you, Cynthia?”

“No.”

“She still has the Naples house,” Regina said.

“I’d like the address,” I said. More than that, I wanted an introduction. I hoped Regina was up for a Sunday-afternoon social call. “I’m sure the police have already contacted Elizabeth. But I want to talk to her.”

“Why?” Cynthia challenged. “Seems ghoulish.”

“Research,” I said, perhaps defensively. Maybe she was right.

Regina had an impish smirk on her face. “You want to do the Nancy Drew thing. Snoop around. Get into some trouble.”

I laughed. “Exactly. Want to come with me?”

“Seriously?”

“Elizabeth will be more receptive to a chat if I’m introduced to her by someone she knows. Like you.”

“True.” Regina got to her feet. “Besides, she lives right on a canal. It’s a tricky place to find. Be easier if I just drove you. Cynthia, are you coming?”

“I pass.” Cynthia’s sleeping child was beginning to stir. “David needs lunch.”

Regina gave little David’s leg a pat. “Keep an eye out for my boys. I’ll call you later.”

“My car’s out front,” I said.

But she shook her head. “We’ll get there faster by water.”

On the way past the bar, Regina scooped up a second bottle of Moet and tucked it under her arm. At double-time march, she led me downstairs and out the back way to the ranks of moored boats.

When Greg Szal mentioned his Bayliner, I had assumed big. It wasn’t. It was a behemoth. There was enough gear on the fishing tower to go into the tuna business if his nose-job practice failed.

A craft that size would tear up the open water, but in narrow passages like the boat channel or the canals of Naples it would be a nuisance, a shark in a goldfish bowl. I was thinking it might be faster to swim to the Ramsdales’ than go through the bother of bringing the beast out when Regina ripped a tarp off a four-man Zodiak raft that was tied alongside.