Douglas, Nelson - Cat in a Flamingo Fedora

But of course he didn't. He was too anxious about his own confession to enjoy another's discomfort.

"Nancy Drew!" Molina was still laughing. "Perfect, and here I thought Savannah Ashleigh's brains were all in her purebred cat."

"They are," Temple snapped. "And she had a very hot fling with Darren Cooke a couple years back, if you're interested."

Molina the Poker-faced could sober up instantly once she had fallen victim to humor. She composed her expression to the usual deadpan. "Yes, Nancy?"

"I'm not gonna call you Bess. But I will tell you what I should have told you three days ago.

His wife thought I was ... the other woman. A other woman," she corrected. "An other woman?"

"And why would anyone think Darren Cooke would proposition you?"

"Because he did! But, don't worry, I left in a huff of injured virtue."

"Is that why his wife thought you and he had--?"

"The fact that I was there, that I went into his bedroom for a few minutes ... it was perfectly innocent, but I knew people would smirk and rush to the wrong conclusion, which was why I kept quiet about the other thing. It's enough to have a widow ringing you up because she thinks you were her dead husband's last lay and she wants to know his state of mind--"

Molina was her old, stoic self again. "Why was she so sure?"

"He always kept a trophy of his... inamoratas, on which he wrote the date of their one-night stand, as a kind of keepsake, or scorecard. For some reason, he'd written Sunday's date on my business card, so naturally his wife assumed--"

"Where did he hide that card? We searched that suite from whirlpool to coffeemaker."

"You'll have to ask Michelle."

"Michelle?"

"Yes, we became quite good friends once she realized that I wasn't his last stand, so to speak. She's French, you know. Michelle Bonard, a world-famous French model, but she's a wonderful mother and she even advised me on my love life."

Oh! She had been rattling on and then... Temple didn't dare look at Matt. Or Molina. She studied the framed document on the wall over Molina's shoulder. Some kind of degree, or award, with thick, tortured calligraphy.

"She's at the Crystal Phoenix," she finished.

Molina leaned forward to prop her elbows on what free space remained on the glass-topped desk. "Miss Barr's love life. Now that I'd like to hear. Wouldn't you, Mr. Devine?"

"No, I don't care for idle speculation."

"Then you're not cut out to be an investigator."

"I know I'm not. I was trained to hold other people's confidences as sacred, no matter what."

"And this is where your part of the confession comes in."

"No, not yet." Temple drew the harsh spotlight of Molina's attention back to herself. "You see, Darren Cooke really did need a Nancy Drew. That's what he told me in the bedroom. He showed me a manila envelope, an ordinary nine-by-twelve-inch envelope, but inside was an extraordinary collection of letters dating back, oh, a couple of years."

"Love letters?"

Temple shook her head.

"Blackmail letters."

"No, hate letters, pure and simple. From a young woman who claimed she was his daughter.

She was bitterly angry, blamed him for everything that had gone wrong in her mother's life and her own. I was sure the police would find something as big as a manila envelope. But Michelle told me that you hadn't, as far as she knew, and that even she hadn't known about the letters.

Michelle said that you didn't even find my card because her late husband was exceptionally clever at hiding things. That was his whole life: hiding things, especially from himself."

"And yet he told you, a virtual stranger, all about the letters."

"He was feeling the pressure. That's why I think he was calling Matt. He really wanted to change, but his obsession with seduction was too strong. His wife knew about it, and thinks he was no longer able to attract the foxy young things he'd been used to. He was really anguished about those letters. And sorry that this 'daughter's' mother had kept her existence hidden from him. A couple of years ago, he and Michelle had a first child, a baby daughter he adored; maybe he would have adored this adult daughter if he'd had a chance. He wasn't as afraid of her as I thought he should be. I told him he had to contact the police--"

"Thank you for that." Molina inclined her head as slowly as Queen Victoria. Tall, dark-haired women with morning-glory eyes can get away with those sorts of gestures, Temple had found.

She couldn't.

"I told him that if he wouldn't contact the police, he should try some pricey, discreet Beverly Hills private-investigation agency."

"Astute, if not forthcoming."

"He wouldn't have done it. I could tell. And, then, when I was leaving, he made a veiled suggestion."

"Aha. The wolf pounces on the helpful little lamb."

"I was so angry. He was ignoring my advice, but apparently he could find me horizontally useful. I told him a no-shilly-shallying no and got out of there. I wanted to forget about the encounter. I both felt sorry for him, and despised him. So pathetic and so true-to-form. So when I heard he'd killed himself that very night, I figured that you'd find the letters."

Molina remained quiet, doodling on her legal-pad desk mat for a moment. "So you think he could have been murdered--?"

"Maybe. Though, the mood he was in, having struck out in his halfhearted seduction and worried sick about this disenchanted daughter, suicide could be likely."

"And what do you think?"

Molina had spun to drill her memorably blue eyes into Matt's.

He refused to bolt, speaking in a flat, reportorial tone. "You know I've been receiving calls at ConTact for several weeks from a sexual addict. A man with an impressive speaking voice. He's also an impressive manipulator, which comes with the addict's territory."

"You've concluded this was Darren Cooke?"

"This could have been Darren Cooke. I don't know for sure yet. If he never calls again--"

Matt shrugged, and then shrugged the sheepskin jacket, which was much too hot for a small office, onto his chair back.

Molina, Temple noticed, was riveted on his every move.

"The incident that Temple wants me to tell you," Matt went on, "was one I was reluctant to report to anybody. I'm simply not sure who I've been talking to all these weeks. This call came Sunday at about midnight."

Molina was no longer riveted on Matt, but on his testimony. And she didn't interrupt him as much as she did Temple. Sexist!

Matt toyed with a leather button on his new jacket. That way he could look down and talk more to himself.

"I tried not to judge him, but he would never take positive steps to work on his addiction. I found out last week that he was calling me not only from out of town--I was supposed to think I was vital to him--but that he'd been calling other phone counselors." Matt smiled sadly. "He had to know more than whomever he was dealing with. A tragic personality."

Molina could wait no longer for the tale to tell itself. "So. Sunday night. At midnight."

"I got another call. He alternated between dependency riffs and angry rejection."

"Of you?"

"Of course of me. In these situations, the counselor is the punching bag. He is everybody the caller thinks failed him in life. And then, his tone suddenly changed. I could hear him moving around with his portable phone, answering the door. Apparently what he craved was standing right there. 'Hello, baby,' I heard him say. 'Just what the doctor ordered. Come on in!' He hung up before I heard his visitor speak. That's all."

"That's all? You could have heard the arrival of the last person to see Darren Cooke alive."

"Yes, but what good does that do? I don't know who came to visit, or why or what happened next. Temple's main concern is that you find the missing letters. Perhaps his widow wo uld know where to hunt for them. She found Temple's card quickly enough."