“We can go to Oregon. I have a place there.”
“Would it be safe?”
“Probably not,” he admitted, frowning as somewhere on a floor above, footsteps could be heard. “I do have a watch dog of sorts, but I doubt if Tough Guy would deter too many people.”
To Marla it sounded like heaven. Peaceful. Safe. At least within this horrid, complicated and terrifying nightmare, she’d found Nick. If nothing else, she knew what it was like to love someone. To care. “Someday,” she said hoarsely, “I’d like to see it.”
“Someday you will,” he promised, but she didn’t know if she could believe him.
Before she could answer, the phone rang sharply.
“Now what?” His expression sober, Nick checked his watch, strode into the foyer, and grabbed the receiver before the telephone jangled again. “Hello?” A pause. The lines around his mouth deepened. “Marla Cahill? Right here.”
Marla’s heart dropped.
“Just a minute.” Nick carried the receiver into the sitting room and handed it to her. His eyes locked with hers. “It’s the nursing home in Tiburon.”
Her father. Doom settled in her heart. “This is Marla Cahill,” she said, though she wasn’t certain.
“Good morning, Mrs. Cahill,” a strong, female voice greeted. “This is Kara Dunwoody, the administrator at Rolling Hills Care Center in Tiburon. I’m afraid I have some bad news. Your father passed away this morning . . .”
“You wanted a break in the Pamela Delacroix case?” Janet Quinn asked as she dropped into the chair opposite Paterno’s desk. She was carrying her oversized briefcase and set it on the floor beside her.
“At least one. Two or three would be better.” He reached into the drawer, discovered he was out of gum, and leaned back in his chair. “What’ve you got?”
Janet grinned. “We found Marla Cahill’s purse. With the impact of the accident, it had been thrown about fifty feet and slid down an embankment. We would never have located it if she hadn’t been so insistent that it was missing.” Janet’s eyes were bright behind her glasses, as if she was privy to an important secret. Paterno had seen the look before and recognized it. She was holding something back. Something important.
“And?” he prodded.
“And we found her wallet . . . well, actually more than her wallet. But there’s an interesting little twist here. The credit cards, driver’s license, and checkbook weren’t issued to Marla Cahill. All of them, every piece of ID was in the name of Kylie Paris. She lives here in the city.” Janet reached down, snapped her briefcase open and withdrew a small handbag, wrapped in plastic and tagged, then pulled out a larger plastic bag filled with other items, all tagged as well. Through the plastic, Paterno viewed the driver’s license. “Notice anything?” Janet asked.
“Only that Marla Cahill and Kylie Paris could be twins.” He stared at the image.
“Believe me, they’re not.”
“And I thought the resemblance between Marla Cahill and Pam Delacroix was close. It is nothing compared to this.”
“Think what it could be, if, after she was in the car wreck, the surgeons altered her face a bit. You know, people would expect that after the accident and the plastic surgery, Marla Cahill just might look a little different from the way she did before Pam’s Mercedes did a nose dive off the highway.”
“Who is this woman?” Paterno asked, waving Kylie Paris’s ID at the other detective.
Janet was only too happy to answer; she’d been waiting for that question. “According to state records, Kylie Paris was born a couple of years after Marla Cahill, to a woman named Dolly Paris, who, at one time, worked as a waitress at a men’s club where Conrad Amhurst played cards and golf. She wasn’t married at the time, had no permanent boyfriend, but managed to get pregnant. There were some rumors that the kid was fathered by a member of the club, but no father was listed on the birth certificate and Dolly died nearly five years ago. Heart disease. Kylie grew up with a series of . . . almost stepdads, for lack of a better term. Smart kid, did well in school, got herself some scholarships and worked her way through college. After graduation she talked her way into a job at an investment firm downtown. Very ambitious girl. Even had another offer at a competing firm.”
“Had?”
“Yep. She quit. About a year and a half ago. Just out of the blue. Didn’t give much of a reason, but it was out of character as she was determined to claw her way up the corporate ladder, no glass ceiling for this girl. She wanted the good life and how. But then, one day, just up and gives it up.” Janet’s eyes gleamed. “None of her friends have heard from her since. She just seemed to drop off the face of the earth.”
“She died?”
“Nope. Don’t think so. Otherwise the rent on her apartment and her utilities would be delinquent.”
“And they’re not?” Paterno said, his mind racing. Who the hell was this woman—this potential half sister to Marla Cahill. What was the connection?
“Paid every month to the leasing company.”
“Really?” he asked, feeling that tingle of exhilaration, that spurt of adrenalin that he always sensed when a case was about to be solved. “Why did she quit her job?”
“This is where it gets good. I think she quit to have a baby—a baby she didn’t want anyone to know about. Marla Cahill’s baby.”