Walt barked out a laugh that ended in a coughing fit. “So it’s true. Blood is thicker than water.”
“Thicker than a lot of things in my case. Look, what I want is as much information as you can get on the accident, on Pamela Delacroix and I don’t know anything about her except that she’s got a daughter down at UC Santa Cruz. The kid could even have a different last name for all I know.”
“Y’know a social security number, or driver’s license or husband’s name. Even a friggin’
address would help.”
“That’s why I pay you.”
Walt sniggered.
“Okay, so get as much info as you can and fax it to me or send it through e-mail. I’ll link up my laptop here. Scan me photos if you can find them.”
“Is that all?” Walt asked, not bothering to mask his sarcasm.
“Not quite.” Nick was on a roll now, and he felt the same surge of adrenalin in his bloodstream as he had years ago when he’d made a healthy living as a consultant to companies in trouble. “I’ll fax you a list of the employees of the company tomorrow along with some family friends that I want checked out.” Nick stretched the cord of the phone to the window and peered through the curtains. He saw Cherise on the corner, glancing at her watch and holding her umbrella against the rain . . . or was it Cherise? She’d left his room over ten minutes earlier and the black jeans, boots and leather jacket were common garb here in the city. On top of that, it was dark—city dark, the lamplight weak and ethereal. She glanced back at the hotel just as an SUV pulled up to the curb and she shook out the umbrella. Her blond hair with those glittery clips caught in the illumination from the streetlights as she disappeared into the rig. She was still closing the door when the impatient driver gunned the engine, running an amber light, water spraying from his wide tires. “Check on all the members of my family,” Nick instructed Walt. “Alex and Marla, and my cousins, Cherise and Montgomery—he goes by Monty sometimes.”
“All have the last name of Cahill?”
“No, wait.” He walked to the night table and picked up the card his cousin had left. “Cherise’s last name is Favier.” He spelled it and added the home phone number. “Her husband is Donald; he’s with the Holy Trinity of God church in Sausalito.” Frowning, Nick rattled off the number of the church.
Walt grunted, indicating that he’d gotten the information. “What about your mother?” he asked. “Eugenia? What should I do about her?”
Nick didn’t miss a beat. “Check her out, too.”
Chapter Eight
Tony Paterno stared at the computer screen where images of Pam Delacroix looked back at him, photos taken for her driver’s license, passport, and a couple of more glamorous head shots she’d used for her business cards when she’d worked at a real estate company in Sausalito. Pam wasn’t a dead ringer for Marla Cahill, but they certainly resembled each other. He’d seen the photos before, of course, but the longer this case dragged on, the more the two women seemed to resemble each other.
So what did that mean? That they were related? That the woman behind the wheel wasn’t Marla and the real Mrs. Cahill had already been cremated? But why? And if so, there had to have been a real fuck-up at the scene. It was impossible. And yet . . . Drumming his fingers on the arm of his chair, he glanced at the other images of Pam Delacroix, not nearly so flattering, pictures taken at the scene of the accident. Lying face up on an embankment, her body was little more than a bloody heap, her neck broken, her face nearly scraped free of skin, her broken arms flung wide on the forest floor. Other pictures showed the wreckage of the Mercedes, windows shattered, metal twisted, leather upholstery ripped and covered in blood. Impact had blown the tires, shattered the glass, twisted the shell of the car and sprung the spare clean out of the trunk. It was a sheer stroke of luck that Marla Cahill had survived.
If she really was Marla.
Was the resemblance a fluke? Another coincidence? Could she be faking her amnesia? He snapped his gum and scratched at his jaw, his fingers scraping over a day’s worth of stubble. Charles Biggs was dead—pushed into the grave by someone who’d slipped into the hospital, disguised himself and suffocated the poor bastard. Pam Delacroix or some other woman who looked a helluva lot like Marla Cahill had also been sent to her maker. The “accident” was looking more like a setup. But how? Why? Who was behind it? Who was the intended victim?
He thought hard. Motive. That’s what he needed. Who wanted one or more of the three people involved in the wreckage dead?
“Son of a bitch.” He pushed a button on the keyboard and leaned back in his chair as the printer whirred to life. There was something about the accident involving Marla Cahill that had never felt right, but he hadn’t been able to put his finger on it. He’d inherited the case. As both victims who had survived the crash had been life-flighted back to the city, SFPD was handling the investigation on this end, helping out the California Highway Patrol who were first to arrive on the scene and in whose jurisdiction the accident had occurred.
No crime had been proven. No drugs, no alcohol in her system. There was no reason to believe that she’d been driving in a negligent manner as there were no witnesses.
But one woman had been killed outright and Charles Biggs, the only witness, had been murdered.
He twisted in his chair and picked up reports on all the people related to Marla Amhurst Cahill. What a bunch of bluebloods. Marla came from a wealthy family in Marin County. Her father, Conrad James Amhurst, was living in an expensive care center with a view of the marina at Tiburon. If Paterno’s information was correct, the old man had one foot in the grave already. Pancreatic cancer. Conrad Anhurst would be lucky if he lived another three months.
From all reports the old man had been a womanizing bastard in his youth, his wife, Victoria, Marla’s mother, a cold fish. She’d died a few years back, complications after cosmetic surgery—a liposuction that had gone bad. Paterno snorted but kept scanning the files. Their only son, Rory, had been injured as a toddler and had ended up in an institution. That left Marla as the wealthy old man’s only heir. And she couldn’t remember anything. Or so she claimed. Paterno’s fingers tapped out a nervous tattoo on the arm of his chair. Maybe she was lying. But what the hell for?
He pulverized his gum as his eyes narrowed on page after page of reports.
The Cahills didn’t exactly epitomize the Ozzie and Harriet image of the American family. Nope, they seemed a little more like something straight out of Dynasty. Eugenia was the matriarch—prim, proper with all the warmth of a smiling snake. As phony as the proverbial three-dollar bill.
Alexander, the eldest son and Marla’s husband, was, from the outside, every woman’s dream husband. Handsome and fit, educated at Stanford and Harvard, he’d practiced law some years before stepping into his ailing father’s shoes and assuming command of Cahill Limited, an international corporation. When the old man had kicked off, Alex had inherited everything.
But Paterno didn’t trust him. Rich, arrogant and sarcastic, Alex Cahill seemed to think he was above the law. Paterno had dealt with him before; didn’t like the supercilious son of a bitch.
Alexander’s brother, Nicholas, seemed to be the black sheep. While Alex had excelled in school and garnered athletic and scholastic awards, Nick had gotten himself into trouble with the law, deep enough that the old man had to bail him out more than once. None of the charges, everything from stealing cars to possession of alcohol to vandalism—had ever stuck. The charges had always been dropped. Probably because Daddy had paid off everyone involved, not that it said as much in the report.
Nick had finished high school and left home at eighteen, worked as a trucker, on an oil rig, even tried his hand at ranching in Montana where he’d later been a fishing guide. He’d owned his own fishing boat, ran a company that made truck parts, built up a small fortune and began buying and selling small businesses in the Seattle area. Somehow, he’d become a corporate troubleshooter, then quit abruptly about five years ago and settled down, presumably with enough cash, in some rinky-dink town in Oregon. Devil’s Cove, for crying out loud. Somehow it fit.