Granted, he’d never liked George Ramon. The man had been a drunk, a sketchy gardener, and a lousy father, but he’d never been violent, not even when he was completely plastered.
Mia parted her lips, but before she could speak there was the sound of approaching footsteps that had him spinning around to face Vicky.
“I have proof,” the older woman said, her tone smug.
Lucas moved to block her from reaching Mia. Not only to ensure the woman couldn’t touch Mia, but to keep the younger woman from going nuclear and doing something that might mean having to bail her out of jail.
“Show me,” he commanded.
Vicky came to a halt, her expression mocking as she took in his protective stance.
“Fine.” She nodded toward the stack of photos he still held in his hand. “Turn over the last picture.”
Lucas briefly considered crossing the room to toss the pictures into the fire. He and Mia had come there for answers, but suddenly the photographs seemed to pose a threat to Mia and her happiness.
Only the knowledge that Mia would remain in danger if they didn’t halt the killer made him turn over the pictures to glance at the backs.
Lucas frowned as he found the picture and skimmed the block-style letters that looked like they’d been formed by a five-year-old. Or a man who was barely literate.
“Lucas.” Mia touched his arm, her voice unsteady. “Let me see.”
Knowing she wouldn’t let it go, he reluctantly tilted the picture to the side so she could see the words.
“‘I have your husband’s body hidden where you’ll never find him. I want fifty thousand dollars in cash left on my doorstep before sundown tomorrow,’” she read out loud.
“I’m sure you recognize your father’s handwriting,” Vicky drawled, making Lucas wish he didn’t have a rule against hitting women.
Instead he sent the coldhearted bitch a fierce glare. “Did you pay him?”
“Of course,” Vicky murmured. “I was terrified he intended to kill me as well.”
Bullshit. Lucas gave a shake of his head, shifting his attention to Mia, who looked as if she’d been hit by a truck.
“Is this your father’s handwriting?” he asked in a gentle voice.
She licked her lips, a pulse at the base of her throat racing as she struggled to contain her volatile emotions.
“How can I be sure?” she muttered. “Anyone could forge this note.”
Vicky gave a flick of her hand, the diamonds glittering in the firelight. “Play stupid if you want,” she taunted, the confidence in her voice assuring Lucas the photos and the note were real. “I’m sure the investigators could prove whether or not it’s a forgery.”
Grudgingly accepting that Vicky held the upper hand, at least for the moment, Mia wrapped her arms around her waist. “Why would my father or Tony want to hurt Mr. Fontaine?”
Lucas covertly tucked the pictures in his jacket pocket. He’d have Max run a few tests on them later. For now he concentrated on Vicky’s polished performance as she gave a soulful shake of her head. The bitch had truly missed her calling. She should have been on stage.
“It’s partially my fault, I suppose.” There was a dramatic sigh. “Tony was so young and passionate and not overly bright. He somehow convinced himself that if he could get rid of Paul, we could be together.” She paused, giving a tiny shiver. “I never dreamed he would do anything like that.”
Lucas couldn’t deny the charges against his old friend. Tony had always been a victim of his emotions. And unfortunately, he hadn’t been particularly intelligent. But that didn’t make him a killer.
In fact, Tony would never have the brains or backbone to plot a cold-blooded murder. He could, however, be easily persuaded to do anything to earn the approval of someone he loved.
“You’re saying Tony killed Paul so the two of you could get married?” Lucas asked, his voice edged with disbelief.
Vicky shrugged. “That’s exactly what happened.”
Mia stepped around him, ignoring his warning glare. “You said my father was involved,” she reminded Vicky.
“He was there,” the older woman said, an emotion that Lucas couldn’t define searing through the gray eyes. “Tony needed his assistance to move the body.”
“No way,” Mia breathed. “My father hated Tony. He would never have helped him.”
“According to Tony your father was desperate for money,” Vicky said.
Lucas wasn’t impressed with the claim. It’d been no secret that George Ramon had struggled to make a living.
“Tony paid him?” she demanded.
“Of course not.” Vicky gave a sharp laugh. “Tony was constantly broke, but he assumed he would have access to my bank accounts after we married.” She gave a laugh that was like sandpaper against Lucas’s nerves. “When I made it clear I didn’t have any interest in making our relationship legal, he informed your father he couldn’t come up with the money.” She deliberately held Mia’s angry gaze. “That’s when your father arrived at my office and shoved the envelope in my hands. What choice did I have but to give him the fifty thousand dollars in cash he demanded?”
Mia stiffened, and Lucas knew she was thinking about the cash that’d been stuffed in the hope chest her father had given to her.
Damn. He didn’t believe Vicky’s story. At least not entirely. But it was growingly obvious that she’d spent the past seventeen years creating a story that not only covered her ass, but squarely laid the blame on other people.
“Why didn’t you go to the cops?” he demanded.
Vicky turned away, pacing back to the table to pour herself another glass of wine. Lucas studied her seeming display of unease.
Just an act?
Or a tool to give herself time to think of her answer?
“When Tony confessed what he’d done I was in shock,” Vicky at last murmured, slowly turning to meet his suspicious gaze. “A part of me felt responsible for what’d happened. After all, if I hadn’t allowed my loneliness to lead me into an affair with Tony, Paul might still be alive.” She flicked her gaze toward Mia. “And naturally I was scared of what your father might do.”
Lucas spoke before Mia could. “And that’s the only reason?”
Vicky swirled the wine in her glass, her lips pursed. “I’m not an angel.”
“No shit,” Mia muttered.
Lucas gave her arm a small squeeze, keeping his gaze trained on the older woman. “You were happy to have your husband dead?”
“Not happy,” she protested, sending him a chiding frown before her gaze lowered and her expression hardened. “But our marriage had become a nightmare. Paul drank too much, he spent outrageous sums of money, and he preferred spending his nights with cheap whores instead of his own wife.”
Lucas had heard his mother discussing Paul Fontaine and his unsavory habit of spending nights in seedy bars. Having her husband the subject of constant gossip must have brutalized Vicky’s pride.
A very real motive for wanting him dead.
Of course, there were easier ways to deal with a husband who turned out to be a drunken sleazebag.
“Why not divorce him?”
Vicky hesitated, no doubt deciding whether or not to answer Lucas’s question. Finally she lifted her lashes to reveal eyes that were hard with a hatred she couldn’t disguise.
“He held the mortgage to this estate,” she admitted, her head turning toward the portrait over the mantel. “He threatened to have my parents thrown out. It would have destroyed my father to be publicly humiliated.”
Lucas’s lips twisted. He didn’t doubt that the older couple would have preferred death to the horror of being thrown out of their beloved mansion by their own son-in-law.
“So you said nothing?” he asked.
She shrugged, trying to look repentant. “I know it was wrong.”
Accepting that she’d rehearsed her story often enough that she wasn’t going to be rattled by his obvious questions, Lucas abruptly tried
to catch her off guard.
“What about the pictures of your husband in Bolivia?” he demanded. “There’s no way in hell Tony could have come up with those.”
Wine sloshed from Vicky’s glass as she gave a sharp jerk, but with a speed that was chilling, she was rapidly regaining control of her nerves. She even managed to paste a stiff smile on her lips.
“No, Tony was able to hide in the condo when it became public knowledge that Paul was missing. I, however, wasn’t so fortunate. A week after he didn’t show up for work, his office called the authorities. I was forced to deal with the mess.” She carefully set aside her glass, perhaps sensing that Lucas intended to keep her rattled. “It was sheer luck that I’d had a private detective following Paul for months before he disappeared, even when he’d left the country on a supposed business trip. When the cops arrived and started asking questions, I panicked.” She gave a lift of her shoulder. “Before I knew what I was doing I was giving them the pictures the investigator had taken.”
Lucas resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He doubted this woman had ever panicked in her life. In fact, he was fairly certain that he’d never met a person so deviously capable of thinking on her feet.
Without a blink of her eye, she’d confessed that her husband had been dead for the past seventeen years. Then promptly pinned the murder on her lover and George Ramon. She even managed to absolve herself of the cover-up by saying she’d simply freaked out and used her husband’s serial infidelity to explain his disappearance.
It was all so smooth.
Which meant trying to force the truth from her was going to be next to impossible. The only thing he could hope was to keep her talking long enough she made a mistake that gave her away.
“And the cops were satisfied?” he demanded.
Vicky lifted her hand to study her manicure, her expression unreadable. “Hardly satisfied, but the investment bank where Paul worked wanted it all hushed up.”
“Yes.” He folded his arms over his chest. “The investment bank.”
She lifted her gaze. “Do you have a point?”
He arched a brow. Clearly the woman surrounded herself with lackeys who had no choice but to allow themselves to be bullied and intimidated by this woman.
He, thankfully, wasn’t one of them.
“According to the official report your husband managed to pilfer millions of dollars,” he said. “What happened to the money?”
Vicky didn’t miss a beat as she waved a dismissive hand. “Paul was a gambler,” she said, her voice edged with contempt. “And like most things, he wasn’t very good at it.”
Lucas tried to imagine Vicky and Paul seated at their dining table, the air thick with mutual hatred as they silently wished each other dead.
The mere thought was enough to make him shudder in horror.
“You’re saying your husband wasted millions at the poker table?” he demanded.
“It wasn’t just his gambling,” she clarified. “There were also risky investments, his expensive cars, and of course, his lavish trips with his whores. It all added up.”
Lucas glanced around the room, which was perfectly restored with all the modern conveniences while keeping the impression of Old World charm.
He had a vague memory of visiting when he was young. It’d been one of those endless fund-raising parties for his father’s reelection, which meant they all had to play the happy family. The party had been held in a side garden, but like most kids, Lucas had an insatiable curiosity, and the fact that he had been warned to stay out of the house only ensured that he’d crept inside the minute his parents’ backs were turned.
There’d been nothing particularly shocking, but even his youthful eyes had noticed the shabby emptiness of the rooms, including this library.
Nothing at all like the glowing beauty that now filled the home.
“And renovations on this estate?” he asked.
“No,” she denied. Too quickly. “Unlike Paul and my father, I happen to possess a talent for business. Once Paul was . . .” She hesitated, as if searching for the word.
“Dead?” he helpfully supplied.
“Gone,” she corrected, her lips flattening at his blatant expression of disbelief. “I sold our house and used the funds to make my own investments. They’ve paid out nicely.”
Yeah, right. Lucas didn’t doubt that she was more capable than her husband of managing her fortune. Unlike Paul, she would never toss away millions on gambling or lavish vacations with expensive women. But he was fairly certain her seeming business acumen came from the missing funds that’d been stolen from the investment bank and not some hidden talent for finance.
“Your husband’s secretary claimed he kept two million dollars in a safe in his office,” he said.
The older woman gave a sharp bark of laughter. “Ginger Albee said a lot of things, most of which were lies.”
Lucas arched his brows. No need to ask Vicky what she thought about her husband’s secretary. “Why would she lie?”
Vicky abruptly paced across the floor to straighten the carved pieces of the nativity scene. Was she hiding her expression, or giving herself time to think of her next lie?
Impossible to say.
“She didn’t want to admit that she’d been sharing my husband’s bed from the day he hired her, or that he was paying for her apartment as well as buying her a new car every year,” Vicky at last claimed.
“What would it matter?” Lucas moved to the center of the room. He didn’t want to give Vicky an open pathway to the door. Not that he thought she was going to make a run for it, but better safe than sorry. “I doubt Paul Fontaine’s habit of sleeping with other women was much of a secret.”
She turned to send him a narrow-eyed glare. “Ginger was beautiful, but she wasn’t very bright. She might have thought the investment bank would demand she pay back the money that Paul spent on her.” She shrugged. Lucas studied her with open suspicion. “Or more likely she stole whatever cash was in the office and laid the blame on my missing husband,” she added. “All I know is that his safe was empty when I went through his things.”
“Hmm.” Lucas gave a slow shake of his head. She truly was masterful. Now she’d managed to pin the theft of millions of dollars on the hapless secretary. “You seem to have an answer for everything.”
She sniffed. “I don’t have answers, I have the truth.”
Yeah, and pigs could fly. He faced her squarely, knowing it was time to pull out his ace in the hole.
“There’s still one thing you haven’t explained,” he drawled.
She smiled, revealing her utter lack of fear. The sight pissed him off.
Oh, he wasn’t a bully. He didn’t get a kick out of terrifying females. But he needed to find a way to rattle this woman, and the fact he hadn’t managed to do it was annoying as hell.
“What’s that?” she demanded.
“The picture of Mia you tossed on your lover’s chest.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Mia was barely aware of Lucas’s continued inquisition, her mind reeling with Vicky Fontaine’s shocking accusations.
It couldn’t be true.
Could it?
Okay, her father had a habit of drinking too much after her mother’s death. And he wasn’t the hardest worker, which meant there never had been enough money. . . .
The money.
With a shudder Mia was blasted with the memory of finding the fifty thousand dollars that had been hidden in the bottom of the hope chest.
She’d told herself it had to be a part of her mother’s life insurance policy, which her father had mentioned when he’d first learned he was sick. He had, after all, made vague promises that she would have what she deserved after he was gone. And it would be just like the paranoid man to hide her inheritance in a chest rather than put it in a bank where it could be kept safe.
Now, however, she couldn’t shake the fear that she’d deliberately stuck her head in the sand.
She
hadn’t wanted to question the notion that George Ramon would actually purchase life insurance for his young, seemingly healthy wife. He hadn’t even believed in health insurance. It’d been easier to bury the past along with her father.
Her cowardice had come back to bite her in the butt.
Nothing could make her believe her father was an accomplice to murder, but how had Vicky managed to get her hands on her father’s handwriting? There’d been no mistaking the childish block letters, no matter how much she might have protested anyone could have scrawled the note on the back of the picture.
And how could the older woman have possibly known about the fifty thousand dollars?
There had to be an explanation. But what?
She was jerked out of her brooding thoughts when she heard Lucas mention the photo with her name on it.
As disturbed as she was by the slander against her father, she was far more troubled by the knowledge someone wanted her dead.
“Ah.” Vicky flicked a glance toward Mia. “The picture.”
Not for the first time since entering the mansion, Mia had to battle back the urge to slap the condescending smile off the older woman’s face. “I suppose you have some sort of story that explains wanting me dead?” she asked, her voice edged with barely suppressed fury.
Vicky pretended to be startled by the accusation. “It wasn’t me.”
Mia rolled her eyes. “Of course not.”
“If you don’t want to hear my explanation, leave,” the older woman snapped.
Lucas shifted to stand at Mia’s side, his arm wrapping around her shoulder. Mia wasn’t sure if it was meant to be soothing or a warning that they wouldn’t get anything from Vicky if they were thrown off the estate.
“We’re all ears,” he drawled.
There was a long pause, as if Vicky was considering whether or not to answer. Mia wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d decided she’d had enough.
In fact, Mia was astonished the older woman was willing to talk to them at all.
She could easily have ordered them to leave the minute they’d stepped into the house. Instead she’d allowed herself to be pumped for information.
The question was why?