Murder in Aix (The Maggie Newberry Mystery Series Book 5) (17 page)

“She took credit
for the suicide attempt?” Danielle extricated a tissue from her purse and
dabbed at the perspiration on her top lip.

“Oh, my God,”
Maggie said. “Poor Julia. I can’t imagine what she must be feeling to have
tried something like this. I need to go to her.” She stood up without knowing
she was doing it, and Grace reached across the table and pulled her back down
into her chair.

“Maggie, no.
She’ll be in the hospital under heavy guard. You’re not family. You won’t be
allowed anywhere near her.”

“She is right,”
Danielle said softly.
        

Maggie looked at
them with misery and acceptance. “Annette said it was because Julia was moved
into general population—something Annette is taking credit for. How can
one person be so full of hate?”

The three were
silent for a moment and Grace noticed that Danielle had caught the eye of the
waiter. He nodded as if he understood perfectly her visual shorthand and
disappeared into the café.

“I’ve totally let
her down,” Maggie said.

“Nonsense,” Grace
said. “You’re working on it. These things take time.”

“Julia almost ran
out of time last night.”
 

The waiter
approached and set out three wineglasses. He decanted a bottle and poured the
glasses, then silently retreated.

“I guess it’s
that time of day,” Maggie said sadly as she lifted the glass to her lips.

“I thought we
could use something a little stronger than coffee,” Danielle said. “Did Madame
Tatois threaten you?”

“No. She was just
gloating. Horrible woman.” She turned to Grace and then to Danielle. “It occurs
to me that
Annette
knew that Jacques
was trying to get back together with Julia. Remember how I said that was
something only a few people and the murderer knew?”

“So now you think
Annette
is the murderer?” Grace asked,
lifting her wineglass. It was a white wine, unusual for Provence, and she
wondered how in the world Danielle had ordered it without ever mouthing a
single word.

“I don’t know,”
Maggie said, biting her lip.
“But I’m
telling you she knows stuff only the forensic police lab or the killer knows.
And here I sit with nothing. Roger won’t even take my calls.”

“Have
you been calling him?”

“Well,
not lately,” Maggie said. Grace noticed she squirmed uncomfortably, but that
could just be the late stage pregnancy.
 
“But he’s my only contact on the case. Can you believe I heard about
Julia’s suicide attempt from her alleged victim’s ex-wife? Why couldn’t Roger
have let me know?”

“Maybe
because he’s too busy having your husband arrested and fining you for
jaywalking?” Grace relaxed into her chair and wondered where the fear had come
from a few moments ago when she thought it was her family in danger.
So much for believing she couldn’t feel
anything any more.

“I
know! Can you believe that? If the head cop in France has a personal beef with
someone he can just ignore her rights?” She looked indictingly at Danielle.
“And everyone just accepts that?”

Danielle sighed
heavily. “If you are asking is it only France where people abuse their power, I
would venture to guess no.”

“Okay, fine.
Whatever. But I can’t just sit here. The last time I talked to Julia she hung
up on me. She must be feeling so alone.”

“Have you talked
to her attorney?”

“I tried. He
won’t take my calls. Poor Julia. I still can’t believe this nightmare is
happening to her.”

“Your purse is
ringing, Maggie,” Danielle pointed out to her.

“It’s probably
Laurent,” Maggie said picking it up. “No, it’s another number I don’t
recognize. If it’s Annette again, I swear…Hello?”

Grace watched
Maggie frown in annoyance, so obviously it wasn’t Annette.

“What did you say
your name was?” Maggie listened for a moment and then made a face. “And how did
you get this number? I see. Have you been in touch with Julia? Did you hear
about her…accident?”’
  

 
Grace could see the impatience bristling
off Maggie. Her fingers drummed the table and Danielle surreptitiously pushed
her wineglass toward her.

“It’s a pre-trial
detention center, not a prison,” Maggie said. “Have you talked to her?” Maggie’s
fingers stopped drumming. She looked at Grace and her mouth fell open. She
spoke into the phone: “Are you shitting me?”

Grace exchanged a
puzzled look with Danielle.

“Do you know that
because she
said
you could have them,
or because you figure she’ll be in a French jail for the next fifty years so
you
might as well
have them?”

Danielle covered
her mouth as she listened.

“That’s right,”
Maggie said to her caller. “You
don’t
need to explain yourself to me, but you might want to try explaining the coat
hanger you have stuck up your ass. I think you totally suck, Miss Patrick, and
I can see why Julia never mentioned you. But don’t worry, I’ll see to it that
the antiques you’re talking about are carefully taken care of until Julia is
released. And in the unlikely event that she isn’t, I’ll make sure they take
center stage in the huge goddamn bonfire I intend to build in my back yard!
Hello? Hello?”

Maggie held the phone
away to confirm that her caller had, indeed, hung up. She looked at Danielle
and Grace, but before she could say a word Grace laughed and said, “Do not even
begin to tell us what that was about, darling. I feel sure we got the picture.”

At which point Danielle
joined her in the first good belly laugh she had had in over a year.

Chapter
Fifteen

That afternoon,
after dropping Danielle off at her home, Grace and Maggie came back to Domaine
St-Buvard for a quiet evening. Maggie could tell that Grace’s spirits were
vastly improved. As she reheated the quiche that Laurent had made earlier in
the day and compiled salads, she watched Grace play a simple game with Zou-zou
in the living room.
Children help
,
Maggie thought as she watched Grace’s face.
When
you’re forced to act happy for their sake, you end up feeling happy.

She glanced at
the kitchen wall clock and was surprised that it was as late as it was. Laurent
was off at his weekly meeting with the other vintners in the area to discuss
the processing of the recent grape harvest. Maggie knew that business had
probably concluded by this time and the men were likely all just drinking and
relaxing. She didn’t begrudge Laurent that. She smiled to think of him and
wondered if he ever really did relax? Partly due to his criminal past and
partly because of just who he was intrinsically, Laurent never seemed to let
his guard down. Or just the opposite: he did
seem
to let it down.

He just never did.

“I don’t know, Z.
Why don’t we ask Aunt Maggie?”

Maggie looked up
to see Grace standing in front of her with Zou-zou in her arms. Grace’s face
was flushed pink from her exuberant play with the toddler and the thought
occurred to Maggie that Grace would have no trouble attracting another husband.
Maggie always knew Grace was stunningly beautiful. Her classic good looks were
as much a part of Grace’s personality—and the reason for most things she
did—as anything else about her. But the agony of her recent depression
had obscured that fact for a bit. Now Maggie could see that when the time came and
Grace was fully back to being herself, when she was over all of this as much as
she ever would be, she would be as beautiful and magnetic as ever.

It was a shock to
realize that one could survive something so devastating as the loss of one’s
marriage and the happy cohesion of the family you created, and
outwardly—at least eventually—there would be few if any changes at
all. The light in Grace’s eyes when she looked at her daughter told Maggie
that.
Ha!
she thought.
Do not tell me children don’t help.

“Ask me what?”

“When dinner is
ready. It’s not for me, mind you, but Z is not used to going more than fifteen
minutes before
Oncle
Laurent pops
something tasty in her mouth.”

“Yeah, I know the
syndrome. It’s why
Tante
Maggie is a
full pants size larger than last year.”

“
One
pants size?”

“Now
why
is it I thought I missed you? Help
me remember.” Maggie smiled as she handed Grace Z’s plate. “Y’all go on in.
I’ll bring our plates.”

After an
exhausting meal of mopping up the child, the dining room table and the
floor—with help from the ever vigilant Petit-Four—Grace went
upstairs to give Zou-zou her bath and put her to bed. Maggie stacked the dishes
in the sink, intending to deal with them later and went to feed the dog, who,
not surprisingly, was too full from the baby’s dinner droppings to care.

With another
quick glance at the kitchen clock, Maggie sat on the living room couch, pulled
out her phone and punched in the number she had found on the Internet earlier
that day. With any luck, Laurent would be gone for another hour or more. As she
waited for the line to connect, she could hear Grace upstairs singing over the
sound of Zou-zou’s bathwater.

It’s all going to be fine
.
Grace is going to be
fine.

“Hello?” The
voice on the other end of the line was cool, clipped and American.

Maggie figured it
must be the wife. “Uh, yes, my name is Maggie Dernier.”
It’s always good to identify yourself right off the bat when calling
women whose husbands are known to be big fat cheats.
“I was hoping to speak
with a David Armstrong?”
Along those same
lines, it was also always good to try to make it appear as if you don’t know
the husband personally since wives who have been cheated on are typically a
little sensitive
about strange women calling
to talk to their husbands.

Clearly she
needn’t have worried. Without responding to her, the woman yelled away from her
phone, “David! It’s for you.” Maggie heard the phone being set down with a
clunk. She waited.

“Hello?” A
reluctant, almost sullen, but definitely American voice.

“David
Armstrong?”

“Who’s this?”

“My name is
Maggie Newberry. I am a friend of Julia Patrick, who is a suspect in the murder
of Jacques Tatois.”
Might as well just
come out with it.

“Okay.” He was
obviously waiting for more. He was curious. Maggie thought that was a good
sign. People who killed people in cold blood like Jacques was killed tend to
like to see the media releases on their handiwork. If this guy were the
murderer, he would be interested in seeing how much of the case Maggie had put
together.

“I’m calling you
because I had a conversation with Michelle Tatois, who is the victim’s
daughter.”

“I know who she
is.”

Maggie detected
that he had dropped his voice a level. The wife must still be nearby. “She said
you might be able to help me in reconstructing the events of Jacques’s last
hours.” Okay that was a stretch, but Maggie had hoped the conversation would
have taken on a life of its own by now instead of her being forced to drive
every inch of it. This David guy was cool and he was giving her nothing to sink
her teeth into.

“Why in the world
would she say that? I didn’t even know the guy.”

“That’s not what
Michelle says.” Maggie willed herself not to say more. She bit her lip to let
the statement do its magic without her talking it into meaninglessness.

It worked.

“Yeah, okay,” he
growled. Maggie could hear an agitation in his voice that made her think he was
walking with the phone—moving somewhere away from the ears of his nearby
wife. “I had a run-in with the bastard and I’m sure Michelle told you all about
that, too.”

Shit! So Michelle was telling the truth? What run-in?

“I’d love to hear
your side of it,” Maggie said, holding her breath.

“The only side
that matters is the one where that turd attacked my wife at last year’s company
Bastille Day picnic and then went about as if nothing had happened.”

Maggie’s mind
raced. Last Bastille Day Jacques and Julia had still been together.

“Michelle thinks
you decided to provide your own brand of American justice by killing her father.”
 

“She doesn’t
think that.”

“I assure you,
she does. She says she has proof.” That last part was a lie, but Maggie hoped
it might trigger a slip up, or even a confession. Crazier things had happened.

“Well, then she
planted it or made it up. Michelle’s pissed because we…” He dropped his voice
to a whisper. “We broke up last week. Shoulda done it a month ago but the sex
was decent and my wife is still shook up from what happened to her.”

Maggie felt her
skin crawl.
This low-life went looking for
sex outside his marriage because his sexually-assaulted wife wasn’t providing
it?

“What did happen
to her?” Maggie asked. “I was told the attack was unsuccessful.”
It was amazing the things people would tell
you if you just probed a little with stuff you were absolutely just making up
off the top of your head.

“Michelle didn’t
tell you? Never mind. She probably lied about that, too. Her father was drunk
and ran into my wife in the garden after the picnic was dying down.”

“Your wife was
alone?”

“Well, I was
there but she…we were having problems and she was upset…about something.
Anyway, that doesn’t matter. He caught her alone and took advantage of her.’

“He raped her?”

“He was in the
process of it when they were interrupted.”

“You’re sure it
was rape?”

“Now I
know
you were talking to Michelle. Yes,
it was
attempted rape
. My wife even
filed a complaint with the American consulate the next week.”

“Why so long?”

“I don’t know. I
guess all the crying and thoughts of suicide in the meantime took up too much
of her time to get around to it.”

Feeling like she
was starting to lose his cooperation, Maggie hurried to the question she really
needed to know. “Can I ask you if the police questioned you in Monsieur Tatois’s
death? Michelle said you talked freely in your office about wanting to quote
kill the bastard
. End quote.”
Which is really rich considering you’re a
cheating wad of pond scum,
Maggie thought as she waited for his answer.

“They only needed
to ask one question. And when I answered that they checked it out and haven’t
called back since.”

“Can I ask what
the question was?”

“You say you’re a
friend of Julia Patrick’s?”

“That’s right.”

“Let me just say
that if there was anyone Michelle hated more than Julia Patrick, it was her
father. She could talk for hours about how much she detested him. Why aren’t
the police looking at
her
as a
suspect?”

Maggie ignored the
question. “Any idea why she hated her father so much?”

“Oh, I don’t
know, I suppose the fact that he screwed her best friend in high school might
have been a major reason.”

Holy shit.

“
While
she and Michelle were both in high
school. But, personally? I think it was the relentless hate campaign waged by
Michelle’s mother against Jacques. Pretty hard to have a decent opinion of dear
old dad when your mother is telling you on a daily basis what a bastard he is.”

Maggie realized
he was talking about himself now. Between his infidelities and his wife’s
trauma, things were probably pretty shaky on the marital home front. She
wondered if he had kids.

“Can you tell me
what the question was the police asked you that made them drop you from their
list of suspects?”

“Because that’s
exactly where you’d like to place me, huh? Never mind. I’d probably be doing
the same thing if I had a pal in trouble. Sure, I’ll tell you, although I can’t
imagine it’ll help you. They asked me where I was during the time of the
murder. And I did them one better. My wife and I were back in the States for
the two weeks prior to and during the time Jacques was killed. It was pretty
easy to confirm. Anyway, sorry I couldn’t help you out.” His voice was light
and indicated he was not at all sorry.

“Well,” Maggie
said. “Thanks for talking to me.”

“Yeah, sure. Good
luck with your friend.”

Maggie
disconnected and sat on the couch for a moment staring into space.
The world was full of some seriously
screwed up and unhappy people
. She put a hand on her large belly and was
instantly rewarded with a solid kick from a little foot.

She turned to
watch Grace come down the stairs, a faint smile still on her face.

“Baby all tucked
in?” Maggie asked, scooting over on the couch to make room for Grace.

“Did you notice
at dinner how much she’s starting to talk?”

“I did.”

“I hate that Win
is missing it,” Grace said. “But I suppose that’s the future for both of us.”

“Grace…”

“Never mind,
darling. Distract me. I heard you on the phone. More people calling to piss you
off or was this constructive in some way?”

“I called David
Armstrong. He’s Michelle’s ex-lover and he was heard threatening to kill
Jacques last year.”

“My goodness,
that’s helpful.”

“Not so much. He
has an alibi for the critical time.”

“Well, pooh. Do
you want to bounce a theory or two off me? I know I haven’t been very helpful
in other ways but I’m happy to listen.”

Maggie tucked her
feet up under her and then groaned and pulled them back out. “It’s impossible
to get comfortable,” she said.

“I remember this
stage very well. It’ll be over before you know it. No, I take that back. It
seems like it will never end.” She leaned over and squeezed Maggie’s hand. “But
of course it does. No woman ever carried a child to her sixtieth birthday. This
time next month, you will have joined the ranks of mamas everywhere.”

“Grace, do you
worry about Windsor badmouthing you to the girls?”

Grace frowned and
Maggie watched her seem to physically retreat at the question.

“Of course not.
You know Win. He’s as honorable as they come.”

“I only mention
it because the guy I was just talking to said that one of the reasons Michelle
hates her father is because Annette made it a full-time job to blacken his name
every chance she got.”