Read It and Weep (A Library Lover's Mystery) Page 12

  Lindsey glanced around the dimly lit hallway, hoping someone, anyone, would show up. The place was as abandoned as a graveyard.

  “It’ll be okay, really,” she said. “It just takes time.”

  “You don’t understand. No one cared about me like Robbie did,” Lola sniffed. “He looked after me. Now I have no one.”

  Lindsey looked at the woman next to her. She was a dark-haired beauty who had the helpless and vulnerable thing down pat. Is that what Robbie had seen in her?

  “Oh, please,” a voice said from the end of the hall. “Robbie’s dead. There’s no one to come to your rescue. Surely you can cease the waterworks now.”

  Lola wailed louder, and Kitty strode toward them in knee-high black leather boots, a miniskirt and a sweater that dipped low in the front and hugged her figure tight.

  “You wouldn’t understand,” Lola sobbed. “What Robbie and I had was real; you were just his business partner.”

  “That’s right,” Kitty said. “I managed his career. I made all of our lives better because of my fabulous business sense, but without Robbie, my business no longer exists. So, if anyone should be crying, it would be me—which is exactly what I told the police and why they let me go.”

  Lindsey gave her a surprised look, and Kitty glared at her.

  “What?” she asked. “Did you think I busted out of jail?”

  “No, but being the spouse . . .” Lindsey’s voice trailed off.

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m the chief suspect,” Kitty said. “I got that. Fortunately, even the pea-brained police in this podunk town can see that as Robbie’s manager, it really made no sense for me to kill him. Sort of like cutting off my right arm. Stupid.”

  “That doesn’t mean you didn’t do it,” Lola said. “It could have been a crime of passion. You just couldn’t bear that he loves me now.”

  “Ha!” Kitty let out a mirthless laugh. “In case you didn’t notice, dearie, Robbie was already looking to replace you. Or did the fact that he dumped your lame ass escape you?”

  “He didn’t dump me!” Lola wailed. “He just wanted to take a break. Lots of couples do that.”

  “You’re pathetic,” Kitty sneered. “If Robbie wanted a break, it means he was done with you. In fact, I do believe it was our lovely librarian here who caught his eye.”

  “No, I—” Lindsey protested but Lola’s crying drowned out her words.

  “He would have gotten sick of her,” Lola said. She sniffed and wiped her nose on her sleeve. “She’s not a theater person. Robbie never liked anyone outside of the theater. He said they didn’t understand our world. She was just a plaything to him.”

  “Plaything?” Lindsey asked. Now she was getting irritated.

  “Now you’ve done it,” Kitty said. “You’ve made the book nerd mad.”

  “I’m not mad,” Lindsey said.

  “Then why is your face red?” Kitty asked.

  “It’s hot in here,” Lindsey said.

  “And getting hotter,” Kitty taunted her. “So, were you interested in Robbie? Did you fancy yourself as his next girlfriend?”

  “No!” Lindsey protested. “He was charming, but I had no intention of dating him.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Lola said. She had stopped crying and was eyeing Lindsey like she’d like to do her some harm. “Everyone loved Robbie. Women were always throwing themselves at him, even when he was with me.”

  “Same here,” Kitty said. “Even when our marriage was happy, which, all told, was about six months long, women would chase him down the street, show up naked at our front door, send him expensive presents.”

  “Remember that one woman who tried to kidnap him?” Lola asked.

  “That was on your watch,” Kitty said.

  “I know, but who expected a team of men to shimmy down from a hovering helicopter and scoop him up from the breakfast table?” Lola asked. “I really wasn’t prepared for that.”

  “What happened?” Lindsey asked in awe.

  “Some rich woman decided that Robbie was going to be her shiny new toy,” she said. “He had to make a run for it.”

  “But he got away?” Lindsey asked.

  “Oh yeah,” Kitty said. “He just had to go hide out for a while. You wouldn’t believe some of the crazy things women do to get noticed.” She paused and looked at Lindsey. “Maybe that’s why he took a shine to you. You’re not like that.”

  “Thanks, I think,” Lindsey said. The three of them were silent for a moment. Lindsey was trying to wrap her head around the stories Lola and Kitty told her and the strange relationship they seemed to share.

  “What are you two going to do now?” Lindsey asked.

  “Well, the police have told us we can’t leave town until they’re done with the investigation,” Kitty said. “So, we will perform in the play just like we would have, and I will handle the business end of things just like I did before Robbie—”

  For the first time, Kitty showed a flash of vulnerability, but she scrunched up her face and took a deep, fortifying breath.

  “Come on, sad sack, we need to rehearse,” she said. She took Lola by the arm and hauled her up the stairs toward the stage.

  Lindsey watched them go. Could Kitty have killed Robbie in a jealous fit? It seemed unlikely, but maybe she had a financial motive. What about Lola? She was obviously still in love with Robbie; if he had tried to break it off with her, she might have killed him out of spite.

  Then again, all of the incidents with Robbie had happened at the theater. If it had been Kitty or Lola, wouldn’t she have killed him where she had easy access to him, like in the house they were all renting? Unless, of course, killing him at the theater gave them an alibi of sorts.

  And what about the crazy female fans they talked about? If a woman was crazy enough to try to kidnap a man, certainly she might turn into a killer if she didn’t get what she wanted.

  Lindsey made her way back to the costume room, more confused than ever. If she looked at who had the most to gain by Robbie being dead, then, if what Kitty said was true, it wasn’t her. Lola didn’t seem to have enough oomph in her to commit a murder, but then again, how much oomph did you need to poison someone?

  Lindsey felt as if the more she learned, the less she was certain of and there was only one thing she could do about it: research. It was time for the skeletons to come out of Robbie’s closet once and for all.

  16

  I love this database, Lindsey thought as she sat at her desk looking at the unending list of articles that had been brought up using the magazine and newspaper search option in the library’s online catalog. Now she just needed to narrow her parameters to weed out the fluff pieces.

  More than twenty thousand articles had been written about Robbie Vine. This sure beat using a lame Internet search engine and getting random web pages, or even worse, some unverifiable bits of information cobbled together by a collection of self-proclaimed “experts.”

  If she sorted out all of the articles that were reviews of his shows and movies, that should trim it down. She revised her search. Wow. Still a lot of articles, but if she was looking to know about Robbie’s past, she was betting she wanted the interviews from when he was a breakout star and had been less cautious with his words.

  A knock sounded on her door, and she called, “Come in.”

  Emma Plewicki walked in, and Lindsey suddenly felt like the kid caught reading a comic book in history class. She leaned forward, covering her monitor.

  “Hi, Emma, how’s it going?” she asked.

  “Why do you look weird?”

  “Weird? What do you mean?”

  Emma narrowed her eyes. “Chief Daniels warned me about you. Are you being a buttinsky?”

  Lindsey sat back in outrage. “Did he call me that? Because that’s just rude.”

  “Is that an article searc
h on Robbie Vine?” Emma asked. She leaned around Lindsey to see her computer. “He was right; you are a buttinsky.”

  “I’m not—okay, I am,” Lindsey said. She dropped her head into her hands and then peeked at Emma through her fingers. “I can’t help myself. Seeking information is an occupational hazard.”

  “Or interfering with police work,” Emma said. “Depending upon your point of view.”

  Lindsey raised her right hand. “I swear I’ve done no interfering of any kind.”

  Emma took the seat across from her desk and said, “Are you quite certain?”

  “Yes, it’s just . . . well, I can’t help wondering who could have had such a grudge against Robbie that they would kill him,” Lindsey said. “Yes, he was arrogant and a narcissist, but from what I could tell from Kitty and Lola, they both still cared for him.”

  “I thought you said you weren’t interfering.” Emma sat up straight and glared at Lindsey. “What were you doing talking to Lola and Kitty?”

  “I just ran into them in the theater,” Lindsey said. “And by that, I do mean literally ran into them. I came around a corner and Lola was standing there crying, then Kitty came up and they both started talking about Robbie.”

  Emma raised one eyebrow and stared at Lindsey. “And now you’re looking up articles about him?”

  “Well, it doesn’t seem like either of them had a reason to kill him if you take the whole crime of passion equation out, and a poisoning does seem a bit too plotted to be a crime of passion. But then there are the two incidents with him getting hit by a piece of set and then stabbed in the dark.”

  “Either of those two could have been a crime of passion, but I agree, it seems unlikely,” Emma said. “Statistically speaking, in a crime of passion the weapon is usually something that was at hand, which is why you get the blunt-object trauma so often in those scenarios.”

  “Really? I had no idea,” Lindsey said. “I would have guessed a gun or a knife.”

  “No, that would indicate premeditation,” Emma said. “Which would not be a crime of passion.”

  “Huh,” Lindsey said. “Is it wrong that I find this fascinating and horrifying at the same time?”

  “I wouldn’t say wrong, necessarily,” Emma said. “Human beings and what they are capable of doing to one another is intriguing and repellant.”

  “So, you’re pretty clear that it wasn’t a jilted lover who did Robbie in?” Lindsey asked.

  “Yes; in fact, it’s why I came to see you,” Emma said.

  “Me?”

  “Everyone says Robbie was showing an interest in you,” Emma said. “Did he say anything about anyone to you, anyone who was giving him grief or causing him concern or anything like that?”

  “No, he didn’t mention anyone specifically,” Lindsey said. “I did overhear him in an argument with Brian Loeb.”

  Emma raised her eyebrows but was silent, letting Lindsey continue.

  “Brian accused Robbie of having an affair with his wife, Brandy,” Lindsey said. “Robbie denied it, but Brian didn’t seem to believe him.”

  “Did Brian threaten him?” Emma asked.

  Lindsey thought back to the argument. It had been a nasty one. “Yes,” she said. “He did threaten him. First he said he was going to squash him like a bug. Robbie laughed him off and then—”

  “Then?” Emma prompted her.

  “Brian said that he was going to kill Robbie when he caught him with Brandy,” she said.

  Emma pursed her lips. “As far as you know, did Brian ever catch Robbie with Brandy?”

  “No, not that I know of,” she said.

  “Can you think of anyone else who might have wanted to harm Robbie?”

  “Other than Harvey Wargus, the critic, no,” Lindsey said.

  “I’ve already had him in for questioning,” Emma said. “He’s a squirmy little fellow.”

  “Right,” Lindsey agreed. “And I don’t like him. Did Violet talk to you at all about her ex?”

  Lindsey felt as if she were betraying her friend by mentioning him, but how could she not when he could very well be the reason that Robbie was dead?

  “Yes, both she and Charlene mentioned that Sterling Buchanan could be vindictive when he doesn’t get what he wants.”

  “Robbie was like family to them,” Lindsey said. “Do you think Buchanan would have been angry enough to have him harmed in order to hurt them?”

  “I don’t know,” Charlene said. “But I have made inquiries in that direction. The man has so much money that he’s made himself quite untouchable. Good thing I’m not easily deterred.”

  Lindsey smiled. No, she didn’t imagine that Emma would be easily put off.

  “If you think of anything else, let me know,” Emma said as she rose to leave. “Oh, and if you find anything of interest in those articles about Robbie—”

  “I’ll be sure to let you know,” Lindsey promised.

  “Thanks,” Emma said, and Lindsey was pretty sure that it was non-ironic.

  She spent her lunch hour eating a tuna fish sandwich at her desk while reading the articles. The later ones all read pretty much the same about a boy born in Manchester being raised by a single mom who got a scholarship to the Italia Conti Academy of Theater Arts in London. The articles glossed over his rebellious youth, his troubles with the law and a stint in jail. The earlier articles had more meat and more bite, since Robbie was not yet a huge star with PR handlers who could cushion and bend his interviews to their will.

  It was an article in the Times that caught Lindsey’s attention. Robbie had just starred in Noël Coward’s Design for Living at the Gielgud Theatre on Shaftesbury Avenue to rave reviews. The reporter joined Robbie for breakfast and found him quite distraught. He had just been informed that he was to be a father. He was not happy about the news. He told the reporter that he and the mother, an American soap opera actress, had just had a fling, one that hadn’t been good enough that he’d want a reminder of it for the rest of his life.

  Lindsey cringed. He was young in the article, true, but he came off as harsh, selfish and frankly nasty. He did not sound like the charming man she had come to know. She wondered if the PR firms took over his press shortly after this mess.

  She scanned the next two years’ worth of articles. There was no mention of a wife until he’d married Kitty ten years ago. Kitty was American, but Lindsey doubted she was the mother of Robbie’s unnamed child; as far as she knew, they had had no children.

  Lindsey wondered what had happened to the mother and child. She checked the date of the article and she figured the baby would be somewhere in its late teens now. She scanned the next few years of articles. The pieces were much less invasive. It was easy to see that Robbie had control of his interviews now, and he gave away nothing that he didn’t want known.

  The actress was out of the business. She had married a tycoon and moved to Austria. There was nothing current about her, but Lindsey looked up the story line to the soap opera and her character had been pregnant at the same time she would have been. Had they written it into the show just for her? It seemed likely.

  Violet had known Robbie since before his debut on Shaftesbury Avenue in London when she had been a guest teacher at his acting school. Lindsey wondered if they’d been close back then and if so, did Violet know he’d fathered a child?

  She hated to disturb her when she was under so much stress, but there was only one way to find out if Robbie’s child or its mother had ever resurfaced in Robbie’s life and that was to ask Violet. She had a feeling Charlene would know, too.

  She knew from Beth that Charlene had taken a few days off from the television station to deal with what had happened. She and her three kids were at their cabin on Wishbone Island, one of the smaller Thumb Islands out in the bay. Lindsey suspected that Charlene was trying to protect her kids from the media scrutiny surroun
ding Robbie’s death.

  • • •

  In fact, before Lindsey had come into work, she had baked a batch of pumpkin squares that she had hoped to bring to Charlene and her family. She had been wondering how Charlene had been handling Robbie’s death. This would give her a good reason to pop in and see her friend. Lindsey was off the clock at six, and left the library in the very capable hands of her library assistant, Jessica Gallo. Beth and Ms. Cole both headed straight to the theater while Lindsey stopped by the house and retrieved Heathcliff for a walk. Charlie was home and Lindsey rapped on his door on her way out.

  “Door’s open,” Charlie called.

  “Charlie, I need to run an errand,” Lindsey said as she entered the apartment into his living room.

  He was sprawled on his neon orange velvet couch reading Mad magazine. Heathcliff did not hesitate but launched himself on top of Charlie and began to lick his face.

  “Okay, okay.” Charlie laughed. “I’m petting you. See? Lots of pets. Ugh, why does he always lick me on the mouth?”

  Lindsey laughed.

  “Sorry about that,” she said. “He has boundary issues.”

  “As in, he doesn’t have any?” Charlie asked with a grin. He rubbed Heathcliff’s head and said, “Love me less, little dude.”

  “About my errand . . .”

  “Did you want to use my van?”

  “Uh . . . no,” Lindsey said with a shudder.

  She had borrowed his van once and it had taken her three washings to get the man stink out of her clothes. Charlie’s decrepit van was used primarily to schlep his band to all of its gigs, and the smell of stage sweat and stale beer permeated its shag interior.

  “But thanks for the offer,” she said. “This errand is actually a run to Charlene’s cabin on Wishbone Island.”

  Charlie glanced up at her from the magazine still in his free hand and said, “Oh, so you need a boat?”

  17

  “Yep.” Lindsey nodded. She clutched the Tupperware tub full of pumpkin squares to her chest and tried to look the part of the concerned friend.