The Complete Maggie Newberry Provençal Mysteries 1-4 Read online

  "Again?" He snapped his own daily paper against his thigh. "What's the deal here? She's always sick. What's the point of having a receptionist if she's never here to receive? Oh, never mind." He turned on his heel and stomped into the recesses of the office, presumably to wind his way down the corridor to the kitchen where Dierdre had a pot of coffee perking away.

  She looked back down at the newspaper article. "An unidentified young woman at the Claymore Apartments was awakened in the middle of the night by an intruder who told her to put a pillowcase over her head...”

  "Hey, Dierds, is Gerry in yet?"

  Maggie leaned over the receptionist's desk to sign the agency attendance sheet.

  Dierdre nodded, "Uh huh, just got here, he--"

  "Where's Jenny? Man, that girl is hopeless. What is it this time?"

  "I don't know. Just sick."

  "Gerry is in, did you say?" Maggie hurried down the corridor not waiting for a reply.

  Dierdre sighed and straightened the paper back out. "...after which she was sexually assaulted by the man, said to be in his early thirties. Detective Lieutenant John Burton revealed to the press that the woman was made to..."

  The phone rang and Dierdre gave another sigh, pushed the paper away and picked up the receiver before it could ring twice.

  "Selby & Parkers, good morning," she said, wondering if this day was going to be as long as it felt.

  "Have I got news for you."

  "I hate it when people tell me that. Don't tell me that."

  Maggie pulled a chair up to Gerry's desk, and settled her briefcase on the floor.

  "Guess what."

  "I don't like guessing. Just tell me."

  "Elise is back."

  "What are you talking about? Your sister? What do you mean 'back'?"

  "I mean, she's here. In my apartment. Gerry, she came back!"

  "Maggie, that's wonderful!" Gerry stood up and squeezed her by the arms. "But how? How is she--"

  "It's a long story. She was trying to protect my parents by dropping out, I guess because some of the things she was involved in at the time. She thought it was for the best. Can you believe it?"

  Gerry shook his head slowly.

  "Sort of unusual, isn't it?" he asked.

  "She had her reasons. But now she's back and she wants to get back with the family and raise Nicole, and you know...integrate."

  Maggie looked so happy, so beamingly, foolishly happy that Gerry could only sit and smile woodenly at her.

  "Man, that's great, Maggie. Your parents must've flipped."

  "I haven't told them yet."

  "You haven't?"

  "Gerry, she looks like hell right now. She looks like a junkie, okay?"

  "Sure, Maggie. It's just that, I don't know, your parents thinking she's still vanished off the face of the earth when she's sitting in your apartment drinking Perrier and making tuna salad sandwiches...it just feels wrong to me."

  "It's just till the weekend. I'll call 'em on Friday and tell them the news and then Elise and I'll both go over on Saturday. If I were to call them now, they'd be over at my place and, I don't know, Elise can be sort of funny. I want things to go as well as they possibly can."

  "Look, I'm sure you know what you're doing. That's great news that she's back. Just terrific. How is she at answering phones? We need a new receptionist." Gerry began shuffling through the papers on his desk.

  "Gerry, will you stop thinking of yourself for just five minutes? I'm not finished here. I also met the famous Gerard last night."

  "You're kidding."

  "That's how I got Elise. Gerard called and demanded five thousand dollars or else he'd cause trouble with Nicole--"

  "He called to blackmail you?" Gerry was incredulous.

  "Well, I guess he did blackmail me, because I got a hold of my Dad and he scraped up the money--"

  "You paid some scum-ball blackmail money?"

  "Gerry, he was going to cause a stink about Nicole. I brought her into the country illegally, you know."

  "You did?" Gerry stared at Maggie as if seeing her for the first time.

  "I told you all this!"

  "You most certainly did not."

  "Well, that confirms that you don't listen to me. Do you want to hear about Gerard, or not?"

  "Speak."

  "So, I handed over the money to him--"

  "When?"

  "Last night, Gerry. All this happened last night."

  "Late last night?"

  "Latish, I guess, around midnight in the parking lot at Lenox Square."

  "I cannot believe you were running around last night...I won't even let Darla take the garbage out because of all the crime in this town and we live twenty miles away in Marietta!" He tossed a newspaper in her lap. “Read any headline! Read the funny pages! Nothing but murder and rape.”

  Maggie scanned the headline.

  "You make Darla take out the garbage?"

  The media director, Patti Stump, stuck her head in Gerry's office doorway and smiled at him.

  "Are we meeting on Hi-Jinks, Gerry? I've got some time this morning."

  Gerry ran a hand through his hair in exasperation.

  "Oh, God, I don't know. I don't really want to."

  "But we need to."

  "I know, I know. Okay, five minutes in the conference room. Maggie, you need to be a part of this too. That is, if you're not busy committing any felonies between now and then."

  "What is your problem, Gerry?"

  "My problem, Maggie, my problem is..." He looked at Patti, still hovering in the doorway and smiled easily at her. "Why don't you go on ahead, Patti, and we'll be right there." She shrugged and left. "My problem is that I worry about you and you don't have the sense God gave lettuce."

  "Thank you for that vote of--"

  "And quit pissing around. Here I am worried sick about Darla and I have to worry about you too because you haven't got brains enough to stay inside behind locked doors when the city's crawling with maniacs and psychos. I swear, I feel like the whole world is squatting right on my shoulders, you know?"

  "Gerry, I'm sorry--"

  "Don't be sorry. Be smarter. Please. I worry about everything, you know? I mean, give me a break, Maggie. I would greatly appreciate it."

  "Okay, okay." She stood up to leave. "Gerry, it's not all that important you know." She waved her hand to take in the office. "I mean, it's not worth having a stroke over."

  "Five minutes. The conference room. And...I am glad your sister's back."

  She sighed, picked up her briefcase and walked to his doorway. She turned to look at him but he wouldn't meet her eyes. She thought about calling Darla later. Maybe Darla could give her a better idea of what was going on with him.

  She turned and walked down the corridor to her office and, pushing the door open with her hip, was startled to find Patti sitting at her desk.

  "Hello, this is a surprise." Maggie forced a smile. She wanted to oust the woman from her swivel chair and spend her five-minute grace period getting a mug of coffee. That didn't seem likely now.

  "Hey, Maggie, I wondered if you have a minute."

  "The same as you," Maggie dumped her briefcase on the desk. "Five of them."

  "Oh, yeah, right. Well, I wondered if you might have some time to talk with me about a...situation I've got. Maybe you could give me some advice on how to handle it."

  "Really?" Maggie thought the whole morning was beginning to feel very surreal. "Well, sure, what can I do for you, Patti?" She perched on the edge of her desk, hoping it was hint enough to the media director to relinquish Maggie's chair but not feeling aggressive enough to come right out and ask her to move.

  "It's a guy." Patti blushed mildly and smiled.

  Maggie was surprised. It hadn't occurred to her that Dr. Stump might have another a softer, less snide side to her.

  "He's very special and I'm hoping he will become a more permanent fixture in my life."

  Maggie should have guessed Stump wouldn't h
ave a normal affair of the heart. It already sounded less like a love affair and more like she was shopping for a towel rack.

  "That's great, Patti. What seems to be the problem?"

  "How do I get him out of neutral gear? I mean, he seems content to keep things as they are. That is unacceptable to me." She shrugged and smiled again. "I want more from him."

  "Hmmmm." Maggie shifted uncomfortably on the desk edge. "That's hard, Patti. I'm not sure you can force someone's hand, so to speak. How long have you known this guy?"

  "About six months. We've gotten pretty close."

  "Do you, like, want to marry him? Is that what we're talking about here?"

  "Marriage would be agreeable," Patti said, smiling almost shyly. "Very agreeable."

  "Well, in that case, I'd just tell him what you want." Maggie hopped down from the desk corner and began to pick out the materials she would need for the meeting. "I mean, you have rights in this relationship too. Just say: 'I'm hoping this leads to marriage. That's what I'm looking for with you.' And then see how he reacts."

  Patti stood up slowly.

  "Right, well, thanks, Maggie," she said coldly.

  "I mean, does that help?" Why did the woman always make her feel so tense?

  "What do you think, Maggie? A man who is acting reluctant to forward a stagnant relationship? I'm to torch the whole project by pushing him to the point where he has no alternative but to reject me? What sort of help do you think that qualifies as?"

  Maggie reddened and gathered up her notebook and schedules. Why did the cow ask her in the first place?

  "Well, look, I'm sorry you don't like my advice. But that's what I'd do," she said defensively.

  "Sure you would, Maggie." The smile had returned to Patti's lips but it was not a nice one.

  2

  "I cannot believe you went out last night!"

  Maggie pushed her half-eaten lunch away from her on her desk.

  "I've already been through this, Brownie," she said.

  "Not with me, you haven't! I could throttle you, Maggie. Do you have any idea--"

  "Well, what about you!? Some help you'd have been if I had gotten mugged. I called you at eleven-thirty last night and you weren’t even home yet. On a Tuesday evening!”

  "I didn’t go home last night."

  "Oh, really? All night?"

  "Goddamn it, Maggie--"

  "Oh, well, I'm sure it's none of my business."

  "Maggie, I’d like to strangle you! Will you just tell me what the hell happened last night?"

  "Well, if you'd calm down for a minute, I'd tell you."

  "There was a murder committed yesterday! In your neighborhood. Are you totally insane? Should I talk to your father about the wisdom of letting you have responsibility for yourself? Are you not old enough to have your own apartment?"

  "I'm hanging up now."

  "No, don't! Just...look, just tell me what happened, okay?"

  "If you'll shut up for five minutes, I will."

  "I'll shut up. Talk."

  "Okay. Gerard Dubois called last night around ten o'clock--"

  "Oh my God..."

  "...and said I had to come up with five thousand dollars immediately or he'd make trouble about Nicole. I couldn't have him going to the police, Brownie!"

  "Are you crazy? He's probably a convicted felon back in France! He'd no sooner go to the police over here than--"

  "Well, then he might call up my mother or something! He could harass us, Brownie. Do you want to hear my story or not?"

  "Go on."

  "So I got the money from my Dad."

  "Did you tell your fath--"

  "No, no, no, but I think he figured it out what I wanted the money for."

  "Jesus! And he didn't stop you?"

  "Well, maybe he's just not as good a father as you'd be, Brownie."

  "All right, all right, I'm sorry, go on."

  "So I met Gerard at the parking lot over at Lenox Square...and don't tell me the woman was murdered right across the road because I already read all about it, now what's done is done. I gave him the money and he gave me Elise. That's all."

  "I see. How does Elise look?"

  "She looks fine, thanks for asking."

  "Maggie, don't be a pain in the ass. Forgive me for caring about you. I'd like to come over tonight, or will y'all be at Brymsley?"

  "No, we're not going over until the weekend." Maggie paused for a moment. "But you can come over tonight if you want." What was there about competition that made a man seem just that much more interesting?

  "I'll be there at eight."

  "Make it nine, could you? I'm clothes-shopping for Elise after work. And we'll have already eaten."

  "Fine. Nine, then."

  "Sorry about the squabble."

  "Yeah, me too. Bye."

  Maggie hung up the phone and stared at it. Something, besides the obvious, did not feel right about that phone conversation and she wasn't sure exactly what.

  A full-color marker-comp of the ad she'd written yesterday lay on her desk where the art director, Pokey, had dropped it earlier. It was for a client who owned a plant nursery. Maggie noticed she must have dripped coffee on the edge of the presentation board. The marker colors blurred in a muddy version of the originals, displaying dark fronds of blue and aqua instead of green, pink terra-cotta pots and yellow blossoms. The colors mingled pleasantly, companionably, quite inoffensively, it seemed to Maggie, and she found herself wondering if the art director would even notice the change. Knowing the volatile Pokey, he would notice to the tune of a very dramatic coronary, probably in a reception room full of waiting clients.

  Maggie stood up and stretched, working the knots out of her neck by rolling it from side to side and letting it flop--chin down onto her chest--as she'd done hundreds of times before during the cool-down segment of her gym workouts. She had been trying to get Elspeth to try aerobics for the benefits of stress relief.

  She talked with her mother earlier that morning for a report on Nicole’s first time at a local Mother's Morning Out program. According to Elspeth, it had not gone badly nor well. Nicole, true to form, sat on the sidelines neither observing nor pretending not to observe. Elspeth had stayed the whole morning, which Maggie thought rather defeated the purpose of a Mother's morning out, and had taken the child home just before lunch. ("I think she made real progress, dear.")

  It was all Maggie could do not to tell her mother that Nicole's mother would soon be there to help put things right. But she had promised Elise she would wait. She had, however, begun to wonder if perhaps Gerry weren't right. It could be an awful shock, just springing Elise on them out of the blue. Perhaps she would talk to Elise tonight about a phone conversation with them first. If Elise would just talk to them on the phone, then they needn't see her in her present condition until she was ready.

  Satisfied with this plan, Maggie put a call into Elise. She waited for ten rings before hanging up. She had talked with her about two hours ago and knew that Elise was spending most of the day sleeping. That's fine, she thought, looking at her watch. It was two thirty. She would talk with her this evening. And in the meantime, as much rest as possible was the best remedy for Elise. She imagined her mother's face animated by rapture at reclaiming her daughter. She saw her father, with tears of unrestrained joy as he embraced his youngest girl. Maggie felt a thrill run through her. How many times in one's life could you actually anticipate the happiest of all moments to be lived? For, surely, that is what Saturday will be for her unsuspecting mother and father, Maggie thought.

  The letter had come to her office. Tissue-thin, nothing more than a wafer of paper. Addressed to her.

  From Laurent.

  Maggie maneuvered her Mitsubishi out of the Lenox Square parking lot, deliberately avoiding the side of the mall where she'd met with Gerard the night before. She inserted a "Traveling Wilbury's" cassette tape in her tape player and turned the volume down low.

  Dierdre had brought in the mail that aft
ernoon, grumpily dumped two industry magazines, a flutter of portfolio postcards, and a computer software catalog onto her desk, before pulling out the aqua-blue air mail envelope and placing it squarely in front of Maggie. "It's come. Merry Christmas

  Just a few crippled words, which Maggie had memorized. My God! It had been nearly five months! No explanation as to why he hadn't written earlier, no comment as to the fact that so much time had passed between them, just

  "Maggie,

  I miss you very much and think of you now. I think, too, that I will see you in a little time. Very soon, ma cherie. Remember Laurent loves you.

  Laurent Dernier"

  As Maggie drove down Peachtree Street toward her apartment, she leaned over her Macy's department store purchases to reach for the letter again. "I think, too, that I will see you in a little time." Did that mean he was coming to Atlanta soon? The unfortunate English was just choppy enough and she was just insecure enough on the status of things between them, that she wasn't at all confident that he was promising to see her soon. Perhaps he was going to suggest she come back to Cannes? She tucked the letter into her handbag in the passenger seat. Why does he say 'and think of you now'? Is that just bad English, or is he some place special that's now made him think of being with her? Has he returned to Cannes, perhaps, after a long trip and now he's reminded of her? She rubbed her eyes tiredly.

  It didn't matter. He'd written her. Finally. She might not be a French Fling after all.

  She parked the car in the back parking area of her apartment building and looked up at the darkened structure. Smack in the middle of fashionable, trendy Buckhead, The Parthenon was a throw-back to another era. It was one of the main reasons Maggie loved it so much. A huge, looming edifice, it looked more like a haunted castle or even a mausoleum than a honeycomb of modern apartment units. It was made of rugged, gloomy stonework instead of the burnished woods and pastel stuccos that typified the architecture of the neighborhood. Somber and out of step with its surroundings, it had been an area landmark for over eighty years. The Parthenon was that curious mix of something so wrong for its eco-climate and cultural setting that it was perversely viewed as a resounding success. It was "cool" to live at The Parthenon. It was the acceptably weird thing to do. Maggie had felt a small sliver of pride in thinking that Elise would be impressed that she, Maggie, hadn't picked the typical digs, the eclectic, color-coordinated tastefulness of an upscale apartment complex, but had gone for something so artsy and off-beat. It hadn't occurred to her that maybe Elise was too sick to care where Maggie had chosen to live.