A Stranger on the Beach(84)

“Fine. But it’s still not my gun.”

“Who planted it, then?”

“I said. Mike.”

“And I said, we can’t use Mike. Other than Mike. Who else can we point the finger at?”

“Nobody.”

“I’ll tell you who. Caroline Stark.”

“Why would she plant a gun in my truck?”

“For obvious reasons. She killed her husband and framed you for the murder.”

“Caroline wouldn’t do that to me.”

“Oh, but she’d do it to him?”

“Maybe.”

“You think she’d kill her husband, but she wouldn’t frame you? What a sap you are, Aidan. People will go pretty far to get away with murder. My gut says this lady is no exception.”

“Even if I agreed to use it, we could never prove that.”

“I’m the lawyer here. Leave that up to me. I think there’s a chance we can prove it. After our meeting the other night, I looked into the state of her marriage. There’s a ton of evidence to show they were at each other’s throats. Everybody at that party saw him show up with his mistress. They saw a big argument between the two of them. My investigator has a source at the county clerk’s office who found out that Caroline actually filed a divorce complaint. She withdrew it, but we were still able to get a copy. It says he took all the money. Did you know that?”

“I did know that. That’s why she asked me to kill him.”

“Jason leaves Caroline for his mistress and takes all the money. She murders him and frames some poor schlub for the crime. You being the schlub in question. That’s good. This is turning into a decent defense case. I’m actually starting to believe it.”

“But—”

She pointed a manicured nail at him. “Don’t tell me that you won’t talk bad about your girlfriend. This is our best shot. We’re using it, or else I really will think about dropping you.”





51


Jess and Mike put aside their disagreements long enough to join forces to search for Caroline Stark. Jess believed Caroline with all her heart. She wanted to bring her star witness in from the cold and offer her protection. She also needed to reassure the prosecutor that Caroline could be relied upon to testify. Mike had a different agenda. He wanted to find Caroline so he could question her more aggressively about the night of the murder. He thought he could uncover discrepancies that would implicate her in the crime. Jess didn’t like that idea, but she wasn’t going to argue about it now. The important thing was to find Caroline, and quickly. For that, she needed Mike’s help.

Jess delegated the technical side of the search to Mike. He’d serve subpoenas on the wireless companies to ping Caroline’s cell phone regularly and monitor her sister’s and daughter’s phones. If Caroline used her phone, or if Hannah or Lynn communicated with her at a different number, they’d be able to track her down. Meanwhile, Jess would search for Caroline in the real world, starting with her sister’s house.

It was getting dark as Jess pulled up to Lynn and Joe Lombardo’s house on a quiet street in Massapequa. Jess remembered Caroline saying that Lynn had inherited their childhood home. The house was modest, with an older BMW sedan and a newish Ford pickup in the driveway. Lynn’s husband supposedly owned a trucking business, and it looked like they did okay for themselves. But nothing lavish, and not anywhere close to the lifestyle that Caroline and Jason had enjoyed. Apparently, Caroline didn’t believe in sharing the wealth.

The doorbell echoed inside the house and set a dog to barking. Lynn came to the door eventually, opening it a crack, keeping the chain on. Jess flashed her badge.

“Mrs. Lombardo, I’m Lieutenant Jessica Messina with the New York State Police. We spoke on the phone yesterday. I’m investigating the murder charge against Aidan Callahan. Can I come in and—”

“Hold on. I can’t hear you with the dog,” Lynn said, and shut the door.

The dog, which sounded big and mean, was barking wildly. Jess heard Lynn yelling for Joe to come take it away. She pressed her ear against the door. The barking stopped suddenly, and she heard Joe Lombardo ask his wife who was at the door.

“You better not talk to any cops,” he said.

Jess heard that quite clearly, as well as Lynn’s reply—

“What am I, stupid?”

Huh.

A second later, the door opened wide, and Lynn stood there with a smile on her face.

“Sorry about that, Officer. You were saying?”

The smell of spaghetti sauce wafted from the depths of the house. It was dinnertime already, and Jess hadn’t eaten since breakfast. She wished this encounter would go smoothly, that she could find her witness with a minimum of fuss, that the case would fall into place and she could eat a good dinner and get a decent night’s sleep. But that wasn’t going to happen; she could see it just by looking at Caroline’s sister. Lynn was armored for battle. Her smile was fake. She was shiny and untouchable, in capri slacks, a fancy blouse, high-heeled mules, with lots of jewelry and her hair carefully lacquered. Lynn’s style was Real Housewife, while Caroline’s was ladylike. Jess would have said they were nothing alike. But there was a toughness to Lynn that Jess had seen echoes of in Caroline. She remembered how dry-eyed Caroline had been during their interview. She didn’t want to believe that Caroline was the third man. But she was starting to wonder.