French Silk(49)

"Why? I'm sure you already know. I assaulted a policeman."

"The charge was dropped."

"I was only fourteen."

"What happened?"

"Wasn't it in the records?"

"I'd like to hear your side."

She pulled in a deep breath. "A friend of mine from school was staying with me."

"You were hiding her. She was a runaway."

"Yes," she said sharply. "I was hiding her. When the policemen came to take her home, she became hysterical. One tried to handcuff her. I tried my damnedest to stop him."

"Why were you hiding her? Even when they threatened you with jail, you never told the police why your friend was hiding in your house."

"I gave her my word that I wouldn't. But that was years ago and she…" She made a gesture with her hands that said it didn't matter anymore. "Her stepfather was sexually molesting her. She was being raped, sometimes sodomized, every night while her mother looked the other way and pretended it wasn't happening."

Muttering swear words, Cassidy dragged his hand down his face.

"It got to a point where she couldn't take it anymore. There was no one for her to turn to. She was afraid that if she told the nuns, or a priest, they wouldn't believe her. She was also afraid of reprisal at home. When she told me, I offered to hide her for as long as she wanted to remain hidden."

Claire stared into space for a moment, recalling how furious she'd been over the futility of her own actions. "Two weeks after they returned her home, she ran away again. She must have left the city. No one ever heard from her again."

"You could have spared yourself a police record and told them what was happening."

"What good would it have done?" she asked scornfully. "Her stepfather was a millionaire. They lived in a gorgeous house in the Garden District. Even if someone had believed her, it would have been swept under the rug and she'd have been sent back. Besides, I had promised her I wouldn't tell." She shook her head. "The consequences I suffered could hardly compare to what she went through, Mr. Cassidy."

"Tell me about Andre Philippi."

She gazed at him belligerently. "What do you want to know?"

"You both attended Sacred Heart Academy."

"Grades seven through twelve," Claire said. "Sister Anne Elizabeth is Mother Superior. Or she was when Andre and I were students there." She tilted her head; her hair brushed her shoulder. "Is it incriminating that we were classmates?"

"Tell me about him," he said, ignoring the dig. "He's a funny little man."

Instantly her aspect changed. She dropped all vestiges of fun and flirtation. Even her voice assumed a hard edge. "I suppose that athletic, macho types like you might think Andre is 'funny'."

"I didn't mean anything derogatory."

"The hell you didn't."

"Is he gay?"

"Is that important?"

"I don't know yet. Is he?"

"No. In fact, he's got a schoolboy's crush on Yasmine."

"But he's not intimately involved with anyone, male or female?"

"Not to my knowledge. He lives alone."

"I know."

"Of course you would."

"I have a file on him," he said. "I have a file on all the employees of the Fairmont Hotel, even those who weren't on duty that night."

"Do you have a file on me?"

"A fat one."

"I'm flattered."

Cassidy was frowning. "What about Andre's parents? What's his heritage? I couldn't tell."

"Is that question racially motivated?"

"Shit," Cassidy said. "No, it's not. And would you stop being so goddamn defensive?"

Claire weighed her options and saw the advantage in telling Cassidy about Andre. If she didn't, he'd go prying on his own, and it seemed that the more he pried, the more precarious her situation became.

"Andre's mother was a quadroon. Are you familiar with the term?" He nodded. "She was an exceptionally beautiful woman, somewhat like Yasmine. Although she was intelligent, she never graduated from high school. Instead, she trained herself in the skills necessary to her profession."

"Which was?"

"To be a companion to men. She learned the techniques from her mother. She began taking clients when she was fifteen."

"She was a prostitute?"

The word offended Claire and she let him know it. "A prostitute hangs out on street corners and hustles passersby. There's a distinction here. Andre's mother cultivated multidimensional relationships with gentlemen that often lasted for years. In return they compensated her well."

"Were these 'gentlemen' white?"

"For the most part."

"And one of them was Andre's father."

"That's right. He was a prominent businessman who couldn't claim the child but accepted responsibility for him."

"Do you know who he was?"

"Andre does, but he's never disclosed his identity to me."

"And even if you knew, you wouldn't tell me."