Killers of a Certain Age(86)

“Why only ten to four?” Helen asked.

“Because the only way we’re fighting is if you start something, and then I’m going to defend this baby until I’ve got nothing left, and I’m a biter,” Naomi told her coolly.

Helen thought a minute, then lowered her arm.

“Thank you,” Naomi said dryly. She looked around the circle. “I’m inferring this is your handiwork,” she said, pointing to the hole in Martin’s forehead.

Helen nodded. Naomi bent, one hand under her belly, and took a good look at the wound. Blood still oozed, moving slowly over his open eye, puddling in the crease of his nose. “A little to the left, but not bad at all. He looks surprised.”

“He was,” I assured her.

She reached out a hand and closed his eyes. Then she straightened, taking another deep swig of ginger ale. “Dumbass,” she said, shaking her head. She took a phone from her pocket and punched in a number. “I need a cleaning crew.” She gave the address of Benscombe Hall. “Make it fast and quiet. In the garden.” She paused and looked around. “Anybody else we need to take care of tidying up?”

“Bodyguards scattered around the property,” I told her. “Pieces of a few folks in the kitchen, but they’re probably burned up by now. And Vance Gilchrist is by the greenhouse.”

She raised her brows but didn’t reply to me. She related the information to the voice on the other end, then hung up without saying good-bye. “Twenty to thirty minutes.” She looked around. “I may have gone to Cambridge, but I am from Atlanta and this cold is about in my bones. Let’s go inside.”

She headed towards the garden shed and the rest of us looked around. Naomi had seamlessly taken charge, and we might have overpowered her—she wasn’t exactly fighting fit, and as a member of the Provenance department, her training was much less comprehensive than ours. The bottom line was, we could take her if we chose.

But we didn’t choose. Instead, we followed her into the garden shed, where we were joined by Minka and Akiko, who helped us pile up some mulch bags for Naomi to sit on. I didn’t bother to look around for Taverner. He’d have done what we asked and slipped away when the getting was good. I just hoped he’d stuck around long enough to see the end.

When we’d gotten comfortable, Naomi started to talk.

“First, I presume that you are responsible for terminating Vance Gilchrist, Thierry Carapaz, and their bodyguards,” she began.

“And Günther Paar,” I added.

She narrowed her eyes. “That was determined to be natural causes. He choked on an apple during a heart attack.”

“I shoved a piece of apple down his windpipe after Mary Alice and I slathered him in a mud wrap made with nicotine.”

Naomi’s mouth opened, then closed. And then she burst out laughing. “That is impressive, ladies. Some real old-school shit.” She sipped again from her ginger ale. “Alright, that’s another notch in the body count. Did you have help?”

“No,” I said smoothly.

She looked around the table, but nobody else was willing to give Taverner up either. She nodded. “Okay, y’all are lying to my face, but I get it. You’re protecting somebody. That’s fine, but I can’t protect you if you don’t tell me the truth.”

“Protect us?” Mary Alice asked.

Naomi’s expression was cool. “There is an entire organization sniffing after a nice fat bonus for each of your heads. And since I’m in charge now, I’m the one who can call it off. So yes—I am here to protect you.”

“Why?” Helen demanded.

Naomi pointed outside to where Martin’s body was cooling in the garden. “Because you got rid of that little shit-heel and saved me the trouble.”

Natalie’s eyes went wide. “You were after Martin?”

“For two, almost three years now, I’ve been watching him. He ingratiated himself with the board, taking on extra work, making sure he always saved the day. It was a little too perfect. It got on my tits,” she said. “So I started paying attention.”

Mary Alice spoke up. “How did you manage to keep tabs on him?”

Naomi smiled. “Every quarter when the board met for me to brief them, Martin was there too. I installed a keystroke logger on his computer and spyware on his phone. Ten minutes’ work and I was able to see everything he did, every search, every email, every nasty little move he was planning. I know his level on Angry Birds, I know his bank account is way higher than his pay grade, and I know he had a case of athlete’s foot that his doctor was concerned about because it took so long to clear up.”

“Nasty,” Natalie muttered.

Naomi grinned. “I won’t tell you about his fanfic. It’s pretty out there.”

“So you were able to see everything he did,” I said slowly. “Including setting us up.” I held her stare, but she didn’t back down.

“Yes, I was. And I knew I had no way to prove it. Anything I showed the board, he could turn around and say I had installed on his devices in order to frame him for whatever I was doing. Besides, you think they were going to listen to me? They were in this up to their hairy eyebrows.” She took one last gulp of ginger ale and slowly exhaled a low burp. “This baby is killing me by inches.”