Kiss the Girls and Make Them Cry(46)

“Does anybody know her name?” Carter asked, trying to sound disinterested.

“Stephenson,” a woman said. “Her unit was up there on the fourth floor.”

Carter eased his way from the group and started to backpedal up the driveway. He made eye contact with a police officer who held his gaze. The travel bag in his hand made him feel uncomfortable. It was as if the officer was sensing that something inside the bag was linked to what happened to Stephenson. Carter gave a half smile, turned, and began to walk away. With each step he expected a whistle to blow and a loud voice to order him to stop. He reached the street without looking back and turned right. His mind was racing, and he needed the opportunity to think things through.

Problem solved had been his first thought when he learned that Paula Stephenson was dead. Another loose end tied off, this time at no expense to REL. No more worries about a drunken, loose cannon. But was there another scenario that was not nearly so rosy? The police would keep looking until they found her parents, a sibling, some relative who would volunteer to come in and take charge of her personal effects. In plain view, on top of a desk or a kitchen counter could be her settlement agreement with his name on the letterhead. What will happen if some relative shows up and takes the time to read it? Why did this group, Carter & Associates, give her $2 million?

There had been a steely resolve in Stephenson’s voice when Carter had spoken to her only five days earlier. His attempt to bully her into adhering to the original settlement had gone nowhere. If anything, it had backfired. She had laughed at him, saying derisively, “If I hire a lawyer, what are you going to do, Mr. Carter, sue me?” She then mentioned three prominent New York law firms that had negotiated huge payouts for their abuse clients. She insisted on reciting the amount each woman had received. “If we don’t work something out and fast, I’m going to call one of these firms.” Ironically, Paula Stephenson’s last words to him when they had agreed to meet at eleven o’clock were “Be on time.”

It just didn’t make sense. Far from being afraid, Stephenson seemed to be spoiling for a fight. How can somebody in five days go from being so gung ho to putting a rope around her neck?

Carter came to an abrupt halt as a sickening thought swept over him. “Oh my God,” he said aloud. Suppose somebody else put that rope around her neck. How convenient for REL that a troublemaker, a woman who was threatening to go public with her accusation, had taken her own life.

A few minutes ago, the thought of a relative finding the settlement agreement had been a concern for Carter. Now it was far more ominous, particularly if the police got hold of it and considered the possibility that she had been murdered. He had a motive to kill her. His airline ticket and hotel reservation were in his name, so they could establish that he was in Durham around the time she was killed. The receptionist and the notary public could confirm the time he spent at the temporary office space, but that wouldn’t do him any good if she were killed in the wee hours of the morning. He berated himself for taking the early flight to Durham the previous day to give him time to visit the Museum of Life and Science. If he had flown down this morning, all of his time would have been accounted for.

Stop, he said to himself. He knew he didn’t do it. The question was, who did? There was only one choice. Sherman. After initially not wanting to know the details of Carter’s work, the CEO had reversed himself and wanted to know everything. He was setting Carter up as the fall guy if the police started investigating. Sherman would be too smart to do it himself. He’d be in Connecticut with a rock-solid alibi while somebody he hired dispatched Stephenson.

A sickening thought entered Carter’s mind. Killers get a morbid sense of satisfaction when they watch the police investigate the crime they committed. They often return to the crime scene, fueled by a sense of power that they alone know what happened to the victim. If the police reviewed the records from Uber, they’d find that he was driven to the building just in time to watch the body being taken away. The image of the police officer staring at him flooded into his mind.

Calm down, he ordered himself. Stop playing Dr. Phil. Any number of factors could have caused Stephenson to snap and take her life after he spoke to her. The most important thing for him was to focus on self-preservation.





50





Dick Sherman was alone in his office on the third floor of his Greenwich mansion. Tonight he was happy to have the house to himself.

Using the computer he kept in a locked file cabinet, he had just finished reading the email from Carter summarizing his trip to Durham. Paula Stephenson dead, an apparent suicide. Perfect, he thought to himself. Stephenson could have been a real headache for him and for REL. Now she was in a drawer in a morgue with her mouth the way it should be. Shut. He had no patience for anyone who reneged on agreements. Good riddance!

But Stephenson’s trip to the Great Beyond did not solve all his problems. Not by a long shot.

Matthews’s arrogance infuriated him. Instead of gratitude and cooperation, “America’s anchorman” had left it to Sherman to clean up the mess he had made. I should have left that hayseed at the southern Virginia cable station where I found him twenty years ago, he sneered to himself.

Sherman still didn’t trust Carter as far as he could throw him. But he’d painted himself into a corner with the two-bit lawyer. Fire him, and he’d have to hire somebody else to finish the job. And that would make Carter another person who knew too much and who couldn’t be counted on to keep his mouth shut. Were lawyers the professionals who committed suicide the most, or was that dentists? he wondered.