Malice. Lisa Jackson

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СКАЧАТЬ folded her arms under her breasts, felt them lift upward. Good. They were incredible and she knew it. “You know, it seems to me you didn’t pay her a whole lot of attention when she was alive, so why would you want to talk about her now?” She eyed him critically. The guy favored one leg as he stood. What the hell was his deal?

      “That’s what I’d like to talk to you about.”

      Hmm.

      More out of morbid curiosity than an urge to help, Shana moved out of the doorway, grabbing Dirk’s collar and dragging him toward the patio. She figured she might as well work on her tan while she was at it. The dog gave off another low warning growl as she led Bentz down the hallway and through the French doors to the patio. Dirk definitely didn’t make it easy, the big beast. Behind her Bentz limped a little, she noticed, though he tried like hell to hide it.

      Once outside, she let go of the dog. “Leave us alone, Dirk. Go!” she said and snapped her fingers, motioning toward the side of the patio where a thicket of palms provided some shade. The dog hesitated for just a second, then padded obediently to a spot in the grass. After a quick circle he laid down, chin on his paws, eyes focused on Bentz.

      “Pretty big dog,” Bentz observed, staring at Dirk’s massive head.

      “My husband’s. Has him for protection.” A little stretch of the truth there, but hey, why not? “Really, all he does is bark at the neighbor’s yappy little Chihuahuas. I guess I should offer you something to drink. Something…nonalcoholic?” she asked, smiling through her barb at his affinity for the bottle.

      “I’m fine.”

      She doubted it. Otherwise he wouldn’t be here. “So what’s up?” She settled into one of the faux-wicker chairs surrounding a large glass table and motioned him to have a seat. “What is it you want to know about Jennifer?”

      Bentz sat in the shade of an oversized umbrella. “Her suicide,” he said.

      Shana frowned, felt her lips pull into a knot of frustration.

      “You were one of her closest friends. I thought you could tell me her state of mind before her death—did she really want to end it all?”

      “Wow. That’s it? You want my take on what she was thinking?”

      “Yeah.”

      Okay, he asked. Shana rolled the years back in her head, remembered Jennifer—fun and naughty and terminally sexy. “It never made sense to me. She was too full of life, too into herself to want to end it.”

      “We found a note.”

      “Oh, pooh!” She swiped at the air as if a bothersome fly were buzzing around her head. “I don’t know what that was all about. Sure, she told me she fought depression at times, but…I didn’t think it was that serious. Maybe I was wrong, but I would have bet at the time she wrote the note it was just a way to get attention, you know? She was big on that. I mean who kills themselves by driving into a tree?”

      He was listening, not bothering to take notes.

      “She could’ve had an accident, I’ll grant you that. She was known to drink a little and then there were pills, but…” She looked him straight in the eye. “If you’re asking me if I think Jennifer was capable of suicide, I’d say no. Just like I said pretty loudly at the time she died.”

      Bentz nodded. As if he remembered.

      “I lived with Jennifer at Berkeley and then afterward when…you know she was dating Alan Gray? No, not just dating. I think they were engaged for a while, right?”

      She saw the narrowing of his eyes, the quiet assent behind his shaded glasses.

      “But she didn’t move in with Alan, probably because she met you. Personally, I thought she was crazy. I mean, Alan was this super-rich real estate developer. God, he must’ve been worth tens of millions. Yet, she fell for you. A cop. Threw the millionaire over. Go figure.” Shana sighed theatrically. “But then who could figure our girl out? Jennifer was nothing if not a dichotomy.” Shana remembered Jennifer the flirt. Jennifer the extrovert. Jennifer the wild. But never could she recall Jennifer the morose. “However, I never considered Jennifer someone who would hurt herself. Not intentionally. I mean I just don’t think she was capable of it. She would do a lot of things for attention. A lot. But never really self-destructive.” Shana caught herself and sighed. “Well, unless you mean the affair.” She met his gaze, but she doubted it so much as flickered behind his shades. “James was definitely her Achilles’ heel.” She looked away to the pool where sunlight danced on the water, clear and aquamarine. “Look, it’s been a long time and really, I don’t know what was in her head at the time. I just doubt that it was suicide.”

      Bentz asked her a few more questions about her friendship, then, when she looked at her watch, came up with the bombshell.

      “Do you think Jennifer could have faked her death?”

      “What?” She was shocked. “Are you kidding?” But he wasn’t. His face was stone-cold sober. “No way. I mean, how would she go about it?” Her thoughts swirled. Goose bumps rose on the back of her arms. Was this some kind of trick question? But Bentz’s expression told her differently. “Okay, I don’t know what you’re getting at, but no, I don’t think she could have…what? Staged the accident? Put someone up to it? Killed another woman? No…that’s nuts, Rick.” She felt her insides churning. This was just too weird. “Weren’t you the one who identified her body?”

      He nodded, his lips tightening just a bit.

      “Well, then, did you make a mistake?”

      “I don’t know,” he said and she let out a long breath. “She didn’t talk to you about it? Didn’t show up afterward?”

      “No! For the love of God!” Was the man bonkers? Holy crap! “What kind of dope are you smoking, Bentz? Jennifer’s dead. We both know it.”

      “If you say so.”

      Shana leaned back in her chair and eyed the man who had been Jennifer’s husband. He hadn’t been known to hallucinate. At least, not before all his problems. At one point he’d been the shining star of the LAPD, but that star had been tarnished, along with his badge.

      Today, though, he looked like the old Bentz. Handsome and hard-edged. Oh, he was a little more shopworn around the edges, the years starting to show. But this Bentz was clear-eyed and determined. Passionate. Some of the qualities Jennifer had been drawn to in the first place.

      “What makes you think Jennifer is alive?” she asked. This conversation was weird, weird, weird.

      He withdrew something from an envelope—photos that he fanned over the glass-topped table. Shana’s heart nearly stopped. The woman in each shot was Jennifer, or her goddamned identical twin. “Where’d you get these? I mean…you’re saying these are recent?” she asked, her mind boggled. Jennifer was dead.

      “Someone sent them to me. I thought you might have an idea who.”

      “Not a clue…but…this can’t be…I mean, she’s dead. You were the one who—” She picked up the shot of Jennifer crossing the street. A chill slid down her spine.

      “I’m just looking into her СКАЧАТЬ