That’s terrible—a tragedy.” Trent shaded the truth. He’d be a hell of a lot richer with Hayley out of the way. “Car bombs happen in the Middle East, not Newport Beach.” He tried to keep his mind off the money, adding, “Besides, who would want to kill Hayley?”
“DEAR LORD, WHAT IS the world coming to?” Meg Amboy asked the nurse who’d brought her breakfast just after dawn. Along with it came her medication and the morning paper. “Did you see there was a car bombing right here in Newport Beach last night?”
“Umm-hmmm,” the middle-aged woman with a chest like the prow of a battleship responded. “It was out by the airport. That’s Costa Mesa.”
Meg noticed the nurse had dismissed the incident as if it had happened on another planet. Typical attitude around Twelve Acres. The staff had been trained to be elitist. Newport had money and cachet while Costa Mesa, which bordered on Newport, was decidedly middle class with an area that could only be termed a barrio. Meg knew most of the help in the kitchen and the housekeepers lived in Costa Mesa or just beyond in Santa Ana.
Meg prided herself on not being a snob. True, she spent her money on the best assisted-living facility she could afford because she knew she didn’t have much longer to live. But she remembered with fondness growing up poor and earning her own way. Making a fortune with no one’s help.
The battleship nurse, whose name Meg always failed to remember even though Meg had been at Twelve Acres for two years, left. Meg went back to the paper, content to read it until it was time to go downstairs for a second cup of coffee with Conrad Hollister. After they’d finished, she would walk beside his wheelchair to their morning game of bridge.
“Conrad,” she whispered and lowered the paper. She stared out at the craggy shoreline framed by her huge window. The rampartlike bluffs had been weathered by wind and the unrelenting surf. Now scrims of early morning mist clung to the shore. Short trees bowed by the elements stooped like hunchback sentinels along the tops of the bluffs where mansions were perched.
The view was breathtaking but she often experienced a haunting, solitary feeling when she gazed at the sweep of the deep blue sea. It made her lonely, which was an emotion she’d rarely experienced when she was younger, but she had more time to reflect now. Too much time.
“What might have been?” she whispered to herself. What if she’d met Conrad Hollister ten, twenty, even thirty years ago?
Meg refused to allow her thoughts to stray in this direction. At eighty-five, she had the same sharp mind that had guided her as she amassed an empire in real estate. She wouldn’t be here if she didn’t have a heart that refused to recognize her brain was still young. Why dwell on what might have been when she had accomplished so much?
Conrad was nothing more than an intellectual companion. They enjoyed many of the same things, like competitive bridge, but they weren’t lovers and probably never would have been. Still, once in a while thoughts crept into her mind and she speculated like an old fool.
“It’s people who matter,” she quietly assured herself, then realized she’d been talking to herself more and more. There were plenty of folks at Twelve Acres to talk to—besides Conrad—but Meg missed her baby sister. Allison had been killed in a plane crash. Until she was gone, Meg hadn’t realized how much she counted on conversations with her sister.
There was Hayley, of course, but her niece had her own life. She visited often, making time for an old woman. Hayley was going to Santa Barbara, then on to San Francisco to buy fabric for the fall line of clothes she was designing. It would be ten days or so before she returned. Until then, Meg would be on her own.
CHAPTER TWO
FARAH FORDHAM pulled her sleek black Ferrari into the Twelve Acres parking lot just after 6:00 a.m. The facility was situated on prime real estate on Pacific Coast Highway, overlooking the coastline between Newport Beach and Laguna Beach. Why they called it Twelve Acres was beyond her; the place was a little over an acre of Cape Cod–style buildings shaded by stately palms.
When Trent had called her at three this morning, he’d insisted she deliver the news of Hayley’s death to her old battle-ax aunt. Before he’d gotten that far, Trent had asked, “Did you do it?”
“Do what?” Farah had been engaged in some extremely kinky sex—she loved being the dominatrix—with Kyle, her boyfriend.
“Kill Hayley.”
“That’s a hell of an idea.” Their father’s estate was currently in probate. As a CPA, Farah knew how big a chunk the state would claim, then the rest would be split three ways. Two would be better. One would be ideal.
Despite having a successful business, Farah was overextended and trapped in the economic downturn. To make matters worse, her boyfriend was a residential real estate developer. His career was in limbo and she was supporting him.
“Seriously, Hayley was blown to kingdom come by a car bomb.”
“You’re kidding.” She tried to sound upset but doubted she’d fooled her brother.
“I’m not joking. I’ve got to go to the station and give a statement. You have to tell Aunt Meg.”
Great! Just great! Farah would rather be interviewed by the police than deliver bad news to Meg Amboy. The old crone was giving ninety a hard shove but she was still tough, the same woman who’d turned meager funds into a real estate empire by buying up what people assumed was worthless land east of L.A. Soon urban sprawl drove hundreds of thousands of people to what was laughingly called the “Inland Empire.”
As far as Farah could tell, Meg Amboy loved two things. Money and Hayley. The old biddy had a heart condition; the news would probably kill her. The thought made Farah grin as she slithered out of the sports car she really couldn’t afford but loved with a passion. What would happen to Meg’s money with Hayley gone?
Farah wondered if she could ingratiate herself with the old biddy. Considering the money involved and Meg’s lack of relatives, it wouldn’t hurt to try.
MEG STARTED at the knock on the door to her suite. She made her way to the door and opened it. Farah Fordham stood there dressed in an expensive suit with a handbag that probably cost more than any nurse at Twelve Acres made in a month. What was she doing here?
“May I come in?”
Meg decided these were probably the first words Farah had ever directed to her other than a polite hello and goodbye at family functions. She eased the door open and watched the young woman saunter in. Meg saw something of herself in Farah—not in the arrogant manner, but in the self-made young woman who’d put herself through college. Her brother, Trent, had ridden on his father’s coat tails, going into the family business. Not Farah; she had her own CPA firm.
“Let’s sit down,” Farah said, looking as if she were facing a firing squad.
Meg’s stomach heaved then took a sickening plunge. She staggered backward toward the small sofa where she’d been reading the paper. “Hayley,” she cried. “What’s happened?”
Farah had hold of both Meg’s arms. She eased her down on the sofa before speaking. “There’s been an accident.”
Relief washed through Meg, leaving her weak; blood pounded like hail in her ears. An accident.
