Palm Beach Nasty by Tom Turner Read Free Book Online Page A

Misty.
    “What went on there . . . at his house?”
    Misty flicked her hair back and slumped into the chair.
    “Well . . . first, it was just me, then my girlfriend came along—”
    “So . . . had yourselves a nice little ménage a . . . whatever?” Ott asked.
    Crawford gave Ott his “back off” look.
    “And where exactly did this take place?” Crawford asked.
    “Started out in his indoor pool, sometimes the hot tub, ended up in a bedroom.”
    “The master?”
    “No, on this huge water bed upstairs.”
    “Didn’t know they were still around,” Ott said.
    “So it was the three of you?” Crawford asked.
    Misty coughed nervously.
    “Until one of those friends of Ward’s showed up,” she said.
    “Guys, you mean?” Crawford asked.
    “No, two women.”
    “Who were they?” Ott asked.
    “I don’t know . . . well-dressed, expensive jewelry, older.”
    “How old?” Ott asked.
    “One maybe twenty-five, the other . . . thirty, I guess.”
    “They come together?” Ott asked, walking behind her.
    “I don’t think so.”
    “So, they got there . . . then what?” Ott had his hand on the back of her chair.
    “We had some champagne, blew a few lines . . . then you know . . .”
    “What?”
    “Took our clothes off.”
    She said it like it was the same as brushing her teeth.
    “These two women,” Crawford asked, “what’d they look like?”
    “Their bodies?”
    Ott laughed.
    “Faces,” Crawford said, “eyes, hair color, distinguishing features . . . you know?”
    “Well, first one had kind of reddish hair. Lot of rings. Really pretty.”
    She lit another cigarette. Crawford rolled his eyes, but let it go.
    “The other one . . . even more.”
    “Even more what?”
    “Pretty . . . a blonde, awesome blue eyes, a few freckles here,” Misty said, touching below her eye.
    “How long ago was this?” Crawford asked.
    “Um, eight or nine months about.”
    “Remember their names, Misty?” Crawford asked.
    She bit the fingernail on her right index finger.
    “Red-haired one was Nicole.”
    “Any last name?” Crawford asked.
    “No,” she said, looking at the tape recorder.
    “And the other one?”
    “She was only there twice, maybe three times.” Misty’s eyes scrunched up, “Kind of a funny name.”
    “Think real hard,” Crawford said.
    She put her hand on her forehead and closed her eyes.
    “I remember now,” she said, smiling. “He called her Liliana. That was it, Liliana.”

NINE
    N ick wished he had watered down the Bahama Blasts because Cynthia was getting less and less intelligible. She had just slurred her way through an explanation of how Spencer Robertson’s only living relative was a bad seed grandson named Avery Robertson, who she described as a kind of pudgy, shorter version of Nick. Then she started going on about how handsome Nick was. The Blasts clearly affected her vision. “Sexy” hair and “nice bone structure,” she was saying now. Not that he minded hearing it, but he wanted her to stick to the dysfunctional Robertson family. This was business after all.
    Then she started blathering on about some incident that took place years before, when fifteen-year-old Avery Robertson showed up out of the blue at the Poinciana. Kid was on spring vacation from boarding school. He and three friends went there to play golf—and unbeknownst to his grandfather—went straight to the Poinciana pro shop and charged up four sets of top-of-the-line golf clubs, along with shirts, hats, sweaters, balls, the works. All totaled the tab was more than $5,000 including guest fees and a $250 lunch.
    The shit hit the fan when Spencer Robertson’s conservator at J.P. Morgan, Paul Broberg, got the bill and in a rage called the club manager. The manager was no dope and deftly handed the ball off to Cynthia. She listened to a ten-minute harangue as the irate Broberg demanded to know why a fifteen-year-old kid was allowed to just walk into the Poinciana and charge up any damn thing he wanted. It