82 Desire

who’d made her wait deliberately.
    He was mopping his brow, and his hair was mussed, as if he’d been playing with it.
    She decided to be the Good Cop. “Nice to see you, Mr. Cavignac. Let’s go sit down, shall we?” He nodded, not speaking, as she turned and led him to an interview room.
    She gestured and smiled. “Sorry the accommodations aren’t a little more elegant.”
    He nodded again, looking slightly annoyed. Evidently, he wasn’t buying the Ms. Niceguy routine.
    She tried again anyhow. “Sit down, won’t you?”
    He sat and so did she. “I’m missing an appointment, Ms. Langdon.”
    She looked at her watch. “Ah, twelve-thirty. Due at the Pickwick Club?”
    “Ma’am, what can I do for you?” His voice was openly hostile. She thought he meant it to be icy, but he couldn’t quite pull it off. He was a bearlike person, a warm person rather than a cool one. Hostility was possible, but not chilliness.
    She did a masterful chill herself. “My name isn’t ma’am, Beau; nor is it Ms. Langdon. It’s Detective Langdon, please.” She smiled an arctic smile. “Or Skip if you like.” Ha. Got him both ways. She’d pulled rank and still given him permission to ignore it—he couldn’t first-name her just to be annoying.
    She didn’t pause to let him call her anything. “I understand you and Russell are quite close these days.”
    “I told you that, ma’am.” His eyes had turned to hard little beads.
    Damn him. She felt a quick, electric flash of fury and suppressed it. She didn’t think he was the sort who’d blurt things in the heat of anger. Instead, he’d just get stubborn and intractable.
    She raised a conciliatory palm. “Beau. Beau.” She uttered his name as if patting him. “There’s nothing to be upset about. I need your help, that’s all. Russell might be in danger.”
    He might. You never knew. He might also be dead, or living it up in Tahiti. “I know you and Russell have been in touch a lot lately.”
    She thought she saw a movement somewhere, as if a thumb had jerked in his lap; she couldn’t really be sure. “I’ll tell you what I think. I think Russell had some real problems and he was talking about them to you. Now that makes me think, why you? Do you have the same problem? If so, you could be in danger yourself.”
    “What are you getting at, Detective?”
    He must be cooling down—at least he was using her title. “If something’s happened to Russell, I don’t want it to happen to you.”
    He looked at his watch. “I think I can take care of myself.” He got up.
    “Sit back down, Mr. Cavignac.” (One “Detective” earned him a “Mister.”) “I’m just going to ask you, flat out—why have you and Russell been on the phone so much recently? What were you talking about?”
    “None of your damn business.”
    “Mr. Cavignac. You have the right to remain silent. You have the right to an attorney …”
    “What the hell are you talking about? You can’t arrest me.”
    “Not now, no. I just wanted to remind you where you are, and to whom you’re speaking. This is a police investigation. When are you going to start taking it seriously?”
    He sat back a little, drawing in his breath. She thought he looked a little shamefaced. “I’m sorry. We’re all under a lot of pressure.”
    Perspiration broke out on his forehead and once again, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket, he mopped it. “This is hard for me. I feel as if I’m betraying a friend’s confidence.”
    Skip nodded, as reverently, she hoped, as if he’d disclosed the whereabouts of Atlantis.
    Beau said, “He knew about Mrs. Fortier. About her…” he paused and spat out the distasteful word “… affair.”
    “Yes?”
    “He was distraught about it.”
    Once again she nodded.
    “It was … well, you can imagine how upsetting it was.”
    “What did he tell you?”
    “Tell me?” He looked bewildered. “That’s self-evident, isn’t it? That she was having an affair with Ernest LaBarre. What else was there to say?” Once again, he sounded hostile.
    She wondered if it was all a big fat squishy lie, or just a little dried-up baby lie, maybe with a grain of truth in it. She shrugged. “You tell me. There sure were a lot of phone calls.”
    “Who told you that?”
    “Nobody. I saw the phone bills.”
    “Well, you know how people are when they have a problem. ‘My wife’s having an affair and I’m so unhappy I could just die.’ “
    “He threatened suicide?”
    “No! Of