Let Me Call You Sweetheart Read Online Free PDF Page B

selection still dragged along. They had used eight of their peremptory challenges. But careful as they were being in choosing this jury, it was obvious that the federal prosecutor had a strong case. It was almost certain that Haskell was going to cop a plea.
Both men were somber over dinner.
"Even if Haskell does plead, I think I can destroy him on the stand," Kinellen assured Jimmy.
"You think you can destroy him. That's not good enough."
"We'll see how it goes."
Weeks smiled mirthlessly. "I'm beginning to worry about you, Bob. It's about time you got yourself a backup plan."
Bob Kinellen decided to let the remark pass. He opened the menu. "I'm meeting Alice at Arnott's later. Were you planning to go?"
"Hell, no. I don't need any more of his introductions. You should know that. They've done me enough harm already."
Kerry and Robin sat in companionable silence in the family room. Because of the chilly evening, they had decided to have the first fire of the season, which in their case meant turning on the gas jet and then pressing the button that sent flames shooting through the artificial logs.
As Kerry explained to visitors, "I'm allergic to smoke. This fire looks real and gives off heat. In fact, it looks so real that my cleaning woman vacuumed up the fake ashes, and I had to go out and buy more."
Robin laid out her change-of-season pictures on the coffee table. "What a terrific night," she said with satisfaction, "cold and windy. I should get the rest of the pictures soon. Bare trees, lots of leaves on the ground."
Kerry was seated in her favorite roomy armchair, her feet on a hassock. She looked up. "Don't remind me of the leaves. I get tired."
"Why don't you get a leaf blower?"
"I'll give you one for Christmas."
"Funny. What are you reading, Mom?"
"Come here, Rob." Kerry held up a newspaper clipping with a picture of Suzanne Reardon. "Do you recognize that lady?"
"She was in Dr. Smith's office yesterday."
"You've got a good eye, but it's not the same person." Kerry had just begun reading the account of Suzanne Reardon's murder. Her body had been discovered at midnight by her husband, Skip Reardon, a successful contractor and self-made millionaire. He had found her lying on the floor in the foyer of their luxurious home in Alpine. She had been strangled. Sweetheart roses were scattered over her body.
I must have read about that back then, Kerry thought. It certainly must have made an impression on me, to bring on those dreams.
It was twenty minutes later when she read the clipping that made her gasp. Skip Reardon had been charged with the murder after his father-in-law, Dr. Charles Smith, had told the police that his daughter lived in fear of her husband's insane attacks of jealousy.
Dr. Smith was Suzanne Reardon's father! My God, Kerry thought. Is that why he's giving her face to other women? How bizarre. How many of them has he done that to? Is that why he made that speech to me and Robin about preserving beauty?
"What's the matter, Mom? You look funny," Robin said.
"Nothing. Just interested in a case." Kerry looked at the clock on the mantel. "Nine o'clock, Rob. You'd better pack it in. I'll come up in a minute to say good night."
As Robin gathered her pictures, Kerry let the papers she was holding fall into her lap. She had heard of cases in which parents could not recover from the death of a child, where they had left the child's room unchanged, the clothes still in the closet, just as the child had left them. But to "re-create" her and do it over and over? That went beyond grief, surely.
Slowly she stood up and followed Robin upstairs. After she kissed her daughter good night, she went into her own room, changed into pajamas and a robe, then went back downstairs, made a cup of cocoa and continued to read.
The case against Skip Reardon did seem open and shut. He admitted that he and Suzanne had quarreled at breakfast the morning of her death. In fact, he admitted that in the preceding days they had fought almost