Skinny Dip Read Online Free PDF Page B

scrapped at a later date. In his unshakable vanity Chaz thought that he would eventually charm his new bride into sharing her vast inheritance. He had pictured the intimate ceremony taking place in the bedroom, of course, after a night of athletic lovemaking—Joey, still aglow, unfolding the pre-nup and holding it to the flame of a lilac-scented candle. It had never happened, though, and after nearly two years of waiting Chaz had given up hope. Joey wasn’t hoarding the family fortune so much as ignoring it, which Chaz regarded as a crime against nature. What was the point, he’d asked himself, of staying wed to a wealthy woman who refused to act like one? The answer: There was no point.
    “And after you were married,” Rolvaag was saying, “what was the financial understanding between you and Mrs. Perrone?”
    “Simple. Separate checkbooks, separate bank accounts,” Chaz said. “We split the bills down the middle.”
    “I see.”
    “How come you’re not writing this down?”
    “Not necessary,” said the detective. “Do you have a lawyer, Mr. Perrone?”
    “Do I need one?” Chaz asked.
    Up until then, the conversation had gone exactly as he’d imagined it would. “I mean, is there something you’re not telling me? Did they find any evidence that points to, you know, a crime?”
    “No, sir,” Rolvaag said. “Earlier I noticed you using the pay phone in the hotel lobby. I’m curious why you weren’t calling from your room—you know, for the privacy and all.”
    “Well—”
    “And then it occurred to me that you might be speaking with your lawyer,” the detective said, “because that’s the sort of thing some lawyers would do—have their clients phone from a pay booth.”
    “Why?”
    “Because that way the hotel won’t have any record of the outgoing call,” said Rolvaag. “Some of these guys, they see too many bad movies.”
    Chaz said, “I don’t even know any lawyers.”
    “All right.”
    “I was calling our cleaning lady. I had to give her the alarm code to the house, since I won’t be there when she comes Monday. I forgot all about it until I was in the elevator on my way down to the bar.”
    “Well, you’ve had a lot on your mind,” Rolvaag said.
    “Her name is Ricca, you want to check it out.”
    “Not necessary.”
    “Ricca … now what the heck is her last name?” Chaz mumbled, as if to himself.
    By now the two men were on the beach, trudging through the soft sand in the direction of the jetties. Chaz was satisfied with the way he’d covered himself on the phone call; the detective seemed totally suckered.
    Abruptly Rolvaag stopped and placed a hand heavily on Chaz’s shoulder. “Look out there, Mr. Perrone.”
    For a long chilling moment Chaz was afraid to raise his eyes. Obviously the stroll was not so casual—the detective had set him up in the crudest way. Chaz’s knees began to wobble as if they were coming unhinged.
    But it turned out that Rolvaag wasn’t pointing at Joey’s bloated corpse in the surf, as Chaz had dreaded. He was pointing at the twinkling outline of a cruise liner off the coast. The ship’s prow was aimed out to sea.
    “That’s the Sun Duchess” the detective said. “They kept her in port two extra hours to finish the search.”
    Chaz took a slow breath and tried to conceal his giddy relief. “And there was no sign of my wife anywhere on board? Nothing?”
    “Afraid not.”
    “So she’s definitely in the water,” Chaz said.
    “That would be a reasonable assumption.”
    “Joey’s a swimmer—I mean, like, a champion swimmer. They can’t give up searching after only a day or two. They can’t..”
    Rolvaag said, “I understand how you feel.”
    “So what’m I supposed to do?” Chaz’s voice cracked convincingly, the result of many private rehearsals. “What the hell do I do now?”
    They turned back toward the hotel, the detective saying, “Is there a clergyman you could call, Mr. Perrone? Someone close to the family?”
    “Let