“Dumber than dirt,” Candace said. “I always thought he was a little creepy too.”
Larkin frowned, then said, “Did Mia know Earl was already married.”
“Yeah.” Candace turned long enough to slosh some gin into her glass. She drank it straight. “But Sweetpea was a teenager. What did any of us know at that age?”
—“Do you think we’ll be together forever, Everett?”—
Larkin reactively winced.
“She told me that he claimed he was going to divorce his hellfire-and-brimstone wife so they could run away together. And Sweetpea believed him. Kept believing him even after she got pregnant and was still flashing her underage tits for cash, while Earl went home every night to that wife of his.”
“Why did Mia believe him despite evidence to the contrary.”
Candace raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow and asked, “Have you ever been in love, baby?”
“Yes.”
“It’s messy, isn’t it?”
—“You ruined my marriage!” Noah had screamed at Doyle—
“Larkin?”
Larkin shook his head, turning. Doyle stood in the threshold, phone in hand. “One minute.” He looked at Candace again. “You knew Mia was pregnant.”
“I met her—the baby,” Candace answered.
“When.”
“May, I think? It was 1988.”
“You’re positive,” Larkin asked.
“Hm-hm. Sweetpea had a beautiful little girl. She’d named her Candace, afterme.” Candace set her half-finished glass on the cabinet and waved both hands in front of her eyes while blinking rapidly. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to have to do my makeup again.” She blew out a long breath. “I was there for another one of my shows and Baby Candace was at least six months old. Sweetpea told me that Earl still hadn’t left his wife and she was scared he’d leave her high and dry with a baby to look after herself. Then the Dollhouse was hit with a lot of red tape that had Vinny closed for days or weeks at a time, before the place got locked up for good on New Year’s Day—I remember that. I never heard from Sweetpea again. She didn’t have a phone, so what could I do? She always calledme.”
“And she never did.”
“Never again.”
“Larkin,” Doyle said a second time.
Larkin held up his hand and asked Candace, “Who do you believe had reason to hurt Mia.”
Candace snorted, and a rogue tear slid down her face. “Who else? Earl.”
“Do you believe him capable of murder.”
The question gave her pause. Reluctantly, Candace admitted, “I don’t know.”
Larkin turned as Doyle strode across the room, took him gently by the elbow, and pulled him aside so that Candace couldn’t overhear them speak.
Doyle leaned down and whispered, “That was Matilde Wagner. She says the hospital just called—Earl’s dead.”
Chapter Seventeen
“O’Halloran told you that he was stable,” Larkin protested from the passenger seat of the Audi.
“That was then, this is now,” Doyle said as he checked his side mirror before merging onto the FDR.
