Emerson Ward Mysteries

The Worldwide Mystery paperback edition of A Forever Death (ISBN 0-373-26463-1) is available through your favorite local bookstores and online booksellers everywhere -- $5.99/($6.99 Canada).

The hardcover edition is available from online booksellers such as barnesandnoble.com.

For a free sample of A Forever Death, send me an e-mail. I'll return a Word file of Chapter I. To purchase this book in hardcover, visit an online retailer such as barnesandnoble.com

Puppy didn't really call at the best of times, but his call didn't come at the most inopportune time, either.
A social gathering is a group of friends getting together after work for a couple of beers, or long-time acquaintances milling around the hors d'oeuvres table and the bar at Brandt's annual Christmas fete, or even four of us sitting around a bridge table on a weekday night munching cheese and crackers and trading news. But a social affair sparkles with diamonds and emeralds, glistens with Dior silks, smells of exotic perfumes, colognes, and previously uncirculated spicy rumors, tinkles with laughter and titters with chatter, shifts and swirls in eddies like the blue-gray smoke of fine cigars, slides over the palate with the double-edged bite of good cognac, leaving one just a bit breathless and giddy. It is an event to which a seemingly exclusive set of conspicuous consumers is invited -- those with townhouses in Aspen and Acapulco and two or three Mercedes are the most likely candidates. But as the old saying goes, we all know how to live rich -- it's simply that the rich have had more practice.
I'd been invited to this particular "affair" to provide local color, I'm sure. Some of that ilk recognized my name from my byline -- Emerson W. Ward -- on magazine articles, and even fewer said they'd actually read the one novel I'd published. Generally, when it's discovered that I'm neither famous nor rich, it's assumed that either a horrible mistake has been made or that I must be "Myrna's new friend."
As it so happened, I had come with Myrna, but we were old friends, not new friends. Myrna Goodwin was a charming and vivacious sixtysomething lady who wore the years even better than the collection of clingy designer gowns she owned for occasions such as this. With a couple of nips and tucks, a chemical peel, and a lot of hard work with a personal trainer in the privacy of her own weight room in her twenty-fourth-floor Lake Shore Drive co-op, she packed all that vibrant energy into a petite five-foot-two body that exuded the looks and sensuality of a woman twenty years younger.
She had gobs of money by virtue of the fact that she had outlived all three of her husbands, all of whom had been very wealthy men. She had made the mistake of latching onto the twenty year-old son of her friend, the senator, one summer for a brief dalliance. The boy got greedy, or stupid, and stole a large portion of her jewel collection. Lord knows how he thought he was going to unload the stuff, but dear Myrna was caught between a rock and a hard place. Not wanting to call the police, she had asked Brandt Williams for advice, and he had recommended me. I had shaken the boy up some, scaring the wee out of him, and had returned the lady her jewels intact. We had since been good friends, although on occasion Myrna had hinted broadly at other favors I could do her.
If I put my mind to it, I can play the game as well as anyone, but just then I was hard-pressed stifling yawns. The "my-fortune is-bigger-than-your-fortune" competition was not holding my attention, and I could think of only three reasons why I was still where I was: out of deference to my host, who was a good friend; because the charity for which the affair was raising money was a good cause; and because a woman who looked like she didn't belong had attracted my attention.
I'd caught glimpses of her throughout the evening, and each time had felt a strange stirring inside more akin to curiosity than desire. She now stood on the other side of the room among a small group, nodding and smiling faintly at a little balding man who was talking oh-so-earnestly to the little knot of concerned citizens. But it seemed to me that the smile was merely polite and the nods automatic. I stood for a moment and watched, absorbed in a new game.
After a moment, she glanced around the room, and her eyes briefly met mine. They were the glass eyes of a rag-doll, reflecting emptiness, and I sensed a cold steel door behind those eyes that perfunctorily and emphatically shut out the world. The game took on a new dimension.
I drifted casually across the room, considering various opening gambits, not finding anything in my repertoire that might be suitable. With little effort, and no one taking notice, I silently became a part of her small group, using my gangly six-foot-four frame to cut her a step away from the group like a calf from the herd. She made room for me, and I discreetly divided my attention between her and the balding man. At this distance, I now judged her to be early to mid-thirties, even more attractive than I'd originally thought, and as cold as a February breeze off Lake Michigan. Three minutes of that chill was almost more than I could stand. When an opening came, I seized it almost vindictively.
"Are you always so wonderful?" I murmured, turning toward her so that we were slightly separated from the knot of rapt listeners. The things we do to relieve boredom.
"I'm sorry?" She turned to look at me, her eyes devoid of expression.
"If your friend wasn't so taken by your beauty," I said, nodding my head towards the bald man, "it would be patently obvious to him what a conceited, condescending bitch you are." My smile was disarming, and my voice was friendly, without animosity, but I was getting the expected reaction.
"Who are you?" Her eyes widened, but still gave nothing away.
"Nobody special."
"As if I couldn't guess."
"I'm sorry if I've insulted you. It was terribly ill-mannered of me, but I gave up making excuses for myself a long time ago. You know, standing next to you is like standing next to an air conditioner." It was a mean game, and already I felt twinges of shame for having started it, but I'd already come this far.
There was the barest flicker of life in those amber eyes. "I don't know why I'm standing here expending energy in intensely disliking a total stranger."
"Then walk away."
She didn't move, indicating her own degree of boredom, her consent to play the game, or her determination to stand her own ground. The rest of the party vanished around us. It was just us, predator and prey, squared off. I looked her up and down, and there was a lot to look at. Even the modest and conservative dress couldn't hide the full breasts and generous swell of hips, nor could it hide the grace with which she carried all that perfection.
"Such a waste. Oh, not just the body -- bodies are easy to come by, even ones as shapely as yours. It's just such a damn pitiful waste of a person. You never let go, do you?"
"What on earth would you know about it?"
"Maybe nothing." The eyes had more depth now, and suddenly I had a flash of what lay behind that steel door. I took a wild guess. "Daddy's little girl," I murmured softly, "all grown up in a body she can't even stand to look at."
She bit her lower lip, and now the eyes held fear. "You are positively nasty," she whispered in disbelief.
Before I could think of a reply, someone grabbed my arm just above the elbow.
"Here you are, you naughty man." Myrna to the rescue. "How on earth did you manage to escape my clutches?" She laughed. "I see you've met the lovely Ms. Meriwether."
"No, as a matter of fact I haven't," I said. "But I was just commenting to Ms. Meriwether that I have never seen a glacier more lovely than she."
"Oh, for God's sake, stop it!" Meriwether cried, causing a few heads to turn in our direction. For an instant, it looked as if she might burst into tears, but the amber eyes flashed with anger as she regained control and slammed the steel door shut. A quick look of disgust faded into the bland mask she'd worn before I'd traversed the room, and she spun away into the crowd.
"Come, Emerson," Myrna said, looking at me curiously. "I want you to meet some dear friends of mine."
"Yes, Myrna dear." I let her lead me away, and when we had gotten half way across the room, she stopped me and turned to face me.
"What on earth was that all about?"
"I was bored."
"What did you say to the poor girl? Good lord, I thought only women were that vicious. I thank my lucky stars I wasn't the object of your displeasure. I hope I don't bore you. I don't bore you, do I, dear?"
"No, you don't bore me, Myrna," I smiled.
"Thank goodness for that." She sighed.
Myrna's dear friends, however, did bore me, and I soon got fidgety again, so I excused myself to go order another drink. I took my time getting back, surveying the crowd on my way. There were probably well over sixty people gathered in three rooms and the patio, all in formal evening attire, many of whom were recognizable from the society pages and local television. Just then I did not feel especially privileged to be part of that group. Aren't they just folks like us?
I watched as a maid approached my friend Greg Edwards, our host, and asked him something. He looked up and began searching the room until his gaze fell on me, then he gestured at me and said something to the girl. She started in my direction. Puzzled, I met her halfway.
"Mr. Ward?"
"Yes?"
"There's a phone call for you, sir. He says it's terribly important. If you'll follow me?"
"Yes, of course." I followed her to the foyer to take the call.
I bowed to modern convention some years ago and got a cell phone, but still refuse to take it anywhere I think it will be a nuisance. Call me old-fashioned, but I think it's rude to talk on a cell phone in restaurants, theaters and black tie parties. I also don't think I'm so important that people have to track me down day or night, so I was surprised that someone was calling me at Greg's.
I don't know the statistics, but in my experience, phone calls herald good news far less than fifty percent of the time. The thought did not make me overly eager to pick up the receiver, but the evening did need a little excitement.
"Emerson Ward here."
"I smell a party, and you didn't invite me. Some friend." A man's voice. Familiar, but ... then I had it.
"I'll be damned," I said softly. "Puppy?"
"Yeah, it's me. You were maybe expecting a call from a Hollywood agent, huh?"
"Hell, I didn't even know you were still alive, you sorry son of a bitch. It's been a long time."
"Agh. You know they can't kill me. The gods look for tastier tidbits than I'd make."
"How did you find me, Puppy?"
"I called Brandt when I couldn't reach you at home. I'm surprised he's not there."
"Me, too, but he said he wasn't feeling very well."
Brandt was on the board of just about every charitable organization in the city. For him to miss the opportunity to press the flesh for a good cause meant he really was under the weather, or that a bigger priority had demanded his attention. His presence, I realized selfishly, would have made the party more bearable.
"They told me it was important, Puppy. Is it?"
"As a matter of fact, yes." His voice suddenly went serious. "I need your help, Emerson. Can you break away?"