Mr. Monk Goes to Hawaii by Goldberg, Lee (best large ebook reader .txt) 📗

breast?” Monk asked, almost running in place. The neighbors leaned in close and stared at the tattoo. “The heart symbolizes her love for Lance, the wings her willingness to let him go and have affairs with other people.”

“Cool,” the man said.

“What about you two?” the woman asked, shifting her gaze between me and Monk.

“Us?” I said. “We aren’t involved.”

“We’re investigating them,” Monk said, motioning to Lance and Roxanne. He was getting a little breathless from his shoe wiping.

The woman nodded knowingly. “I totally get it. We like to investigate, too.”

Monk smiled and turned to me. “See, I’m not the only one who does it on vacation.”

“That’s the best time.” The man winked at me and unlocked their door. “When you four are done, you’re welcome to come over for drinks. We’re up late.”

They went inside their condo and closed the door.

“What a nice couple,” Monk said to me. “It might be nice to talk shop with them later.”

He may be a brilliant detective, but there are times when Monk is completely clueless. I shoved him off the welcome mat, picked it up, and set it down on the carpet.

“Get in and stand on this,” I said, pointing down at the mat. It was an order, not a suggestion.

Monk seemed to sense that. He took a big step from the door onto the mat, careful not to touch the carpet. I slammed the door shut behind him.

“Okay, what the hell is going on here?” I asked.

“Here’s what happened,” Monk said, and started wiping his shoes on the mat again. “Lance and Roxanne fell in love and were a couple until greed got the better of them. Somehow they came into contact with Elizabeth Dahl, a wealthy widow who fell for Lance. They saw a chance to exploit that attraction for money.”

“You can stop with the shoes,” I said. “You’re inside now. You’ve probably got no soles left anyway.”

“Oh.” He stopped cleaning his feet, rolled his head, adjusted his shoulders, and continued talking. “Roxanne agreed to let Lance marry Elizabeth Dahl, as long as he got a healthy allowance that she could share and they continued to see each other on the side.”

“You make it sound so tawdry,” Lance said.

“And it isn’t?” I said incredulously. “I think the word was created specifically to describe the two of you.”

“Lizzie knew exactly what the deal was.”

“Easy for you to say now that she’s dead,” Monk said.

“It was Lizzie’s idea,” Roxanne said. “She came to us and made us an offer. If I would share Lance with her, she would share her money with us. Liz got what she wanted out of it. She got to share Lance’s body and his love with me.”

“And you got her money,” I said.

“There was nothing cruel about it,” Roxanne said. “It made her happy.”

“It made us all happy,” Lance said. “No harm, no foul.”

“Until she died and the money left to you wasn’t quite enough to set you up for life,” Monk said. “So you went searching for someone else with whom you could repeat the lucrative arrangement.”

Monk started to take a step toward them, but Roxanne wagged her finger at him as if he were a misbehaving child. He stepped back onto his little island.

“You moved to Seattle,” Monk continued, “where no one knew you and you could look for a wealthy new benefactress for Lance to marry. His job as a personal trainer and yours as a hairstylist gave you an opportunity to screen plenty of potential lovers for him. Like Beatrice Woodman, whom I’m certain we’ll find was a client at the hair salon before she became Lance’s personal-training client and, eventually, his wife.”

“That’s not how it was. We didn’t set out to find someone. Someone found me,” Lance said. “Beatrice was a bright, vivacious, but lonely woman who longed for companionship and passion in her life again. I knew I had enough love in my heart for her and Roxanne. Lizzie taught me that, and I knew that doing this would honor her memory and the special relationship we had.”

“But as soon as Beatrice Woodman died, you moved to Cleveland and found another widow to seduce,” Monk said. “You started the scheme all over again.”

“So he’s a professional, live-in boy toy and she’s his pimp,” I said. “How romantic.”

“Roxanne is the love of my life,” Lance said, slipping his arm possessively around her waist.

“And yet you marry other women for their money,” I said, then glanced at Roxanne. “What could you possibly see in this jerk?”

“His compassion,” Roxanne said. “His heart.”

“Mega dittos, baby, right back at you,” Lance said to her. “Roxy wants older women who are at the end of their lives to have one last chance to experience the joy and passion that she has with me every moment…and that they’ve never had. It’s an act of unselfish kindness, and I love her for it.”

“No, honey, it’s you that’s making the sacrifice,” Roxanne said. “And I love you for it.”

I thought I was going to puke. Roxanne kissed Lance on the cheek, then looked Monk in the eye.

“If you ask me,” she said, “he’s an angel.”

“Of death,” Monk said.

“I had nothing to do with their deaths,” Lance said. “But I had everything to do with the happiness my wives experienced before they passed on.”

“I doubt Helen Gruber would agree,” Monk said.

“I didn’t kill her,” Lance said.

“You’re the one with the best motive,” Monk said.

“And Roxanne is the runner-up,” I added.

“We were both on a catamaran on the Na Pali Coast when Helen was murdered,” Lance said. “There’s no way we could have killed her, and you know that.”

He seemed awfully proud of the alibi, to me. “Did Helen know you brought your little love honey with you to Hawaii and that you were off playing together?”

“Of course,” Lance said. “Helen knew all about Roxanne.”

“We know you’re lying,” I said.

“Really?” Lance said. “How?”

I almost said, Because Helen told us, but I caught myself.

“Because your story is a bucket of crap,” I said. “You