Beauty Expos Are Murder

by Libby Klein

  His hands did a lot of roving, considering my jeans had shrunk so tight after the sugar in the iced tea that my cell phone was popping out like the timer on a Thanksgiving turkey. I couldn’t squeeze a dime down the waistband, yet he felt around like a blind man trying to memorize my assets.

  “Here you go.” It was Connie. He hit the Answer button and held it up to my ear.

  “Thanks.” Uck. “Short and sweet, I’m being arrested.”

  There was a moment of stunned silence. “The warehouse was purchased nine years ago by Clementine Newsome.”

  Holy crap.

  CHAPTER 54

  “Are you kidding me?” Officer Birkwell picked me up from the mug-shot room. “I’ve only been on duty fifteen minutes. I just saw Amber in the tank, and Joanne Junk’s being fingerprinted. I had to trade Simmons my next day off to process you. What have you done now?”

  He dropped my file on his desk and I took a seat.

  “Forget about that for a second. I need your help proving Amber didn’t kill Temarius Jackson, and we need to move fast before the evidence disappears.”

  He gave me a wary look under lidded eyes. “I can’t get involved with that.”

  “You know she’s a good cop and someone here is setting her up. I just need some information.”

  He picked up a pen like he was taking notes. “Like what, for instance?”

  “What happens when a cop confiscates a gun from a crime scene?”

  His eyes scanned the room. “There’s a chain of custody. They write it on their report, log it into the system, then turn it into evidence.”

  “So, if Amber turned a gun into evidence eight weeks ago, what kind of record would there be for that?”

  “She would have her copy of the report and a case number. And there would be a record of her logging the gun into the evidence file on the computer. Plus, she’d have signed the logbook when she put it in the evidence locker.”

  “Would she, like, go put it in a box in the evidence room herself?”

  “After-hours she could. If she got the key from the watch commander. If she turned it in during the day, she’d sign it in with the property clerk.” The tone of his voice changed. “Spell your full name.”

  “You already know that.”

  Kieran Dunne approached the desk and gave me a look of contempt. “Welcome back. As soon as you’re processed, I’ll be conducting your interview.”

  I stared him down. “I can’t wait.”

  He gave me a haughty look down his perfect nose. “Neither can I.”

  He started walking away and I called after him, “Shayla Rose told me that she knows you’ve been ghosting her.”

  His eyebrows dipped slightly and he looked up to his hairline. “Who?”

  “Shayla Rose, the biochemist you’ve been dating.”

  Only his eyes moved, and they shifted slightly to the right. Then his lip curled and he blew me off.

  Officer Birkwell’s eyebrows shot up and his eyes grew wide. “What was that all about?”

  I said, more to myself than to him, “Just checking something. What if a dirty cop wanted to keep some evidence for themself?”

  “I don’t know anyone who has ever done that.”

  “But what if they wanted to?”

  “They wouldn’t put it on the report, that’s for sure.”

  “Can you look up Amber’s report from eight weeks ago? The one where she confiscated the gun?”

  He gave me a frustrated look and sighed. After some keystrokes he pulled up a database. “What was the call for?”

  “Domestic disturbance.”

  He paged through a few records. “Here’s the only domestic reported by Amber in the past three months where a weapon was seized. The wife refused to press charges, so Amber confiscated a thirty-eight at the scene for the wife’s protection.”

  “Okay. Where is the evidence report that gets turned in with the gun?”

  He clicked a link and an error message popped up. “No report with that number. Huh. That’s not right. Let me check the evidence log.” He typed some more and opened a new screen. He sat up very straight and ran his eyes around the room, then looked over his shoulder, then back at the screen. “There’s a report missing. See these numbers? They’re sequential: 115-818, 115-819, then it goes to 115-821. Amber’s evidence record from the domestic was 820. It appears to have been deleted.”

  I immediately felt vindicated.

  An officer passed the desk and her radio crackled. I stretched to release some of my tension before it snapped my neck like a rubber band. “So, someone deleted the evidence file from Amber’s report?”

  Officer Birkwell tabbed back over to the database. “That’s what it looks like. Everyone has a unique ID code for signing into the evidence log. Here, you can see my code was entered four minutes ago. If I enter or delete a record, it leaves a trace.”

  “Who’s been in there recently?”

  “In the past two weeks Carter, Consuelos, Crabtree, and McBride have logged in. And now me.”

  “Does that mean one of them deleted the record?”

  He squeezed his eyes half shut and shook his head. “We don’t know when the record was deleted. I think that’s a question for IT. But there’s also a written log that everyone has to sign when they turn in evidence. I can check to see if Amber signed the logbook, but I’ll need a little time to get in there.” Officer Birkwell’s eyes darkened and his expression changed.

  Kieran Dunne grabbed me under the armpit and jerked me to my feet. Well, he jerked me halfway to my feet. I was several inches taller than him and he couldn’t reach high enough to get me all the way to my feet, so I had to help him. “Let’s go.”

  I passed one last look to Officer Birkwell. “You need to call IT to fix that virus before it spreads.”

  CHAPTER 55

  Kieran Dunne led me down the hall to an interrogation room with a table and two benches that had been bolted to the floor. A window made out of a one-way mirror was on the wall next to the door. I knew who was on the other side.

  “Have a seat.” Kieran dropped a file folder on the table between us that said Jackson, Temarius—Homicide on the tab. “So, tell me what happened the night of April the first.”

  “I went back to my home after a long day setting up for the Beauty Expo at Convention Hall, where I met Shayla Rose.”

  “And who is Shayla Rose?”

  “She’s the woman who was catfished through her Facebook page so her antiaging concentrates could be stolen while she was on a date.”

  He looked up and blinked. “Uh-huh. Now, tell me what happened at the home of Temarius Jackson.”

  I looked Kieran Dunne dead in the eyes, then I looked at the one-way mirror on the wall. “I went to the home of Temarius Jackson and found a burner phone in the couch. There was only one contact.”

  Kieran scribbled some notes on the file. “What time was this?”

  The door opened, and Chief Fischer entered the room. “I’ll take it from here, Dunne.”

  Bingo.

  Kieran began to protest. “I just got started.”

  The chief put his hand on Kieran’s shoulder. “I got it.”

  Kieran Dunne stood in a huff and straightened his tie. “This isn’t finished, Fischer.”

  Before he could shut the door, the chief said, “Dunne. Go get the other one and take her back down to fingerprinting. Stay with her and make sure she cooperates. She smudged the prints the last time.”

  Kieran ground his teeth like he was trying to get his temper in check. “I don’t work for you.” He left and shut the door behind him.

  I locked eyes with the chief. “Didn’t want him on the other side of the glass, did you?”

  Chief Fischer smiled. “We like to thwart Internal Affairs whenever we can. Cops should look after their own. Not investigate them.”

  “But you don’t have any problem framing one for murder.”

  He didn’t blink.

  I examined h
is face. “I bet you are really good-looking with glasses on. Do you actually wear them, or were you just Clark Kenting? And did you specifically pick glasses that look like Kieran’s, or was that a coincidence?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Now, I’m going to ignore for a minute that you broke into a crime scene that was sealed. Tell me about this cell phone you found. Why didn’t you turn it in to the police?”

  “I didn’t know who I could trust.”

  “You can trust me. I’m in charge of the station. We’ll need that cell phone for evidence.”

  “You’re in charge of the shift assignments too, aren’t you?”

  His eyes flicked with impatience. “I am.”

  “Did you plan to frame Amber from the start, or was it a last-minute decision because she had a gun in evidence?”

  He tapped his finger on the folder in front of him. “Amber has arrested both you and your aunt for murder this past year. This is your chance to help me put her away.”

  “Why didn’t you frame someone who was off-duty? Then you wouldn’t have had to use the ice cubes to mask the time of death until you could get Amber over there. Unless you were setting up your alibi.”

  His eyes narrowed slightly and his lip curled, but his voice was perfectly calm. “Miss McAllister, Poppy. You’re in way over your head here. You have no idea what you’re talking about. I would hate to have to charge you as an accessory to murder because you didn’t cooperate. What would happen to your aunt if you weren’t there to take care of her? She could fall down the stairs and break her neck. You don’t want that on your conscience, do you?”

  My veins felt like they were pumping ice water. “Are you threatening to hurt Aunt Ginny? Because my neighbors won’t be as easy to fool with gunshots outside their windows as Mrs. Rotnitzky was.”

  He sprang to his feet, his face flushed and his nostrils flaring. He pounded his fists on the table. “Where’s the damn cell phone!”

  I leaned back so far I almost fell off the bench. “I’ll tell you everything if you give me immunity. But first I need to know that there’s really no one in that room who can burn me with the information later.”

  He sat down with a cocky grin. “Go knock on the glass and see if anyone knocks back.”

  I got up and walked to the mirror. I could see the reflection of the chief, watching me. I held up my hands, still cuffed together, and made a fist. His hands moved to the edge of the table and his back arched like a loaded spring. I pretended to knock on the glass, but instead reached over and slapped the light switch off. The room went dark and silent. I spun around and caught Chief Fischer’s fingertips glowing bright blue.

  He flew off the bench and slammed the lights back on. His face was twisted in rage.

  My eyes locked on his. “Clementine is a really unusual name. You had to know I’d remember it from the picture of your dog.”

  His brow furrowed and he pulled his gun. He grabbed me by the throat and pushed me into the glass. “You think you’re so clever, don’t you?”

  He covered my mouth with his hand and dug the nose of his gun into my ribs. Then he opened the door a crack and looked out. He threw it open all the way and prodded me. “Move!”

  He pushed me through the door and dragged me farther down the hall.

  My blood was thudding in my ears and the gun bit into my ribs, but all I could think was how much I loved Gia and Henry and Aunt Ginny. Also, I was really glad that I’d worn good underwear.

  He opened a metal door that led to the stairwell and shoved me through. I tripped and cracked my knee on the concrete step. “What are you going to do? Shoot me here in the police station? IT has already found where you logged into the evidence log and deleted Amber’s record.” I hope.

  “There are no cameras in this part of the building. My report will say you tried to escape and grabbed my gun.”

  “Even if you kill me, they’ll still know it was you. Shayla Rose can ID you. How much of a disguise is a pair of glasses? And that blue glow will last a couple of days.”

  He grabbed my wrist and pulled me to my feet. He used his gun to corral me down the steps. “Go!”

  “How could you kill that kid? Do you have no decency in you at all? I understand that he’d become a liability. He made a mess with Shayla’s face cream, and he tracked that stuff everywhere, including your warehouse. And I’m sure he was being a nuisance, complaining about doing your dirty work when he wanted to go straight, but you killed him like his life didn’t matter. Losing the burner phone that could be tracked to you was the last straw, wasn’t it? What? Is it registered to you? Does it have your fingerprints on it? A voice mail? Cell tower records?”

  Chief Fischer said nothing. He poked me in the back with his gun and prodded me through a door into the basement under the police station.

  “But why’d you kill Lance Rubin? As far as I can tell, he didn’t know anything about you. He was busy trying to create some miracle cure for aging.”

  We reached a dark hallway and the chief’s fingertips lit up brightly.

  “It was the glow, wasn’t it? His fingers were glowing the same blue from mixing Shayla’s creams. I bet he took one look at you and knew you had stolen her samples. And since your face wasn’t glowing, he knew you weren’t just putting it on. He figured out exactly what you were doing, didn’t he? All he had to do was report it to the right person and your career would be over. But when did you see each other in the dark?”

  “If you don’t shut up, I’m going to crack you in the head and drag you down the hall by your hair.”

  Come on, give me something. All the other bad guys love to monologue. “I bet you were looking for that burner phone in Shayla’s booth after the Expo closed. No wonder you agreed to patrol Convention Hall overnight for security. Did you catch the doctor mixing beauty creams and experimenting with the mask?”

  He pushed his gun into my neck. “You don’t know anything.”

  “That’s it, isn’t it?” His eyes bore into mine and I saw a mixture of fear and wrath. It was a lethal combination. He would surely kill me before tonight was over. “I bet he confronted you, and you killed him in a panic because you were about to be exposed. You fought with him and stepped on the power supply. Then you hit him in the head with your nightstick. It’s not on your belt anymore. Where’d you stash it?”

  He dragged me to a door, and I could see through a tiny window that it was a dimly lit parking garage. He can’t kill me in here. It would leave too much evidence. He must be planning to drive me somewhere and dump my body.

  He threw me against the door. “For god’s sake, shut up!”

  “I get why you tossed the place and threw a bunch of Agnes Pfeister-Pinze’s flyers around to make it look like she’d finally snapped. That wouldn’t be hard to prove since Dr. Rubin had just been down to the station to press charges against her. But why did you put him on the exam bed and cover him with the mask? You’d already knocked him out. Why not shoot him?”

  He flung the door to the garage open and threw me against the wall. My head slammed against the cinder block and I saw stars. He threw his body into mine and put the gun to my head. “I had no idea he would be there or that that creepy mask was deadly. But I’m going to do to you exactly what I did to him if you don’t stop talking. I’m going to bash you in the head and force that mask on you until I see it eat the skin off your face. Is that what you want?”

  “ No.”

  “Then shut up!”

  He dragged me across the parking lot, and I saw my window to escape closing. “Why in the world are you making counterfeit face cream to sell online? There has to be an easier way to get rich. Why don’t you just sell the cocaine you confiscate like all the other dirty cops?”

  “You can’t sell cocaine anonymously on the Internet.” He grabbed my wrist and twisted hard. He started pulling me toward an unmarked black SUV.

  “Well, just so you know, Shayla Rose’s Immortality wasn’t supposed to glow
in the dark. You went to all the trouble to mix the glow sticks into the cold cream for nothing. It’s not even approved for sale by the FDA.”

  He threw me against the SUV and clocked me on the side of the temple with his gun. “I warned you.”

  Blood trickled down the side of my face. I knew no one was coming. I would die tonight, so I had nothing left to lose. “Just tell me one thing. Was it personal with Amber, or was she just the most convenient?”

  “I’d like to know that too.” Amber stepped out from behind a police SUV with her gun pointed at the chief.

  Chief Fischer yanked me in front of him and pointed his gun at my temple. “Drop your weapon or I’ll shoot her in the head. I’ve been wanting to for twenty minutes. Just give me a reason.”

  Amber kept her aim. “Why’d you frame me, Clayton?”

  “You know why.”

  “I wasn’t a threat to you.”

  “It was just a matter of time. I needed someone to take the fall, and I didn’t think anyone would look too hard to prove your innocence, hotshot.”

  “All this for wrinkle cream? You killed two people.”

  Fischer’s breathing was getting erratic. “It’s not about the wrinkle cream. It’s my retirement. It’s what I’m due. I’ll make more money selling fake Shayla Rose than I have in my 401(k). And there’s no way I’m letting you, or her, or a rich plastic surgeon pull it out from under me.”

  I managed to get a breath and squeaked out, “What about Temarius? Did he have to die?”

  “No punk kid in the system is going to destroy my career and my reputation because he suddenly wants to go straight and confess.”

  Amber took a step closer, and Chief Fischer’s arm tightened around me. I was getting a little dizzy and knew I might pass out soon. “What were you going to do if Amber had an emergency and got stuck at another crime scene when she was supposed to be caught standing over him?”

  Amber cocked her head but held her arm steady. “Were Crabtree and Simmons your plan B?”

  The chief snarled, “I had more contingency plans than you can imagine. Now get out of my way or you’re going down with your friend. It would be easy to prove you killed each other when she turned on you. I laid the groundwork for that yesterday.”