Murder Likes It Hot

by Tracy Weber

  I pulled into a convenience store lot and turned off the engine. “Okay, Rene, talk.”

  “While you were walking down memory lane with Rainbow’s family photographs, I was sorting through the mail.”

  “I saw you. I take it you found something interesting.”

  “You could say that. April Rhodes is Rainbow’s mother, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “I found an open envelope addressed to her.”

  “That’s hardly surprising. She lives there.” I paused. “Or at least she does part time. If her husband’s telling the truth, she’s been gone more lately than she’s been home.”

  “Yes, but this wasn’t junk mail or a credit card statement. It was a certified letter from a law firm.”

  That got my attention. “Is Rainbow’s mother in legal trouble?”

  “That’s what I thought at first, or that maybe she was filing for divorce. I didn’t have time to look at it before Dean came back from the kitchen, so I borrowed it.”

  “Borrowed?”

  She swished her hand through the air. “Borrowed, stole … potayto, potahto. I put it back while Dean got the towel. He didn’t have a clue.” She looked insanely, justifiably proud of herself.

  “Well, don’t keep me guessing here. What did the letter say?”

  She pulled out her cell phone, pressed a few random-looking places on the screen, and handed it to me. “I took a picture of it. See for yourself.”

  The letter on her screen was dated October 27.

  From: The Law Offices of Johnson, Meek, and Fredrickson

  To: Ms. April A. Rhodes

  We received your request for a one-time payment of ten thousand dollars ($10,000) from the trust fund of Rayne Rhodes. This request has been denied. As outlined in Ms. Rhodes’ trust documents, fund disbursements are conditional on her maintaining a grade point average of three point five or higher. Ms. Rhodes’ first monthly scholastic report for the 2016–2017 school year was due on October 10. Until we receive this documentation, we are unable to release the requested funds or deposit future monthly stipends for living expenses. We will reconsider this request upon receipt of the required documentation.

  Sincerely,

  Fred Fredrickson, Attorney at Law

  I swiped across the screen, but there were no additional pages.

  “Interesting, huh?” Rene asked.

  I handed the phone back to her. “Email this to me, would you?” I drummed my fingers against the steering wheel and stared out the windshield. Rainbow had told me about a trust fund, but she’d said it was her mother’s. Did she know it actually belonged to her?

  Rainbow’s mother could have easily deceived her. Her grandparents died when she was five, and the payments had likely been electronic. Periodic grade reports would have been trickier for April to get without a teen’s knowledge, but she could have asked Rainbow’s teachers directly. I bit back a rising sense of anger. Did this poor kid have any adults in her life who didn’t take advantage of her?

  “Earth to Kate,” Rene said. “What are you thinking?”

  “That I’m glad I didn’t grow up in Rainbow’s family.”

  Rene tapped the top of her phone screen. “Did you notice the date on the letterhead?”

  “Yes. October 27.”

  “It would have arrived right around the time April came home. Isn’t that when Dean started looking for Rainbow?”

  I felt my jaw clench. “Yes.”

  “You see what that means, don’t you? That jerk wasn’t looking for Rainbow because he cared about her. Her mother probably doesn’t care all that much either. They both needed her to get back in school so they so they could pick a few more dollars off the money tree.”

  I mumbled words so foul, they might be illegal.

  Rene continued. “The letter is addressed to Rainbow’s mother. Do you think she asked for the ten thousand dollars?”

  “No. The timing’s off. The request would have been sent not too long before the denial letter was written, and Dean said April was gone until Halloween. I think Dean asked for the money, pretending to be his wife. He probably didn’t know about the grade requirement. When the letter arrived and Mommy Dearest returned home, they both realized they were screwed.”

  “Unless they found Rainbow and got her back in school,” Rene added.

  “Exactly.”

  “Where do you think Rainbow’s mother is now?”

  “I have no idea. Stoned in a crack house somewhere? Off selling her body for drugs? Trying to track down her daughter herself?” I pointed to the phone. “That letter tells us one thing for sure. Dean definitely doesn’t know where Rainbow is. If he did, he’d have brought her home by now.”

  Rene dropped the phone back inside her purse. “Maybe, maybe not. He certainly won’t get more money out of the trust fund if Rainbow’s in prison. Maybe he’s trying to figure out a new end game.”

  “It’s possible, I suppose.” I turned the key in the ignition. The Honda’s engine rumbled to life.

  “Does any of this help solve Gabriel’s murder?” Rene asked.

  “Honestly, I don’t see how it would. I’ll call that trust fund lawyer, Fred Fredrickson, after we get back to Seattle, but if he’s anything like Dale, he won’t tell me anything.”

  “So where does that leave us?”

  “Exactly where we were before. Trying to find Rainbow.”

  fifteen

  The Seattle area traffic gods extracted their revenge on the drive home. Interstate 5’s infamous Tacoma traffic netted us almost sixty minutes of stop-and-go driving. The downtown Seattle corridor added another half hour. I dropped Rene off at Infant Gratification and asked her to give Sam my condolences. By the time I got to the studio, the Slow Flow teacher was already checking in students for her seven o’clock class.

  “Hey Kate,” she said. “I don’t know who taught the noon class today, but they left the place in a shambles. The garbage cans were all full, and there were more leaves on the carpet than outside on the trees. I’m pretty sure the yoga room floor hadn’t been swept either. I got here early for my five-thirty class, so I cleaned everything myself, but you might want to remind whoever it is that this is a shared space. Students notice when the studio is dirty, and it’s not my job to clean up after everyone else.”

  I felt blood rush to my cheeks. “I’ll talk to them.” Informing her that the inconsiderate boob was yours truly would have served no purpose other than to make us both feel uncomfortable. Instead, I thanked her for the extra effort and made a mental note to add a small bonus to her next paycheck.

  The moment my butt hit the driver’s seat, I pulled out my cell phone and closely examined the photograph Rene had sent me. White parchment, black print, blue-and-gold letterhead. The twist about Rainbow’s trust was certainly interesting, but how did it help me? The letter said nothing about the teen’s current whereabouts. Could there be a connection to Gabriel’s murder? A shadowy motive was taking shape in my mind, but I wasn’t sure I believed it.

  The letter gave me more questions than answers, but it had also introduced me to someone who might be able to answer them: Fred Fredrickson, Attorney at Law.

  I pulled up a browser and clicked on the website for Johnson, Meek, and Fredrickson. The office had closed for the weekend almost two hours ago, but I dialed the phone number just in case. The voicemail message encouraged me to call back on Monday.

  I pulled up an Internet white pages site. Fred Fredrickson’s home address and phone number weren’t listed. There wasn’t even an F. Fredrickson to give me false hope. I was disappointed, but only a little. Even if I’d managed to track down the administrator of Rainbow’s trust after-hours on a Friday, chances were pretty much zero that he’d have divulged information to Rainbow’s yoga teacher, no matter how good her intentions.

  If he was con
tacted by the police, however …

  I pulled out Martinez’s card. She answered on the second ring.

  I dispensed with the pleasantries and jumped right in. “I promised I’d call you if I learned anything about Rainbow.”

  Her voice sharpened with interest. “You found her?”

  “No, but I have new information. Turns out, Rainbow’s a trust fund kid. Her mother and stepfather have been living off her inheritance for years. I strongly suspect that’s why her stepfather came looking for her. He needed his golden gosling to come back home.”

  “Reeeeally.” She drew out the word, making three distinct syllables. “I’ve spoken to that man three times now, and he never once mentioned a trust fund. How did you find this out?”

  I hesitated. “Umm … let’s say a friend told me.” I didn’t think “borrowing” and photographing mail was a federal offense, but I wasn’t willing to take any chances.

  Martinez sighed. “In other words, it might not have been strictly legal.”

  I hoped Martinez heard the grin in my voice. “I’m exercising my right to remain silent. But I know who the trust administrator is.” I gave her Fred Fredrickson’s contact information. “The office is closed for the weekend, but maybe you can use your police magic to locate him.”

  “If I had any magic, I’d have found Rainbow already.” She paused. “Then again, maybe the trust is why I haven’t.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve been assuming Rainbow has a few hundred dollars on her at most. That limits where she can hide. If she has thousands, she has options I haven’t considered.”

  “There’s no way she has that kind of money. At least she didn’t. I don’t think she even knows the trust is hers and not her mother’s. But I do think her trust might be connected to Gabriel’s murder.”

  “How?”

  “The trust fund gives her parents thousands of reasons—maybe millions, depending on how large the fund is—to want Rainbow home.” I fleshed out my theory by saying it out loud. “The trust has strings attached. Stepdaddy dearest won’t get a red cent unless Rainbow gets back in school and maintains a high GPA.”

  “How would killing Gabriel accomplish that?” Martinez asked.

  “Stick with me for a second, because the rest of this might be a stretch. Gabriel wasn’t happy when Rainbow’s stepfather showed up at the center. Their argument got physical, and Gabriel threatened to call the cops. There’s no way he would have sent Rainbow back to that jerk without a fight. He once had a case like hers that went bad on him. The kid committed suicide.”

  “That’s terrible.”

  “Yes, and Gabriel wanted no part in a repeat performance. What if Dean came back to the center that night looking for Rainbow and found Gabriel instead? Heck, he might have found Rainbow and Gabriel both. The two men could have gotten into a fight. Dean could be the shooter.”

  “So basically you’re saying that the stepfather came to Seattle in the middle of the night, found Rainbow and Gabriel at the center, took the gun away from the kid, and shot Gabriel with it?”

  “It’s a theory.”

  “I don’t buy it.”

  “I said it might be a stretch, but it’s the best idea I’ve got.”

  “I have a better one. The kid was at the center, exactly like you said. She and Gabriel fought. She shot him.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “Kate, you’re not being rational. The physical evidence points to the kid. All of it.” I imagined Martinez ticking off points on her fingers. “First, we have the missing drawing. Who would have wanted it except for the teen?”

  “A fan of her work?” The idea sounded ludicrous, even to me.

  “Second, the gun. Ballistics confirmed that the handgun found at the scene is the murder weapon.” She paused, as if considering whether or not to continue. “Third, we got a match on the fingerprints. We’re ninety-nine percent sure they’re the kid’s.”

  “I thought you hadn’t found any fingerprint matches in the system.”

  “We didn’t. I sent a patrol officer out to the kid’s house this morning.”

  Dean had admitted that he’d spoken with the police, but he’d conveniently neglected to mention that they’d been at his house. Then again, why would he? The only reason he’d spoken to us at all was to score Rene’s money.

  Martinez continued. “The guy’s a jerk, but he’s a cooperative jerk. The officer got prints off the kid’s bedroom door knob and a water glass on her nightstand. We’ll double check when we catch Rainbow, but the prints from the bedroom match the ones on the magazine. She’s our shooter. The judge issued an arrest warrant this afternoon.”

  Martinez’s words sucked the oxygen out of my Honda. The space felt cramped. My lungs, empty. I opened the door to let in some air. “It doesn’t make any sense. Why would Rainbow kill Gabriel? He was on her side.”

  “I don’t know, Kate. We still need to talk to the kid. But it makes a lot more sense than the story you came up with. Remember that cash box we found the gun in?”

  “Yes.”

  “It was wiped clean too, but the chef—Chuck, I think his name is?—said it’s a petty cash box that he keeps in the pantry. Rainbow volunteered in the kitchen a couple of days a week, so she would have known about it. According to Chuck, there was over three hundred dollars inside when he left that night. When we found it, the box was empty except for the gun.”

  I groaned. “That’s why you said Rainbow had a few hundred dollars. You think she stole that money.” The Rainbow I knew wasn’t capable of premeditated murder, but swiping petty cash? Absolutely. I knew that firsthand.

  “It certainly seems like it. Like I theorized at the scene, the kid decided to get out of town, so she went back to the center to score some quick cash. The victim surprised her in the act, and she panicked. She may not have intended to shoot Gabriel, Kate, but we’re pretty sure that she did.”

  I got out of the car and started pacing. Back and forth, forth and back, from one end of my car to the other. “If she thought far enough ahead to wipe the outside of the gun and the cash box, why didn’t she wipe the magazine?”

  “No one said she was a professional killer.”

  Martinez’s theories made more sense than I cared to admit, but deep down inside, I didn’t believe them. At least not all of them. Rainbow going back to the center to steal cash? Sure. Rainbow panicking when she was interrupted in the act? Absolutely. But Rainbow following Gabriel to his office, pulling the gun out of her backpack, and then shooting him point-blank in the chest? Not a chance.

  I spent the rest of the night brainstorming theories with Michael and begging forgiveness for saddling him with Ed and Lonnie. Michael had modified the latch on their cage, so the prison break problem was solved at least for the time being. Managing his clients’ reactions to the little fur beasts? Well, that hadn’t gone nearly as well.

  After several complaints and two threats to call the health department, he’d decided to relocate the little monsters to the storage room. The boys weren’t happy, but it would do for now. Later this weekend, I’d implement plan B, which was to sweet-talk Dale and Dharma into picking up their new pets on their way back to Orcas after the fundraising event.

  It was the obvious solution, now that I thought about it. Dale and Dharma ran an animal rescue. Surely they had space for two tiny rodents. How much trouble could Ed and Lonnie be compared to sixty-four donkeys, thirty-four goats, and a Jack Russell Terriorist?

  Problem theoretically solved, I wrapped my arms around my husband’s shoulders. “I love you, you know.”

  He took my hand and glanced meaningfully at the staircase to the bedroom. “Then prove it.”

  I did. Multiple times. With pleasure. For one of very few times in six frustrating, no-baby-making months, there was nothing mechanical about it.

  si
xteen

  Saturday passed and bled into Sunday without further progress. I taught yoga classes, visited Ed and Lonnie at the pet store, and circled the blocks around Teen Path HOME hoping to find Rainbow, or at least someone I recognized who could lead me to her. Other than a locked door and a sign reading Closed until Further Notice, I found nothing. If Martinez had better luck, she didn’t call to let me know about it. I considered calling Dharma and Dale to get their advice, but what would they tell me? Keep looking? I already planned to do that. Starting that morning at Gabriel’s memorial.

  I pulled into Queen Anne Memorial’s parking lot at nine-forty and parked near a small group of teens gathered on the lawn near an ancient cedar tree. Henderson was with them, interviewing two girls I recognized from the center. I tucked my head down and hurried to the facility’s entrance, hoping he wouldn’t notice me.

  Avoidance was futile, I knew. Henderson would inevitably confront me inside. But that was the lesser of two evils. If he stopped me now, I’d never make it through the front door. I needed one hundred percent of my willpower to keep from jumping back inside my Honda and driving away.

  I hadn’t attended a funeral since my father’s death almost five years before. I kidded myself that I’d recovered—and for good reason. I’d gone on with my life. These days, I had Michael, Bella, and Serenity Yoga to keep me on kilter. So I was caught off guard when PTSD-like memories assaulted my senses. The sickeningly sweet smell of burgundy roses and ultra-white lilies. The sour taste of bile on the back of my tongue. The murmur of black-clad voices commenting about how peaceful my father’s corpse appeared.

  They were wrong. Dad hadn’t looked peaceful, not in the slightest.

  He’d looked dead.

  My stomach lurched. Maybe coming here hadn’t been such a great idea after all.

  A large man holding a clipboard and wearing a somber expression stopped me at the door. His energy felt hard, unyielding. A black-clad bouncer outside a melancholy nightclub.

  “I need your name and identification, ma’am.”