by Julie Hyzy
When I hung up, I said, “There it is. Debbie sent Cathy in to find that brochure. She directed her to that bathroom cabinet specifically.”
“And the reason Debbie planted it there,” Frances said as she reasoned aloud, “was to throw the police off the murder scent.”
“And, I suspect, to cause trouble for Dan. She’s angry with him. She knows Gus died of insulin poisoning, because she injected him. She also knows that you and I aren’t going to stop until we get you cleared of the charge. That means delivering the real guilty party. Debbie’s only hope now is to convince the police that Gus injected himself.”
“Hmph,” Frances said. “I’ll bet she would have let me take the fall, too, if it hadn’t been for you poking around and asking questions.”
I smiled. “Thanks, Frances.”
She shot me a glare. “Yeah, but it’s only because I pushed you to do it.”
Chapter 36
I zipped through my cell phone’s directory. “I’m not waiting until tomorrow to tell the Rosette detectives about this,” I said as I dialed. “And we’re calling Tooney, too.”
My call to Madigan at the police station went immediately to voice mail. The same thing happened when I tried Nieman’s extension. I left brief but succinct messages for both women.
“What kind of police station doesn’t answer its telephones?” Frances asked when my third attempt, to the station’s nonemergency number, went unanswered after six rings. I hung up. “Even Rodriguez and Flynn are reachable around the clock.”
“True.” I dialed Tooney. When he answered, he started to tell me that Anton, Harland, and Joslyn were winding up, but I interrupted him to share our theory.
“I think you nailed this one, Grace,” he said. “Again. Where are you right now?”
I told him.
“How about I meet you there? I don’t like the idea of you two on your own at a tiny motel that probably considers motion-sensor spotlights the height of security.”
“We’re in for the night,” I said. “But you could take my room and I could bunk with Frances.”
She frowned mightily.
“I’ll get another room, thanks,” he said. “Assuming they have a vacancy.”
“I’m betting that they do.”
“Great. I’ll be there in a little while.”
This time when I hung up, exhilaration and exhaustion hit me at once. “We did it,” I said. “I know it was Dan and Debbie. I know it.”
“And, for the first time, you and I have solved a murder without one of us almost getting killed.”
I grinned and stood to begin clearing away our dinner mess. “That makes this win ever so much sweeter.”
Frances got to her feet, too, and began crumpling up the paper bags.
I picked up my head. “What was that?”
She stopped what she was doing. “I didn’t hear anything.”
A second later, the noise came again. Tiny, clicking sounds. I pointed through the open connecting doors. “It’s coming from my room.”
She blinked, leaning forward, concentrating.
“Maybe I imagined it,” I said.
She shook her head. “No, I heard it, too.”
I held up a hand when the faint clicking resumed.
“It sounds like someone is trying to get a key in a lock,” Frances said.
“My lock.”
I lunged for the door.
Too late.
Before I could yank my chair out of the way to allow me to swing the connecting door shut, Debbie and Dan raced into my room. Dan carried a gun and pointed it toward the bed. In the two seconds it took for them to comprehend the situation, I banged the chair away and began shoving the door closed.
Still too late.
Dan slapped a purple-gloved hand against the hollow yellow door and elbowed his way into Frances’s room.
We shouted for help and turned to run, but Debbie pushed past Dan. She, too, wore gloves. Using both hands, she struck me hard, propelling me sideways and sending my butt skidding along the indoor-outdoor rug.
When Frances screamed, Debbie punched her in the stomach. Frances doubled over, gasping for breath. I scrambled up in time to grab Frances’s arm and help her into the chair.
“What is wrong with you?” I shouted at Debbie.
“Keep your voice down,” Dan said. Though he trained the gun on me, I couldn’t help notice that his hand was shaking.
Debbie waved him back toward the connecting doors. “Stay out of her reach. I’ve read up on her; she’s a wily one.” She crossed to the bed, grabbed one of the pillows, and handed it to Dan. “This will muffle the shot.”
He nodded and held the pillow up around the front of the gun’s barrel.
Crouching next to Frances, I asked, “Are you okay?”
Wheezing hard, she nodded.
How could they have found us? And, more important, how were we going to get out of this? I ran a hand along Frances’s shoulder. “Hang in there,” I said.
She sucked in a noisy breath and, gasping, tried to talk. “Spoke too soon, I guess.”
I stared up at Debbie’s angry face and counted my blessings that she wasn’t the one holding the gun. She wouldn’t hesitate to pull the trigger. Dan, on the other hand, might. Sweating profusely, the man fidgeted, glancing toward the picture window every couple of seconds as though he had X-ray vision and could see through the heavy drapes.
“You won’t get away with anything,” I said as I got to my feet. “Your only chance is to run. And you better go now, because help is on the way.”
“Yeah, right,” Dan said.
“We’re not leaving until she writes a suicide note.” Debbie pointed at Frances, who still struggled for air. “She has to admit that she killed Gus, and say that the guilt got to be too much to live with, so she killed herself, too.”
A surprised laugh bubbled up, despite my terror. “You’re crazy,” I said. “No one would ever believe that.”
“Sure they will,” Debbie said. “But even if the police do eventually figure it out, it will take a long time. Enough time to get out of the country with Dan’s half of the estate.”
“No, it won’t.” This time my laugh was forced, derisive. “Dan doesn’t get half the estate. He’s only entitled to his share of his father’s insurance policy. Gus made Anton his sole beneficiary.”
“What?” She spun to face Dan.
I read guilt on his face. He’d already learned the truth.
“Dan didn’t mention that tidbit to you, did he?” I asked in a taunting tone. “Didn’t you wonder why he was so upset about you planting that assisted-suicide brochure in his father’s room?”
“No, that’s not right. It can’t be.” She stamped her foot. “Dan?”
Perspiration dotted Dan’s receding hairline. Every time his fingers twitched, I sucked in another breath. We couldn’t die here. We’d taken every precaution to keep ourselves safe. Unbidden, my mind swirled with thoughts of Bennett and how hard he’d take the loss. And my roommates—their plans for buying the Granite Building would be quashed. Tooney would be devastated. And maybe even Joe.
I couldn’t let Frances get hurt; I couldn’t let myself get hurt.
“How did you find us?” I asked. “There’s no way you could have followed us here.”
Debbie tapped her forehead. “Thanks for the reminder.” She glanced around the room. Not finding whatever it was she was looking for, she brushed past Dan, shoulder-checking him as she stormed into my room.
I held my breath. Dan seemed to be holding his. “You can put the gun down,” I said. “We’re not going anywhere.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Debbie shouted from my room.
A second later she returned, carrying my purse. “What do you have in here?” she asked as she dropped it onto one
of Frances’s beds. “This thing weighs a ton.” She reached in and pulled out the bottle of anisette. Holding it aloft, she shook it so that its contents burbled back and forth. “You two really had a party planned tonight, didn’t you? Sorry to spoil your fun.”
“Debbie, let’s get going,” Dan said. “Maybe we should take her advice and get out of here now while we can.”
“Don’t be stupid,” she said as she continued to dig through my belongings. “If Frances doesn’t write the suicide note, the police will never stop investigating. If she confesses to the crime, it’s solved. Closed. Done. You get your money and the two of us start a new life in a new town.”
Dan’s expression darkened.
“No one will believe Frances shot herself,” I said. “And they certainly won’t believe she shot me. Because that’s your plan, isn’t it? Shoot us both and make it look like a murder-suicide.”
“Here it is.” Debbie pulled one of Indwell’s locator bracelets from my purse. “I had a feeling about you so I dropped it in there yesterday when you were busy showing the police where Percy hid the moonshine.” She shoved the bracelet into her jacket pocket. “Amazing little devices, and, if you download the app to your phone, you can trace any of them anywhere. As long as you know the bracelet’s individual code.” She smiled. “Which, of course, I do.”
Dan ran his tongue along his bottom lip. “Go on, Debbie. Give them the morphine. I want to get out of here.”
She pointed to a little pad of paper featuring Sunset View’s letterhead. “Write what I tell you,” she said.
Frances had been able to straighten herself. Her breathing had returned to almost normal. “I will not.”
“Oh, yes, you will,” Debbie said.
Dan swallowed hard. “What if we don’t get the insurance?” he asked. “What if it doesn’t go through?”
“We’ll figure something else out.” She dug through her own purse now. “As long as we’re together, right? Ah, here they are.” She pulled out two syringes. “Morphine. Easy enough for Frances to have procured from Indwell on her many trips there. Nobody will think twice about the two of you being dead from an overdose. I filled these up specially.”
“Nobody will think twice?” I asked. “Are you delusional?”
“All we need is a little time.” She wiggled the syringes back and forth. “These will provide that.”
Instinctively, I stepped in front of Frances. “And when you dose us—when you pull the cap off of those syringes—will you use your teeth?”
Under any other circumstances, the look on her face would have been comical. “What are you talking about?”
“You pull caps off with your teeth, don’t you? Every time you give an injection.” Before she could say a word, I turned to Dan. “We put that together today—this afternoon, in fact. You understand what that means, don’t you? Debbie left her DNA on those syringe caps—the ones she replaced in Percy’s refrigerator—the ones in police custody right now. And her DNA is on the cap Santiago found rolling around on Gus’s floor.”
Debbie advanced on me. “Doesn’t matter. Nobody’s looking for DNA. And once Frances writes her confession, no one will care.”
Dan’s attention swung between me and Debbie. Every time he moved, his aim shifted, too.
“Except testing is already in progress,” I said with far more calm than I was feeling. “You think we kept this to ourselves? We called Frances’s attorney immediately. And Rosette’s detectives. And our private investigator. They all know everything we do.” I purposely left out the part about Tooney being on his way here now. “You’re not getting away with it. Not a chance.”
Dan looked perplexed. “Her DNA is on those caps?” he asked. Turning to her, he repeated the question, then said, “You’re not going to get away with this, are you?”
“They’re bluffing,” Debbie said.
“No, they’re not,” Dan said. “And if they arrest you, you’ll turn me in. I know you will.”
“Dan, baby. Never. They’re lying. They’re just guessing.”
“No, they’re not,” he said again. And before I could blink, he fired.
The gunshot, though muffled, made me yelp.
Debbie crumpled, grabbing at her abdomen. Crimson blood blossomed and grew beneath her outstretched, grasping fingers. Her mouth made a silent O and she stared at Dan, her face a mixture of hatred and disbelief. She fell sideways, her shoulder and head hitting the end of the bed before she toppled, lifeless to the floor.
I made it to her side in seconds, but there was nothing I could do for her.
Dan took a step forward. “She would have turned me in,” he said, looking eager for absolution. His lips were the color of dead fish. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
Using one hand to cover his mouth, he swayed from side to side.
We had seconds before he’d turn the gun on us.
“I don’t have the stomach for this sort of thing, you understand,” he said from between his fingers. “I couldn’t do it myself. Not to Dad. That’s why . . .” Still swaying he blinked, striving to regain control. “I’m sorry. I don’t have any choice. You have to understand.” Bile must have risen up the back of his throat. He coughed, then choked it back down and turned his head to the side.
I grabbed the bottle of anisette from the bed. Holding it by its neck, I swung the heavy bottle in a wide arc, making contact with Dan’s head in a bright, shattering crash. Glass shards exploded over us and licorice-scented alcohol poured down Dan’s surprised face.
As the bottle connected, I flashed back to a similar move I’d made a few months back wielding an antique club. That weapon had been much heavier, however, and had packed a much heftier wallop.
Dan staggered sideways but didn’t fall as I’d hoped he would. In his shaky hands, the gun wobbled. He fired wildly. Miraculously, he’d maintained his grip on the pillow long enough to muffle the sound. A second later, the beleaguered cushion dropped to the floor.
Before he could get another shot off, I jammed the bottle’s jagged edge into his gun arm, using every bit of strength I had. The pain made him gasp, but he still didn’t fall. He had too many clothes on for the glass to have enough effect. I thrust the bottle at his face, but he ducked away. When he pulled the gun up again, I knew I was a goner.
Until a second bottle of anisette crashed across the back of his skull.
This time, he fell.
Frances stood behind his bloodied body, holding the neck of the broken bottle like a bat, looking as though she wanted him to get back up so she could smash his head again.
“Thought you needed a little help this time,” she said.
“Thank you, Frances.” I said. And then I hugged her.
Chapter 37
Because Debbie was beyond all help, she was beyond our concern. Dan, on the other hand, began to stir almost immediately. We had mere moments before he’d come to. I grabbed the gun and moved it to the bed, out of his reach.
When I flipped him onto his stomach, he moaned.
Frances delivered a quick kick to the back side of his leg. “Serves you right.”
With one knee wedged hard on Dan’s back to keep him down, my gaze raced around the room, looking for something to tie him up with.
“The phone,” I said, pointing.
Frances lifted the old-fashioned instrument from the nightstand and brought it over. I unhooked the curly cord and used it to tie Dan’s hands behind his back.
I unhooked the flat cord from the back of the phone and had Frances detach the other end from the wall jack. Pulling the long gray wire up, I bound Dan’s ankles together.
“That should keep him out of trouble,” I said. “Now, let’s call the police.”
* * *
By the time Rosette’s homicide detectives showed up, a pair of uniformed officers had secured the scene. F
rances and I sat on the bed in my room while paramedics tended to Dan’s bloody wounds and whiny complaints.
Madigan strode in first, her partner trotting along behind. “What do we have here?” she asked.
The uniformed cops provided a dispassionate account of what they’d found and what steps they’d taken. Madigan and Nieman nodded and jotted notes. After assessing the situation themselves, the two of them came through the connecting doors to talk to us.
“We’ll take your statements now,” Madigan said. “Separately.”
While they interrogated Frances outside, I took up a position in the connecting doorway to watch the goings-on in the other room. Though Dan had regained enough stability to sit up straight, he remained on the floor. The paramedics were having a difficult time bandaging his head and chest as the man rocked side to side, moaning whenever anyone tried to touch him.
“Try to stay quiet, sir,” one of the paramedics said. “We need to take you to the hospital.”
To my surprise, Dan began to weep. “She talked me into it,” he cried. “I didn’t want to. I didn’t. I swear.”
The two uniformed cops were bright enough to drag Madigan back in to hear what Dan had to say.
“What happened?” she asked.
He touched his forehead, felt the swath of bandages wrapped there, and began sobbing anew. “It’s all Debbie’s fault. I never wanted to hurt anybody. All I wanted was for my dad to stop wasting all his money.”
Crouching next to him, Madigan adopted a more soothing manner than I’d believed her capable of. “It’s okay now. Everything will be all right. As long as you tell me what happened. From the beginning.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” he said again. “It was hers.”
“I understand completely,” Madigan said. “And after a stop at the hospital, we’re going to take you back to the station so you can tell us all about it. But first, you have the right to remain silent . . .”
As she recited the rest of the Miranda warning, I blew out a breath of relief. She heard the exhalation, locked eyes with me, and gave a shrug as if to say, “Hey, I was just doing my job.”
