This tendency to assume I couldn’t take care of myself was one of Hector’s few faults. “Fine,” I told him. “Stay right here.” I turned to the detective. “Let’s go to my office.”
“Tell me about last week’s owners’ meeting,” Detective Jackson began.
My eyes widened. We’d gone to my office and I was seated at my desk, Jackson in one of the guest chairs. This arrangement should have given me some sense of control, but it just made me self-conscious.
“What do you want to know?” I asked. “I told you all about it the other night.” I’d shared a pizza with Jackson and Marty two nights ago, and I’d been pretty clear about my feelings toward Tommy. But Jackson had to know I’d just been blowing off steam. Didn’t he?
“You told me a lot of things the other night,” he said. “Among them was that you wanted to kill Tommy May.” He looked at me expectantly.
I stared at him. “Well, I mean…you don’t really think…” I couldn’t even finish the thought. “Marty said the same thing!”
“Yes, but Marty was with me all last night and this morning when Tommy was killed. Was anybody with you?”
“No, I—” I couldn’t believe he was seriously asking me if I had an alibi. This was crazy, and it was starting to get truly frightening, probably because of the little notebook Jackson had pulled out of his pocket. That little notebook told me this wasn’t just a simple chat. That little notebook was for writing things down that a suspect said under questioning.
At least he hadn’t read me my rights. Yet.
“You told me Tommy threatened to close the Palace,” Jackson reminded me.
“That was a misunderstanding,” I said. “Tommy and I talked about it last night. He said he hadn’t made himself clear—that he wasn’t arguing to close the theater for good, just for some financial restructuring, so we could become a non-profit or something.”
The detective looked at me. “That’s quite a misunderstanding.”
I blew out a breath. “I know what you’re thinking. Was that just something Tommy said to get me on his side because he wanted my help?”
“Was it?”
I blinked. “I suppose we’ll never know.”
Jackson wrote something. “You say Tommy wanted your help. Did you help him?” The pencil remained poised over the notebook.
“I think so,” I said. “I realized that he was the last person who would have wanted S dead because S was the only one who knew where the coins were and how the rest of the game was planned out. Tommy’s whole business was in massive trouble without S. That seemed like a logical argument for his defense.”
“So you parted on good terms last night?”
I’d said goodbye to Tommy at the lobby doors. “He thanked me,” I said. “And then he texted me this morning asking for more help.” Expecting more help.
“Which is why you were waiting for him at the café.”
I nodded. Then I thought of something. “Who else knew he was coming to meet me?”
Jackson raised an eyebrow. “This is the part of the conversation where I ask the questions.”
“Right.” I nodded again. I felt like I was losing my mind. “What was your question?”
“Let’s skip straight to the big one, for the record.” He looked me in the eye. “Did you kill Tommy May?”
My jaw dropped. “Of course not!”
He wrote something.
“Are you kidding?” I sputtered. “You can’t actually think—you know me!”
Jackson held up a hand, finished writing, and closed the notebook. When he looked back up something had shifted. “It’s not about what I think or who I know. It’s about being thorough and being able to honestly tell my lieutenant that I questioned you.”
I blinked. “Then you don’t think—”
“Nora.” His deep voice rumbled. “You are just about the last person in the world that I can see doing violence to anyone. Anyone except that ex-husband of yours, anyway. Now if he ever shows up poisoned…”
I slumped back into my chair. “Thanks for scaring me half to death.” Then I sat up. “Are you saying Tommy was poisoned?”
Jackson’s mouth twitched. “And she’s back.” He tucked the notebook into his pocket. “You know it’s too soon to know definitively how Tommy May died.”
“But S was poisoned,” I reasoned. “And the deaths have to be related.”
“The deaths don’t have to be anything,” Jackson said. “And I might as well tell you, since it will be announced at a press conference in twenty minutes, S might not have been poisoned. At least not intentionally.”
“What?”
“He was killed by a reaction to bee pollen. Probably from that smoothie he drank on camera.”
“Bee pollen? Are you serious? It wasn’t murder?”
“I’m told people take it all the time. They say it increases energy, reduces inflammation—you know, all the usual claims the health nuts make with no actual proof.”
Jackson wasn’t exactly noted for his healthy lifestyle. It was one of the reasons he was perfect for Marty. Their preferred food pyramid had French fries at its base.
“Have you tested the smoothie?” I asked. “The energy drink? Did it have a massive dose or something? How much would it take to kill someone? Would you have to be allergic to bees, or would too much pollen kill anyone?”
Jackson just looked at me. I assumed we were getting beyond the scope of the announcement that would be made at noon. “We’re in contact with the drink maker for their exact components,” was all he said.
“Does that mean you didn’t test the bottle S drank from?” I asked. My mind raced. “Does that mean the bottle is missing?”
Jackson’s face was completely blank.
“You do still think it was murder, don’t you? I mean, the police are still investigating it, right? They don’t just think it was some sort of accident?”
“We might have, but now?”
I nodded. “Now that Tommy’s been killed.”
“Might have been killed,” Jackson cautioned. “For all we know, Tommy May might have died of an aneurism or some other perfectly normal—”
“Highly coincidental—”
“Tragedy,” he concluded.
“Sure,” I said. “But I bet he didn’t.”
After Jackson left I watched the press conference on my laptop, but didn’t learn anything beyond what he’d already told me. I was gratified that a few of the reporters asked the same questions about bee pollen that I had. Also perversely gratified that the police didn’t tell them anything more than Jackson had said. I could only assume that every bee expert in the country would be getting calls from reporters before the hour was out.
Once the twelve-fifteen was underway I made the rounds of the theater, reassuring everyone that Jackson and I had just had a nice quiet conversation, and that I wasn’t in any imminent danger of being hauled off in cuffs in the back of a paddy wagon.
I sent a text to Hector, letting him know, then sent texts to Monica and Robbie, asking if they had any idea who would own Tommy’s share of the theater now. They didn’t.
This could get messy. How do we find out if Tommy had a will?
That was Robbie’s question. I replied.
I know he had a team of lawyers working on the murder charge. I’ll see if I can find out who they are and if they know anything about it.
Great. Just what I needed. More lawyers.
I locked up around midnight, setting the alarm before leaving through the lobby doors. Outside, a tiled walkway lined with movie posters led to the ticket booth at the sidewalk. Because I’d turned the lights off, the walkway was dim, the only illumination coming from the streetlights. But that was enough for me to make out a figure near the ticket booth when I turned around, a figure with something in their hand.
/>
I’d just locked the door behind me. I made a fist around my keys. “Who’s there?” I called, at the same moment the figure said, “It’s just me.”
Hector stepped out of the shadow of the booth. “Don’t be frightened.”
I sagged against the door. I hadn’t realized how much adrenalin had flooded my system until I didn’t need it anymore. “Why didn’t you just come inside like a normal person?”
“I was going to come inside like a normal person, but I had to finish a call.” He moved toward me, his phone in his hand. “I just hung up when I saw the lights go out and I thought I might frighten you if I was waiting right outside the door.”
“Sure. This was much better.” My heart was still racing. But it did that a lot around Hector these days, even without him lurking in dark walkways.
“I apologize,” Hector said when he reached me. He cleared his throat. “And I also apologize for behaving like a testosterone-soaked caveman earlier today.”
I looked up at him. “Where did you pick up that very apt phrase?”
He shrugged, and it may have been the shadows, but I swear he blushed. “Gabriela might have used it when I told her how we left off this morning, with you shutting the door in my face to talk to Detective Jackson on your own.”
“Have I mentioned how much I like Gabriela?”
“You have. She likes you too. More than she likes me, at the moment.”
“Don’t worry. You have a way of redeeming yourself.”
Our eyes met. It was dim and suddenly very warm in the walkway.
“Um…” I said softly. “What are you doing here, anyway?”
“Um…What?” He’d gotten very close to me somehow. I could feel the heat of his body. “Oh.” He took a step back, his face clearing. “I thought I might take you home.” He held out his arm as if he were some rakish gentleman and I was a dowager duchess. “Unless you have any objections.”
“Not a one.”
When we got to the sidewalk I looked around. “Where’s your car?”
“I know you prefer to walk.”
So he walked me home to the little guest house, under streetlights that seemed just a bit more sparkly than usual.
We chatted about nothing for a few blocks. It wasn’t until we were in sight of Robbie’s house that Hector broached the subject of my talk with Detective Jackson. I filled him in.
“After he left, I realized how incredibly lucky I am,” I told Hector. “I’d been researching poison online the morning before Tommy was killed. Suppose someone else had been on the case and had looked at my browser history or something?”
“Someone still might,” Hector warned. “I won’t feel you’re safe until they’ve caught the real murderer.”
“Thanks, that’ll help me sleep,” I said, wondering if I would look more or less guilty if I cleared my browser history. Probably more. “In any case, there might not be a murderer,” I told him. “You heard about S and the bee pollen?”
“I did. What do you make of that?”
“I don’t know what to think. But apparently the Internet has decided that S got a bad batch of that energy drink he endorsed,” I told him. “Brandon brought me up to speed on the latest cyber gossip this afternoon. They’re saying Tommy might have had a bottle from the same batch. Everyone’s saying they should dump their drinks down the drain and sue the company.”
“Is that what the police think?” Hector asked. “That it was just some sort of industrial accident?”
“The police aren’t on social media,” I told him. “At least I don’t think they are. Personally, I think Tommy would have died of thirst before he’d ever take a sip of something that S endorsed. He was beyond furious that S drank the thing during the webcast.”
“Tommy’s death was different from the first one, as well,” Hector said. “From what you saw I doubt he ingested the same thing as S.”
Tommy’s death. Had it only been that morning? I shivered.
“Are you cold? Take my jacket,” Hector said, beginning to shrug out of his soft leather coat.
“I’m fine. And we’re here.” We’d just turned down the path alongside Robbie’s house. Past the gate was the small yard and guest house.
“I still can’t believe you met with that man alone last night,” Hector said as I unlatched the gate. I’d been wondering how long it would be before we’d return to that touchy subject. “I know, you’re a sensible adult woman who can take care of herself,” he said, sounding like he’d memorized the phrase, “but it still makes my blood burn to think of you taking that risk. For all you knew he was a murderer.”
“I honestly didn’t even think about that,” I said, choosing to omit the moment when Tommy had lost his temper in the break room and I’d very much thought about that.
“That doesn’t make me feel any better,” Hector grumbled. “You being oblivious to a risk doesn’t make the situation any less risky.”
“Oblivious?” I flared. “If that’s what you think—”
“I think you take too many chances,” he cut my protest off, his voice raised. Dim safety lights blinked on when we entered the yard. They provided just enough light to see that Hector was simmering again, and not in a good way. “How many more close calls do you have to have with potential murderers? How many more times do you think—”
“He wasn’t a murderer!” I protested loudly.
“You didn’t know that!” he shouted.
“Neither did you!” I yelled. “And who says you get to be the one who gets to say what’s dangerous and what isn’t? What—”
“I get to say what’s dangerous because I understand danger! Because I’ve lived a dangerous life! I’ve seen things and done—” He cut himself off and looked at the ground, his jaw working. When he looked up and spoke again his voice was low and controlled. “I get to say because I know what danger is, and it isn’t fun. It isn’t adventurous, and it isn’t exciting. It’s just something that can get you killed.” He gave me a look that shot straight through me. “I get to say because I care about you, and if you can’t see that you’re not very good at this detective thing.”
I didn’t think. I moved on pure instinct, wrapping my hand around the back of his neck and pulling him to me in a kiss that had been a long time coming. A kiss that sent hot sparks along every vein in my body.
Then I pulled away and looked up at him. “I care about you, too,” I told him.
He hesitated less than a second before pulling me to him, melting me into another kiss, this one long and deep and insistent. I felt my feet leave the ground, and I didn’t know if it was because he lifted me or because I was floating.
When he released me we looked at each other for a long moment. I was sure Hector could hear my pulse pounding. The neighbors could probably hear my pulse pounding.
Then something like coherent thought seemed to return to Hector’s eyes. He blinked, and he swallowed, and without a word he turned and walked away.
Chapter 17
“That did not just happen.”
I said it out loud as soon as I was inside the house.
“That could not have just happened.”
But it had. After six months of simmering looks and undeniable attraction, Hector and I had shared a kiss. An epic kiss. A phenomenal kiss. The kind of kiss they make whole movies about. Good movies.
And then he’d walked away.
“Does every man on this planet exist just to drive me crazy?” I asked the empty room.
There was no answer.
There was, however, wine.
“Did you hear? Can you believe it?” Lisa greeted me when I staggered into a busy Café Madeline the next morning somewhat the worse for wear. Or, at least, somewhat the worse for having been passionately embraced and wordlessly abandoned, and having fruitlessly searched for an explanation in a b
ottle of merlot.
“Heard what?” I asked, not taking my sunglasses off. “And I can’t believe anything, anymore.”
She slid a hot mug of salvation across the counter toward me. “They just announced what killed Tommy,” she said. “I heard it on the radio.”
I drank deeply, afraid to ask. “Bee pollen?”
“Arsenic.”
I took my sunglasses off and blinked at her in the bright morning light. “Arsenic?”
“As in old-school, classic, straight-from-an-Agatha-Christie poison,” she nodded.
“How?”
Our conversation so far had been at the counter, crowded with Sunday morning brunchers. Now she gestured toward our usual window table, where a young couple was just leaving. Once we sat she leaned forward. “It was in his orange juice.”
“Orange—? Is that what he drank in his car?”
“Room Service at the Four Seasons confirmed that he’d ordered a large orange juice in a travel mug that morning,” she nodded. “He must have taken it with him and not had any until he parked.”
“The police tested it?”
“They must have, because the news said it was highly concentrated,” she confirmed. “The arsenic, not the juice.”
“No, I’m sure the juice at the Four Seasons is freshly squeezed,” I said, a little dazed. Then I focused. “How did the poison get in the juice? Was the room service guy an assassin?”
“They didn’t get into that on the radio.” Lisa shrugged. “But can you believe it? Where do you even get arsenic these days?”
“I don’t know.” I had my phone in my hand before I thought the better of it. I put it on the table. “If I wasn’t afraid my search history would be used against me, I’d look it up,” I said.
“What do you mean, used against you? Nobody thinks you…?”
I gave her a look. “Yesterday was quite a day.”
She regarded me for a moment, then flagged down a passing server. “Chip,” she said, pointing to me, “the lady’s going to need a caramel chocolate baby cake.” She turned back to me. “Because I’m going to need to hear everything.”
Movie Palace Cozy Mystery Boxed Set: Books 1-3 Page 60
