“That’s so sweet.” More hair twirling.
Noah leaned on the counter. “I bet you know everything that goes on around here.” She nodded. “Can we talk somewhere . . . private about the murder?”
The girl nodded and giggled nervously. “How about my office, Noah?” The way she breathed out his name made him inwardly wince. The young woman was barely legal. Thankfully, he’d brought his own chaperone.
Tiffany walked over to talk to a coworker, then opened a low swinging door. “Come this way.”
The young woman frowned as Harper walked past her, as if noticing her for the first time. If she had any hopes of getting Noah in any form of undress, those dreams vanished.
He wasn’t playing games, or planning to lead her on, but had to get her back to his side. “My sister and I appreciate your help.”
Happy Tiffany returned. “Your sister?”
He leaned to the girl. “My mom makes me take her along on my investigations. Otherwise she’d sit on the couch all day watching talk shows and eating cheese puffs.”
Tiffany looked over her shoulder at Harper and back, then whispered, “Cheese puffs are so unhealthy.”
Noah could feel the hot sharp jab of Harper’s glare between his shoulder blades. “I think Mom is more worried that Cricket will secretly move her dumbass boyfriend and his six kids into her house while she’s in Florida, and she’ll never get them out.”
Tiffany’s eyes went wide as they went into the closet-sized office. “Your parents named her Cricket?”
Of all the BS he’d laid on her during this brief interaction, that’s what she took from this? Maybe she was future manager material after all.
His expression turned grim. He lowered his voice. “If you ask me, I think that set her up for failure.” He pulled out her chair and pushed it back in when she sat. “When you have kids, think of my sister and choose their names wisely, Tiff.”
Her head bobbed. “I will.”
Harper glared when he glanced at her. But there was a reason for this odd conversation. Tiffany connected with him on a personal level with her attraction to him and sympathized with his family situation. Although he’d never play with her emotions, she was more likely to be helpful with a connection than if he’d stormed in and started grilling her for information.
Time for the interrogation. “If it’s okay with you, I have some questions about the night before Gerald Covington was murdered.”
She bit her thumbnail and her eyes turned worried. “Will I get in trouble with my boss?”
“What happens in this office stays in this office.”
Clearly, she’d seen the Las Vegas slogan. She cheerfully clapped her hands together. “What do you want to know?”
He pulled up the video and showed her a still of the man on the balcony. He didn’t plan to show her the acrobatics. “Do you know which room this is?”
With a fingertip she counted across from right to left. “It’s 602. There is no 601 on that floor. We had a fire in there a month ago and are still waiting for the insurance payout to remodel the room.”
He jumped on that. “Are all those rooms connected?” Even with the fire damage, wouldn’t there still be a 601? He let it pass.
“All but those on the far end. They’re singles,” Tiffany said. “Some customers like to rent two suites if they have a family, or just like the extra space to party. That’s how the room got burned. A party.”
Now they were getting somewhere. “I assume the doors both have locks.” She nodded. “Would it be difficult for a large man to force the doors?”
Frowning, she said, “I suppose not. We’ve never had anyone try.”
Noah turned to Harper. “I think we found how he got in.” They nodded. He forwarded to where the guy jimmied the glass door next to Covington’s suite. “Which room is this?”
Again, she counted across. “605.”
He’d already figured it out, but wanted confirmation. If a strong guy could force the other door, then he could get into Gerald’s room, too.
“Was there damage to the connecting door in Gerald Covington’s suite?” Harper asked.
Tiffany thought for a moment. “Not that I remember,” she said and then flushed. “I snuck my boyfriend in after the police said we could take down the tape. He’s kind of a freak for creepy stuff.”
Noah took notes. “Did the police talk to the guests or employees on duty the afternoon or evening before the murder?”
“They did.” Tiffany nodded. She’d proven to be a wealth of information. “No one saw or heard anything.”
Damn. “Was anyone checked into 602?”
“Not that night. There were guests in three and four.”
Strange those guests hadn’t heard noise on their balcony. “What about 605?”
Tiffany nodded. “The room was booked for a guest who said he needed a late check-in. We held the room all night but he never showed up.”
“Because he was already there,” he said to Harper. She was nearly jumping out of her skin.
The desk phone buzzed. Tiffany answered and listened. “The police?” Then, “Send them back.”
Noah darted a glance at Harper; she was already on her feet. “Do you have a back entrance to the parking lot?”
“Go out and right,” Tiffany said slowly. “All the way back and then right again.”
He reached to shake her hand. “Thanks for the help and tell the police everything you told us.”
“Okay.” She looked and sounded confused.
Harper rushed out the door and darted right. Noah knew they’d probably get their butts arrested by Mignon for interfering with the investigation, even if the charges were bogus. They had a right to investigate.
They hurried down to the end of the hallway.
“Hey!” a voice called out.
Mignon. She made the second right. An exit door loomed ahead. They pushed through and took off running. By the time they got to the car, they were laughing.
After taking a minute to catch her breath, she took his hand. He hoped she planned to go in for a kiss. Instead, she led him to the back of the car and positioned him a foot back from the bumper. “Stand right there.”
“Why?”
She released his hand and jangled her keys. “I’m going to back Harvey over you, pull forward, and then go again.”
Revenge was at hand. He liked feisty. “Hate the messenger,” he said with a wink. “But not the results, sis.”
Chapter 38
Harper wasn’t mad. Noah knew his stuff. Still, she had to give him grief for his comments to Estelle and Tiffany about her glaring incompetence. The man was a comedian, in his own mind.
“Next time we talk to someone, I get to portray you as a nincompoop,” she said and poked him in the chest.
“A nincom-what?”
She poked him again. “It’s a word my aunt uses to describe crazy people. You fit that bill.”
“Is that so?” He leered and reached for her. She avoided his hands with a spin and sidesteps.
“It is so.” She sent him a playful glance and quickly got into the car. He joined her. “I can honestly say that was the first time I’ve run from the cops.” She started the ignition. “It was fun.”
“It won’t be so much fun if we don’t get out of here,” he said and indicated she get moving with his hand. “Mignon won’t like that we got here before him. I suspect our truce with the good detective is over.”
The rental sped out of the lot. “At least we know how the killer got into Gerald’s room. That’s a good clue and good hard evidence if some D.A. wants to build a career on my case.”
Noah grinned. “Oh, babe, we got a hell of a lot more than one clue.”
Harper drove to the nearest strip mall and pulled in. “What do you mean we’ve got a lot more?” She
was in the same interview, and although pleased with the information, wasn’t nearly as excited as her PI.
He unlocked his seatbelt and turned to her. “Think about this. The day you found the body, the police had already been called about the murder, correct?”
“I believe so. They were not surprised to find Gerald dead and my call never went through.”
“Right. Now we go backward.” He continued. “We know that the killer entered Gerald’s room through the room next door and probably rented the room to keep it open.”
“The video and Tiffany confirmed that.”
Noah nodded. “But according to Tiffany, she says the door wasn’t damaged. So how did he get in?”
Harper puzzled over the question. Then her mouth opened. “Could Gerald have let him in? That would explain why the door wasn’t damaged.”
“Correct. I’m thinking the same thing.” Noah gave the clue a moment to sink in. “You know Gerald pretty well. Do you think he’d open the connecting door for a stranger?”
The edges of the puzzle were coming together. “He always carried cash and was paranoid. I don’t think he would fling open that door at a knock. The hallway door, maybe.” Her eyes widened. “Oh, Noah. He knew the killer.”
The more time she spent with Noah, the more she’d been learning how to put clues together. She might earn her amateur detective badge after all.
Although anyone associated with Gerald and the Muskrats had the potential to be suspects, she’d hoped that the killing was a random crime. To realize that she might have been friends with, or at least knew, the killer made her brain hurt.
“Let’s go back further to the night at the bar where you threatened Gerald. You said there were several team members and cheerleaders there. Have you talked to any of them?”
“I talked to a few of the cheerleaders and players at the ball.” She cupped her face with her hand. “They all claimed to know nothing pertinent to my case.”
“You believed them?”
“No one openly acted guilty if that’s what you’re asking.” She had no feelings one way or another of guilt or innocence. She’d worked too close to the suspects to get an objective read.
Her mind went to Noah at the bar with Cassidy.
“I think Cassidy has beady eyes. She’s guilty,” she said, feeling feisty and energized by the new leads. “We should send Mignon to arrest her right away.”
Noah’s lids narrowed. “Cassidy? As in the cute cheerleader from the ball?” He read her like a James Patterson novel. “I think you’re jealous.”
“Why would I be jealous of her?” Harper refused to meet his gaze. “I think I remember that she came from a long line of criminals. It’s hereditary. She’ll have criminal kids someday.”
Noah eye-rolled. “I’d be more worried about your gene pool, HJ. Clearly, there’s crazy in your chromosome pairs.”
How could she deny this without the confirmation of jealousy? She didn’t really think Cassidy was guilty. She wanted to see how far Noah would go to stick up for her.
One thing she did take from the exchange is confidence that Noah wasn’t pursuing Cassidy. He wouldn’t look at her like she was a gooey hot fudge sundae if his interest was elsewhere.
“Fine, no Cassidy on the list. I don’t remember her from the bar anyway.” She disregarded his smug expression. “Let’s lock down what we know so far. The killer heard me at the bar and knew I’d confront Gerald the next day. He somehow got into the unused room, played Spiderman along the balconies, killed Gerald, and then called the police so I’d be there when they came.”
“I’ll bet Harvey that’s exactly what happened.”
“That’s diabolical. And genius. And Harvey isn’t yours to bet.” The puzzle pieces were coming together. “We need to get home and lay this all out.”
* * * *
Several hours later, they firmed up a good picture of what they were dealing with. Harper had been set up. What didn’t fit was her Mustang, or the goat.
“I think the car is separate from the case,” she said after scanning the evidence. “The motel was crap. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was kids looking to steal my radio, or some jealous jerk trashing a cool classic car.”
“I agree.” He ran a black marker line through “Mustang” on the white poster board they’d purchased on the way home.
That took out one area no longer needing investigating for her case. “As for the goat, I think that’s also unconnected,” she said. “It makes no sense that the killer would go all the way out to the farm, steal Harriet, and dump her on me. Surely Estelle would notice the goat kidnapping and call the cops.”
Noah drew a line through “goat.” “We’ll figure that one out after the killer is caught.”
Harper looked down at the poster laid out on the table and saw a clear pattern. Nothing pointed directly to the killer, but they were getting close.
“I think we need to have another chat with Kimmie,” she said. “She was at the bar, knows everyone in the organization, and acted suspiciously when Alvin and I visited. I want to know what she knows.”
The trip to Lansing took a half hour longer than usual. Harvey was losing its enthusiasm for road trips.
“The oil probably hasn’t been changed since the car was new and the transmission is likely original,” Noah said. “With close to three hundred thousand miles on it, this car is a decade and double the miles past its expiration date.”
“And yet, dear Harvey keeps chugging along.” She patted the dashboard. “We’ll get a few more days out of him yet.”
They got to the stadium on fingers crossed and a prayer. They talked their way past the youngster with a thin patch of upper lip fuzz guarding the delivery entrance by Harper claiming to have lost her ID. She showed him a selfie of a team shot with the other cheerleaders and he took that as better than a driver’s license.
He’d smiled a gap-toothed grin, asked her to sign his sunken chest with a permanent marker so he could tattoo it on later, and waved them past.
“Some security,” Noah said.
Harper shrugged. “Not my problem anymore.” She led him to Kimmie’s office. As had happened during the previous visit, they found Kimmie in Gerald’s office. This time she was on her knees in front of a file cabinet, with her slacks-clad butt up in the air in front of a stack of papers.
Noah cleared his throat.
She startled and jumped to her feet, sending papers scattering over the expensive Oriental rug.
“Oh, hey, Harper.” She made a feeble attempt to kick the papers under the desk. “What are you doing here?”
Harper walked over and picked up a sheet. It was some sort of accounting form covered with columns and numbers. “We came to talk to you about the bar night before the murder, but now I’m thinking we need to move you up the suspect list.”
Kimmie’s jaw dropped and she put a hand on her chest. “You can’t think I killed Gerald?”
“I don’t know what to think.” Harper noticed a briefcase stuffed with files. “This is the second time I’ve found you rooting around in here and you’re acting pretty suspiciously.”
For a moment, Harper thought the young woman was weighing her chances of making a run past Noah. Instead, she slumped into Gerald’s chair, defeated.
“I didn’t kill Gerald.” She tucked her hair behind her ears, making her appear younger than she usually did. “I’m looking for blackmail evidence.”
* * * *
The longer the case went on, the more Noah realized that during his years with the FBI, he had not, in fact, seen everything. Sitting behind a desk in a chair twice her size was a girl who looked fourteen, admitting to blackmail.
“Would you care to clarify that statement?” he pressed.
She trembled. “Are you a cop?”
He introduced himself as Harper’s PI.
“If you want off the hook for the murder, we need the truth.”
Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath. Clearly trapped, she must have figured she had nothing to lose. When she opened them again, she was ready, and angry.
“I’ve put up with so much shit around here. Gerald did nothing to advance the interests of this organization. In fact, he was nothing but a figurehead.” She flung open her arms. “Right out of college, I ran all of this. And he treated me like dirt.” She stood and her eyes flashed. “Yes, I wanted him dead. Hell, I celebrated with a bottle of wine when I heard the news.”
For someone so young, Kimmie had hardened up quickly.
“You know what I’m getting for my service?” Rant not over. “Willard is hunting for Gerald’s ‘male’ replacement and I have to train him before I get kicked to the curb.”
“That hurts,” Harper said. “I think we can take her off our list,” she said to Noah under her breath. He nodded.
If anyone knew what happened when someone got screwed over by the Covingtons, Harper did. Yet, now was not the time to commiserate. Noah asked, “Do you think blackmail will work?”
Skinny shoulders lifted. “Who knows, but I’m damn well going to try. These people are up to their eyeballs in corruption. I just know it.”
Noah felt a twinge of concern. “Make sure you’re careful. I understand the Covingtons are ruthless.”
Her ponytail bobbed with her head shake. “I plan to have copies of what I uncover sent to a couple of lawyers, in case I get my knees smashed.”
Other than watching too many gangster movies, Kimmie was on the right track to cover her ass. The blackmail had been well thought out. “Good luck.”
Harper broke in. “Before you take down the organization, how about we put our heads together and come up with a list of names at the after party. Men only.”
She and Kimmie worked over it for few minutes. All but four were on their previous list and had already been talked to.
“We’ll need addresses, too,” Harper said.
Kimmie opened the computer and give her the list. “Chaney and Klein won’t be home. They’re in Rome on their honeymoon.”
The Sweetheart Mystery Page 21
