Three Charms for Murder (The Case Files of Henri Davenforth Book 5)

by Honor Raconteur

  I grimaced in understanding. Class B fires were categorized with the use of any ignitable liquids or gases. Alcohol, oil, paint, gasoline—any of those would designate the fire as a Class B. Using water on such fires only spread the flames and did nothing to extinguish them. Firemen were armed with different foams on their station wagons in order to combat such flames.

  “How much of the house is still standing?” Jamie asked anxiously.

  “About half,” McCoy answered bluntly. “I have to ask. Your criminal investigation—which part of the house was it in? Was it near the pool?”

  “Yes,” I answered, heart sinking. Oh, don’t tell me… “That’s the side that burned, isn’t it?”

  “That it is.” McCoy took off his cap and ran a hand through his hair, looking tired and fed up. “Seems like someone didn’t want you examining the place too closely.”

  “We went through that area with a fine-tooth comb.” As Jamie spoke, her eyes found mine, and I could see her examining my expression as I was hers. “Whatever there was to find, I thought we’d found it?”

  “Either we’re wrong”—I swallowed at the possibility of missing crucial evidence—“or the murderer is so paranoid about us finding something they missed that they decided to burn the house just in case.”

  “Well, this just sucks.” Jamie let her head fall forward for a moment, breathing deeply. “How did they even get past the ward? It’s still up, isn’t it?”

  “An excellent question, and one I fail to have an immediate answer for. Likely how they managed to get past it the first time.” And I’d solve that part of the mystery or go mad trying. “Chief, there was a fire suppression hex active in the house. I saw it myself. It should have activated.”

  “Good to know, sir. I will definitely look for it and investigate why it didn’t engage.”

  Jamie rubbed at both eyes, visibly trying to wake up fully. “Chief, how soon can we get into the rubble?”

  “Probably tomorrow afternoon. I need time to work my own investigation. But I’d like for you to be there in the morning to help me make sense of things. You’ve been in the house, so you knew what it looked like. I have no clue.”

  “We can do that.” Jamie looked torn between wanting her bed and wanting answers. “We’ll get properly dressed and meet you over there.”

  It turned out McCoy hadn’t exaggerated in the slightest. Half the house was completely gone, the other half streaked with smoke and dirty from ash. Restoring the house would be a major job and, frankly, I wasn’t sure if the framing of the house was up to it. The fire might have warped it so as to threaten the integrity of the structure.

  The reporters were already on scene when we arrived, drawn to the smoke billowing through the sky, no doubt. Only a handful this time, those that actually worked here in Deems. As a courtesy, and because she didn’t want McCoy distracted, Jamie stepped aside and answered their questions. I left her to it. Frankly, the repetition of their questions sometimes bordered on stupidity and drove me marginally insane. Better for Jamie, who was better at public speaking anyway, to deal with them.

  The morning stretched a decade long already, and it wasn’t anywhere near noon yet. Seaton, Jamie, and I stayed on hand to help and oversee. We’d need to witness the destruction to report later. Seaton pitched in and helped them subdue the fire, which the firemen appreciated. With such a large house, their wagon didn’t hold enough foam to adequately suppress the flames.

  But it left the place in quite the mess, the foam now scattered over the charred remains. I stood well back on the lawn to avoid getting in anyone’s way and surveyed the scene. Jamie was likely right—this fire was meant to erase whatever traces the criminals had left behind, but to me it felt more like added insult to injury. I did not look forward to telling the family about it.

  Someone came up and offered me a clean porcelain cup of coffee. I accepted it before realizing it was Gerring. “Gerring. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. But you should have woken me up, sir.” Gerring frowned like a child who had been left behind.

  I took a sip of rejuvenating fuel and sighed, relieved to have the artificial boost. “There would have been little point. We weren’t of much help ourselves. Well, Seaton was—he helped them extinguish the flames. Jamie and I have been witnesses and little more since our arrival. Why make us all sleep deprived?”

  Gerring shrugged, but not truly in agreement. “I suppose. I wonder if the neighbors saw anything.”

  “It’s something of a long shot, as the fire was set roughly after midnight, but it doesn’t hurt to check. Some people keep odd hours.”

  “I’ll go with McSparrin and ask, then.” Gerring hesitated, staring at the house. Or what remained of it. “Sir. You don’t think this was to cover up something we missed?”

  “That’s one option. And I’m about as keen on it as you are. The second option is that the murderers were paranoid about us finding some clue to their identity and burned the house just in case.”

  “I’d rather the second, myself. I’d hate to think we overlooked something.”

  “Yes, quite.” But while we were wishing on things, I wished they hadn’t burned the house at all. It was just another headache the Atwood siblings would need to deal with. And they had enough grief and stress already.

  McCoy and Jamie left off poking at the house and approached, Jamie shortening her stride to keep pace with the much shorter man. McCoy took in Gerring with a sweep of the eyes and a nod hello before addressing me. “Well, that didn’t take as long as I’d suspected it would. This is definitely arson. The fire suppression charm was ripped clean off the wall. It’s torn into multiple pieces, so much confetti. Someone moved two small barrels of gasoline near the back of the pool house, pried off the tops, and set the barrels on fire.”

  “The lids were tossed to the side and failed to catch on fire with the rest of the house,” Jamie filled in, mouth screwed up in dark humor. “Hence why this was so easy to confirm. I think whoever set this fire is rather new to the whole arson thing.”

  McCoy grunted sourly. “Still managed to do the job well enough. But you’re likely right, their method was a bit slap-dash. At any rate, I can let you lot back in now. I’ll have to write up a formal report, but we’ve taken pictures and such, and there’s nothing else I can do here. I do have a few questions for you. You have any suspects for this yet?”

  I dearly wished I could say otherwise but had to shake my head. “I’m afraid not. Just leads we’re following.”

  “And you said you’ve already been through the house twice, with care?” McCoy waited for us to nod confirmation before he turned and eyed the house suspiciously. “Then this is strange. To my mind, it would make more sense if the murderers torched the house after killing the Atwoods. Why wait to do it now, when you’ve already gone through the house? Why take the chance of you finding something?”

  That was true. We kept hoping we hadn’t missed some vital clue before, but really, even if we had, it had been quite the gamble on the murderer’s part. They would have had to bet we wouldn’t see whatever it was they wished to cover up. And who would be fool enough to do that?

  “Maybe we’re looking at this from the wrong angle,” Gerring suggested.

  We all turned to look at him askance.

  Indicating the coffee cup, he explained, “When I stopped by the bakery to pick these up for everyone, I heard people talking about the fire. And, of course, I also heard them talk about the Atwoods’ murders. There were people in the shop who hadn’t heard about RM Seaton joining us here. Some of them seemed surprised by the news. What if our murderer had only just heard yesterday that RM Seaton had joined the investigation? I think it’d be alarming enough to have us all come in, but a royal mage? Maybe they spooked.”

  Jamie pointed a finger at him. “That is an excellent theory. I’ll lay good odds that’s it exactly. The timing would be explained that way.”

  The theories were all well and fine but ultimate
ly didn’t solve the issue. We now had a crime scene in nothing but ash and rubble. Whatever evidence we wanted to use, we hopefully had. There wouldn’t be anything else to recover.

  “I’ll get cleaned and packed up,” McCoy told us. “Please stop by later to sign the witness reports. I’ll have them done by tomorrow.”

  “We will, Chief, thank you.” As he walked off, Jamie requested of Gerring, “Can you go with Penny to the neighbors on this side of the street, see if anyone saw anything? Henri and I will take the other side.”

  “Sure thing, Detective.” Gerring oriented, found McSparrin next to the fire wagon, and loped off that direction.

  Jamie immediately snagged my coffee cup and swallowed a healthy amount before sighing in satisfaction. I watched her with a sardonic sort of amusement. She’d had no respect for my chocolates while we were friends. Now that we were courting, I had no expectations about the sanctity of anything else I ate.

  Or in this case, drank. “Good?”

  She ignored my sarcasm and smiled as she handed it back. “Stolen coffee is more delicious. You know, this isn’t how I planned to start the morning.”

  “Oddly enough, neither did I. What was your plan?”

  “Go for a jog, then kiss you awake. More fun, right?”

  I envisioned that scene and felt my already dark mood sour. I’d missed that morning awakening because of this nonsense? “I would have vastly preferred that, yes. Feel free to put that plan into action tomorrow instead.”

  “Oh, trust me, I will.” She put an arm around my waist and leaned in, her head against mine. “We’ll figure out who did this, Henri. If they’re burning down houses, that means they’re running scared. It also means we’re likely much closer to the truth than we realize. We’ll figure it out.”

  “I have faith we will. We haven’t met a crime we couldn’t solve yet.”

  And I had no intention of breaking that pattern here and now.

  I went for my early morning jog because frankly, I had some frustration to burn off. No one was happy about the fire yesterday, Henri least of all. He reported it to the Atwood siblings last night, and they’d not at all taken it well. It ate at me, too, raising doubts where there were none before and irritating me that the criminal might have one up on me.

  So, I ran a little further than I normally would have, Clint keeping up with me admirably, the kittens struggling. I ended up carrying them back since their tiny legs couldn’t handle the distance just yet—which was something I’d relay to Jules. The man was dying for data.

  As I reentered the hotel lobby, I saw Henri heading down. He had the pad in his hand, but he held it as if he were listening. I could hear his mother’s voice coming through clearly. Ah, a phone call. Henri received more than a few strange looks from people passing by, but then, the concept of having a phone call with someone while walking around was still alien to this world. He spotted me coming in and gave me that pleased little grin he’d been wearing ever since we started dating.

  The man was entirely too smug.

  Cute, too.

  I put the kittens down so they could go find their water bowls, Clint right on their heels. I needed a quick shower myself, but first I had a man to kiss good morning. Henri must have had the same thought because he beelined toward me.

  Ophelia was in full volume, straddling that motherly line of I’m-happy-for-you and how-dare-you-not-tell-me. A fine line, but one every mother I knew could walk well. “—can’t believe my own son can’t tell me he’s finally courting the woman he’s been madly in love with for years, no, I had to hear it from someone else entirely—”

  Henri rolled his eyes at me. “Yes, and who did you hear it from?”

  “Colette. Now, why didn’t you tell me, that’s the question.”

  “Things have been a bit hectic over here,” Henri deadpanned. “And we only agreed to court the other night. I thought I had time to tell you when we returned to Kingston.”

  “Why would you put off telling me anything when we have this magical contraption to use?”

  Yeah, he wasn’t getting out of this argument anytime soon. I didn’t think I could save him, either. I gave him a light good-morning kiss, which he returned, then headed upstairs. Taking a shower took precedence over arguing with a woman who felt left out.

  What with the fire, Penny and Gerring hadn’t left until early this morning to escort both bodies up to Jordane and start in on the interviews there. I was very curious to know if the other people the Atwoods had sued had an alibi for the time of the murder. We knew they had a good possible motive, but nothing else. Right now, I would kill for a decent suspect to follow up on.

  Sherard was still poking through the rubble of the house to make sure we hadn’t missed something, leaving Henri and I to conduct the rest of the interviews. We’d accrued an interesting list of people the Atwoods had sued to find and have a chat with.

  It’s funny how dynamics changed. Three days ago, I wasn’t aware of how much I touched Henri while at work. I didn’t realize until this morning just how much I did. But now that we were romantically together, we both agreed to try and behave professionally at work, which meant watching my behavior. Easier than it sounded, trust me.

  It might have been for the best that we had interviews today. It was easier to keep my touchy-feely nature under control when tracking down possible suspects and asking them questions.

  Without a precinct interrogation room to use, we defaulted to hunting people down at their workplaces. The first was the man who had installed the home safe in the office.

  Tilford’s Home Security was a secondary shop attached to the hardware store. It had its own storefront, but also clearly shared the same space as the larger store. The little chime over the door sounded as we stepped in, and a young face popped up over the counter’s top. He couldn’t have been more than ten, face grimy with something he probably shouldn’t have been eating before lunch.

  “Hello,” he greeted cheerfully, sucking the oozy goodness of candy off his thumb.

  “Hello,” I returned with amusement. And who did this charming redhead belong to? “I’m looking for the owner.”

  “That’s my dad.”

  “I figured. Where is he?”

  The kid turned his head and yelled through the open door that led into a back storeroom, “DAD!”

  Henri audibly sighed, as if resigned to the poor manners. Me? I rolled with it. I didn’t expect anything else out of this age. “Thanks for yelling for me.”

  The kid grinned. “You’re welcome.”

  In quick steps, someone came through the back, hissing, “Don’t yell in the stor—oh, of course, we have customers. Hello, I’m Tilford. How can I help you today?”

  I pulled a badge and gave him my best smile. “Detective Edwards, and this is my partner, Dr. Davenforth. I need to ask a few questions about the safe you installed in the Atwoods’ house.”

  Tilford’s greeting smile froze and then dropped sharply off his face. “I don’t want to answer any questions about that court case.”

  Wow. Yeah, no love lost there. “I completely understand. It’s more we have other questions about the safe itself. Did you hear the Atwood house burned yesterday?”

  Tilford was one of those people with a round, expressive face, so it was almost comical how shocked he looked. “Did it really?!”

  “Yes, sir, not completely. About half of it.”

  Slapping a hand against the counter, Tilford barked out a humorless laugh. “Now there’s karma for you. Here they made such a stink about nothing being built right, or installed right, and it burns to the ground.”

  Henri cleared his throat and asked gently, “We did review the court case. It seemed to me there wasn’t much grounds for it. I don’t understand why you were penalized?”

  Oh, so Henri was going to be good cop this round. Okay, I was fine with being bad cop.

  Tilford seemed perfectly willing to have a listening ear and turned immediately to Henri. “Non
e of it made sense. Not one speck of it. When they first asked for a house safe, I showed them the catalogue, gave them their options. They were firm on their selection, so that’s what I ordered. That’s what I had Morton build a frame for in the wall.”

  “Morton, as in Morton Construction?” I threw in. I needed to make sure I had the players straight.

  “Yeah. He’s a friend. We do projects together pretty often.” Tilford waved a hand to indicate the rest of the hardware store. “I own half of that business, too, see. I supply Morton with a lot of his building materials. Good man. Didn’t deserve what happened to him. Not anymore than I did. But we were careful with the installation of that safe. We wanted to make sure we didn’t get on the wrong side of a court case. Atwoods were famous for that. Didn’t matter how careful we were, they found a loophole. When they ordered that safe, the Stims 9000, it was the best on the market. But of course, building a house takes time. In the six months it took to pour the foundation and complete the framing and roof, a new model came out. The Stims EXE. I didn’t think anything of it. And that was my fatal mistake.”

  Henri had read me the court case, so I sort of new this narrative, but I was curious on his perspective. Tilford looked indignant even now, righteous in his anger, practically purple with it.

  “Their contract with Morton, see, it said he would install the best security available. And he had me as a subcontractor to do the installation. So, despite the fact we had a bill of sale with them buying the safe, despite the agreement we had to install the 9000, that clause got us all in trouble. All because they wanted the latest and greatest. Never mind that the new safe was taller and deeper and wouldn’t have fit. Never mind that it was back-ordered and wouldn’t get in for another six months, completely throwing off Morton’s deadline for finishing the house.” Tilford ran a hand over his head, sending his hair spiking up in every possible direction. “Bastards. What did they want from us, the impossible?”