Unintended Detour: A Christian Suspense Novel (The Unintended Series Book 3)

by D. L. Wood

  Chloe said, “Well, so do we.”

  “The problem is that the evening prior to that he spent a long time with Ms. Nolan, and in fact, spent a good part of that time in the basement. Why did he go back down there? And what happened that prompted someone to think he needed to be killed? Did he witness something earlier in the day? Or interrupt something during his late-night visit? Did he uncover a clue as to who was behind all the sabotage?”

  “Hold on. So now they’re calling it actual sabotage. Are they admitting that Nate Lewis was right? That there was a plot to undermine this place and keep it from opening?”

  “It seems to be a major part of their theory that points to Ms. Nolan as the culprit,” Li said.

  “I don’t understand why she’s their suspect,” Chloe said.

  “Initially, it was a lot of coincidences. She was the last to see Nate Lewis alive and the last to see Riley before he was attacked.”

  “How do you know that?” she asked.

  “They reviewed the texts on Riley’s phone. He texted Ms. Nolan a little before ten that night, wanting to see her.”

  “That was probably just Riley being romantic,” Chloe said, “trying to start something with Deidre. He’s got a thing for her. Frankly, I think it goes both ways. That text doesn’t prove anything.”

  “A witness saw them together in the west wing sometime before eleven.”

  “There you go.” Jack tossed his hand as if the man had made an important point. “Like Chloe said, they were into each other. What does that prove?”

  “Nothing by itself. Ms. Nolan confirms that they did meet up in the study for a few minutes after ten but says it was a brief meeting, and then Riley walked her to her suite on the top floor. She says she was in her room well before eleven. So now they’ve got her as the last person to see Mr. Riley before he was attacked.”

  “What do the cameras show?” Jack asked.

  “The cameras in the study and the downstairs hallways support Ms. Nolan’s story that they left for her room around ten thirty. But they took the employee service stairs, and there aren’t cameras there or on the fourth floor where the live-in employee residences are, including Ms. Nolan’s suite. Mr. Riley does appear on camera in his own hallway before eleven and then again later, leaving near two a.m. But he took the service stairs as well—”

  “Of course he did,” Jack groused.

  “—so there’s no footage of what happened after he left or who he met.”

  “Again, not proof that Deidre was involved,” Chloe opined. “In fact, her not being on CCTV footage should help.”

  “Except, like I said, there aren’t cameras on her floor, and if she used the service stairs and hidden passages, she could have gotten to the basement unseen. And unfortunately, there’s more. Yesterday, after Mr. Riley was found, the police discovered Ms. Nolan’s name tag on the floor of the basement not far from where Mr. Riley was found. It has his type blood on it. They’ll DNA match it to be sure it’s his.”

  “They worked together down there yesterday,” Jack said. “He was filling in, helping out with the preparation for tonight’s ball. Her name tag probably just fell off while they were working. Or possibly it was a spare that fell out of her pocket? Did you ask her? And as for the blood, maybe it just ended up too close to where he was bleeding.”

  Li’s shoulders sunk slightly, and he offered a sympathetic half-smile. “True. But that doesn’t explain the way the pin was bent, as if pulled off in a struggle. Plus, during the staff interviews, a housemaid mentioned seeing blood on the railings of one of the employee staircases. The police searched for more deposits that might have been missed in a quick cleaning. They found some on the underside of the railing of the staff stairs leading from the third floor to the fourth.”

  “Deidre’s not the only one who lives up there,” Chloe said.

  “No, but after finding Ms. Nolan’s name tag, the police were already turning their sights on her. Finding evidence that whoever was leaving the deposits went up to the fourth floor only fueled their suspicions. They wanted a more in-depth interview and suggested her private quarters. She agreed without realizing the possible evidentiary issues and gave them entry to her living area. Would you care to guess where they found the last blood deposit?”

  “Deidre’s room?” Jack suggested.

  “On the inside of the entry door casing, on an edge easily missed if someone were to wipe down the frame. It was in plain view, if one knew what to look for, which the officer who accompanied Detective Yarbrough did. At the time, they also took Ms. Nolan’s company laptop”—he held up a hand before Jack could comment—“which we can’t challenge, as it’s resort property and Ms. Nolan had no privacy interest in it.

  “Overnight, they had all the blood samples typed and each one matched Mr. Riley’s. They’re still awaiting DNA results, of course, but that result, along with Deidre’s name tag and the witness sightings of Mr. Riley with her shortly before the attack and her own admission of the same, was more than enough to obtain a search warrant for her private quarters.”

  “And?” Jack asked. “What did they find that justified the arrest?”

  “They removed the ceiling light fixture and discovered Mr. Lewis’s cell phone as well as a knife. Again, an attempt had been made to wipe it clean, but although there were no visible blood deposits, the forensics lab was able to extract samples from the crevices between the blade and handle which also matched Mr. Riley’s blood type. They determined that the blade is a good match for Mr. Riley’s wound.”

  “If Deidre did all this, why would she be stupid enough to keep the phone and knife with her? Seems to me it’s just as likely she’s being framed.” Chloe knew that her staunch support of the woman felt unearned given their short acquaintance. But she also knew that sometimes your gut mattered more than the length of time you knew a person. And this was one of those times.

  Li shrugged. “They’ll argue she simply didn’t have a chance to get rid of it yet. Not without being seen or missed. They’ll come up with a reason. The evidence is stacking up against her.”

  “But it doesn’t make sense!” Chloe cried. “What motive could she possibly have?”

  Li huffed. “That’s the kicker. Ms. Nolan has been using the laptop to access a private email account. It was hidden, but not well enough. There are emails between her private account and another going back to the beginning of the renovations here, discussing the sabotage of the restoration of the property and opening of the hotel.”

  Chloe felt as if the bottom dropped out of her stomach, a wave of disbelief crashing through her. She looked at Jack, and the white pallor of his face told her he was experiencing the same shock.

  This can’t be right. It can’t be. I know I’m not wrong about her.

  Am I?

  “I can’t believe it,” Jack said. “Deidre? The plant? She was the one working against the resort all this time?”

  Li shook his head. “She says no. In fact, she’s desperate for you and the company to believe her. She maintains she had nothing to do with it and has never seen that account before.”

  “Could someone else have accessed the email account on her computer?” Chloe asked. Please say yes. Please.

  “It’s possible. It’s a hole in their theory, and one we’ll exploit. Anyone with the password or access to it once the laptop had been opened could have checked that email. Fortunately, she had it set to stay open for two hours once the password was entered, so there is room for that argument. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the only thing they found on the laptop. There was an encrypted file, hidden inside another, that accessed a numbered account in the Grand Caymans. That account has been receiving deposits of five thousand dollars a month for the last twelve months.”

  “Money? You’re saying she did this for money?” Chloe quickly did the math in her head. “Sixty thousand dollars to do all this? To kill for?”

  “The police think Lewis’s death and the attack on Riley weren’t pla
nned. They think they were collateral damage. The theory is that Mr. Lewis discovered her attempting to further tamper with something inside the outbuilding. As for Mr. Riley, they think he stumbled onto some additional act of sabotage she was planning in the basement. They aren’t sure. They’re still making their case. But they believe they’ve got their culprit. And I have to tell you, it doesn’t look good.”

  “What about the person on the other end of those emails?” Chloe asked. “The person depositing that money into that numbered account?”

  “They aren’t sharing much about those aspects of the investigation.”

  Jack leaned forward. “You think it’s Kingsford?”

  The lawyer shrugged. “I think they’re taking a hard look at him. But I don’t have the specifics.”

  “So now what?” Jack pressed.

  “There will be a bail hearing within forty-eight hours, but I expect them to push it to the last minute, to give themselves as much time as possible before releasing her.”

  “What can we do? The company stands behind her.”

  Li wobbled his head back and forth. “You’re going to want to talk to the company’s lawyers about that. I get the feeling that they might be wavering in light of the mountain of evidence accumulating against her.”

  “Wavering?” Jack glanced at Chloe. “That’s the first I’ve heard of that.”

  “I’ve been in communication with their in-house counsel since leaving the jail at the sheriff’s department. You’ll want to get in touch.”

  “I will,” Jack said, his features set hard.

  “In the meantime, I suggest, if you want to help Ms. Nolan, try to find out who would have had access to her computer. That means also finding out who would have had access to her office and private quarters. And I need a clear picture of where all the security cameras are and what they’ve picked up since Nate Lewis’s death.”

  “I’ll get our security people to start pulling together whatever they already haven’t,” Jack said. “But I know there’s limited footage. The cameras cover most of the common areas inside, guest room hallways, and selected exterior locations. But the setup leaves a lot unaccounted for. It’s something we’re dealing with going forward.”

  Li nodded. “I’m hoping something on there will help establish a timeline of Deidre’s whereabouts.”

  Jack rose and held out a hand toward the lawyer. “Do what you can for her. We’ll try our best on this end.”

  “Do.” The man shook his hand. “Because without something significant, she may be looking at a very, very long prison sentence.”

  36

  It was difficult to concentrate after meeting with Ethan Li. A heaviness settled on Chloe that was hard to shake. Although she had not known Deidre very long, she had quickly grown to like the woman very much and found it impossible to believe she was behind the sinister acts that had been going on at the resort. Something in her spirit told her the police were latching on to the wrong suspect, and though she understood why—every bit of evidence pointed to Deidre—Chloe knew in her heart of hearts that there was more to the story.

  But how do we prove it?

  At two thirty, Jack had a quick meeting with the interim manager from the Hotel Bartholomew in Manhattan. Chloe chose to sit that one out and spent the time putting the final touches on the exhibit. The display wouldn’t be everything it could be by the time of the ribbon-cutting and New Year’s Eve Ball that night, but it would be much more than anyone expected, especially with the addition of Will’s letters. She had insisted, over Jack’s objections, that the curtains hiding the exhibit from view be put back in place now that there were only hours leading up to the big reveal. Chloe and Jack didn’t agree with the police that they had their culprit, which meant there was still a dangerous person on the loose. But she did believe that the true culprit wouldn’t dare strike in the middle of the day with the hotel as busy as it was. And certainly not now that the police had someone in custody. Why would they want to make it clear that the culprit was still at large?

  She had rearranged the exhibit articles to accommodate Will’s letters to Lily and was placing them inside one of the glass cases for viewing when Jack slipped inside. “How’s it going?” He wrapped an arm around her waist.

  “Good, I think.” She leaned into him, pressing her back into his chest and feeling his warmth. She tilted her head, resting it against his shoulder. She could feel her blood pressure drop and a calm she hadn’t realized she was missing settled over her. He was her person. Her everything. Home. Even here.

  “I spent the last hour with Tim Broyles, the manager the company sent, bringing him up to speed. This is his deal now. He says he’s got it under control and doesn’t seem fazed even by the ball tonight. So that’s good.”

  “What about liaising with the police?”

  “I’m still handling that. That way I can stay in the loop.”

  She turned to look at him, giving him her best evil-eye impression.

  “I mean we,” he said, correcting himself with a good-natured snort. “We can stay in the loop. I’ve also spoken to the company lawyers.”

  “And?” Chloe could hear the concern creeping into the edge of her voice.

  “Li was right. They’re waffling on how much to support Deidre. At the moment, they’ve agreed to continue providing her legal counsel, giving her the benefit of the doubt until this plays out a little more—hopefully at least until Riley wakes up and can tell them it wasn’t her. I had to fight for it, but I convinced them in the end that it was too early to cave. It wouldn’t look good if we dumped our employees in moments of crisis, at least not until there’s more clarity.”

  “What happens if they do end their support?”

  “They’ll stop paying Li to represent her. She can retain him on her own at that point, if she can afford him, which…” He shrugged, showing he doubted she could.

  “Deidre must be terrified. Can we see her?”

  Jack shook his head. “I already looked into that. They’re still within their forty-eight-hour hold. No visitors allowed. But as soon as that changes, we’ll go.” He squeezed her hand encouragingly. “It’ll be all right.”

  She sighed and nodded, wanting that to be true. After a few moments of standing like that, Jack glanced around the space as if just noticing the details. His eyes roved over the reorganized glass cases with the additions of Will’s letters to Lily and the velvet purse they came in. There was also a new e-tablet propped on a stand with a photo of Lily and Cora as children on the screen and a label superimposed over the bottom. It read, “Touch to hear an account of Lily Stone from Joseph Graves, son of Miss Stone’s lady’s maid, Mary Graves.” Beside that was a printed and framed account of Joe’s connection to the family and his story.

  “That’s a nice touch,” Jack said, tapping the screen. Joe’s voice sounded as he began talking about his relationship with the Stone family.

  “I pulled it from my interview,” she said.

  “It brings some life to the exhibit.” Jack tapped the screen again to stop the playback. “It’s great, Chlo. You’ve done an amazing job.”

  “It’ll be even better when we have time to get a graphics designer to work up some permanent signage and informational placards.”

  “My dad said to tell you he owes you.”

  “He called. I told him we’re family. You do what you can for family.”

  Jack smiled and kissed her. “You’ve done more than you should have. I hope you’ll be able to leave the rest to the person they’ll bring in to work on the permanent exhibit.”

  Chloe nodded. “I will. I’ve nearly done all I can. I just want to stay a bit longer. What about you? How’s the writing coming?”

  “Non-existent. I can’t be creative during crisis. Speaking of which, I was coming up here to tell you I’m headed to the hospital to see Riley.”

  “Any word?”

  Jack shook his head, the corner of his mouth turning down. “Not much. Slowly im
proving, which is a blessing. But they haven’t removed his breathing tube yet. They’re waiting to be sure the lung holds or something. Hopefully soon.”

  “Then maybe he can tell them it wasn’t Deidre that attacked him.”

  “Yeah. Well, since we know that, and we know the guilty party is still out there, I don’t want you running around the property alone, got it?”

  “I’ll be here till I’m done, and then I can come meet you at the hospital.”

  “What if, instead, you finish your work and then take it easy here at the resort? Take a nap, go to the spa, whatever. It’s our anniversary, and you deserve to do something special, even if I’m all wrapped up in this right now. Riley isn’t going to know you’re not there, and they’re only letting one person in at a time anyway. I’ll be back this afternoon, and we can do something together before the ball—take a hike or horseback ride or something.”

  She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him to her, kissing him. As he returned it wholeheartedly, she felt the electric thrill wash over her that hadn’t faded with time. She wondered if it ever would. When she pulled back, staring into those green eyes, spiky blond hair, and crooked half-smile, she already had her answer.

  One hundred percent, no.

  Despite what Jack suggested, Chloe worked straight through the afternoon, making sure everything that could be right was right. Her insides buzzed at the thought of revealing the exhibit to not just the guests, but the community who would undoubtedly come to see the letters and learn the truth about the mystery that had remained unsolved for so long. At first, she thought knowing the facts behind the robbery might diminish the allure of the estate, but the more she thought about it, the more she believed otherwise. Knowing the motivation behind the robbery, and the fact that Lily was involved, made the young woman’s death less random, though no less tragic. It made one think about the lengths a person would go to—however misguided—to help others. Hoping visitors would be moved, Chloe had compiled a list of vetted orphan and foster care programs and charities in the local and Manhattan area. Guests could donate simply by scanning a QR code with their phones. For the time being, the codes were printed on a temporary foam board and mounted on an easel at the gallery’s exit.