A soft rain had started to fall and didn’t help my current mood. As I drove to Java Time, my thoughts shifted to Eric. In the newspaper article, I’d read that a relative of Eric’s had given a statement but only said the family was grieving privately and planned to hold his wake tomorrow afternoon between 1:00 and 5:00 p.m.
When I arrived at Java Time, the shop was bustling with activity, and it was a few minutes before Archie could take my order. When he caught sight of me, he smiled broadly and gave me a small wink. “We made a batch of your favorite hot chocolate, honey. How about a cup?”
Rich chocolate with sugar and laden with whipped cream was definitely the way to go. “Sounds good. Make that two, with lots of whipped cream, please.” Since I was already here, I decided to stop and see Gabby as well. I reached into my purse for the pictures I’d brought. “Hey, Arch. Remember that guy you told me you saw Dylan with the day before his accident? Can you look at this photo and see if it’s him?”
He glanced at the picture of nonsmiling Ned, then put his glasses on to look more closely at the one of Ned’s head. “I can’t swear to it,” he admitted, “but yeah, the hair’s the same exact shade and greasy looking. I think he’s the one I saw with Dylan.” He lifted an eyebrow at me. “Your husband didn’t like the guy.”
“But you said they didn’t argue,” I reminded him.
Archie pursed his lips. “No, but Dylan’s body language gave him away. Even though he was sitting next to the guy, he was rigid and not relaxed. I knew something was off.”
Oh, something was definitely off, all right. After I saw Gabby, Ned Reinhart was going to tell me what their little meeting had been about.
* * *
Gabby spooned some whipped cream into her mouth. “God, Tess. It wasn’t bad enough that someone murdered your husband. Now you find out he was stealing from his company, one of your coworkers got shot in front of you, and you were in a car accident. How are you dealing with all of this? There can’t be much room left in your freezer for more tomato sauce.”
She’d meant to sound sympathetic, but despite everything, I chuckled. “Shows how much you know. I made cookies instead.”
“Figures.” We leaned over the front counter in her shop, sipping our hot chocolates as Liza, her lone employee, came out of the back storage room. Liza was about forty, with long auburn hair that hung down her back in a single braid. She smiled at me and adjusted the glasses she wore on her pert nose. “Nice seeing you, Tessa. Bye, Gabs. Catch you tomorrow.”
“Have a good one, girl.”
“So Liza’s working tomorrow?” I asked. “Are you free in the afternoon?” If we went to Eric’s wake, maybe we could pick up some useful information about his death and link it to Dylan’s somehow.
Gabby shrugged. “She could handle the store by herself for a couple of hours. Thursday isn’t usually a busy day for me. Why?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe we could go to a wake?”
“What am I, the grim reaper? You know I hate those things.” She paused. “Wait a second. It’s for Eric, the delivery guy, isn’t it?”
“Correct. I want to poke around and see what we can find out.”
Gabby’s entire face lit up. “Oh, hell yes. The entire town is buzzing about that kid. I’ll bet they even have a news crew there.” She paused. “Guess that means my dear brother will stop by as well.”
“Which reminds me,” I said thickly. “Gino told me about his whole ‘let’s get Tessa back to work so she thinks she’s helping with the investigation’ scheme. It doesn’t surprise me that Gino would do something like that, but I was really hurt to find out you’d decided to play along as well.”
To Gabby’s credit, she hung her head in shame. “I’m sorry, Tess. When he came to me with the idea, I was willing to try almost anything to snap you out of your depression. I’ve been so worried about you, hon. We all have. But I really do want to help you find out who did this to Dylan. Whatever you need, I’m here for you.”
There was no denying the sincerity and affection in her voice, and it almost brought me to tears. “Let’s forget about it.” I glanced out the window, noting the darkening sky. “What time is it?”
Gabby stared at her watch. “Five minutes to four. Man, this day has flown.”
We Care didn’t close until five, so Ned should still be at his desk, but I had to be sure. I reached for Gabby’s phone on the counter and dialed a number. She stared at me in confusion as I handed the receiver back to her. “Who are you calling?” she asked, taking the phone.
“Not me. You’re calling We Care and asking for Ned Reinhart. I want to know if he’s in the office, and Olivia might recognize my voice.”
Gabby’s eyes gleamed. “Awesome. Can I have a Southern accent?”
“You can speak with a Russian one for all I care.”
She waved me off, indicating that the phone had been picked up. “Hey there,” she drawled into the phone. “Can I speak to Neddy Reinhart?” She paused. “Yes, voicemail. Thanks y’all.” Gabby disconnected and placed the phone back on the counter. “How’d I do, Nancy?”
I made a face. “Awful. And what’s with the Neddy bit, anyhow? You could have made her suspicious.”
“Oh chill. Like it even mattered.” Gabby sipped her drink. “The girl didn’t catch on. She sounded like her Happy Meal was short a few fries.”
“So Ned wasn’t there?”
Gabby threw her empty cup in the trash. “He was there but on the phone. She asked if I wanted his voicemail. I said yes and then waited to hang up after she transferred me.”
I dug my car keys out of my purse. “I’m going over to talk to him before the office closes.”
Gabby stuck her lower lip out. “Bummer. I want to go too! But I can’t close the store early. Mrs. Jenson’s coming in to pick up the entire Harry Potter collection for her granddaughter in hard cover. That’ll be my biggest sale of the year.”
“No worries. I’ll be fine.” The bells over the door jingled, and we both looked up expectantly, then froze. Matt Smitty stood there, hands thrust deep in the pockets of his jeans, blond hair plastered to his head from the rain shower. He and Gabby both exchanged a frown.
Gabby placed her hands on her hips and eyed him with annoyance. “Sorry, we don’t carry Popular Mechanics here.”
He shot her a dirty look and turned to me. “Tess, I saw your car out front and was wondering if I could talk to you.”
A blanket of fear wrapped around me. Why was Matt so interested in me all of a sudden? Was it because Dylan was out of the picture now? It felt a bit stalkerish. Maybe he had been the one to drive by my house the other evening. Call me anytime, even if it’s in the middle of the night.
If Matt thought I doubted his innocence it might ruin everything, so I had to act casual and not let my concern show. “Sure. What’s up?”
“Alone.” He narrowed his eyes at Gabby.
“You don’t think I’m going to leave my cousin here with the likes of you, do you? And, um, hello, this is my store. Forget about it. I’m staying.” Gabby’s voice rose.
“Gabs.” Maybe Matt had remembered a detail about Dylan. “Isn’t there something you could do in the storage room for a minute?” I gave my cousin a pleading look, not wanting to blow this opportunity.
“Oh, whatever,” she grumbled. “He’s got five minutes.” She strode swiftly to the door marked Employees Only and slammed it behind her.
“Your cousin came to see me. Again.” Matt jerked his head toward the door Gabby had disappeared behind. “Not that one, who obviously hates me. But come to think of it, I don’t believe Gino’s ever been a fan of mine either. This is the second time he’s questioned me.”
I had known that Matt would be ticked off, so I tried to play dumb. “What did he want?”
He laughed bitterly. “Come on. You know what he wanted. I tried to fo
ol myself into thinking maybe he was suspicious of Earl, but nope. It was me he had his eye on all along.”
“Matt—” I began.
He cut me off. “Gino thinks I’m the one who loosened that fitting in Dylan’s engine the day before he died.”
I glanced uneasily at the door where Gabby had disappeared, wondering if she had her ear pressed up against the door. “Sorry about that. Gino was doing his job. Someone wanted Dylan dead, and we have to face facts here. You guys never liked each other, and his vehicle was at your shop the day before he died in a car accident.”
He looked at me in surprise. “You know I’d never do anything to hurt Dylan.”
I didn’t answer because, honestly, I didn’t know. Matt hadn’t liked Dylan, and everyone seemed to believe he was still carrying a torch for me. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure what to believe anymore.”
“Damn it,” he whispered. “Tell Gino to back off. He came to my house, Tess. My house! Lila heard the whole thing, and now she thinks I’m involved too. We were already having problems before this came along. I’m afraid she’s going to leave and take the boys with her. Let me tell you, I won’t let that happen. I won’t lose my family over this.”
Matt’s eyes darkened as he said the words, and I cringed, remembering that final time he’d been waiting for me at work all those years ago, begging and pleading with me to give him another chance. He’d been drinking, and it had scared me when he started crying and grabbed my arm, refusing to let go. Matt had apologized for his behavior soon afterward, and since that night, he seemed to have come full circle. Still, how well did I really know him, or for that matter, how well had I ever known him?
He didn’t wait for me to respond. “Lila thinks I’ve been fooling around on her. She knows I dated you years ago. Someone must have told her about the argument Dylan and I had—you know, at On the Rocks, when I found out you guys were getting married? After we got back from Dylan’s wake, she lit into me and said it was clear that I still had feelings for you.”
“I don’t want to get involved in your marriage.”
He continued to examine my face so closely that my cheeks started to burn and were probably turning red. “Wait a second,” he said slowly. “Do you actually believe I killed your husband?”
My hesitation was a second too long, and I saw a brief reminder of the sweet, hurt boy from high school before his face hardened, as if it had been carved from stone. “Try to look at this from my point of view. I’m not sure who to trust anymore. Don’t you understand?”
“Yeah, I understand,” he said quietly. “I understand that I apparently never meant anything to you. Now tell Gino to back off, okay? He’s playing with my life, and I won’t let him take everything that I love away from me.”
With one last indignant glance at me, he pushed the door open and sent the bells on the door jingling merrily.
Gabby emerged from the back room and ran up the aisle. “I heard the whole thing. He’s guilty as sin, Tess. I’d stake my life on it. We should call Gino and have him picked up.”
“We don’t have any proof.” I watched Matt crossing the street, his shoulders hunched forward against the rain, and thought back again to the argument at On the Rocks that had cemented his and Dylan’s dislike of each other. Shortly afterward, I’d learned Matt had left town for a while. My mother heard it was a rehab program for drug addiction but admitted she wasn’t positive. He had returned to town a couple of months before my wedding and hooked up with Lila shortly afterward.
When I’d received the text from him the evening before my wedding, it had been an unwelcome surprise. Before the confrontation with Dylan, I’d convinced myself that he’d put me in his rearview mirror forever, but now I was no longer sure. Maybe Matt figured he’d leave me with some parting words to think about—words that, six years later, kept repeating themselves in my head.
If you marry him, you’ll be sorry one day.
Thirteen
Thanks to the daylight saving time change last week, it was already growing dark when I pulled my car into a parking spot across the street from We Care’s building. I glanced at my watch—4:45 p.m. Most of Dylan’s colleagues worked the 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. shift, but the building stayed unlocked until five. The lobby was pin-drop quiet as I got on the elevator and rode the car to the eighth floor. Olivia was noticeably missing from her desk when I opened the heavy glass doors and made my way quietly down the hallway toward Ned’s office.
Ned would not be happy to see me, but I didn’t care. I wanted answers. Why had he met Dylan at Java Time that day? Was he in on the scheme with him? If so, maybe he’d been afraid Dylan would squeal after losing his job and decided to shut him up—permanently.
The door was open, and Ned was staring out the window at the remainder of a brilliant orange sun that was rapidly sinking into a blackened sky. I rapped my knuckles against the doorway and he jumped in his seat, then immediately whirled around to face me.
“What are you doing here?” Ned asked, anger registering in his tone.
I folded my arms over my chest. “I thought we should have a little talk.”
He drew his eyebrows together, and his expression clearly said he was not in the mood to chat. “About what? Didn’t you get all of Dylan’s stuff out yesterday?”
“Yes, I did.” I stood tall and erect, refusing to let this man intimidate me as he’d done yesterday.
“Then why are you here?” he demanded. His dark eyes were cold and aloof, but I thought I interpreted something else in them as well. Fear?
“I need to ask you a couple more questions.”
Ned frowned. “I’ve got a meeting.”
“At five o’clock?” I asked, disbelief registering in my tone.
If looks could kill, I’d be six feet under by now. “My schedule is none of your business,” he said curtly.
My temper flared. “I know why Dylan was fired, Ned. He was supposedly embezzling money from the company.”
Ned inhaled sharply. “Who told you this? These are private company matters that don’t concern you.”
“This is my husband we’re talking about,” I said calmly. “Of course it concerns me. Dylan is dead. He won’t tarnish your precious company’s reputation anymore. What difference does it make why he was fired now?”
Understanding slowly dawned on Ned’s face. “Olivia told you, didn’t she? That girl is a complete moron, and I’ll fire her for blabbing this all over the place.”
“It wasn’t Olivia.” I paused before adding another lie to the mix. “And I know that Dylan didn’t act alone.” Time to see if my fishing expedition snagged anything.
“I will not discuss this any further with you, Mrs. Esposito. But I can assure you that whatever your husband did, he was responsible for his own actions.”
“I’m not so sure.” I leaned back against the wall, trying to look more confident than I felt. “I know that you met him for coffee the day before he died. He’d already been fired from his job, and let’s face it, you guys were not exactly buddies, so why did you meet him?”
He scowled and shuffled some papers on his desk. “Your husband begged for his job back. Like I’d ever consider rehiring a thief. For the record, he got what he deserved.”
“What…getting fired or killed?” Ned didn’t answer, so I continued. “I found a journal among his personal effects. He made notes about what was going on in the office. It proves you were also taking money from the company, and he’s got dates and amounts…everything a prosecutor would need to prove you guilty.” Sure, I was bluffing up a storm here, but he didn’t need to know that. “I’m guessing that Dylan told you at Java Time if you didn’t admit to your part, he was going to the police. I think you killed him.”
Ned’s eyes glittered as he slammed his fist down on the desk and rose to his feet, his body trembling with apparent rage. “How dare
you make such assumptions.”
“These are not assumptions,” I said quietly. “If you come clean now and admit your part, maybe the police will go easier on you.”
He let out a howl of laughter. “You’re making this all up. Show me the so-called journal.” Then his voice turned to a growl. “I want that journal.”
I gave him a smug smile. “It’s in a safe place. If anything happens to me, it will be sent to the cops. Specifically, my cousin Gino who’s on the force.” Liar, liar, pants on fire.
“Why are you telling me this?” he asked between clenched teeth. “Why not give it to the police then? If it exists at all, which I doubt.”
I hoisted my purse over my shoulder, hoping he didn’t notice my fingers shaking. “Admit your part in the plan and clear Dylan’s name. It won’t be long before word gets out that he was fired for embezzlement. I don’t want that to be his legacy.”
His smile was cold and thin. “Fine. If knowing will get rid of you, then it’s worth it. I figured out what Dylan was doing but needed time to prove the deception. Once I was convinced, I alerted my boss. He ordered me to fire Dylan immediately, and I was only too happy to do so.”
“Then you killed him so he couldn’t reveal your involvement in the embezzlement.”
Ned chuckled. “I wasn’t even in town the day your husband died. Why don’t you ask your so-called cop cousin to check my plane records? I had to fly to our headquarters in Michigan for an all-day conference and didn’t return till the day after your husband died.”
I hadn’t been expecting this twist, and my stomach sank. It would be easy enough for Gino to check out if Ned was telling the truth. But if Ned didn’t kill Dylan, who did?
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