Murder of the Eccentric Billionaire: A Jolene Park-Attorney At Law, Cozy Mystery

by Liz Turner

  Jacob stared, unable to believe his ears. He shook his head firmly. “No, Luce. I love you. I want to marry you. You’re not a mess. And definitely not a burden.” He took her limp hand in his. “Why are you saying this? Did your uncle tell you that you would be a burden to me?”

  Lucy met his gaze, her eyes wide and watery as they seemed to search for an answer in his stare. “Okay,” she sighed, sounding somewhat relieved. “I guess it’s just engagement jitters.” She laughed, yet, Jacob could see that she was still in pain.

  “Well, listen,” he said, “let’s sit down and—” But he was interrupted by a colleague who’d come to the door, beckoning him. He held up a finger to wait, but his colleague insisted. “Hold on, Luce. I’ll be right back.” He walked quickly to the door. “What is it?”

  “The grant application for the study was approved!” his colleague, a young woman he had met in graduate school, exclaimed. Her eyes gleamed.

  “Are you serious?” Jacob said, momentarily forgetting Lucy was behind him. The lab had been trying to get funding for a new cutting-edge study and had applied for dozens of grants over the past two years, so this was a much-needed breakthrough.

  “I know! I just couldn’t wait to tell you! I’m going to find Pablo and tell him now.” Flashing one more smile at him, she disappeared down the hallway.

  Jacob turned around, unable to wipe the smile off his face. Meanwhile, Lucy sat on one of the lab stools, slowly swinging her legs.

  “We got the grant!” Jacob said. Excited, he picked Lucy up and twirled her around like a child before hugging her tight. “Ah, Luce! This year’s gonna be a good one, I can feel it!”

  Lucy smiled. “That’s great. I’m so happy for you!” She smoothed her button-down top. “I’ll let you get back to work now.”

  “Lucy,” Jacob said.

  She stopped in her tracks. “Yes?”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you too.” And then she was gone.

  About twenty minutes later, once Jacob was once again entrenched in his work for the day, he reached under his station for the bottle of potassium cyanide stashed there, but couldn’t find it. That’s odd, he thought. Maybe one of the techs used it and forgot to put it back. But he thought that unlikely. Each station had its own bottle, so there was no need to borrow someone else’s. After looking for five minutes through his things though, he accepted that he had lost it somehow. Shrugging, he pulled a bottle from his desk-mate’s things.

  ***

  Lucy walked into her uncle’s house, determined to put yesterday’s events behind her. Jacob had made it clear that he wanted to be with her, and if the time ever came to divulge what Uncle Foster had told her, she felt sure that it wouldn’t mean the end.

  But that doesn’t mean I’m going to tell him now, she told her confidently.

  Part of her, maybe a bigger part than she would like to think, didn’t quite believe Jacob would still want to marry her if he knew her father’s history, which was her history too, by extension. After all, who would want to marry into a family of monsters?

  While she felt sure he meant what he’d said now, that was only because, as her uncle had insinuated, he didn’t have all the information.

  “Ah, Lucy,” Uncle Foster said, getting up from where he lounged on the sofa. “I take your return to mean you did the right thing.”

  She smiled cheekily. “I did.” She flopped her keys on the little table. “I’ve decided to tell Jacob the truth, but only when I feel the time is right. When I want to, not you. This is my life, Uncle Foster.”

  He scoffed. “I see. You mean that you’ll tell him once you’re already married. When he can’t get away from a bad situation so easily. I’m so very proud of the woman you’ve become…” he said sarcastically, his voice trailing off as he retreated to his study.

  How dare he! Lucy thought, burning with anger. It made her even angrier to know that his motives were far from pure to begin with.

  “Lucy?” he called out, “would you put on some hot milk for my cocoa? I’ve had such a long day with my lawyers. I decided to change my will. I’m leaving everything to my foundation. They know how to appreciate and put all the money I’ve given them over the years to good use. They deserve it.”

  Lucy’s jaw dropped. Her uncle could be cold at times, but he had never done anything like this.

  Was he really so hurt by her decision to get married and move away that he had divested her of her inheritance, or was it truly that he thought her refusal to tell Jacob about her father was the mark of a bad person?

  Her stomach sank.

  “Lucy? The milk?” came his voice again.

  “Yes, okay, okay,” she answered, her voice hollow.

  She went to the kitchen, filled a mug with milk, and put it in the microwave. Waiting for the milk to warm, the row of medicines on the kitchen counter caught her eye. Seeing it was a firm reminder that her uncle wasn’t exactly in the best of health.

  How much longer does he have? she wondered. The subtext to this question ran through her mind though her guilt forbade her from directly acknowledging it. Still it was there, insidiously making her wonder how much longer she had before she was cut off completely.

  The microwave dinged, interrupting her thoughts.

  Putting the pill bottle she had picked up without realizing it back on the counter, she turned to get the milk out of the microwave.

  “Hi, Lucy,” her cousin, Aunt Rebekah said, appearing suddenly in the kitchen. “What are you doing?”

  Lucy almost jumped. Rebekah was Uncle Foster’s cousin, and technically Lucy’s distant cousin. But due to the age difference, Lucy had always referred to her as Aunt Rebekah out of respect.

  Aunt Rebekah was staying with them for a few months while she looked for her own place. She had a habit of sneaking up on Lucy. Despite her apparent kindliness, Lucy never quite felt comfortable in her presence. Each of Rebekah’s attempts to forge a connection with the girl had somehow rang false to Lucy for some reason.

  “I’m just—” Lucy began, when Rebekah’s husband, Lucas, entered the room.

  “Lucy!” he exclaimed, obviously relieved. He glanced at Rebekah and strode over to give his young relative a hug. “I wanted to call and ask if you were okay and,” he lowered his voice, “if Foster had done something. But Rebekah said it wasn’t appropriate.” Releasing Lucy from the hug, he patted her shoulders. “I’m glad you’re all right,” he said, his voice back to its normal pitch.

  “Of course she’s all right. Had a little tantrum yesterday, that’s all,” Rebekah scowled.

  Lucy frowned and wanted to retort, but thought better of it. She had made enough members of the household angry for one day. “I’m just going to take Uncle Foster his hot chocolate,” she said instead, scooping a spoonful of sugar into the steaming cup and leaving the room.

  Rebekah Auen watched Lucy scurry away like a nervous little mouse. She scoffed aloud and threw a frown at her husband. She didn’t trust that spoiled brat. Since Rebekah had arrived, it had been clear to her that the girl was in no hurry to grow up and strike out on her own. And why would she? Rebekah thought. She’s got it made here. Twenty-five years old with free rent. But I suppose her new fiancé will be taking the reigns from now on.

  Rebekah smirked. Kids these days never wanted to grow up, and it was people like her cousin that enabled them.

  “Didn’t even clean up after herself, like usual,” she muttered under her breath. The fixings from the hot cocoa were still strewn out across the counter. She caught sight of the pill bottle Lucy had been handling—rather suspiciously, now that she thought about it.

  She jumped like I’d caught her naked, Rebekah thought.

  She picked up the bottle and examined it, but found nothing readily wrong with it.

  “Rebekah! Rebekah!” Foster yelled from his study.

  She groaned. “What in the world do you want now?” she shouted back. Yeesh, he can be a handful. She mentally made a note to
double down on her efforts to move out. Fast.

  “Rebekah!” he shouted again, sounding desperate.

  With a touch of resentment, Rebekah trotted down the hall to his study, hearing panicked shouting from within. She swung the door open. “What is going—?” she began. But before she could say anything further, the sight of her cousin—drooped into his chair like a rag doll, breathing rapidly and turning a shade of red she’d never before seen on a human body—shocked her into silence.

  “You poisoned me,” Foster panted, casting a horrible anguished glare at Lucy, who stood frozen in front of him with her hands over her ears.

  “What?” Rebekah said, bewildered. When Foster wailed again, she knelt beside him and whipped out her phone to call an ambulance.

  Foster’s breathing became impossibly rapid, and he muttered incomprehensibly. When Rebekah hung up with the ambulance, she patted his hand and screamed for Lucas.

  Lucy, on the other hand, was nowhere to be found. Rebekah figured she must have left when she’d been calling the ambulance.

  Chapter 1

  Confidentiality

  Jolene Park and John Walter were enjoying their last day of vacation. They had spent the last week at the Ocean Front Resort, about an hour north of their home in Los Angeles.

  “Mimosa for me please,” Jolene said, smiling briefly at their server. They had elected to have a late breakfast at one of the resort’s restaurants.

  John’s eyes twinkled. “And a bloody for me, thank you.”

  “And coffee!” Jolene added. Turning to John, she said, “We’re going to start the day off with the essentials, I guess?”

  John took a swig of water. “Well, we’ve got to return to the real world tomorrow, so might as well live it up as long as we can.”

  When their drinks arrived, Jolene raised her glass. “Cheers,” she said, clinking it against John’s.

  Just then, there was a clamor in the lobby behind the restaurant. A young-looking girl wearing a tasteful black bathing suit and white linen pants was on the floor, laughing hysterically. Her companion, a tall man with glasses and light brown hair, leaned down to help her up, but she declined, instead leaning back against the floor, her body shaking with laughter. The young man looked around and shrugged at the small audience that had gathered. He then proceeded to lie down on the floor next to the girl, joining in on her laughter.

  “Well, they’re certainly having fun,” John said. “You think they’re drunk,” he made a show of checking his watch, “at eleven a.m.?”

  Mesmerized by the scene, Jolene stared at the young couple a few moments before turning back to her own table. “I think they’re just in love. And young.” She leveled a glance at John. “Remember those days?”

  “Being young? Of course.” He winked mischievously. “As for the love…”

  Jolene frowned mockingly at him and kicked him under the table for good measure. “After breakfast, let’s hit the sauna.”

  “As you wish,” John said, grinning broadly.

  ***

  A week later, Jolene was sipping coffee in the office kitchen, taking a break from her current case research. She scrolled absently through the local news on her phone when a photograph caught her eye. It was attached to a story with the headline, ORANGE COUNTY BILLIONAIRE MURDERED BY NIECE. The photograph featured two juxtaposing photos of the same woman. In one, she wore a light pink sweater and smiled directly at the camera—most likely taken from a social media profile. In another, she wore a t-shirt and looked dazed, her features slack. A mugshot.

  Jolene nearly choked on her coffee. It was, unmistakably, the young woman she and John had seen laughing bizarrely on the floor of the Ocean Front Resort lobby. She quickly skimmed the article. The niece’s name was Lucy Fielder, and she’d been the charge of Foster Fielder, a billionaire who had made his money largely by making sound investments throughout his career in computer software. His niece was twenty-five.

  Fascinated, Jolene kept reading.

  State police say Lucy Fielder confessed to poisoning Foster Fielder, her elderly uncle, with potassium cyanide the day of his death by adding the deadly substance to his habitual evening cup of cocoa. The confession took place during the alleged murderer’s stay at a treatment facility for “luxury, all-natural mental cleansing.” Family members say they admitted her after her nervous breakdown following the death of her uncle.

  Potassium cyanide is deadly to humans even in tiny amounts. Once ingested, cardiac thrombosis, a clogging of the main arteries that lead to the heart, sets in at record time. An affected person dies within fifteen to thirty minutes, sometimes even despite emergency medical treatment.

  Trial for Lucy Fielder will be held on the 12th. Police consider this a closed case.

  Jolene took at a seat at one of the tables in the office kitchen and mused over the story. The article didn’t mention anything about a possible motive for Lucy Fielder.

  She thought back to last weekend at the resort, seeing the undeniably happy young couple. They had seemed without a care in the world.

  What could have happened between then and now? Jolene wondered.

  After googling the case for more information, she found out that Lucy had lived with her uncle since girlhood, after the death of her parents. Most reports claimed the motive was money, as the late Foster Fielder had just made the first moves toward changing his will, directing all his money away from his niece, the natural heir, and to a charity instead.

  Jolene frowned, sensing that something wasn’t right about this case. She rhythmically tapped her fingers on the table, trying to puzzle it out. Pulling a pen from her blazer pocket, she jotted down on her notebook two lines from the article.

  Staring at what she had written, she felt sure her hunch was right.

  No, she thought, with a mixture of grimness and excitement, this case is not at all closed.

  The next morning, Jolene arrived at the office, feeling chipper. She stepped out of the elevator and instead of putting her light jacket on the coat rack in the lobby, she strode straight to John’s office.

  “John!” she said cheerfully. “Oh good, you’re in!” She grinned as he looked up from his desk with red-rimmed eyes. There was a cold Styrofoam container of Chinese takeout and two half-empty mugs of coffee still on his desk. “You look terrible.”

  John winced. “It’s the Samson case. They’ve pushed up the hearing to next week, and frankly, I’m not nearly as prepared as I need to be.” He gestured around his desk at the haphazardly strewn papers. “This case runs deep.” He sighed and looked at Jolene, amused. “But you seem to be in a good mood today.”

  “Well,” she said, pulling out the chair on the other side of his desk to sit in. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

  “Oh?”

  She put the print-outs of a few articles from the Lucy Fielder story on his desk. “Something is very wrong with this picture.”

  John rubbed his eyes and read. “It’s surprising, that’s for sure. But what makes you think…”

  “It’s the girl from the resort. The laughing girl?”

  John did a double take and chuckled. “You’re right! Wow. Who would have thought?” He paused abruptly and slapped himself on the cheek. “Sorry. That was awful of me. I shouldn’t make light of something like this. I’m just too tired.”

  But Jolene hardly heard what he said. “I did some research to figure out which facility Lucy is being held at. Far as I can tell, she’s still in recovery and police have determined she’s safer in this luxury treatment facility than in prison where she might harm herself. And, get this!” She pulled up the page on her phone from the facility’s website and began reading. “‘Wild Vines aims to heal without the harsh intrusive methods of western medicine. Our qualified doctors are trained in the gentle manipulation of mental pain points to rid patients of their trauma rather than compound or repress with chemicals.’ And then,” she added, briefly looking up at John, “they list on their site these so
-called treatments they use, which include acupuncture, massage, group therapy, and hypnotherapy.”

  John blinked. “You think Lucy Fielder was coerced into confessing?”

  Jolene nodded. “If confession was given under the influence of hypnotherapy, it’s utterly inadmissible.”

  John sighed. “Why do you want to get into this?”

  Jolene thought for a moment. “Justice. And I just didn’t see anything violent or deviant in that girl. Did you?”

  “I don’t think it matters what I think, Jo. I can see those wheels already turning in your head. You’ve already got a plan to move in on this case, don’t you?”

  “The state always wants the easy conviction, not the truth,” Jolene said. “So I’m going to Wild Vines in a few minutes to speak to Lucy’s doctors,” she used her fingers to make air quotes, “and I’m going to find out for myself the circumstances of her confession.”

  John gave no immediate response, and Jolene interpreted his silence as an agreement to cover her at the firm for the day. So she got up to leave.

  “Jo,” John said before she reached the door, “I’m coming with you.”

  She came to a halt, her heart flipping with adoration as he got up to follow her.

  Chapter 2

  The Investigation Begins

  The tires of John’s car crunched over the gravel drive just as the clock struck nine a.m. Wild Vines Natural Treatment Center was an old mansion in the Hollywood Hills, marked only by a small, partly covered sign at the drive. The place was gated, and even without the gate, it would have been difficult to enter due to the massive stone wall surrounding the grounds, the large hedges, and low-hanging trees adding to the obfuscation.

  John stuck a hand out of his window to hit the call button on the gate.

  “Wild Vines Natural Treatment Center,” came a female voice.