“That was a warning.” She motioned with her left hand. “Don’t be foolish, Pat. Hand it over.”
I heard the door at the back of the building close, followed by the sound of heavy boots on the staircase. Al!
“Pat! Ivy!” Al called out. “Turn on some lights in here.”
Nuala turned toward the door. “What the—”
“Here! It’s yours.” I threw the logger at her.
She swung around to me, then jumped back as she fumbled her attempt to catch it.
I sprang at her and grabbed her right arm. I forced it up as high as I could. The gun exploded, sending a bullet into the ceiling. Pieces of plaster fell on us.
We toppled to the floor. I clasped the wrist of her gun hand as we rolled over, but she squeezed off another shot that hit the office wall.
“Yee haw!” Al rushed in and stomped on Nuala’s arm. Nuala screamed and loosened her grip on the gun. Al snatched the weapon and flung it into a corner.
I disentangled myself from Nuala. Al straddled her and pinned her arms over her head.
“Get off me!” Nuala cried. She flailed about, kicking her legs.
“Got any duct tape?” Al yelled over her shoulder.
“Coming right up.”
I hurried over to Nuala’s office where Jamie was squirming in her chair. She gasped and coughed when I pulled the rag from her mouth.
“You okay?” I asked.
She coughed again and nodded.
I grabbed a roll of duct tape and a pair of scissors from Nuala’s desk. “Al’s here, and we’ve got Nuala on the floor. We’ll be back for you, but we have to tie her up first.”
“Go!” Jamie croaked.
In my office, Nuala was still struggling beneath Al.
“I’ll get her feet.” I knelt and grabbed one of Nuala’s slender ankles.
She bent her other leg and aimed her stiletto heel at my face. I leaned back, but she tried it again.
I ducked and reached for the shoe. I grabbed it by the heel and yanked it off. Then it was easy to get hold of her ankle.
She continued to thrash and swear. I knelt, holding her ankles.
“Sit on her legs and throw me that roll of tape,” Al said.
I pulled off Nuala’s other shoe and planted myself on her legs. With her thrashing under me, it was like riding a bucking bronco. I threw the roll of tape to Al and slid the scissors across the floor.
“Get off me!” Nuala cried.
Al’s back was to me so I couldn’t see how she did it. But she managed to tape Nuala’s wrists together. She cut another long strip of tape and gave it to me. “Truss ’er up real good.”
Nuala rolled from side to side, but I managed to stay in the saddle. I bound her ankles together. Then I wound another strip of tape around her calves.
“Heave ho!” Al flung a screaming Nuala over her shoulder and deposited her in my desk chair.
I quickly moved to tape her to the chair.
“You’ll be in jail for a long time,” I said as I bound tape around her. “For the murder of Lyle Critchley and the theft of $1 million.”
Nuala glared at me like a malevolent cat. “Stupid bitch!” she spat out. “You still haven’t got it right.”
Al picked up the roll of tape. “Shut yer trap or I’ll do it for you.”
“If you think I—”
Al cut off a strip of tape.
“Hang on, Al,” I said. “Let her continue.”
Nuala lifted her chin and appraised us coolly like a celebrity condescending to meet the press. “You think I killed that old man but I never even met him.”
Of course she would say that. “Then who killed him?” I asked.
“How would I know?” Fire flashed from her eyes. “All I know is what I heard on the evening news.”
“Why did you get Jamie to come here today?”
She turned her face away.
I nodded at Al. “Tape her up. The police will get her to talk.”
She slapped the strip of tape over Nuala’s mouth.
I retrieved the keystroke logger and picked the gun off the floor. My hand was shaking. I dropped the logger in my shirt pocket and stuck the gun in a large envelope. We left Nuala squirming in the chair and went to free Jamie.
“Foster can’t say we knocked Nuala senseless,” I said.
“Wouldn’t have been the end of the world if we had,” Al muttered.
Jamie rubbed her wrists after Al and I cut her loose. “You arrived in the nick of time.” She put her arms around our shoulders.
Then she stared at Al. “What happened to your face?”
Al touched her face where a bruise had started to blossom. “Just a bruise. I’ll tell you about it later.” She gave Jamie a hug.
Then it was my turn. “I’ve finally caught up with you,” I said.
Jamie returned my embrace. “I know Tracy’s been out of her mind with worry, but I had no choice.”
“We have to get the police over here,” I said. “Is there anything you can tell Inspector Foster, Jamie?”
“I didn’t learn as much as I’d hoped, but I’ll tell him what I know.”
I patted the shirt pocket with the keystroke logger. “I might be able to fill in some blanks.”
She looked at me quizzically.
“I’ll explain later,” I said. “Go on.”
Jamie retrieved her handbag, which had been flung into a corner of the office, and pulled out a cell phone. “Nuala knew I was on to her and she got me here with an email from Ivy.”
She started to punch in a number. “I’ll tell you about it, but there’s something I have to do first.” She held up the phone. “Babe, it’s me…Yes, I’m okay…”
Al and I stepped out of the office so she’d have some privacy.
“Time to call the police,” I said.
“You bet.” Al glanced at the door of the office where Jamie was, then back at me. “After what she put Jen through, if there’s anything I can say that will put Nuala behind bars, I sure as hell will.”
I went over to Ivy’s desk and punched Foster’s number into the phone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The next two calls I made were to Toronto. I left a voice mail for Keith Kulas, telling him what the woman he had hired to run the Braeloch branch had been up to. My third call was to Norris Cassidy’s compliance department, the office that ensures that its advisors and money managers follow regulatory requirements to the letter. I connected with a deputy compliance officer, and I asked her to look over all the accounts that had been opened at the Braeloch branch.
Five minutes later, Foster arrived with two uniformed officers. As usual, he didn’t look happy.
“You were told to proceed to the detachment when you left the police cruiser,” he said when I opened the front door.
“If we had, there’d be another murder for you to investigate.” I led the way to my office where Al and Jamie were standing guard over Nuala.
“We finally catch up with you, Ms. Collins,” Foster said. “And I understand that we nearly didn’t.”
Jamie met his eyes but said nothing.
At a signal from Foster, the uniformed officers cut Nuala loose, handcuffed her and took her away.
I handed Foster the envelope with Nuala’s gun and the keystroke logger.
“What’s this?” he asked turning the logger over in his hand.
“What Nuala hoped would make her very rich,” I said.
He cleared his throat. “Right, then. Over to the detachment, the three of you.”
We gave our separate statements. Al and I finished around the same time, and we sat in the reception area.
“Jamie could be in there for some time.” The words were no sooner out of my mouth when I began to shake. I pulled on my parka, thinking that would do the trick, but it didn’t.
“Delayed shock reaction,” Al said.
She went over to the machines on the other side of the room and returned with a paper cup and a han
dful of sugar packets. She dumped three of them in the cup, stirred the contents and handed the cup to me. “Sweet tea. Drink up.”
The beverage tasted like it might remove the enamel from my teeth. But I managed to drink it down and the shaking gradually subsided.
I called the rectory on Al’s cell, and told Celia what had just gone down at the branch.
“Good Lord!” she said. “That gun could have gone off in your face.”
I closed my eyes and held my breath for a few moments. “What are you up to?” I asked.
“We’ve just had soup and sandwiches, and Tommy is about to fall asleep in his chair. I’ll put him in Father Brisebois’s bed.”
“I’ll wait here for Jamie,” I said.
“We’d better stay here in the rectory tonight,” Celia said. “I’ll take the sofa in the office. You and Farah can bunk in with Tommy. Father’s bed is big enough for three.”
“Don’t forget Jamie and Al,” I said. “They can’t go back to the farmhouse.”
“We’ll figure something out.”
I left Al at the detachment and walked down Main Street to scout out some snacks. I was about to pay for a big bag of potato chips and two cans of Coke when Kerry walked into the convenience store.
“You’re working late,” he said to me.
He took a bag of milk from the refrigerator at the back of the store and joined me at the cashier’s counter. “You okay?” he asked. “You look beat.”
After we’d paid, I told him about my day.
“It never rains but it pours,” he said.
He looked so sympathetic that I blurted out, “And we can’t go home tonight.”
“Hey, there’s plenty of room at our place. Three guest bedrooms. I can put all of you up.”
Addled as my brain was, I realized that this was not a good idea.
He put a hand on my arm. “I’m serious, Pat. Get the others and come over.”
I pulled my arm away but gave him a smile. “Thanks, Kerry. We’ll be fine at the rectory.”
It was after eight when Foster escorted Jamie to the reception area. “Tomorrow morning, Ms. Collins,” he said. “Nine o’clock sharp.”
He fixed his eyes on Al and me. “And let me know if either of you is even thinking of leaving the area.”
“I’ll be needed here until we find a new branch manager,” I said.
Al put an arm around Jamie’s shoulders as we left the building. “Let’s get some supper at the Chinaman’s place. How about it, Pat?”
“Sounds good.” I wanted to hear Jamie’s story.
We ordered green tea and the Dinner for Three—the vegetarian option—at the Tiger Lily Café. The pretty teenage waitress brought a teapot to the table, and Al filled our cups. With her hands cradling her cup, Jamie launched into her story. She began with the car accident that killed her sister and broke her parents’ hearts.
“Then two weeks ago I got a letter from the old geezer. I couldn’t believe my eyes.” She shook her head. “Four pages, handwritten. He wanted my help.”
“Written by hand,” I said.
Jamie and Al looked at me, clearly puzzled.
“I wondered why the police didn’t find a copy of the letter on Lyle’s computer,” I said. “But a man of Lyle’s generation would write any personal correspondence by hand.”
“That’s right,” Jamie said.
“He wanted you to find out who had bilked client accounts at the Lindsay branch.”
She nodded. “He knew I’d been legal counsel for Betsy Cornell.”
“Betsy Cornell lost a lot of her savings when a financial advisor put her into high-risk investments,” I said to Al. “Jamie got a good deal of her money back. After that, Jamie led the victims’ committee in the Edward Lloyd case, a slimeball advisor who swindled more than a hundred investors in a Ponzi scheme.”
Creeps like those made me ashamed of my profession.
“I didn’t know you was such a hotshot lawyer, Jen!” Al’s face glowed with admiration.
Jamie blushed. “Lyle’s letter mentioned those cases but I shredded it as soon as I read it. Lyle, of all people, asking me for help. But then I started to think about what he’d written. Ignoring him wouldn’t bring Carly back. And I might be able to stop another fraudster from harming more small investors.”
“There was a conviction in the Lindsay case,” I said. “What made Lyle think the wrong person had been charged?”
“His letter rambled a bit, but he said that what happened in Lindsay might repeat itself in Braeloch.”
“Did the letter mention Nuala?”
“He gave no names.” She paused for a few moments. “But he seemed to think the police had messed up. He talked about a fall guy.”
“Did you speak to him on the phone before you drove up here?” I asked.
“It never occurred to me to call him,” she said. “I assumed I’d find him at home. Old folks around here are homebodies.”
The waitress placed bowls of egg-drop soup and a plate of spring rolls on the table. Al and I turned our attention to the food, but Jamie kept talking.
“I took Tracy’s car and got up here around one o’clock that Thursday,” she said. “I went straight to Lyle’s place. There were no vehicles outside, but I went to the house and knocked in case his car was in the garage. No one came to the door.”
She sipped a spoonful of soup and went on. “I spent the afternoon with Al and Ruby, and went back to Lyle’s place before it got dark. No vehicle around, and no one answered the door. So I drove into town and got a room at the Dominion Hotel. I planned to go back to Lyle’s first thing in the morning.”
Our waitress unloaded a tray with platters of chow mein, honey-garlic tofu, fried rice, steamed vegetables and three dinner plates. Al ladled the food onto the plates.
When our plates were empty, Jamie and I leaned back in the booth. Al pointed to the food that was left on the platters, but we shook our heads. She slid the contents of the platters onto her plate.
“I heard about the fire on the TV news that night,” Jamie continued. “They hadn’t identified the body, but I knew it had to be Lyle.”
Al put down her fork and looked at me. “Jen called us, and I came to get her at seven the next morning. We left your daughter’s car in the parking lot.”
“Why didn’t you tell the police about Lyle’s letter?” I asked Jamie.
“When I heard he’d been killed, I figured his suspicions were correct. I needed to find out who had been skimming money from those accounts. I figured that when I found the fraudster, I’d have Lyle’s killer. I decided to get on to it before the police started asking questions. With the history between Lyle and my family, I knew I’d be a suspect. I’d be tied up for days.”
She paused for a few moments, emotions flickering across her face. “The next night, I heard on the news that the police were looking for me. Someone had seen me at Lyle’s place.” She ran a hand through her short black hair. “My hair was burgundy then, so I was easy to spot.”
“The fire that killed Lyle broke out around nine,” I said. “You went out to his place before it got dark. Then you drove into town and checked in at the hotel. You were out there long before Lyle was killed.”
Jamie gave me a small smile. “But I had no alibi for time of the fire. I ate a sandwich in the hotel dining room, and I went up to my room and read. Nobody knew that I never left the hotel.”
“You shoulda spent the evening in the bar,” Al said.
“So you started to check things out on your computer,” I said.
“On my computer.” Al raised her cup to signal the waitress to bring more tea. “Jen left hers back in Toronto.”
“I thought I’d just be up here for the day.” Jamie glanced at her watch. “Now, two weeks later…”
The waitress brought us a fresh pot of tea and fortune cookies. Jamie waited until the girl had refilled our cups. “I started with the premise that, despite the evidence, Ken Burrows was not the
thief. I did background checks on the other employees at the Lindsay branch. I have a friend in human resources at Optimum who was very helpful. I found that Nuala had worked for three different firms in five years. There were thefts at each firm, someone was arrested and Nuala moved on.”
“She’d been at it for some time,” I said.
Jamie nodded.
“But you had no proof,” I continued. “This was all circumstantial.”
“Right. You could have argued that Nuala’s moves meant that she was an ambitious woman who was trying to move up in the world. But she moved to small-town offices; the Braeloch branch was her first managerial job. So I kept digging.”
She tossed back her tea and set the cup on the table. “I contacted the two firms where Nuala worked before she went to Optimum. And on Monday, Ruby drove me down to Lindsay and I spoke to Christine Ritter, the branch manager. But I still have no hard evidence against Nuala and I don’t know how she managed to pull everything off.”
I smiled. “I think I can help you.” I told them about Nuala’s keystroke logger scheme.
“Ingenious,” Jamie said when I’d finished.
“She stuck to small-town offices where there’d be fewer eyes on her. And fewer techies who might spot the logger.”
“What did Lyle know?” Al put in.
“He didn’t tell me in his letter,” Jamie said. “But Christine said he’d come by recently with questions about the Burrows case.”
“So when Lyle started askin’ questions…” Al said.
“Nuala somehow got wind of it and decided she had to get rid of him.” Jamie opened a fortune cookie and smiled. “ ‘All your hard work will pay off,’ it says.”
“Nuala’s a tiny little thing,” I said. “I can’t see her taking on a man, even an elderly one.”
“It didn’t take brawn to kill Lyle,” Jamie said. “She splashed gasoline around the garage, and when he drove in she lit a match. Whoosh! That’s all it took.”
But I still had questions. “Was Nuala going to kill everyone who caught on to her?”
Jamie held out her hands, palms up. “People like Nuala are incredibly arrogant. They believe they’re smarter than everyone else and can get away with just about anything. That’s their fatal flaw.”
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