by Paige Sleuth
“My lips are sealed,” Kat assured her.
But she would be having a talk with Gina Hayes herself, and very, very soon.
CHAPTER TEN
“You’re GH,” Kat said, storming into the Fuel ’Er Up.
Gina swiveled on her stool by the register. “Excuse me?”
“GH. Those are your initials.”
“Yeah, so?”
Kat held up the red ribbon Lindsay had given her. “So, you make these.”
“Yeah, so?” Gina repeated.
Kat set her palms on the counter and leaned closer. “So your company is in direct competition with Nikki Jefferson’s.”
“And your point would be?”
“My point is, you consider Nikki Jefferson to be your enemy, don’t you?” Kat waved the ribbon around like a matador’s red cape. “And once word got around that she was manufacturing a superior product, everybody who had previously ordered from you started turning to her.”
Gina’s jaw clenched. “There’s nothing superior about Mrs. J’s stuff.”
“Tell that to the schools and whoever else you duped into buying your merchandise.”
“I didn’t dupe anybody. They were all eager to support a small, local business.”
“Until a better local business popped up.”
Gina stood up, her hands balling into fists. “She’s not better. And nobody ever had a problem with my hair ties until she came along.”
“Or maybe they just didn’t have anyone else to buy from until then,” Kat proposed. “She gave them options—better options.”
Gina glowered at Kat. “How dare you. I work hard.”
Kat scrutinized the barrette in Gina’s hair. This one featured little red ladybugs roosting on green felt leaves. “I’ll admit you’re talented. But that doesn’t make up for using substandard materials.”
Gina huffed. “So I can’t afford to buy all that fancy-schmancy, shimmery garbage that Mrs. J splurges on. I’m working on a budget.”
“Working on a budget doesn’t mean scrimping on quality.”
Gina dismissed her with a wave. “Oh, what do you know?”
“I know you wanted Nikki Jefferson’s business to fail. Except, you knew it wouldn’t unless you helped it along. So you thought, why not burn up everything she’d worked so hard to create?”
Gina didn’t reply, her lips compressing into a thin, white line.
“I also know you lied to me,” Kat went on.
“When?”
“When you told me Kevin Jefferson filled up a gas can this week. But he claims it wasn’t him.”
Gina lifted one shoulder as her eyes skirted toward a beverage display. “So my memory’s a little faulty.”
“Or you were deliberately trying to mislead me,” Kat said. “You saw me talking to the fire inspector yesterday. You must have thought I was working with the authorities on the arson investigation.”
“You’re not?”
Kat shook her head. “The only reason I was there yesterday was because I happened to be in the area when the fire began.”
Gina twirled a piece of her hair around one finger, appearing to ponder that. “So you’re an average citizen, a nobody.”
Kat poised her tongue to snap out a retort but changed her mind at the last second. Perhaps Gina would be more willing to confess to someone she viewed as insignificant. And Kat had come here for answers. Who cared if she had to swallow her pride to get them?
“That’s right,” Kat said, although she couldn’t help squaring her shoulders a little.
“It’s okay. I’m a nobody, too.”
Gina’s quiet declaration left Kat speechless. Maybe Gina hadn’t called Kat a nobody to insult her after all. Maybe she had merely thought she’d found a kindred spirit.
“What makes you say that?” Kat asked.
“Look at me.” Gina gestured toward her face before plucking the unflattering Fuel ’Er Up shirt away from her body and letting it go. “I’m plain. There’s nothing remarkable about me at all.”
Kat did think Gina was rather plain, but she didn’t have the heart to say so. “You truly are talented,” she offered instead. “Seriously, that ladybug barrette is very eye-catching.”
Gina’s smile was shy. “That’s the one remarkable thing about me, only I didn’t know it until I started making my hair ties.”
“So when Nikki Jefferson started her own business doing the same thing, it felt like she was stripping you of your identity,” Kat mused, Gina’s motive for wanting to eliminate her competitor becoming much clearer in her mind.
Gina’s lip curled up, a flash of anger darkening her face. “Mrs. J, she thinks I don’t hear things because I don’t socialize with the neighbors. But I do. So when she goes around bragging to all her friends about those headbands she’s designing for her daughter’s dancer friends or how she has enough orders from the local schools to keep her sewing full-time from here until eternity, word eventually gets back around to me.”
“You were jealous,” Kat said. “You thought you should have those school contracts.”
“She stole those orders from me. If it wasn’t for her, my phone would be ringing off the hook. I would be important again.”
“Didn’t you ever stop to consider there might be room for two of you in this business?” Kat asked gently.
Gina shook her head. “Mrs. J, she had everyone hoodwinked. She has two kids in the school system and friends on the board. And everyone in the neighborhood—probably everyone in Cherry Hills, even—likes her. Next to her, I’m invisible.”
“And the only way you figured you could be seen again was to destroy Nikki’s business.”
“I had to do something. I couldn’t just sit back while she stole the one thing, the only thing, I ever had that was mine and mine alone.”
Kat didn’t know what to say. Obviously the issue in Gina’s eyes went much deeper than Nikki Jefferson’s decision to start a rival company.
Gina fell back onto the stool, the fight leaving her body. “My mom loves Mrs. J’s products. My designs she barely looks at, but she gushes over Mrs. J’s all the time.”
Kat noticed Gina seemed much smaller now than she had earlier. Her shoulders were hunched forward, her body almost folded in on itself.
“My mom, she says next to Mrs. J’s stuff, my things look dull.” Gina touched her barrette. “Mom’s the whole reason I decided to launch my business, you know.”
“She’s your champion?” Kat ventured.
“My champion?” Gina threw her head back and cackled. The sound was harsh and grating as it echoed throughout the store. “Hardly. She’s my tormentor.”
Kat felt a twinge in her gut. That hadn’t been the response she had been expecting.
“Half the time Mom is on my case about something, telling me I should put on more makeup, do more around the house, make some friends. She even tries to push me to wear Mrs. J’s barrettes instead of my own. As if. Then the other half of the time she pretends I don’t even exist.” Gina closed her eyes for a moment. “It’s like I can never win with her, no matter what I do.”
Sadness washed over Kat. Gina’s mother had obviously played a huge role in making her daughter feel perpetually invisible and inadequate.
“Do you know what it’s like to be trapped with your worst enemy day after day, month after month, year after year?” Gina looked around the store. “But what choice do I have? I don’t earn enough here to afford a place of my own. All I wanted was to change that. My business, it’s my out.”
Kat’s tongue felt heavy when she said, “Does your mother know you set that fire?”
“No way.” Gina snorted. “Mom would turn me in if she knew.”
“How did you make sure she didn’t see you?”
“Yesterday Mom was in one of her phases where she doesn’t pay much attention to me. But still, I was careful. I snuck out of the house while she was in the shower.” Gina fingered her barrette. “It was perfect. Mom was busy in the b
athroom, the Js were at another one of Carmella’s dance things like they are every Saturday morning, and the people between us were off doing who knows what. But their car was gone, so I knew the coast was clear. All I had to do was cut through our backyards, smash that garage window with my glue gun—the same one I use for my hair clips—and voilà, I was in. Piece of cake.”
“It was pretty bold of you to break the window,” Kat said. “Weren’t you worried somebody would hear you?”
“Who’s going to hear? The deaf old lady across the street?” Gina scoffed. “Fat chance of that.”
“And you must have already bought the gasoline you poured over Nikki’s workspace.”
“I had it secreted in my room.”
Kat jutted her chin toward the dish of matchbooks on the counter. “I’m assuming you took one of those too.”
“Naturally.”
“So you had it all planned out.” The reminder of what Gina had done washed away any sympathy Kat had felt for her. “Didn’t you care that you were forcing a family out of their home? Didn’t you ever stop to think about Carmella or Timothy while you were going through with this?”
“My goal wasn’t to displace them, it was to shut down Mrs. J’s business.”
“That still doesn’t make it right.”
“Oh, yeah? Well, what about the ethics of her stealing business from me? Don’t you think that’s wrong, too?”
“Nikki didn’t break the law.”
“But she broke me!” Gina cried, vaulting off the stool and throwing her hands up.
Kat flinched, Gina’s emotional outburst startling her into silence.
Gina fisted her hands in her hair, the motion dislodging the barrette and sending it clattering to the floor. “She shattered my dreams! I want so much to get out of my mother’s house. You don’t know what she’s like. Nobody knows what she’s like. And Mrs. J, she took away my only escape. She deserved to suffer for that.”
The anger in Gina’s eyes caused the first seeds of fear to bloom in Kat’s belly. She hadn’t told anyone about coming here. It had been foolish, she had to admit now. But half an hour ago she hadn’t been thinking as clearly. She had been so eager to exonerate Alyssa that it hadn’t occurred to her she might be confronting a madwoman. Now, she wished she had at least texted Andrew her plans so someone knew where she was.
She risked a glance over her shoulder, hoping to spot someone pumping gas outside. If she saw anyone, she was going to grab one of the beverage bottles and hurl it at the glass storefront to alert them to her plight. But hers was the only car in sight.
Sweat broke out on Kat’s forehead as the reality of her situation sank in. She was completely and utterly on her own.
She could try making a run for it, she considered. Being closer to the door, she had the advantage. Gina would either have to climb over the counter or go around it. But would a two-second head start provide her with enough of a lead to escape?
“I’m not going to hurt you.”
Gina’s words snapped Kat back to the present. Kat stared across the counter, unsure whether to believe her.
Gina’s hands fell to her sides, and her shoulders caved forward again. “I’m not a killer.”
The words weren’t spoken with any confidence. It sounded as though Gina were testing out the phrase in an attempt to convince herself of its truth.
But when Gina looked up and Kat saw how flat her expression was, she realized the softness in her tone wasn’t borne from a lack of conviction. It was defeat, plain and simple. Gina wouldn’t chase after her if she ran. She would bet her life on that. Gina knew she’d been caught, and there wasn’t anything she could do to escape the consequences of her actions. And for that one brief moment, Kat’s sympathy returned.
Except, she considered, maybe Gina didn’t really need her sympathy. After all, in the end she might get exactly what she’d always wanted—a place of her own far away from her mother.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Kat arrived at the Cherry Hills Hotel promptly at noon. She scanned the lobby for Andrew but didn’t spot him anywhere. He must have gotten delayed while booking Gina.
But although Andrew was nowhere in sight, Alyssa was. She waved from her spot on a couch near the center of the room.
Kat walked over to her. “I guess Andrew got tied up.”
“The hazards of being a cop.” Alyssa patted the couch cushion beside her. “Sit down. We’ll chat while we wait.”
“Okay.” But instead of joining Alyssa on the couch, Kat perched on a nearby armchair. Sitting across from each other seemed more conducive to conversation.
Plus, Kat had to admit, she felt a little uncomfortable in Alyssa’s presence. She was still ashamed of her willingness to believe the worst about Andrew’s sister.
Alyssa leaned back, draping her arms across the back of the couch. “So, it didn’t take long for my big brother to nab the guy—or girl, in this case—huh?”
“Nope,” Kat agreed. Alyssa apparently hadn’t heard about Kat’s role in figuring out Gina’s guilt, and she could see no sense in mentioning it. Why risk dimming the sibling admiration currently reflected in Alyssa’s eyes?
Alyssa crossed her legs. “That’s good. I know he thought I did it for a while. Our Aunt Deb called me up last night to relay a very interesting conversation she had with him.”
Deciding she needed to come clean, Kat steeled herself. “That was my fault, actually. I kind of planted the idea in his head.”
“I figured as much.”
“You did?”
“I saw the way you looked when I showed you that matchbook. Your eyeballs almost popped right out of your head.”
Kat felt her face flame. “I might have overreacted a bit.”
“It’s okay,” Alyssa said. “I get it. You don’t know me from Adam, and maybe you were even trying to protect Andrew a little.”
“I’m sorry if I caused any problems between you two.”
“Hey,” Alyssa said with a shrug. “It could’ve happened to anyone.”
“I don’t want you to think Andrew—”
“Look, enough with the apologies. You’re forgiven. Life’s too short and all that.” Alyssa grinned. “Besides, it gave Andrew and me something to talk about. Otherwise dinner had the potential to be really awkward.”
Kat wasn’t sure how much more awkward a first-time meeting between a brother and sister could get than for one to accuse the other of arson, but she decided to let it go.
“So.” Alyssa uncrossed her legs and scooted closer. “I’m curious about this pyro. Did Andrew tell you anything about her?”
“I don’t think she’s a pyro,” Kat said. “She just saw a chance to eliminate a competitor and took it.”
“People are jerks. That’s why I prefer the company of old bones.”
Kat frowned. “Bones?”
“Didn’t Andrew tell you? I’m studying paleontology. University of Washington is one of the schools I’m considering for my master’s. That was my whole reason for flying out here.”
The corners of Kat’s mouth twitched. “He mentioned something about a master’s program starting with the letter p.”
Alyssa made a face. “Don’t tell me. He said I was majoring in pyromania.”
Kat laughed. “No, nothing that bad.”
Alyssa’s eyes twinkled. “Good. Because if that were an actual major, I’d be all over it.”
They smiled at each other, and Kat relaxed into the chair. She was really starting to like Alyssa.
“Kat!”
She twisted around. Nikki Jefferson was heading toward them, appearing to have just stepped off one of the elevators.
“I’m glad I ran into you,” Nikki said, stopping beside her. She glanced at Alyssa, then took a step back. “Oh, I’m sorry. Am I interrupting something?”
“Nope,” Alyssa said. “We’re just waiting for my brother.”
“Okay, good.” Nikki turned toward Kat, a happy flush to her cheeks. “We’re g
oing home this week.”
“So soon?” Kat asked.
Nikki nodded. “The insurance money is on its way, and Kevin found someone to expedite the repairs.”
“That’s great news.” Kat hesitated. “What about your business?”
“I actually think I’m going to be okay. I’ll have to work my butt off this summer, but Carmella volunteered to help if I taught her how to sew, and Timothy and Kevin said they’ll divvy up all the household chores between the two of them to free up my time. I might have to work some late nights, but I did the math and I should meet all my deadlines.”
“I’m so glad to hear that,” Kat said.
“I’m really blessed to have such a great family, aren’t I?”
Kat smiled. “You sure are.”
“Listen.” Nikki crouched down so they were at eye level. “I’ve been thinking about what you said, about Furry Friends Foster Families and all those cats you have looking for homes.”
“You want to adopt one?”
“Yes, I do. Timothy and Carmella really took to your Matty, and it made me realize how much a pet of their own would mean to them.”
“That’s wonderful news. I’m sure we can find a cat that will fit in perfectly with your family.”
“Oh, thank you.” Nikki clasped her hands together as she stood up. “I can’t wait to see the looks on Carmella’s and Tim’s faces when I tell them.”
Nikki waved goodbye and walked away, a bounce in her step. Maybe the Jeffersons didn’t just look like the quintessential all-American family, but they had the values to match. Kat recalled the way Kevin had held Nikki up when she needed it, and how he never hesitated to offer his son a kind word or a comforting arm around the shoulders. His tenderness toward his family said everything about the type of husband and father he was, not to mention how willing he was to step up and accept more household responsibilities in support of his wife’s career.
And Nikki was just as much the all-American mom. Nobody had ever looked prouder than Nikki when she talked about Carmella’s dancing ability. And the prospect of brightening her children’s lives with a cat to call their own seemed to have made Nikki as happy as it was bound to make her kids.