Murder in D Minor Boxed Set

by Virginia Smith

  “Love you, too, Little Brother.”

  In the background he heard Mom shout, “Tell him to be sure and wear his bulletproof vest when he’s working.”

  He laughed. “Tell her I always do. Bye.”

  Tim shook his head as he disconnected the call. Maggie had never given up her role of Big Sister Protector, and truth be told, he wouldn’t have her any other way. Besides, she was right—the pain when Liz dumped him for Jeremy had been almost more than he could bear. But the memory of pain faded in the light of hope, and Tim couldn’t stop thinking about the way Liz had melted in his arms when he’d kissed her on the slopes. Maybe she wasn’t still in love with him … but maybe she was. If he had a chance, even a slim one, of getting her back, he was willing to take the risk of being hurt again. No matter what Maggie said.

  Liz closed the door behind her and threw the dead bolt. Seconds later, Jazzy and Caitlin charged out of their bedroom. They took up stances in front of her.

  “Okay, girl, truth time.” Jazzy planted her hands on her hips and glared into Liz’s face. “You’ve been holding out on us.”

  Caitlin agreed. “Yeah. Who is this Jeremy character, and what is the deal between him and Tim? And you?”

  Liz heaved a sigh. “Truth time” indeed. And right now her head was spinning so much she needed to talk it out. What better listeners than her best friends?

  “Okay, I’m ready to come clean.”

  She allowed herself to be guided to the couch. Jazzy sat beside her, and Caitlin perched on the matching chair. They turned expectant gazes her way, two invitations to spill her guts. No, not invitations. Those expressions were too insistent to be called anything less than demands.

  “Okay, what I told you last night about Tim was absolutely true. But I didn’t tell you the whole story about how we broke up.”

  Jazzy snorted. “No kidding.”

  Caitlin gave her a stern glare. “Go ahead, Liz.”

  Liz drew in a breath. “After our engagement, I started feeling … I don’t know. Trapped.” She stared at her hands in her lap. “Marriage is a permanent step. And I kept wondering if I was making a mistake.”

  “Didn’t you love him?” Caitlin’s voice was soft.

  Liz sucked in her lower lip. “Ye-es.” She said it like a confession. And maybe it was. “I did. But I started wondering if love is enough, you know? Tim and I went to a church down in the valley. There was a couple we got really close to. They kind of took us under their wing, you know? We went out to dinner together, and played games at their apartment almost every weekend. They’d been married five years and I really looked up to them. I guess they were having problems we didn’t know about, because they got divorced right after Tim and I announced our engagement. It threw me. I mean, if it could happen to them, what made me think Tim and I would make it?”

  She paused, then let out a humorless laugh. “You have to understand, I didn’t lay out my thoughts logically at the time. It’s only been recently that I’ve put all my feelings together. But I see now that their divorce really sent me into a tailspin.”

  The next part was hard to admit. Liz couldn’t meet either of her friends’ gazes. “Jeremy was one of Tim’s friends. They’ve known each other since high school, and we all ran around together during college. He worked with Tim and Ryan as a lift operator on weekends during ski season. Jeremy’s always been a big flirt. I guess I just let the flirting go too far.”

  “How far did it go?” Jazzy’s tone held a surprising amount of compassion.

  Heat burned in Liz’s face. She could not lift her gaze from the carpet in front of her feet. “We were in the commons at the U. We’d had finals that day. Jeremy and I took an English lit class together, and we’d left class after the exam to get a cup of coffee. We picked out a quiet bench to recover, you know? Just sit in the sun and let the strain of the exam seep out. One thing led to another and he kissed me. And then he kissed me again. And I responded. Several times.” Liz closed her eyes. She couldn’t stand to remember what had happened next. “That’s how Tim found us.”

  “Ouch,” Jazzy said.

  “Oh, poor Tim.” Caitlin’s voice held a trace of the pain Liz felt at the memory. “He must have been devastated.”

  Liz nodded, miserable at the vivid memory of Tim’s face. “He was. But even worse, over the next few days I decided if I could respond to Jeremy like that, I couldn’t really love Tim as much as I thought I did. So I broke off our engagement.” She gave a silent laugh. “Not that he wouldn’t have broken up with me if I hadn’t done it first. I didn’t even face him to give him his ring back. I made Debbie do it.”

  Caitlin leaned back in the chair. “Well, that explains why Tim is so hostile to Jeremy.”

  “Yeah,” Jazzy agreed, “but what about you and Jeremy? What happened there? There don’t seem to be any hard feelings between you two.”

  “Oh, trust me, there were.” Liz bounced off the couch and paced over to the silent television. “We had a fling for about a month after Tim and I broke up.” Two sets of eyebrows arched. “Not that kind of fling,” she hurried to say. “But I admit I thought he might be future husband material. Until he dumped me.”

  Her friends winced.

  “That must have hurt,” Jazzy said.

  Liz nodded. “I’ve been nursing a grudge against him for three years, until we ran into him at the Java Hut last night. That’s when I realized I wasn’t really angry with Jeremy.”

  “Let me guess.” Caitlin’s smile bore so much sympathy Liz’s eyes filled with tears. “You were angry with yourself.”

  Liz nodded. “Jeremy shares some of the guilt, but I can’t do anything about that. The only person I can answer for is myself. And you want to know a secret?”

  Jazzy slapped a hand to her chest. “There’s more? I don’t know if my heart can take it.”

  Liz smiled through tear-flooded eyes at Jazzy’s dramatics. She cleared her throat and blinked to clear her vision. She did not cry easily, and she hated it when she did.

  “I think Tim still has feelings for me.”

  Her friends exchanged tiny smiles.

  “Yeah,” Caitlin said, “so what’s the secret?”

  Liz stared at the two of them.

  “Oh, come on, Liz.” Jazzy shook her head. “Are you going to tell us you haven’t noticed him watching you? He can’t keep his eyes off you.”

  “Yeah, but he’s always glaring at me. Like he hates me or something. Not that I’d blame him.” One traitorous tear slid down her right cheek. Liz brushed it away with an impatient gesture.

  Caitlin leaned forward, watching Liz carefully. “Is it possible you don’t know that you’re still in love with the guy?”

  Liz’s head shot up. “I am not!”

  Jazzy laughed. “Oh, Liz. Who are you kidding? You’re talking to us. Your friends.”

  Liz returned their stares with a defiant one of her own. For about five seconds. Then the enormity of what they were saying broke over her. She bowed her head and covered her face with her hands. “I can’t love him. I can’t! Things can never be the same between us. You don’t understand what I put him through.”

  Her own sobs sounded loud in her ears, gut-wrenching moans from the depths of her guilty heart. She felt two pairs of arms surround her, and she buried her face in someone’s shoulder.

  “Come on.” Caitlin’s even tone broke into her grief and Liz felt herself being pulled toward the couch. “It’s time to pray about this.”

  Liz realized her friend was right. It was long past time to pray.

  NINETEEN

  An unfamiliar sound echoed through the jewelry store just as he was getting ready to close the doors for the night.

  Christy paused in the act of pulling on her coat to glance at him. “Mr. Cole, I think your cell phone is ringing in the office.”

  Duke Cole’s grip on the door handle tightened. His personal cell phone had a different ring tone. This was one he didn’t hear often. The fact tha
t it was ringing now didn’t portend good news.

  He forced a calm smile. “So it is. If you’ll let yourself out, I’ll go grab it.”

  Christy selected a key from her key ring and held it up with a smile. “Sure thing. Have a good night.”

  The door tone sounded as Christy left the store. He heard her key turning in the lock from the outside as he hurried through the showroom and into the office.

  The untraceable cell phone, the cheap prepaid kind, had been purchased by Jason Sinclair in Lexington, Kentucky, on Duke’s orders. With Jason gone, only two people had the number. One was his associate in the brooch deal. The other …

  Duke grabbed his jacket off the hook on the office wall and fished the phone out of the inside pocket. A glance at the screen showed him the number was not local. His pulse performed a queer rhumba as he pressed the talk button.

  Keep the voice pleasant. Calm. He’ll be able to tell if you’re nervous.

  “Yes?”

  “Do you have it?” English, but the heavy accent made the words difficult to understand.

  “Not yet. But I’ve seen it.”

  “It is genuine?”

  Duke closed his eyes. An image of the lovely piece swam into focus. “Without a doubt.”

  “But you don’t have it.” The hint of an edge crept into the man’s voice. “Six weeks, and you still don’t have it.”

  He gulped. Steady, steady. Sound confident. “I have pictures I can send you.”

  “Pictures are worth nothing.”

  “They’re proof. It’s within reach. I’ve seen it, held it. I’ll have it within a few days.”

  A long pause. “Very well. Send your pictures.”

  Duke’s head went light with relief. “I’ll e-mail them tonight. You’ll be very happy with the piece.”

  “If you deliver the Jersey Brooch you will make a good addition to our organization.” The accented voice broke the last word into separate syllables. “Of course, if you do not …” The man’s tone sounded pleasant. Almost as though he would enjoy the consequences if Duke couldn’t get the brooch.

  Duke swallowed. Hard. “I will deliver.”

  “Good. Oh, one more thing. There has been a change of plans. You will turn over the brooch in person. I will pick it up from your store on Saturday.”

  Duke sank into the desk chair. The big boss was coming here? Why? They had a perfectly good delivery plan that didn’t require anyone coming into the jewelry store. What if someone saw him, noted his presence? “Are you sure that’s wise? What if you’re seen?”

  A low laugh purred through the phone. “I am very careful.”

  Duke didn’t dare speak. He didn’t trust his voice.

  “Send your pictures. I will contact you on Saturday.”

  The phone went dead.

  A dozen clocks ticked in the other room like drumbeats in the silence. The rhythm of Duke’s racing heartbeat jangled in contrast to their even pulses. He had to get that brooch. The Carmichael girl would be back tomorrow to pick up her appraisal. With luck, she would bring the piece with her. If he could manage to get it into the back room, or even behind a counter for a minute, he could pull a switch.

  Of course, he’d need a substitute. And he didn’t have one. A decent forgery would take months to produce. The workmanship in the gold, the quality of the gemstones, all those things took time to pull together. And he only had one night. He glanced at his watch. Thirteen hours before the store opened at ten tomorrow.

  But first he had to e-mail the pictures. And he couldn’t do it from here. The university library down in the valley was open until midnight. He’d have to send them from one of the computers there. That way they couldn’t be traced to him if things turned nasty.

  Duke dropped his head into his hands. The way the situation looked tonight, things could become very nasty, indeed.

  TWENTY

  “Dude! You just wiped out my truck.”

  Patrick’s fist connected with Tim’s shoulder, but Tim didn’t relax his grip on the game controller, even though the energetic music Ryan had customized for this video game vibrated in his ears. Good thing the condos around them were empty, or they might get reported for disturbing the peace.

  He jerked the device sideways. The truck on the television screen in front of him responded by rounding a sharp corner on two wheels. A gigantic rock loomed ahead of him in the center of the dirt road. Tim swayed sideways, his red monster truck matching the motion of his controller. At exactly the right moment, he mashed the 2 button and watched the truck return to the road.

  “Whoa, that was close,” Ryan said.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Tim saw him lean forward to grab a handful of chips from the bag on the coffee table. Patrick dropped to the couch, leaving the space in front of the television free for Tim to maneuver. He stepped sideways to position himself dead center in front of the game console.

  Tim’s cell phone rang. “Aw, not now! I’m almost to the finish.”

  “Let it go, dude.” Ryan stuffed a stack of chips into his mouth and chomped. “They’ll call back.”

  Tim was tempted. But what if it was Liz calling to say she needed to go somewhere? He wouldn’t put it past her to leave the lodge without him, even though she’d promised to let him know. Her voice mocked him in his head. “Hey, I tried to call. You didn’t answer.”

  Tim puffed a blast of air. “Can’t. Patrick, bring ’er in for me.”

  Patrick jumped up and took the remote Tim thrust toward him. He stepped into Tim’s place in the center of the room as Tim jogged to the dinette table and grabbed his phone. The display showed a local number. He punched the talk button as he made his way to the bedroom, away from the loud music.

  “This is Tim Richards.”

  “Daniels here.” The sheriff paused. “Richards, what is that racket?”

  Tim closed the door and the music dimmed considerably. “Uh, I’m just hanging with some friends, Sheriff.” A glance at the alarm clock on the nightstand between the two beds showed him the time was after ten o’clock. Uh-oh. Must be something major for Sheriff Daniels to call him this late. “Has something happened?”

  “The boys dug up a piece of evidence I thought you’d want to be aware of. Remember our murder vic, Jason Sinclair? Seems he took a trip last December. You’ll never guess where.”

  “Kentucky?”

  “Bingo. Guy wasn’t too smart, apparently. He bought his plane ticket with cash, but flew under his own name. Rented a car with his Visa card. Stayed in a Days Inn registered in his name, paid for with the same card. He was there for two days, but kept a low profile. Didn’t cause any trouble for the local PD.”

  Tim’s free hand tightened into a fist. “Except for when he broke into Liz’s apartment and trashed the place.”

  “It appears that way. Safe to say he was after that fancy pin she showed you.”

  Tim paced to the window, thoughts piling up one after another. “Did Sinclair have any priors?”

  “Couple of B and E charges, but no convictions. And those were local.”

  “Why Liz’s heirloom pin?” Tim pulled the curtain back from the window and stared into the darkness outside without seeing. “Were the prior B and E charges connected to missing jewelry?”

  “Not really. I had the boys pull the reports. A few minor rings and necklaces, nothing antique. Electronics mostly, and cash. Guy liked to gamble, according to his credit card statements. Spent a lot of time in Wendover, with a few recent trips down to Vegas. No legitimate job on record, though his mother says she gave him money on a regular basis, told her he was paid under the table laying flooring for a guy. I’ll eat yellow snow if he ever laid flooring. My instinct tells me Sinclair was a local thug working for somebody else.”

  Tim nodded. Logical conclusion. “Somebody who decided they didn’t need him around anymore.”

  “That’s right.” The sheriff paused. “Richards, you know what this means, don’t you?”

  Ice settled
in Tim’s core. No doubt now that the murder and the attack on Liz were connected. “There’s a killer running around. And he’s after Liz’s pin.”

  “I don’t think she ought to keep that thing on her.”

  “She isn’t. It’s secure.”

  “Good. I’ve stepped up patrol in the Eagle Summit area, and don’t forget there are a couple of deputies hanging out there tonight. You make sure that girl understands the situation so she doesn’t go off and do something stupid, you hear?”

  Tim straightened. The sheriff barely knew Liz at all, but apparently he’d picked up on her stubborn streak. “Is it okay to tell her what you dug up?”

  “Yeah. Maybe it’ll convince her to take precautions.”

  A dull silence followed Sheriff Daniels’s statement. Tim looked at the display. “Call Ended.” He shook his head. The guy really had a thing against saying goodbye.

  “Oh, Liz, thank you! It’s just beautiful.” Debbie lifted the white nightie Liz had bought for her out of the tissue paper and held it up for everyone to see. “Isn’t it stunning? I’m going to wear this on my wedding night.”

  Liz could have looked at the light shining in her cousin’s eyes all night. Back when she was in school, she’d had an abstract art teacher who’d given them assignments to paint emotions, like sadness, or joy. If Liz had to paint happy right now, she’d use Debbie as a model.

  Grandma leaned forward to pick up a carrot stick from the veggie tray on the coffee table. Liz caught the smile hovering at the edges of her mouth. Grandma was thoroughly enjoying this bachelorette party. No doubt it had been a long time since she’d been included as “one of the girls.”

  Someone pounded on the door. Betsy was closest, so she got up and put an eye to the peephole. She addressed the room. “It’s Tim.”

  A giddy tickle started in Liz’s ribcage. She didn’t look at her friends, but knew that Jazzy and Caitlin were watching her with amused expressions. In fact, was that a knowing grin Debbie was trying to hide behind her glass of Diet Coke?

  Grandma drew herself up. “Tell him this is a girls-only party. No men allowed.”