Kaladi’s was the corner shop in a single-story building on the corner of Evans and Williams Street. Each unit was a different color, one lime green, another boring gray, but The exterior of Kaladi’s was blond brick with huge, red-framed windows and a red railing in front of a small patio. The east side of the building was painted with a colorful, eye-catching mural.
No one was sitting outside, so I entered the shop. Coffee aroma hung heavily in the air as I stood just inside the door and let my eyes adjust. It was crowded with mostly college-aged people waiting in line or sitting at a long row of tables along one wall. Baristas hustled about behind a long counter. I looked up at a menu written on a large chalkboard and didn’t know how they could keep up with all the variety.
Someone bumped past me so I moved out of the way and looked for Trisha Appleton. She wasn’t in line, so I walked back by the tables. Most of the tables were occupied by groups, but I spotted a lone woman reading at a table in the corner. As I approached, however, I realized it wasn’t Trisha – this woman had shorter hair and I didn’t see the telltale tattoo on her neck. The woman glanced up at me as I drew near, gave me a dirty look and then focused on her book again. So much for that.
I noticed a short hallway that led to bathrooms, so I took a seat at a table nearby where I could see if someone came out of the Ladies Room and also keep watch on the front area. I checked my watch. One o’clock on the nose. I shifted on the uncomfortable wooden chair and waited. The minutes ticked by, but no Trisha. I gazed out the front window. A couple of guys had sat down at one of the outside tables, one of them with a large black Labrador. I waited some more. Then an older woman walked past me and down the hall toward the Ladies Room. I jumped up and casually walked down the hall as she entered the bathroom. I got a quick glimpse inside before she shut the door. The bathroom was a one-room affair, no stalls. And no Trisha.
I checked the time again. 1:15. I walked outside and looked around, but didn’t see her anywhere. When I went back inside, I’d lost my spot at the table. Just as well. Trisha wasn’t going to show up. I scoured the shop one last time, just to be sure, then went back outside. I stood on the corner and watched traffic zoom along Evans and cursed the situation. Trisha had bailed on the meeting. Was she scared to talk to me? I couldn’t blame her, but it left me wondering if she was guilty of something. Maybe Haley had changed her mind about my trustworthiness and called Trisha back and said not to meet me.
Then I had an idea. I had Trisha’s last name – Appleton – and I knew she had an apartment somewhere near the DU campus. Maybe I could find where she lived. I stepped into the shade on the side of the building, got out my phone and connected to the Internet. I found a White Pages site and typed in “Trisha Appleton” and “Denver”. It didn’t have a match for her, but it did have one for Patricia Appleton, with an age of twenty-two. The address was nearby. Bingo.
I trotted back to my car, a satisfied elation coursing through me. It didn’t last.
***
Trisha lived in an older apartment building on Josephine Street, just east of the DU campus. I parked down the block and walked back to her building. It was nothing fancy – four stories, each unit with a tiny balcony, no elevator. An outside security door led to a small foyer, but unlike Pete’s apartment, which had a similar setup, this one was locked. Next to the door was a panel with buttons and an intercom so you could call a specific apartment. I pushed the button next to 303 and waited. Trisha didn’t call back or buzz me in. I wondered if students now were as lax about security as I was when I was in college. I started pushing the other buttons randomly until I heard a buzzing sound. Yep, they were. The lock clicked and I pushed open the door.
Trisha lived on the third floor, so I climbed the stairs and rapped on her door. I counted to ten and knocked again, but she didn’t answer, so I scoped out the rest of the building. A back entrance led out to an alley, but there was no parking there, so I figured Trisha would have to park on the street as I had. I went outside the front door and back to the 4-Runner. From the driver’s seat, I had a view of the entrance to the apartment, so I rolled down the window and got comfortable. I just hoped that if Trisha came home, she wouldn’t use the back entrance. Then it occurred to me that, even now, she could be skulking around Charlie’s condo. If that was the case, I was wasting my time here. But there was a way to check. I called Charlie.
“I need a favor,” I said after the usual greetings.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“Are you at home?”
“Yes, and I hope you’re making some progress because I can’t stand not playing.”
“I’m working on it,” I said. “I need you to go outside and see if your stalker is out there.”
“My stalker-girl?”
“The woman with the tattoo who’s always watching your condo.”
“Okay,” he said slowly. “That’s it?”
“Yes. Call me back and let me know.”
“Sure.”
I ended the call and tapped the wheel impatiently while I waited for the phone to ring. A few minutes later, it did.
“She’s not around,” Charlie said. “I walked up and down the block.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah, I haven’t seen her since Tuesday. Gil surprised me with a visit to see how I was doing, and I pointed her out to him.”
“Okay,” I said.
“What’s this about?”
“I’m not sure, but you’ll be the first to know when I know something.” Just then, in my rearview mirror, I saw a woman walking up the block.
“I’ve got to go,” I said to Charlie. “I’ll call you back.”
I put my phone down and turned away from the window as the woman hurried past the 4-Runner. She didn’t notice me, but I got a good look at her. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail and I saw the tattoo with the number twenty-three on her neck. Trisha. She disappeared into her building. I got out and ran to the building. I grabbed the door just as it was about to shut tight. I held it so it wouldn’t lock, then eased it open and stepped inside. I heard footsteps on the stairs. I quietly followed. Then I heard someone walking down the third-floor hallway. Keys jingled, a door opened and closed, then silence. I hurried up the last steps and down the hallway to 303. I knocked on the door and waited. It opened a moment later. Trisha made eye contact with me, then recognition filled her face and she tried to slam the door shut. I stuck my foot out to keep the door from closing, just like the detectives do in the movies. And the door smashed my foot into the jamb.
“Ow!” I yelped. “That hurts!” How in the world do those detectives do this without breaking bones in their feet?
“Then don’t put your foot in the door,” she snapped.
I put a hand against the door. “I just want to talk to you.”
“No way. I’ve got to go before that guy figures out where I live.” She held the door in place, still crushing my foot.
“Who?”
Her eyes darted past me. “The guy that was following me.”
I glanced over my shoulder. “I’m alone. And if you were worried about some guy, why’d you open the door in the first place?” I shoved my finger at the peephole in the door. “You should’ve checked through that.”
“I wasn’t thinking,” she snapped, then gazed at me warily. “Besides, I lost him.”
“I want to help,” I said through gritted teeth. “Give me five minutes of your time.”
“I can’t. That guy may figure out where I live.” Fear etched her voice.
“Who?” I repeated.
“The guy who was at Pete’s the night he was murdered.”
“You were there.”
She nodded.
“You know who killed Pete,” I said.
She nodded again. “Yes.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“Five minutes,” I said. “That’s all I ask.”
She suddenly relented and opened the door wider. I almost fell into her, ve
ry un-Bogie-like. I righted myself, pulled my foot back and grimaced, then gingerly stepped on it. Nothing was broken, thank goodness.
“Come on in,” she said.
“In” was a small, tidy living room with a loveseat, two small armchairs, and a TV on a black stand. A couple of throw pillows with the Rockies logo on them were on the loveseat. A poster of Charlie Preston hung on one wall, and another had Rockies team pictures, a poster of Coors Field and more pictures of Charlie. A sliding glass door in the wall behind the couch opened onto a tiny balcony.
“I’m kind of infatuated with Charlie,” she said before I had a chance to comment.
“I know.” I noticed a small carry-on suitcase near what I assumed was a bedroom. I pointed at the case. “Going somewhere?”
“For a few days.”
“Hiding?” I asked. She looked away and didn’t say anything. I tipped my head to make eye contact. “Who killed Pete Westhaven?”
She hesitated, then said, “I don’t know his name.”
“But you saw him.”
“Yes.”
“Tell me about it,” I said softly, trying to draw her into my confidence.
“Haley called me back today, after I had agreed to meet with you.”
“I figured as much.” I wondered where she was going with this.
“She said you knew we’d been kind of following Charlie, and that I was trying to find someone who could introduce me to Charlie.”
I nodded.
She stepped back to the loveseat, perched herself on the arm, and straightened a pillow. She drew in a breath and let it out slowly. Then she began. “All that’s true. I’d seen Charlie with that guy Pete. I was curious about Pete, so I found some online articles that talked about how Charlie and Pete had been friends since high school. I thought if I could get to know Pete, he could introduce me to Charlie. That night – Thursday – I followed Charlie to Pete’s apartment. I went up the stairs and waited in the stairwell. Then Charlie came out of the apartment by himself, and I suddenly felt so stupid that I’d followed him so I ran down the stairs and hid outside. He came out and I almost followed him, but I thought he might’ve seen me, so I decided not to. Then I thought, this was my opportunity to talk to his friend. But I was nervous about approaching Pete, so I kept waiting. Then I finally got the courage to go back inside. I was almost to the third floor when I heard the gunshot. It made me jump. And I saw the guy come out of Pete’s apartment. At first, I didn’t have any idea what had happened, but he had such a hateful look on his face. I thought he’d caught me following Pete, and it scared me. So instead of going on up the stairs, I turned around and left.”
“And he saw you.”
“Yes, and he chased me. I ran outside, and I was trying to get my car keys and I dropped them. I couldn’t find them right away, so I left them and ran down the street and hid in some bushes. He didn’t see me, and then he took off.”
“Did you see his car?”
“No, he must’ve parked on a different street and walked to Pete’s building.”
“So when you were hiding from Charlie, you must’ve seen the guy go in.”
“A few people went in the building, but I wasn’t paying attention. But I did get a good look at him when he was leaving.”
I nodded. “Then you waited for the police, right?”
“I stayed nearby.”
“A neighbor saw you,” I said. “Why didn’t you tell the police what you saw?”
“I thought about it but I was scared, and a little embarrassed. I didn’t want to tell them about my obsession with Charlie. If I had to testify or something, my parents and friends would find out, and I don’t want them to know….other than Haley and Sharonda.” She shrugged. “Besides, I didn’t know at the time what had happened, just that the police were there and they removed a body. It wasn’t until the next day that I saw that Charlie was a suspect in Pete Westhaven’s murder. Then I knew the killer must be the guy I’d seen leaving Pete’s apartment.”
“Why didn’t you say something then?”
“I wanted to find the guy myself and then I could tell the police who he was.”
Then it dawned on me. “By doing that, you’d be Charlie’s savior and he would be so grateful, he’d go out with you.”
Her face burned deep red. “It was silly. And now I think that guy might be after me and…” Tears filled her eyes.
“It’s okay,” I said. “We’ll take care of him.” Whoever he was.
“He’s killed two people.”
“Did you see him shoot Maggie Hollenbaucher, too?”
“Who?”
“You said he killed two people.”
“Yeah, I tailed that guy from Pete’s apartment the night he followed that woman who’d gone into Pete’s building.”
I snapped my fingers. “I knew I’d seen you there.”
“Yeah.” She sniffed. “I’d been watching that guy, too, ever since he visited Pete. When I spotted him at Charlie’s, I couldn’t believe it. He’d killed Pete, but then he was hanging around at Charlie’s? So I decided to see what he was up to. He drove to Pete’s apartment. That’s when I saw that other woman go into the building. I’ve seen her and Pete going into Charlie’s building. That guy waited until she left, and then he followed her to a gym. And I tailed him.”
And I, too, was tailing Maggie. I was so intent on her, I’d missed them. We must’ve made quite a caravan through the city.
“You said you didn’t see him shoot Maggie,” I pointed out.
“I didn’t. I watched him for a while and then left.”
I frowned. “Too bad.” Then something else occurred to me. “Wait, you first saw this guy at Charlie’s?”
“Yeah, around eight or so. I’ve seen him with Charlie. They must be friends.”
Greg? I wondered. Or someone else? But Greg had an alibi the night Maggie was murdered. Was I dealing with two killers? I shook my head in frustration. What was I missing?
She sighed. “I know you think I’m crazy, and maybe I am, but I just want to help Charlie.”
“That’s why I need to know everything you know.”
“I’m telling you everything!” she said defensively. “I don’t even know why the police think Charlie killed Pete. Just because he visited Pete, doesn’t mean he killed his friend.”
“Charlie’s gun was used,” I said. “That’s the main reason.”
“Oh. That wasn’t in the news, just that Charlie was the suspect.”
“What did the articles say?”
“Not much. The police didn’t release any information, so all I know is Pete was found dead in his apartment, not anything about the crime scene, like where the body was found or stuff like that. And they said nothing about a gun, even though I knew that part because I heard the shot.”
I nodded. “That’s true. I…wait, what did you say?”
“About the gun?”
“The body.”
“The news didn’t say where Pete’s body was found.”
“Yeah.” I stared out the glass door to the balcony. And the pieces fell into place.
The killer had plenty of access to Charlie’s apartment and to his gun. I’d seen the killer’s car outside Pete’s apartment the night Maggie was murdered, I just hadn’t realized it. It was the same car Trisha had followed. And I’d also seen that car parked near Charlie’s condo a time or two. But the most damning piece was that only one guy had known exactly where Pete’s body had been discovered. Since that hadn’t been reported in the news, only someone in the apartment when Pete died would’ve known that.
“What’s wrong?” Trisha asked.
“I know who the killer is.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
“Who?” Trisha asked.
“Charlie’s agent. Gil Valducci.” I ran a hand over my face as I put it all together. “I ran into him the other day outside of Charlie’s condo, and he said something about not understanding how a man is shot in his own apartment, near
the kitchen, and the police can’t find the killer.”
“So?”
“Gil couldn’t have known that unless he was in Pete’s apartment when Pete was shot.”
“Why would his agent use Charlie’s gun to kill Pete? It would ruin Charlie’s career.”
“Pete was branching out. There were rumors he was selling to more athletes. And Gil is an up-and-coming agent who needs more clients. He wants great athletes because that means bigger contracts and then Gil makes more money. I’ll bet Pete was selling steroids to Gil, too, but Charlie didn’t know.”
“But why use Charlie’s gun?” she repeated.
“I’m not sure,” I said.
Something thumped in the hallway. Trisha bolted to her feet and I whirled around. Then we heard footsteps.
“It’s okay,” she said. “Must’ve been a neighbor. But I have to get away from here. That guy’s going to come after me.”
“Hold on.” I tiptoed to the front door and peered out the peephole. “I can’t see anyone.” But what if someone was standing by the wall next to the door, out of view of the peephole? I turned back to Trisha. “Gil will find you. He can’t have witnesses to what he did.”
“What do I do?” she wailed.
“We need to get you somewhere safe.” My mind raced. I’d taken a previous client to Cal’s house in the mountains. If I could get Trisha there without being followed, she’d be safe. Cal wouldn’t be happy with me, but I could make it up to him later. I stepped around the loveseat and looked out on the balcony. “Can we get out this way?”
She followed my gaze. “And go where?”
“Is there a fire escape?”
“Why would we need a fire escape?” She pointed to the front door. “You said that guy’s not out there.”
“He could be hiding.”
“Don’t worry. I lost him earlier. He hasn’t had time to find out where I live.” She headed toward the front door. “I’ll just peek.”
“No, wait!” I started after her.
She reached the door and turned the knob. I hurtled over the loveseat, pushed her aside and collided into the door just as it flew open. I knocked the door back and pinned Gil Valducci between the door and the frame.
The Third Fan: A Reed Ferguson Mystery (A Private Investigator Mystery Series - Crime Suspense Thriller Book 9) Page 15