by Sky Curtis
Crystal visibly relaxed. “We started with software for schools. Although I never had children, I have always been interested in education, especially for girls. Girls get the short end of the stick in the classroom because boys are always kicking up shit. Teachers spend half their time disciplining the boys and not teaching. Working on computers seems to level this out a bit. The boys are more focused on what they are doing and the girls get the attention they should have. It’s win-win.”
What? She didn’t have children? Todd said he had three! That she got complete custody! This was all so unreal. Plus who says “kicking up shit” in a press interview? So unprofessional. Didn’t she have any boundaries? Or was she refreshing? The flower show world was very different than this.
“And now?” I asked.
Crystal looked out the window while fidgeting with a ragged fingernail. She seemed to come to a decision. “I guess it doesn’t matter that you know. We’re revealing the product in a few days. We’re working on technology for the food industry. Software that regulates temperatures for the food industry.”
“Well, everyone needs to eat.” Some more than others, like me. “Energy costs are going through the roof and if energy use can be made more efficient, the price of food can be stabilized.”
Crystal nodded, “So, you understand the importance of the work that we do. The boys kept going on about ice cream, but eventually we’d expand to all frozen foods.”
Cindy interjected, “Robin and I wrote a couple of articles on Everwave, your husband’s baby, and were quite impressed by the concept of the deep water cooling system. So, yes, we have a bit of background on that.”
Crystal again looked at Cindy with dislike. No wonder. Saying “baby” to a woman who hadn’t had children could only be a trigger of some kind. Plus it was belittling. Me, I wanted to figure out Crystal’s role in the two murders, if she had one. But Crystal’s response floored me. I had got it so wrong.
“Yes, Todd had the technology for extracting cold from water for air conditioning, which he used at Everwave. This technology can also be applied to freezers as well. For the past year, Softwareit’s been developing it further, so cold can be extracted from regular tap water.”
And here I was thinking she was in a plot to steal Everwave’s technology. Right out in the open, she was. I took a wild guess. “So, he had rights to the Everwave patent?”
A cloud passed over Crystal’s face, “He and the vice president, Richard van Horner, had equal ownership of the patent. Everwave was a totally different company with different investors. The food application would be done under a separate company. We didn’t even have a name yet for the new company. It was going to be a three-way partnership with them and Softwareit. I don’t know what’s going to happen now that they’re both dead.”
Richard had died a few hours ago—how did she know he was dead? I hadn’t yet written the story! Was she involved in his death?
“Richard van Horne is dead?” Cindy asked, acting puzzled. So, she had caught on as well.
Crystal’s face was an open book of grief. “Yes, it was in the web edition of the Times about half an hour ago. Shot. It’s all so terrible. We were good friends, the three of us. In fact, the four of us. We went out as couples once a month or so, Todd and I with Richard and his wife, Melissa.”
Jack England scooped the story. Damn.
“So you know Melissa?” Despite her heavy hand at times, Cindy could be pretty shrewd at getting out information.
“Oh sure, she and I grew up together in Hamilton. By the waterfront. Both our dads worked in the mill. Steel town. We’re not really good friends, but we have history. And we go to the same kick boxing gym.”
That explained the “kicking up shit” comment. She had a blue-collar background, like Melissa. But why hadn’t Melissa mentioned that she’d known Crystal as a kid?
“You take kick boxing?” Cindy tried not to sound too disbelieving.
“Oh, I know I’m large. In Hamilton we say ‘round.’ But that doesn’t mean I’m in bad shape. Really, there’s such prejudice against overweight people. Kids who are fat are bullied worse than kids who are handicapped in any other way. I kick box with Melissa once or twice a week.”
“What gym?” I asked innocently. Melissa hadn’t said.
“You wouldn’t know it. It’s full of unsavoury characters who train hard to be really tough. I like feeling as strong as the guys. West Side Gym.”
But Cindy was on the scent of the technology motive. “Melissa wasn’t part of the partnership?”
“No, it was a three-way deal. She’s busy with her real estate. Highly successful. Makes a ton of money selling houses. She would acquire a third ownership of the patent only if her husband…” Crystal trailed off here and I mentally filled in the blank: died.
Was this the motive? Did she love money more than her husband? And why had Melissa said “Bye bye, Crystal?” No doubt she knew with the two men dead that she and Crystal were going to be partners on the new cooling system. Was she planning to kill Crystal? Was she trying to mislead us? And then a thought struck me. Perhaps the two women were in cahoots together. Maybe they were lovers. No, couldn’t be. Melissa was homophobic, that was clear.
“She loved her husband,” Crystal said hastily, perhaps sensing all the places we could go with this information. “And I loved mine. Sure, I knew Todd was a bit of a wanderer, both sides of the fence, but he always came home to me at the end of the day. I mean, he loved me and I loved him. I knew that.” I watched as if in a spell as her whole body started to shake. Tears spilled from her eyes and slowly rolled down her cheeks. My heart went out to her as she fell apart in front of us. “I can’t believe they’re thinking that he killed himself. We were so happy together.” Her voice cracked. “I don’t know what I’m going to do without him. He was all I had,” she whispered, her voice tight with emotion.
So the police hadn’t told her they were now considering his death accidental or a murder. I watched sadly as this high-powered go-getter wept in front of us. I believed her. This was no show. If she could say that her husband was all she had when she had a highly successful company, tons of money, a roomful of kids who obviously thought the world of her, then that was enough proof of the depth of her love for me. I felt for this woman. She was hard-working, creative, she hired misfits, for heaven’s sake. I was now even more determined to discover who had murdered her husband. I knew it wasn’t an accident.
Cindy caught my eye indicating that we should quietly slip away, leaving this poor women alone in her grief. Cindy said quietly, “Thanks for your time, Crystal. I know it will all work out.” She patted her on her arm as she stood up.
Work out? I thought not. Her husband was dead, for heaven’s sake. Plus, with van Horner dead as well, she would have to work with Melissa van Horner on her freezer project. I couldn’t imagine the two of them seeing eye to eye, even if they did kick box together.
We hustled out of her office leaving her stooped over her desk. We jostled through the long aisle of desks and finally burst into the waiting room. Ms. Nelson startled up from reading her movie magazine and quickly shoved it in her lap, like a child in school, caught texting. “I’ll buzz you out,” she coughed and I could hear the electronic unlocking of the door.
“Thanks, we appreciate your help.”
We pushed through the steel door and landed on the hot uneven pavement outside. Our steps gathered momentum until we were almost jogging as we hurtled towards Cindy’s car. Cindy beeped the locks while we were moving, now at a high velocity. When I reached the passenger door I grabbed the scorched handle and flung it open. A wave of heat tumbled out from the sun-baked interior onto my feet. I toppled into the leather seat, burning the backs of my legs. I turned up the air conditioning as soon as Cindy had the key in the ignition.
Cindy pulled out of the parking spot, warm air blasting from the vents.
“I don’t think she had anything to do with Todd or Richard dying. Did you see her crying? She was full of grief that her husband had died.”
“I can’t make sense of this story.”
“No, me neither. Let’s go through it, bit by bit.”
“I think we should tell Creston what we know.”
“Are you kidding? He can find his own information. We have a story to write.”
Here we go again. Wasn’t it my story? There was no “we” here. Wasn’t she just going along for the ride, in sort of a mentoring role? “I have a story to write. And I think Creston should know what we’ve found out.” There. I’d spoken up. That was twice in one day. I could get used to this.
Cindy looked suitably chastised. “Right. Sorry, Robin. It is your story, but I am your mentor. It’s my job to act in the best interests of the paper. And keeping the facts close to our chest totals a great exclusive story, so no Creston, not yet.”
“But what if we are in danger? Two people have died.”
Cindy was heading south on Dufferin Street towards the lake. We’d be at the office by four-thirty or so. Enough time to report in to Doug.
“We can talk about it with Doug. He’s good at assessing stuff like this. In the meantime, do you have the hots for Creston?”
I laughed. Cindy plainly wouldn’t give up. Such a nosy parker. “You are jumping to conclusions. Of course not. I have absolutely no interest in him” I was saying these words while remembering the way his eyes had swept over my body and his gentle touch when he brushed my hair off my face.
“It’s time for you to meet someone, Robin. Get out there. Enjoy a few guys. Have fun. Do the internet dating thing.”
“Yeah, that worked out so well for me. Maybe I should put in my profile: ‘Adventurous woman seeks drop dead gorgeous man.’”
“He didn’t die because of you, Robin.”
“I know that. But still. Kind of puts me off the whole internet dating experience.”
We rode downtown in an easy silence. It was nice to be driven around. I looked out the window and let my thoughts swirl in circles. “Thanks for driving, Cindy.” I was enjoying feeling gratitude. For a brief moment in time, I felt at peace. That gratitude business was some sort of magic, I decided.
Cindy pulled into the underground parking lot below the office. “So, who do you think did it?”
“I don’t know, Cindy. I really don’t. There are so many players. Maybe Melissa.”
But Cindy was clear. “I place my bets on Melissa. I think she did both murders. Motive. Opportunity. Means.”
Despite my periodic reservations about working with Cindy, I was learning from her. First NASH and now motive, opportunity and means. MOM. I would have to remember that, the next time I was looking for a murderer. God forbid, not in the near future. “So, you saw the wasp trap?”
“Oh yes. She did it. Absolutely no fear of wasps.”
“I know. And even though Todd had made it no secret that he was allergic to wasps, she certainly didn’t mention it. But the gunshot? Her own husband?”
“I think she hired a sniper, a hit man, to do her husband. I think both murders were similar in that they were somewhat removed from the murderer.”
“Well, that works if it was a hired gun.” Listen to me talk, like I knew the jargon. “Do you think she’d be smart enough to take down Todd’s dating site? I mean, Crystal on the other hand, she would certainly know.”
Cindy countered. “Melissa probably knew him well enough to guess his password. Ask Alison. She gets a bull’s eye almost every time. I think Melissa did both murders. She had a hand in the wasp business and she hired a hit man. I feel sure of it. She probably paid someone from that seedy gym she goes to.”
“How can we find out?”
“Look at her bank account. If she hired someone she would have to pay them. And snipers don’t come cheap. You’d notice some discrepancies in her withdrawals.”
“We’ll have to go to Creston. No way we’ll be able to look in her bank account. You need all kinds of warrants for that kind of stuff. Banks are pretty anal.”
Cindy hemmed and hawed. “I don’t want to alert Creston. Maybe Alison can find out. Let’s talk to Alison first.”
30.
OUR STEPS ECHOED EERILY OFF THE concrete walls and pillars in the underground parking lot as we headed toward the basement door. It opened onto the hallway that led to the research department and Alison. Cindy banged the hand-lettered steel door open with her shoulder. Over the edge of the formica counter we saw the top of Alison’s head, hunched over her computer.
Cindy barged into the room, “Any way you can find out if Melissa Mowbray paid off a hit man?”
“Um,” Alison looked up and then around to see if anyone was listening, “Sure, I could do that,” she said nervously. Then she regained her zip. “I think. I could probably find out if she hired a hit person.”
Kids today were so politically correct.
“Don’t do anything illegal,” I warned.
“Never,” smiled Alison playfully.
Cindy gave Alison a finger wave and pulled me out of the door by the arm. She called over her shoulder, “Thanks, Alison.”
When I got to my desk I whipped off a short filler piece on how Todd Radcliff’s tox screens had come back revealing that he had been killed by a wasp and the police were so far treating his death as accidental, until more forensic results came in. When this hit the press I would no longer be a target, the only person who knew something that the murderer didn’t want anyone to know, that Todd was allergic to wasp stings.
I shot the piece off to Doug, who was listlessly typing on his computer. I heard a ping as my article arrived in his inbox. His movements were slow and deliberate, not at all like the Doug I knew from two days ago. What was going on with him? Maybe an awful edict had come from above. Maybe he was ill.
I swirled my chair around and looked for Shirley. Were we going to be subject to stringent cutbacks? I’d heard a lot of papers were letting staff go. The internet was decimating the printed industry. People read the news on their phones. But still, writers created the copy, didn’t they? Fear curdled in my stomach. I needed my job. And right when I had finally moved up in the world.
Shirley was standing over by the coffee machine. She looked utterly wretched as she poured herself a cup. She glanced over at Doug’s office from under her fake eyelashes, her chest heaving. Then she poured another cup. I snapped my head down as she quietly walked past my desk balancing the coffees and then thumping on the door frame of Doug’s office with her elbow. He didn’t turn around as he said come in. She shut the door behind her with her foot and I could hear their voices rising and falling. Ah. They were in the middle of a fight. Phew, my job was safe. Hopefully.
I didn’t want to look like I was spying and busied myself by tidying up my desk. The clock across the floor ticked slowly towards five and I, for one, wasn’t staying late tonight. Cindy seemed to sense all the activity beside her, and started collecting up her various bits and pieces and tossing them into her bag. “I’ll give you a ride home,” she whispered.
I had completely forgotten that I didn’t have my car. Ralph had dropped me off at work this morning after interviewing Jimmy. I mouthed thanks and stood up to stretch as the clock hit five.
Cindy looked a little perturbed as we walked past Doug’s door. “We should be giving him a rundown of the day, you know.”
“Shirley’s in there with him. Let’s get out of here. I need to get home to Lucky.”
As we were standing by the elevator Cindy’s cell rang. She looked at the caller ID and said to me, “Alison,” and then spoke into the phone. “Cindy speaking.” A long pause while she listened. The elevator came.
When we got in Cindy hung up from Alison and said, “Okay. Melissa’s business account is fairly erratic because of her work
, you know, huge commissions going in and out pretty randomly, but it looks like there were five cash withdrawals of exactly nine thousand dollars each in the past two months. Any cash withdrawal over ten thousand triggers a bank’s scrutiny. So she was being careful. Alison thought these withdrawals might be for a hit person” Cindy looked at me with the corner of her lip slightly raised in a small smile.
The elevator doors opened to the parking garage. “So,” I summarized, “Melissa has motive, opportunity, and means for both murders.”
“Yessirrebob.” Cindy looked grim.
We scurried quickly towards her car. I thought I saw movement out of the corner of my eye, but it must have been the yellow streamer tied to a vent cover, flapping in the manufactured breeze. Only after getting into Cindy’s car and locking the doors did I take a deep breath. I kept an eye on the side mirror as Cindy drove up the ramp to the street.
“You’re the nervous one.” She saw me looking behind us.
“Yessirrebob.” I mimicked her flippancy.
After Cindy dropped me off at home I poured myself an eight-ounce tumbler of cold white wine and took it out to my small back deck. It was one of those lovely summer evenings where the cicadas had quietened down and the crickets were gearing up.
My view was of a somewhat bedraggled garden, much torn up by Lucky, who was now sniffing the perimeter way too intently for my liking. Was someone watching me? Was I paranoid? I would be safe once the story about the wasp venom as cause of death was out this evening on the web.
Despite Cindy’s desire to keep our info to ourselves, I felt I should be talking to Creston about all that had been discovered today. I bet he had no idea that Radcliff and van Horner were in a relationship. He’d be floored if he knew that Melissa knew this, wasn’t afraid of wasps, had enough money to sink a ship, and had made consistent large withdrawals. Cindy was probably right, that Melissa had done both murders, but I wanted to go over it all in my mind to make sure.