Deadly Production (Mapleton Mystery Book 4)

by Terry Odell

  “What about this?” Gordon tapped the image.

  Solomon leaned in closer. “Thermal carafe. I’d assume it held milk, or something else that needed to be kept at a regulated temperature.”

  “Like hot chocolate?” Gordon said.

  “But look.” Solomon reached over and enlarged the image. “There are packets of hot chocolate, so why have a carafe of it? Milk makes more sense.”

  Gordon tapped the screen. “But they’ve got a basket full of those non-dairy creamers, so why deal with milk at all?”

  “Good one, Chief. I was stuck on the visual of a regular thermos bottle. You want me to go check the trailer?” Solomon asked.

  “Any of our people still on security duty?” Gordon said. “I don’t trust the studio clowns.”

  When Solomon said he didn’t know, Gordon called Tessa in Dispatch, and she told him Jost was the only MPD officer assigned at this time.

  “Tell him to get to the VIP lounge trailer, take a picture of the coffee area, and if there’s a carafe there, to put on gloves and bring it here. Pronto.” Gordon described the carafe in the picture. He disconnected and turned to Solomon. “How big you think that carafe is?”

  Solomon frowned. “Without anything to compare it to, I couldn’t say. Half a gallon, maybe. I don’t think they make smaller ones with those pump tops.”

  “And half a gallon is two quarts, right?”

  “If I remember my sixth grade math, yes.”

  Gordon grabbed the phone again and called the lab. Xander had left for the day, but had instructed the tech on duty to expect calls from Mapleton.

  “What do you need, Chief Hepler?”

  Gordon explained Bart and Kathy's accident. “I know it wasn’t connected to a crime at the time, but we’re looking into the driver as a suspect in a homicide. Is the car still at the impound lot?”

  “Let me check.”

  Gordon listened as the tech clattered away on a keyboard. Cop Muzak. “Yeah, the rental people are going to pick it up Monday. What do you need?”

  Gordon explained the receipt listed in the inventory. “I need to know what the item with the ThCrf2Qt in the code was, and what time it was purchased.” And, if the gods were smiling, what credit card was used, but Gordon didn’t think Bart would have been stupid enough to use one if the item was a thermal carafe he planned to use to deliver drugged hot chocolate.

  “Will do. I can scan the receipt and email it to you if it’s still there.”

  “Should I worry that it wouldn’t be?” Gordon asked.

  “Nah, even if the accident team didn’t know what it was, they don’t throw anything away. They’re big on CYA-ing.”

  “Their habit of keeping their asses covered could be what we need.”

  After disconnecting, Gordon asked Solomon, “Who on the production crew is responsible for stocking these trailers?”

  “No clue. You want me to check it out?”

  “Damn right I do. And get whoever it is over here. Now.”

  Chapter 33

  Gordon marched to the interview room. Before he got there, Xander’s text came through. The prints on the prescription vial matched the ones on the hot chocolate cups.

  We’ve got you now, Bart.

  He yanked the door open. “You know, Mr. Bergsstrom, you might resemble Cassidy Clarke enough to be his stand-in, but you’re not his double. What were you going to say if Mrs. Findlay had been a movie buff and knew you weren’t Cassidy Clarke?”

  Bart shrugged. “Didn’t come to that, did it? And so what if you can put me in his room. Even my prints on the vial don’t prove I took it, only that I touched it.”

  “Here’s what I think happened, Mr. Bergsstrom. You wanted to get rid of Cassidy Clarke as a rival, figuring if he’s discredited, you’ve got one less obstacle in the way of your rise to stardom. That Mr. Clarke once had a drug problem was common knowledge, but what he was addicted to wasn’t. You saw pills in his bathroom. You took them, wanted to show them to Marianna Spellman as proof Mr. Clarke was using. How am I doing so far?”

  No response.

  Gordon went on. “The pills. Did you even try to look them up, see what they were, what effects they might have had if a person took too many of them?”

  More silence. Gordon stepped in to fill it.

  “You kept most of the pills, leaving a few in the vial. You took that to Miss Spellman’s RV, trying to convince her Mr. Cassidy was using. You told her you wanted to be in her new company. What happened then? She tell you you hadn’t made the cut? Or worse, that she was going to badmouth you in the industry?”

  “It wasn’t like that,” Bart said.

  Since Solomon wasn’t here taking notes, Gordon glanced at the recorder, making sure it was still running. “How was it, then?”

  Bart scratched the back of his head. “It wasn’t fair. Cassidy getting all those prime roles, while I’m stuck in stand-in or extra territory. I live a clean life, I never got hooked on drugs, I do my job. So, when I heard Marianna was going to start a new company, I wanted in.”

  “Where did you hear that?” Gordon asked.

  “Around. I overheard her talking to Yolanda while we were shooting at the lake. When I was alone with Yolanda, I pretended I’d already been approached, and asked Yolanda if she was going to be joining, too. She told me she was considering whether she should give up her unpredictable assignments for steady work, even though the pay scale would be lower.

  “Then, it was a matter of keeping my eyes and ears open. Marianna was always making notes on the tablet computer she had with her. One thing about being a mere stand-in, is you tend to be invisible. I could hear her asking people questions, practically interviewing them for jobs. She never approached me, so I decided I’d be proactive and ask her first.”

  “When was this?” Gordon asked.

  Bart stared at his fingers, which were doing a tap dance to rival Fred Astaire on the table. “Thursday morning.”

  “The same morning you said you were in Denver?” Gordon stabbed Bart with an icy gaze.

  “Yes.” Bart’s response was barely audible.

  “Louder, please.”

  “Yes. I was in Mapleton, not Denver. The whole Denver story was made up, okay? I lied. People lie all the time.”

  “We know that all too well, Mr. Bergsstrom,” Gordon said. “Trouble is, when you lie to a cop about an investigation, it becomes obstruction of justice, and we can charge you with that if we want to. Let’s agree you’re going to tell the truth from this point forward, and maybe we’ll overlook the previous lies.”

  Bart’s nod was almost imperceptible.

  “To confirm,” Gordon said, although it wasn’t a confirmation, since Bart hadn’t admitted it yet, but being proactive was always a good thing. “You, under the pretense of being Cassidy Clarke, enlisted the help of a housekeeper, one Mrs. Findlay, at the Richardsons’ Bed and Breakfast on Monday, in order to remove a vial of Celexa, a prescription anti-depressant, from his possession.”

  “You make it sound so … so … sleazy that way. I wanted to look around, and I found the pills and took them.”

  “But you went there with the intent to find something you could use to further your cause and eliminate a rival.”

  “Discredit,” Bart said. “The way you say eliminate makes it seem as though I wanted to kill him. I had no such intention. I wanted him … less in my way. At least for a while, so I could show everyone on this picture I could handle a regular role.”

  “And you believed your answers were in Miss Spellman’s files,” Gordon said. “How did you get her laptop?”

  “I took it. From her purse.”

  “Details, please. Remember what Officer Solomon said about things going easier on you if you tell us the truth. And I strongly suggest you man up and not try to blame things on Kathy. She wasn’t with you in the morning, and you could have gotten her killed when you had your accident.”

  Bart exhaled a deep, tremulous sigh that seemed to emer
ge from somewhere deep beneath the earth’s crust. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Marianna was supposed to see the pills and confront Cassidy. If she didn’t get him kicked off this picture, at least make it harder for him to get work.”

  “Ah, but if your intention was simply to show Miss Spellman the pills, why did you keep some?”

  Bart lifted his chin. “Can I get more water now, please?”

  “After you finish telling me everything,” Gordon said. “Shall we start when you arrived in Colorado?”

  A rap on the door before it opened, and then Solomon walked in. “Got what you needed.” His gaze was directed at Bart.

  Bart rested his elbows on the table and lowered his head.

  Gordon smirked. Then he called Gaubatz. “Tell Miss Bennett she's free to go.”

  “Let’s hear it,” Gordon said.

  Gordon could tell Solomon was trying not to gloat as his officer pulled out a chair and sat. He plopped a picture onto the table. He must have stopped by the workroom and printed out a picture of the beverage counter in the VIP lounge, which is what he placed in front of Bart.

  Solomon rapped an index finger on the image of the carafe. “You see this, Mr. Bergsstrom? This is not part of Vista Venture’s setup. The person who keeps the trailers stocked said she’d never seen it until Thursday. It had hot chocolate residue in it. She assumed—and you know what they say about people who make assumptions—that it was property she hadn’t been informed about, and it must be new because it didn’t have a Vista Ventures ID sticker on it. She washed it out and put it in the cabinet, because she didn’t know what she was supposed to do with it.”

  Solomon stood. Walked around the table and hovered by Bart’s chair. “I think you used it to transport your drugged hot chocolate, and then, due to the confusion after Marianna Spellman’s body was found, and the trailers were locked down, you couldn’t go back for it. Maybe when you did, it was already gone. I’m not a gambling man, Mr. Bergsstrom, but my money says that carafe will match the one on the receipt we found in your rental car.”

  Bart’s eyes went blank. His jaw dropped. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “When I took the bottle of pills from Cassidy’s room, you’re right. I was going to confront Marianna with them. But then I started thinking. If she was drugged with them, the obvious suspect would be Cassidy, and maybe I’d get a chance to play his part—all I wanted was a chance to show I could do it. I wasn’t sure how to get her to take them, but I knew she liked hot chocolate—I saw her drinking it at Aspen Lake—and I bought the carafe on a whim.”

  Gordon wondered how anyone would think a movie company banking on a box office draw from a well-known actor would replace him with an unknown, but his mind didn’t work the way Bart’s did. He wondered if anyone’s mind worked the way Bart’s did.

  Bart exhaled and went on. “So, I told Kathy I had errands to run and would get an early start the next morning, that she could sleep in, and I’d be back for her in time to get us to the Mapleton shoot. I’d already decided if I could get at Marianna’s laptop files, maybe I could change whatever negative things she’d said about me. Or move me onto the approved list.”

  “And you figured drugging her was the best way to get access to her laptop?” Solomon said.

  “Well, yeah. First, I was going to use sleeping pills, but then when I found the ones in Cassidy’s room, I changed my mind. That way, there would be no way to trace me buying the sleeping pills. I looked Cassidy’s pills up on line, and it said drowsiness was a common side-effect.”

  Apparently Gordon was one of the few people who hadn’t known about looking up drugs. He urged Bart to continue.

  “Kathy and I had brought food with us, and we had fancy hot chocolate fixings. I mixed up a batch, added extra cream and sugar, dissolved the pills in it, and brought it with me to the set.”

  “And what time was this?” Solomon asked. He was busy taking everything down on his laptop.

  “I left a little before five a.m.,” Bart said. “I went to Marianna’s RV, and asked to talk to her for a minute. Then, like it was an afterthought, I mentioned I had great hot chocolate, and asked her if she wanted some. I told her it was a low calorie, bittersweet dark chocolate, that tasted like the rich gourmet stuff, and she brought over her fancy mug and I poured her some. She drank part of it—I don’t think she ever finished anything she ate or drank.”

  “Then what?” Gordon asked, not wanting to let Bart get sidetracked with a discussion of Marianna’s eating habits.

  Bart rolled his eyes. “She said thanks for the cocoa, but she’s already made up her mind and she’s not going to be considering me for a spot in her company. She practically kicks me out. I hung around, waiting to see if she’d fall asleep, but a few minutes later, she leaves the trailer and goes to the VIP lounge.”

  “Did she have her purse?” Solomon asked.

  “Yeah, it was like glued to her shoulder, I think. Anyway, I follow her to the lounge. Yolanda’s there, and Marianna sees me come in with the thermos and tells Yolanda how great the cocoa was, and could she please have another cup. I’m not going to say no—she might still change her mind about hiring me—and besides, nothing was happening. She seemed perfectly normal. I figured the drugs were too old. So, I pour her and Yolanda some, and figured it would seem funny not to have some myself, but I only took a tiny bit. In case of a delayed reaction, you know.”

  Effectively giving Marianna a double dose, which might also explain why she died and Yolanda had minor side-effects.

  “Marianna pulls out her tablet and she and Yolanda start yammering on about the new company. Marianna’s messing with her tablet, pointing stuff out to Yolanda, and Yolanda’s giving me those sideways looks—like she wants to say something about me, but doesn’t want to say it in front of me, you know. So it can’t be good.”

  “So, Miss Spellman had her laptop with her in the lounge,” Gordon said.

  “The tablet part, anyway. She wasn’t using the keyboard. But it was the tablet part I needed. I went to her RV to poke around, but it was locked. I hung around Wardrobe, figuring I could get costuming out of the way, and Yolanda came back. She seemed perfectly fine, too, by the way. She gave me a different shirt to wear, to match the color of the one Cassidy would be wearing. I asked her if she’d put in a good word for me with Marianna.”

  “What did she say?” Solomon asked.

  “Maybe. Like, we know that means no, right? So, I leave and was going to give up and head to Evergreen, but then I see Marianna going into her RV. So I decide to hang around awhile longer, trying to decide if I want to go and grovel.”

  “Do you remember what time this was?” Solomon asked.

  “No. Sevenish?”

  “All right. Any sense of how long you were waiting around?” Gordon said.

  “Probably not nearly as long as it seemed. I’m hiding under Marianna’s RV, and wondering what the fuck I’m doing there. Then I see Yolanda walking past, so I think I can wait in the lounge where it’s more comfortable, but I’m crawling out when I see Marianna. She’s walking funny—you know, like she’s drunk—and I think maybe the pills are kicking in. I walk around the trailer so she doesn’t see me coming out from under it, and I see she’s grabbing the rail to the Wardrobe steps, like she’s dizzy. I rush over and help her up inside, and she sits on the chair.”

  Bart hung his head, then gazed into Gordon’s eyes. “I suppose I should have gone for help, but honestly, you have to believe me, I thought she’d pass out, sleep for a while. If I’d known she was dying, I’d have gone for help. But I didn’t know, so I rushed into her RV and grabbed her laptop, shoved it in her purse, and then got the hell out of there.”

  “You locked the door when you left?” Gordon said.

  “Well, yeah. I mean, she always kept it locked. And since I had the key, I could get in if I wanted to.”

  “Where did you go?” Solomon asked.

  “About a block or so away. To that park place where people wa
lk dogs and stuff. I sat at a picnic bench and tried to figure out how to get into Marianna’s files.”

  “Did you?” Gordon said. If Marianna was as lax about her laptop security as she was her cell phone, it might not have been too hard.

  Bart pounded a fist on the table. “No, damn it. I tried everything I could think of. I could see where some of the files were, but they were locked. Computers aren’t my thing. So I shoved the tablet into the purse and wandered around a little, trying to figure out what to do.”

  “Carrying a woman’s purse?” Solomon said, his eyebrow raised.

  Bart snorted. “That thing was more like a piece of carryon luggage. I tucked it under my arm and it didn’t look like a purse. Besides, there was hardly anyone on the street. They were all rubbernecking at the shoot.”

  Marianna’s laptop had yet to be uncovered. “So you tossed the purse in a vacant lot. What did you do with the laptop?” Gordon said.

  “I kept it. Figured I’d find somebody to hack in.”

  Gordon tried not to show his surprise at the admission. Why not say he tossed it? Maybe that lent more credibility to Bart’s statement.

  “What did you do next?” Solomon asked.

  “I figured I’d hang around a little longer, go into Marianna’s RV. By now, all hell seemed to be breaking loose, but I thought nobody would notice me in the chaos. I know we all filled out paperwork when we got here, so I wanted to dig through her hard copies. See what she said about me. But then I saw Lionel Dawson and a cop.” Bart paused, looked more closely at Solomon. “It was you, I think. You went into the RV. You left with some papers. I thought you had all the files, so I knew I needed to check.”

  “But you’d already tossed her purse, so you had to break in,” Gordon said.

  Bart swiped his hand under his nose. “Not exactly,” he said in a quiet voice.

  “Repeat that,” Solomon said.

  “See, I thought if I made it look like someone broke in, trashed the place, then you’d think it was some crook or vandal, and it would throw you off the track.”