by J. S. Marlo
The veteran popped his head in the doorway. “Liliane Irwin called 911 at 6:47 a.m. Welsh and I arrived ten minutes later.”
Liliane didn’t belong in the office at 6:47 with a dead body. Something didn’t add up in Jasper’s mind. “Was she alone?”
“No, Nathalie Jacobs was with her.” Glancing behind his shoulder, Officer Morse lowered his voice. “They both wore gym clothes.”
Their presence baffled Jasper. “Did you take their statements and send them home?”
“Neither, sir. They’re drinking coffee in some offices down the corridor. I thought you’d prefer to interrogate them yourself.”
Jasper intended to talk with every employee throughout the morning, but to avoid any perceived conflict of interest, he would let another officer conduct and record Liliane’s initial interview. “Morse, I need you to look for a toolbox with pink tools, but first, I’d like you to do me a favor.”
~ * ~
After the police officers’ arrival, Liliane retreated to her office to phone Damien, but each repeated call she made was forwarded to his voicemail. Surmising he was either asleep or in the shower—driving had unfortunately never stopped him from answering—she left him a succinct message after her fifth attempt.
Thomas is dead.
The three words should rouse him faster than a thermos of strong coffee chugged under an icy shower.
Through the air ducts, she overheard Jasper’s exchange with the female coroner. Unless she misinterpreted the exchange, Thomas had sex in his office and was murdered before he could pull up his underwear. The poetic justice failed to soothe Liliane’s frayed nerves or calm her churning stomach.
She conspired against Thomas in Nathalie’s office while his body was still warm in—
A knock on her closed door pierced the heavy silence permeating her office, ending her brooding. “Come in.”
Hoping to project a collected appearance, Liliane leaned back in her chair and clasped her hands on her lap to stop her fingers from fidgeting.
The officer who introduced himself as Morse when he first arrived stepped inside her office. “Detective O’Neil sent me to write down your statement and ask a few questions while he talks to Mrs. Jacobs. He thought it might look more impartial since your daughter is involved with his nephew.”
The unclear nature of their children’s relationship complicated their lives. Besides, she wouldn’t call Dillon his nephew. It didn’t matter that Jasper’s late sister gave birth to the boy, or that the boy’s estranged birth father refused to renounce his parental rights, preventing Jasper from legally adopting his nephew, Jasper had raised Dillon since he was eight years old. The young man traveling with her daughter was Jasper’s son, not his nephew.
“I’ll make it easy for you, Officer Morse.” Regardless of her illicit activities in the office—activities she’d rather not divulge yet—Liliane wasn’t involved in Thomas’ murder. “I woke up at 5:00 a.m. I got dressed. I ate a bagel. I talked to my daughter for a few minutes. I drove to the Recreation Center where I met Nathalie shortly after 5:30 a.m. We worked out until 6:10 a.m. then we jogged to the office. My Blackberry didn’t synch correctly so I asked Nathalie to look at my passwords, then—”
“At 6:10 in the morning?” The dubious look on his face betrayed his incredulity.
“Nathalie never shows up for work before 10:00 a.m. I’m here between 8:30 and 9:00 every morning. Stopping after our workout sounded easier than begging her to come to work early.” Liliane wouldn’t dream of interfering with Nathalie’s long morning shower and elaborate breakfast.
“I see.” The officer scribbled something in a forest green notebook. “What happened when you came in?”
“The front door was locked, but the alarm wasn’t set.” In retrospect, she regretted not listening to Nathalie when she suggested getting the hell out of here.
He frowned. “And you didn’t find it strange?”
“Strange, yes. Alarming, no. I thought maybe someone was working inside or came in and left with the intent of returning soon.” When she called out and no one answered, it never occurred to her someone dead might be present. “We couldn’t hear any sound, and there were no signs of a break-in, so we went into Nathalie’s office to fix my Blackberry. We were ready to leave when we heard a loud thud. We looked in every office in case someone dropped something heavy or fell down. When we peeked inside Thomas’ office, we found his body. We then called you right away.”
The officer flipped to a new page in his notebook. “Aside from that thud, did you see or hear anything else?”
As much as she racked her brain, she couldn’t recall anything amiss, unless— “No, but the thud resembled the sound his head would have made hitting the desk when he slumped forward.” If that were the case, he couldn’t have been dead for very long.
The officer lifted his gaze toward her. “Who has keys to unlock the doors and who knows the alarm code?”
Her iPhone vibrated on her desk, but she ignored it. “The landlord gave us six dimple keys. They are numbered from one to six and cannot be replicated.” The number of keys was written on the lease locked in Liliane’s filing cabinet. “In numerical order, the keys were assigned to Thomas the returning...the victim, Gloria the receptionist, Nathalie the technology officer, Sophie the revision supervisor, Jasmin the training officer, and myself the finance officer. The code isn’t much of a secret, and everyone with a key knows it.”
“I see.” The officer wrote lengthy notes. “Now that Thomas Finch is dead, who takes his place in this office?”
Good question. “On paper, it would be the assistant returning officer, Leonard Hassler.” In reality, Liliane feared the answer to that question.
“What kind of relationship did you share with the deceased?” Morse stared at her with unconcealed interest.
Mindful of how her answer might be perceived, Liliane pondered her words. “I didn’t know Thomas on a personal level, but within the walls of this office, we shared a strained relationship. I ended up overriding many of his decisions, but I didn’t kill him. Part of my job consisted of protecting his integrity. His death will undoubtedly cause me a considerable amount of professional grief and aggravation in the days ahead.”
The officer flipped to another page then continued writing in silence for another few seconds. “One last question, where were you between 3:30 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.?”
Establishing and checking everyone’s alibi was an integral part of the investigation. Her brain understood the process, but her heart refused to cooperate. “I was asleep in my bed.”
His eyes were clouded with the reflection of the unspoken question hanging between them.
“Alone,” she added as she held his gaze without flinching. “Will that be all, Officer Morse? Can I go home and change?”
~ * ~
Liliane waited until she reached her car in the parking lot of the Recreation Center to look at her messages. Two missed calls from Damien and a text message from Nathalie.
I’m headed home. Let me know when you want me back in the office.
Her friend didn’t quit or threaten to quit. The small favor lifted Liliane’s spirits. She called Damien once seated in her car. It rang once.
“Lily? Where are you?” The panic in Damien’s voice was palpable.
“I’m at the gym. I need to make a quick stop downtown, then I’ll go home.” Something had occurred to her when she walked out and she wanted to check the lead. “Where are you?”
“In the lineup at Tim’s.” His location shouldn’t have come as a surprise. He loved his coffee. “I’ll grab you a coffee and meet you there.”
His consideration touched her. “Make it an extra-large.”
“Noted. See you later.”
Her quick stop took place four streets down toward the river. If she wasn’t mistaken, the security company in charge of monitoring the election office opened at 8:00 a.m.
The door of the security company chimed when Liliane pushed
it. Three empty chairs were set out in the small vestibule.
To her dismay, no one manned the counter. “Anyone here?”
“Coming.” The voice originated from a corridor behind the counter. An eternity later, it was followed by an elderly woman trudging behind a walker. “How can I help you?”
“I’m Liliane Irwin. Finance officer at the election office.” She presented her electoral badge which featured her position and an unflattering picture taken in a hurry a morning long ago. “Could you print me or email me a copy of the security log between 9:00 last night and 7:00 this morning, please?”
The woman eyed her from head to toe. “Back in the good old days, people used to dress up to go to work.”
Liliane forced a smile. “I’m not working until later.”
The elderly employee’s rant about the good old days and young people not getting dressed up continued as she labored to bend behind the counter. A stack of contracts landed with a thump on the top. The woman leafed through it one sheet at a time.
“Election...Election...”
To resist the urge to help her, Liliane inquired about the computer sitting on the corner of the counter.
The woman, who never volunteered her name, scowled at her. “No, it’s not broken, but I need the code written on your contract to access your file.”
Liliane bit her tongue. Hard. Whoever designed that system was technologically impaired.
“Election office.” With a trembling hand, she removed a sheet from the stack. “You signed up for our regular service and you pay monthly.”
Yes, a hefty fee. Liliane faked a smile. “That sounds right.”
“The regular service only monitors the alarm. It doesn’t keep a daily log of the activation and deactivation of the system. You should have paid for the premium service if you wanted to track your employees. I can switch you to premium starting next week, but that’s twenty dollars more a month.”
Sweet chocolate. Why didn’t Thomas register for the premium service? By the end of the by-election, she would have paid thousands of dollars for security. Twenty bucks was pocket change in her seven-hundred-thousand-dollar budget.
“That won’t be necessary. Thank you.” The activity log would have helped narrow down the time window during which Thomas was murdered, but Liliane suspected he didn’t want anyone to know when he entertained guests in his office.
The irony wasn’t lost on her.
~ * ~
As Liliane parked inside her garage, Damien pulled into her driveway. She stole a coffee from his hands and he followed her into the kitchen.
The man sat at the end of the table. “Okay, Lily, I’m listening. I want every detail.”
Between sips of coffee, she recounted her eventful morning.
Damien didn’t interrupt her until she finished. “When I read your message, I pictured a heart attack or a stroke, not an erotic murder. This is bad.”
In spite of the tragic circumstances, the horrified look on Damien’s face amused her, but had she spotted the parts poking out of Thomas’ pants, she might have sported the same expression. “Sorry, but I’m hard-pressed to feel sorry for anyone right now. Headquarters knew Thomas possessed a despicable character, but as long as he didn’t misbehave in the public domain, they turned a blind eye on him. Guess what? It caught up with them. End of story.”
A long heavy sigh whooshed through his parted lips as he leaned back in the only armchair around her round table. His gaze traveled to the ceiling fan and his hands stilled inches away from his cup of coffee. Silence filled the air.
The situation stank, but she refused to shoulder the blame for the consequences. While she waited for him to say something, anything, she surfed through Thomas’ emails. Synching her Blackberry with his account proved to be valuable.
“Damien, doesn’t the rulebook state the ARO would take over should the returning officer become incapacitated in any shape or form?” Being murdered does fit the definition of incapacitated. Permanently. “That means Leonard will be in charge, right?” Not that Liliane believed for a second that Leonard was the right man for the job, but it beat putting her in charge.
“I spent some time around town with him.” Damien gulped down a mouthful of coffee. “I doubt he’d recognize a ballot if it stared him in the face. What do you know of him?”
“A few things you won’t like.” Nevertheless, she repeated what she learned from Amanda.
“A gambler?” The man groaned. “Could she have lied to you?”
“Amanda? She had no reason to lie. Then again, she heard it from Leonard’s sister, who may—or may not—have exaggerated. Maybe you should run a background check on him. If he owes money to dubious characters, he may also end up with a screwdriver in—” An email caught her eye.
She focused her attention on her Blackberry.
“Lily?” Her guest straightened up in his chair. “What is it?”
“An email from Leonard.” She read it aloud. “We need to talk. You said I wouldn’t need to be in the office. I want my money and I want out. I won’t be your scapegoat. Meet me at 5:00 a.m. Len.” The timing and content of the text raised her suspicion. “He sent it at 1:04 this morning.”
Damien frowned at her. “Why did he email you?”
“He didn’t email me, Damien, he emailed Thomas. I told you I hacked his account. Have a look.” She placed her Blackberry on the table then gave it a push. “The email had been read before I opened it. If Thomas agreed to the meeting, he didn’t reply using his Blackberry.”
The election phone slid all the way to Damien who picked it up. As he mouthed the message, more lines and wrinkles creased his forehead.
He bore a strange resemblance to a Chinese Shar-Pei puppy. “That email places them together at the time of death and money is a strong motive, especially for a gambler.”
It seemed too easy, too convenient, and Liliane had never trusted easy or convenient.
“It doesn’t explain the sexual angle. Besides, Leonard wasn’t the only one with a motive. Almost everyone in the office held some sort of grudge against him, some stronger than others. The list of suspects who had the means, the motive, and the opportunity to kill him is longer than my arms.” It occurred to her, she also met the criteria and that her fingerprints might be on the screwdriver if it turned out to be the same one she used to change Amanda’s doorknob. “Could the by-election be postponed until the investigation is concluded?”
“I talked to Headquarters. They would consider postponing it, but only as a last resort.” Damien tilted his head back and forth as if it helped to turn the wheels in his brain. “If they promote anyone else but Leonard to the position of returning officer, it will raise questions.”
Regardless of Leonard’s appointment, questions were bound to fly right, left, and center about Thomas’ murder—and his killer.
No one, not even her, would be immune to the scrutiny. “Did you miss the part about quitting in the email Leonard sent to Thomas? Or that he might be a potential killer?”
“The law states he’s innocent until proven guilty.” Damien juggled with her Blackberry. “For an additional ten thousand dollars, I should be able to convince him to sit in Thomas’ office, sign papers, and play poker on an iPad all day. It’s all about money, Lily.”
Had she known this corresponded to the returning officer’s job description, Liliane would have applied for the position herself.
“And who’s going to do his work?” She glared at Damien, challenging him to give her the wrong answer. “Are you planning on staying more than a few days?”
“You know I can’t. I need to fly back to finalize my divorce.” Without breaking eye contact, he pushed her election phone toward her, and it glided on the table until it hit her cup. “You’re the only one I trust implicitly, Lily. I’ll make sure Leonard understands you’re in charge and he needs to follow your orders to the letter.”
Traci, a friend of her daughter, managed her gallery while Liliane work
ed the election, but that didn’t give her time to paint. She missed the tranquility and solitude of her studio.
“I’m going with you to see Leonard.” Whoever retired Thomas didn’t do her any favors. “Let’s go before I change my mind and seek refuge in my studio.”
~ * ~
Liliane had pictured Leonard living in his sister’s guestroom, but no rooms occupied her unfinished basement. Only a washer, a dryer, a Ping-Pong table, and an old couch on which Leonard sat wrapped in a blanket.
The gambling man looked haggard and confused. “Why are you offering me Thomas’ job? He told me I could stay home, that he’d deal with you, Liliane.”
That sounded like a threat. Once she returned to the office, she would peruse all Thomas’ messages to try to figure out under which bus he intended to toss her.
“Did he say how he would deal with her?” Damien kept a blank expression and a low even tone, which usually meant he was angry or shocked.
In this case, she suspected both.
“When did he tell you this?” she pushed when Leonard didn’t respond right away.
“When we met at Tim’s for coffee this morning.” The glare in his glassy eyes encompassed both of them. “And no, he didn’t say, but he knows you’re embezzling money. Your days are numbered.”
Had the situation not been so serious, she would have laughed at the ludicrous claim. “So you did meet him at 5:00 this morning?”
The assistant officer straightened up on the couch. The blanket tumbled down, exposing his bare chest and the large tattoo of a shark above his bellybutton—a tattoo distorted by rolls of fat. “Were you spying on us? Wait till I tell Thomas. He’ll shred you to pieces.”