Sally Berneathy - Death by Chocolate 03 - The Great Chocolate Scam

by Sally Berneathy

  “Julia pulled the car out of the garage while I went back inside to get my wallet. I came out just as everything blew up. Scared the beejezus out of me, I can tell you! But I was thinking fast. I threw my wallet out into the rubble so they’d think I was dead, then I went inside, ran out the back door and kept running.”

  “To the condo you own in Prairie Village?” Fred asked.

  “The condo he owns in Prairie Village?” I repeated. Prairie Village is an upscale suburb on the Kansas side. That condo probably cost at least twice what my little house cost. “What condo is that?”

  Fred frowned. “Did I forget to tell you about the condo? Sorry. I just found it last night. I was going to tell you today, but then we got off on Marissa and Bryan.”

  Rick shot up from the toilet seat. “Marissa and Bryan?”

  I shoved him back down. “A bank account and now a condo? How many more assets were you hiding from me? I told you I didn’t want any of your stuff, so why were you going to all the trouble to hide it? Do you think I’m as despicable as you are? Is it true what Fred told me, that you judge everybody by your own immoral code?”

  “Do you think I could have some dry clothes and we could talk about this someplace other than the bathroom?”

  “Dry clothes? I haven’t got—sure. Stay right here and I’ll bring you something to put on.”

  Fred walked out of the bathroom with me. “I’m locking the door so you can’t escape until I get back,” I called to Rick.

  “Like I’m going anywhere soaking wet!”

  Fred studied the ancient knob. “There’s no lock on this door.”

  “I know. And I don’t have any dry clothes for Rick. How long do you think it’ll take him to figure all that out?”

  We headed downstairs. “Long enough for a fresh batch of cookies, at least,” he said.

  “Speaking of locks, how did you get in here?”

  “Through the front door.”

  “That door does have a lock, a strong deadbolt, and I locked it when I came in.”

  “I know.”

  “You heard me scream?”

  “Yes.”

  Super hearing as well as x-ray vision.

  I checked the front door as we went past and found it unlocked. Apparently he wasn’t able to walk through walls. “Easier to unlock them than relock them?” I asked as I flipped the lock mechanism.

  “Takes more time, and I was worried you were in danger since I heard you scream.”

  “Good call.”

  We went to the kitchen where Henry was still snoozing happily.

  I took out some frozen cookie dough and a pan. “Apparently during the term of his demise, Rick’s been spying on me,” I said, tilting my head in Henry’s direction. “He gave Henry catnip.”

  Fred sat down at the table. “Remember that night Marissa and her boys were here and I thought I saw one of them outside looking in the window?”

  I shuddered. “Yes, I remember. Oh! You think it was Rick?”

  He nodded.

  I moved the roast to one side of the oven and slid the cookies in beside it then sat down on a chair next to Fred. “That’s disgusting, but it explains some things. I’ve had this creepy feeling whenever I’ve been with Trent that Rick was watching us. Like one night we were on the porch, and I heard an animal hissing in the bushes. I thought I was just being paranoid, but I’ll bet that was him, spying on me!” I slammed my fist onto the solid wood of the table. “I’m going to kill him. Everybody already thinks he’s dead so I should be able to get away with it.”

  Fred shook his head. “You probably shouldn’t do that. The police have doubts about his being in that explosion. They can’t be far behind me. They’ll find that bank account, discover that he took out money after he was supposed to be dead, and track him to that condo before long.”

  “That sucks.”

  “I know.”

  I had just taken the cookies out of the oven when we heard Rick pounding on the bathroom door. The cookies were cool enough to transfer from the pan to a rack before he figured out the door wasn’t locked and came downstairs wearing his wet clothes and a frown.

  “Very funny.” He plopped down into a chair at the table.

  “About as funny as you spying on me.” I eyed the marble rolling pin sitting on the counter. If I were to whack Rick upside the head, I was pretty sure Fred wouldn’t tell.

  “I was looking out for my interests,” Rick protested. “You’ve been hanging around with that cop like you were a single woman!”

  “I was until a few minutes ago!” I leaned forward, wishing my words were bullets.

  “No, you weren’t! I didn’t sign the divorce papers, and I wasn’t dead!” He leaned toward me, looking smug.

  Fred pushed us both back. “Entertaining as it is to listen to you two argue, I’d really like to ask you some questions, Rick, beginning with, who tried to kill you?”

  Rick ran a hand through his damp hair and blew out a long breath. “I don’t know. It could be one of several people.”

  “No surprise there.” I rose and transferred the still-warm cookies to a plate. I thought about dividing them on two plates, one for Fred and one for me, but my mother’s manners kicked in, and I set the single plate in the middle of the table. Of course Rick took one. With any sort of luck, it would be the cookie that contained the one chocolate chip that had been infused with a deadly poison before leaving the factory. But if I’d had that sort of luck, he’d have stayed dead in the first place.

  “Are you making a roast?” Rick asked. “Something sure does smell good. I haven’t had a decent meal since I’ve been on the run.”

  “Pizza Hut still delivers.”

  Fred cleared his throat. “I understand a lot of people probably wanted you dead, but do you have reason to suspect anyone in particular? Have there been threats?”

  Rick shrugged and took a bite of cookie. “Sure. I get those a lot. It goes with the business.”

  “Who threatened you recently?”

  “Julia’s husband, of course.”

  “Of course,” I said. “It goes with the business.”

  “He’s a jerk. Abuser. Used to beat the crap out of her. Hey, a woman doesn’t cheat on her husband if she’s got a good relationship at home.”

  I lifted an eyebrow but decided I’d just file and save that comment for the next time he accused me of cheating on him with Trent.

  “That’s why Julia came to me with the information about the highway extension. She wanted to divorce Akin, but when she talked to a lawyer, he told her she wouldn’t get anything. Akin made her sign a pre-nup, and he was really careful to keep his money hidden. Seems his first wife got a big settlement and he was determined that wasn’t going to happen again. So Julia and I had a business deal that she’d give me the information, and I’d split the profits with her.”

  I arched an eyebrow. “A business deal?”

  He shrugged. “We got involved personally too. It just happened.”

  “Who else?” Fred asked, interrupting the discussion of Rick’s love life.

  “Bryan Kollar.”

  “Because you wouldn’t sell him back his parents’ property?”

  “Yeah. He said I’d be sorry if I didn’t sell it back to him. Said his parents wanted it because it’s been in the family for generations, but I’m no fool. He must have found out about the…” He stopped in midsentence and looked at each of us in turn.

  “The shopping center,” I finished for him. “Old news. Go on.”

  “Albert Mayfield.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Oh, we were involved in a project that didn’t work out, and he got all upset about it.”

  “Let me guess. He threatened you when he lost a lot of money but somehow you made a profit.”

  “I’m good at what I do. Not everybody is. If they don’t know what they’re doing, they should stay out of the game.”

  “Who else?”

  “Franklin Murdock.�
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  “Wife or business deal?”

  Rick shrugged. “Both.”

  “What about your mother? She ever threaten you?”

  “Marissa?” He gave a short, cynical laugh. More of a snort, actually. “On a regular basis.”

  “How about more recently when you wouldn’t let her in on your shopping center deal?”

  “Oh, that. Sure, she carried on and made all kinds of threats. But she would never try to kill me. Would she?” The last bite of cookie seemed to stick in his throat. “Can I have a glass of water?”

  “Get it yourself. I’m sure you know where I keep the glasses if you know where I keep the catnip.”

  He glanced at Henry. “I had to do something! That cat acted like he was going to tear me apart.”

  “He would have if you hadn’t drugged him. You just need to be sure you aren’t still here when those drugs wear off.”

  “About that. I need to stay here until they catch my killer.”

  “You don’t have a killer because you’re not dead, and you’re not staying here.”

  “I don’t have a killer yet, but I will if you don’t help me!”

  “And why do you think I’d help you stay alive?”

  “Because you’re my—”

  “Don’t start with the wife crap again!” I shot up out of my chair and grabbed the rolling pin.

  Fred stood and took it from me. “Don’t do anything rash,” he advised, guiding me back to my chair. “Rick, I think you can see that it would not be a good idea for you to stay here. What’s wrong with the condo where you’ve been staying?”

  “I think he’s found me. I’ve seen somebody in a dark sedan sitting outside, and when I leave, he follows me.”

  I frowned. “I saw a dark sedan with its lights out going down my street a few nights ago.”

  “Oh, that was me,” Rick admitted. “That’s my temporary car, just a used one I paid cash for after mine got blown up.”

  A temporary car that he paid cash for?

  I started to get up and grab the rolling pin again. Fred laid a hand on my arm and shook his head. Sometimes he can be really annoying.

  “Hey,” I said, “I got a great idea. Why don’t you go back to your house? With all the people there, you’ll be safe.”

  Rick flinched. “I can’t believe you let those people in my house. They’ve probably destroyed it by now.”

  “Those people are your family. Your mother, your brothers, Grace and your son.”

  Rick’s eyes became narrow slits. “That rotten boy is not my son,” he said through clenched teeth.

  “As soon as we get the results of the DNA test back, we’ll let you know.”

  Rick shook his head. “You don’t have to do that. There’s no way that kid is mine. For one thing, he doesn’t look anything like me.”

  “He looks like his mother. That happens. You don’t get to dictate which physical traits your children inherit.”

  Rick reached for another cookie and smiled. “Sometimes, you do. I had a vasectomy. I never told you because you wanted to have kids.”

  “A vasectomy? Why do I not believe that? You’d have been awfully young to have one of those before Rickie was born.”

  He shrugged. “I was seventeen, Mike was sixteen and Dan was fifteen.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, that’s right, you know them as Brad and Clint.”

  “I know who Mike and Dan are. But why would three teenage boys have vasectomies? What reputable doctor would do that?”

  “A friend of Marissa’s.”

  “Your mother…” I couldn’t finish the sentence.

  “After Dad left. She didn’t want to take any chances, said we were enough to take care of. She didn’t want any grandkids. We were all pretty wild.”

  “Where’s your father now?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Liar.”

  He glared at me.

  A knock sounded on the front door.

  Rick shot to his feet, perspiration breaking out on his forehead. Or maybe it was still his hair dripping. “He’s here!”

  “Who?” Fred asked.

  “I don’t know! Whoever it is that’s trying to kill me!”

  “I think it’s probably Trent,” I said, rising.

  Rick grabbed my arm. “Don’t let him in!”

  I shook him off. “I invited him here. I didn’t invite you. Why don’t you just go out the back door and head over to your condo?”

  “No,” Fred said. “Rick, you need to talk to Trent. If you want the authorities to catch the man or woman who’s threatening your life, you need to work with them.”

  “No way! I don’t want anything to do with the cops, especially not my wife’s lover.”

  “I told you not to start that wife crap again!” I kicked his shin.

  “Ouch!”

  “You have a choice, Rick,” Fred said. “You can leave by the back door, get in your car, drive away and hope for the best, or you can talk to Trent and ask the police for their help.”

  I went toward the living room, hoping Rick would be gone when I returned with Trent.

  When I opened the front door I found Trent standing on the porch, smiling, happy, anticipating a night of fun and frivolity.

  “Rick’s alive.”

  He stopped smiling. “That explains why we haven’t been able to find his DNA in the remains from the explosion.”

  Two men who supposedly cared about me, and both of them babbled about DNA instead of the impact of this tragedy on my life. “Thanks for the sympathy.” I turned away and headed back to the kitchen.

  Henry still slept peacefully in the corner, a cat smile on his lips as catnip dreams played through his head. Other than that, the room was empty.

  Rick, Fred and all the cookies were gone.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I let out a deep sigh and flopped into a chair, relieved Rick was gone but distressed I couldn’t produce him for Trent. “He was here, I swear he was. Rick and Fred were sitting at this table eating my cookies when you knocked on the door.”

  Trent walked over to stand behind me, his strong fingers kneading my shoulder muscles. “Relax. Tell me what happened.”

  I considered my options. Burst into tears or make more cookies. I still had plenty of dough. But for the moment I decided to sit there and let Trent massage my knotted shoulders while I told him about Rick’s near-death experience.

  When I got to the part about Rick tossing his wallet out after the car exploded, Trent’s fingers clenched. “That’s the piece of evidence we withheld, the piece of evidence that anonymous caller gave us the other night when I had to leave you to meet with a man who never showed up.”

  My own fingers clenched, imagining them wrapped around Rick’s throat. “That worthless creep. It was him. Rick was your anonymous caller who jacked you around all night. He just wanted to keep you and me apart.”

  Trent sat down in the chair next to me and took my hands in his. He looked every inch a cop now. “We need to find Rick. We’ve got to bring him in and question him. He has information that could help us find this killer.”

  I shook my head. “There are a lot of people who threatened him, but he doesn’t know which one actually tried to kill him.”

  “We need to get all that information from him, and…” He cleared his throat and shifted in his chair then looked me squarely in the eye. “Now that we know Rick wasn’t in the explosion, we have to consider him a suspect.”

  It took a minute for the full import of Trent’s words to sink in. “You think Rick might have killed that woman?”

  “At this point, I have no opinion one way or the other. But it happened at his house to his car and he somehow miraculously escaped while a woman died. That makes him an automatic suspect.”

  “Rick’s good at that. Escaping while everybody around him goes up in flames, I mean.”

  “You said Fred was with Rick when you left them to answer the door.”

&n
bsp; “Yes. Sitting where you’re sitting, eating cookies from that plate.” That reminded me of my dinner plans. “Do you want some roast?”

  Trent blinked a couple of times at the abrupt change of subject. “What?”

  “I made a roast. It should be done. And I can make another pan of cookies in ten minutes. I have plenty of dough. We might as well eat. Rick’s gone back into hiding. You’re not going to find him tonight.”

  Trent released my hands and sat back in his chair. The expression on his face told me we weren’t going to have an intimate dinner and a cozy evening together. He pulled out that ubiquitous pen and small notebook. “Do you have Fred’s phone number?”

  “Of course I do.” I did not like the direction this conversation had taken.

  Trent’s jaw clenched. In a few minutes he’d be at the teeth-grinding stage. Well, I was already there. It was only fair that he share my frustration. “Would you please give me Fred’s phone number?”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No. If Fred wanted you to have his phone number, he’d have given it to you.”

  Trent frowned. “Lindsay, this is official police business. I need to call Fred and see if he knows where Rick went.”

  I folded my arms obdurately. “Get a warrant if you want me to give you Fred’s phone number.”

  Trent’s frown deteriorated into a scowl, and his lips got tight. “I can call someone at the station and have them get that number for me in five minutes.”

  “Go for it.” I stood, turned my back on him, took out my cookie sheet and cookie dough and began preparing to bake again.

  “Lindsay, don’t you want us to find Rick before the killer does?”

  I considered that question while I slid the cookies into the oven and took out the roast. “I wouldn’t mind going back to being a widow.” Nevertheless I picked up my cell phone and sat down at the table. I didn’t want the Karma cops coming after me. I punched Fred’s speed dial number.

  “Do you know where Rick is?” I asked as soon as he answered.

  “Yes, he’s in the car in front of me.”

  I looked at Trent and nodded. He picked up the pen and poised it over the paper.