Lawson maintained his hold with no apparent effort. “You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney—”
“I know my rights. My husband is an attorney.”
Is? Was or will be would have been more accurate.
“—one will be provided for you. Would you like to change clothes before we leave?”
“Detective Adam Trent is a friend of mine. I demand to see him.”
“Yes, ma’am. He’s downstairs. If you’d like to change into warmer clothes, we can go downstairs.”
Kathleen lifted her chin. “I need privacy to change clothes.”
Lawson stepped back and released his hold on her door.
She disappeared into the room.
A couple of minutes later my cell phone rang, a number I didn’t recognize.
Trent. “You need to come downstairs.”
“But—”
“Kathleen is not going to come out of the room as long as you’re there.”
That woman had seen me and snitched me off. She’d called Trent. And Trent was doing what she wanted.
“I’m on my way,” I ground out through gritted teeth.
I headed for the stairs. I didn’t want to ride the elevator. I didn’t want to stand passively in a box. I stomped down each step all the way to the lobby.
Actually, I was so busy stomping I missed the door to the lobby and stomped my way to the basement. I had to turn around and stomp back to the main floor.
By the time I got to the lobby, all I saw was Trent’s back as he ushered Corey through the front door to a squad car parked at the curb. Trent put him in the backseat then got in the passenger side in front. Lawson must be driving. Kathleen must be seated in the other side of the backseat, a position where I couldn’t see her.
Damn!
They drove away.
Double damn!
Fred came up behind me. “You should go home and get some sleep. You look tired.”
Tired?
As the anger drained, I realized I was tired. Exhausted. Emotionally and physically.
I nodded. “Good idea.”
Being tired doesn’t necessarily lead to sleep.
I tossed, turned, dozed, tossed, turned…
Henry lifted his head and glowered at me. I was interrupting his sleep.
Shortly after 2:00 a.m. I heard the front door open.
I sat bolt upright in bed. Had Gary somehow made bail in the middle of the night and come back for that key?
At the foot of my bed Henry raised his head, gave me a disgusted look, and leapt to the floor where he curled up and went back to sleep.
Henry wasn’t excited. I had no cause to be excited.
Footsteps came up the stairs.
I grabbed my iron skillet from the nightstand.
“Did I wake you?” Trent asked.
I laid the skillet back on the nightstand. “No.” My voice croaked a little since my heart was still in my throat.
“I’m sorry. I probably shouldn’t have come over this late.”
I lifted the covers. “I’m glad you did.”
He climbed in and pulled me close. “I was so worried about you.” He pulled me even closer. “I’m the one in the dangerous profession. I catch criminals. You make chocolate. You’re supposed to worry whether I’ll get hurt, but I have to worry about you because somebody’s always breaking in or kidnapping you or trying to kill you. Get your car locks fixed. Get your garage fixed. Get metal doors on your house. I love you. I can’t live without you. I need you to be safe.”
It was the most impassioned speech I’d ever heard him make, and it went a long way toward relieving my fears about Kathleen. I wanted to ask how he felt about the fact that she’d planned to kill his friend, but I didn’t want to bring her into our world. I wanted to savor the time between us.
First I had to tell him about my conversation with the Gablers and the possibility that the infamous key might fit the lock on Ransom’s toy chest. “I told them we’d be over around 4:30 or 5:00, but I assume your meeting with Kathleen and Gary is off since they’re both in jail. We can probably go as soon as I close up. I’ll call them in the morning and set a definite time. What works for you? Around 3:00?”
“That’s okay. I’ll call them. Since I have the key, it’s official police business.”
Trent’s body was warm against mine, his breathing slow and intimate. He loved me. He worried about me. Kathleen was in jail.
I didn’t want to disrupt the closeness.
Therefore I refrained from pointing out to him that Ransom had left the key for me to find and that his parents had called me.
I would be there when that toy chest was opened, official police business or unofficial Lindsay business.
Chapter Nineteen
As usual Paula was rolling out dough when I got to work the next morning. “How was your evening with Trent and his high school buddy?”
I grabbed an apron. “You’re not going to believe it.”
She continued rolling. “Yes, I will.”
I tied the apron strings behind me. “If I have to leave for half an hour today, can you cover for me?”
“It depends. Are you planning to do something that involves Kathleen? You’ve become a little obsessed with her.”
“She’s in jail.”
Paula’s rolling pin halted halfway across the dough, and she looked up. “In jail?”
I took down my mixing bowl and made cookies while I told her about Fred’s ruse and Corey’s confession.
She showed no surprise.
When I told her about Gary holding a knife to my throat, she gasped and lifted a hand to her throat. “You need to get your garage repaired and park your car in it.”
“I’m going to get my car repaired and painted and then I’ll get the garage fixed.”
“More like burn it down and start all over.”
“My garage?”
“No. Your car.”
I let that one pass. She’d change her mind when she saw my car all shiny and dentless.
“Do you think normal people are awake yet?” I asked.
We opened for brunch on Saturday. The hour was later than usual, but it was still dark outside.
“Not this early. Why do you ask?”
“I need to call the Gablers but I don’t want to wake them.”
“Give it a few hours.”
“I’ll call Fred. He never sleeps.”
He answered. “Do you know what time it is?”
“Of course I know. Don’t you? Is your clock broken?” Another thought struck me. “Is Sophie there?” I cringed at the idea that I might have interrupted something.
“I assume you have some reason for calling me at this hour.”
“Were you sleeping?”
“I was.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. We need to get an appointment as soon as possible to take the copy you have of that key to the Gablers and see if it opens Ransom’s toy chest.”
Silence.
“Are you still awake?”
“Yes. Can you explain why we need to open Ransom’s toy chest?”
“Sorry. We were so busy last night, I didn’t get a chance to tell you. Maggie Gabler called and said Ransom’s toy chest has a new padlock on it, and she wants us to bring over the key and see if fits that lock. Gary’s a lawyer. He’s never going to confess, but we know he killed Ransom, and that toy chest may contain evidence to convict him.”
“Shouldn’t Trent be the one to open it? He has the original key, and he has legal authority to do something with any evidence that may be in the box.”
“I was going to let him go with us, but he says that toy chest is official police business. He’ll open it and never tell me what was in it.”
“I see. Maybe we could all go together.”
“When he gets on that police kick, you can’t reason with him.”
“Let me try.”
“Call me back.”
He hung up.
The day got busy fast, so busy I didn’t have time to bug Fred every few minutes about our visit to the Gablers. But I had plenty of time to worry about it and wonder if Trent and Lawson had already been there and discovered the contents of that toy chest and I’d never, ever know what was in it because it was official police business.
Fred finally called a few minutes after 1:00, just as I locked the door behind the last customer.
“Three o’clock,” he said. “You, me, Trent, and Lawson.”
“Are you bringing your copy of the key?”
“Not unless you want to tell your boyfriend that I made one.”
“Not really.”
“Come home first, and you and I can ride over there together.”
“So you can keep an eye on me and be sure I don’t do anything?”
He hung up.
The neighborhood where Trent and his friends grew up had towering trees and large lawns with small, tidy houses. The older area had aged gracefully.
Fred stopped in front of a white house with green shutters and door. Three large pine trees loomed from the back yard. They had survived the ill-fated experiment with a cigarette lighter.
We walked down the sidewalk to the front porch.
“I don’t see Trent’s car,” I said. “If by any chance you have that duplicate key in your pocket…”
“We’ll wait for Trent.”
“Of course. I was just asking.”
Rats.
Maggie Gabler opened the front door as soon as we stepped onto the porch. Lines etched her face and she looked several years older than the day before. “Good to see you again, Lindsay. And you must be Fred.”
Fred stepped forward and shook her hand.
“Come in. I’ve made a fresh pot of coffee.”
I gave her a hug. I’m not really a hugger, but the occasion seemed to call for it.
She hugged me back tightly. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“You heard what happened last night?”
Her lips thinned. “Gary was my son’s friend, and Kathleen was my son’s wife. I don’t understand how they…” She lifted a hand to her lips.
I held up the box of desserts I’d brought and forced a smile. “I have chocolate.”
She returned my smile even though her eyes were shiny with tears. “Chocolate always helps.”
We went inside.
Warren Gabler introduced himself to Fred. “Have a seat. Adam’s on his way.”
Warren looked as tired as his wife.
The living room was cozy and inviting with comfortably worn furniture, lots of pictures, and a brick fireplace with bookshelves on both sides.
Maggie brought coffee and Coke along with a large glass plate for my chocolate offerings and a stack of matching dessert plates.
In the cozy, comfortable room we all settled uncomfortably. Fred and I sat on the sofa, Maggie and Warren on the loveseat. Actually Fred never seems uncomfortable, not even when somebody’s trying to kill him or bash him with a tree branch. But the rest of us did.
“It’s so hard to take in,” Maggie said. “Jeff was a good person. Everyone loved him. I knew he and Kathleen had their problems. I didn’t like her, didn’t like the way she treated him, but I would never have dreamed she’d want to kill him.”
“Kathleen is evil and devious.” I wasn’t a bit prejudiced.
Maggie dabbed her eyes with a tissue. “I liked Gary when he was a little boy. I felt sorry for him. He was a late in life baby, and he could never measure up to his older brothers. They were honor students and athletes. For the most part, his parents ignored him. The only thing he and his dad did together was deer hunting.”
“I guess that explains his obsession with knives.” I would never forget the feel of that cold blade pressed against my neck. “If he can skin a buck, he can slit somebody’s throat.”
“I don’t know if I’m hoping we find nothing but dusty old toys in Jeff’s chest or evidence to prove who murdered our son,” Maggie said.
If the key Gary wanted badly enough to kill for it fit the padlock on Ransom’s toy chest, the contents would likely incriminate him. That was my optimistic assumption.
For once, I kept my mouth shut. No need to add to Maggie’s sadness until we knew something definite.
Warren wrapped an arm around his wife’s shoulders. “It’s hard enough to deal with losing Jeff, but to think the kids who played in our yard and ate at our table may have been involved…” He choked and held his wife closer.
I nibbled on a brownie which had changed from moist and chewy to dry and tasteless between one bite and the next. Suddenly I wasn’t so anxious to see the contents of that toy chest.
Someone knocked on the door.
Maggie and Warren went to the door. Trent came in, embraced Maggie, and he and Warren did the man hug thing.
Lawson walked in behind Trent.
They did introductions, but nobody hugged Lawson. I considered doing it just so he’d feel included, but the stony expression on his face discouraged me.
Maggie offered coffee and chocolate to the new arrivals.
Trent ran his hands down the legs of his jeans and cleared his throat. “Do you want to wait or do this now?”
“Now.” Maggie’s voice was firm.
Trent produced the key. “This may be a false alarm. It may not fit.”
Nobody believed that.
Maggie and Warren led us down the hall to a back bedroom.
The twin size bed, small desk, and white wooden chest in the corner identified it as a child’s room, that of a boy who, through the years, had probably changed the bed spread from cartoon characters to super heroes to the current masculine dark plaid.
The wooden chest with a shiny new padlock was roughly the size of a trunk and could hold a lot of toys and video games, perhaps law books during college, and now…?
The six of us huddled in the room, looking at the chest but not moving toward it. Macabre visions of severed heads, bloody hammers, and deadly guns alternated with visions of stuffed dogs, toy trucks, and baseball gloves.
Trent squeezed my hand then reached inside his jacket pocket, withdrew a small envelope, and produced the key then donned rubber gloves.
His hazel eyes were so dark, I could barely distinguish the pupils.
He was a cop, through and through. But Ransom had been his friend. He was, as he’d said, personally involved.
He crossed the room, knelt beside the chest, and inserted the key.
The padlock opened.
The air in the room became preternaturally still and silent.
I held my breath.
Nobody moved.
Finally, slowly, he lifted the lid.
From across the room I stared at the contents.
Books, DVDs, video games, odds and ends of the life of a boy grown into a man. No severed head. No bloody hammer.
I dared to breathe again.
Trent took out a book and laid it on the floor, then a DVD and a video game. Finally he produced a large brown envelope with the word Private sprawled across it in bold red letters.
He held up the envelope and looked at Maggie and Warren.
Maggie bit her lip and nodded.
“Open it. Now.” Warren’s voice cracked when he spoke.
Lawson, also wearing gloves, crossed the room and stood beside Trent.
Trent rose and withdrew the contents of the envelope.
Papers and pictures.
A small card fell to the floor.
A driver’s license.
Trent retrieved it.
The top paper was a typed document. He and Lawson looked it for several moments then lifted it to expose pictures. From my distance I couldn’t see the details of the pictures. Trent and Lawson scanned them and handed t
hem back and forth but did not offer to share.
I had to know. I took a step toward Trent and Lawson. Fred laid a hand on my arm. “Wait,” he said softly.
I didn’t want to wait any longer. I wanted to read that document and see those pictures. I wanted to know what had been so important that Gary was willing to kill me to get it.
This was like being stuck at one of those traffic lights so long that people begin with teen-age acne and end up on social security before it changes.
“What does it say?” I asked. “Who’s in the pictures?” Somebody had to break the spell.
Trent lifted a troubled gaze to mine and shook his head.
“Read it.” Maggie’s voice was surprisingly firm.
Trent looked at the top paper again and compressed his lips. “It’s evidence.”
“I call bull,” I said. “It’s not like anybody wants to touch it or change it. Read it!”
His gaze moved to me then to Lawson then to Maggie. “Let’s go back to the living room and sit down.”
That did not sound good.
Silently we all moved to the living room and resumed our seats.
Trent eased into the big recliner at one end of the room.
Lawson paused beside him and extended his hand. “I’ll do it.”
“No. I need to.”
Lawson nodded then moved to the arm chair at the other end of the room.
Trent turned the pictures upside down on the lamp table beside him and clutched the printed document in both hands.
“It’s dated two weeks ago.” He cleared his throat. “To whom it may concern. A year ago I, Jeffrey Gabler, came to Kansas City to spend a week taking care of some business at our main office. I came early to spend the weekend with friends and family.” I’d heard Trent sound like a stern cop, a considerate friend, and an excited lover. This was different. His voice was a monotone, all emotion damped down far below the surface. “At that time I was a practicing alcoholic. My friend, Gary Durant, and I went out drinking that Saturday night. Our expressed intention was to become intoxicated. By the end of the evening, we had achieved that goal.”
Trent paused and drew in a deep breath then returned his gaze to the document. “We were in Gary’s car. We closed down the bar, bought a six-pack, and decided to go to the lake and do some moonlight fishing. At that hour, there shouldn’t have been any traffic out there. But there was. A woman came out of the darkness. Gary didn’t stop in time. We hit her.”
Deadly Chocolate Addiction (Death by Chocolate Book 6) Page 17