Kill the Competition

by Stephanie Bond

  Truett drained his coffee cup and wadded it up in his hand. “I swear to God, I ought to arrest all four of you right now. All of your fingerprints are on the trunk or somewhere on the car, all of you have pillows freaking galore, all of you have motive.” He shook his head. “Jesus, what a big damn mess.”

  Assistant District Attorney Greer stood. “I think that’s enough for now, Detective. Ladies, search warrants have been issued for your desks, your homes, and your vehicles. If any of you have something to say, now’s the time.”

  Belinda was sure everyone in the room could hear her heart slamming in her chest as she scoured the faces of the women who had befriended her. How well did she really know them? And from the revelations made in the last few minutes, how well did they really know each other? Rosemary seemed composed, but pale. Carole twirled her hair nervously. Libby hovered near tears.

  She would have been disappointed, but not wholly shocked, if any one of the three had jumped to her feet and admitted to smothering Margo in a moment of blind rage. Hadn’t Wade said that anyone was capable of doing something terrible?

  No one said anything for a full minute. Belinda started to feel light-headed. At last, Greer lifted her hands. “Okay. I strongly suggest that no one leave town. Meanwhile, whoever comes forward first will receive the lightest treatment. Think about it, ladies—friendship isn’t worth sacrificing your life for.”

  The woman and the detectives gathered their things and left the conference room. Wade leaned close enough to murmur, “I’ll be in touch.”

  In touch—ironic word choice. She nodded absently and watched him leave, resisting the urge to run and wrap her arms around his leg. What must he think of her, the pathetic little bride whose groom had reneged while the Macarena was still playing at the reception, who was now immersed in this drama?

  Belinda sat at the table, waiting for one of the women to say something, but everyone seemed preoccupied with their own thoughts.

  Finally, Carole moaned and looked all around. “What are we going to do?”

  Rosemary stood. “If they had enough evidence to arrest us, they would have,” she said in a low tone. “I suggest we get back to work. And act normal.”

  Belinda resisted the urge to laugh hysterically. Act normal? Acting abnormal had landed her in this mess. Normal seemed like a long time ago, and a place she might never get to go back to.

  Here lies Belinda Hennessey. She got caught.

  Chapter 27

  Margo’s memorial service the next morning was an awkward affair, with a small wad of attendees. It was, Libby had told her, the same place the memorial service for Jeanie Lawford had been held. Belinda wasn’t sure it was such a good thing that a company had established a standard procedure for memorializing employees.

  The four of them had agreed to go for reasons ranging from obligation to keeping up appearances, and they had walked the five blocks to a small chapel in jerky silence. It seemed to Belinda that silence now defined the relationship between the women, along with wounded looks and betrayed glances. The commute home last night and to the office this morning had been interminable. She considered suggesting that they call off the car pool arrangement, but Carole didn’t have a car, and Libby hadn’t yet recovered her repossessed SUV. She herself was the proud renter of an egg-yolk-yellow Ford Focus, aka the largest Matchbox car ever produced, and she didn’t relish going bumper to bumper with eighteen-wheelers through Spaghetti Junction.

  Plus she had a theory that this pervasive sense of distrust was actually holding them together—it was as if they were afraid to let each other out of their sight.

  “We are gathered today,” a robed minister announced, “to remember the life and the death of Margo Eleanor Campbell.”

  Belinda sat with hands folded, listening to the generic words offered up on behalf of Margo’s soul, trying to fold them into her heart. No matter what her faults, Margo hadn’t deserved to die so tragically. But in truth, Belinda wasn’t able to reach past the buffer of numbness she’d acquired and work up sentiment for the recently departed. It was self-preservation, she recognized, an anesthetized fog of denial to keep her moving through her days as if she weren’t a murder suspect.

  “But let this be a happy occasion,” the minister said, “for death is the beginning of a life with God.”

  Apparently no one had enlightened him on the particulars of Margo’s send-off.

  Julian hadn’t called, although she knew he was back from Chattanooga because he had resumed his regular chopper reporting. It was difficult to reconcile the man of the mellow voice with the man who might have murdered Margo, yet she couldn’t dismiss his proximity or his strange behavior the night of the murder.

  “Margo Campbell made her home in Atlanta for twelve years. For most of that time, she was a valued employee of Archer Furniture Company.”

  She hadn’t spoken to Wade. When she’d arrived home last night, he had left a short message on her machine saying that considering the turn of events, it was better if they didn’t speak directly. (He apparently had made his call after her place had been searched, because the message was one of the few things that had appeared untouched.) He’d warned her to keep her doors locked and the security alarm activated. “And if Hardeman contacts you, call me.” Wade suspected that Julian had murdered not only Margo but Jeanie Lawford as well. But she had to wonder how much of Wade’s belief of Julian’s guilt was rooted in the fact that he wanted the man to be guilty.

  “Let us pray for Margo’s soul, and for our own souls. If you are carrying a heavy burden on your conscience, let this be the time to confess your sins.”

  Was it her imagination, or was everyone in the chapel glancing in her direction? Actually, there was one sin she wanted to confess, but Juneau Archer was still ill and not expected in the office until Monday morning. She wasn’t entirely disappointed, though, because she had yet to track down those damned—er, darned contracts. She made a mental note to call about the packet again when she returned to the office, then forced her attention back to the remainder of the service. The minister struggled for words to describe a woman he didn’t know, but Belinda wondered if anyone had really known Margo Eleanor Campbell.

  A lesson for the arrogantly independent souls left behind.

  “Amen,” the minister said finally. “Go in peace.”

  Everyone stood to file out with the proper solemnity. Since they had arrived early and had sat in the front, Belinda had a chance, while they waited to exit their pew, to study the crowd.

  Clancy Edmunds, sporting his signature bright colors and, bizarrely, sunglasses. Monica Tanner, impeccably dressed, talking to a short man that Belinda recognized as one of the board of directors. The buff trainer from the gym, and a couple of women she vaguely recognized, perhaps from the locker room, although it was hard to tell, since they were fully clothed. She scanned the group and noticed that Tal Archer was missing. Not surprising, but supremely bad form, considering the fact that his father couldn’t attend. Libby’s friend from HR had come, and stood to the side, presumably waiting for Libby. Tina Driver, the courier who had delivered the papers Sunday, waved to Carole and waited for her near the entrance. A man sitting in the far corner, away from everyone else, caught Belinda’s attention. He lifted his hand.

  Julian.

  Wade’s warning sounded in her ears. Perspiration broke above her upper lip. The girls were already ahead of her, so they didn’t notice when she slowed. He stood and made his way toward her, his steps unhurried, his shoulders down. He was minus the bomber jacket, plus a tie, his handsome face grave, his green eyes lined with fatigue.

  When he stopped, she was glad to have the pew between them. Everything about the man she had once found appealing now seemed to repel her because she had been so blindly charmed. She had done what every parent feared most for their daughter: Moved to a big city and started dating a potential serial killer.

  “I’m surprised to find you here,” she said.

  “I
came to see you. I wanted to see for myself how you were holding up.”

  “I’m…fine.”

  He made a rueful noise, then gestured vaguely to the pulpit in the front of the chapel. “And I suppose I wanted to assuage some of my own guilt.”

  She chose her words carefully. “What do you mean?”

  “I lied to you.”

  Her pulse raced. “Oh? When?”

  “When I told you that Jeanie Lawford and I weren’t romantically involved. To be honest, I was crazy in love with her.”

  She was struck silent. Julian didn’t seem like the kind of person who could be crazy in love, but perhaps that judgment wasn’t fair to Jeanie.

  He gave her a sad smile. “I did, I loved Jeanie.”

  “And…did she feel the same way about you?”

  He shook his head. “No, Jeanie was so independent. She had no intention of settling down. At least not with me.”

  His expression looked pained, and for a split second, scary. Had he been stalking Jeanie—was that why she had been acting skittish before her death? Individual hairs raised on Belinda’s neck.

  “This is where her memorial service was held,” he said wistfully.

  “I know.”

  He pushed his hand into his hair. “The police have been questioning me about my relationship with Margo.”

  She nodded calmly. “Were you involved with her as well?”

  “Yes. But it’s not what you’re thinking.”

  “What am I thinking?”

  He averted his gaze, then looked back. “That I killed Margo, that I might have killed Jeanie, too.”

  Just hearing him say the words put ice in her veins. Was he taunting her? She’d heard that some killers liked to talk about what they’d done, work it into dinner conversation. “That’s not what I was thinking,” she managed to get out.

  “That’s what the cops think,” he said. “Especially Alexander.”

  “You’re wrong,” she said, taking an inadvertent step back.

  “The radio station grounded me until the investigation is over.”

  “I’m sorry, Julian.”

  “Yeah,” he said, nodding. “Me too.”

  “My friends are waiting. I need to get back to the office.”

  He leaned closer, putting his knee in the bench seat and gripping the back of the pew. “Just be careful, okay? I don’t want to see anyone else get hurt.”

  His eyes looked moist and glassy. She nodded and stumbled back, then race-walked to the entrance of the chapel with as much composure as she could summon. She pushed on the door and practically fell out into the June sunshine. Yet she couldn’t completely dispel the chill that had permeated her.

  Libby, Carole, and Rosemary stood at the bottom of the stone steps, waiting for her. “Saying your last respects?” Libby asked, squinting up at her.

  “Something like that,” Belinda said. “Thanks for waiting. It was a nice service, wasn’t it?” She made her feet move as fast as her mouth.

  “Everyone is spooked,” Carole said, falling into stride beside her. “Someone’s brother’s friend works in the police department and said that a serial killer might be on the loose in our building.”

  Julian’s glazed eyes came to her, and she swallowed hard. “I’m sure that’s an exaggeration.”

  “My friend in the mailroom—Tina—she said that someone broke into her apartment, but nothing was stolen.”

  “That’s weird,” Belinda said, but she remembered the figure she thought she’d imagined outside her bay window.

  “Even weirder, Monica Tanner said the same thing,” Libby added. “That someone had entered her condo through a window while she was at work yesterday, but didn’t take anything.”

  Rosemary quirked an eyebrow. “All this talk about a serial killer has shifted the attention away from the money that was stolen.”

  Belinda happened to be looking at Libby when Rosemary made the remark, and she didn’t miss the flush that stained the blond woman’s face. Did Libby know something about the missing money? A forgotten remark came back to her from the night she’d picked up her car.

  “I came into a little unexpected cash.”

  “Clancy broke down after the polygraph and admitted he might have left the drawer unlocked,” Carole said. “He called and told me, said he felt guilty that the police might think either Brita or I took it since we both had keys.”

  “So,” Libby said in a falsetto voice, “everyone thinks whoever murdered Margo also stole the money?”

  Carole nodded.

  Belinda worried the end of her tongue with her teeth during the walk back to the office building, pondering Libby’s reaction, and still too shaken by her encounter with Julian to converse easily. She certainly didn’t want to start a wild rumor about Julian being a potential stalker/killer. But at least the ice had been broken between the women, and they were talking again, if haltingly. Perhaps Margo’s memorial service had reminded them all that life could be a lonely business without friends.

  Belinda was certainly starting to get the picture.

  When they arrived back at the office, they were greeted in the reception area by an armed guard. Clancy waved them by and let them know they would need to carry their identification badges with them at all times until further notice.

  The mood of the department had taken on a pronounced gloom. Voices were lowered, and people were openly discussing self-defense classes and the purchase of weapons. Belinda fought the panic bubbling in her chest and escaped to her cubicle. She rummaged for one of the packets of aspirin she kept in her desk—the police search had displaced nearly everything in her office. She found the painkiller wedged between a stapler and a hole punch, and she swallowed the pills dry.

  Her first call was to Hank Baxter’s cell phone, a number that she’d practically memorized.

  “This is Hank.”

  “Hi, Hank. This is Belinda Hennessey. Again.”

  “Hi, Belinda,” he said cheerfully. “I might have a line on that lost package.”

  She straightened. “Really?”

  “Yeah. I removed the label so it wouldn’t be processed, and I realized that the package might have been sent to the undeliverable department. I’m going to the terminal this weekend to look for it myself.”

  She heaved a tremendous sigh. “Oh, Hank, that is great news. Keep me posted?”

  “Sure thing, glad to help.”

  She hung up, feeling lighter than she had in days. At least when she went in Monday to talk to Juneau Archer and explain her actions, maybe she could hand him the contracts in question.

  Her next call was to Wade Alexander’s cell phone—also memorized…hm.

  “Alexander,” he barked.

  She gripped the phone, trying to touch his big, grumbly voice. “Wade, this is Belinda.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I saw Julian. He came to Margo’s memorial service.”

  “Did he touch you? Threaten you?”

  Why did she have the feeling that he was standing now? “No. He did say some weird things, though. He told me he was in love with Jeanie Lawford, but that she didn’t love him.”

  “Slow down, I’m making notes…. Okay, what else?”

  “He admitted to being involved with Margo, although he told me it wasn’t what I thought. He asked me to trust him.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “He said the station had grounded him.”

  “That’s standard procedure when a pilot is being investigated.”

  “He said he knew you thought he killed Margo and Jeanie. He told me to be careful, that he didn’t want anyone else to get hurt.”

  A thump sounded in the background—a fist meeting the top of a desk? “Stay away from him.”

  She blinked. “I…am.”

  “Do you have someone you can stay with tonight?”

  “I…probably.”

  “Do that.” He slammed down the phone.

  She frowned at the receiver. Th
e man was good at telling people what to do. On the other hand, he wiped his feet before he came in.

  What was a woman to make of that?

  Her wrist was well enough to go to the gym with Rosemary, but she didn’t want to risk running into Julian again, so she opted for lunch at her desk, getting so caught up on paperwork that she spent the afternoon moving things around on her desk and trying to assimilate just how her life had gone in the toilet. It was, she decided, the traffic.

  A hellish morning commute had led to the accident, which had left her with 1) Disabled Car and 2) Furious Boss. Confrontation with Furious Boss had led to subsequent Shameful Bathroom Deal, which had led to her regretting Shameful Bathroom Deal and confronting Furious Boss again, this time mere minutes before Furious Boss had been murdered. While she’d been tumbling down the back stairs, someone had been stuffing Furious Boss into trunk of Disabled Car, which wouldn’t have been possible if she hadn’t had the accident in the first place.

  Yes, all the bad things that had happened to her since she’d arrived in Atlanta she could attribute to the traffic.

  Tal Archer came over the intercom around 3:30 and told everyone that in light of the week’s disturbing events, he and his father wanted everyone to go home, spend time with their families, and come back refreshed on Monday. “Until further notice, please wear your employee badge at all times, and report any suspicious individuals to the armed security guard posted by the department entrance. Have a nice weekend.”

  Not the most comforting of parting remarks, but she was arguably more relieved than anyone to end this dreadful workweek. She cleared her desk and joined the mass exodus, thinking at least they’d get a jump on the traffic, then she once again pondered the influence that traffic had on the lives of Atlantans. (Atlantanians? Atlanti?)

  “Well, I’m shocked at the man’s generosity,” Libby murmured a few minutes later as they climbed into Rosemary’s car.

  “Me, too,” Carole said. “But grateful.”

  Rosemary rolled her eyes as she turned over the ignition. “It was my idea. I found Tal asleep at his desk and suggested that he let everyone go home. No one was getting any work done, and being cooped up just fosters gossip.”