Poisoned Pairings

by Lesley Diehl

Kathleen seemed to read my thoughts. “He can skip the area so easily. Consider how little we know about him. We’re not even certain what his name is or where he’s from.”

  “The guardianship papers. They should provide a clue to his identity,” I said.

  “We have them, of course, but they merely refer to him as pastor of Sara’s parents’ church and name him as Father Charles. The church was located about twenty miles from here, but the congregation no longer exists.”

  “Jake would know what to do,” I said.

  “Well, then so would Deputy Petrovski. We need to call him,” said Jeremiah.

  Kathleen nodded her head in agreement. Was I the only one who worried whether Cliff was up to handling this?

  Kathleen fished her cell out of her purse. “I’ll call on my phone so we can keep the others free in case Megan calls.”

  ~

  I wrapped the sheet around me and hugged the pillow next to mine close. I missed Jake more than I thought possible. I piled several blankets and the comforters from my room and Megan’s over me, yet the chills buried deep in my body wouldn’t let go.

  Cliff had gotten to the house within minutes of Kathleen’s call, taken down all the information about Megan and Sara, and assured us he would send out cars to search for the girls. What Kathleen had said about Father disappearing stayed with me throughout the morning, and it kept me from sleeping. I heard the door to the bedroom down the hall open and close—Jeremiah, as anxious as I.

  “Where are you going?” I stood in the hallway in my flannel pajamas, wrapped in one of the quilts from my bed.

  “I’ll check the barn,” he said. “Something to do. You go back to bed.”

  I did, yet as my frozen brain defrosted, it led me down a pathway of anxiety filled with images of Megan and Sara, tied and gagged, in the hands of Father and his goons, bound for another county. Or state. Or country.

  The phone rang. I grabbed it. “Megan? Where are you?”

  But it wasn’t Megan.

  “It’s Amy. I’m sorry I stood you up last night, but I couldn’t get away. Several of the lambs were watching me.”

  “Lambs?”

  “Father’s lambs.”

  “Oh. Do you know where Father took Megan and Sara?”

  “I don’t know anything about them, but listen. I have to talk to you. It’s about Bruce’s death. I know something, something I’d better tell someone before it’s too late.”

  Eighteen

  I suggested Amy come to my place. The roads were clear, no problem to travel today. It would be safer for us on my home turf, especially with Jeremiah working in the barn.

  “No. I want someplace where there are people around.”

  I heard the fright in her voice, and I wasn’t certain if she feared Father or me. Maybe both of us. “Where, then?”

  “The college union. In the cafeteria at two this afternoon.” She hung up.

  I told Jeremiah about my meeting.

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “You stay here in case Megan calls or comes back. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be surrounded by people.”

  And I was. The student union building offered the perfect place on campus for students to grab coffee between their classes or to meet and talk with classmates. I searched the faces for Amy and located her sitting on a couch against the far wall, cradling her backpack, eyes anxiously scanning the room.

  I did my own surveillance of the area before I grabbed a chair and positioned it directly in front of her. She had the advantage of seeing who entered the room. My back was to the door. Still, I wanted to be able to look her in the eye when we spoke. If Father came in, I’d know by the expression on her face.

  She said something, but I couldn’t hear her over the sound of chairs scraping across the floor and cutlery rattling against cups and plates.

  “What?” I pulled my chair closer so our knees were touching.

  “Bruce and I were kind of going together, you know.”

  “Yes, I knew that.” I wanted to move this conversation along.

  “We fought a lot.”

  “Amy, I’m not interested in that. I only care about who killed him. Don’t you?”

  She nodded. “We had a terrible fight right before the night of the pairings preparation.”

  “Amy.”

  “I feel so guilty.”

  I could relate to that feeling. So did I. If I had been at the barn that night, perhaps …

  “I should have stopped him.”

  “Stopped him from what?”

  “He was trying to blackmail Senator Loftus. I heard him on the phone with someone from the senator’s office, arranging a meeting to pick up the money. I think they killed him.”

  “Okay. Slow down a little. What did Bruce know that he could use against the senator?”

  “Bruce told me one night when he was home during the summer, Senator Loftus came to his parents’ house. He eavesdropped at the door and heard his father offer the senator money if he would vote a certain way on a committee.”

  “What committee?”

  “Bruce said it was a state group set up to study gas drilling. I didn’t understand it, but Bruce said the senator was chairing it, and he could sway the outcome of its deliberations.”

  Maybe Amy didn’t understand the implications of that meeting, but I did. Senator Loftus headed the committee studying gas hydrofracturing in the state. It was to present its findings soon, findings that would go to the Department of Conservation and could impact the DEC’s position on fracking.

  “Bruce told me it would be a way for him to get some money and not have to ask his father to set him up in the restaurant business. I warned him it was dangerous.” ‘But don’t you see, Amy,’ he said, ‘it’ll do good. The senator will be afraid to vote the way my dad wants him to, so fracking might be banned, and he’ll pay me to keep my mouth shut. Everybody wins except for Dad. Well, he won’t have to give me money. We all win.’ I told him it was wrong, against the law to blackmail somebody, but he shrugged it off.”

  “Did Senator Loftus pay Bruce?”

  “I don’t know if he did. We didn’t speak much after that, but I got to thinking about what he said, and I’m sure the senator wouldn’t want that meeting to get out. Now Bruce is dead. Poisoned. At first I wanted to believe you did it, but I knew better all along. The senator did it.”

  The senator certainly had a motive to get Bruce out of the way, but how could he know Bruce was the one who would eat the kebobs on the oleander sticks? I was convinced the senator himself didn’t set up the lethal chicken. He could have hired someone to do it, but who?

  “Amy, if someone killed Bruce because of what he knew about the senator, and you know it, too, then you’re in danger. You need to talk with Deputy Cliff Petrovski. He’s handling Bruce’s case now.”

  She shook her head.

  I didn’t want to terrify her further, but I had to tell her what I’d said last night to Father. “There’s something else you should think about. I told Father and his boys about our meeting.”

  “You did what?” She jumped up from the couch. I watched her eyes fixate on someone behind me and then grow wide with fear. “I gotta get out of here.” She ran for the side door of the cafeteria.

  I turned my head to see whom she had spotted. Father, of course, accompanied by his two sidekicks, Chad and his clone. The threesome headed toward me, but before I could decide whether to follow Amy’s retreat or stand my ground, Petroglyph Cliff entered with an officer at his side. He stopped Father and crew and gestured toward the door. They all left the cafeteria, and I watched them walk out of the building. Good. Cliff had tracked them down to talk with Father about Megan and Sara.

  By the time I ran after them, hoping to hear what Father had to say about the girls, he and his guys were marching down the hill into town, and the county’s sheriff’s car was headed toward the lot’s exit. I flagged it down.

  Cliff lowered his window.

  “We
ll? Why didn’t you arrest them?” I demanded.

  “He claims they don’t know where the girls are.”

  “Maybe not, but I’ll bet they were in my house last night threatening them.”

  “I can’t prove that.”

  I thought about the story Amy had told me about the blackmail. Should I tell Cliff? It was pretty farfetched. I decided to give it some additional thought and try to get Amy to speak to Cliff herself. I didn’t want to make things any more difficult for her. Meantime, there were some avenues I could explore on my own.

  I flipped open my cell which I had retrieved earlier from the hospital and punched in Jake’s number.

  He answered on the first ring. I felt an odd sense of relief at the sound of his voice. It was a feeling the female laughter in the background banished.

  “Jake? Did I catch you at a bad time?”

  He answered my question with his own laugh, then “No, no. I’m giving a colleague a ride home. What’s up?”

  I told him of Megan and Sara’s flight but left out my experience in the flooded tunnel and Amy’s blackmail tale.

  “You still don’t believe Megan’s story about seeing Marshall at my brewery the night of the murder?”

  “I don’t believe much of what Megan says. It’s your business if you want her working for you, but I recommend you keep your eye on her. She was one of Father’s recruits. What makes you think she still isn’t loyal to him?”

  “You’re so suspicious.”

  “I’m a cop. It’s part of my nature.”

  “I guess you won’t want to hear the good news then.”

  “Tell away.” Again I heard the sound of a woman’s voice in the background. Now I was developing a suspicious nature.

  “Jeremiah and Megan are getting married. What do you think of that? Still think she’s a part of Father’s group? Father would never allow her to marry Jeremiah.”

  There was a pause at the other end of the connection. “They’re not married yet, are they?”

  After I said good-bye to Jake, I sat in my battered truck, shifting my butt around on the broken spring in the driver’s side seat that had to be the contribution of the previous owner’s portly body. Jake was right, of course. He always was. Jeremiah and Megan weren’t married yet, but I wanted to believe they would be. I felt certain—well, almost certain—Megan had freed herself from Father’s shackles. Damn Jake and his cop mentality.

  If I believed in Megan, then I also believed she had seen Marshall at the brewery the night of her brother’s death. All of us here in Libertyville were so taken with Marshall looking like Michael that we assumed he had to be a relative. Maybe he was, but other than knowing he came from nearby Sidney Center, Marshall was an individual without substance. I wanted to get to know more about him, but I was convinced he wouldn’t willingly offer up the information.

  My stomach growled, and I realized I’d had nothing to eat since the toast last night. I drove down the hill into town and pulled up in front of Tony’s place.

  It was too late for the lunch crowd but not yet time for cocktail hour. The dining room was empty, and no one sat at the bar. I headed toward the kitchen and was about to open the swinging door to stick my head in when I heard voices raised in anger. Neither one sounded like Tony, so I hesitated and wondered if I should turn around and leave.

  “Hey, Hera.” I turned to find Tony behind me.

  “Hey there. Where’d you come from?”

  “I came in right behind you. What can I do for you?”

  “I had a meeting at the college and thought I’d stop by to see how you were doing. I know it’s a long shot, but you can help me with something.”

  He gestured toward the bar stools. “Sure. Anything.”

  “You haven’t seen Megan in town yesterday or today, have you?”

  “That’s the same question Cliff asked me when he came by several hours ago. I gather she’s missing.”

  “She and her friend Sara.”

  “Sorry, I can’t help you.” He jumped off his stool and went behind the bar. “How about a drink, or would you prefer a brew?”

  “I really should be getting back.” The sound of pots crashing to the floor made both of us jump.

  “What the hell?” Tony moved toward the kitchen.

  The door swung open, and Martin Davis’s rotund body stumbled through it. I’d only encountered him with a smile on his face, but this time he was scowling, and his cheeks were red with anger. He shook his fist in the direction of the kitchen.

  “Fine, you lowlife scum. Leave those kids hanging. All I wanted was to look at the recipes for the menu you submitted to the culinary competition in New York City. The students are depending upon you.”

  The door swung open and almost hit Davis in the face. My old nemesis, Risley, strode through, a frying pan in his hand.

  “Find your own damn recipes. Oh, right, I forgot. You’re not a real chef, are you? Maybe one of the kids can help you. You’re not using my recipes. Figure it out yourself.” He menaced Davis with the pan, then turned and reentered the kitchen, mumbling to himself.

  Tony followed Risley through the door while I stood watching Davis regain his composure.

  “What’s going on? Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, but that man is crazy. He threw a sauté pan at me.”

  “Were you hit?”

  “He doesn’t throw any better than he cooks. I knew I shouldn’t come here, but I thought I could appeal to his finer nature. He doesn’t have one, it seems.”

  “Appeal?”

  “Well, of course, you wouldn’t know, would you? The college entered the culinary contest in New York City this coming spring. Risley submitted a menu, but when he was removed as head of the program, he took the recipes with him. I just wanted to get them so the students could use them to practice.”

  “You could develop new ones.”

  Martin looked at me. “No. The college’s entry specified those recipes.” He pushed the door open a crack and yelled through it. “Thief!” With that, he spun around and stalked toward the exit.

  “I’ll be back,” he said. Not the same drama coming from a short, fat man as when Arnie said it in The Terminator.

  “Is he gone?” Risley stuck his head out of the kitchen.

  I whirled around to fix him with one of my Hera-as-lawyer-stares.

  “Yes, but I don’t understand why you won’t give him those recipes. It’s for the students’ benefit. Why are you so mean-spirited?”

  “Aha, I see you buy that image of the jolly fat man, but he’s not, you know. He’s a mean, mean man. He’d do almost anything to beat me out of what’s rightfully mine.”

  “Those recipes? Don’t they belong to the program and the students?”

  “Oh, hell. I was just jerking his chain. I’ll send them along to the dean tomorrow or soon. I just like to see the fat man wiggle his chins and get all red like he might have a heart attack.” Risley’s look seemed to challenge me.

  I despised the man, but maybe I could use him.

  “It sounds like you and Martin have known each other for a while. How? You meet in culinary school?”

  “Oh, hell no. He never went to culinary school. We met at a restaurant in Woodstock, downstate. He was my sous chef, and a damn poor one.”

  “I guess you don’t have much respect for cooks who don’t have any culinary training like yourself.”

  “Not true. I have my degree, but I worked a lot of other jobs before I went to school and discovered I liked to cook.”

  “Like what?” I leaned back onto the bar and tried to give the impression of a sympathetic ear.

  “I worked in a nursery for ten years before I caught the cooking bug. Before that I was a finish carpenter. I guess I like to work with my hands and make things for others.”

  The kitchen door opened. “You can start making things for our dinner guests, if you don’t mind,” said Tony.

  “Right.” Risley threw me a questioning loo
k and retreated into the kitchen.

  “Discover anything important?” asked Tony. “You were obviously trying to find out about his past.”

  “Was I that obvious? Interesting man.”

  “Oh, yeah, interesting, more like irascible. He’s a great cook but impossible when it comes to working with others.”

  The sound of sauce pans clanging against one another drew Tony’s attention. “I’d better check on the state of my equipment and try to calm him down. Replacing pots and pans can be costly.” He started for the kitchen door but stopped. “Hey, got plans for dinner tonight? Stop by later. I’m trying a new recipe with rabbit.”

  I turned up my nose. “I don’t think I’m into bunny.”

  “I’ll make it with chicken for you then.”

  “You’re on.”

  Out in my truck I considered what Risley had told me. What interested me was his work in a nursery. He had to know about poisonous plants like oleander. Maybe he wasn’t gone the time he said he was. Jake had checked the story that he was interviewing with Tony the night of Bruce’s murder, but he could have had time to get back to the brewery, sneaked in and put some of the chicken on the oleander skewers. How long did the interview take? I’d have to ask Tony that question later tonight. Opportunity to kill Bruce, but what was his motive? Would Loftus hire him of all people? I didn’t know Senator Loftus, but I wondered if he was the kind of man to kill or hire someone to kill for him.

  Before I went off like the Lone Ranger, I should check on Risley’s position with the nursery. He could have been a clerk and know nothing much about plants. Surely Tony had a copy of his resume. I’d ask him about it.

  I started the truck and headed home, turning over in my mind what I’d learned about Risley. I was so preoccupied I had to slam on my brakes at the last minute or I would have run the stop sign on the road out of town. I killed the engine with my abrupt stop. As I restarted the truck, I noticed papers had slid from under the driver’s seat. I shoved them back with my heel and continued toward home, wondering about what I’d heard from Amy concerning Senator Loftus. Now I had two possible leads to explore, the Senator and Risley. The sound of a woman’s laughter in the background of my call to Jake chased those thoughts away. A colleague, he said. Why was I so concerned?