A Date With Death: Cozy Private Investigator Series (Flora Lively Mysteries Book 2) (19 page)

‘Is he in this country illegally?’ Flora was on her feet now too. She leaned on the table, her eyes fixed on Celeste. ‘Is that what all this is about?’

‘No! Of course not. Oh, forget it.’ Celeste swirled around and circled the table, throwing the wrap at Flora’s feet with a dramatic flourish. ‘I thought we were friends,’ she said, her voice high and full of emotion. ‘I thought you cared about me.’

‘I do care. It’s not fair to put that on me, and you know it.’ Flora’s jaw was aching with tension. She unclenched her teeth and took a steadying breath. ‘Look, Marshall has agreed to do the Channel run first thing tomorrow.’ This was a lie, but Flora was confident she could talk him round. ‘So, your things will be over there ready for you when you need them, and as soon as Eduardo is released you can get on a plane and put all this behind you.’

‘But what about –’

‘I’ll try and talk to Jack,’ Flora said, ‘but I can’t promise anything. Meanwhile, why don’t you go and see Sidney, ask him to check if the police have finished with your room. Then you can go and have a bath or something, get changed, make yourself feel a bit more human.’

The thought of a hot bath reminded Flora of her own plans, but there was no chance of a spot of relaxation for her. What a day, she thought. She sent a mollified Celeste in search of Sidney, then headed out across the gardens. At the very least she needed to change out of her wet things before she tried to get hold of Jack. She thought it unlikely that he’d listen to her again, but for Celeste’s sake she would try. It was the least she could do.

The sun was right behind the trees now, shining into her eyes sideways in staccato flashes. It was disorientating, and she wished she hadn’t left her sunglasses in the yurt. She slowed her pace and held up her hand to shield her eyes. The effect was even worse once she entered the wooded area – darkness, then blinding light, then darkness again. Her foot hit something soft but unyielding and she nearly tripped. She heard a sort of umphing sound and looked down, still shielding her eyes. Lying on the mossy ground, her legs spread out like a rag doll’s and her back half propped against a fallen log, was Gabriella. Flora dropped to her knees. She saw the hilt of a knife sticking up from the young woman’s chest, she saw that her eyes were closed and her mouth was open. Flora reached for her blindly, her hands fluttering. What was she supposed to do?

‘Gabriella,’ she said, ‘Gabriella, hold on. I’m going to call for help.’ Flora’s phone was in her rucksack. She reached for it, her fingers fumbling with the straps. She dropped the phone, picked it up again. Gabriella opened her eyes. She spoke, it was little more than a whisper, but Flora bent close and put her ear to the woman’s mouth. She felt Gabriella’s hand touch her arm, and then heard her voice again.

‘
En la honda
.’ She said it again, this time rising on the last word, and then her hand fell away. When Flora turned to look at Gabriella’s face her eyes were still open but all the life in them had gone.

***

‘I just don’t understand it.’

Flora was watching Jack’s team as they worked, quickly and efficiently, to seal off the scene of Gabriella’s murder. They had erected a kind of tent around her body, and a man in white overalls was trailing through the trees now, winding out the police-issue tape. Flora stood next to Marshall. He’d been the first one to reach her when she started to scream for help. Marshall had taken her phone from her hand and called Jack. So far he’d been unable to convince her to come back to the yurt to warm up, to get some rest.

She said it again. ‘I just can’t understand who would want to kill Gabriella. She was so young, so alive. And now she’s gone. Just like that.’ She looked up at Marshall. ‘It’s wrong. You shouldn’t be able to take someone’s life like that. It feels …’ She couldn’t put into words how it felt. Like a crack in the universe, like the sudden reminder of what she’d always known – that one moment a person could be living, laughing, storming around the place, full of life, and the next … Nothing. It had been like that with her father, the heart attack so sudden it was like a personal assault on her very being. Her mother’s death had been more drawn out, but there was still that moment – there, and then not there. ‘I don’t know, Marshall. Alberto was a shock, of course it was, but he was so hated, he had so many enemies it seemed –’

‘Inevitable?’ Marshall ventured. He had his body turned inwards to face her, or perhaps to protect her. She shook her head.

‘No, not that. Oh, I can’t explain. But this? Poor Gabriella. What could she have done to hurt anybody?’

Marshall dipped his head in Jack’s direction. The detective had just come out of the tent, was talking to one of the SOCO team. ‘I’m sure he’ll find out. He looks like he knows what he’s doing.’

Flora squeezed Marshall’s arm in thanks. She knew how much it would have cost him to offer that gesture of support.

‘She spoke to me, you know. Just before she died.’

Marshall gave a low whistle. ‘What did she say?’

‘It was in Spanish. I’ve no idea what she said.’

They watched a while longer. The sun had dipped beyond the hills and the evening carried the threat of more rain. In the clearing, artificial lights mimicked the Rojo film set, lighting up the trees and the earth with white brilliance, turning the surrounding area even darker by contrast. Jack picked his way towards them, nodded to Marshall, then said, ‘Flora, we need to talk. Do you feel up to it now?’

She didn’t, but she said okay.

‘Not here, though,’ Jack said. ‘Let’s go into the house.’

Once again Sidney had been asked to put on tea and coffee in the dining room, and the others had been instructed to stay put. Celeste rushed up to Flora as soon as she and Jack walked in.

‘What’s happening? No one will tell us anything.’ She turned to Jack, her expression suddenly frosty. ‘So you’ll be letting Eduardo go now, I expect. Clearly he couldn’t have had anything to do with this, not while he was in custody.’

Jack ignored her and put his hand under Flora’s elbow. ‘Over here,’ he said, gesturing towards a room further along the hall. It was the library, or at least it had been the library once. Flora looked sadly at the empty bookshelves, at the lumps of white sheeting hiding ancient furniture. Sidney hovered at the door, but Jack sent him away. Flora managed to catch his eye first, and she sent him a reassuring smile. She wondered what the old man made of all this. He probably rued the day he’d agreed to host Rojo Productions and the filming of
Una Cita con la Muerte
, no matter how much money Alberto had agreed to pay for the privilege.

She told Jack about finding Gabriella’s body, trying to remember every detail. The adrenaline was starting to leave her now, and she felt wiped out and flattened. When she’d recounted everything she could think of, including the exact angle of the knife, and the time and the conditions of the ground and goodness knows what else, she told Jack about Gabriella’s final words.

‘Can you remember them exactly?’ he asked. He sat up a little, his eyes gleaming.

‘Yes. I think so. She said “
En la honda
.” She said it twice, but the first time was clearer than the second.’ Flora watched Jack’s face. He would understand, of course. She was desperate to find out what final message the wardrobe girl had entrusted to her.

Jack thought for a few seconds. ‘In the deep?’ he said. ‘That’s what it translates to. In the deep. What do you think it means?’

‘I don’t know. I was hoping you’d know.’ Flora let out an infuriated breath. ‘I thought it might have given us a clue to her killer. Why wouldn’t she want that? For God’s sake, if I was dying and someone found me, I’d want to tell them who did it.’

‘Hey, calm down.’ Jack laid his hand over hers for a moment. He said, ‘Maybe she didn’t know she was dying. When your body goes into shock it releases its own painkillers – it’s possible she wasn’t afraid, or even aware of who you were. Or maybe she was delirious. The sad thing is, Flora, we’ll never know.’

‘In the deep,’ Flora repeated, her forehead creased in thought. Then she shook her head. ‘No, you’re right. She must have been delirious. It’s a shame, though. I really thought it might have been a clue.’

Jack watched her for a moment. ‘Flora, I don’t want you thinking about clues. You’re not a detective, it’s not up to you to solve this. You’ve been helpful so far, really you have –’

‘I found out about the note,’ she said, indignantly. ‘You’d still be questioning Marshall if not for that.’

‘True enough,’ he said, smiling. ‘But we would have found out about it eventually.’ He laced his hands behind his head and leaned against the pitted back of one of the old wooden chairs Sidney had uncovered for them. ‘Anyway, I think we have this pretty much nailed down now. Just a few loose ends to tie up, then we’ll be able to draw a line under it. Let this lot get back to Spain.’

‘What do you mean?’ Flora sat up. She rubbed her cheeks, surprised at how cold her hands felt.

‘Come on, Miss Detective,’ Jack said, laughing. ‘You must have worked it out by now.’

‘I’ve had a hell of a day, Jack. How about you just enlighten me?’

He nodded, and gave her an apologetic look. ‘Sorry. Well, we found the tiara’s case in Gabriella’s bag. I recognised it straight away. Our theory at the moment – and it seems pretty robust – is that Gabriella killed Alberto for the Infanta Tiara. That’s how come she was hanging around outside his room when you and Raquel found the body.’

‘She had the tiara on her?’

‘The case, yes. Which proves she stole it. She must have been after it for a while, we think it was why she took the job in the first place.’

Flora thought for a moment. ‘You know, I saw her coming out of Alberto’s room on my first day here. He was outside with the others at the time. Maybe she was looking for it then.’

‘Maybe. But of course, Raquel was wearing it most of the time. Must have been frustrating for Gabriella. So she picks a time when Raquel is out with Vincenzo, a time when she isn’t wearing the tiara, and then sneaks into their room. But Alberto’s there, or he comes back and disturbs her –’

‘And she kills him,’ Flora finished. ‘But why did she do it with Eduardo’s sword?’

Jack shrugged. ‘She was the props lady. Maybe she had it in her bag. Or maybe she was setting Eduardo up for it. He had been threatening Alberto that morning. In front of everyone.’

‘It’s a lot of maybes, Jack,’ Flora said. ‘Don’t you need some facts to build a case?’

He sat back as though she’d slapped him. ‘We have facts. I’ve been into her background – Gabriella Marino has a criminal record in Spain. Fact. Also, we know there’s been a gang of fences operating in this area, dealing in art, jewellery and antiques. Fact. It won’t be hard to trace her movements now, and I’m betting she’s been in touch with them. I’m betting she only took this job to spy on Alberto and get to the Infanta Tiara. After all, it would be useless to anyone else – it’s too high profile to sell on. You’d need an expert to handle it for you.’

A door slammed in the distance. Flora heard voices in the hall, then silence again. She said, ‘Isn’t it a coincidence, though? Their wardrobe person resigns just before they leave Spain, and then Nick happens to find Gabriella, an international jewel thief cum make-up artist and costume designer?’

Jack laughed and slapped his leg. ‘Oh, Flora, you crack me up. So, first of all, Gabriella studied hairdressing and make-up in prison. Has a qualification in it. Fact. Second, it was no coincidence. The Infanta Tiara’s trip to England made the local news in Spain. She would have made sure she was first in line for the job, no matter what.’

Flora thought about the photos of Alberto coming on to the young woman, and wondered whether that was how she’d made sure. She shuddered to think of it. But after seeing the photos, it wasn’t hard to imagine Gabriella hating him enough to kill him. With or without the priceless diamonds.

Jack seemed to be reading her mind. ‘We also have the evidence from Eduardo’s phone. And the tiara’s case found in her bag. Are these enough facts for you, Miss Detective?’

She nodded, then gave him a half-smile. ‘I’m not second-guessing you, Jack. It’s just a shock, that’s all. I was so sure it had been a man who killed Alberto.’ She thought again about the man who had spooked her on the hillside earlier. Coincidences did happen. Not that she was hard to spook at the moment. ‘So,’ she said, stretching out her legs, ‘if Gabriella killed Alberto, who killed Gabriella?’ She looked up at him, her eyes questioning. Jack’s frown deepened.

‘We think she was stabbed by whoever she was using to fence the diamonds. Maybe she asked for too much money, or maybe she just picked the wrong person to deal with this time.’ He shook his head. ‘Silly, silly girl. Greed, you see. It always gets you in the end.’

Jack got up and held out his hand for Flora. She stood and looked around. What a place. It was as though Hanley Manor itself had infected Rojo Productions and its crew. But of course, the seeds for this fiasco had been planted before Rojo had even left Spanish soil.

‘The one thing I don’t get,’ she said, ‘is why Gabriella would have left that message for Marshall. Not only why, but how? Her English was terrible, but Sidney said it was printed by hand. If she planned to frame Eduardo, why also try to incriminate Marshall?’

‘Well, we certainly can’t ask her now. Maybe she got someone else to write it on the serviette. Or maybe it was meant for Eduardo, and Sidney made a mistake.’

‘Maybe.’ Flora was distracted. A thought came to her and she stopped suddenly, resting a hand on the nearest bookshelf. ‘Jack, didn’t Nick Gibson say he found Gabriella just as they were about to leave Spain?’

He nodded. ‘I’d have to check his official statement, but yes, I remember that it was all very last minute. Why?’

‘Those photos. The ones on Eduardo’s phone. There are photos of them, of Eduardo and Celeste, back when they first started working together. Working for Alberto.’ She thought very hard, then nodded. ‘There’s one of Nick and Gabriella, Jack. If you scroll back through them in order, there’s one of her and Nick together before they said they’d even met. I remember now – it bothered me at the time, but I hadn’t figured out why.’