A Reunion to Die For (A Joshua Thornton Mystery) (11 page)

Joshua didn’t intend to fall asleep. He was resting his eyes when the dongs of the doorbell echoed through his head. He sat up at attention in his desk chair so abruptly that he pulled a muscle in his neck. His knees banged against the underside of his desk, and he let out a yelp.

Admiral must have been asleep, too. Uttering a bark, he jumped into a sitting position from where he was stretched out in the middle of the study floor. He looked at his master for an order about what to do next.

Rubbing his knees, Joshua went to answer the door.

Tori waited for him on his threshold. Her seductive style of dress had been transformed in a casual ensemble of blue jeans, a sweater, and boots. She held a bouquet of flowers and a carton of McDonald’s food and drinks. “I thought you could use some company.” She offered the flowers to him.

He refused to touch them. “Now’s not a good time.”

“Why will you not even accept a token of friendship? Do you hate me that much?”

“I don’t hate you.” With a sigh that she interpreted as defeat, Joshua took the flowers and stepped back to permit her into the foyer.

She tried not to gape at the interior of the three-story stone home at the end of Rock Springs Boulevard. In her youth, she could only imagine being invited inside the home that had been in the Thornton family for five generations. It was several times bigger and homier than the trailer in which she had grown up.

Joshua led the way to the kitchen to set the table with paper plates and plastic utensils. Admiral followed the scent of the burgers.

“I’m a gourmet cook. Did you know that?” Tori chatted away while she set up the fast food with the elegance of a three-course meal. “I went to Europe for a couple of weeks with this guy. I tried authentic European cooking. It’s nothing like anything that you get here. But, I have to tell you, when I got back, I was dying for a big ole greasy burger.” She held out the sandwich to him.

As he slid into his chair at the head of the table, Joshua stared at the hamburger that she offered to him. Admiral was also staring at the ground beef that was four inches from his nose. He licked his chops. If his master was not going to take it, he would.

Joshua accepted the burger, much to the dog’s disappointment. “Tori, why did you come here?”

She took a bite of her hamburger and chewed. She watched him gazing at the burger on his plate. “I did not have anything to do with Max coming after you.”

His eyes were tired. “That is ancient history.”

“If you really believe that, then why can’t we be friends?”

“You seem to have this warped idea that friends should engage in casual sex with each other and I don’t. I’ll be your friend, but I’m not going to sleep with you.” Joshua took a bite of his burger, but didn’t taste it.

“Why do you assume that I sleep with every man who I’m friends with? Is it because I’m a whore?”

He was exhausted with the topic of their discussion. “I’ve said no thank you. Why do we have to keep talking about it?”

“I want to sleep with you because I have always been attracted to you, and I know you are attracted to me.”

“This conversation at this time is inappropriate.” Joshua reminded her of his friend who was found dead.

“I’m sorry.” She balled up the wrapper from her burger. “I did not come here to pick you up.” She stood up. Her voice rose an octave. “Yes, I like sex. I make no apologies for that. If that makes me a whore, then I guess that’s what I am.”

She had gathered up her purse and tossed the bag from McDonald’s into the trash as she added the closing line of her statement. “The problem with people from your side of the tracks, Joshua Thornton, is that you won’t look beyond the label that you stick on people to see what lies underneath.”

She left him alone in the kitchen with the bouquet of flowers sitting in the middle of the table without a vase to stand in.

Admiral ate his hamburger in one gulp.

Joshua had resumed his nap on the sofa in his study when the sound of the doorbell brought him back to the foyer. Assuming that it was Tori returning, either to argue for the affair she was wanting or to apologize, he swung open the door. “Can’t you see that now is not a good time?” He started at seeing Seth Cavanaugh on the other side of the door.

“Now is as good a time as any, Counselor.” He pushed open the door and stepped in without invitation. “We have to talk.”

Joshua folded his arms across his chest. “If you want to interview me about Gail, I suggest we make an appointment to do it downtown in Sheriff Sawyer’s office.”

Seth took in his tired eyes and disheveled appearance. “You look like hell.”

“Lack of sleep.”

“Guilt does that.”

“One,” Joshua replied, “I did not kill Gail. Two, what evidence do you have to suggest that I did?”

“Opportunity. You were on the murder scene. We have witnesses who heard you admit to that.” The detective pointed out to the driveway. “And I just saw your motive leaving. Were you going over your stories for the police?”

“Damn it, Cavanaugh!” He gritted his teeth. “Tori Brody is a colleague. She came over here to offer condolences on the death of a classmate. If you had bothered asking me, instead of jumping to conclusions—”

“Why bother asking? You would have told me the same lie you are telling me now.”

“Well, I do bother asking, and then I take the time to go after the truth. You just jump on the train and ride it until you railroad your case into court!”

“Is this railroading?” Seth held up a plastic evidence bag containing a blue pen with gold engraving on the side.

Joshua uttered a gasp at the sight of his lost pen.

“Aren’t you even going to ask where I found it? Or do you already know?”

“I lost that pen weeks ago.”

“And I found it . . . in Reynolds’s living room. How did you lose it? Did it fall out of your pocket while you were unzipping your pants? Then she found out that she wasn’t the only woman you were dipping your pen into—”

“Have you spoken to the medical examiner?”

Seth snorted.

Joshua opened the door and gestured for him to leave. “Talk to Dr. Johnstone and then, after that, we’ll talk in Sawyer’s office.”

“We will talk again, Thornton.” He could feel the frost of Seth’s breath in his face. “You should be more careful about whose past you go around checking out.”

“So that’s what this is about. What are you afraid of my finding out?”

“Nothing now.” Seth predicted, “By the time I’m through with you, no one will believe a thing you say.”

Joshua closed the door behind him and then went to the window to watch Seth pull out of the driveway and down Fifth Street to town. Then, he picked up the phone and hit a speed dial number.

Tad picked up on the first ring.

“Cavanaugh was just here.”

“And?”

“I think I need to lawyer up.”

Chapter Nine

“Gail did not have any baby,” Carey Hoffman stated.

The writer’s sister worked as a clerk for an automotive service in New Cumberland. She glanced around to make sure that none of the three customers waiting for their cars were listening to her conversation with Jan Martin, who countered her version with proof of the lie.

“That’s not what the autopsy said. They did find evidence of childbirth.”

With a combination of a sigh and a snort, Carey asked, “Why can’t you leave well enough alone?”

“We have to check out all possibilities.” Jan pressed her lips together. “Had you seen Gail since she came back home?”

“We were not that close.”

“I noticed. I recall back when we were all kids that you two didn’t exactly hang out with the same crowd.”

Carey rationalized the lack of friendship. “I was three years younger than Gail. That’s a big difference when you’re kids.”

“But you’re not kids anymore.”

“When Mom was sick, Gail started planning for her death and had the legal connections to get everything of value. All I got were the photo albums and the chipped family china. There were hard feelings about that.”

“Then why are you so set on protecting her name now?”

“I have a daughter who wants to be a journalist just like her Aunt Gail. I don’t want her name dragged through the mud,” Carey told her. “That’s what they do every time someone famous dies. Dig up all the dirt on them. They don’t think about the person, and all the pain and hurt she might have suffered.”

Seeing a light in the tunnel that pointed in the direction she was seeking, Jan offered, “Why don’t you try telling me about the pain and hurt she went through?”

“Gail did not want to put the baby up for adoption. My parents insisted that she give it up. Either that, or they weren’t going to pay for her to go away to college.”

“Do you know who the baby’s father was?”

Carey shrugged.

“Gail didn’t tell you?”

She responded with a hollow laugh. “Gail was not a well person. Of course, when I mentioned that to Mom and Dad, they practically disowned me.”

“How was she not well?” Jan didn’t want to confess to knowing about the nervous breakdown.

“Gail fantasized. She told me that Joshua Thornton was the baby’s father. But I was there at the Valentine’s Day dance when he and Beth Davis announced their engagement. He was with her that whole evening. There was no—”

“Could—?”

“That was the night that Gail got pregnant. I know. I found her in the backseat of our car afterwards.”

“I guess you are wondering why I’ve been in the twilight zone.”

Joshua sucked in a deep breath and observed the faces sitting before him around the kitchen table. He tried to think of the most diplomatic words to express the sin he committed in his youth that threatened to come back now to bite him in the butt. It would mean risking the loss of his children’s respect.

“It’s hard losing a friend.” Tracy reminded him of Grace’s murder with a nod of her head.

Joshua shook his head. “Gail was a friend. I’ve lost friends before, but—”

“Did you two have an affair?” Sarah asked.

He asserted, “We were friends, nothing more.”

“Mom said that she was trying to get you.”

Joshua cocked his head at his younger daughter. He had realized that he and his wife would fight after Gail came to visit. He wasn’t aware that the children had noticed it as well. He had thought that his late wife didn’t like Gail because she was a hardcore feminist. There was another reason. Valerie sensed her attraction to him.

Jan rushed in through the kitchen back door. “Josh! We have to talk!”

He groaned.

“I think you are going to want to hear what I found out.” Her tone told him that she was bursting with news.

With the effort of an emotionally and physically exhausted man, Joshua raised himself up from the table and led the way into his study. He was aware of five pairs of eyes on his back.

Jan plunged ahead. “Were you aware that the network let Gail go from her contract and paid her off? In other words, she was fired.” She explained the termination of Gail’s contract. “There is a family in Connecticut that had a restraining order against her for stalking their son, whom she’d hunted down after giving him up for adoption. She ended up spending some time in a psych ward.”

“Are you aware that there is a possibility that that boy is my son?”

She squawked. “Is that why Ernie is nosing around to find out if you were sleeping with Gail?”

“How did Gaston find out about all this so fast?”

“I don’t know. He called me wanting to know about your love life. I told him that it was none of his business.” Jan asked, “Exactly what was going on with you and Gail?”

“It was a one-night stand back in high school! We were kids!” He forced her back on track. “What did you find out about this kid in Connecticut?”

She responded to his question with a question. “When did you sleep with Gail?”

“Jan!”

“It’s for the math. I have the boy’s birth date. He was conceived in February. When did you and Gail do the deed?”

“First week of January.” He sighed with relief. “He can’t be mine.”

“She wanted him to be yours. She wanted it so much, she convinced herself that he was.”

“But who is the father?”

“Gail was not exactly a hot date back then. Her sister is convinced that the baby was conceived Valentine’s Day night at the school dance. Gail got drunk and went out to the parking lot. She was drinking with a bunch of the jocks. Carey kept trying to get her to come back inside, but she refused. After the dance, she found Gail passed out in the backseat of their car. Her panties were missing. She told Carey that you sneaked out of the dance to make love to her.”

“That’s not true! I was with Beth. We got engaged that night!”

“Gail had some big issues, but she was so good at coming across like she had it together that no one saw it.”

The phone rang on his desk. “Now what?” He snatched up the phone. “What?” He barked into the receiver. After Tad, who was on the other end of the line, reminded him of his manners, he apologized.

While Jan watched him plop down behind his desk with the phone at his ear, her mind reeled. She had done it. She had helped Joshua in the case Seth was racing to put together against him.

But once again, Gail had one-upped her. Not only did she live the life Jan had dreamed of having, but her rival also had the pleasure of having Joshua make love to her, even if it was only once. Jan imagined the feel of his body touching hers.

With a curse, he hung up the phone.

“What?” she snapped out of her thoughts to ask him.

“The housekeeper at the motorlodge just found Bella Polk’s body. She had been beaten to death.”

“Who is Bella Polk?”

“She was Rex Rollins’ landlady,” Joshua told her. “You know, she was very inquisitive about if there was any reward for information leading to the arrest of Rex’s killer. I wonder—”

“If maybe she knew who killed him.”

Joshua squinted while asking himself more than her, “You don’t think Rex’s landlady was foolish enough to have gotten hold of his manuscript and tried to blackmail his killer with it?”

Excited by the prospect of getting the jump on one of Ernie’s reporters, Jan raced out to get the story of yet another murder in Chester.

Joshua sat in silence. He stared out the window at the backyard without seeing anything but the swift second hand making its way around the clock while Seth Cavanaugh put together his case against him.

“Did you read the newspaper?” Sheriff Curt Sawyer tossed The Glendale Vindicator, its front page displayed, on the center of his desk as a gesture for Seth to read the subject of their meeting, which had been called before the detective had a chance to finish his first cup of coffee.

Seth frowned deeply in order to conceal the smile that crept to the corners of his lips.

Somehow, somewhere, the owner and editor of The Glendale Vindicator had found a picture of a teenage Joshua Thornton and Gail Reynolds, her sitting in his lap, to print on the front page of the newspaper with the headline, “All the Women Thornton Has Loved.”

After suggesting that Joshua and Gail had had a secret love affair for years, Ernie Gaston then led into the collection of mementoes she had. He insinuated that the prosecutor was currently having an affair with lawyer Tori Brody, whom he had been seen sharing drinks with at Dora’s.

When asked about her relationship with Hancock County’s prosecuting attorney, Tori stated that she was unable to comment. “After all, a sexual relationship between a defense attorney and prosecutor could be construed as a conflict of interest in some criminal cases.” The newspaper journalist then noted that Joshua Thornton had struck deals for two of Tori’s clients, including a murder suspect.

The editor went on to list the women in Joshua’s life who were now deceased: Beth Davis, his late wife, Gail Reynolds, and finally Tricia Wheeler. The last name was complemented by a picture: Tricia, the deceased topic of Gail’s book, held in the arms of the valley’s favorite son.

The chronology ended with an unasked question about his innocence. What was his connection with Tricia Wheeler? Was there something in their relationship that he feared Gail would discover during her investigation? An unnamed source had told The Glendale Vindicator that he was the last person to see the journalist alive. Gaston left much up to the readers’ imaginations—which was more damaging than drawing a conclusion.

“Who is the unnamed source in the Hancock County Sheriff Department that told Gaston about Josh’s stuff being at the murder scene?” Sheriff Sawyer flipped the newspaper to show a second article about Grace Henderson’s murder. “Is it the same idiot who leaked that Grace Henderson was pregnant?”

“That source could have been any of those rent-a-cops you have working for you.”

Curt was almost half a foot shorter than his chief of detectives, but his solid muscles, which bulged when he crossed his arms across his chest, were enough to make Seth flinch. “You mess with Thornton and you mess with everyone in this valley.”

Before Seth could respond, Joshua came through the glass door to the sheriff’s office. He held the newspaper with the article in his hand. “You son of a bitch!”

“Hey!” Seth held up his hands. “Don’t blame me if your womanizing has finally caught up to you! All of the women I have slept with are still alive!”

Joshua grabbed him by the front of his suit jacket and threw him up against the wall. “My children read this over breakfast before I woke up!”

The doorway to the sheriff’s office was filled with deputies hoping to see their chief of detectives brought down to size by the county prosecutor.

In spite of the pair of fists threatening to damage his pretty face, Seth Cavanaugh was smug. “Looks like the great Thornton has a temper.”

Ashamed of his display of anger, Joshua released him.

Seth smoothed his hair with both of his hands. “You were at the scene of the crime and that is your skin under her fingernails.”

“I did not kill her. We weren’t having any affair. My love life is no one’s business.”

“But murder is everyone’s business.” Seth suggested to the sheriff, “Considering Thornton’s involvement with the victim—”

“You don’t have to do that,” Joshua interjected. “I called the attorney general yesterday—before this article came out. A special investigator will be here today to take over the Reynolds case. I’m out of it.”

“Do you have everything you need?”

Tad could see the answer to his question in Hallie Shearer’s face. The widow-to-be lied when she said that she had all she needed. There was no health insurance for her dying husband, nor was there any life insurance that would help with the financial burden she was doomed to encounter after his death. Bankruptcy was the only thing that kept the family from losing their home along the rural stretch of Route 30 on the Pennsylvania side of the state line. It was because of the desire to spend his last days with his family as much as to conserve money that Bert Shearer refused to stay in the hospital.

Tad was willing to make time to come to their home to check on his progress instead of forcing Hallie to go through the ordeal of transporting him to the doctor’s office to be told that the cancer was spreading through her husband’s body with the speed of a pop culture fad. On this last visit, he was barely aware that they were in the room.

“How much more time does he have left?” Hallie wanted Tad to tell her that he would soon be dead. It was exhausting to care for her husband, work full-time, and at all times appear optimistic in front of their children.

Tad took the medical bag he had asked her to help him to carry to his motorcycle and slipped it into the carrying compartment. “Jesus was the one who said that no one knows the day or the hour.”

“But it’s close.” She lowered her eyes to her feet. “It will all be over soon.”

“Soon.” He clasped the compartment shut.

Tad took her hand. Hallie grasped his fingers and palm to take in the comfort of his touch. Instead, she felt paper against her palm. She tore her eyes from his sympathetic expression to study her open palm. He had slipped a wad of twenty-dollar bills into her hand.

“Doc—”

He couldn’t hear her objection over the roar of his cycle as it sped out onto Route 30. He didn’t stop until he got to Rollins Corner Café to have lunch before going to the hospital for his afternoon rounds.

“Hey, Doug,” the doctor greeted yet another one of his patients when he stepped up to the counter to order a bag of cinnamon coffee and an egg sandwich. He unzipped his coat and set his helmet on the stool next to him.

Doug rushed back to the kitchen.

Tad swung around on the stool to take in the handful of customers during the mid-morning lull. Two farmers were eating a late breakfast. Their table was filled with an assortment of food that made up a major feeding. In the corner booth behind Tad’s seat, a deliveryman was enjoying a slice of pumpkin pie and a mug of coffee.

“Hey, aren’t you Doc MacMillan?”