Battered to Death (Daphne Martin Cake Mysteries) (23 page)

I
DROVE TO
the hospital, planning to ask Pauline about the argument she overheard between Chef Richards and Gavin Conroy. If she knew something that could possibly implicate Gavin in Chef Richards’s murder, she needed to come forward with it before it was too late . . . before Gavin left Brea Ridge.

When I arrived, I asked the nurse in the emergency room how Pauline was doing.

“Great. She’s staying at the Brea Ridge Inn, and I’ll be going back there,” I said. “I’ll be happy to give her a ride.”

“Excellent.” The nurse smiled. “I was planning on calling her a cab, but you know how slow those things are around here. The only ones we have are those driven by Winnie Amos and Jack Griffin, and getting either one of those to roll off the couch on a Sunday afternoon is like pulling teeth.”

I laughed. “Thanks for taking such good care of Pauline.”

“That’s what we’re here for.” She nodded toward the trophy. “What did she win?”

“First place in the floral sugar craft competition,” I said.

“Well. Good for her.”

I went into Pauline’s room. I wanted to be discreet in case she was getting changed, so before stepping around the curtain into her area, I called, “Congratulations!”

Based on the nurse’s report, I expected to see Pauline dressed in the clothes she had arrived in this morning rather than in the hospital gown. Instead, she was not only still wearing the gown, but she was clutching the blanket up around her chin so tightly that her knuckles were white.

She rapidly shook her head as her eyes darted to the right.

I followed her gaze but didn’t see anything. “Why don’t I get the nurse?”

“No! Please . . . don’t. I’ll be fine.” Again, her eyes darted to the right.

I noticed the toe of one sneaker behind the curtain. I gasped.

Despite Pauline shaking her head like crazy, I asked, “Who’s there?” When I didn’t get an immediate response, I pulled back the curtain. “Chris? What’re you doing here?”

“I . . . came by to . . . talk with . . . her,” he said.

“Why were you hiding?” I asked.

He shrugged.

It seemed unlikely that he had been about to pop out and yell
Surprise
. What could he possibly be up to that would make him feel that he should try to hide in a hospital room?

Before I could ask him, the nurse brought in Pauline’s paperwork.

“I’ll step outside while you’re taking care of that,” Chris said.

After he and I stepped into the hall, I asked him again, “What are you doing here, Chris?”

“I was afraid Pauline was going to implicate me in the murder of Jordan Richards,” he said.

“Why would you think that?”

“At the awards ceremony, Myra said that Pauline overheard
a certain someone
arguing with Chef Richards,” he said. “She looked right at me.”

“Myra was just bragging,” I said.

“You mean Pauline
didn’t
hear anyone arguing with Chef Richards?”

“She did. She heard Gavin Conroy and Chef Richards arguing but that was right after class on Thursday.” I frowned. “So you’re saying you argued with Chef Richards too?”

“Uh . . . yeah . . . I did.” He shrugged. “Molly, Alex, and I got into Brea Ridge on Thursday evening. We were staying at another hotel, but I went to the inn looking for Jordan Richards. I wanted to make him apologize to Alex for the way he’d treated him. I wanted Richards to make things right with Alex . . . to tell Alex that he was a good cake decorator.” He ran his hand over his face. “Alex has struggled so much since that incident at the cake show a few months ago. The kid hasn’t been the same. I just wanted my nephew back.”

“He told me I was an idiot and he asked if I really expected him to believe that he’d done irreparable harm to a child simply by telling the child that his work was too good to have been done without help,” said Chris. “He said most kids would’ve been flattered by that. I told him Alex wasn’t
most kids
and that I didn’t care whether Chef Richards believed it or not. I explained that Alex had Asperger’s Syndrome and that he hadn’t decorated since Chef Richards had been so rude to him.”

“Wait,” I said. “You’re not telling me Chef Richards refused to apologize to Alex, are you?”

“That’s exactly what I’m telling you. And I told him he
was
going to apologize to Alex first thing Friday morning—that I’d be bringing my nephew to his class. I told Chef Richards that if he didn’t want to be embarrassed in front of his students, he’d better step out into the hallway when he saw us at the door. So, uh, yeah . . . he and I had a pretty heated argument.” Chris put his hands in his pockets. “I thought that Pauline had overheard us and that her testimony, combined with that surveillance footage, would put me in the kitchen close to the time Chef Richards died and that I’d take the blame for hitting him on the head with that cake stand and then shoving his face into the vanilla cake batter.”

Chris smiled. “Well, thanks for understanding. I’m going to take off. Molly and Alex are waiting for me back at our hotel. I’m going to follow them as far as their house in North Carolina tonight and then go on home to Georgia tomorrow. Please apologize to Pauline for me. I didn’t mean to scare her. I just wanted to explain what she might’ve overheard.”

“I’ll tell her,” I said. “You guys have a safe trip home.”

“Thanks, Daphne.”

As Chris strode down the hall, the nurse came out of Pauline’s cubicle.

“Ms. Wilson is dressing and will be ready to go in just a couple of minutes,” said the nurse. “I wish I’d have been off this weekend. I’d have sure loved to see all those pretty cakes.”

“I wish you had been able to come too,” I said. “There were some really beautiful ones on display.”

“That’s what Ms. Wilson was telling me earlier today,” she said. “Oh, well . . . maybe next year.” She returned to the nurses’ station.

I stepped up to the closed curtain. “Pauline, it’s Daphne. Do you need any help with anything?”

“Is that man with you?” she asked.

“Good. He was creeping me out.” She pulled back the curtain. “Let’s get out of here.”

“You’ve had a horrible day,” I said. Call me Captain Obvious.

She smiled and picked up her trophy. “It wasn’t all bad.”

“I know Ms. Compton will be happy to see you.”

“You said that guy left,” she said. “He wasn’t going back to the inn, was he?”

“I don’t think so. Pauline, what did he do to make you so afraid of him? He seemed all right to me.”

“It wasn’t what he did or said. It was his attitude. He just . . . ” She blew out a breath in frustration. “He just came across as menacing. He wanted to know who I’d heard arguing with Chef Richards and what I’d heard.”

“What did you tell him?” I asked.

“I didn’t tell him anything. I asked him to please get out of my room,” she said. “And then he heard you talking to the nurse, and he hid behind the curtain. Now do you see why I was freaked out?”

“I certainly do,” I said. “I can’t figure out why he’d feel the need to hide, though, if he was only here to talk with you.”

“Because he was a nut,” said Pauline. “He was so nervous about what I might’ve overheard.”

“What was he arguing with Chef Richards about?” she asked.

I explained the situation between Chef Richards and Alex.

“Poor kid. Still, I don’t know why the uncle would’ve thought my hearing him arguing with Chef Richards would be such a big deal,” she said. “Everyone argued with Chef Richards.”

“And yet you stabbed yourself with floral wire when you saw Gavin Conroy during your demonstration,” I said. “Do you think Gavin killed Chef Richards?”

“Do I think he did it? Yes. Like Chef Richards, Gavin has a violent temper. Do I have any evidence that Gavin killed the chef? No.” She shook her head. “I wish I did. Then you and I would be off the hook.”

“Maybe we can put our heads together with Mark—the private investigator—and with Ben and come up with some sort of trap where we could trick Gavin into confessing,” I said. “What do you think?”

“I guess it’s worth a shot. But could we do it tomorrow over breakfast?” she asked. “I’m really exhausted, and I just want to go back to the inn and crash tonight.”

I
DROVE
P
AULINE
back to the Brea Ridge Inn. She took her trophy and prize basket and went to find Kimmie Compton, and I stopped by the front desk.

“Hi,” I said to the clerk. “Has Gavin Conroy checked out yet?”

The clerk tapped a few computer keys, looked up, and said, “No. Would you like for me to ring his room for you?”

“No, thanks,” I said. “I’ll catch up with him later.”

I walked over to the seating area and called Ben. “Where are you?” I asked when he answered.

“I’m still with Mark and Myra in the snack area,” he said. “Where are you?”

“I’m in the lobby,” I said.

“Great.” He lowered his voice. “I’ll head on up to our room and be there when you get there.”

“Wait,” I said. “Why don’t we have dinner with Mark and Myra? We can eat in the inn’s dining room and go over this case one last time.”

He sighed. “But I was really looking forward to some alone time with you.”

“All right,” Ben said. “The three of us will meet you in the dining room.”

“I’m on my way.” He sounded really disappointed that he and I weren’t having dinner alone in our room. I wondered if that was a good sign or a bad one. Maybe he was going to tell me his decision about Kentucky. If he was staying, I’d like to know that right this minute. If he was going, I’d prefer to delay his announcement for as long as possible.

I was walking in the direction of the dining room when I met Gavin Conroy in the hallway. I thought,
Speak of the devil
. . .

“Hi, Gavin,” I said. “Are you going to dinner?”

“Just finished up,” he said. “I’m ready to go up to my room and rest awhile. It’s been a trying day.”

“Well, if I don’t see you before you check out, have a safe trip home.”

He smiled. “You take care, Daphne.”

I continued on to the dining room, wondering why Gavin Conroy had suddenly seemed nicer than he ever had. Was it because he knew he was
this close
to getting away with murder? Or was he simply glad to have the competition behind him?

I stood to the right of the maître d’s podium and waited for Ben, Myra, and Mark to join me.

“Hello, Daphne,” said Ms. Compton. “I’m treating Pauline to dinner this evening. She’s had such an awful ordeal. Would you care to join us?”

“I’d like to, but I’m waiting for friends,” I said. “I appreciate the offer, though.”

“Maybe next time, then. By the way, Pauline told me about that man skulking about the hospital,” Ms. Compton said. “If he shows up here again, I think we should have security throw him out.”

“I don’t believe he meant her any harm,” I said. “As I explained to Pauline, he told me that he wanted to make sure she understood why he’d been arguing with Chef Richards.”

“And I told Daphne that
everybody
argued with Chef Richards,” said Pauline.

Ms. Compton smiled as she lifted and dropped one shoulder in a semishrug. “Maybe his death was our own little version of
Murder on the Orient Express
.”

The hostess arrived and took Ms. Compton and Pauline to their table. I didn’t express my wish to the maître d’, of course, but I hoped Ben, Myra, Mark, and I got a table far enough away from Pauline Wilson and Kimmie Compton that we wouldn’t have to worry about them overhearing our conversation.