Blind Dates Can Be Murder (52 page)

“Why are we going to Peter Trumble’s house?” Jo asked as Chuck told her to slow down and watch for the driveway.

“Yeah, right, like you don’t know,” he replied.

“I don’t,” Jo said. “I really don’t know.”

She came to a stop, and he told them both to get out and walk to the front door of the house as though nothing was wrong.

“Knock,” he commanded, moving to the side and behind Lettie so that he might not be seen at first glance.

Jo knocked as he had directed, and soon the door opened to reveal Peter Trumble on the inside.

“Jo?” he asked. “What are you doing here? I thought our appointment wasn’t until five o’clock this afternoon.”

At that moment, Chuck stepped out, a gun in his hand pointed straight at Peter. Jo hadn’t even realized he had a gun.

“Surprised?” Chuck said.

Eyes wide, Peter shook his head.

“What are
you
doing here?” he asked.

“I think you know,” Chuck said. “I believe you have something that belongs to me.”

Try as hard as they might, Danny and Monica couldn’t come up with anything bad on Brock Dentyne. He had no police record, no aliases, not even any parking tickets. Moving back to a Google search after all, they confirmed that Brock did have, however, lots of good stuff: awards, citations, honorary degrees. The guy was a modern-day renaissance man, obviously talented, intelligent, and capable.

The all-around perfect fellow.

Danny realized that it would be a waste of time to continue the search. But sitting there with Jo’s address book, he thought it might be prudent to poke around and check a few other names of people they didn’t know all that well. Tasha Green came to mind. She was a new addition to the book, and Jo said that the woman had been extremely solicitous of late, leaving several messages on her machine just to ask how the investigation was going.

“Try the name Green,” Danny said to Monica. “Tasha Green.”

She typed her into the computer to see what they could find.

Chuck directed them all downstairs at gunpoint, where Peter said he had some duct tape. Chuck lost his balance on the last step, and Jo took advantage of his momentary lapse to reach for a nearby knickknack to use as a weapon. He was faster and stronger than she, however, and before she knew it, he had knocked it out of her hand and thrown her across the room. The wind was knocked out of her as she slammed against the marble counter of the bar. Jo stayed there, trying to catch her breath, her hands pressed down against the smooth surface of the marble.

Only it wasn’t so smooth now. It was actually rough, the stone gritty under her fingertips.

“On the floor,” Chuck said pointing at her.

With an angry glare, she did as he directed, kneeling down and putting her hands behind her back. It was almost a repeat of the night before, at her house.

“Tape her hands,” Chuck told Peter.

Reluctantly, Peter pulled out long strips, binding first Jo’s hands and then her feet.

“Lettie next,” Chuck said.

When Peter had finished taping Lettie, Chuck told him to kneel next to them. With the gun pointed at Peter’s head, Chuck taped up Peter as best he could. Finally, he stepped back and seemed to appraise the situation.

“I want the money,” Chuck said, cocking the gun at Peter’s head. “The money you took from Frankie Malone.”

Though he and Monica still sat the computer, Danny had finally given up on finding anything compromising about Tasha Green. The woman was obviously an exemplary citizen, just as Brock Dentyne had been.

But that still left the question of who killed Frank, poisoned Mickey, and stole the money. Flipping through the address book again, Danny was about to suggest trying the name of Peter Trumble when there was a disturbance at the front door of the station. They both looked up to see Ming Lee—Peter Trumble’s girlfriend-slash-architect—standing in the doorway of the police station, a suitcase in one hand and a pet carrier in the other.

“I want to know why! I just want to know why!” she exclaimed.

“Ma’am,” a patient deputy was explaining to her, “we told you on the phone, you had to evacuate your home because of a bomb threat.”

“But who’s bombing me? Who made the threat? Where am I supposed to go until it’s safe?”

Danny looked at Ming and then peeked in to the carrier to see a cat with long, white fur—a lot like the fur found on the pillow in Frank Malone’s car, the one that had probably been placed there to induce his asthma.

“Hey, Chief,” Danny said, pulling the man off a phone call. “That’s one of the people from Jo’s address book. Maybe you should ask her if her cat is missing a blue pillow.”

The chief hung up the phone, got a few more details from Danny about who the woman was, and then approached her at the front desk. After he got her to calm down about being evacuated, he asked if she knew a man named Frank Malone.

“No. Is he the one who threatened me with a bomb?”

“No,” the chief said, but before he could continue, she noticed Danny standing nearby.

“Hey, you’re the photographer. Danny, right?”

“Yes,” he said. “That’s me.”

“What’s going on here?” she asked, genuinely distraught. He could tell she was one of those people who couldn’t stand to have her routine or her life messed with in any way.

“That’s a beautiful cat,” Danny said, ignoring her question. “You’re not missing one of his pillows, are you?”

She seemed a bit surprised.

“As a matter of fact, I am,” she said. “A navy blue one. It’s been gone for about a week. How did you know?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Peter said to Chuck tiredly. “Haven’t you done enough to me already?”

Lettie was still and silent, listening to all of the activity that swirled around her. She knew there was only one way for this to end, and it wasn’t good. As Chuck railed at Peter and Peter kept proclaiming his innocence, she closed her eyes and thought back to last night, to sitting in Marie’s kitchen with Anna.

Somewhere very late, after Marie and Jo had gone to bed, Anna had talked to Lettie about Jesus. Mostly, she had tried to explain about forgiveness and redemption, but all Lettie could think of now was sacrifice. Jesus had sacrificed for her on the cross, and she finally understood how, and why.

Last night Anna had taught her the “sinner’s prayer,” and as Lettie had whispered it, she had finally gotten a glimpse of what a father’s love was supposed to look like. It was pure. It was unconditional. It was unending.

“That’s what grace is, Lettie,” Anna had explained, smiling at her through tears. “Unmerited favor. You can’t earn it, but He gives it to you anyway.”

Now, less than twelve hours since that prayer, Lettie knew Jesus was calling her to a sacrificial act of her own. She wasn’t sure how, but she knew she had to do whatever it would take to save these people and resolve this situation.

Even if it cost her her life.

29

S
o Peter wasn’t going to cooperate. Fine. Chuck would tear the house apart until he came across the money himself. And if Peter really was telling the truth and there was no money to be had, then surely Chuck would be able to round up enough stuff out of this fancy house to make it worth his while anyway.

Isolated up here on top of the mountain, Chuck knew he had time to play this out. By making a big bluff about another explosive, he had convinced the cops to let them go. They had managed to escape the long arm of the law. Now he could relax just a bit. No one would ever think of looking for them there.

He left the three of them downstairs, bound with duct tape, and went up to find the master bedroom. That was a good place to start. Digging through the drawers and closets, he came up with jewelry, cash, even pain pills. Lots of pain pills. He also grabbed some nice clothes. Though Peter wasn’t as broad in the shoulders as Chuck, they were about the same height. Chuck took shoes, pants, shirts. He’d have a brand-new wardrobe without having to spend a penny.

Chuck carried his booty downstairs and dumped it near the front door. Then he continued down one more flight to check on his prisoners. They were still there, still securely taped, though Chuck had a feeling that the two women had been working to free each other. He added more tape to their bindings, just to be safe, and then he went back upstairs and attacked the other bedrooms.

He found some suitcases, which he tossed down the stairs. They would be useful for getting the stuff to the car. It wasn’t until he came to the home office and began looking through the drawers that he found a big surprise.

“Well, well, well,” he said, reaching inside the deepest drawer and pulling out a handful of electronic surveillance equipment. “What have we here?”