Deadly Devotion (14 page)

“If I hadn’t turned up in Aunt Daisy’s life when I did, you would’ve gotten her whole estate, I’m sure.”

Kate gasped. “I’ve never even considered the idea. Until Daisy died, I had no clue I was even named in her will. I don’t begrudge you a penny. Believe me. If anything, as her only blood relative, you should get it all.”
If you didn’t kill her.

Kate pushed through the main door. At the sight of people strolling through the grounds, she was finally able to take a full breath. Surely Edward wouldn’t threaten her in a public place.

He laid his arm across her shoulder and squeezed her to his side. “You were like a daughter to Daisy.”

If Edward was aware of how she stiffened in his embrace, he didn’t show it.

He grinned down at her. “That makes us kind of like cousins.” Halting, he curled his arm toward his chest bringing them face-to-face.

She froze under his intense gaze. Edward had always been a flirt, but never like this. Interest simmered in his eyes. Interest, and something more. Something like surprise, as though he were seeing her—really seeing her—for the first time.

He skimmed his thumb over her lips. “Or maybe not cousins.”

She pushed her palm against his chest, breaking his hold. “You’re supposed to be engaged. Remember?”

He blinked, grinned. “Yes. Molly’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

The roar of an engine split the air, startling them both. A red car sped out of the parking lot.

“Was that Molly?”

Edward stared after the disappearing car, his unwelcome flirtation thankfully forgotten.

Kate’s car sat in the shadow of a nearby copse of oaks—perfect for staying cool, not so good for staying in view of the afternoon visitors to the grounds. But the sooner she got what he came to deliver, the sooner he’d be on his way. “Were you going to get me that stuff or not?”

“Right.” He popped his trunk and wrestled out a duffle bag.

“What’s in it?” And did she really want it in her trunk? For all she knew, he’d buried a bomb inside. After all, only she stood between him and
all
of Daisy’s money.

“Uh, ladies’ stuff. You may not want any of it. We’ll have to plan a time to go through the rest of my aunt’s belongings together.”

Kate left her trunk closed. She had no intention of going through anything with Edward. Not alone anyway. But reminding herself of Tom’s instructions not to reveal her
suspicions, she said, “Sure,” in as cheerful a voice as she could muster.

Edward rested the oversized duffle bag on her car bumper. “Are you going to open the trunk?”

“That’s okay, just set the bag over here on the grass.” She moved to the front of her car. The sun slipped behind a cloud, and the long afternoon shadows faded. “I’ll, um, go through the items before I leave, in case there’s, um, anything I want to drop off at the thrift store.”

Edward set the bag where she’d directed but didn’t release the handle. “It’s heavy. Are you sure you can manage? I’d be happy to follow you home.”

“No. Thanks. I’ll be fine.” She eyed the bag suspiciously. If it held a bomb, he wouldn’t let her rummage through the contents on the research station’s lawn. Would he?

Edward released his hold and skimmed his fingers over the bag. Backing away, he glanced at his watch. “Well, if you’re sure you’ll be all right, then”—he hitched his thumb toward his car—“I’ll get going.”

His gaze dropped to the bag one last time, and he gave her a tight smile.

Her heart kicked, but before she could find her voice, Edward ripped out of the parking lot in a spray of gravel.

Everything and everyone, from the birds chirping in the trees to the dozen or so people wandering the grounds, stopped at the sound of Edward careening out of the parking lot in his flashy Porsche.

Warn them
, Kate’s mind screamed, but like a quivering reed, she stood transfixed by the bag he’d left at her feet. From the way he’d glanced at his watch and then hightailed it out of there, she knew she should run. Run before this bag blew her to smithereens.

But her legs refused to cooperate.

A hand touched her shoulder.

She whirled around, keys clawed between her fingers, and missed a nose by inches.

Tom grabbed her wrist. “Whoa, there! I’m on your side.”

Jolted out of her trance, Kate screamed, “Bomb! Get everyone away!” She swept her arms through the air and ran toward the research building. “Everyone stay back. Stay back. I think there’s a bomb.”

Keith appeared and joined her and Tom in urging people to move back. Dog walkers wrangled in their pooches and dragged them well away, while those who’d been out of earshot jogged over to see what the commotion was about.

Tom formed a barrier with his arms and raised his voice above the murmur. “Please, everyone stay back. I’m Detective Parker. We have a suspicious package. Until we’re sure it’s safe, we need you to stay back.”

“What makes you think there’s a bomb in the bag?” Keith whispered in Kate’s ear.

“Edward was acting so strange, and he wanted to put the bag into my trunk, and when I wouldn’t let him, I thought I saw him fiddle with something in the bag. The news reporters talk about car bombs all the time. I just thought . . .”

Keith met Tom’s gaze, and without a word being spoken, Keith nodded and then moved toward the bag.

“What are you doing?” Kate tried to grab his arm, but Tom yanked her back. She pummeled his chest. “You have to stop him. We need to call the bomb squad.”

“Dad used to be in bomb disposal,” Tom said quietly, crushing her clenched fists against him. “He knows what to do.”

At the feel of Tom’s protective arms around her, she stopped fighting him. “I . . . I was so scared,” Kate mumbled against his shirt.

“You did great.”

Keith knelt next to the duffel bag and muttered something she couldn’t make out.

She eased herself from Tom’s arms. “Shouldn’t he be wearing protective gear? What if the bomb goes off when he opens the bag?”

“Trust me. Dad knows what he’s doing. Tell me again why you think there’s a bomb in the bag. What did Edward say to you?”

“I . . . I don’t remember. But he was acting so strange and—” A sob cut off the rest of her explanation. Putting her reasons into words made them sound embarrassingly far-fetched.

“It’s okay. You did the right thing.” Tom’s grave tone made her fears seem absolutely legitimate. He drew her farther away from the bag and then gently lifted her chin. “Are
you
okay?”

She sniffed. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. It’s just that Edward showed up at my lab and all I could think of was how you’d warned me to be careful. But I didn’t know what to do.” She hugged her arms around her waist and focused on Keith.

He pulled out a long yellow rope attached to pulleys and gingerly set it on the ground.

A man in the group whispered to his wife, “That looks like that thingamabob you exercise with.”

The woman jabbed him with her elbow. “Shh.”

Next Keith pulled out a black rubber ring, about a foot in diameter, with red sponge handholds on either side.

More whispers swished through the crowd and Kate’s heart sledge-hammered her ribs with bone-crushing thumps.

Slowly Keith pulled out a pair of turquoise, gelatinous-looking balls. His head tilted as he studied the one in his right hand, pressing his fingers one after the other into the semisolid material.

Kate held her breath, every muscle taut, as she watched his examination.

A moment later, he tossed the balls onto the grass. The group gasped.

Kate ducked, certain the gelatinous masses would explode on impact.

They didn’t.

And maybe Keith hadn’t exactly tossed them, but he could have moved them with a lot more caution.

“That stuff is just exercise equipment,” a woman in the group said, waving a hand at the collection on the ground and then walking away.

Kate glanced from the seemingly innocuous items to the skeptical faces in the crowd, but her own pounding heart wouldn’t let up. Not until . . .

Keith pulled the next item from the bag—a pair of thick purple spirals, joined in the middle by a black plastic, sausagelike thing—and Tom actually laughed.

“Isn’t that one of those thigh beaters?”

“Oh yeah.” Keith chuckled. “Your mom went through a couple of these puppies. Swore they shaved inches off her thighs.”

Kate cringed at how ridiculous her fears looked in light of what was really in the bag.

Keith sat back on his heels. “Nothing suspicious here.” He grinned. “Unless you count the—ahem—torture gadgets.”

The spectators laughed and broke into applause.

“Okay, folks,” Tom announced. “It’s safe to go.”

As Keith tossed the items back into the bag, Tom returned his attention to Kate. Oh, joy. This was not the kind of attention she’d wanted.

“Why did Edward come here?”

“To give me the bag. He said he saw my car. He wants me
to go through Daisy’s belongings with him, but I don’t think I can do that. I can’t bear the thought of him pawing through Daisy’s things. Why haven’t you arrested him?”

“I can’t arrest him without evidence,” Tom said, all traces of humor gone.

“Well, he wiped the browsing history and emails from Daisy’s lab computer. An innocent man wouldn’t do that. And—” Kate told Tom about the backup disk and the detective agency and the article on the swindler. “I think Daisy was suspicious of Edward and he knew it.”

Tom cupped Kate’s elbow and steered her toward the research building. “Okay, I want you to show me what you’ve found.”

Kate swiped her ID through the exterior electronic lock and led the way to her lab.

“How would Edward have accessed Daisy’s computer?” Tom asked.

“She kept her pass card and keys in her purse. Security probably never thought to ask for them back.”

“What about her password?”

“That would’ve been tougher. Daisy changed it every week. She’d go through the alphabet using Latin plant names.” Kate unlocked the lab door and switched on the lights. “If Edward knew what letter she was on, he could have guessed the password. That’s how I got in. Or maybe he watched over her shoulder as she entered it.”

Tom nodded, but his furrowed brow suggested he was dubious about her theory. “Your boss accessed Daisy’s computer for me after her death.”

“He has administrative privileges. They probably allow him to override passwords. I’m not sure.”

“So he might’ve cleaned the personal stuff from Daisy’s computer.”

“Darryl? I can’t think of any reason why he would. It’s got to be Edward.” Kate powered up the computer and pulled the portable hard drive from her pocket.

“Did Daisy mention anything to you about someone pilfering from the labs?”

“No.” Kate’s gaze strayed to the bare spot she’d noticed on the shelf over her workbench. When Tom’s followed, she backpedaled, self-conscious about the apparent discrepancy. “I don’t know. Maybe. What’s that got to do with anything?”

“It’s another case I’m working on. Daisy’s name came up.”

“You think the thefts had something to do with Daisy’s death?” Kate recalled Darryl mentioning that the missing intern used to invent stuff.

“The timing is suspicious.”

“We had an intern named Gord Laslo quit around the time Daisy died. Apparently, he used to tinker. He could have taken the stuff for his inventions.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about this guy sooner?” Tom practically growled.

“I found out about him the day your boss accosted me in the woods. Can you blame me for forgetting?”

“Any other potential suspects you’ve forgotten to tell me about?”

She chewed on her bottom lip. If she revealed her suspicions of Brewster after imagining Edward planned to put a bomb in her car, Tom might lock
her
up. Better to stick to one suspect at a time. “No, just Gordon. Daisy had threatened to have him expelled for plagiarism.”

“You think this kid committed murder to get out of an expulsion?” Tom pulled a notepad from the inside pocket of his jacket and started writing.

“No.” Kate sunk into the computer chair. “I
had
thought that he might have switched Daisy’s tea as a prank and then skipped town when the prank went bad.”

“Wait a minute. You’re saying Gordon left town?”

“Yes.”

“And you didn’t think this was important enough to tell me?”

“Edward is the one who told me about Gord. He probably wanted to keep me busy chasing ghosts.”

“If you’re going to be a detective, you can’t ignore half of your clues because they don’t fit your suspect. This student had a motive and he had the knowledge and means to substitute the marigolds. How about opportunity? There was no sign of forced entry at any of Leacock’s doors or windows. Would she have allowed Gordon into her house?”

“Daisy welcomed everyone into her home. But I don’t think Gord’s our killer. If Edward hadn’t been the one to point me toward him, I’d be more worried the kid was another victim.”

“Victim?” Tom’s raised voice rattled the test tubes.

“Yes, a victim.” To avoid Tom’s scowl, Kate punched in Daisy’s password and navigated through the computer pages. “Gord worked at the greenhouse near where your chief grabbed me in the woods. I thought Gord might have seen something he shouldn’t have.” The horrible scenario unfolded in Kate’s mind, and for a moment, she forgot about Edward. “If he’d mentioned
that something
to Daisy before going missing, Daisy might have asked the wrong people questions.”

“What wrong people?”

“Drug dealers, of course.” The news article about a swindler loaded onto the computer screen, reminding her where they needed to focus. She tilted the screen toward Tom. “Never mind about that. It was just a theory. I know you think I’m letting my imagination get carried away, but take a look at this.”

“No,” Tom said, blowing out air like a dying balloon. “I think you’re right that Daisy stumbled onto something that got her killed.” He skimmed the article, showing no sign of surprise at its content. “Figuring out what she stumbled onto and proving it is a different matter.”

“We can’t give up.”

“We won’t. I’ll see if I can track down this Gordon Laslo, but I don’t want you putting yourself in any more danger.”

“But—”

Tom stopped her words with a fingertip to her lips. His touch made her shiver in a whole different way than Edward’s had. “Please, don’t argue. I promise I will do everything I can to get to the bottom of this, but I won’t risk your safety.”

“You’re the most stubborn woman I know,” Tom said with a mock glare, a half hour later, as they stood side by side on the front porch of Gordon Laslo’s family home.

Unable to think of a snappy comeback, Kate just poked out her tongue.

“Oh, and mature too.” Tom’s voice held censure, but his eyes twinkled.

She gave him a toothy grin. She wasn’t the kind of woman who flirted with any single guy who came along, especially not law enforcement types, but the little zaps that kept knocking
her heart out of rhythm every time Tom smiled at her made her want to flirt with him. Later. After Daisy’s murderer was safely behind bars.

If she hadn’t waited so long to divulge the rest of her suspicions to Tom, they might already have the proof they needed. He’d plugged Gord’s name into the driver’s license database and within seconds the computer spit out addresses for five Gordon Laslos in the region. Only one was Gord’s age, and voilà! They had their match. The best part was, Kate hadn’t had to expose Tom to Lana with the long eyelashes to get the address.

Tom pushed the doorbell for the third time. “Looks like we’ll have to come back later.”

A kid delivering newspapers popped a wheelie on the sidewalk in front of the Laslo house. “They ain’t home.”

“Cool bike,” Tom said and joined the boy at the curb. He admired the long handlebars and banana seat, making an instant friend. “You know the Laslos?”

The boy shrugged the shoulder not weighed down by a bagful of newspapers. “I’m their paperboy.”

“We’re looking for their son, Gordon. Have you seen him around?”

“He’s away at college.”

“Does he come home for visits?”

“Sure, I guess, but Mr. and Mrs. Laslo went to Europe for a month.”

“Without their kids?”

“I dunno. All they told me was to stop delivering their paper until the middle of June.”

The boy popped another wheelie and swerved into the next driveway.

“Now what?” Kate said. “We don’t know if Gord’s missing or gallivanting through Europe with his folks.”

“Shouldn’t be too hard to figure out what airline they flew with, and then it’s just a matter of looking at the passenger manifest.” Tom held open the passenger door of his car for her.