Fatal Chocolate Obsession (Death by Chocolate Book 5) (6 page)

My chin dropped. “Are you sure?” I cringed as I heard the silly question come out of my mouth.

“Of course I’m sure,” he snapped. “I found her body.”

If attention was what he wanted, he had it—my attention and that of the few people left in the restaurant.

Paula came out from the kitchen and stood beside me.

“Did you hear?” Rick asked her, his voice a loud wail. “Ginger’s dead!”

“I heard,” Paula said quietly. “I’ll take over out here. You two can go in the back and talk.”

I walked around the counter and took Rick’s arm. “Let’s go to the kitchen.”

He threw himself at me, wrapped his arms around me and made huge gulping noises. If I hadn’t known him better, I might have thought he was crying.

I patted his shoulder and tried to disentangle myself while moving us closer to the kitchen door.

“It’s my fault!” he pseudo-sobbed. “I broke up with her!”

“Breaking up with her got her murdered?” I pushed against the kitchen door with one hand and dragged Rick through with the other.

“She killed herself because of me!”

When the kitchen door swung shut behind us, I shoved him away. “Suicide?” She had been pretty distraught when she’d come to my door. I supposed it was possible a woman could kill herself over Rick. It’s also possible the Easter Bunny lays colored eggs and leaves them under the Christmas tree for good children to find. “I thought you said she was murdered. How did she die? If she was stabbed fifty-seven times, suicide is unlikely.”

He reached for my hand. I put both of them behind my back and moved away from him.

He rubbed his eyes with a thumb and forefinger. “It was awful.”

I had no doubt it was awful, but it was hard to feel sorry for him when he was being so melodramatic. Actually, it was hard to feel sorry for Rick, period. “Tell me what happened.”

“Larry from up the street called me this morning. He always goes to work early, you know.”

“I know. Get to the part about Ginger.”

“When Larry tried to back out of his driveway he couldn’t because her car was in the way. It was just sitting there, not moving.” He paused, gulped and blinked a couple of times. His eyes were a little damp. Maybe he truly was upset. It’s just hard to see the genuine emotion when there’s so much phoniness surrounding it. “She was in the car. Dead.” His voice choked on the last word. Real or pretend choking? Hard to say, but I’d put money on the
pretend
choice.

“So Larry called you?”

Rick nodded. “He knows her—knew her, knew she used to live with me, and he knew we broke up. He figured she had too much to drink, came to confront me and passed out in her car.”

“She came to confront you but parked two houses up from your place?”

“She was probably watching my house to see when Robin left so she could talk to me alone.”

Translation:
She was stalking him to see if the new woman would come out so she could make a scene.

“Okay, Larry called you this morning and you went out to wake Ginger up?”

He bit his lip and nodded. “Do you have some place we can sit down?”

I pointed toward the door to the small office. “We have a couple of chairs in there.”

“Thank you.” He smiled weakly. “Can I have a glass of water?”

Oh, good grief!
“Of course. Have a seat and I’ll bring it to you.”

I got him a glass of tap water, a compromise between refusing him anything and giving him bottled water.

I grabbed a cold can of Coke for myself and went to the office where he sat with his elbows on the desk and his head in his hands. Maybe I was being too hard on him. Surely even Rick had some genuine emotions. He must have cared for Ginger. He lived with her for several months, and he did look a mess.

I set the glass of water on the desk and laid a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry about Ginger.”

He looked up, his expression tormented. Or a good imitation thereof. “Have you ever seen a dead person?”

“Well, yeah. Remember when you were trying to convince me to sell my house to that guy, and he dropped dead on the sidewalk out front?”

“That’s different. He was a stranger. Ginger was somebody I knew, somebody I once loved.” Naturally his dead body trauma was worse than mine. “Not as much as I loved you, of course.”

“Don’t start with that.” I moved my chair as far away from him as I could get in the small office and popped open my Coke. Talking to Rick is always a two-Coke or three-glasses-of-wine deal. “Tell me how she died.”

He shook his head, took a drink of the water and made a face. “This is terrible. Don’t you have bottled water?”

“Sold out.” Yes, it was a lie, but the idea of fetching purified water for such an unpurified person seemed wrong. “How did Ginger die? Knife wounds? Gun shot? Poison?”

“Her head was smashed. There was blood in her hair and all over the car. It was terrible.” He shuddered and rubbed his eyes again.

Another person murdered in the same way Bob was killed. Maybe that would get the cops’ attention. Maybe the murders were linked and that would force them to make every effort to find Bob’s killer.

Yeah, and maybe JFK’s assassination was connected to Lincoln’s.

Ginger and Bob had absolutely nothing in common. My fleeting moment of optimism vanished as quickly as it came.

“I doubt she smashed her own head in, so I think suicide is out.”

Rick took another drink of the tap water. “I don’t know any of the details. Your
boyfriend
—” he spat out the word— “wouldn’t tell me anything.”

Made sense that Trent would have been there. He was a homicide detective on the small local police force. Pleasant Grove doesn’t have a lot of homicides or a lot of homicide detectives.

“Deal with it,” I said. “If you’re here because you think Trent might have told me more than he told you, he didn’t and he won’t.” In the shadows of the night Trent and I talked of our lives and hopes and dreams. He told me his deepest fears and his innermost needs. But he wouldn’t tell me squat about an
ongoing investigation
.

Rick scowled. “That’s not why I’m here. I’m here because…because I needed to talk to somebody.” He leaned forward and grabbed my hand before I could yank it away. He has quick reflexes.

I twisted my hand out of his grip. “You don’t think it’s a little weird to go to your ex-wife for comfort when your ex-lover is murdered?”

“You knew her too.”

“Not really. I met her a couple of times, and she made a scene on my front porch night before last.” I rose. Surely I’d been compassionate long enough to satisfy whatever rules of compassion existed for ex-husbands. “I’m so sorry for your loss. I really need to get back to work. I can’t leave Paula with all the cleanup.”

He stood. “Can I call you later?”

“Sure.” Promise him anything to get rid of him then don’t answer the phone.

We walked through the restaurant together. The tables were empty. Brandon still sat at the counter and Paula stood behind it.

Rick paused at the front door and turned to give me another bone-crushing hug. I grimaced, patted his back and shoved him away.

He smiled sadly and squeezed my hand. “Thank you for being there, Lindsay. It means a lot to me. You mean a lot to me. I’ll call you later.”

He walked out the door then turned back to smile and wave. Oh, gag.

I spun away, back to the restaurant. Brandon and Paula watched me with expressions of concern.

“My ex,” I explained to Brandon. “He’s…um…well, there are a lot of reasons he’s my ex, and you just saw a few of them.”

Brandon slid off his stool and came toward me. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. He’s annoying but harmless.”

Brandon put a tentative hand on my shoulder. “Are you sure? He seemed pretty aggressive.”

“He is, but not in that way. Rick’s a salesman with Rheims Commercial Real Estate, very successful, which means very pushy.”

“What did he mean about somebody being murdered?”

“He found his ex-girlfriend’s body this morning. She was parked up the street from his house.”

He grimaced. “No wonder he was so upset.” He slid a card from his shirt pocket and handed it to me. “I wrote my cell number on the back. If he gives you any more trouble, call me.”

I accepted the card. “Thank you. That’s very sweet, but I’ll be fine. Rick Kramer has been a huge thorn in my side for a lot of years, but the worst he’s done is give me gray hairs and drive me to drink. Speaking of that, I think I’ll have another Coke.”

“Promise you’ll call me if you need me.”

“Okay.”

He smiled and left. He didn’t know about the code word.

Paula locked the door behind him. “Things are never dull around here, but I do believe that’s the first time I’ve seen somebody go all protective over you.”

I shrugged. “It was nice of him to offer, but I can take care of myself.”

“As I recall, Fred and Trent have stepped in a couple of times to save your neck.”

“I would have been fine even if they hadn’t showed up.”

Paula looked at me.

I looked at her.

That statement was so ludicrous, we both burst into laughter.

We cleaned and locked up. As we headed for our cars, I couldn’t stop my gaze from going to the outline that marked the place where Bob had died. The spots of blood were brown now, but I knew what they were. The lifeblood of a person.

Maybe I’d been too hard on Rick. It was devastating when someone you knew and cared about was murdered. I had to blink back tears when I looked at the evidence of Bob’s murder and I hadn’t seen the body. Rick had actually found Ginger’s body. Maybe I’d answer when he called and be compassionate some more.

Or maybe not.

I got in my car and took out my cell phone to call Trent so he wouldn’t call me when Fred and I were talking to Peterson. He gets a little upset when I
interfere
(his word, not mine) in
ongoing investigations
. Besides, he just loves it when I call him while I’m driving.

I put my Bluetooth in my ear, dialed his cell number and drove down the alley to the street.

He answered on the second ring. “Hi, babe.”

“Hey, sexy. I hear you met with my ex this morning. How fun was that?” I turned into traffic and prepared to be angry at the other drivers. If everybody would just forget those stupid speed restrictions, we’d all get to our destinations faster and my blood pressure would be a lot lower.

“Talking to Rick is almost as much fun as a root canal without Novocain,” Trent said. “He must have called you about Ginger.”

“He called me a couple of times but I refused to talk to him so he came by and made a scene. Selling real estate and making scenes are his major talents.”

Some jerk pulled directly in front of me from a side street. I started to honk but Trent would have heard the sound and realized I was driving and talking. He doesn’t think I can multi-task. I settled for glaring at the man. He couldn’t see my expression, but it made me feel better.

“What did he tell you about Ginger?” Trent asked.

“That he found her parked up the street from his house with her head bashed in. He said you refused to tell him anything.”

Trent laughed. “I kind of enjoyed not telling him anything. It’s pretty easy to push his buttons.”

“For once, I’m good with you not telling me anything about the crime. I didn’t really like her, I don’t want to talk about her, and I don’t care who killed her.” That wasn’t true, but I thought maybe he’d tell me more if he thought I wasn’t interested.

“Actually, I can tell you something about her murder.”

It worked!

I braked at a four-way stop sign. The car already sitting at the cross street didn’t move. Great. Had to be someone who thought it was polite to let the woman go first even though it totally messed up the timing or someone who was busy texting. In the second instance I could start through about the time he looked up from his cell phone and end up with a dent in my passenger door.

Oh, well, what was one more dent? I barreled through the intersection without incident.

“Okay, what can you tell me about Ginger’s murder?”

“Ginger’s GPS shows she drove to your house last night and the night before. You need to come to the station. You’re a person of interest.”

I suppose being a person of interest is better than being a person of boredom. However, when I walked into the Pleasant Grove Police Department as a person of interest in my ex-husband’s ex-girlfriend’s murder, I would have much preferred to be the boring kind.

Detective Adam Trent—not Trent, the man I’d spent the weekend with—met me at the front desk in his usual uniform…rumpled sports coat, rumpled slacks and rumpled hair. His hazel eyes showed little trace of green. He was not happy. Neither was I.

“Thanks for coming in, Lindsay.” I was surprised he didn’t call me
Miss Powell
. “Detective Lawson is going to take your statement.” He turned and headed through the door, leading me to an empty interrogation room.

I’d actually been in that room once before when we thought Rick was dead. Should have known he wasn’t. Rick is like one of those monsters in the horror movies who keep coming no matter how many times the heroine shoots him. Not that I’ve ever shot Rick. Thought about it, planned it, but never actually done it.

“Go on in,” Trent said. “Detective Lawson will be right with you.”

He gave me a brief pat on the fanny before walking away. That pat came from boyfriend Trent, not Detective Adam Trent. He was still in there somewhere.

I sat in one of the wooden chairs at the wooden table. If the purpose of that room was to make people so uncomfortable they’d confess to anything just to get out of there, it was serving its purpose.

Gerald Lawson entered with a regular size notepad. “Afternoon, Lindsay. How are you?”

“There are blood spots in the alley behind my business from my friend’s murder, my ex-husband just showed up at my restaurant and acted like a crazy man, and now you all have hauled me in for questioning. How do you think I am?”

The detective folded his long body into a chair across from me and set his notepad on the table. “I’m sorry you’re having a bad day. We won’t keep you long.”

Lawson is a nice guy. He’s just not into emotion. Except for the fact that he has gray hair, he reminds me of Sergeant Joe Friday on that old show,
Dragnet
.
Just the facts, ma’am
.

That day he lived up to Joe Friday’s image and to my nickname for him, Granite Man. His thin lips formed a straight line, and his narrow, chiseled features showed no sign of any expression. However, I suppose that in itself is an expression…and not a friendly one.

“How well did you know Virginia Lancaster?”

“Who?” I shook my head. “I don’t know her. Good grief, has somebody else been murdered?”

Lawson took a photograph from his folder and laid it on the table in front of me.

I looked at the picture. “Oh. That’s Ginger. Virginia Lancaster? I didn’t know her real name. Obviously I didn’t know her very well if I didn’t even know her real name.”

“She came to your house twice over the last forty-eight hours. You knew her well enough for her to visit in the middle of the night.”

I leaned forward and spread my hands on the table. “Hey, it’s not like I sent her an invitation to visit. I can’t be responsible for every nut job my ex-husband sleeps with.”

I waited for a response, an apology or something. Of course I got none. He stared at me and waited. I’d seen this on TV. The cop sits quietly while the suspect spills his—or her—guts. I just sat there and stared back at him. Two could play that game.

“Okay,” I finally admitted, “she came to my house night before last to yell at me.” I’m not very good at sitting still and silent. I’m a lot better at spilling my guts.

“About what?”

“She wanted me to let her have Rick.”

Lawson looked even stonier. “Are you back together with your ex-husband?”

“Of course not! You know that Trent and I…well, we…uh…” I waved a hand to indicate words I wasn’t sure I should be saying in an interrogation room where the conversation was probably being recorded. It would not likely be a good idea for a suspect—excuse me, person of interest—to say she and another detective were lovers.

Lawson raised one eyebrow ever so slightly, maybe two centimeters, but said nothing.

“Come on! You know better than that. Rick told her we were getting back together because he has somebody new and didn’t have the guts to be honest.”

“What did you tell her?”

Yay! I made him talk even though I had to speak twice in between. “I told her she could have Rick, that I’d give him up, he was all hers.”

“If you aren’t back with your ex, how could you give him up?”

I heaved a deep sigh of frustration at Lawson’s inability to understand how things worked in the real world. “I just said that to shut her up. What would you have done if some crazy woman showed up on your porch in the middle of the night, shouting at you?”

“You could have called the police.”

“Why would I do that? She wasn’t waving a gun or threatening me. She was just drunk and pitiful. It was easier to say, yeah, okay, whatever you want, and then she went away.”

“Why did she come back last night?”

I heaved another deep sigh to show my annoyance. “Since I didn’t talk to her, I have no idea. Maybe she came to see somebody else in my neighborhood.”

“Who?”

“How would I know? She didn’t put an update on her Facebook page.”

“Are you friends on Facebook?”

This was getting ridiculous. “I don’t have a Facebook page. It was a joke.”

“When did you last see Ms. Lancaster?”

“I told you already. Night before last when she came to my door.”

“What time was that?”

“It was maybe a half hour after you and Trent left. Check it out. I’m sure you keep better records of your time than I do of mine.” I slid my chair back. “Are we finished?”

“How would you categorize your relationship with Ms. Lancaster?”

I clenched my fists, gritted my teeth and reminded myself that this man was Trent’s partner and friend, that he’d hugged me when he thought Rick was dead, that he was only doing his job and wasn’t deliberately trying to irritate me.

“Nonexistent. I saw Ginger a couple of times with Rick, and then she came to my house in the middle of the night and carried on like a drunken banshee. We were not BFFs. We didn’t do lunch or exchange friendship bracelets. I didn’t even know her real name until you told me a few minutes ago.”

“Who would want to harm Ms. Lancaster?”

I stood, placed both hands on the table and leaned toward him. “Funniest thing, she hasn’t confided in me lately. The only person I know who’d have reason to kill her is her former lover, Rick.” Yes, I threw him under the bus and gleefully anticipated the way he’d squish when the wheels rolled over him. “She was killed while sitting in her car up the street from his house. Obviously she was spying on him, probably planning to make a big scene with the new girlfriend. Maybe Rick killed her so she couldn’t. Maybe she already made a big scene and the girlfriend killed her.”

“Do you have a name for the new girlfriend?”

With one foot, I shoved my chair back. It hit the wall with a satisfying thud. “I think he called her Robin. You’re the cops. It’s your job to find out that kind of stuff.”

He slid the picture into his folder and stood. “That’s all for now. Thank you for coming in.”

I started toward the door.

“Did you bring any cookies with you?”

I could not freaking believe he would grill me as if I were a murder suspect and then ask for chocolate! I opened my mouth to tell him exactly what I thought then closed it. Over the years I’ve learned that it is never a good idea to rag on a cop when that cop stops me and accuses me of exceeding some arbitrary speed limit. Very likely the same thing applied to a cop accusing me of killing somebody.

I smiled at Lawson. “I’m sorry. I didn’t bring anything today—short notice. But I promise I will tomorrow.”

He nodded. “I really like your chocolate chip cookies.”

“I’ll bring you a dozen with nuts.”

His lips twitched slightly. He almost smiled.

I left the room and started down the hall toward the exit.

Trent came up behind me. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” I snapped.

“Want me to come over for a while tonight?”

Yes, yes, yes!
“No.” I walked stiffly through the reception area and out the front door.

Trent followed me and put a hand on my shoulder. “I get the idea you’re upset.”

I turned to face him. “Who’s asking? My boyfriend Trent or Detective Adam Trent of the Pleasant Grove Police Department?”

He grinned, a wide, open expression that always makes me want to grin back. “Both of us.”

I refused to grin back. I scowled instead. “I’m not ready to be charmed. I’m angry at you for treating me like a suspect. You know I’d never kill anybody.”

“Of course I know that. But we have to follow procedure. We have to check out everybody associated with the victim.”

“Then go check out Rick. He just loves talking to you.”

“Rick and his lawyer are coming in tomorrow.”

“Already lawyered up? That tells you something!”

“Do you think Rick killed Ginger?”

I didn’t, but I’d been wrong about Rick before, like when I thought he was a nice man and married him. “It’s possible.”

I stalked down the steps, away from Trent and Detective Adam Trent.

“I’ll call you tonight.”

“Maybe by then I’ll be over being mad and answer the phone.” I didn’t stop, just threw the words over my shoulder. “And maybe I won’t and I won’t.”

I drove home without incident or ticket and fed Henry.

Fred called. “Are you ready?” he asked by way of greeting.

“Of course.” My answer was automatic, but it took me a moment to figure out what I was supposed to be ready for. In the course of being a person of interest, I’d forgotten about the proposed visit to Peterson.

“What are you wearing?” he asked.

I looked at my blue jeans and red knit shirt, both with traces of chocolate on them. “Black suit,” I lied.

“Good. Come on over.” He hung up.

I raced upstairs and changed into my trusty black suit, the one I only wear to funerals, visits to mobsters and other excursions with Fred. That suit is getting a little worn, and I haven’t been to a funeral in a long time.

Henry accompanied me to Fred’s then left to pursue his own agenda. I fervently hoped I would return home to an empty porch—no mice, no flowers, no bottles of wine. After Ginger’s demise, I assumed Rick’s offerings would cease, but Henry’s would likely continue. With all the little critters scurrying around, busily preparing for winter, he might even double up.

Fred, wearing a dark suit and tie, opened the door and stepped out. “Why did you arrive home so late?”

Further evidence he didn’t know
everything
. I wasn’t sure if I was elated or disappointed. “Cops.”

“Lindsay, whether you think those speed limits are valid or not, they’re going to give you a ticket when you exceed them.”

“Only when they catch me.” I followed him to the driveway where his vintage white Mercedes waited. If I kept my Celica a few more years, would it change from
old
to
vintage
? “Anyway, that’s not what they hauled me in for. They think I killed Ginger.”

He halted, his hand on the passenger door. “Ginger’s dead? They think you killed her?”

“Yes and yes. I’m shocked you didn’t know all that.”

He opened the door and I slid onto the soft leather seat.

“I’ve been busy today,” he said.

“With Sophie?”

He closed my door, walked around to the driver’s side, and got in. “We’re going to visit A-Plus Construction. There may be more to Bob’s death than I first thought.”

“You found out something about Nick Peterson, didn’t you?”

He eased the car from the driveway onto the street. I have no idea why he rigidly adheres to the speed limit. I’ve been with him when he drove like Jeff Gordon, and with his hacking skills, he could get out of any tickets.

“Maybe,” he said in response to my question. “His real name is Nicholas Peretti. Remember my friend, Donato Orsini?”

“Like I could ever forget meeting a mobster and you telling the man he shouldn’t be smoking in his own office! I thought we’d both soon be wearing concrete shoes at the bottom of the Missouri River.”

“Donato’s finally decided to quit smoking. I was forced to get his wife involved.”

“So you snitched off the mob guy to his wife? Why not just tell on him to his mother?”

He moved onto the freeway, driving at precisely the speed limit. “His mother’s not in the best of health. I didn’t want to worry her.”

“Of course you didn’t. So getting back to Nick Peterson-Peretti, what did you find out about him?”

“He and Donato go back a long way.”

“You mean Nick’s a member of the mob? You think he had Bob killed? Why would he offer him a job and then put out a hit on him?”