How to Host a Killer Party (28 page)

I ate and thought about what she’d said, hardly tasting my soup. Admiral Stadelhofer had been using his men as guinea pigs to test for some kind of germ warfare? Could that have something to do with the death of Ikea Takeda or Andi Sax? Could one—or both—have discovered proof of his involvement in something so unethical and diabolical it could have ruined him?

For the rest of the meal, my mother did the talking, mostly about her party heyday and plentiful paramours. Then, out of the blue, she said, “Dear, are you in some sort of trouble? You look a little pale.”

I smiled and shook my head. “No, Mom, I’m fine. I’m just trying to find out how Ikea Takeda and Andi Sax were murdered so I don’t end up—” I started to say in jail—or worse—but didn’t want to alarm my mother.

“Murdered? Who was murdered?”

Apparently she’d forgotten what the admiral had said, another sign that her long-term memory was still good, but not so much her short-term.

I sighed internally, shook my head, and rose from the table. “We’ve got to get you back home. Your friends will be wondering where you are.”

She stood and delicately brushed at the front of her dress, removing nonexistent crumbs with bright red nails. “Oh, I hope I haven’t missed the party!”

“What party?” I asked, following her to the door.

“It’s my birthday, silly! Did you forget? I’m having a huge gala to celebrate.”

I didn’t have the heart to tell her that her birthday had been six months ago. Why spoil an excuse to celebrate? “Happy birthday, Mom.”

 

“I had a little chat with Admiral Eugene Stadelhofer,” I said to Brad, who stood in my office doorway looking down at me. He pulled the folding chair up to my paper-littered desk and glanced down at the increasing notes I’d been making about the murders.

“Really?” He looked a little disappointed. Why? Because I hadn’t taken him with me? Or because I’d learned something that he might not know? “So what did you chat about?”

I decided not to tell Brad about my mother’s questionable relationship with Gene, as she called him. I didn’t think it was necessary to involve her in this.

“How’d you get him to talk?” he asked.

“Rang the doorbell,” I answered smugly.

“What, no breaking and entering? No criminal trespass?”

I glared at him. “Stop sounding like a cop. I thought you were interested in helping me. If not, go . . . clean something.”

He sat back. “Whoa. We’re a little crabby, aren’t we? I just want to keep you from breaking any laws. How’s it going to look if you’re arrested for a 602?”

A 602? I assumed it was police code for trespassing, but how would he know that? Had he been arrested for a 602? I really knew nothing about this guy who had walked into my life so coincidentally. Brad Matthews might claim he was a crime scene cleaner, but I had a feeling he was something more. A snitch for the cops? Letting him get involved in this had been a bad idea.

I underlined Admiral Stadelhofer’s name and added a fat question mark, along with the acronyms SHIP and SHADE my mother had mentioned.

Brad looked at my notes. “You’re going about it the wrong way.”

“Oh really? Got a better idea, Holmes?”

“Yeah, Drew. Think about it from the killer’s perspective. That’s what I do when I’m bored cleaning up a homicide. I try to imagine what happened and get inside the killer’s head while I’m wiping up all that blood.”

“Easy to say,” I said, sighing. “I don’t have any solid suspects, other than the mayor—and that’s just because he looks guilty. I don’t have any incriminating evidence, either—except my connection to the chocolates. Frankly, I’m running out of time. It’s only a matter of hours before Detective Melvin reads me my rights—or I move to Argentina.”

Brad patted my knee, then stood up and left me alone to my self-pitying thoughts. I turned on my iTunes, plugged in my earbuds, and listened to the Smiths sing “Girlfriend in a Coma.” Luckily for me, having ADHD is akin to multitasking, so while Morrissey crooned, I started to formulate a plan.

It was time to throw another party. The theme: “Catch a Killer.”

Without a backward glance at Brad, I left the office and drove to my condo. My cats gave me a mixed welcome—Cairo hid under the coffee table, no doubt thinking I was an intruder. Thursby tried to attack my feet because he thought they were mice. And Fatman barely lifted his fat head from his place on the kitchen counter, probably because I wasn’t food.

I plopped down on my couch and switched on my blue netbook. My laptop was still in the old smoke-damaged office—I hadn’t had a chance to move it to the new barracks next door yet. My mini-computer would give me access to as much information as I could get before I took the next step.

I Googled “Bradley Matthews.” Apparently it was a common name, since over a dozen hits appeared. I narrowed down the search by adding “San Francisco” and “crime scene cleaner” and came up with nothing. I took out the job, leaving only his name and the city.

Bingo. An article appeared, dated three years earlier, no picture. What I read sent a shiver through me.

Bradley Matthews had killed a man.

I reread the passage slowly, making sure I hadn’t skipped anything important or misunderstood it.

Oh my God.

I knew it. Brad had been a cop. What I never would have guessed was that he’d killed an unarmed man. A disabled unarmed man.

That must have been devastating for him.

Was he kicked off the force? Or did he leave voluntarily? He had most likely suffered—was still suffering—from PTSD, posttraumatic stress disorder. Is that why he’d become a crime scene cleaner?

This bit of news took some of the wind out of my sails, but it still didn’t explain everything about Brad Matthews. Or anything, for that matter. It was hard to read between the lines of the article, but had Brad been some kind of renegade cop who shot first and asked questions later? If so, I’d better not make any false moves.

I checked the time. I couldn’t afford to waste another minute pondering Brad Matthews. I’d just have to watch my step and do what I had to do.

I Googled my interviewees one by one, but found nothing that offered a motive for murdering two women. In fact, the only thing they had in common was their interest in Treasure Island. It was no secret—at least on the Internet—that Spaz Cruz wanted to follow in the footsteps of George Lucas, whose film company basically owned San Francisco’s Presidio. Cruz wanted his own private island to house his cutting-edge computer graphics studio.

Siouxie, aka Susan Steinhardt, got plenty of Internet hits. She frequently made the papers in the name of some save the animals/earth/universe cause. Her current campaign was “Save Treasure Island.” I wasn’t sure whether she meant the flora, fauna, or possibly future marijuana fields, but she’d certainly brought awareness to the need for cleaning up the toxic chemicals left over by the navy.

And speaking of the navy, the name “Eugene Stadelhofer” garnered over a hundred hits, most of them citing his military service records—all glowing. No wonder Stadelhofer wanted to turn TI into a monument to his arm of the armed services—not to mention his bust. At least the pigeons would have a new place to poop. But I couldn’t find anything that linked him to germ warfare testing. My mother had probably confused him with someone else.

The only other person I still wanted to talk to was Dakota Hunter. His name Googled up as “chief” of the Gold Rush Casino in Calaveras County. In one article he talked about his desire to expand his Indian gambling empire into the mostly untapped and lucrative San Francisco Bay Area. Indian gambling clubs were hot and getting hotter. The only thing keeping more casinos out of the Bay Area was the lack of available land. Treasure Island would be the perfect place for his tribe to set up camp.

Aside from their interests in the island, I could find no other link to the mayor, still the most obvious suspect—at least to me. According to
Law & Order
, most spouses—and future spouses—are murdered by their not-so-better halves. Those TV shows were pretty accurate, weren’t they? There was still a chance Ikea knew something Mayor Green didn’t want exposed, and he killed her because of it. But why would he have murdered Andi? And why make me look guilty?

Under this cloud of suspicion, my time was running out. I had to get my party plan started. Much like gathering all the suspects in the parlor to unveil the killer, I’d gather a few key people at a GPS Treasure Hunt and maybe catch a murderer.

I pulled up
E-vite.com
, the online invitation service, and typed in the details, hoping the proposed guests would drop whatever they were doing and join me on such short notice, as in tonight.

After I finished working out the rhyme, I filled in the rest of the pertinent information:

Bad, bad party planner!
I admonished myself silently. Using the mayor’s name like that could get me in big trouble. No doubt he’d come after me—exactly what I hoped.

Taking a deep breath, I clicked SEND and watched as the E-vite shot out to Siouxie, Dakota Hunter, Admiral Stadelhofer, Spaz Cruz, and, of course, Mayor Green, along with a few other names that had been on the wedding party list.

If my party plan worked, the killer would show up to retrieve the clue alluded to in the cryptic invitation—and then I’d know for sure.

Let the fun and games begin.

 

I fed the boys, then changed into khaki shorts, an old “Bay to Breakers” T-shirt, and my skates. The fog was filling in the landscape, so I pulled on my SFSU hoodie. A skate around the island would relax my knotted muscles while I placed the hidden clues.

It took me nearly an hour, but after everything was in place—a fake fur wrap, a copy of one of Ikea’s books, and the “missing” gold earring—I skated back to the old barracks to move my smoky office supplies and party stuff to the building next door. When I arrived, Delicia was standing in front of what would be our new digs. She waved me over.

“What’s up, Dee?” I called, skating over.

Delicia took me silently by the hand and led me up the steps to Barracks C, an identical building next door to our fire-damaged barracks.

“What’s going on?” I repeated.

She said nothing, just led me through a matching reception area, down an identical hall to the first office on the right—what would have been my office in the old water-damaged building that still reeked of smoke.

Inside stood my other coworkers.

“Surprise!” they shouted, waving party flags, crepe paper streamers, and balloons.

I glanced from Raj to Delicia to Berk to Duncan. Behind Duncan stood Brad.

Grinning stupidly, I asked, “What’s this all about? My birthday was months ago. You missed it.”

“Voila!” Delicia stepped aside and waved an arm at the desk filled with my papers and the new shelves loaded with my party stuff. Hiding behind Raj was a big red ribbon on the open door.

I scanned the room. “Oh my God!”

Everything from my old office had been moved to the new site, right down to a fresh supply of chocolates in my drawer.

I turned to the gang, tears welling in my eyes. “You all did this? For me?”

“It was Brad’s idea.” Delicia beamed as if it were her own. “We just helped. He even hooked up the computers. We still need a few things—some of the furniture smells like smoke, and you lost a couple of those giant people cutouts, but we were able to save a lot.”

“Actually,” Raj said, “it was not too difficult. And you have done a lot for us, Ms. Presley. We were glad to return the favor.”