ILL-TIMED ENTANGLEMENTS (The Kate Huntington mystery series #2) (30 page)

As Skip stepped away from him, Rob looked down at the other man’s handkerchief in his hand. After a beat, he turned away to swipe at his eyes with it.

Another moment of processing and Skip decided the stab of jealousy he was feeling had nothing to do with Rob. He turned to Kate.

“Why exactly are you now
Kate
but I’m still Mr. Canfield?” he asked, in a deceptively calm voice.

But Kate hadn’t missed the touch of steel under the calm. Nor did she fail to notice that Skip’s jaw was tight.

Kate closed her eyes for a second and prayed for patience. She wasn’t sure how much more of this she could take in one day. Turning away from all of them, she went over to her customary chair.

Liz took her cue from that and gestured to the others to take their seats.

Kate was about to flash her friend a grateful smile, when Liz threw her to the wolves. “Yeah, I’ve been wondering why the good detective has been so open with us about the investigation.”

Kate sighed. “He wants to go out with me.” She could hear Skip grinding his teeth beside her. “I told him it was too soon, but I didn’t want to be too rejecting, so I agreed that he could call me in a few months. I guess he’s trying to stay on my good side.”

Skip turned toward her, a scowl on his face.

Kate just barely caught herself as she was about to take the Lord’s name in vain in front of Betty. “For Pete’s sake,” she hissed at Skip. “I’m
not
interested in him. I hate to use the guy, but it is nice to have a cooperative relationship with the police for a change.”

Skip’s tense expression only relaxed a little.

Arrgghh! Men!
Kate thought. At the moment life-long celibacy was starting to have considerable appeal.

Liz decided a change of subject was in order. “I researched chloroform some more today. Mostly colleges and universities use it, for research. But one of its uses is as a solvent, so some industries and institutions in the past used it for that purpose, to clean built-up gunk off of machine parts, for example.”

“So it’s possible that Joe might have access to some,” Kate said, grateful to have the focus off of her love life.

“Well, probably not from that source. Hasn’t been used that way for years, because it was discovered to be a carcinogen. But I did some digging on Joe, now that we have a last name for him. He has a police record, not just in Pennsylvania but in several other states as well. Mostly petty theft, barroom brawls and such. He’s been enrolled, off and on for the last couple years, at the Lancaster campus of Harrisburg Community College. And get this,
most
of the classes he’s taken have been science classes.”

“So he knows where the labs are and where they keep the controlled chemicals and could have stolen some chloroform,” Kate said.

“And Mr. Morris might conceivably have some, since he was a maintenance man for several decades,” Skip said.

“I’m afraid I didn’t get anything new out of Mr. Johnson,” Betty said. “I’m inclined to agree with Kate and Robert. He didn’t really know Jeff that well. And it definitely felt like he was trying to pump us for information about the investigation… I kept getting the feeling that he was angry, but was trying to hide it. I couldn’t tell if he was mad at Jeff Morgan, or just irritated about the questions I was asking.”

“Or that we weren’t satisfyin’ his curiosity,” Mac said.

“So he may have had something against Jeff, and was responsible for his death,” Kate said.

“Or he just wants to be in on the action,” Liz said. “I’m not having any luck researching him. I got several hundred hits for that name, and none of them seemed to be him.”

Betty excused herself and headed into the bedroom to get fresh clothes for the next day.

“I need to narrow down which Paul Johnson this guy is,” Liz said. “I’ll bet The Villages’ financial records have his social security number listed.” She got up and headed for the den and her computer.

“What’d I tell ya, Kate. She’s totally unrepentant,” Rob said, shaking his head as he followed his wife to attempt to rein in her felonious tendencies.

Skip saw his opportunity. “Rob didn’t want to say anything in front of his aunt,” he said quietly, “but somebody tried to run him down with a car a few minutes ago.” At the alarmed look on Kate’s face, he added, “He’s fine, but we all need to be extra alert. The killer’s still trying to…”

“Big, dark car? Older model?” Rose interrupted.

“Yeah.”

“Tried to run us down yesterday,” Mac growled.

“And the same kind of car almost hit me the day before,” Kate said. She stopped talking abruptly as Betty re-entered the room. Liz came out of the den, followed by a slightly limping Rob.

Kate anxiously looked her friend over. His clothes were rumpled and she spotted the grass stain, but other than the limp he seemed to be unharmed.

Rob noticed her perusal. He looked at Skip, a frown on his face.

Okay, this is really getting old,
Kate thought. Out loud she said, “Rob, can I ride with you back to the motel. Skip’ll take Liz and Betty with him. I need to talk to you about something.”

He looked at her for a beat. “Okay.”

A
s they walked to Rob’s car, Kate’s stomach growled quite audibly.

“Let’s stop somewhere for a bite,” Rob said. “Denny’s okay?”

On the way over, Rob told her about the research his staff was doing. “Hopefully they’ll come up with something I can use to pressure the Lancaster police chief into letting us take Aunt Betty home with us.”

Kate fervently prayed that they would because she had decided she was definitely going home by tomorrow evening. She wasn’t willing to be separated from her child any longer. And now, rather than helping Rob cope, her presence was causing him more stress, because of the tension between him and Skip.

Once they had ordered their food at Denny’s, Rob sat back and said, “So what’s on your mind, Kate?” She noted that he was wearing his court face.

Tired and hungry, she snapped, “Damn it, Rob! Get the stick out of your butt so we can talk about this like the friends we used to be.”

His face registered shock and hurt. “Used to be?”

Her chest hurt as he said those words back to her. “And will be again, once we clear the air,” she said more gently.

Rob lowered his eyes to the table. “I owe you an apology, Kate. Liz pointed out that I shouldn’t have run a background check on Canfield…”

“
Stop
calling him Canfield!” Kate made herself stop and take a deep breath.
Okay, one step at a time here.

“Apology accepted. Do you
get
why you shouldn’t have done that?” She heard the edge of anger in her voice and willed herself to calm down.

“Yes. It’s none of my business who you’re friends with,” Rob said, still not meeting her gaze.

Kate covered his hand on the table with her own. “I don’t agree. I’m glad you care enough to worry about me. And good friends should always feel free to point out if the other one seems to be doing something potentially harmful. And you did that. Now you have to trust that I know what I’m doing.”

Rob wrapped his big hand around her fingers, as he raised his eyes to meet hers. “This may piss you off but I’ve gotta say it anyway. You and Skip are not
just
friends, and if you think you are, then you’re the only one who’s being fooled.”

Kate sighed. “We are currently friends but, yes, there’s definitely some strong interest in taking things to another level, on
both
of our parts. But I told him it’s too soon and he’s respecting that.”

“What about… what I found out?” Rob asked. He let go of her hand as the waitress arrived with their food.

Kate waited until she was gone to answer him. “I’m not going to violate Skip’s confidence. You’ll have to take my word for it that there’s a good reason why he blew up at his boss and quit the state troopers.”

“What about the job instability?”

“That
is
none of your business, Rob. That’s Skip’s business.”

The pain in his face at the sharpness of her tone made her drop her eyes. She stared at the burger on her plate. She didn’t even remember ordering it. Her stomach roiled at the sight and smell of the meat.

Rob’s voice was low. “Dear God, Kate, I never meant to bring us to this, where we’re waltzing around each other…”

She covered his hand again and gave it a squeeze. As her stomach grumbled, then heaved a little, she said, “Can I have a quarter of your sandwich? I can’t eat this burger. It’s too heavy.”

He handed her the peace offering.

She took a bite of the turkey club, chewing slowly. Her stomach settled down some.

Thinking she was changing the subject to a safer topic, she said, “Skip told us about the car. Are you sure you’re okay? You were limping earlier.”

Kate noticed the flash of annoyance in Rob’s face. “Banged my knee up some, but I think it’s okay. I’m not convinced it wasn’t just a resident whose driving has deteriorated.”

“Rob, I was almost run down by a similar car a couple days ago, and Mac and Rose had a close call with him yesterday.”

Rob frowned as he processed that. “So the killer hasn’t moved out.”

“Or they moved out but are still nearby.”

Kate ate another bite of his sandwich while she had a short internal debate. Should she let it go? No, there was too much at stake here, and the whole point of this conversation was to clear the air.

“Why the annoyed look a minute ago?” she asked.

“What do you mean?”

“I assume you’re not annoyed with me for asking if you’re okay. So you must be annoyed with Skip for telling us.”

“I asked him not to say anything because I didn’t want to worry Betty.”

She narrowed her eyes as she saw the subtle signs on his face. That wasn’t necessarily a lie, but she was fairly sure it wasn’t the whole truth.

“Which is why he waited until Betty was out of the room, and as it turns out, it’s a good thing he told us right away. Now we all know about the other near misses and we know they were intentional. So why are you annoyed with him?” Kate finished off the quarter of his sandwich as she watched him closely.

“I’m not. It’s good that he told you.” His expression was a little too innocent.

“But you were annoyed, a minute ago. Why?”

“Because…” Rob stopped.

Kate leaned forward. “Rob, are the words, ‘because he had no right to’ hovering in the back of your mind, by any chance?”

He pressed his lips together. The fact that she could read him so well could be damned irritating at times.

“Why wouldn’t he have that right, Rob?” Her voice was almost conversational, as she picked up another quarter of his sandwich and took a bite.

“Okay, what if I asked you not to tell Liz something? You would respect that request, wouldn’t you?” Even as he was talking, a little voice in the back of his head was warning him that he was digging a hole under himself.

“Yes, I would.” Kate put the sandwich down. “Because she’s your
wife
, so you have the
right
to ask that.” In a gentler voice, she added, “What gives you the right to ask Skip to not tell
me
something?”

He dropped his eyes, then reached out and swiped one of her fries. He ate it slowly while he sorted out his thoughts.

After a moment, he looked up, a chagrined expression on his face. “Damn. I wasn’t this bad when the girls started dating.”

She smiled. “You were probably more consciously aware of what was going on then. This snuck up on you while you were focused on other things.”

“I
really
owe you an apology, Kate. I’ve been a bit of a jerk.”

She cocked an eyebrow at him.

“Okay, I’ve been a total ass about it.”

She chuckled. “Apology accepted.”

They breathed out a big sigh in unison, and then laughed together.

“And I guess I’m applying a double standard here,” Rob said. “Since I just got pissed at you for keeping something from me.”

She grinned at him. “I was going to let you slide on that one.”

“It’s human nature, though, isn’t it? To want to protect the people you love,” he said, in his own defense.

“Natural,” Kate agreed. “But not always wise.”

Her stomach grumbled. The queasy feeling had subsided and hunger was reasserting itself. “You want half of my burger since I ate half of your sandwich?” she asked.

Rob nodded, and she cut the burger, transferring half to his plate. As she took a bite, he asked, “So, Kate, what’s really going on here between you two?”

She looked at him while she chewed, trying to decide if he was ready for the truthful answer to that question.

“Kate, please. We used to be able to just blurt out what we were thinking. I’m just asking what are you feeling about this guy?”

She put down the burger and wiped her mouth with her napkin before answering him. “Honestly, Rob, I think I’m already half in love with him.”

Rob froze, his half of the burger partway to his mouth. “Oh,” was all he could think of to say. After a beat, he asked, “How do you think he feels about you?”

“I’m fairly sure he’s about at the same place.”

“Really? What makes you think that?”

“Because between all the interviewing and avoiding falling pots, we’ve been doing a lot of talking. We haven’t blatantly said how we feel out loud, but we’ve agreed that the potential is there for us to have a really great relationship. So neither of us wants to blow that by rushing into things.

“We’ve even talked about how hard it is, for both of us, to resist the physical attraction. It was his idea that we implement a four-foot rule.”

“Which is?”

“We have to keep at least four feet between us at all times.”

Rob thought about that for a moment, then asked, “Uh, is it okay if I play devil’s advocate here?”

“I guess,” she said a bit hesitantly.

“So he’s not just interested in your body. Could he be interested in your money?”

“Okay, that’s a bit insulting on several levels. I think I’m a pretty good judge of character, Rob, and I know Skip doesn’t have any ulterior motives. He’s interested in
me
. Besides, I haven’t even told him about Eddie’s insurance yet.”