Laina Turner - Presley Thurman 09 - Romance & Revenge (4 page)

“Sure,” I said
, giving it to him.

H
e programmed it in his phone and said, “I’ll call you. Nice to meet you, Katy. Talk to you soon, Presley.” Then he hurried off.

“Now that is a very attractive man,” Katy said
as we watched him walk away. “How come I haven’t heard you mention him before?”

“Nothing to mention.
Like I said, he was the lead detective when my boss at Silk died. We just had a professional relationship.”

“I would say he has more than just a professional interest in you, Presley,” sh
e teased and I shook my head.

“I doub
t that. He’s just a really nice guy and if I remember right, he has a serious girlfriend.”

“But that was a long time ago. A lot can change over time,” she said. 
“You heard him, he’s been trying to get ahold of you. There has to be a reason and if it’s not professional then …”

“You’re nuts.”

“I’m just saying.”

I felt my phone buzz and looked to see a text from Jared.

“Jared said Sally can meet us in a couple hours except now that will put us smack in the middle of our meeting with Peter. Maybe we can make it closer to five,” I said to Katy and texted Jared back.

“Sure. Will that still leave
us time for checking out the shoe store before meeting Peter?”

“
Yep, Ok. Jared said five was fine. So let’s go shoe shop.”

Katy loved the shoe store as much as I did, but agreed that it was way too expensive for her budget. It was just fun to look. So fun, in fact, we lost track of time and ended up rushing to meet Peter.

A few minutes after two we found the Stargate. It wasn’t at all what I had imagined and no wonder I hadn’t heard of it before. It was pretty much a dive bar of which there were quite a few in Chicago and some even had a following. Cool for being a dive, but this didn’t look like one of them. It was very run down on the outside and half the neon on the sign was burned out. We walked through the door and our eyes took a few minutes to adjust once we stepped inside. Once I could see again, I saw a group of men sitting at a table in the corner. Besides the bartender, they were the only ones in the place, so I assumed Peter must be sitting at the table and headed in that direction. Katy and I got to the table and they stopped talking and all looked at us.

“I’m looking for Peter.”

A man, late thirties I’d say, sandy brown hair and brown eyes said, “That’s me. You must be Presley?”

I nodded and he stood up and motioned for
us to follow him over to a booth a few feet away.

“This is my friend Katy. I hope you don’t mind if she sits with us.”

“Of course not. The more the merrier,” he replied and by his attitude and the pungent smell of liquor coming from his mouth when he talked, I was pretty sure he was drunk. But then who could blame him. His girlfriend just died. Everyone had their own way of handling things.

“Can I get you ladies a drink?”

“Sure,” I said, thinking he might feel more inclined to talk if we were also drinking.

He waved the waitress over and said, ”I’ll have another scotch and whatever these ladies would like.”

“House white. I’m not picky,” I said.

“Make it two,” Katy added.

When the waitress walked away I thought about how I should open the conversation but there was no need as Peter just bluntly laid it all out there.

“So why d
o you care that my girlfriend was killed?”

“We, uh, well … like I told you on the phone she worked with our friend Jared and he’s very upset by it, as are all the other people she worked with. We just wanted to know what happened. And if there was anything we could do.”

His eyes filled with tears and it almost made me want to cry, I felt so bad for him.

“I don’t know how this could happen,” he said finally. “We had dinner, I took her home, but didn’t stay long because we both had to be up early, and then the next morning the police called. And she was dead.”

“Did the police give you any information?” I asked gently, not wanting to seem callous.

“About how she died?”

I nodded.

“They didn’t really say much. They asked a lot of questions about where I had been all night. I got the feeling I
’m a suspect. Luckily, I have a friend crashing at my place for a few weeks who can vouch for me. I was home all night.”

“So they didn’t give you any indication of how Becky was killed,” I said, and could feel Katy kick me under the table. She probably thought I was being
mean asking it so bluntly. But he didn’t seem that affected by it. Especially since the waitress had dropped off our drinks and he was almost done with his. Alcohol could be a great temporary pain killer.

“Not really. They asked me if she had any enemies and who might have keys to her place. They did say there weren’t signs of a break-in.
But other than that, not much. I know they cleaned out her medicine cabinet, because I had some migraine pills I had left at her house and they asked me about them.”

“Did Becky have any enemies that you knew of?”

“No. Everyone loved Becky. She was a bookkeeper for goodness sake. Not a cut throat job that would attract enemies. She was quiet and nice to everyone.”

Apparently not to everyone, I couldn’t help but think.

We chatted for a few more minutes but I was starting to think this was a waste of time in the sense he didn’t have any information. Katy and I finished our wine and made our way to leave.

“I appreciate you talking to us, Peter
, and I am really sorry for your loss.”

“Tha
nk you,” he said and we slid out of the booth. We started to walk away when Peter said, “Someone she used to work with contacted her a couple weeks ago and she seemed upset by it.”

I turned around. “Who?”

“I can’t remember her name, but someone who had retired a short time ago.  Becky talked to her on the phone a few times and I overheard one conversation that got pretty heated. I asked Becky what it was about and she just said work stuff.  She wasn’t one to bring work home so I didn’t ask anything else. Sorry. You don’t think that could have anything to do with her being killed, do you?”

“I don’t know but it could be something. Did you tell this to the police?”

“No. I just remembered. Should I?”

“It would probably be a good idea.”

“OK,” he nodded and went back to his drink.

When we got outside and my eyes readjusted to the light, I dug my phone out of my purse to call Jared.

“I wonder who this retired person is who Becky was talking to?” I said to Katy, as the phone was ringing.

“Voicemail,” I s
aid annoyed. I hated voicemail so I didn’t bother to leave a message.

“We’d better hurry if we are going to make it on time to meet Sally,” Katy said, looking at her watch.

“Crap! I didn’t realize we spent so much time in that bar with Peter.”

“It was so dark, I couldn’t tell.”

“No kidding. Look, there’s a cab,” I said moving as fast as I could in my high-heeled boots.

We got in the cab and headed back the direction we had come to meet Sally.  The cabbie let us off at the corner the Starbucks was on and we quickly made our way to the front door. The wind had picked up and it was freezing.
I was definitely ready for a cup of coffee.

Chapter 4

“What are you going to say?”
Katy asked.

“Not sure.
I just want to pick her brain.” I opened the door and stepped in.

Sa
lly was already there drinking coffee and reading something on her Kindle.  I told her we’d join her in a second and we ordered our drinks and went to sit down at the table she was holding for us.

“Presley, it’s so good to see you,” Sally said, standing to give me a hug
and looking great as usual in a dark gray sweater dress with a black belt and black leggings. Riding boots, black of course, completed the outfit. I loved those boots.

“You, too, Sally. I think the last time was at Muldoon’s after you guys landed one of your big accounts. That was at least four months ago. I like
how you have your hair.” She had cut it short since the last time I had seen her and it suited her. Not a style I could ever pull off. My auburn hair was too thick and wavy and if I cut it short, it would be a fuzzy mess. I needed to be able to pull it up when the climate wasn’t cool and dry.

‘Thanks. I got tired of
blow drying it and just decided to chop it all off. Much easier to deal with,” she said, running her fingers through it. It was blond and shiny and I was envious.

I made the introductions and
once the pleasantries were over with, I asked her what her thoughts were about what was happening at Sleeping Bear Designs.

“Jared said on the phone you wanted to talk to me about
this, I don’t really know if I can help. This whole situation is distressing,” Sally said. “I can’t fathom something happening to Sleeping Bear Designs nor can I imagine who would do such a thing.”

“Do you think what’s happened is just coincidental?” I asked.

“I wish I thought that was the case, but I know that it’s too much to be coincidental, I just can’t even imagine how it’s not. None of this makes any sense,” Sally said, and I could tell she was very distraught.

Jared had told me I should talk to Sally because he said he was sure without a doubt that she had nothing to do with anything that would be detr
imental to Sleeping Bear Design and as upset as she was, I could see why he felt that way. Sally was an account rep who had worked for the company for over ten years. She was the top producer and had the best relationships with clients. He had told me she was the most knowledgeable about the business and area industry and that the owner had instilled a lot of trust and confidence in her.

“What do you think is happening?”
I asked.

“Someone in our company
, or maybe someone who is friends with someone in our company, has to be giving the competition our ideas and designs. There’s just no other way our exact ideas could be getting out otherwise. But since it’s been different companies who have upstaged us I’m not sure what someone would have to gain. I could better understand if it was just one company and maybe one of our employees was working to get hired somewhere else, but that’s not been the case. Which just makes it look like someone wants to take down Sleeping Bear Design in general and I have no idea why anyone would want to do that. It’s not like we are the biggest competition in town and there is plenty of business in this city for everybody. This whole thing is baffling.”

“Are there other marketing companies who would benefit if you went out of business?” I asked.

“No specific one comes to mind. This is a big town and there are a lot of companies our size. If we folded, it’s not like one firm would pick up all our work. And even if that were the case, we aren’t some billion dollar company. Realistically, clients would go to several different places so I don’t see any one company ready to gain anything. It just doesn’t make sense. I’ve been working here for a big chunk of my professional career and I couldn’t imagine something happening to the business.   John’s dad has worked so hard to grow it to what it is today and to have this happening and an employee murdered…”

“I can’t make any promises, but I’m sure together we can all get to the bottom of this,” I said, wanting to be optimistic. I hated the thought of people worrying about their livelihood. Money
and jobs were the worst to worry about. That I knew from experience.

We sat and chatted for a while longer, but Sally didn’t have any helpful information
about Becky either and finally I ran out of questions to ask. Usually in cases like these you knew of someone who had it out for you, but there didn’t seem to be any clear situation like that here.

We finally left and went back out into the brisk air to walk home. One thing I liked about living in the city was the ability to walk most places. It was good exercise even though on days like today quite chilly. It jus
t made me walk faster and I needed all the exercise I could get.

I forgot all about
seeing Willie until later that evening when we were sitting around having our favorite meal of wine and popcorn— my version of a well-balanced meal —and my cell rang.

“Hello?”

“Presley? It’s Willie.”

I looked at Katy and Jared and pointed to my phone and mouthed,
“It’s Willie.”

Katy smiled and whispered,
“I told you so.”

“Hi, Willie. I didn’t expect to hear from you so so
on.”

“I didn’t want to wait another year or so before getting
in contact with you. I was wondering if you were free tomorrow night.”

“Yeah, I think so. Katy is visiting from out of town
, but we don’t have plans.”

“Then I would like to take you out.
And Katy, too, of course. I wouldn’t want you to leave out your friend.”

“I
’ll have to talk to her and see what she wants to do, so let me do that and call you back?”

“Sure. Just let me know,” he said.

I hung up and looked at Katy. “He wants to take us out tomorrow night.”

“How does that not surprise me? I told you he liked you!” Katy said to me
, laughing.

“Seems to me you thought he
was pretty handsome back when you first met him, “ Jared joined in.

“You guys stop. He’s a really nice guy
and I admit cute.”

“But…” Katy said. “It sounds like you have a
‘but.’ Come on, out with it.”

“Nothing,” I said. “It just seems weird. You know, going on a date.”

“If I go with you, it’s not so much like a date but just friends hanging out. So nothing weird about it. So no problem there. Call him back and say yes, or I will,” she said and grabbed for the phone, which I playfully kept out of her reach.

“O
K, OK. I’ll call him back.” I walked into the kitchen so I could call talk in semi-private. I did think Willie was a nice guy and good-looking. Yet Katy was right. There was a ‘but.’ He was all that, but he wasn’t Cooper.

After confirming with Willie that Katy and I would love to hang out tomorrow night, I walked back into the living room and sat down. Grabbing my wine off the coffee table before tucking my legs under me and leaning back.

“Jared, tell me more about the person Becky replaced who retired.”

“
Glenda? She was actually John’s dad’s assistant for years and years but she also did the bookkeeping. When it got to be too much to handle we hired Becky and she picked up a lot of the duties from Glenda. She finally took it all over when she retired, which was almost a year ago, when John’s dad retired.”

“Peter said she had called Becky a few times and he overheard them arguing.  Can you think of any reason why they would be arguing?” I asked.

Jared shook his head. “I didn’t know Glenda was in contact with anyone from the office. She couldn’t wait to retire and get out of here. Why? Do you think it could be related to Becky’s death?”

“I don’t know. It just seems odd
for them to be arguing after Glenda was already retired don’t you think? Besides we don’t have anything else to go on right now.”

“
How do we find out what they were arguing about?” Katy asked.

“Peter didn’t
know and Becky’s dead. Maybe we should ask Glenda? Jared, do you know how we could get a hold of her?”

“I can find out first thing tomorrow morning. It’s too late to be calling people tonight,” he said, looking at his watch. I looked at my phone and saw it was almost midnight.

“I didn’t realize it was so late. I need to get to bed,” I said and drained the rest of the wine from my glass.

“See you in the morning.”

“Good night,” Jared said while Katy said she was right behind me. Jared was a bit of a night owl and was always staying up late so said he would see us in the morning.