Loose Lips (12 page)

She didn’t move.

“I’d ask you to come with me, but it isn’t
inside. It’s just in the shed, and a shed’s a shed.”

She looked a bit disappointed, but still
didn’t budge.

“Okay, then, I guess I’ll just shut—” I
reached up to pull the back gate down so I could lock the Jeep and
my borrowed treasures inside while I went to get the second
box.

Laura stopped me. “Don’t worry about it. Abi
and I will wait for you. That way you don’t have to mess with
trying to unlock your car with your arms full. I was going to take
a few more pictures anyway.” She rose up on her toes and looked to
the right, in the direction of the bed and breakfast.

A little suspicious that maybe Laura wasn’t
out photographing flowers, and hoping Phyllis didn’t decide to peer
out a window while her
WIL
buddy was around, I thanked her
for the offer and scooted off to get the second box.

It was heavier than the first, but I was
motivated. With it pressed against my gut and chest, I walked as
fast as I could back to the Jeep.

Laura and Abi were still there as promised,
and my box was still inside. Eager to get back to my shop and share
my loot with Betty, I thanked Laura for her help and fired up my
rig.

As I drove off, I could see Laura in my
rearview mirror, her body pointed toward the bed and breakfast, her
camera up to her eye and her hand moving to zoom in on something
that I couldn’t see.

Once again, I hoped Phyllis kept her nose
out of sight. Or if she was caught, didn’t mention that I’d already
discovered her whereabouts.

The police, I’d learned, could be quite
snippy about not being informed of little things like a prime
suspect hiding out right under their badges.

o0o

Back at my shop, I unloaded both boxes and
plopped down on the floor to happily go through the contents.
Kiska, ever hopeful for a treat, wandered out of my office and
shoved his head into the second, heavier box. He was in up to his
shoulders and trying to go deeper when Betty came up behind him
and, placing both hands on his collar, tugged him out.

“Unless that’s cast iron in there, I
wouldn’t trust it with that dog.” Kiska knocked his head against
her thigh, telling her she was free to leave. She squinted down at
him. “I’m not even sure about iron. If it was smaller than a
T–bone, he’d make a good try at getting that down too.”

I was about to object to her unfair
statements, which made my pet sound like some cross between goat
and trash compactor, when the back door to my shop opened.

During store hours, I never locked the door
that led out into the alley, and customers were free to use it or
the front, but almost everyone except Betty, Phyllis and I used the
front. Even Rhonda tended to come in the front.

I looked up at Betty. “Phyllis,” I mouthed.
Then went back to sorting through my box, or pretending to. I
wasn’t sure how I was going to play Phyllis returning, especially
since I hadn’t told Betty that I had come across the third piece of
our complete set at the B&B.

Except it wasn’t Phyllis who walked in.

It was Klein.

My head dropped back between my shoulders
before I realized what I was doing.

The detective’s gaze washed over the three
of us and the boxes, seeming to take in every nano–detail that
existed, or might exist.

I licked my lips and started formulating a
story – about what I wasn’t sure, but there was something about the
detective’s regard that told me that I was going to need one and it
better be good.

He stopped six or so feet away from us and
studied Kiska. “Your dog looks better.”

Kiska, still in Betty’s grip, grinned.

He knew when people were talking about
him.

Feeling at a disadvantage sprawled on the
floor, I scrambled to my feet. “He is.”

“Did you figure out what he ate?”

I shook my head.

Klein’s head moved up and down ever so
slightly, but I could tell it wasn’t because he was agreeing with
me. More as if he was taking in what I said and fitting it into
some missing spot of a puzzle he was trying to solve.

“Is that your Jeep out back?”

I frowned. He knew it was. Not only had he
seen me with it, but he could easily have run my plates. Not to
mention the “I <3 My Malamute” magnet or the “This Vehicle Stops
At All Yard Sales” sticker.

In my experience, the police asking you a
rhetorical question was not a good sign. Not that that mattered. I
didn’t have a reason not to answer him. “It is.”

“Mind if I look inside?”

Now this I knew I didn’t have to do, and
since Phyllis’ laundry was still inside, I wasn’t all that keen on
complying. Not that Phyllis was big on monogramming her tops or
labeling her underwear as far as I knew. I tapped my finger against
my leg. I wasn’t a fan of confrontation, but I could tell by his
casual stance he was settling in for the long wait. If I didn’t
either comply or muster up the
cojones
to flat out say no,
he’d probably still be standing there when my parents arrived this
summer.

But if I said no, he’d get all pushy and ask
why and maybe even call in Peter.

The smart thing to do would have been to say
no and then, if he insisted, call Avery Gregor, a local attorney
who had had the pleasure of representing me the last time the law
and I crossed.

The two of us stood there silent for a good
five minutes. It was long enough that Kiska wandered over to sniff
Klein, decided the detective was treat–free and continued his
wanderings into my office. Betty glanced from me to the detective,
shook her head and went back behind the desk where she fired up the
computer and began tapping away.

Finally, I crossed my arms over my chest and
sighed. “Why do you want to look inside my Jeep?”

He stared at me, and I knew he wasn’t going
to answer.

Twisting my lips, I thought some more. Now
he had me wanting to look inside my Jeep, but if I went out there,
he would most certainly follow. And while he couldn’t poke around
inside without my permission, he could look through the door and
claim he saw whatever he expected/wanted to see.

I twisted my lips again, this time the other
direction. I dug my keys out of my pocket and stomped out the back
door to my Jeep. Klein followed. I walked around the vehicle a few
times, peering in the windows to see if anything looked amiss.

Then I walked twenty feet away and called
Peter.

“Klein is here. He wants to look inside my
Jeep.”

I could almost hear Peter gritting his
teeth. “Call Gregor.” Then he hung up.

Ten minutes later, Peter and Klein were
standing in the parking lot that sat on the other side of the
alley. Neither moved much. No waving of arms. No jumping up and
down. Not even a nod or a shake of a head to give me a clue as to
what direction the conversation was going.

I had called Gregor, and he was on his
way.

Another twenty minutes, and he actually
arrived.

I saw Peter watch him as he got out of his
car and lumbered in my direction. Some tension that I hadn’t
realized he was holding escaped from my boyfriend’s shoulders and a
few minutes later, Klein and Peter had stopped their conversation
to join the attorney and me.

Gregor didn’t waste time on pleasantries. “I
understand you would like to look inside my client’s vehicle,
Detective...?” He tilted his head in question at Klein.

The Chicago native didn’t bother introducing
himself. “I would. Unless there’s some reason she doesn’t want me
to look.”

Gregor chuckled. “There is. It’s called
right to privacy, along with illegal search.”

“Nothing illegal about probable cause.”

Peter’s head jerked at this. Gregor chuckled
again. “If you had probable cause, the Jeep would already be
open.”

“No, see, I was being polite, but since Ms.
Mathews saw the need to call an attorney, I figure nice alone isn’t
going to cut it.”

Klein’s level gaze and steely voice made me
want to run inside and hug my malamute, but it didn’t seem to
rattle Gregor in the slightest. Peter either. It did get his
attention, though. He stiffened again.

Klein turned to me. “Ms. Mathews, I have a
search warrant for your Jeep. Could you open it up, please?”

Sure enough, he pulled a piece of paper out
of his pocket. Before I could reach for it, my attorney already had
it in his hand.

I didn’t have to wait for his ruling,
though. I could tell by Peter’s expression that the thing was
legit. My boyfriend had probably known Klein had one when he left
the police department. It’s probably why he came. To make sure
there was time for Gregor to arrive before Klein got me to open the
Jeep. Peter knew I was going to need him.

Feeling more than a little sick, I nodded my
head and unlocked the Jeep.

He started with Phyllis’s laundry which had
conveniently tumbled out of its bag, or been helped out of its bag
by a certain nosy malamute. Klein dropped each piece on the ground
only pausing to give me one questioning glance as he placed a pair
of floral print capris on the stack.

Definitely not my style, but Klein didn’t
know me well enough to know that. I smiled and tried to look
girly.

Peter, however, was a different story. He
stiffened and his gaze shifted to me, but only for a second. By the
time Klein had moved on to my glove box, all signs of my
boyfriend’s potential suspicions were gone.

The glove box turned up nothing more
interesting than a dried up bottle of white out and about twenty
markers that I guessed were equally as useless.

Undeterred, the detective stood and studied
the remaining contents of my vehicle. With a slight shake of his
head, he pulled on a pair of latex gloves and dug under the
driver’s side seat. Chip bags, soda cups, and hamburger wrappers
quickly formed a hill on the ground next to Phyllis’s laundry.

I crossed my arms over my chest and let out
a humph. The gloves were unnecessary. All of the items were
perfectly clean. If they hadn’t been, they wouldn’t have been in my
Jeep at all. Kiska would have eaten them.

When the pile on the ground brushed up
against the bottom of my rig, Klein walked around to the
passenger’s side and repeated his efforts.

Gregor muttered into my ear. “What’s he
going to find?”

Besides more trash and possibly the almost
new tube of mascara I was pretty sure rolled out of my drugstore
bag last week when I hit a particularly gruesome pot hole, I had no
idea.

Finally, Klein stood again. I turned to
glance at Peter to see if he had any idea what it was Klein could
be looking for and immediately heard my attorney mutter again.
“What’s that?”

I swiveled back, just in time to see Klein
pull out a pill bottle and hold it up to the light. After reading
the label, he pinned me with those watery gray eyes. “Still sure
you don’t know where Mrs. Cox is, Ms. Mathews? Or do you want to
admit to stealing this prescription?”

A half an hour later, I was sitting in a
plain gray box of an interview room. Recently renovated, but still
gratingly institutional. I stared at the mirror, which I suspected
was two–way,, and tried to look calm.

The door opened. Gregor and Klein walked in.
Leaning to the side, I was able to catch a glimpse of Peter and
George standing in the hall. Peter, busy arguing with someone out
of my range of view, didn’t see me, but George did. He gave me a
thumbs up.

Reassured that my support team was still
there, supporting, I settled back upright into my seat and smoothed
my face back to calm.

Klein placed the pill bottle on the table so
I could read the label. Phyllis’s name was indeed on it, along with
a brand name that I recognized from many TV ads that featured a
well–rested woman strolling on a beach.

Phyllis, it seemed, had insomnia.

I sighed.

He tapped the lid. “Have you seen this
before?”

Phyllis and I weren’t in the habit of having
sleepovers. “No,” I replied.

“But I found it in your car.”

I made a face. This wasn’t something he had
to tell me. I’d been there. I had to assume that it had come out of
the bag along with her laundry, but since I couldn’t exactly admit
that I was hauling around Phyllis’s laundry because that would lead
to other questions like when I had procured said laundry, I pressed
my lips together and tried not to look pained.

Seeing my expression, Gregor cleared his
throat. Unfortunately, Klein had caught the look too. He
smiled.

I pulled in a breath to re–find my calm. “I
didn’t put it there.”

“Did Mrs. Cox?”

Phyllis had never been inside my Jeep. The
thought of her sitting in one of its dog–hair covered seats was, in
fact, laugh–out–loud funny.

I started to shake my head. My attorney
stopped me by leaning forward, placing his elbows on the table and
crowding me out so that I had no choice but to sink back against my
chair.

“Ms. Cox is my client’s business partner. It
is highly likely she could have left her medication in my client’s
vehicle at some point in the past.”

Klein picked up the bottle and shook it.
There was no telltale rattle. “Medication or bottle? Was there
medication in here when you last saw it, Ms. Mathews?”

Again Gregor cut me off. “My client has
already said that she hasn’t seen the bottle before. If you have no
more questions...” He hoisted his considerable girth up and shoved
the chair back with his legs as he stood. It screeched as it slid
across the concrete.

We’d almost made it to the door when Klein
called out. “The bottle was empty, and your dog was poisoned. I
called the vet. This drug could have done that. If I were you, Ms.
Mathews, I’d be wanting to have a very serious conversation with my
business partner about now. That is, of course, if you really don’t
know how the bottle got into your Jeep.”