PENITENCE: An Andi Comstock Supernatural Mystery, Book 2 (95,893 words) (30 page)

“Too much?” Andi ventured.

Jack smirked. “Anyone ever tell you that you’re the mistress of understatement?”

Maybe, but Andi would be damned if she’d admit it. “Did you get anything viable from what she said, at least?”

“You mean other than the fact that she’s a liar? No.”

Andi’s expectations deflated. “I was hoping she’d dispense some pearl that would….” Now that she thought about it, she couldn’t really remember why it had seemed so urgent that she be involved in that interview, or that she redirect it to suit her own needs. “I’m sorry, Jack. Next time, I’ll ask you directly.”

“Don’t bother, because we already know you don’t pay attention when I say
no
. If ever even the smidgen of such a thought enters your mind again, kick it to the curb, because whether you ask me or go to the LT behind my back again, there ain’t gonna be a next time.”

“I said I was sorry.”

“I know, and I appreciate the apology, but I wish to God the whole fiasco had never happened.”

Andi didn’t agree. If not for her questions to Helen, she might not have learned that Davis MacLeary’s wife was related to Clem, although how that fit in to anything concerning the hitman Clem had hired to kill Denise, she had no idea. She considered offering a third apology, but decided against it.

Jack, however, apparently wasn’t ready to let the issue drop. “Things might have worked out okay if you hadn’t started giving her the Andi Inquisition about Clem. Why’d you do that, anyway?”

Andi thought about it for a moment. “Honestly, I’m not sure. It was like the devil made me do it or something.”

He aimed his frowny face at her again. “Really? You can’t just accept culpability?”

Suddenly feeling miserable about her actions, Andi said, “I do accept responsibility for what I did, but really, I don’t know what came over me. I felt compelled to ask her those things, so I did.”

“You made me look like an idiot.”

As soon as she realized he was dead serious, she said, “I didn’t mean to, Jack. I never gave a thought to how she might perceive you as an officer of the law if I butted in with my questions.”

“That was obvious.”

“How many times do I have to say I’m sorry? What can I do to make it up to you?”

“Promise you’ll never do it again.”

Andi couldn’t make that kind of promise, except with a caveat. “I’ll try.”

“You’d better do more than that, Andi.”

“I’ll try super hard.”

He stared at her a few moments longer, then grunted.

She took that for acquiescence, and from her perspective, decided it was time to let the issue drop. At least for now. “Thanks for staying the night with me. It couldn’t have been comfortable for you, sleeping in the chair. You should have climbed into bed with me.”

“It wasn’t that bad.” He stood and leaned over her, gently pushing her hair aside so he could examine the knot near her temple. “Icing it must have helped. The bump is diminished considerably.”

Andi raised tentative fingers to examine it. “It does feel smaller.”

“Are you hungry?”

“I don’t know yet, but I am thirsty and my body is screaming for more ibuprofen.”

“I’ll get you some. You want to stay in bed or move into the living room?”

She thought about it for a minute. “Since you’re giving me options, I’d like to get up.” Things were still left unfinished between them and the conversation might fare better from an upright position.

Five minutes later, he had her situated on the sofa with the blanket tucked around her. “I can scramble some eggs or make pancakes.”

“You go ahead and eat. I might have something later.”

“Remember what the doctor ordered.”

“I will, but I’m not hungry right now.”

“How about a glass of OJ, at least?”

“I can probably handle that.”

Jack fixed his breakfast and ate sitting on the floor on the other side of the coffee table.

Andi said, “Don’t you need to go to work?”

“I called in a sick day.”

“But you’re not sick.”

“True, and since the LT knows the situation, she authorized me to look after you.”

“What situation?”

He froze with his fork halfway to his mouth. “The present from whoever it is that hates your guts enough to maybe want you dead.”

His frank appraisal of
that
situation had the effect of dousing her with cold water.

“For a moment, I’d forgotten about it.” Andi rearranged herself into a sitting position. “Before we dig into that, do you mind if I clear the air a little more about yesterday?”

“Be my guest,” he said, his eyes steely again.

“I went to EPD yesterday morning to ask about a note on my police report concerning a witness to my car crash who hadn’t yet given a statement. Helen MacLeary, FYI, but then you already know that now.”

He let out a sigh.

Andi took it as a sign to hurry her explanation along. “I happened to run into Stacy while I was talking to Officer Stark. She informed him that she’d have
you
talk to Helen. Off the cuff, I asked if I could accompany you, given that I’m the one who’s been conversing with dead people these days.” He opened his mouth to speak, but she put up her had to forestall him. “It never occurred to me to track you down and ask you again.”

“You weren’t thinking, that’s why.”

“It was a spur of the moment idea, Jack. I repeat, I was not circumventing you.”

“Actually, you were.” He clenched his jaw a couple of times, then scooped up the last of his eggs.

Andi conceded the point with a nod. Deep down, she had known better.

Jack remained silent and finished his toast.

“Is that all you don’t have to say?”

He used his napkin, crumpled it, and tossed it onto his plate. “No. I realize I was a butt to you yesterday, but you have to understand this from my perspective. I’m a cop. I don’t take civilians along with me when I’m talking to witnesses or perpetrators. Because I didn’t know the full story, I may have overreacted and for that, I apologize, but, Andi, in the future, you absolutely can’t tag along while I’m working.”

“Okay.”

“That’s it? Just
okay
?”

“I’ve already said I’m sorry about a gazillion times, and for the record, I don’t like it when we’re not getting along.”

“I don’t, either.”

“But we should be able to compromise somehow.”

“Agreed, although at the moment, I don’t see how that’s going to be possible, since I will never agree to you riding shotgun with me while I’m working.”

She took hope from the fact that he was injecting humor into the conversation again. “We can start by discussing things ahead of time.”

He shot her an incredulous look. “You mean you asking me once and me saying no wasn’t having a discussion ahead of time?”

Andi managed not to squirm, though she knew darn good and well that she was the guilty party on the discussion issue. “Do you want me to pinky swear that I won’t do it again?”

He shook his head, fighting a grin. “Like that would do any good.”

She lifted a shoulder, working hard to suppress a grin of her own. “A girl can change her ways, you know.”

“I’ll believe that when I see it.”

She tilted her head at him, determined to prove her point. “Don’t you want to know how I came by the stuff on the table?”

“Damned straight I would.” He lifted an eyebrow at her. “As you may recall, it wasn’t me who decided revisit a conversation we pretty much had just an hour ago.”

Andi chose to ignore his somewhat mocking observation. “Someone knocked on my door. When I looked through the peephole, no one was there. I went to the deck and got the license number off of a car leaving the complex. Later, I got brave enough to go out and look.” She pointed over her shoulder in the direction of the dining table. “That’s what I found.”

Jack’s gaze followed the direction of her finger.

“I took pix with the digital before I touched anything and I used the dishtowel to pick up the toy car and my gloves to remove the note from the door.”

“Nancy Drew at her finest,” Jack noted with amusement. He pushed himself up off the floor and picked up his plate.

Andi trailed after him, holding tight to the blanket. She took a chair at the dining table. He cleaned up his breakfast dishes before he sat down across from her. He stared at the crushed toy and the note, giving away nothing with his expression.

When he looked up, she wasn’t quite sure how to read him. “Interesting, don’t you think, that whoever left this did it the same day we paid a visit to Helen MacLeary?”

“Damned interesting, but completely unrelated,” he said, picking up the piece of paper with the license plate number on it. He pulled out his phone and hit a speed-dial number. “Got a plate I need you to run,” he said to the person who answered. “I’ll wait while you do it.”

Not two minutes later, he jotted down four words. Reading upside down from her spot on the other side of the table, Andi’s brow knitted.

The car belonged to Orion’s Belt, or more specifically, Orion Lee. She raised her eyes and met Jack’s intense blue gaze, which at the moment resembled the turbulence of a blustery sea.

“Thanks,” he said to the party on the other end and disconnected. “WTF?”

“We have two small SUVs in the lot with the Orion’s Belt logo on them. They’re for transporting computers when we make product presentations at trade shows or other events.”

“You didn’t notice that the vehicle you saw was emblazoned with the Belt’s logo?”

“No, I heard the car start up and I ducked inside really quick to get the binoculars. All I saw of it was the tail end, which is what I focused on to get the license number.” She shook her head. “I don’t understand. Why would someone from the Belt leave something like this on my doorstep?”

“I can think of two good reasons.”

“Two?”

Jack nodded. “First, you got hired on and managed to take a game app that was, by all accounts, in the toilet and make it viable. Orion and Vaughn expect it to put Orion’s Belt in the black, in a big way.”

Andi knew her partners were relying on her, but it was weird hearing Jack voice their expectations. “And second?”

“Vaughn and Orion formed a partnership and included you as the third partner. You’re not just a co-worker anymore, Andi, you’re an equal boss of the operation.”

Andi stared a
t
Jack, bewildered. The implication that someone she worked with hated her guts...how could that be? She got along great with everyone at Orion’s. Granted, she wasn’t besties with any of them, but she thought she knew them well enough to notice whether or not anyone held some kind of grudge against her or felt animosity toward her.

“Where are the keys kept and who has access to the vehicles?” Jack asked.

“There’s a small room on the first floor. Everyone calls it the mail room, but aside from the mail cubbies and outgoing mailbox, it’s where timecards are kept, along with wall hooks for building and car keys. The room isn’t locked and there’s a clipboard hanging next to the keys for signing vehicles in and out. We have to note the time taken and our destination before we leave and when we come back. We also have to record the date and time returned, the mileage, and any gas purchases. Anyone who’s conducting offsite business can use a vehicle.”

“Did they do a DMV check on you when you started?”

“Yes. As far as I know, everyone has to have one.”

“I need to get down there and check the log sheet.”

Andi frowned. “If Orion wasn’t out of the country, I’m sure he’d let you walk right in and do that, but the receptionist won’t, unless I’m with you.”

“You’re sick and you’re not going outside.”

“I can bundle up, and besides, I feel a lot better this morning.”

He gave her a look. “Andi, in case you hadn’t noticed, it’s snowing outside and I repeat, you’re sick.”

“I did notice, and I promise, I’ll dress warmly. We can park on the inside lot in Orion’s spot, since he’s not here. We’ll hustle ourselves inside the building with hardly a snowflake landing on us.”

“Ain’t gonna happen. Compromise, remember? Call Brent and tell him I’m coming. He can meet me at the door.”

Andi didn’t like being told what to do, but she knew Jack was right. On two counts. She’d agreed to compromise and she had pneumonia. She didn’t need to be out running around, super-sleuthing. She decided to give in, but offered him a small pout to let him know she wasn’t happy about it.

He smirked back at her, his eyes lit with mirth. “I won’t be gone that long.”

“I’m sure you won’t.”

He hesitated. “I’m going to ask you again, and I need to really think seriously about it before you answer. Who down there might go to these lengths to threaten and harm you?”

Andi mentally visualized each co-worker. She’d met Ted, Susan, and Lacey on the first day. They were the sound designer, writer, and artist, respectively, and they’d given her a warm welcome. So had Brent, who was her supervisor. She’d met Margaret, who handled marketing, later, but they’d also hit it off. Aside from those five, there were twelve additional employees, including an HR person, three more programmers, two quality-assurance techies, and three others who had the same job titles as Susan, Lacey, and Ted. She got along with everyone, although now that she thought about it, one person did give her weird vibes. “I do seem to have offended someone at Orion’s, but for the life of me, I don’t know why.”

“Who?”

“His name is Rico Fontaine. He’s a game coder, like me. He worked exclusively on Wild Hare when it was still called Bunny Hop.”

Jack tapped his pen against the tabletop. “I suppose you could say that you took his job away from him, then.”

“No, I….” Andi reflected on all the encounters she’d had with Rico over the past few months. Had any of them been friendly or positive? Not that she could recall. “I guess I must be dense, because I never thought of it that way. Brent said he was going to put Rico on another game that Rico and one of the other programmers had proposed. They’re still in the developmental stages.”

“Orion must not be holding out much hope for it. He told me, and I quote, ‘Wild Hare is going to put the Belt on the map.’”

Andi shrugged. “I’m not sure I agree with him, but he’s supposed to know what he’s talking about, right?”

“You would hope and Vaughn agrees with him. Don’t you think all the positive hype around you and Wild Hare might piss off the programmer who was working on it before you showed up?”

“I guess it might, but…why? He makes a much higher salary than me because he’s been there since Orion started the company.”

“I think your new partner salary will trump his, don’t you?”

Andi bit her bottom lip, considering that. “I keep forgetting that I’ll get more pay as a partner, but salary aside, he does have one other great game to his credit.”

“Great but not wildly successful?”

“I suppose not.”

“Aren’t you the only female coder there?”

“Yes.”

“And now you’re essentially his boss.”

“Jack, do you really think he’d have that kind of hostility toward me?”

“I don’t know, Andi. I haven’t met him, but I can tell you that people kill for a lot less.”

“He hasn’t tried to kill me!”

“Really?”

Andi frowned.

“Think about it. Whether it was Fontaine or not, the two notes and the hit-and-run are connected. Otherwise, why would someone leave
this
exact threat on your doorstep? In fact, how would whoever ran you off the road even know how to find you, unless he or she had access to your personal information?”

Andi didn’t want Jack to be right, but all the bits and pieces of her car crash were beginning to coalesce into a quagmire of cow excrement.

“What better place to get your address than from your personnel file? Security seems pretty lax down there, from what you’re telling me. I think I’d better have a talk with the HR person, too, just to see if any requests have come in about your address or if anything’s looked out of place recently.” He pushed away from the table and stood.

“That would mean that files were accessed in her absence.”

“Essentially.”

Andi planted her elbows on the table. “This is starting to get depressing.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you feel worse.”

“It’s not your fault. You have no control over someone wanting to hurt me.”

“True, but I do have control over stopping his sorry ass. Or hers.”

Andi smiled at him. “You’re a regular knight in shining armor.”

He wiggled his eyebrows at her. “Just doing my job, ma’am, fighting for truth, justice, and the American way…although in your case, I admit to feeling even more determined than usual about bringing this shithead down.”

Andi stood, disentangled herself from the blanket, and went to slide her arms around his waist. She rested her cheek against his chest. “Thanks, officer. I just love it when you talk cop to me.”

“Happy to oblige, ma’am. I’d kiss you to show my appreciation, but your sister-the-doctor said to lay off the mouth-to-mouth with you for a week.”

Andi pulled back, staring up at him. “A week? Really?”

He planted a kiss on her forehead. “Yep, so for now, we’ll have to be satisfied with” —he grinned— “other ways to show our affection. When you feel better, that is.”

“I feel just fine,” Andi groused, though she really didn’t.

Jack gave her a squeeze and grasped her shoulders, setting her away from him. “Gotta go, sunshine. Want me to bring you back anything?”

Andi didn’t have to think twice about it. “Another strawberry shake and some Twinkies.”

Jack laughed. “I don’t remember Natalie telling you to eat junk food while you’re recovering.”

“It’s not junk food,” Andi informed him. “Twinkies are comfort food. If I can’t have kisses, I need comforting.”

Jack shook his head. “Okay, a shake and Twinkies it is. Don’t forget to call Brent and tell him to expect me, and phone me if you think of anything else you need or want.”

She waved him off, the word
phone
ringing alarm bells in her head.

. . .

Andi had promised Jack she’d rest while he was gone, but that didn’t mean she had to climb back into bed.

Instead, she went to her home office in her pajamas and rebundled in the blanket. She didn’t normally imbibe in a nice hot toddy on an empty stomach, but she figured it would soothe the cough she seemed to be developing.

Once her laptop booted up, she searched first for
wife swapping
, wondering why she hadn’t looked it up before. She learned immediately that wife swapping reflected a sample of couples’ sexual activities, but the players, in general, were known as
swingers
and they engaged in anything remotely connected with sex. Participation in such groups was purported to be growing, extending beyond couples to include single women, and sometimes single men, all of whom could be either hetero or bi.

She also learned that to be called
vanilla
meant you were a non-swinger. At least as it pertained her, Andi thought wryly, Helen had that part right.

Several of the articles she read claimed that swingers swapped to improve or keep their own marital relationship on an even keel. Andi wondered how that was even possible. She would never agree to share her man with anyone.

Losing interest in swingers and their idiosyncrasies, she plugged
Helen MacLeary
into the search engine.

Result after result went on about what a wonderful, caring woman Helen was, constantly doing this for the community, and that for the community. How on earth did she make time to go to swinger parties? Though she soon tired of reading about Helen’s vast altruism, Andi persisted. At the bottom of page six of the results, she vowed that article would be her last on the amazing St. Helen of Edgerton.

Andi’s lips curled into an ironic smirk, wondering what Father Riley would think of a saintly reference being bestowed on a woman whose virtue was a facade.

Five minutes later, she stared at the screen, flabbergasted. She reached for her phone and dialed Denise. She barely heard her say
hello
before she blurted out, “Why didn’t you tell me Helen had been married before?”

“Andi? Is that you?”

“Yes. Please, Denise, answer the question.”

“I don’t know. I guess I didn’t think it was relevant. Shall I give you a complete family history?”

Andi ignored the sarcastic overtone of Denise’s suggestion. “No, but I want you to tell me what happened to Helen’s first husband and if she had any children with him.”

“His name was Glenn Fontaine. He was a building contractor who specialized in custom homes. They were married for nine years and had two boys. Being a hands-on builder, he was on the roof of the house he had under construction for his family, installing vents. He’d taken his oldest boy up with him and neither one of them were tied off. Glenn slipped and accidentally hit the boy, according to one of his crew. Both of them fell from a second-story height. The boy died instantly. Glenn passed a day later.”

“Oh, no. That’s so sad. So the second child, that was a boy, too?”

“Yes.”

“What was his name?”

“Enrico.”

Andi almost took a breath of relief, but then it hit her. Could it be possible? “Did they call him Rico, by chance?”

“Yes. How did you know?”

Andi didn’t have the energy to go into it, especially since she had more questions for Denise. “I’ve been reviewing all my notes and I made a calendar of the timeline for Clem’s communications with The Liquidator. I need your input to know if any of it’s important.”

“Okay.”

“Did Clem ever take his laptop to work?”

“Never.”

“You’re sure?”

“Positive. Where’s this going, Andi?”

“I’m not sure yet. Who might’ve had access to his laptop?”

“Helen used to look stuff up on the Internet sometimes, and now that I think of it, so did Rico.”

“Were Davis or Helen in the house any time between December first and Clem’s death? I mean, I know Davis died at the end of December, but after that, did Helen come over?”

“They came over together a couple of times before Christmas, and since the day of Clem’s funeral, she’s been here several times. I don’t remember if I told you, but we hosted a brunch following the funeral. A lot of people came for that.”

“Including Rico?”

“Yes. They’re all family, remember?”

“All right, let me get this straight. Davis and Helen tried to solicit you and Clem to their swingers group. You declined and severed ties with them. Davis and you subsequently went head-to-head over a survey-slash-land-use thing. Clem met with Helen trying to figure out a way to get you and Davis to play nice together again. They approached you one more time about swinging with them, you both said no, and the estrangement continued.”

“I suppose that’s correct, in a nutshell sort of way. I’d say it semi-continued, because Davis still came around for….”

Ah, yes, Davis in pursuit of Clem. “Have you spoken to Helen lately?”