Snowmen In Paradise (Book 2 Tj Jensen Paradise Lake Mysteries) (19 page)

“But Chelsea c
ame in and messed everything up,” Kyle guessed. “Travis followed her out of the bar, and I imagine Albert felt obligated to follow after them as well, to ensure that Travis didn’t come to any real harm.”

“He did,” Dylan verified.

“So why didn’t he report what happened in the locker room?” Kyle wondered.

“Because he’d have to admit his own role in the affair,” Tj
said.

“Exactly
.” Dylan nodded. “He said he waited around until Chelsea and Sarah left, and made sure there was no real danger from the stab wound. He decided to let Travis sleep it off in his room, so he got the wheelchair and covered Travis with a blanket to hide the blood. He accessed the Inn thorough the back entrance, so no one even saw him come in. Then he used Travis’s room key, which was in his shirt pocket, to get into his room and put him safely into his bed.”

“So why did Albert confess now?”

“When he found out Travis was dead, he realized he might actually be responsible for the man’s death,” Dylan continued. “When he spoke to Tj, he realized she was suspicious of him. According to Albert, Tj is like a dog with a bone when she sets her mind to something, and if she’d set her mind to uncovering what happened, it would only be a matter of time. He decided I’d go easier on him if he turned himself in and confessed his involvement.”

“And will you?”
Kyle asked. “Go easier on him, I mean?”

“It
’s not really up to me. The guy knowingly drugged a man, something that may or may not have contributed to his death. He’s being transported to the larger county jail in Indulgence as we speak. It’s hard to say what the district attorney will do, but I’d be willing to bet he’ll take Albert’s cooperation into account.”

“I just thought of something
.” Tj sat forward.

Dylan smiled
. “I was wondering how long it would take you to figure it out.”

“Figure what out?”
Kyle asked.

“Albert said he went into the locker room after Sarah and Chelsea left
. He verified that Travis was alive before moving him
and
verified that Travis still had his room key, so Chelsea couldn’t have taken it and snuck in later,” Tj explained.

“
So Chelsea couldn’t have killed him,” Kyle finished.

“
Has Chelsea been released?” Tj asked.

“Not yet,” Dylan
said. “Boggs is dragging his feet, but I think Albert’s testimony will be enough to convince a judge to let her out on bail at the very least. I’d be willing to bet she’ll be sleeping in her own bed tonight.”

Tj took a deep breath of relief
. “Thanks for taking the time to tell me this.”

“I figured you’d want to
know. Now that I’ve shared it with you, I was hoping you might be inclined to share with me what you know,” Dylan prompted.

“What
makes you think I know anything?”

Dylan raised one eyebrow.

“I may have talked to Coach Parker and Jeremy Young today,” Tj admitted. “They both appear to have alibis, so I think we can take them off the list.”

“I concur,” Dylan agreed
. “I spoke to them as well.”

“I guess that le
aves Johnson, Sean Wright, and Pete Quinn,” Kyle said.

“
Barney Johnson loathed Travis Davidson about as much as I’ve ever seen a man loathe another, but as far as I can tell, he’s not our guy,” Dylan asserted.

“No?”

“He claims he was in the bar talking to Sean Wright and a few others, but then he left to head over to Mayor Wallaby’s office. He spent the next hour threatening to have him removed from office. I checked with the mayor, who corroborated his story.”

“Which gives Mayor Wallaby an alibi as well,” Tj concluded.

“Sort of,” Dylan answered.

“Why w
ould the mayor need an alibi?” Kyle asked. “Isn’t he the one who brought Travis here in the first place?”

“Yeah, but word around
the Antiquery, where I get most of my gossip,” Dylan teased, “is that he was partnered with him in some sort of business deal. What if the deal went sour?”

“You hang out at
the Antiquery to catch up on the latest gossip?” Tj had to ask.

“Certainly
. Serenity is a small town. The best way to keep tabs on what’s
really
going on is to have a cup of coffee and listen to the chatter of the women who make it their business to know everything there is to know. I stop by almost every day.”

Tj laughed
. “Now I’ve heard everything. So you said the meeting
sort of
gave the men an alibi?”

“
Just to be certain that the double alibi wasn’t intentional, I mentioned the meeting to Harriet, who I ran into at the Antiquery this morning, and she confirmed that it was a lively meeting indeed. Based on the time of death and the distance from town to Angel Mountain, either man could have returned to the mountain and killed Travis after the argument.”

“Did the men say where th
ey went after their argument?” Tj wondered.

“Johnson said he went home
. Unfortunately, he was alone in the house, so we don’t have anyone to verify his statement. Tim and Roy are questioning neighbors. We figure that someone might have seen him come home.”

“And Mayor Wallaby?”
Tj asked.

“The good mayor is being a bit more evasive
. He said he went to visit a friend, but he won’t divulge the name of that person. I told him that I couldn’t completely clear him as a suspect, and he said he wasn’t worried about it because he didn’t do it, and once we find the real killer, he’ll be cleared anyway.”

“Mayor Wallaby has a way with the women,” Tj
said. “He seems to prefer married women. He’s most likely protecting his newest mistress.”

“What about Sean Wright?” Kyle asked. “It seems he has the most to gain with Travis out of the way.”

“Sean was in the bar at Angel Mountain during the time Chelsea and Travis fought
. He told me that he witnessed the altercation, had another drink, and left shortly after they did. He claims he went directly back to your resort. I checked with members of the staff. Logan Cole remembered seeing Sean in the bar at around eight, but since we estimate that Travis died between five and seven, that doesn’t really help him. Sean would have had plenty of time to kill Travis and still be at the bar by eight.”

“And no o
ne else remembered seeing him?” Tj wondered.

“Not that we’ve been able to find
out so far.”

“I guess that does it for now.’’

“Are you sure you haven’t uncovered anything else?” Dylan asked.

Tj hesitated
. The last thing she wanted to do was make Dennis or Jenna mad, and if Dylan handled her news in the wrong way, mad was exactly what they’d be. On the other hand, she’d never known him to be anything but fair, and she had no reason to believe he wouldn’t handle the situation with sensitivity.

“It’s about the fire at Angel Mountain
,” Tj began.

“You mean the fire Travis started in order to destroy the evidence Pete Quinn has been using to blackmail him
?”

“Pete Quinn
has been blackmailing Travis?” Tj asked. “How do you know that?”

“I’m a cop,” Dylan pointed out
. “I go out and investigate. What did you think I was doing all day while you were coaching races and questioning suspects?”

Tj actually blushed
. It really hadn’t occurred to her that Dylan might turn up evidence in her absence.

“So why was Pete blackmailing Travis
, what did he have on him, and how is it related to the murder?” Tj asked.

“As you’ve already informed me,” Dylan
said, “Pete Quinn invested a lot of money in Travis only to have him renege on his agreement to act as a spokesperson for him after he made a name for himself. To make matters worse, Travis announced that he was in negotiation with Pete’s biggest competitor. It turned out Pete knew that Travis had taken steroids prior to last year’s nationals. Coach Parker wanted to cover it up, and Pete somehow helped him to falsify the official records. The original drug results were kept in a file in the admin office because Travis was still on the Angel Mountain team at the time, and Pete used his knowledge of them to blackmail Travis after he bailed on him.”

“So Travis
was in town to meet with sponsors and Pete used the files to threaten Travis if he signed with his competitor,” Tj guessed.

“Exactly
. Travis didn’t have access to the file, so he decided to burn down the whole building,” Dylan confirmed.

“How do you know that for sure?” Kyle asked
. “Travis is dead, and dead men don’t talk.”

“I know
it because a nice chap by the name of Josh Steinbeck told me that Travis had told him as much.”

“You talked to Josh?”
Tj asked.

“
This afternoon,” Dylan confirmed.

“But how did you know
to talk to him?”

“
I tracked Josh down to the hospital in Sacramento where his father is being treated for third- degree burns.”

“So that’s where he’s been
.” Tj sighed in relief. “We’ve been trying to get hold of him, but he isn’t answering his cell or returning calls.”

“He told me that he dropped his phone at some point and has
n’t been able to find it. He used the pay phone in the hospital to call in to work and had no idea anyone was looking for him.”

“Okay, let’s back up
,” Tj said, trying to wrap her head around the whole thing. “How exactly did
you
find Josh?”

“Af
ter my source from the bar told me about Josh’s reaction after receiving the phone call on Sunday evening, I decided to have a chat with him. The first place I looked was at the firehouse. They told me that he’d called in requesting time off for personal reasons. When he wasn’t at home and didn’t answer his cell, I pulled the phone records for the day and time Josh called the firehouse and found out the call originated from a hospital in Sacramento. I called the hospital and had him paged. Once I got hold of him, he was quite helpful.”

“
So we know that Travis called Josh on Sunday and confessed to starting the fire, and we also know that the man who was burned in the fire is Josh’s biological father,” Tj said. “We can assume that when Travis found out the man was injured, he felt bad and called Josh to apologize. What we don’t know is how Travis knew Bert was Josh’s dad.”

“Travis knew Bert was Josh’s father because Bert is also Travis’s father,” Dylan informed her.

“What?” Tj was stunned. “Josh and Travis are brothers?”

“Half
brothers,” Dylan confirmed.

Tj
had known that Josh’s biological father had had an affair that resulted in the birth of a child. That child must have been Travis. After Josh’s mother divorced Bert, he’d taken off and hadn’t been heard from for years. More recently, he’d returned to Serenity to try to establish a relationship with his son. It made sense that he’d have been in contact with both of his sons, and that they knew of each other’s existence.

“
Let me get this straight,” Tj began. “Josh and Travis are half brothers. Travis set the fire at Angel Mountain to destroy the records relating to his drug test, but I’m assuming he didn’t intend for anyone to get hurt. Bert, who was working in another building, saw the smoke and went to investigate. He tried to put out the fire with a hose while he was waiting for the fire department, but what he didn’t know was that someone had carelessly left dynamite from the recent avalanche control in the back room. The dynamite blows and Bert was seriously injured.”

“Travis, coldhearted bastard that he
was,” Tj continues, “actually feels bad about what happened to Bert and called Josh to confess. When Josh heard that Travis was responsible for Bert’s injuries, he took off to confront him. Then what?” she asked. “How did he end up in Sacramento?”

“While he was on his way to Angel Mountain
, he received a call from the hospital. The doctor he talked to told him that Bert’s injuries were serious enough that they were airlifting him to Sacramento. It looked like he might lose an arm, so Josh decided it was more important to be with his father during the surgery than it was to beat the snot out of his brother. He changed direction and headed down the hill.”

“And somewhere along the way he los
t his phone, so he used the pay phone in the hospital to call into work, never knowing that anyone was worried about him,” Tj finished.

“On the bright side
, he has an alibi for Travis’s murder on Monday,” Kyle pointed out.

“Yeah,” Tj
nodded, “there’s that.” She looked directly at Dylan, “I’m sorry. I should have told you about Josh right away.”