Sudden Vacancies (7 page)

Chapter 18

A few of the people who had died a few days earlier at the Paradise Hotel had ordered flowers from Tommy’s florist shop. However, investigators found that two of the crime scenes showed the presence of several toxic compounds. Subsequent testing showed the toxins were on the flowers.

The most important toxin that was identified at the crime scenes was Scopolamine or ‘Devil’s Breath’ as the Colombians call it. Used for years in native rituals and by criminals, it is from a plant that grows naturally in Colombia. Once ingested or inhaled by the unknowing victim, they soon lose all control of free-will, became dizzy and prolonged exposure could even incapacitate the victim

It was clear that anyone who wanted to use Scopolamine on plants would probably do so as a means of trying to incapacitate them and to make it easier for someone to be murdered.

The police department went through the florist shop after this material was discovered. A few of the bouquets that were already assembled showed traces of the toxin. The toxin didn’t seem to be isolated to one type of flower, and no source of the toxin was found.

The compound created a slight odor when individual flowers were examined. Combined in a large bouquet the smell would blend with that of the flowers and while noticeable, it would not be cause for true concern. It was relatively acidic and infrequent contact with contaminated flowers would produce an irritating sensation to those exposed, but not enough to warrant investigation. However, prolonged or confined exposure to the toxin could render the victim defenseless.

The big question in the minds of the investigators was whether Tommy was responsible for the toxin’s presence.

It had become clear that the murderer was someone within the hotel. Therefore, it was necessary to follow up every lead. Did Tommy intentionally poison the flowers and was he responsible for taking the life of several people? If so, what was the motive?

The police chief and district attorney were ready to prepare an arrest warrant at a moment’s notice. The question was whether it would be worthwhile to actually arrest Tommy now, or just question him and then wait and watch.

*****

“Mr. Williams?”

“Yes, sir?”

“My name is Michael Young; I’m the detective in charge of the investigation at the Paradise Hotel. I’d like to have a few words with you about some of the recent activities that have been going on around here.”

“What do you need in particular?” Tommy had seen the police going over every inch of the hotel, and had been delayed in finishing up the day’s orders as they searched the flower shop for several hours. He hated to seem impatient, but he had work to do.

“Well, we recently received the toxicology reports back and it appears that you have been selling flowers that are laced with chemical materials that can easily cause people to become disoriented and even lose consciousness. Now we don’t want to worry you, but we believe there is a link.”

Detective Young paused and waited for Tommy’s response. When he saw none was forthcoming, he continued, “We’ve found that these flowers in particular have come from your florist shop. Would you like to talk with us about this?”

Tommy was startled. He had no idea what the man meant. “Are you accusing me of having anything to do with the deaths of those people?” he responded. “I mean, I don’t even know much about what is happening here. I mind my own business and stay in the flower shop.”

“Well, we’re going to need you to explain why this toxin is showing up on the flowers that have come from your shop, aren’t you?”

Tommy didn’t have any immediate answers and willingly accompanied the detective to one of the meeting rooms being used to conduct employee interviews. He wasn’t arrested, but was taken into custody for a few hours as the forensics team took a closer look around the shop. There had to be some kind of a clue as to what was going on.

*****

The police department completed their search of the florist shop, including the flowers that had been removed from the coolers due to spoilage and were destined for disposal later that day. The flowers that were to be disposed consisted of many items—roses, tulips, daffodils, chrysanthemums and many others in a large variety of colors.

Most of these flowers starting to wilt or their leaves were beginning to brown at the edges. Their colors were fading and some pedals were falling off. The forensics team inspected all of the discarded flowers, but found no traces of the toxin.

Investigators were puzzled by this, assuming that poisoned flowers would be the first ones to be discarded. However, that was not the case at all.

It turned out that the flowers that Tommy did have for sale and was currently stocking up on contained the toxin. While some of the flowers only had negligible amounts of Scopolamine on them, it was still a serious problem. Anyone who bought one of these flowers would be at risk of being harmed and more vulnerable to injuries or attacks.

As the investigation went on, the police had to turn away several clients who came to pick up their flowers. The police informed people that they would receive full refunds on their orders and that the flower shop was being investigated as part of the murders that had recently taken place.

Chapter 19

“Mr. Williams, how do you explain this?”

“What do you mean? I didn’t know about any of this stuff on these flowers! I’d been working with the same vendor for the last couple of years and I’ve been getting shipments twice each week. I was supposed to get one later today too.”

Upon hearing this news, Detective Young arranged for the new shipment to be delivered as normal and tested. If this shipment didn’t contain the toxin then it would prove that Tommy might legitimately be a person of interest.

However, all shipments that were coming into the hotel were being screened with security purposes in mind and there was no way to isolate the flowers from other employees. Therefore, the police department was forced into screening these flowers off-site.

A full toxicology screen was run on the flowers and they all showed the presence of the toxin. Although this seemed to point towards someone other than Tommy being responsible, the police department still wanted answers.

“We need to talk for a moment,” Michael said. “What can you tell me about this vendor that you’re getting your flowers from?”

“It’s the same vendor that my family has been using in Akron. Do you want to call them about it?”

“I don’t know that I need to talk to someone else buying these flowers. I’m more interested in getting direct answers. In fact, if I try and contact this vendor right now then maybe I’ll get something.”

Tommy had been using Rose City Flowers as his vendor for years. It was the same company that his sisters were using because they found that the vendor was extremely effective in terms of getting more flowers out without delay.

The vendor was based out of South Korea. Many of its flowers were located in the northern part of the country and had hundreds of acres of land for growing them. Its state of the art shipping methods helped to make it easier for these flowers to survive while in transit.

However, there had been recent concerns over the security of their fields. That’s because the field’s northern-most border was only two miles away from the designated border with North Korea.

Michael used the phone directory in Tommy’s office and located the vendor’s number. However, the office’s lines were jammed with several people at the same time. Was this because people were just trying to order flowers or was it because the office was shoddy and didn’t have enough lines for all its vendors to get in touch with?

While Detective Young was trying to get through to the flower vendor, Tommy got a call that really changed things. That is, a call that Tommy would have normally taken was received. Since Tommy was still technically in police custody, Michael took the call on his behalf.

While waiting to dial again, the phone rang. He chose to answer the phone himself. Tommy told him that he’d take care of it but Michael overruled that. After all, he was the one who was in charge here with the investigation.

A plain Midwestern accent came from the other end. “Hey Tom, what’s going on?”

“Excuse me, this is Michael, Tommy is not here at the moment. Is there a message you want to leave?”

Obviously, he did not want to say anything about him being associated with the police or else he might startle the caller.

“Yeah, I wanted to know if he’s okay and if he got the same funny smells out of his flowers as we did. I even talked with another florist in Detroit that uses the same exchange about it. They have the same vendor and they said they had the same smell in their flowers.”

“Okay, thanks for letting me know, I’ll pass that over to Tommy as soon as I see him.” Detective Young’s suspicions grew even more. Were there other places in the country that had contaminated flowers and dead people as a result?

Determined to get some answers, he tried the vendor’s phone number again.

“Rose City Flowers, Andrea speaking.”

“Hello, madam, this is Michael Young and I am a detective with the Columbus Police Department here in Ohio. I’m working on a case involving flowers that are contaminated with a toxin. The florist gets his shipments from your warehouse. A shipment was delivered today and all of the flowers in it were contaminated as well. What can you tell me about this?”

“Well, we have received several calls from people complaining about a strange odor coming from their flowers from recent shipments. We hadn’t been aware of any issues until yesterday and our phones have been ringing off the hook ever since.

“We’ve been told that some local forensics offices have scanned these materials and three of them say they contain Scopolamine or at least something like it. We honestly don’t know what’s happening here.

“We get our flowers from South Korea and they are shipped here into San Francisco before we take them out to florists like the one you might be calling from.”

This announcement was a surprise to Michael; he honestly thought Tommy was hiding something. “Well, I’ll need you to provide me with a list of florist shops that also received flowers from the same shipment in the last week. “

After arranging for the company to fax over the list, he inspected the website for Rose City Flowers—and didn’t come up with anything suspicious.

After looking up information on the florists that work with Rose City, he spent two hours getting in touch with eight different florists from around the country who worked with that vendor. All of them said the same thing—their recent flower shipments had been contaminated with some unusual materials. In addition, two of them stated that their flowers were indeed hit with Scopolamine according to police reports. This included one case where a man fell ill after leaving the florist with flowers and ran his car headfirst into a roadside guardrail, killing him.

It was clear to see that Tommy was just caught up as an innocent bystander in this mess. Eager to follow up on some other leads, he left the florist shop. “Well, you’re good to go,” Michael said to Tommy.

That was the last thing Michael said to him; Tommy assumed that he was off the hook.

Chapter 20

Tommy was not aware that his sisters were dealing with the same problem until two weeks after the investigation. Detective Young had disrupted Tommy’s life, but that was inconsequential. Only the facts mattered. So is the life of a police detective—the detective always makes sure that the facts come out even if it means ignoring the emotional needs of a person who is in distress. In this case, he didn’t have much of a need for Tommy.

Tommy Williams was officially cleared from the investigation after he was released. The police found that he was ignorant to what was going on and that he had absolutely no idea about the use of Scopolamine in any of the plants that he got for sale.

Tommy began to think about what was going on at the hotel after the investigation—what had he gotten himself into? Is this really what happens at the hotel? Is he really being an accessory to people around here? Or maybe it’s just the vendor that’s a problem; after all, not every part of South Korea was immune to the North’s influences.

Either way, it was clear that he needed to change things in order to be happy. The events of the last several days had shaken his confidence in his life choices. He definitely needed to change flower vendors, the sooner the better. But was there more going on here? Was it a need to change the hotel and the way things were being done in the flower shop…or was it a need just to change who he was and where he was headed?

It was a sick world out there; it certainly wasn’t something that Tommy really felt happy about. While he was never a real moral authority on things going on around him, he worried that life might have been better if he had just taken a completely different direction.

“Maybe I should have stayed in Akron,” he said to himself. Since he didn’t know that his sisters were dealing with the same issues, he began to seriously consider giving up the flower shop and moving back home. No more wading through the prostitutes when he parked down the block. No looking over his shoulder to make sure there wasn’t someone waiting in a dark alley to steal him blind. No – Akron was a much safer place. Why had he ever left?