Allergic to Death (25 page)

“What is it then?” Mertz’s crystal blue eyes got even icier, if that was possible. Gigi shivered just looking at them.

“Research.” Gigi tilted her chin up and looked him straight in the eye.

“Research?” Mertz looked far from convinced. “I thought I’d already mentioned that the police have closed the case?”

“Then why am I getting threatening letters?” Gigi gestured toward the note still open on his desk. “Someone is spooked. Spooked enough to try to stop me.” She raised her chin another notch and continued to glare at him.

To her surprise, he nodded agreement. “You’re right.” Now he was the one looking her straight in the eye. “Someone is running scared.” He picked the note up and let it flutter back to his desk. “And I’d like to know why.”

“So would I,” Gigi said, but she mumbled it under her breath, and Mertz didn’t hear.

“But I don’t want you”—he pointed a finger at her to emphasize the
you
—“doing any more so-called research.”

He looked frighteningly stern, his brows drawn together straight over his ice-chip eyes, mouth set in a grim line. But Gigi sensed something different buried deep underneath—a warmth that all his posturing couldn’t completely obscure.
She felt an answering warmth grow in the pit of her stomach, and a tiny smile played around the edges of her mouth.

“Does this mean you’re going to reopen the case?” Gigi fiddled with the strap of her handbag.

Mertz pursed his lips and tapped the note with his forefinger. “Not necessarily. But we’re going to look into this note.” He tapped it again. “Where were you when you found this?”

“At the theater. I’d stopped to deliver everyone’s lunch.”

“Who is
everyone
?”

Gigi closed her eyes to think. “Well, Adora for one. She’s the lead in the play the Woodstone Theater group is performing. Then Emilio was there, too.” Gigi hated having to bring up Emilio’s name, but Mertz would probably find out anyway. “Also Alice, and Barbie and Winston. Alice and Barbie are in the play, and Winston was there to have lunch with Barbie.” Gigi thought for a moment. “Oh, and Sienna, but she doesn’t count.”

“Why doesn’t this Sienna count?” Mertz scowled across the desk at her.

“She’s my best friend, and there’s no way that—”

“The first thing you learn in police work is to never rule anyone out.”

“But she was with me the whole time, except of course when—”

“Yes?”

Gigi shook her head. “No, Sienna couldn’t have had anything to do with it.” She crossed her arms over her chest definitively. “Do you think this means someone thinks I’m getting close to something?”

“Close to something? Yes,” Mertz said. “But what, I’m not sure. Is there anything else you can tell me?”

Gigi hesitated. Should she tell him about Martha’s purse? Would that mean he might take this more seriously?

“There’s the matter of Martha’s, er, purse.” Gigi tried not to squirm as she met Mertz’s direct gaze.

“What about her purse?”

“Well you never did find it, did you?”

Mertz sighed, took the top handful of file folders off the pile on his desk and began to sort through them. He picked one out and replaced the others. He glanced up at Gigi and then opened the file.

He skimmed the first page and put it to one side, his index finger scanning the lines on the second sheet of paper. “There’s nothing here”—he looked up at Gigi again—“about a purse. Nor”—he flipped through several more pages—“is a purse mentioned in the list of contents of the car.”

“That would be because it had been stolen.” Gigi suddenly realized that Martha had crashed before getting to the police station to make a report about the theft. “It happened while she was at the theater.”

“A lot seems to be happening there,” Mertz muttered half under his breath as he closed the file and replaced it on the stack at his elbow.

“I think the person who stole her purse wanted to make sure she didn’t have her EpiPen. It’s not a pen really, but an—” Gigi stopped short when she saw Mertz’s expression.

“I know what an EpiPen is.” If possible Mertz was sitting even straighter than before. “If that’s true, then this is beginning to smack of foul play.” He scribbled something on a notepad. “But how do you know Martha carried an EpiPen in her purse?” He looked up suddenly.

Now Gigi was squirming in earnest. She couldn’t think of any way to explain what had happened without bringing Mertz’s wrath down on her head.

“I happened to find the purse.” She looked at him through her lashes to see how he was taking it. Not good. His face
had become a dangerous, dusky red color, and his brows were drawn down low over his eyes. Gigi felt sweat trickle down her back even though she was sitting directly in the flow from the air conditioner that was wheezing away in the window.

“When did you find the purse?” He said the words as if there were a period after each one—slow and deliberate—never taking his eyes from Gigi’s face.

The trickle of sweat became a torrent, and she wiped her damp palms on her thighs. “It was a couple of days ago actually.”

“And you’ve only now decided to tell us about it?”

Gigi nodded, trying to think up a reason for the delay and failing. She decided to take the offensive. “The police certainly haven’t been very interested in Martha’s accident until now.” She tilted her chin higher.

“That could be because certain members of the public were keeping things to themselves,” Mertz said through gritted teeth, although Gigi thought she saw the ghost of a smile pass quickly over his lips before submerging in his frown.

“Well, I did find it. And her EpiPen was in it. I think someone sprayed peanut oil on her food and then took her purse so she wouldn’t have the medicine to counteract her allergic reaction.” She drew herself up to every single millimeter of her five feet five inches. “I don’t think Martha’s death was an accident at all.”

“You might be right.” Mertz scribbled some more notes on his pad, then tossed his pen down on the desk. “Where is this purse of Martha’s now?”

“At my house,” Gigi admitted weakly.

“And where did you manage to find this purse?” Mertz
leaned forward as if he were extra anxious to hear her answer.

This was the bad part. Gigi squirmed even more. “We found it in Martha’s yard. Hidden in some bushes,” she said quickly, hoping that if she glossed over it, he would do the same.

“Who is
we
?” The quizzical look on Mertz’s face looked relatively benign, but Gigi knew better.

“Sienna and me.”

“And just how did you end up being in Martha’s yard? I’m assuming Martha was already dead and hadn’t invited you for a garden party.” Mertz’s lips tilted upwards very briefly.

“True.” Gigi traced a circle in the carpet with her toe. “Actually, Sienna and I happened to be walking Reg by her house, and he pulled us onto the lawn and began foraging in the bush. Reg is the one who found the purse.” Gigi spoke really fast so that all the words ran together. She felt her face getting hotter with each syllable.

“I’m not going to ask you what you were doing walking past Martha’s house. I don’t want to encourage you to lie to an officer.” This time Mertz’s smile lasted an entire two seconds before disappearing. Surely a record, Gigi thought.

“I suppose your hands have been all over it?” Mertz gestured toward Gigi’s own purse. “And your friend Sabrina’s as well?”

“Sienna. Her name is Sienna.”

Mertz shrugged. “Do you mind if I keep this?” He lifted the note from his desk and waved it around.

Gigi shook her head.

“I’ll need the purse as well.” He looked at his watch. “Would three thirty be okay?”

“Three thirty? For what?”

“For me to pick up Ms. Bernhardt’s purse from your house.” He said the words slowly and patiently, as if for a child.

“Oh. Yes. Of course.”

Chapter 17

Gigi’s doorbell rang at exactly three thirty
P.M.
She jumped, even though she knew Mertz was coming. As a matter of fact, she’d washed her face, redone her makeup, put her hair up, taken it down, put it back up again, and changed her clothes twice. She was exhausted.

He looked as tired as she felt and stood visibly drooping on her steps when she yanked open the door. He straightened immediately, and Gigi felt her heartbeat go into overdrive.

“I hope I’m not keeping you,” he said, glancing at Gigi’s outfit.

She realized she must look as if she were dressed to go out, and she knew her face was as red as the geraniums in the pot next to the door.

“No. Not at all. I was just about to finish dinner prep and then load up the MINI for my deliveries.” She pulled the door wider. “Won’t you come in?”

He stood awkwardly by the front door, hands clasped behind his back. Gigi wondered if the man ever unwound.

“The purse is in the kitchen.” She gestured toward the back of the house. Mertz followed her closely down the hall.

She’d put Martha’s purse on a chair by the kitchen table. Mertz cringed when she picked it up.

“What’s the matter?”

“We might be able to get some fingerprints off the bag—after we eliminate yours, of course.” That last was tinged with the faintest sarcastic edge.

Gigi paused with the bag halfway toward Mertz. Should she put it down or hand it to him?

Mertz reached into the pocket of his sport coat and pulled out a pair of thin latex gloves. He eased them on, and only then did he put out a hand for the purse.

He started to put it down on the table, but Gigi stopped him.

“Let me put some paper towels under that. The bottom of a woman’s purse,” she said, hoping she didn’t sound like she was lecturing, although it seemed that way to her ears, “is extremely dirty. We put them down everywhere, you see.” She gestured toward the table and countertops. “In my business I have to keep everything extra clean.”

Mertz nodded approvingly and waited while she spread out two sections of paper towels before putting the purse down on the table and opening it.

He reached inside and drew out a cylinder that looked like a pen. “I imagine this is the EpiPen?”

Gigi nodded. “That’s what I think the person who stole her purse was after.”

Mertz’s expression turned grim. He carefully looked through the remaining contents of Martha’s purse.

While he searched, Gigi gave him the whole chapter and
verse that she and Sienna had come up with regarding the murder…excluding Emilio’s name, of course. This was her last chance to convince Mertz that the case merited reopening.

Gigi was gratified to see that Mertz’s expression had changed, and he was nodding approval.

“You could be right.” He grinned, and this time it lasted long enough for Gigi to be positive that she’d actually seen it. “I just wish you had come to us with your theory and let us do the investigating.” He put the EpiPen back in Martha’s purse and snapped it shut. “Do you have a plastic bag or something I can put this in?”

“Of course.” Gigi grabbed a bag from the fabric sleeve hanging on the corner of her door. It had
Shop and Save
written on it in red print.

Mertz carefully placed the purse in the bag but made no move to leave. He looked around her kitchen and sniffed. “It sure smells good in here.”

Gigi thought she heard his stomach growl. “It’s tonight’s dinner order. Are you hungry? There’s plenty.”

A look of hesitation blurred his features for a moment, but then he squared his shoulders and straightened his back. “Thanks, but I have to get back.” He glanced at his wrist. “I have a meeting.”

Gigi felt slightly foolish, and she stuffed her balled hands into her pockets. She felt her shoulders lift defensively as she walked Mertz to the door.

After an awkward good-bye, Gigi pulled open her door and was astonished to see Carlo coming up her front walk, carrying a square, white pizza box with
Al Forno
scrawled across the top in curly black letters. He stopped short when he saw Mertz.

Gigi sensed Mertz stiffen as he contemplated Carlo, his
face as emotionless as usual, except for the faintest flicker of his left eyelid. Carlo, on the other hand, was anything but a blank slate. His face fell so comically that Gigi would have laughed if she hadn’t felt so sorry for him.