Murder with a Twist (8 page)

Unfortunately, it didn't last.

T
he bar was still crowded when we got back—a good thing for my bottom line, though it again made me feel guilty that I hadn't been there to help. As usual, my very capable staff had things well under control, and the crime group was in their regular spot with several tables pushed together.

One of the things I had done with my inheritance was expand my staffing to handle the booming business so I'd have the option of not working all the time. At first, I'd thought it was a dumb move, one that didn't make a lot of fiscal sense. But I discovered that using that time to schmooze with my customers and to oversee the operations to make sure things ran smoothly was much smarter than being a part of the everyday workforce. I still tended bar quite often; it was something I loved to do. And occasionally I'd take a turn in the kitchen and experiment with some new food items that I would then try out on some of my customers. So far, things had gone as well as could be expected.

Duncan and I headed over to the Capone table where Carter, Sam, Alicia, Holly, Tad, and Cora were seated. Cora was showing Sam something on her laptop, but she quickly closed it as we approached. I suspected that whatever she was showing him wasn't fit for public consumption, because Cora dallies in some rather questionable websites whose ratings look like a tic-tac-toe win.

After greeting everyone and making sure they had plenty of food and drinks, I leaned over and whispered in Cora's ear. “Join us in my office?”

Duncan and I headed that way and Cora followed as directed, bringing her laptop along.

“What's up?” Cora asked once we were behind closed doors.

“I did my first real crime scene today,” I told her, settling onto the couch I had along one wall.

Cora took the chair behind my desk where I usually sit, and opened her laptop. “How did it go?” she asked. “Was it hard for you?”

I nodded. “It was definitely unpleasant. But I got through it.”

“She did well,” Duncan said. “She was able to pick up on some valuable clues.”

“Clues you didn't really need. You already knew it was a staged suicide,” I said.

“That's true,” Duncan said. “But you definitely added insight into the process, particularly with the toilet paper thing.”

“Toilet paper?” Cora said, looking back and forth between the two of us. “Should I ask?”

“It's not as bad as it sounds,” I said. “I happened to sense that something was moved or different in the victim's bathroom when we were there the first time, but when we went back I didn't get the same feeling. And the toilet paper roll was obviously a new one. I mentally walked through what you do when you change a toilet paper roll and suggested there might be fingerprints inside the tube, or on the spindle the paper rolls on. Fortunately, one of the culprits involved was the one who had put that roll on. Revealing the fact that we knew that, or at least suspected it, and might be able to get prints from inside the roll was enough to elicit a confession.”

“Impressive,” Cora said. Duncan's cell phone rang and he put himself in the corner to talk. “And I'm guessing you have some new impressions for me to record as a result,” Cora said to me.

“I do, if you don't mind.”

“You know I'm happy to do it.”

Cora and I spent the next few minutes recording some of my reactions until Duncan finished his call. “You were spot on, Mack,” he said. “The techs found prints on the inside of the toilet paper roll and on the spindle. And Theo is singing like the proverbial bird. Apparently the whole thing with stringing up Dan's body made him so nervous, his bowels got in an uproar and he had to use the bathroom. He admits to putting a new roll of toilet paper on the spindle, so I'm pretty sure the prints will be his. And he said that Cindy was the mastermind behind the whole thing. She flirted with Theo and apparently slept with him, knowing he had a crush on her. She convinced him to help her by getting Dan's passwords, which she then used to move some money around and place it in her own offshore accounts. She knew that if anyone discovered the missing money, it would look like Dan was the one who had taken it. Once she heard that the theft had been discovered, she decided to kill Dan and make it look like a suicide so that the blame would stay with him. She planned it well until the end, but she couldn't stage the hanging by herself. Since she had to ensure Theo's silence, she got him to help her with the suicide staging, thinking that his involvement would keep him quiet.”

“Well done, Mack,” Cora said. “I knew you could do it.”

I wasn't as convinced as Cora was. Cindy's final threat was still uppermost in my mind. It reminded me that my involvement was more than a simple game. The stakes were life and death, and that included my own.

I turned to Duncan and said, “If you already knew that Thornton didn't hang himself, why did you take me there? Was it some kind of test?”

“In a way, yes. But simply knowing it wasn't a suicide didn't solve the crime. I truly wanted your help. I thought it might help us figure things out quicker, and I was right.”

“Still, it was rather harsh. You could have picked something a little less graphic for my first real case,” I said, recalling Dan's purple, bloated face. “Especially since I'm not convinced you needed my input at all. You would've solved it on your own eventually. I'm pretty sure Theo would've caved at some point, even without the toilet paper thing.”

“He probably would have,” Duncan admitted. “But whether you admit it to yourself or not, you were a big help. I'm sorry if it was hard for you, but it wasn't a wasted effort. You provided us with insights we might not have otherwise had.”

“But I could just as easily have led you down the wrong path. You admitted you already knew Thornton didn't hang himself, and that would have led you to suspect that the note wasn't legitimate, and that other people had to have been in the apartment at the time of his death.”

“But we might not have known there were two people in there close to when he died. Or that one of them was a woman.”

“I didn't say it was a woman, just that it was someone who was smaller, lighter.”

“Hold up, guys,” Cora said, looking at the two of us with a confused expression. “You're going too fast for me. What impression was this? I need to get it down.”

“Sometimes it's not about what you know, but rather what the suspects think you know,” Duncan said, ignoring Cora's protest. He narrowed his eyes at me. “And you knew there had been more than one person in that apartment close to the time of death.”

He had me there. “I did,” I admitted. “There were two distinct fragrances in there. And while it's true that smells can drift, they don't do so inside of a closed environment as much as people think. Molecules of smell tend to settle on things and linger there.”

“I need to know more about these smells,” Cora insisted.

“See, there you go,” Duncan said with a smile. “If we hadn't already solved this case, your knowledge that there were two people inside that apartment around the time of death would have given us a better focus in our investigation.”

Cora sighed with frustration and leaned back in her chair, arms folded over her chest. “If you want me to accurately record this stuff, you guys are going to have to explain yourselves better,” she said.

“Sorry, Cora,” I said, finally giving her the attention she wanted. “We knew that Dan's girlfriend, Shelly, was there in the apartment pretty close to the time of death because she was the one who found him. She swore she didn't go anywhere except the foyer, the kitchen, and the bathroom. And that was consistent with the smells I got from her when we talked to her and the smells I picked up elsewhere in the apartment. It made me hear something like a washing machine running . . . wet and mechanical.”

“That doesn't sound particularly appealing,” Cora said, making a face.

“I guess not, but it is what it is. I heard that washing machine sound elsewhere in the apartment, but only by the door, the kitchen, and the guest bathroom. Later, when we explored the rest of the apartment, the sound disappeared until we got into the bedroom. Then it surged when we were near Thornton's bed. I'm guessing her smell was stronger in the sheets for reasons we can all guess.”

Duncan smiled and arched an eyebrow.

“The girlfriend told us she spent some time in Thornton's place last evening,” I went on. “And I'll bet the majority of the time was spent in the bedroom. She wasn't feeling good so she probably left without dawdling, which is why her smell wasn't detectable elsewhere in the apartment except for the spots she was in when she came back later and found him. I'm guessing the victim must have showered after his girlfriend left, and that's why her smell wasn't on him. Plus, I knew there was someone in the apartment who smoked, and neither the girlfriend nor the victim did.”

“The smoke smell could have come from Theo,” Duncan said.

“True,” I agreed, “but the Chanel No. 5 smell didn't. Cindy's perfume is what did her in.”

“Chanel No. 5,” Cora said, typing away. “What did that smell trigger for you?”

“High-pitched flute music.”

We went on discussing the various impressions I'd had and what we thought had triggered them, while Cora typed it all in to her database. After an hour or so, we were finally done and I sent Cora out front to get a meal and a glass of wine on the house, my payment for her services.

As Cora packed up her laptop and left the room, Duncan got another call on his cell. When he was done, he turned to me and said, “That was Jimmy. He said they have no evidence that Will was involved so they let him go. They found Theo's sex tape, and both he and Cindy are locked up. I imagine if she had the chance, Cindy would probably kill Theo right now. She isn't talking, but Theo is telling everything he knows. He said Cindy told him she showed up at Dan's last night around eleven and told him she was locked out of her apartment and her roommate wasn't answering her cell phone and likely wouldn't be home until after two, so she needed a place to hang out for a while. Dan let her in and after they chatted and watched some TV for a while, she drugged Dan's drink with Xanax. Since she knew we wouldn't be able to find any unexplained funds in Thornton's accounts, she wrote the suicide note to explain why the missing money couldn't be found. I'm sure she was hoping that would keep us from looking for the money.”

“The Xanax explains that high-pitched whine I heard mixed in with the rhythmic grating sound of the Johnnie Walker Black. Remind me to have Cora add that one to the database.”

“See, you're better than you realize.”

“But Will wasn't lying and I interpreted the changes in his voice that way. So you see, I'm not as good as you think.”

“Just because we don't have evidence pointing to Will doesn't mean he's innocent. Maybe he
was
lying.”

“Or maybe he was just very angry that we suspected him. That's why I'm not one hundred percent comfortable with this. What if you'd arrested him because of what I said? He could have ended up in jail simply because he was pissed off.”

“I'm not going to arrest anyone based solely on your reactions, Mack. It's just one part of the puzzle. Without any concrete evidence, I can't arrest anyone or prove anything legally. I think that's why Jimmy is worried. He's afraid I'll rely too heavily on your input, but I promise you, I won't.”

“He thinks I'm crazy, doesn't he?”

“Who, Jimmy?”

I nodded.

Duncan scrunched his face up into something that looked like a cross between a smile and a grimace. “To be honest, I think he's on the fence, but you're slowly winning him over. I think he believes you have a unique talent. He's just not convinced that using it is wise. He focuses on every miss you've had during our test runs and he's afraid that if I rely too much on what you say, it will lead us down some wrong paths and waste valuable time and resources. But he also can't deny that you've produced some accurate results, too, sometimes amazingly so. However, he tends to attribute those incidences to luck, or simply good powers of observation combined with a strong understanding of human nature.”

“He's right that I seem to be hit and miss with this thing. So maybe he's also right in thinking this isn't such a good idea.”

Duncan frowned. “There are bound to be a few mistakes until you get more experience. But I think they will lessen over time. You'll get more familiar with how to interpret your reactions, and what they mean. There's a learning curve and I think we just need to be patient.”

“I'm not sure I agree. And I'm not sure that I want to get involved with this death and misery on a regular basis.”

I could tell Duncan was disappointed by my comments. I wanted to help him, but I just wasn't sure if I was cut out for this sort of thing.

“I can't force you to do it,” Duncan said. “But I hope you'll stick with it.”

With that, he got up, kissed me on the cheek, and left. I stayed in my office for a while to have some alone time and sort through the jumble of thoughts running through my mind. The only thing I knew for sure was that Duncan Albright had definitely complicated my life.

W
hen I finally left my office and went out to the main bar area, I looked around for Duncan, but he was nowhere in sight. I poured myself a glass of wine and carried it over to where Cora was sitting. Before I had a chance to say anything, she offered up the very information I wanted.

“If you're looking for the hunky detective, he left,” she said. “And he looked really sad when he did. What did you do, Mack, break his heart?”

I didn't know about
his
heart, but mine was definitely aching. “It's complicated, Cora.”

“How so? The two of you make a great team. And it's obvious that you both like each other. In fact, I'd say it's a little more than
like
.” She punctuated this last statement with a salacious wiggle of her eyebrows.

She was right about one thing; I definitely felt something for Duncan Albright. That was part of my problem. I wasn't sure if I was helping him with this crime stuff because I truly wanted to be involved with doing something good that would better the community, or if I was doing it simply because I was attracted to him and wanted to please him and spend time with him. I suspected it was a combination of the two.

Plus I had some lingering doubts about his attraction to me. There were times when I felt confident Cora was right, but there were other, more cynical times when my inner voice suggested that his interest in me might be a fleeting infatuation, or be solely because of how my little talent could be of use to him. Was I just fooling myself ? Was I behaving like some besotted teenager with a schoolgirl crush? I found it ironic that I possessed this so-called talent that made me more sensitive to the world around me, and yet I didn't seem to be able to sense anything with regard to my own love life.

I looked around the bar at my customers, many of whom, along with my employees, were like family to me. Were they all looking at me now with pity, seeing me as the poor lonely girl who would do anything for a little attention?

“Sit down,” Cora said, gesturing toward the seat across from her. “I want to try something.”

Curious, I did as she instructed. She tapped some keys on her laptop and after a moment she said, “What sort of sensations did you get when you were with your father?”

I gave her a confused look, unsure what she was going for.

“I mean, when the two of you shared a special moment,” Cora explained. “When you were a child and you curled up in his lap, or hugged him, or had one of those special father–daughter moments, what sensations did you have?”

I saw where she was going then and thought I knew what she was aiming for. “Most of the time I felt a warm, secure pressure over my shoulders and back, as if I had a cozy blanket wrapped around me. I also remember times as a child when he would poke his head in on me at night after he'd closed down the bar and come up to the apartment. He always checked on me, and there were times when he would come and sit beside me on my bed and it would awaken me. When that happened, he would try to talk me back to sleep by telling me stories about things that happened in the bar, or sometimes things about my mother—how they met, the early days of their marriage, how excited she was about being pregnant, that sort of thing. Sometimes he would make up stories about fantasy lands populated with anthropomorphic creatures, most of whom were thinly disguised versions of some of our regular customers. For instance, the Signoriello brothers would appear as Neapolitan Mastiffs, an Italian breed of dog known for protecting home and family. It made sense because both the dogs and the brothers were big, and the brothers were insurance salesmen so, like the dogs, they were in the business of protecting home and family. And when I looked up the dogs in a book at the school library, they had these funny, sweet, kind of saggy faces like the Signoriello brothers have.”

Frank and Joe Signoriello have a strong sense of family, though their own families have spread out like the tufts of a dandelion gone to seed. As a consequence, they have adopted me as their family, an arrangement that suits me just fine.

“Another character Dad often used was a chatty parrot named Lilly that was very vain and constantly preening,” I went on. “The parrot talked with a heavy New York accent that my father pulled off surprisingly well. It was obvious to me that the parrot was based on a woman named Molly who used to come into the bar all the time hunting for men to date. She dressed in bright jewel colors, she had the New York accent, and she was forever taking a compact out of her purse and primping.”

“How fun,” Cora said.

“It was, and I loved it when my father would tell those stories. He only did it on Friday and Saturday nights during the school year because I would get so interested in the stories and the characters that I couldn't go back to sleep.” I paused and smiled. “I always told Dad he should write those stories down and try to sell them as children's books.”

“I take it he never did,” Cora said.

I shook my head. “He kept saying he would, one of these days. Maybe once he retired he would have done it, but he never got the chance.”

“I doubt your dad would've ever retired,” Cora said.

“Yeah, you're probably right.”

“But your memories of those times are exactly what I'm after,” Cora went on. “Can you remember what other synesthetic reactions you had during those special moments you and your dad shared?”

“A taste,” I said. “Warm and chocolaty, like hot cocoa.”

Cora typed and said, “A taste for you is usually associated with a sound, something you see, or a tactile sensation. Which do you think this was?”

“Sound,” I said without hesitation. “It was the sound of his voice when he talked to me in a certain way.”

Cora shot me a curious look. “You seem pretty certain of that. Have you had the same experience with others?”

I nodded and felt myself start to blush. “Yes, with Duncan. His voice also makes me taste chocolate.”

“Interesting,” Cora said, tapping away on her keys. “Do you taste chocolate when you hear any other people's voices?”

I thought about it a moment and realized I didn't. “Not that I can recall. I do experience tastes when I hear other people's voices, particularly men's voices, but not chocolate. Most women's voices have a taste, too, but some manifest as a visual.”

Cora looked up from her computer for a moment and narrowed her eyes at me. “Do you taste something when you hear my voice?”

I laughed. “It depends on your tone,” I said. “You always taste like barbeque sauce, but sometimes it's a sweeter taste than other times. At the moment, you sound rather tangy.”

She considered this a moment. “I'll take tangy,” she said. “What about Zach?” she asked then, referring to my recent ex-boyfriend. “What did his voice taste like?”

“Fresh baked bread. Nice . . . comforting . . . ordinary,” I concluded with a shrug.

“Interesting,” Cora said, once again tapping away at her keys. “Let's get back to your dad. What other experiences did you have with him? What about when he touched you or hugged you? What did that trigger?”

“An undulating image of color—sort of a blue-green shade—like soothing waves on the ocean.”

“I think that was your interpretation of the love you felt emanating from your father when he hugged you.”

“Perhaps,” I said, unsure.

“And when you touch Duncan, what happens then?” Cora asked. I blushed—a curse of us pale-skinned redheads—and Cora read me like a book. “I gather the two of you have touched a lot lately. Did you finally take your relationship to the next level?”

“We did,” I admitted in a low voice after looking around to see who might be within hearing distance. “When he touches me, I get a zing of a shock, like an electric current, and I tend to see hot red-and-yellow jagged lines.”

Cora cocked her head to one side and considered this. “What do you suppose that means?” she asked me.

I smiled. “Near as I can tell, it's the fires of hell.”

Cora let out a hearty laugh. “Why would you think that?”

“I don't know. For me, the act of feeling includes both tactile senses and emotional ones. I can't always tell which is which if I'm touching someone I have strong feelings for, or who may have strong feelings for me. For instance, there were times when Zach and I were alone and I would catch him looking at me a certain way. I could tell just from his expression that he was having fond thoughts about me, and that would trigger a visual manifestation. The same thing happened at times with my father.”

“What sorts of visual manifestations?” Cora asked, once again typing away.

“Typically swirls of colors—soothing, comforting, relaxing colors.”

“So these visual things made you feel comforted and loved?” Cora suggested.

“Yes, I suppose they did.”

“What do the visual manifestations you get with Duncan make you feel?”

“Fireworks,” I said with a fond smile. Then the smile faded. “But at times I also feel unrest and discomfort. Maybe it's the things he sees in his work that cause it. I'm not sure if the manifestations are triggered by what I feel when he touches me, or by the emotion I sense coming from him.”

“Maybe they're triggered by the emotion you sense coming from
you
,” Cora suggested.

It was an unsettling thought, yet it made sense. Maybe my body and my skewed senses were trying to tell me something. It was then that I made the decision not to work with Duncan anymore. If there were shared feelings between us that might lead to something permanent, it would have to happen without our working relationship. The decision felt right to me, and I thanked Cora for her help and insight.

Unfortunately, my newfound resolve dissolved an hour later when Duncan called and told me about Davey Cooper.