Truffled to Death (A Chocolate Covered Mystery) (12 page)

Erica’s eyes narrowed. “I’d like to talk to you about the professor’s special projects.”

Oh good. She was going to take advantage of Lavender’s guilt.

“Is there anything he was working on that was making people angry?” she asked.

“No,” she said, sitting up. “He was focused on this exhibit. It’s all he cared about.” A tear leaked from her eye and she wiped it away.

“I’m sure he cared about you too.” Erica changed tactics and spoke in a reassuring voice. “It’s why he trusted you so completely, isn’t it?”

Erica turned the desk chair around to face Lavender and sat down. “Can we start at the beginning of this mess?” When Lavender nodded uncertainly, Erica asked, “How did your Addison learn about the Rivers’ collection?”

I slowly sat down in the rust-colored chair in the corner so I wouldn’t distract her, resisting the urge to pop my feet up on the matching ottoman.

Lavender took a huge, shuddering breath as if preparing to unburden herself. Now maybe we’d learn something. “He met Adam Rivers at a museum fundraiser, and Adam told him about the pieces his great-uncle brought back,” Lavender said. “Dr. Moody volunteered to verify that they were authentic.” She paused. “When he saw them, he knew they were special. He was so excited that Adam was willing to make such a generous donation.”

“So Dr. Moody convinced Adam?”

“Yes,” she said. “He told Adam that the pieces were historically important and should be in a museum. Addison wanted to ‘get back in the game.’” She used finger quotes. “He’d just quit the university and started working at the museum. He thought the Rivers’ collection would establish his credentials.”

“Why did the professor change careers?” Erica asked.

Lavender’s face reddened. “The museum lured him away,” she said. “It made him a very generous offer that he couldn’t refuse. He’s a brilliant scholar and in high demand.”

Right, I thought. She sounded like she was trying to convince herself.

“Oh,” Erica said, and then carefully added, “We saw some ridiculous claims online—”

“That was nonsense.” Lavender sat up. “A bunch of hussies with bad grades getting together to try to ruin his reputation. It was shameful!”

“I agree,” Erica said. “As you know, we had our differences but I never heard anything like that before this.”

“He was a good man,” Lavender said, shaking in her anger.

Did she really believe that? Usually when anyone said such a thing with such vehemence, the opposite was true. Deep down, she had to know the truth.

“He was.” Erica nodded. “Some people will say anything to get attention.”

How did Erica do that? She had to be burying her feelings deep to get the information we needed.

“So Adam talked his family into making the donations?” Erica asked. “Do you know if any of them objected?”

“I don’t know what happened before, but by the time I met the Rivers, the deal was set,” she said. “They all seemed happy with it.”

“What was Dr. Moody most excited about in the display?” Erica asked. If Lavender knew her better, she’d realize Erica’s casual tone meant she was the most interested in this one answer.

“That short vase,” she said, which certainly gave points
to Erica’s theory that it was worth far more than the professor said. “And the diary.”

“Why the diary?”

“It provided the documentation needed to authenticate the art,” she said. “And the amount of historical detail fascinated him.”

“It’s too bad it’s gone,” I said. “It might provide a clue.”

“I have a copy,” she said.

Erica couldn’t help a little jump of surprise, and probably anticipation. “Could I see it?”

“Sure.” Lavender reached over to yank her oversized purse onto the bed, and pulled out a large envelope. She tossed it toward Erica.

I had to give Erica credit. She just picked it up from the bottom of the bed and tucked it into her own huge bag as if it was no big deal. She must be dying to read it.

“Is it the whole diary?” Erica asked. “Dr. Moody had mentioned that pages in the back were damaged.”

“Those were analyzed by some lab,” she said. “I don’t have the results yet.”

“I’d love to see them when they arrive,” Erica said.

I stood up, wanting to get out of there before Lavender changed her mind. “You’ll send that retraction?” I reminded her.

She nodded, an earnest expression on her face. “I really am sorry.”

E
rica had the envelope open and was reading the diary before I drove out of the hotel parking lot.

“What does it say?” I asked, trying not to look at it and focus on the road.

“Right now, just writing about his preparations for travel,” she said. “It looks like he was planning to visit sites I’ve never heard of.”

“Wow,” I said. “One thing in the world you don’t know about.”

She smiled. “It could be that those spots were destroyed, or simply swallowed up by the jungle.” She flipped through to the middle and showed me a page. “Look. He was an artist too.”

I glanced over to see a detailed sketch of a monkey holding a shirt up as if examining it for defects. Bertrand had
even captured the mischievous look in the monkey’s eyes. Erica turned it back to read more. “Can you drop me off at home? I need to get ready for the flash mob meeting.”

“Sure.” We were cresting the hill near our house when a police car zoomed up behind us, sirens blaring and lights flashing. I pulled over to get out of the way and the car stopped behind us.

“Damn,” I said. “I wasn’t speeding.” I so did not need a freakin’ ticket on top of everything else today. I sighed and started pulling my wallet out of my purse.

Erica turned around. “It’s Bobby.” She pushed the diary into her large bag and we both tried to look innocent.

Bobby strode over to Erica’s side of the car, looking mad as hell. “Hand it over,” he demanded in a voice that threatened bodily harm if we didn’t comply.

“Hand what over?” I asked.

His face turned red. “The diary. Now.”

“Don’t you need a warrant?” Erica asked.

“I can see the papers sticking out of your bag,” he said. “It looks like evidence for a murder investigation.”

When she still resisted, he said, “You can’t win. Give it to me.”

Erica grumbled as she dug into her bag and gave him the papers. “We were on our way to take this to the chief,” Erica said, “since you’re not speaking to me.” She kept her tone light, but we couldn’t miss the undercurrent of hurt.

His expression faltered a little and then he looked down at the papers as if proof of why they were no longer dating.

I jumped in. “So you also figured out that Reese’s lies came from Lavender? Did she tattle, or are you following us?”

He left without another word.

We watched him drive away, and I pulled back onto the road. “Now what?” I asked.

“Screw it,” Erica said. She made a call. “Lavender?”

There was a torrent of excited conversation from the other end.

“I know,” Erica said. “It’s not your fault.”

She let Lavender spew a little longer as I continued driving. “I understand. But you can’t let that stop your efforts to find your friend’s killer.”

What efforts? That was Erica all over—giving other people missions they didn’t even know they had and making them happy about it.

All I could hear was silence from Lavender’s end. I raised my eyebrows and Erica gave me a little smile. Maybe Lavender was wavering.

“If you could request another copy of the diary be sent to you by email,” Erica said slowly, “and then forward it to me, it might break this case wide open.”

Case? Erica was starting to talk like a TV PI.

Still nothing from Lavender.

Erica continued. “And we can both get off the suspect list.”

That gave Lavender something to say, in what sounded like a very shrill voice from my side of the car.

“I totally understand. And you must definitely follow your conscience,” she said. “But if you could find the courage to forward the document to me, along with the analysis done of the destroyed pages, it might be just what we need.”

I pulled up in front of our house and put it in park, listening to Erica say good-bye to Lavender. “Did Bobby tell her not to give us another copy?”

“Yep,” Erica said. “But she’ll come around.”

I thought about how most people viewed orders from the police. Lavender probably wouldn’t help us anytime soon. “I wonder if Rose Hudson knows something about the diary.”

Erica’s face lost its determined look. “Let’s hope we don’t have to go there.”

She opened the door to get out, but we both received a text at the same time, which couldn’t be good. It was from Leo.
Check out the Examiner’s office
. We drove the short distance into town, cutting through an alley and pulling to a stop across the street from the small storefront that served as Reese’s office. The afternoon had started to turn cool, the first hints of a crisp fall breeze blowing through our open windows.

A crowd of uniformed veterans, Leo’s buddies, stood in front with signs that said
Shame on Reese Everhard
and
Shut down the Examiner
. They stood silently at attention, which was somehow more powerful than if they’d been shouting and chanting.

“Wow,” Erica said, with a mixture of awe and worry.

“Reese deserves it,” I said. “Every bit of it.”

“But why is Leo doing this?” Erica asked, surprising me.

“What do you mean?” I asked defensively. “You’re like a sister to him.”

She bit her lip. “Maybe you should ask his therapist if this behavior is okay. It’s not like Leo to go . . . this far.”

I looked at the soldiers lined up. Maybe he was going a little overboard, but I knew his therapist wouldn’t reveal anything to me. “What do you think Reese will do?” I asked.

“She’ll probably try to ignore it all and wait for the anger to wear off.”

We could only hope that she at least changed her ways first. We parked and got out so that Erica could hug all of the protestors.

“This is cool, Leo,” I said to my brother. “Do you think it will work?”

“Well, she already took down that article,” he said proudly. He pointed to an older man at the end of the line. “Jennings is organizing a boycott of all of her advertisers, and his brother is meeting with the mayor to see what the town council can do.”

Reese’s office was dark and empty. A tattered
West Riverdale Examiner
banner flapped over our heads, no longer attached to the wall on one corner. “Has she seen you guys yet?”

“Oh yeah,” he said. “She just kept driving.” Some of the vets close to us chuckled.

“What’s the goal?” I felt a little overwhelmed, wondering what new problem this could cause. Sometimes the devil we knew was better than someone new taking over.

Leo’s eyes narrowed. “Make sure she finds a different line of work.”

•  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •  •

“D
id Bean send you that info about El Gato Blanco?” I asked Erica. She looked more concerned than happy that Leo and his friends had her back, but maybe the fictional story of White Cat Man would take her mind off of our real troubles.

“No,” she said. “Does he have news?”

“Not really.” I told her what the reporter had written, but at the last minute decided not to burden her with Bean’s suggestion that he might be headed east. She didn’t need to
be worrying about a homicidal white rabbit, regardless of his charitable goals.

I dropped Erica at home and drove back to the store.

Kona was happy to see me. “Is it okay if I leave early? I have Kona’s Kreations orders backed up.” Of course I agreed.

Colleen was studying at the cashier’s counter in the bookstore. She had only one customer who was perusing the Travel section, trying to decide between
Rick Steves’ Ireland
and
Lonely Planet Ireland
travel guides.

I brought Colleen a cappuccino and a few of her latest favorite, Ginger Grant Darks, which only my most adventurous customers loved. Their chocolate ganache exploded with ginger and wasabi, and were sprinkled with sesame seeds. “I’m about to order dinner from Zelini’s. Want anything?”

Colleen closed her calculus book with a sigh. “No, thanks. I brought something.”

“That looks complicated,” I said.

She stretched her arms above her head and wriggled her shoulders. “Yeah, but it’s fun too. Being in just a few classes makes me feel like, I don’t know, the whole world is bigger.”

“Erica said you’re busting the curve all the time,” I said.

She smiled, delighted that her sister was bragging about her.

“What else are you taking?” I asked.

“I’m trying to figure out what I want to major in,” she said. “So I’m kind of all over the place.” She ticked off the classes on her fingers. “Bio, U.S. History, and English Literature.”

“You have to be killing the lit class, working here all these years.”

“Yeah,” she admitted, a little shyly.

“How are the kids handling all of this?” From what I’d
seen, they seemed fine. But as I knew, home could be a different story.

“Actually,” she said, “better than I’d hoped.” A look I didn’t recognize crossed her face. “Mark’s being a little . . . weird.”

“What do you mean?” I was ready to jump to her defense.

“He . . . drunk-dialed me a few times,” she said with a look that could only be described as sweet satisfaction.

“What?”

“Yeah,” she said. “You know what men do. The whole ‘I was an idiot to give you up’ kinda nonsense. My divorced friends said it was more common than you’d think.”

“Does he want you back?” I asked.

“So far, only when he’s drunk,” she said lightly, as if not taking him too seriously. “He wanted to come over one night, but I told him absolutely not.”

“If he’s bothering you, I know more than a few people who’d be happy to set him straight,” I said. Including me. And a whole bunch of customers who now officially hated him. He’d caused Colleen a whole lot of hurt just a few months ago.

She smirked. “Nah. I kinda like it.” She rushed to add, “Not that I would ever let him come back, but it’s nice knowing, even if it’s too late, that he has some regret. That he realizes what he gave up was, I don’t know, pretty special.”

“You certainly are.” I noticed someone standing at my counter. “Oops. I’ll be back in a minute.”

“It’s okay,” she said. “I’m going to get back to taking derivatives.”

I took care of a few customers, and then my neighbor Henna rushed into the store. Henna’s coming-of-age
happened rather later than most. Straitlaced her whole life, she’d decided to let her hippie flag fly when she’d become a widow in her sixties. Now an artist, she wore brightly colored outfits every day, and recently had taken to dying her hair unusual colors. Today, the bottom was tinged with purple like it had been dipped in an ink pot.

“I have a clue for you,” she said in a conspiratorial voice, leaning over the counter to get close to me.

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“Oh stop it,” she said. “Everyone knows what you and Erica are up to, and we’re all rooting for you to win.”

“Win?”

“Win,” she insisted. “Find the bad guy before the police do.”

“Why in the world would we want to do that?” I told her.

“Who knows why anyone does anything?” she said. “It’s just what you two girls do.”

When I just stared at her, she grew impatient. “Do you want to hear it or not?”

“Fine. What is your ‘clue’?” I asked, resigned to the fact that she would tell everyone she knew that we were investigating and that she’d “helped.”

“I was out at the River estate meeting with Vivian about their annual grant for the Arts Guild,” she said. “For some reason, she’s having everyone jump through extra hoops for River Foundation money this year. When I finally got her to agree to give us the money and went out to my car, I heard raised voices in the barn.” She stooped over and mimicked tiptoeing over to the barn with her fingers pinched together. “Gary was yelling at his sister, Jennie. He said that boot camp was next for her if she doesn’t do what she was
supposed to. The military kind.” She stood up straight. “I feel so bad for that boy.”

“Is that all you heard?”

“Yes,” she said a little defensively, and then she got an eager look on her face. “What do you think it means?”

“Right now, I have no idea,” I said.

When she looked disappointed, I reassured her. “But thanks for telling me. Maybe it’ll be the puzzle piece we need.”

I couldn’t help but wonder if his warning wasn’t something else entirely. Maybe someone in the family was telling her to keep her mouth shut and Gary was warning Jennie what would happen to her if she didn’t listen.

I texted the information to Erica, sure that she’d add it to her notes on the investigation.

I usually loved being in the store when it was empty, but tonight it made me feel a little unsettled. Kona had already cleaned the counter and the tables, but I wiped them all down again. I turned on my Find My Friends app and saw that Bean was on his way to West Riverdale! My bad mood vanished.

Closing time seemed way too far away, so I called Kayla to see if she was available to work. She was happy with the extra hours and I checked to see Bean’s progress. Shoot! He had turned around and was heading back northwest.

There went my good mood.

Then he actually texted me as if he could read my mind.
How’s your this?

I texted back.
Making progress. How’s your this?

No answer. Maybe he’d accepted that Erica and I were investigating.