A Rendezvous to Die For (14 page)

He was a hulking six-foot-three
at least. I felt puny and unsubstantial next to him. His presence was
so commanding, it seemed to take up the whole room in the little
coffee shop. His yellow Eddie Bauer-type raincoat was shedding water
like a seal and he pulled out a cloth handkerchief to wipe his face,
running it over his carefully styled and blow-dried hair. “You’re
Cassandra Cassidy, aren’t you?” His voice was loud to the point
of almost shouting.

How does he know who I am?
My heart was hammering, but I sputtered out a reply. “Yes, I’m .
. uh-huh. I mean, yes, I am she. That person. Cassandra.” Something
to that effect.

“
I’m Guy Strothers,” he
said, his voice still booming. “Bridgewater Land Development
Company.”

“
Nice to meet you,” I said,
sticking out my hand. He ignored it. I jammed it into the pocket of
my black funereal dress slacks.

“
I want to talk to you.”
Without waiting for a reply, he took my elbow and guided me to the
back of the coffee shop. He pulled out a chair for me and practically
pushed me onto it. Seating himself across from me, he folded his arms
on the table and leaned toward me. “I’ve seen some of your
photographs. You must be pretty close to those people, to get so many
pictures of them.”

“
Those people? What are you
talking about?” I tried to keep my voice from shaking. His loud
voice unnerved me.

“
You know damn well what I’m
talking about.” He almost spit out the words. “Your Indian
friends.”

“
I’ve gotten to know some of
the local Indians,” I said, curious about where he was heading.

“
They’re nice pictures. Very
nice.” He leaned back in the booth, his long legs stretched out
into the room. He contemplated his well-manicured fingernails for
such a long time, I started to get up to leave. He placed his hand on
my arm, pinning me in place. His lips were tight and his eyes blazed.
“And you live out by Madigan?”

I glanced fleetingly around the
coffee shop for allies, in case I needed help. We were the only
customers. “What does one of these things have to do with the
other?” I rubbed my arm where he had gripped it.

“
Somebody fed Madigan
information that is hurting my business. I’d just like to know who
it was.” He had dropped his belligerent tone.

“
I
guess I still don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

“
I think you do know.” He
paused, peering at me over tented fingers. “And I could make it
worth your while to discuss it sometime.” He flashed a toothy smile
and tossed a business card on the table. “If you want to talk about
it further, call me.” He rose without even looking at me and
stalked out of Grizzly’s and back into the rain.

I remained in the booth for
another ten minutes racking my brain. Indians. Marty. Something
connecting them with me to Strothers. What on earth? All I could
muster up was that maybe Strothers believed I had gotten information
from an Indian friend and told Marty about the illegally dumped
materials on the reservation. It was farfetched and a stretch of the
imagination, but with all the publicity in the papers about my
finding both Eric and Randy, I couldn’t fault Strothers for
thinking I was an important instigator of doom.

I watched through the window as
Strothers climbed into a dark-colored SUV, backed out of his parking
space, and sped away. Then I had a more sinister thought. Was he the
one who had tried to run me off the road, or was it just a
coincidence that he showed up at Grizzly’s when he did? Not for the
first time, I rued the day I’d accepted the Rendezvous job.
Attending that one event had initiated a series of others: I had
found two murder victims and, within the week following, my darkroom
had been trashed, my photographs stolen, and my vehicle had been
purposely pushed off the road. Now, Strothers’ comments had the
effect of a punch in the stomach. Instead of speaking up for myself,
I’d acted like I was a wilting, week-old greenhouse rose. It was
difficult enough for me to stand up to this kind of pressure from
Shaw, but now Strothers, too?

As I climbed back into my Jeep, I
conducted a pity-party of one. I’d gotten into this situation
simply by taking pictures and befriending a few local Indians. I
wanted my life back. I drove straight to Anna’s.

Stephanie, Anna’s summer sales
clerk, was at the counter. Pert, petite Stephanie fit into Anna’s
tiny originals, and she always wore one of them to show off the
merchandise. Today, her Barbie-like figure was decked out in the lacy
bustier Anna had tried to interest me in buying, paired with a pair
of tight blue jeans. Whenever I saw Stephanie, I felt I was
hopelessly sliding into middle age.

“
Hi, Cassandra,” she chirped,
fussing with a garment she was arranging on a hanger. “If you’re
looking for Anna, she’s back in her office.” She gestured with
her head toward the back of the store.

Anna saw me coming through her
glass office door and motioned me inside. She peered at me over her
half glasses. “You’re looking uncharacteristically overwhelmed,
Cassandra. Is this investigation getting to you?”

“
Nope.” I sank into an easy
chair. “This is how I look when someone is trying to kill me.”

“
Kill
you?”
She stared at me, her eyes wide. “My dear, what are you talking
about?” After I had described my early-morning encounter on the
road and my conversation with Guy Strothers, her tone of voice
changed. “I know Strothers. He’s a dangerous man.”

I sat straighter. “How do you
know about Strothers?”

“
I heard about him when I lived
in Chicago.”

“
If he lives in Chicago, what’s
he doing around here?”

Anna shuffled through some papers
of her desk and leaned closer to me. “Things weren’t going well
for him there. His wife left him in a very messy divorce that was
played out in the Chicago papers.” She tapped a pen on the desk and
her voice rose. “But, he deserved to be divorced. He brutalized her
both physically and psychologically. She was lucky to be rid of him.”
She crossed the room to her bookcase, straightened a couple volumes,
and then turned to lean her back against the shelves. “He moved to
Colton Mills to work on the Minnesota land development.”

I pushed forward to the edge of
my chair. “He lives
here
?” I asked, stunned by the
revelation. “I could be running into this character on a
daily
basis?”

Anna rushed over to me and knelt
in front of my chair. “I don’t want to scare you, dear, but he
has a reputation of being very nasty to people who get in his way.”

“
But . . . I didn’t do
anything!” I pounded the arm of the upholstered chair. “I didn’t
say
anything
to anyone about him either.” I threw up my hands. “Where on earth
did he get the idea that I said something to Marty that put his
company in hot water? Anna, this is crazy!”

“
Did you go to the police about
the road incident?”

I shook my head. “I don’t
want the police involved in anything else where I am concerned. I
have no proof that someone tried to run me off the road, and,
unfortunately, my old Jeep has so many scratches and dents already,
they probably couldn’t tell if any of them were caused today. And,
I certainly don’t want to report anything about my conversation
with Strothers. You can’t arrest a guy for an imagined threat.”

Anna returned to her desk and
started to thumb through her calendar. “It may look dismal now,
Cassandra, but this will all play out for the best. You’ll see.”
She jabbed her finger on the calendar. “You’ve got some breathing
room. Strothers will be in Chicago for next week’s land-developer’s
conference. He’s the keynote speaker. I would think he’d be there
for at least a few days.”

“
Small comfort,” I said. “But
I’ll take any relief I can get.”

Chapter
14

Wednesday—Week
Two

Whenever my cell phone rang, it
was a good chance Shaw was on the line. He was still playing the odds
that the one who found the body was quite likely the one who
committed the crime Whenever he called—which was often—I always
referred him to Lawton Sanders. Today, I wanted him to call.

He didn’t disappoint me. At
9:00 sharp, the phone rang. “Miss Cassidy,” Shaw said, “I’ve
been going over my notes and would like you to clarify something for
me.”

I cradled the phone on my
shoulder while I pulled on my boots. “I’m listening.”

“
When you approached the sweat
lodge, a week ago Sunday, was the flap of the tent totally closed or
hanging partly open?”

“
You know I won’t comment on
that, sir,” I said. “You’ll have to call my attorney.”

“
It would be so much easier if
you would just answer my questions.”

“
Deputy, you know I’d be
foolish to do that.”

“
If you have nothing to hide,
it shouldn’t be a problem.”

I sighed, exasperated that we had
to keep having these no-win conversations over and over again. “Would
you like to know what happened to me yesterday?”

“
Is it something that’s
relevant to this investigation?”

“
It could be,” I said. I
paused for more dramatic effect. “Someone tried to run me off the
road on my way to Randy’s funeral, Deputy.”

“
Is that right? What happened?”
He listened while I described the incident. “Did you report the
incident to the police?”

“
No, sir,” I said, shrugging
into my shirt and trying to button it one-handed. “But I hope
you’ll take it into consideration while investigating Eric’s
murder. A break-in at my house. Someone trying to run me off the
road. They’ve got to be connected somehow. Don’t you think?”

“
Did anyone else witness this
road incident?”

“
I don’t know. I doubt it,
sir.”

“
I see,” Shaw said.

I knew he was thinking his
favorite suspect was making up incidents to get herself off the hook.
To his warped way of thinking, it probably strengthened his case
against me. “It happened, whether anyone else saw it or not.” I
know I sounded defensive, but I felt the urge to speak up for myself.
“And remember, we had a fierce rainstorm that morning. There was
thick fog and visibility was difficult. That’s why I can’t
identify the driver of the dark car and why I couldn’t get the
license plate number.”

When Shaw finally ended our
conversation, my message light was blinking. It was Jack. I called
him back and told him about the latest developments. He listened
carefully, then ended the conversation. I didn’t hear from him
again until that afternoon. “Meet me at the coffee shop in a half
hour,” he said. “I have some news that might cheer you up.”

Jack’s pickup was already in
the parking lot when I pulled beside it. He had snagged a table in
the rear of the coffee shop. I got a mug of my favorite brew and
joined him. “This better be good.” I shot him a stern look. “I
need some good news this week.”

“
Okay, babe. How’s this for
openers?” He flipped open a notebook, circled something on the
page, turned it toward me, and pointed to what he had circled.

“
What’s that?” I asked.

He grinned triumphantly. “I
think Eric Hartfield was being paid off by Strothers.” Wider grin.

I eyed him skeptically. “Where
did you get an idea like that?”

“
I have my ways.”

“
Your ways. C’mon, spit it
out. What ways?”

He leaned closer and lowered his
voice. “This is strictly between us, right?”

I hesitated before answering,
folding and refolding my napkin. “Did you do something illegal?
Could you be arrested?”

“
If I got caught, maybe. Which
I didn’t. Now, do you want to hear?”

“
Yes,” I said, sighing. “I
want to hear.”

He took a sip of coffee, peering
at me over his cup. “I paid Strothers a visit.”

I nearly spit out my coffee.
“Good grief,” I sputtered. “On what grounds? What did he say?”

He was grinning again. Smugly, I
might add. “He didn’t say anything. Because . . . he didn’t
seem to be home.” I dropped my head onto my chest, closed my eyes,
and drummed my fingers on the table. After counting to ten, I raised
my eyebrows. Jack continued. “His office was as clean and orderly
as a dairy farm system, like he compulsively puts everything in
place. I flipped through some of his file drawers. They held mostly
financial folders. I couldn’t understand the titles, so I kept
looking.”

“
And . . . ?”

“
Well, he had a lock on his
desk drawers. Fortunately, I was able to trigger them open without
much effort. That’s where I hit the jackpot.” He tapped his
notebook.

Propping my elbows on the table,
I massaged the scar on my neck. “What did you find?”

Jack motioned for me to lean
closer to him so that he could whisper his response. “I found a
ledger of some sort with figures written next to dates. Interesting,
because it wasn’t computer-generated like most of his financial
stuff. And . . . I found some envelopes behind the ledger. Inside
each one was a handwritten note, listing different amounts. Each
amount and each address was different. It totaled more than $250,000
over a period of eighteen months, in amounts ranging from $10,000 to
$40,000.”