Framed in Cherry Hills (Cozy Cat Caper Mystery Book 2) (5 page)

Much to Kat’s relief, Andrew was still at work when she stopped by the police station. A junior officer escorted her from the lobby to the inner depths of the building.

“This is it,” the officer said, motioning toward an open door.

“Thanks.”

Andrew glanced up from his computer as Kat stepped inside. “Hey there.”

“Hi.” Kat looked around the tiny, gray room. “You have your own office.”

He grinned, sending flutters erupting in Kat’s stomach. “One of the perks of making detective.”

“I didn’t realize you were so high up the Cherry Hills PD totem pole.”

“You should see the janitor’s closet. It’s got more square footage plus a sliver of a window for ventilation.”

“Don’t knock it. At least you have a door.” Kat didn’t mention that the privacy would make it that much easier for her to talk to him about what she’d come here for. Although it was past standard working hours, the last thing she needed was for one of the more chatty officers to overhear them and start spreading Kat’s speculations around as fact.

Andrew gestured toward the door. “You’re welcome to close it.”

Kat obeyed, then occupied the lone visitor chair. The room was so small she couldn’t sit down without her knees grazing the front of the desk. She was careful not to move too quickly, fearful she might disturb one of the massive stacks of papers in front of her. Andrew hadn’t been joking earlier when he’d claimed to be in danger of getting buried.

Andrew leaned back in his chair, his head bumping against the wall behind him. He didn’t seem to notice or care. Kat figured he was used to the limiting space.

“What brings you by here today?” he prompted.

Kat folded her hands in her lap. “Willow Wu’s arrest.”

“What about it?”

“The more I think about that cocaine bag falling out of her glove compartment, the less sense it makes.”

“It does seem like an unlikely place to store drugs,” Andrew agreed. “But users aren’t always thinking clearly.”

Kat regarded him. “Do you know her?”

“Not personally, no.”

“Well, after talking to some people who do, Willow hardly sounds like a druggie. If she does use, she’s most likely a casual user, which again raises questions as to why she had a bag of cocaine in her car large enough for her to be charged with intent to sell.”

“She could be a dealer who doesn’t personally indulge,” Andrew suggested.

“In that case, she would be
really
unlikely to transport drugs around in her glove compartment. A professional would have to know better than that.”

“I understand your point.” Andrew bent forward and set his elbows on the desk. “But I’m not sure what you want me to do. The fact is that bag was there.”

Kat took a deep breath. “I think somebody else planted it.”

Andrew pursed his lips. “Why would they do that?”

“Revenge.”

“Do you know of anybody with a grudge against Willow Wu?”

“Vicky Easton,” Kat said. “Do you remember her from high school? She was a few years ahead of us and went by Vicky Jones back then.”

“Sure, I remember Vicky. Tall, attractive, really into her looks.”

Kat studied him, trying to get a feel for whether he’d disliked Vicky as much as she had, but she couldn’t read anything from his face. Maybe Vicky’s teenage hostility had been reserved for other girls.

“What makes you suspect Vicky?” Andrew asked.

“She came into Jessie’s Diner today.”

“And she was high?” Andrew guessed.

“No, at least I don’t think so.” Kat couldn’t imagine anyone high on drugs walking as smoothly in stiletto heels as Vicky had.

Andrew’s mouth crooked. “But you think she had something to do with those drugs in Willow’s car?”

“I’m not sure,” Kat admitted. “She just seems really angry at Willow.”

“Angry?”

Kat nodded. “From what I gather, she’s not happy that Willow decided to go with a catering company other than Easton’s Eats for the 4F benefit dinner. What if her resentment drove her to frame Willow? Willow visited the Eastons on Saturday morning, hours before her arrest. While she was inside the house talking to Sam, Vicky could have been in the driveway planting that cocaine and disabling the taillights of her car.”

Andrew frowned. “We’re talking about Vicky Jones—the girl who in high school didn’t want to lift a pencil because it might break a nail—tampering with somebody’s car taillights?”

“She might have been desperate.” Kat decided not to mention how Vicky had jumped on her son for his own dirty fingernails. That wouldn’t do much to support her theory.

But even without that added bit of information, the skeptical expression on Andrew’s face suggested he wasn’t buying her version of events. “You think Willow’s business decision would be enough for Vicky to set her up for arrest? I’m sure people switch caterers all the time. It’s part of the business. Vicky should be used to it.”

Kat couldn’t dismiss his point. She wondered now if her own history with Vicky had been responsible for the woman’s hostility this afternoon rather than her affiliation with Willow and 4F.

“Besides, what would framing Willow gain her?” Andrew went on.

“Revenge,” Kat reiterated. She might be having second thoughts about Vicky’s guilt, but she was just stubborn enough not to admit that to Andrew.

Andrew tapped his finger on the desk, then lifted one shoulder. “I’ve seen people do stranger things.”

Kat took his concession as her signal to proceed with the request she’d come here for. “I was thinking you could run a background check on her and see what comes up.”

Andrew blinked. “You want me to run a background check on Vicky Jones?”

“Vicky Easton,” Kat corrected. “Or, Victoria Easton, rather.”

He quirked one eyebrow. “What am I looking for exactly, a record of her disabling car taillights and planting drugs on other people?”

Kat rolled her eyes. “I doubt she would have done this exact thing before. But if she has a drug charge on her record, that would prove she knows where to get cocaine.”

“It wouldn’t prove anything,” Andrew countered.

“Strongly suggest then.”

Andrew didn’t say anything. Kat held her breath as his gaze darted between his computer and her several times.

Finally, he shrugged. “I suppose I could run her name through the database and see what comes up.”

Kat exhaled. “Great. Than—”

“But if she has a record, I’m not at liberty to give you the details,” Andrew warned. “I’ll have to ask that you have Willow’s attorney go through the official channels to obtain that information.”

Kat nodded. “Sure, absolutely.”

Andrew studied her for a moment longer before turning to his computer.

Kat’s heart pounded as he tapped on the keyboard. She tried to angle her head around the desk to get a look at the screen, but the room was too small and the piles of paper stacked too high for her to maneuver much.

“Did you find anything?” she asked.

Andrew sat back. “The system’s still working.”

“Oh.”

Kat attempted to relax as she waited for the machine to finish its magic, but every position she tried felt uncomfortable. When Andrew reached for his mouse, she thought her heart might jump right out of her chest.

“Did you find something?” she asked, crossing two fingers in her lap.

Andrew’s eyes scanned the computer monitor, then he slowly shook his head. “Nothing but the usual.”

“Usual?” Kat queried, sitting up. “What’s usual?”

“Parking infractions, speeding tickets, that sort of thing.”

Her spirits deflated. As much as she wanted to believe that what he’d found helped to build a case against Vicky Easton, she honestly didn’t know a single person who didn’t have at least one traffic violation on record.

She gripped the sides of her chair, recalling her suspicions concerning Andrew’s colleague. “What about Raoul Leon?”

“What about him?” Andrew returned.

“Can you run a background check on him?”

Andrew squinted at her. “So now you’ve given up on Vicky and are focusing on Raoul?”

“I’ve been thinking, and he had the opportunity to plant that cocaine in Willow’s car too.”

“And, pray tell, when was his opportunity to do such a thing?”

Kat figured the answer was obvious. “When he pulled her over.”

“I thought that bag fell out of the glove box,” Andrew said.

“It did. At least, that’s my understanding.”

“In that case, Raoul would had to have put it there
before
he pulled her over. When would he have found the chance to do that?”

Kat clamped her mouth shut, unable to come up with an answer to his question.

“And what would his motive be?” Andrew continued.

Kat perked up. “That one’s easy. To prove he was worthy of a promotion within CHPD.”

“We already know he’s worthy of a promotion. His credentials from Wenatchee prove that. At this point, it’s just a matter of a higher position opening up.”

“Well, maybe he has a thing against Asians,” Kat said, her desperation growing.

“I think he was more sensitive to racial profiling against Hispanics than anything else.”

Kat frowned. For once, she wished Andrew didn’t make so much sense. “Can’t you still run a background check on him?”

“I could, but I won’t find anything. If he had something incriminating on his record, he never would have been hired in the first place.”

Kat hadn’t thought about that, although it made sense.

Andrew sighed. “Kat, you’ve just provided me with two different motives for two different people. I can’t be running background checks on everybody because you get an idea in your head that they might have had something to do with Willow’s arrest.”

She straightened, indignant. “You make it sound like I’m casting unwarranted accusations.”

He eyed her. “Well?”

“Well, I’m not,” she replied tartly. “I’m trying to get to the bottom of this.”

“Have you ever considered that Willow Wu might be guilty? Have you considered that nobody is setting her up, that the coke in her car actually belonged to her?”

“Of course I’ve considered that,” Kat spat. “But Imogene doesn’t believe it.”

“Drug abuse isn’t something you would necessarily confide in your fellow non-profit volunteer.”

Kat’s face grew hot. “I know that.”

He bent over the desk, his voice softer when he spoke next. “Kat, are you sure you aren’t so adamant to disprove Willow’s guilt because of your own experiences?”

Her stomach lurched at the reminder of her mother’s substance abuse issues. “This has nothing to do with my childhood. That was ages ago.”

Andrew stared at her for seemingly forever. His scrutiny made her feel as if ants were crawling all over her body.

Kat folded her arms over her chest, hoping she didn’t look as vulnerable as she felt. “I only want to make sure that somebody innocent doesn’t end up in prison.”

“But you don’t know this woman from Adam.”

“Neither do you,” she said, feeling a tiny burst of triumph. “If she had a drug history, as a member of the police force you would be more familiar with her, right?”

Andrew’s eyes bored into hers. “That doesn’t change the fact that you might be trying unusually hard to absolve her of any wrongdoing because you’re equating her situation with your mother’s.”

Kat lifted her tongue to protest, but her mouth had gone dry. Besides, she had to admit he wasn’t completely wrong. Although she had never doubted that her mother was a bona fide junkie, she often wondered how both of their lives would have been different if someone had cared enough about her mother’s addiction to help.

Andrew sighed. “Kat, I’m worried this whole Willow thing is becoming too personal for you. The way you jumped on Raoul earlier, I thought he might book you for harassing a police officer.”

She noticed her hands were shaking and wedged them under her thighs. “I just don’t want an innocent woman serving time.”

“If Willow is innocent, that’s bound to come out before she serves any time,” Andrew assured her.

Kat didn’t reply. She had never shared Andrew’s faith in the justice system. After all, where was the justice in a child growing up without a mother?

“Do you ever think about looking into what happened to her?” Andrew asked quietly.

Kat didn’t have to ask who he was talking about. “Sometimes.”

“You think she’s still alive?”

Kat swallowed hard as her stomach started doing flip-flops. She’d often wondered if her mother was still alive. Part of her hoped so. She had so many burning questions that nobody else could answer.

But another part of her wasn’t sure she wanted to discover that her mother had been alive all these years and never once initiated contact. She didn’t want to believe she was that expendable to the woman who had given her life.