How to Succeed in Murder (17 page)

“Lalit was behind the software glitch?”

“It’s possible,” Jack answered.

“It’s one theory,” the inspector nodded.

“And it’s the one the police are investigating, isn’t it?” I realized. “The only one.”

“But if it’s wrong, and if what you and Brenda saw in the rain that night was someone holding a gun on Kumar…” Jack began.

“Then we’re the only ones who are still looking for the real killer,” I finished.

And if our encounter at the museum was any indication, the real killer was seriously looking for us.

Chapter Twenty-eight

The upside to having my car shot to pieces was that I didn’t have to drive to work the next morning. The downside was having Flank as my new chauffeur.

Jack categorically refused anything like getting his own bodyguard. I suppose half a lifetime of military training and extensive experience in clandestine operations can leave a man fairly confident in his own abilities.

But I was still worried about him.

He was worried about me, too. It crossed my mind that mutual worry might in fact be what marriage was all about. In any case, Jack was worried enough that he presented me with a small black .22 Smith & Wesson before we went to bed that night.

“How romantic.”

He frowned. “You shouldn’t ever have to use this. Flank should be around you when I’m not.”

“I know.”

“But the killer has seen you with me both times he’s tried to get at me.”

“I know.” I swallowed. “But I’m telling myself that it would have been as hard for him to get a look at me in the tunnel that night as it was for me to see him.”

Jack nodded. “And tonight? You’re willing to bet that it was dark and drizzly enough that he didn’t realize who you are? Because I’m not sure I am.”

My uncle Harry had done his best to ensure that I knew my way around small firearms before my sixteenth birthday. So I took the gun, getting that familiar sick feeling in my stomach that came with handling instruments of death, and checked the chamber and the safety before tucking it into a pocket of my laptop bag. Then I looked up at Jack.

“If I were the type of woman to play things safe, I probably would have married some nice, boring investment banker.”

“That would have made Eileen happy.” He looked at me sideways.

“I’m not Eileen.” I moved closer to him. “I married you, and you come with danger and guns and secrets, and sometimes that drives me crazy, but it’s who you are.” I reached up, wrapping my arms around his neck. “And I married you.”

He pulled me close, and the last thing I remember him saying was “Damn right you did.”

***

Naturally, Jack was gone by the time I made it downstairs the next morning. But he’d left a note next to a plate of fresh banana bread.

Oh, ha ha.

***

The Hummer was parked at the curb. I really didn’t think it was worth depleting the last remaining fossil fuels on the planet just to get to work in the thing, but it didn’t appear I had any choice.

Besides, I didn’t think Flank would fit into a hybrid.

He got out to open the back door for me, but I went for the passenger seat up front. He grunted something incomprehensible and held the back door open.

“I’m sitting in front, Flank. Someone may see us, and I might be able to get away with saying my car was stolen and you gave me a lift, but I wouldn’t be riding in the back seat if that were the case, would I?”

He glared at me, which was a little unnerving, the look coming from beneath his Pleistocene-era brow as it did. But he gave in and shut the door.

It was going to be a long ride. And the conversation, I knew, would be minimal—mainly because Flank seemed incapable of articulate speech unless he had a gun in his hand. So I tried to concentrate on what I planned to accomplish in the day ahead.

Krissy was my highest priority. Now that we knew she’d been on the point of getting fired, she was the clear frontrunner for the role of Clara’s killer. Luckily, I’d already scheduled a lunch meeting with her. If I played the scene right—

“You’d be safer in back.”

I jumped.

Flank’s eyes were on the road, and his right hand was on the gearshift. It was a massive gearshift, with a solid metal shaft and a leather-wrapped handle. Was it sufficiently…masculine…to have the same effect on him as a pistol?

“It’s my job to keep you safe.”

Apparently so. Wow. Flank could talk. Unfortunately, his topic was a little sulky, but that should be easily fixed.

“You’re doing a great job,” I told him. “Look how safe I am.”

He frowned. “Should have been there.”

I assumed he meant he should have been at the shooting spree last night. “No.” I shook my head. “You’re only supposed to be looking after us at Zakdan, and we’ve all been fine there. Besides, we figured out last night that the killer was after Jack, not me.”

He didn’t look reassured.

“You’ve been a huge help at the office. Saving me parking spaces, and making sure everything is organized…”

He lightened up a little, much to my relief. And I realized we’d never asked him whether he’d heard or seen anything suspicious at Zakdan.

“Flank, do you have any leads on the case? Have you noticed anything or overheard anything?”

He blinked a couple of times, then looked over at me. I don’t suppose he gets a lot of call for delivering intelligence reports. Maybe some prompting would help.

“Have any of the other secretaries told you anything?”

He seemed to think it over. “They like to be called admins.”

Oh. Okay. Duly noted.

“Are there any rumors going around? How do people feel about Krissy?”

He shrugged, and we stopped at a red light on Pine Street.

“How about Jim Stoddard? Any gossip about him?”

“Drinks too much.”

“Really? Jim drinks?” Oh, but I knew that already. Brenda had found out about the engineer’s old DUIs in her initial research. But it was good to know he still drank. At least, good in the sense that it offered the possibility that rampant alcoholism had led him into a life of crime. Maybe.

“What about the rest of them? Troy? Or Bob Adams? Or MoM?”

Something in Flank’s reaction suggested we’d be better off taking the suspects one at a time. “Let’s start with Troy.”

The light turned and I gave him a minute to get things in motion again.

“Creep,” he said. “Womanizer.”

Fascinating. If the head of Marketing had that kind of a reputation, maybe someone had filed a harassment suit against him. And if that someone had been Clara…but wouldn’t Morgan have known about that?

“Oh,” I said. “What about Morgan? What do they say about him?”

Flank shook his head. “Poor guy.”

“Are you saying that? Or do they say that?”

“Them. He was getting married.”

I was stunned. “Are you saying it’s common knowledge at Zakdan that Morgan and Clara were engaged?”

He nodded and made the left onto Golden Gate.

This was amazing. Morgan thought nobody knew. If the whole company was talking about it, the list of suspects could be huge.

“Bob.” Flank interrupted my thoughts. “Loser.”

I can’t say I was surprised at the prevailing opinion about the head of Quality.

“MoM,” he continued flatly. “Bitch.”

My eyebrows went up, more at his use of the word than the consensus about Millicent O’Mally.

“Really?” But the higher-ups seemed to love her. Maybe she was only a bitch to the underlings. Which Clara had been once…

I shook my head. We were supposed to be finding people who might have hated Clara, not people Clara might have hated. “What about Tonya from Human Resources?”

“Gossip.”

Not enough for my taste, she wasn’t. “How about—”

But further conversation would have to wait for the trip home. Traffic had picked up and Flank needed both hands on the wheel.

***

“Do we have to guess where you were last night?”

Eileen asked the question as she handed me a copy of the
Chronicle
. I’d spotted her, huddled with Brenda and Simon over it, as I’d scanned the Friday morning crowd at Café Arugula.

I looked at the paper. The front page gave prominent space to the story of a mysterious shootout at the Palace of the Legion of Honor. Lots of bullets. No bodies and no suspects.

“Charley, are you okay?” Brenda asked.

Simon’s eyes sparkled. “I’ll forgive you completely for standing me up at that party last night, darling, but only on the condition that you tell us absolutely everything.”

So I did. Which made us very late for work.

***

“Ready for lunch? It’s Mongolian Hot Pot day and there’s usually a line.”

Which is how I found out from Krissy that Zakdan actually had an on-site cafeteria. And that the Friday build-your-own-stir-fry event was an experience not to be missed.

The cafeteria was on the first floor at the back of the building. And Krissy had been right—there was a line.

I didn’t really get a chance to question her in the crowd as we inched forward, putting raw veggies from a sort of salad bar into our bowls. The line moved pretty smoothly. The cooks seemed to know the drill. They’d probably been doing it for years. Except for one. I was almost sure it was his first day.

Because it was Gordon.

Jack’s former partner and Harry’s former chef looked at me as if we’d never met.

“Meat?” he enquired.

“Chicken,” I accused.

How the hell had Jack gotten him in position so quickly? And what did he think Gordon would be able to accomplish from behind the cafeteria counter?

But my what-do-you-think-you’re-doing-here stare provoked no response other than a slight glint of amusement in Gordon’s unflappable expression.

“Hot and spicy, or mild?”

“What do you think?” I answered testily.

He reached for the hot sauce.

Whatever. I looked around the place. The get-your-lunch area consisted of a salad bar, sandwich bar, and grill station, in addition to the hot meal line where Gordon was igniting my stir fry. The eat-your-lunch area was a colorful space beyond the cashiers where it looked like the whole company was congregated.

The same corporate colors from the lobby were splashed around here. Tables shaped like ink blots in deep red and purple, minimalist acrylic chairs in yellow-gold and more red, with big abstract blotches of color on the walls.

“Tess?” Krissy poked me in the ribs, and I saw Gordon holding my bowl back to me.

“Have a nice day,” I told him, and was rewarded with the briefest of grins before he turned to the next person in line.

I followed Krissy to the cashier and then to the seating area. She paused, looking around the crowded room, and for a moment I had a little first-day-in-the-high-school-lunchroom déjà vu.

“Who do you normally sit with?” I asked Krissy. I saw several of the execs all together at the far side of the room. Tonya, Bob, MoM, and Troy were at a table with several vacant seats, but Krissy was steering us away from them.

She led me to a small table in the corner, and answered as she unloaded her tray.

“Lately I’ve been taking my lunch back to my desk. I used to sit with them.” She nodded in the direction of a loud group at a large central table.

They were noticeably younger and considerably more tattooed than the rest of the lunch crowd, and several looked as though they’d probably arrived for work on their skateboards.

“They’re the customer service reps,” she explained. “At least the ones we still have here. Most of that work is outsourced now.”

“So they’re the group you manage?”

“I used to manage just them, but since Clara…” She didn’t seem to know how to end that sentence. “Anyway. Now I have the knowledgebase writers too, and I oversee the outsourced firms.”

“That sounds like a lot.”

Her shoulders had tensed. She tried to shrug but it came off more like a twitch. “I can handle it.”

Right. Then why did she look like she was playing Ophelia on her way to the river?

“Why don’t you sit with them anymore?” The gang at her former table looked like they were having a good time.

“MoM told me it wouldn’t be appropriate, because of my new position. She says you have to draw the line firmly when you get to a certain level. She’s been really helpful in all of this.”

Right. I remembered her helpful slap at Clara’s funeral.

I waved my chopsticks in the direction of the execs. “So are you supposed to sit with them now?”

She looked toward them. “Oh, sometimes…” Her voice trailed off and she toyed with her broccoli, keeping her eyes on her plate. “They don’t like me.”

“Oh, um…” This was not exactly the way I’d seen our conversation going. Time to change the subject if I wanted to accomplish anything other than making her cry.

I looked around the room for a distraction. Flank was sitting two tables over from us, devouring cheeseburgers and keeping an eye on things. I didn’t think drawing Krissy’s attention to him would have quite the calming effect I was going for. I scanned the crowd behind him.

“Who are they?” I gestured to a group of vampires in the far corner. At least they looked like vampires. Dyed black hair, pasty complexions, black clothes, and lots of eyeliner.

Krissy glanced over and made a face. “The Goths. They hired one in Creative Services six months ago and the next thing you know we’ve got a whole flock of them.” She sniffed. “They think they’re so cool.”

“What does Creative Services do here at Zakdan?” Implying that I knew exactly what they did at the many, many other companies I’d consulted with.

“They work for Marketing. They do the artwork and design and stuff.”

It was a wonder the Zakdan packaging didn’t look like the work of Charles Addams.

I took a bite of spicy chicken. Krissy seemed to have given up on eating. The more time I spent with her, the more I just didn’t see her as Clara’s killer. She hardly had the demeanor of someone who’d killed to get ahead in her career. I decided to ask her a direct question.

“Krissy, do you like your new job?”

It turned out to be really the wrong thing to say.

***

“She burst into tears right there in the cafeteria?” Brenda looked appalled. I’d found her in the conference room as soon as I’d been able to extricate myself from Krissy’s emotional breakdown.

“It wasn’t a burst so much as a slow leak,” I explained. “She just started weeping, so I hustled her out of the lunchroom and got her to the nearest ladies room.”

“What did she do then?”

“You know how all the bathrooms here have a room with all the sinks, and then a separate room beyond that with all the stalls?”