Interior Motives (23 page)

“I have nothing against you, Miss Perfect. It’s just that painfully perfect perfection that grates on my nerves.”

“Me?” She looked stunned. “Perfect?”

Then she snorted. Yeah, her. Wilmont PD homicide detective, Captain Lila Tsu. The most elegant, well spoken, classy . . . I don’t know how many other superlatives I could with good reason add to describe Lila’s exquisite image.

“That shows how little you know. I’m nowhere near perfect.” She glanced at her hands, clasped tight in front of her. “For the record, I’m the one who feels inadequate around you. You’re a formidable woman, you know.”

I snickered.

I hooted.

I laughed so hard my eyes leaked. “You’ve got to be kidding, Lila. You’re talking about me: Haley Farrell, the klutzy interior designer you say bumbles into your cases and tromps all over your evidence.”

“You might be a klutz, and you are too curious for your own good, but you have a rare kind of courage. You also have rock-solid convictions, and you cling tenaciously to them.”

“But I—”

“This time you’re going to shut up long enough for me to say what I want. Even more than your bravery and strength of conviction, I admire the way you’ve put your life back together after the rape.”

“How’d you know about that?”

“I do have access to all of Wilmont’s records, you know. Think I wouldn’t check you out? Give me credit for knowing at least a little about police work.”

I saw red. “You went digging into my life? Man, are you—”

“I’m a cop, Haley. Remember back when Marge died? You were the prime suspect. I had to investigate you. And what I found rocked me to the core. You survived a rape and a brutal beating but managed to recover, study martial arts, go back to school, launch your own business, and live a rich life. It takes a unique kind of tenacity, a special woman, to manage all that. You humble me.”

My tears flowed. The memories hit me hard. Flashes of fear, pain, rage, grief dug into me. I remembered the struggle to crawl out of the pit of despair where I lived for a time after the rape.

And Lila understood enough to say all that.

“Thanks,” I said when I could speak again. “But I had no choice. He didn’t kill me. I had to go on and live.”

“And you’ve learned to live well. Precisely my point. Kudos to you, Haley. I mean it from the bottom of my heart.”

“Hey! What’s up?” Dutch asked. “Why’s Haley crying? I leave you two alone for a minute, and I come back to this. Did you accuse her of some monstrous crime again?”

“I’m okay,” I said. “Lila said something nice. How rare, huh? So I got mushy and cried.”

Lila shrugged. “I called her an admirable woman, and she didn’t know how to take it. I’m impressed by the way she’s put her life back together. That’s all.”

Dutch jerked his gaze so fast from the one to the other of us that he must have wound up with whiplash. “This mutual admiration society’s too weird for me. And I have to get back to work. You ready, Haley?”

I nodded, still choked up. Who’d a thunk?

When we reached the door, Lila called me. “Don’t do anything stupid, okay?”

I rolled my eyes. “Them’s fightin’ words, Detective Tsu.” “Just let me do my job.”

“That you do
so
well,” I countered tongue-in-cheek.

I left without a backward look. Dutch and I returned to Tedd’s office, and each of us took a dive into our work. I had a million pillows to stuff. He had a gargantuan bookcase to build.

We both had too much to think about.

We didn’t talk.

The next day I brought the rest of the artwork I hadn’t yet staged around Tedd’s office. Since I’d worked last in the meeting room, where I’d left my toolbox, and since the conference table had the largest flat surface in the whole place, I went straight there. The paintings, sculptures, and other Mexican artifacts looked great spread out on the table as a group. They would really shine when I highlighted them one by one.

With some of the items, like the antique carved Mayan chieftain, I’d known where they belonged right from the start. Others, like an amazing handwoven wall hanging in shades of pumpkin, pomegranate, vanilla, and walnut, required a little extra thought.

I walked down the hall and into the waiting room, hanging in hand. I finally decided it belonged in the waiting room, smack dab under one of the small halogen lights I’d had installed around the perimeter of the ceiling. I’d last used the ladder back in the meeting room, so I dragged it out, apologized to the two women and one man waiting to see Tedd, and began to bang the necessary anchors into the faux-adobed drywall.

That’s where Dutch found me.

“Here,” he said. “You left your cell phone in the meeting room. I answered it when I recognized the number. You’re going to want to take this call, but I suggest you come down to solid ground before you do.”

Great.
His silent message came through loud and clear. When I heard Lila’s voice on the other end, I said, “Wait!” then sent Dutch a grateful look and hurried back to the privacy of the meeting room. He followed and closed the door.

“Okay, Lila. What’s up?”

“You wanted the test results on the vial, didn’t you?”

“Is Frank Lloyd Wright a genius?”

“I presume that’s your way of asking if the sky is blue, only more funky, like you.”

“Watch it, Miss Perfect.”

“Do you want the results? Then give me a minute to tell you.”

Even though the silence threatened to deafen me, I waited her out. I refused to give her another chance at a verbal swipe.

After a long silence, she said, “The vial contains human growth hormone, just as you thought.”

I sucked in a sharp breath. There are times when being right is the absolute pits. This was one of those times.

“I’m waiting,” Lila said. “When does your ‘I told you so’ routine start?”

My response came in a simple headshake she’d never see.

Dutch came up from behind, and although he didn’t touch me, the warmth radiating from his solid bulk brought me unexpected comfort.

“Very well,” Lila went on. “There’s more. The serum was tainted—”

“With arsenic.”

“Yes, Haley. You’re right about that too.”

“Is that it now? Or do you have another shoe to drop on me?”

“I’m done dropping shoes.”

“Okay. Gotta go. Tons of work. You know how that goes.”

“Actually, there is one more thing. Please don’t play gumshoe and confront anyone. We don’t have enough concrete evidence to do that yet. And you’re not the one to do it—ever.”

“I’ll behave, Karate Chop Cop. I do know how.”

“We’ll see.” And with a truckload of skepticism in her voice, she said good-bye.

When Dutch placed his hands on my shoulders, all my starch and oomph took a hike. I sagged against him and fought hard to pull off a lousy imitation of normal breathing. My stupid stomach revved up to a rollicky rumba.

“I bet you never thought you’d hear me say this,” I told my human crutch, “but being right’s not all it’s cracked up to be.”

“And you’re not going to do anything about the vial of poisoned HGH, right?”

“Not directly, no.”

He turned me around in his big hands. “Are you out of your freaky, scary, wacko mind?”

“Unfortunately, no. I’m not going to confront anyone with the lab results, but I am going to hold you to that meeting with Ron. Did you ever call him? I want to check out the Weikert brothers, Dr. Dope, the HGH lab and its former owners, the furniture studio that made the chairs—even the agent in Tijuana who markets them. And yes, I want to check out Tedd’s business dealings too.”

“That I can do. And I called him the night you and I talked.”

I grabbed his forearms. “Will you give him another call?”

“Now?”

“Of course now. Why would we want to wait?”

Dutch called Ron, and in minutes we’d agreed to meet at his home within the hour. I hauled my ladder, hammer, anchors, and wall hanging back to the meeting room with a fresh apology for Tedd’s two remaining clients.

At the Richardsons’, Ron let us in before we had a chance to ring the doorbell. The men shook hands, then wrapped their free arms around each other. Quite different from the first time I came here with Dutch. That time they were bitter enemies bound by old angers and unresolved rivalries. By the grace of God, and after an unspeakable tragedy, they’d rebuilt the friendship they once shared.

Ron’s bear hug surprised me. “How’ve you been, Haley?”

“Same old, same old. Too many houses to beautify, too little time. Too many antiques to sell, too little time.”

“I know you’re not here to redo our house or sell me something ancient and fabulous, so let’s head back to my office.” When I stepped inside the large room, I took a shocked look around. “You’re as bad as Larry Weikert!”

Ron gave me a faux angry look. “You owe me an apology, young woman. I work hard for my money.”

“Meaning Larry doesn’t.”

“I could only find a bunch of Internet sales of used electronic equipment and some sporadic consulting jobs. I also tracked down his favorite electronics mart, and when I hinted I might do business with them, the manager didn’t balk at my questions. Over the years Larry has dropped close to half a million bucks there.”

I goggled. “That buys a lot of wire.”

“How did he pay for it?” Dutch asked.

“A couple of times he brought trade-ins. Other times he paid his tab over a period of time. But the bulk of his purchases were cash transactions.”

“No wonder Cissy called him a leech.” I couldn’t get my head around so much money for computers and printers and gadgets of the electronic kind. “I can’t believe a smart woman like Darlene shelled out a fortune for . . . for . . .”

Ron shot me a grin. “It takes all kinds, Haley. And the younger one, Tommy, is another mess. He’s just stupid when it comes to money. He gets suckered into every bogus scheme that comes down the pike. And his mother paid and paid, until she forced him to settle down. That’s when she put up the money for the vintage imports and agreed to pay rent for the showroom and an apartment.”

“Aside from how much Larry has sunk into his obsession,” I said, “none of this surprises me. I don’t suppose you found corpses in their shady pasts.”

“That’s the extent of the skeletons in their closets. As far as the Mexican doctor goes, he’s clean. He has a good credit history, doesn’t ever owe much—or at least, not for long—his practice is successful, and he recently invested years of profits in a manufacturing lab. It wasn’t enough, and that’s why he borrowed money from Darlene Weikert to buy the lab. I also learned he sold his home to pay off the debt, together with funding he arranged from some European pharmaceutical company.”

“So money wouldn’t be his motive, even if it is a good one for the brothers.”

“That’s how I see it,” Dutch ventured.

I took a deep breath. “What about Cissy?”

“She hit hard times right after she retired. She needed a stent about sixteen months ago. Medicare and her partial supplementary insurance didn’t cover everything. She was left with thousands of dollars worth of bills and back rent, and she lost the car she’d bought with a loan. I don’t know where she came up with the money, but she paid it all back and then bought an inexpensive used subcompact. She doesn’t owe a thing.”

My throat closed at the next name. A bullfrog with laryngitis had nothing on me when I asked, “Tedd?”

Dutch wrapped his arm around my waist. I leaned into him.

“She’s even cleaner than the others. She’s never been a big spender, donates to a number of victims’ rights charities, bought her first home three years ago at a government tax sale and paid cash. Aside from a number of flights to Tijuana in the last eighteen months, and they could have been to visit family, there’s nothing there.”

“Dr. Dope,” I murmured. “She was engaged to Dr. Dope.” Ron chuckled. “That’s what you call the guy? You’re brutal, woman!”

I shrugged. “If the pusher label fits . . .”

“Behave,” Dutch said with a squeeze. Then to Ron, “Anything on the previous owners of the lab?”

“The chemist turned seventy-one, neither his son nor daughter was qualified to run the place, and he sold it to Díaz, who’d been one of his regular customers. The guy retired to Acapulco.”

I brought my hands palm to palm, then gave a tiny bow. “I’m impressed, Mr. Richardson. You’re very, very thorough, even though I have no idea how you got access to that information.”

“I aim to please,” he said with a grin. “The info is available to me because”—he winked—“I’m no plain old builder, you know. I do some consulting work for the bank on the side—you know, appraising businesses borrowers put up as collateral. Plus, I have access to all kinds of info through my membership in an international consortium of businessmen and women.”

“He’s too modest,” Dutch said. “It’s an ethics group, and he was just elected president, even though he hasn’t been a member for long. Don’t think it’s a small deal.”

Ron blushed. “Had to make up for a lot.”

“Never crossed my mind to discount Ron’s abilities or accomplishments.” Then I sighed. “I have another favor to ask. Maybe you can use your connections to check out an artisan furniture studio in Guatemala.”

Ron looked intrigued. “I thought we were dealing with Mexico.”

I explained the connection, how the studio sold its pieces through an agent in Mexico—Tijuana, to be exact—how it did a good amount of business with various import/export places in Seattle, and he parked himself in front of a wall of monitors. He typed in a number of pieces of information, frowned, and then typed some more.

We watched him do this a number of times. Each time, his frown grew deeper and his expression more tenacious.

When my curiosity got the better of me, I blabbed. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s the weirdest thing,” Ron said, a bit distracted. “I’ve found three layers of holding companies, and each one comes back to the good old U.S. of A.”

“Can you explain that in any-moron-can-get-it words?” I asked.

“You’re no moron,” he said, still typing at a fever pitch. “It means that someone has gone to great trouble to hide the owner’s identity. A holding company is nothing more than an entity that controls a certain percentage of decision-making votes in another company. Many times they’re bogus companies that do nothing much but cloud a trail of shady dealings. In this case, the owners and presidents I’ve found have names like William Cosby, Theodore Turner, and Lincoln Abraham.”