Remote Consequences (23 page)

I almost made a move to touch him. To let him know that I was there, but I took a huge bite of pie instead.

Some detail was niggling its way to the front of my brain. I tapped my fork on the edge of my plate and then speared another fat strawberry onto it. I was waiting. It was his turn to talk.

Just when I thought he was going to ghost out of there without saying any more, he started to talk.

"I've always used my sources to keep up with my family. A few years ago, I heard that my grandfather was on his death bed and I decided to come and see him."

"How'd that go over?"

"Surprisingly well. He was happy to see me. He apologized for my father's actions and asked me to check into the case of my father's disappearance. He said that he'd just known that the Mills were responsible."

"Why'd he think that?" I asked.

"Yeah, well, you know how it has always been between the Brooks and the Mills. I really thought these were just more crazy ramblings of the old man. You know, get one more jab in before died."

I swallowed down a clump of whipped cream and crust. "But?"

"But it played on my mind and I couldn't let it go. When I saw that he'd kind of silently claimed me in his obituary, it meant a lot to me."

"Yeah, I saw that."

He raised his eyebrows.

"You aren't the only one that can investigate stuff and keep secrets." I smiled. He reached over and wiped a smear of whipped cream off my chin and then stuck his finger in his mouth.

Grrr.

"Anyway, one day, I called the mayor. I just decided to go right to the source. I told him who I was and asked him if he knew anything about my father's disappearance. He basically told me to buzz off and that my father had just been skirt chasing, as was usually the case. And that he probably got himself killed by some jealous husband."

"Needless to say, that pissed you off?"

He ran his tongue over his top two teeth and leaned back in the chair again. "Just a little bit."

"I can see how it might. Then what?"

"Then I got a call out of the blue from Mrs. Mills."

I stopped eating for a moment. "You got a call from Myrna Mills? Why am I just now hearing this?"

He held up his hands in an "I surrender" display. "She told me that she'd overheard my phone call with the mayor and she wanted to set up a meeting with me. I planned to meet her last week, but she never showed up. I decided to stick around and see if I could catch up to her and coax this information out of her. I figured she'd gotten cold feet or that the mayor had found out what she planned to do and put the big hush on it."

My brain was starting to catch up. "And so, then you just happened to overhear my conversation with Penny and you took a wild guess that something was going down around here?"

He stood up and began to pace the room. "Only things have been going a bit crazy since then, and I can't help but wonder if I've put you and Paget in a bad situation by asking you to help me figure this out."

"Hey…" A tiny trickle of fear came over me, but I shook it off. I had a lifetime of guilt over not being the best big sister in the world, and tonight I was certainly feeling the heat, but being hysterical wasn't going to solve anything—I needed to focus on something else for a bit. "Look. We just need to line up all the details and work the equation."

This seemed to amuse him, and he grinned at me, which just made me hungrier, so I ate a huge bite of pie in response.

"Well, to start…someone killed my father, and I've thought it was the mayor all these years. But since you found his body and someone is after you to stop snooping around, I think there is something more going on here than we originally thought. I can't quite put my finger on it—but you are personally connected to this. Will you help me? Will you trust me—just for a little bit longer?"

I stopped mid-chew. "Who said I ever trusted you to begin with?"

"You've never called the cops on me despite the fact that I've all but broken into both your car and your home several times now. You've eaten every single thing I've brought you to eat despite the fact that I could have poisoned any of it—and you haven't even hesitated to wolf it down."

I set my fork down.

"And you've seen me with your sister, and we both know that she would be a damned easy target for me if I wanted to hurt you or manipulate you in some way. Yet you seem fine with me interacting with her."

I stood up from the table. My legs were a little shaky, so I held on to the table's edge. He made a good point—too good of a point.

"Are you saying that I should be afraid of you? Are you really an agent for the government, or are you just some shadow man that goes around breaking the law and living under the radar? And you didn't have anything to do with Paget's disappearance, did you?"

"No, Mandy." He walked to me and took my shoulders in his hands. "No."

We stared into each other's eyes for what seemed like forever.

"I'm saying that despite all my training to the contrary, I need you, Mandy Murrin, one of the smartest, most beautiful women I've ever met. I need you to help me solve the murder of my father so that I can—finally—put this part of my life behind me."

I didn't hear much after
most beautiful woman he'd ever met
, but I did hear enough to know that this man was in pain and he needed me to help him. Wasn't that what I did? Help others with their pain?

"Okay, Colin." I tried to cross my arms with confidence, but failed miserably when my lower lip trembled, proving just how tough I wasn't. "I'll help you figure this out, but you have to tell me more. You can't leave me in the dark and expect me to solve your problems. I have problems of my own. No car, no money, no job, and oh yeah—my sister is missing and I'm out on bail."

He leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek. His lips were soft and I felt a little woozy.

I sighed, then said, "I'm going to need a lot more Tic Tacs."

He grinned.

*  *  *

An hour later, we'd finished off the pie. Oh, okay, I'd finished off the pie. Still no word on Paget, and I'd called Ty at least a half-dozen times. After each call, Colin would jump right back into our discussion and try to pull my attention off my current crisis.

As a result, we now had one empty pie plate and one very long list of suspects. Colin had explained that for a crime to be committed, you needed motive, means, and opportunity. There were a lot of folks on our list and all of them had one of the above, but we were having a hard time fusing it all together.

"We have Mayor Mills, but he's such an obvious suspect. And there's the part about him moving the body to his own office. I just don't get it." I tried to work through it from the top, one more time.

We sat there staring at our suspect list, and Colin tapped the pen on the notepad in a staccato rhythm. "We can't totally rule him out. He had it in for my father, and somehow my dad ended up in the mayor's attic."

"Okay, moving on to Mrs. Mills. She was definitely ready to spit nails when the cops were searching the house, but that may not be reason enough to accuse her. Any woman would be irritated about that kind of intrusion. Plus, I know she was hanging out with Allyson at the club for brunch earlier this week. Do you think those two could be in cahoots?"

"I think that family is connected to everyone in this town in one way or another," he said.

"But she did contact you after she overheard your conversation with the mayor. Do you think she wanted to confess to you?"

"Maybe. I couldn't get her to reach out to me again after she stood me up for our meeting. And don't forget that she showed up at the pub and had some kind of heated discussion with Trask. Something was going on there. I followed her briefly after that and couldn't garner any more information, but I did confirm one thing."

"What was that?" I sat up a little straighter, but my full tummy protested.

"She drives a Mercedes, just like the one that rolled up at the river house the day that you were crawling around in the bushes."

"I was not crawling around in the bushes. I was tailing a suspect." I'd done a good job, too. I raised my chin slightly. "Anyway, big deal. She showed up at her own house."

He looked amused. "Well, what are the odds that she'd pull up to the house at that very moment? When Mills, Matson, and Trask are there arguing over the unpleasant discovery in Mills' office."

I scrunched up my nose. "That's a little weak."

"Speaking of Matson, that little twerp has to be involved somehow." Colin switched gears.

"Well, yeah, he poisoned me with Rohypnol. That little twit is definitely on my radar. He pops up everywhere. He was there the morning I found the body. He was at the country club when I had it out with Allyson. And he was at Mills Landing having a chat with Trask when the mayor showed up in his heated rage. He's definitely up to something, but he's a bit younger than me. Wasn't he something like twelve years old when your father went missing?"

Colin rubbed his chin. "I think he's the type that is easily manipulated into anything. It just takes the right person to pull his strings. I wonder if that puppeteer is Trask. What about this housekeeper you mentioned? How long has she been working there?"

"That's a great question. I think I remember her from way back when we had a graduation party at Mills Landing. Yes, now that I think of it, I'm pretty sure she's been around almost forever. You mentioned that she brought Trask to the states when he was a baby. He's not too much older than I am, and I'll bet they've been with the Mills this whole time."

"Yeah, the file stated that the mayor actually sponsored her for U.S. citizenship. So, she's been a loyal member of the family for quite a while."

"Ha, loyal member? I have it on good authority that she and the mayor have been up to the hanky-panky biz for years." I scrunched up my nose at the image.

"On good authority? Whose good authority?" He sounded amused.

"Ms. Lanier's authority."

He gave me a comical eye roll. I smiled. But then I thought of Paget again and reached for my cell phone. He stopped my hand.

"Let Ty do his job. He'll find her. Let's keep going."

I attempted a deep, cleansing breath, but it caught in my tight chest.

Okay, I can do this. She's going to be fine.

"Amika was also there the day I found the body. And then she followed me at some point later that day. We had a disturbing little confrontation at the Thrifty Mart. I'm not sure if she was threatening me or warning me."

He stood up and ran his hand through his hair as he started his favorite pacing.

I stood up too, but made my way to the fridge to see if there was any Coke left over. I needed something to wash down all that pie, and since I'd never made it out to get groceries, I doubted there was any milk there. I found the soft drink and held it up to Colin, but was relieved when he waved off the offer. There was just enough for one glass, anyway, and I was parched.

Since there was a lull in our detective work, I grabbed a bag of marshmallows from the cabinet and stuffed one in my mouth. It wasn't exactly a healthy dinner, but the hour was growing late and all this detective work was helping to keep my mind off Paget's disappearance. Sort of.

Thinking of marshmallows made me think of Allyson. "Allyson Harlow. She's close with the Mills family and she's involved in all this somehow. I'd bet this bag of cloud-shaped delights on it."

He stretched his arms in front of him. "I know you don't like her, but the only thing we really have on her is that she has some secret with Trask, and possibly a relationship. And now possibly this business with your car and Paget, of course. But what does any of that have to do with the murder case?"

I stuck another marshmallow in my cheek and munched harder. "Owwifer Chooby," I managed to squeeze out.

"Who?" He leaned back against the counter and crossed his legs at the ankle.

"Chubby," I said.

"Trask, yes. He does seem to keep popping up. I need to check into him. I know that Captain Owens hired a whole new police force with the exception of Dempsey and Trask when he arrived here. My understanding is that Dempsey is a third- or fourth-generation cop and we are certain that Trask is sort of 'one of the family' when it comes to the Mills. Trask certainly could be involved in a cover-up and would have had the means and opportunity to move the body. But the why of the matter is really hanging me up here."

I remembered the way Captain Owens had taunted me at the jail. I didn't like the guy, but maybe we'd just gotten off on the wrong foot. "And therein lies another connection…Captain Owens and Douglas Mills. Old college buddies. The mayor gives him his job, and who's to say that he didn't bring him in specifically to hide this crime?"

I twirled a strand of my hair around my finger.

"Your sister does that, too." His voice interrupted my concentration.

"What?"

"Your sister twirls her hair like that."

I cut my eyes over to the strand of hair wrapped around my finger and then released the hair. "It's a terrible habit." My eyes started to tear up, but I shook it off.

"So, who else is on the list?" He got back to business.

"We're forgetting at least one more suspect here."

Colin gazed at me. "And that would be?"

"Well,
you
."

He pushed away from the counter and walked toward me. Stopping just inches in front of me, he reached out and ran his fingertips down the previously twirled strand of hair and then returned it to its place behind my shoulder.

My breath caught in my throat. "I don't mean—"

"Of course you're right," he said, interrupting me.

"I am?" I yelped. His close proximity suddenly made me very nervous.

"Yes, they'd gladly pin this on me, if they could. And I understand why they accused me. It's easy to accuse someone you don't know. Someone that is a stranger. Someone that disappeared so easily and left no trace behind. They could say that I was the black sheep of the family with a vendetta against my father. The Mills have hated the Brooks, and vice versa, for a long time—so why not? And that opens up a can of worms about my mother. And, well, I can't talk to her about any of this. She cut off contact with me when she found out I came to see my grandfather." He paused, seeming thoughtful.