The Readaholics and the Poirot Puzzle (10 page)

“Screw you, lady. I don't need to listen to this,” Foster said, unzipping his coverall with a quick motion and stepping out of it. His foot got caught and he hopped awkwardly.

Resisting the urge to push him over, I asked, “Do the police know about your connection with Gordon?”

Balanced on one foot, Foster raised his head and gave me a slit-eyed look. “I told you I didn't kill him. Kudos to the guy who did, but it wasn't me. I was in the ladies' bathroom half the night, pretending to clean
up the mess I caused by stopping up the toilets, and then I was hanging around in here, waiting for my chance to set off my little incendiary device in the microwave. I never went near the roof. I left when everyone evacuated for the fire and I never came back. The cops can ask my wife what time I got home.”

“I'm sure they will,” I said, planning to call Hart and offer up Foster as a suspect replacement for Derek.

I sidled past Foster, out of his reach, while he was still trying to drag the coverall over his shoe. He made no move to stop me. When I reached the stairs and started up to Derek's office, I heard him yell, “And you can tell your brother I quit! I'll be in tomorrow to pick up my paycheck.”

A door slamming told me he'd gone out the back way, past the Dumpsters.

I charged up two flights of stairs to the offices on the third floor. “Derek!” I ran down the hall, calling my brother's name. A chair scraped, his door squeaked open, and his head popped out.

“What's the matter?”

I skidded to a stop and began to pour out the story of my encounter with Foster. “Your janitor—he might have killed Gordon,” I babbled.

“You're not making sense.” Derek drew me into the office. “Calm down and start over.”

The sight of the office knocked the words out of me. The clothes that had been there were all gone, as were Derek's computer and the papers that had cluttered his desk. “Where'd everything go?” I asked.

“The police.”

“They can't just march in here and take your stuff,” I said, incensed. I stalked from one end of the room to the other, trying to figure out what all was missing. The family portrait and the tacky dogs still graced the walls.

“They can with a search warrant. My lawyer was here with me. Everything was by the book. If you think this looks bad, you should see Gordon's office.” Derek ruffled his auburn hair, seeming resigned rather than pissed off. “What were you saying about Foster?”

“Oh yeah, right.” I filled him in on my conversation with the erstwhile janitor. “He's been sabotaging the pub all along,” I said, “because he's got a gargantuan grudge against Gordon. He says he didn't kill him, but I wouldn't bet the house on that. I mean, it's one thing to admit to clogging the toilets and exploding something in the microwave, but—”

“He did that?” Derek took a hasty step toward the door, as if he was going to have it out with Foster.

I stopped him by saying, “He's gone. And yes, he put an ‘incendiary device,' as he called it, in the microwave. Seemed proud of it. Anyway, he admitted the sabotage but said he didn't kill Gordon. I think we should tell the police.”

“Damn right we should.”

“Oh, and he says he quits and will be in for his check tomorrow.” Foster's chutzpah in blithely assuming
Derek would hand over a paycheck after what he'd told me would have made me giggle if I weren't afraid that he'd killed Gordon.

“There won't be much left of it by the time I subtract out the cost of the microwave and repairing the damage in the kitchen and bathrooms,” Derek said wrathfully. “If it isn't just like Gordon to hire a guy who hates his guts.” He pulled out his cell phone and called the police, putting the phone on speaker.

Lindell Hart wasn't in the office, but the officer who answered the phone promised he'd pass along the message. “Detective Hart will call you back tomorrow,” he said.

“I guess criminals don't work on Sundays,” Derek said as he hung up.

In all fairness, there wasn't much crime in Heaven as a routine thing, and Hart was a detective shop of one. I didn't plead his case with Derek, though, and I didn't mention that I was going to see Hart tonight. Nothing would make me bring up any aspect of the case this evening, not after promising that I wouldn't. Hart could get Derek's message in the morning and ask me about Foster then. An image of the janitor fleeing to a South American hideaway worried me for a sec, but I dismissed it; he didn't seem to have the funds to jet off to a nonextradition country, and nothing he'd said made me think he would take off.

“I've gotta go,” I told Derek. I still needed to stop by the grocery store and shower, and Hart would be on my doorstep in just over an hour. “I've got company coming.”

T
he thought of seeing Hart tonight made me anxious to leave. Anticipation simmered in me, making my skin extrasensitive to the cold spray in the produce area of the City Market, and my nose susceptible to the heady scent of roses and the herbal tang of the carnations as I passed through the florist section. Throwing together a quick marinade for the salmon steaks when I got home, I shoved them in the fridge and hopped in the shower. I dithered over which top to wear—the lacy tobacco-colored tank top that made my copper hair glow, or the loden green peasant blouse that greened my eyes?—and had barely slipped the latter over my head when the doorbell rang.

I opened the door. For a split second, I expected to see Doug, and the realization that I hadn't cooked dinner for a date since breaking up with Doug made me widen my eyes. I needed to move on. I was moving on, I told myself, inviting Hart inside and taking the bottle of white wine he offered.

“From Two Rivers Winery, right down the road,” he said.

He looked good. And he smelled better, with a fresh, woodsy scent that made me think of hiking through the trees bordering Lost Alice Lake in the fall. His slightly
receding hair curled crisply around his ears, and his eyes smiled down into mine. I smiled back, truly happy to see him, and he reached for me, his hands on my waist pulling me toward him until we were pressed together from chest to thigh. “Can we just get this out of the way?” he murmured, and kissed me.

His lips were warm and firm against mine. Tendrils of heat uncoiled from the pit of my stomach, and warmed every inch of me, especially the inches mashed against Hart's solid body. His hand at my waist snugged me more firmly against him as his mouth plundered mine. I moaned and went to put my arm around his neck, clonking him on the head with the wine bottle I still held.

“Ow,” he said, as I gasped, “Sorry!”

He rubbed a spot above his head. “That's the first time I've been beaned by a wine bottle for kissing a woman.” He smiled, his gaze falling to my swollen lips. “I've been thinking about doing that for three months.”

We'd only known each other for three months. Possible replies zipped through my head: “Don't wait another three months before doing it again” and “Was it worth the wait?” Both sounded stupid inside my head, which meant they'd sound worse if I actually said them. I stood mute, feeling flustered and aroused, trying desperately to come up with something that would be lighthearted yet not dismissive, meaningful but not OMG-you're-going-to-turn-into-a-stalker. Finally, I said, “Are you hungry?”

“Oh yeah.”

The look he gave me left no doubt about what kind of hunger he was referring to, but I had some of my equilibrium back and I headed for the kitchen, saying, “You can open this”—I hefted the wine—“while I put the asparagus in to roast.”

The house I'd bought six months ago was 1980s vintage and small (what Realtor ads called “cozy”). That held true for the galley kitchen, where it was impossible for two people to work without bumping into each other. Luckily, Hart and I were okay with bumping into each other. I found him the corkscrew and he levered the cork out of the wine while I spread the asparagus on a cookie tin, rolled it in olive oil, salt, pepper, and garlic, and put it into the oven, which had preheated while I showered. Hart had found the wineglasses and now poured the wine into them. It was a lovely pale gold color—like angel hair, I thought fancifully.

“What shall we drink to?” Hart asked, raising his glass.

“Heaven, Colorado,” I said, maybe because I had angels on my mind.

“Possibilities,” Hart countered.

“Both.” We clinked our glasses and drank. The cool crispness of the wine slid down easily. “Yum.”

“What can I do to help?”

“Set the table.” Like Foster's apartment, my house didn't have a dining room. (Unlike Foster, I did not feel resentful over the lack.) I pushed all thoughts of Foster out of my mind. The options were tray tables in the den or hunching over the glass-topped coffee table in the sunroom. I loved the sunroom, so I handed Hart woven
place mats, napkins, and utensils and pointed him in the right direction. Moving the asparagus to the lower rack after five minutes, I slid the salmon under the broiler and set the timer. Hart returned when it dinged. My body sensed his presence before I turned around; he emanated a magnetism that pulled me toward him. My distraction made me careless and I burned my wrist pulling the salmon out.

“Oh!”

My involuntary gasp brought Hart the two steps to my side. “Run cold water on it,” he said, grabbing a pot holder and taking the broiling pan from me.

I ran water on the pink line creasing my wrist. It throbbed a bit, but it wasn't bad. I told Hart as much, but he insisted on raising my wrist to inspect it. “I think you'll live,” he said. He drew my wrist to his mouth and said, “A kiss will make it better.” His eyes met mine, and then he bent his head and gently touched his lips to the burn.

I swallowed hard and fought the urge to rake my fingers into his hair. If that happened, we'd end up in the bedroom and I was not, not, not going there. Not tonight. Not when Hart might arrest my brother on Tuesday. Reluctantly, I pulled my hand back. He might have been thinking the same way, because he let go immediately and took a step back so I wouldn't have to brush against him to reach for plates in the cupboard.

I took a deep breath to steady myself and told my hormones to go back into hibernation. “Salad's in the fridge,” I said, dividing the fish onto the plates and using a spatula to dish out the asparagus spears. The dark
green made a pleasing contrast to the salmon's pink flesh and I added a slice of lemon to each plate because I liked the yellow with the other colors. The effect made me smile. I carried the plates into the sunroom while Hart followed with our wineglasses.

The peace of the sunroom settled over me as I put the plates on the mats. Furnished with wicker chairs upholstered in bright floral cotton, the room had floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out to the front, side, and back yards. Sunlight slanted in, striping the celadon-colored ceramic tile with gold. A profusion of plants that I'd bought from Lola grew happily from windowsills, large ceramic planters, and hanging baskets. Adjusting the blinds to cut the worst of the glare from the setting sun, I sat.

“This is excellent,” Hart said after a mouthful of salmon. “I was going to offer to cook for you next time, but all I can do is burn meat on a grill. And veggies. Dessert comes out of the freezer.”

“Sounds like fun,” I said, glad we were already talking about a next time. “You know, I don't even know where you live.”

He told me about his rental condo on the south side of town, up against the mountain. “A bear got into my trash last week,” he said. “Not a problem I had in Atlanta. I don't put the cans out for collection until the morning now.”

“Are you liking Heaven, despite the bears, now that you've been here awhile?” I nibbled on an asparagus stalk.

“I like Heaven
because
of the bears and other critters,
and the sky, and the clean air, and no gangs, and friendly people,” he said. “There aren't nearly so many people killing each other here, either.”

The specter of Gordon rose between us. I dropped my gaze to my plate and pushed at some salmon skin with my fork.

“Damn. Sorry. Didn't mean to bring that up,” Hart said, wincing. “It's one of the biggest contrasts with Atlanta; I was getting burned out, catching three to four homicides a month. You can only marinate in the juices of people's inhumanity to each other for so long before you get—”

He broke off and finished the wine in his glass in one long swallow.

“Is that why you left? You were burned out?”

He hesitated a second and then said, “I left because my partner got shot. Killed. We were on the scene of a domestic, where a uniform had had to shoot a man whaling on his wife with a shovel. The EMTs were loading him into the bus when Sarah and I arrived. The wife, a little-bitty thing, was on a gurney, head bleeding, IV in her arm, about to get taken to a different hospital in a separate ambulance. I wasn't even out of the car when she pulls out a .32 and begins spraying bullets around, yelling that the cops had murdered her husband. One of the bullets ripped through Sarah's right eye. She died. The man and his wife both lived.”

“That's awful,” I said. I finished my wine, horrified by this glimpse of his life before Heaven. Something about the way he said his partner's name made me
wonder if their relationship had gone beyond the workplace.

“I kept at it for another six months. When my air force brother came home on leave, he took one look at me and told me to quit the job. He had the distance, the perspective, that I didn't have right then. I was too close to it. As soon as he said it, though, I knew he was right. I became a cop because I wanted to make a difference, but I began to see that I couldn't make a difference in Atlanta. Collar one pusher, another takes his place before you snap on the cuffs. Put away a gangbanger, knowing that at the same moment some ten – or eleven-year-old kid is getting initiated, sucked into a way of life that will have him laid out on a slab or in prison before he's sixteen. I turned in my badge the day Philip flew back to Germany, took some time off to fish and think, ended up here.” Hart smiled ruefully. “I didn't mean to get all heavy and depressing on you.”

“I'm glad you told me. And I'm glad you chose Heaven.” I leaned over and kissed him gently on the lips, then stood and gathered our plates. “Dessert comes out of the freezer here, too,” I said. “Vanilla or Moose Tracks?”

“Some of both?”

“You got it. With Kahlúa on top?”

“Heck yeah!”

I laughed.

He stayed another hour and we deliberately kept the conversation lighter, talking about books, movies, and music we liked, about high school memories, and childhood pets. When the last bit of sun had almost faded from the room, and the floor lamp I'd turned on cast plant shadows on the floor, he stood to go.

“Good thing we took care of that kissing thing up front,” he said at the door, “so we don't have to stand here and feel awkward, wondering if—”

I shut him up by pulling his head down to kiss him. Fifteen minutes later he tore himself away and jogged down the sidewalk to his car. I closed the door behind him, leaned against it with my eyes shut, still tasting him and feeling his hands on my body, and thought how much it was going to suck if he had to arrest my brother. It made me determined to redouble my efforts to find out who had really killed Gordon Marsh.