Toxic Attack: Spirit of the Soul Wine Shop Mystery (A Rysen Morris Mystery Book 2) (6 page)

"Shouldn't we get up there?" she asked, her hand on his shoulder now, so close to him that she was whispering in his ear.

"No.  We wait," he said.  "If he doesn't come down here, then we'll rush upstairs after him.  He'll hear us coming if we go now.  Don't want to spook him off."

Good point, Rysen decided.  The floorboards upstairs weren't the only things that were squeaky in the shop.  So they waited while more things crashed upstairs and then a man's muffled voice was added to the noises.  Then everything went silent.

The intruder was at the top of the cellar stairs.

Before pretending to leave, Rysen had made sure to bring her sister's ledger down here.  That was the real bait, after all.  It sat on an upright oaken barrel not far from the bottom of the stairs just on the other side of the wine rack they were hiding behind.  It was open to a random page, resting in such a way that it looked like it had been left there accidentally.  Like Christina had been using it when she got sick and then left it where it was.

Which should be exactly what the intruder expected to find.

The man from upstairs started down, slowly, one step at a time.  At the fifth or sixth step he threw aside his caution and came rushing down.  He'd seen the book.  Thinking he was alone, he figured he had nothing to worry about.

He was very, very wrong.

Reaching up to squeeze Rysen's hand, Brandon left her where she was and came around the end of the shelved wines with his gun in hand.  "Stay where you are," Brandon told the man in a loud, stern voice, his Australian accent coming out heavier in the excitement.  "Do not make me use this."

The look of shock on the man's face nearly made Rysen laugh.  It was comical.  He was a heavy man, with definition that showed he used to be all lean muscle in his younger days before gravity had gotten the better of him.  He was balding, and his bare scalp wrinkled up as his eyebrows rose and his mouth hung open and he spit and sputtered trying to form a coherent sentence.

"Wha…who?  What are you…this isn't…wait, wait, wait!"

He was holding the ledger book.  Rysen squinted through the empty spaces in the rack, staring at his hands.  They were a pasty white.  No.  Those were gloves.  The man was wearing gloves!

Now she knew her guess had been right.  All the clues pointed to this.  The page of writing in the dead woman's secret pocket.  The fact that the only one poisoned had been Christina.  It all added up to the ledger book. 

Pages of the ledger book had been replaced, copied over in ink laced with arsenic.  That was how Christina had been poisoned.  Intentionally, maliciously, and very craftily.  She would have missed it entirely if she hadn't had that fit over Josh storming out of the store.  When that heavy leather book had fallen off the counter…uh, when she'd
pushed
it off…everything had clicked together in her mind.

Detective Rysen Morris.  Apparently she really was good at this stuff.  She couldn't wait to tell Josh!

The man was still being held at gunpoint by Brandon.  The moment seemed to hang in the air as Rysen came out from around the wine rack, smiling, thrilled that the two of them had done it again.  "I'll go call the police," she told him.  "Can you keep him here?"

"Shouldn't be a problem.  It's all aces.  Go ahead.  We'll be down he—"

When Brandon turned his head to talk to her, the pudgy man snapped forward with a lot more speed than Rysen would have thought possible, leading with the ledger.  The book flashed forward to slam the revolver sideways and out of Brandon's hand.

Then it came back in a reverse arc that took him in the side of the face.

Rysen heard herself yell out Brandon's name, watched him lose his balance and fall sideways into the cement wall of the cellar, heard the crack of his skull as it hit hard.  When he slid to the floor in a heap, she thought her heart had stopped.

Then the man turned to her with a menacing smile.  "I don't think anyone's going to be calling the police, missy."

Something came over her.  Some calm decision that she was only aware of at the edges of her mind.  A single thought formed and took hold of her.

She was not going to let this man get away.

Reaching behind her she grabbed the very first wine bottle that she touched by its long, skinny neck.  She was aware of the smoothness of the glass, the grit of the dust that coated it, the weight of it in her grip.  Sliding it from its angled shelf she bladed her body to the man holding the book.

"Hey," he growled.  "What are you doing?"

She didn't answer him.  Not in words.  Still thinking of how this man had struck Brandon down, she swung the bottle as hard as she could.

Too surprised to even defend himself, the guy took the bottle squarely across his right ear.  A hollow
tink
sound echoed around the cellar.  Blood leaked from a cut along his cheekbone.  His eyes rolled back and his head crumpled over to his left shoulder before he fell backward onto the cellar floor.

The bottle didn't break.

Rysen stared at it in her hand.  Wow.  Strong glass.

Had she really just done that?  She had just acted without giving it much thought.  The crazy thing was, she enjoyed it.  Her heart was racing a mile a minute and she knew, if she could see herself, that she would hardly recognize the woman standing here.

It was a rush.  Something she definitely wanted more of in her life.

Watch out world, here comes detective Rysen Morris.  Yes.  That had a nice ring to it, didn't it?

Over near the wall, Brandon moaned and stirred, holding his head in both hands.  She dropped the bottle—it bounced once against the floor and then spun on its side still unbroken—and rushed to him.  Gently, she helped him sit up.

"Brandon?  Brandon are you all right?"

He looked up at her but his eyes wouldn't focus.  Her fingers found a huge lump just above his one ear, and came away sticky with blood.

"Wait here," she told him, thinking she must sound really stupid.  Where else was he going to go?

Running upstairs where she could get cell phone reception she hastily dialed 911.  It felt like it took forever for the dispatcher to answer after the very first ring.  "Hello, my name is Rysen Morris.  I'm at 242 Main Street in Cambria.  I need an ambulance and the police."

Then she caught herself smiling.  "We just caught a murderer."

***

The police asked a hundred different questions.  Sometimes the same ones twice.  By the time she had given a statement and signed three…no, four…official forms, the emergency responders had bandaged Brandon's head and loaded him into the ambulance with its red and blue flashing lights and taken off.

The bad guy was led out of the wine store in handcuffs between two Sheriff's Deputies.  Everyone on the street was watching and staring.  She recognized a few faces but most of them were tourists who had gotten more than they bargained for by walking down the streets of Cambria today.  Rysen felt her face heating.  This was more attention than she was used to.  Especially in her home town.  Detective Rysen Morris wasn't ready to make her debut appearance.  Not yet.

The ledger book was handled like it was toxic.  Which in a way, she supposed, it was.  Crime scene detectives in heavy rubber gloves placed it into a plastic sleeve with a red seal and the big black word EVIDENCE across the front.  Poor Christina, Rysen thought.  She put her whole life into that book.  What would she do without it? 

Officer Richards was the last Deputy there.  Rysen remembered him from the murder scene at Bea's flower shop.  She still couldn't see what he was thinking behind his sunglasses, but there was something in the way he spoke to her.  Almost like he was impressed by what had happened here.  "You're going to be all right?" he asked before leaving.

"Um.  Yes.  I think so."

"Not every day you catch a murderer in your place of business, is it?"

"I certainly hope not," was her immediate response.

He actually smiled at her when she said it.  She couldn't help but smile back.  It might not be every day that something like this happened, but things were definitely not boring in her life.  Cambria sure wasn't the sleepy little town she remembered from her childhood, either. 

After Officer Richards left she stood in the wine shop, looking all around at the frescoes on the wall and the bottles of wine in their displays and remembering what her life had been like in the big city.  Had she ever really been happy out there in San Francisco?  That had been her dream life, or so she thought.  A promising career, a man to hold her tight, her whole future within her grasp.

Or so she had thought.

Now, she considered that just maybe her life had been waiting for her here in Cambria all along.  What had she been running away from, anyway?  Her father?  Her limitations?  What she had right here, in this moment, was pretty sweet.  What could be better?

She turned around and around with her arms spread out wide, imagining herself basking in the light of a full life.

On her third rotation she saw Josh standing and watching her, an amused smile playing over his lips.

She startled and nearly lost her balance, recovering very ungracefully with her feet crossed and strands of her hair falling across her face.  "Josh!  Um, how long have you been standing there?"

"If I say not long will you do that little dance again?"  He came right over to her and to her surprise, wrapped his arms around her.

"Wow," she said, her words muffled into his shoulder.  "What's this for?"

"Because I was worried about you.  It's all over town how you caught the killer here in the shop."

Of course it was.  News in a small town travelled faster than even the internet could manage.  Hmm.  This was so nice.  Josh, holding her and stroking her hair.  Murmuring soft words of comfort.  This is how every day should end.  Not just the ones that involve crimes and danger and trips to the hospital.

Oh, right.

Nestling into the crook of Josh's arm she tapped a finger against his chest.  "I need to get to the hospital.  Want to drive me?"

"Yeah, that's right.  You'll want to check on Christina and tell her about this.  I know the charge nurse working the afternoon shift.  You want me to call her and get an update on her condition?"

"That would be sweet.  I'm not talking about Christina, though.  They just took Brandon to the hospital from here.  He got a pretty bad bump to his head.  Not as bad as the one I gave that guy with a wine bottle, though.  You should have seen it…"

She stopped.  Josh had stiffened up around her.

"What?" she asked.  "What is it?"

"You didn't tell me you were here with Brandon."

"I thought you knew."

"How could I know?"

"You said you knew!"

"I knew that you were in danger.  Again!  I did not know that you called Brandon to help you instead of me!"

They were shouting, and Rysen didn't understand how the conversation had gone so bad so quickly.  "Josh, it wasn't like we were out on a date!  We were here on a stakeout!"

"A stakeout?  Rysen, this ain't some detective movie!  You were here.  With him."

"We were trying to catch a killer.  Remember?  The murder you got arrested for?  I was doing this for you, Josh!  Someone had to do it!"

"You are not," he said slowly, "a detective!"

Her arms folded themselves across her chest and she glared at him.  "The detective thing was your idea.  Remember?"

"Whatever.  If I'd known you were going to use it as an excuse to do stakeouts with other guys I never would have said anything!"

"Josh!  Stop it!"  She couldn't believe how mad she was at him.  Why couldn't he understand this?  "Brandon promised to stay out of the picture."

Well, she thought, biting her lip.  That wasn't the complete truth.  It was close enough for now. 

She hoped.

He threw his hand in the air and turned around.  "I can't do this anymore.  Every time I open up to you, there's Brandon.  You know what?  You want him so bad, have him.  I'm going home."

"Josh, don't walk out again!"

The words hung in the air as the door slammed shut.

Christina was asleep when Rysen drove out to the hospital.  She couldn't help but be disappointed because right now, she needed her sister's advice.  Did she and Josh just break up?  She wasn't sure how she felt about it, one way or the other.  She and Christina had always been able to talk about boys.  She really needed that right now.

Especially since her next stop was to see Brandon.

He was in a room on the first floor, the rooms set aside for patients who weren't staying long.  When she saw him laying there with a gauze pad wrapped to the side of his head she felt like a vise had just wrapped around her heart.

"It's okay," he told her.  "They want to observe me for a few hours.  Apparently I wasn't exactly coherent when they brought me in."

"You got hit with a book.  I understand hospitals take that very seriously."

Shaking his head, he laughed, then winced.  "I can't believe this has happened to me twice."

"This is the second time you've been hit in the head with a book?"

"No," he said.  "This is the second time you've stopped the bad guy after I let myself get taken down."

Yeah, she thought, it kind of was.  Huh.  The first time had been with a crate of wine.  This time with a ledger book.  "You do lead an interesting life."

"I try to.  So.  I spoke with my police contact a little bit ago.  He told me that our killer is pretty well known to them.  Long rap sheet.  Including, I might add, forgery charges.  Now he's going to be facing a murder wrap.  They think that lacing ink with arsenic is a new trick for him but they're going to interrogate him more to be sure."

Rysen sat down on the edge of the bed as she listened to him talk about what the police knew.  The alarm had been bypassed, just like at Bea's shop.  Brandon wasn't surprised.  A good criminal knew how to bypass even the best alarms and this guy was definitely an experienced criminal. 

The discrepancies Christina had found in her books were the result of this man forging pages of the ledger.  He'd gotten her handwriting perfect but little details had been messed up, making funds appear to be missing.

"He might have even done that on purpose," Brandon guessed, "to make Miss Christina spend more time with the ledger.  Every time she touched a page or ran a finger along a column she would have been absorbing arsenic through her skin.  What I can't figure out is how you managed not to be poisoned, too."

"Chris never lets me touch her ledger book," Rysen explained.  "I only did the computer spreadsheets and things like that.  So do they know why he killed the woman in Bea's shop yet?"

"No.  Not yet."  He paused.  "There's something else."

"I could tell."

"Oh?  Getting to know me that well?"

Her smile slipped.  "A little too well, maybe."

He must have read the look on her face.  "Troubles with your boyfriend?"

She nodded miserably.  "He might have, sort of, broken up with me."

"Sorry to hear that."

"Are you?  Really?  Because you don't sound it.  And I'm not sure how I want to feel about it, either."  She wanted so badly to be mad at him, was what she wanted.  She just couldn't make herself do it.  This wasn't Brandon's fault.  None of it was.  She had chosen to be with Josh, but fate or God Himself kept throwing her and Brandon together.  She just wasn't sure what to make of it.

"How about we let that go for now?" he suggested, reaching out to take her hand. 

She looked to the door, expecting Josh to be standing there to see this, too.  She was almost disappointed when there was no one there.

Still, she didn't take her hand away.

"Tell me the rest of it," she said, feeling his fingers curl around hers.  "You said there was something more."

"Right.  Turns out the police found a connection between the dead woman and the delivery truck driver we busted last month.  Their bank accounts are tied to the same bank account.  Both of them got paid from that account.  Someone hired both of them.  I wouldn't be surprised if they hired the bald guy in your cellar, too."  He put a hand to his head like he was remembering the events in the cellar.  "It's a good first step, anyway.  Maybe now we can find out who the real person behind all this."

"They don't know who the bank account belongs to?"

"Not yet.  It's under a fake name, and I'm betting it leads to another fake account, and another, and so on.  Someone's gone to a lot of trouble to cover their tracks."

She didn't know what to say.  All of these people, hired by a single, shadowy bastard who they didn't know.  How could anyone hate her sister that much?  Robbed, assaulted, laid up in the hospital.  Who would do that?

And why?

Rysen didn't know those answers.  Yet.  She would have to put all of her new found sleuthing skills to work solving this riddle.

For now, all she knew was that Brandon's hand felt good in hers.  Warm and strong and comforting.  Brandon didn’t expect anything from her, and he was always there when she needed someone's help.  As guys went, he was wonderful.

There was a fleeting moment when she knew this was what she wanted in her life.  This, right here.  Even the dangerous situations they kept falling into.  It was that simple.  Or, it should be.  Shouldn't it?

Why couldn't things be this simple all the time?

***

The next morning, Rysen awoke to the smell of pancakes wafting up from downstairs.  She smiled.  Christina must be back from the hospital, her sleepy mind reasoned.  Stretching, she rolled out of bed and put on her slippers, then padded down the hallway still in her pajamas. 

She was halfway down the stairs when she remembered Christina wasn't going to be released from the hospital until tonight.  Rysen was supposed to pick her up, for that matter.

So who was downstairs making pancakes?

When she came around into the kitchen she saw him.  Tall, imposing, and very out of place flipping pancakes on an electric griddle.

"Uh.  Good morning, dad."

He scooped a pancake up and placed it over onto a plate that held a growing stack.  "Good morning to you, too.  I thought you might like some breakfast."

"Well I usually eat breakfast in the morning, so that's good timing."  Was that a smile she saw on his face?  It was there and gone so quickly she couldn't be sure.  "Dad, what are you doing here?"

With his back to her, he shrugged and poured out more batter.  "Like I said, I'm making you pancakes."

"Okay…"  She didn't get it.  The last time she'd spoken to her father he had practically frozen her out and then stormed out of the room like all the men in her life had been doing recently. 

Every one of them except Brandon, that is.  Something else to consider.

She sat down at the kitchen table, feeling awkward in her pajamas and still confused.  The silence continued for a long time as her dad put together plates of golden brown pancakes with syrup and strips of crispy bacon.  He put one plate in front of her, and sat down with the other one, folding out a napkin onto his lap.

As she stared at him, he cut into his three pancakes, took a bite, and chewed.  It was like this was a normal thing for them, something they did every day, like nothing had ever been said between them or—

"I'm proud of you, Rysen," he said after a drink of milk.  He never looked at her as he cut another bite.  "What you did for your sister means a lot."

Rysen couldn't believe what she had just heard.  Her father had just told her that he was proud.  Of her!  Wow.  She'd have to mark that one on her calendar.

They ate in silence after that, but Rysen couldn't help like the fact that she and her dad had just grown a little closer.  It wasn't like he'd come over to give her a big hug, but it might just be the first step toward healing the hurts between them.

Those were the best pancakes she'd ever had in her whole life.

***

The wine shop was going to stay closed today.  With everything that had happened Rysen figured she needed a day off.  Christina would be back tonight and they could discuss how to go forward from here.  One thing was certain.  They would need to have much better security.  If the man who killed the woman in Bea's shop and then tried to steal the poisoned ledger to cover his tracks could break through security alarms that easily, they'd have to come up with something different.

Brandon would probably be able to help them with that.  He'd already offered to stay in the area for them, and help with whatever they needed.  Rysen sighed as she walked up Main Street.  That was one more complication she would have to iron out.

Josh or Brandon.  Both men were perfect, in their own way.  Both of them were obviously into her.  She couldn't just lead both of them on and she couldn't just keep pretending she didn't have feelings for both of them.

She was a leaf being blown around on the wind.  She needed to land somewhere, to make a decision and ground herself in her choice.  It would be nice if someone could make the choice for her, but that wasn't how these things worked.  It was her choice to make and she would have to make it.

Just not today.  Today she was going to drop in on Beatrice and let her know everything they had found out.  The killer.  The arsenic.  The link to whoever was behind everything.  It was like the plot to a mystery novel.

The bell above the door to the flower shop jingled as she entered.  The buzz around Bea's store had died down in the days following the murder, and now the shop was empty in the early morning hours.  Rysen found Bea in the work area behind the sales counter slamming vases out of her way to toss a bunch of flowers down on the table.  She must be putting together an order.

"Hi, Bea," she said, leaning over the counter.  "Did you hear about what happened?"

Bea jerked around to Rysen, a pair of curved garden shears gripped tightly in her gloved hand.  "Oh," she said almost immediately, "hi, Rysen.  I didn't hear you come in."

"That's all right.  You must have a lot of work to catch up on."

"I do," she said with a tight smile.  "Especially now that Josh doesn't work here anymore."

She turned back to the flowers, roses and purple lilies, and began expertly snipping the stems shorter.  Rysen could only imagine how Bea must feel, how she must be tense and upset still about the dead woman in the back of her shop.  Hopefully what Rysen had to tell her would make her feel better.

"Well," she said to Beatrice's back, "I've got good news.  Christina's going to be home tonight.  Wait until you hear the rest of it!"

Bea turned, a rose in her hand.  With a harsh
snip
she cut the head of the flower off.  It fell to the floor at her feet.

"Bea?  What's wrong?"

"What's wrong?  What's wrong!  Seriously, Rysen?"  Bea slammed the shears down on the counter and began waving her hands around as she practically screamed at Rysen.  "How about the fact that you basically swooped in here and stole Josh away from me?  How about the fact that there was a murder here in my shop and now the police are back asking questions since they think there's a big old conspiracy going on, thanks to you!  How about the way you—"

Beatrice took hold of herself, fisting her hands, squeezing her eyes shut, and breathing for a long few seconds while Rysen stood there in complete shock. 

"Bea," she said, "I had no idea that you were so upset about all of that…"

"Nevermind," her friend said slowly, sighing out the word with a heavy breath.  "Just…forget it, Ry.  I didn't mean all of that.  I'm just so upset.  Worried, I guess.  I mean, all of this murder and intrigue stuff may be great for you and that Brandon guy but it's just too much for me.  I'm all worked up.  Forgive me?"

Rysen brightened immediately.  "Of course, Bea.  I understand.  I'm just glad that Chris is going to be all right.  It shouldn't be much longer and we'll be able to catch the person behind this as soon as the police track the bank account information they found."

"Yes," Bea said with a tired smile.  "I'm glad for all of that, too.  Listen, I have a bit of a headache.  Can we maybe catch up later?  Please?"

"Um, sure.  Sorry, Bea.  I didn't mean to worry you."

"It's all right.  Really.  It's just like I said.  You and I are very different people."

"Still friends, though, right?"

Beatrice picked up a lily in bloom and handed it to her.  "Of course.  Friends.  I'll call you later.  Promise.  I just think I need to lay down now."

They said their goodbyes and Rysen left, still worrying about Bea.  She'd really taken all of this hard.  And she obviously wasn't as over Josh and her dating each other as Rysen had thought.  Well.  She'd have to think about that, too.  Not that it would be the final deciding factor, but she had to consider her friend's feelings, at least.

For now, it was a bright sunny day.  The sun was out and the air was warm and scented with the nearby vineyards and the distant ocean.  Rysen breathed in the world around her and smiled. 

Life in Cambria might not be as boring as she remembered.  From where she stood, that wasn't a bad thing.  This really was becoming home now.  Everything was unfolding around her in ways she never could have dreamed.  Some good, some bad.  Wasn't that what life was all about?