Fiona Silk Mysteries 2-Book Bundle (14 page)

When I yanked the door open, Tolstoy nuzzled up to
Sarrazin, who patted him on the head then pointed to the box on my door. “That stupid contraption is a terrible idea. Why would anyone stick an ugly box like that on their front door?”

I said, “It works for me. Usually.”

He actually shivered in the heat. “Well, it gives me the creeps.”

“Really?”

“I have no idea where you would get something like that.”

“A friend made it for me. After all that trouble last year when I needed to be left alone by the media and all that. I'm sure you remember.”

“I'll never forget it. Who made it?”

What kind of inquisition was this? I couldn't see any harm in the answer. “Josey Thring. But she made it for me as a special gift. She doesn't make them for... Is there a licensing issue or something?”

“No. I just wondered where you'd get one. And why you'd want one. You don't have the media chasing after you this year. I should have known it was that Thring kid. Comes from a pretty bad family.”

“I'm a writer, and I always need to protect my time. I don't want distractions.”

He glanced at my mop of wet hair. “And were you writing?”

“Are you here to see how I spend my time?” Was this some new tactic by the tax people? Find out if people are really doing what they claim in their deductions? Use the local cops as moles?

He glowered at me. He had the eyebrows for it, and the seventeen-inch neck added impact. “I'm here to find out what your relationship was with Daniel Dupree.”

“I didn't have one. I explained that when I called you yesterday. Why do you keep asking about that?”

Again with the bearlike look. “Here's the way it works: I am the cop. I ask the questions, madame. It's the law.”

I didn't ask what exact law that was. Instead I said, “You may as well come in. It's still a bit cooler in the house.”

He followed me through the door and into the living room. “You weren't really straight with me about that relationship. Try again. Get it right this time. It will be easy. Then I'll leave.”

“I have it right. He had business dealings with my former husband. I don't think I ever talked to him.”

He stopped and blinked. “Didn't you used to have some chairs in here?”

“My friend borrowed them. Try the sofa.” The sofa was lumpy, so maybe it would cut his visit short. I didn't offer coffee or lemonade.

He plunked himself down. I swear the sofa groaned. He said, “He was your ex-husband's partner?”

Tolstoy climbed up next to him on the sofa. I didn't care.

As I walked toward the kitchen to get a chair, I said, “In some business dealings. Philip's not...”

“Gay?”

“Not really sexual at all. At least, I never really noticed it. Now you've made my head hurt.”

“That's all this Daniel Dupree was?” He held up his hand. “Let's review this: you don't need to know why I'm asking. You just need to answer. Did you see him often?”

“Maybe twice or three times. I told you that.”

“Are you sure, madame?”

“Of course, I'm sure.”

“Did you have a reason to be angry with him?”

“No!”

“Take your time, madame.”

“My ex is taking quite a while to liquidate his assets as part of our divorce settlement. I was angry at
him.
But he's still alive. I never thought about this Dupree. That is the truth.”

“Hmm. Your divorce settlement. I'd heard about that. I hear you were pretty upset about it.”

That's the trouble with living in St. Aubaine. There's a very good chance that everyone in town knows your business. Financial problems are a preferred source of local chatter, running a close third to fractured love lives and extramarital flings. I was pretty sure that Sarrazin had done his homework and knew that I was behind on my municipal taxes and a few bucks short of paying the Hydro bill.

“Maybe you blamed Daniel Dupree for your financial problems.”

“Are you listening to me? I was angry at Philip for stalling. I still am, not that I see what that has to do with anyone but me.”

“And this Dupree was involved too?”

I massaged my temple. For some reason it felt like I might have a migraine coming on.

“Only in that he and Phil probably still had business dealings.”

“But he was contributing to your financial problems?”

“It's really just a cash crunch,” I said.

“Did you hold Dupree responsible for this, madame?”

“What? How could he be responsible?”

“Uh-uh-uh. Who asks the questions?”

“He has nothing to do with it because...” I paused. Hang on. Maybe he did. If Philip was having trouble getting my share of the community property into my hands, was that because of Dupree?

“Yes, madame? You have something to add?”

“It's possible that one of the reasons Phil has been slow to settle is because of the business dealings they have together,
but I'm not aware of it. You'd have to ask Philip about that.”

“I plan to.”

“Oh. Well. Good.”

“But I am talking to you right now.”

What was the question? “No. I didn't blame him. I prefer to blame Philip. It's familiar, and it just feels right. Danny Dupree was in that accident. That's the one fact I am sure of. I didn't have anything to do with that.”

“You know I hate coincidence.”

“But I can't explain it. I was going home from the hospital at my regular time when he hassled me on the road. The next time I saw him, the Escalade was upside down in the ravine.”

“Did you pursue him on the highway?”

“In the Skylark? That would be funny if it wasn't so...”

“Did you?”

“Of course not.”

He leaned forward. The man gives new meaning to the word menace. And he's supposed to be a good guy. “So, let's see if I understand. You were following him, and...”

“Well, actually, let me correct you there. He was preceding me. He passed me just before Exit 13 and...”

“Yeah, okay. You made that point. So he was ahead, and you were behind and then...?”

“Quite far ahead. He must have been doing one-fifty. Maybe more.”

“And you were doing?”

“The speed limit. Probably less.”

“Okay. That's not possible, is it? It takes awhile for the first responders to get there. It took a few minutes to close the road. You would have been there minutes afterwards. Not a half hour later.”

I stared at him, perplexed. I'm not so good with time and
space calculations at the best of times. “I was a bit shaken up. I got off at exit 13 and drove back on the 105 to get some chocolate Kahlua cake at Suki's.”

“You never mentioned that.”

“Why would I mention it?” I squeaked. “I went to get a slice of cake and some dog treats. It never occurred to me that it was important, if it is, which I doubt.”

Tolstoy's tail tapped on the floor.

“And you can prove that?”

“Prove it?”

He watched me wordlessly.

My voice went up an octave or so. “There was a person I knew very very very slightly who acted like a jerk, even though I didn't recognize him. He got in an accident, probably because he continued to act like a jerk. I came along afterwards and was stopped by the police officer. I told the officer about the earlier incident, and that's all there was to it. It was a horrible accident, but it has nothing to do with me. You have to stop...persecuting me.”

He cleared his throat. “Three points, Madame Silk. One, I am just doing my job. Two, it was not an accident. And three, it appears it does have something to do with you.”

“Not an accident?”

“No, it was not.”

“Suicide? But he was such a...”

“No, madame. Doesn't look like suicide.”

“But that leaves murder.”

Contributed by Miz Josey Thring,
EA

4 homemade or frozen waffles—prepared

1 peach and 1 nectarine, pitted and sliced

½ teaspoon lemon zest

½ cup fresh blueberries

¼ cup blueberry syrup

1 teaspoon maple syrup

Heat syrup, zest, syrups and berries. Place two waffles on each plate. Top with fruit and syrup. Serve with chilled champagne and orange juice.

Yes, madame.”

“Well, he was alive and obnoxious the last time I saw him. Oh. Did someone shoot at him from the side of the road? A rifle? Because...”

He shook his head. He reached out and picked a shrivelled leaf from the poor old philodendron that Aunt Kit had left behind.

“Please leave my plant alone and tell me what happened.”

“Preliminary tests indicate the presence of drugs.”

“Drugs? He took drugs?”

“
GHB
. A date rape drug. I suspect he didn't know he was taking these.”

I stared at him. “You can't think I had anything to do with it. I barely knew him. And what about the woman who was with him? Maybe she—”

“There was no woman.”

“Believe me, I don't hallucinate women. What if someone gave her drugs too, and she was injured or shocked, and she crawled into the woods.”

He shook his head. “You saw the vehicle. No one would have made it out of that.”

“Perhaps she was thrown from the vehicle on impact. That happens. Doesn't it?”

“Sure, but there's a body when it does happen. Based on what
you said, we did a very careful search of every centimetre of that ravine. Believe me, no one crawled away from that accident.”

“I can't believe you suspect me.”

“I don't.”

“Are you asking everyone in St. Aubaine if they blamed Danny Dupree for their problems? How about my neighbour Jean-Claude Lamontagne? I bet you're not asking him.”

“You are right, madame. I am not. I'm just doing—”

“Well, I'd like to be doing my job too, but the police won't leave me alone. This situation isn't the same as the last time. I actually
had
a relationship with Benedict, but Danny Dupree meant nothing to me. Hardly even an acquaintance. There would be hundreds of people more involved with him than I was.”

“We got a tip.”

“A tip? What do you mean a tip?”

“A tip. Everyone knows what a tip is. Someone called the station and suggested that you had something to gain from Danny Dupree's death. I have no choice but to follow up.”

“I have nothing to gain from his death. I keep telling you, we're not connected. He held some of my husband's investments, that's all.” I thought about my words. Unfortunately, it was too late to call them back.

“That's what our caller said. You want your husband to settle your property division, and he's stalling. Dupree was helping him with that game.”

“Game?”

“Sure. Men play it all the time. Maybe women do too. But mostly it's men. This Dupree was your husband's ally. So, poof, you even the odds.”

“That's ridiculous.”

“You do need money, madame.”

“Lots of people need money. Most of us don't bump people
off to get it though.”

He shrugged yet again.

“The woman saw me. She even tossed a cigarette out the window. Oh wait,
she
must have called in the tip.”

He shook his head.

I said, “Well, none of it makes sense. Who else would call in a tip like that about me?”

“Someone who has a grudge against you and wants suspicion deflected from them?”

“I don't know who that could be.”

“Your ex-husband perhaps.”

“No. Trust me, Philip is a jerk, but he's not a crook.”

“We'll be checking him out.”

“Oh, boy.” That's all I needed—Philip, distracted from the business of settling up with me, liquidating everything he owned to fight false charges, weeping because the laundry services in the local slammer didn't put the right amount of starch in his shirts.

Sarrazin unbent from the sofa. “And madame?”

“Yes?”

“This plant is in the wrong place. If you don't move it so it gets more indirect light, it's just going to get worse.”

Tolstoy was sorry to see him go.

Josey showed up so soon after Sarrazin's departure that I could only surmise she had been hiding out behind a tree. Perhaps studying since, once again, it turned out to be a study day. Where were all these sunny June study days when I'd been chained to a desk at school?

“You know what I think would be sexy, Miz Silk?”

“What?” I gulped.

“Breakfast in bed. With homemade waffles and maybe peaches. And fresh orange juice with champagne. Wouldn't that be great?”

“It would. Of course, I have no idea where you'd start with something like that.”

“Try here,” she said and handed me a fresh batch of cookbooks from the library. I took them to the lumpy sofa as she headed into the kitchen with a package to install a spice rack. I didn't like to ask where she'd gotten it. What do I know about product placement?

I was working my way through the latest pile of cookbooks and looking forward to
The Wacky World of Waffles.
A tap on the window caught my attention.

I looked up from my spot on the sofa to see Hélène Lamontagne's attractive nose pressed against my living room window. She doesn't bother with the door since I rarely answer it, but Hélène is one of the few people I am always glad to see.

I hoisted myself off the lumpy sofa and headed for the door.

“Fiona!” she said, sweeping into the room.
“Oh là là.”

“Oh là là?”