The Scent of Lies: A Paradise Valley Mystery (28 page)

The housekeeper opened the door and held it for her.

“Oh, by the way,” Delia added, “I wanted to say how glad I was to hear you’re all right. I heard someone took a shot at you.”

“Where did you hear that?” Emily questioned. An uneasiness prickled her.

“Alex told me.”

“I wish he wouldn’t have. I honestly didn’t want it to get out.”

“Well, I’m just glad you’re okay. Private investigation can be a dangerous profession, you know. Look at what happened to your poor husband, digging around people’s business.”

Emily wasn’t sure if she should read more into that comment or not, the uneasiness turning into agitation.

“Don’t worry about me. I’m fine, really. The sooner we catch Ricardo’s killer the better.” Emily stepped out onto the porch, anxious to get away.

“Emily, I’m curious,” Delia said.

Emily paused and impatiently turned back to face her. Delia was looking pensive, standing in the doorway.

“Yes, Delia?”

“How much was the severance check for?”

“I don’t know, Anna didn’t say.” Emily wondered what Delia was getting at. Perhaps she was thinking Anna fired herself, knowing it was coming, and paid herself handsomely for it.

“I think I’ll give Henry a call and find out how much of my money that little tramp left with.”

* * *

Emily headed back to Isabel and Alex’s home. She phoned him at his office to fill him in on her discussion with Delia.

“You’re saying she did not fire Anna?” Alex asked

“No, she claims she didn’t, and she actually looked rather surprised when I asked her about it.”

“So who did?”

“Don’t know. It sounded to me like Delia was saying between the lines that she thought Anna might have fired herself. It would certainly be easy enough for her to send herself an email from Delia’s office, and then send one to the accounting department.”

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

“Delia wanted to know how much the severance check was for.”

“I think I’d want to know that too, given the circumstances,” Alex said.

“You don’t think she took a big pay-out and will disappear, do you?”

“She might, which would probably help Delia’s case. Laraway wouldn’t be able to call her to the witness stand during the trial.”

“True, but Colin already has her statement. Wouldn’t that carry some weight?”

“Maybe, but not as much as having her in court on the witness stand. If she does disappear, I might even be able to get her statement thrown out, since I wouldn’t be able to cross examine her.”

“Yes, that would help Delia’s case.” Unfortunately it wouldn’t help Emily catch Anna as the killer if she disappeared with a bundle of money.

“You don’t think Delia would fire Anna and give her a fat severance check to get rid of her, do you?” she asked. There was something unsettling that kept Emily from erasing all doubt that Delia was innocent. The timeline was just too close to be absolutely certain.

“I hadn’t thought of that. Geez, I hope not.”

“Sorry, Alex, I have another call coming in. Can we talk more later?”

“Sure.”

Emily clicked off her call with Alex and answered the incoming one from Colin.

“Hey, Emily, what was that crazy phone call about?” Colin asked.

“Yeah, about that.” Emily explained her calculated plan to him and how there was no real new evidence, only the promise of it. She figured whoever was the actual killer would show up to make sure that new piece of evidence never got into the hands of the police. “I’ll see who shows up, Anna or Delia.”

“I hope you know you’re playing a dangerous game, Emily Parker,” Colin warned. “Please don’t do this. Go home to Isabel’s and let me take care of it.”

“You can’t talk me out of it, Colin. It’s the only way I know of to catch the killer and get her to stop shooting at me.”

“Sheesh, Emily. You are the most stubborn woman I’ve ever known.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” she said with her usual bit of sarcasm.

“When and where is this shindig going down?” he asked. She could hear the concern that lined his voice.

“Seven o’clock at Evan’s office.”

“I’ll meet you there at six-thirty. I’m not letting you do this alone.”

“I was hoping you’d say that.”

Chapter 26

Emily entered the office around six o’clock. She purposely showed up early, figuring since she was going to be down there anyway, she might as well take the extra time to search through Evan’s things—something she had put off far too long. Colin had kindly offered to do this chore for her next week, but she had time and incentive so she kicked off her shoes and slipped them under the desk, ready to begin.

The orange glow of the setting sun was beginning to color the sky and soon it would be dark, but Emily left the lights off, not wanting to expose herself as a sitting duck. Being shot at twice in one week was more than enough for her liking.

As she got comfortable in the desk chair, facing the door, she glanced around the room. Maybe she should make this her office now. Could she live with the memory of Evan’s murder in this place? If she solved this case, surely there would be others that would come her way if she decided to promote herself as a private eye.

She grasped a drawer handle, and sucked in a big breath, ready to go through his old metal desk. She hadn’t wanted to do that after he died. She hadn’t wanted to be anywhere near that office, actually. But now that she was here, maybe she might find something that could be a clue to his death, something Tolliver had overlooked. Maybe she could find answers—closure.

Pulling all the drawers out one at a time, she snaked her hand all the way back, feeling around in the rear corners. Then she ran her hand along the edges and underside of the drawers. She was coming up empty handed.

Emily slumped in the chair, defeated. A part of her had been desperate to believe there would be something—anything—that had been missed during the initial search. She leaned back further and crossed her legs under the desk. “What the—”

She reached under the center pencil drawer and felt a hard object. Emily traced the shape of it with her fingertips. It felt like a gun strapped to the bottom with some type of heavy tape. She got down on her knees to get a better look and pull it free. Evan must have kept it under there as backup in an emergency.

She was about to begin working to un-tape the gun when it occurred to her that she should probably show it to Colin just the way she found it. As she eased up from under the desk, headlights flashed across the windows.
That must be Colin.
Emily checked the time.
He’s early
.

He didn’t want her doing this alone, he had said, in his protective vibrato. Evan used to sound that way too, Emily remembered, but Colin had more reason. Emily had never felt her life was in danger before, but in retrospect, maybe Evan knew something she didn’t—what with all the secrets he was keeping from her.

The sun had now sunk below the horizon, no more fiery orange to light the room. The office was almost dark, lit only by a small sliver of moonlight shining through the windows. Emily perched back in the desk chair to wait for Colin. She heard the main door to the building squeak open and then shut.

The opaque glass in the door revealed a shadowy figure out in the dimly lit hallway. It approached the door and stopped.
 

“Colin?”

The figure stood there, unmoving.
What is he doing?
The doorknob rattled and squeaked as it turned.

“Stop playing around and come in.” Emily tried to keep her voice light, convincing herself it was Colin’s idea of a bad joke, still she kept her eyes riveted on the door.

A tiny strip of yellow light cut the darkness as the door opened just a crack.

“Colin?”

Emily’s thudding heart threatened to drown out all other sounds in the room. “This isn’t funny,” she whispered to herself, “you’re scaring me.”

The door slowly swung all the way open and then quickly shut as someone walked through. Emily’s eyes did not have a chance to focus with the short burst of light from the single incandescent bulb out in the hall and now it was too dark to make out who was there.

It was too short to be Colin, she knew that much. She squinted and stared harder. It looked like a woman with dark hair that hung around her shoulders. Anna or Delia? She couldn’t be sure.
Colin, where are you?

“Where’s the evidence?” the woman said gruffly.

The voice didn’t belong to Anna or Delia—familiar, but she couldn’t place it.

“What evidence?” Emily replied with an innocent lilt, stalling for time.
Come on, Colin. Hurry!

“Don’t get smart with me!” the shadowy woman snapped back.

A quick flash of light caught Emily’s attention and she blinked and squinted. It was moonlight glinting off a pistol the woman wagged. Her heart skipped in rapid succession as her mind flew to the gun taped under the desk drawer. Surely it had to be loaded. She couldn’t imagine Evan would leave it there empty. What would be the point? She had to keep this person talking, to buy time to dislodge the gun.

“I, I’m not—I just,” Emily stammered as her fingers worked at the heavy tape, but time had only strengthened the adhesive.

The woman stepped forward, and by the streak of moonlight, Emily could tell her gun was aimed right at her. “Get it now!”

With the distance between them closed, Emily could make out the woman’s face. She gasped in surprise. “
You
murdered Ricardo?”

“I said get it!”

“But why, Marcela? Why would
you
kill Ricardo? I don’t understand.” Emily continued to work at the tape.

“I guess there’s no harm in telling you now.”

The iciness in Marcela’s voice sent chills up Emily’s spine as she realized that Marcela’s willingness to talk meant she planned to kill her. It was also likely she was the one who had shot at her the day before. She’d already stabbed Ricardo to death, what did she have to lose now? In fact, she stood to gain by Emily’s death—she believed that Emily was the only one that had seen the supposed DNA evidence, and with that and Emily gone, Marcela would be safe. No one so much as suspected her. Delia would go to prison and the maid would get away with murder—twice.

Emily picked furiously at the tape, trying not to alert her assailant to her actions, all the while praying for Colin to arrive.

“Ricardo and I were having an affair,” Marcela said.

“I thought he was having an affair with Anna Petrova?” Emily interjected, trying to distract her and keep her talking.

“At the time, I didn’t know about that other woman. Ricardo always said he wanted to be with
me
.”

Emily heard the tightness in Marcela’s throat as her voice cracked with emotion, but then the harsh edginess she had come in with returned. “Once his wife was out of the way, we would be together, he said.”

“Out of the way?” Had Ricardo shared his plan to have his wife killed?

“You know—
dead
.” Marcela spoke without emotion.

So Marcela knew about Ricardo’s plan, but she clearly didn’t realize he considered her expendable as well. Emily decided to keep that revelation to herself. This certainly was not the time to say something that would push this woman over the edge she was clinging to.

“But Delia told me that you and Ricardo hardly spoke to each other.”

“Well, not in front of
her
. It was our little game, so she wouldn’t know. But when she was gone on business trips, we’d have the house all to ourselves. There probably wasn’t a single room in that house that we hadn’t made love in.”

“So why did you stab him, if you loved him as much as you say?”

“I told you. I didn’t know about the other woman he was seeing. When I found out he was cheating on me—and she was pregnant! I went
loca.
”

“That must have been very difficult to hear, Marcela.”

“I know what you’re trying to do!” Wagging the gun in Emily’s face, Marcela seemed to refocus on why she had come. “Now you stop talking and get me the evidence so we can get this over with.”

“I don’t have it,” Emily admitted, “at least not here.” The gun was refusing to come loose from the drawer. What if she wasn’t able to keep stalling until Colin arrived? Emily shuddered.

“What do you mean?” Marcela asked, her voice rising. “You said you had evidence that would prove who the killer was!”

“I did say that.”

“Then where is it?” Marcela looked around manically.

“Standing right in front of me. You are the proof, Marcela.”

Her face took on a look of surprise, the moonlight reflecting in the whites of Marcela’s eyes. She stepped closer, forcing the gun right up to Emily’s chest. “Are you trying to make a fool out of me?” Marcela snapped. “We’re done talking.”

“Don’t do this, Marcela,” Emily pleaded. “The police are on their way. You’ll never get away with it.”