Prologue
One year earlier . . .
The hallucinations were worsening rapidly.
She halted at the top of the staircase and tried to steady
herself. The hall of dark mirrors stretched away into
infinity, a treacherous fun house filled with night and
shifting shadows. She had to forge a path through this
disorienting landscape before she lost her grip on the
last remnants of her sanity.
The planes and angles of the shadowed corridor were
melting and flowing into bizarre shapes that reminded her
of Mšbius strips. Endless loops with no beginning and no
end. She did not know how much longer she could hold
together the disintegrating fragments of her awareness.
She longed for sleep but she could not give in to the
nearly overwhelming urge. Not yet. There was something she
had to do first.
The electricity had flickered out of existence a moment
ago. Weak starlight seeped in through the narrow windows
at either end of the endless corridor. She gazed down the
length of the writhing passage and saw a sharp sliver of
silver. She knew it marked the entrance to the library.
Fourth door on the left.
A desperate urgency swept through her. If she could get to
that shard of light she could leave her message.
"Bethany?" The killer's voice came from shadows at the
foot of the stairs. "Where are you? Let me help you. You
must be very sleepy by now."
A bolt of icy panic gave her the energy required to
overcome the drug's effects for a moment. She tightened
her grip on the strap of her purse, staggered a few steps
down the hall and came to a stop again. She fought to
remember what it was that she had to do. It had been so
clear there at the bottom of the stairs. But now it kept
slipping away.
She stared into the nearest of the dozens of black mirrors
that lined the walls. In the gloom she could just barely
make out the heavily gilded and scrolled frame of the
eighteenth-century looking glass. She searched the
bottomless pool behind the glass for wisps of her memory.
There was something she had to do before she went to
sleep.
"I can help you, Bethany."
She thought she saw a shifting of the shadows in the old
looking glass. An image gelled there for an instant. She
struggled to make sense of it. The library. She had to get
to the library. Yes. That was it. She had to go there
before the killer found her.
A number swirled up out of the depths of her disappearing
memory.
Four.
The entrance to the library was the fourth door on the
left.
She clung gratefully to the number. It steadied her as
nothing else could have done. She was at home in the
universe of mathematics; comfortable and serenely content
in a way she had never been in the world where human
emotions made things complicated and illogical.
Four doors down on the left.
Getting there meant running the gauntlet of mirrors. The
enormity of the challenge almost paralyzed her.
"There's no need to hide from me, Bethany. I only want to
help you."
She had to do this. Deke would need answers. He would not
be able to rest until he got them. And Thomas would help
him because Deke was his brother and the Walker brothers
stuck together. She had never fully understood the depths
of that kind of bond, but her logical mind accepted the
strength of the link that existed between Deke and Thomas.
It was as real as any mathematical relationship.
Summoning every ounce of will she possessed, she made her
way toward the shard of light that marked the library
door.
The hallucinations intensified. Strange creatures pulsed
behind the reflective surfaces of the antique looking
glasses that surrounded her. They beckoned her to join
them.
Not yet.
She set her teeth and concentrated on putting one foot in
front of the other.
She dared not look directly into any of the old, dark
mirrors for fear that she would be sucked into the world
on the other side. It was not that she was afraid to go
there, it was just that she knew she had to stay in this
universe for a few more minutes. She owed that much to
Deke and Thomas.
"Bethany? You're ill, Bethany. Let me help you."
The killer was in the hallway behind her.
"Not much longer now, Bethany. The hallucinations must be
terrible. But soon you'll sleep and then it will all be
over."
She focused intently on the triangle of moonlight. The
glowing lines drew her and calmed her. The mathematical
purity of the moonlit angles was a strong, if temporary
antidote to the hallucinations.
She reached the fourth door, went through it and paused in
the middle of an aisle of books, trying to think. There
was a small office in here somewhere. And inside the
office there was a book. She had been looking at it just
this afternoon. It was a very important book because it
contained a picture of her killer. She had to mark the
picture for Deke and Thomas.
The shelves of books around her curved and warped
themselves into a maze. Gathering her waning strength, she
staggered through the twisting corridors to the office.
The little book was lying on the desk, just as she
remembered. She got it open and stared helplessly at the
first page. The picture was here somewhere. She had to
find it quickly. The killer was halfway down the hall.
She turned pages, taking refuge once more in the comfort
of numbers.
Seventy-nine.
Eighty.
Eighty-one. There it was. A picture of the killer.
There was a pen next to the book. After three attempts she
finally managed to pick it up. She was beyond being able
to write a name but she had enough eye-hand coordination
left to draw a shaky circle around the picture on page
eighty-one.
She paused when she finished, concentrating hard.
There was something else she wanted to do just to make
sure Deke and Thomas understood.
The envelope, please.
She smiled with satisfaction as the memory blazed clearly
in the fog of her thoughts.
The envelope was in the purse draped over her shoulder.
She got it out. Managed to slip it inside the book.
Now what?
Hide the book and the envelope. She could not risk having
the killer discover them.
"I know where you are, Bethany. Did you think you could
hide in the library?"
She looked around, searching for a place in which to
conceal the book and the envelope.
The large, old-fashioned wooden card catalog stood against
one wall, the rows of little drawers neatly organized in
lovely straight lines.
Perfect.
"Mirror, mirror on the wall," the killer chanted from the
door of the library. "Who is the smartest one of all? Not
you, Bethany. Not Sebastian Eubanks, either. I'm the
smartest one of all, Bethany."
She ignored the taunting and wedged the book with the
envelope inside into the hiding place. Deke and Thomas
would find it sooner or later.
It was done. A sense of peace flowed through her. She had
completed the task. She could sleep now. She turned
around, clutching the desk for support.
The killer came to stand silhouetted in the office
doorway.
"I'm the smartest one of all, Bethany."
Bethany Walker did not respond. She closed her eyes and
slipped into a peaceful world on the other side of the
looking glass, where the laws of mathematics reigned
supreme and everything made sense.
Chapter One
The present...
A shifting of the light reflected in the mirror above the
dresser was the only warning she had that she was not
alone in the dead woman's apartment. Her hands went cold.
The fine hair on the nape of her neck stirred as if she
had been zapped with an electrical charge.
Leonora straightened swiftly from the drawer she had been
searching and spun around, a soft, pale pink cashmere
sweater in her hands.
Two junkyard dogs stood in the doorway of the bedroom.
One of them was human.
His broad shoulders filled a lot of the available space
and cut off the view of the hall behind him. There was
about him the deceptively relaxed, totally centered grace
of the natural-born predator. Not an impulsive young
hunter overeager to take down the first of the prey that
bolts from cover, rather a jaded pro who prefers to pick
and choose his targets. He had the face of a man who had
done a lot of things in life the hard way and he also had
the cold gray eyes to match.
The ghost-gray beast at his heels had a lot in common with
his companion. Not real big, but very solid. One of his
ears was permanently bent, the result of a fight, no
doubt. It was difficult to imagine this creature springing
playfully in pursuit of a Frisbee. Probably tear the thing
to shreds and eat the plastic raw.
Both of the intruders looked dangerous but her intuition
told her to keep her eyes on the man. She could not see
his hands. They were thrust casually into the deep pockets
of a charcoal-colored windbreaker. He wore the lightweight
jacket open over a buttondown denim shirt and a pair of
khaki trousers. His feet were shod in leather work boots.
The boots looked large.
Both man and beast were damp from the rain that misted
this stretch of the southern California coast today. Each
gave the impression that going for her throat would be no
big deal. All in a morning's work.
"Were you a friend of hers or did you just happen to hear
that she was dead and decide to drop in to see if there
was anything worth stealing?" the human junkyard dog
asked.
His voice suited him. A low, dark, very soft growl.
She got a grip on her hyperactive imagination. "Who are
you?"
"I asked you first. Which is it, friend or casual
opportunist? Either way, I figure you're a thief so maybe
the answer is moot."
"How dare you?" Outrage incinerated some of the alarm that
had quickened her pulse. "I am not a thief. I'm a
librarian." Damn, that sounded dumb. Well, no one could
say that she couldn't hold her own when it came to snappy
reporters, she thought.
"No kidding." His mouth curved into a mockery of a
smile. "Looking for overdue books? You should have known
better than to give Meredith Spooner a library card. Doubt
if she ever returned anything she stole in her entire
life."
"Your sense of humor leaves a lot to be desired."
"I'm not auditioning for a late-night comedy show."
One had to be forceful in situations such as this, Leonora
thought. Take the initiative. Take charge. Gain the upper
hand with a show of confidence and authority. It wasn't as
though she had not had some experience with difficult
people. In the course of her career as an academic
librarian she was occasionally obliged to deal with a
variety of obnoxious patrons, from egotistical, demanding
faculty members to boorish frat boys.
She went deliberately toward the door, praying that the
stranger and his dog would step back in that automatic way
most creatures did when you made it clear that you wanted
to move past them.
"As a matter of fact I have every right to be here, which
is probably a good deal more than you can say." She gave
man and dog a steely smile. "I suggest we discuss this
with the apartment manager."
"The manager's busy. Something about a plumbing emergency
down on the third floor. I have a feeling we'd both rather
deal with this privately, anyway. Got a name?"
It became glaringly apparent that neither he nor the dog
was going to get out of her way. She was forced to halt in
the middle of the room.
"Of course I've got a name," she said crisply. "But I
don't see any reason why I should give it to you."
"Let me take a wild guess. Leonora Hutton?"
She froze. "How did you know?"
He shrugged. The easy movement drew her attention once
again to the impressive width of his shoulders. The fact
that they fascinated her was worrisome. Normally she was
not the least bit attracted to male muscle. She preferred
the intellectual type.
"Meredith didn't have a long list of friends," he
said. "Mostly she just had marks, from what I can tell."
"Marks."
"Marks. Targets. Victims. Dupes. Whatever you call the
people she used, conned or fleeced in the course of her
scams. But unlike most of the people in her email address
book, you and she went back a ways from what I can tell."
He paused a beat. "Assuming you're Leonora Hutton, that
is."
She set her teeth together. "Yes, all right, I'm Leonora
Hutton. Now, who are you?"
"Walker. Thomas Walker." He glanced down at the dog. "This
is Wrench."
Wrench tilted his broad head and grinned in response to
the sound of his name.
She looked at Wrench's impressive array of teeth. "Does he
bite?"
"Nah." Thomas was apparently amused by the
question. "Wrench is a real sweetheart. Very
nonconfrontational. Probably a miniature poodle in his
former life."
She did not believe that for one moment. If Wrench had had
a former life he had no doubt lived it as a giant medieval
hunting mastiff. But she decided not to make an issue of
it.
"We've been waiting for you to show up, Miss Hutton,"
Thomas said.
She was aghast. "Waiting for me?"
"Three days now. Spent most of the time in that coffee
shop across the street." He angled his jaw toward the
window and the partial view of a block of small
shops. "You were the one who claimed the body and made the
burial arrangements last week. Figured you'd come to clean
out her apartment sooner or later."
"You seem to know a great deal about me."
He smiled. It was the kind of smile that made her want to
take a couple of steps back, turn and run for her life.
But that would be the worst thing she could do, she told
herself. She knew enough about animal behavior to know
that predators only got more excited by fleeing prey.
"Not nearly as much as I'd like to know about you, Miss
Hutton."
There was nowhere to run, anyway. He had her cornered in
this small, barren room. She stood her ground.
"How did you get hold of Meredith's email address book?"
she asked.
"That was easy," Thomas said. "I came here and helped
myself to her laptop just as soon as I heard the news
about the crash."
The casual admission left her speechless for a few
seconds.
"You stole her computer?" she finally managed to ask.
"Let's just say I borrowed it." He gave her another one of
his chilling, humorless smiles. "In the same spirit that
she borrowed one-point-five million bucks from the Bethany
Walker Endowment Fund."
Oh, damn. This was bad. This was very, very bad.
Embezzlement had been one of Meredith's favorite sports
but her preferred victims had been other cons and scam
artists who had not been in a position to complain too
loudly. And to the best of Leonora's knowledge, she had
never gone after a score of this magnitude. Trust Meredith
to go out with a bang, not a whimper.
And trust her to leave me with the mess to clean up.
"Are you a cop?" she asked warily.
"No."
"Private investigator?"
He shook his head. "No."
Not the law. She didn't know if that was good news or bad
news.
She cleared her throat. "Did you know Meredith
personally?"
"Oh, yeah, I knew her," he said. "Of course, like a lot of
folks who had that privilege, I wish I had never met her,
but hindsight is always twenty-twenty, isn't it?"
Understanding descended with the inevitability of a
shroud.
"I see. You were one of her-" She broke off, searching for
a diplomatic turn of phrase. "The two of you were, uh,
acquainted socially?"
His mouth was a flat line. "Not for long."
He had been one of Meredith's lovers, then. For some
reason that news was oddly depressing. Why should she care
whether or not this man had had an affair with Meredith?
He certainly wouldn't have been the first. It occurred to
her that he might have had the distinction of being the
last, however.
"I'm surprised," she said, without stopping to
think. "You're not her usual type."
Oh, jeez. What in the world had made her say that?
It was the truth, though. Meredith had had a long-standing
policy of sticking to men she could manipulate. Something
about Thomas Walker sent a message that he wouldn't play
the puppet-on-a-string game for long, not even for a woman
as savvy and sexy and as skilled in manipulative
techniques as Meredith.
If she could see that stark truth, Leonora thought,
Meredith, who'd had preternaturally acute instincts where
the male of the species was concerned, had almost
certainly seen it also. Maybe that was why the
relationship hadn't lasted long.
"Meredith had a type?" Thomas looked mildly surprised by
that information. Then he nodded in a thoughtful
way. "Well, hell, I guess you're right. She did have some
distinct preferences, when it came to her social life,
didn't she? Far as I can tell she only dated men she
figured could help her further her own agenda."
Leonora wondered if the real problem here was that Thomas
had been badly hurt when Meredith's true nature was
revealed. A broken heart could generate a lot of pain, and
pain could produce anger. Maybe he was grieving in his own
macho, masculine fashion.
She offered a sympathetic smile.
"I'm sorry," she said very gently.
"Yeah, me, too. More than sorry. When I found out that she
had embezzled the one-point-five mil I was kind of pissed
off, if you want to know the truth."
Okay, he wasn't exactly prostrate with grief. He was mad.
"Uh-" Inspiration failed her.
"What about you?" Thomas asked much too pleasantly. "Any
fond memories of the deceased? How far back did you two
go?"
"We met in college. We've kept in touch all these years,
but-" She swallowed and tried again. "I didn't see much of
her in the past few months."
Not since I found her in bed with my fiancŽ, she added
silently but she saw no reason to bring up that dismal
subject.
"You should probably consider yourself fortunate," Thomas
said. "Meredith Spooner was bad news. But, then, I'll bet
you already know that."
Old habits were hard to break. The instinct to cover up,
defend and make excuses for Meredith kicked in, just as it
always did when crunch time hit.
She raised her chin. "Are you absolutely certain Meredith
embezzled that money?"
"Positive."
"How did she manage that?"
"Easy. Took a job as an alumni endowment fund development
officer at Eubanks College. As the person in charge of the
money on a day-to-day basis, she had access to all the
accounts and to a lot of wealthy alumni. Add in the fact
that she had the morals of a con artist and great computer
skills and you have the recipe for embezzlement."
"If what you say is true, why are you here? With that kind
of money involved, I would have thought you'd have gone to
the police."
"I'm trying to avoid the cops."
"When there's more than a million dollars missing?" She
saw a chance to go on the offensive and grabbed it. "That
sounds very suspicious to me. It certainly casts some
doubts on your story, Mr. Walker."
"I want to avoid the cops because that kind of bad
publicity can really hurt an endowment fund. Undermines
the faith of potential donors. Makes them question the
integrity of the folks entrusted with the responsibility
for managing the money, know what I mean?"
She'd had enough experience with the delicate politics of
academic endowment fund raising to realize that he had a
point. But that was no reason to let him off the hook.
Besides, he didn't look at all like the kind of person who
got involved in college endowments. That business was run
by suave, cultured types who wore good suits and who knew
how to make nice with wealthy alumni.
She gave him her most polished smile. "I think I'm getting
the picture here. My turn to take a wild guess. Could it
be that you haven't reported the missing money to the
authorities, Mr. Walker, because for some reason you think
you might be a prime suspect?"
His dark brows rose in silent appreciation of the direct
hit. "Close, Miss Hutton. Not quite on target, but very,
very close."
"I knew it."
"Meredith left a trail that would point to my brother,
Deke, if the embezzlement is exposed."
"Your brother." She digested that slowly. "Where exactly
is the headquarters of this Bethany Walker Fund?"
"It's part of the alumni endowment of Eubanks College. It
was set up to support research and teaching in the field
of mathematics."
"Eubanks?" She frowned. "I'm not familiar with that
institution."
"It's a small college in a little town called Wing Cove.
About an hour and a half's drive north of Seattle."
"I see."
"The fund is named for Deke's wife, Bethany, a brilliant
mathematician. She died last year. Deke is the head of the
board that oversees the fund's operations and investments.
In three months there will be an audit. If that money
turns up missing, he will look like the guy responsible
for making it disappear, thanks to sweet Meredith."
A typical Meredith operation, Leonora thought. Make sure
the victim of the scam won't call the cops.
"I realize how upsetting this must be for you and your
brother, Mr. Walker. But I must say, for a man who wants
to keep the situation low profile, you seem to be quite
chatty on the subject."
"That's because I have a strong interest in recovering the
money. I want it back in the fund's account before that
damned audit."
"I understand," she said. "But why are you talking to me
about this?"
"Simple. You're my best lead."
She stared. "I beg your pardon?"
"Let me put it this way, you're my only lead."
Panic shot through her. "But I don't know anything about
that missing money."
"Yeah?" He looked unconvinced. "Let's say for the sake of
argument that you're telling me the truth-"
"I am telling you the truth."
"Even if that is the case, you're still my only lead."
"Why?"
"Because you knew Meredith better than anyone else, as far
as I can tell. I'm really hoping that you can help me out
here, Miss Hutton."
In your dreams, Leonora thought. "I just told you, I
didn't have much contact with her this past year. I wasn't
even aware that she had a job at Eubanks College. I didn't
know she was living here in this apartment until the
authorities contacted me after the accident."
"No kidding. According to the manager, she used your name
on the rental application."
Leonora said nothing. It wasn't the first time Meredith
had borrowed her good name and credit references.
"I doubt that she intended to stay here long." Thomas
surveyed the room with its bare-bones furnishings and
uninspiring view. "Probably just needed a staging area and
an address she could use while she set up her next scam."
"Look, I really don't know what to say. I can't help you,
Mr. Walker. I'm only here to pack up Meredith's
belongings. I intend to donate most of her stuff to a
local thrift shop. When that job is done, I'm going
straight home. I have reservations on an evening flight.
I'm supposed to be at work in the morning."
"Home is Melba Creek, right? Outside of San Diego?"
She tried to ignore the unsettling sensation that trickled
through her. "Okay, so you know where I live. Is that
supposed to scare me?'
"I'm not trying to scare you, Miss Hutton. I'm trying to
work with you."
"Uh huh."
"I've got a business proposition for you."
"Give me one good reason why I should listen to it."
"I'll give you a couple. The first is that if you
cooperate with me and help me locate the money, I'll see
to it that you get a finder's fee."
"Let me get this straight. You'll bribe me to return the
money?"
"Beats going to prison for embezzlement, doesn't it?"
"Prison?" She did take a reflexive step back at that.
Wrench shifted a little in response and looked interested.
She froze. "Why would I be arrested? You said your brother
was the one who would appear guilty if that money isn't
found."
"I don't intend for my brother to take the fall for
Meredith's embezzlement scam," Thomas said softly. "If
that money isn't back in the account before the next
audit, I'm going to make sure the cops look real hard at
you."
"How?"
"Deke is a wizard when it comes to computers. I'm pretty
good on the financial side. Shouldn't be too difficult to
create a trail from Meredith to you."
"Me?" She was dumbfounded. "But I had nothing to do with
Meredith's embezzlement."
"Who knows? Maybe you'll even be able to prove that in the
end. But I can arrange to make life damn miserable for you
in the meantime. Tell me, how do you think your employer
would react if it got out that you were being investigated
for embezzlement?"
"How dare you threaten to drag me into this mess?"
He took one hand out of his pocket. It was a very large,
powerful, competent-looking hand, the hand of a man who
worked with tools or climbed rocks. Not the soft,
manicured hand of a businessman.
He spread his fingers in a fait-accompli gesture.
"In case you haven't noticed, Miss Hutton. You're already
in this mess. Right up to your very nice ears."
"How can you say that?"
"You're the closest thing to a friend that Meredith had,
as far as I can tell. In my book that makes you the
closest thing she had to a partner."
"I wasn't her partner."
"The two of you have a history. You're the only person she
kept in touch with through thick and through thin. I'm
pretty sure that with a little help from Deke, I can make
you look like her accomplice."
"My God, you're serious, aren't you?"
"With one-and-a-half million, plus my brother's reputation
on the line? Yeah, Miss Hutton, I'm damned serious.
Cooperate with me. Help me find the money and we can both
walk away from this without anyone having to hire a
lawyer."
"Just where do you think I would stash that kind of cash?"
"At this point, all I know for sure is that it's not in
your personal bank account."
She felt her jaw drop. "You checked?"
"First thing after I found your name in Meredith's email
address book."
"How?"
"I told you, my brother is good with computers."
"That kind of invasion of privacy is illegal. I could have
you arrested."
"No shit. I'll have to remember that for future
reference."
She glared. "And you have the nerve to accuse me of
criminal behavior."
"Go figure."
"I don't believe this." She felt dazed. "It's beyond
bizarre."
He looked almost amused. "Be grateful. You've got the easy
part. All you have to do is help me find the money."
She watched him warily. "What's the hard part? Getting it
back into the endowment fund?"
"No. That will be simple. The hard part is going to be
convincing my brother that Meredith Spooner wasn't
murdered."
She felt the air leave her lungs in a rush. Stunned, she
gazed at him, her mind a complete blank for about three
full seconds.
"The police didn't say anything about murder," she finally
got out.
"That's because they didn't find any evidence to indicate
the crash was anything other than an accident," he
said. "Probably because there wasn't any."
She got the feeling he'd had this conversation a number of
times in recent days.
"But your brother takes another view of the situation?"
she asked.
"Deke is-" He broke off, apparently searching for the
right word. "Some people think he's a little obsessed with
his theory that his wife, Bethany, was murdered a year
ago. When he heard about Meredith's accident he leaped to
the conclusion that the killer had struck again."
"Good grief. What do you think?"
Thomas was silent for a time. Wrench leaned heavily
against his leg, as though offering support.
She thought that Thomas might brush off the question with
all its horrifying implications. But to her amazement he
just shook his head.
"I don't know," he said eventually.
"You don't know? What is that supposed to mean? We're
talking about murder, here."
"Look, all I can tell you is that a year ago when Bethany
died, I didn't think there was any question about what had
happened. The official verdict was suicide. Unfortunately,
it seemed to fit the circumstances and there was no
evidence of violence."
"Was there a note?"
"No. But that's not as unusual as people think."
"Suicide is always so difficult for those who knew the
victim. No wonder your brother is looking for other
answers. But what is it about Meredith's death that makes
him think there's a connection?"
"Not much," Thomas admitted. "Meredith didn't arrive in
Wing Cove until six months after Bethany died. The two
never even met. But Deke is trying to see patterns where
none exist. The only thing Meredith and Bethany had in
common as far as I know was that each of them spent a lot
of time at Mirror House."
"What is Mirror House?"
"The headquarters of the Eubanks College Alumni
Association."
"That's it? They worked in the same place? That's the only
connection you've got?"
He hesitated briefly. "The only solid one."
"No offense to your brother, but that's extremely weak."
"I'm aware of that, Miss Hutton." Thomas's voice was
grim. "Like I said, Deke has had a difficult time coming
to terms with Bethany's death. I've done my best to
discourage his conspiracy theories. I thought I was making
progress in the past few months. He seemed to be coming
out of his depression, at least. But Meredith's death has
set him off again."
She replayed his earlier comment in her head. "Wait a
second. You said the fact that Bethany and Meredith worked
in the same place was the only solid link between the two
deaths. Are there other, less substantial connections?"
"Maybe," he said slowly. "One possibility, at any rate."
His obvious reluctance told her that he was not buying
into his brother's conspiracy theory completely, but that
he felt obligated to give it some credence. A family
loyalty thing, probably. She knew only too well how that
worked.
"What?" she asked when he offered no further details.
"After the funeral, there were rumors."
"Rumors?"
"Some local gossip that Bethany may have been
experimenting with drugs at the time of the suicide," he
said reluctantly. "Deke and I agree that would have been
completely out of character. She never did drugs so far as
we know."
"Were any drug tests run at the time of her death?"
"There were some routine things done, but there was no
reason to go looking for anything exotic that would have
required a lot of unique and expensive testing. Small-town
law enforcement and medical examiner budgets don't allow
for extensive tests unless there's a serious question
about the cause of death. She had no history of drug use.
Deke had questions about the suicide, but they didn't
revolve around drugs. And there's no going back now.
Bethany was cremated according to the stipulations in her
will."
"Meredith's death was ruled an accident. There was no
indication of drugs or alcohol involvement. How do the
rumors about Bethany Walker link to her death?"
"After the news of the crash reached us in Wing Cove,
there was some gossip that Meredith had been doing drugs
while she lived there."
"No," Leonora said flatly.
He narrowed his eyes. "No? You're sure of that?"
"Oh, yes. Very sure. Lord knows, Meredith had her faults,
but doing drugs was not one of them. Her mother killed
herself with them, you see."
"Huh."
Thomas said nothing more. Just looked thoughtful. Wrench
looked bored.
"Traffic accidents happen all the time." She wondered if
she was trying to convince him or herself. "And there's no
motive for murder."
"I wouldn't say that. One-point-five mil is a lot of
money. Let's assume for the sake of argument that Meredith
did have a partner. Someone who didn't want to split the
profits."
She felt as if she was falling down the rabbit hole. This
was getting worse and worse.
"For the last time, I wasn't Meredith's partner," she said
tightly. "I knew nothing about this scam you claim she was
running at Eubanks College."
"Prove it. Help me find the money she embezzled."
"You're threatening me. I really hate that."
"I've also offered a hefty finder's fee," he reminded
her. "Think of it as the carrot-and-stick approach."
"If you don't mind," she said icily, "I've got to finish
packing up Meredith's things."
"Which reminds me. I've got a question about that."
"What question?"
"Why are you the one who came here today? Why is it your
job to clean out the apartment and deal with the final
details of Meredith Spooner's life?"
Leonora looked around at the unadorned walls and the
impersonal furnishings. It was difficult to imagine
Meredith, always so vivid and exciting, spending the last
few days of her life in this plain, dull space.
A great sadness welled up inside Leonora. Meredith had
been complicated and frequently maddening. Whenever she
had appeared, trouble had followed. But the world would
certainly be a less colorful place without her.
"There was no one else to do it," Leonora said.