Deadly Traditions, page 8
Jerald lowered the trimmers, a frown blossoming on his unattractive face. “Murder? Somebody killed Carol?”
“I’m afraid so.” I said. “Have you spoken to her lately?”
Jerald stiffened, his dark brown gaze turning hostile. “You think I killed her.” It wasn’t a question. “Why would I kill a woman I barely knew?”
Eddie slipped the laminated card bearing his credentials back into his pants pocket. “We understand you had a motive.”
When the other man bristled, the trimmers rising a few inches between them, Dietz held up a hand. “Mr. Troka, please put the trimmers down.”
“I don’t think so.”
Dietz and Troka stared at each other for a long, tense minute. Finally, Troka complied, his gaze swimming away. He lowered the trimmers to the ground and stepped back. “I’ve never hurt a woman in my life. Yeah, Carol Ling made me really angry.” He reached up to rub the pink scratch lines on his cheek. “But, she attacked me. I didn’t attack her.”
Dietz nodded. “Tell us what happened.”
“We were working together. There are four of us. The idea was to write and produce a song we could sell to Vonda Williams. I’d heard she was looking for a new song for her spring album, and approached her about giving ours a look.” He shook his head. “Then I get a call from Marty…”
“Who’s that?” Eddie asked.
“Marty Sanders. He was going to perform the song for us. Marty sometimes does Broadway. He’s got a great voice.”
Eddie nodded.
“Anyway, Marty heard Vonda Williams had already acquired a song so he asked some of his connections to get the details. Carol’s name came up and I realized what she’d done.”
“Jennifer told us you were planning to submit the song to songsub.com,” I said. “She didn’t mention Vonda.”
Jerald nodded. “We were going to submit to both. Vonda was a distant hope. She only takes about one out of every five-thousand songs submitted to her.”
“What happened when you learned what Carol had done?” Eddie asked.
“As a group, we decided to go talk to her.” He nodded toward me…or rather my costume. “She wasn’t answering our calls or texts, but we knew she’d be caroling tonight.”
Motive and opportunity, I thought. Looking at Jerald’s beefy hands, I knew he also had the means. “You found her,” I said. “You argued and she scratched your face. Did you retaliate?”
Jerald’s gaze snapped to me. He shook his head. “I couldn’t have done it,” he said, his tone impassioned. “I experienced childhood trauma. My best friend fell out of a fishing boat and drowned. It had been my idea to go out in the boat, even though I knew we weren’t supposed to be out there because Scott couldn’t swim. I’ve lived with the guilt of that day my whole life.”
He apparently didn’t think we looked convinced because he added. “I can’t even kill a mouse. I’ve got one in my house right now. I went as far as to buy traps, but in the end I just couldn’t kill it.”
Tears ran from his dark eyes. “I’m not a killer.”
“Could any of your friends have done it?” Dietz asked.
Jerald frowned. “I don’t know. I doubt it. Jennifer’s a victim of domestic abuse. She’s scared of her own shadow. Marty just didn’t seem that mad about what Carol did. He’s a fatalist. He told us we could write another song. I don’t think he understood how important that song was to us. It represented a ticket out of obscurity. For Jennifer, it was a way to stand on her own.” He shook his head. “It was going to change our lives.”
Instead, I couldn’t help thinking, it had ended Carol’s life.
Chapter 4
“Well, Jennifer obviously lied to us about when she last saw Carol,” I told Dietz. Shakes was curled up in my lap, his tiny body a riot of gray fur the texture of dandelion fuzz. His brown button eyes were closed and his tiny chest rose and fell in sleep. It had been a long day for him.
“But I don’t think she killed her,” I added as we drove across town toward Marty Sander’s home. “None of our current suspects seem plausible.”
Eddie slid me a look. “I disagree,” he replied. “I could make a case on any of them.”
My phone rang and I looked at the ID. “It’s Dani.” I frowned, hitting Accept. “Hey, I didn’t think we’d hear from you again tonight…”
“Stop talking and listen.”
I blinked in surprise. I’d never heard Dani speak that way. Especially to me.
“I can’t get there in time. I need Eddie to go inside and see if she’s still alive. You stay out of there or Argh will kill me. Stay in the car and call 9-1-1.”
I opened my mouth to ask questions but there was screaming on her end.
“Dangit!” Dani was breathing hard into the phone, her voice wobbly like she was running. “Vonda’s house,” she screamed. “Hurry!”
“But…?”
Dani was gone. My throat closed up and I suddenly felt sick. “Dani’s in trouble. I heard screaming.”
Eddie accelerated. “Where?”
It took me a beat to realize what he was asking me. My mind was roiling. Then it clicked what she’d asked us to do. “No. She wanted us to rush to Vonda’s house. She needs you to check if she’s alive and for me to call 9-1-1.”
He slowed enough to make a quick U-turn and roared off again. “Why not call your brother?”
“I don’t know. But Dani was in the middle of something intense. I’m guessing she figured we might still be in the area and we could get there faster.”
“Well, we aren’t too far from the address Vonda gave us. We’ll be a little early for our appointment, though.”
I nodded. Vonda had agreed to speak to us in person the following morning. My heart started to pound. “What could have happened to her? Dani doesn’t know if she’s alive.”
Eddie took a turn on two wheels and roared forward, the big tires eating up the curvy road. “Vonda must have called Dani in a panic. Dani’s first instinct would be to call HPD, but it would take them a good forty-five minutes to get here this time of day. I’m not even sure this is their jurisdiction. It could belong to the Asheville PD.”
The last thing Vonda needed was to be neglected in the name of a turf war.
Dietz whipped the truck around another turn, the tires squealing and then gripping, shooting us forward. The road where Vonda lived was beautiful. A forest of trees hugged the road on either side and arched overhead as Eddie’s big truck flew through its curves and over its hills.
Vonda’s driveway was gated but the gate was open. One side hung at an odd angle, as if something had crashed through it. Two giant wreaths sagged off center from the halves of the gate, their red-velvet bows mashed and ornaments broken.
The house was built into the trees, enormous windows looking out over the stunning vistas. A pond shone in the dying sunlight off to our right, a fountain sending the pleasant sound of falling water through the space.
Eddie braked hard and threw the truck into Park. Vonda’s front door stood open. “Stay in the car!” Eddie barked as he climbed out. I promptly ignored him.
Following him to the house, I noted an array of blood specks dotting the curving concrete walkway leading to the door.
Eddie slipped quickly up the steps and tucked himself off to the side, his gun in a two-handed grip in front of him. He looked at me and frowned, shaking his head. “Stay down,” he whispered, and I nodded.
He edged toward the opening. “Hello? Vonda?”
Silence met his call. He looked at me again. “Stay. There.”
I scowled at him.
In a blink, he’d ducked inside the house and disappeared from view. I remembered Dani’s instructions and dialed 9-1-1.
A gravelly voice answered after a couple of rings. “9-1-1 What is your emergency?”
“We’re at Vonda Williams’ home and there’s blood. It looks like somebody broke into her house.”
“Are you in a safe place?” the man asked.
“Yes, but my boyfriend is a private investigator. He went inside.”
“Ma’am, please call him back. You should both wait for the officers to arrive.”
“I’ll stay outside. Just please hurry.” I disconnected the call and shoved the phone into a handy pocket in my velvet cloak. Besides being warm and comfortable, the cloak was practical too. I was quickly reevaluating my hatred of period clothing.
Though I’d still rather eat nails than wear that corset.
There was a shout from inside and the pounding of footsteps over something crunchy. “Eddie!” I screamed, forgetting my musings as I dove through the door. I didn’t get far before a large dark blur flew past, a fist slamming into my shoulder and sending me flying. I hit the ground, skidding across broken tile and slamming into an upholstered chair that was shaped like a hand.
In the distance, shrill barking told me Shakes’ canine senses were working. He knew something bad was going down.
More footsteps thundered toward me and I shoved myself off the ground, biting back a groan. If there was more trouble coming my way, I wanted to be on my feet to meet it.
Eddie ran into the room, his worried face softening with relief when he saw me. “Are you all right?” He grabbed hold of me and pulled me into a hug.
“I’m fine. But I predict I’ll have a bruised tushy and a sore shoulder tomorrow.”
He tightened his grip until I squeaked.
“Sorry.” Releasing me, he kissed me gently on the lips. “When you called out to me, and he took off running in your direction…” Shaking his head, he hugged me again.
“Did you see who it was?” I asked hopefully.
“No. It happened too fast. He came up behind me and shoved me. By the time I picked myself up from the floor, he was running in your direction.”
“The police are on their way,” I said, my voice muffled by his coat.
“Good.”
“How is Vonda? Is she badly hurt?”
“She was hit on the head with a crowbar. There’s a lot of blood.”
Right on cue, sirens blared in the distance. It sounded as if they were coming fast.
Eddie led me to where Vonda lay draped over a pile of tile boxes. Her face was too pale and she was twisted where she’d landed, one side of her face bloody. A crowbar lay on the ground beside her.
“I didn’t move her, just in case she has a spinal injury,” he said.
“I guess we can count Jerald out of this,” I said. “He couldn’t have made it here ahead of us. At least not long enough ahead to have done this before we arrived.”
Eddie frowned, glancing at his watch.
“Marty?” I asked.
“I’ll be interested in finding out whether old Marty has an alibi.”
“If that was Marty who ran past me, he’s a big guy. He could have strangled Carol.”
The sirens I’d been hearing were close, emergency lights flashing urgently through the window of the room where we were standing.
Eddie took my hand. “Let’s go tell them what we found when we got here. As soon as they release us, we need to go talk to Marty.”
In the end, it took a phone call from Dani to get us released. The uniforms who responded to my call seemed inclined to think we’d had something to do with the attack on Vonda. No amount of reasoning convinced them otherwise. Fortunately for us, Dani knew one of the cops and she vouched for us.
As we climbed into Dietz’s truck, his phone rang. He put it on speaker. “Dani. Thanks for running interference. You’re on speaker with May and me.”
“Hey,” she said. “Are you both okay?”
“A little bruised,” I said, gently working my shoulder. “But otherwise good.”
“I’m really sorry I sent you guys into that mess. Vonda called me in a panic. Somebody was going after her and all I heard at the end of the call was screaming. I panicked.”
“I take it you’re running PPD for someone?” Eddie asked.
I knew from hanging around with cops that PPD meant personal protection detail.
“A local politician. Someone tried to shoot her. I won’t say I understand the sentiment, but let’s just say the arrogance runs deep with this one. If you know what I mean.”
“Got it,” Eddie said, grinning. “EMTs said Vonda should be okay. She’s lucky we got there so fast. Though the guy was still there when we got to her place.”
“Seriously? What an idiot.”
“I know, right?” I agreed. “We think we might know who attacked her. We’re going to check on that next.”
“Okay. Keep me posted. I’m going to the hospital. I’ll see if I can speak to Vonda. If I learn anything useful, I’ll let you know.”
“Thanks, Dani.”
Chapter 5
Shakes sniffed the corners of the front stoop, his feather duster of a tail happily whipping the air as he investigated. The front door of Marty Sanders’ house opened on the first knock. The man who stood in the doorway was tall and broad-shouldered, with dark hair cut business style, dark eyes and a square jaw. “Marty Sanders? We’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“Are you cops?” His gaze found Shakes and he smiled. “I guess not. Unless canine cops have shrunk considerably since I last saw one.”
“I wouldn’t count him out,” I told the man. “Shakes is a lot fiercer than he looks.” Putting the lie to my words, my dog smiled at Sanders, tail still wagging.
Dietz showed his credentials to the man. “We aren’t with the police, but we work alongside HPD occasionally.”
Sanders settled a cool gaze on Eddie. “What can I help you with?”
I studied his demeanor. Sanders was a cool customer. He fit Jerald’s description of a laid-back guy pretty well. Though he was dressed in black slacks and a black turtleneck, his feet were bare and his dark hair was neatly combed away from an unlined forehead. He didn’t look like he’d just committed a crime of passion.
“We’ve been investigating Carol Ling’s murder.”
Sanders’ shoulders softened as if he’d been tensing them. “Carol’s dead? That’s terrible.”
“We heard you had a disagreement with her tonight. You, Jerald Troka, and Jennifer Plotz.”
Sanders frowned. “Where did you hear that?”
“Jerald told us the three of you confronted Carol in an alley at the caroling event,” Eddie said. “We also happened to be there.”
Sanders skimmed a look over my velvet cloak. “Ah, that explains the weird costume.”
I gave him a smile I hoped would disarm. “To tell you the truth, I’m turning into a fan of the cloak. It’s warm and comfortable.”
He nodded. “I can imagine.”
“Mr. Sanders?” Eddie urged.
The man sighed. “Jerald was telling the truth. We did confront Carol in the alley. She stole from us. But I can assure you that we left her alive.”
“Where did you go after that?” Eddie asked.
“I came home. I’m not sure where the others went.”
“Is there someone who can verify that?”
Sanders looked at Eddie, his dark brows lowering. “You think I killed Carol?”
“It seems like a strong possibility,” Eddie agreed.
“I wouldn’t have killed her,” he said, looking at me as if I were the key to us believing him. “I didn’t really care about that stupid song. We can always write another one.”
His words were almost verbatim what Jerald had told us he’d said. “If you didn’t kill her,” I asked. “Who do you think did?”
He seemed hesitant to answer my question. Eddie and I stayed quiet, forcing him to be the first to speak. “Jennifer was really mad,” he finally said. “I’ve never seen her so angry. She screamed at Carol for a full fifteen minutes before she stormed out of there.”
His portrayal of Jennifer Plotz didn’t match Jerald’s. Troka had described Jennifer as “scared of her own shadow”. The woman we’d spoken to hadn’t seemed all that fearful.
“And Jerald?” Eddie asked.
Sanders frowned. “Jerald has emotional baggage. He’s spent decades trying to deal with his friend’s accidental death. I can’t imagine how he’d suffer if he’d actually killed someone.”
I nearly sighed. Everything in their stories seemed to line up.
“But Carol scratched Jerald’s face,” Eddie said. “We have an eye-witness that said he had scratches on his face after the altercation.”
Sanders laughed. “She did slap him, but she didn’t scratch his face. Were you aware that Jerald has a cat? Mean little thing. But he loves her to death.”
I watched Sanders for a moment as he and Eddie talked, only half listening. Something about him seemed so familiar. Then it hit me. “What were you doing at Vonda Williams’ home tonight?” I asked.
He winced, the first real sign of emotion he’d shown since we’d arrived. “Why do you…”
I interrupted him, suddenly certain I was right about him. “I was the one you shoved down on the way out of the house.”
Sanders closed his eyes, his entire body drooping. “Okay. You’re right. I was there. But I didn’t kill her.”
Eddie and I shared a look. The man didn’t realize Vonda was alive. “Let’s go inside, Mr. Sanders,” Eddie said. “I think you need to start from the beginning.”
Sanders inclined his head, looking like a beaten man. He stepped back and we followed him into a small but elegant room, furnished with what looked like expensive antiques. When he caught me ogling the furniture, he gave me a wistful smile. “My grandmother left this stuff to me when she died. She and I used to haunt antique stores when I was a kid. It was our favorite thing to do together.”
His sorrow lived in the lines of his face.
“You and your grandmother were close?” I asked.
He nodded. “She sang in the Italian opera. She had a beautiful voice.”
And he sang on Broadway. It seemed he and his grandmother had more than antiques in common. “The pieces are beautiful,” I told him, meaning it.
Sanders indicated a divan that was covered in forest-green velvet, and took a seat in an elegant chair upholstered in cream colored fabric with tiny pink and green flowers on it. Eddie sat down on the divan, but Shakes and I wandered over to the built-in bookshelves on either side of a crackling fireplace. It seemed Marty Sanders enjoyed more than just antique furniture. He also owned a full array of classic literature, the books were hardbound and covered in leather with gold embossing. I smiled at the Jane Austen section, skimmed my fingers over Ayn Rand and Edgar Alan Poe, and sighed at the sight of War and Peace and Anna Karenina.
