“Sure, that would work fine,” Shirley said.
I could feel the conversation was winding down. Kate hadn’t mentioned anything about Michael being here before we arrived and I found that strange. I thought I’d toss out something and see where it got me.
“My sister and her husband love what you came up with and she and Michael are anxious to put their own touches on the room, but since it didn’t pass inspection, they’re hesitant to use it.” I was beginning to wonder if perhaps Michael’s visits with Kate might have something to do with the room’s failure to pass the city’s inspection, and maybe he was simply trying to work things out and get the process concluded.
Kate turned her attention to Shirley. “Don’t let that upset you. I assure you there is nothing wrong with the room I designed for the Danielses. I called the city myself and they’re sending someone else out this week. There was a bit of a problem with one of their inspectors, I’m afraid, but that’s all been sorted out.”
“I believe the man who did the inspection is the guy who was recently killed,” Shirley said. “Isn’t that right, Alex?”
“Yes, it is. Just tragic. He died shortly after he was at my sister’s home. She was very upset, as was Michael. My brother-in-law is so protective of his family.” It was at this point that I expected Kate to say that Michael had come to her for help in sorting this whole mess out, that he had just been here, in fact, and all would be right shortly, but she surprised me with her reply.
Kate leaned back in her chair and smirked. “Oh, it wasn’t so tragic. That guy got exactly what he deserved.”
Chapter 51
Kate Cavanaugh’s remark did not sound like a very professional thing to say, and she must have felt the same because she put her hand to her heart and shook her head.
“Where are my manners? Please forgive me for that unprofessional outburst. I shouldn’t have said anything. It’s just that Mr. Sanjari was a very difficult man. I work with a lot of contractors and we’ve all been having a hard time getting work inspected and signed off. The city was well aware of the problem and was working on resolving it when, well, when Mr. Sanjari was killed.”
“It sounds as if you had some unpleasant dealings with him,” I said.
Kate straightened up, clasped her hands together on the desk in front of her, and put the dazzling smile back on her lightly freckled face. “I shouldn’t be talking about such matters. So,” she continued as she turned to look at Shirley. “Let me check with Silvio about availability and I’ll set up an appointment for you. Which works better? Week days or the weekend?” She started to get up.
“Kate, as a matter of fact, I’m looking into Mr. Sanjari’s death for a couple of reasons and my husband is the detective on the case, so if you have any ideas on what happened I’d like to hear them.” What I really wanted was to know what this woman was doing with Michael, and I found myself having to force a smile on my face, but it didn’t look like I was going to get anywhere on that front, so I’d settle on more dirt on the recently departed Victor Sanjari.
The desk chair squeaked as Kate settled back into it. “Okay. Full disclosure, because if we do work together, Shirley, you should know. I did have dealings with Victor, unfortunately. None of them pleasant. I’m sure part of the reason he didn’t pass the Daniels project was because of my ongoing problems with him. I understand your sister had issues with him as well, and that only exacerbated things,” Kate said, looking at me. “The truth is he caused me a lot of trouble, and not because any of the work my contractors did wasn’t up to par, but because I wouldn’t give in to his sexual advances, if you must know, and he took it out on my clients. He cost me a lot of work over the last year. I was surprised your sister hired me, but she saw some other rooms I did and was willing to take the chance. She also had the same problems with the man so she understood my predicament. Now with him dead, I’m hoping to rebuild my reputation for solid work. That sounds harsh and I understand the man had a young daughter. I’m very sorry about that, but Mr. Sanjari wasn’t a nice man.”
“Any thought on who killed him?” Shirley asked.
Kate laughed. “Take your pick. A ton of contractors, other designers, frustrated home owners. If he didn’t have a state job, he probably would have been fired a long time ago. I’ll bet a lot of people at that agency are glad to see the back of him, too.”
Shirley and I left after she made her appointment with Silvio, and found a coffee shop close by that we could walk to.
“She didn’t mention Michael at all. Did you notice that? She should have said something like, hey, you just missed your brother-in-law.”
“I did notice and I also noticed that she didn’t put herself on the list of potential killers, even though she seemed to have a lot of reason to want the man dead.”
Chapter 52
After lunch I asked Shirley if she had time to stop by The Food Co-op so I could ask Elizabeth Applegate a couple more questions. As we pulled into the parking lot of the store I saw a young woman that looked like Elizabeth walking to an old car.
“I think that’s her.”
Shirley found a place two spots down from where Elizabeth was parked and I jumped out just as the young woman was opening up her car.
“Elizabeth! Hi, I’m glad I caught you.”
Elizabeth tilted her head to the side and gave me an exasperated look. “What now?”
“Just a couple of things. It’ll only take a minute.”
Elizabeth leaned against the car and glanced at me over the rim of her over-sized sunglasses. “Okay. So?”
“So, the night that you and Victor were supposed to meet at the restaurant, do you remember him saying anything, anything at all about having to meet someone before he met up with you? Maybe there was an appointment he had to keep. Do you remember if he told you that he might be late for your date?” I said.
“No. I already told you that. We made plans to meet here in New Haven because I had to work. As soon as I got off my shift, I changed in the restroom and went to the restaurant. It’s only a few blocks from here. If he had said anything about being late I would have waited for him, but he didn’t, so when he didn’t show up, I got my stuff to go and then I left. Can I go now?”
I was momentarily distracted by a candy wrapper in Elizabeth’s very messy car. It was an empty bag of M&M’s and it reminded me I needed to replenish my stock. As a rule, I keep my car clean, and other than M&M’s, I never eat in it and don’t use it as storage space. But Elizabeth had no such rule. Her car was full of junk in the back seat and empty food cartons and an assortment of candy bar wrappers on the passenger seat. She was a tiny little thing and seemed to maintain her figure despite an obvious diet of junk food. Ah, youth.
“Hellooooo.”
“Sorry. Just one more thing. Did you ever get the impression Victor was seeing someone other than you?”
Elizabeth stood up straight and slammed the car door she had been leaning on. “Are you crazy? What are you trying to say? Are you, like, thinking that Vic was cheating on me? Huh? Is that what this is about? Because he wasn’t. And besides, he asked me to move in with him. Would he want us to live together if he was going to be screwing around behind my back? Huh? Answer that.”
“I take it that’s a no. Funny, someone told me that they thought he was dating someone else. You’re sure there was no one?”
She took a step forward, no doubt trying for an imposing stance, but she was about a foot shorter than me. I tried not to smile.
“Look, lady, I kept that man happy. He had, like, no reason to see anyone else. I know we weren’t together all that long, but we loved each other. We had something good, and now I have to pick up the pieces and move on with my life. If someone saw him with another woman, maybe it was his mother or his sister. We were together, like, all the time. He didn’t have time to be with anybody else.” Elizabeth turned, opened up the car door, and got in. She backed it out of the spot and drove off.
“She’s a li
ttle spitfire,” Shirley said, when I got back to her car.
“She is that. I just wish she would stop calling me lady. Well, that was a waste of time. I still have no idea what made Victor go out to the construction site, and it had to be something or someone.”
Shirley started the car and waited for a woman pushing a cart full of groceries to walk past us before backing out of the tiny lot. “Where to next?”
“My office, I guess. I have an appointment this afternoon. Thanks for going with me today.”
“No problem. Cheer up. You’ll figure it all out. You always do, lady.”
I gave Shirley’s arm a playful punch and then we headed back to Indian Cove.
Chapter 53
It felt good to be in my office working on something I was actually proficient at. I felt productive, and, more importantly, I felt I was pulling my own weight—something I didn’t always do when working on a case. And right now I needed the validation that I was an adept businesswoman, because I was having a hard time getting somewhere with this latest murder.
Shirley was right; I would figure it all out eventually, but this crime weighed heavily on me for a lot of reasons. I knew my sister wasn’t involved and was pretty sure neither was my brother-in-law, but my visit with Kate Cavanaugh did nothing to help me figure out what Michael was up to. As a matter of fact, it only served to put Ms. Cavanaugh on my list of suspects. And that bothered me to think that Michael might be up to no good with a murderess.
Then there was the whole thing with Moshi. I didn’t know the girl at all except that she was now left with no mother or father. What would happen if I discovered that the killer was her aunt Maddi? I was almost tempted to drop the entire thing and leave it to the police, but then there was Jenna. Just when she felt strong enough to get out of the clutches of her controlling husband, she had to die. There was always the chance that her death was a horrible accident, but deep down, I knew it wasn’t. Victor would never be punished for killing her, but knowing the truth would help Maddi.
And of course there was John. I loved him dearly and knew we were a perfect fit. I also knew that he had a job to do, but his questioning of my sister’s guilt had just thrown me for a loop. Sure, everything would all blow over, but it was still hard to come to terms with the fact that my husband had put his job above my family. The man was only trying to find a killer and keep our town safe, but it still left a bad taste in my mouth.
“You’re awfully quiet in here,” Marla said from my doorway.
“I’ve had a very productive couple of hours, my appointment went well, and it feels good to get some things off my desk.”
“I thought you might like an afternoon cup of tea.” Marla placed a steaming mug of Earl Grey on my desk and sat down. “Alex, since I started working here, I, well, love coming to work. Oh, I’ve always liked keeping busy, but you and Sam and Millie are like family to me. With my two boys grown and on their own, and my husband keeping so busy with all his retirement projects, I just can’t tell you what this job has meant to me.”
I looked at Marla Scottsman, middle fifties, beautiful mocha skin, and a pair of dangly silver earrings resting on the collar of her sea foam green blouse. She had been a perfect fit with the three of us from the beginning. She was always the calm to our storm, and I sensed that something was on her mind.
“Please tell me that you’re not leaving,” I said.
“Oh, heavens no! I plan on being here until you all kick me out. I’m worried about Sam, and I don’t want to overstep my bounds, but I know something is going on, and if there is anything at all that I can do, and that includes taking on more work so she can have some time off, then please just let me know.”
“Thank you. That’s very kind. Has she said anything to you?”
“Not really, but I sense there might be some tension with her and Michael. I hate to see that because they’re such a great pair, but I’ve been married a long time and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that men have to be put in their place every now and again. Even the good ones can be a handful. So you just let me know if you need me to step in and take some of the burden off your sister.” Marla started to get up.
“Marla, I’ll keep that in mind and I appreciate it more than you know. So, can I pick your brain for a few minutes?”
Marla sat back down and put a huge smile on her face. “Sure. Sam’s gone for the day and there aren’t any more appointments scheduled this afternoon. I’m all yours.”
I took a sip of the warm tea. The sky outside my office window had turned dark and a breeze had picked up. I had the window open and the smell of the ocean, only a couple of miles away, came flooding in.
“So, here’s my dilemma. I have a ton of suspects and have no idea who the killer is.”
“Oh, is that all? Okay, what you need is a list. Lists make everything easier.”
I reached for my iPad from my bag, but then changed my mind. The list I started on Saturday night while watching Doc Martin, like with so many things, especially software, had become obsolete immediately as new information came to light. I needed a new list. This time I would do it the old fashioned way. I opened up my drawer and pulled out a pad and a pen.
“Tell me who you’re writing down and why you feel they’re a suspect,” Marla said.
“Okay. First is Gary Hachmeister because Victor was forcing him to hire illegal workers and also because Gary had a thing for Jenna.”
“Sam told me about Gary getting attacked. Thoughts?”
I looked at Marla. “Not sure. Could be a coincidence. Could be that Gary caused his own injuries to throw us off.”
“Okay, next.”
“His wife, Gail. She’s been keeping tabs on her husband for years. She knows all his dirt, and maybe had enough of Gary and Victor running her company into the ground. I also think she could have killed Victor first to throw off suspicion, or maybe the man treated her like he did all other women, and she thought what the hell, I’ll kill him, too. Rid the world of one more sorry man.”
Marla nodded. “Men’ll do that to you. At some point or another, you just want to wring their necks.”
“Then I have Jenna’s sister Maddi. I know why she would kill Victor, but she had no gripe with Gary as far as I know.” I wrote down her name, took another sip of tea, and continued.
“Next are the victim’s sister and mother. They used Victor as a meal ticket and saw that source of money vanishing because Victor had a new woman in his life. Maybe several. Plus, Victor told them he changed the trust, which would have made one of them executor. They stood to gain a lot from his death. But here’s the thing; he never changed the trust. So if they did kill him, it was all for naught. And why didn’t he change it? I bet he never had any intention of doing so. He had to know his daughter would be better off with Maddi than with his mother or sister.”
“I hate seeing this side of humans. Family killing family.”
“Happens all the time,” I said. Was I becoming jaded? I hoped not. “Next, I have an assortment of women. Elizabeth Applegate because she found out Victor was cheating on her. Ditto for Mary McCarthy. And then Kate Cavanaugh because he was ruining her business. There’s also the school principal, Brian Jankowski. The man was in love with Jenna, felt certain Victor killed her, and grief may have gotten the better of him. He couldn’t stand to watch Victor get away with murder. I think that’s it.”
“All good suspects with all good reasons.”
“But? I hear a but in there, Marla?”
“There’s always the possibility that the murderer was someone he worked with, or someone on one of the construction crews just royally pissed off at him for not passing an inspection. But for the sake of your sanity,” Marla gave me a wink, “we’ll just stick with your list. You have viable suspects for Victor’s murder. Any one of these people could have literally nailed the man, but besides Gail Hachmeister, I don’t see one of these people good for the attack on Gary.”
I scrunched up
my face and then banged my head on my desk. “So what now?”
“The way I see it, either Gail Hachmeister killed Victor and tried to do in her husband, too, or, sorry to say it, Alex, but you just may have a second potential killer out there.”
Chapter 54
A flash of light lit up my office, followed by the loud crack of thunder. I love summer storms, and this one had already helped to lower the temperature considerably.
I had told Marla to go on home while I tried to finish up a few more things at my desk. But my mind was wandering. My talk with Marla had put a few things into perspective. One was that maybe none of the people currently residing on my suspects list would turn out to be the killer. That person may well be someone I hadn’t even thought of and might never find. Second, Mary, Brian, Maddi, and the rest of the people on my list were great candidates for Victor’s murder, but they had nothing to do with Gary Hachmeister.
I reached for my jar of M&M’s. Maybe chocolate would help me out of my dilemma. I popped a few in my mouth and savored them while I thought about Mrs. Hachmeister.
Did all of this mean that Gail was the killer? My first impression of her was that she seemed nice and was very poised and intelligent, but at the same time I thought it was creepy how she kept tabs on her husband. Sure, I could understand checking the guy out before you married him and put him in charge of your family business, but why keep it up, if in fact she had been, which I thought very likely. Maybe I should try to track down which charity event she had attended on Saturday night and find out if anyone saw her slip out at some point.
And what if the killer wasn’t Gail? What then? Was it possible that Victor’s murder and Gary’s attack were coincidental and had absolutely nothing to do with each other? I wondered what the police thought about that. Or, did Gary Hachmeister stage his own attack to cast suspicion off of himself and onto another? He said that the first blow was to his back. Why not his head and be done with it? Of course, it had been dark in the hallway, and there was a good chance the killer missed his or her mark. The second blow that Gary sustained did get him in the head and just about knocked him out, but neither strike had been life threatening, and I had no idea if the attacker would have finished him off if the person from the other office hadn’t stepped into the hallway at a most opportune moment.