Night Of The Living Dandelion Part 32

"Kyle couldn't understand why all the women were attracted to him. He kept trying to a.n.a.lyze it. I told him women obviously found vampires s.e.xy and to please drop the subject."

"Did he ever talk about the murdered woman?" Marco asked.

"He said he knew her from the bar. I said it was a shame about her death, and he agreed."

"How tall are you?" Marco asked.

J.C. ran his hand over his hair again. "Six feet two."

"Ever dress up in a Dracula costume?"

J.C.'s face flushed but he didn't reply, merely looked down at his lap.

Marco leaned toward him. "Did you dress up as Dracula to help Kyle stage a photo in the casino parking lot?"

"Kyle said it would be funny to make people believe there'd been another vampire sighting. I did it as a favor, that's all."

"Are you aware that the photo was on a Web site called HOW TO KILL A VAMPIRE?" Marco asked.

"No," J.C. said, shaking his head.

"Did Kyle put that Web site up?" Marco asked.

J.C. sat back. "Honest to G.o.d, I don't know any more than what I've told you. I meant what I said before. Give me a lie detector test."

Marco looked into my cup. "Ready for another cocoa?" He made a slight motion with his head in the direction of the counter. I glanced around and saw Jerry Trumble waiting to pay. I also noticed that the shop had pretty much emptied out.

I finished the last swallow and gave him the empty cup. "I am now."

"Okay, J.C., we're done," Marco said, and offered his hand. "We appreciate your honesty. Our conversation won't go any further than this room, just so you know."

The paramedic looked relieved. "What do I tell Kyle if he asks about this meeting?"

"Tell him what I told you," Marco said, standing. "We're trying to rule him out."

As soon as J.C. was gone, Marco said, "I'd like you to question Trumble on the information you got from his wife's friends. I'll interject when I have a question."

As Marco headed for the counter, I ran quickly through the conversation I'd had with Alison and Becky, picking out things to ask. I saw Marco speak to the pharmacist and then Trumble stiffened. I guessed Marco had just informed him that we'd seen him on the casino's surveillance videos. Marco ordered another hot chocolate and headed back to our table. Trumble picked up his coffee and followed.

"You remember Abby Knight," Marco said to him, taking his seat.

Trumble didn't sit down, but he did lean over to say to us in a low voice, "I'm going to tell you this once more. I did not kill Lori Willis. Despite what you think you saw on that video, I didn't see Willis at the casino last Tuesday night. I didn't know she even frequented the place. If you keep hara.s.sing me, I'll get a restraining order against you. Is that clear?"

"What isn't clear," Marco said, "is why you didn't tell us about your evening at the casino. If you didn't know Willis was there, why lie about being there?"

At that, Trumble pulled out a chair and sat. "Okay, look, I had a gambling problem at one time, and after Dana died, her parents made an issue of it. They called it an addiction, like it was an ongoing problem, so they could get custody of my son. That's why I didn't say anything. If it gets out that I've been to the boat, my in-laws will try to take my boy away from me."

"How often do you go to the boat?" Marco asked.

"Maybe once a week. There's not much fun in my life anymore, so I look forward to an occasional night out. Can you understand that?"

If I hadn't spoken to Dana's friends, I would have felt sorry for Trumble. But I kept replaying their conversation in my mind. "How did Dana feel about your gambling?"

"She didn't like it. That's why I stopped going. I hated to upset her."

I wanted to stick my finger in my throat to show what I thought of his lie, but I refrained. "Have you ever been in debt because of your gambling?"

"A long time ago," he said. "I'm in control now."

I gave him a dubious look. "You haven't lost money in the past six months or so?"

"Who could stand to throw away money in this economy?" He smiled, trying to make light of it.

"What was the trip to Australia for?" I asked.

"Dana and I went through a rough patch," he said, trying to look embarra.s.sed, "the kind of thing that happens in every marriage from time to time. So we decided to take a second honeymoon to repair our marriage. It was supposed to be the trip of a lifetime." He looked down, s.h.i.+elding his eyes with his hands, as though trying to hide tears. "I never in a million years thought it would be the end of Dana's life."

I glanced at Marco and raised my eyebrows. Why wasn't I buying Trumble's grieving-husband act? Maybe because it felt like an act? Somehow I needed to shake him up, get him off his rehea.r.s.ed pity party. I decided to let my tactlessness work for me.

"Was Dana going to divorce you?"

He lifted his head and opened his eyes wide in a fair imitation of shock. "No! Where did you get that idea?"

"Someone close to your wife told me," I said.

The pharmacist's look of shock was replaced by one of fury. He pressed his lips together so tightly that if the air in his lungs had tried to escape, it would've blown a hole through the top of his head. "You talked to Alison and Becky."

"Was Dana going to divorce you?" I asked again.

"No!"

"Wasn't the purpose of your trip to talk her out of divorcing you?" I asked.

He hit the table with his fist. "She had no intention of divorcing me! She never would have left me!"

"Because you wouldn't let her?"

Marco pressed his knee against mine, signaling for me to back off. But I felt like I had Trumble on the ropes now and I didn't want to lose the momentum.

"I think Dana was going to divorce you on her return from Australia," I said, "so you killed her."

The pharmacist was so angry the cords in his neck stood out like strands of spaghetti. "I don't care what you believe! It isn't true!"

"How much did you collect on Dana's insurance policy? Enough to pay off your gambling debt?"

Trumble's mouth opened, but only a choking sound came out. He was almost to the point of cracking. With a little more effort . . . Marco pressed my knee harder, but I forged ahead. "Lori Willis found a way to prove you injected Dana with the heparin, didn't she? So you had to kill her, too."

Trumble lunged across the table, hands outstretched, going for my throat. I froze. I hadn't seen that coming. Luckily Marco had. Because of his lightning-fast reflexes, he was able to block the attack, and in a matter of seconds, the pharmacist was on the floor on his stomach, arms pinned behind his back, Marco straddling him.

The few customers in the shop had fled their tables and were behind the coffee counter with the barista, who was on the phone, no doubt calling the cops. But the best I could do was to sit there shaking all over, trying to regain my composure. I'd been too c.o.c.ky. I shouldn't have pushed Trumble that far.

By the time I got my wits about me, Marco was dragging Trumble to his feet.

"We're going outside," Marco said to me. "Wait here."

No problem. My legs were trembling too hard to stand anyway. I couldn't begin to imagine how I'd balance on crutches now.

The barista came over with a cup of coffee. "This should help steady your nerves. The cops are on their way. What a jerk that guy was." Shaking her head, she went back to the counter.

What an idiotic thing I'd done was more like it. And what had we learned from it? Nothing. On top of that, I knew I'd disappointed Marco. I sipped the coffee and let it warm me from the inside. I glanced at the window, but it was too dark to see what was happening outside.

When Marco finally returned, he didn't seem angry at all. "Ready to go?"

I gazed at him in surprise as he picked up my crutches. "Don't we have to wait for the cops?"

"Trumble decided he'd rather keep the cops out of it, so I explained to responding officers that it was a misunderstanding, and they let him go."

"Where's Trumble now?" I asked, as we headed toward the door.

"On his way home is my guess. He got into his car and drove off."

"I'm sorry, Marco. I should have paid attention to your warning."

He didn't say anything. We left the shop and walked around the corner to his car, not speaking. It wasn't until we were pulling away that I asked, "Are you angry with me?"

"I was-for about a minute, but only because you put your safety in jeopardy."

"I shouldn't have goaded him. I really messed up."

"You made a judgment error, Abby. I made my share of them when I was starting out. It's called experience. If you ever feel that you have to push someone like that, make sure you have somebody there to watch your back. I was there, so it turned out okay."

"If only something useful had come from it."

"Something did. We learned that Trumble can be pushed to violence pretty quickly. By the way, good job with J.C.'s interview. I don't think you'd have any problem handling an interview like that by yourself."

Like I'd want to. But I accepted the compliment graciously. "J.C. had some pretty revealing things to say about Kyle. It's clear to me that Kyle is jealous of Vlad, which makes me think he's the one behind the HOW TO KILL A VAMPIRE Web site."

"I agree. When I go out to the casino tomorrow, I'll look into this debt Kyle claims to have. If he lied about that, too, he moves to the top of my suspect list."

"We've got three suspects and all of them lied, so why does Kyle move to the top?"

"For one thing, I think Holloway is playing coy with us because he knows he's not guilty. My guess is that a woman is involved, someone he spent time with in Phoenix, maybe a colleague, or a hospital executive, and neither one wants news of their liaison to get out. I don't think he's our killer, but I won't move him off the list yet either.

"So that leaves Trumble and Kyle in a dead heat. I'm hoping what I find out at the casino will tip the scales one way or the other. If that doesn't do it, then we'll have to look at the next layer of the investigation. Where would each suspect keep a woman hidden for three days?"

"And why would he keep her hidden for three days?" I added.

Marco leaned over and kissed me. "If all is well at Down the Hatch, what do you say we forget about this for the night and go home?"

Alone time! Music to my ears. Wait. That was Marco's cell phone.

"Salvare," he said, pressing it against his ear. "Yeah, Rafe. When? Okay, I'll take care of that in the morning. Everything good there? Terrific. Abby and I are retiring for the evening."

"What was that about?" I asked when he ended the call.

"A message on the answering machine back at my apartment. Nothing urgent."

"Good, because I want you all to myself."

At the next red light, Marco took out his phone and shut it off. "That makes two of us."

After a blissful night with the man I love, I woke up on Wednesday feeling optimistic. Marco and I were going to find the killer, clear Vlad, make our announcements about our engagement and Marco's possible deployment, and then, the very next day, Marco was going to get a letter from the military saying he wasn't being recalled after all.

That seemed a bit much to hope for, but the way I felt, all things were possible.

We left my apartment earlier than usual so Marco would have plenty of time to get me safely installed at Bloomers, then start working on the items on his to-do list. First on that list was a stop at his apartment to check the message that had come in for him. After that, he would pick up the enlarged photo of Lori Willis, head out to the casino to watch the rest of the security tapes, and arrive back at the bar in time for Rafe's next business lesson. After a quick lunch, we'd be off to see my foot doctor.

I got to Bloomers half an hour before Grace and Lottie were due to arrive, so I pulled an order from the spindle and was about to collect my supplies when the phone rang. I picked it up at my desk, noting the caller ID. It said: PARKVIEW HOSPITAL. My first thought was that Jillian had taken a turn for the worse.

"It's me, Abs," Jillian said in a scratchy voice.

"Jillian? Are you okay?"

"Yes, thanks to my guardian vampire."

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about Vlad. He was here during the night."

"Why would Vlad be in your hospital room?"

"To watch over me. We even have a secret code. At least I think that's what he said."

She was hallucinating again. "Do you still have a fever?"

"A tiny one. Would you thank Vlad for watching over me when you see him? He left before I woke up."

Slight fever and hallucinations. "Sure, Jillian. Has the doctor been in to see you?"

"Yes, about half an hour ago. He said if my fever is gone, he'll release me today."

Not if I alerted him to the hallucinations. "Will you call me when you're home?"

"Okay. Gotta go. They finally thought to bring me breakfast." She covered the phone to say to someone, "Would you take that back and bring me an espresso? Make that a double. With room for cream. Is that supposed to be an omelet?"

My phone beeped, so I said, "Jillian, I have another call."

"Abby, can you believe they don't have espresso? What kind of hospital is this?"