Button Box Mystery: Hot Button Part 10

Apparently, the universe was looking to confirm my statement because at that moment, an elevator opened onto the lobby and Nev raced out, caught sight of me through the gla.s.s walls of the coffee shop, and stopped so fast that he skidded across the granite floor.

I got money from my wallet and left it on the table before I hurried out to the lobby to see what he was up to.

And didn't it figure, that was just when his phone rang.

"Nothing, huh?" Nev spoke into the phone at the same time he held up one finger, signaling that he'd be right with me. "You're going to try again in the morning? I sure would appreciate it. And if you'd give him my number-" He listened to what the person on the other end said, expressed his thanks, and hung up.

"Santa Fe police," Nev said. "They've been talking to his neighbors and found out Thad Wyant has a brother out in California. The guy is apparently a small-time actor. They've been trying to get ahold of him, but-"

"No luck?"

Nev's sigh was all the answer he needed to give, but he put aside his disappointment in a heartbeat and latched on to my arm. "Hey, I'm glad I found you," he said. "I was up in Wyant's room, and I got a call from the security office, and I was on my way over there. You know, to watch the tapes from yesterday. You want to come along?"

He knew I did.

"GOT THE TAPES you wanted all set." A security guard, who thankfully was not Ralph, waved Nev over to the desk with the three monitors in front of it. "I didn't bother with the gift-shop tapes or the ones from the loading dock," he explained. "If you're looking for the person who vandalized those posters, those cameras aren't going to help you at all. There weren't any posters hung in those areas. But the lobby camera..."

He pointed to the live feed running on the monitor in front of us. "There's the registration desk and the concierge, and see, if you look right here..." The guard pointed to the far left of the screen, where a smidgen of the area outside the lobby-level elevators showed. "If I remember correctly, there were posters hanging there."

"Yes, there were." I confirmed his theory. "When I came downstairs yesterday morning, they were fine. But later, that's when I saw that Thad's eyes had been gouged out."

The security guard nodded, went to a console behind us, and popped in a tape, and both Nev and I turned that way. "That's what I was thinking," he said. "So I tried every tape from yesterday after eight in the morning." He fast-forwarded through what must have been hours of tape, then put the video on pause. "It's pretty quick," he said. "So you're going to have to pay real close attention. Remember," he tapped the upper-left-hand corner of the screen. "Look right there, near the elevators."

He started the tape again, and as one, Nev and I got up and stepped closer to the monitor, watching the comings and goings as hotel guests got on and off the elevator. At one point, there was no one in the little alcove outside the elevators, and something told me that would have been the perfect moment for our culprit to strike. I held my breath.

"Here it comes," the guard said. "There." He stopped the video.

And I gasped. Sure, the image was small and hard to see, but there was no mistaking the woman who strolled up to the poster on the wall opposite the bank of elevators, no mistaking that she lifted her right hand toward the poster at the level of Thad's eyes and that something metallic flashed from her hand.

There was no mistaking who she was, either.

Small and gray. A little mouse on a mission.

I put a hand on Nev's shoulder and said, "That's Beth Howell."

Chapter Ten.

"MS. HOWELL, IT'S THE POLICE. OPEN THE DOOR."

Nev rapped on Beth Howell's hotel-room door, and when no one answered, he looked at the manager, a man named Mike, who'd come up to the sixth floor with us. "Will you unlock it, please?" At the same time Nev asked, he put out an arm as a way of telling me to stay back while he entered the room.

It wasn't a suite like mine or Thad's, so it didn't take Nev long to look around and signal the all-clear.

"So..." I stepped into the room and looked around, too, relieved to see that Beth Howell-though she might have had felonious tendencies of the destroying-the-posters sort-did not share Thad's penchant for extreme sloppiness. "The place is immaculate."

"Sure is." Nev didn't say this like it was a simple matter of fact but more like he thought it was plenty curious. He went into the bathroom, and I saw him run one finger carefully over the shower wall. He looked toward Mike. "You must have the world's best cleaning crew. Or..." Nev swung his gaze in my direction. "This room hasn't been slept in for a while."

Since there were no clothes hanging in the closet, no sign of a toothbrush or toothpaste, and those tiny hotel samples of shampoo and soap had obviously never been touched, I was going with Nev's last theory.

This was confirmed when Mike called down to the housekeeping office, and the woman who cleaned this end of the sixth-floor hallway showed up.

"Never seen no one." The housekeeper's nametag said she was Darla, and she glanced around, too, just like we'd been doing, and shook her head. "I come in every morning, but I never seen the bed rumpled or the towels used. Asked Bernice." This was apparently Darla's supervisor. "Asked her this morning if the person in this room was gone, and Bernice, she checked with the folks down at registration. Said the room's reserved, all right. Has been since Sunday night."

"For Beth Howell, the woman who paid for a room but has never used it." Weird. Which was why I mumbled to myself-to try to make some sense of it, even as Nev called the crime-scene techs so they could come in and dust for prints. "We'll wait here for them," he told Mike and Darla, and when they were gone, he closed the door and leaned against the far wall, his arms crossed over his chest.

"A little strange, don't you think?" he asked.

I did. "Why pay for a hotel room you're not going to use? And come to a b.u.t.ton conference if you're not going to attend any of the functions? After that night on the cruise..." I thought back over the last two days. "I only saw Beth once, and I tried to catch up with her so I could ask about that fight she had with Thad and if she was OK, but I never had the chance. And believe me, I've tried. I check for her at every panel. Well..." I am nothing if not responsible, and the fact that I hadn't exactly been a shining example of what a conference chair should be weighed on me like a ton of bricks. "I've checked at every panel and every meal I've actually been able to attend."

"My fault." Nev pushed away from the wall. "If I hadn't talked you into helping-"

"Really. Don't feel bad." I was standing near the entertainment center that held the TV, and I waved away Nev's apology with one hand. "b.u.t.tons mean the world to me. I guess you know that by now. But nothing's more important than a human life. Even a human as disagreeable as Thad Wyant. If there's anything I can do to help-"

"You said you didn't want to." Nev's smile was kinder than Gotcha! but it sent the same message.

I gave in with a smile of my own. "But I'm helping anyway. I guess that tells you something else about me."

"You like to solve puzzles." He took another step nearer.

And like there was some sort of magnetic pull tingling in the air between us, I couldn't help myself. I took a step closer to him, too. "And I guess I like to help when I can."

"Kind of like me."

By this time, Nev was just a couple feet from me. I closed the distance between us. "Looks like we have two more things in common."

When he reached out to put his hands on my arms, his eyes sparkled sapphire. "Before you know it, we'll practically be best friends."

It was the worst time for his phone to ring.

Or maybe it was the best.

Either way, he knew he had to answer it, and his eyes reflected his disappointment. Apparently, the crime-scene techs had been close by, because they were already down in the lobby, and he told them what room we were in and said they should come up. By that time, that magnetic sizzle in the room had pretty much evaporated, and I suppose it was just as well. It was time to get back to business.

Nev realized it as surely as I did. He stepped back and rubbed a hand over his chin. "So that fight Beth Howell had with our victim the other night... Tell me about it again. What were they fighting about?"

I moved to the window, the better to make sure all that tingly energy had a chance to scatter, and did my best to report as much as I remembered as accurately as I could. "Beth accused Thad of not caring. Not caring about what..." I shrugged.

"And Wyant?"

"Whatever Beth was upset about, he couldn't have cared less. He was his usual, annoying self. He told Beth he didn't know what she was talking about, and it was almost as if..." I pictured the look on Beth's face when she turned and fled the scene. "It was like just hearing those words shattered her into millions of pieces. Once she was gone and I apologized to Thad about the commotion, he said he didn't know why she was angry, because he had no idea who Beth was."

"And that seems a little strange, too, don't you think?"

"It does. Because she obviously knew who he was. Otherwise, she wouldn't have been so devastated by the way he treated her. And I don't think she would have gone through the effort of defacing those posters. Unless she thought he was someone else. But I don't know..." Again, I let my thoughts wander to the events of the last couple days. "Seems to me you don't pick a fight with a man unless you're sure of who he is. And you don't destroy posters with his pictures on them. Not unless you're carrying one heck of a grudge."

"Agreed. And I sure would like to talk to her and find out what that grudge was all about."

I could only imagine. But then, Nev was obviously a man with a mission. His chin was set. His shoulders were steady. When he finally caught up with Beth Howell-and I knew he eventually would-I had a feeling he wouldn't waste much time with niceties. Then again, a man was dead. There was nothing nice about murder.

I wanted to help as much as I was able, and I thought back to the cruise and the two days of conference that followed. "After Sunday night, the only other time I saw Beth was before the banquet."

"Which would have been just about the same time our victim was killed."

I knew where Nev was headed, and in the great scheme of things, I knew it was a good thing. After all, the whole point of this investigation was to get to the bottom of the mystery and find out who had taken that glorious hand-carved awl and plunged it into Thad's throat. That didn't stop my stomach from flipping when I said, "You think Beth is our killer?"

"Can't say for sure." We heard voices and footsteps from out in the hall, and Nev went to the door and held it open so the three techs who arrived with their cases of dusting powders and brushes could come right in. He told them he needed a thorough sweep of the room, and they got to work, starting in the bathroom.

That left Nev and me alone again. "It sure makes Beth Howell look suspicious," I said.

"Especially since she's apparently disappeared into thin air. We've got the tapes, but they're not exactly great. I'd like you to work with a sketch artist when you have the time. You've got a good eye for detail. I'm sure you can give us a better idea of what Beth Howell looks like."

"Of course. Sure. Only..." That chill in my stomach turned to a solid block of ice. "You don't think the reason she hasn't been around is that she's another victim, do you?"

Something told me Nev had already thought of this. Of course, cops are trained not to wear their emotions on their sleeves like we ordinary mortals do. "I'm not ruling anything out," he said. "Not until we can figure out what the heck is going on. But don't worry. If Beth was somehow involved in Thad's murder and if she was a victim, too, I think we would have found the body by now. And you know we haven't. We haven't found anything."

I'd been careful not to touch anything since I came into the room, but believe me, I'd done my share of hands-off snooping. My sigh reflected my opinion of what I'd found. Or hadn't found. "Not even a b.u.t.ton," I said. "That's two people-Thad and Beth-who've shown up at a b.u.t.ton conference and haven't brought one b.u.t.ton with them that we've been able to find. And that's just weird."

Nev's cell rang again. When he answered and his eyes flew open and he said, "Really?" I decided I had to revise my previous thought about cops not wearing their emotions on their sleeves. Apparently, there were things that could surprise even a cop, and eager to know what this one was, I waited impatiently for him to get off the call.

"That was Ralph, down in the security office," he said. He told the techs he'd be back and headed for the door. When he held it for me, I figured I was invited along. "They just found something."

My stomach soured and I gulped. "Not..." I prayed I was wrong at the same time I gasped, "Not Beth's body?"

"Nope." Nev pushed the b.u.t.ton to call the elevator. "The Geronimo b.u.t.ton."

WE CAUGHT UP with Ralph on the first floor outside the vendor room. He was standing next to a trash can, and when a woman walked by and tried to toss her empty water bottle in it, he held up one hand like a no-nonsense traffic cop.

"Crime scene, ma'am," Ralph said, his chin on his chest. "No gawkers. Move on."

"Crime scene?" I am usually more trusting than skeptical, but after all, this was Ralph. The looks Nev and I exchanged said as much. Together, we peered into the trash can expecting to see nothing but... well... trash, and again, we exchanged looks. This time, they weren't as skeptical as they were thunderstruck. Not sure I could trust my eyes, I turned back to the trash can for another look at the piece of mat board lying at the top of the heap as if it had been gently and deliberately placed there and-much more important-the MOP b.u.t.ton attached to it. My breath caught, and I grabbed Nev's sleeve and tugged like there was no tomorrow. "It's the Geronimo b.u.t.ton!"

Nev was two steps ahead of me. But then, the sight of a historic b.u.t.ton was not enough to make his non-b.u.t.ton-collecting heart beat double-time like it had mine. He untangled himself from my grasp, slipped on latex gloves, and took an evidence bag out of his pocket. He opened it, gently lifted the card holding the b.u.t.ton, and slipped it into the bag.

"And the papers." I pointed to the folded papers that were under the b.u.t.ton. It was hard to tell, what with them being in a trash can and all, but they looked official to me. "Provenance papers," I said, after Nev had rescued those, too, and I had a chance to take a better, albeit quick, look. "The papers that prove the b.u.t.ton is the real thing. But why-"

I didn't need Nev to remind me that this wasn't the time or the place for speculation. Sensing that something was up, conference attendees had already gathered around us, their voices buzzing with curiosity.

"Is that it? The Geronimo b.u.t.ton?" One woman dared to dart forward, but a well-placed look from Nev drove her back.

He instructed Ralph to wait there until a tech arrived to collect the garbage can, and the evidence bag and its precious contents safely in one hand, he walked right past the gawkers without a word.

"I need to get this back to the station," he said, once we were past them and their buzzing had risen to a din. "You want to come along?"

I glanced down at the legendary b.u.t.ton inside the bag and my blood raced. He didn't need to ask me twice.

"SO WHY WOULD somebody go to all the trouble of killing Thad so they could steal the Geronimo b.u.t.ton and then throw the b.u.t.ton away?" I wasn't going to get an answer from the b.u.t.ton, but I was staring at it through the plastic evidence bag, anyway, so enthralled to be this close to it, and so confused by all that had happened back at the hotel, I couldn't help myself.

"You think it's real?" Across his desk, Nev was staring, too. In fact, if I shifted my gaze just a smidgen, I could see his face, distorted by the plastic so that it looked as if I was glimpsing him through an aquarium full of water. His nose looked smooshed; his blue eyes seemed even more pensive than usual. Thanks to the way the plastic made him look as if he'd been cut apart, then glued back together with overlapping pieces, his hair looked messier than ever.

I looked up from the bag and the b.u.t.ton inside and saw that when it came to Nev's hair, it really wasn't an optical illusion. He must have been tugging at his sandy, s.h.a.ggy hair; it was messier than ever. I resisted the urge to smooth down the lock of it that stood straight up at the top of his head. It was too personal a gesture, and personal was the last thing I wanted to be in the bullpen-like office, where dozens of gray metal desks were lined up like soldiers in formation and plainclothes detectives and uniformed cops worked side by side, answering phones, talking to witnesses, and writing reports. I kept my hands in my lap, curling my fingers into my palms to remind myself to stay on task-and off anything that even smacked of intimacy-and dared to speak the words that had been eating away at me in the hour we'd been at the police station. "If we could take the b.u.t.ton out of the bag so I could have a closer look at it..."

It says a lot about Nev that he humored me. He opened a desk drawer, got out a pair of latex gloves, and handed them to me. He put a pair on, too. "Ready?" he asked, and honestly, he shouldn't have had to. Now that the big moment had arrived, I was vibrating like a car with the idle set too high. I guess maybe he noticed, because he finally took pity on me and opened the bag.

"The techs tell me there are no fingerprints," he said, slipping the poster board and b.u.t.ton out of the bag and setting it on his desk. "So we don't have to worry about messing anything up."

Awed, I didn't dare grab the poster board. Instead, I ran my tongue over my lips, pulled in a breath, and looked to Nev for the go-ahead, and when he gave it with a nod and a smile, I lifted the board.

"Geronimo." I whispered the name and stared at the b.u.t.ton. "It's the right size for a shirt b.u.t.ton of the late nineteenth century." I confirmed this by glancing from the b.u.t.tons on Nev's shirt to the one on the card. "Men's shirt b.u.t.tons haven't changed much. And it's a sew-through, see?" With my finger poised just above the center of the b.u.t.ton, I pointed.

"Because you can sew through the holes to keep the b.u.t.ton on the shirt." Three cheers for Nev-he was falling into discussing b.u.t.tons like he'd been born to it. "That makes sense in terms of that story you told me, that when Geronimo sold one b.u.t.ton from his shirt, he sewed another one on, then he sold that one, and so on and so on."

"And the b.u.t.ton feels..." Since Nev told me I didn't have to worry about messing up any fingerprints, I touched the b.u.t.ton to my cheek. "Mother of pearl is cool against the skin," I said, and to prove it, I held the b.u.t.ton to Nev's cheek, and yes, I guess it looked a little weird, the two of us sitting there and me holding this eight-by-ten piece of poster board to his face. That would explain why another detective walked by and chuckled and why Nev mumbled, "Working here, Lewis, if you don't mind."

I pulled my hand back, but Nev pointed to his cheek, and I put the b.u.t.ton against it again. He nodded, feeling the coolness, too.

"You wouldn't get that feel with a plastic b.u.t.ton," I told him. "Plastic b.u.t.tons are great for a whole lot of things, but they are not a product of Mother Nature. They feel manufactured. Dead. And if we look at the back of this b.u.t.ton..." Again, I waited for permission, and when Nev gave it, I turned over the card, unwound the piece of coated wire that Thad had used to fasten the b.u.t.ton to it, and took the b.u.t.ton off the poster board.

That's when I had to stop to catch my breath.

"I'm holding a piece of history," I said. Hearing my voice waver, I realized I must have sounded like an idiot, and I glanced up at Nev. "You must think I'm crazy."

"I think it's..." He paused for a heartbeat before he added, "Nice. I think it's nice that a woman as sophisticated as you can be impressed with such a little piece of history."

Sophisticated? I liked the sound of that, and before I could decide I liked it a little too much and forget where we were and what we were supposed to be doing, I turned back to the b.u.t.ton.

I flipped it over and looked on its underside. "See here." I pointed so Nev wouldn't miss what I was talking about. "These little ridges and lines are what we call striations. That's a sure sign that it's a MOP. And if you turn the b.u.t.ton toward the light..." I did. "You can see the coloring of the mussel sh.e.l.l. The mussels..." I set down the b.u.t.ton and cupped one hand to demonstrate. "Say my left hand is a mussel sh.e.l.l... The b.u.t.tons were punched out of them." With my right hand, I made a stamping motion. "They came out as little blank circles; then the sew-through holes were drilled in them." I let go a reverent breath. "This b.u.t.ton looks to be the right age. And it's made of the right material. The papers. . ?" The provenance papers were in a nearby evidence bag.

"The techs will be taking them for testing in a couple minutes, but I looked them over quickly." Nev lifted the bag that contained the papers we'd found in the trash under the b.u.t.ton, then set it down again. "Everything looks to be in order. This is the Geronimo b.u.t.ton, all right."

"The Geronimo b.u.t.ton." I put it in my palm and stared in awe. "Imagine Thad being killed for a little thing like this."

"Except we don't know that was why he was killed."

"But we can a.s.sume it."

"We can't a.s.sume anything. Not in a murder investigation. Take Beth Howell, for instance. You said she was upset after talking to Thad on Sunday night. To me, upset and b.u.t.tons don't go together. Don't get me wrong." Like he expected me to jump all over him for insulting b.u.t.ton collectors everywhere, he sat back, and when I didn't go on the attack, some of the starch went out of his shoulders. "I know you and other b.u.t.ton collectors take your b.u.t.tons very seriously, and like I said, I think that's pretty cool. But from what you said, Beth Howell's reaction to the way Thad treated her on the boat, that was personal."

"But Thad said he didn't know her."

"That's why they call it a mystery." Nev shrugged. "And we won't get answers until we question Beth Howell. That's why-"