Candy Shop Mystery - Goody Goody Gunshots Part 12

That niggling feeling of irritation spread through my arms and down my legs. I've always hated bullies, ever since I was a kid-especially when they badgered others over problems they'd created themselves. Back then, I didn't always have the courage to stand up to them, but I wasn't a kid anymore, and my conscience wouldn't let me stand by and let Dwayne badger the poor girl any longer.

Swearing softly under my breath, I reached past the woman in front of me and tapped Dwayne on the shoulder. "She's explained why she can't cash the check," I said. "Why don't you give her a break?"

Dwayne whipped around to face me, and for a minute I thought he might hit me. When he saw who I was, he choked back whatever he'd been about to say and growled instead, "I don't see what business it is of yours."

"You're making it my business," I said, still trying to sound moderately pleasant. "I've been waiting here fifteen minutes while you try to bully that poor woman into breaking the rules of her job. If she can't do it, she can't do it. Just come back tomorrow and talk to someone who can."

Dwayne's eyes narrowed a little further with every word I spoke. I'd been carrying a mental image of him as a geeky kid, but as we stood there staring at each other, it occurred to me how much larger-and no doubt stronger-he was than me.

To my surprise, he s.n.a.t.c.hed the check from the counter and turned away from the teller window. He rammed into the woman behind him with his shoulder, knocking her off balance, but he didn't seem to notice.

He only had eyes for me. "You know what your problem is, Abby?"

I refused to let him intimidate me. "No, and I'm not in the mood for you to enlighten me."

"Your problem is you don't know how to mind your own business. One of these days, you're going to get yourself into big trouble."

In light of the past few days, his threat sent a shiver up my spine. This was the second time Dwayne had said something vaguely threatening, and I wondered if I should be worried. I decided to get angry instead. "Why don't you can the tough-guy att.i.tude, Dwayne? n.o.body's impressed. Just go home, get a good night's sleep, and come back in the morning."

He leaned in close and lowered his voice. "Yeah, I'm going. But you might want to be more careful driving around out by Hammond Junction. Next time you're out there in the middle of the night, you might not be so lucky."

Dwayne's warning echoed through my head even after he slammed out of the bank's lobby, and so did about a hundred questions. Had he just been trying to act tough, or had he threatened me? I wondered if his att.i.tude meant that he was connected in some way to the strange things happening around Paradise, or if he just had issues.

He lived near Hammond Junction where the dead man had first vaulted into my life. He could easily have chased the limping man into the junction and then vanished. But was Dwayne capable of murder?

When it was my turn at the teller window, Chloe smiled as if she'd just found her new best friend. "Thanks for the help with that guy," she said. "I just hope he doesn't decide to take it out on you later. He looked pretty upset."

I glanced over my shoulder at the sidewalk and turned back with a shake of my head. "Don't worry about him. He's just a big blowhard. I don't think he'd ever do anything."

Chloe unzipped the bag and removed the day's receipts. "I hope you're right," she said as she began to run the numbers on her calculator. "I don't mind admitting I've been nervous ever since they found that dead guy over at Walgreens. I hate working this shift."

"Are you the only one working tonight?"

Chloe shook her head, and her mouth curved in a sly smile. "No, the night manager is in the back. I just didn't want to tell that creep."

I grinned at her, surprised by her s.p.u.n.k. "Well, I wouldn't worry too much about the murder," I said, hoping to rea.s.sure her. "I don't think it was a random killing."

Her dark eyes shot up from my deposit. "Really? Do you know something about it?"

"Not as much as I'd like to."

Her smile disappeared. "So you're just saying that to make me feel better?"

"Not at all. I'm pretty sure that whoever killed that guy was somebody he knew."

Chloe let out a squeaky laugh. "Well, that doesn't help much. Not in a place like Paradise, where everybody knows everybody else."

I grinned and shook my head. "You think it's bad now, you should have seen it twenty years ago. Besides, I think the victim was just in town visiting someone."

"Really?" Chloe gave that some thought before going back to the calculator. "You might be right, except when he came in here, it sure seemed like he was planning on staying."

The hair on the back of my neck stood up. "He came in here? The man with the limp?"

Chloe nodded. "Yeah. A couple of times at least. Opened two accounts and everything." She shot a guilty glance at the door behind her and dropped her voice. "I can't believe I said that. I'm not supposed to talk about our customers' business, so pretend you didn't hear me, okay?"

I nodded, ready to promise anything. "Sure. But does that mean you know his name?"

She nodded again, but she didn't look at me, and her fingers moved faster on the keys. "I do, but I can't tell you what it is. I've already said too much."

I couldn't very well yell at Dwayne for badgering her and then do the same thing myself, so I swallowed all the arguments that occurred to me. "You can tell the police, can't you?"

"Probably, but I think they already know." She finished calculating and tapped the checks into a neat pile. "They were in here talking to Frank Ogden for a couple of hours this afternoon."

The police had talked with the bank president? I wondered what they'd found out and whether Jawarski would tell me. It wasn't just idle curiosity that made me wonder. After everything these creeps had put me through in the past week, I thought I deserved a few answers.

Chloe returned my empty bag and receipt in the tray. "I wish I could be of more help," she said with an apologetic smile, "but I can't afford to lose this job."

"That's okay," I a.s.sured her. "I understand. Just one more thing. Did the guy ever come in here with someone else?"

"You mean a friend?"

"A friend, a business a.s.sociate." A realtor.

Chloe shook her head slowly. "I don't think so. Mostly he just came in for a few minutes at a time, to make deposits into his account."

Interesting. "Do you know where the money came from? Do you remember the names on any of the checks?"

"Oh, he didn't deposit checks," Chloe said. "He always brought in cash."

"Nothing but cash?"

"Not that I ever saw. Of course, I didn't help him every time, so I can't say he never, ever brought in a check. But I never saw one." She tilted her head to one side, and a frantic look flashed across her face. "I can't talk about this anymore. My manager is going to hear me, and I'll lose my job."

I was eager to hear more, but I didn't want to be responsible for her being fired. Reluctantly, I picked up my bag and receipt and turned away.

Chapter 21.

Outside the bank I stood for a minute in the gathering dusk, watching streetlights blink on and the tiny white lights in the trees along Prospector Street turn the old mining community into a fairyland-as long as I didn't look too closely. There were a handful of reasons why I should have just walked across the street and gone home, but Chloe had touched a match to my already smoldering curiosity. I was dying to know what Quentin Ingersol would have to say about his a.s.sociation with the dead man, and I was almost positive that I'd never find out unless I asked for myself.

I checked my watch and realized with disappointment that the real estate office would be closed by now. I had no idea if Quentin would even agree to talk to me, but I probably stood a better chance of getting to him if I showed up during regular business hours.

Forcing myself to do the right thing, I spent the rest of the evening balancing Divinity's checkbook while Max chewed on a hunk of rawhide bone. I climbed into bed before the nightly news was even over, but I kept reliving my conversation with Elizabeth, remembering John Doe's eyes as he looked at me through the windshield, and wondering who had been out at Hammond Junction with him that night. Dwayne seemed easily capable of murder, but his only link was proximity to the Junction. Kerry seemed connected, but I had no clue what his motive would be. And Quentin Ingersol . . . I tried telling myself that John Doe was probably just a client, but if that was the case, why hadn't he come forward to identify him?

I have no idea what time I finally fell asleep, but I woke the next morning to clear blue skies, springlike weather, and a town full of long faces brought on by the realization that the ski resorts probably wouldn't open for Thanksgiving.

The morning flew by in a flurry of phone calls and paperwork. I even finished the centerpieces for Richie and Dylan. At a few minutes after eleven, I left Divinity for lunch and set off down the stairs that would take me down the hill to Ski Jump Way. Five minutes later, I opened the door to the small first-floor office of Big Horn Real Estate.

A young woman who looked familiar sat behind the reception desk just inside the building. Her dark hair and wide, almond-shaped eyes blended with her deep olive complexion to hint at an exotic ancestry. The nameplate on her desk said Elena Whitehorse, but that didn't help me place her.

She smiled as I came inside. "Good afternoon. Can I help you?"

"I hope so. I'm looking for Quentin Ingersol. Is he in?"

She nodded and lifted the receiver from her phone, then waited with one finger poised over the keypad. "Who should I tell him is here?"

I couldn't believe my luck. Maybe things were finally looking up. "My name is Abby Shaw."

"Are you a client?"

"No, but this won't take long. I just need to ask him a couple of questions."

She punched in a series of numbers. "I'll see if he has time to see you. Why don't you have a seat over there?" She nodded me toward a row of chairs near the window. She spoke for a few minutes in hushed tones, then replaced the receiver and smiled as if we were friends again. "Quentin can give you five minutes," she said. "His office is down this hall, the last door on your right."

I thanked her and wandered down the hall until I found Quentin's office, where he was waiting for me. I guessed his age at late twenties to early thirties, a husky guy with blond hair and a tuft of hair just below his bottom lip. He wore jeans and a striped blue shirt under a sports jacket, and he strode toward me wearing a broad smile and holding out a hand for me to shake. "Ms. Shaw, what can I do for you?"

I shook his hand and followed him into the sunny office, the walls of which were covered with framed certificates and licenses. Just in case I had any doubts about his qualifications, I guess. I settled into a nicely stuffed chair across the desk from him and waited until he sat to tell him why I was there. I figured it would be harder for him to throw me out if I'd already laid claim to something solid. "I know this sounds odd, Mr. Ingersoll-"

"Call me Quentin. Please. 'Mr. Ingersoll' makes me feel like an old man."

I smiled and started over again. "I know this sounds odd, but I'm wondering if you can give me some information about a man I believe was a client of yours."

Quentin looked surprised by the question, but he leaned back in his seat and rocked slightly. "That is an odd request. What do you want to know?"

"I'd like to find out who he is, and if you know why he was here in Paradise."

"Was?"

"He's the man who was murdered outside the drugstore the other night. Someone told me that they saw you picking him up a couple of times."

His eyes shuttered, and the expression on his face gave nothing away. "Whoever told you that must have been mistaken. I never met the guy."

"How can you be so sure? Did you see the dead man?"

"Of course not. The police came by the businesses on the block with a photograph. I couldn't help them, and I can't help you. Even if I had known him, I wouldn't be able to tell you anything about him. We take our clients' privacy very seriously."

Between the blank-eyed stare and the stony expression, I had a hard time believing that he was being truthful with me. "And I'm sure your clients appreciate it. But these are kind of unusual circ.u.mstances, so I'm hoping you'll make an exception."

"And what's so unusual-besides the fact that someone killed the poor guy?"

"I nearly ran into him out at Hammond Junction one night. I thought he'd been killed that night. Obviously he wasn't, but I guess that near accident made me feel responsible for him somehow. I'm curious to know who he was."

The edges of Quentin's lips curved slightly. "That's understandable, I'm sure. But as I said, I didn't know the guy."

"Are you sure? I've talked to a couple of people who are sure he got into your car on more than one occasion. If he wasn't a client, maybe he was a friend."

Slowly, Quentin folded his hands in the center of the desktop. "I don't know where you heard that rumor, but I can a.s.sure you it's not true. I've never met the man who was murdered the other night."

What was with these people? First Kerry Hendrix, now Quentin Ingersol, both denying things I knew must be true. "If you did, it's only a matter of time until the police figure it out."

Quentin's lips tightened into a thin line. He tugged on his cuffs to adjust his sleeves, and I had the impression he was trying to buy time. "I have to admit, I find this all very troubling. Why don't you satisfy my curiosity and tell me who's spreading these nasty rumors?"

Did I look that gullible? I shook my head and matched his smile. "That's not important."

His gaze grew as stony as his face, but I wasn't ready to give up. "The dead man was out at the recreation center last week. I saw him myself. He got into a dark-colored SUV with a broken light on the side. Do you know who owns that SUV?"

Quentin's eyes locked on mine. "How would I know that? There must be hundreds of SUVs in this part of the world. The man is dead, Ms. Shaw. Why don't you just let him rest in peace, whoever he was?"

"I wonder if someone who has been murdered can rest in peace."

Quentin didn't even bother with a reply. He stood, making it clear he considered our conversation over. "I'm sorry I can't help you, Ms. Shaw, but I'm afraid you're wasting your time. Now, if you'll excuse me, your five minutes are up, and I have a busy schedule."

I couldn't think of an argument that might change his mind, so I stood and handed him one of Divinity's business cards. "If you change your mind, give me a call."

"Of course." He tossed the card into a desk drawer where it would probably stay until he emptied the drawer into the trash. I could feel him watching me as I walked down the hall, and I saw him step back into his office as I left the building.

That, I told myself as I walked away, had been a monumental waste of time. Other than validating my suspicions about Ingersol, I'd only succeeded in frustrating myself more than I already was. So far, what I knew about the dead man and his reasons for being in Paradise could fit on the head of a pin and leave room for a blog entry or two.

I thought about stopping at the bank to see if Frank Ogden would talk to me, but I know a dead end when I see one. Frank Ogden would rather eat rocks than tell me about an account holder, dead or alive. Besides, I didn't want to get Chloe in trouble for telling me about the dead man's accounts in the first place.

I'd climbed the first couple of steps leading back to Prospector Street when I heard someone call my name. I turned back and saw Elena Whitehorse hurrying toward me, her pretty face pinched with worry. She checked over her shoulder as she walked, and I had the distinct impression she was trying to make sure she wasn't being followed.

Intrigued, I turned around and descended the stairs again. Without saying a word, she snagged my sleeve and tugged me toward an alcove nestled beneath the stairs. A quiet little voice inside my head whispered caution, but her behavior was so odd I ignored the warning and went with her.

Chapter 22.

A cool breeze circled through the alcove as Elena and I hid beneath the stairs. Darting concerned glances at people pa.s.sing by on the sidewalk, Elena spoke in a soft voice. "Quentin will kill me if he finds out that I'm talking to you. He thinks I'm getting coffee."

My heart beat a little faster. "Why wouldn't he want you talking to me?"

"I overheard your conversation," she almost whispered. "He's not telling you the truth."

That wasn't exactly a news flash, but she'd piqued my curiosity. "How do you know that?"