Panic Button Part 12

Hence my detour on the way to the b.u.t.ton Box that morning.

After our divorce, when I stayed in the apartment where I'd dreamed we'd have our happily-ever-after and Kaz went on (or so he claimed) to build a new life for himself, he'd rented a place above a storefront in a Chicago neighborhood known as Bucktown, and in spite of my objections, he'd insisted I keep a key. "Just in case," he said.

I was reasonably sure that just in case should actually have been when h.e.l.l freezes over, but to shut him up, I took the key. It hung on a hook inside my kitchen door, and it had remained untouched-and pretty much forgotten-for more than a year.

But sometimes life holds surprises, and truth be told, this was one of them.

When I arrived at Pelogia's Perogi Palace and went around to the back entrance reserved for the tenants who lived above the take-away Polish food joint, the rain that pelted down from thick gray clouds was icy cold.

h.e.l.l, it seemed, was about to freeze over.

I let myself into the building and climbed the steps to the third floor. From what Kaz had told me, I knew his apartment was up front and to the left.

Yeah, that one.

The one with at least a week's worth of newspapers piled in front of the door like Lincoln Logs.

It's embarra.s.sing to admit, what with me actually being a b.u.t.ton seller and all, but I immediately slipped into detective mode.

No sign of forced entry.

No sounds of distress-or anything else-from inside the apartment.

Nothing that indicated anything was wrong.

That didn't keep me from slipping my key in the lock as quietly as I could. Just as carefully, I pushed open the door.

"Kaz?" Well, he was never going to hear me if I sounded like a squeaky little mouse. I told myself not to forget it, and tried again with a little more oomph. "Hey, Kaz. It's Josie. Are you home?"

No answer.

Since it was gloomy outside and gloomier in, I felt along the living room wall for the switch that operated the ceiling fan and overhead light and flicked it on. Kaz's apartment is a lot like Kaz himself. That is, pretty basic. He isn't Mr. Neatnik, but he's not a slob, either, and from the look of the issues of ESPN, The Magazine scattered over the coffee table and the beer bottle (empty) on the floor next to the couch, it was impossible to determine when he'd last been in the room.

The kitchen proved no more helpful.

Which only left his bedroom.

I remembered Stan's theory about Kaz shacking up with some buxom blonde and knew (thank goodness!) that if it was happening, it wasn't happening here. There was no sign of a woman's presence, no whiff of perfume, no sound of a throaty, satisfied laugh coming from the bedroom. And no sign of Kaz, either, when I peeked in there and in the bathroom.

I breathed a sigh of relief, and it wasn't because I feared I'd find Kaz with some cutie. That might have been embarra.s.sing-not to mention awkward-but it wouldn't have broken my heart. Kaz had done that long before and for all different reasons.

No, truth be told, I knew there was always the possibility of Kaz getting on someone's bad side. Someone he'd borrowed money from. Someone he'd lost to in a poker game. Someone he'd beat in a poker game (hey, it actually happened once in a while) who was a sore loser. At least I could put that image to rest, the one of Kaz lying by the side of his bed, kneecapped and b.l.o.o.d.y.

"Very odd," I told myself, plunking down on the couch and taking another look around the room. While I was at it, I wished Kaz had a landline instead of just a cell. That way, at least I might be able to check his messages. I was just about to throw in the towel when I noticed a couple pieces of mail on the coffee table. The postmarks showed they'd been sent nearly two weeks before, and that told me that nearly two weeks ago, Kaz had been home.

Also on the table was a pile of charge receipts and I shuffled through them: Dinner at the local greasy spoon.

Jeans and sweatshirts from a nearby emporium.

And a receipt from a sporting goods store that showed the purchase of one waterproof tent, a metal detector, and a sleeping bag.

Camping? Not exactly a pastime I'd ever a.s.sociated with Kaz, and as befuddled as ever, I left the apartment, locking up behind me.

"Camping, huh?" I grumbled once I was outside, huddled in the folds of my raincoat, my shivers keeping tempo with the rain that pinged against the sidewalk. "Well, at least that explains where Kaz is. Maybe."

I'm pretty sure I was still grumbling like this when I got off the El at the stop nearest to the b.u.t.ton Box and approached the shop. I already had the key to my front door in my hand before I noticed the car parked in front of the shop. And the slightly disheveled guy behind the steering wheel watching my every move.

"Hey." Nev, man of many words. He walked around the unmarked police car and joined me on the sidewalk, apparently oblivious to the rain that was soaking his sandy-colored hair and turning it to a shade that reminded me of honey. "I was surprised the shop wasn't open when I got here."

"I had an errand to run." I guess I didn't have all that many words to offer, either. Besides, I was wet and cold and anxious to get inside, and this seemed a simpler explanation than the whole bit about Kaz and how I wasn't missing him.

I opened the shop, discarded my wet coat in the back room, and went through my morning routine, turning on spotlights over the display cases, flicking on my computer and the stained gla.s.s lamp that sat atop my desk, putting on a pot of coffee.

"What's up?" I asked Nev when I was done.

He'd slipped off his trench coat and hung it over the back of the chair next to my rosewood desk. "I just wondered what you found out in Ardent Lake yesterday."

Where to begin?

I told him about Marci and made sure to add that she'd promised to return everything to Angela's. That way, it was up to him to decide if the Ardent Lake police should get involved. I also told him Larry and Susan were a couple again, though since he didn't react, I guess he didn't think it was relevant. Maybe he was right.

"What I really don't understand," I admitted, "was why Angela promised the charm string to the Little Museum, then gave it to the Big Museum."

"You think it matters?"

I glanced his way. That morning, Nev was wearing a gray suit, a cream-colored shirt, and a green plaid tie. He hurt my eyes. "Do you think it matters?" I echoed back. "I'm just the b.u.t.ton expert here, remember. You're the professional."

"If only that meant I had all the answers!" The aroma of fresh-brewed coffee filled the b.u.t.ton Box, and Nev went into the back room. When he returned, he had a mug in each hand and he set one down on the desk in front of me.

"That Marci, the first museum curator, she might have been mad at Angela for changing her mind about the charm string," he said, falling into professional mode and walking us both through the case. "Or from what you've said about her stealing, she might have been worried that Angela knew what she was up to. That gives her motive, too."

"It does." I took a sip of coffee, enjoying the heat against the back of my throat.

"The second museum curator was jealous that Angela stole her man from her. And now that Angela's out of the way, they're back together. Which pretty much proves that Angela was the one keeping them apart. That looks like pretty good motive for her."

"And the man in question..." I was just about to take another drink of coffee and I paused, the cup near my lips and the aroma tickling my nose. "He and Angela had a fight. The afternoon of the day she was killed. He says they were golden again by the time she left the hardware store, but there's no way to prove that. So that might give him motive, too. And all we need to do is figure out which motive is the motive that's the motive for murder."

Big points for Nev, he did not mention how nearly incomprehensible my last comment was. In fact, all he did was shiver. "I can't get warm today," he admitted. "It's like the cold goes right through you out there."

"Which means it would be terrible weather for camping."

Blank stare.

Well, what did I expect?

Fortunately, I didn't have to explain. The phone rang, and I spent a pleasant fifteen minutes talking b.u.t.ton gossip with a collector from Saint Louis who was interested in some of the moonglow b.u.t.tons featured on my website. We came to an agreeable price, she gave me her credit card number, and I promised to ship the b.u.t.tons that day and send her an e-mail receipt.

"Receipt." I hung up, mumbling the word and drumming my fingers against the phone. "There were receipts," I said, and no, I didn't add at Kaz's. Like I said, all that was too complicated to explain to a cop on a rainy morning. "Receipts at Angela's," I said. I dug through my purse to look for them, and when I fished them out, I was sure to mention that Charles had given me permission to take them. Just so Nev didn't get any ideas about me having a felonious side.

When I set them on the desk, he nodded. "They were in her home office. I looked through them when I was there the day after the murder. As far as I remember, there was nothing promising. Or even anything interesting."

Just as a way of having something to do, I looked through them, too. Though there were more of them, Angela's receipts weren't any more interesting than Kaz's.

"Restaurants." I set those receipts on one pile. "Clothing stores." They went in their own little stack. "Hairdresser, nail salon." I started a third stack. "Groceries." These, too, were set aside. It took me only a couple minutes to finish, and when I was done, I was left holding only two receipts. Neither of them fit neatly into any of the categories.

"A fishing charter," I said. "Scheduled on a Monday..." I held up first one receipt, then the other. "And canceled on a Wednesday."

"Hmmm..." Nev scanned the piles of receipts. "Do you have a pile for recreation?"

Honestly, sometimes even the brightest cop can be dense. I look at him hard when I asked, "Did Angela seem like the kind of woman who would fish for recreation?"

He pursed his lips. "Can't say. I didn't know her. What do you think?"

"I think she wore tailored business suits and got her nails done." I pointed to each appropriate pile in turn. "I think her house was full of expensive antiques, and in the one photo I saw of her and Larry in the great outdoors, I think she looked cold and uncomfortable. Call me crazy..." I gave him a chance, but like I said, Nev is pretty bright; he knew better than to take me up on the offer. "Angela on a fishing charter seems odd to me. So does scheduling a boat and then canceling it so soon after. So does..."

I took another careful look at the receipts. Something about them jogged a memory, and I tapped my finger against them.

"The dates," I said, thinking back to my meeting with Marci at the Little Museum. "I knew they looked familiar. That Monday, that was the day Angela called Marci and offered the charm string to her."

Nev came around to the other side of the desk and leaned over my shoulder for a look at the receipts. "And the day she canceled the charter?"

"That..." Just to be sure I took another gander. "That was the day after she told Marci she'd changed her mind, the day after she offered the charm string to Susan."

Nev didn't say if he thought this was significant or not. Then again, cops are a closemouthed bunch. Especially when it comes to offering an opinion before they have all the facts. What he did instead was slip the receipts off my desk and get out his cell. He made a call, and while he waited for the person on the other end of the phone to answer, he said, "Maybe the weather forecast was bad for the day the boat was scheduled. Maybe that's why she canceled."

I was already one step ahead of him. Except for that day with the rain pelting down and the one morning when I had the charm string in my possession to photograph, it had been a mild and mostly sunny spring, but just to be sure I hadn't forgotten any particularly nasty weather, I looked online and saw that the weather the day of the scheduled fishing excursion had been ideal.

While I pointed to the computer screen, Nev nodded and started talking to the person on the other end of the phone. He identified himself and asked about the receipts in question.

"So was she excited? I mean when she hired the boat in the first place?" Nev asked. "Did she say she was interested in doing a little fishing?"

He paused and listened, then thanked the person and hung up.

"That was the charter company," he explained. "The lady who schedules the excursions says she remembers Angela because Angela told her she wasn't going out on the lake to fish. When she chartered the boat, Angela said she didn't want to bring anything back, she was going out on the water to get rid of something."

"The charm string?" The very thought of all those wonderful old b.u.t.tons lying at the bottom of Lake Michigan made me so queasy, it took me a minute to wrap my head around it.

"It actually makes sense," I concluded, controlling my gut-wrenching reaction to such a loss. "Because Angela really believed the charm string was cursed. She might have figured dumping the b.u.t.tons in the lake was the only way to get rid of them. But then...then she changed her mind." I almost added thank goodness, then decided it made me sound like too much of a b.u.t.ton nerd. Nev already knew that about me, I didn't need to hit him over the head with it. "And that's when she decided to donate the charm string to the museum."

"The first museum. Then she changed her mind about that-"

"And offered it to the second museum."

Maybe it was too early in the morning. Or maybe I just hadn't had enough coffee. All this speculation was making my head pound. I took another sip of my coffee and I can't say if it was the warmth or the caffeine that jump-started my brain.

"Maybe..." Just so I didn't lose the thought, I took another sip. "Maybe Angela's murder wasn't about her dating Larry or about Marci stealing from the museum. Maybe it really was all about that enameled b.u.t.ton. Maybe someone knew how valuable it was. And maybe that same someone heard Angela talking about how she was going to get rid of the fish b.u.t.ton and all the other b.u.t.tons by tossing the charm string in Lake Michigan."

"That same someone might have talked her out of the fishing charter and into donating the b.u.t.tons." Nev liked where this idea was going; his blue eyes gleamed.

"And the reason that someone wanted Angela to donate the b.u.t.tons was so that person had more time to get his-or her-hands on the enameled b.u.t.ton. Obviously, that was never going to happen if the b.u.t.ton was in the lake. And that-" Another idea jolted through me and I sat back, my hands clutching the edge of my desk. "That would explain the attempted break-in at her house that Angela told me about. And that fire in her kitchen. Maybe someone was really trying to get her out of the house so she-or he-could get into the house and take the charm string."

Another thought struck and I sucked in a breath. "Oh my gosh, Nev, Angela said there was a small fire at Aunt Evelyn's, too. Angela's the one who put it out. She just a.s.sumed it all happened because of the curse, but-"

"The person who was after the b.u.t.ton could have engineered the whole thing."

"And..." In spite of the coffee, my throat went dry. I grabbed my mug and took another drink, but thanks to the idea that just popped into my head, it didn't exactly help. "Maybe that's why someone tried to steal my purse. To get my keys and get into the shop. The charm string spent the night here. It's the same reason the lights went out here at the shop the day I had the charm string." I would have slapped my forehead if I didn't have both hands wrapped around my coffee mug. "Stan said the fuse wasn't blown. He said it looked as if the breaker had been tripped. Maybe someone thought that if the lights went out, I'd leave the shop for a while. Or maybe that person thought I'd be the one who went into the bas.e.m.e.nt to see what was wrong, and I'd be easy to overpower. He didn't count on Stan being here with me. We didn't leave. Nev, that could mean the killer was here. In the building."

Even though it had all happened more than a week before, that didn't stop my heart from starting up a rumba rhythm inside my chest. I looked over my shoulder toward the workroom. "If I'd been here by myself..."

"We're not going to worry about that." Nev put a hand on my shoulder. "Nothing happened, and we're not sure about any of this, anyway. But if it is true-"

"Then somebody really wanted that b.u.t.ton. Enough to kill for it. We need to figure out who that could be."

"You said the cousin-"

I nodded. "Charles. He's pretty up on the value of things. He would have known how much that charm string was worth. Maybe..." I didn't like to think about Angela's last moments, but I forced the words out, anyway. "Maybe he meant to steal the entire charm string and never counted on it breaking when he strangled her."

"And the rest of our suspects?" Nev asked.

"Susan and Marci certainly know what's what when it comes to antiques," I said. "They've got museums full of them. Larry, I'm not so sure about. I can't imagine a guy who owns a hardware store knows a whole bunch about b.u.t.tons."

We both knew what all this meant. For his part, Nev would do the official digging. And me? I'd get on the phone again and make all the calls I'd made the week before to all the b.u.t.ton dealers and collectors who might have come across someone trying to unload a particularly pretty b.u.t.ton. Maybe the killer had laid low for a bit. But sooner or later, he'd try to sell the b.u.t.ton. I was sure of it. It was the only thing that made sense.

I reached for the binder I kept in my top desk drawer that included a listing of all the phone numbers I'd need. "I love b.u.t.tons," I said. Not that this was news to Nev. "But I can't imagine killing for one."

"And it was worth...what? Maybe a thousand bucks or so? It just doesn't seem worth risking life in prison for a thousand bucks." Nev slipped on his coat. I was about to walk him to the front of the shop when something smacked against my front door.

Automatically, we both looked that way.

No customer coming in. No one standing on the sidewalk.

But again, we heard another thump.

Nev got to the door first, and the moment he opened it, he rolled his eyes and smiled. "Friend of yours?" he asked.

LaSalle stood on the stoop, his tail thumping against the door.

The dog had never been inside the b.u.t.ton Box and I wasn't much for setting that kind of precedent, but hey, it was cold and rainy outside, and the poor dog was drenched. I urged him into the back room, closed the door so he couldn't cause any damage to the front of the shop, and looked for a towel to dry him.

Nev had followed us and he pointed at the mutt. "He's got something in his mouth."

I watched the way LaSalle worked over the whatever it was and imagined all sorts of disgusting things. "I'm not sure I want to find out what it is."

"Except that it's crunching." Nev knelt next to the dog. "Come on, good boy." He held out his hand. Yeah, like he actually expected LaSalle to just spit out whatever the tasty prize happened to be.

I had other plans. I'd brought a tuna sandwich for lunch, and I got it out of the fridge and ripped off a piece. "How about this?" I dangled the morsel in front of LaSalle's nose. "I'll trade you, buddy. What you have in your mouth for tuna with mayo, celery, and sweet pickle."

It was, apparently, a deal.