A Score to Settle (17 page)

His party guests were all gone; the festivities had broken up pretty quickly after Jamie’s collapse. His ever-efficient servants had already cleaned everything up. Even the melting ice sculptures had been set outside and the paper snow put into recycling.

The place felt strangely large and empty to him, unusually quiet.

He could go to her. He could wake up Randall and have him drive…or he could drive himself, like a normal human being. But the last time he’d gone out had been such a disaster. He still tightened up inside just thinking about his visit to the prison. A hospital wouldn’t be much better.

Finally the phone rang, and Daniel snatched up the receiver. “Ford?”

“Yeah. It’s me. Jamie’s conscious. Looks like she’s gonna be okay.”

Thank God.
“So what happened to her?”

“You’re not gonna like this.”

“I already don’t like it. What, for God’s sake?”

“She overdosed on barbiturates and alcohol.”

“She tried to…to…”

“Well, that’s what everyone thought. But right now, a Houston P.D. detective is on his way over to talk to her. She claims she didn’t take anything, and that someone must have slipped her the drugs somehow.”

The news just got worse and worse.

“You know her better than us, Daniel,” Ford said. “Did she take pills? For pain or whatever?”

“Absolutely not. Jamie wouldn’t try to kill herself. That’s preposterous. She was levelheaded, smart, well-grounded.”

“She’d lost her job.”

“She knew that was a possibility from the beginning, and it was a risk she was willing to take. She wouldn’t have been happy about it, but she wouldn’t be suicidal.”

“Which leaves us with a pretty uncomfortable alternative. Someone at the party tried to kill her. Has she had trouble with anyone? Any conflicts with the staff?”

A painful possibility occurred to him. He hesitated to say anything; the last thing he wanted to do was falsely accuse someone. How much of a hypocrite that would make him!

“Jillian. She formed an irrational dislike for Jamie from the moment they met. But Jillian would never… I mean, I’ve known her since she was a kid. No way.”

“There was the incident with the TV in the bathroom.”

“That was an accident. A…a glue failure. Jillian couldn’t be responsible for that.”

“It’s an awful coincidence, then. Jamie almost dying twice at your place. As a former cop, I can tell you, cops don’t like coincidence.”

“There’s nothing I can do about that. Will you be there when Jamie talks to the detective?”

“She’s asked us to be present for the interview, so we can back up her statements whenever we can.”

“Try to keep a lid on things.”

“I will.”

“And please tell Jamie, if there’s anything I can do, all she has to do is ask. She could recuperate here. I could hire a staff of twenty-four-hour nurses, her own private doctor, whatever she needs.”

“I’ll tell her. But Daniel, don’t hold your breath. You weren’t exactly the most gracious host last time she was there. And considering she almost got killed at your place twice, she won’t be too anxious to spend time under your roof.”

All of which meant, if he wanted to see her and repair the damage he’d done, he was going to have to go to her.

Maybe he could. For Jamie, maybe he could do the impossible.

Tomorrow. Would tomorrow be too late?

She’d asked Robyn and Ford Hyatt to stay with her during the interview. They were all crammed into Jamie’s hospital room—she’d finally been admitted sometime around 2:00 a.m.

She started to say no, that no one had tried to harm her before the previous evening. But then she remembered the TV incident. “When I was staying at Daniel’s, I was about to take a bath when a TV fell off the wall where it was mounted, into the tub. I could have been electrocuted. I thought it was just a freak accident.”

“It was an accident,” Ford put in. “The company that put the TV in admitted it was their fault. Something about the wrong kind of glue.”

Abe looked at Ford. “And you know this…how?”

“Daniel told me.”

Abe made a few scratches in his notebook, then returned his attention to Jamie. “You say you and Daniel had a very public argument a few minutes prior to your getting sick. What did you argue about?”

Jamie saw no way out of this. “He’d just found out the prosecutor who sent him to death row was my father.”

Abe’s eyes widened and Robyn gasped, but Ford obviously already knew.

“I should have told him, and he had a right to be angry,” Jamie said.

“Do you think he was angry enough to harm you?”

“He was very angry,” Jamie said. “But honestly? He would never hurt me physically. I just can’t see it.”

“Who else would want you dead?” Abe asked. “Because without another viable suspect, Daniel Logan is looking very suspicious.”

This wasn’t the direction she wanted Abe to go in. “There’s something else. I’ve been working to prove that a man I prosecuted is actually innocent,” Jamie said. “We now have the DNA of an alternate suspect. Maybe…”

“Project Justice does make plenty of people angry,” Ford said. “When someone is falsely convicted, the real perpetrator gets away with his crime. Then we come along with new evidence, and the perp gets nervous. Just a few months ago, my wife was assaulted by one such person.”

“And then there was Raleigh,” Robyn said. “Our chief legal counsel almost got pushed off a rooftop—”

“That one, I remember,” Abe said. “And I thought my work was dangerous. But how would this as-yet-unnamed murderer be at Daniel’s office party? Doesn’t make sense.”

Jamie sagged in defeat.

“There is one other possibility we haven’t mentioned,” Ford said, sounding supremely uncomfortable. “One other person at the party who doesn’t like you, Jamie.”

Jamie looked at him questioningly. “I don’t think— Oh.”

“Who?” Abe prodded.

Jamie sighed. “Jillian, Daniel’s assistant. She was jealous of me. Mistakenly,” Jamie added quickly, hoping it didn’t come to light that she and Daniel had had sex. “She’s rather territorial about Daniel, and I think she saw me as an invader—coming into his home, spending time with him, sharing meals with him. We were working very closely on this case and she resented me.”

“Everybody knows Jillian has a…a thing for her boss,” Ford added.

“Jillian wouldn’t hurt anyone,” Robyn argued.

“She might not have intended to kill anybody,” Ford said. “Maybe she just wanted Jamie to act drunk…make a fool of herself.”

Abe made more notes. “I’ve always wanted to see Daniel Logan’s house. Now, I guess I have a reason to drop by.”

“Jillian has the guest list, too,” Jamie said, feeling the first stirrings of unease about bringing this mess down on Daniel. If only this was some huge mistake. But blood tests don’t lie, and she
was
drugged. And it
did
happen at the party, there was no question.

Abe finally left. He didn’t offer her any protection, citing budget cuts and a lack of evidence suggesting she was in urgent mortal danger.

She didn’t argue with him. She was too exhausted.

“I’ll keep an eye on things,” Ford offered. “Daniel would want that. He’s offered to let you recuperate in his home. He said he would hire a staff of private nurses to watch over you every minute.”

“No.”

“I told him you probably wouldn’t be too keen on the idea. But he feels bad, Jamie.”

If he felt all that bad, wouldn’t he be here? If he cared about her at all… But instead he’d sent his soldiers, two of the hundreds of people who went out into the world to live his life for him.

“Some things his money can’t fix,” she said to no one in particular, “no matter how many nurses he can hire.”

Robyn looked as if she wanted to argue, but she kept quiet.

“I appreciate everything you two have done for me tonight. Really. But tomorrow I’ll get out of this place. I just need to go home and forget tonight ever happened.”

“Good luck with that,” Ford said. “If someone truly tried to kill you, the ordeal is just beginning.”

“You had a party here last night?” Comstock began conversationally, looking around with obvious curiosity.

“Yes, that’s right.”

It had been a long time since Daniel had last been interrogated, but he knew the routine. Abe would act like a pal, try to get him to relax, ease into the subject gradually. But Daniel already knew he would be considered a suspect. He had argued with Jamie, loudly and publicly, just minutes before her collapse.

He had a motive—revenge. He couldn’t kill the man who had wrongly prosecuted him, but he could kill that man’s daughter. That was exactly what Abe Comstock must be thinking right now.

“Place sure is clean.”

“My staff is very efficient.”

“Do you always clean this thoroughly right after a party? ’Cause it always takes me and the missus days to find all the half-empty beer cans.”

“This is the first party I’ve had in this house since my parents died. Please, sit down.”

Comstock parked himself in a red leather armchair, and Daniel sat on the leather sofa—the one he and Jamie had made love on. He probably should have chosen a different locale, one that wouldn’t remind him of her—and what he’d lost—in such a visceral way.

Daniel decided to go on the offensive. “I’ve already spoken with Ford Hyatt this morning. He says I’m suspect number one in the attempted murder of Jamie McNair.”

“You don’t seem too surprised.”

“I was plenty surprised—and horrified—when I learned Jamie had been drugged. I also understand exactly why you think I did it. I’m willing to cooperate in every way possible so that you can find out who’s responsible. You can search anywhere on the estate. I’ll give you a complete list of everyone who was here.

“I’ll do anything in my power to make you see that I would never hurt Jamie.”

“Are you involved with her?”

“Yes.” It was true, and if there was one thing his work with Project Justice had taught him, it was that you never lied during an interrogation, even if your answer seemingly had nothing to do with the crime. It would come back to bite you.

“I felt betrayed when I found out she hadn’t been completely truthful with me. I did lose my temper. I said some things intended to be hurtful. But that was as far as it went.”

Comstock asked a lot more questions; he wanted a minute-by-minute timeline of Daniel’s whereabouts. He had Daniel walk him through the various locations involved.

Then he asked to see Jillian.

“She didn’t do it,” Daniel said. “From the beginning she didn’t like or trust Jamie. But she was the one who found out about Jamie’s father and told me. That was her revenge. She wanted me to cut Jamie out of my life, and I did. She wouldn’t have any reason to act.”

“Unless she knew you and Jamie had…”

“I don’t think she knew.”

“Women always know. They just do.” It sounded like Comstock knew from personal experience.

“I’ll call Jillian.”

But before he could, Jillian walked into the room. Maybe she’d been eavesdropping. Wearing a pair of wrinkled jeans and a plain blue T-shirt, she didn’t look quite as well put together as usual. Her hair looked as if she’d just gotten out of bed, and she wore no makeup.

She’d probably been up late last night, he reasoned, seeing to the cleanup.

“I was just getting ready to call you,” Daniel said. “This is Lieutenant—Jillian, what’s wrong?” Her eyes were filled with tears, and his first thought was that she’d heard something from the hospital and Jamie had taken a turn for the worse. “Is it Jamie?”

“It’s Chef Claude. He was in a car accident this morning, on his way to work. His mother just called. He’s got a broken leg, a bruised kidney…and he’s…he’s lost an eye.”

“Oh, dear God. Is he going to live?”

“She said yes. But she doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to work again.”

“Of course he will. We’ll get him the best doctors, the best physical therapists. Call his mother back. Tell her we’ll spare no expense.”

“This Claude is your employee?” Comstock asked.

“He’s much more than that,” Daniel replied, wanting to crawl into a hole and forget the last twenty-four hours had ever happened. “I’ve known him since he was a kid. He was an assistant in the kitchen when I was growing up. While I was away at college, my dad sent Claude to the Cordon Bleu school in Paris. He was my first business partner.”

“I didn’t know that,” Jillian said.

“We opened a restaurant. It’s not something I mention much, seeing as it was a crashing failure.”

“You had a business failure?” Comstock asked, seemingly fascinated. “Was the food that bad?”

“Claude’s cooking wasn’t the problem. His ambition was. He wanted to expand too much, too fast, when we didn’t have enough cash flow. We went our separate ways after that. But when I got out of prison, my father tracked him down and hired him to work here—for me. He’s been here ever since.”

“Who should I put in charge of the kitchen?” Jillian asked.

“Cora. But wait a minute,” Daniel said. “Lieutenant Comstock wants to talk to you.”

“Me?”

“Someone tried to kill Jamie McNair,” Daniel said.

Jillian took a step backward and blinked. “You think I had something to do with it?” she shrieked.

“Jillian. Calm down. Just answer Lieutenant Comstock’s questions. I urge you to answer truthfully.”

“What do you want to know?”

“You were there when Jamie and your employer argued,” Comstock said. “I want to know what you saw, what you heard. For instance, was she eating or drinking anything at the time?”

“She was poisoned?”

Comstock said nothing, just waited for her to answer the question.

“Oh, my God.” Jillian turned the color of grits. She grabbed on to the nearest table as she swayed on her feet, then sank onto a footstool. “Daniel, do you remember why I interrupted you and Jamie?”

“Frankly, no. Your timing was very bad, and I was focused on Jamie.”

“I was trying to give you a drink. Claude made it special. For you.”

Daniel strained his brain. “I do remember something…about cranberries?”

“Yes. You took the drink from me, but you didn’t taste it. You set it aside.”

“Yeah…”

“After you walked away from Jamie, she picked up that drink and chugged down the whole thing. Oh, my God. I’m the one who poisoned her.”

“Wait. So you were trying to poison
me?
”

Her eyes widened in horror. “Oh, Daniel, of course not. I would never hurt you. I lo—” She caught herself. “I think you’re a wonderful person.”

Comstock hadn’t missed the slip.

“But if that drink was poisoned…” Comstock’s voice trailed off.

“Claude gave it to me. To give to Daniel. Jamie wasn’t the target. You were.”