Engaged in Murder (Perfect Proposals Mystery) (8 page)

“Hey, Miss Pomeroy, what are you doing here?” The kid who sat in the guard shack at the entrance to the airport looked a little less bored today.

“Hi, Jimmy, I brought you cupcakes.” I lifted the lid on a tin holding a wide variety of cakes. “Can I come in?”

“Wow, are those chocolate?” His blue eyes grew wide.

“Yes, and fudge and mocha and vanilla swirl and chocolate chip. I’m trying to figure out what to serve at my sister’s engagement party. I need a second opinion and remembered that you were here. You look like a guy who likes a good cupcake.”

“I do like a good cupcake.” Jimmy was as skinny as any twenty-something could be. His blond hair flopped forward in his eyes. His tan security uniform appeared to be pressed this time. He hit the button that raised the arm of the gate and I drove into the parking spot beside the guard shack. I looked at the cupcakes. Bribery seemed to be my best idea yet. I hoped I could get some information out of Jimmy. Anything would be more than Detective Murphy gave me.

Jimmy opened the door to the tiny guard shack and let me inside. There was room for two people, two stools that were bar height, and a counter that held a coffeepot, some mugs, and a microwave.

I handed him the platter of cupcakes and took a seat on the stool away from the window. Should Jeb decide to come by, I didn’t want him to see me right off. “Wow, you have electricity in here?” I asked and pointed to the appliance.

Jimmy sat down on his stool and put the cupcakes in his lap. “Yeah, gets cold in the winter, so Jeb thought coffee would be good. Trouble with that is you have to . . . well, you know . . . go a lot when you drink.”

“I see.” I looked around. There definitely was not another room in the shack. “How do you take care of that?”

He picked up a double-chocolate cupcake and peeled off the paper holder. “Hangar number one.” He bit into the cake and closed his eyes in joy.

“Who watches the gate while you . . . you know . . . go?”

“I call Jeb. Sometimes he comes out. Sometimes he watches the cameras.” Jimmy devoured the cupcake in a second bite and picked up another. This one was chocolate chip with fudge icing.

“You have cameras?”

“Sure, everyone does. It’s standard security.” He took two more quick bites and finished off the second cupcake.

“Do the police know?”

“Yeah.” He picked up an orange Dreamsicle cupcake. This one was orange cake with white cream filling and orange butter cream frosting on top. “Cops took all the tapes. Pissed Jeb off because he had to go buy all new ones. We generally use the same ones and tape over them.”

Tilting my head thoughtfully, I watched as he ate the orange cake in one bite. “You still use actual tapes? I would think you would have that all digitized.”

“Naw, it’s an old system. Jeb says it’s good enough for our low rate of crime. Might digitize now, though. It’s hard to replace tapes. Not too many people selling them anymore.”

“Well, that’s certainly true.” My mom had been complaining that all her movies on VCR tapes would have to be bought again as DVDs and that at the rate technology was changing she didn’t want to invest in DVDs only to have to replace them all again in five years with whatever was new. “How many tapes were there?”

Jimmy swallowed his mouthful of cupcake.

I handed him a napkin from the stack on the counter near the coffeepot. “You have orange stuff on your cheek.”

“Thanks.” He wiped at it, effectively smearing it across his face. “Don’t know for sure how many tapes. We have cameras set up every hundred yards around the perimeter of the airport. Then there are cameras that are pointed at the hangar doors.”

“That’s a lot of footage.”

He downed two more cupcakes. The kid was skinny as a rail. I had no idea where he was putting it all. If I so much as smelled a cupcake, I gained five pounds on each thigh and not in a good curvy way.

“Not really.” He shrugged. “Only half the cameras work.”

“Only half? Won’t someone unauthorized get in?”

“Naw, see, Jeb had them set to randomly turn on and off. There’s no way to tell which cameras are recording and which aren’t. He said it was ingenious and it saves the company a couple grand a year.”

“Interesting . . . Who knows about the cameras? Being random, I mean?”

Jimmy shrugged and finished off the cakes on the platter. “I do and Jeb . . . I suppose the rest of the crew does.”

“Does management? I mean, someone like Warren Evans, would he know?”

“Sure, he signed off on the thing when Jeb proposed it.”

That was not a good sign. “Do the cops know about that?”

“Don’t know.” Jimmy twisted and reached behind him. There was a mini fridge under the cabinet. He pulled out a bottle of water and offered me one.

“Thanks.” I twisted off the cap and sipped. Jimmy guzzled his own bottle. “Surely Jeb told the investigators.”

Jimmy frowned. “Can’t see why he would. The tapes cover random spots. There really is no way to tell what was turned on and what wasn’t.”

“Aren’t they time stamped?”

“Oh, huh, maybe . . . sure. I suppose they could tell then.”

I twirled my bottle of water between my fingers. “I was questioned for a long time about what I saw. It was really tough to remember. Did the police question you, too?”

“Yeah.” Jimmy nodded. “They asked all kinds of questions. I told them what I know. Jeb said that was the right thing to do.”

“Was it difficult?”

“Naw, I have a good memory.”

“I heard it was a janitor that was killed.”

“Yeah, poor Stromer. The guy had his troubles, but he didn’t need to be killed over it.”

“Right?” I agreed. “I mean, who doesn’t have troubles these days.”

“I know, especially when you have a gambling problem.” Jimmy looked both ways as if someone else might overhear and leaned in toward me. “I hear he was in deep with the casinos. He even sold his house.”

“Ouch.” I winced.

Jimmy’s mouth curled and he shrugged. “Didn’t stop him. He thought he could win it all back, but that didn’t work. Them casinos sucker you in.”

“What did he do once his house was gone?”

Jimmy looked around again. “I hear he had something over Mr. Evans.”

“You mean, he tried to blackmail Warren Evans?”

“No, I mean, he told him he knew his secret, and if Mr. Evans wanted him to keep his mouth shut, he’d have to pay.”

“I see.” I sat back. Things were not looking good for Warren or Felicity. “Did you tell the cops this?”

“Naw, they didn’t ask.”

“Did anyone else know what Stromer did?”

“Sure, he bragged to everyone that he had Mr. Evans over a barrel. The guy was sure to give him a couple grand. Strom was going to win back his house and enough money to buy Mr. Evans out.”

“Huh, so anyone could have told the cops about Stromer bragging he’d get money from Mr. Evans.”

“Sure, I guess so.” Jimmy checked out the window. “Someone’s coming. You have any more cupcakes?”

“No, that was it . . . only a dozen.”

“Too bad . . . you should go before Jeb sees you.”

“Right.” I got up and picked up the platter. “Just one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Which cupcake did you like best—for my sister’s engagement party . . .”

“Oh.” He drew his eyebrows together. Then his expression brightened. “The chocolate ones!” He nodded and raised a finger. “Definitely chocolate, although the orange were good . . . No, chocolate. It’s an engagement party and all. I think chocolate equals love or some such thing.”

“Thanks.” I stepped out of the shack. Okay, so there were several chocolate ones—red velvet, chocolate chip, dark chocolate. Sigh. I mentally shrugged. I didn’t really want his opinion anyway. I got in my car and he opened the gate for me to drive out.

I dialed Warren.

“Hey, Pepper, how’s the engagement party planning going?” he asked as he answered my call.

“Hi, Warren, things are going fine. I’ve got a line on a beautiful venue downtown. We never did talk budget,” I said. “It’s kind of important.”

“Sure, sure, you know how I feel. Spare no expense. If Felicity wants it, make it happen.”

“Right.” I tried not to roll my eyes. “Listen, I heard that the dead janitor talked about you a lot. Did you know him well?”

“Sure.” Warren sounded distracted. “I knew him. Randy Stromer was a hard-core gambler. It was tough to see him throw away his money.”

“I heard that he was blackmailing you.” I let that sentence float out on the air a bit. I would have loved to ask him to his face. People gave away things in their expression, but there wasn’t time for that. “Was he?”

“Randy? No,” Warren said. “Who told you that?”

“I heard it through the grapevine.” I turned into the parking lot of the bakery I’d gotten the cupcakes from. J’s Bakery was in Elk Grove Village and had some of the tastiest cakes in town. They weren’t the famous downtown cake girls, but they had been in business for nearly a hundred years. There was something about good old-fashioned baking that appealed to both me and Felicity.

“I don’t know what grapevine you’re tuned in to, but Randy did not blackmail me. To begin with, I haven’t done anything worth blackmailing over. Unless you were thinking about the money I offered him to go into rehab for his gambling addiction. Pepper, I even offered to send him back to school once he got his addiction under control.”

“So he had no reason to blackmail you . . .”

“He had no reason. I swear.”

“Maybe you should have your lawyer tell the police that,” I suggested.

“I did.” He sounded upset. “They asked if I had proof. I don’t know what kind of proof they wanted me to have. I don’t make a habit out of recording conversations.”

“Did you look up rehab places on the Internet? Or maybe offer to pay his tuition at a certain school? Have them track your Internet searches. That’s proof.”

“I can’t, Pepper. I have financially sensitive corporate information on my computer. There’s a certain trust factor I have to maintain with my clients. If anyone even hinted that I would share that information with the cops, I wouldn’t be able to do business.”

“What about the business of proving your innocence?”

“Is that what this is about? Are you thinking I had something to do with Randy’s death?”

“Let’s just say that, for Felicity’s sake, I hope not,” I said. “She’s my only sister. I don’t want to see her hurt.”

“I love Felicity,” Warren insisted. “I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize our relationship.”

“Not even pay off a blackmailer?” I turned off my car and sat in the parking lot in front of J’s Bakery and studied the cakes in the window.

“Pepper, I swear—”

“What if we have the engagement party in Rosemont?” I asked, changing the subject. The man could swear he was innocent until he turned blue in the face. It wouldn’t convince me I should believe him. Especially if the cops didn’t believe him.

“Rosemont would be fine, too.” Warren blew out a long breath. “Whatever Felicity wants. Okay?”

“Okay. Bye, Warren.”

“Good-bye, Pepper.”

I hung up and frowned at my steering wheel. Innocent or not, Warren’s proclamations didn’t mean the police would stop suspecting him. The police needed evidence of his innocence that would stand up in court before they stopped. I needed them to stop. Preferably before Felicity married Warren and had a baby. I didn’t want my niece or nephew having to go to prison on visiting day to meet their dad.

“I’m serious, Pepper,” Mom said. “You can’t work from that tiny apartment of yours. You have to have a place where clients would feel comfortable meeting you.”

“I’ll meet them at Starbucks or Panera.”

“Coffee shops and restaurants?” Mom looked horrified as she paused in her clothes folding. The towels had gone from a tangled pile to a neat stack of perfect squares.

“People do it all the time—especially if they are small business owners . . . like me.” I twirled my coffee cup. It was Thursday morning. One of the perks of being self-employed was the ability to stop by and have coffee with my mom any day of the week.

“It doesn’t seem appropriate,” Mom said. “You have to be aware of your image when it comes to your own event planning. You no longer have a full marketing crew or corporate brand to back you up.” She placed the stack of towels on the counter and dumped the load of clean whites on the table to be folded next.

I winced at her words. It wasn’t as if her piano room in the basement would create the image she spoke of, either. “Mom, I’m fine living on my own. Really. All it will take is one or two well-placed events and I will open an office space. Okay?”

“You won’t have to open an office space.” Mom frowned and folded one of Dad’s T-shirts with military precision. “I have a nice office space right here that you can use.”

“I came over to talk engagement party.” I sat at the small table in the basement laundry room. It smelled of dryer sheets and fabric softener. “Warren told me that money is no object, but that doesn’t help me with the budget. I feel funny spending a lot of money without any set budget. What are your thoughts?”

“I thought your father and I were paying for the engagement party.” Mom narrowed her eyes at me. “We’ve saved for years not only to put you both through school, but to pay for your weddings, too.”

“Oh, sweet.” I sat back. “But from my perspective, you might as well use it all on Felicity. I don’t see a man in my life anytime soon—if ever.”

“We will spend equally,” Mom insisted as she folded the last of the T-shirts and started on the socks.

“Fine, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.” I sipped coffee and did my best to change the subject. “So what is your budget?”

The amount she so proudly gave me made me flinch. It would cover half the venue in Rosemont and an eighth of the Chicago venue. Rosemont it was. As long as Mom didn’t ask for receipts, I would talk to Warren about paying the bills. I hated to make my parents feel bad. They really did work hard and save as much as possible. Felicity and I didn’t care if we had simple parties in the warm atmosphere of the home we grew up in, but I know a man of Warren’s stature demanded more than that.

It was a fine line to walk between budget and expectation. It was also something that I was good at doing.

“All right.” I took my planner out of the large leather tote I carried and wrote a budget amount at the top. “I will need a list of people you want to invite. The numbers will help determine venue size.”

Mom paired socks and flipped them together. “I have no idea how many people Warren’s parents would like to invite. Warren gave me his mother’s phone number and I’ve left two messages, but she has yet to return my calls.”

“You and Felicity should meet with Warren’s mom and have a get-to-know-you lunch.”

“I’m sure that would be helpful.” Mom took the clothes upstairs. I followed her. “Felicity hasn’t even met his parents.”

I leaned against the frame of the door to Mom and Dad’s bedroom and watched her carefully put the clothes in drawers. Mom was so different than me. I generally shoved my clothes in whatever space they fit into. Mom always had a place for everything and everything in its place.

Dust never settled in Mom’s house. Their bedroom always smelled like my Dad’s aftershave and clean sheets. “She hasn’t met his parents? That seems kind of weird, doesn’t it?”

“Not really.” Mom shrugged. “Felicity tells me that Warren thought introducing her to his parents sooner would have given away his secret.”

“Seriously? Doesn’t that bug her?”

“Listen up, kiddo, Warren Evans is the man your sister wants to marry.” Mom turned on me, her gaze fierce. “You will support her in this.”

I straightened up. It was habit really. Whenever Mom gave you “the look,” you knew to take notice. “I simply don’t understand his reasons for keeping these things from her, that’s all.”

“Warren’s reasons are fine with Felicity and that’s all that matters. I don’t want to hear any more negative talk from you. It makes you sound jealous and petty.”

“I’m not jealous.” I drew my eyebrows together. “Really, I worry for her. That’s all.”

“If you love her, then you will take care not to let her become aware of your concerns. Felicity is the happiest I’ve ever seen her. I won’t have anyone take that away from her.”

I swallowed my reply and simply nodded. Mom was right. It appeared I would be on my own with my investigation. To keep Felicity happy, I was even more determined than ever to find out who killed the janitor. “I understand.”

“Good.” Mom nodded. “Now are you staying for dinner?”

*   *   *

My talk with Mom only strengthened my desire to get to the bottom of this murder. Don’t get me wrong, I liked Warren. He paid me well and gave me the idea to start my own business. The problem—as I saw it—was that as long as the investigation hung over their relationship, my sister would never be safe.

Since Mom would hear no more of my reservations, I took it upon myself to press Detective Murphy for more information. When he called me, I jumped at the chance to speak to him face-to-face.

“Thanks for coming down, Ms. Pomeroy.” Detective Murphy sat at his desk. “You didn’t have to. A simple phone call would have done it.”

Detective Murphy wore a white shirt, a green striped tie, and black pants. I liked the fact that he wore a white T-shirt under his dress shirt. Not too many men wore T-shirts under dress shirts anymore. I liked that it gave the shirt a cleaner look. For an old guy, Detective Murphy was okay in my mind.

“I prefer to visit in person.” I leaned toward him from my place on the orange plastic chair in front of his desk. “You said the coroner determined a time of death for Mr. Stromer?”

“It’s approximate, but yes, we have the window of time during which his death occurred,” Detective Murphy said. “So tell me if you can what time you arrived at the airport?”

“It was around four
P.M.
,” I said. “Jimmy should have it in his gate logs. They checked my ID before I was allowed into the airport.”

“I’ll check the logs later,” he said. “For now give me your best version of the time frame.”

“Okay.” I sat back and held up my hand, marking each point on a finger. “I arrived after four
P.M.
My ID was checked and then Jimmy called Jeb Donaldson. I waited until Jeb got there and checked my ID again.”

“How long did that take?”

“I don’t know. Fifteen minutes or so? I remember that I’d been running a bit late and their delay at the gate had me worried about how much time I had left to get my decorating done before Felicity was supposed to arrive. Warren had asked her to come out after she got off work at five
P.M.
”

“What time did you get to the hangar?” His hound dog eyes were flat and calm.

“You know, I don’t have a watch.”

“Estimate.”

“Okay, well then, probably four twenty—if you account for the delay at the gate and then five minutes to find the right hangar.”

“Who was the first person you saw?” He wrote notes on a pad of yellow legal paper.

“Daniel Frasier, the pilot. He came out and offered to carry my potted palm into the hangar and show me around.” I hadn’t thought about the fact that Daniel would also be a suspect. In fact, he might be a better candidate than Warren.

“Was Frasier with you the entire time?”

“Well, no.” I chewed on my bottom lip. “Let’s see . . . he helped me bring the palm into the plane and showed me the interior.”

“Was anyone else there when he did this?”

“Yes, Laura Snow, the flight attendant, was there as well, but they both left me while I decorated the interior. I have no idea what time that was or for how long. All I know is that I was on a deadline and I had a lot I wanted to do to create the perfect atmosphere.”

“But you said your sister was to arrive by five
P.M.
Is that correct?” Detective Murphy looked at me over the top of his reading glasses.

“No, she was leaving work at five. She works in Des Plaines near O’Hare Airport. So you need to figure in extra time with traffic, she would most likely get there between five twenty and five forty. This means I couldn’t have been decorating for more than forty-five minutes.”

“So you were done decorating around five
P.M.
”

“Give or take.” I nodded and smoothed the pleats in my skirt. I had a meeting with the venue manager for Felicity’s engagement party. So I was dressed professionally in a tan midcalf-length pleated skirt and a cream and tan sweater over a crisp white shirt. It made my orange-red hair and blue eyes stand out.

“What do you consider give or take? Roughly? I want to clarify the timeline,” he said as he made notes.

“Okay, well, give or take ten minutes,” I said. “I’m terrible at estimating time. Ask anyone. I’m notoriously early or late—never on time.”

“Maybe you need a watch.”

“Maybe.”

His dark gaze showed a hint of humor for the first time. “Who did you see after that?”

“I exited the plane and Daniel gave me a quick tour of the exterior—well, the safe zones anyway. I wasn’t supposed to go past the wing. Wait—he did that before I decorated.” I frowned. “I mixed that up. He took me on a tour inside and out—even showed me where the bathrooms were, all before I decorated.”

“So he showed you the bathroom before you decorated. Did you go inside?”

“No.”

“Did he go inside the restroom?”

“No, he simply pointed it out. Then I went back inside the plane and decorated.” I threaded my fingers together nervously. How could I have mixed that up?

“Okay, so Frasier showed you the outside of the plane and pointed out the restrooms, then you went into the plane and decorated. Correct?”

“Yes.” I nodded. “When I came out, I was looking for Laura, the flight attendant. I didn’t see her—but I did see Daniel in the cockpit.”

“That fits with his statement,” Detective Murphy muttered. “Did you find Laura?”

“No, I thought maybe she was in the bathroom, so I went in and called her name.”

“Was the deceased inside at that time?”

I chewed on my lip. “Yes, but I thought he was passed out. I mean, he looked a little blue but some people turn green when they are drunk.” I shrugged. “Green, blue, they are pretty close. So I was about to shake him and tell him he needed to leave when Warren opened the door a crack and let me know Felicity was coming through the gate.”

“So you left the dead man and watched your sister’s proposal, drank champagne, and waved them good-bye—letting everyone leave—knowing there was a dead guy in the bathroom?” He raised one gray eyebrow and gave me a look like I was about the biggest idiot he’d ever known.

“I didn’t think he was dead,” I defended my actions. “I’ve never seen a real-life dead person, except at funerals, and they don’t count.”

“So you thought he was passed out and didn’t think to tell anyone there was a passed-out
man
in the ladies’ room?” He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair.

I tried not to twitch. “I was caught up in the excitement of my sister’s big day. I didn’t think it was a big deal. After all, Laura and I were the only women in the hangar that I knew of and we were both busy. I didn’t think that a passed-out man would disturb anyone. Besides, for all I know, he died while Warren was proposing.” I fished for a timeline on the janitor’s death. Detective Murphy ignored me.

“When did you realize he was dead?”

“After they left, I went to collect my bags and I remembered the man in the bathroom. I called 911. The dispatcher took my information and told me to call airport security. After I talked to Jeb on the phone, I figured I’d better check on the drunk guy. I mean, if he got up and left, then there was nothing I could do, but if he was still in the stall, I could at least stay with him until the police came.”

“So you went back into the bathroom with a possible drunk that you didn’t know and didn’t take anyone with you?”

Now he did make me feel foolish. “Yeah, I guess that wasn’t very smart.” I wasn’t about to mention that I was afraid the drunk guy would leave before the police got there. “He was drunk, right? I could outrun him if he tried anything.”

“When did you realize he was dead?”

“He was still in the same spot when I went back inside. His position in the bathroom stall looked painful, so I went to shake him. I thought if I could get him out of there and maybe at least get him flat on the floor, it would help. I used a mop handle to poke him . . .” I shuddered. “He was cold and stiff.”

“We have in our records that you called 911 at six thirty
P.M.
”