“I guess I can’t blame her.” Baronick leaned back in his chair. “She mentioned the name to me on Tuesday when I stopped at Franklin’s office to get the autopsy reports on Elizabeth. I didn’t make the connection until I was going over the witness list this morning.”
Pete took off his glasses. “Why’d Zoe mention Gina to you?”
“She and Doc had just completed the autopsy. When I came in, she assumed that’s why I was there.”
“Did they find something suspicious?”
“No. The exact opposite. According to Zoe, there was no obvious cause of death, pending toxicology. But a young, healthy woman doesn’t usually come home from work, go to her room to rest, and never wake up. I was supposed to check with the officers who took the call and forgot about it. My bad.”
Pete gazed out the deli’s front window at the people passing on the street, only vaguely aware of them. An apprehensive murmur arose from his gut to settle in the back of his skull.
“Tell me what you remember about her,” Baronick said.
“She was quiet,” Pete said, picturing the woman from the trial. She looked younger than her age, with a smattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks. She also looked devastated the entire time she testified. “Smart,” he added. “And very much in love with Dustin Landis.”
“Couldn’t have been that smart then.”
“There are different types of smart.” The businessman who’d been ahead of Pete in the deli line collected his order and left. Pete’s would be next. “Her relationship with Landis had ended at least a year before he killed his wife. Gina had broken it off as soon as she discovered he was married. Her testimony, along with that of the other mistresses, showed his history of infidelity.”
“He got tired of all these cute chicks dumping him because of his wife, so he bumped off the old ball and chain.”
“Overly simplified, but yeah.”
“Adams,” the woman at the counter called out.
Pete stood. “Aren’t you getting anything?”
Baronick shook his head. “Late breakfast. I’ll walk back with you. I want to hear if Zoe’s learned anything else about Gina’s death.”
After picking up a large bag containing his and Zoe’s lunches and a carrier with their coffees, Pete headed for the door. Baronick gathered the papers into the folder and followed. Outside, the clouds had begun to split, revealing patches of blue, hopefully a good omen for tomorrow. Moving day. The home edition.
Zoe was once again on her hands and knees, this time beneath Paulette’s desk with the secretary holding a tangle of cables over her.
“Your lunch is here,” Paulette said to the backside sticking out from under the desk.
The backside shimmied out—stirring some deeply unprofessional sensations in Pete—and Zoe’s blonde head popped up.
“Great. I’m starved.” She climbed to her feet only to be met by a scowling Paulette who held up the still detached cords. “I’ll eat fast.”
Paulette grunted. “You couldn’t have taken two more minutes to plug these in?”
“Nope.” When the secretary continued to glare, Zoe added, “Hey. You already had your lunch. Don’t begrudge me mine.” She closed the short distance to her own desk in three steps and swept it clear, depositing a hodgepodge of papers on one of the unpacked boxes.
Pete set the bags on the desk’s surface and watched as Zoe ripped into them.
Baronick shouldered the doorframe, looking at Zoe. “Did you find out any more about Gina Wagner’s death?”
Zoe paused, short of biting into her sandwich. “Not yet. Did you?”
“Not about her death.”
She followed Baronick’s gaze to Pete. “Gina was one of the prosecution witnesses against Landis,” he said.
Zoe’s lips parted in surprise. “Why?”
Pete didn’t reply and watched the realization dawn in her baby blues.
Gina Wagner had been one of Dustin Landis’ lady friends. The news shocked Zoe more than it should’ve. Although Gina had helped tutor Zoe in high school, they hadn’t run in the same circles. Gina was one of the studious kids the teachers loved. Zoe? Not so much. Gina was one of the good girls, a category the teenaged Zoe could never claim. She’d changed over the years. Apparently, Gina had as well.
Once Pete and Wayne left, Zoe finished sorting cables and setting up the computers. Paulette’s pleasure was short-lived when the promised delivery of office chairs didn’t happen. With the secretary off to do battle with the office supply store—heaven help them—Zoe dragged a stacked pair of sturdy boxes over to her desk and plopped onto them. Not comfortable, but easier on the spine than standing and leaning over her computer.
Her phone interrupted before she could touch the keyboard.
“This is Everett Jones with Hulton’s Funeral Home. May I speak to the coroner please.”
Zoe fought the urge to swear. “This is Zoe Chambers. What can I do for you, Mr. Jones?”
“I’ve been told you were to release Franklin Marshall’s body to us, yet I haven’t heard anything from your office.”
“We’re not releasing the body yet.”
After a pause, Everett Jones said, “Oh. But the widow said—”
“The widow got a little ahead of herself. The investigation into Mr. Marshall’s death is still ongoing. I’ll call you once the body can be claimed.” Zoe ended the call before the man could argue.
She took a deep breath to bring her blood pressure back to where it should be and opened the same files on Elizabeth that she’d dug up earlier in the week for Wayne and Dr. Davis. When she clicked print, nothing happened. Muttering, she dove into trouble-shooting mode.
Gina Wagner and Dustin Landis.
Zoe couldn’t shake the feeling she—and Pete and Wayne—were overlooking something. She did the math. Elizabeth was killed nine years ago. Pete had told her Gina’s relationship with Dustin ended a year or more earlier. Ten years. Gina’s daughter, the one Zoe had helped deliver, was about five, and the boy was no more than two years older.
At least Dustin wasn’t the father of either
