His thoughts strayed to that incredible kiss. When Flora was in his arms, they had been standing right by the kitchen widow. The roller blind had been up. Moments before, Leon had looked out into the night and seen nothing. But what had been going on behind the cover of darkness?
“Looks that way.” Laurie flipped to a clean page in her notebook. “I need to ask you some questions. If that’s okay?”
Flora nodded. “Whatever it takes.”
“When was the last time you saw Jennifer?”
“It was on the first day the Ryerson Center opened. I had met her once before that. We had a staff induction day a week before the official opening. Several of the employees were new in town. Jennifer and I chatted about the difficulties facing single women starting out in a new place. It was the only real interaction I had with her.”
Laurie scribbled a few notes. “And she worked at the Ryerson Center for one day?”
“Technically, she only stayed for the morning,” Flora said. “She took her lunch break and didn’t come back. One of my colleagues, Dr. Rajiv Laxman, called her to find out if she was okay. She told him then that she was leaving. Something about a family emergency.” Her eyes widened. “It wasn’t her Raj spoke to, was it?”
“It seems unlikely,” Laurie confirmed. “I’ll need to speak to Dr. Laxman to find out more about that conversation.”
Flora sucked in a breath. “My shed. I kept the boys away from it, but still—”
Leon knew exactly what she was picturing. Two little figures playing with a ball. Laughing and tumbling as they kicked it toward the shed. The ancient door creaking open...
He gripped her hand. “We will find the person who is doing this.” The look he gave Laurie was almost fierce. “Right?”
“Of course.” Laurie nodded her agreement. “But, the discovery of Jennifer’s body, coupled with the new information from Bulldog Warren and the social media smear campaign, takes this investigation in a whole new direction. Although we can’t close down the Alan Grayson angle completely, it’s looking more and more likely that Flora is the target.”
“Damn it, Laurie.” Leon ran a hand through his hair. “Just blurt it out, why don’t you?”
She gave him her unblinking cop stare. “That’s what I do. I tell it like it is, then I catch the bad guys.”
“Wait.” Flora cut across their conversation. “What are you talking about? Who is Bulldog Warren? What new information?”
“Sorry.” Leon turned back to her, annoyed that he’d let himself be distracted and that the worry and confusion in her eyes had deepened as a result. He would do anything he could to take that expression away. Giving his own feelings an outlet by snipping at Laurie wasn’t helping. “I had a visit today from one of Alan’s former patients. It was the same old story. Misdiagnosis. Expensive, unnecessary treatment over many years. Only, in this case, the patient, a man called Bulldog Warren, had taken his case to a malpractice lawyer. Alan had already received a letter informing him of Bulldog’s intention to claim.”
Flora took a moment to process the implications of what he was saying. “All this time we thought Joy and Lilith could have been murdered because they had information that would lead to a malpractice charge against Alan Grayson. But that now seems unlikely because he was already facing such a charge.”
“Exactly,” Laurie said. “Killing them would have been a waste of his time.”
“So, why were they killed?” Flora asked. She looked from Laurie to Leon and back again. “Was it because of me?”
“The three women who were killed all have a link to you. And it’s clear that someone is targeting you in other ways.” Laurie’s voice was gentle. “But we can’t rule anything out. It now seems increasingly likely that the murderer and whoever is harassing you is the same person. And, since Alan Grayson has gone missing, and even though there are some questions about his involvement, he is presumed innocent, and he could also be a victim. We have to look at this from every angle.”
Flora looked lost. “I don’t understand. I didn’t know anyone in town when this started happening. And I’d barely spoken to Jennifer when she went missing.”
“Which means we can’t ignore the possibility that the person doing this has no connection to Stillwater. The timing of these events and your arrival here could be a coincidence.” Laurie pursed her lips. “Although that’s not a word I generally use. Bearing in mind that we could be looking for someone who has a grudge that has nothing to do with Stillwater, I’ve issued a statewide alert for Luella French. I already have an alert out for Alan Grayson. Even though it looks less likely that he is our murder suspect, the malpractice evidence against him is mounting.”
“Maybe Alan became unhinged by these events.” Leon disliked speculating in this way about a man he had, until recently, considered his friend. “If he wasn’t thinking clearly, perhaps he thought he could weather the storm of Bulldog’s lawsuit if he got rid of Joy and Lilith?”
“Anything is possible,” Laurie agreed. “But we don’t know how many other cases of malpractice we will uncover during the course of this investigation. There could be dozens. Alan would have had to become very disturbed very fast to decide he was going to kill them all.”
“And that doesn’t explain why Jennifer was murdered and her body hidden in my shed.” Flora rubbed her hands along her upper arms as she spoke as though trying to warm herself. Since the day was sunny and bright the gesture was an indication of her emotional state rather than the temperature. Leon drew her closer and she turned her head to smile at him.
At the same time, something bumped his leg. Hard. He looked down and a small, brown-and-white goat gave him a side-long glance before trotting away. It was a measure of how his
