“What is it you want to talk to me about?” she asked as she climbed inside.
“It looks like we’re not as out of the woods yet as we thought on Phoebe Masterson. There are already rumblings about filing charges again.”
“Because Lucas kicked the bucket?”
“Yeah, it helps to have somebody to prosecute, and with him getting shanked, all of a sudden his talk about being set up sounds a little more credible.”
“The person he says set him up is me—or at least, he says I planted Tim Masterson’s razor.”
“For the record, no one at Browers is buying that nonsense.”
“That’s good to hear.”
“The idea someone gave him that straight razor isn’t so crazy though. The idea it was a setup isn’t, either.”
“If that was a setup, it was a bad one.”
“How so?”
“I stumbled on him having that straight razor by accident. I certainly didn’t go to his place with the intent of having him try to cut my nose off. What I thought might be there, the actual murder weapon, wasn’t there.”
“If it was a plant, I’m guessing you weren’t meant to find it. Someone was going to make an anonymous phone call, but you beat them to it.”
“I guess it’s possible, but it sounds like a stretch.”
“No doubt, but as I said, the D.A. likes to actually prosecute somebody on high profile crimes like this one. They’re not going to give up on Phoebe yet. Before you dug up Lucas, they thought they had a solid case. It was her husband and the woman he was having an affair with floating in the hot tub. And it was still her dress with the blood all over it. Plus, the murder weapon is still out there. Without Lucas around to run his mouth and say something incriminating, she starts looking like a prime suspect again.”
“Yeah, I guess I can see that.”
“The good news is you're working with us again.”
Margot nodded. That was good news. The better part of it was she could still bill Harry Lee since the cases crossed over. If Lucas was set up and his murder was part of the cover-up, his killer and the Masterson Hot Tub Massacre killer were most likely one and the same. If she could figure out one, she would likely have the solution to the other.
The problem was, neither was easy to solve.
“You think you could swing by her place sometime, maybe tomorrow? As you might guess, she’s stressing pretty hard about all this. Knowing you’re back on the case might make her feel a little better.”
“I didn’t know I was in the make-Phoebe-feel-better business.”
“You’re not, but it might give you a chance to ask her how Lucas might have gotten her dead husband's straight razor. She hasn’t told us anything and you seem to be better at getting things out of her than we are.”
Margot nodded again. Even though Phoebe was openly hostile towards her most of the time, Margot had managed to get her to tell her where she was the night of the murder and who she was with.
Thad drove her back to her office. She was surprised to see Cassandra Cole waiting in the lobby.
“She wanted to talk to you,” Ms. Collins, Shaw’s longtime secretary said as Margot walked in the door. “I told her Mr. Shaw was available, but she insisted on you.”
“Really?” Margot looked over at Cassie. “You know, if you hadn’t sicced a couple of cops on me, I would have been here a lot sooner.”
“I didn’t tell them to pick you up,” Cassandra said.
“What do you want, Cassandra? I know I promised you an interview…”
“This isn’t about that. I want to hire you.”
Chapter 3
Margot sat at her desk and Cassie sat in the client’s chair directly across from her. Before they started, Margot hit record on the digital recorder she used when conducting interviews.
“You have a problem if I record this?”
“No, I guess I don’t.”
“Good.”
“First, let me apologize for the cops coming after you. It was the younger cop’s idea. He saw the episode where you threatened to hit me and was convinced you were a suspect.”
“I never threatened you.”
“Yeah, but you managed not to threaten me in a way that scared the shit out of me.”
“That didn’t stop you from reporting things about me.”
Cassie smiled. “I guess there are different levels of scared, which is why I’m here.”
“Because you’re scared?”
“Terrified. I don’t know how you felt when someone shot at you, but I didn’t like it.”
“Me neither. Terrified is a good way to describe it.”
“Which is why I want to hire you to find this person and stop them.”
“You’ve got two detectives on the case.”
“Yeah, but they seem to be wasting their time harassing you.”
“Considering the things you say about me in your videos, I’m surprised you’re so confident I’m not the one. Shouldn’t you be afraid of the feared cartel assassin Viuda Negra?”
“Who better to have on my side?”
“I have other cases right now.”
“So, you won’t do it?”
“Like I said, I have other cases right now.”
“What if I could tell you who it was?”
“If you can tell me, why didn’t you tell the police?”
“You of all people should understand.”
“I should?”
“Your friend Mal is a wanted man. Even before his current situation, he was thought to be some sort of hitman in a cop’s uniform. The rumor was he worked for Harry Lee among others. Yet,
