Crunch Time

“I’ll get her,” he said. He stood up. I watched him make his stealthy way up the spiral staircase. My stomach clenched and prickles broke out on my skin. If anyone had interrupted the Jerk when he was howling at me, that person would have risked physical attack. What if Sean hurt Tom?

A door slammed. Sean Breckenridge, his face blazing, stormed past Tom. He raced down the stairs and into the foyer. Tom signaled for me to stop him from entering the kitchen. In the kitchen entryway, I raised my arms like someone about to be crucified. Sean seemed not even to notice me. He sprinted sideways in the foyer and went through a door, which he slammed behind him. It probably went to the basement, where, presumably, there was a guest bedroom.

Tom said to me, “Okay, come on up. I need you now.”

Oh, peachy, just what I wanted—to deal with a woman whose unfaithful husband had just stalked away. Nevertheless, once upstairs I went to the closed door Tom pointed toward and knocked gently. Rorry, her eyes filled with tears, opened the door so suddenly I was taken aback. The enormous room behind her featured a four-poster mahogany bed and oodles of lace.

“Is everything all right?” I asked. I felt like a dolt asking, but I couldn’t pretend I hadn’t heard their argument.

“No, but that’s all right. What’s up?”

“We . . . wanted to check on you. And Tom needs you in the kitchen, please.”

She shook her shoulders, as if to bring herself back to full awareness. “Just a sec.” She went to a mahogany dresser that was the size of my catering van, pulled open a drawer, and said, “Oh, damn him.” She grabbed a batch of keys and disappeared into a closet. When she emerged, she was holding a considerable wad of cash with the keys.

“Rorry, you’ve paid us,” I protested. “You’ve tipped us. There’s no need to—”

“This isn’t for you,” she said matter-of-factly. “My husband took . . . he emptied—” Then something occurred to her—decorum, maybe—and she clammed up. “Let’s go downstairs.” She closed the bedroom door quietly, moved past me toward the staircase, and held the large roll of bills aloft. “Does Yolanda have health insurance?”

“Yes.”

Tom had returned to the kitchen and had gotten down on his hands and knees again. The two-man fingerprint team was working at the far end of the room. They were making an unholy mess. Rorry ignored all of them as well as the chaos. She took my hand and pressed the clump of cash into my hand. “This is four thousand dollars. Those insurance companies don’t cover everything, so please let me know if Yolanda’s medical bills are more than that, would you? This happened in my kitchen, and I feel responsible.”

“Rorry, really, you don’t—” But she marched up to Tom. “Thank you,” I said to her back, then stuffed the money into my apron pocket.

“What can I do for you, Officer Schulz?” Belatedly, Rorry looked with despair around her kitchen. In addition to every cabinet being open, Tom’s team had spilled the fingerprint powder on the cabinets and countertops. Rorry cocked her head at Tom. “How long will the kitchen have to be like this?”

“I’ve gotten what I need to have analyzed. Sorry about the black powder. Do you and Sean have Colorado driver’s licenses? I’m wondering if your prints are on file.”

“We do and they are. Don’t worry about the mess.” She frowned at the open cabinet doors. “What are you looking for inside all these?”

“Space. You said earlier the electric frying pan wasn’t yours, correct?”

“That’s right.”

“And, Goldy?” Tom asked. “You brought your own roasting pans, correct?”

“Yes.”

Tom pointed at an empty area in a cupboard that held shiny top-of-the-line pots. “Rorry? There’s space for an electric frying pan here.”

Rorry ducked down, peered into the cabinet, and wrinkled her brow. She shook her head. “I just wish I knew where Etta kept everything. Do you want me to phone her?”

“Yes, please.”

Rorry put in a quick call to Beaver Creek and explained the predicament to Etta, who replied quickly. Rorry closed the phone. “That’s where she keeps the double boiler.”

Tom picked up his notebook and read through it, flipping pages. “No double boiler in the inventory I’ve taken.”

Rorry, genuinely puzzled, turned to me. “You couldn’t have packed it up with your things, could you?”

“She did not,” Tom said decisively. “I’ve already inventoried every single item in her van.”

“But,” said Rorry, again scanning the kitchen, “where is it?”

“My guess,” Tom replied as he got to his feet, “is that whoever put the electric frying pan onto one of your counters wanted to make it look as if it really was yours.”

Rorry slumped into one of her kitchen chairs. “Oh, my God. Why would someone do that?”

Tom peeled off his gloves. “To make it look as if you had put what we’re assuming was a sabotaged electric frying pan on the counter.”

Rorry shook her head. “Who would do such a thing?”

“That’s what I’m going to find out,” said Tom. He crossed his arms. “I’ve only gotten a few fingerprints, but I’m going to check them out. Still, I’m guessing those belong to Yolanda, Goldy, and my man Boyd. Whoever did this, and I’m guessing again here, wiped everything down.” He paused for a moment. “Mrs. Breckenridge, you and Mr. Breckenridge have children?”

Rorry blushed. “We have a little boy, Seth. He’s five.”

“I’m not being judgmental here,” Tom said soothingly. “I just want to know who inherits your money if something happens to you.”

Rorry put her finger to her mouth as she got up and closed both doors to the kitchen. “It was Sean. But I had my will changed about a month ago,” she whispered. “Sean doesn’t know. If something . . . happens to me, my money goes to Seth, with my cousin as executor. Thirty-five million dollars.”

I swallowed hard. That was a lot of money.

“You’re sure Sean doesn’t know?” Tom asked, his voice just above a whisper.

“I flew back to Louisiana last month, ostensibly to visit old friends, but really to see our family lawyer. He drew up the documents himself.” She hesitated. “My husband and I are not getting along. I’m hoping we can straighten things out, but I wanted to be covered. Just in case.” She hesitated. “Did Goldy tell you I hired Ernest McLeod to follow Sean, to see who he was . . . having an affair with?”

Tom hitched his eyebrows at me. I said, “I didn’t know until tonight that Ernest was working for her. I also found out tonight that the person Sean is fooling around with is Brie Quarles.”

Tom said, “Anything else you’re not telling me?”

“I found a credit card belonging to Sean out at that cabin I went to this afternoon.”

Tom shook his head. “Have you still got it?”

My cheeks reddened. In fact, I did. I pulled it out of my pocket. “Do you want it?” I asked him, then turned to Rorry. “Or should she—”

Rorry held up her hands to stop me. “Don’t give it to me. I’ll just cancel it and then cut it up.”

“I’ll take it, please,” said Tom. He turned to Rorry. “I’d feel better if you went to a neighbor’s house for the night. It’s possible you weren’t the target of the pan ring falling or the skillet accident. But we want to cover all the bases. We’ll wait here while you pack. Then call us when you get where you’re going, and let us know where you are. Then phone Etta and have her bring Seth to you in the morning.”

“There’s no need for you to wait.” Rorry moved toward the foyer. “That ‘just in case’ I mentioned? I always keep a packed suitcase in the trunk of my Mercedes. I’ll drive up to our Beaver Creek condo tonight and change the security code so Sean couldn’t get in even if he wanted to. Seth and Etta and I will be fine,” she said, reassuring me. She glanced around at the chaos of the kitchen. “Will your people clean this up?”

“I’ll ask them to,” Tom promised.

Rorry thanked us both again, turned on her heel, and walked quietly away.

Tom packed up his evidence kit and placed his notebook in his coat pocket. “Miss G., are you ready to go?”

“The sooner the better.”