Murder Brewed At Home (Microbrewery Mysteries Book 3) Page 2

  I bent down to observe, although there was no mistaking it: the man was dead.

  And wet.

  He'd come in from his run in the rain and had not bothered to change his clothes.

  Amanda appeared in the doorway with her cell phone. She was in the midst of speaking with 911.

  "Tell them it looks like a heart attack," I said.

  #

  In the light of recent events, the Carl's Cove Police Department was forced to adopt Detective Lester Moore as their official homicide detective. He showed up, tall and handsome as always, his crystal blue eyes searching the room for clues while two officers assisted the medical examiner with the body.

  Lester himself had been examining the body carefully. Now he stood up, snapped off his blue nitrile gloves, took out a pocket-sized memo pad, and began jotting.

  "So," I said, "heart attack."

  "Sure seems like it," he said to his pad, "but I'm not a doctor."

  I had to remind myself that he could be awfully curt when working.

  "The scene is telling," I said.

  "Mm."

  A moment passed as I watched him scribbling furiously on the pad, and then he said, almost under his breath, "Leaky ceiling in here?"

  "What's that?"

  He finally looked up at me and pointed to the ceiling with his pencil. "The rafters up there. You see them? There's one spot up there, see that? About a five-inch spot on the wood that's all wet."

  "Oh, yeah," I said, pretending I'd noticed it. "Yeah, I was wondering about that."

  "What do you make of it?"

  "Not sure."

  "Yeah? Me neither."

  "The wet body has me concerned, though," I said.

  "It's pouring out there. Didn't you say before that he'd just come in from a run?"

  "Yes, and he'd been here for some time and didn’t bother to change his clothes. Don’t you think he'd change his clothes if he was going to be working?"

  "Maybe he wasn't feeling well. Maybe he was in and out of consciousness."

  "Listen," I said, glancing behind me to see if anyone was eavesdropping on our conversation, "can we talk about this downstairs?"

  "I'll be down in a minute."

  #

  "Ok, door was locked from the inside. No means of getting into the room. Physically fit man has heart attack. That last bit doesn’t fit into the equation very well. I'm not a doctor, but I'm not ruling out suicide."

  "Suicide?" I said, disbelieving.

  "Yeah, what's wrong with that?"

  "Lester, this guy was meticulous with a capital M. Everything about him screamed routine. His desk, the placement of stuff on the desk – everything was done neatly and in an organized manner. Doesn't it strike you as a bit odd that a guy who had everything prepared with such exactitude would have neglected to...well, dress for the occasion?"

  "What did you want him to wear? A black suit?"

  "No, and I'm not joking here. And besides, why is a guy who’s planning suicide taking a run for his health in the first place?"

  "Maybe he thought he'd think it over one last time."

  I let the words turn over in my head, and then said, "No. And I still think he would have changed his clothes."

  "That's your opinion. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll call you tomorrow morning?"

  "Stay here."

  "Pardon?"

  "There's room on the couch downstairs. Candace is unnerved. I don’t think she'll mind having you stay. You'll be a comforting presence."

  "I doubt it. And why do you want me to stay so bad?"

  "Because there's something amiss here. I don’t think this was suicide or a heart attack."

  "The door was locked from the inside."

  "I know," I said. "I was there."

  "And did you examine the window?"

  "No."

  "Well, I did. It was sealed. Painted shut. From the outside, there's a steep drop to the ground. The rain's made a lot of muddy ground down there. No footprints whatsoever. I checked it out."

  "Something is strange here."

  He ran a hand through his dark, wavy hair. He looked impatient. "Ok, one more time. He was in his office when you guys came home."

  "I guess so."

  "And you guys heard a thump right above you."

  "Yes."

  "And you went right up there. Didn’t see anyone fleeing the scene."

  "Correct."

  "So we can be pretty sure he was alive up there until you heard him drop."

  I thought for a moment. "Unless he was dying the whole time."

  "So, someone came in and poisoned him and left? And then you guys came home? And he didn’t bother to call out to you or call the cops or anything until he just dropped?"

  I let out a sigh. "Ok, you win."

  "Madison, you've got a great mind. You're just not used to asking the right questions. But I love your spunk."

  He kissed my cheek.

  "You do that – kiss my cheek – as if it's going to make me forget how condescending you are."

  "I do it because I like you."

  I'm a pushover sometimes. It's the blue eyes. "Then I guess I'll talk to you tomorrow," I said.

  "Good night, Madison."

  I shut the door behind him and stared for a minute at it. Then I opened it.

  "Lester!"

  He'd bolted to his car in the rain. I saw him look up at me through the windshield. I motioned for him to come back.

  "Hurry!" I yelled.

  "What is it?"

  "You have the note?"

  "What? The note he left not to bother him? I gave it to my guy."

  "I need it."

  He shook his head. "Why do you need it?"

  "Just have him send you a picture of it. Please. For me?"

  I looked him in the eye. He could see that I was intently focused. I didn’t want to tell him until I was sure. But I have to say, I was pretty sure.

  A moment later, as the two of us stood on the Young's porch watching the rain, the picture text came through.

  I widened it. Or a portion of it. The portion that had flashed into my mind just as I shut the door behind Detective Moore.

  "Look," I said.

  "Ok. What am I looking at?"

  "This phrase here. Read it to me."

  He read, "...to respectfully keep your voices down. Ok. What is it supposed to mean?"

  "It’s a split infinitive. 'To respectfully keep.' Putting a word between the to and the transitive verb. Kyle Young was a grammar Nazi. They were arguing when I got here over his correcting her grammar. I'm telling you: Kyle Young did not write this note. No way would a grammar snob let a split infinitive go. Especially in something so carefully-worded as a suicide note, if that's what this amounts to. Not when posterity is at stake."

  He looked at the picture, then at me. "Are you sure?"

  "Very."

  He looked at it again, and then he looked up and out at the falling rain. Still watching the downpour, he said, "You don’t think Candace will mind if I stay?"

  "Let's ask her."

  Chapter 3

  We sat in Candace's living room, all sitting across from each other on facing sofas. Candace had already declined several times to be taken somewhere else.

  "Where would I go?" she said, curling her legs up next to her and leaning heavily on the armrest.

  "To my house," I offered. "Why not?"

  "Last I heard," she said, "you didn't exactly have a lot of space. But maybe you shouldn’t listen to me. I guess I'm in what they call shock, aren’t I?"

  "You could be," I said.

  She stared off into space for a moment. "Upstairs," she said, "in the bathroom in my bedroom. In the medicine cabinet. I have Valium. Would you mind?"

  "No," I said, "not at all." I turned to Lester, who had been sitting next to me. "Excuse me."

  I went upstairs and found the pills. In the hallway, I glanced over at the office. The door was open. Padding over to it, I took a peek ins
ide the room. All was in a bit of disarray from Lester and his men having swept the room for clues. There was still tape on the floor outlining the position of Kyle Young's body.

  That was odd. If this was a suicide, wouldn’t Kyle Young make himself comfortable, as comfortable as can be under those circumstances? Wouldn’t he perhaps lie down on a couch or sit in a chair or something? And the fact that he didn’t bother to change his clothes rubbed me the wrong way. Surely if this really was suicide, he would have done some research into whatever method he was using in order to be as comfortable as possible.

  I figured I'd spent enough time staring at this spot for now. I went back downstairs with Candace's pill and gave it to her.

  She had a blanket wrapped around her. Lester could be a sweetheart like that.

  "Thank you," she said softly. She took her pill with a glass of water she had on the coffee table before her, one she'd barely touched until now.

  After taking the pill she again reclined against the armrest.

  "I feel terrible," she said, closing her eyes.

  I was a bit puzzled by this. "Why?"

  "The night was ruined."

  "What are you—?" I started to say when I felt Lester's hand on my arm. I looked at him and he shook his head slowly.

  "It's ruined. The whole thing. The whole thing was ruined."

  "Candace," I said gently, "you can’t be blaming yourself."

  "Oh, but I do. I'm a terrible wife."

  The drug was acting fast in her system. Her voice became airy.

  "All he wanted was for me to become a good wife to him and I wasn't. I didn’t make enough money. I used poor grammar."

  I leaned forward. Lester put his hand on my arm again and I lightly shook it off. "Don’t be that way, Candace."

  "But it's true," she said in almost a whisper. "It's true... I..." She was drifting off to sleep. "My...fault... I didn’t...mean it..."

  I looked at Lester, who stared back at me with his intensely blue eyes.

  "Let's leave her," he whispered.

  We went to the kitchen, where Amanda and Bernadette were sitting with cups of coffee.

  "There's some left if you want it," said Amanda.

  "She's sleeping, by the way," I said. "And thank you, I'd love a cup."

  Lester and I sat and shared a sigh.

  "You're feeling the same way I do, I see," said Bernadette.

  "It's been a strange night," I said. "I guess I didn’t need to say that."

  Bernadette smiled warmly at me. "Did you know him?"

  "Kyle? No. I mean, I saw him a few times with Candace. Never really knew him that well. You?"

  She looked up at Amanda, who had been hovering over me with the pot of coffee. Amanda returned the look with silence and poured out coffee for Lester and me.

  "I didn’t know him," said Bernadette, and looked at Amanda again. "Same as you. Met him a few times. He didn’t seem very nice."

  "You shouldn’t speak ill of the dead," Amanda said curtly.

  "Well, would anyone rather I lied? I'm sorry, but every time I saw them together they didn’t look like they were together, and I couldn’t blame her. It looked as though he considered her a status symbol to go along with the BMW and the gym in his garage. I'm sorry, but I thought she could do better."

  A sound came from behind. It was Amanda placing the coffee pot back onto the machine's warming plate with a hard, angry clang.

  "I'm sorry," she said.

  We sipped our coffee in uncomfortable silence.

  And I thought about the door to that office.

  #

  Say what you want about Amanda and Bernadette, something made those two want to stay with Candace. I must say that their decision didn't help me much. At this point, I didn’t trust anyone or their motivations. But when I told A and B that Lester and I needed some air, they didn’t even hesitate before shooing us out, telling us that someone had to stay with Candace and they would gladly be the ones.

  Now, "need some air" is a very vague term. But had I told them that we were on our way to the morgue to talk Lester's forensics guy into giving us a quick once-over of the body, I have a feeling their reaction would be, shall I say, less than forgiving.

  Lester told me on the way there that he wasn't too hopeful. His medical examiner, a skinny young kid fresh out of college with a hipster beard and black horn-rimmed glasses, wasn't exactly the most compliant of personalities. Being the only ME in the department kind of gave the guy some clout – being the only game in town and all – and it didn’t matter who gave him the order. If it was the President or the Pope, maybe. But anyone else? The guy needed some incentive.

  A case of Darby's Maple Porter turned out to be the perfect currency with which to bargain.

  It didn't get us a full autopsy, but we were able to get a little bit of information to tide us over.

  I did, for example, get to examine the contents of the dead man's pockets.

  Namely, a pack of breath freshener strips, a ring of house and car keys, and his cell phone.

  "We checked his phone for any messages sent or received," said Lester. "Nothing. Ditto for phone calls."

  I swiped the phone to unlock it and discovered that it was password protected.

  "Sorry," said Lester, "I forgot about that. What was it? Yeah: 0419."

  "What is that?" I said, punching in the code.

  "Not sure. I'll tell you this: whatever it is, Kyle Young hid it from his wife. The one she told us didn’t work. We had to get it from the phone company."

  "You got through to the phone company after hours? I can’t even get through to them during hours."

  "It helps if you’re a cop and you know who to call."

  "Whom to call."

  "That too."

  "It does raise some suspicion though, doesn’t it? His changing the passcode from one his wife knows to one that she doesn’t know?"

  "It does indeed. You can’t jump to any conclusions though on that. It doesn’t really tell you anything."

  I flipped and swiped around the device.

  "What are you doing?"

  "Looking at his apps. Ah, here we go." I turned the screen to face him.

  "What is that?"

  "It's a runner's app. I thought about it on the way here. Kyle seemed like the kind of guy who kept up with the latest trends. Voici. Any religious runner would track his runs."

  "Wait a second... Madison, you’re a genius."

  "I know," I said suppressing a giggle.

  "And I'm an idiot. Man, I can’t believe it!"

  "It's ok, you'll get over it," I said, opening the app and playing around with the features.

  The ME, who had been privy to our conversation and contributing little, finally spoke. "Can I ask what you two are talking about?"

  "GPS," Lester and I said simultaneously.

  "I owe you a beer," I said. "I have plenty." I turned to the ME. "This shows us a map of Kyle's run, the last one he ever took in his life."

  Lester pointed at the phone. "It's is like going back in time and getting a glimpse of his activities leading up to his death. It's pure genius to think of looking at that app and I can’t believe I missed it."

  "Relax," I said. "You probably would have gotten to it sooner or later. But there's one more thing."

  "What’s that?" said Lester.

  "These apps also track the time you run."

  "Ok...?" He made a face to indicate that I was to explain more.

  "So," I said, "it's still running."

  "Huh."

  "Say Kyle really completed his run when he got back to the house. A religious runner would stop the thing out of habit, even if he started it before he left."

  "I understand what you're saying," said Lester. "But I'm not sure I follow your logic."

  "I'm saying this: Kyle really went out for a run tonight with absolutely no intention of killing himself. He set his app to track his run and was attacked outside. He must have come back in a daze with wha
tever poison was still in his system and died in the house some time later."

  "Ok," said Lester, staring straight ahead and nodding, "I follow you there. But you're not accounting for the syringe and the note."

  "Somebody accompanied him back to the house."

  "And the locked door?"

  Darn it, I thought, he was right. That stupid door again. I had been thinking about it on the way over and was sidetracked by the idea of the running app. The door to Kyle's office had the same doorknob set used on every other door in the house. If you locked it with the door open, the latch stuck, preventing you from closing the door. That office door had been closed first and then locked from the inside.

  Lester spoke the words I'd already been thinking. "Kyle would have had to have let his killer out. If he was too dazed from the poison – assuming it had that effect on him at all – how would he be coherent enough to allow his killer to plant that evidence?"

  Sometimes it just helps to have a guy like Lester around. I recommend a Lester in everyone's life, someone to help you use up the obvious ideas in order to get to the not-so-obvious ones, which, once spoken, become incredibly obvious upon revelation.

  Such was the case when, after a moment of thinking about it, I said, "Assisted suicide."

  "Huh," said Lester.

  "He enlisted help. Some unknown partner."

  "Why?"

  I shrugged. "That's what we need to find out."

  "No, I'm talking about the app. It was set to track his run. Let’s assume for a moment that he did enlist help in killing himself. Why set the app as if he wanted to track his run?"

  "Maybe the app does more than that," I said.

  "Like what?"

  "A lot of these apps share your info with friends in a network. Maybe Kyle didn’t want to track his run so much as he wanted to alert a friend or two about his activities." I swiped at the app screen a couple of times. "Here we go. There were two friends he routinely shared his running stats with. I think maybe we ought to track these fine folks down and have a word with them, what do you think, Detective?"

  "I think you're amazing. And I think I'm jealous."

  "And I think I'm nauseous," said the ME, turning to exit the room. "Lock up when you leave, will you, Lester?"

  "Will do. So, how would you like to tag along tomorrow?"