Chapter Five
Alayah had apologized profusely to Kieran for being late.
It hadn’t been by much, but she lied that she’d run into some problems on the road.
He was new to Secure Watch, and she didn’t want him to think she was wasting his time.
He assured her she was fine as he’d run into some problems on the road with wildlife too.
She was okay with letting him think the problems she encountered on the road were from wildlife.
Telling him she was driving around with a possible murder suspect in the back of her SUV would have gotten her a ticket to Cal’s office without passing go.
Now she was at a crossroads. Did she swing back through the gas station and get Derek, or did she continue driving?
The smart answer was to continue driving and pretend she’d never met Derek Benjamin.
The problem was that she couldn’t live with herself if Derek was innocent and he got hurt or killed because she was too afraid to help him.
She decided to pick him up and drive him to his cabin.
From there, he was on his own. Once he was out of her car, she’d make sure to tell him the cops wanted to question him about his boss’s death.
No sense opening herself up to a hostage situation.
Not that she could get there with the handsome stranger.
By all accounts, he was kind, funny and probably a saint to put up with Hugo Victor for a boss.
But people often said some of those things about serial killers, too.
Her giggle filled the car. If Derek had laced his boss’s water with antifreeze, he probably wouldn’t have stuck around to see if it worked.
As she pulled into the station, Derek emerged from the shadows.
Staying low, he slid into the back seat and closed the door.
When she glanced up into the rearview mirror, she noticed the look on his face.
“Why didn’t you tell me Hugo is dead?”
She bit her lip as she tried to think of a workable lie. “I thought you knew.”
“You thought I knew and just didn’t bring it up in the twenty minutes we were on the road?”
Rather than speak, she put the car into Reverse and backed out, turning onto the highway. “It seemed like you had bigger fish to fry.”
“How did he die?” he asked, the words desperate to her ears.
“You don’t know?”
“No, how would I know?” he asked, shifting on the seat. “The report on the television said he collapsed and died, and authorities are investigating. Was it a heart attack? He did have high cholesterol and high blood pressure. He was also high-strung.”
“I don’t think his high cholesterol had anything to do with being poisoned.”
There was silence from the back seat. “Did you say poisoned?”
“I did,” she answered. “With antifreeze.”
“Alayah, my boss, who was also my friend, just died. It’s cruel to be sarcastic at a time like this.”
She shook her head as she peered through the murky darkness. “Trust me when I say there’s no sarcasm detected in that statement. I was there and watched it happen.”
“You watched it happen?”
“Yep,” she said, swallowing down the bile. “He took a drink from his bottle and said a few more words before he collapsed.”
The silence from the back seat was deafening.
“Derek?”
He leaned over the seat, making her jump, but she bit back the shriek that had tried to escape. “You’re saying the antifreeze was in the water bottle?”
“That’s the assumption,” she said. “That’s need-to-know information, by the way. I only know because the water bottle was in our care for a period of time.”
Alayah knew the moment the realization hit him. He threw himself backward in the seat as though he’d been punched. “They think I did it!”
“They certainly want to talk to you,” she agreed. “The cops are looking for you as we speak. I’m surprised law enforcement didn’t show up at your cabin already.”
“No one knows where it is,” he answered, his hand on his forehead.
When she didn’t say anything, he sighed.
“That was on purpose. If Hugo knew where to find me on the rare occasion I left the city, he wouldn’t hesitate to bombard me with never-ending tasks.
The cops will eventually find the location, but the deed is in my mom’s name, so it will probably take them some time.
Doesn’t matter. Once we stop at the cabin and pick up my things, you can drop me off at the station. I have nothing to hide.”
Alayah was silent as they drove, allowing him a few moments to think about what she’d told him.
She didn’t know him well, but she was sure that he hadn’t faked surprise at the news that his boss was poisoned.
He didn’t know what was going on, and the wild look in his eye told her he was either scared or concussed. Then again, it was probably both.
“How did the antifreeze get in the water bottle?” he asked, as though the thought just struck him. “I poured his special vitamin water out of the original bottle and into his and then handed it to Cal.”
“You dumped already bottled water into another bottle?”
He nodded with exaggeration. “Ridiculous, I know. Hugo was superstitious. He always insisted that the water bottle had to be with him at every event for it to be successful.”
“Man,” she muttered. “That would be a serious problem if you ever lost it.”
His laughter was surprising in the face of the conversation, but even she could admit that he was probably still in shock. “We had four of those same bottles, Alayah. He never knew that, but there was no way I was getting caught unable to find one.”
“Wait, so there are other bottles?”
“Yes, but I left the extras at home since I wouldn’t be with Hugo. I cautioned him that he had to keep an eye on it because if he lost it, I couldn’t help him.”
“Sounds like you treated him like a child,” she observed, glancing in the rearview mirror. He was incredibly handsome, even with a bruised eye, nose and lip. She was glad to see that the swelling had subsided, now allowing him to open it fully.
“Everyone knew who Hugo Victor was,” he said with a shrug. “He liked being catered to, and despite owning and running a multibillion-dollar company, he also wanted people to hold his hand when it came to just about everything else.”
“Some people would call that eccentric,” she said, to which he shrugged.
“Others call it self-indulgent and lazy. I call it exhausting. You need to turn soon to get to my cabin. It’s just on the other side of Knife River.”
She was silent for a moment, wondering why on earth he thought it was smart to go back to his cabin when he’d been attacked there just hours before. “Maybe it’s a better idea to just go to Duluth. What if those guys are waiting?”
“It’s a chance I have to take,” he said, and then let silence prevail.
* * *
HUGO HAD BEEN poisoned with antifreeze via his water bottle. Derek still couldn’t wrap his mind around that. What was worse was that they thought he had something to do with it. He had literally no idea it was ever used that way other than on television or in detective novels.
“Does antifreeze kill someone that quickly?” His question was aloud, but he hadn’t intended for her to answer.
“According to our sources, as little as four ounces of it can kill a man. He’d been sipping at the bottle for at least an hour before he collapsed, and it was over half empty by report.”
“The bottle holds twenty ounces.”
“It wasn’t straight antifreeze, though. He would have known if that was the case. It was mixed with something else. The police suspect the chemical caused a heart attack. Now that you’ve mentioned his other heart conditions, that seems more likely.”
“I still can’t believe it.” A shudder went through him at the thought of poor Hugo drinking antifreeze.
The saddest thing was that Hugo died with few to mourn him.
Sure, he had friends, but true family was nonexistent.
Due to his work, he never married, and his desire to become one of the world’s richest tech gurus drove a wedge between him and his extended family.
Derek always wondered if that was one of the reasons why Hugo depended on him so much.
He didn’t need Derek to do everything for him.
He just needed to feel close to someone.
Hugo saw Derek as much as a son as an employee.
They’d worked together for years, planning and creating apps.
Derek moaned. If only he’d talked to Hugo sooner about how he was feeling.
“Are you okay?” Alayah asked as she slowed for the gravel road near his cabin.
“Fine,” he lied, sitting forward again. “Let’s drive past the cabin slowly. It sits to the front of the lot, so we’ll know if anyone is in the driveway besides my sedan.”
“I hope there’s an outlet somewhere because I can’t turn around easily on this narrow road.”
He nodded and pointed straight ahead. “If we see anyone else parked there, floor it to the end of the road. You can turn back onto the highway there.”
“I’m driving, you’re checking,” she said, eyes straight ahead.
Derek could hear the fear in her voice, but he didn’t say anything.
She was trying to help him, and while he could go to Duluth, explain the situation to the police, and then try to convince them to take him to the cabin, there was no guarantee they would.
He needed the information sooner rather than later if he was going to prove his innocence or, at the very least, give them reasonable doubt.
“You’re doing fine,” he assured her, patting her shoulder. “I’m aware that I’m asking a lot from someone you just met, and I wouldn’t blame you if you just keep driving, but I implore you not to. If we’re going to find Hugo’s killer quickly, the information inside that cabin is imperative.”
“Those guys, though,” she said, and he shook his head.
“Those guys are long gone. Once I bolted, I’m sure they just grabbed my bags and took off. I’d already told him what he was looking for was in my bag, and they couldn’t be sure I wouldn’t call the cops. I would guess they wouldn’t want to be there if I did.”
“That’s fair, but maybe we should call Cal. He could send some guys out to cover you while you go in.”
Derek couldn’t argue that it was a bad idea.
It just wasn’t a timely one. For every minute he waited to present to the police, he looked more and more guilty.
They might even think he hid the cabin’s address to keep them from finding him.
Why would he stick around town if he’d poisoned his boss, though?
That didn’t make any sense and was the exact question he would pose to them when he finally arrived in the city.
“I would understand if that made you more comfortable, but do you want to get your employer involved in this?”
The car jerked slightly as it came to a stop.
“Secure Inc. is already up to its ears in this, Derek. The equipment in the hatch is meant to help us track down Hugo’s killer faster and more effectively than sitting in the dark by a cabin that’s already been broken into once.
I should be back in Duluth doing my job, but I’m here with you instead.
We’ve never been more involved in this. Besides, Cal has been involved in cases with much higher stakes than a dead billionaire tech mogul. ”
Derek couldn’t deny that. Secure Inc. had been involved in some high-profile cases, with the implications of the most recent Secure Watch cases traveling through the tech industry like a ripple.
From a Trojan horse that took control of video cameras around the world to a hostage situation in a biohazard lab, they’d had their fair share of notoriety when it came to being involved in, and ultimately solving cases like this.
Having Secure Watch on his side could only help him, so getting one of their operatives messed up in this probably wasn’t the smartest move. He just wished he had a choice.
“That’s fair, but it’s also a lot of time wasted. Let’s just drive by and see what we see. If all is quiet, I can be in and out in a matter of minutes.”
Alayah let off the brake with a sigh, and the SUV rolled forward at a crawl. As they passed the cabin, he noticed a single light glowed from the back. It revealed his sedan in the driveway, but no other vehicles. She pressed down slowly on the accelerator as she drove down the gravel road.
“There’s a light on in there,” she said, approaching the stop sign at the end of the road.
“It’s in the kitchen. I turned it on right before that guy jumped me,” he explained. “I’m not surprised they didn’t shut it off before they left. I wouldn’t be surprised if both doors were hanging open, too. There weren’t any cars in the driveway, so it’s safe to return.”
“Ha,” she said as they came to the stop sign. “For all you know, one of them is lying in wait for you.”
“Doubtful,” he said with a shake of his head. “They got what they wanted from me.”
“They think they did, but when they figure out you lied to them, they’ll be back,” she said, her voice filled with nerves.
No one could say she wasn’t smart. The fact was, he had no choice, but he didn’t have to drag her with him.
“Let me out,” he said, patting her shoulder. “I’ll go by myself, get what I need, and hightail it back here. I could drive into town, but they know my car now. That’s a risk I can’t take this late at night with so few cars on the road.”
Alayah opened her mouth to speak just as ringing filled the car’s interior.
Both their gazes darted to the console, where Cal’s name was flashing on the screen.
With a grimace, she reached out and punched the button.
It felt like a punch to his gut, but he couldn’t blame her. He’d have done the same thing.