Chapter Thirty-Seven
Nick Tyler sat at his desk in the little mainland police station, his finger clicking on the Refresh button in his email every twenty seconds. What was taking so long?
A few years ago, Nick had gone on a few dates with the pretty brunette who worked in the forensics lab; they had enjoyed each other’s company, bonded over their enjoyment of Doctor Who, and parted amicably when she realized she was still in love with her ex-boyfriend.
Nick had brooded for about forty-one hours, during which time he realized his ego might be bruised but his heart was not particularly broken.
They remained friends, and his life went on comfortably without her in its center.
This had not prevented him from taking advantage of Jodie’s still-guilty conscience for unceremoniously dumping him; he didn’t often beg her to slip his requests through more quickly than her lab would ever admit was humanly possible, but when he did, she usually came through.
A new message appeared at the top of his inbox from Jodie. He clicked it open; there were several attachments and two words: Call me. He picked up the phone and dialed her number, his fingers drumming impatiently on the desk as he waited for her to pick up.
The coroner’s phone call that morning, confirmed by the preliminary written report, had confirmed what he had suspected all along—that Willow and her nosy band of research nerds were correct, and Geralt Talbot’s lithium poisoning had been developing for weeks.
Considering the extent to which Rina and Geralt had habitually avoided one another, no one could place them together long enough for Rina to have had access.
Nor could anyone on the island recall ever seeing Rina in conversation with Naomi—or, for that matter, with anyone working at the Talbots’ house on the other side of Little North.
Geralt and Naomi had always brought their own people in from Boston when they came to the island, and the staff more or less kept to themselves.
Jodie picked up on the third ring. “Nick?”
“Hey, Jodie; got your email. Thanks for pushing it through.”
“No worries. And I know you’ll go through the fine print, but I wanted to make sure you got it and that you knew your super-specific question came back with a definite yes.
There were traces in the plastic bottle and in the remaining bits of liquid.
Fairly high concentration, given lithium carbonate is only partially soluble in water, but I’ll tell you what else—whoever put it there clearly knew exactly how much would be able to dissolve in the liquid without leaving a visible sediment.
And if they knew that, they would also have known lithium carbonate has a faintly sour taste and that it would be easily disguised by the artificial lemon flavor. Your victim drank a lot of it?”
Nick felt a grin spreading over his face. “By the case, literally. The coroner said he’d been taking the lithium into his system for a while, and guess what one of the side effects of chronic lithium toxicity is?”
Jodie didn’t hesitate. “Thirst. It’s diabolically perfect, really; give the man something that makes him thirsty so you can put the same poison that makes him thirsty right into his primary drinking source.”
“Fingerprints?” Nick asked, moving on to the second page of her report.
“A search for fingerprints on the bottle gave us your victim and one unknown set”—Probably Willow’s, Nick thought—“and that’s it.”
Damn. But that would have been too easy, he supposed.
“On the bottle,” Jodie said mischievously. “Now ask me about the cap.”
Hope bloomed. “Okay, Jodie, tell me about the cap.”
“Say please.”
“Oh, for God’s—please. Please, Jodie, tell me what you found on the cap.”
He could hear her on the other end of the line trying not to laugh.
“Don’t get your hopes up too high; it’s not exactly the brass ring.
But I don’t think they are the original caps.
One of my coworkers swills down this stuff on a regular basis—I don’t know how, I find it pretty nasty—and has a stash by his desk.
I compared the cap on this bottle to his; it fits perfectly, but it doesn’t have the company logo stamped on the lid. ”
His mind was leaping ahead. “You’re suggesting that, to get the poison into his sealed bottles of fancy flavored water, someone opened them all, added and dissolved the powder, and replaced the original lids with new ones that made the bottles appear to have never been opened?” His email chimed.
“I sent you a link. You can buy ’em on the internet. You can buy anything on the internet,” she said a little smugly.
She’d earned a little smugness. “Jodie, you’re the best. I can’t even—thank you.” He paused. “That short guy still treating you okay?” he asked. “If he ever doesn’t, I’ll arrest him for jaywalking, I’ll sit outside his house and look menacing, whatever you need, you know it.”
Jodie laughed. “Of course I know. But yeah, David—who’s six feet tall, by the way, which hardly qualifies as short—is great. In fact”—he could almost hear her beaming through the phone line—“we have a little David or Jodie coming along in about five months, so I think we’re both all in.”
“You’re—Jodie, that’s amazing! Congratulations to both of you.” He was glad things had worked out between the two as he pushed down the tiny hollow thread of sentiment that rose unbidden.
“Thanks, Nick. Hey, gotta go—but let me know how this comes out, okay? I’m curious now.”
“You bet, Jodie, and—” But she had hung up.
So Jodie was having a baby. He was happy for her. Really. Very, very happy.
Nick brought his crime board file up on his second monitor—he was old-fashioned enough to still call it a crime board, but twenty-first-century enough to use an app rather than a physical piece of cork on the wall—and studied it for the hundredth time that day.
Susan Davis. Geralt Talbot. Naomi Talbot. Hank Ramsey. And, if Willow Stone was right, Effie Cameron. And the attempt on Patricia Ramsey.
This break in Geralt Talbot’s murder investigation was running through him like a shot of adrenaline as the noose began to close in.
He didn’t know yet who it was closing around, but the more people it excluded, the fewer were left inside.
It was looking less and less likely that one person could have been responsible for the entire string of violence on the normally peaceful little island.
On the other hand, he had a hunch if he could nail down one guilty party, the others—if there were others—would fall into place.
He studied the screen. Every piece of evidence, big and small, still pointed to Naomi Talbot and Hank Ramsey as coconspirators behind Geralt Talbot’s death, and likely Effie Cameron’s and Susan Davis’s as well.
She had the access; he had the motive. In this light, even the attempt on Patricia’s life made sense: Naomi had been at the bar; Hank owned a long-term parking and car rental facility off the island with its own service department.
Maybe, once Patricia had crafted whatever genealogical gymnastics Hank needed, the conspiring pair wanted her out of the way as quickly as possible so they could be together; if Hank’s Cameron claims had seemed a little dubious, Naomi’s position as spouse of the last Cameron would bolster his, and Hank’s station in the town would give Naomi a little more island clout.
If this were true, their deaths had probably saved Patricia’s life.
But someone had killed them. Which suggested that either there was a third conspirator, or they had not been responsible to begin with.
For some reason, he found himself wanting to tell Willow Stone what he’d found, how the bottle she had absentmindedly picked up might be the break their investigation needed, how they were now that much closer to finding Geralt’s killer.
But he pulled his hand back when it twitched toward his phone to call her.
He couldn’t comment on a continuing investigation. Even if he just wanted to hear her voice.
His email dinged; he clicked on the message and downloaded the deep background check reports on Hank’s, Geralt’s, and Naomi Talbot’s employees and household staff.
It was going to be a long evening. He poured another cup of bad coffee and started reading.