Chapter 14 #2
“Oh, yeah, we found what might be the murder weapon in the back room. I thought it was from the EMTs, but Jonathon thinks it might be veterinarian grade. Or bought from a vet store.” She saw that everyone was looking expectantly at her.
“It was a syringe. Sorry, I thought I said that. Anyway, Jonathon took it to Drew for testing. And now that’s all I know. ”
“I doubt that, but we’ll go on. Who else has a report?” Jonathon looked around the room.
Holly raised her hand. “I’ve been looking into Talia. After she broke up with Mason, she started dating Bret Black. I talked to him one night at the Garnet. He was drinking hard at the bar when I went to walk Malia home from her shift. She was scared to be alone.”
“I was not scared, I was cautious. That’s not the same thing.” Malia looked around the room. “There was a lot going on in town, and I thought a friend might not quibble about walking with me home.”
“Okay, fine, she was cautious. Anyway, Bret’s a mess.
He’s in love with Talia but the girl runs hot and cold.
And right now, it’s icy in Bret’s world.
He said anytime they were around Mason, Talia would be all over him.
But now that Mason’s dead, she won’t even return Bret’s calls.
Weird, huh?” Holly stood to get another cookie.
Rarity thought it was really strange. “You don’t think Talia was just using him to get Mason back, do you?”
“From the way he responded to Darby, I think Mason had a type. Talia. I wonder why they broke up in the first place.” Holly pointed to the board. “We know when they broke up, but maybe the answer is in the why.”
“And do any of these people have a pet?” Rarity asked, motioning for Jonathon to write down the question. “After what we found today, maybe someone’s like Edith and likes to save money on vet bills by giving their own meds.”
“There are other reasons that someone would be administering meds to pets than being cheap,” Jonathon said, but he wrote down the question.
“Oh, is Romeo sick?” Rarity stared him down. Finally, he laughed.
“No, he’s fine. Edith’s just cheap.” He looked around the room. “More reports or questions?”
There were a few that he wrote down; then he assigned out the questions to people. “We need more data points, people. We need to find out when these people arrived in Sedona. When and if they left, well, besides Mason. We have that information.” Jonathon stared at the board.
“Let’s each take one person and fill in all the blanks for Jonathon.
Well, he’ll have to make us a checklist of what to find out.
Then we can bring them back and compare them.
Maybe we’ll find a hole that way.” Shirley put her knitting away.
“I’m choosing Talia. Holly should have this guy, Bret. The rest, you all can divvy up.”
“I’ll take anyone but Tyra. She already thinks I’m too nosy,” Rarity said as Jonathon made a list of people they needed to talk to about either of the two mysteries. Then he assigned them out. Rarity had Jane Carey.
Before Jonathon could dismiss the group, Rarity raised her hand and asked, “Why this one? She was his assistant. She’s really quiet and now she’s looking for a new job.”
Jonathon nodded. “See. You know so much about her already. This will be a piece of cake for you. I’ll email everyone the question list. Hopefully you either have the information already or can get it using creative conversation techniques.
You guys can do this. I have faith in you. Besides, we always close our cases.”
“That’s true, but we’ve never had Hollywood stars in the mix,” Malia added with a grin.
“Okay, maybe not A-listers, but everyone has to start somewhere, right? What if one of these actors is someone who might make it big soon? And we become friends and they invite us to the screening of their big movie and then an after-party, and we find the love of our life?”
“At an imaginary after-party for a movie screening that hasn’t even been made yet.” Holly stared at her friend. “Why not just fall in love with this imaginary actor you’re becoming friends with instead. Then you can have the big house, the yacht, the Italian villa, and the fancy parties.”
“I’m not asking for the moon here. Just a little help in the dating pool. I’d even be happy with a writer. I’d have lots of time to shop,” Malia pointed out.
Jonathon chuckled. “Maybe lots of time, but the money thing might be an issue.”
“He can be from a wealthy family.” Malia glanced around the room. “Seriously, don’t you guys ever think about your dream guy? How do you know what you want, then?”
“You kiss a lot of frogs.” Holly glanced at her watch as she stood. “Sorry, I’m working tonight. Let me know if you need some help researching online. I need to do updates on all the city servers, so I’ll be just hanging around waiting for software to load all week.”
Jonathon held out a hand. “Hold up a minute, I’ll give you a list of people and places to check out.”
“Okay, while Jonathon’s setting up Holly with some work, anything else we need to talk about? Is Malia right? Is the fact that Mason Pike was an actor and a director getting in our way here? What can we do about it if he is?” Rarity asked the group.
“We had that famous doctor once and we found out what happened. I think if we keep our heads on straight,”—Shirley aimed the comment at Malia—“we just need to treat them like they’re normal people.”
“With really big houses and fancy cars,” Malia added.
“A big house doesn’t mean you’re not a killer,” Darby said.
Rarity’s lips twitched, but Malia said it before she could. “Right? Look at you. You have a huge house and you still could be a killer. Maybe you killed Mason when he tried to get to second base.”
Shirley giggled. “I haven’t heard that term since high school. Seriously, girls, there’s no way Darby could be a killer.”
“No? Why are you so sure?” Rarity wondered where her friend was going with this.
Shirley nodded to where Darby sat. “She cries at the end of romance novels. I’ve seen her do it when we’re slow here at the shop and she gets some reading time.”
“In my defense…” Darby held up a hand. “It was a really sweet ending and they’d both gone through so much to earn their happily ever after, they deserved a little emotion.”
As they got ready to leave, Rarity wondered if the romance or even reading test would predict if someone was a murderer. Just have them read the most romantically satisfying book and see if they cried. If not, something must be wrong with them.