Chapter Forty-one
Jill had slept in a chair at the hospital, her arms crossed, chin tucked to her chest, the tension in her body refusing to unwind even in exhaustion. She had barely shut her eyes before footsteps approached, and she snapped awake.
Katie stood before her, a clipboard in hand, a weary but relieved expression on her face.
“She had a rough night,” Katie said in a hushed tone, casting a glance at the others scattered around the waiting room—Cord, Sandy, Oliver, and Audrey—all looking ragged from worry. “It was touch and go for a while, but this morning she’s stabilizing.”
Jill exhaled, releasing a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding.
“She’s not out of the woods yet,” Katie added, “but the doctors are optimistic.”
Sandy slumped back in his chair, rubbing his face. Cord let out an audible breath, his jaw tight, as if forcing himself not to break something. Audrey pressed her palms together, closing her eyes for a second in silent gratitude.
“Mom’s always been a fighter,” Jill said, her voice rough from exhaustion.
Katie nodded, but then, after a quick scan of the room, she lowered her voice.
“There’s something else.”
Everyone went still.
Jill straightened in her seat, sensing the weight in Katie’s words.
“The toxicology report came back.”
The room seemed to shrink.
“She tested positive for dimethylmercury.”
Jill’s stomach dropped.
Cord’s hands balled into fists. “What the hell is that?”
“Extremely toxic,” Katie said grimly. “A few drops absorbed through the skin can be lethal within weeks.”
A cold chill ran down Jill’s spine.
Cord was out of his chair in an instant. “I’m going to kill him.”
Jill grabbed his arm, hard. “No, you’re not.”
“Jill—”
“No, Cord.” Jill’s voice was steel. “You’re going to let me handle this. I promise you—” She met his furious gaze. “I will nail him for this.”
Cord’s chest heaved, but he stepped back, shaking his head in rage.
Jill turned, grabbed her coat, and headed straight for the station.
Jill sat at her desk, flipping through the toxicology report again, as if staring at it hard enough would make the missing pieces magically fall into place.
Dimethylmercury.
The poison was lethal.
A drop or two absorbed through the skin could take weeks to manifest, but once symptoms appeared, it was often too late.
She knew Bradley Comstock was behind this.
She just didn’t know for certain how he’d delivered it.
She was banking on the toothpaste Audrey had given her.
Mason walked into her office, file in hand, his face grim.
“Well?” Jill demanded, sitting up straight.
Mason sighed, tossing the folder onto her desk. “Toothpaste came back clean. No trace of mercury or anything remotely toxic.”
Jill gritted her teeth.
“Damn it.”
Mason slumped into the chair across from her. “You really thought that was it, huh?”
Jill pressed her fingers to her temple, thinking fast. “It made sense. Bradley, somehow with help, poisoned Chips Hogan’s clam chowder. Probably drugged Griffin Mead in his dental chair. Why not do the same to my mother?”
Mason shook his head. “Maybe it wasn’t the toothpaste, but what about the rest of that gift bag?”
Jill’s gaze snapped up.
Mason nodded toward her. “She probably used everything in that bag, right? The toothbrush? The mouthwash? I mean, I would. Save me from having to go buy it at the drugstore.”
Jill’s eyes widened.
She shot up from her chair. “We need to go back to the house. Now.”
Mason blinked, scrambling to his feet. “Wait, what? Right now?”
“Right now, Dooley.” Jill was already grabbing her jacket. “We missed something. I know it.”
Mason sighed, grabbing the car keys. “Guess I shouldn’t have ordered lunch, huh?”
Jill strode past him toward the exit.
“You can eat when we have our damn evidence.”
The ride to the Holbrook house was silent, except for the occasional grumble from Mason’s stomach.
“God, I’m starving,” he muttered.
Jill barely heard him. Her mind was racing, going over every interaction she’d had with Bradley Comstock.
He was confident.
Too confident.
He knew she didn’t have a smoking gun.
But that meant one thing—he thought he’d covered his tracks.
And that? That meant there was something still there.
She gripped the steering wheel tighter.
She’d find it.
She’d bury him with it.
Mason sat up straighter as they pulled into the Holbrook driveway.
“All right,” he said, stretching. “Let’s go hunt for poison.”
Jill threw the car into park.
And together, they headed inside.
Jill flung open the door to Maggie’s bathroom, Mason right on her heels.
The small space was pristine, except for the faint scent of lavender from Maggie’s usual soap and the neatly arranged toiletries on the counter.
But Jill wasn’t here to admire Maggie’s impeccable housekeeping skills—she was here to find out how Bradley Comstock had tried to kill her mother.
She turned to Mason, who had already pulled on a pair of latex gloves.
“All right,” Jill said, rolling up her sleeves. “We tear this place apart.”
Mason cracked his knuckles. “And here I thought I was just gonna be solving parking disputes today.”
Jill ignored him and reached for the small white gift bag from Comstock Dental, sitting by the sink. She turned it over, examining it carefully before dumping the contents onto the counter.
Out spilled:
A mini bottle of mouthwash
A pack of floss
A brand-new toothbrush still in its plastic packaging
A second tube of toothpaste, not the one Audrey had given her to get tested.
There must have been two in the bag.
Jill picked up the toothpaste first, unscrewed the cap, and sniffed it. Nothing unusual. She squeezed the tube slightly, watching the paste ooze onto her glove.
Mason peered over her shoulder. “What, you think he dabbed it on there like some Cold War spy?”
Jill scowled. “I don’t know. I thought maybe he laced it with something.”
She turned to Mason, holding out the tube. “Bag it.”
Mason took out an evidence bag, sliding the toothpaste inside before sealing it.
Jill reached for the mouthwash next. It was one of those small, single-use bottles, the kind you could toss in a travel bag. She unscrewed the top, giving it a cautious sniff.
Mason watched her warily.
“Uh, should you really be sniffing a bottle that might be laced with a neurotoxin?”
Jill shot him a glare. “What do you suggest? Taking a swig?”
Mason put his hands up. “Hey, I’m just saying, let’s not be the next two victims here.”
Jill rolled her eyes and poured a tiny drop of the mouthwash onto a paper towel, rubbing it between her fingers.
Nothing.
She sighed, tossing it aside. “Bag this one too.”
Mason obliged, muttering under his breath. “Gonna need to order more evidence bags at this rate.”
Jill turned her attention to the floss, pulling the tab and unraveling a few inches. She ran it between her gloved fingers, feeling for anything unusual—a residue, a powder, anything that might explain what had made Maggie so sick.
On the sink, Mason spotted another toothbrush resting in a ceramic holder. He picked it up carefully. “This one looks used,” he observed, examining it under the bathroom light.
“Check the bristles,” Jill said.
Mason frowned, holding it closer. The blue-and-white bristles looked normal at first glance, but as he turned it, something glimmered faintly under the light.
“Uh … Chief?”
She looked up from the floss.
Mason tilted the toothbrush toward her. “Tell me that’s just the light playing tricks.”
Jill snatched the brush from his hand, holding it up. There was an unusual, silvery sheen to the bristles—barely noticeable unless you were really looking.
Her pulse kicked up.
Mason exhaled sharply. “Son of a bitch.”
Jill met his gaze, her jaw tightening. “Bag it. Now.”
Mason carefully slipped the toothbrush into an evidence bag, sealing it with a decisive snap.
Mason hesitated. “You think that’s it?”
Jill let out a breath. “I don’t know. But if Comstock poisoned Mom, and she used this toothbrush every day …” She didn’t need to finish the sentence.
Mason sealed the toothbrush in an evidence bag, his face tense.
Jill stared at the evidence bags lined up on the counter—the second tube of toothpaste, the mouthwash, the floss, and now the toothbrush.
If Bradley had poisoned her mother, this was the proof they needed.
She turned toward Mason.
“Let’s get this tested,” she said. “And if this is what I think it is … Comstock is going down.”
Jill stormed into Comstock Dental, sending a ripple of alarm through the waiting room.
A woman clutching a magazine peered up, wide-eyed. A man who’d been flipping through his phone froze mid-scroll.
Melanie looked up from the reception desk, her face pale. “Dr. Comstock is with a patient.”
Jill’s voice sliced through the office.
“Get him out here. I need to talk to him.”
Melanie hesitated.
“I’m not playing around,” Jill growled.
Melanie jumped. Bradley’s office door swung open violently, and Comstock stormed out, his irritation barely concealed.
“Chief Holbrook,” he said, coldly, glancing at the patients now nervously watching. “Are you seriously disrupting my patients again?”
Jill ignored the growing tension. “Office. Now.”
With a sharp glare, Bradley motioned for her to follow him inside.
Jill shut the door firmly behind them.
She leaned over his desk, voice low but lethal.
“Maggie Holbrook was poisoned.”
Bradley’s expression didn’t flicker.
Jill kept going. “Just like Chips Hogan. Just like Griffin Mead, who was likely drugged in your chair and later pushed into the water and left to drown.”
She leaned in closer, eyes narrowing.
“I know what this is about,” she said, her voice razor-sharp.
Bradley’s lips twitched, but he said nothing.
“Revenge.”
Still, he remained cool.
Jill pushed harder.
“You blame Hogan, Mead, and my father for your father’s death. For the failed deal. You wanted payback.”
Bradley let out a slow, measured breath. “That’s a fascinating theory, Chief.”
Jill’s fists clenched.
Bradley leaned back in his chair. “So where’s the poison?”
Jill hesitated—too long.
A slow smirk curled at the corners of his mouth.
“You don’t know.”
Jill’s blood boiled.
“It’s only a matter of time, Bradley,” she spit out.
“Test everything,” he offered, spreading his arms in an almost mocking invitation. “My novocaine, my toothpaste—whatever you need. I have nothing to hide.”
Jill’s teeth gritted.
Bradley tilted his head. “You have no evidence.”
Jill’s jaw locked.
Bradley leaned forward. “So unless you’re here to arrest me, Chief, I have patients to see.”
He was cool and collected, but she noticed his hand shaking slightly.
“I’ll be back,” Jill said before turning sharply and storming out.
She was fuming as she climbed into her cruiser.
She knew she didn’t have enough to hand off to the DA yet—not the kind of airtight proof that would hold up in court.
But rattling Comstock had its own purpose.
If he felt the walls closing in, maybe he’d make a mistake, slip up, and give her what she needed.
She relished the thought of throwing him off his game, watching him squirm.
Of course, it was a gamble—one she might regret if he clammed up instead of cracking under pressure. Still, she was so close.
Her phone buzzed.
A text from Sandy.
Get to the hospital.
Jill had never driven so fast in her life.
The moment she’d gotten Sandy’s frantic text, she’d floored it, racing through town toward the hospital, heart pounding in her chest. She didn’t know what she was walking into—another emergency?
Worse? By the time she screeched into the parking lot, her own hands were shaking, her knuckles white on the steering wheel.
She rushed through the automatic doors, her boots clacking against the linoleum floor as she darted past the nurses’ station and into the waiting room.
But where was everyone?
The usual group of Holbrooks wasn’t huddled in the uncomfortable hospital chairs. No Cord pacing like a caged tiger. No Sandy fidgeting in the corner. No Oliver sitting with his arms crossed, trying to look calm but failing miserably.
A deep pit settled in Jill’s stomach.
She turned sharply, ready to grab the nearest nurse and demand answers, but before she could, a familiar figure appeared in the hallway—Katie.
Jill felt the blood drain from her face.
The nurse’s uniform, the serious look on her sister-in-law’s face—it didn’t help calm the storm raging inside Jill’s chest.
“Where is she?” Jill demanded.
Katie gave her a sympathetic smile. “Come on, she’s awake. The family’s with her.”
Jill didn’t hesitate. She followed Katie down the hall, past closed doors and busy nurses, until she reached Maggie’s room.
Inside, the entire family was gathered, surrounding Maggie’s hospital bed like a protective circle.
Cord stood closest, his arms crossed but relief evident in his tense shoulders.
Oliver sat in the chair beside Maggie, looking both exhausted and relieved.
Sandy leaned against the wall, hands shoved in his pockets, watching their mother with a cautious, almost childlike worry.
And Audrey—Audrey was at Maggie’s side, clutching her hand.
And then there was Maggie sitting up in bed.
Her cheeks had color.
Her eyes were open.
And when she saw Jill, she smirked.
“Damn, kid,” Maggie rasped, voice hoarse but strong. “You look like hell.”
Jill let out a shaky laugh, blinking back tears.
She rushed forward, grabbing Maggie’s hand—warm, solid.
Jill choked on a breath, relief rushing through her.
Maggie squeezed her fingers.
“Don’t let that bastard get away with it.”
Jill’s eyes darkened.
“I won’t.”