Authors: Leslie Caine
and my intellect would eventually introduce themselves
to each other.
"Hey, Gilbert," he said as he strode toward his desk.
"There was a traffic snarl-up on Main Street this morning. Really slowed me down."
"Was it caused by construction?"
"Maybe. The police had it detoured. Around Aspen
Street." He gave me a sly smile, then turned back toward
the door. "Almost forgot." He reached into his coat
pocket and removed what looked like a tiny white paper
cup for a catsup dispenser from a fast-food chain. "This is
for you, m' lady."
Inside the cup was a single red grape, which he had
somehow managed to carve into the shape of a rose.
"Oh!" I cried, gently removing the grape from the cup.
"This is amazing!"
He grinned at me and said, "Glad you like it. You'd be
surprised how many grapes I had to search through till
I . . . found one that was shaped like a flower." He'd grown
distracted as he spoke and was now peering at the drawing behind me.
Holding his miniature fruit sculpture up to the light, I
cried, "I love it, Steve! I shall cherish this until it turns
into a raisin rose!"
I had just decided to risk having a customer walk in on
us while I kissed him, but I hesitated. For some reason,
he was glowering at my artwork. "You're redoing Burke's
solarium?" he snarled.
"A little. I was thinking we could check out the salvage
yard again for some metal to remake into benches.
Maybe from some old iron security bars. Why? You don't
like it?"
"Jeez, Gilbert! I thought you'd be willing to take
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Richard's advice for at least twenty-four hours! He says we
should back off from working for Stratton!"
"I'm not going to do that!" I dropped my carved grape
back into its catsup cup. "If this was anybody but Richard
Thayers talking, you would never have given a suggestion
like that a second thought!"
"But it was Thayers! Somebody whose opinion I know
I can trust. So your point is utterly--"
He broke off at the sound of someone opening our
door. I had to stop myself from cursing out loud at the
sight of the blue uniform. A police officer entered the studio, followed by a second officer.
"Morning," the first man said with a solemn nod. "I'm
Officer Dantley. This is Officer Riggs."
Steve rose and shook their hands. "Steve Sullivan.
And this is my partner, Erin Gilbert." His features were
drawn, and I knew he had every bit as bad a feeling about
this visit as I did.
Officer Riggs nodded at me. "We met last year, Ms.
Gilbert."
"That's right. At the benefit." I had a good friend,
Linda Delgardio, who was on the Crestview police force.
"We've been told you both were in a class at CU last
night taught by Richard Thayers. True?"
"Yes," Steve managed, his voice uncharacteristically
low. "He was a mentor of mine. He taught some of my
classes at the Art Institute of Colorado when he was living
in Denver."
"We've got some bad news for you," the second officer
said. "Richard Thayers died early this morning."
c h a p t e r
4
Oh, no," I moaned. Steve just gaped at the officers.
"He was poisoned," Officer Dantley said. "At least according to the preliminary tox screens. He drank something that he apparently didn't realize was extremely
poisonous."
The color drained from Steve's face. I rounded my
desk and grabbed his arm. He appeared to be too
shocked to say anything. I resisted the urge to embrace
him and instead asked the policemen, "You mean the
gold paint from last night's class?"
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43
"That's what it appears to be," Dantley replied. "The
autopsy won't be ready for another day or two."
"According to our information," Riggs interjected,
"he's done that drinking-paint act more than once. This
time it caught up with him."
"That's what a former client of mine in his class said
last night," I muttered.
"Margot Troy?" Officer Riggs asked.
I nodded.
"Professor Thayers had her name circled on his class
roster," Riggs explained. "We spoke with her earlier this
morning. She told us about your being there."
Sullivan pulled away from my grasp and leaned back
onto his desk, gripping the edge so firmly that his knuckles turned white. I wished that the policemen could give
him a minute or two to collect himself.
"Mr. Thayers was obviously feeling ill after drinking
the paint yesterday," I said. "Did he get himself to a doctor?"
Riggs shook his head. "That's where we think he was
heading last night. But he pulled over. Apparently too
sick to keep driving. Unfortunately, he pulled into a
small side street. Nobody saw him there. Or if they did,
they didn't realize he was in distress."
"He died in his car?" I asked.
" 'Bout halfway between the campus and the hospital," he answered with a grim nod. "A jogger found him
in the early hours of the morning."
"He was murdered," Steve insisted. "Someone must
have switched labels on the can . . . fooled him into thinking it was his own nontoxic paint, when he was actually
drinking a toxic product from some other manufacturer.
That's the only reasonable explanation."
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"We're investigating that possibility, Mr. Sullivan,"
Dantley said sternly. "Although it could also have been a
careless accident, made in the production line. Or
maybe a deliberate act on his own part."
"Suicide, you mean? No way!" Sullivan fired back.
"Mr. Thayers had a half dozen of his environmentally
friendly products in his book bag," Officer Riggs explained, "which he apparently brought to class with him.
First thing the lab did was test all six cans, and they all
had exactly what the label said. 'Cept the gold paint."
"He always drinks that one product," Sullivan said.
"It's the most impressive, because it's metallic. Yet he says
it also thins out with water the best."
There was a pause as both policemen peered at Steve.
"So . . . you knew he added water," Officer Dantley stated.
"Did you share that information with anyone else?"
"No. Not counting Erin. And I only heard about it after the fact. When Richard told me."
"For this to have been murder, the killer had to be real
familiar with Mr. Thayers's routines," Riggs said.
"We need to interview you two separately," Dantley
said, giving his partner a piercing glare. He had a more
authoritative manner than Riggs, which led me to believe he was his superior officer. "Miss Gilbert, would
you mind coming with me?"
"Uh, no, that's fine." I cast a longing glance at
Sullivan, hating to leave him reeling from the news, as I
followed the policeman through the inner door that led
to the lobby and stairs.
The main entrance to our three-story office building
had a rarely used alcove--rarely used because it was
poorly lit, stark, and unappealing. Dantley and I took
seats on the marble slab of a bench as I recounted for him
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45
the short history of my dealings with Richard Thayers.
That led to a lengthy discussion about what little I knew
of Richard's relationship with Burke Stratton.
Eventually, we returned to the matter of who could
have been highly familiar with Richard's lesson plans.
"Margot Troy told me she'd taken the class two other
times," I said. "I don't know if anyone else in the class was
a repeat."
He made a notation in his pad. "Anyone in the class
strike you as acting suspicious?"
"A local furniture maker named Matthew Hayes was
heckling Thayers, as I'm sure Margot already told you."
"Yeah. She did." Dantley held my gaze for an uncomfortably long time. "She also said the two of you came in
together last night."
I was surprised and a little offended. How had Margot
even noticed our entrance directly behind her? And why
had she reported such trivia to the police so quickly? "We
weren't together. He held the door for me. We just happened to arrive at the same time. That's all."
"So you didn't talk to him, other than maybe to thank
him for getting the door?"
"Not exactly, no." My seat on the marble bench felt intolerably uncomfortable, so I tried to reposition myself,
then noticed Dantley raise an eyebrow and scribble
something in his pad. "I chatted with him after class. I
was curious about the statements he'd made to Richard."
"Can you recall the exact conversation?"
I took a calming breath and tried to quell the feeling
that I was being investigated as a murder suspect. Nobody
was pointing a finger at me. Officer Dantley was merely
being thorough. Margot, too, must have felt this anxious
during her sudden early-morning police interrogation. I re-
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peated what Matthew and I had said to each other last
night as best I could, omitting Sullivan's and my brief quarrel in Matthew's presence. Afterward, Dantley flipped
back through his notes.
"What's your personal take on Burke Stratton?"
"I'm not sure what you mean by 'personal take.' He's
been our client at Sullivan and Gilbert Designs for
around six months. He's trying to win the Earth Love
green home contest. He's a nice guy. Thanks to this contest, he's on the verge of getting major recognition for his
house, and we're helping him."
"Who's 'we'?"
"Steve Sullivan and myself."
"Got any idea what caused the rift between Thayers
and Stratton?"
"All I know is that Burke said he'd hired Richard four
years ago and fired him because he felt his work was
shoddy."
"Had to have been pretty bad, right? Their parting of
the ways, I mean. You said that Thayers warned you he
might damage your professional lives."
"Yes."
He studied my features, waiting, but I had nothing to
add.
"Your partner might be able to fill us in a little better."
Dantley shut his notepad and tucked it into a jacket
pocket. "Wait here, please." He returned to my office,
and I promptly rose. No way would I stay seated on this
uncomfortable bench like a disobedient child waiting for
the principal's punishment; I wanted to know what was
happening in my own office.
After a minute or two, both officers emerged, and
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47
Riggs said, "Thank you, Ms. Gilbert. Please call the station house if you think of anything important you'd like
to add. We'll be in touch."
Dantley tipped his cap, and they left.
I rushed back into my office, deeply concerned about
Steve. He was staring at the drawing I'd been working on
for Burke. To my dismay, he tore the drawing off my easel
and crumpled it.
"Steve? Do you want to talk about it?"
"It?" he snapped.
"About Richard." I couldn't keep my discouragement
from my voice. Was this how it was always going to be between us? One door opens a crack only to have another one
slam shut in my face? My rose-shaped grape was still sitting in its little cup on the corner of my desk. It seemed to
be shriveling before my very eyes.
"No. Talking won't help. Only getting the bastard who
did this to him will. Seeing him get locked up with the
key thrown away. That's all I care about at this point."
"So when you crumpled Burke's plans for the solarium just now . . . you think he did it?"
"Yeah, actually, I do. I think he hated Richard. I think
it was the last straw for Burke when he found out Richard
was cutting him out of the competition. And I think he
killed him."
"Burke wasn't there last night. And the two of them
have been estranged since before Richard started teaching that class. So, even if he had learned somehow about
Richard's drinking his products, he couldn't have realized that it was always gold paint."
"You don't know that." His hazel eyes were once again
burning with anger. I had to turn away. I slunk toward my
desk. Some defeatist part of my brain whined that this
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thing between Sullivan and me was just too hard. Not
meant to be. Not worth it. "They were probably friendly
at one time," he said.
"True."
"This is my fault," he muttered, staring at the red and
black oil painting against the exposed brick wall behind
his desk.
"No, it isn't!" I leaned forward on my desk. "Steve.
Please. Don't bludgeon yourself like this!"
"I should have insisted on taking him to the hospital.
I knew something was wrong." His fists were clenched.
He tossed the mangled floor plan into the steel trash
can.
"But he told you he was feeling better. And that appeared to be the truth."
"I should've seen through that. My god, the man
drank poisonous paint right in front of me! And I let him
walk out and try to make his own way to the hospital. All