MURDER at the ALTAR (The Wedding Planner Mysteries Book 3) Page 3

  “What happened to Marcus’? Why were you called in?”

  He took a deep breath then held it. He didn’t look at her when his brows knitted, the byproduct of thorough consideration.

  “Kitty,” he said, and then again fell into deep consideration. “You’re distracting.”

  That was it? Just one blanket statement? She waited on baited breath for further explanation.

  “It took way too much effort and energy for me to focus.”

  “How’s that my fault?”

  “It’s not.” He stirred the Margarita with his straw, not that it needed it, and then leaned forward and pulled a long sip. When he leaned back again he told her, “You have this effect on me. And... Let’s just say I need you to stay out of the way.”

  “I was staying out of the way.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Did she?

  “It’s not your shortcoming. It’s mine. I just need you to stay out of my way.”

  She took a deep breath and gave him silent credit for treading lightly. She knew Sterling and she knew he thought she’d get in the way if she weren't there already.

  “I was only asking about your day, Sterling. It’s a common question. I didn’t mean anything by it.” Disappointment rose up in her chest. He’d put a wall up, and if she tried to break it down, he’d resent her.

  “Alright, well...” He pushed the Margarita back to her side of the table. “This is too sweet for me.” He raised his hand, garnishing the waiter’s attention. “I think we should make a pact.”

  “What kind of pact?” she asked, but the waiter arrived and Sterling took his time ordering a double whiskey on the rocks.

  It wasn’t until the waiter strolled all the way to the other side of the restaurant that Sterling resumed his idea.

  “When it comes to these kinds of cases,” he went on. “I think we should have a pact. You don’t ask and I don’t tell. Let’s keep our two lives separate.”

  “Keep my life separate from yours?” Her heart was sinking. Is he breaking up with me?

  “No, I mean keep our work lives separate from our personal ones. I’m not shutting you out.”

  But he was.

  “I just mean on cases like this.”

  “Cases where someone in my wedding party gets killed,” she supplied.

  “Right.” Sterling kept his gaze trained on the waiter, as he crossed back through the restaurant and deposited Sterling’s drink in front of him. Kitty was getting sick of these interruptions, but held her tongue.

  “Have an idea what you’d like?” he asked, poised with his note pad to take their order.

  “We need more time,” she said with an apologetic wince.

  “Anyway, if we can just keep the case out of our conversations...”

  “You don’t think I had anything to do with this, do you?”

  “No, not at all,” Sterling assured her. “And Officer Colt got your statement. He’ll circle back if he has any other questions.”

  “But you won’t?”

  “No, if I need to know anything else I’ll have him contact you.”

  Kitty tried to wrap her head around the proposed dynamic then realized it wasn’t a proposition. It was a demand that wasn’t up for discussion. He was being reasonable, but it still stung.

  “Can you do that for me?” he pressed.

  “Well...” The urge to argue was nagging. “The families are going to have questions.”

  “I’m not talking about the families. I’m talking about us. You don’t ask, and I don’t tell. You can gossip all you like with the families.”

  Gossip?

  “For the record,” she started in a stern tone. “You wouldn’t have solved those other cases had it not been for me.”

  He laughed at that, which only compelled her to argue further.

  “I found something that might interest you,” she said, meaning to sound intriguing.

  “I doubt that.” He placed both hands on the table, palms down as if to take control of the conversation. “I’m asking you to stay out of it for the sake of our relationship. Can’t you see that?”

  Indignantly, Kitty extracted the Ziploc bag of dark grains from her purse and set it on the table.

  “I know you think Marcus was poisoned—”

  “Kitty—”

  “You had every officer inspecting those tea bags on the silver tray as well as the teacup he drank from—”

  “Kitty, come on—”

  “Marcus was the only one who drank all his tea. It was Earl Grey, did you know that? No, of course you don’t know that. You won’t for another two or three days when some guy in a lab gives you a call. I know things, Sterling.”

  He didn’t interrupt again, but he was shaking his head as if he was at a total loss. It didn’t give her a very good feeling, quite the opposite in fact. But she was relentless.

  “No one checked the kitchen, but I did. That’s where I found these.” She held up the bag of dark grains. “I didn’t drink any tea, but Gretchen did as well as her mother and they weren’t feeling well. I asked them how much they drank and it wasn’t more than a sip. What if they’d drunk all of their tea? Would they be dead?”

  Sterling stared at the bag. His eyes turned flat. He wasn’t amused.

  “Well?” Kitty demanded, expecting to be thanked or at the very least invited into his investigative mind.

  “Well, what?”

  She pressed her mouth into a frustrated line, snatched the Ziploc from the table and opened it. “I’m going to show you something,” she stated, pinched a few grains from the bag.

  When she opened her mouth to swallow them, Sterling yelled her name and grabbed her wrist.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to eat a few grains and prove to you that this is the poison that killed Marcus!”

  “Are you insane?”

  “You’re making me insane!”

  “Lower your voice for Christ’s sake.”

  “Tell me what you know or I’m doing it!”

  Kitty jerked her arm up, a desperate attempt to throw the grains in her mouth, but Sterling stopped her once and for all stealing the bag and slapping the grains from her fingers.

  “Those are mice droppings you idiot!”

  “Huh?”

  “You were about to eat rodent turd! What the hell is the matter with you?”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Have you completely lost your mind? You hunted through a kitchen and collected a pile of mouse poop then threatened to eat it?”

  Oh dear.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, I’m sure!”

  “Hmm, well, could that have killed Marcus?”

  “Give it up, Kitty! Just stop!”

  But she’d fallen into deep thought. “I suppose that would explain why Gretchen and Roberta looked ill...”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Marcus wasn’t poisoned. It was his pacemaker.”

  Kitty leaned in, eyes growing large.

  “I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Pacemaker? Then he died of natural causes...”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “Why would someone so young have a pacemaker?”

  Sterling glared at her then rose to his feet.

  “I was really looking forward to spending time with you,” he said, staring down with regret. “I need to be alone tonight.”

  Kitty’s mouth dropped open, sadness and disappointment and guilt rising up in her chest.

  “Do yourself a favor—stay out of it.”

  “Sterling, I—”

  He held up a hand, stopping her. “I’m not doing this with you.”

  “But—”

  “Kitty,” he barked, cutting her off. “I hate to say this, but maybe we should take a break until I get through this case.”

  He didn’t wait for her to respond. He was already stalking through the restaurant, leaving her to weigh her priorities. Was satisfying her
curiosity more important to her than Sterling?

  Kitty spilled through Trudy’s apartment door, but wasn’t met with her best friend.

  “Hello, Ronald,” she scoffed with dry contempt.

  “Kitty! Come in!”

  Ronald, a stocky, bald man whose glasses slunk down his nose as if they were trying to escape, was Trudy’s new boyfriend. Boyfriend was putting it mildly. He was more like an appendage, attached to Trudy at the hip and somehow always in her apartment. For the past three weeks whenever she’d seen Trudy, Ronald had been there. When she’d needed advice, Ronald was quick to offer guidance. When she’d needed support, Ronald supplied it. When she needed to vent or complain or bubble up into an all-out rage, it was Ronald who’d looked on in wide-eyed amazement. Trudy had been right beside him, but as far as Kitty was concerned, her best friend had taken a back seat to her beau. And Kitty had had no choice but to keep a lid on her annoyance.

  “Is Trudy here?” she asked, barreling through the apartment and making a beeline for the Chardonnay in the fridge.

  “Of course,” he said, his mild manner grating on her nerves. That was the thing about Ronald. You couldn’t dislike him, not outright anyway, not without coming across as cruel. “She’s just changing.”

  Kitty lumbered to the couch, Chardonnay bottle in one hand, wine glass in the other. What she wouldn’t give for a night with Trudy alone like old times.

  Ronald hurried after her with two more wine glasses and waited patiently as Kitty poured herself a generous glass. When she handed the bottle over, Ronald filled the other glasses and asked, “Is something on your mind?”

  She glared at him, but was met with his bright smile.

  Trudy emerged from behind the Chinese folding screen and tied the sash on the satin robe she wore.

  “How’s it going?” she asked as Kitty strew her limbs, monopolizing the paisley couch.

  “It happened again.”

  Not quite grasping the crisis, Trudy draped her arm around Ronald as she sat on the arm of his chair and took her glass of Chardonnay.

  “Sterling left in the middle of the night?” she guessed.

  “No! It happened again!”

  Ronald stared at her blankly and took a dainty, little sip of his wine.

  “The minister dropped dead!” she exclaimed then a miserable, groaning sigh escaped her, which she silenced by gulping her wine.

  “What?” asked Trudy, alarmed.

  “And Sterling all but forbids me to get involved!”

  “I’ll get the sage!” Trudy was on her feet, rushing to find the sage smudge and a box of matches.

  “I think I’m losing it,” Kitty complained.

  “And that usually happens days into the investigation,” noted Trudy, the implication of which was that her friend being driven mad on day one wasn’t a good sign.

  Trudy waved the burning sage around Kitty, who made every effort to breathe the smoke in deeply. She sensed Ronald was trying not to judge. He was polite like that.

  Then it occurred to Kitty that for once in his waddling life, Ronald might actually serve a purpose greater than merely annoying her.

  “You’re a doctor, Ronald,” she began.

  “A cardiologist,” he clarified to refresh her memory.

  “What do you know about pacemakers?”

  “A lot,” he said, not that it was helpful.

  “My minister, Marcus Joseph had a pacemaker, evidently.”

  “Ah, yes, Marc Joseph,” he said with recognition.

  “You know him?” Kitty sat up in attention. “Did you put in his pacemaker?”

  “I have to abide by confidentiality, Kitty, but yes. I did.”

  “Really?” She was intrigued and her mind started racing with what she might be able to get out of him without him violating doctor-patient confidentiality.

  Ronald nodded and sipped his wine.

  “How would someone... say... kill someone with a pacemaker?”

  “Oh Lord, is that what happened?” said Trudy, moving to the couch.

  Kitty nodded. “Not that Sterling would give me any details, but he alluded to the possibility that it was Marcus’ pacemaker that had killed him.” She turned to Ronald. “He’s a homicide detective. See where I’m going with this?”

  Ronald considered the ways in which a person might pull that off then said, “The killer would’ve had to have damaged the device.”

  “How?” she demanded, nearly interrupting him.

  “I suppose one way would be to electrocute the man.”

  “That didn’t happen,” she cut in. “I was right there in the room.”

  “Another would be to place a strong magnet against his chest.”

  “No one placed anything against his chest,” Kitty said, pondering the day’s events. “What if someone had a concealed magnet and got within a few feet of him?” She asked, excitedly.

  “Ah,” he thought. “It would have to be an extremely strong magnet.”

  “How strong?”

  “Well, it’s the size, Kitty. I doubt someone could conceal a magnet strong enough to scramble his pacemaker because it would be the size of a hubcap.”

  Kitty considered that. Marcus had died within minutes of entering the mansion. Maybe he’d been exposed to a magnet before he arrived?

  “How long would it take?” she asked, spitting out her questions as quickly as they came. “Is there a delayed reaction?”

  “No, I don’t believe so. Once a magnet gets within range the pacemaker would scramble and short out, then it could take between twenty seconds and three minutes for the heart to give out on its own since the assistance has been destroyed.”

  “That narrows it down to the people who were in that ballroom,” she said, thinking out loud. “Who was standing nearest Marcus?”

  Trudy and Ronald exchanged a confused look then returned their gaze to Kitty.

  “Hun, did you say Sterling forbids you to get involved?” Trudy’s attempt to breathe reason into her friend only irritated Kitty. “Maybe we need more sage.”

  “I don’t need more sage!” Kitty exclaimed as she jumped to her feet, Chardonnay splashing all around. She chugged the last of it then slammed the glass on the coffee table. “What I need is to figure this out!”

  Kitty tore through the apartment and was out the door in a jiffy, racking her brain for whether or not Home Depot would be open at this hour.

  Chapter Four

  Sterling dropped his keys on the kitchen counter then opened the refrigerator, but it was as though his eyes weren’t really seeing what was there. The last thing he wanted was another bump in the road with Kitty. Things had been going well for the most part, though he wasn’t ignorant to the many disappointments he’d caused her—spending the full night together being the biggest bone of contention at this point. Still, she’d been doing a good job of being understanding. She’d been working with his many quirks, giving him distance when he needed it and remaining unresentful—a major feat for most women who preferred to fester their grudges until it strained the relationship into ending. He wanted to hand it to her for stepping up to the plate over and over again. Did he have to be so final about it? Did he really have to put his foot down?

  He grabbed a beer from the door and slammed the fridge shut. He was angry. Of course he’d rather be at Kitty’s right now.

  Had his argument sounded reasonable? He had a million ways to justify that it had. She should understand they both wanted the same thing, to keep this relationship going. And he didn’t see how he could if she nosed into his investigation. But at the same time, he knew Kitty. She nosed into things. That’s what she did. It had been the only reason they’d gotten together in the first place.

  Sterling realized that by asking her to stay out of it, he’d inadvertently asked her to change who she was. He kicked himself for the gross double standard and hoped like hell she wouldn’t pick up on it and rub it in his face. Maybe he hadn’t been reasonable. Maybe he’d been unfair. B
ut he was between a rock and a hard place, his career at odds with his personal life. What was he supposed to do?

  He sat on his couch and cracked his beer open but didn’t drink it. Instead he pulled his cell from his jeans pocket and stared at it. He wanted to call her, get her over here at least for a few hours, but she wouldn’t like it. He knew it killed her every time he’d asked her to leave.

  Oh God, and he’d suggested they go on a break. Who was he really punishing here? Only himself.

  Sterling tried to reason this out, but he was coming up short. He needed to get her off of his mind. Lifting the can to his mouth, he made himself chug the beer then lit a cigarette and turned on the TV. But he couldn’t concentrate on the college basketball game that was playing. He muted it, drank more, and sucked his cigarette down to the filter, all the while failing to get Kitty Sinclair out of his head.

  He shouldn’t have told her about the pacemaker.

  At least he’d gotten himself out of La Luna before he could divulge what he knew about Marcus Joseph. He’d been a man leading a double life. He had enemies. There’d been other attempts on his life. Sterling had spent the greater part of the afternoon reviewing the restraining order Joseph had taken out against his acquaintance—a person who had been in that ballroom—a dark history that made Sterling shocked the man would agree to officiate a wedding that would put him in close proximity to the very person he feared most in this world.

  As he ran through the bullet points, Kitty crept from the back to the forefront of his mind. She wasn’t going to let this go. Whatever he knew she’d eventually find out. And the frustrating fact of the matter was that she had access to his prime suspect. It would only be a matter of time before she put together who that was and did her own poking around. Could he stop her? What could he give her to make her back off and let him do his job his way?

  He could give her the one thing she wanted most: him.

  Sterling dialed her cell number and pressed his phone to his ear. She didn’t pick up. His heart melted for her when he heard her soft, melodic voice come through as her outgoing message played.

  “Hey, it’s me. I want you to come over. Call me?”

  He hung up and tossed the cell to the coffee table.