Pam skipped out the door, a woman on a mission. Torie was about to buzz the nurse when another man walked in. Unfamiliar, but obviously a cop. He was gray-haired, but fairly young. As evidence, he immediately flashed a badge.
“Sorry to bother you, Ms. Hagen, but I’m Officer Tibbet. I’m here about your—” he consulted a notepad. “cousin, is it? Mister Devereaux Chance?”
“Yes, do you know how he is? My friend’s gone to check on him.”
“He’s been out of surgery for a while now, and the nurses say he’s doing great, considering.”
“Surgery,” Torie managed weakly, envisioning all manner of terrible things.
“Yeah. You knew he was stabbed, yes?”
“Yes. The other officers, the fire investigators, they told me.”
“He got some licks in, too, evidently. Your cousin’s no slouch in the self-defense area, I’m guessing.”
“No, I’m sure he’s very proficient. I know he did a stint with some kind of bodyguard business, or something.”
“Hmmm, yeah, I’m figuring it’s the ‘or something’ part, but either way, he fought back. Problem was he got a whack on the head as part of the package, so he didn’t get a look at his attacker.”
The officer took her through the same time line the detectives had, but he dug deeper into her dating habits and her situation with Todd, searching for a link among the men she’d dated. A link other than her.
“The investigators gave me their data, what they pulled out of the database. This is the run of all the guys who uh,” he cleared his throat. “Anyway, I wonder if you’d look over this list, and see if I’ve left anyone off.”
She looked. Read the notes he’d penciled in next to each name: burglary, vandalism, arson. Arson. Two hit-and-run accidents, identity theft issues—although that one had been weird. The culprit had actually closed everything and told the credit bureaus the guy was dead.
The only one missing from the list was Christian.
Closing her eyes against the continued pain in her heart, she told him about her dates with Christian, and what had happened.
“Hit-and-run?”
“That’s what they told me.”
Tibbet took Christian’s name and last address, and jotted down the date of his death.
Where was Todd? Paul Jameson paced the lush confines of his office, worrying over the whereabouts of his best friend. He was sure that Todd was in trouble, just as he was sure that Torie Hagen had something to do with it. He’d told the police, when he reported Todd missing that she was the one with the most to gain by Todd being in trouble.
After all, she stood to inherit everything.
Not that she knew that. Unless Todd had been stupid enough to tell her.
He hoped Todd hadn’t been that rash.
The woman was a menace. Everything she touched—especially Todd—was damaged. He’d been glad when Todd had left her. There had been a time when he wanted her for himself. Even now he could see her, picture her athletic build and her twinkling brown eyes. Thinking about her, though, brought him around to the memory of her terrified face, from the incident in college to the look on her face as she socked Todd at the church.
Neither memory was pleasant, and pretty much negated any feelings of warmth he’d ever had for her in the first place. And, of course, after the disaster at the church, she’d run away, leaving Todd and Paul to clean up the mess.
“Mister Jameson? There are two investigators here about a fire.” His starchy assistant sounded affronted at the very idea of the officers.
“A fire? Todd?” Paul hurried toward her and the door. “Send them in.”
“Of course,” she said, unbending enough to add, “I hope everything’s all right with Mister Peterson.”
“I do, too, Martha. I do, too.”
“Gentlemen.” Martha ushered the two men into the office, where Paul shook their hands and showed them to the chairs opposite his desk. “How can I help you? Have you heard from Todd? Found him?”
“We’re not missing persons, Mister Jameson. We’re fire investigators. I’m Investigator Sorrels, he’s Chief Marsden. We’re here about a fire at Victoria Hagen’s home. Could you tell us where you were between six and eight p.m. last night?”
“Torie? A fire? Oh, my God. Is she okay?”
“You seem concerned, Mister Jameson,” Chief Marsden drawled. “I’ve been given to understand that there’s bad blood between the two of you.”
“Bad blood?” Paul could hear the harshness of his own words. “Not so much that I’d torch her house. As to your question, I was here, working on a deposition with a client, a stenographer, and my assistant until nearly nine.”
“If I could get the stenographer’s name?”
It pissed him off, but Paul gave them the woman’s name. The sooner they ruled him out, the better. “Is Torie okay?”
“She’s in the hospital.” This was from the chief again, Marsden. “She got a conk on the head, a nasty cut. We’re investigating who might have wanted to hurt her. Do you know anyone else who bore her a grudge, Mister Jameson?”
“You say that as if you think I bore her one. I didn’t.”
“And yet you didn’t want her marrying your best friend. Why?”
“There were a lot of reasons. What does that have to do with anything now? That was five years ago.”
“Humor us.” Sorrels smiled. “Never know when things are connected.”
“I didn’t think they were well matched.”
“Were you interested in Mister Peterson, and didn’t want Torie to marry him?” Sorrels shot back.
“Interested…” Paul threw his head back and laughed. Wait till he told Todd. “Uh, no. Did Torie tell you that?” He hadn’t thought she’d be that petty.
“No, actually she didn’t. Quite the opposite. Did you prefer her for yourself?”
Paul tamped down his anger at the question. These were experienced investigators. No need to give them anymore ammunition to look his way.
“No, but I did see that she was a far more serious, settle-down kind of girl. My friend was and is a happy-go-lucky sort. He didn’t need to get married that young. Then things changed, and he didn’t.” Paul sighed. “Regardless, that was years ago. Todd has moved on with his life, and so, I presume, has Torie.”
“Ms. Hagen indicated that she and Mister Peterson were to have lunch today, after he had a meeting with you. Were you aware of that?”
Paul frowned. Damn Todd and his endless need to make it up to Torie. Hadn’t he done enough in apology for leaving her?
He shut down that line of thinking, since it was particularly fruitless. He’d never been able to convince Todd that Torie wasn’t damaged for life by being left at the altar.
It served nothing to lie to the men before him, so Paul answered with the truth.
“No, I didn’t know that. I would have tried to talk him out of it if I had. That’s probably why he didn’t tell me.”
“Do you have any idea why he’d want to meet with her, and hide it from you?”
“He knew I wouldn’t approve.”
“And was your approval so important to him?” This from the taller one, Sorrels.
“We were friends, Inspector. I was also his counsel. Todd hasn’t had an easy life, even with the money he won. I assume you know about the money?”
“Yes,” Marsden replied. “Ms. Hagen indicated that he’d won a considerable sum, and that the win was the reason he called off the wedding. Do you agree with her assessment?”
“I do. I think he also had cold feet. He was worried about her mother’s interfering ways, and about his own ability to be faithful. His eyes wandered a lot when they were dating. He never cheated on her, but I believe he thought about it.”
Paul closed his eyes. He remembered how he’d once pulled Todd back from the brink when his flirting had nearly gone too far with a waitress in a bar. Paul hadn’t wanted to see either Todd or Torie hurt. That had been the first time Paul had tried to talk him out of the marriage.