Unfortunately, Torie had walked in on that discussion.
“Anyway, he didn’t cheat. Then he won the jackpot. He came to me with the news, and wondered how on earth he was going to tell Torie. I asked if she would be happy about it, and he said he didn’t know.”
“He didn’t know if his fiancée would be happy about several million dollars?”
Chapter Three
Sorrels seemed surprised. Paul smiled.
“You see why I was worried?” Paul shrugged. “I kept asking him why he felt she wouldn’t be happy about it. He said he wondered if she’d want to leave her widowed mother behind, travel the world.” Paul remembered Todd’s boyish excitement about the prospect of honest-to-goodness world travel. “I knew that anyone, especially a woman, would be happy about money coming in, but if he was worried, I was worried.”
“Especially a woman? You thought she was a gold digger?”
“Oh, no, not in the sense you mean. Before the big win, her family had far more money than Todd’s. Her father owned some sort of manufacturing business, did pretty well. He passed away a few years before they were to be married, and the business was sold, but at the time, they were doing well.”
“So why else did you dislike Ms. Hagen? She indicated that there was an antipathy long before the aborted wedding.”
Once again Paul squelched the instant spurt of anger. How did you admit that kind of pain to a couple of strangers, both of whom had already decided you might be gay?
“We’d had a confrontation over some college…” he hesitated. Torie had been adamant about the situation then, and given the trouble it was still causing, he’d better choose his words with care. “Pranks. We argued about it. Very loudly. And she heard me tell Todd I thought he shouldn’t get married. In typical fashion, she thought I was dissing her. I wasn’t.” He stated it flatly. Truthfully. It had never been about Torie, despite what she believed. “After that, she asked Todd not to invite me to their house. It wasn’t very pleasant to be excluded, but hey, we were adults. I got over it. It was hard to see my friend put in the middle of a tug of war, though.”
“I see,” Sorrels made a series of scrawling notes. Paul wondered what inference the man had drawn from the simple words. Obviously Torie was up to her old tricks, pouring out the poison. How had he ever wanted her so badly, seen her as the pinnacle of everything desirable?
“It’s old news, gentlemen. I didn’t have anything to do with Torie’s house being burned, and I’m sure Todd didn’t either.”
“You reported him missing.”
“We were supposed to go to the Flyers game on Wednesday. He didn’t call to cancel, and he didn’t show up. When I couldn’t get him on the phone, I went by the Ritz, where he was staying. The manager checked the room, the bed hadn’t been slept in, so I reported him missing this morning.”
“Cell phone?”
“No answer.”
“Would he hate Ms. Hagen enough to burn her house down, flee the country? Was he someone who acted rashly?”
“Rashly? Todd? No. He was considerate, usually thought things to death. And he didn’t hate Torie. Ever.”
“Hmmm.” Marsden’s comment wasn’t articulate. Sorrels took one last note, and closed his book.
“Thank you for your time. If you hear from Mister Peterson, please let us know.”
“Will do.”
Paul ushered the men out, only to find another officer, this time a cop, waiting to see him. Detective Tibbet was less annoying, but covered the same ground. At least he was more focused on Todd’s being missing, rather than Torie’s fire. Paul’s imagination of that event was a little too vivid, and he didn’t want to think about it.
They were about ten minutes into their conversation when Tibbet got a call.
“Scuze me,” he said, flipping open his phone to take it. His end of the conversation was unenlightening. Neither was his expression at the end of the call.
“Tell me again where you were for the last two nights?”
Frustrated, Paul went over his activities yet again.
“Good to know. I’ll need names and numbers.” Tibbet sighed. “Hate to tell you, but you’re going to get another bunch of cops in here. Your friend’s been found.”
Paul was on his feet in an instant. “Where? Is he okay?” He knew as soon as he said the words that Todd wasn’t okay. Tibbet’s face, stony as it was, told him the story. “No. Please tell me he’s okay.”
“I’m sorry, Mister Jameson, but your friend’s been found dead.”
“Oh, hell.” The bad luck which had dogged Todd since he’d left Torie at the altar had finally caught up with him. “How? Where?”
“Oh, my God. He’s what?”
“Dead,” Pam managed through her tears, collapsing into the chair by Torie’s hospital bed. “You know, I thought I hated him for leaving you like he did, being such a prick, but…but…”
“No.” Torie couldn’t fathom that Todd was gone. Dead. Not Todd, with his infectious laugh and booming voice. He couldn’t be gone, forever. “How?”
Pam gulped and averted her eyes. “Pam, what aren’t you telling me?”
“He was…he was…murdered,” she whispered. “At the church.”
“Nooooo,” Torie wailed as her heart shattered into a million tiny fragments. It was her fault. Everything she touched turned to ash. To death. First Christian, now Todd. And if Dev hadn’t been as strong and as fierce as he was, he, too, would be dead because of her.
Did she have to die to end this curse?
Two weeks later, she still couldn’t fathom Todd’s death.
The prayer ended and the pastor motioned for her to come forward. When she sat paralyzed, the funeral director touched her elbow, a concerned look shadowing his features.
“Ms. Hagen? Are you all right?” he whispered.
Torie shook her head no, but managed to stand anyway. She wasn’t okay.
It had been two weeks. Two long weeks had not been enough for her to begin to come to grips with the losses, the double blow of her house burning and Todd dying.
She wasn’t sure she would ever be okay again. Grief carved a hollow in the core of her body. She felt empty.
Straightening her skirt as she rose, she tried to adjust the suit jacket as she stood behind the podium. The clothes were new, the shoes uncomfortable; everything she owned was in the house, covered in soot and saturated with smoke. The woman at her insurance agency warned her she might have to replace her entire wardrobe.
As it was, until the fire investigators released the scene, she couldn’t go back in. She had nothing.
Torie forced her mind away from that terrible, wandering path.
The church looked so solemn. Not that she usually saw it from the pulpit, but the difference was obvious. Everyone was in black or a somber color. The sea of tear-streaked faces, pale and grim, made a horrible contrast with the gorgeous riot of flowers surrounding the casket situated in front of the altar.
Many of the people here today had been in these very seats five years ago, waiting for the bride to appear, for her to appear.
“I don’t know why Todd wanted me to be the one to speak today,” she began. She really didn’t know. She cleared her throat. “The last time I was in this church, many of you were, too…when Todd and I…when Todd left me at the altar.”
Torie hadn’t meant to say it so bluntly. The pages of her carefully prepared speech quivered in her cold fingers.
“Todd…” she began, but had to stop, fight the tears. “Todd hated to let anyone down.”
Yes. That was it. Focus on that. “We’d only been dating six weeks when my father died. He hardly knew me or my family, but he was there for me. For us.” She saw her brother nod, felt the small smile of encouragement warm her.