Read Online Some Like It Hawk by Donna Andrews - Free Book Online Page B

reinstated as town attorney.”
    The chief sighed and rubbed his forehead slightly, as if he felt a headache coming on.
    “So you believe Mr. Throckmorton didn’t do it,” he said. “Any idea who did?”
    “Someone who had access to the basement,” Randall said. “On this side of the barricade.”
    “FPF hasn’t been allowing much access to the courthouse,” the chief said. From the look on his face, I could tell he knew exactly what Randall was getting at, but he was going to make Randall come out and say it.
    “No,” Randall said. “Nobody much gets in here except for the guards and the creeps they work for.”
    The chief nodded slightly.
    “I don’t know whether we were a complication in their plan,” Randall said. “Or whether they deliberately did it when they did so Meg and I would be witnesses. Either way, they shot her—probably crouching down low, so it would look as if it came from behind the barricade.”
    The chief had squatted down to get a closer look at the body. He glanced from it to the barricade as if following what Randall was saying.
    “Then they could run up that back stairway while we’re coming down the front one,” Randall went on.
    “One of the guards came down that way,” I pointed out.
    “But not right away,” Randall said. “If the killer was a guard, all he had to do was run up till he was out of sight and then come down again and pretend to be in on finding the crime scene with us. If it was anyone else working for the lender, he could just trot on past the guards, get rid of his bloodstained clothes, and go back to doing whatever he was supposed to be doing when the news broke.”
    “Good point,” the chief said. “Did anyone happen to notice which guards came down here?”
    “I made a point of checking their name tags,” Randall said.
    “So you think the killer’s either a Flying Monkey who’ll be trying to barge in on my case,” the chief said, “or a corporate goon who’ll be complaining to you that I’m not moving fast enough and telling the media we’re not competent to handle a case of this magnitude.”
    Randall nodded.
    “And if they find out about the tunnel, the manure will really hit the fan,” Randall said. “Unless, of course, we can prove one of them is the killer. Aiding and abetting a trespasser will seem like pretty small potatoes next to arranging a murder.”
    “So all we have to do is figure out which one of a tight-knit group of corporate crooks and their hired thugs committed a murder,” the chief said. “Not just figure it out, but prove it, and all before the crooks manage to manipulate public opinion to the point that we have to call in the State Bureau of Investigation or the FBI.”
    “I didn’t say it would be easy,” Randall said. “But that’s what we have to do. And if anyone can do it, we can.”
    Randall looked at Sammy and then at me, as if including us in the “we.” Sammy, who had been looking on with big eyes, stood a little straighter and lifted his chin. I hoped I didn’t look as tired and pessimistic as I felt.
    “Just one thing,” the chief said. “I gather you think this is a conspiracy?”
    Randall frowned for a moment, then shrugged.
    “Who the hell knows?” he asked. “I think some of them are capable. And if it wasn’t a conspiracy to kill her, it could easily turn into a conspiracy to cover it up. Even more of them are capable of that, if you ask me.”
    The chief nodded, and took a deep breath.
    “Sammy,” he said. “You’ve been through that confounded tunnel a couple of times, haven’t you?”
    “Yes, sir,” Sammy said. “To help Rob and Mr. Throckmorton test Rob’s new game.”
    “Tunnel bother you at all?” the chief asked.
    “Well, I don’t much like it, if that’s what you mean, sir,” Sammy said. “But I can do it if I have to.”
    “Good. Go in there ASAP and secure the basement. No one goes in or comes out without my orders. Keep Mr. Langslow and Mr. Throckmorton