Purrfectly Deadly

Chapter 24

It was a pity Chase wasn’t there to outfit Veronica and her drug dealer boyfriend with a nice set of handcuffs, but since they both looked pretty banged up, and Rubb’s Ducati looked like a total loss, Odelia didn’t think they’d skedaddle this time. She sat cross-legged across from the couple.

“So what about that restraining order, huh?” she asked Veronica. “Looks like it didn’t restrain you from going near this freak.”

“Hey, that’s Mr. Freak to you,” grunted Rubb.

She’d retrieved her phone from the dealer, who now sat spitting out cat hair and checking his face for puncture holes. She leafed through the snapshots she’d taken of the couple.

“Pretty hot,” she said as she held out her phone so they could have a peek. “I wonder what my uncle will say when he sees these. Oh, I know. He’ll say that the two of you planned the murder of John Paul George together. Who was the brains behind the operation? I’ll go out on a limb here and say that it was you, Veronica. The doting daughter?”

“You think I killed my father? You’re even crazier than I thought.”

“Well, I also thought you and lover boy over here were still seeing each other, so not so crazy after all.” She pointed an accusing finger at Veronica, whose tank top was on backward. In her haste to get dressed, she’d missed that minor detail. Like her boyfriend, she looked a little frazzled, and was now checking a broken fingernail. No other bones were broken, though.

“I have nothing to say to you,” she said.

“That’s all right. I have plenty to say to you. You weren’t happy about Johnny divorcing your mother and marrying Jasper, which would make you lose out on several hundred million dollars, so you figured you’d better kill him now before it was too late. So you asked your boyfriend to supply the venom—where did you get that, Donny? I guess a man with your contacts would have no trouble acquiring that kind of stuff, huh? And then somehow you managed to get Jasper’s fingerprints on the vial to make him take the fall and voila. Easy peasy. Now all you needed to do was make sure that there was no connection between you and Donny, so you faked a breakup, which I’m sure made your mother happy, and even went so far as to get a restraining order.”

“All lies,” said Veronica, but she looked like the fight had left her. She knew that Odelia was holding all the cards now, with those pictures of her.

“Tell her about Chase,” Brutus supplied helpfully. “How she set him up.”

“And then there’s that little matter of Chase Kingsley,” said Odelia.

“What about him?”

“He never did assault you, did he? You just made that up because Commissioner Necker asked you to. You cut a deal so Donny would walk free, in exchange for your testimony against Detective Kingsley.”

Veronica was giving her just about the meanest look any woman had ever given her, but Odelia didn’t care. She had proof, and she wasn’t letting go.

She tapped her phone. “You know what I’ll do? I’ll publish these on the front page of tomorrow’s Hampton Cove Gazette. Let the good people of this town draw their own conclusions. I’ll blur out the X-rated parts, of course. Don’t want to shock people more than is strictly necessary.”

“You can’t do that,” said Veronica hoarsely. She looked appalled.

“I can and I will,” she promised.

“Look, I didn’t kill my father, all right?” said Veronica. “I would never do that. I loved that man. He was a deeply flawed individual, but he was also a very sweet guy. The problem was that he had the mental age of a fifteen-year-old, which made me feel like I was dealing with a younger brother, not a father. I still loved him, though, like the funny, goofy guy he was. And as far as money is concerned, he set up a trust fund in my name when I was born. I don’t know how much is in there but last time I checked there were millions. So it’s not exactly as if I’m hard up or anything. And I was happy for Jasper. He’s more mature than my dad ever was, and he was like a second father to me. He deserved everything that was coming to him, including the wedding. It wasn’t easy being Dad’s significant other—just ask my mom. Jasper had to make a lot of sacrifices over the years, and I didn’t begrudge him anything.”

“Millions of dollars?” asked Rubb, eyes wide. “So you’re loaded, babe?”

She smiled. “Pretty much. I didn’t want to tell you as I was afraid you’d only like me for my money and not for me.”

“You told me the only money you had was your allowance.”

“Which is probably more than you’ve made in your entire life.”

He whistled through his teeth. “Well, I’ll be damned, babe.”

“Look, what about the poison?” Odelia asked, not liking the direction this conversation was taking. Veronica should be confessing by now, but instead she was making a pretty convincing case she was innocent in JPG’s murder.

“What poison?” asked Veronica with a frown.

“The spider venom. The only one who could have supplied that was your boyfriend.”

“Hey, don’t look at me, crazy lady,” said Rubb. “Like I told you yesterday, I had nothing to do with that spider stuff. I might be able to get my hands on some top quality narcotics, but I don’t know the first thing about some weird spider venom. Besides, why would I kill my best customer? That’s just crazy.”

“Because you wanted to help your girlfriend vouchsafe her inheritance.”

“I didn’t even know she was loaded, all right? She never told me.”

“And with good reason,” Veronica said. “Now I know you love me for me, and not for my money.”

“I’ve always loved you for you, babe.”

“Listen, what about Chase Kingsley?” asked Odelia, who hated to admit she was starting to believe these two were innocent after all.

Veronica hesitated. “If I tell you what happened, do you promise to delete those pictures? I so don’t want them on the Internet. I’d die of shame.”

“I promise not to publish them. I’ll keep them, though. Just in case.”

“All right. Yes, I did lie about Detective Kingsley.”

“Don’t tell her that, babe. They might put me back in prison.”

“No, they won’t,” she said. “This time I’m getting you the best lawyer money can buy, whatever Mom says. And I’m going to tell her everything.”

“Why don’t you begin by telling me everything?” Odelia asked.

“You were right,” said Veronica. “I set up Detective Kingsley because Commissioner Necker made a deal. In exchange for Donny walking free, all charges dropped, I had to make up a story about Detective Kingsley harassing me. I filed those charges and that restraining order, just like he asked me to, and the next thing I knew, Donny was sprung from prison.”

“Did the Commissioner tell you what it was all about?”

She shook her head. “I never spoke with Commissioner Necker himself. Everything was arranged through Donny’s lawyer, who swore us to secrecy.”

“And a lousy lawyer he was.”

“Mom forbade me to get a decent one, so this one was all we had,” Veronica explained. “I’m pretty sure he was working for the Commissioner all along. They just needed someone to agree to do the dirty on Kingsley.”

“Will you retract your statement?”

“I will,” she said.

“Why the restraining order against Donny?” she asked.

She rolled her eyes. “That was Mother’s idea. She’d seen how easy it was to get one against Kingsley, so she told me to get one against Donny. She’d never liked him.”

“That woman hates me,” grunted Rubb, waggling his beard indignantly.

“What’s not to like?” asked Odelia. “Having a drug dealer for a son-in-law is probably every mother’s dream.”

“She’s right, you know,” said Veronica. “You have to stop with that drug business, babe. It’s going to get you killed one of these days.”

“Not to mention a bunch of other people,” said Odelia, shaking her head.

“I know,” he grumbled. “But it’s easy money. And everybody loves my product. You wouldn’t believe how popular I am amongst the celebrity set.”

“Did you move out here to be closer to Veronica?” asked Odelia.

“Yes, I did,” he said, pulling her close and planting a kiss on the tip of her nose. “I already had a few high-profile customers back in New York, so it wasn’t hard to make the move, as a lot of them had a weekend place out here. And when Veronica introduced me to her dad, I knew I had a winner.”

“I only did that to make sure Dad had the best quality drugs,” said Veronica with a shrug. “If he was going to take that stuff anyway, he might as well buy from Donny.” She tapped his nose. “But now you’re through.”

“If you say so,” he grumbled.

“Yes, I do. If Mother is ever going to accept you, you need to go legit.”

“You’re going to introduce me to your mom again?”

“I am. And this time she’s going to accept you. Just you wait and see.”

Rubb didn’t look too happy about that prospect, but Odelia had the impression that Veronica was the type of woman who liked to get her way, and she was pretty sure she was going to see this through. She didn’t like her cavalier attitude toward drugs, but at least she’d come clean about Chase.

“So we have a deal?” she asked. “You’re retracting your statement about Chase Kingsley?”

“Yes,” said Veronica. “And you promise never to publish those pictures?”

“Deal,” said Odelia, and they shook hands on it. In one fell swoop she’d rid Hampton Cove of a drug dealer, and Chase Kingsley of his pesky accuser. She’d also lost a perfectly good suspect in Johnny’s murder, but that couldn’t be helped. She believed Veronica. She hadn’t killed her father. So who had?