Coldwater Revenge, James Ross [books for 9th graders txt] 📗

of rosary pea from a garden you planted out in the woods, in a spot my brother showed to you, wind up in Billy’s corpse?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re lying.”

She recoiled as if slapped, then she drifted toward the window. It was a long half-minute before she spoke. Tom was ready to call Joe and have him send the state troopers.

“I’m a scientist,” she said at last. “But I read the newspapers like everyone else. When I read about those terrorists in London being caught with something called ricin, I looked it up and found that the plant it came from was from the same family as the rosary pea plant I was using to keep the deer away from my research plots, and that their toxins were similar. So when I harvested the plants, I took some of the rosary pea too, to look at in the lab. Scientific curiosity, that’s all.”

“How did it get into Billy?”

“I don’t know.”

“Guess. Because if you can’t explain that part, the rest isn’t going to make any difference to anybody.”

For the first time, Susan looked unsure of herself. She paced in front of the windows overlooking the strip of woods between the office building and the road. “Let me think out loud. Because I honestly don’t know.”

He waited.

“When I first brought everything back to the house,” she said, “I left the peas on the kitchen window sill to dry. Then I forgot about them for a while. When I noticed them again, I realized that I was going to need a mortar and pestle to crush them into something I could work with. I didn’t have one in the lab at the moment. But I’d seen a small head shop version down in the boathouse in Billy’s bathroom. So one night while he was out, I went down to borrow it. Only he came back there while I was there using it. I guess he got the wrong idea about what I was doing, because he picked that moment to tell me about what he was doing with Frankie and hinting about what he was up to with Suliman. We got into an argument. I told him I wanted him to move out. He laughed and said he’d take it up with Frankie—that maybe he could arrange another boat accident. It was a naked threat. I got out of there fast.

“I’m guessing now that I forgot to wash the mortar and pestle before I left, and that there would have been a residue of powdered rosary pea in it. Actually, considering what had just happened, I’m certain I didn’t remember to wash it. Then Billy must have used it sometime after that for mixing one of his happy powders.”

She stopped pacing and sat down at the lab table. “Anyway, that’s my guess of how the abrin might have gotten into him. But as I told you, I don’t really know.”

Tom waited for his own reaction, and found he had none. He was on overload. Numb. He didn’t know what to think.

“It couldn’t have been a lethal dose,” she added. “It would have been just the residue. And besides, he drowned, didn’t he?”

“Why didn’t you tell this to Joe when the Dooley twins hauled Billy out of the lake?”

“I was going to. But then all of a sudden your brother started avoiding me and ducking my calls. If you’ll remember, I was up at his cabin the very next morning looking for him. That’s when I met you. But Joe was running away from me all of a sudden. And by the time he wasn’t, I had decided it was better to let it slide.”

“Why?”

“I can’t believe a Morgan is asking that.”

Tom closed his eyes while a wave of fatigue swept through his body. “I’m in no mood for guessing games, Susan.”

“Fine. I’ll spell it out. Did you or your brother tell anyone about the thousands of dollars in cash that Morini’s Funeral Home found in your father’s coat?”

A small, choking noise spit from the back of Tom’s throat.

“Did you really think Morini was going to keep a secret like that? In a town like this?”

A surge of adrenaline set his heart pound against his ribs.

“What good would have come of my washing the Pearce family linen after Billy died? I like Coldwater, Tom. I love my work. I want to stay here and enjoy a peaceful, productive life. Even if it helped put Frankie Heller in jail for a while, do I really need to worry about someone like him getting out in a few years and coming after me? Or sending one of his friends to do it? Do I deserve that?”

He had no answer, and Susan didn’t wait for one.

“I do not! I kept my family’s secret for the same reason that you and your brother kept yours.”

Tom tried to form a coherent thought. If true, this latest version of Billy’s death was Hellenic tragedy. Everything that Susan had hoped to keep private was going to become public no matter what she said or did. There was no way to stop it. And if untrue, it was brilliant. Those who might deny the story were dead. And those who might disprove it were compromised.

He looked at her hard. “If they find fibers from Billy’s sleeping bag or anything like that on your father’s boat, then this story’s going to turn around and bite you.”

“They won’t.”

But he could hear the hesitation in her voice. Or maybe she just saw the men in stenciled windbreakers through the lab door window, about to break in.

CHAPTER 27

Tom had a pretty good idea of where they had taken him. The rumbling eighteen-wheelers behind the curtained, ground floor window were one clue. The smell of deep fried fat that clung to the clothes of the public servants who took turns questioning him was another. The tub/shower had a curtain but not a door. The toiletries included shampoo but not conditioner. He assumed he was