Page 116 of It Runs in the Family

He took a deep breath. “Go on,” he said in a deadly calm voice.

“In any case, I knew Selena used to hang out there with her old boyfriend, so I asked the bartender if her boyfriend was around, figuring I could ask him if he’d seen her.”

“And it didn’t go well?”

I grimaced again. “Turns out Tommy T was standing right next to me when I asked, and he wasn’t too happy about it. Especially since Selena stole something of his.”

Understanding filled his eyes, quickly followed by disappointment. “You knew about the flash drive.”

“No, that’s just it,” I said. “I wasn’t exactly surprised she’d taken something from him. It’s the kind of thing she’d do. But I’d figured it was something stupid like a jacket.” I reached for it next to me and lifted it up. “I guess I was partially right.”

He waited for me to continue.

I let the jacket drop to the seat. “Tommy T was plenty pissed at Selena, and since she wasn’t around, I was a good scapegoat.”

“Did he hurt you?” he asked in that same deadly calm.

“No. He just mouthed off. I thought he was just bein’ a dick, you know, with the whole how dare a woman cross me attitude. I had no idea she’d taken something valuable or important… until…”

“Until this morning,” Boone finished, sounding exhausted.

“The possibility didn’t hit me until we found out someone had ransacked my apartment. Even then, I figured that might be about something else, since the guy Mrs. Whittleman saw tried to kidnap me at the Stop-n-Go.”

Boone nodded, his eyes clouding over like he was lost in thought. Finally, he said, “After hearin’ about your encounter with Tommy T at Bueller’s yesterday, I’d be inclined to think you triggered him by askin’ about Selena. So he sent goons to your apartment to look for it.”

“But he didn’t know my name, let alone where I live.”

He gave me a dry look. “It wouldn’t be hard to figure out. Not if you were with Mary Ellen and Ava. Those two are pretty memorable. All it would take is askin’ a few people, and they’d find out your name and where you worked. It wouldn’t be hard to get your address after that.”

He had a point.

“But here’s where that theory gets thrown off. The blond guy tried to kidnap you on Saturday night, before you talked to Tommy. So, Tommy T might not have been involved in the break-in at all. The real question is what instigated the blond guy to go after you at the Stop-n-Go?”

“Somehow, he found out where I worked and figured out that I was on the late-night shift. He came into the store when I would have started my shift on a weeknight. But I don’t work Saturday and Sunday nights, so he got that part wrong. He walked into the store when I was confronting my coworker, then walked out. As soon as I left the store, he approached me by my car.”

“And he asked about your cousin?”

“Yeah, but he didn’t know her name. He had a photo of her in the dress she wore at T-Birds, but it looked like she was somewhere else. He wanted me to identify her and tell him how to find her.”

“I take it you didn’t give him her name.”

“No, I made up a very obviously fake name, but I was freakin’ out and not thinkin’ straight. It pissed him off, no surprise, and he threatened to take me in for questioning. Only he didn’t show me a badge, and when I asked if he was takin’ me to the station on Bradford Street, he said yeah, and I knew he was lyin’.”

“Did he ever tell you explicitly that he was law enforcement?”

I shook my head. “No, and I knew I was takin’ a chance, but I had a gut feeling that if I got into his car, I’d end up dead. So, I left.”

“He just let you leave?”

“No,” I said with a grimace. “I incapacitated him briefly, then took advantage of his momentary paralysis and got in my car and drove away.”

His eyes crinkled. “Did you pepper-spray him?”

“No.” But the deeper I got into this mess, the more I realized I should get some. “Let’s just say he probably wished he was wearing a cup, and then I threw dirt in his eyes to buy myself more time to get away.”

The hint of a smile lit up his eyes. “Good thinkin’.”

“But also risky,” I said with a heavy breath. “If he really had been a cop, I could have been arrested for assault.”