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"Let’s celebrate at Roasted Love," I said. "I hear they brew a mean cup of espresso, no frills."
Jacob walked proudly through the front door of his coffee house to loud cheers from staff and patrons. He and Janie hugged and then he reached for Lily. I introduced him to Claire. He shook her hand firmly. Then he said, "What the heck," and gave her a bear hug, too.
At closing time, customers left reluctantly. Many shook Jacob’s hand and told him how glad they were that he was back. Once things quieted down, everyone pitched in and cleaned up for the day. The three servers clocked out. Jacob pulled me aside. He repeated more than once his thanks to me.
"If it hadn’t been for you, Laila, I wouldn’t be free. Let’s go sit down and enjoy the peace of Roasted Love," said Jacob. "Then I’m going home for a decent night’s sleep in a real bed."
Daniel and I pulled chairs up and sat across from Jacob. Steaming cups of coffee were set in front of each of us. Our eyes were drawn across the street to Sunrise, now dark. The neon sign was gone. The caricatures had disappeared and in place of them were shiny glass windows. The streetlight reflected a new look to the place.
"What exactly did James and Sarah Simms have to do with Michael’s murder?" asked Daniel. "I hear they will be arrested."
Jacob shrugged his shoulders. "I just know they are accumulating evidence against James and he will be arrested, I’m sure. If it hadn’t been for Janie telling how she planted the evidence against me, I would still be in jail. She was scared to death of the Senator. He had quite an angry side to him."
"I do know that the trash I found had James’ DNA on it. The syringe had his fingerprints on it and the empty bottle did too," I said. "If Janie hadn’t missed the trash bin Thor would never have found the bagel. Thor was the real detective."
"I guess that is why you took that monster of a dog, Laila," said Jacob. "Otherwise, no one would have noticed that trash bag as anything of importance."
"Now it all makes sense when James Simms caught Janie in here. He was so angry. He knew she had messed up his plans. I’m sure Janie’s nervousness at what she had done made her careless. I feel sorry for her." I took a sip of my espresso. "He used her by bribing her with a big payoff. She said he paid her a thousand dollars. Best of all, she was too scared to do anything with the check. She still had it. That adds to evidence against the Senator."
"That must have been hard for her not to run to the bank with that much money," said Daniel.
"I’m surprised he gave her a check. Why not cash?" said Jacob.
"He probably has so many checks in and out of his accounts that he figured a way to explain his way out of it, if it came to that," I said. I remembered his sinister ways toward me. Nothing surprised me about Senator James Simms.
We heard a tap on the window and looked up to see David Singer. I let him in and offered him a cup of coffee which he accepted. I knew he had some news.
"Well, the Senator is now behind bars. We searched his condo. There were three containers in his wife’s home office of raw belladonna. She had a small test lab there. James’ lawyer was right by his side when we got him. Against his lawyer’s advice, he spilled everything when we got him down to the interrogation room."
"What about Sarah Simms?" I asked.
"She is in custody, too. She is playing it smart and letting her lawyer do the talking. I have to say, she was more than surprised when we searched the apartment. In fact, she didn’t believe her husband could have murdered his own brother. At first we thought it was all an act on her part."
When David said that, no one spoke for a few seconds. "How did she explain the belladonna in her home lab?" I asked.
"She said she often brought small samples home. Belladonna was something she and her researchers were working on. They wanted to get it safer. Belladonna is used for a pain killer. She told us that. To prevent over-dosing in patients they were trying to develop it into a tamer substance. At least that’s the way I understood it."
I started piecing together everything I had discovered. It all made sense except for one vital part of the whole puzzle.
"I still don’t get why James would poison his brother. He must have known Michael was dying of cancer," I said. "It doesn’t make sense."
"There’s more to the story," said David. "John Andrews, Michael’s best friend, died in the Senator’s office. Sarah Simms was having an affair with John. They both thought James was out campaigning on the other side of the state. They were alone in the office when suddenly James came in. He was livid and ordered Sarah to leave. He told her he wanted to talk to John."
"I get it. Let me
finish," I said.
David smiled and said, "Go ahead, Detective. We all want to hear your conclusions."
"Okay. James beat John up. That brought on an asthma attack and John died as a result of that. But how did Sarah find John if she had already left?"
"You have it right. She didn’t go far. She hid until James stormed out of the office and then she went in to check on John. He was still alive but in serious condition," said David. "She called 911. She never told anyone about James coming in and finding her and John there. James had a grip on her that held all these years."
"How did James know what belladonna was all about?" asked Daniel.
"Sarah told him what she was working on. He pumped her and got information from her. She told him how belladonna was a lethal poison in its raw form."
"That still doesn’t explain why James decided to kill his brother," I reminded David.
