Designed for Death Read Free Page B

128. Skidded on black ice.” My voice shook. “He hit a utility pole and died instantly. The Boston police have it on record.”
    As if he wouldn’t know that. What was the matter with me, anyway?
    Lieutenant Rossi’s features softened. “Sorry. I won’t keep you much longer. But I have to know why you were in the victim’s condo and what you found there.”
    A spurt of red-hot anger shot through my veins and mingled with the grief. I’d had enough. I’d come to Florida to escape the cold that killed the love of my life and, most of all, to escape the memories that tormented me. Whether I would ever find peace again, or a little corner of happiness, I didn’t know. I only knew Jack was dead. And now Treasure was gone too. And this lieutenant with his notebook and pencil wanted to know all about their deaths.
    I swiped at my damp forehead, drew in a lungful of air and slowly exhaled. The lieutenant was only doing his job. How could he know his probing scraped nerves that were still raw?
    “I realize this isn’t easy, Mrs. Dunne,” he said.
    Warmth encircled me. I loved being called Mrs. Dunne. My tension lessened a bit. “I’m an interior designer. Dick Parker, the owner of the building, asked me to help him remodel the units. He’s turning them from rental apartments into condos. Treasure liked my place and asked me to redo hers, 301, next door to this one.”
    “So you worked for her?”
    “You could say that. I didn’t charge her much. I’m just getting established in Naples.”
    “When did you last see her alive?”
    “Yesterday, around two o’clock. I went into her condo to accept a furniture delivery. She was hanging clothes in a closet.” I could still see her big Hollywood grin.
    “Today, when you went there, you let yourself in? You have a key?”
    I nodded.
    “You had free access to and from the condo? Day and night?”
    What was he getting at? “I was doing my job, that’s all.”
    “Why were you in there today?”
    The tension between my shoulder blades tightened. “Giving the condo a final check. Making sure everything was in order. I do that for every design client. It’s part of the service, but when I saw…when I saw Treasure in the tub…I didn’t notice much else.” I yanked at that damned orange thread. It wasn’t budging.
    “Any men in her life?”
    “She said there were. I never met any of them.”
    “Remember names?”
    I glanced up. “No. I never took her stories seriously.”
    He lowered the notebook again. “Why not?”
    “I wasn’t interested, I guess.” Why tell him somehow I always had the feeling Treasure enjoyed inventing phantom lovers? When it came to her love life, I didn’t believe half of what she told me.
    “She have a date last night?”
    “I have no idea.”
    “Besides you, who were her other women friends?”
    “She only mentioned one. Her former roommate, a Faye LaBelle. We’ve never met, though.”

    Lieutenant Rossi asked a few more questions and wrote down a few more answers. At last, he flipped his notebook shut. “That’s it for now, Mrs. Dunne. You’re free to go.” He dropped the pencil into his shirt pocket, extracted a card with two fingers and handed it to me. “If you think of anything else, call me. If you plan to leave town in the next few days, notify my office.”
    I tucked the card into my shorts pocket. As I stood, his eyes lingered on my legs. A spurt of pleased surprise darted through me. But the satisfaction his glance gave me soon turned to guilt that clung like a coat of latex paint. How could I take pleasure in anything at a time like this? Obviously, I was all screwed up, but that was nothing new. I had been since December fifteenth.
    I was halfway out the door when he said, “One more thing, Mrs. Dunne. I need that key.”
    “It’s yours, Lieutenant.” I removed it from my shorts pocket and surrendered it to him without mentioning what I’d learned in Design 101—always make an extra copy of a client’s