Page 69 of Charmed Forces
“Do you know where Captain Brandt was for the last couple of hours?” I asked. “Jord said he was on a call.”
“He was here at the station, but he left an hour ago when the gun was found,” said Garrett. “Don’t ask for my source. Why?”
“The coffee shop I traced from the missing evidence just burned down.”
“You’re kidding me!”
“The news said there was an explosion of some kind.”
“Unbelievable. What’s that got to do with Captain Brandt though?”
“Probably nothing,” I said. “Could be just a coincidence. Do you know where Hertford and Crump were?”
“No clue. I might lose any access to this investigation soon. I expect my invitation to take personal days will soon become a stay-at-home order.”
“Noted,” said Solomon.
“Talk soon,” said Garrett.
“We should head home too,” said Solomon. “There isn’t much else we can do tonight and I want you to pack your ribs with ice. There are leads we can follow tomorrow and we should hope for more intel on Daniel’s gun soon. Let’s go.”
“Okay,” I agreed, stifling a yawn.
~
I slept badly, my thoughts full of deadly manicures in buildings that caught fire. When Solomon offered to make me a coffee while we ate breakfast, I declined. I felt too guilty about the idea that I might have led someone to target the coffee shop. I was even more worried that Brandt and Crump might have been involved with the fire.
Yet they had nothing to do with the case. Brandt was only drafted in to take charge of the murder squad because of Garrett’s conflict of interest. Plus, I just couldn’t see Crump pulling off an arson. He was a bumbling idiot but I didn’t think he was that bad of one. That said, if Crump were following me last night, I didn’t notice him. Perhaps he was better at surveillance than putting two and two together.
Solomon told me he was covering the Tom Victor angle by gathering more detailed research into his business holdings and we agreed to meet later to compare notes.
It was my turn to pick Lily up from her house and she was beyond excited about her next role in the investigation. She’d changed her outfit three times before settling on a bright pink mini dress. However, before we went to the salon, I insisted we made an excursion to The Daily Roast, carefully checking the rearview mirror every few minutes to see if we were being followed.
Instead of the fresh, welcoming café, full of cake and artisan coffees that we visited yesterday, we found the couple standing outside, staring at the blackened shell.
“Hi,” I said as we came to stand next to them.
“Oh,” said the woman, her voice flat and lifeless. “Hi. Sorry, but we’re closed.”
“We saw it on the news. I’m so sorry. What happened? They said it was an explosion,” I replied.
“I don’t know,” she answered with a shrug and a shake of her head. She glanced towards me for a fraction of a second before tilting her head to gaze at the coffee shop. “We locked up for the night and not an hour later, our neighbors called and said the fire department evacuated them because our unit was on fire!”
“I can’t work it out,” said her husband. “They’re saying electrical fire from faulty wiring but my buddy rewired the whole unit. Everything was up to code and he wouldn’t make a mistake.”
“A neighboring unit perhaps?” I asked.
“The fire was concentrated exclusively in ours. Our neighbors are fine.”
“I can’t imagine how upset you are,” said Lily.
“Everything we’ve worked for is gone,” she said. “Just like that.”
“We didn’t even have a chance to build our customer base,” said her husband. “I only just finished printing another round of flyers. We were going to put them in all the mailboxes this weekend.”
“Keep them,” said Lily. “You’ll need them for after you rebuild.”
“Ifwe rebuild,” said the woman.