Chapter Ten
“This isn’t the right pairing,” Todd declared, looking at his wineglass with some disdain. “It’s much too tannic.”
Adam stifled a groan. He was starving. For fuck’s sake, it was red wine—it would go with the steak sandwich just fine. “Tastes good to me, mate.”
Todd stood and gave him a condescending smile. “That’s because your palate is shit, Chase. We need a Syrah. I’ve got the perfect one in the cellar. Be right back.”
“Your sandwich might not be waiting,” Adam warned. Todd snorted and disappeared down the hall.
Adam lifted his own huge sandwich to his mouth. Todd might be unable to eat without a Wine Spectator—approved match, but he had no such qualms. He hadn’t eaten all day and the steak smelled amazing. His mouth was literally watering. He opened wide—
To his absolute shock, Jess burst into the room. Beneath her askew wig, her eyes were wild. When she caught sight of him, she shrieked, “Put that down!”
What the hell?
When he just stared, Jess sprinted across the room and smacked his arms so hard the sandwich fell to the plate on the table.
Which she then shoved to the floor.
She turned to him, tears streaming down her face. “How much did you eat? When did you take your first bite? Tell me! I need to write it down for the doctor.” She broke down into sobs and started tugging at his shoulder. “We need to get you to the hospital.”
He didn’t move. He couldn’t. He’d never seen Jess like this before. She was acting crazy. She was a thousand times more upset now than she was when she’d been shot in June.
“Adam, get up. Now!” In another moment, he might have scolded her for using his real name on a job site, but he wouldn’t dream of it right now when her voice was so high and thin and full of fear. “Please, now,” she choked out through tears. “You need medical attention.”
“I didn’t eat any of it,” he said softly, catching her hand and tugging. “Not one bite.”
Jess’s eyes went from his face to the sandwich, still whole, on the ground. “Oh thank God,” she whispered, closing her eyes. Fat tears emerged from her thick fringe of eyelashes and trailed down her ashen cheeks. “Thank God.”
She really loves me. Adam swallowed over a jagged lump in his throat. Sure, they’d said the words, but seeing Jess so frantic at—well, whatever she was so frantic about—really drove the point home.
He pulled her onto his lap and cupped a hand at the nape of her neck. “It’s all right, sweetheart. I’m fine.” He felt her take a deep breath and nod. “Tell me what’s going on.”
She leaned back to look in his eyes. “Helen was Celeste’s partner. She killed her by poisoning her with toxic mushrooms. I think she planned to kill Todd today the same way. She didn’t know you’d be here.” She glared at the innocent-looking sandwich on the floor. “You would have been caught in the cross fire.”
Before Adam could ask any questions, a furious voice bellowed behind him. “What the hell kind of accusations are you making about my fiancée?”
Todd entered the room and slammed an open bottle of wine on the table so hard Adam was surprised it didn’t shatter. “Did you just say that the love of my life wants to kill me?”
Oh shit. Adam’s brain raced to find some way to control the situation, but damn it, he still didn’t even know what the situation was. “Uh—”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Fielding,” Jess said, rising from his lap and placing her body between Todd and his sandwich. “But I have strong reason to believe that Helen is trying to kill you with the mushrooms in your meal.”
Despite the calm conviction in Jess’s voice, Adam winced. She sounded like a lunatic. Todd looked between her and Adam with an incredulous expression on his face. “I don’t know what kind of crazy chicks you’re into now, Chase, but I’m not going to have this woman under my roof when she’s mouthing off about my soul mate!”
Jess opened her mouth, but a warning glance from Adam had her snapping it shut. He had zero idea why she seemed so convinced of Helen’s guilt and the danger to Todd. What the hell had she been up to today? For a moment, he wavered. How could she possibly have any idea what she was talking about?
But then he remembered the soul-deep fear in her eyes when she thought he’d eaten the sandwich. The way she’d been sobbing and clamoring for him to get to medical attention. Whatever this was, Jess believed it fully.
Maybe it was time to fully believe in her.
He gritted his teeth and threw her a quick wink before turning to placate Todd. “Sorry, mate. Don’t know what she’s on about. Could be she was hitting the wine a bit early today. Gracie, love, come sit for a moment and we’ll sort this.” Nostrils flaring, Jess sat down again. Clearly she realized he was trying to control the situation, but she’d never appreciate the condescending tone in his voice.
Now, he needed to calm and distract Todd. “I don’t think we’ve ever heard the story of how you and Helen met,” he improvised. “Tell us.”
With his eyes still narrowed at Jess, Todd sat down at his place setting across the table.
“Don’t let him eat the sandwich,” Jess whispered. Adam flicked his eyelashes down in acknowledgment, but what was he supposed to do? Throw Todd’s dinner on the floor too? Todd was one inch shy of tossing them out of the house right now.
“I heard the story was really epic,” Adam led. If there was one thing Todd couldn’t resist, it was being the center of attention. “Something about you finding Helen in Tokyo?”
Todd stared at Jess for another long moment but ultimately gave in to the temptation. “Yes. It was one of those nights that make you believe in fate.”
Adam could all but feel Jess rolling her eyes next to him, but he ignored her stiff presence and leaned forward, as if already entranced. “How so?”
Todd poured himself a glass of wine and settled in to his story. “I’d been seeing a woman, Kim, casually whenever I was in town.”
Adam remembered Kim. “You brought her to the wine dinner in Singapore,” he said. Kim had looked at Todd like he was the golden goose, of course, but she also was well-informed on world politics and literature and had a silly, bubbly laugh. Adam had kind of liked her.
“Indeed I did,” Todd said. “During the last two years, I traveled through Asia every three months and I usually took her out when I was in the area, even though we weren’t serious. But then came the night that changed everything.”
Jess let out a little huff of air through her nose. Adam nudged her with her shoulder. Patience, he wished he could say.
“The night?” He grinned at Todd. “Don’t leave me hanging over here.”
Todd smiled into his wineglass. “I was supposed to meet Kim at a cocktail lounge for a drink before dinner. I waited for an hour before I got a text from her saying she wasn’t coming. So I got up to leave and on the way out of the restaurant, I ran right into the most beautiful woman in the world.” He swirled the wine dreamily. “It was raining and I was walking quickly. I knocked her right into a puddle. Then she looked up at me and smiled...it was love at first sight.” He looked straight at Adam, and there was an actual tear in his eye. “Fuckin’ love at first sight.”
Mmm, no. In fact, Adam’s cynical nature told him the whole thing sounded an awful lot like a setup. “What happened next?” Next to him, Jess shifted her weight. Through the corner of his eye, he saw her open her computer on her lap.
Todd swallowed a large gulp of Syrah. “I couldn’t very well leave the most beautiful woman in the world lying in a puddle. I took her to dinner instead.”
He pointed at Adam with his wineglass. “I know what you’re thinking. It’s not just her beauty and my money. From the very first night, I knew she was something more. We have so much in common! We enjoy the same kind of art, the same books. She liked my sense of humor. That first night at dinner I made her laugh over and over—she had no idea who I was or that I had money. We went to a run-of-the-mill sushi place and drank cheap beer. On top of being love at first sight, we liked each other.”
He took another gulp of wine. Repeated, quietly, “We like each other.”
Adam started to hurt for Todd. Whatever this was, Todd wasn’t going to get through it unscathed.
“I’m the luckiest man in the world to be married to her,” Todd announced.
Wait, what did he just say? “You’re not married yet, mate.”
Todd shrugged. “Technically, we are. The wedding and party are for fun, but Helen was so stressed out about her immigration status last month that we went to the courthouse and took care of it legally.”
Oh Jesus, Adam thought. If they were already married, then the timing made a lot more sense. He’d bet a large sum of money that Helen had also convinced Todd to redo his will in the past month. If she was already his wife, she didn’t need to wait for the wedding celebration. Killing Todd right now would make her a very rich widow.
“Did you ever see Kim again?” Jess asked quietly. “What was her last name? What did she do for a living?”
Todd stared at her. “Why the hell are you asking about Kim? I’m telling you the story of me and Helen.”
Adam took a deep breath, preparing to fill the room with bullshit. But Jess surprised him. “I’m listening to your story,” she said. “And it’s beautiful. But I love the nuances and details too.”
Todd shook his head, like he couldn’t quite figure out how he came to be not-having-dinner with a crazy woman with a crooked red wig on her head. “Her last name was Ishikawa and she was a singer at a club called Spaces.” He looked down at the table. “I didn’t ever see her again. One—because I was 100% in love with Helen. But also, the text I got from her that night...well, it indicated that our time together had run its course.”
Jess nodded across the table at the same time her fingers tapped on the keys beneath it. “So you and Helen...”
Todd beamed. “I took her with me when I left Tokyo the next day! She’s been at my side from that moment.”
Adam could see Jess typing furiously. What she was doing, he had no idea. But it would be brilliant. For a moment, his sympathy for Todd knew no bounds. He loved Jess like Todd loved Helen. If it ever turned out that Jess wasn’t who she seemed, he’d be damaged beyond repair.
Todd put his wineglass on the table and reached for his sandwich.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Jess warned, not even looking up from her work.
“And why not?” Todd jeered.
Jess plunked her laptop on the table and swiveled it so both Todd and Adam could see the screen. “Because Kim’s dead.”
“What?” Todd dropped the sandwich back on his plate and leaned forward over the table with an honest look of concern on his face. Adam craned his neck to read the article Jess had found. It was an English translation of a Japanese newspaper article from the spring, reporting on the death of a beautiful young nightclub singer. Her body was pulled from the Sumida River, but an autopsy revealed that she hadn’t drowned. Cause of death couldn’t be ultimately determined but severe liver and kidney damage was found. She’d been reported missing by her employers three days before her body was found in the river.
“She was reported missing on March 15th,” Jess said. “When did you meet Helen?”
Todd looked up, his face a mask of confusion. “March 14th.”
Silence. Adam closed his eyes briefly, trying to line up his thoughts with Jess’s circumstantial evidence. He was so distracted he almost—almost—started speaking without his accent. “You’re thinking that Helen had a plan. That she knew Kim enough to get details on Todd’s personality and likes. That she killed her and took her place.”
Jess nodded. “I didn’t know anything about this when I got here tonight, but Todd’s meeting with Helen sounded so lucky. But it’s really her preferred killing method that makes the pattern.”
Adam looked at his sandwich on the floor. “The mushrooms.”
“Yes.” She swallowed, looking a little nervous. “I think that’s why she had to get rid of Celeste’s body. If she intends to kill Todd using the mushrooms, she couldn’t have two people connected to her show up dead like that. She’d be a suspect.”
Adam caught her drift. “If she was Celeste’s partner, she’d know she was using a fake ID and that she had no family. If she killed her and disposed of the body, there is no crime at all.”
“Right.” Jess risked a glance at Todd, who’d gone still as a statue. “She’s completely alibied for Todd’s ingestion of the mushrooms as well, on the off chance that someone correctly diagnosed the cause of death this time.”
“This is absolutely insane,” Todd whispered. It was the quietest Adam had ever seen him. “You’re saying that the woman I love, my wife, plotted to meet me by killing another woman to put herself in my path. Then, she killed some other woman—I have no idea who you’re talking about or why she would do that—and that she wants to kill me.” He took a fork and speared one of the mushrooms. “And this is the murder weapon.” He looked at Adam with desperation etched in every line of his suddenly old face. “You don’t believe this, do you, Chase?”
Shrugging, Adam moved his head from side to side and thought through the story. It was far-fetched and he hadn’t heard half of how Jess came to her conclusions. Also—Wait a minute! He whispered to Jess, “How would Helen get rid of Celeste’s body? It would have been in the second hour of her own engagement party?”
Jess’s brow furrowed and she bit her lip. “How did Helen like the glee club performance?” she asked Todd. Todd was looking down at the computer screen, re-reading the article on Kim Ishikawa. “What? Oh, unfortunately there was some emergency with dinner. She needed to work in the kitchen for the entire thing.” His voice lowered to a whisper again. “That’s how much she cares, you see? She left her own party for an hour to make sure our guests had a perfect dinner.”
Jess whispered back to Adam. “You could get to Celeste’s apartment and back within an hour. She could have picked her up then and gotten rid of the body in the middle of the night after the party or on her way to Calistoga.”
“Helen’s tiny,” Adam protested. “She couldn’t carry Celeste’s body.”
Jess shook her head. “Maybe she didn’t need to carry anything. Maybe she just needed to lie. Celeste was conscious when she called you. Helen could have shown up and promised to take her to the hospital. Hell, she could have said she had an antidote in her car. Celeste didn’t know what was happening to her. She just knew she was dying. She would have used her last bit of energy trying to get to promised help.”
But Adam had thought of another wrinkle. “Celeste said her partner was a man. Remember when we found her on the floor that day? She said she thought her partner had poisoned her and she was trying to tell us about him. She couldn’t get out the words, but she said ‘He’s a...’”
Jess frowned for a second, but then her face cleared. “Todd, I understand that Helen isn’t her real name. What is it?”
Todd was looking down at the computer screen again. “It’s Hisa. Why?”
Adam closed his eyes. Hisa. He’s a...