Page 12 of Resolution

Finding out who’d insured the ruby had been the first thing Judy had checked on after our meeting with Tawny Flores and Greg Aston. We knew the insurer would have had a recovery agent working on it, and as soon as we learned who the insurer was, our first thought was for Raven to sit down and have a conversation with the agent. That was, until Raven learned who they’d given the job to. As it turned out, the recovery agent assigned by GMS, had been a bitter rival of Raven’s while he worked for the company. Raven said there was no way he would be willing to talk to us, and even less willing once he found out that we’d been retained by their client.

“What can you tell me about your investigation into the ruby?” Tomlinson asked.

“Well, that’s taken quite a morbid turn of events, Mr. Tomlinson,” Raven said.

I wanted to kiss him. He was really putting on a show for this guy who thought it was just fine to pick our brains about the two cases we were working on. Though he wasn’t to know it, the list of jewelry and names he’d shown us hadn’t given us anything…with the exception of Brian Leopard’s name. But there was no way we were going to tell him that. I didn’t even have to ask Raven to be silent about it.

I realized Tomlinson had stopped scribbling and turned fully to face us. His eyes were gleaming, filled with what I could only describe as lust. “Morbid? Oh, please tell me.”

The man was practically salivating. I deliberately turned my head to look back at his closed door, deciding that this poor guy deserved a little drama in his mundane day. When I turned around, he was watching me, convinced that I held the key to everything ever known in the universe. I leaned forward, lowering my voice, sotto voce.

“The widow Flores’ attorney was made aware that his client, Benedict Flores, had been receiving threatening letters, demanding that he give them the ruby or that he would be harmed.” I nodded for emphasis as the man across the desk seemed to vibrate in his seat. He made a small O with his mouth and leaned forward. “Whaaat?”

I nodded violently. “Yes!” I glanced back at the closed door before turning back to him with wide eyes.

“Oh…don’t worry,” he began. “No one can hear you.”

I went on.

“The notes got increasingly violent in nature and eventually, they stopped. Then—”

I let my statement hang for a few seconds as he squirmed. I shrugged and sat back. “I don’t know…well, I didn’t until Mr. Aston’s in-house investigator turned up murdered this morning.” I did my very best to show him scary eyes and when I looked over at Raven, he was doing the same scary eyes. I was so proud of him. I did a mental fist bump.

“Murdered?” Tomlinson’s eyes went even wider than they had before. “How? Why? Where?”

I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing. “His body was found in a dilapidated, vacant building—” Checking the closed door again, I lowered my voice, leaning forward. “Right here in downtown L.A.”

“Nooo!” Tomlinson was practically vibrating.

I glanced over at Raven who was nodding before turning back to Tomlinson. His gaze ping-ponged back and forth between us.

“And the nature of the murder? What can you tell me?”

“He was shot,” Raven said.

I was glad he hadn’t mentioned hearing about Dave Reynolds’ murder from Cassidy and Mike, not that I’d expected him to. I didn’t think our friends would appreciate anyone else knowing that little fact.

“That means the investigator must have found out something nefarious,” Tomlinson said, leaning back in his chair. “Oh, do you think the person who stole the ruby killed him?” His hand flew to his mouth. He was bright red above the collar and pulled his fogged glasses off to clean the moisture from the lenses. He was really freaking out, so I figured I’d played around with him long enough. I didn’t want to give the little guy a heart attack. I glanced at Raven, whose nod was almost imperceptible.

“There’s no way to know who killed the investigator or how far along he was in his investigation,” Raven said.

Tomlinson put his glasses back on his face, wiping perspiration off his forehead as he nodded. “Of course. Of course. Well, in any case, you’ve been a lot of help today, gentlemen.”

“And you’ve been of no help at all,”I wanted to say…but that really wasn’t true. He’d inadvertently given us more help than he knew by showing us Brian Leopard’s name beside the picture of a diamond pin set in coppery yellow gold. I had no idea what the diamond’s carat weight was, but it was sizeable.

“Is there anything you want to share about your search for the diamond and emerald necklace?” I asked.

“Me…uh…well, I haven’t gotten very far.” He waved his hand at the thin folder I’d put back on his desk. He was blatantly lying. There wasn’t even a copy of a police report in the file.

“What about a police report?” Raven asked, picking up my thoughts.

“Oh, that.” Tomlinson glanced around his immaculate office. “Now, where did I put that?” he muttered.

I followed his line of sight as it bounced from the couch against the wall, to the coffee table in front of it, to the thick rug beneath it, and then he turned back to us. He smiled, and it wasn’t a nice one. Gone was any pretense that this was going to be a fact-finding mission for both of us…fucker. “Unfortunately, I think you’re going to have to get a copy of that for yourself. After all, you have friends at the LAPD.”

“Friends at the LAPD?” Raven asked, playing dumb.

“Well certainly,” Tomlinson replied. “If you learned how GMS’s investigator died, surely you have friends who gave you that information.” He went from being weird to smug just like that.

---