“Are you planning to interrogate him in there?” she asked.
“I’m not planning to interrogate him at all,” he said, clearly surprising both her and Jessie. “In his condition, he’s pretty useless at this point. Besides, he already told me everything worthwhile.”
“Like what?” Jessie wanted to know.
“He said that he and Bridget used to date about a decade ago and that they were still close. He said that made Scott jealous.”
“I got a slightly different version of that story from Eleanor Darcy,” Jessie noted. “According to her, Matt wanted them to be tighter than they really were.”
“That doesn’t shock me,” Ryan replied. “In fact, it was when I suggested that the feelings might be a one-way street that got his dander up. He smashed his glass on the table. When I told him to calm down, he got chesty and stood up, threatening to kick my ass. I warned him that he was making a bad choice. That’s when he made a worse one and threw that swing that sent him flying over the railing.”
“Well, you’ve got dozens of witnesses to that part, so it shouldn’t be hard to charge him,” Kat said.
“I’m not inclined to that,” he replied, “at least not yet. I’m not sure it will help much.”
“Why not?” Jessie asked.
Ryan shook out his arms before responding. They were getting stiff and he knew he was going to have to pop a few pills for the pain soon.
“First of all,” he said. “I haven’t seen any evidence that makes me think he’s our guy. It sounds like he came up in that counseling session as more of an annoyance than a threat. And I’m not sure how killing Scott Newhouse helps him.”
“Maybe he thought that with her husband dead, Bridget would turn to him for comfort,” Kat suggested.
Ryan had considered that possibility.
“I think he’d be more likely to believe he could win her over if he could show her that Scott had wronged her in some way: maybe that he was cheating on her or something. But it’s hard for me to buy that Matt Darcy thought he could kill Scott Newhouse and then romance the man’s grieving widow. Despite his protestations, it was clear to me that Darcy knew Bridget didn’t reciprocate his feelings. He had to know that killing her husband would only make her more devoted to Scott’s memory.”
“I think that’s an open question,” Jessie countered.
“Fair,” he replied. “But regardless of that, his key card swipes verify his entry into his casita this morning at the time he said he was there and nothing we’ve found yet indicates he was anywhere near the spa. I’m not saying he’s innocent. But I am saying we don’t have anything that suggests he’s guilty.”
“We’ve arrested people for less,” Jessie pointed out.
“Yes, but unless we have him dead to rights, I think it’s counter-productive. He’ll lawyer up. All of the others in the group will probably do the same. Even if they don’t, they’re sure to stop cooperating. And considering that they’re the only real suspects we have, I’d rather keep them open to talking. But if we don’t arrest him, it might garner some good will from him and the others. We’ll tell them we’re more interested in getting to the bottom of what happened to Scott than arresting people for drunken mistakes. Add that to the fact that I saved the man’s life after he tried to knock me out. I’m hoping that anyone in the group who’s not a murderer will take all that to heart and be more inclined to help.”
“So what do you propose?” Jessie asked.
“I think that we let Eleanor Darcy take him back to his casita with instructions not to leave, maybe have a security guard posted outside to make sure he doesn’t. Then we start fresh tomorrow. Anyone who makes things difficult for us after that act of big-hearted forgiveness will look churlish, and worse, suspicious.”
“So we let him off the hook, appeal to their better natures, and come back in the morning?” Jessie asked.
“Actually,” Kat volunteered. “I think you can do better than that. Let’s call Hugo back. You just saved a guest’s life and prevented dozens of other from seeing him turned into a bloody pancake. I think that at least merits a room for the night.”
Jessie was about to protest that they needed to get back home to Hannah. But then she remembered it wasn’t an issue right now.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
Kat was right.
Jessie wasn’t surprised. One thing about being a private detective constantly scrapping for cases was that it made her friend unafraid to make bold requests. Jessie was still trying to incorporate that attitude into her personal life.
As it turned out, Hugo made no mention of the fact that it was Ryan’s questioning of Matt Darcy that instigated the near-pancaking. Instead, the security chief offered them the very casita they’d been using as their home base all afternoon. He even sent someone to provide them with clothes from the resort shop, all monogrammed with the same “P” found on the towels and take their current ones to be laundered.
“It’s a lovely gesture,” Jessie said to Ryan once Kat had left and they were changed and settling in for bed. “And I don’t want to sound ungrateful. But I think Hugo’s generosity is as much about pressuring us to wrap up this case fast as it is intended to make our lives easier.”
“Either way,” Ryan replied. “This robe is super soft. Between that and the meds I took, my body is finally starting to throb a little less.”
“Good,” Jessie said, relieved. “I was really worried about you. I was sure that by the time I got to that balcony you’d have gone over the side.”
“Me too,” Ryan admitted. “But I guess all that rehab I’ve been doing paid off. There’s no way I could have pulled Darcy up like that even six weeks ago.”
Jessie gave his forearm a gentle pat.
“Well, hopefully the rest of this investigation will be less physically eventful,” she said. “Although, I’m not sure we’re going to resolve this thing in time to satisfy Hugo and resort management. Our suspects include a widow without a bulletproof alibi who admittedly seems to be taking this very hard, her ex-boyfriend, who is still into her, and his wife, who clearly resented the whole situation. That doesn’t even account for the surly tech genius or his aggressively sunny schoolteacher wife.”
“Nor does it account for the less likely, but still viable possibility that Scott Newhouse killed himself,” Ryan reminded her.
“Maybe we take another run at that couple’s counselor, Cedric Cleaver,” she suggested. “We didn’t really get into whether he saw signs of depression in Newhouse during their session.”
Ryan shook his head.
“I don’t think we’re getting anything else out of that guy without a court order, certainly nothing as sensitive as his client’s mental state. And we don’t have time for that. I’m pretty sure that Chief Laird is going to bring the hammer down on us tomorrow.”
Jessie knew he was right on both fronts. As she sat on the bed, leaning back against the headboard, with him doing the same thing beside her, she found herself wondering how her fiancé could be so clear-headed when analyzing other people’s intentions and motives and so dense when it came to understanding his own.