Why was this happening? Who would send her a video like this?
Could it be Nadine’s killer? Teasing me? Once again warning me to back off? Had it been sent by the two people who accosted me tonight?
She studied the video again. Putting something like that together demanded some technical skills.
Theodosia’s first thought was Eddie Fox. After all, he had the cameras, computers, studio, and all the film and video know-how in the world. He could have knocked out this piece of crap in about five minutes flat. Of course, so could any computer-savvy teenager.
Really, she wondered, was Fox trying to taunt her? Enrage her? Did that mean that Fox had killed Nadine? And now that she was hot on his trail, getting dangerously close to exposing him, had he suddenly decided to up the ante and play a game of cat and mouse?
Theodosia pushed her laptop aside and flopped against her pile of pillows. Or was it someone else?
She thought about the possibilities, mulled them around every which way she could imagine. Marvin Chauvet? Harvey Bateman? Or how about Mark Devlin? He was a talented designer. Maybe he knew how to bang out a down and dirty animation and send it to her.
Send it to me. Where did this rotten thing come from, anyway?
She hunted around, trying to determine the sender’s address, but it was no use. Probably, she decided, the sender had been tricky and used a resender. Or maybe even two of them. Possibly a resender that was offshore. If that was the case, there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that she could ever trace it.
Doggone. This is too crazy for words. No, it’s actually spooky-dangerous.
Theodosia slipped under the covers, still thinking, worrying, about the people in the alley and the weird e-mail that had slithered its way into her nice, neat life. Finally, she turned off the light, closed her eyes, and decided this was something better faced in the cold, clear light of day.
But it was a long time before she was able to fall asleep. And even then her dreams were troubled.
19
“I got the weirdest e-mail last night,” Theodosia said to Drayton. It was Thursday morning at the Indigo Tea Shop and they were buzzing about, setting up for another busy day. Haley was rattling pans in the kitchen as teakettles whistled and burped out hot puffs of steam.
“What?” Drayton said as he measured scoops of orange pekoe into a blue-glazed teapot. “A missive from Delaine?”
“No, not from Delaine. It was a strange, almost threatening video.”
“Almost threatening?”
“Okay, threatening, it was threatening. In fact, maybe I should show it to you.”
Drayton looked up, brows beetled together. “Now?”
“If you could.”
Fussing under his breath about all the things he needed to do, Drayton followed Theodosia back to her office. He plopped down in her desk chair while she picked through her e-mails, then played the video for him. When it was done—the video lasted only ten or twelve seconds at most—Drayton leaned back and said, “Creepy.”
“Still, production values aren’t that terrible, so I wondered . . .”
“What?” Drayton spun around to face her. “You think you know who sent it?”
“My initial thought was Eddie Fox. Just because he knows his way around cameras, filmmaking, and the Internet.”
“If you’re right, then he’s warning you to back off the investigation.”
“If he’s warning me, then he’s probably guilty,” Theodosia said.
“Play it again, will you?”
Theodosia played it again.
“Whew,” Drayton said. “It is awfully menacing. Do you intend to show this to Riley?”
“Are you serious? If he knew there was an active threat against me, he’d handcuff me and ship me to Outer Mongolia where no one would find me in a million years.”
“Better the Canary Islands,” Drayton said. “I watched a PBS film about them and, let me tell you, those puppies are remote.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Theodosia said. “Just in case.” She wondered if she should tell Drayton about the two figures that had popped out at her last night. No, maybe not. If she told him, then he might really get worried and spill the beans to Riley. Then where would she be?
“So what are you going to do about this . . . this crazy e-mail thing?” Drayton flipped a hand at the computer screen.
Theodosia shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe see if I can figure out how to trace it.”
“Is that doable?”
“Not for me. I’m not that computer savvy. But I might know someone who could.”
“But maybe you don’t want to know,” Drayton said. “Or shouldn’t know. Maybe this investigation is too much of a hot potato and you—really, the both of us—should bow out.”
“I hear you. But . . .”
“Yes?”
“We made a promise to Bettina.”
Drayton’s shoulders collapsed. “There is that.”
* * *
* * *
They went back to work then, setting tables, brewing tea, huddling with Haley over her morning offerings (which turned out to be English crumpets, apple bread, and cinnamon muffins) as well as her menu for today’s Irish Cream Tea.
Customers came and went, Miss Dimple arrived at ten, and Theodosia continued to puzzle over the e-mail even as she chatted away, acting as if she didn’t have a care in the world. Though she had many.
“I have a question,” Miss Dimple said.
Theodosia was standing at the counter, waiting for a pot of Formosa oolong from Drayton. She turned to the diminutive Miss Dimple and said, “Yes?”
“When you say elevenses, what exactly do you mean by that?”
“Drayton,” Theodosia said. “Do you want to address Miss Dimple’s question?”
Drayton pushed his slightly steamed-up glasses onto his nose and said, “In the UK, elevenses is a term for a midmorning tea break, sometimes thought of as a second breakfast that’s enjoyed around ten thirty or eleven.”
“Kind of like what we’re doing here,” Miss Dimple said. “Like a morning cream tea.”
“That’s it exactly.” Drayton smiled, as if he’d just thought of something else. “And if you think back to your Paddington Bear stories, you’ll remember that Paddington often took his elevenses at an antique shop on Portobello Road run by his friend Mr. Gruber.”