“Morning,” Mendoza said brightly. “I brought breakfast.”
“Kind of you.” I stepped aside to let him in, and Edwina immediately launched herself at his legs. He handed off the bag before crouching down to greet her properly, scratching behind her ears while she wriggled with joy.
“At least someone’s happy to see me,” he observed.
“She has questionable taste in men,” I answered, and then wanted to kick myself when his dimple appeared. “I’m happy to see you, too. And not just because you brought me… what’s this?”
Whatever it was, it smelled divine. It also smelled like about a thousand calories, which he didn’t have to worry about, but I definitely did.
“Bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich,” Mendoza said and stood up. His knees didn’t even crack, the bastard.
“Are you trying to fatten me up?”
He grinned. “Just feed you. I thought, after last night, you might not have felt like cooking.”
I hadn’t. Just the thought of food turned my stomach. But now, holding the bag and smelling the bacon and hot biscuit, my stomach couldn’t have been happier, exorbitant calorie count aside. I’d just have to do an extra twenty minutes on the elliptical tomorrow.
“Let’s take a look at that door,” Mendoza said, and headed down the hallway. I put the bag down on the kitchen island—Edwina’s nose twitched, and she looked from the bag to Mendoza and back, as if she couldn’t decide who—or which—mattered more.
I followed Mendoza, of course—there was no contest for me—and tried to keep my eyes off his rear end in the faded jeans he favored.
In the morning light, the red streaks did look less like blood and more like what they were: cheap red paint, garish and obvious against the dark wood of the door. Still jarring, but not as sinister as they had seemed last night.
Mendoza opened the door and stepped out, careful not to get his sneakers into the puddle of red that had pooled at the bottom of the door. I assumed it would be dry by now, but it was probably best not to take any chances. He walked back and forth slowly, examining the splatter pattern, the pooling on the threshold, the way the paint had run down the wood grain. He pulled out his phone and took several photos from different angles.
“I didn’t see a paint can when I drove up,” he said eventually. “I’ll check the trash can and recycling bin, but most likely whoever did this took the can with them when they left. It’s what most people would do.”
“Of course they did.” I wrapped my arms around myself. “Why leave evidence when you don’t have to?”
He nodded. “Exactly. What time did you get in last night?”
“Two minutes before I texted you. The paint was still wet. Edwina was inside, going crazy, so it couldn’t have happened too long before we got here.”
“And you were with Greg Newsome all evening?”
“From six o’clock on. We had dinner at Fidelio’s, ran into Kenny and Jacquie there, and then he drove me home. But Greg wouldn’t have had anything to do with this.”
“I didn’t think he would,” Mendoza said dryly. “So Kenny was at the restaurant when you arrived. When did they leave? Would he have had time to drop his date off before coming here?”
“He must have,” I said, “don’t you think?”
He tilted his head. “You can’t think of any reason your client would be party to this?”
Could I?
“She’s my husband’s ex,” I said. “I won’t claim that we’ve always gotten on well. But she did hire me to follow Nick. Although I suppose she could have had ulterior motives for that. Maybe she planned to kill him, and she hired me so I’d be part of her defense. If I proved—as much as anyone could—that Nick wasn’t cheating, she could claim not to have any reason to kill him.”
Mendoza nodded. “Possible. Kenny alone, or Kenny and Jacquie, then. Anyone else?”
I thought about it. “Daniel, I suppose. I assume he knows that I’ve tried to warn Rachel away from him. He knows where I live. And he wasn’t at Fidelio’s.”
“He might have been with Rachel, though.” Mendoza made another note. “Beyond family?”
“Like I said, I thought of the mob. This has a certain horse-head in the bed look to it, don’t you think?”
Mendoza’s lips twitched. “It does. Although like I said, I think the mob would have used real blood.”
I nodded. Creepy as that was to contemplate, I tended to agree.
