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“Frankie did accuse Benny of being naive and lonely. That’s what Benny told Sam. That all makes sense, unfortunately. He loved his wife, though. Maybe Roxanne did offer him simple companionship, the kind that Georgia and Eloise couldn’t offer.”
“Well, all we know is that she got him calm for a little while, he got agitated again, and she had him sedated with a doctor’s permission. ‘For his own good,’ ” he added with air quotes.
“She was giving him sedatives orally even before she injected him,” Kit reminded him. She’d shared what she’d learned in the call with Alicia Batra.
“Right,” he allowed. “Slipping him a mickey would have helped her control him. I wonder if she planned to kill him all along. Or at least after she killed Frankie. She wasn’t on duty the Sunday that Frankie was supposed to have died. She had an alibi.”
“Which was why she pulled Frankie’s I’m-okay cord on Sunday morning. To give herself that alibi. She was on duty until eight a.m. that morning, but off for the rest of the day. She had the opportunity to use the master key card on Frankie’s door one more time, to misdirect his time of death until after she was no longer at Shady Oaks.”
“She had to have worried that Frankie had warned Benny,” he said. “But killing Benny so close to Frankie’s death would have been suspicious.”
“So she waited and faked his heart attack,” Kit murmured. “Benny was taking diltiazem. I took a photo of the meds on his bedside table before I left this morning.” By her request, the family had left the old man’s bedroom as it was. “Roxanne would have had to have brought the digoxin with her. Alicia says it’s rarely used anymore. I meant to ask Nurse Janice if anyone at Shady Oaks was currently prescribed it, but I got distracted when she said Roxanne hadn’t come in this morning. Roxanne didn’t leave Shady Oaks after she had Benny sedated, remember? She said she’d crashed in the staff quarters. So if no one at Shady Oaks took digoxin, Roxanne had to have planned to kill Benny before she left for work Monday morning. Damn. Killing Frankie was unplanned, but Benny was premeditated.”
They got to the window and Connor flashed a cordial smile at the very attractive server as he took their coffee from her, when before CeCe, he’d have turned his flirt on high.
“How did CeCe like her carving?” Kit asked, once they’d gotten their coffee.
Connor’s face lit up. “She cried, she was so happy. She’s putting it on her desk at school. I think she’s going to have the kids make an art project for Harlan.”
“He’ll love that.” Kit took a large sip of coffee, not caring when it burned her tongue. “Thank you for the caffeine. I needed it.”
“No big. So did anything happen last night at Shady Oaks?”
“Nope, no Roxanne. It was a quiet night.”
Connor pulled back into traffic, heading for the precinct. “I wasn’t talking about Roxanne. You spent the night with Sam.”
Kit glared at him. “I did not ‘spend the night’ with Sam. I worked and he slept on the sofa. Don’t you go spreading rumors, Connor Robinson.”
“Yes, ma’am, Kit McKittrick.” But Connor’s wicked grin belied his promise.
Kit rolled her eyes, prepared to deliver a diatribe on personal boundaries when her cell phone rang.
“It’s one of the retirement homes I called this morning.” She answered the phone on speaker. “This is Detective McKittrick.”
“Hello, Detective. This is Nora Gregson, returning your call. I’m the director at Serenity Retirement Village.”
“Thank you for calling me back. I’m with my partner, Detective Robinson, and I’ve got you on speaker. Is that okay?”
“Of course, Detective McKittrick. I understand that you’re interested in a police report filed by the Brighton family after their grandfather passed.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Kit said as Connor pulled into a parking lot so that he could safely listen. “According to the police report, a brooch worth about twenty-five thousand dollars had gone missing. Was there ever any resolution?”
“No. The family actually sued the facility, but our lawyers got it dismissed. We have a clearly stated policy that residents keep valuables in their units at their own risk. We warned the family to take it home with them, but they didn’t do it.”
“What can you tell us about Roxanne Beaton?” Kit asked.
There was a moment of silence, followed by the clacking of a keyboard. “Oh. I’d forgotten her after all this time. I do remember her now, though. She was a traveling nurse who completed a twelve-week contract with us. Why do you want to know about Nurse Beaton, Detective?”
Kit proceeded carefully. “We’re looking at anyone who had access to a valuable coin collection that was stolen within the last week. The circumstances of our theft seem similar to the theft of the brooch from your facility. But, unfortunately, we have several murder victims connected as well.”
Gregson gasped. “Is this about Shady Oaks? I read about the murder in the paper. There’s been more than one victim?”
“Possibly,” Kit hedged, regretting the slip of information. Miss Georgia was right. She should have slept more. “We’re still investigating. We think one of our murder victims was an accomplice of some sort to the killer. Did Roxanne socialize when she was working with you?”
Another gasp. “Is Roxanne one of the victims?”
“No, she’s alive,” Kit said, wishing she could just ask what she really wanted to know.
