Page 51 of Silent Ridge

“Tell me you were in there legally,” he says.

“Of course,” I say. “The door to the motor home was open and I was concerned for his safety. There are bears in those woods and they frequently find their way indoors. I was doing a welfare check.”

It’s lame, but he doesn’t question it.

“I need you to contact the sheriff in Snohomish again and find out exactly what went on with Michael Rader,” I say. “Ronnie found out the motor home is leased but he paid over half of it down in cash. It’s a luxury motor home.”

“I see.”

“And when I looked in the bathroom to see if Rader was alive, I smelled a chemical that I thought to be cyanide. Rat poison was in view.” After I opened the cabinet, that is. “And there were syringes sticking out of a container of rat poison. One of the syringes was loaded. I’d like to know what the chemical is that was found at the autopsy.”

“Sorry,” Sheriff Gray says. “I should have told you. Nan found the lab report on your desk.”

Of course she did.

“There was a chemical in it that Yang identified as cherimoya. It’s made from the seeds of a fruit. The fruit is supposed to be very tasty and is edible, but the seeds are poisonous.”

“Are the seeds black? About the size of apple seeds?”

I hear him flipping through some pages. “Yes. Yang sent me a picture of the fruit and the seeds. You want me to send it to your phone?”

“Please. I found some type of fruit in the motor home that I didn’t recognize and the seeds in the fruit were the same as some that I found in the rat poison container.”

Just then my phone dings. I pull up the photos. It’s the fruit and the seeds I collected.

“That’s exactly what I found,” I say.

“The report doesn’t say anything about cyanide, Megan.”

“I’m more interested in the seeds and what’s in that syringe. We’re on our way to the crime lab.”

I hang up. I don’t drive through any of the towns on the way to the crime lab. It will take two and a half hours to get to Olympia as it is, and another two hours to get back to the office. The day will be shot. Ronnie calls Marley and puts it on speakerphone. He answers on the first ring.

“Crime lab. Supervisor Yang,” Marley says in a deeper voice than I remember him having. He knows it’s Ronnie’s phone and so he can’t resist reminding her how important he is.

“Marley, it’s Ronnie.”

“Oh. Hello, Ronnie. I was busy and didn’t recognize the number.”

She looks at me and cuts her eyes. “Marley, I know you must be super-busy, but I have some good news.”

“I heard,” he says. “You’re being hired full-time. Congratulations.”

“Oh, phooey,” she says, with a fake pout on her lips. “I wanted to tell you myself.”

“You still can. How about dinner tonight and we’ll celebrate your good fortune? My treat.”

She looks at me again. I mouth, “Go ahead.”

“That sounds nice. What time?”

They gab some more and I point to the evidence bags.

“Marley, I have a favor to ask. I know I’m always asking, but this is for a big case I’m working with Detective Carpenter and it will really help me.”

“Fire away, Detective Marsh,” he says, and I want to puke.

She tells him about the things I found in the motor home in Silent Ridge. She doesn’t tell him I broke in and searched, so that gives her extra points. He seems to hesitate and I think he might really be busy, but then she says the magic words.

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