Willow raised both shoulders slightly. "That's the one thing I wanted to tell you. Maybe Chris or Aaron won't mention it you, but I thought it was strange."
"What's that?" Nic's antennae quivered.
"Even though I don't open his mail, once it's been sorted, I take it all in to Jim, and he opens it during the breaks. And that's what I did yesterday."
"Yes, yes," Nic said, trying to hurry her to the good part.
"But that package--the package with the poisonous gas--wasn't one of the ones I gave him. It was Victoria who gave it to him right before she left the studio to get her tea."
"What are you saying?" This could change everything. Nic remembered what Chris had said about Jim and Victoria arguing. "Are you saying that Victoria knew what was in there? That she gave it to him deliberately? That she's the one who caused his death?"
Willow's face crumpled. "I don't know. Maybe the mail sorter did put it in her box instead of his. But I mean--everyone knew they had had some kind of fight. They were barely speaking to each other. But, you know, Victoria is so nice! I can't see her being a--a murderer."
Nic tried to picture it through Victoria's eyes if she had been the killer. Imagined handing over the package and then walking as quickly as you could away without breaking into a run. Knowing that as soon as your coworker tore it open, he was dead. And that maybe whoever else was in the room with him would be dead as well.
But if Victoria were the killer, then she would have known just how much gas was in there. Maybe it was only enough to kill one man. And couldn't she have had a backup plan? Nic remembered what Tony had said. Had Victoria had a loaded syringe of Narcan hidden in her pocket or purse, ready to give herself the antidote if she accidentally inhaled some of the gas too?
But why had she stayed behind, stayed with Jim as he died? Was that the act of a killer?
Then Nic thought of another possibility. Maybe Victoria had decided that pretending to care would be the best alibi she would ever have. Had Jim spent his last few moments on earth drawing comfort from his killer?
Chapter 26
KNWS Radio
After Willow left, Allison said, "She dresses pretty nice for someone who works behind the scenes." She wondered if Willow came from money. Probably, since she was going to Reed.
"You know what they say:" Nicole said. "'Dress for the job you want to have: She doesn't want to always be going out to get coffee or sandwiches?'
"Yeah, she's got that hungry look," Allison agreed. "Kind of like Cassidy. But there's something else. Didn't you get the feeling we were just looking at the surface?"
"Well, she was wearing a lot of makeup."
Allison pushed Nicole's shoulder. "That's not what I meant. I don't know. It's just that she seemed artificial somehow."
"She's--what? Twenty-one or twenty-two years old." Nicole shrugged. "At that age, she's just pretending to be an adult."
There was a knock on the door, and then Victoria entered the conference room. Victoria's mixed heritage had resulted in a strikingly beautiful woman. She was tall and slender, with high cheekbones, tip-tilted eyes, and dark, straight hair that fell past her shoulders. Allison wondered how much of a coincidence it was that Victoria and Willow--the two women who worked most closely with Jim--were both so good-looking.
Victoria's black eyes were shadowed, and in her left hand she carried a crumpled tissue. "I want to help you catch whoever did this," she said as she sat down across from them.
"I was surprised to hear you on the radio yesterday morning," Allison said.
"Haven't you ever lost yourself in your work? When I'm on air, I don't have time to think about myself. Talking about Jim was like having a therapy session I didn't have to pay for."
Although she nodded sympathetically, Allison wondered just how high the ratings had been. "Tell me about the day before yesterday," she said.
"It started out like an ordinary day." Victoria blinked, and the next second tears were in her eyes and her voice was rough and sarcastic with suppressed emotion. "It was basically like every other day, only one minute I'm watching Jim die in front of my eyes, and the next some guys in white hooded suits are dragging me out of the building and spraying me down on the sidewalk with a fire hose." She dabbed at her eyes.