Page 147 - Labelle Gramercy, Detective

Airtight

the team. Even Larry had given in to the general funk. Then Toro
came in, and once again the tension level mounted. He sat down and
folded his arms, a slightly quizzical look on his craggy features.
Ray couldn’t stand it. “Out with it, man! Don’t just sit there like a
statue. What happened in there?”
Toro smiled. “They found my fingerprints, too.”
Waldo knew getting information out of him would be like pulling
teeth. “Where? On the BugOff?”
“Right. I found it in there after a few weeks. Didn’t know who put
it there, didn’t want to ask. So I left it alone.”
“My God! You could have saved Laurel’s life, if you had known
what would happen, but it would have meant terminating the trials.”
Ray was working out the implications, or trying to.
“Well, at least the police know Toro didn’t bring in the stuff in the
first place,” said Blanche. “And as for the fingerprints, that doesn’t
make him any guiltier than Waldo.”
“Thanks a lot!” Waldo pounded the table. “At least I wasn’t
personally involved with Laurel.”
Toro regarded him coldly. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Larry shook himself out of whatever introspection had been
gripping him. “Here we go again. Please, people. These accusations
and innuendoes are very counterproductive.” He looked at me. “I
don’t know if you were aware of it, Kelly, but Toro and Laurel
became very close during the past year.”
“Of course she knows,” chimed in Blanche. “You men are so
oblivious. Laurel was making a play for him even before we all locked
ourselves into that hemispheric hothouse. I only signed on a couple
of weeks before we went in there, but I could see what was going
on.”
Dr. Kapil was annoyed. “No, no, that’s not my point. The police
should realize that Toro wouldn’t want to harm a woman he was that
involved with.”
“I can’t believe you’re that naive,” said Ray, scowling ferociously.
“What percentage of murders do you think are the result of romances
gone sour?”
Larry pouted. Waldo wouldn’t let up on Toro, however. “You just
sit there listening to our dirty little secrets become exposed and
kicked around as legitimate topics for discussion by people we

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