I'll Take Care of You by Caitlin Rother Read Free Book Online Page B

she left the store. There is something wrong with her.
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    The next morning, Sue McLaughlin went to pick up her oldest daughter, Kim, from the airport. When Kim arrived at the house after her ridiculously long flight from Japan, she met Kevin halfway into the foyer, dropped her duffel bag, and embraced him. Then she grabbed him by the arms and looked him in the eye.
    â€œOh, my God, Kevin, what happened?” she asked. “What do you know about these keys?”
    But Kevin just shook his head. He had no idea who had left them in the door and on the mat.

CHAPTER 7
    As soon as they cleared the crime scene, Detectives Bill Hartford and David Szkaradek drove to Santa Barbara that Saturday to interview Jacob Horowitz.
    Horowitz gave them an alibi for the night of the murder, saying he’d gone to the barber, then to Vons, and returned home to spend the evening with his wife.
    The detectives explained that they’d found documentation of the complex legal battle between the two former partners, and they’d traveled up the coast to question him. The litigation, they said, seemed like a pretty good motive to kill Bill.
    Asked if Bill had ever threatened him, Horowitz said, “Way back in ’82, he said, ‘If you don’t do this . . . I’ll sue you,’ which he did.”
    Horowitz confirmed that he knew of others who had also been involved in litigation with Bill, but he declined to elaborate or speculate, noting that it was a matter of public record. He also declined to discuss his personal relationship with Bill or whether he felt bitter toward Bill. Even though he had no attorney present, he said, he believed he’d already answered the detectives’ questions about his business relationship with Bill as truthfully and fully as he could.
    As for any character discussions, he said, “I wouldn’t have anything complimentary to say,” so he preferred to say nothing.
    He acknowledged that Bill’s death did surprise him initially. “It’s a shocking thing. And I’m sorry to hear it.” But upon reflection, he said, he wasn’t all that surprised.
    â€œThe way he conducted himself or his business activities, do you think he would cause someone to go to that extreme?” one of the detectives asked.
    â€œI’m no expert in that kind of thing,” Horowitz said coyly.
    Still hoping Horowitz would open up, the detectives said they’d interviewed others who volunteered that they didn’t care for Bill and who also weren’t surprised by the way he died “due to the way he treated other people.”
    â€œIf other people have told you that, that does not surprise me,” Horowitz said. “I would not dispute their opinion.”
    In contrast, Horowitz described Bill’s ex-wife as a “marvelous, dignified person” and a “nice lady.”
    After the detectives confirmed Horowitz’s whereabouts the night of the murder, he was no longer a prime suspect, unless they found some incriminating evidence, such as proof that he’d hired a hit man.
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    Meanwhile, Detectives Tom Voth and Steven Van Horn drove to Las Vegas to search Bill’s house and to talk with his Realtor, David Mitchell, one of the few people Bill interacted with there.
    Mitchell said he’d met Bill several years earlier when he was looking to buy property. He’d sold Bill one home on Harbor Cove to live in and one more as an investment. Since then, he said, they’d become friends.
    During a search of Bill’s house, Voth found a safe in the bedroom closet, where Bill kept paperwork for a trust fund that showed a balance of $488,000, as of October 1990. He also found a promissory note, signed by Nanette and dated July 20, 1991, that showed he’d loaned her $35,000. (Detectives later learned that about a month after she’d moved in with Bill, she’d paid her ex-husband, K. Ross Johnston, $28,000 of the