Free Tea with Milk and Murder (Oxford Tearoom Mysteries ~ Book 2) by H.Y. Hanna Page A

though, it was cold and bare—but it would serve our purposes.
    “What do you know about Jon Kelsey?” said Devlin without preamble.
    “I don’t know much about him,” I said cautiously. “Cassie’s only been dating him for a few weeks.”
    “You said at the party that you didn’t like him.”
    “I… No, not really,” I admitted. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean anything,” I added quickly.
    “No,” Devlin agreed. “But I have a lot of respect for your instincts, Gemma.”
    I flushed with pleasure. “Is Jon a suspect in the murder?”
    “Anyone who had any connection with the girl is considered a suspect until proven innocent,” said Devlin. “In this case, it’s certainly curious that she had a past connection to Jon Kelsey and died in his gallery.”
    “And the post-mortem? Have you got the results back yet?”
    Devlin regarded me silently for a moment, as if trying to make up his mind, then he said, “It’s definitely a suspicious death. There’s going to be an inquest. And yes, the belief is that she was poisoned.”
    Poisoned.
    That word hung in the air between us. It still sounded far too surreal and melodramatic and yet each time it was mentioned, it seemed to become a bit more real. And this wasn’t just the lurid speculation of a bunch of little old ladies anymore—this was the cold hard conclusion of a forensic pathologist.
    “So was it cyanide? That almond smell—”
    “They’re not sure yet,” said Devlin. “The toxicology analysis takes time.”
    “I don’t understand—why can’t you just look for the poison?”
    Devlin gave an impatient sigh. “It’s not that simple… Real life isn’t like what you see on TV. You can’t just run one test which will give you the exact name of the poison. You’ve got to do a bunch of tests and that will only tell you the general type of toxin to start with.”
    I frowned in confusion. “What do you mean, general type?”
    “It’s like… if the sample tests positive for heavy metals, it could be copper… or mercury… or lead, but you don’t know which one. So you have to test for each of those individually and that can take days, even weeks.”
    “But… don’t you just have fancy machines nowadays which you plug the sample into and it tells you the poison in it?”
    Devlin rolled his eyes. “You’ve really watched too many episodes of CSI. It’s not just about the machines—anyone can run machines! It’s about the interpretation, the skill in reading the results. Samples might be contaminated, or it might be something that already exists in trace amounts in our bodies… like arsenic. We all have a bit of arsenic in our bodies, so the toxicologist has to take that into account.
    “But,” Devlin conceded, “knowing what to look for does help to speed things up. I’ve briefed the toxicologist to look for cyanide. So we should hopefully get the results for that soon. In the meantime, we can assume that Sarah Waltham was deliberately poisoned, possibly by someone at the party.”
    “So who’s the prime suspect? That girl, Fiona?”
    Devlin hesitated, then said, “I really shouldn’t be sharing details of the investigation with you, Gemma… but as you were so helpful on the last case and I know I can trust you to keep things confidential… Yes, Fiona Stanley is one of the key suspects.”
    “Did you know that she and Sarah were fellow students? They’re both doing Fine Art. The Old Biddies said there was bad blood between them.”
    “The Old Biddies?”
    I laughed. “Sorry, I forgot—it’s a nickname Cassie and I have for Mabel and her cronies.”
    “The Old Nosies might be more accurate,” said Devlin dryly. “But as usual, their information is spot-on. Yes, I questioned Fiona last night. I gather that she didn’t like Sarah much, but that’s hardly surprising. From what I’ve heard so far, Sarah Waltham was not a particularly likeable character. She was also a total snob and liked to lord it over the