“What’s she doing?” Val said, alarmed.

“She wanted to make a cup of tea,” the officer said.

“Did you let her?” Val demanded.

The officer looked stunned by Val’s outburst. “Didn’t see a reason why not.”

“Holy crap.” Val ran towards the door. “We have to get down there.” She took off down the hall with Gavin trailing. As she arrived in the kitchen, Mrs. Morgan had the cup to her lips.

“Stop!” Val shouted.

Mrs. Morgan pulled the cup away. The look on her face was of surprise rather than defiance when she swallowed.

“Mrs. Morgan,” Gavin said. “We need to ask you some questions. Your husband is dead. Claudia is dead—” Mrs. Morgan put her hand to her chest and Gavin stopped speaking as foam seeped from her mouth.

“Mrs. Morgan, are you all right?”

It only took a few seconds more for Rachel Morgan to slump and fall to the floor.

Val felt Mrs. Morgan’s neck for a pulse. “No need for paramedics. She’s dead too.”

40

“The tea was laced with enough aconite to kill a horse,” Val told Gavin. “One sip was all that was needed.”

“What’s aconite?”

“Deadly wolfbane, a poisonous plant in the nightshade family, like the angel’s trumpets. Only these have pretty purplish-blue flowers. Death is almost instantaneous with large doses. I’m surprised she had time to put the cup down.”

“Mr. Morgan? Same poison?” Gavin asked.

“Yep.”

“Claudia?”

“Yep again. If you want something to take someone out quickly, this is it. And it all came from Mrs. Morgan’s private greenhouse.” Val shook her head, still stunned by what she’d found. Yew, nightshade and more importantly, castor beans, as she would come to find out. Castor beans left Val scratching her head initially, but for Zoe, this was a huge find. She was finally able to detect the poison that killed Gabrielle: ricin.

There are no tests that can determine its presence, though, so Zoe got creative. Ricin comes from processing caster beans for castor oil. It’s part of the waste products of the procedure. Zoe looked for castor bean DNA in Gabrielle’s respiratory secretions and got a hit. “Honestly, it’s the only way to test for it,” Val explained. “She had to read several studies to even learn where to begin on this. Master poisoner at work.”

“Bridget has been questioned at length, now that she’s finally lucid enough. Her mother had been poisoning her for years. The twins and Gabrielle too.”

“You think Mrs. Morgan could have had Munchausen syndrome by proxy?” Gavin asked. Val knew what he was thinking. Was she purposely making her children sick to get sympathy for herself? It was possible Gabrielle also had Munchausen’s. It’s not uncommon for children in this type of situation to exhibit the same mental health problem.

“Maybe. Child abuser, definitely. Some of the stories Bridget told were horrifying,” Val said.