Defensive Wounds Read online

“Not really, but it’s one possible explanation for how the killer got a key to the Presidential Suite. The computer records whenever a new card is programmed, but we only looked at the past week. If it’s further back than that, we might never stumble on it.”

  “I thought they changed the codes every time someone checks out.”

  “I thought so, too, but that’s not the passkey code. Though that’s changed as well—I can’t quite picture how it all works anyway, all those little magnetized electrons zipping around, so I’m left checking out the remaining court cases of the dearly departed for possible suspects. Do you have a minute?”

  “Um … sure.”

  “Got comfortable shoes? I have another crate like this one—could you help me carry them two city blocks? Then I’ll walk you back to your car. You parked on the street?”

  Theresa answered in the affirmative all the way around and accepted the blue plastic crate, waiting while he retrieved the second from the conference room, a little energized to find herself alone with Neil Kelly. But she still needed her cousin. She needed somebody. But she never liked to disturb Frank when he could be in the middle of an interview. He might have worked on someone for an hour to get the guy to a point where he was ready to spill some incredibly useful fact, only to have that intimate, confessional spell broken by the digitally rendered theme from Psycho.

  So she lifted the crate with energy born of nerves and followed the detective down the elevator and through the vast lobby, exiting onto Lakeside Avenue. Neil turned left, and she followed. He made a few attempts at small talk, but she wasn’t in the mood for that, instead recapping her hair and fiber analyses from the two murders. She also gave him the heads-up, as lead detective, about the DNA analysis of the black hair. She’d looked up the Tamika Johnson case, finding Marcus Dean’s name in the reports. He had identified his sister’s body.

  Neil Kelly stopped walking, his face darkening, and for one moment she thought he was going to shout at her. Then it passed, replaced by weariness and a deep worry. “Damn. Damn. Damn.”

  “Yes,” she agreed.

  “He didn’t do it, I’m telling you. I know the guy.”

  “I don’t want to believe it, either—”

  “No. There’s no ‘want to’ about it. He didn’t do it. There’s got to be some mistake. You said the results were preliminary.”

  “Yes—”

  “Don’t talk to anyone about this, then. No one. If the press gets ahold of it … If we arrest him, all cops are monsters. If we don’t arrest him, then cops covered up for their brother cop. Either way we suck.”

  “I would never talk about an open investigation, not to the media or anyone else.”

  He calmed, started walking again. “Of course. Sorry.”

  “But Bruce Raffel was the attorney in the case. What about other people in Tamika’s family?”

  “Yeah, we just went over that one. But her oldest child would still only be about ten now, and her mother’s pushing seventy. Baby daddy took a hike years ago.”

  “It would have to be a blood relative anyway.”

  “Oh, yeah. If she had anyone else, they didn’t show up in court.”

  She shifted her crate to the other hip. “Maybe he’ll give us a DNA sample.”

  “Maybe. Your cousin was going to have a quick chat with him about it before he blew out of town. I’ll see what he and Angela think of the conversation before we go asking a cop to hand over a mouth swab. Thanks for giving me the heads-up. And thanks for the help with these boxes—this way I don’t have to make a second trip, and I’ve seen enough of the homicide unit for a few hours. We may have a psycho killer slaughtering defense attorneys at the Ritz-Carlton, but most of us pulled an all-nighter last night, and I can’t do two of those in a row anymore. It’s kind of hard to believe,” he added.

  “That all-nighters get exponentially harder after you pass forty?” They turned right on West Third Street.

  “That we’re all working so hard to find out who killed these two, when killing them was more or less a public service.”

  “Neil—”

  “Yeah, I know, I’m not supposed to say that out loud. But we’re all thinking it, right? Even you.” He glanced over at her.

  She got a better grip on the crate as they crossed above a set of train tracks. “Where are we going?”

  “My place, at the end of this street. I promised you two city blocks, and I keep my promises. Truthfully, tell me you’ve shed any tears for Marie Corrigan.” He stopped again, turning to her. “I saw your face when you looked at her. Admit it.”

  There are things we won’t admit, even to ourselves.

  She couldn’t confess to feeling hatred, something her mother had trained her to believe unacceptable. She couldn’t admit that some human lives were better ended sooner rather than later, something religion and most political theory had trained her to believe unacceptable.

  So she punted, once again shifting the weight of the box she held. “I’m lucky that the relative personal worth of Marie Corrigan is not my problem. I’m not in the habit of attaching emotion to our victims. If I did, I’d have to get into another line of work.”

  He simply leaned closer, until their plastic crates bumped and joined, holding her gaze with an intensity to which she’d grown completely unaccustomed. “Tell me the truth.”

  She gulped. Felt ridiculous for doing so. “No, I’m not shedding any tears. But I’m still trying to find her killer. So are you.”

  He straightened. “Guess that makes us a bit schizophrenic, then.”

  “No. It makes us professional.”

  They passed the Cleveland Browns Stadium, empty and quiet, the breeze from the lake in front of them fresh and clean against her face. “There aren’t any places at the end of the street.”

  “Think I’m leading you astray, do ya?”

  “Do you slip into that hint of a brogue for comic effect, or were you actually born overseas?”

  “I was born on the wild moors of Elgin, Illinois. I guess I just picked it up from my Irish grandpa. That’s your line of work making you suspicious of everyone. I come by any accent honestly, and there are places at the end of this street—see?”

  She saw only the lake, a warehouse, a small collection of boats.

  “Second from the end, with the blue flag at the top of the mast.”

  “You live on a boat?”

  “I do. Don’t look like that, it’s not as if I’m homeless. Similar, perhaps.” She followed him down a set of wooden steps to a concrete dock. It couldn’t be called a marina, even, only a loose assortment of bobbing watercraft. Two had company names stenciled on their sides, one appeared to be an emergency towing vehicle, and then a houseboat that seemed to be held together by duct tape and chewing gum. Neil’s sailboat appeared, in the diminishing light, to be in good repair if one overlooked the scuffs on the bow and a bait bucket that smelled as if it hadn’t been emptied in a while. But the deck was clear, and a sturdy door secured the cabin below. It rocked gently from side to side as he stepped over the gunwale, then turned to take her crate from her. “I intended this to be temporary, only a rent-saving idea to tide me over during the divorce, but I got used to it. It’s close to work, and I always hated cutting grass anyway.”

  She took the hand he offered and stepped down to the deck, realizing too late that she had no real reason to stay. “Doesn’t it get cold in the winter?”

  “Extremely. I need someone to keep me warm.”

  She tried to look stern and not smile.

  “So I’m thinking of getting a collie. Or a retriever, shorter hair. Want a drink?”

  Now she did grin. “I’d love one, but I have to drive home. My daughter’s going to wonder where I am.” She felt her smile disappear at the thought. “And I need to know where she is.”

  “She seemed like a sensible girl to me,” he said, in what sounded like a very subtle reproach.

  “The problem isn’t her. Need some help carrying them
below?”

  “Yes. No, truthfully. I didn’t really need help to get them here. I just wanted an excuse to show you my cool bachelor pad.”

  “And it’s very cool,” she said with a laugh, relieved at his honesty. Moving into even closer quarters with him would be dangerous, and she had enough danger in her life at present. She should leave now. Right now.

  Instead she turned and walked to the outer side of the deck, feeling the cool evening breeze caress her face. She didn’t want to leave. She wanted to spend a lot more time with Neil Kelly, who moved behind her and stood close enough to make her painfully aware of that fact.

  “So what’s the problem, then?”

  “I … um—I sort of take a long time to get used to people,” she began, wondering how to phrase this. Even though she found him attractive, she almost certainly wouldn’t act on it, because she didn’t let people close, not ever. Other people, through no fault of their own, were never what you thought you wanted. Best to avoid the whole circus.

  No matter how tempted—

  “I meant with your daughter,” he said.

  “Oh, that.” Relief with disappointment. “Well, that’s a long story.”

  He turned her to face him, very gently, arms fully extended to keep her at arms’ length. He didn’t draw her close, didn’t touch her face. He only said, “Tell me.”

  So she did.

  I might need his help, she justified, as well as a little perspective. Frank was too close to the situation, too close to her and Rachael. She could talk to Angela, of course, but Angela didn’t have those ropes of muscle underneath the skin on her forearms and eyes that Theresa could get lost in.

  She told him about Rachael’s new friend, about Jenna Simone’s murder, about the trial and his representation by Marie Corrigan.

  Whatever Neil Kelly had been expecting her to relate, the tale of William Rosedale could not have been it. He appeared by turns surprised, bewildered, and then very, very concerned. By the end of her brief summation, he had slumped to the gunwale, pensive. “Tell her to quit, go home, and never see the guy again. Though I don’t see how he could have killed Marie Corrigan. The restaurant chef said they were insanely busy Tuesday night and none of his staff took even a smoke break from five o’clock until ten-thirty or so, which is about our entire window.”

  “It wouldn’t have taken long. And time of death can’t be fixed that accurately.”

  “True, but he would never have had access to the Presidential Suite.”

  “Unless—” She forced herself to choke it out. “Someone at the front desk made him a key.”

  Rachael worked at the front desk. But Rachael would have made the connection as soon as Marie Corrigan turned up dead. It was unthinkable.

  Wasn’t it?

  “But no one did. That would have been recorded in the mainframe, and it wasn’t. No one made a key. And why on earth would he kill Bruce Raffel?”

  Theresa could breathe again. “Good points. Truly, I don’t think William murdered either of the lawyers. All I know is I do think he killed Jenna Simone.”

  “Rachael’s got to get away from him.”

  “I know. Problem is, that ain’t gonna fly with her. My daughter can’t be rerouted when she feels she’s right.”

  “You mean like her mother, who blacked out an entire hotel?” He gave her a gentle smile. “So you think she’ll side with him?”

  She let her knees sway with the boat as a wave pushed at the stern. “Yes. I know her, despite what she thinks, despite what I sometimes think myself. I know when she’s serious about something. She’s serious about this boy.”

  He stood up, closing the short distance between them once again. He didn’t try to talk her down. Like the majority of people in law enforcement, he knew that the most obvious suspect was almost always the right one. “First of all, you have to stop calling him a boy. He’s a monster in boy’s clothing, and you have to make her see that. Show her the crime-scene photos, take her to the girl’s grave.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “You’ll do whatever you have to do to keep her safe. Won’t you?”

  Even if Rachael never spoke to her again, even if she dropped out of school and withheld all future grandchildren. “Yes.”

  Now he did touch her face, letting his fingers rest on the edge of her jaw. “Good. Since that’s settled, I think there’s something else we should discuss.”

  “Yes.”

  The lake breeze did nothing to cool her skin as his thumb traced the very edge of her lower lip.

  “Or not,” he said.

  Nothing shocks the system like the first kiss of someone new, that electric brush of the unknown, and Theresa’s knees threatened to buckle at the pleasure of it. He touched her only with his mouth and one hand, lips that tasted slightly of coffee stroking and prodding until she broke down and put her hands on his chest, sliding them around to his back. Then an incredible sensation of his fingers on her stomach, her hips, the small of her back, until they were pressed together from shoulder to groin and the breath went out of her, and in a few minutes her brain felt obligated to mention that she was grinding against him in full view of the city of Cleveland.

  When his lips trailed down her neck, she asked herself what the hell she thought she was doing. She barely knew the man, and he was a cop. They were generally trustworthy in every area except this one.

  “Come belowdecks with me,” he murmured.

  “No!” The idea rattled her system so that she stepped back, one foot stumbling over the bait bucket, and Neil had to grab her quickly to keep her from falling into the lake. Fortunately, he seemed to take this discombobulation as a compliment.

  “Okay, okay. I only planned to make coffee, since it’s getting chilly up here. I didn’t mean it as an assumption of your virtue or ease of same.”

  Words poured out with a giggle. “I’m sorry, but I really have to go … My daughter … I like … I like your boat—”

  He gave her nose one very light tap. “Okay. That will do for a start, anyway.”

  And so she grinned wickedly as they climbed back onto the dock, strolled past the stadium, and most of the way up West Third Street. She grinned even harder when he would slide an arm around her shoulders for ten or twelve paces. Amazing how one could walk the planet for forty-odd years and still feel like a schoolgirl. The breeze carried the scent of freedom, and the city glittered like Oz.

  At her car he trapped her in the acute angle of the open door. “Thank you for a very interesting, if too brief, evening, Ms. MacLean. I believe we’ll have to do this again, leaving out the ‘brief’ part.”

  “Absolutely. As soon as we find out who’s killing lawyers and get my daughter away from her new friend.”

  He frowned at that. “Can’t guarantee I’m willing to wait.”

  She protested when he bent to kiss her, gesturing up at the many lit windows of the Justice Center. “Someone might see us. Bad enough for me, but you have to work here.”

  “And your cousin will kick my ass, I know. I don’t care.” He kissed her anyway, letting his mouth explore hers until she leaned on the car roof for support, and breaking away proved difficult and prolonged. “I don’t hide who I am, Theresa.”

  Then he went and stood on the curb until she started up the car and pulled away. When she turned the corner onto Ontario, she caught sight of him in the rearview mirror and for several minutes could form no coherent thoughts at all.

  CHAPTER 24

  *

  Theresa patted the dog and scratched the cat before dumping her purse on the counter. Rachael’s work shoes were by the door, and no messages blinked from the digital recorder.

  No sound from upstairs. Rachael had probably gone next door to hit up her grandmother for some dinner, always a more reliable source than her I-hate-to-cook mother. So Theresa changed clothes, washed her face, and walked up the grassy knoll to the house in which she’d grown up.

  Her mother stood at the stove ove
r a pan of yellow-colored liquid with the consistency of gravy. “What is that?” Theresa asked.

  “It’s an experiment.” Sixty-seven years on the planet had not begun to dull Agnes’s appetite for learning. Theresa, on the other hand, sometimes felt she had absorbed all the information possible and her brain had locked its doors and turned off the porch light. But perhaps it had more to do with the nature of the information.

  “I’m trying a mint-infused custard puff,” her mother said. “How was your day? Rachael said you found another dead lawyer. You have some sort of serial killer?”

  The experimental nature of the dish didn’t put Theresa off. A true foodie, Agnes often devised new dishes for the diner where she worked, and even her failures were edible, while her successes were something to celebrate.

  “Apparently. Either these two were involved in something that ticked off the wrong person or someone really doesn’t like lawyers. I keep trying to think of a serial killer who targeted people of a certain profession, and I can’t think of any. Except for prostitutes and real-estate agents, professions that make it easy to get the victims alone and isolated. That’s a choice of convenience. But I don’t know of any cases where someone targeted lawyers or doctors or used-car salesmen.”

  Agnes stirred, the glossy, buff-colored stuff churning and changing with each pass of the wooden spoon. “It happens on TV every other week.”

  “Of course it does. But in real life, not so much.” Theresa’s finger crept toward the shining, perfect surface of the custard.

  “Hot,” her mother warned. “Maybe the guy is killing hotel guests and they both just happened to be lawyers.”

  “That’s one theory. Hotels are tailor-made for crime—nothing but strangers coming and going, multiple exits, good soundproofing. If the killer had started up next week—or checked in to the hotel next week—the odds might be equally good that he would kill two video-game designers, or aluminum salesmen, or members of a visiting football team.”

  “But you don’t think so.”

  “Too many people really wanted to kill Marie Corrigan. It would be ironic for her to be murdered by some random psychopath with no personal grudge. And this feels personal.”