by Izzy Gomez
Greg's face was strained. “For what?”
“Trust me that he didn’t do it. That showing him those pictures will only make things worse.” Yes, she sounded frantic. But hell, she was. How could she be expected not to use every resource she had to protect him? “Give me an hour to prove it. If I don’t have something for you, then you can use the pictures.”
His gaze searched her face. She wished she knew what he was looking for; she would tell him. She would give him whatever he wanted as long as he didn’t show Dad the pictures.
“Please, Greg.” She put everything she had into those two words. He had to trust her. “He’s my dad.”
He closed his eyes for a long moment. “One hour. If you don’t have anything for me, we’re using these.” When he opened his eyes, they held a sadness she didn't understand.
“Thank you.” She took a step closer to him, then stepped back. If he were Al or Adam or any other colleague, she would have hugged him. But she couldn’t hug Greg. She wanted it too much.
How messed up was that?
Instead she yanked open her desk drawer and pulled out her purse. “I’ll call you.”
“Voegler’s gonna have my balls on this,” he muttered.
She almost smiled as she started toward the door.
“Amanda.”
She paused and glanced over her shoulder. “Yeah?”
“I really am sorry. About all of this.”
Greg shut the door behind him, folder safely behind his back. How the hell was he going to keep Voegler from using the pictures for an entire hour?
Charlie Schreiber sat on the opposite side of the table, staring at his hands. Deep circles ringed his eyes. His hair stuck out in every direction. Hair the same blond-brown as his daughter’s.
His daughter who was getting entirely too far under Greg’s skin. He’d never felt anything like when he’d touched her a moment ago. She was like touching a live wire. Like the time his brother Phil dared him to climb the electric pole.
Greg felt the jolt every time he was near Amanda, traveling through his arms to slam his solar plexus. That day when he was nine and climbed the electric pole, he’d jerked his hand away to escape the shock, nearly falling to the cement below. Today he’d let his hand linger, letting the current warm him. But he was in just as much danger.
Focus. He needed something from Charlie so they could let him go. Even though the evidence suggested Charlie, Greg wanted to believe Amanda in a way that surely clouded his judgment. Especially considering the deal he’d made with Amanda.
Greg could feel Voegler's stare, waiting for him to throw out the crime scene photos. Instead, he put the folder on a chair and sat down.
“Let’s go over this one more time, Mr. Schreiber. When did your wife leave for Kansas City?” They'd covered it, but he needed a stall tactic. Plus, if Charlie were lying, it was a good way to trip him up.
Charlie stared at his hands, clasped together between his knees. “I told you, her flight was at nine. She left the house around seven-fifteen.”
Voegler leaned over the table, shoving his face next to Charlie’s. “And you followed her in your black Mercedes and you found her in the parking structure and you said something to make her get in the car with you and skip her flight.”
Charlie looked up and glared at Voegler. “I wasn’t even home. I was still at work.”
“So how do you know she left at seven-fifteen?” Greg asked. He silently begged Charlie to say the magic words that proved his innocence. Except what was the alternative? Amanda’s brother? Hardly any better as far as she was concerned.
“She called me right before she left.”
Pushing off the table, Voegler moved away. He leaned against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest. “OK. So she calls you, you leave work–no one’s there to see you–and drive to the airport. Where you convince her to get in the car with you.”
“No!” Anger flashed in Charlie’s eyes.
Normally Greg didn’t have any problem pushing a suspect until they cracked. Doing and saying whatever was necessary. He didn’t have time right now to think about why he felt sick watching Voegler push Charlie. Why he couldn’t seem to bring himself to join in.
Maybe if Charlie said the right thing, he could explain things and clear himself.
Christ. Greg was supposed to be the objective one.
“The thing is, we have it on surveillance tape.” Greg leaned back in his chair, hands in his lap. Non-threatening. Let Voegler play bad cop. “It’s your car she gets into. We can read the license plate. I’ll admit, since you have tinted windows, we can’t see who’s driving. But who else would it be?”
“I don’t know.” Charlie moved his hands in a helpless gesture. “I…I don’t know.”
Greg leaned forward, elbows on the table. Made his face sympathetic. And he was sympathetic. For Amanda’s sake, he wanted Charlie to be innocent.
“I want to believe you. But the evidence we have says you did it.”
Voegler’s glare burned his neck, but Greg didn’t look at his temporary partner. Voegler couldn't like this approach. He was an in-your-face guy.
“Maybe someone, I don’t know, stole my car and got her. Maybe someone’s trying to frame me.” Charlie’s voice rose an octave, becoming a squeak.
Voegler snorted. “It's funny. Our prisons are overflowing with innocent people who were framed. And all the bad guys get away with it and are out on the streets. A shame, when you think about it, when perfectly good cops can’t do their jobs.”
“I know it sounds crazy. But I also know I didn’t kill my wife. I loved her. How could I kill her? How could I live with myself? How could I do that to our children?” Charlie started nearly panting as his gaze swung back and forth between Voegler and Greg.
Greg reached across the table. He felt like a real ass. A first for him when questioning a suspect. “OK, calm down. We’re not going to accomplish anything if we get all wound up.” He stood, picking up the folder beneath him. “Why don’t we take a break. Detective Voegler and I will leave you alone for a minute and you can think about what else you might have to tell us.”
Shoulders deflating, Charlie dropped his chin and nodded.
Greg nodded toward the door. Voegler followed him out.
“What the fuck, Cole?” Voegler whirled and got in Greg’s face. “You practically told the guy you think he’s innocent.”
Greg refused to let Voegler’s temper get him riled up. “I do.”
“Despite the evidence?” Voegler shoved his hand through his hair.
“What evidence? Hank could have taken his car. His alibi’s as bad as Charlie’s. And what else do we have? Some type AB, like Charlie and Hank. So what? Yeah, AB is rare, but they’re not the only two people in town with AB.” He looked through the window. Charlie rested his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands. He looked utterly destroyed. Like a man who’d lost his wife. Not like a man who’d killed his wife.
Killers could be cunning. They fooled cops all the time. But Greg usually could tell when he was being played. And his gut, along with a dash of wishful thinking for Amanda, said Charlie was innocent.
“I don’t think he has it in him.”
Voegler scoffed at him. “Fine. Let him squirm a little longer, then we’ll show him those. See how he reacts.” He flicked the folder in Greg’s hand.
“I promised Amanda we wouldn’t. Not yet.”
Voegler let out a growl of frustration. “What. The. Fuck? This isn’t Amanda’s case. She can't stay objective. And promising to be nice to Daddy isn’t going to get you in her pants.”
Chapter 10
Before he could control his surge of temper, Greg grabbed Voegler by the collar and pinned him against the wall. “I am not trying to get in her pants.”
Just because he’d imagined her in the shower with him that morning didn’t mean he wanted in her pants.
Voegler struggled against Greg’s grip.
Letting go of
Voegler’s shirt, Greg stepped back. “I’m trying to help out a fellow cop.”
They glared at each other, breathing heavy. He sure as hell wasn’t going to be the one who lost the staring contest.
Finally Voegler let out a huff of breath. “Brown will have your ass if she hears about this.”
“I gave Amanda an hour. That’s it.” Greg stepped back.
“To do what?”
“Find something we missed. Evidence he didn’t do it.” Greg scratched at his jaw and once again looked through the window at Charlie. He hadn’t moved. “If we haven’t heard from her in an hour,” he checked his watch, “a half hour now, then we show him the pictures.”
Greg could feel Voegler watching him but couldn’t look away from Charlie. Bent in on himself, he looked like he literally carried the weight of the world on his back. In two days, he’d lost his wife, discovered she was unfaithful and was now the primary suspect. Which was fine if he did kill his wife. But was tragic if he didn’t.
“Amanda and I have been partners for four years,” Voegler said. “She’s a good partner, a good cop and a good person. But I’m not going to throw this case because I like her. And at the end of the day, she wouldn’t want that. So you better know what you’re doing.”
Voegler grabbed the folder from Greg’s hand and opened the door to the interrogation room. Charlie didn’t look up.
Voegler pointed the folder at Greg. “Half an hour. That’s it.”
The house was too quiet. Eerie. Like it knew death had visited.
The silence vanished as Rocky bounded down the stairs, whining in excitement.
Amanda scratched his head, barely paying him attention. She had less than forty-five minutes to prove her dad’s innocence. What could she possibly find that CSU hadn’t?
Greg’s concerned eyes flashed in her memory. She didn’t know why, but he wanted her dad to be innocent. Now she had to prove it.
Piece of cake.
Earlier, Greg had snuck her one of the reports. They’d scoured the first and second floors. Upended Dad’s basement workshop. Gone through the laundry. Prowled the closets and garage.
And found exactly nothing. No rope like the fibers in Karen's wrists. No bloody clothes. Just fingerprints galore of the entire family.
Amanda wandered up the stairs, Rocky trotting behind her. She went into Karen’s office, hoping for inspiration. She rifled through the papers on the desk, went through all the desk drawers. Nothing.
The closet door stood open, so she looked in there. Three racks of shoes were missing.
Karen was a shoe person and kept the overflow in her office closet because there wasn’t enough room in the enormous walk-in closet in the bedroom. She'd also kept extra cocktail dresses in the office, all of which were gone.
Along with Amanda’s wedding dress.
Zack broke their engagement after Amanda bought the dress so she’d been stuck with it. She’d wanted to sell it online or donate it. But Karen talked her into keeping it.
“You never know. You could find another man willing to marry you.”
One of the nicest things Karen ever said to her.
She might as well look for the missing dresses and shoes. Maybe their being moved was significant. She checked the closets in all the other bedrooms but came up empty. Which left the attic.
Karen wouldn’t leave her beloved shoes in the non-climate-controlled attic, would she? The fancy dresses? The wedding dress Amanda was supposed to keep, just in case?
Worth a look. It wasn’t like she was overwhelmed with other possibilities.
After pulling down the ladder from the ceiling, she climbed up to the stale, muggy attic. The naked bulbs cast a harsh glare over the boxes and piles of junk deemed unworthy of a garage sale or Goodwill.
Immediately the shoe racks caught her eye. All three stood next to the boxes of camping gear they hadn’t used in twenty years.
Next to catch her eye was a garment rack. Various outfits hung from the single silver bar, along with four garment bags, presumably the missing dresses. And, not deemed worthy of a protective bag, Amanda’s wedding dress. Looking at the yards of white satin left her as cold as her earlier encounter with Zack.
She hadn’t wanted to get married, to Zack or to anyone, but when he asked she didn’t know how to say no. She wasn’t ready to end things either.
She couldn’t stop herself from wandering over to the dress. She ran her hands over the simple bodice. Fingered the delicate fake pearls along the waistband. Fluffed the layers and layers of skirt.
Propelled by the sway of the dress, the rack rolled to the side. She reached to steady it and looked down to make sure the dress wasn’t dragging on the dirty plywood floor.
And froze.
Her heart pounded in her chest and in her gut as she dropped to her knees. Shuffled to a different angle so she didn’t block the light. Bent down to get a close look.
Blood.
What looked like a bloodstain darkened the floor where the rack had been. It appeared recent; the lab could verify that.
She shoved at sleeping bags and boxes nearby and uncovered two more small stains.
Pulse racing, she jumped to her feet. This had to be where Karen was held & tortured.
Amanda looked up at the ceiling beams. She wasn't tall enough, so she dragged over the trunk filled with Emily’s old dolls.
Standing on the trunk, Amanda inspected the beam directly over the stains. There were faint grooves in the wood and what looked like rope fibers.
Bingo!
Backing away from the evidence, she fished in her pocket for her phone. She climbed down the ladder, trying to keep her legs from shaking with relief.
If Karen was held in the attic, there was no way Dad was guilty. He had a hip replacement two years ago and couldn’t climb the ladder. He hadn’t been in the attic in over two years. Which meant he didn’t kill Karen.
Amanda trembled with nervous energy as she waited for Greg to answer his cell. She bounded down the stairs and paced the living room.
Deciding it was a game, Rocky joined her, making excited noises and nipping at her hand.
“Greg Cole.”
“He didn’t do it.” Oh thank God thank God thank God she could say it with certainty. “I know where Karen was killed.”
They had one strand of hair. One three-inch strand of hair found under their victim, Martina Ryder. Too dark to be hers. Amazingly, the follicle was still attached.
But, unless Amanda and O'Donnell came up with a suspect to compare the DNA to, or won the crime-solving lottery and their suspect was in the system, the DNA would amount to diddly squat.
And as far as suspects went, they had exactly that: diddly squat. And no clue where to start. If this were her and Al’s case, they’d sit down and start spinning theories, no matter how ridiculous, until they came up with something. But O’Donnell didn’t work that way. Despite the constant pressure to clear cases, O'Donnell didn't work, period, on weekends.
Amanda pushed her fingers into her eyes until dark spots danced behind her lids. She tried to turn off the static in her mind, tune out the noise around her. She inhaled slowly. Deep.
Gradually the tension trickled out of her face. Her forehead muscles eased. Her headache began to recede.
“You look like you’re ready to call it a day.”
At the sound of Greg’s smooth voice, tension of a different sort wound through Amanda. She moved her hand from her eyes and opened them. As the dots of color faded from her vision, his face came into focus.
He looked down at her with steady eyes and a half-smile.
Her stomach see-sawed.
“I think I crossed that line about a week ago.” She tried to return his smile.
He propped his hip on her desk. “You need to give yourself a break. Let yourself relax and not think about work for a little while. Or the pressure will crush you.” His face turned serious as their eyes met. “Trust me, I know all too well what I’m talking
about.”
She closed her eyes again and took another deep breath, this one for courage, then forced the words out before she could think about all the reasons this was a bad idea. “Do you want to grab dinner?” She tried to make the question casual, but the twisting heat inside her didn’t feel casual. The tightening of her skin didn't feel casual. She forced herself to meet his eyes.
Behind the twinkle, she might’ve detected a spark of something more. Something matching the edginess she felt being near him.
“I was thinking about heading out to get some food,” he said. “I actually came over to ask if you’d be willing to keep me company.”
Dinner. With Greg Cole. She'd asked first, but maybe it was a bad idea. Could she even eat in his presence? He twisted her up so much inside.
Her stomach rumbled, reminding her it had been hours since she ingested anything but coffee. Yeah, she could eat. Maybe if she went with him, she could pretend she was a normal person who did normal things on a Saturday night. Like go on a date.
She pulled her purse out of her drawer. "Dinner sounds great."
Normal. Was it even possible?
“How was the steak sandwich?” Greg leaned back in his chair, taking a sip of beer as he watched Amanda across the table. White strings of light adorned the restaurant patio, casting her hair in a thousand different colors, the breeze sifting it around her face. Her eyes twinkled.
“Perfect. You can’t go wrong with beer cheese sauce.”
Greg nodded. “So true.”
He wanted to take his time, savor both his beer and their conversation. At the same time, he wanted to drag her to the car, break every speed limit on the way to his house, throw her down on the bed and spend the whole night inside her.
No woman had ever hit him this hard, this fast. It simultaneously thrilled and terrified him.
They’d kept the conversation light all through dinner, exchanging silly stories, horrors from cases they’d worked, childhood memories. He’d even gotten her to flirt a little. And smile a lot.
And damn if he wasn’t a complete sucker for her when she smiled. She went from pretty to knock-him-off-his-feet stunning with a curve of her lips. Lips he wanted to spend the next decade tasting.
