“I’ve been fortunate not to lose anyone real close to me.” Sara went with the truth. “But I can imagine what you are going through.”
“Well, it’s rough.”
She was relieved that Nicki didn’t retort with some comment about how Sara could never imagine.
She finished her stretches, and Nicki handed her a twenty-pound weight.
“Time for goblet squats.” Nicki demonstrated, holding the weight vertically in front of her chest. “You can hold the dumbbell horizontally instead, if that’s more comfortable for you.”
Sara performed a few squats, her brain searching for the perfect thing to say that might get Nicki to open up but not feel threatened. “It helps a little to know you’re not alone in your grief.” Sara decided that could be a good start. The statement might seem innocent enough on the surface, but it was a fishing expedition. Sara was hoping that Nicki might mention Mitch.
“True.”
So much for that working…
Step-ups on a twenty-four-inch platform were next. Not Sara’s favorite exercise, grueling, considering that height reached about knee level. But it gave her nice legs and sculpted her bu—
“Great form. Seven more.”
It seemed since Nicki wasn’t going to bring up Mitch, Sara would have to if she wanted anything on that front. She just wasn’t sure she did right now. “Has Levi or Mitch reached out to you?” She put it conversationally, between pants for breath.
“Oh, no, Levi wasn’t my biggest fan.”
“And Mitch? You two went to school together.” Sara was getting a little winded, but the cardio high felt good. I must be a tad sadistic…
“That feels like ages ago.”
“But you keep in touch?”
Nicki stopped counting Sara’s reps and stood in front of her. “Why are you asking something you know the answer to?”
Sara brought both her legs down to the floor. It was there in Nicki’s eyes and her demeanor. There’d be no avoiding this conversation any longer. Sara put a little space between them, keeping a firm grip on the dumbbell. She’d use it as a weapon if she had to. “Mitch told our investigator he was with you at the time Katie was killed. Is that true?”
Nicki’s chin quivered, and she started crying, her shoulders heaving. “I’m a horrible friend.”
When a person cried, Sara was usually moved to console them, but she kept her distance. “Talk to me.”
“I loved Mitch back in high school. Well, both Katie and I did. He didn’t pay attention to either of us. I had braces and a mouth full of metal. Katie was heavy until senior year, and Mitch…well, he was on the football team surrounded by skinny, beautiful cheerleaders with perfect teeth.” Nicki paused a moment and took a few composing breaths. “When I told you Katie wasn’t going to leave Levi because she was afraid of him, that wasn’t really the truth. She loved all the material things he’d lavish on her. She didn’t deserve Mitch. She was just toying around with him, and I hated that.”
Enough to kill her?
“Why did you lie to us about Levi? You even told us you thought he killed Katie.”
Nicki sniffled. “I just figured he might have reason to want Katie dead. Maybe she had ended things, and I didn’t know?” she suggested. “Or was jealous of her being with Mitch?”
The questions were stacking up for Sara. If Nicki hadn’t killed her friend, was she protecting Mitch as they’d thought before? But what would be Mitch’s motive to kill Katie? Jimmy had made it clear with his call last night that Mitch wasn’t emotionally invested. It sure seemed that Nicki was, but did she have what it took to kill her best friend? Then again, Nicki wasn’t the only one protecting someone. What if Chandra had put on a performance last night to take their focus from Levi? But she had to know it would only cast a spotlight on her. Then again, as Chandra had said, love overlooks transgressions.
She and Sean needed to talk to Chandra again, and the sooner, the better. Sara hurried from the room, calling out behind her. “I’ve got to go. Sorry. Just lock up behind you.”
“Okay?” Nicki sounded baffled, but Sara wasn’t going to fill her in.
Sara hurried through the house and grabbed her ID and keys on the way out. If she put her foot to the pedal, she could probably get to the Corning City Preserve in twenty minutes.
-
Chapter 25
TEST OF STAMINA
The fall sun was already up and beating on the back of Sean’s neck. Combing the hillside was hard—and hot—work. It felt even more taxing because he hadn’t found a single thing yet that he deemed as evidence in Katie’s death. And he’d been thorough, covering the ground in a grid pattern—something he’d learned from his days with the Albany PD and working alongside forensic investigators. One thing he could say with certainty was the path above him didn’t have much traffic, even early morning.
“Sean.”
He recognized the voice as Sara’s right away and looked up to the top of the hill. She was standing there, staring down at him, a vision in yoga pants and T-shirt, her long brown hair in a ponytail. “What are you doing here?” He worked to close the distance between them, cognizant of his steps, as he made his way up the steep incline.
“What is it?” he asked the second he reached her. “Is everything all right?”
“We need to talk to Chandra again.” She sounded breathless, excited about what she had to share.
“I’m listening.”
“Last night, we considered that Chandra killed Katie because she wanted to be more than friends with Levi. But what if, like I’d suggested, Chandra had put on a performance?”
“To what end?”
“What if Levi wasn’t so chill about Katie seeing someone else and Chandra knew that?”
The back of his neck stiffened. “You’re back to thinking Levi killed—”
“Why not? He hasn’t been cleared in my books. No verifiable alibi and he had her phone.”
“Because she left it at his place.”
“So he says.” She took a deep breath. “Just hear me out. Chandra could have played things up last night because she thinks Levi killed Katie. She did all that because she loves Levi and she’d do whatever she could to protect him.”
“Even cast attention on herself?”
“Exactly.”
Sean’s stomach soured.
“Levi knew about Katie’s running schedule, where she’d be and when. He also confessed to knowing about her relationship with Mitch. Which brings up something else I need to tell you. Nicki showed up at the house.”
“What?” he snapped.
“Mirela couldn’t come, so Nicki came instead. It was okay, but she did say she was with Mitch, and how she’d loved him back in high school, but he never paid her the time of day back then. She was protecting him from us. That’s what got me thinking about Chandra. Maybe she’s doing that for Levi…covering.”
“So, Mitch is off the hook, but Levi’s not.”
“Nicki can vouch for Mitch’s alibi; Levi has none. I really don’t know if Mitch is off the hook…” She sighed. “But we should talk to Chandra again.” She took in the hill. “How’s it coming here? I can help you finish. Then we’ll go see Chandra, fill in her alibi, too, and get her opinion on whether Levi was acting strange the day of Katie’s murder.”
“It sounds like we should,” he said, hating to admit she had a point. He took her in from head to toe.
“Yes?” she dragged out.
“Looks like you’re dressed to work out, so let’s get to it.”
“Ha-ha.” She let a few beats pass. “Any sign of Katie’s MP3 player?”
“Nope, but I’m finding lots of garbage, which is disheartening.” Sean looked down at two plastic bags he’d left where he’d been working. One was f
ull of what he considered trash, and it was bulging. The bag intended for what he deemed as possible evidence was still empty.
“We figured Katie’s killer untied her lace. Maybe they took her MP3 player. Though why, I don’t know.”
“Yep.” Sean needed a little break from the hypotheticals. He held out a hand to Sara to help her down the first bit of the hill. “Shall we?”
“We shall.”
He proceeded to point out the grid patterns he’d already worked and where he was in the process. She took the one next to it and got started.
He resumed searching his area, his eyes taking in every blade of grass, rock, twig, bush, tree bran— “Sara.”
“Yeah.”
He pulled his attention from his find. “What colors was Katie wearing?”
“White T-shirt, red shorts. Why?”
He pointed to a piece of fuchsia fabric snagged on a low branch. “If that’s the case, where did this come from?”
Sara hurried to his side. “We don’t know that it has anything to do with what happened to Katie.”
“And we don’t know that it doesn’t.” He took the fabric and put it in the plastic bag for possible evidence.
“A vibrant pink like that… I’d say whoever was wearing it was a woman.”
“Anything’s possible these days.” He smiled at her.
“True.”
They continued the search of the hillside and were about ten feet from the riverbank. Sean looked at his watch, and it was nine o’clock. He’d been at this since six that morning, and all they had to show for it was a piece of pink fabric that may or may not have any relevance to their investigation.
There was long grass next to the river, and Sara suddenly jumped back. He caught her in his arms.
A large toad was sitting on a rock that jutted out of the grass.
“Kiss him, and he’ll become a prince.” Sean laughed.
“I already have my prince.” She turned in his arms to face him. “The question is did Katie’s prince kill her? Or did someone else take out the princess?”
Back to the rhetorical questions, which were starting to feel endless with this investigation. Sean’s phone rang, saving him the need to say anything in response. He reached into his pocket, and when he extracted his hand, his keys fell to the ground and tumbled down a few feet.
Sean answered his phone, eyeballing the path his keys had taken.
“It’s Jimmy.”
Sean put him on speaker.
“Whatcha got, Jimmy?” he asked, but his mind was on the keys and their trip down the hill. There was something skittering on the edge of his mind. His gaze went to the river.
“Just came from seeing Dee Dee,” Jimmy started, “and prints from Mr. Devin’s daughter were all over his prescription bottles.”
“Didn’t she say she never touched them?” Sara asked.
“She did.”
“Pay her a visit, bring the police with you when you go,” Sean directed. “She has some explaining to do.”
“That she does. Hey, how are you making out?”
Sean filled him in.
“Wow, a piece of pink fabric. Doesn’t get us too far. It could have been there from anyone at any time. If it had been there when police investigated, I think they’d have found it—even Roland.”
Sean glanced up the hill. “I found it a little east of where police figured she’d fallen from.”
“Ah, thinking outside the box.”
“Just following where my—” Sean shut his mouth. Was I really going to say ‘where my intuition takes me’?
Sara was smiling knowingly at him. As long as he didn’t start reading minds like Sara seemed to, he could live with it.
“Anyway, I better get going. You still want me to speak to Needham?” There was a ring of hope to Jimmy’s voice that he’d be excused from the task.
“Yes, please,” Sean said.
“Just for you—and Sara,” Jimmy grumbled. “No one else.”
“Thanks.” Sean hung up. He knew Jimmy cared about finding truth and justice, but he also believed Jimmy was doing it just for them. If not for them, little—or nothing—else could get him to Needham’s door. He bent to pick up his keys, his eyes on the river.
“Sean? Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m…” He couldn’t pry his gaze away from the water.
She stepped up next to him. “What is it?”
“Just my keys…” He looked at her now, and confusion knitted her brows. “We’re sending Jimmy to talk to Needham about Katie’s death, to see if there’s anything to indicate she met with further foul play after her fall. That someone might have held her face in the water.”
“Yes, I’m aware of that. I suggested it.”
“Katie was found in the river.” He moved closer to the riverbank. “And there was water in her lungs, so she did drown.”
“We know all that.”
“We were thinking maybe someone held her under, but what if she didn’t land in the river?” His mind was fixed on his keys and how little of a distance they had gone. Granted keys wouldn’t roll anywhere near as much as a body, and the hill was steep, but did the journey down take Katie all the way to the river? He met Sara’s eyes. “The damage to her body, the wounds…they might not have all been caused by her tumble. She could have gotten into an altercation with her killer. Jimmy needs to have Needham take a good, hard look at her entire body again—not just for signs she was forcibly drowned.”
“Yeah.”
“We should also conduct an experiment. We get a dummy of Katie’s size and push it down the hill. We won’t be able to imitate exactly how she would have fallen, or the amount of force with which she was pushed, but we’ll be able to get an idea if there was enough momentum to land her in the river.”
She nodded. “We should do it. We also need to pass along our latest line of thought to Jimmy, so he can approach Needham with it in mind.”
Sean placed the call. They’d be proceeding on a wing and a prayer that there’d be any physical evidence to find on the body, but contrary to popular belief, the dead had a way of telling tales.
-
Chapter 26
RUSSIAN TWISTS, HOLD THE RUSSIAN
Jimmy was feeling good about the closure on the Devin case. He’d presented the evidence to the police, and when they showed up at Brooke Mackland’s door, she broke down and confessed. She’d be going to jail for a long time. At least he had that good deed to buoy him as he set out to visit Needham. Seeing that man once a year would be too much; back-to-back days was utterly painful.
Each step toward the morgue was agonizing. Not only did he have to question Needham’s findings, Needham would be expecting him. There went the element of surprise, but Jimmy didn’t have a choice. He wanted Needham to be prepared with Katie’s autopsy report, photos, and ideally—blech—Katie’s body.
Jimmy took a deep breath and pushed through the morgue doors.
“A third day in a row. Lucky me.” That was Needham’s greeting from the far end of the room, where he was seated in front of his desk.
“I’m no happier about it than you are.”
“Uh-huh. So, what is it about this Katie Carpenter that has you so obsessed?”
Jimmy counted to three in his head, a technique that was supposed to calm a person down, encourage logical thought. But not today. “As I told you yesterday, we’ve been hired to look into her death.”
“And why, I’ll never know. The. Case. Is. Closed.” Needham regarded him like the garden-variety village idiot.
“I’m aware that’s what you’ve concluded, but her loved ones have a reason to believe otherwise.”
“You and I have been around the block enough times to know that no one l
ikes to accept their loved one is gone.”
“Doesn’t hurt to get them answers.”
“Especially when they’re forking over money for them.”
The back of Jimmy’s neck tightened. It would take counting to a thousand to have any hope of squashing the spike of anger that fused through his system at the ME’s comment. “Our clients only cover costs, and the rest goes to charity.”
“Well, the Good Samaritan of the Year Award goes to…”
“Stop with that, will ya?”
Needham narrowed his eyes. “Let’s get on with this. What do you want?”
If that’s how Needham was going to be, Jimmy would rather enjoy poking at the cocky medical examiner’s findings. “I reviewed the autopsy report, had a good look at the accompanying photos—that, along with things we’ve uncovered, lead us to suspect that some of Katie’s injuries weren’t just inflicted from the fall.”
Needham leveled a molten-lava glare on Jimmy. “Preposterous.”
Only someone like Needham would use that word.
“We don’t think Katie drowned on her own.” Jimmy peacocked his posture. “We’re not even sure that she would have fallen all the way into the river and/or have drowned without help.”
“There was nothing to indicate that.”
“Her shoelaces were untied, which leads us to suspect the scene was staged.”
“She tripped over an untied lace, stumbled, fell down the hill. End of story.”
“Is it?” Jimmy took a few steps, circled back around again. “Serious runners like Katie knot their laces.” He paused there and watched Needham’s face pale in increments. “Someone touched Katie’s body. That can’t be ignored.”
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