by Karen Rose
“Your stepbrother may have been involved,” Daniel said quietly.
Alex stopped cold. “Oh my God. His letter.”
Daniel nodded and said nothing.
“And the letter he sent to Bailey,” she added. Dazed, she sat down. “My God. And the reverend.” Her eyes flew to his. “Wade confessed to Beardsley.”
“And now he’s missing,” Daniel said.
“Wait.” Meredith stood up, shaking her head. “If Simon and Wade raped these girls, and both of them are dead, then who’s behind all this? Who took Bailey? And who killed all those women?”
“I don’t know. But I don’t think Simon did the raping.”
Alex’s temper blew again. “Of all the—”
Daniel held up his hand, wearily. “Alex, please. Simon was an amputee. None of the men in the pictures were missing a leg. I think Simon may have taken the pictures. It would have been just like him to do.”
“Wait,” Meredith said again. “Men? Like more than one man in the pictures?”
“Maybe five, maybe more. It’s hard to say.”
“So others were involved,” Alex said.
“And they don’t want anyone to know.” Meredith sighed. “Fifteen girls. That’s a hell of a secret to need to keep.”
Alex closed her eyes to keep the room from spinning. “Where are these pictures?”
“They were in my safe, at my house. Luke’s bringing them here, as we speak.”
She heard him push away from the counter and walk across the room. He sat next to her, but didn’t touch her. “I also called my boss. I need to tell him.”
She opened her eyes. He was sitting on the edge of the sofa cushion, back bowed, head down. “Will you be in trouble for not telling him before?”
“Probably. But I didn’t know what do.” He rolled his head to look at her and she saw the pain in his eyes. “If he allows it, I want you to look at the other pictures. You recognized Sheila tonight. Maybe you know some of the other girls.”
She trailed her fingertips down his back lightly. The pain in his eyes had banked her temper. “And maybe we know some of the other men.”
He swallowed. “That, too.”
“You both lived here.” Meredith said. “Why should Alex recognize faces you don’t?”
“I was five years older,” Daniel said. “When it all happened, I was away at college.”
“And he was rich,” Alex added. “The rich kids all went to the private school. Alicia and Shelia and Bailey and I, we all went to the public school. There was a very rigid line between the two worlds.”
“But Simon and Wade were friends.”
“Or at least accomplices,” Daniel said. “Simon was expelled from private school. He graduated from the public school. We need to get our hands on some yearbooks.”
“How do Janet and Claudia fit?” Alex asked. “They were only nine when Alicia died.”
“I don’t know,” Daniel said. He leaned back against the sofa and closed his eyes. “I do know that Sheila had something to tell me. My business card was in her pocket.”
“Who killed her?” Meredith asked.
“Some guy robbing the cash register.” Daniel shrugged. “Or that’s what we’re supposed to think.” Abruptly he lurched to his feet, stunned realization on his face. “I can’t believe I missed that.” He opened the door. “Hatton! Can you come here?” He turned to Alex. “I’m going to meet Luke and Chase at the restaurant. Stay here.”
Dutton, Wednesday, January 31, 1:35 a.m.
Daniel walked back into Presto’s Pizza, where Corey Presto was standing just inside the door, shell-shocked. He’d been crying, his face tear-streaked but now dry.
Dr. Toby Granville was examining the body draped over the counter and one of Frank’s deputies was taking pictures with a digital camera. Frank was crouched next to where the young officer had died, staring at the floor. They must have taken the young man to the morgue first. Sheila still sat in the corner, in her grotesque doll-like pose.
Daniel didn’t see Randy Mansfield and assumed he’d been either taken to the hospital or released. “Frank,” Daniel said.
Frank looked up, and for a moment desperation flashed in his eyes. Then the moment was gone and his old friend’s eyes were flat. “Why are you back, Daniel?”
“I’m taking over this scene. Toby, if you wouldn’t mind, please step away from that body. I’ll be calling in the state ME and crime lab.”
Toby Granville’s gaze swung to Frank, who’d stood slowly, his fists on his hips. “No, you’re not,” Frank said.
“That car out back was involved in a hit-and-run with a witness under my protection, just this afternoon. Now it’s here and another witness is dead. This restaurant is now a GBI crime scene. Please, Frank. Move, or I’ll move you.”
Frank’s mouth had fallen open and he jerked to stare at the man hanging across the counter. “Hit-and-run?” he asked unsteadily. “Where? Who?”
“In Atlanta, outside the Underground,” Daniel answered. “Alex Fallon.” He looked at the doctor. “I’m sorry, Toby. I need to process this internally. No offense.”
Granville backed away, gloved hands out. “None taken.”
“Wait,” Corey Presto was shaking his head as if to clear it. “You’re sayin’ this wasn’t a robbery? That that man meant to kill Sheila?”
“I’m just saying that car was involved in an attempted vehicular homicide earlier today.” Daniel turned his gaze to Frank, who looked broken. “And Sheila is dead.”
“What was she a witness to?” Frank asked quietly, and Daniel glimpsed the man he’d known so well. That he thought he’d known, anyway.
“That information’s need-to-know. I’m sorry, Frank.”
Frank dropped his gaze to the bloodstained floor. “Sam was only twenty-one.”
“I’m sorry, Frank,” Daniel said again. “You can stay while we process the scene if you like.” He turned to Presto. “Mr. Presto, we need to know if any cash is missing.”
Presto wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I’d already made the deposit.”
“You were here tonight,” Daniel said, “when I was here with Alex Fallon.”
“Yeah, I was here.” He lifted his chin. “So?”
“Sheila was talking to me. You called her back to the kitchen, and not kindly.”
“I had orders pilin’ up. I don’t pay her to gab.”
“She said that she’d said too much, that she wouldn’t want to upset the powers that be. Who do you think she was talking about?”
“I don’t know.” But the man was lying and they both knew it.
“How long had she worked for you?”
“Four years. Since she got out of rehab. I gave her a chance.”
“Why? Why did you give her a chance?”
Presto’s cheeks flamed. “Because I felt sorry for her.”
Daniel softened his expression. “Why?”
Presto swallowed hard. “She’d had a hard time. I felt sorry for her, that’s all.” But when he looked at Sheila’s lifeless body his throat convulsed and a unique pain filled his eyes, along with new tears, and Daniel understood.
“You loved her,” he said gently.
Presto’s chest heaved once and he dropped his chin, his fists clenched at his sides. No further answer was required.
“Daniel.” Toby Granville had come up behind him, sympathy on his face. “Let him go. He can answer your questions tomorrow.” Toby put his arm around Presto’s shoulders and led him from the restaurant. Ed Randall passed them on his way in.
Ed took one look at the restaurant and whistled softly. “My God.”
“One of the bodies has already been moved,” Daniel said. “I can give you a detailed description of the scene when I came in. Deputy?”
The young officer who’d been taking pictures looked startled. “Y-yes?”
“If you could give us your camera, I can make a copy of the files and return it to you.”
The de
puty looked at Frank, who nodded. “That’s fine. You’re dismissed, Alvin.”
The deputy looked infinitely relieved and made a quick exit.
“I’d just finished securing the scene at Bailey Crighton’s when I got your call,” Ed said. “I wasn’t more than twenty minutes out of Dutton when I turned around. I’m guessing the ME guys’ll be here in twenty. Until then, tell me what you saw.”
Luke arrived as Malcolm and his partner Trey were pushing the gunman out on a gurney zipped up in a body bag. Sheila was lying on a second gurney, the body bag zipped only to the middle of her chest. Luke walked straight to Sheila’s body and stood for a moment studying her face, his expression hard.
“You’re right,” he murmured. “I’d hoped you were wrong.”
“Where are they?” Daniel asked quietly.
“Locked in my trunk. My mother’s birthday is June first, by the way, not the fourth.”
“Don’t tell her, okay?”
“Your secret’s safe with me,” he said, but didn’t smile. “You sure about doing this?”
Daniel looked at Sheila’s waxen face and knew he’d never been more sure of anything. “Yeah. If I’d said something a week ago, she might still be alive.”
“You don’t know that.”
“And I never will. Neither will she.”
Luke sighed. “I’ll go get the envelope.”
Daniel stood to one side when Malcolm and Trey came back for the other gurney. Chase came in as they were zipping Sheila up. His boss stood in the middle of the restaurant looking around before bringing his gaze squarely to Daniel’s.
“In my car,” he said.
“Okay.” Daniel passed Luke and Luke slipped the envelope under his arm.
“I’ll wait,” Luke said and Daniel only nodded.
Feeling like a dead man walking, Daniel got into Chase’s car and pulled the door closed. Chase got behind the wheel.
“What’s in the envelope, Daniel?”
Daniel cleared his throat. “My demons.”
“I kind of figured that.”
He watched Malcolm and Trey lift the gurney into the rig and slam the back doors shut. Sheila’s blood is on my hands. No more secrets. No more lies. “It ends here.”
“What ends here, Daniel?”
“Hopefully not my career. Although if it comes to that, I won’t fight you.”
“Why not let me be the judge?”
An appropriate starting place, Daniel thought. “My father was a judge,” he said.
“Yes, I know. Daniel, spit it out. We’ll deal with whatever we need to deal with.”
“I am spitting it out. It all started with my father, the judge.” And Daniel told him the entire story, including the details he had not shared with Alex earlier—the part when he’d first laid eyes on the pictures eleven years before, but his father had burned them to keep him from revealing the secret to the police. When he finished, Chase was staring straight ahead, elbows on his steering wheel, his chin propped on his fists.
“So you technically have had these pictures only a week.”
“I gave a set to Vito Ciccotelli in Philadelphia the day I got them.”
“And that’s the one thing that’s going to save your ass. Why didn’t you come to me?”
Daniel pressed the heels of his hands to his brow bones. “God. Chase, have you ever done anything so horrible, you were ashamed for anyone to know?”
Chase was silent so long Daniel thought he wouldn’t answer. But he finally nodded. “Yes.” And that appeared to be all Chase planned to say on the topic.
“Then you know why. For eleven years I have lived with the knowledge that these girls were victimized. That I knew and I said nothing. I promised myself I’d find them, that I’d fix this. Then the moment Alicia’s ID was dumped in my lap I found every reason not to tell. I didn’t want to jeopardize the case. I wanted to atone. I didn’t want to hurt Alex.”
“Did you tell Alex?”
Daniel nodded. “Yeah. She wasn’t as mad as I thought she’d be. Are you?”
“What? Mad as you thought I’d be?” Chase sighed. “I’m disappointed. I thought you trusted me. But I have been in your shoes and it’s not a place where right and wrong are black and white.” He looked at the envelope. “Those are the pictures?”
“Yes. I was thinking Alex might be able to identify some of the other girls. She recognized Sheila from high school.”
Chase put out his hand and Daniel gave him the envelope, feeling as though a weight rolled off his shoulders as he did so.
Chase looked at the pictures, his face tightening in disgust. “Hell.” He put them back in the envelope and slid it next to his seat. “Okay. This is what we’re going to do from here on out. You’re going to put in a formal request for the pictures to Ciccotelli in Philly ASAP. You’re going to say you thought Alicia was one of the girls but that you didn’t know any of the others until you saw Sheila tonight. So we requested the pictures back.”
“That’s not actually untrue,” Daniel said slowly and Chase shot him a rueful look.
“That’s why they pay me the big bucks. You will not mention that you made copies and kept the originals. Who else knows you have these, besides Luke?”
“Alex and her cousin Meredith.”
“Can they be trusted?”
“Yes. But Chase, I want to use those originals tonight. I need to find out who the other girls were. Maybe one of them knows who did this to them. Somebody out there doesn’t want their identity known.”
Chase shook his head thoughtfully. “Killing Sheila supports that theory, but killing Janet and Claudia doesn’t. Why call attention to themselves?”
“Maybe somebody found out,” Daniel said quietly. “And we can’t forget about the keys. It’s important. I just don’t know how.”
“And the hair. Did you get Alex’s hair down to the lab so they can compare them?’
“I did. Wallin’s going to run the PCR on overtime. He thinks he can have a DNA comparison by tomorrow afternoon.” Daniel glanced at his watch. “I mean, today.”
Chase slapped his own face lightly. “We need to get some sleep, Daniel. You especially. You’ve been burning the candle at both ends for three weeks.”
“I want Alex to look at the pictures tonight.”
“Fine. You drive to her bungalow. I’ll follow you.”
Daniel lifted his brows. “You’re coming?”
Chase’s smile was tight and not terribly friendly. “Pal, I’m your new partner. You don’t go anywhere or do anything without telling me.”
Daniel blinked at him. “Forever or for just this case?”
“Just this case unless you pull some other dumbass stunt. You only get so many get-out-of-trouble-free cards.”
“Get out of jail,” Daniel corrected with a smile.
“If this had gone a different way, you might’ve ended up there,” Chase warned, not smiling back. “No more secrets. You tell me everything.”
“Fine. I’m going to sleep on Alex’s sofa tonight.”
Chase leveled him a long look. “Fine. Just stay on the sofa.”
Daniel lifted his chin. “And if I don’t?”
Chase rolled his eyes. “Then just lie and tell me you did. Go on. If we’re gonna show her the pictures, let’s do it before sunup.”
Chapter Thirteen
Dutton, Wednesday, January 31, 2:30 a.m.
They were hideous. Obscene. But Alex forced herself to look at each one even when the sandwich Meredith had forced down her throat threatened to claw its way back up.
“I’m sorry,” Alex said for the seventh time, shaking her head at the picture of a girl being brutalized. I thought my dreams were bad before . . . “I don’t recognize her.”
Daniel put another on the table in front of her while Chase looked on in stony silence. Meredith sat on the other side of her while Daniel’s friend Luke sat on the sofa in the living room with his computer on his lap, watching in the same thoughtful way
he’d watched her at the Underground.
It seems like it’s been years. But it had been less than twenty-four hours since she’d nearly been killed.
“Alex?” Daniel murmured and Alex forced herself to look at the eighth picture.
“I’m—” She frowned, the denial forgotten. She pulled the picture from the table and held it close to her eyes, which felt like they’d been rubbed with crushed glass. She studied the girl’s face. Her nose. “I know her. That’s Rita Danner.”
“How do you know?” Daniel asked.
“Her nose. It’s been broken. Rita hung with the popular crowd, but she had a mean streak, especially if she was jealous of you. She liked to pick on the nerds.”
“Did she pick on you?” Meredith asked.
“Only once. We were at a sleepover and I woke up to find Rita smearing peanut butter into my hair. I took a handful of the peanut butter and shoved it up her nose.”
Daniel blinked. “You broke her nose?”
“I shoved a little too hard.” Alex sighed. “I hated her. But this . . . My God.”
“Luke?” Daniel asked.
“I found a wedding announcement. Rita married a Josh Runyan of Columbia, Georgia.” He tapped a few more keys. “And here’s a divorce announcement dated two years ago. But it looks like Rita still lives in Columbia.”
“It’s not too far,” Daniel said. “We can visit her. See what she recalls. What about this one?” He slid another picture on the table. “Well?”
“I know her, too. Cindy . . . Bouse. She was a nice girl. I didn’t break her nose.”
“Then we should try to talk to her first,” Daniel said dryly. “Luke?”
Luke’s expression was stricken. “She committed suicide eight years ago.”
Alex sucked in a breath. “Oh God.”
Daniel stroked her back. “I’m sorry.”
Alex nodded unsteadily. “Let’s see the next one.” She couldn’t identify the girl in the tenth picture, or the eleventh. There had been fifteen victims and Daniel had told her from the outset that he would not show her Alicia’s picture. For that she’d been grateful. Daniel had already identified Sheila’s picture, so Alex had only two pictures to go.
