Alibi II

by Teri Woods

  The gun used in the murder was found outside in a Dumpster behind the hotel of the crime scene. The police would later identify the woman as Paige Hunter, Diana’s best friend and college roommate. Paige and Webster had been having an affair for the past nine months.

  It turned out that Webster had never left town, nor did he plan to. His conference in Miami had actually been postponed, but he failed to mention that. Instead, he pretended to be traveling. He packed a carry-on bag and went twenty minutes away from his home to downtown Phoenix, where he checked in to a hotel with Paige.

  After housekeeping found the bodies, the hotel manager phoned 911. Of course, the police were on the scene within seconds, combing the hotel and surrounding area looking for clues, and they found the gun immediately. Within a matter of hours, forensics came back with fingerprints on the gun belonging to none other than Diana Praeliou, Webster’s wife. An arrest warrant for Diana was issued, and an all-points bulletin alert was sent out as well.

  As Diana turned the corner that led to her block, on Camelback Mountain, she could see the red and blue lights atop a crowd of police cars that were surrounding her home.

  Jesus, Webster, you had to file a missing persons report, didn’t you? I knew he’d do this. Diana knew her husband all too well, and there was no way she could be missing without his calling in the army and the national guard.

  She parked her car down the street in the closest available parking space, not wanting to intrude on all the police vehicles and the commotion on her lawn. She locked her car and walked up the block to the front of the house.

  “Sorry, ma’am, no one allowed except for authorized personnel,” said an officer.

  “I live here…what’s going on?”

  “Are you Diana Praeliou?”

  “Yes, I am Diana Praeliou. This is my house and I live here. Did my husband call you?”

  “Diana Praeliou, you’re under arrest. Please turn around and place your hands behind your back,” the officer said as he stepped back from her and drew his automatic, pointing it at her face.

  “Arrest for what?”

  “For the murder of Webster Praeliou and Paige Hunter,” said the officer as he manhandled Diana, taking her into custody as the other officers ran over to where the arrest was being made on her front lawn.

  “Are you joking? You must be mistaken,” she said matter-of-factly. She felt her world begin to shatter as the officer handcuffed her, tears running down her cheeks as thoughts of her husband, Webster, being murdered crippled her into a mini-meltdown.

  “No,” she screamed. “No, not Webster. No, please, God, no.”

  One Week Later

  Lieutenant Delgado was parked outside Graterford Prison waiting for his brother Sammy to come walking through the gates. Tommy had been sitting there since six-thirty. He could only imagine spending nine years behind bars, only to be released and find no one waiting for you. He wanted to be there. They started releases as early as five-thirty, so he could walk out the door at any moment. It had been a long time since he had seen his kid brother—nineteen years, five months, and three days to be exact. Nineteen years is a long time, but then again, he had served his time straight for robbing a Brinks truck. He refused parole. He could have come home after serving thirteen years, but the family didn’t want the cops sniffing around, so Tommy wrote him and told him to stay inside, and he did, for another six years. No one visited, least of all Tommy. God forbid someone that he had arrested see him in the visiting room. That would only have made life harder for Sammy. Not that life was hard. Sammy was making more money on the inside than one could have imagined.

  Tommy looked at the reflection of himself in the mirror. He had done a lot, seen a lot, and lived a lot of lives. He turned his face to the side. The lines of age, frustration, and stress had begun to set in. Shit, I’ll be fifty in two more weeks. I look good, though, I’m still here, God bless the dead.

  He turned his face to the other side and stroked his jaw. He needed a shave; he could feel the stubble. He smiled at himself. You’ve had a great life, Tommy Delgado, a great life. And he had, because Tommy had family, a network unlike any other. It crossed states, and his family was tied into other families. Knowing that there was a sea of men ready to stand strong and battle for any cause made life’s turbulent ups and downs worth it. Plus, his family had honor, and that was something that would last forever and stays with you always, and he had honor among men.

  “Whadda ya doing?” asked a gray-haired, rail-thin Sammy, puffing on a Newport as he leaned down and looked at his brother admiring himself in the mirror. “You think you’re sexy? Jesus Christ, open the door, Mr. America?” he joked.

  “Sammy, oh, my God, look at you.” Tommy smiled, happy to see his kid brother, a mirror image of himself. He opened the driver’s-side car door and got out of the car, making his way around the back of the car to hug his brother. “Jesus Christ, Sammy, look at your hair, it’s so gray.”

  “Do you believe this shit?” he said, as if he couldn’t stand it. “I gotta get my hair done,” he said, hugging his brother.

  “You sound like a woman,” joked Tommy.

  “You look like one,” joked Sammy back.

  “It’s good to see you,” said Tommy, smiling.

  “It’s good to see you, too.” Sammy smiled, “Where’s that FBI ex-wife of yours?” he said, looking all around as if the police were scoping him out.

  “Please don’t say her fucking name, it’s like saying beetle juice. This bitch used to come with her unit, Jesus Christ,” said Tommy opening his door, “and the fucking ATF, DEA, and every other agency,” he continued, sitting behind the wheel as Sammy closed his door, “this psychotic bitch could think of just to get her child support or a document signed. I don’t know where she is and I don’t want to know. She doesn’t bother me anymore and I don’t bother her. I think we have a mutual hate relationship, built on mutual disrespect and disregard for one another, and it works, you know?”

  “No, I really don’t know,” said Sammy, still a tad upset with Viv for arresting him. But had his brother not been such a shithead to her, she probably would have let him go. Sammy was glad he didn’t have the women problems Tommy always had. He had married his childhood sweetheart and they were still together. Of course, Sammy did what he wanted to throughout his life, but he always loved Marie, and he always took care of her. What was Marie going to do? She had had five babies within eight years, locking herself to him for the rest of their lives. Right now, she was waiting for him at their house, with their children and grandchildren. And later tonight at the Donatella Lounge on the corner of Ninth and Snyder, they would join everyone from the family to celebrate Sammy’s homecoming.

  Nothing but the finest meats, lobsters, and champagne was being sent in for Sammy, and right now everyone who mattered in South Philly was preparing for his homecoming. It would be a night that no one would ever forget. Since Tommy was an officer of the law, he would have to sit that party out. Tommy had big plans, and someday he would be the chief of police, and he would do whatever it took to make that happen. And it would, one day, of course. But there was nothing he wouldn’t do for Sammy and nothing he wouldn’t do to protect the family.

  “I need you to take me to the house on Livezly Lane. Remember the house?” asked Sammy.

  “Yeah,” said Tommy, looking quite confused.

  “Well, I’m gonna need your help,” said Sammy. “And we got to grab some shovels, too.”

  Tommy heard the word “shovels” and automatically responded as if the last thing he was doing was digging holes to bury god knows who for Sammy.

  “Shovels, what the hell you want to do with a shovel?” he asked, not sure he even wanted to hear it. “I’m a fucking lieutenant, Sammy, come on. I can’t fuck around with you, and no bullshit, you hear me?”

  “We can stop at Home Depot, get the shovels, then go to Livezly Lane,” said Sammy with a devious grin on his face.

  “What do we need
shovels for and what’s at Livezly Lane?” demanded Tommy.

  “I got so much money buried in my old backyard, Tommy. I swear to God, at least a million dollars buried out there.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me, Sammy?”

  “Would I fucking lie to you?” Sammy asked, looking at his brother as if Tommy were fresh out of the looney bin for even assuming he was joking.

  “Come on, you gotta help me. All you got to do is pull that badge out on whoever’s living there and we’re digging up the backyard. Come on, what are you a cop for? I got shit to do, I got a party tonight, baby. How do I look?” Sammy asked in all seriousness. “I look good, right, Tommy?”

  “You look like a million bucks, Sammy, a million bucks.”

  “Ha, good answer.” Sammy laughed as he grabbed his older brother around the neck. “Good fucking answer.”

  Daisy went back to her block after seeing her assigned social worker. She felt as if she were trapped in a nightmare not her own. The past week spent behind bars had been pure hell. She never thought in a million years she would ever be living her life without Webster, let alone that she would be charged with murdering him. She passed the guard’s desk on her block just as a CO held out her mail and passed it to her.

  In this facility, mail was opened and screened before being given to the inmates. Diana was hoping that she would receive a letter from her lawyer with good news. She had requested another bail hearing because her bail had been denied. Her lawyer was hopeful, but it didn’t look as if she’d be granted another hearing. With Diana’s DNA evidence found at the scene of the crime and prints on the murder weapon, it didn’t appear that she would be going anywhere, but rather that she’d be spending the rest of her life behind bars, and there was nothing anyone could do to change that.

  She looked at the first envelope and then the second. Her heart began to pound, as her fingers and her hand began trembling. She recognized the writing and realized it was that of the blackmailer, as the envelope looked identical to the first one she had received from him. Quickly, she walked back down the block, careful not to let anyone see what she was holding. She went into her cell, sat down on the edge of the bottom bunk, and pulled out the letter inside. It was him, the same person. She could tell by the cut-and-paste letters scattered across the lined yellow tablet paper. The note was barely readable. She slowly made out the cut-and-paste wordplay, and it was then that she realized exactly who had blackmailed her, killed her cousin, and brutally murdered her husband. And as she read the note, twenty years of pieces of a puzzle slowly came together in her mind, and she knew who he was.

  “HOPE YOU GOT AN ALIBI—YOU’RE GONNA NEED ONE, BITCH!”

  About the Author

  Teri Woods is a native of Philadelphia. She worked as a legal secretary/paralegal for eight years in a Philadelphia Center City law firm. She began writing her first book, True to the Game, in 1992 and began to submit her work to publishers. After being turned down, the book sat dormant in a closet for four years. In 1998, she began selling handmade copies of the book out of the trunk of her car. With the success of the handmade books, she started her own publishing and production company, Teri Woods Publishing.

  Teri Woods has successfully written, co-authored, and published twenty-one novels and sold over two million copies worldwide. She is currently working on her next release.

  For more information visit www.teriwoodspublishing.com

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Welcome

  1986

  Bamboozled

  I Spy

  Law and Order

  Silence Is Golden

  Knock Knock

  Reasonable Doubt

  Plans A, B, C, and D

  Die at the Door

  1988

  College Life

  2006

  Eyes Free

  Money, Money, Money

  A Gangster’s Reunion

  Freeze

  Death Becomes Her

  The Come Back

  Cocktail Time

  Say Good-bye, Teri

  One Week Later

  About the Author

  Newsletters

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2012 by Teri Woods.

  Cover design by Christine Foltzer.

  Cover art of skyline by Enjoynz/Getty Images.

  Cover copyright © 2012 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

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  First e-book edition: November 2012

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  ISBN 978-0-446-56979-8