by Karen Rose
‘It was found on his person. Agent Brodie has it now. She’ll have to tell you if they lifted any prints from it.’
Joseph took out his phone and started to text. ‘Asking her now.’
‘What about gunshot residue?’ JD asked.
‘Perry tested positive,’ Quartermaine confirmed, ‘but that only means he held the gun at least one of the times it was fired. Both shots were fired at fairly close range, but the leg wound was made with the gun almost touching his skin.’
Hector’s eyes narrowed. ‘The shot fired when he was already unconscious. You’re saying that someone put the gun in Perry’s hand, pointed it at his leg, and pulled the trigger.’
‘I said that I only think he was unconscious,’ Quartermaine cautioned. ‘I have no evidence to support that. But . . . essentially yes. What you just said.’
JD let the scene play in his mind. ‘If there was no trail of blood where Toby and Mancuso were found, Perry was not shot there. If he wasn’t conscious when he was shot the second time, and he did all his bleeding where he was found, is it even likely that he was ever in the alley with Mancuso?’
Joseph checked his phone when it buzzed. ‘Brodie says the blood on the blade matches Mancuso’s type and she did find Perry’s prints on the knife’s hilt. Perfect ten-point matches. No smudges. The rest of the hilt was wiped clean.’
JD drew a breath, let it out. ‘Perry was framed too.’
Hector’s face creased into a snarling frown, like he didn’t want to be thinking that Perry hadn’t done it. Because it meant his friend’s murderer was still out there. ‘Why? Why would anybody pick Cleon Perry to frame? He’s just a two-bit dealer. So low on the totem pole that nobody even tries to take over his territory. He’s no threat.’
‘Maybe that’s exactly why,’ Joseph said thoughtfully. ‘Nobody will miss him. Nobody will seek revenge. He just disappears. A footnote.’
Hector scowled. ‘And the SOB who killed a mother, a twenty-year-old addict, a two-bit dealer and a decorated cop walks away free.’
JD tried to line it all up in his mind. ‘So . . . Toby is framed for Valerie Jarvis’s murder, but I don’t arrest him. Sometime last night he shoots himself up with enough coke to kill him. Any idea on his time of death?’
‘Four to six hours before Officer Mancuso and Cleon Perry died,’ Quartermaine said.
‘That would have been helpful to know up front,’ Joseph snapped, annoyed.
‘Like I could get a word in edgewise,’ Quartermaine returned sarcastically. ‘I was going to tell you, but JD starts going off on how Toby Romano never did coke.’
‘Which he didn’t,’ JD said firmly. ‘So let’s—’
‘I’ve got a question,’ Hector interrupted. ‘Toby Romano was no weakling. Neither was Cleon Perry. How’d this cowardly fucker get close enough to do these things to them? Did he tie them up?’
‘Unlikely,’ Quartermaine said. ‘No ligature marks. But Toby also had ketamine in his urine. Not much. Certainly not enough to give him much of a high. Ket and coke are often taken together, but if the ket was given first, it would have sedated him. At least enough to pump him full of coke.’ He brought up another file on the computer, the screen now filled with numbers. ‘Same with Perry. I’ll run some more tests to see how it would have been administered.’
‘So . . . can I go back to thinking this through now?’ JD asked.
‘Not yet,’ Quartermaine said. ‘I have a question. You said when you first recognized him that Cleon Perry wasn’t Toby’s dealer. How did you know that?’
‘Because I’ve been watching Toby ever since he was caught selling the brooch, and he buys from somebody else.’ JD remembered too late that Toby was laid out on the table right behind them. ‘Bought from someone else. And before you ask,’ he added, because Quartermaine’s mouth had tightened disapprovingly, ‘no, I did not arrest Toby or his dealer, but I have enough photos of their transactions to go back and get him later. Toby’s dealer is not terribly covert and he always deals from the same street corner.’
Quartermaine’s nod was reluctant. ‘Just do it soon, okay? I get enough addicts on my table. The thought of a known dealer walking around free to peddle his poison to kids . . . Just arrest him soon.’
‘After we arrest the bastard who killed a cop,’ Hector growled.
‘Yes,’ Quartermaine murmured. ‘You can continue thinking it through now, JD.’
JD raised an eyebrow at the doctor, then said, ‘Okay. Toby shoots up with coke, even though he wasn’t a coke user. He dies and somebody dumps his body in his normal spot but doesn’t expect a cop to be there. There’s a scuffle, Officer Mancuso draws his weapon, and somebody – most likely not Perry – knifes him.’ He glanced at Hector, who closed his eyes. ‘Sorry,’ JD murmured. ‘Where was Mancuso stabbed?’
‘Up under his vest,’ Joseph answered. ‘Long blade. Just sliced his gut open. The gunshot was to the side of his head.’
‘He was already down on the ground when he was shot,’ Hector said quietly. ‘Cowardly fucker to shoot a man when he’s already down.’
JD wholeheartedly agreed. ‘Same kind of coward who’d beat a woman until she was unrecognizable.’
‘You really think it’s the same guy, then.’ Hector didn’t phrase it as a question, but JD answered anyway.
‘Yeah. Toby had pawned one of the pieces stolen from Valerie Jarvis’s apartment, but I didn’t even bring him in for questioning for the murder. I knew he hadn’t done it. His pawning the item in a shop with a camera was too damn tidy. So Valerie’s killer must have gotten tired of waiting. He had to make it so obvious that Toby had murdered Valerie that we’d have to come to that conclusion. It would have been more believable if he’d also planted the murder weapon on Toby, but he couldn’t have done that.’
‘Because he beat Valerie with his fists,’ Quartermaine said quietly. ‘Which Toby couldn’t have done.’ He turned back to Toby’s body and gently lifted the young man’s hand. ‘No scarring.’
‘It’s been a fucking month,’ Hector said bitterly. ‘It would have healed.’
‘I took photos of Toby’s hands as soon as I got the report from the pawnshop,’ JD told him. ‘That was only two days later. They weren’t even swollen. They should have been cut up and scabbed over. Traces of the killer’s blood and skin were found on Valerie during autopsy.’
Hector’s eyes narrowed. ‘Enough to get a DNA sample?’
‘Yes,’ Quartermaine said. ‘The results came back a few days ago.’
‘So we can prove it wasn’t Toby’s blood on Valerie Jarvis,’ Joseph said.
Quartermaine nodded. ‘But you don’t need DNA for that. The blood type’s no match.’
‘The DNA didn’t match any in the database,’ JD said, ‘but that just means her killer isn’t in the system.’ He hesitated, then sighed. ‘It didn’t match Jazzie’s DNA either. No overlap whatsoever.’
Joseph frowned. ‘You didn’t tell me that.’
Quartermaine looked surprised. ‘You had the kid tested?’
‘Her aunt gave me a hair sample.’ JD glanced at Joseph. ‘I just got the results. I was going to tell you, then this all happened first.’
‘So the killer was not Jazzie’s father.’ Hector’s voice was terse as he brought the conversation back to topic. ‘Or at least not her biological father. Is Gage Jarvis the stepfather?’
‘No,’ JD said. ‘His name’s on her birth certificate. If he found out he wasn’t her biological father, it could be motive for Valerie’s murder. Either way, when we find an actual suspect, we can do a DNA comparison.’
‘But first we need to find an actual suspect,’ Joseph said pointedly.
‘So let’s think this through,’ JD snapped back. ‘Like I’ve been wanting to. Okay? Okay. So somebody kills Valerie and tries to make it look l
ike Toby did it. But I don’t arrest Toby and time passes and somebody gets impatient. He wants us to believe that Toby did it so he sets him up with more items stolen from the apartment. Toby ODs on coke – not his usual drug. Somebody dumps him in the alley, but he doesn’t expect Mancuso and knifes him, then shoots him to make sure he’s not ID’d.’ He paused a moment, thinking about what had to have happened next. ‘Did Mancuso get a call into dispatch before he confronted whoever was dumping Toby’s body?’
Hector nodded. ‘He called for backup, then called me, which was why we got to him so fast. Said he saw a guy in a hoodie, about six feet tall. Couldn’t tell much else.’
‘The shootings of Mancuso and Perry happened within minutes of each other,’ JD continued. ‘This guy didn’t have time to really make a plan, which says a lot, because he came up with a good one on the fly – except for no trail of blood in the first alley. So Perry’s in the next alley, unconscious. Let’s backburner the why for a few minutes. The shooter runs to Perry and shoots him with Mancuso’s gun, because he suddenly needs someone to take the fall for the cop’s murder. He puts another stolen item in Perry’s pocket to connect him to Toby and sticks the gun in Perry’s waistband to connect him to Mancuso. This way it looks like there were only three people involved – Toby, Mancuso and Perry.’
‘Okay,’ Joseph said slowly. ‘I can buy that. But why Perry was there in the first place is still a big question.’
‘True.’ JD scratched at his face under the mask he still wore. ‘That’s a damned good question. What if he hadn’t been?’
Joseph’s brows crunched. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean, what if Perry hadn’t been there? Dead or alive?’ JD chuffed out an impatient breath. ‘If you can’t think forward, think backward. For now, leave Officer Mancuso out of it entirely. He was an unexpected development. Unplanned. What would we be thinking right now if we’d found only Toby Romano’s body, OD’d and holding on to more items stolen from Valerie Jarvis?’
‘That he’d been in the Jarvis apartment on the day of the murder,’ Hector supplied. ‘That he’d lied to you about only having one item that he’d conveniently “found”, so he’d probably lied about other things. We’d want to conclude Romano killed Valerie Jarvis.’
‘We might close the case on the basis of Romano alone,’ Joseph said grimly, understanding sharpening his eyes. ‘He didn’t need Cleon Perry to frame Toby Romano. Perry was there for another reason.’
Hector shrugged. ‘Cleon Perry was a coke dealer. Romano was pumped with coke. His killer had to get it from somewhere. Maybe he bought it from Perry and planned to kill Perry to keep him quiet, but later.’
JD nodded. ‘But Officer Mancuso surprised him and he had to change his plan.’
‘There’d be huge pressure to find and arrest a cop killer,’ Joseph agreed. ‘This way, it looks like it’s all tied up with a neat little bow. Both bad guys are dead. We can close the case. Walk away.’
‘Why?’ Quartermaine pressed. ‘Why go to so much trouble to make you close the case?’
‘Because if we close the case, we won’t investigate anyone else,’ Joseph said quietly.
JD nodded. ‘And our initial suspect – Valerie’s estranged husband Gage Jarvis – is never investigated. What do you want to bet that Gage magically materializes in the next few weeks?’
Joseph’s eyes narrowed. ‘If he does, we need to be ready to grab him. And if Gage Jarvis is not involved, we still have a killer out there – he’s up to four victims, including a cop. And if he finds out there was a witness hiding in Valerie Jarvis’s apartment that day?’
Hector blew out a breath that puffed out his mask. ‘He’d kill that little girl without losing a minute’s sleep.’
JD’s gut tightened painfully. ‘We won’t let that happen.’
Four
Hunt Valley, Maryland,
Saturday 22 August, 3.45 P.M.
Taylor was almost finished brushing Gracie, her afternoon lesson horse, when Dillon made his feeding rounds. He broke off a flake from the hay bale, putting most of it into Gracie’s trough. The rest he hand-fed the gray mare that was almost as gentle as Ginger. Out of all the horses on the Montgomery farm, Ginger and Gracie were Taylor’s two favorites.
Dillon scratched Gracie’s nose and the horse leaned into him. ‘Hey, sweetheart,’ he said softly, forcing her to lean even closer to hear him. He kissed her muzzle. ‘Did you miss me?’
‘She certainly did,’ Taylor said, and Dillon jumped, pressing his hand to his chest.
‘Crap, Taylor!’ he exclaimed. ‘You scared me to death.’
Taylor moved out of Gracie’s way when the horse shuffled backward, startled by Dillon’s outburst. ‘I’m so sorry, Dillon. I thought you saw me.’
Dillon drew a deep breath. ‘No, I didn’t. But it’s okay.’ He grinned. ‘Heart’s still beating.’
Taylor’s eyes popped wide. ‘Do you have a heart condition?’ It wasn’t uncommon in individuals with Down syndrome. She wanted to kick herself. Holy shit. I nearly gave the bridegroom a heart attack.
‘I did.’ He tugged the V-neck of his T-shirt down a few inches to show a scar. ‘I had surgery when I was five. The scar goes down to my belly button. But the doctor says I’m fine now. I was only teasing.’
Taylor nodded, trying to calm her own racing heart. ‘Good enough.’ She leaned against a support pole, partly because her legs were shaky and partly to decrease the difference in their heights so that Dillon didn’t have to look up so far to meet her eyes. He was about five-four with his boots on – average for an adult man with Down syndrome and obviously tall enough to do his job, because he did it so well – but Taylor still felt like she towered over him. ‘I’d hate to give you a heart attack before the wedding.’
He grinned at her. ‘Holly would kick your ass. She could, you know. She’s a blue belt.’
‘That’s amazing. I wish I’d taken karate in a real school. I never got a belt.’ And . . . she hadn’t meant to say that. Shit. She was disclosing personal details all over the damn place today. You’re just rattled. It had been a rattling kind of day. Jazzie’s outburst and then . . .
Ford. She drew a breath. Yeah. Him. She liked him. Don’t even think about it. You can’t have him. She was going home. As soon as she got what she’d come for. Probably.
Dillon was tilting his head, looking confused. ‘Where did you take it, then?’
She blinked, stalling for time so that she could remember what they’d even been talking about. Oh. Right. Karate. ‘My dad taught me what he knew.’ She gave him a rueful smile. ‘He worries about me, especially all the way out here all by myself.’
Dillon frowned. ‘You’re not by yourself. You’re with us.’
‘But I’m not at home. This is my first time away from home.’
Dillon nodded knowingly. ‘My mom and dad worry about me too. But they let me go. Let me have my inde . . . independence.’ He stumbled over the word and she was quiet while he forced it out. ‘They let me live alone. And now I’m going to live with Holly.’ His smile returned, pride in his eyes. ‘We have our own apartment.’
‘Good for you,’ Taylor said with a hard nod. ‘For both of you. I’ve never had my own apartment.’
‘You still don’t,’ he pointed out. ‘You live in the big house with Maggie.’
Taylor’s lips twitched. ‘True enough. But until two weeks ago, I’d never been away from home without my dad or my sister Daisy. Or my mom, when she was alive.’
Sorrow had Dillon’s mouth bending down. ‘I’m sorry, Taylor.’
‘It’s okay. She’s not hurting anymore. I’m starting to remember her before she got sick, so that’s a good thing, right?’
‘Right.’ He scrunched his brow, thinking. ‘If you want, you can go to karate class with Holly. Maybe you can still get you
r belt.’
She should have told him that she’d be going home at the end of the internship. But she didn’t and she wasn’t sure why. ‘Maybe after you and Holly get back from your honeymoon.’
His grin was devilish. ‘Yeah.’ He drew out the word and waggled his brows.
Taylor threw back her head and laughed, and Dillon laughed with her. She slipped from the stall and made sure the door was latched. ‘You’re naughty, Dillon. I like that.’
He gave her a slow wink. ‘Holly does too. Are you coming to our wedding? She wants to meet you.’
‘I am, absolutely. I still have to get a present. I hope something’s left on your registry list.’ She held up a finger to silence him when he opened his mouth. ‘And I hope you’re not planning to tell me that I don’t have to bring anything. My mother brought me up better than that. If I showed up to a wedding without a gift, she’d come down from heaven to haunt me.’
If indeed that was where her mother had ended up. Taylor wasn’t so sure.
‘Then I won’t say that.’ He walked her to the barn door, his expression going a little shy. ‘I heard about what happened with Janie and Jazzie today. That’s really nice, Taylor.’
Taylor’s cheeks heated. ‘I didn’t do anything special.’
‘You’re nice. They both know that. Kids and horses know,’ he said wisely.
‘Thank you,’ she said softly. ‘Holly is a lucky lady.’
He grinned again. ‘I know. I tell her every day, too. Gotta go home now. She hasn’t seen me since before the camping trip.’
The camping trip that nearly every male in the place had attended. ‘Did you guys have fun on the trip?’
‘Oh yeah. It was amazing. Ford and Cole came, Grayson and JD too. And Clay was able to be there for the last few days.’
Taylor’s cheeks heated at the first name, but her heart started to thunder in her chest when she heard the last one. Finally. Finally someone had mentioned his name in a way that allowed her to ask her questions.
