“I’m Detective Valentine. What’s your name?” I had my notebook out.
“I’m Kelly. Kelly Milton. I signed a lease on this house a few days ago and was expecting to move in tomorrow.”
“I need to see your ID.”
She dug in her purse for several moments, checking her wallet and compartments. Then she looked at me and shrugged. “I can’t find my driver’s license.”
“Okay. Do you have anything that proves you rented this house?” I asked. “Maybe a lease?”
Kelly brightened. “Yes! Of course I do.” She stared, not moving.
“Do you have it with you?”
“No, I didn’t think I’d need it. I was just coming to see if I needed to clean before moving in. My husband’s coming back.”
“Where is your husband now?”
“In San Francisco.”
“Where were you last night?”
Her hand flew to her chest. “What?” The color drained from her face.
“Where were you last night?”
“At home. I mean, at my parents’ house. That’s where I’m living … temporarily.” She trembled, hugging herself tight.
“And your husband lives in San Francisco?”
“For the past year he has. We’re teachers, and Jake was laid off last year. He … couldn’t find work locally.”
“Is he moving back here now?”
“He is. It was too expensive for him to live there.”
I nodded. “What’s your parents’ address?”
She gave me an address a few miles away. “Will I get my security deposit back if I can’t move in?”
“How did you find out the house was for rent?”
“I answered an ad on one of those list websites and viewed the house last week.”
“Which website?”
She gave it to me, then I asked her for the key to the house and dropped it into an evidence bag, which I put in my pocket. I wrote out a receipt for the key and handed her a business card before taking my leave and returning to the house. Once inside, I called Lieutenant Peterson and gave him a heads-up. If someone had rented her this house illegally we were going to need the assistance of someone in the Fraud Division on this one. The two cases could be related.
I met up with Bernie as Joe, one of the coroner’s assistants, prepared to remove the body. I approached Joe before he wheeled her away.
“Joe, can you confirm her eye color for us, please?” I asked.
“Sure, Sydney.” The eye on the visible portion of her face was swollen shut. He gently tilted her head away from the rim of the hot tub, giving him access to the other eye. That side of her face wasn’t as swollen, and I could tell she’d been a pretty young woman. Joe pulled her eyelid up. “The eye is barely cloudy. I don’t think she’s been dead that long but it looks blue to me. What do you think?”
Bernie and I moved closer, leaning over the body.
Bernie nodded. “Blue,” he said, scratching his chin.
“Yeah, I agree. Thanks, Joe,” I said.
The decedent wasn’t Jennifer Moore.
After a final walk-through, we spoke to Moore again. He’d left voicemails for his wife and daughter and said he would keep trying to contact them. I gave him my card and requested he let us know when he reached Joan. Sometimes, wives have contact with estranged children and don’t tell their husbands. From my experience, it was a mom thing. Not that I was a mom or had any desires to head in that direction any time soon.
Time to hit the road and see what the good folks down at Frakes Realty had to say for themselves.
Bernie drove while I responded to Brad’s latest text. I’d met Brad after my married sister, MacKenzie, signed me up for an online dating site without my knowledge. I’d discussed it with Bernie at the time, and he’d thought it was a good idea. I felt his eyes on me, trying to see what I was texting.
Nosy.
“How’s it going with Brad? Getting serious?”
“Too early to tell, but it’s going better than I expected.”
Rain drizzled onto the windshield.
Bernie flipped on the wipers.
“But?” Bernie asked.
“But nothing. It’s going okay. He complains that my job gets in the way of us spending time together.”
“Not easy being a cop’s significant other. It’s hard when dates get broken.” He’d know because he used to cohabitate with my friend Khrystal.
“You should try online dating.”
“I don’t think so.” He shrugged. “It’s not something I want to do.”
I turned in my seat to face him. “You encouraged me to date online. In fact, when you tried to sell me on the idea, you said your brother and sister-in-law met online.”
“So?” The rain grew heavier, and he busied himself with adjusting the wipers.
“You nagged me to do it, but you won’t do it yourself? What gives? Out with it.”
“Nothing gives,” he snapped and pointed toward the street corner. “Frakes Realty is up ahead.”
He pulled up to the curb.
I shook my head. “Saved by the bell … or whatever.”
I opened the door to Frakes Realty, stepped inside, and turned the corner. A man in his late twenties smacked into me, sending me backing into Bernie.
“I’m sorry!” His face was flushed and he wiped perspiration from his brow. “You okay?”
“I’m fine. Are you?”
He nodded vigorously and breathed rapidly, as if he had been running. “Really, I’m sorry.” He rushed out. Bernie and I watched him hurry down the sidewalk.
Inside Frakes Realty, we found five or six people behind desks, on the phone, meeting with clients, or clicking away on computers. The office hummed with activity. I scanned the desk nameplates for Monica Stewart, Dr. Moore’s real estate agent.
“Over there.” Bernie walked toward a woman in her late twenties to early thirties with straw-like blonde hair. It looked like she’d applied her makeup with a spatula. She wore the deer-in-the-headlights expression, which I equated to, ironically, dimness.
Yeah, I know stereotyping people is wrong.
I followed Bernie to Monica’s desk, and we showed ID. She barely glanced at them.
Monica waved us to the chairs opposite her desk, which looked like a small greenhouse or nursery had exploded onto it. Flowers and potted plants covered her desk and surrounded it on the floor. How could she work in that jungle? Not to mention the smell. I’d never had allergies, but my nose tickled, and I wanted to cough.
“How can I help you?” she asked once we’d settled into our chairs.
I leaned against the back of my seat. “We’re here about the Moore house at 23987 Tremont Street. Dr. Moore indicated you were the agent.”
Monica turned to her computer then clicked and scrolled with her mouse. “Oh, yes. The doctor and lawyer. Sure, I represent them.” I was impressed by her ability to recall her clients’ jobs. She looked from me to Bernie and smiled. We were treated to a view of her braces—with whatever she’d eaten last stuck in them.
I forced my eyes to meet hers. “When did you last visit the house?”
She frowned and twisted her mouth. “Let’s see …” Her head tilted, and she gave me a blank look. “Yesterday?”
“Are you asking me?”
“No. It was yesterday.” She nodded and looked at me expectantly.
“Do you remember the time of day?”
Another frown.
“Do you keep track of your appointments? On your phone? Computer?”
“Yes! I’m sorry. I’m not with it today.” She flipped through a binder and ran her finger down the page. “Here it is. Ten o’clock yesterday morning.” She turned to her computer and began typing.
“Were you alone?” Bernie asked.
“No. I had clients with me. The Joneses. The property was too large for them. Too many stairs.” She continued clicking away on her keyboard. She sat up straight, and her brow furrowed.
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Uh-oh.
She reached for dark-blue, rectangular-framed eyeglasses and pushed them onto her face. Her fingers began to fly. “Hmm.” She no longer looked like the stereotypical dumb blonde and had morphed into a smart geek. Something was up.
I sat up straighter, too. “What did you find?” I glanced at Bernie, who mirrored my movements.
“This is odd.” She picked up her desk phone and pushed a button. “Sylvia, we’ve got a problem.” She dropped the phone onto its base and looked at us, her lips in a thin line. “She’ll be right out.”
“What’s happening?” Bernie asked.
Before she could respond, a stylish but skinny, dark-haired woman approached. Monica introduced us to Sylvia Frakes, joint owner of the agency with her husband, Vincent.
Bernie stood, and Sylvia took his seat. Such a gentleman.
Monica began. “Sylvia, the detectives are here about the Moore house and I have something to show you.”
“What’s the problem?” Sylvia looked up at Bernie and blinked.
“You’re the agency of record, and your lockbox is missing,” Bernie said.
“Dr. Moore told us the realty sign was also missing,” I said. “Any idea where they are?”
Sylvia and Monica looked at one another.
Monica pointed to her screen and said, “The electronic key has been used since I was last there.” She tapped the computer monitor with a squared-off, French-manicured nail and turned it toward us.
I leaned in and scanned the screen, not making heads or tails of what I saw. “What time was it activated?”
Monica scrolled then pointed. “Here.” She scrolled again. “And here.” She peered at a scowling Sylvia.
“How did this happen?” Sylvia stared at Bernie and me as if we had the answer—we didn’t.
I stared at the colorful charts showing the dates and times their listings had been accessed. “Does it say who used the key?”
“Let me check.” Monica brought up another page. “Oh!” She frowned again.
Lots of frowning going on.
“Who was it?” I asked.
Staring at Sylvia, Monica cleared her throat then pointed. “According to the data, you did, Sylvia.”
“That’s impossible. I was there around noon, and that’s it.” Sylvia reached forward, grabbed the mouse, and turned the keyboard further toward her. She selected different menu options, but the answer remained the same. She shook her head.
“How do you use the electronic key?” I asked.
“With our cell phones. The lockboxes are smartphone compatible.” Sylvia chewed her lip. She’d turned pale.
“Can we take a look at your cell phone?” I asked.
Sylvia gazed at me then Bernie. “I’m afraid I’ve misplaced it. I’m sorry.”
I studied Sylvia. “Mrs. Frakes, I have to ask you—”
She held up a hand. “I know. What time are we talking about here?”
“Tell me where you were last night and this morning, beginning at six.” I prepared to write.
“I left here at seven to go home and checked our multiple listing service database until ten thirty before going to bed. After working out at the gym from six until seven thirty this morning, I stopped at Starbucks, then was here by eight. I’ve been here ever since.”
“Can anyone corroborate your whereabouts?”
“Not for my time at home. My husband isn’t in town. But at the gym, I attended a group class, and I stopped at the juice bar afterward. I have a receipt for that and for the coffee at Starbucks.”
“Where is your gym?” Bernie asked.
“I don’t understand why you’re making an issue out of a missing lockbox and realty sign. They’re my property and can be replaced.”
“Mrs. Frakes,” I said, trying to keep my tone even, although the woman was starting to annoy me, big time, “we’re investigating a homicide.”
“Oh!” Monica gasped.
Sylvia flopped back into her seat, her eyes wide, dazed. “My gym … it’s the one on Wilson Street … by the library.”
“All right. We’ll check it out. Can you please find those receipts?”
“Sure. Be right back.” She eyed Monica before standing and leaving us.
I studied Monica, who’d raised her eyebrows.
“Do you have something to say?”
She fingered her gold serpentine necklace. “Me?”
Good grief.
I looked at Bernie. “There’s no one else in this conversation. Yes, you.”
She shot a quick glance in the direction Sylvia had gone. “Uh, no. Nothing.” Monica peered at Bernie. “Did Dr. Moore’s wife die?”
Bernie cleared his throat. “Not that we’re aware. If you know something that might be useful in our investigation, I suggest you tell us, Ms. Stewart. And tell us now.”
She batted her eyes. “Call me Monica.” Her gaze slid toward Sylvia’s office again before she turned to face Bernie. “I don’t think—”
Sylvia hurried into the room, handed me the receipts, and said, “Here you go, Detectives. As requested,” as she narrowed her eyes at Monica.
Hunh. A warning?
The times on the receipts coincided with the information she’d given us, but anyone can have receipts. We’d need to confirm her alibi later.
Monica turned away and busied herself on the computer. We wouldn’t get anything else out of her with Sylvia around, if ever. The woman appeared frightened and nervous. Of what? Or whom? Sylvia definitely played a role in the investigation. No doubt about it. I nodded at Bernie and we stood.
“Thank you, Mrs. Frakes. We’ll be in touch.” I handed her and Monica business cards and took one from Monica’s card holder on her desk—I planned to call Monica after business hours.
Bernie and I took off.
Interestingly, Sylvia never asked who had died at the Moores’ house.
3
Bernie opened the driver’s side door. The rain had stopped, but the air felt heavy and warm.
“What were you saying before we got to Frakes?” I asked.
“I wasn’t saying anything. I seem to recall you doing all the talking.”
“Why won’t you create an online dating profile when you were one of the reasons I tried it? I don’t get it.”
“Nothing to get. Forget I mentioned it.” He started the car and cranked up the air conditioning.
“Don’t give me that shit. Talk.” I turned to stare at him as I adjusted my seatbelt shoulder strap.
He mumbled something, looked out the window, then rolled away from the curb.
“What? Speak up.”
“Khrystal’s pregnant.” As if on cue, lightning lit the sky and it poured.
Bernie ramped up the wipers.
“Huh?”
“You heard me. Khrystal’s pregnant.”
“Since when? And the baby’s yours?”
Of course it was his. Why did I have to ask?
He frowned and skimmed a hand over his hair. He’d just had it trimmed short. A few strands of gray I hadn’t noticed before were sprinkled through the dark hair at his temples. I made a mental note to tell him he was getting old.
“She says it’s mine.” He fixed his eyes on me, frowning. “Didn’t she tell you?”
“No.” I stared out the window, confused. I was a little hurt my friend hadn’t told me she was pregnant with my partner’s child. Well, all right, I hadn’t spent much time with her since the two of them became an item. Then again, there’d been work and everything else. But, still …
“She called me a couple of days ago. Dropped the bomb.”
I scoffed. “Seriously? You’re acting like you had nothing to do with it.” I shook my head.
“Syd, you know I wasn’t ready for this.”
“Then, you should’ve kept it in your pants.” I couldn’t believe it.
What the hell?
“I’ll work it out.”
“You’d better! How?”
&
nbsp; “Is this any of your business?”
“I guess not.” I returned to looking out the window. “No. Hold it!” I spun around in my seat. “You can ask me about my love life, but yours is off-limits?”
“Okay. Listen.” He sighed. “We’re talking about trying again.”
“A baby is not a reason to get back together with someone. You guys need to figure out why you broke up and work that out before your bouncing bundle of joy arrives.”
“And suddenly, you’re a relationship expert? Anyway, I wasn’t ready before.”
“And now you are? What changed?”
His alcohol consumption had increased. That’s for sure.
“My brother told me I needed to grow up. And I miss her,” Bernie said. “She’s moving back in with me tomorrow. When we split up, we were living together, but separately…for months. I didn’t see her that much because she was so busy. Since she wasn’t there or was studying when she was home, I partied a little too much. Still, I should’ve realized that she wasn’t getting fat from overeating. That’s what I thought and I didn’t want to mention it to her. I asked her why she didn’t tell me she was pregnant when she left and she told me she didn’t know.”
“What changed your mind about the relationship?”
“I think I might be more ready than I was then. Don’t know for sure, but I do know I don’t want another man raising my child.”
“You do realize children aren’t property, right? You never know, another man might be a good father.”
“My child doesn’t need a good father. He or she will have me,” he said, then laughed. “That didn’t come out right.”
“I knew what you meant, and I hope you’ll both be happy. Together or apart. Doesn’t matter. Mostly, I want you to be focused while you’re on the job.”
“I always am.”
“Yeah. Until you’re not.”
“Where’s this coming from?”
Back up, Syd.
Annoyed with myself, I dialed back my tone. “Are you forgetting you were unconscious when you were hit over the head during the CPS case not that long ago? You were out cold for a couple of days.”
He grinned. “So, you’re worried about me, huh?”
“No, dumbass. I’m worried about me.” I glanced his way. “Distractions get cops killed.”
Criminal Negligence Page 2
