The Upstaged Coroner

by Paul Austin Ardoin

At that, the professor blinked hard; a tear threatened to run down his face.

  “You want fairness, you want justice—I know. I’ve been there, too,” Fenway said, “but I’ve never heard of anyone who wanted justice to find peace through revenge. They don’t become better people; they don’t sleep better at night. It’s letting go that brings that peace. It’s forgiveness that brings you the calm and the quiet you’ve been desperately wanting.”

  Rose’s breathing, too, had slowed. She seemed to understand that Fenway was talking Cygnus down.

  “You won’t feel better if you pull that trigger,” Fenway said. “You might think you’re getting justice, but you won’t feel it.”

  Fenway saw the doubt in Cygnus’s body language, saw his hand loosen its grip on the handle slightly—and she saw the determination return to Rose’s eyes.

  Rose snapped her head back, hard, and caught Cygnus in the chin. He dropped the gun in surprise and took a shocked step backward as Fenway dove for the gun.

  Fenway expected a scramble for it, but she grabbed it before either of them could react. She rolled on her back, gun pointing into the air, more or less in the direction of Professor Virgil Cygnus.

  “Back away!” Fenway yelled, but he was already five steps back, holding his mouth and partially doubled over. He didn’t even look at her as he pulled his hand away, blood on his upper lip.

  Rose scooped up the broken pieces of the usb drive and started running across the stage.

  “Hey!” Fenway yelled, but it was too late; Rose ran down the stage-left stairs and Fenway heard a door open, then footsteps running away, and then the door slam. Rose was getting away, and Fenway couldn’t do anything about it.

  “I guess it’s just you and me, Professor,” she said.

  “I need another six months with Judith,” he whispered. “Another six months. Is that so bad? Jessica would have given me up.” He used the back of his other hand to wipe his bleeding lip, and Fenway, gun still trained on Cygnus, pulled herself into a sitting position. “I thought I understood Jessica. I thought I meant something to her. But, no, I didn’t mean nearly as much to her as the promise of a bigger payday.”

  “Virgil Cygnus.” Fenway got to her feet and gritted her teeth. “You are under arrest for the murder of Jessica Marquez.”

  IV

  Saturday

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  There was nothing but darkness and heat and the gentle sound of rain against the bedroom window. Then a dull ringing sound. Then an elbow in her back.

  “Your phone,” McVie said.

  “Ugh,” Fenway mumbled, rolling over and reaching blindly in the direction of the ringtone. “Sorry.” Her fingertips caught the edge of the phone, and she pulled it toward her an inch or two before getting her hand around it. She lifted her head, the pillow on top of it, and saw the screen.

  “Charlotte.”

  “You better get it. She’ll call again until you do.”

  “I know.” She hit Answer. “Hi, Charlotte.”

  “Fenway—are you planning to come to your father’s arraignment on Tuesday?”

  “What?”

  “I didn’t wake you, did I?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact.”

  “Are you planning to sleep all day?”

  “It’s Saturday, Charlotte.”

  There was silence on the other end of the line.

  “Look,” Fenway said, “I know you’re worried, but you’ve got a great criminal lawyer now. When my father shows up for the arraignment, they’ll set reasonable bail and then you can work on the defense.”

  “Of course you’re right,” Charlotte said. “Sorry to wake you.”

  “Anyway,” Fenway continued, “if I get any more information on the case, you’ll have it as soon as I do.”

  “All right,” Charlotte said.

  “Anything else?”

  “Are you enjoying the Porsche?”

  “Yes, Charlotte. Thank you for letting me borrow it. They’re returning my Accord to me any day now.” She elbowed McVie in the ribs, and he grunted.

  They said their goodbyes and Fenway rolled onto her stomach. “What time is it?”

  “Almost eight,” McVie said, turning onto his side to face Fenway.

  “Charlotte’s up early.” She yawned. “I guess we should get moving too. I need to finish the paperwork from last night. And we’ve still got open cases to solve.”

  Something was different. Fenway didn’t feel anxious with McVie in her bed. Was it really just another two days of working the case with McVie that had loosened the knot in her chest and made her human again?

  “We’ve had few late nights in a row,” McVie said. “We can sleep in.” He traced his hand lazily up the side of her calf to her knee, and then her thigh.

  Fenway smiled. “I get the feeling you don’t intend for us to sleep.”

  McVie shifted his weight and planted a kiss on Fenway’s shoulder, and then another closer to her neck.

  His phone dinged.

  “You don’t have to get that,” Fenway said, her breathing coming heavier.

  “Let me just make sure it’s not an emergency,” he said, picking up the phone off his nightstand. “Ah.”

  “What is it?”

  “Cygnus’s arraignment has been set for Tuesday.”

  “Hmm. Maybe he’ll get arraigned with my father. It’ll be like a parade of celebrity murderers.”

  McVie looked at Fenway. “You want to be there?”

  “I kind of do, yeah.”

  McVie leaned in and kissed her neck, one hand on her shoulder, the other on her hip, and Fenway shuddered with anticipation.

  After Cygnus’s arrest, Fenway didn’t want to work on Saturday, but she hadn’t submitted the paperwork on the arrest Friday night, and thought she could finish it with an hour in an empty office. Fenway took the Porsche, arrived a few minutes past ten, and found Rachel waiting in her office, two large cups from Java Jim’s on her desk.

  “Been here long?”

  Rachel shook her head. “Only a few minutes. I knew you’d be cleaning up the paperwork on your arrest last night. I thought I’d catch you in time for your midmorning latte.” She slyly smiled. “But I didn’t think it would be your first of the day.”

  Fenway blushed.

  “Solving the murder in the first forty-eight hours. Very nice.”

  “Not quite. First seventy-two, maybe, but thanks.” Fenway sat down at her desk and gratefully reached for the latte. “I wish Cygnus would give us information on who’s paying him and who’s behind the accounts. I wish we had caught Rose Morgan, too. It would have been nice to play the two of them off each other. See which one would crack first.”

  “It’ll be good for Cygnus to spend the weekend in jail,” Rachel said. “Make him realize how serious the crime is, see if he’ll name names.”

  Fenway shook her head. “If he doesn’t get to spend the next few months with his dying wife, I don’t think he cares about anything else.”

  Rachel was quiet for a moment, a morose look on her face.

  “What is it?”

  “Well—look, Virgil Cygnus was a dog, wasn’t he? I mean, he was sleeping with Leda Nedermeyer for over a decade. He’s been cheating on his wife for ten years—and yet, he wants to risk going to prison for the rest of his life just to be with her at the end of hers?”

  “I know,” Fenway said, “and he wouldn’t even stop directing the play. People are funny.”

  “Do you think Cygnus truly loves his wife?”

  Fenway looked into Rachel’s eyes, saw the searching and desperation there, and knew Rachel wasn’t just asking about the Shakespeare professor. Fenway took a breath. “I think it’s possible for a person to truly love someone else and still cheat. It’s horrible for the person who’s being cheated on, of course, and it signifies something kind of screwed up about the cheater, but just because”—she paused and lowered her voice—“just because Dylan cheated on you doesn’t mean he didn’t l
ove you.”

  “I can’t believe I didn’t know,” Rachel said miserably.

  Fenway nodded. Dylan hadn’t been dead quite six months, so Rachel’s wounds were still open—not as fresh as they once were, but still raw. “Yeah,” Fenway said. “I’m sorry.”

  “Anyway,” Rachel said, straightening up, shaking her hair out, and lifting her arms. “I didn’t come over here to have a pity party for myself. I came here to tell you what I learned from Deshawn.”

  “What you learned—what? Tell me you didn’t—”

  “Yeah. I took matters into my own hands.”

  “Rachel—no! I didn’t want you to—”

  Rachel waved her hand as if shooing a fly. “I’m a big girl. I make my own decisions.”

  Fenway paused, gaping at her friend, and then sat back in her chair. “And you’re calling him Deshawn?”

  Rachel shrugged. “He’s a nice guy, Fenway. He was in the bar when I walked in, and he couldn’t take his eyes off me. He was the one to approach me.”

  “Tell me you weren’t wearing that red dress.”

  Rachel laughed. “I did try it on before I left, but you were right—it was too much. Like the girlfriend in a bad gangster movie.”

  “I can’t believe you, Rachel! I told you I’d think of something else.”

  “You needed the information, and I thought it would be fun.”

  Fenway covered her eyes with her hands.

  “I pretended I had been stood up on a blind date. I looked sad. He sent over a drink to my table, and then we started talking.”

  “What the hell, Rachel?”

  “He’s lonely. His wife left him a couple of years ago and he hasn’t even dated. We talked about how much it sucks to start dating again.”

  “Rachel, I didn’t want you to—”

  “Relax, Fenway. It’s fine. He was on his third bourbon before I even asked him what he did for a living.”

  Fenway paused. “And did he tell you anything?”

  “He said he was a homicide detective, and that he was trying to get the guy who’d hired a hit man.”

  “What did you say then?”

  “I told him I saw an episode of a cop show where they had to let the bad guy go because the hit man wouldn’t talk.”

  “Holy crap, Rachel, that’s brilliant. And he bit?”

  “Hook, line, and sinker. He said the hit man did talk—and gave up the guy who hired him.”

  Fenway’s jaw dropped open. “Well, then, what the hell was he doing out of jail?”

  “I’m not done with my story yet, Fenway. I said, ‘Oh, Detective, that’s wonderful—getting two killers off the street!’”

  Fenway shook her head and laughed.

  “And he said that the ada was so intent on getting the rich guy who hired him that she offered the guy immunity before she realized he’d confess to murder.”

  Fenway sat back. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  Rachel shook her head.

  “ada Kim offered Grayheath immunity just to get something on my father?”

  “That’s sure what it sounded like. Deshawn was mad about it, too. He said they had a ton of evidence tying the hit man to the murder, and he was pissed that the ada threw it out the window.”

  “Evidence?”

  Rachel nodded. “They’ve got video.”

  “Video? Of what?”

  “He searched video feeds of atm cameras in Bellingham, then he found what he called a ‘secret account’ that proved the guy in the video was hired to kill the target.”

  “Did he say how he found it?”

  “He went on about it for a while. How hard he worked, elbow-grease, ear-to-the-ground detective work. Then he said that none of it mattered, and it was an anonymous tip a couple of weeks ago. A copy of a bank statement he found under his office door one day.”

  Fenway nodded. “He didn’t think that was fishy?”

  Rachel shrugged. “I don’t think that even crossed his mind. He thought he had finally caught a break on the case.” She tapped her foot. “He didn’t have nice things to say about the victim. At one point in his investigation, he thought you were behind it.”

  “Me?”

  “Well—he said the murder victim had sexually assaulted several young women at the university during his time there, and that he had a bead on a couple of the women who had ties to Estancia. One who parked long-term at the airport.”

  “I guess that would be me.” Fenway paused. “Wait—a couple of them? Professor Delacroix assaulted another woman who lives in Estancia besides me?”

  “He’d had another bourbon by then and he was pretty happy. Maybe he was embellishing.”

  “Maybe.”

  “If I’d been in his shoes, I would have looked at myself as the main suspect, too,” Fenway said. “That makes me think my father didn’t do it. Because of how likely it would be for the hammer to come down on me.” She paused. “You know, my father can be a real ass, and he missed my graduation and everything, but he’d never hang me out to dry.”

  “No, he wouldn’t,” Rachel said.

  “What else do they have? Tapped phone conversations? Video of my father meeting Peter Grayheath in a park?”

  Rachel shook her head and then paused. “They’ve got the confession from Grayheath and the payment from your dad’s account—but now that I think about it, he said there were payments. Multiple payments.”

  “To Grayheath?”

  “I—I’m not sure. Like I said, he was pretty drunk by then. He was slurring his words.”

  Fenway looked sideways at Rachel. “It makes a lot more sense if there’s more to their paper trail than a single payment. My father’s lawyers would tear that apart.”

  Rachel nodded. “Yeah, they must have something else. Maybe they wanted to get your father in custody while they built the case against him.”

  “Think the d.a. will ask for remand?”

  “It’s what I’d do,” Rachel said. “Your dad’s an obvious flight risk—more money than the Queen of England, and access to airplanes that could have him sipping margaritas on the beach in the Caymans before the weekend is over.”

  They sat in silence for a moment.

  “Did you get anything else from Ridley?” Fenway finally asked.

  Rachel blushed.

  “No,” Fenway said. “You didn’t. You kissed him?”

  “Well, he kissed me, but I didn’t say no.”

  “You didn’t, huh?”

  She smiled. “He’s a pretty good kisser. Even after all those bourbons.”

  “Did you do anything else?”

  Rachel rolled her eyes. “You know I’m not that kind of girl.”

  “Oh, come on, Rachel, for the right guy, we’re all that kind of girl.”

  Rachel’s eyes grew wide.

  “Well,” Fenway said, “maybe I’m just speaking for myself.” She tapped her fingers on the desk. “Will you see him again?”

  “No. I don’t know. He said he’d leave in the next few days.”

  “After the arraignment, probably,” Fenway mused.

  “Probably.”

  “And if you’re not that kind of girl in the next couple of days—well, Bellingham’s an awfully long way away.”

  “Hah. True enough, I guess.”

  Fenway thought of Officer Brian Callahan, mooning over Rachel a few days before. “Besides, there are other options.”

  “Other options?”

  “Locally, I mean.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “Well.” Rachel stood up. “I think I’ll head over to the bar at Phillips-Holsen again tonight. Just to see what happens. But I might be asking you more details about these options I have.” She smiled and walked out of Fenway’s office.

  Fenway typed up the last paragraph of her report, leaned back in her chair, and shook her latte cup. There was one last sip in it.

  The phone on her desk rang. She looked at the number; it was from the Sa
n Miguelito county offices.

  “Fenway Stevenson.”

  “Hey, Fenway. It’s Melissa from the lab. It’s about that award you sent us.”

  “You’re working on Saturday, too, huh?”

  “The lab’s backed up. I’m sure you’re not surprised.”

  “Right.” Fenway bit her tongue to stop herself from asking about her car. “So, the award. This is the Macbeth award? Or is it the acting award from Amanda Kohl’s dorm room closet?”

  “The acting award you sent us yesterday.”

  “You got the results already? Wow, that was fast.”

  “It’s only fast because there weren’t any prints on it.”

  “Wait—what?”

  Melissa laughed. “Just what I said. No fingerprints on it, at all.”

  “That can’t be right. Amanda loved that award. She put it on the top shelf and everything.” Fenway paused. “Why would someone wipe the fingerprints off it?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why you get the big bucks.”

  “Wow. Okay, thanks.”

  “You still don’t have a murder weapon, do you?”

  “I know what it is—I’m almost positive it’s the missing award. The one from last year for The Merchant of Venice.”

  “Oh—one other thing. The base had a big scratch in it.”

  “Is that significant?”

  “It is when there’s paint transfer in it. It’s a dark gray paint with a metallic finish. Don’t quote me on this since we haven’t done the official analysis yet, but I’ve only seen this kind of paint come from machine sprayers, like in factories. Cars, appliances, that kind of thing.”

  Fenway emptied the last of her latte in her mouth, thinking.

  “Fenway? You still there?”

  “What? Oh, yeah, Melissa, sorry. Thanks for the information.”

  “Any time.”

  Fenway couldn’t help herself. “Hey—if you hear anything about when I’ll be able to pick up my car…”

  “You’ll be the first to know.”

  “Thanks.”

  Fenway hung up, glanced through the completed form on her screen, and hit the submit button. She got up and stretched, then walked over to it to tell Piper everything Rachel had said.