Nothing to Hide

by Allison Brennan

  “Lucy,” Jerry said, shaking his head. “I may be stymied now, but in no case that I’ve worked has psychological profiling given me anything that good police work didn’t. And we talked about this—I’m not going to be diverted from an organized investigation chasing down some rabbit hole because a shrink says the killer is a one-armed man with daddy issues.”

  She resisted calling him on his bias. With as much calm as she could muster, she said, “Just today we used psychology—psychological profiling in action. With George Andres. I assessed him and found a way to get him to talk. And you, with Carl Franklin, getting him to spill everything without so much as breaking a sweat because you could read him.”

  “That’s police work. Knocking on doors and asking questions and assessing witnesses and suspects right in front of us.”

  “Andres would never have talked to you, and I think you know it. And I don’t think Carl would have been as forthcoming about his affair with me, a woman, because he was embarrassed.”

  “You have a way with people, I’ll give you that, but that’s being a good cop—not a shrink who pulls things out of the air just because it sounds good.”

  “If you just—”

  “No. Because we talk to him and if I disagree with his assessment he’ll pull rank and you’ll ice me out. I’m not walking away from this investigation.”

  “Dillon can’t. He’s not FBI. He’s a private consultant who is authorized to work with the FBI. I can make the call, it’ll be—”

  “No. Every damn time the head shrinks come in they screw things up. Your brother’s probably a good guy, might be smarter than anyone I know, but I don’t trust your process. This isn’t against you, Lucy. I’ve liked working with you, you’re sharp as a tack. But I’m not giving up control to some shrink who isn’t on the ground, who hasn’t interviewed witnesses, who is looking at pictures and reports and making some academic determination that the killer is a white male between the ages of thirty-five and forty-five whose daddy beat him with his belt.”

  Lucy was trying to keep her blood from boiling over. “That is not profiling. I talked through the case with Dillon. I thought about it yesterday, after watching Ash’s simulations, but talking through it with Dillon, I realized this is theater. A show. The killer is setting the stage. The real question is for who? For the victims? The survivors? The police? It’s an act, every time, yet he’s compelled to make sure the end looks the same, even the victim who died with the first blow.”

  “Nonsense.”

  “We’re missing something and having an objective eye will help.” Lucy glanced at Sean, who was watching the exchange while biting his tongue. She was grateful he didn’t interfere.

  “Then I’ll bring in a task force of objective cops to look at the evidence again. But no way in hell am I turning this case over to the FBI. And if you have a problem with that, you can walk away, because this is still my jurisdiction, and your boss already promised they wouldn’t pull rank and take the case. That’s the only reason you’re tagging along.”

  That made her angry. “I’m doing more than tagging along,” she snapped.

  “That’s not how I meant it.”

  “Yes it was. I am going to finish this out. I’m not walking away because you’re being a jerk.”

  She was stunned that she had actually said that.

  “I didn’t think you would, but we’re still not calling the shrinks.”

  She was getting nowhere with him. She thought for sure that Dillon being not FBI would be a bonus, that Jerry would listen.

  She grabbed her gun, badge, and phone off the small kitchen desk and said, “It’s nearly seven thirty. We’d better go.”

  * * *

  Abigail James was a tall girl who looked like she’d suddenly grown six inches and didn’t quite know what to do with her body. She sat awkwardly at the formal dining table in sweats and a volleyball T-shirt with her high school emblazoned across the front in green and gold, her long blond hair braided down the back, still damp from a recent shower.

  “Teri said you had some questions for me. About my dad.”

  “Yes,” Jerry said. “I hope that’s okay. We know that this situation is difficult.”

  “It’s okay,” she said. She picked at her fingernails, which were all short. “I just—I don’t know who could do something like this to my dad.”

  “We’re putting together a time line of your father’s days and weeks leading up to his murder. The weekend before he left for his business trip, what did you do?”

  “We went shopping for school supplies—school started Monday. He had to go on the business trip—he wanted to reschedule it, but I told him it was fine. He postponed it a day so he could be here when I got back from my first day at high school. Dad never really liked shopping. I told him we could order everything online, but he wanted to make a day of it.”

  She looked off, not really focusing on them.

  Teri took her stepdaughter’s hand and squeezed. “He always did what we wanted to do, even if it made him uncomfortable. Hold on to those memories, sweetheart.”

  Abby nodded. “We had fun. Went shopping all morning, had lunch, did some more shopping. Sunday we hung around the house.”

  She got up and walked across the room, looked at a photograph of her, her dad, and Teri on the hutch. “I just wish I had more time with him.” She looked down at her hands and took a deep breath and slowly let it out.

  “Abby,” Lucy said, “did your dad say anything to you during your day together that you were concerned about?”

  “I don’t understand.” She turned back to face them, but didn’t sit down. “We just—it was just like always. Dad was a good listener. But he didn’t say anything was bothering him.”

  “We believe that whoever killed your dad might have followed him. That he knew where your father would be and when.”

  “Like, that he was coming back from a business trip?” she asked.

  “Exactly. And sometimes when people are followed, they have a feeling that they’re being watched, even if they don’t see anyone.”

  “My dad didn’t say anything about that. We talked about high school—I’m a freshman—and I talked to him about volleyball. Tryouts were the week before school started, and I made the team. He was happy about it—my dad doesn’t really get sports. He was all about numbers. He said there was peace in knowing that there was only one possible answer, that two plus two would always equal four. But he promised to come to all my games and said I’d have to explain the rules to him. But then—I saw he’d bought a book about volleyball and took it with him on his trip.”

  The more Abby talked, the more upset Lucy became. Someone had taken a good father from his daughter. The unfairness to the tragedy just hit her. Maybe because Jesse was about the same age and he, too, had lost a parent.

  “Did your father ever mention to you about feeling threatened or scared? That maybe someone was angry with him? It might not have been about work,” Jerry added. “Maybe a neighbor or someone at church or the store.”

  “Dad didn’t go to church,” Abby said. “And really, everyone liked my dad, but he didn’t socialize a lot. He liked working and he liked being home.”

  “Outside of your family, who knows that your mother left you with a sizable trust?”

  Both Teri and Abby were surprised by that question. Teri said, “What does Abby’s trust have to do with this?”

  “We don’t know that it has anything to do with this case, but it’s one more angle we have to look at,” Jerry said. “It’s our understanding that the trust can’t be touched, aside from a monthly allowance, until Abby is twenty-one—even in the event of her father’s death.”

  “That is true,” Teri said.

  “Why would someone k-kill my dad for my money? They can’t get it—I can’t even get it. I don’t want it. If I could have my dad back, they could have all my money, I don’t care about any of it!”

  Teri looked over at Abby, then back t
o Jerry and Lucy. “Deputy, it seems that this line of questions is not getting anyone anywhere. It’s clear to me that my husband’s murder was a random act of violence, or someone’s sick head. You’re upsetting Abby.”

  “I’m okay,” Abby said. “Really. I want to find out what happened. I want to know. I miss him so much and it doesn’t seem fair.”

  “It isn’t fair,” Lucy said. “And we will find out what happened to your dad. I’d like to show you both a few pictures. If you can tell me if you have ever seen these people before.”

  “Are they suspects?” Teri asked. “Are you actually showing my daughter suspects?”

  “No. But they may be connected to Steven’s death. We just don’t know how yet.”

  Jerry looked at Lucy oddly. She hadn’t discussed this with him because she’d just formulated the idea this afternoon.

  “I want to,” Abby said. She sat back down, closer to Lucy so she could more easily see the pictures.

  Teri sighed. “Very well.”

  Lucy had photos of everyone involved, even remotely, on her phone. She quickly added them all to one folder, skipping Steven James’s photo, and then turned her phone to show Abby. Teri stood behind her stepdaughter to see better. Lucy started with Susan Standish.

  No reaction.

  She went through Susan’s two current lovers, then her onetime lover from Baton Rouge. Then Billy Joe Standish. “I saw him on the news,” Teri said. “He was killed before Steven. The reporter said it might be the same person.”

  “Yes,” Lucy said. She flipped to his friend Joey Adkins. Nothing.

  She showed George Andres, Julio Garcia, and Marissa Garcia.

  “Wait,” Abby said.

  Lucy’s heart skipped a beat.

  “Go back.”

  She did, and Abby looked carefully at the picture of Julio Garcia. She bit her lip. “He looks familiar but I don’t know why.”

  Teri studied the picture. “We saw it on the news this weekend.” She turned to Lucy and Jerry. “That must have been it.”

  “I guess,” Abby said.

  “Think, Abby. Do you recognize him? Other than seeing his picture on the television?”

  “I—I don’t know. Maybe. But…” She shrugged.

  Lucy didn’t want to push her too hard because sometimes memories could be led down the wrong path. If she recognized him, Lucy hoped that it would come to her, but she decided to push a little.

  “He was a chef at a hotel on the Riverwalk. The Sun Tower. Do you go to the Riverwalk?”

  “All the time,” Abby said. “Well, I used to. My dad’s office is down there on West Guadalupe. Sometimes after school I’d meet him and we’d go for ice cream. My dad was so serious all the time, but he loved ice cream. Mint chocolate chip was his favorite.”

  Her voice was strong, but tears burned in her eyes.

  Lucy pulled the phone back. “If you think of anything, please call us.” She slid over her card.

  “Wait,” Abby said. “I’ve seen him.”

  Lucy looked down at her phone as her screen faded. She pressed the HOME button and turned the phone to Abby. “Him?”

  “Yes, like all the time. He walks a dog.”

  Teri stared. “Are you saying my husband’s killer is a neighbor?”

  “No,” Lucy said. “This is my husband. We live a few blocks over. We have a golden retriever.”

  Abby smiled. “I thought I recognized you, too,” she said, “but I wasn’t sure. You run sometimes in the park.”

  “Not as much as I should. My San Diego–raised body doesn’t like running in Texas humidity.”

  “I was born in California. In Santa Barbara.”

  “Beautiful up there.”

  “Do you miss San Diego?” Abby asked.

  “Sometimes. The weather, yes. The beaches. My family. But I like San Antonio.” She assessed Abby. “You miss it?”

  She shrugged. “I guess sometimes, too. My grandpa died a couple years ago, I never really knew my grandmother. I don’t have anyone there but some cousins I don’t know who are older than me. And my uncle—my dad’s brother—is in the navy, stationed out of San Diego, but he’s not there most of the time.”

  Lucy didn’t have in her notes that Steven James even had a brother.

  “If that’s all?” Teri said. “Abby has school tomorrow, and it’s been a long day.”

  Lucy and Jerry stood, thanked them for their time, and left. Jerry drove Lucy back to her house.

  “I hadn’t thought of showing photos,” he said. “But it didn’t get us anywhere. She may have thought Julio looked familiar, but unfortunately, cross-race identification can be sketchy.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “A young white girl may think that all adult Hispanic men look alike. So he looks familiar but she never really saw him.”

  Witness identification was notoriously a problem, and one of the easiest things for lawyers to refute in court.

  “Except, he worked less than a mile from where Steven James worked. What if Standish did a job in the same area in the last year? What if somehow the Riverwalk connects the victims?”

  “That’s a stretch, Lucy.”

  “Did you talk to Steven’s brother?”

  “No. He was deployed on a ship somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. He was granted hardship leave for a week and was here for the funeral, but there was no reason to interview him.”

  “Maybe James called him. Talked to him about whatever was bothering him.”

  “I’d think the brother would have reached out to us if he knew anything.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t know that he knows something.”

  He sighed and pulled up in front of her house. “I’ll find out where he is and go through the channels to talk to him, but I think it’s a waste of time.”

  “We have to pursue every thread we have until it ends.”

  “True. We’ll show Marissa and her sister the photos, see if they recognize anyone. But at this point, I don’t know which end is up in this investigation.”

  Lucy didn’t, either. She wanted to work through the crime scenes again and talk some more to her brother Dillon. But Jerry had put his foot down.

  He’d put his foot down at officially bringing in a profiler, but unofficially …

  Lucy would have to tread carefully.

  Because at this rate, they would never solve this crime, and that would increase the chance that there would be another victim.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Wednesday Night

  Sean was surprised to get a call from Michael at seven thirty. Lucy was in the middle of an interview with her temporary partner—though Sean wasn’t sure he liked him much after his piss-poor attitude—and Jesse was in his room. He’d been quiet and sore after soccer. Sean asked if practice was bad, and Jesse simply said, “Tough.” He said he wasn’t hungry and went to shower and Sean wondered if the coach had yelled at him. Sean had never participated in team sports. His parents never put him in anything, and in high school he was too angry to commit to a team. He just wanted to do his own thing.

  The first thing Jesse asked to do when they came back from California after his mother’s funeral was to find a soccer team. Brian’s team had a position for him, and though it wasn’t in the neighborhood, Sean didn’t mind driving him to and from. It was a competitive team so they didn’t have regional boundaries. Jesse tried out and made it. Sean was so proud of him, and Lucy felt strongly that team sports, especially soccer—which Jesse loved—were a great way for Jesse to adjust to living in a new city as well as make friends with similar interests.

  But Sean had never seen him so down after a practice. It had only been a month, but still—Jesse was unusually tired and sullen.

  He shook it off and answered Michael’s call. “What’s up?”

  “I need math help. I have a test tomorrow.”

  “Ask away.”

  “It’s geometry. It’s complicated. Father tried to show me, but he made it worse, now I’m
completely confused.”

  St. Catherine’s was more than twenty minutes away, and Sean had just been on that side of town picking Jesse up an hour ago. But Michael rarely asked for help in anything, and Sean didn’t want to say no. “Okay. I’ll come over. Thirty minutes?”

  “Thank you.” He hung up.

  Sean went upstairs to tell Jesse he was going out. “I won’t be long—and Lucy should be home in an hour or so.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “You look tired. You should go to bed early.”

  “I am, but I want to go. Unless you don’t want me to come.”

  Why would he think that? “Of course not. We’ll bring Bandit and make it a party.”

  Jesse got out of bed and winced. A small moan escaped.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “That’s not nothing. Did you get hurt?”

  “Just got hit with the ball. I wasn’t paying attention and it knocked me down. Totally took the wind out of me. I’m fine, just feel stupid, and the coach yelled at me for not paying attention.”

  That could explain his moodiness, but Sean wasn’t sure. “Maybe Lucy should look you over when she gets home. She’s an EMT, and she has a lot of experience taping up bruises and cuts between Kane, Jack, and me.”

  “I’m fine. I promise. But I’m glad we don’t have practice tomorrow.”

  Sean was still adjusting to this whole parenthood thing, and he didn’t want to make something from nothing, but he didn’t want to miss something important, either.

  Sean was glad he had Jesse’s company, even though Jesse wasn’t chatty. They pulled up at St. Catherine’s, and Michael met them at the door. They went to the family room where Frisco and Tito were playing games. When Bandit saw them, he ran around the couch three times at high speed. Sean whistled and Bandit stopped, then looked up at him with anticipation of playing.

  “Can we take him out back?” Frisco asked. “We won’t let him get in the pool.” Bandit loved to swim, but driving thirty minutes in a car with a wet dog wasn’t fun.