by Carsen Taite
“Do you think my father was guilty of killing Linda Bradshaw?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t sit through the trial, hear what the jury heard.”
“The jury apparently didn’t hear everything,” Riley said.
“That’s for a judge to decide.”
“Kind of a chickenshit answer, don’t you think?”
“It’s the only answer I have. I know what you know. Do you believe he was guilty?”
Riley wished the answer wasn’t such a struggle. She’d been wrestling with this question since the day the detectives had arrested her father. The words came out before she could stop them. “I don’t know.” She looked down and saw that she’d torn her napkin into tiny little pieces and she shoved the debris to the side. “But it doesn’t really matter what I think. His case was mishandled, depriving him of a fair trial.”
“Some people think the best way to resolve a situation like that is with a new trial,” Claire said.
“And by some people, you mean cop people, right?” Riley shook her head. “He did fifteen years. If he’s tried again and found not guilty, what’s the remedy then?”
“I don’t know.” Claire grimaced. “The system isn’t perfect, but it works most of the time.”
Riley let the statement go without comment. She could hardly expect to influence Claire when she wasn’t certain of the facts. Deep down, she didn’t believe her father was guilty of murder, but she wasn’t equipped to argue the finer legal points. She was, however, determined to find out why Claire was considering him a suspect in these recent murders. “Tell me what other clues you have in these recent murders. You keep coming back to me about them. Maybe if you give me a clue what you’re looking for, I can help you.”
“We’re looking at lots of things, people.”
“Like who?” Riley wanted Claire to either admit she was a suspect and tell her why or move on. She pressed the point. “Do you think I was involved?”
A slight pause and then Claire said, “We are covering a lot of ground and it’s too soon for me to comment on the status of a pending investigation.”
“What a nicely packaged bullshit answer. Are you really looking at a lot of possible suspects? Because it seems like you’re only focused on ones whose last name is Flynn.”
Claire bit her lower lip. Riley could tell she wanted to respond, but something was keeping her from it, and Riley had lost all patience about the subject. “You really have nothing to say?”
“Riley…”
Riley stood and pushed her chair in. “We’re done here. Don’t contact me again,” she said, feeling silly as she said the words, since she’d been the one to call Claire this time. “I mean it.” She tossed a couple of twenties on the table. “And lunch is on me. If you want to know where I got this money, get a subpoena for my bank records.”
She stalked off without looking back. When she slid behind the wheel of her SUV, she slammed her palms against the steering wheel to drain some of her anger before she pulled out onto the road. Her anger was directed inward. She’d lapsed into a feeling of comfort, sharing easy conversation with Claire like they were friends, when she should’ve realized Claire was a cop looking for clues and any questions she asked were to bolster her investigation against the most convenient suspect so she could close this case and move on to the next. She’d let herself believe that Claire was different from the cops who’d arrested her father, who’d settled on the easiest explanation instead of the right one, letting expediency substitute for justice. And she’d done so because Claire was beautiful and engaging and all the things she’d never have because of a life story she did not create.
Chapter Eleven
Claire sat at the table for a few moments while she tried to process what had just happened. When Riley had called her and offered to meet, she’d taken the overture as an opportunity to see what she could find out about the elusive artist as it related to the case, but when she’d seen Riley again, her instinct to interrogate took a back seat to a genuine desire to get to know her, to see beneath the no affect veneer Riley projected, but now she was as mystified as she’d been from the start.
Did Riley believe her father was innocent or not? Did she? Claire heard Nick’s voice in her head, saying she should weigh the facts in light of the issues the detectives caused by withholding evidence. She believed in the importance of loyalty, but if her primary allegiance wasn’t to the truth, she wasn’t doing her job. Her gut told her Riley didn’t have anything to do with these crimes, but truth was based on facts and evidence, not gut feelings.
She should’ve shown Riley the sketches, asked her outright if they were hers. The second murder meant it was past time to keep the sketches a secret if they wanted to catch the murderer. If Riley said the drawings were hers, they might have enough to get a search warrant for Riley’s apartment to see if there was any other evidence to tie her to the case. If she said the drawings weren’t, then it was time to show them to the rest of the Eastside Sketchers to see if someone else claimed ownership. Either way, they needed a break and they needed it soon.
Her phone buzzed with a text from Nick. Reyes wants us to come by. Where are you?
Oak Lawn, she typed back. I’ll pick you up.
On the way to the station, Claire considered what she would tell Nick when he asked where she’d been. It wasn’t like they were joined at the hip, but she knew he’d have opinions about her sharing a meal with a person of interest in the case and for sure he’d wonder why she was meeting Riley without him. Ultimately, she decided to hope he wouldn’t ask—not the most ingenious strategy, but it was the best she could come up with short of outright lying.
She pulled alongside the building and texted Nick she was waiting outside. A few minutes later, he got in the car.
“What’s up?” she asked. “Did Reyes give you a clue why she wants to see us?”
“Nope, but you know how she hates the phone when she wants to make a point.”
“Accurate.” Claire maneuvered her way through traffic to the medical examiner’s office, trying to think of something to say that wouldn’t provoke a discussion of Riley Flynn or her father. “I keep thinking about Buster Creel. Remember he said he left the rest of the group early the day Jill Shasta was murdered.”
“Right, because he had to go let out his dog.”
“What if he doubled back and dumped her body while the others were on the way to the bar?”
“I’ll have to check my notes,” Nick said, “but I think he made it to the bar before Riley.”
“He could’ve taken a different route.”
“True, but you saw his work online. Those sketches definitely aren’t his. I guess he could’ve gotten hold of someone else’s work, but why would he choose to leave it at the murder scene?”
Claire tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. Nick was right, of course. They’d found samples online of most of the group member’s work, but none of them appeared to be the same style as the sketches they’d found at the murder scenes. She was desperately casting about for anything that might clear Riley, and her desperation was a problem since it had the potential to compromise their investigation. “Any luck finding samples of Riley’s work?”
“None. I’ve looked everywhere.”
“I think it’s time we go to the Lofton Gallery and see if we can convince them to give us a sneak preview of her work.”
“I thought you didn’t want to tip anyone off.”
“I don’t, but I’d rather do that than have more dead bodies show up because we’re focused on the wrong suspect.”
“On it.” Nick jabbed at his phone. “Uh, not going to happen today. Gallery’s closed. They open back up Thursday at noon.”
“Let’s be there when they open.” Claire had mixed feelings about the decision to strong-arm the gallery. Her gut told her Riley didn’t have anything to do with the murders, but she was ready for a break in this case and she could no longer afford to tiptoe around evidence
in the name of a strategy that wasn’t paying off. She pulled up at the Dallas County Medical Examiner’s office, and she and Nick went in and asked for Dr. Sophia Reyes.
A few minutes later, Reyes appeared in the lobby and motioned for them to follow her back to her office. “You two look like shit.”
“Thanks, Doc,” Nick said. “Between this case and the four babies my wife delivered over the weekend, I’m not getting much sleep. Medical question for you—why do babies always seem to come in the middle of the night, especially if it’s the weekend?”
“You know what they say. The best and worst things happen in the middle of the night. It’s definitely when we get the most dead bodies. How about you, Claire? What’s your excuse for looking like you slept on a bed of nails?”
“Same. Except the part about the babies.” Claire kept her answer simple, but she knew it wasn’t. Unlike Nick, she’d had uninterrupted time in the middle of the night, but sleep eluded her. In its place was a constant stream of unanswered questions and jumbled emotions, most of which revolved around Riley Flynn. “What’ve you got for us?”
Reye’s handed her a file. “Tox screen and fiber analysis. I had to rush these along, so consider the results preliminary, but there are a few interesting items.”
Claire opened the folder and held it between her and Nick. She scanned the first page. “Tell me what we’re looking at.” She pointed at a section in the middle of the page. “Because it looks like this says there were GHB levels in each of these women.”
“That’s correct. The question is whether it was endogenous or exogenous.”
“English please,” Claire asked.
“She means whether it was introduced into the body or whether the body created it during the decomposition process,” Nick said.
“Thanks, nerd man.”
He shrugged. “Years of helping Cheryl study. Oh, and I took a couple of forensics courses online last year. Besides, chemistry is my jam.”
Claire turned back to Reyes. “Is he right?”
“Essentially, yes. GHB doesn’t stay in the bodily fluids for very long, and measuring the exact levels is complicated by regular metabolism and the fact the body’s cells can produce GHB during decomposition. There have been studies that look at the measurement parameters to determine which is which, and based on my own research, it’s entirely possible these women were drugged. The science around this is complicated though, and a good defense expert will be able to challenge my conclusions, but I wanted you to know about it because if these women were given GHB, they likely wouldn’t have been able to resist being strangled.”
“Which widens the pool of possible suspects to anyone who could drug a drink,” Nick said.
“Whoever it was would’ve still had to find an opportunity to administer the GHB, so either they were able to get close enough to slip it in a drink or they overpowered them to administer the drug, and if it’s the latter, then why bother with the drug if you’re already in a struggle.” Claire stared at the page. “What about DNA? Anything showing a defensive struggle?”
“No,” said Reyes. “And the GHB would explain why. If he drugged the women, they wouldn’t have been able to resist.”
“Or she,” said Nick. “We don’t know if the perp is a he or a she, yet, and if whoever it was used a drug to debilitate the victims, it would’ve been easy to strangle them.”
Claire’s stomach roiled at the word “she.” She couldn’t imagine the Riley she’d shared civil conversation and brisket tacos with dosing an unsuspecting woman and then strangling her to death, but any questions about whether Riley had the strength to do so were laid to rest by this new finding. “You said you had some info on the fibers?”
“Yes.” Reyes took the file and flipped to another page. “We found some trace fibers on the neck of each woman and were able to match them to the same material. Silk. We don’t have the capability here to determine if they were both from the same item, but I took the liberty of sending samples to the FBI lab. “We also found some dog hairs. Did either woman have a dog?”
“No for Shasta. I don’t know about Wendy Hyatt,” Claire said. “There wasn’t one at her apartment. We’re meeting with her parents this afternoon and we can ask them.” She scrawled a reminder in her notebook. “How soon will you know about the fibers?”
“I put a rush on it, but you know how that goes. Hurry up and wait. It just depends on where we are in line. I’ll call you as soon as I know more.”
“Thanks. Anything else we need to know?”
“No.” Reyes pointed at the folder. “Leave that here. I’ll get you a copy of my official report as soon as I hear back from the lab.”
Claire thanked her for the heads-up and she and Nick left the building. Once they were in the car, Claire’s head was buzzing with ideas. “I’m not sure what to think about all that. Any thoughts?”
“My first thought is Buster Creel has a dog.”
“Let’s find out what kind.” Claire jotted a note as a reminder.
“How about you?” Nick asked. “Did anything else Reyes said give you any revelations?”
“I’d have to look back through the files, but I don’t think Frank Flynn strangled Linda Bradshaw with anything other than his bare hands.”
“Uh, you seem to be forgetting that he probably didn’t strangle anyone at all, but no need to look back through the case file. Linda Bradshaw’s killer left handprints not silk fibers. You still think we should talk to him?”
Claire considered her answer carefully. Bruce had texted her this morning to ask where things stood regarding Flynn. His impatience at the stagnant investigation was apparent from the use of all caps on the word FLYNN. She hadn’t bothered responding to ask which Flynn he was talking about since she figured he wouldn’t care as long as he could tie one of them to the murders. And that was the problem, wasn’t it? Bruce cared more about exacting punishment for what he perceived as a missed opportunity in Linda Bradshaw’s case, and it felt more like revenge than justice. But his obsession was her problem because Frank Flynn’s hearing was coming up, and if she didn’t give Bruce something he could use to keep Flynn from being completely exonerated, she could kiss her promotion good-bye. “I think we should at least try.”
“I hear he’s staying at a place in Oak Cliff.”
“He is.” She grimaced at his questioning look. “I did a little digging. And I got a squad car assigned to both his place and Riley’s. Not full surveillance, just to keep an eye on their comings and goings.”
“When were you going to tell me about it?” Nick asked, clearly annoyed.
“There wasn’t really a chance. I thought about it last night and didn’t know it had been approved until I was on my way to lunch.”
“Secret lunch,” he said with a grunt. “If you and Bruce are going to work this case together, I’m not sure why I’m here.”
She started to protest his characterization of her lunch, but she wasn’t ready to tell him she’d shared a meal with Riley, which made it secret after all. “I’m not doing Bruce’s bidding, but even if I was, he outranks us both. Don’t tell me that if he gave you a direct order you would disobey it.”
“I wouldn’t, but there’s a difference between taking orders and currying favors.”
“Wow.” Claire couldn’t remember Nick ever confronting her like this before and it stung. “Tell me how you really feel.”
“I’m looking out for you, like you’d do for me. I know Bruce is your guy in the department, but be careful tying your future to him. If he goes down, you will too.”
Claire didn’t respond. Nick was right, but his warning was premised on Bruce having done something wrong. All he’d done so far was urge her to look harder at a couple of persons of interest. Any other superior might do the same, and she’d be expected to follow orders, old family friendship or not. No, Bruce wasn’t the obstacle here, but her growing attraction to Riley Flynn was definitely a problem, and if she wasn’t careful, it could
cost her career.
Chapter Twelve
Riley tugged at the sleeves of her blazer to keep the scratchy wool from rubbing against her wrists. She wasn’t sure why she’d felt the need to upgrade her clothing for this meeting, but the memory of her mother urging her to put on her Sunday best to go meet with the lawyers was a strong probability.
The offices of Bradley and Casey were located on the south side of downtown, and there was plenty of parking behind the building. As she walked down the block, she remembered a time a couple of months ago when the Eastside Sketchers had met down the street at the old Sears building that was now a mixed-use development called Southside on Lamar. It had started to rain that day and most of the group bugged out when the raindrops started to fall, but she, Buster, Jensen, and Warren had stayed for the full two hours to be rewarded by a blast of sunshine from the fickle Texas sky as they were packing up. She smiled at the memory of them making the most of a bad situation and realized she treasured her time with the group more than she realized.
The next meet-up was Saturday at the Dallas Farmer’s Market. She was strongly considering not attending. She would tell Buster it was because she was busy getting ready for her show at the Lofton, but really it was because she associated their last meet-up with Jill Shasta’s death. Despite the fact she hadn’t witnessed the crime scene, she hadn’t been able to get the image of a dead body against the backdrop of the beautiful mural out of her mind. And while she hadn’t been at the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge the day the second body had been found, she’d often sketched the stunning bridge, and one of her paintings of the landmark would be featured at her opening.
It felt like her entire life was on hold since Claire Hanlon had appeared in her life. Normally, she wouldn’t be reading the news, but lately she couldn’t get enough, digging deep in internet searches to memorize every detail of these deaths while Claire’s questions played on a loop in the back of her mind. She didn’t care about the questions that implicated her, because she knew she hadn’t done anything wrong, but when it came to her father, she couldn’t be entirely sure. Which was why she’d taken him up on his offer to meet with the attorney who’d handled his appeal and get the firsthand details about why the conviction had been overturned.
