“That’s what I thought, too.”
“But there’s always that one-in-a-million chance that he’s decided to dump it. We’d be foolish to operate only on assumption here. There’s too much at stake.”
“Maybe we’ll get real lucky. Maybe he’s shown it to someone.” Dana glanced at her watch. “It’s well past noon. I’d like to leave for lunch. Do I take Amanda with me?”
“If you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind, but I know that my spending time with her takes an officer away from the investigation.” She leaned against the doorjamb. “Last time I looked, we only had five other officers in the department.”
“Nothing we can do about that. We can’t take the chance that he’ll move in on her if she’s alone.”
“Have you thought about asking for help from the FBI?”
“For all of about thirty seconds,” he snapped.
“Sorry.” She took a few steps back, surprised by the sharp tone of his voice. “I just thought . . . It’s just that we have such a small department. Maybe we could use a little help, that’s all.”
“We have some fine officers. We’ll do just fine.”
“Sean, I didn’t mean . . .” Dana sighed. “I’m sorry.”
“Take Amanda to lunch. The department will reimburse you.”
“Chief, your sister is on line two,” Joyce announced through the speaker.
“Thanks.” He hit the button and waved to Dana as she turned her back and left the room. “What’s up, Greer?”
“Did you really sleep in your patrol car out here in front of my house last night?”
“And top of the morning to you, too.”
“Did you? Kay across the street mentioned it when I went out to my fitness class this morning. Wondered what was going on.”
“Actually, I slept on the sofa in your den last night.” He shuffled through some papers on his desk, looking for the reports on an armed robbery suspect they’d transferred to the county prison two days earlier. “And you’re just figuring that out? Hell of a detective you’d have made.”
“And here I thought you just showed up early for breakfast.” Greer paused. “You plan on doing that again tonight?”
“Most likely.” Where the hell was that ballistics report?
“I’ll leave you some proper bedding then. Honestly, Sean, why didn’t you say something?”
“Didn’t think about it. Got tired of sitting outside, started thinking about that sofa, figured, hell, what difference did it make if I was outside or inside, as long as I was there.”
“True enough, though why you thought you should be sleeping outside is beyond me. By the way, did I think to tell you this morning that I have the Karmas monthly pot luck dinner tonight? It’s at Mary Beth’s.”
The Karmas was the official name of the group Steve referred to as Greer and the Do-Gooders. Each month they met to discuss who in town was going through a hard time and what they could do to help out in a small, anonymous way. The ladies had chosen Karma as the name because they believed that you got back what you gave out, and by giving out a little kindness into the world, the world would give them kindness in return.
“No. You hadn’t mentioned that.”
“I’ll be home by ten or so, but you might want to make other plans for Amanda, if you think she still needs watching. Unless you think she might want to come along.”
“I’ll let you know. Thanks, Greer.” He wasn’t sure Amanda was ready for the Karmas.
He hung up the phone and walked down the hall to the reception area.
“Dana go through here yet?”
“She and what’s ’er name—the Crosby woman—just left,” Joyce said without looking up from her keyboard. “You can probably catch them in the parking lot.”
He caught up with them just as Dana was backing out of her parking place. Sean walked toward the car, motioning for her to roll the window down.
“Dana, what time do you go off today?”
“My shift is up at four, why?”
“Got plans for the evening?”
“Preview night at school for Courtney. She starts kindergarten next week, and tonight’s the night when the parents bring the kids in to check out the classroom and the teacher. Get them familiar with the whole deal. Why, what’s up?”
“Well, I’d thought Amanda would be having dinner with Greer tonight, but she just informed me that she has a previous commitment. It’s the Karmas’ night to have dinner.” He leaned into the window just slightly. “Amanda, looks like you’re stuck with me for a while tonight.”
“Who are the Karmas?” Amanda frowned.
“Group of friends Greer gets together with to do good deeds and spread positive vibes through the cosmos. I’m sure she’d be more than happy to tell you about it.”
He heard someone call his name and turned to see Joyce waving from the doorway, indicating that he had a phone call.
“Look, I could probably—”
“No, you probably could not.” He smacked the palm of his hand against the side of the car. “Dana, you’ll bring her back to the station after lunch.”
“Why can’t we go to my shop for a while?” Amanda asked. “I want to try to get in touch with Marian’s niece, and the only place I have her phone number is on the Rolodex in my office.”
He thought it over for a moment, then said, “I guess it doesn’t matter where you are, as long as you’re not alone. Just keep in touch, though. Let me know your plans.”
“Will do.” Dana rolled up her window and put the car in drive.
Sean jogged back to the building, his mind on making the phone call to the D.A. to discuss a possible press conference. He wanted that sketch of the pendant out today. Someone might have seen it. Maybe they’d be willing to tell him where.
“Do you mind stopping at my house for just a minute?” Amanda asked as the police cruiser pulled out of the parking lot of Broeder’s one and only fast-food restaurant. “I wasn’t prepared to spend more than one night at Greer’s. It looks as if I might be there for a few more days.”
“Not a problem. It’s down Jackson, if I remember correctly.”
“Right.”
“This is a nice neighborhood,” Dana noted. “I like how you have such big lots, and those fields and woods behind. It feels like you’re out in the country, but you still have sidewalks and other houses along the street. When Kyle and I first moved to Broeder, this was the neighborhood we wanted, but there was nothing on the market at the time. I love these old houses. They all look so trim and homey. Like a neighborhood in a magazine.”
“I was lucky, I admit. Derek’s aunt had owned the house, and she had decided to sell it right about the time I’d decided to look for one.” Amanda pointed to their right as a reminder to Dana that they were almost to her house. “There, it’s three down from here.”
The car came to a stop, and Amanda opened the door. “I’ll be right back. This won’t take but a minute.”
“Uh-uh.” Dana shook her head. “I’m with you. White on rice and all that.” Dana followed Amanda up the drive. “Front or back?”
“We’ll go in the front.” She turned up the cobbled walk. “And I’ll just grab the mail while I’m here.”
Amanda reached into the box and pulled out a stack several inches thick. “Magazines, junk mail, and bills. And a new Publishers Clearing House thing. There’s something to look forward to. . . .”
She unlocked the front door and stepped into a silent house. Setting the mail down on the small oak hall table, Amanda paused, her head tilting slightly to one side.
“What?” Dana asked softly, straining as if listening to the house sounds.
“Nothing, I guess.” Amanda still stood in the same place near the table.
“Something off?”
“Something . . .” She laughed self-consciously. “You’ll think this is strange, but something smells off. Must be something in the trash.” She walked down the hall toward the kitch
en. “Though I could have sworn I’d emptied it before I left the other day. . . .”
Dana’s hand was on her gun as she checked the first floor, room by room, on the way to the back of the house.
“Well, I’m not crazy. I did empty the trash.” Amanda opened the refrigerator and scanned its contents. “Nothing going bad in here. . . .”
“What exactly do you think you smell?”
“Can’t put my finger on it. Just something that shouldn’t be here. Cologne or something.”
Dana sniffed the air. “I don’t smell it.”
“I don’t either, not in here.” Amanda nodded. “Just there in the front hall. Maybe it’s my imagination.”
“Maybe not. Maybe someone was here.” Dana drew her gun. “Let’s go on upstairs. Stay behind me.”
They crept up the stairs and into each room, each closet. Behind the shower curtain, through the small attic, back down to the second floor.
“Anything look out of place?” Dana asked.
Amanda shook her head. “Not that I can tell. Let’s get my stuff and get out of here. I’m feeling spooked.”
She grabbed an overnight bag from a peg on the back of the guest room closet and went into her bedroom, pausing in the doorway to look around.
“Anything?”
“I guess not. Let’s just get out of here.” She laid the bag open on the end of the bed and proceeded to go through a few drawers, pulling out some underwear here, a few shirts there, another pair of jeans, tucking all into the oversized bag. Another pair of shoes from her closet, a small leather case holding her few good pieces of jewelry from a shelf under her bedside table.
She hesitated, frowning.
“What?”
“I must really be losing it. I don’t remember bringing this magazine up here.” She gestured toward the bedside table. “I guess I’m just letting my imagination get the best of me. Let’s just go.”
Amanda noticed that the light was blinking on the answering machine in the hallway when they came back down the stairs. She hesitated, then pushed play. Her dentist’s office, reminding her to call to make an appointment for a checkup. One of her young stepsisters calling to see if she wanted to be involved in plans for a sixtieth birthday party for their father. A hang-up call. Several colleagues who’d heard the news about Marian. Another hang-up. She hit the speaker and dialed the number for last incoming call.
“The number of your last incoming call is unknown.”
“Thanks,” she muttered, then gestured to Dana to go on out the front.
Dana paused at the door. “You going to set that alarm?”
“I can’t, not until I have the entire house rewired, which I haven’t been able to afford to do,” she said, thinking that now would be a good time to have it working. “It sure would come in handy, but unfortunately, the old wiring just sets it off. The alarm company started charging me for false alarms, so I disconnected it.”
Amanda locked the door and started across the porch, then stopped. “I meant to pick up a book while we’re here,” she told Dana. “I’ll just be a minute.”
“Well, here, give me that and I’ll put it in the car.” Dana reached up for the bag and caught Amanda’s easy toss.
Unlocking the door, Amanda stepped back inside. The house was still as a tomb. The unfamiliar scent lingered in the air. Was it more pronounced now? Stronger? Amanda shook her head. Impossible. She and Dana had just been all through the house. There was no one there.
She ran up the stairs and quickened her pace as she went into her bedroom. She went straight to the chair near the window and picked up the book she’d been reading before all of this started. Maybe she’d have time to read a little tonight while Greer was out. Maybe it would take her mind off—
Without warning, an arm snaked around her throat and tightened, abruptly cutting off her air. A rough hand covered her mouth and she bit down hard on a finger. Something hissed in her ear, and the hand that she’d bitten punched the side of her head once, twice.
Gasping for breath, blinking against the bright lights that exploded inside her head, she gathered all her strength and bucked forward, far enough to create space between her body and that of her assailant. One elbow sent sharply to his midsection surprised him, caused his grip to slacken enough that she could throw him off. He bounced backward and she spun on one foot, her weight and force centered in the leg and heel that landed a direct shot in his jaw. He howled, shoving her hard, and spun backward through the door, then took the stairs two at a time. She heard him hit the landing on both feet just as her head struck the side of the dresser.
“Son of a bitch,” she growled from between clenched teeth, and struggled to the top of the stairs. “Son of a bitch . . .”
She made it to the front door and all but fell down the steps.
“Jesus!” Dana yelled and dashed from the car. “What the hell . . .”
“He was inside . . . in the house . . .” Amanda gasped and slumped to the ground halfway across the lawn. “He was in there the whole time.”
Drawing her gun, Dana dashed into the house. Within minutes, she was running back down the driveway.
“He went out the back door, probably through the field and into the woods.” She reached into the car for her radio. “Are you all right? Did he hurt you? Do you need an ambulance?”
“No. He roughed me up, that’s all. Surprised me, mostly.” She rubbed her throat. “Neck’s going to be sore. Head’s sore. Not as sore as he’s going to be, though.”
“You land a shot?”
“Right to the jaw.” She looked up and smiled. “With any real luck, I might have even broken it.”
“He’ll need it set, if that’s the case.” Dana nodded and turned her attention to the dispatcher as she called for backup.
Within minutes, the street was alive with activity, the woods swarming with officers searching for signs of Amanda’s assailant.
“Tell me again why you went into the house alone?” Sean stood next to the passenger side of the patrol car in which Amanda now sat.
“I went in for a book—”
“And Officer Burke was where?”
“She was on her way back to the car. She was taking my bag. We’d just come out and I’d locked the door and I remembered that I’d left the book—”
“So instead of having Officer Burke accompany you back inside—”
“Stop right there. Dana did nothing wrong. We’d just both come out of the house. There was no one there . . . no one that we’d seen, anyway. He must have been hiding someplace—”
“Well, gosh, who’d have suspected he’d have hidden himself when he heard you two come in? How clever of him.”
She lowered her voice. “Stop it, Sean.”
“He could have killed you, Amanda.” His eyes narrowed, darkened. “Do you understand? This is the man who killed Derek. He killed Marian. He wants to kill you.”
“Yeah, well, he didn’t, did he?” She got out of the car, her jaw set squarely, her eyes flashing like lightning. “I fought back this time, Sean. I was ready to fight back. He’s the one who left here hurting, not me. I fought back. . . .”
He watched the fury gather in her face, watched it explode as she shoved him away and walked off down the drive toward the back of her property. He gave her a minute, then followed.
He found her sitting on the bench near the koi pond.
“That’s what this is all about to you, isn’t it?” He sat on the end of the bench. “Fighting back.”
“Everything I’ve done since Archer Lowell has been about fighting back.” She looked him directly in the eyes.
“Didn’t it occur to you that he might have had a knife? Or a gun?” He tried to avoid looking at the reddened area near her temple that had already begun to swell. Since she’d denied being hurt, he chose not to mention it.
“Do you know what it’s like to be a victim, Sean? To be totally helpless, to be at the mercy of someone bigger and stronger and have n
o way to fight back? To be afraid all the time, and everywhere you go?” She wiped away a few escaping tears, not waiting for a reply. “After the attack last year, I promised myself I would never be anyone’s victim again. Lowell took every bit of security, every small bit of confidence I’d ever had. He made me afraid to be in my own home and afraid to leave it. Afraid to go to work. Afraid to run early in the morning or go to the grocery store alone.”
She drew her knees up to her chest.
“Before all that last year, I was very shy. Timid. Didn’t even have the nerve to open my mouth to bid at auctions for things I wanted for the shop.” She smiled ruefully. “Derek even had to negotiate prices for me. I wasn’t assertive enough to argue with anyone over money.”
She looked up and saw the look of skepticism on Sean’s face.
“Archer Lowell changed all that. That woman—the one he had terrorized—no longer exists.”
Sean leaned forward and with one finger traced the L-shaped scar on her face.
“Yeah, that’s the mark of my liberation,” she laughed darkly. “The doctors suggested that a little plastic surgery would take that right away, but I wouldn’t let them. I think they thought if they removed the physical evidence, I’d be able to put it all behind me.”
“That’s only the scar that shows on the outside,” he said softly.
“Right, Chief. Though I must say, I’ve done a damned good job of healing the inner ones all by myself.” Her chin thrust forward just slightly. “I’ve driven away my demons and I’m a stronger person for it. I can take care of myself for the first time in my life. I wasn’t afraid in there, Sean. I wasn’t scared.”
“You should have been.”
She shook her head. “I knew I could take him. I knew he wouldn’t expect me to fight back. Especially not with the level of expertise that I did.”
“Black belt?” he asked.
“You betcha.”
“How’d you manage to do that in sixteen months?”
“Well, I was hardly starting from scratch. I’d taken tae kwon do in high school and in college. Evan insisted on it. But after Archer, I started back to class three, sometimes four nights every week. It didn’t take long to get back in the swing of things.” She made a meek attempt at smiling. “No pun intended.”
Dead Certain Page 18
