the dead girl (BREAKDOWN Book 1)

by Debra Webb

  Mr. Cole’s expression hardened to granite. “So what you’re telling us is that you don’t have any evidence. You don’t have any idea who did this?”

  A trauma-filled beat passed with nothing but the sound of Mrs. Cole’s sobs expanding between them.

  “No, sir,” McCabe admitted. “We don’t have anything at this time. We hope to find prints or some other evidence that will help in our search, but we’ve got nothing right now.”

  Before the older man could launch the anger now seizing his face, Laney said, “But we’ve only just begun, sir. It’s rare to have any leads at this stage.”

  Zion Cole stared at Laney. Like every other member of the Shutter Lake City Council, he was aware of her background. She had a stellar resume from the Los Angeles Police Department. She’d spent her final two years in L.A. working homicide. This tragic event was nothing new to her. She hoped that knowledge proved some comfort to the grieving man.

  “Just promise me you’ll find who did this. That’s all I want to hear.”

  “We’ll do everything in our power,” Laney assured him. “Chief McCabe has already taken every necessary step to ensure we have all the backup we need. The county’s crime scene unit is en route as we speak.”

  “We’ve got this under control, Zion,” McCabe assured him. “Trust me on that. We will find him.”

  “I need to see her,” Mrs. Cole said. “I need to see her before they start cutting on her.”

  “I’ll talk to the coroner’s office and make the arrangements.” McCabe reached for her hand, gave it a squeeze. “I’ll see that no one touches Sylvia before you have some time with her.”

  Laney went over the procedures that would follow with Mrs. Cole while Mr. Cole questioned McCabe further about how the investigation would be conducted. Sylvia’s parents were both putting on a fairly brave face but Laney understood the collapse would come after she and McCabe were out of the way.

  ~

  Ten minutes later the anguished sobs of the parents followed Laney and McCabe as they exited the Cole home. Laney exiled the sounds as they made their way along the stone walkway. Her focus on this investigation could not be splintered by emotion. Every damned member of the department was a lifetime resident of this town—except her. She couldn’t get caught up in the emotional side of this tragedy.

  They climbed into McCabe’s decades old, fully restored Ford Bronco. The man liked his classic vehicles. He had a Mustang from the sixties and a Ford truck from the fifties, all in immaculate condition. When they were first getting to know each other, he’d told Laney that everyone should have a hobby. Maybe that was her problem. She had never taken the time for hobbies. The closest things she had to hobbies was her fixation with the firing range and her determination to outdo her own record when it came to endurance runs.

  But she learned a couple of years ago that those things didn’t count.

  “Thanks for jumping in when I hesitated.”

  She glanced at the man behind the wheel. “You’ve known these people your whole life. This can’t be easy.” Not to mention this was his first homicide. The first one was always the hardest.

  “That’s why I need you to be lead on this, Holt.” He sent her a sideways glance. “You have experience. I got nothing.”

  “You have instincts about the people you know,” she countered. “You have no idea how much difference that makes.”

  The words weren’t just to make him feel better. The more an investigator knew about a victim and those around that victim, the better the chance of finding the truth. There were times, like this one, where that knowledge presented a double-edged sword. McCabe’s connection to the victim and her family also came with emotional baggage and certain expectations.

  Any and all expectations had to be thrown out the window. People were rarely exactly who you thought they were. A good cop had to look beyond the expected to the carefully shielded part beneath the surface.

  “Maybe,” McCabe said. “But I still want you to be lead. You can stay emotionally detached. I’m not sure I can.”

  Laney thought about the one time she’d had a somewhat personal encounter with the victim. Maybe three, three and a half months ago, sometime in July. She’d gone to Johnny’s for beer and pizza. It was a weekday night so the place wasn’t that crowded. Sylvia had been there with a friend. Laney later learned that the Hispanic girl was her newest employee. Sylvia was well beyond buzzed that night. She was seriously drunk. The younger woman whose name Laney couldn’t remember had been trying to get her to quiet down, but Sylvia was having no part of it. One of the two had apparently just broken up with some guy or something. Whatever the case Sylvia was on a roll about what jerks men could be.

  The second time Laney saw the manager go over to the table and ask Sylvia to settle down, she felt compelled to intercede—even though she was off duty. She joined the ladies at their table. Sylvia at first ignored her but then she’d ranted on about how she hated men. Laney had suggested that she take the two home. It was late, after all. Sylvia argued for a minute, maybe two, but she’d come around. On the drive to her house she had grown quiet and withdrawn. The other girl’s English wasn’t so good and she hardly talked at all. Laney suspected she was afraid of being asked for some sort of ID.

  Once they had reached Sylvia’s house she had grown belligerent again. She’d ranted at Laney about how the Shutter Lake police were worthless. They wouldn’t know a bad guy if one stumbled into City Hall. Laney hadn’t argued with her. It was best not to try and reason with a drunk. It was a battle rarely won by anyone. Instead, she helped the friend get Sylvia inside and urged her to make sure she stayed inside until she sobered up. The younger woman nodded her understanding and Laney went home.

  She hadn’t thought about that night since. Now Laney wondered if she should have asked Sylvia what she meant by bad guy. Had she gotten involved with someone who was into some illegal activity? Was that the kind of bad she meant? Or was she just pissed at her guy and considered him a different kind of bad? Laney had a feeling Sylvia was far too smart to get mixed up with a jerk of a guy even when she was inebriated.

  By the time they reached Olive Tree Lane both hers and McCabe’s cell phones were buzzing.

  “Holt.” Laney answered hers, turning toward the window so as not to talk over McCabe who’d answered his.

  “Ma’am, this is Trask. I think I found something you need to see.”

  Evidently McCabe received the same news. The Bronco went from rolling along at the posted speed limit to barreling down the tree lined two-lane road as if he’d just entered the Indy 500.

  The coroner’s van was already on site and so was the crime scene unit. McCabe pulled over to the side of the road next to the Shutter Lake police cruiser since the driveway was packed with the other official vehicles.

  Laney followed McCabe up the walk and into the house. Sylvia’s body was already bagged and on a gurney.

  “Hey, Tom,” McCabe said, “you got anything on time of death?”

  Tom Parker, one of the Nevada County coroners, was in his mid to late fifties, blond hair with plenty of gray sprinkled in and the tanned, lean physique of someone who spent a lot of time in outdoor activities.

  He nodded to Laney before answering. “I’d say she’s been dead around twelve to fifteen hours, maybe a little more, between nine last night and midnight would be a safe estimate.”

  “Manual strangulation?” Laney asked.

  “Looks that way but you know I can’t say for sure until we complete the autopsy.”

  “Any question in your mind whether or not this was a homicide?” McCabe asked.

  Parker shook his head. “None at all. But we’ll run the usual tests, check her blood alcohol level, look for drugs and sexual activity, anything else out of the ordinary. I’ll give you everything I can as quickly as possible. I can well imagine how difficult this is going to be for your community.”

  No one ever got used to murder, but in cities like L.A it
was never a surprise to hear about it on the news.

  Shutter Lake was nothing like LA. This was going to rock the community.

  “Thanks, Tom. The parents want to see her before you start the autopsy. Can you take care of that?”

  “Sure will,” Tom assured him.

  McCabe shifted his attention to Trask who waited at the entrance of the small hallway that lead to the master suite.

  Laney watched the coroner and his assistant leave with the body before following McCabe and Trask. She heaved a big breath and glanced over at the guys in the white suits who were dusting for prints and searching for other trace elements of potential evidence. Their rhythmic movements prompted far too many bad memories for her comfort.

  By the time she caught up with McCabe, he and Trask were in the victim’s sizeable walk-in closet.

  “As I made a final walk-thru of the house before the crime scene investigators got started,” he was explaining, “I thought it might be a good idea to look behind all these clothes.” He indicted the line of blouses and tees hanging in a colorful row. “You know, just to make sure we weren’t overlooking anything that might be relevant.”

  McCabe nodded and motioned for the younger man to get on with it.

  “When I got to this row,” he reached up and parted the garments, “I found this.”

  Behind the silk and cashmere tops was a wall safe. Not so surprising. Laney imagined most of the houses in Shutter Lake had hidden safes. Admittedly this one was considerably larger than average. She moved closer as Trask reached for the door.

  “It wasn’t even closed all the way.” He glanced back as he opened it. “I think maybe this might be important.”

  Once the safe stood open, the officer stepped aside so that McCabe and Laney could move in closer. The steel box in the wall was a little deeper than Laney had expected. A full foot at least and noticeably larger all the way around than the average ones she’d seen.

  “What’s behind this wall?” she asked, still reeling with surprise at the contents staring her in the face.

  “There’s a coat closet on the other side of this wall. I checked,” Trask said. “Behind the coats you can see the outline of this thing. You know, anyone could have reached right in and taken all that.”

  He was right. Evidently the person who killed Sylvia Cole had no idea the safe existed.

  “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen one this big,” McCabe said, almost to himself.

  But it wasn’t really the size of the safe that was so stunning.

  It was the stacks and stacks of bundled cash sitting inside it.

  Chapter Three

  Chief of Police McCabe surveyed the crowd gathered in front of City Hall for a long moment before he spoke. This was another task Laney didn’t envy him. Rumor of some terrible event, of course, had spread like a wildfire. The phones hadn’t stopped ringing.

  People were worried and afraid.

  “At eight o’clock this morning Shutter Lake resident Sylvia Cole was found murdered in her home.” He said the words clearly and with surprising strength. The disbelief had worn off and the anger had set in.

  A rumble went through the crowd. The rumor had swept along the town’s grapevine, feeding the frenzy. Whatever story they heard, people instinctively understood that something very bad had happened, but no one knew exactly what.

  Until now.

  Laney stood next to the parents while McCabe relayed the carefully worded press release. Three reporters from Sacramento had shown up for the press conference. Another one was from Grass Valley as well as an additional five—no six—from various other nearby towns. Between this morning’s summons of the crime scene unit and a coroner and the noontime announcement that there would be a press conference at five, word had gotten around.

  The story would no doubt run on the national news when folks connected the event with the many articles about the best small towns in the country that had run just two months ago in several major magazines. The urge to pack up and go off into the mountains for a long, soul-cleansing retreat was a palpable force inside Laney.

  Stiffening her spine against the old panic that wanted to gnaw at her, Laney focused on the crowd. Killers often liked to put in an appearance at press conferences related to their work. Sometimes they even showed up outside a crime scene, hanging around in the gathered crowd feigning shocked curiosity.

  She scanned each face, noted the names of those she recognized. So far all were residents save the half dozen or so reporters. No one, least of all Laney, wanted to believe anyone who lived in Shutter Lake was capable of murder. But she wasn’t a fool and rose-colored glasses had never been one of her preferred accessories.

  If pushed just the right way for just long enough, almost everyone was capable of violence.

  Laney spotted Julia Ford and wondered if she was here as a resident or if she was representing the Firefly, Shutter Lake’s weekly newspaper. Carrie Stone, the owner of the small paper, was traveling in Europe. The Firefly focused on community news and events with a small classifieds section and the occasional obituary. Julia Ford’s lifestyle column that ran in the Sacramento Bee was also featured in the Firefly. Like Laney, Julia had her own dark history with murder.

  Julia stared straight at Laney as if she’d sensed she was thinking about her. Laney gave her a nod and moved on to the next face in the sizeable crowd. There would be questions at their next girls’ night out.

  Next to Laney, Yolanda Cole quaked with the effort of holding back the breakdown she’d had only minutes before the press conference began. The poor woman had cried until her face was a red, swollen mask. Though Laney most likely would never have children of her own, she had two nieces. She couldn’t imagine the horror of losing one of them. Even a hard-assed cop like her had a heart.

  On the other side of Mrs. Cole was her husband. He stood tall, shoulders back, face a veneer of somberness. His breakdown had happened at his home this morning as Laney and McCabe left. He wanted to be strong for his wife, for his lost daughter. Any father would want to do so. It wasn’t difficult to zero in on his agenda: find the son of a bitch who did this and make him pay. She imagined if their investigation failed to bring this nightmare to a speedy conclusion that Cole would hire a private investigator. She couldn’t blame him. He possessed the means, why not? A reputable PI could be an asset to an investigation. God knew a resourceful PI could cross lines a good cop wouldn’t think of crossing.

  Laney flinched. Just another little something from her past that she had no desire to revisit. She hadn’t always been a good cop when it came to not crossing lines. Sometimes to get the job done you had to step over a line here or there.

  Murder was a very good reason for ignoring the rules.

  Not going to happen this time, Laney.

  She recalled the promises she’d made to herself when she put L.A. in her rearview mirror. No more pushing the boundaries. No more allowing the job to take over her life. No more pretending it didn’t matter if she survived as long as she got the bad guy.

  Balance. The word echoed through her. Months of therapy had driven that word home. Funny how she just couldn’t seem to keep her mental footing no matter how hard she tried. One of these days, maybe she would master that fine art.

  Reporters shouting questions dragged her back to the here and now.

  “Hold your questions,” McCabe ordered, raising his hands stop sign fashion. “Mr. Cole, Sylvia’s father, has something to say first.” McCabe surveyed the crowd. “Please, be respectful of how difficult this time is for these people. I’ll answer all your questions to the best of my ability when Mr. Cole completes his statement.”

  McCabe stepped back from the podium and Zion Cole moved forward. Without his presence next to her, Yolanda sagged against Laney. Laney put an arm around her waist and held her steady.

  Mr. Cole spoke of his beautiful daughter, of the light she had brought to their lives, of the immense contributions she had made to this community. He gras
ped the podium with both hands as if he needed it for leverage to remain vertical.

  “My wife and I,” he said, then hesitated to steady his voice, “are offering a one million dollar reward to anyone who provides information leading to the arrest of the person who brutally strangled our daughter. Someone saw or heard something. Please,” he cried, “come forward. We want justice for our sweet Sylvia.”

  He turned away and moved back to his wife’s side. Questions fired in the air once more. McCabe answered each one even if it was only to say we just don’t have that information at this time.

  “Please.” Mrs. Cole turned to Laney. “I can’t take anymore.”

  Laney ushered the parents into City Hall, away from the crowd and the ongoing discussions of their daughter’s murder. As much as she wished Mr. Cole hadn’t announced the cause of death, she wasn’t about to mention the slip. He was in enough pain without being made to feel as if he’d made a misstep.

  The police department spanned half the building. The other half housed the city planning office as well as the water and utility service departments. Water was about the only resource citizens in Shutter Lake had to worry about carving into their budgets. A number of the wealthy geniuses who called Shutter Lake home had decades ago pushed the town to the forefront of alternative energy sources. Shutter Lake operated completely by solar and thermal energy. Local taxes were a little higher than average but part of that revenue took care of maintenance for the forest of solar panels just outside the city limits, as well as the underground works that no one ever saw.

  Today, other than the dispatcher and receptionist, City Hall was empty. All their resources were in the field or working crowd control outside. Laney nodded to the two women as she crossed the lobby, ushering the Coles down the hall and into her office. Both she and McCabe had offices. There was one big room further down the hall for the officers to share. Beyond their shared space was a conference room, small break room and then the locker room and bathrooms.