The Wrong Girl (Jane Ryland)

by Hank Phillippi Ryan

  Jane punched her phone onto speaker as Ginnie answered. “… take a message, that’s what I’ve been told,” she said. “I don’t know what else to tell you.”

  “Hang on, my call waiting is beeping in,” Jane said. “Maybe it’s Alex.”

  “Yeah,” Ginnie said. “Maybe.” And she hung up.

  “I’m on the way.” Tuck didn’t bother with hello. “But it’ll take us at least ninety minutes. Can you wait?”

  Us? Interesting. That meant Carlyn was coming, too. Although how else would Tuck get there? Jane made the turn onto Route 128, the eight-lane highway that looped around the city. To get to the Brannigan was a huge pain.

  “I’ll try,” Jane said. “But if anyone’s there, ah, I don’t know. I may have to go in myself. The Brannigan people are the only ones who have the answers.”

  *

  “The Brannigan people are the only ones who have the answers.” Jake pointed to the framed photo DeLuca was examining as Jake drove them across town. Jake had found it in Kellianne’s macabre tote bag of treasures.

  Backup had finally arrived to cart off the handcuffed and cursing Sessions trio to lockup. Desperate for leniency, Kevin had ratted out Hennessey as their conduit and Internal Affairs was already into the cop’s records for evidence of kickbacks.

  “Lillian Finch and Niall Brannigan, huh?” Jake considered the couple in the photo. “That’s a cozy little snapshot. Now they’re both very dead. Apparently Ardith Brannigan has taken over the reins at the agency. Very interesting.”

  “And very guilty. Woman scorned, huh?” DeLuca held up the photo.

  “Maybe.” They were only a few blocks from the Brannigan. Something he’d seen nagged at him.

  D interrupted his thoughts. “Friggin’ Sessions.”

  “Yeah. My favorite part was when Kellianne tried to explain how selling—what’d she call it? Murderabilia? Wasn’t illegal.”

  “The look on her face when you explained how selling stolen property is illegal?” DeLuca put the photo back into the bag. “Worth the price of admission.”

  “Now we can give Phillip and Phoebe back their teddy bears, at least.” Jake sneaked the cruiser through a just-changing yellow light. “Whenever the district attorney is done with them.”

  He needed to call Bethany, too, check on those kids. And the baby. The brick edifice of the Brannigan appeared as Jake turned onto the tree-lined side street. Perfectly pruned evergreen shrubs, shaped without one stray branch, lined the flagstone path to the front door.

  “So. Alvarez called undercover this morning, pretending to be a worried mother. Confirmed Ardith Brannigan is here. You ready for this? Think we can nail her for killing Lillian Finch?”

  “Hell hath no fury,” DeLuca said. “And the killer could have been a woman, all right. Kat says it looks like Lillian Finch got a plastic bag over the head after a dose of sleeping pills. Then the pillows were taped around her head. No muss, no fuss. Female style.”

  “It’s a wonder any pills were left for the Sessions to swipe.” Jake pointed left. “Let’s park over there. On the side street. No need to give them a heads up, right?”

  *

  One good thing about reporting for a newspaper. You didn’t need anything but a pencil and paper. You could do it with nothing more than a reliable memory.

  Jane turned onto Linden Street, resisting the caffeine temptation of the Lotsa Latte on the corner. In the old days—less than six months ago—she’d have had to call Channel 11 and beg for a camera guy. Now she had only to tell the city desk where she was going. If anyone cared. Which, this morning, no one seemed to. Budget cuts, probably.

  And there was the Brannigan, in all its austerely pruned glory. The Web site had listed the public’s opening time at ten, but Jane’s “Sorry, wrong number” test call revealed someone was already there.

  She puffed out a breath, slowed her car to a crawl, deciding. Tuck and Carlyn had not yet arrived, nor called her back. Should she wait?

  She’d wait.

  Ten more minutes. She drove past the Brannigan, turned right. So no one noticed her, she’d go once around the block. Maybe twice.

  On the other hand, having a camera guy with her made forays like this a bit safer. Hard to beat up a reporter when someone with a video camera was getting it all on tape. Hard to refute a lie you’d told while the camera was rolling.

  Past the Brannigan again. One more time. Jane took out her cell, deciding to put it someplace more accessible than the black hole of her tote bag. She could shoot video with it, too, if need be.

  Damn.

  Her cell was less than half-charged. She pulled to the curb, grabbed her plug from the center console. Jammed it into the thing on the dashboard. Why hadn’t Alex called back? She sat at the wheel, engine idling. Seeing reality.

  She was going to be laid off. That was why he hadn’t called. Why Ginnie had acted so weird. Why the desk hadn’t responded. They couldn’t. If they talked to her, they’d have to say something, so it was easier to ignore her. Put her off. Until the axe fell.

  She rested her forehead on the steering wheel. She envisioned her future unfolding and it was not pretty. Her father would be so disappointed. Again. She’d have to slink home to Oak Park, a failure, live in the shadow of her perfect sister, a pitiful minion at Lissa’s wedding. A failure at TV. A failure at newspapers. A single woman with a cat.

  Mom, she thought. I’m glad you’re not here to see this.

  No. She sat up, shaking a finger at herself. No one had fired her. As far as she knew, really knew, nothing had changed. Onward to her story. If she was getting kicked out of the Register, she’d go out with a bang.

  Once more around the block. Then she was going in.

  74

  “I apologize, Detectives, for the disarray.” Ardith Brannigan, dressed for success in a dark suit and pearls, gestured at nothing. Jake and D now stood side by side in front of the widow’s desk, a sleek slab of glass set on elaborate wrought-iron pedestals. Already she’d changed all the furniture, Jake noticed. No more club chairs and tweed. Now it was all sleek black leather, heavy brass. A black monolith of a couch with chrome armrests. What was it, two days since the funeral?

  “We’re on a bit of a skeleton crew right now, reorganizing, of course, after…” She paused again, dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.

  Grief 101, Jake thought, then tried to stay objective. He heard DeLuca clear his throat. He was feeling the same way, Jake could tell.

  “We’re here about your employee Ella Gavin?” Jake decided to keep it vague, see how this woman reacted.

  “What did she do?” Ardith Brannigan’s eyes narrowed. She no longer seemed on the verge of tears. She sat in her black swivel chair and tapped a chunky black pen against the desk, her pearl bracelets clacking. Hearing the sound, she stopped. Blinked at them.

  “Do?” DeLuca asked.

  “Have you heard from her today?” Jake asked. This woman was nervous. Guilty. About something.

  Ardith blinked again, several times. “Well, I’m sure we have.…” Her voice trailed off. “We asked our staff to stay home today, so I assume…”

  Jake waited, silent, watching this woman’s mind work. Maybe realizing she’d jumped to an ungracious conclusion.

  “Would you like me to check?” She raised both palms, questioning. “Detectives, is she all right?”

  “Yes, she’s fine,” Jake lied. “Let me ask you—how well did you know Lillian Finch?”

  “Yeah, Mrs. Brannigan?” DeLuca broke in, flipping open his notebook. “I’ll take it from here.”

  Bad cop. Right on cue. Jake gave him the floor.

  “Can you please account for your whereabouts last Sunday? Did you go to Lillian Finch’s home?” DeLuca was being a hardass. “Your memory should be pretty clear on that, it was only five days ago. Sorry to bring it up—but it was the day before your husband died.”

  “She was with me,” said a voice at the door.

  *

&nbs
p; Jane had driven around the block four times. Still no Tuck, even though there’d been plenty of time for her to get here. And, a little worrisome, there’d been something in Tuck’s voice, some hesitancy. For some reason she wasn’t hot on coming.

  “I’m done,” Jane said out loud. She drove into the parking lot, plenty of spaces, only one other car. Five more minutes. She’d sit in the car for five minutes. Look at the files again. Continue not-worrying about her job.

  Then—Tuck or no Tuck—she was going in.

  *

  That’s the guy. The thing Jake had been trying to remember. Old-school tie, tortoise shell glasses, nose in the air. Hard-edge. The one he’d seen outside All Saints’, his arm around an elegant woman in mourning. Mrs. Brannigan, he now knew. Squiring the widow to her own husband’s funeral.

  “She was with you.” Jake repeated the man’s statement. “All day Sunday? And night?”

  “And you are?” DeLuca put in.

  “Collins Munson.” The man closed the office door behind him.

  “Mr. Munson is the—,” Ardith interrupted, fluttered a hand, no wedding ring, Jake noticed. “—director of History and Records for the Brannigan. He’s a longtime and valued—”

  “We’ll take it from here,” DeLuca said.

  “I heard you asking about Ella Gavin,” Munson said. “I attempted to call her this morning, but no answer at her apartment. So I’m afraid I have no answers for you. Happy to give you her address. If you need to contact her? For some reason?”

  Jake ignored his offer. Munson didn’t seem to know of Ella’s situation. The cops had kept her name out of the news coverage. “So I’m sure you heard Detective DeLuca here ask if Mrs. Brannigan was at Lillian Finch’s home. If you were together, were you ‘together’ at Lillian Finch’s home?”

  “Why would we be at Lillian Finch’s home?” Munson took a step closer to Ardith, then another. “We were here at the Brannigan, working on a case. Which case was it, Ardith? Our cars were parked here, all day. Although we have no parking lot surveillance video, I fear.”

  “Well, that’s no problem, of course, Mr. Munson,” Jake said. Big smile. “I’m sure we’ll be able to confirm through the building’s pass card reader. Correct?”

  Munson flickered a glance at Ardith Brannigan, whose hands had curled into fists. “I’m sure I have no idea,” Munson said. “Sometimes it doesn’t work. It’s new.”

  “Technology, huh?” Jake stayed pleasant. He was the good cop this time. But about to go bad.

  He tapped his cell phone, pulling up photos, found the one he’d snapped of a guy in a Newbury Street cafe he’d thought was Harry Belafonte. It wasn’t. “Do you recognize this man?”

  He held the phone toward Munson, who lifted his glasses to peer at it. Jake glanced at DeLuca, who’d looked at it, and now was frowning. It was DeLuca who’d confirmed it wasn’t Harry Belafonte.

  “I’m afraid not,” Munson said.

  “Mrs. Brannigan?”

  She moved closer to Munson, took her turn examining the little screen.

  “I’m afraid not,” she said.

  “I see,” Jake put his phone away. “That’s the cab driver who brought you to Lillian Finch’s home Sunday afternoon. That’s why we don’t need nonexistent surveillance video of your cars in the parking lot. And we don’t really need you to recognize the man in the photo. Because he recognized you. One of the neighbors keeps track of every license plate that goes by. She got the number of your cab. She didn’t see you, since you cleverly got out up the street, behind that big evergreen. And it was snowing, I’m sure you remember. But well—you can figure out the rest. An absolute and unmistakable identification.”

  Munson wrapped his arm around Ardith, who moved into the circle of his embrace. “Preposterous.” Munson flipped one hand, dismissive. “Our cab driver was a—”

  He stopped.

  “Don’t say a word, Ardith,” he said.

  75

  Jane walked through the parking lot, up the evergreen-trimmed length of winding sidewalk, then turned onto the manicured flagstone path. Looked for a doorbell, saw only an electronic entry thing. Maybe she needed a pass card? But the door opened with a turn of the polished brass knob.

  The more Jane thought about it, the more it was better to do this alone. She’d figure out whoever was in charge and simply lay her cards on the table. The files, that is. They were safely in her tote bag, with the smoke-stenched footprint. Tuck was a no-show. Fine.

  She pushed the door the rest of the way open, heard it huff over the thick pile of the interior carpeting. Took a step inside, pushed the heavy door closed behind her.

  Strange. Jane expected a bustling office, or at least some sense of activity. But what looked like a reception desk—with a phone console and a guest book and a crystal vase of fiery chrysanthemums—was unstaffed. A long carpeted hallway stretched in front of her. She took in the glass-windowed doors, an occasional chair, and on one wall, a floor-to-ceiling gallery of framed photos.

  Jane stood on the entryway’s circular oriental rug, alone, in the silence. The phone jangled. She stepped back, expecting someone to come answer it. It rang again, and again, and again. Then stopped. No one appeared.

  Jane frowned, calculating. The front door had been unlocked, so the place was open. Only that one Mercedes in the lot, though. Still, it was Thursday, a weekday, and now past ten o’clock in the morning. So, open.

  And hey. She’d knocked on doors before, looking for answers. She could knock on a few again. Since the place was open, someone had to be here. She headed down the hall, unzipping her black wool jacket, stuffing her gloves in her pocket. A light was on in the office at the end. She could see it through the window of the closed door.

  All good.

  Was Tucker Cameron the wrong girl? Jane was about to find out.

  *

  “So why were you at Lillian Finch’s house?” Jake asked.

  Munson’s face had turned to stone, but Ardith Brannigan’s seemed about to crumble. Dolly Richards had indeed gotten the cab’s license number, but Alvarez in Records had reported the real cab driver could only describe a man and a woman, bundled in mufflers and winter coats, silent behind the cab’s thick plastic barrier. And he’d dropped them off on a side street. So score this one for Jake.

  DeLuca pulled the framed photo from his inside jacket pocket, showed it to the unhappy couple. “Was this the motive? Jealousy? Revenge? Mrs. Brannigan? That your husband was—sleeping with—Lillian Finch?”

  “What?” Ardith Brannigan paled, her eyes widening as one hand flew to her mouth.

  “I said, not another word, Ardith.” Munson kept one arm around her, his hand clamped to her shoulder. With the other he reached into the pocket of his tweed jacket. Took out a gun. And rested it on Ardith’s right temple.

  Jake and DeLuca went for their weapons at exactly the same time. Shit.

  “Gentlemen, I wouldn’t do that,” Munson said. “You’re going to let us go. If you touch your weapons, I’ll shoot her. If you interfere, I’ll shoot her. If you follow us, I’ll shoot her. I’m sure you can tell I’m dead serious.”

  *

  Great. There were people in that office. Jane could tell as she walked closer to it. The wooden door had a four-part glass insert, and though the glass was frosted and faceted, it showed signs of people inside. Even down the hall, she could see colors moving, and indistinct shapes. Three people, maybe. Four.

  Someone in there would know something. All she had to do was knock.

  *

  “Collins.” Ardith Brannigan’s voice was a whisper. She was looking at something over Jake’s shoulder, it seemed, but Jake couldn’t risk turning around.

  He’d mentally raced through all the possibilities and the result was zero. Munson had Ardith at gunpoint, both standing behind a huge glass desk. No way for him or D to get close. In time, at least.

  “How do you plan to—” The guy was nuts. Jake could almost smell the crazy.


  “Shut up.” Munson moved his gun. Jake saw the woman wince as he pushed it against her forehead. “You two. On the couch.”

  “Mrs. Brannigan, we can help you,” Jake said. Calm. Compassionate. Rule one. Keep the victim on your side. “You can see this is a doomed proposition. You can see how much Mr. Munson cares about you. He’s decided to use you as a hostage.”

  “True love,” DeLuca said.

  “DO it!” Munson yelled.

  Jake perched on the edge of the black leather and aluminum couch. D beside him. Ready to move the instant there was a chance.

  “Lillian was going to ruin the Brannigan,” the woman said. She was still looking over Jake’s shoulder, not at him. Not at Munson. “Collins told me she’d—”

  “Shut. Up.” Munson pointed at DeLuca. “You. Put the cuffs on your friend. Cuff him to the armrest. Both hands. Do it.”

  Shit. “Munson. Look. There’s no way—”

  “DO it!” Munson yelled.

  He didn’t want to break concentration on Munson to look at DeLuca, but he knew his partner was making the same calculations.

  Munson, Ardith, desk, gun.

  *

  Whoa. It sounded like they were having some hell of a meeting. Fine, she’d knock, they’d stop yelling. Jane couldn’t really hear all they were saying, but if they were in a meeting, they were in a meeting. People yelled in meetings, no biggie. It wasn’t like it was life or death.

  She rapped the wooden door, once. No answer.

  Again.

  “We’re busy!” someone yelled.

  Well, that was pleasant. Must be some meeting.

  *

  “We’re busy!” Munson yelled again, without taking his eyes off the officers.

  D unsnapped his cuffs. Flipped one over Jake’s wrist, then the other, then around the metal armrest. There was no way to communicate, but Jake knew he was assessing how to fake it. Fool the moron into thinking he was cuffed. Whoever was outside the door—he hoped they left. Fast. If they didn’t, they were certain to be in the line of fire. Do not endanger additional victims.