by Lis Wiehl
Allison thought of another scenario. “Or maybe she was stabbed someplace else and moved here?”
“If they did that, there should be blood between here and wherever they killed her. And all we’ve got is a few drops.” She bent down again to look at Cassidy. Her voice muffled, she said. “I don’t see any stains or marks on her clothes. But her skirt’s bunched up, like she’s been moved.”
Allison hoped Cassidy hadn’t been raped. She tried to work it through. “Maybe they cleaned up.”
“There should be evidence of that too. But I didn’t see any wet or missing towels in the bathroom. And the tub and sink were dry.” Nicole leaned down. “The kitchen sink’s dry too.”
While she heard Nic’s words, Allison’s brain kept toggling back and forth between the terrible now and the past that now could never be anything but past.
Cassidy’s empty, staring eyes. The Mexican restaurant where she and Nicole had just eaten while complaining about Cassidy’s lateness. The blood that now soaked the front of her friend’s coral-colored jacket. Cassidy’s habit of twisting the back of her hair—a place the camera never saw—whenever she was lost in thought. How Allison and Nicole had chattered away while their friend must have been dying.
She had a thousand memories of Cassidy laughing, joking, eating, gesturing, and talking. Always talking, her words coming a mile a minute.
Then Allison’s eyes would again find the real Cassidy, absolutely still and absolutely empty, looking like a clever doll fashioned from pale wax.
For the dozenth time, she tore her gaze away from those flat eyes. “I just don’t understand how this happened. We know that Cassidy sometimes took risks. But to be killed here, in her own condo. It feels personal. I mean, I wouldn’t have been surprised if she was in an accident driving too fast to a story or if some suspect she was interviewing turned on her. But to die here, in her own home . . .” She let her words trail off.
“I didn’t see any signs of forced entry—no tool marks or anything on the doorframe,” Nicole said. “And I don’t think the lock was broken.”
Allison walked back into the living room and looked at Cassidy’s things. “Okay, she came in here, she put down her keys and her purse and her mail and then what—someone knocked on the door and she answered it?”
Nicole came out to join her. “Maybe. Or she could have come home and surprised a burglar.”
Allison surveyed the room. “Only if that’s what happened, where’s the mess? Nobody’s gone through things. There’s no sign of a struggle.”
“Maybe it was someone she knew, and when she let them in, they suddenly attacked her.” Nicole’s eyes were slitted like a cat’s. “And if it was someone she knew, you know who I keep thinking of? Rick.”
Allison blinked. She was still considering the idea when there were two sharp raps on the door.
“Open up,” a woman’s voice said. “Police.”
Taking from her pocket the tissue she had used earlier, Nicole opened the door by turning the section between the knob and the door. The cop who stepped over the threshold was young with short dark hair. Half-moons of sweat darkened the underarms of her short-sleeved blue uniform shirt.
Twenty-five at the most, Allison thought.
“I’m Officer Santiago with the Portland Police Bureau. The 9-1-1 dispatcher reported you found a body?”
Nicole said, “I’m Nicole Hedges, FBI. And this is Allison Pierce. She’s a federal prosecutor. We’re the ones who found Cassidy Shaw. She’s our friend. And she was definitely murdered.”
Santiago swallowed and pulled back her shoulders. “Where’s the victim?”
“In the kitchen,” Nicole said.
The three of them walked back to stand at the entrance to the kitchen. When the cop saw Cassidy’s body wedged under the sink, she let out a tiny gasp. Allison wondered if it was the first dead body she had ever seen.
“It looks like she was stabbed,” Nicole said. “How long until your backup officer and the homicide detectives get here? We need to canvass the area immediately. The body is still warm.”
“Are you sure she’s dead?” Under brows plucked to a thin line, the cop’s eyes were wide. She started forward.
Nicole put a hand on her arm. “Yes. I checked. You shouldn’t go near her. We don’t want to disturb any trace evidence. There are some drops of blood by her phone on the floor over there and more blood in front of the sink.” She pointed.
Santiago nodded, but her eyes never left the body. Finally she said, “I need to notify dispatch.” She reached toward the landline phone sitting in a cradle on a side table.
“What are you doing?” Nicole’s voice rose as she grabbed her wrist. “You’ve got a radio and a phone on your belt, and you’re going to use the victim’s landline? Didn’t they teach you about fingerprints at the academy?”
“Nic—” Allison said, but Nicole shook her head. Earlier she had been calm and methodical, but now she was so tense she was nearly vibrating. Nicole rarely got angry, but Allison realized her friend would rather surrender to anger than to sorrow.
Santiago pressed her lips together, then pulled her radio from her belt. “Dispatch, I’m on scene at Unit 414 of the Riverside Condominiums. We have one victim, deceased, apparent homicide, no fire or ambulance needed. No suspects on scene.”
After putting away her radio, Santiago took a pen from her breast pocket and a notebook from the back pocket of her pants. “May I see some ID, please.” Her voice was chilly. “I’ll need your name, address, date of birth, and phone numbers.”
“Why are you wasting time? Cassidy’s body is still warm—whoever killed her could still be in the building or on the block! What you need to be doing is searching the area.”
Office Santiago acted as if she hadn’t heard. Moving with deliberate slowness, she flipped back a page and turned to Allison as if Nicole wasn’t even there. “Name? And spell first and last.”
“What?” Allison realized that Santiago must be so unnerved by the body that she was falling back on her training.
“We need to be able to get hold of you in the future. Witnesses have a habit of disappearing.”
“Are you kidding me?” Nicole asked. Her voice rose. “We’re not just some bystanders who happened to be walking by on the street. We’re in law enforcement. And Cassidy Shaw is one of our best friends. You can bet that we will see this thing through to the end, until whoever did this to her is in prison. And you need to be helping us achieve that goal. You need to get the homicide detectives and some more officers out here as fast as possible. I will not have this investigation messed up by some girl who has no idea what she’s doing.”
Allison saw a muscle flicker in the cop’s face and knew that Nicole had pushed her too far. “Look, you can’t take what she’s saying personally,” she said hurriedly. “Cassidy’s our friend. Nicole’s very upset.”
Ignoring Allison, Santiago set her jaw. Slowly she put away her notebook. Then she drew herself up to her full height, which was probably no more than five foot three.
“Nicole Hedges, I am placing you under arrest.” The cuffs were already in her hand.
“What?” Allison couldn’t believe this was happening. “Why?”
“For obstructing an investigation.”
“But—”
“You watch it or you’ll be next.” Santiago’s gaze swung back to Nicole. “Now turn around, Ms. Hedges, and put your hands together behind your back.”
Nicole just observed her calmly, her tip-tilted eyes making her look like a cat, inscrutable and haughty. “You’re joking, right? Let me advise you, Officer Santiago, that this is a very, very poor career move.”
And then Nicole turned her back and presented her wrists.
CHAPTER 5
The metal cuffs slid around Nic’s wrists and clicked into place. Anger burned in her like a cold fire.
Anger at Santiago, the rookie cop who was impeding the vital work of investigating Cassidy’s death.
> Anger at herself, for doing the same.
She had to shut up. She had to bite her tongue and not say a thing. She owed Cassidy justice, not a three-ring circus.
Nic was so busy lecturing herself that she didn’t notice that a new person had entered the condo until she heard his gruff voice.
“What’s going on here?”
She turned. The speaker was a Portland homicide detective she’d crossed paths with at some point in the past—Johnson, Johanssen, something like that. He was a tall man with sandy hair going silver and receding at the temples. His eyes turned down at the ends, and Nic remembered him as having a gentle expression.
Not now. Now his mouth twisted and he shook his head in exaggerated disbelief at the sight of Nic in cuffs.
Officer Santiago threw back her shoulders. “Sir, this woman is interfering in an investigation.”
“This woman also happens to be an FBI agent.” He sighed. “What exactly did she do?”
“She was yelling at me and trying to give me orders.”
Allison started to interrupt, but Santiago raised her hand sharply and continued. “Once I arrived on scene, I was the officer in charge. In this situation, this woman is nothing but a civilian, and she was interfering.”
The detective wore a crumpled white short-sleeved shirt and a shiny polyester tie that was already loose. Now he tugged at it as if it were strangling him. “She’s also on the FBI’s Evidence Recovery Team, if I remember correctly. So she could probably teach you a thing or two. Uncuff her.”
The cuffs sprang open. Nic refrained from massaging her wrists, even though the cuffs had been too tight. No point in making things worse. Instead she held out her hand to the detective. “Thank you, Detective . . .” She hated to admit that she didn’t remember his name.
“Jensen.” His gaze moved past her to Allison. “And you’re . . .”
“Allison Pierce. I’m a federal prosecutor.”
Allison sounded better than she had earlier, but Nic could see the shadow in her dark eyes. She seemed to be relying on a certain level of formality to prop her up. Just as Nic was relying on a certain level of anger to keep her from falling to her knees.
Allison continued, “In some ways she’s right, Detective Jensen. Nicole and I aren’t here in a professional capacity. Cassidy is our friend. She was supposed to meet us for dinner, but she never came, and she didn’t answer her phone. That’s not like her, and we got worried about her. We came here, found the door unlocked, and then discovered her . . .”—she stumbled a bit and then recovered—“her body stuffed under the sink. Understandably, we’re both upset. And understandably, we’re anxious that steps be taken immediately to find whoever did this to her and bring him to justice.”
“Understandably,” Jensen echoed. He squinted at the officer’s name badge. “Look, ah, Santiago, when you signed up to be an officer, it means you signed up to deal with other people’s problems. And that means you need the patience of Job. Nobody thanks you. Everybody argues with you. You need to develop thicker skin.”
“Yes, sir.” Santiago hung her head.
Unexpectedly, Nic felt a flash of empathy. “I pushed her buttons pretty hard. But this murder didn’t happen long ago, and we need to get moving.”
Jensen raised his arm and wiped his forehead on the edge of his sleeve. “Who else lives here?”
Nic knew why he was asking. “You don’t need a search warrant. This condominium is owned by the victim, she lives here alone, and she has never shared the space with anyone else at any time.”
She wanted to scream at him to hurry. Jumping through hoops to procure a search warrant would mean someone had to get hold of a district attorney, who would then have to get hold of a judge, who would then sign the search warrant. Meanwhile, precious moments would be ticking away.
But screaming, as Nic had already experienced, would do no good at all. Instead she added in a mild tone, “Only about half the units here are occupied. You should ask the manager if there’s an empty unit on this floor that you can set up as a command post.”
“Thanks for the tip,” Jensen said, not sounding particularly thankful. His eyes roamed past her. “Where is it?”
It took Nic a long second to realize that by it he meant Cassidy’s body. Cassidy was just an it now. She met Allison’s eyes and knew she was thinking the same thing.
“In the kitchen.” The four of them walked to the edge of the carpet.
“Oh,” Jensen said, and Nic heard the shock in his voice. “That Cassidy. Cassidy Shaw from Channel Four. She’s covered most of the cases I’ve investigated.”
Nic realized that Cassidy might be personally acquainted with nearly everyone who would be assigned to solve the mystery of her death. She tried to view the kitchen as if it were just another crime scene. “The body’s still warm.”
“Yeah, and . . . ?” Jensen ran the back of his hand across his shiny forehead. “It’s also about a hundred degrees in here. That doesn’t mean it just happened.” Still, he took out a notebook and jotted something down.
“We both got texts from her only a couple of hours ago,” Nic said, although she knew it was possible that someone else had sent them. “I really don’t think she’s been dead long. That means whoever did this could still be in the vicinity.”
“Don’t worry, dispatch has scrambled a few dozen officers,” Jensen said. “We’ll have people doing canvasses of the building and the neighborhood in five minutes.”
That many cars would be sure to draw a crowd, even in a neighborhood that only a few minutes ago had looked deserted.
“Don’t forget to have someone take photos of any spectators,” Nic said.
The shots might identify not only witnesses but even a potential suspect. After the body of his victim had been discovered, “Preppie Killer” Robert Chalmers had sat on a stone wall in Central Park and coolly watched as the detectives investigated.
Jensen let out a huff of exasperation. “I don’t need to be reminded how to do my job. You can be sure we’ll do what’s necessary.”
Nic took a deep breath and reminded herself to stop pushing. This guy was an old hand. He would want to clear this thing as badly as she did. And unlike Santiago, he would have a good idea of how to do it. She wished she could remember what case it was they had both worked on.
He turned his head to look up the hall that led to the bedroom and bathroom. “Besides the body, did you notice anything missing or out of place? Anything unusual?”
“Her phone’s underneath the dining room table.” Allison pointed. “The front’s cracked.”
“And there are three drops of blood near it. Passive spatter,” Nic said. “That’s why I was trying to keep Officer Santiago out of the area.”
He nodded, and Nic was glad they were back on easier ground.
“I’ll let the criminalist know. Since you’ve been here, what have you touched? We’re going to need elimination prints. Oh, and I’ll need photos of the bottoms of your shoes in case we turn up any shoe prints.”
“It’s possible we didn’t touch anything at all except for when I initially knocked on the exterior door and then turned the knob.” Nic went back through it in her mind. “We were pretty careful. I used a pen to turn on lights and open the cabinet under the sink, and when I opened other doors I used a tissue to twist the connection between the knob and the door shield.”
Jensen’s eyes narrowed. So much for easier ground.
“Just because your friend was late for dinner, that was reason enough for the two of you to walk in here already treating it like a crime scene? And if you were thinking that, why didn’t you call 9-1-1 right away?” As if to punctuate his words, sirens began to sound in the distance.
“There weren’t any signs of forced entry, but the front door wasn’t locked,” Nic explained. “Cassidy can be absentminded, but you put together an unlocked door with her not answering her phone, and we got hinky.”
“Hinky?” he repeated dubiously. “So you
just went inside instead of calling someone?”
Nic took a deep breath. “And are you telling me that if you thought your friend was in danger, you would have just hung out in the hall and called 9-1-1?”
His mouth crimped. “Leave me out of it, Special Agent Hedges. You should have called us first thing. As soon as you saw the door was unlocked. As soon as you found that broken phone. We had one chance to perform an untainted search. We didn’t need you corrupting any evidence.”
“You don’t understand.” Allison took a step toward Jensen. Her voice shook. “She’s our friend. Our priority was helping her. We were hoping she was still alive.”
“Look.” Jensen spoke through gritted teeth. “I appreciate that the deceased was your friend. But it would have been better if the scene’s integrity had been kept intact. Instead you both go in and play detective. And this is not the FBI’s jurisdiction. This is a Portland Police Bureau matter.”
Nic took a half step toward Jensen. “This isn’t about which agency has jurisdiction. This is about bringing a murdered woman’s killer to justice.”
Behind them, the building’s hall was suddenly full of voices and radio transmissions. The troops were here.
“Let me tell this to you straight, Special Agent Hedges.” Jensen’s skin was red and blotchy. “You both are going to go downtown for interviews and then you are going home. Right now, you’re not law enforcement. You’re not even witnesses. You’re bystanders. Nothing more.” He took a step forward until he was nose-to-nose with her. “I don’t need your help.”
“She’s my friend, and I will see justice done.” Nic bit off the words. She was close enough that she could smell the pepperoni pizza Jensen had eaten for dinner.
“Trust us that it will be.” His eyes were so narrow they had nearly disappeared.
Nic took a deep breath. “Come on, Allison.”
