HER SISTER'S KILLER an absolutely gripping killer thriller full of twists

by MICHELLE S. SMITH

  “What are you talking about?” Victoria was startled.

  “Don’t you remember how that little creep Joe Evans used to follow her around? He cornered her in the street and said he wouldn’t let her go till she had promised to go out with him.”

  “Oh, yes! I would have murdered him if Steve hadn’t done such a good job of half-killing him first,” Victoria remembered. “I screamed for him to help me pull Joe away. Steve hit him so hard he ended up in hospital with broken ribs and a fractured nose. He had a real temper!” She shook her head. “I wonder what happened to Steve? He pitched up here out of the blue the year my parents divorced. Everyone thought we were so cool to have a friend who had finished high school. And then my mom got her claws into him. I don’t know what she said, but he made some excuse about having to work through some family issues and left Hancock. Even back then she was insanely possessive of us.”

  Janet stood up and dusted off her skirt. “Steve’s back,” she said. She glanced at Victoria. “Have you seen him? You guys have a lot in common now.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You didn’t hear he went into law enforcement and he’s been made a detective recently?”

  Victoria shook her head.

  “Not only that,” Janet continued, “but he’s been assigned to your sister’s case. I guess you guys will be seeing a lot more of each other very soon.”

  Chapter 4

  “So, how’s the rookie feeling?” Officer Karen Timms teased the man opposite her at Hancock Police Department. “Your first homicide.”

  Detective Steve McCade didn’t answer her for a moment.

  She came closer to his desk. “Scared?” she asked.

  The young man rose from his seat, towering above the petite officer before him. Powerfully built, with blonde hair shaved to a buzz cut and a gun holster on his hip, his face was dominated by a slightly bent nose, the result of his teenage kickboxing career.

  “No leads so far,” he replied. “It could have been anyone who killed Rebecca Wharton. Classic cold-case material.”

  Karen frowned.

  “I hope, for Vera’s sake, you are wrong. My daughter Claire used to play with her twins, Rebecca and—”

  “Victoria,” Steve interrupted, giving the skew smile that Karen was sure was the reason for her grown-up daughter’s sudden interest in her mother’s work. “Claire was a few years behind the twins at school, right?”

  Karen nodded. “Victoria was quite an intense girl, I recall. She was forever in the library as a child. I can just picture that mop of dark curly hair half-hidden behind a big book. According to my son, at least, she still had that gorgeous hair after she’d grown up, and nice legs to boot. I guess it will feel strange working together with her on the case,” she continued, preparing to head out. She was stopped by a powerful hand on her shoulder.

  “What do you mean?” Steve demanded, blocking her way.

  “Victoria phoned a couple of days ago, when you were on leave, and the chief of police has said you two will be collaborating on the case. Didn’t you get his message? It seems Victoria is highly thought of as a detective in Chicago. She’s staying at the Hancock Inn. Here’s her number. You need to get in contact with her.”

  Steve bit his lip thoughtfully, his eyes never leaving Karen’s. “She’s a detective then?” he said, his expression hard to read. ”And she’s been given permission by the Chief to investigate her own sister’s murder? How did she wangle that?”

  “Yes, it’s a conflict of interest, but wouldn’t you demand to be seconded to the investigation if it were your sister? Plus, she’s one of the best. It’s said she never gives up.”

  Steve entered the number Karen had given him into his phone. “Never gives up? Doesn’t she have family waiting for her in Chicago?”

  Before Karen could answer, they were interrupted by a knock on the door.

  “I’m single, if that answers your question,” replied Victoria, entering the room.

  She thought a smile flitted across Steve’s mouth, but it was gone so quickly she couldn’t be sure. The fuller face she remembered had slimmed down, leaving a hardened jawline and lean cheeks. The casualness of his oversized sweaters was gone, discarded for the formality of a buttoned work shirt, which, though fitting well around his waist, was too narrow for the breadth of his shoulders.

  “Good to see you again, Steve, Karen. I just wanted to check in and let you know I’m here.” She looked at Steve. “I’ve been driving most of the day, so I thought we could meet tomorrow morning to discuss my sister’s case?”

  “Sure,” Steve replied. “Whenever suits you. I can come by the inn.”

  “You have our full support, Victoria,” Karen said. “If anyone can discover who did this to your sister, it is you. Your boss sent on this to us.” She held out several stapled pages to Vicky, who took them, maintaining the slight distance that she always kept between herself and her colleagues.

  “What’s this?”

  “Your transfer reference. You’re a heroine for the work you did with gangs in the 11th District while you were a cop.”

  “The heart of Chi-raq,” murmured Steve.

  “Don’t call Chicago that,” Victoria snapped, defending the city she had come to call home.

  “It wasn’t me. You know why rappers named it that?”

  “Of course. It was in Time magazine — in the year the article was written, the overall homicide rates of Chicago and Iraq were seventeen and twenty per one hundred thousand respectively.” She reeled off the figures effortlessly. “In the 11th District, the homicide rate was higher than in Iraq.” Her eyes looked beyond him briefly as she recalled the faces, so many of them, of the families she had worked with.

  “You’re too young to be married to your work, Detective,” Steve said, smiling ironically.

  “It’s always been faithful to me,” Victoria sighed, tossing down the papers in her hand. “Until now, that is.”

  Chapter 5

  Victoria groaned as the alarm on her phone beeped. She put out a hand to switch it off and sat up groggily, wishing the night had brought the rest she needed. A dull ache sat behind her eyes, and she fumbled in her drawer for the headache tablets she always kept with her. She glanced out of the window. It was light already, the sky an early-morning grayish blue.

  “Fresh air,” she said firmly, pulling her hair into a ponytail. She had more than enough time to go out before her meeting with Steve, she told herself, glancing at her phone. After quickly downing her tablet, she pulled on a T-shirt and some sweatpants and stuck her sunglasses on her forehead before shoving her phone in her pocket and heading outdoors.

  Once outside, she took a deep breath, her brain clearing in the morning air. She walked past the red-bricked Main Street Cheese she had visited the day before, its white-painted windows all still closed. The sidewalk was almost clear of the leafy layer that covered the path in the fall, and the streets were quiet.

  Automatically, born of long practice, she started heading in the direction of her family home. It was only when her head started aching that she realized she was clenching her jaw.

  She felt in her pocket for her phone, and her index and middle fingers tapped out a nervous drumbeat on the screen.

  “Just try calling her again,” she chided herself. “The worst she can do is answer.”

  Victoria took out her phone and pulled up her mother’s number. The phone rang several times before cutting off abruptly. Victoria felt as though she had been slapped. Her shoulders slumped, though whether from disappointment or relief she wasn’t sure. Maybe it was both. She shrugged to herself and headed back toward the inn.

  “Coffee!” she muttered as she pushed through the door. “Strong coffee.” A few minutes later, she was sinking into a chair in the living room of the Hancock Inn, her hands cupped around her mug to warm them. She stared ahead of her, bleary-eyed, her hair — whipped wild by the wind — falling in her face.

  “Not a morning pe
rson, I take it?” Glancing up, she found Steve McCade right in front of her, looking indecently awake and alert for so early in the day. Victoria hastily tried to straighten her hair into some sort of order. Amused, he sat beside her and leaned across to brush a strand from her eyes.

  She drew back at the unexpected gesture. “Steve, hi,” she replied lightly, hoping her cheeks were not as red as they felt. “I wasn’t expecting you so early. Excuse the bed hair! A combination of a bad sleep and a walk in the Hancock wind. I’ve just got back.” She swallowed. “My sister and I used to come to the inn when we were younger. I didn’t quite believe she was dead until I arrived yesterday and she didn’t come rushing through the red door.”

  “You’re staying here for the duration of the case, then? Not with your mom?”

  Victoria got the feeling he was watching her closely. She laughed humorlessly. “You think my mother would have welcomed me with open arms? She didn’t even wait for me to arrive before she held the memorial. Doesn’t answer my calls.” She shook her head, then put down her coffee and got up. “I’d better go and get some breakfast. Then I thought I’d head along to the library. One of the volunteers who is assisting with the family story time they have on Thursdays is apparently the jogger who found my sister’s body?”

  Steve nodded. “Paula Gardner, a retired English teacher. You don’t need to see her — I’ve spoken to her already. The interview is in your sister’s file. But like I said, she really had nothing to add. You’ll also see that we went through your sister’s apartment and got a forensic report both from there and from the crime scene, but there wasn’t really anything of significance in either report. Although one thing that may be valuable is that a few fingerprints found on your sister’s body match those on a beer bottle from the murder scene.”

  “When can I see the file?” Victoria demanded.

  He shrugged. “Any time, but looking at it is not even worth your time, believe me. There are really no leads at present.”

  “I’ve got to try,” she replied. “I loved my sister.”

  “I cared about Becky too,” he said.

  She stared at him blankly. Her sister never allowed anyone but those closest to her to call her that. She took a step closer, trying to read his thoughts. Exactly how close had he been to her sister?

  Chapter 6

  Paula Gardner had been buttonholed at the library by one of the mothers, who was keen to gossip.

  “Everyone knew who Rebecca was, of course, but none of us really knew her,” the sharp-faced mom of two screaming toddlers was saying, oblivious to the glares of those trying to read.

  “She kept very much to herself.” Paula, a round, contented woman with neatly cropped gray-blonde hair, picked up the Gruffalo book she had selected in the hopes her companion would stop talking. No such luck.

  “I bet there was a boyfriend involved. I’ve heard the rumors.”

  Victoria slipped in behind a group of moms in time to overhear the words.

  “Apparently,” said the sharp-faced mother, “there was not just one guy after her but two. Who knows, probably more.”

  Paula Gardner did not like gossiping, but she was intrigued. She opened her mouth to ask whose name Rebecca’s had been linked to, then her better judgment prevailed and she closed her mouth again.

  Victoria took cautious a step forward. Neither woman even noticed her presence.

  “I saw her with someone else recently. Right across the road from here.”

  “It could have been anyone.”

  “He was carrying her shopping bags for her, a broad-shouldered man in his twenties, with a small scar on his face. Curly coppery hair.”

  Paula stared at the woman uneasily, giving her full attention for the first time.

  “What sort of a — where was the scar?” she asked, trying to sound casual.

  “It curved over his jaw.”

  Paula slammed the book shut.

  “Nonsense. You couldn’t possibly have seen that detail from across the street,” Paula snapped, losing her composure. “I’m sorry. I think I’m going to start reading my book now.”

  “Just a moment. Mrs Gardner?” Victoria stepped forward. Paula started at the sound of her voice.

  “I’m Detective Victoria Wharton, sister to Rebecca.”

  The sharp-faced woman beat a hasty retreat, and Paula stretched out her hand to Victoria in greeting. “I suppose you overheard all that,” she said in embarrassment.

  Victoria nodded. “I hear you discovered my sister’s body. Do you have a moment before story time begins?”

  Paula nodded and gestured to Victoria to go outside with her where they could speak in private. They stood at the top of the steps leading up to the entrance. Victoria shifted away from the large red-, white- and-blue flag on the door and looked at the woman beside her. “Could you tell me what happened, Mrs Gardner?”

  “I was taking the dogs for a walk early on Friday morning. I set off from the Harris Center and did one of the East Side trails. It’s good exercise through hardwood forest but not too strenuous. I was expecting it to be busy, but I guess after the rains the night before, people thought it might be too wet. The dogs started barking at something off the trail, not far from the Harris Center.”

  Paula sighed and took off her glasses to wipe her eyes. “It was then I discovered your sister’s body, behind some rocks. I had left my phone in the car, and I hurried back to call the police. Detective McCade responded with another officer — I didn’t catch his name — and met me at my car. The officer escorted me home.”

  “Was there any chance she might have fallen? I mean, are you sure she was murdered?”

  Paula shook her head. “Her head was injured,” she said with difficulty, “as if she had been hit with something heavy. It didn’t look like an accident.”

  “And no evidence of—” Victoria hesitated — “any other motive?”

  “I don’t know. Her cell phone was with her, so it didn’t look like it had been a mugging or something.”

  Victoria looked at her squarely. “Did you know her at all?”

  “Slightly, yes, I— by sight, I did. My family moved here recently, a few years after my retirement, so I didn’t know her well, but we would smile and greet each other if we passed. She was always warm and friendly. There was an innocence about her.”

  “Yes,” replied Victoria slowly, staring at her hands. Innocent. What had Janet called her? Naive.

  “The woman you were talking to when I arrived mentioned a young man? With a scar, she said?”

  Paula looked flustered. “She must be mistaken,” she said. “She’s just a troublemaker.”

  “Why do you say that?” Victoria asked.

  “Because that description only fits one person in this town,” replied Paula. “And that’s John.”

  “John?”

  “John Gardner,” Paula replied. “We moved here to be closer to him. He’s my son.”

  Chapter 7

  “Steve, Victoria, look at this,” Officer Karen Timms called.

  Steve strode across the room and leaned over Karen, peering at her screen, his broad back blocking the sunlight.

  “Look at this Facebook profile.”

  “Rebecca Wharton? I’ve checked it already. Why would you do that?”

  Victoria came through at this, and Steve glanced up at her, smiling slightly and holding her gaze for a moment. A faint smile line curved invitingly around the corner of his mouth, she noticed, and she suppressed an unbidden desire to touch his face. Becky. He had called her sister Becky. The thought kept churning through her mind, reminding her, as though she needed reminding, never to trust anyone. Don’t let anyone close. But even as she thought it, she realized with annoyance she was smiling back.

  “Curiosity,” said Karen. “Look at all these posts on her wall from Megan Jenkins.”

  She pointed to one as she read. “Hey Rebecca. Thought you would identify with this.”

  “It’s just a cartoon a
bout a nurse accidentally swapping patient charts,” Victoria shrugged. “And there’s another one about a nurse who messed up medication for a patient. Quite funny actually.”

  “Not if Megan Jenkins is the daughter of Winifred Hulbert,” said Karen. She pointed to a link to an obituary. It had been shared by Megan — again on Rebecca’s wall.

  “Click on the link to the full obituary,” snapped Victoria. She leaned forward as the article popped up. They read in silence, then stared at each other.

  Victoria shook her head. “Janet, my friend, mentioned the other day that my sister had had a patient who died and whose family were causing legal trouble,” she said. “Sounds like it wasn’t just the hospital they were after. Look at all these cartoons.”

  “Why would your sister be friends with someone like that?” asked Karen.

  Victoria shrugged. “She was very gentle. Patients and their families often looked her up on social media, and she was too kind-hearted not to accept their friend requests.” She sighed. “But these cartoons amount to threats. I didn’t see anything about Megan Jenkins in Rebecca’s file. It’s definitely an angle to be added.”

  Steve McCade placed a hand on her shoulder. Her usual instinct was to draw back, but another part of her rebelled, and she felt a brief longing to lose herself in his arms.

  He smiled. “Are you finished with your sister’s file?”

  His proximity was distracting. She couldn’t think.

  “Yeah, I guess so. It says in the file that according to my mother, a scarf was missing from her apartment that wasn’t found with her body?”

  “Maybe she had lost it?”

  Victoria stepped back, trying to remember what else it was that had bothered her. Steve’s smile faded as she paused.

  “I wanted to ask you — why was robbery mentioned as a possible motive?”

  “Simple. Because her phone was taken. We searched her home, and it wasn’t there, and when we dialed the number your mom gave us, it went straight to voicemail.”