Laura had been through so much he couldn’t stand the thought of an insensitive government bureaucrat dredging all this up again. He’d lied, he knew exactly where Laura was. She was getting on with her life and he loved her too much to stand in the way.
I’ll always be here for you, Laura.
He dialed her cell phone.
“Tom?”
Her voice was incredulous.
“How are you, Laura?”
“I’m fine. Why are you calling me? I thought I told you never to call.”
She had. Call me only in an emergency. A real emergency.
“Some attorney called me and was asking about Shannon. And asking about Jason.” He could barely say the boy’s name without red rage blinding him.
Silence. “Who?”
“Chandler. Julia Chandler. I think she said she’s with the District Attorney’s Office.”
“I have to go,” Laura said.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked. “Do you need money?”
“I’m fine.” She hung up before he could ask any more questions.
Of course she didn’t need any money. She had half the money from the sale of his construction company and the house they’d shared for nearly twenty years. He had the other half collecting interest in the bank. He didn’t need anything. He didn’t want anything.
But he’d give every last cent for his old life back, to have Shannon alive and Laura happy. Together as a family. It wasn’t going to happen.
He opened a fresh bottle of Jack Daniel’s and sat on the porch. It was cold, even now in April, but he didn’t care. And after a few shots of booze, he wouldn’t feel a thing.
TWENTY-THREE
“YOU’RE SECURE,” Patrick Kincaid told her after he checked out her security system. “It’s a good system, though I improved it, of course.” He blew air on his fingers and wiped them on his T-shirt.
Connor hit him in the arm. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, don’t let your head get too big. Your hat won’t fit.”
“The system automatically dials your alarm service company when there’s a break-in, but I now have it dialing the police department as well. Your address should already be flagged in the system since you’re a DDA, but I’ll double-check tomorrow morning.”
“Thanks, Patrick, I appreciate your help,” Julia told him.
Her doorbell rang—again. “I don’t think I’ve ever had this many visitors at once,” she said, joking, but the sad realization of her solitary life made the joke fall flat on her ears.
She let Dillon in.
“Julia, you were right to be suspicious about Judge Small’s death,” he said.
“He was murdered? Why didn’t we hear about it?”
“It was ruled an accident. It was three in the morning and the police report suggests he fell asleep at the wheel. Nothing indicated foul play to them. But why was he out driving at three o’clock in the morning? He drove his car right off the Coronado Bridge.”
“That wouldn’t be easy,” Patrick said.
“If he fell asleep and his foot was on the gas pedal, he could hit the edge and flip over,” Connor said.
“They would have done an autopsy report to determine if he’d been under the influence of drugs or alcohol.”
“Yes, and all the standard tox screens were clear,” Dillon said. “The autopsy revealed an arrhythmia, essentially a minor heart attack. It could have caused him to panic, or perhaps render him unconscious.”
“So why isn’t this an accident?” Julia asked.
“Because it’s the same type of arrhythmia found during Jason Ridge’s autopsy. I compared the reports. No doubt in my mind.”
“Do you want to exhume the body?” Connor asked, marking Small’s death on the timeline he and Julia had created.
Julia said, “I don’t see Stanton going for it. We don’t have enough at this point. Especially since we haven’t even a suspect.”
“I agree,” Dillon said. “But it makes me wonder if perhaps both Ridge and Small were given drugs to induce heart failure. In Ridge, the steroids would have been a contributing cause, not the primary cause, and in Small he went off a bridge. Died instantly of trauma.”
“Do you know what drugs would cause an arrhythmia?” Julia asked.
“Several, but I’m not well versed in that area. If we can prove Jason Ridge was in fact murdered, I think Stanton will agree to exhume both bodies.”
Dillon continued. “I have some other news about Bowen’s murder. It turns out he was hit with a Taser gun.”
“They don’t leave physical evidence,” Connor said.
“Not usually, but when fired they release microparticles with the gun’s serial number etched in them. These particles were collected by the crime scene unit on both Bowen’s body and the second floor hallway.”
“And where did it lead?”
“The Taser was registered to Victor Montgomery.”
He saw the first flaw in his plan.
He didn’t expect anyone to connect Jason Ridge to Shannon Chase, yet Julia Chandler had made the connection. How? How did she even know Jason Ridge’s name? What had led her down that path?
He would adapt. It saddened him that he would have to execute the contingency plan, but what choice did he have? If Robbie hadn’t screwed up the hit-and-run, Julia Chandler would never have talked to Tom Chase.
Chase. Another idiot. But he was too far away to be effectively handled. He could always hope Chase would drink himself into oblivion.
After, they would disappear. He’d planned to stay in town, but it wouldn’t be wise. He had a few loose ends to clean up, appearances to make, but in forty-eight hours he and Faye would be on an airplane for Brazil.
From there, they could go anywhere in the world.
Will Hooper knocked on Julia’s door late that night. She almost laughed. “You just missed Patrick Kincaid,” she said. “He upgraded my security system.”
“Can I come in?”
“What’s wrong?” Julia tensed. Connor stood behind her, put his hands on her shoulders.
“Let’s sit down.”
Julia didn’t like the secrecy.
“Emily’s being released tomorrow morning,” Will said.
Dillon frowned. “I thought we talked about that. You agreed we could keep her in the hospital for her protection.”
“Stanton and Chief Causey have another idea.”
“You can’t arrest her!” Julia jumped up. “You told me you believed her!”
“I do,” Will said. “We all do. But this is what we know. We know that three or more people killed Victor Montgomery. We know that Garrett Bowen’s online list was used to incite people into planning, and likely executing, murders. I thought Bowen was behind it all, I was ready to serve him a warrant today, then he turned up dead.
“But as e-crimes proved, Bowen wasn’t the one inciting people to talk about their killing fantasies. Someone else on the list is responsible—the same person who text-messaged Emily three months ago about meeting at Starbucks.”
Julia shivered. “The killer knows who Emily is. They know how to get to her.”
Will said, “What the prompts suggest is that someone was fishing for information. Someone was encouraging Emily and others to reveal as much information as they could. They wanted a reason to go after Victor.”
“But where does Judson fit in?” Dillon asked. “There is no connection between Paul Judson and Emily—he didn’t teach at the same school—no evidence that he knew Montgomery or Bowen or Jason Ridge.”
“No one prompted Billy to share the information about Judson. He did it on his own. There were other similar e-mails and there may or may not be murders associated with them—we don’t have enough information at this point. But as far as Victor Montgomery was concerned, someone was pushing Emily for information.”
“So you’re saying that maybe he was the target all along?”
“It was well planned and well executed, but I think Judge Montgomery�
��s killers didn’t expect Emily to come home when she did. What if they were already inside when Emily came home early?”
Dillon interrupted. “Judson was a red herring. Or a test.”
Connor nodded. “This is a group of killers who maybe needed to initiate someone into the group, or it was a test to see if Billy Thompson would be arrested. Or to watch the police investigation and see if Wishlist was shut down. Whatever their reason, he’s not connected with Montgomery.”
“The only connection between all the victims—if Jason Ridge was in fact a victim—is Garrett Bowen,” Julia said.
“And now Bowen’s dead.”
“We’re back where we started,” Julia complained.
Connor said to Will, “You said you had an idea.”
“We have a plan to draw out someone in the group. Emily has been under wraps. No one knows what she knows, though the killer most certainly knows we have pegged Wishlist as part of the investigation. The e-mails have virtually dried up, according to e-crimes. Someone in that group knows Emily personally. Otherwise the information she gave online wouldn’t have drawn the killers to her.”
“Maybe someone had access to Bowen’s records,” Dillon said thoughtfully.
“Can they be hacked into?”
“Not easily,” Will said. “How would they know if Emily was a Bowen client unless it was someone inside?”
“Because her sentencing was public record,” Julia said.
“So anyone could find out that Garrett Bowen was her shrink,” Will said. Glancing at Dillon, he added, “No offense.”
Dillon shrugged it off with a half smile. “We need to follow up with Jason Ridge’s parents. I can do that tomorrow morning.”
“I need you at the hospital,” Will said. “To approve Emily’s discharge.”
“I’ll talk to Stephanie Ridge,” Julia offered. “She’ll be more forthcoming than her husband. I sensed that at the fund-raiser the other night. And I want to find out what Michelle O’Dell knows. She was friends with both Shannon and Jason.”
“What’s getting me is motive,” Connor said, changing the subject. “What is this group of killers getting out of their game?”
“The thrill of the kill,” Dillon said.
“Too simplistic.”
“Is it? Some people kill simply because they enjoy hurting people. Some kill because they don’t want to be left out. Remember what we talked about the other night? You get a group of seemingly normal kids together and they start committing crimes? Usually vandalism, petty theft, carjackings. Add a dynamic and homicidal leader to the group, and it’s not a huge leap into murder. It’s how cults work, it’s mob mentality and how a group of normal people can band together to kill in extraordinary circumstances.”
“But there’s a pattern here,” Julia said. “Outside of Paul Judson, these aren’t random murders.” She stood, looked at the timeline she and Connor had drawn out. “It all goes back to Jason Ridge.”
Hooper was skeptical. “So what’s the connection between Montgomery and Ridge? Montgomery doesn’t fit,” Hooper said.
“Yes he does.” Connor held up a single piece of paper. “Victor Montgomery handed over a list of cases to Vernon Small when Montgomery went on vacation two years ago. One of them was 5CAG44563JV. We don’t have the file because it was expunged, but we do know that was Jason Ridge’s case number.”
“Where’d you find that?” Julia hurried over to her desk and its towering stacks of paper.
“When you said there was a pattern, I started thinking about how Montgomery fit into the puzzle, so I flipped through the reports. It just jumped out at me, now that I know about the case.”
“You mean because Montgomery handed Jason’s case over to Small, he got killed?” Dillon said. “Because Montgomery went on vacation?”
“You could argue that if he hadn’t gone on vacation, Ridge wouldn’t have gotten off so easy. Victor had a reputation for giving first offenders jail time, but Vernon Small was notorious for leniency with first-time sex offenders.” Julia sat at her computer and brought up the judicial contributor reports on the screen. “What if there’s another connection between Montgomery and Ridge? A financial connection?”
“Montgomery was up for reelection three years ago,” Will said.
“I was looking at these when Tom Chase called, and never finished going through them.” Julia sat back at the computer.
Silence fell on the group until ten minutes later Julia said, “Bingo! James and Stephanie Ridge gave Victor Montgomery ten thousand dollars. And it wasn’t in the election year, it was the following year. After Montgomery passed on their son’s case to Judge Small. If the killer knew that, they might think it was a payoff.”
“Well done, Counselor,” Will said. “You should have been a cop.”
“Who has motive?” she asked.
“Shannon Chase’s parents,” Dillon said. “They lost their daughter. The system didn’t work for them.”
“Tom Chase lives in Maine,” Julia said. “I called him there.”
“But,” Connor reminded her, “he returned your call. What if he retrieved his messages from elsewhere?”
“That’s easy to determine,” Will said. “I’ll contact authorities in Maine and have them pay Mr. Chase a visit.”
“What about Mrs. Chase?”
“I haven’t been able to find her,” Julia said. “Her last known address was in San Diego, the house where Shannon killed herself. The Chases sold it over a year ago and the father moved to Maine. Laura Chase didn’t.”
“I’ll work on that one,” Will said.
“What if there was another victim?” Connor suggested. “Someone else Jason attacked, after Shannon?”
Dillon nodded. “And because Shannon had been ostracized at school, the victim didn’t come forward. Decided to take justice into her own hands.”
“One person couldn’t commit all these crimes,” Will said.
“No,” Dillon concurred, “we’re looking for a killing team. And they’re even more dangerous than we imagined, because they think their motives are pure.”
“Or they just want to make it seem that way,” Connor said thoughtfully.
“Then my plan is definitely going to bring them out,” Will said.
“What plan?” Julia asked.
“We take Emily to the courthouse tomorrow. She goes into a judge’s chambers. We have the press all over the place. She comes out and there’s no comment. Chief Causey makes a report that she’s a material witness and in protective custody.”
Julia jumped up, almost knocking over her chair. “Absolutely not. You’re making my niece a target for a killer.”
“She’ll be in protective custody. No one will know where she is.”
“She’s a child. You can’t use her like that. I’m her guardian,” said Julia. “I won’t allow it.”
“Julia, listen.” Connor forced her to look at him. “We have to find a way to draw the killers out, to make them think they screwed up somewhere. We don’t know that they don’t have others on their ‘wish list.’ Bowen may not be the last.”
“They’re empowered,” Dillon agreed. “They’ve gotten away with murder. They may feel they can expand the scope of their actions. Enact more of their brand of justice.”
Connor said pointedly to Julia, “Someone tried to kill you. They think you know something.”
“Exactly! And they’ll try to kill Emily, too!”
“She’ll be long gone before we ever make the announcement to the press,” Will said.
“You can’t possibly agree to this!” Julia spun around, feeling like everyone was jeopardizing her niece. The people she trusted most. “What if someone wanted to use your little sister Lucy as bait?”
“Emily won’t be bait,” Connor said. “She’ll be safe. We can get a policewoman to be bait in a known safe house. I would never jeopardize Emily’s life.”
Julia was torn. Her head saw the value in the plan, but anything that even s
uggested harm to Emily deeply disturbed her.
“Where would she be?”
“How about Montana?” Dillon offered. “Carina is still up there. We can have a deputy fly her up tomorrow and she can stay until we have this locked down.”
Connor agreed. “Julia, Carina is with Nick, another cop. They would never let anything happen to her. She’d be out of the area, completely safe. I wouldn’t agree to the idea if I thought there was even a chance we couldn’t keep her safe.” He touched her cheek. “You know that, right?”
Julia found herself nodding, but she didn’t like it. Not one bit. But the thought that someone was going to get away with Victor’s murder and let Emily take the blame made her physically ill.
Will stood. “I’ll set it up. We’ll bring Emily downtown and then drive her out of the garage in a windowless van. No one will know where she is. I’ll call Carina, too, though if she balks about cutting her vacation short to play bodyguard, I’m blaming you guys.”
Dillon and Will left, and Julia turned to Connor. She just wanted to go to bed, though she doubted she’d get any sleep. “What time are you going to pick me up tomorrow? I have a rental car lined up if you could drop me off—”
“Rental car? I’m not letting you out of my sight. I’m staying here. Security system or not, you’re a sitting duck all alone. Someone could break in and kill you before the police are even dispatched.”
“I’m hardly helpless, Connor,” she said.
“Right, you have a gun.” He rolled his eyes, then walked through the house pointing out all the security flaws. She had no choice but to follow him. “Your house has more windows than walls. Anyone can see you. Take a sniper shot.” He started pulling down blinds, then continued through the rest of the house.
“Connor, stop. You can’t stay here.”
“Why? This place is certainly big enough.”
See No Evil Page 23
