by Linda Howard
“I’ll…ah…give you a moment,” he heard Sam say as she followed him.
In the hallway, she joined Nick in resting her head against the cinderblock wall. “Are you all right?”
“I was,” he said with a sigh. “I was doing a really good job of convincing myself, despite what I saw yesterday, that he was in Richmond or at the farm. But after that, after seeing him like that…”
“Denial’s not an option any more.”
“No.”
Soft words and sounds of weeping drifted from the conference room.
“I’ve never before felt like I didn’t belong with them. Not once in all the years I’ve known them, have I ever felt I didn’t belong…until in there…just now…” His voice caught, and he was surprised when her hand landed on his arm.
“They love you, Nick. Anyone can see that.”
“John was my link to them. That’s gone now.” His head ached, his eyes burned. Hating the uncharacteristic bout of self-pity but needing her more than he’d needed anyone in a long time, he sighed. “He’s gone…my job…everything.”
Sam squeezed his arm and then removed her hand abruptly when Freddie came around the corner.
Seeming to sense he was interrupting something, Freddie paused and looked to her for guidance.
“They needed a minute after seeing him,” she said. “Could you do me a favor and find Mr. Cappuano some water?”
“That’s not necessary,” Nick protested.
A nod from Sam sent Freddie off.
“You didn’t have to—”
“It’s water, Nick.”
“Thank you.” He glanced over at her. “How’re you holding up?”
“I’m tired.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“Something else.”
She cast her eyes down at the floor and kicked at the tile with the pointed toe of her fashionable black boot. “I’m pissed. Seeing those people,” she nodded toward the conference room. “Others like them. Something like this happens to them and their lives are permanently altered. That bothers me. A lot.”
“You care. That’s what makes you such a good cop.”
“I don’t know too many who’d call me a good cop lately.”
Taking her hand, he saw that he’d startled her with his public display of affection. “There’s no one else I’d rather have on John’s case. No one.” He surprised her further when he kissed the back of her hand and released it.
Before Sam could chew him out for the risky PDA, Freddie returned with a cold bottle of water for Nick.
“Thank you.”
“May I have a word, Sergeant?” Freddie said.
“Of course,” Sam said. To Nick, she added, “Tell them we’ll be right in.”
*
Sam followed Freddie into the conference room across the hall and closed the door. “I know what you’re going to say, and it’s not what you think.”
“Guilty conscience, Sergeant?”
Since his question was accompanied by a teasing smile she didn’t remind him that she outranked him by a mile and an insubordination complaint wouldn’t look good on his record. “Not at all.”
“The financials came back on all the principal players.”
“And?”
“Royce Hamilton is up to his eyeballs in debt.”
Sam’s heart reacted to the burst of adrenaline by skipping in her chest. “Is he now?”
“There’s a lien on their house, which is mortgaged to the hilt.”
“And his kids were O’Connor’s likely heirs. Very interesting, indeed.”
“We also found a regular monthly payment of three thousand dollars from the senator’s personal account to a woman named Patricia Donaldson. I ran the name and came up with hundreds of hits, which I’ve got some people checking into.”
“We can ask his parents who she is.”
“Third thing, the tox screen on the senator was clean, except for the small amount of alcohol we already knew about. No drugs, prescription or otherwise.”
“Okay, that’s good,” she said, starting for the door. “One less thing to figure out.”
“Wait,” he said. “I wasn’t done.”
She waved an impatient hand to encourage him to proceed.
“They found porn on his home computer. A lot of it.”
“Kids?”
“None so far, but what’s there is hard core.”
She smoothed her hands over her hair. “Christ, can you believe a United States senator would take such chances?”
Freddie frowned at her use of the Lord’s name. “What do you suppose it means for the case?”
“I don’t know. Let me think about it. Any word on the warrant to search Christina Billings’s car and apartment?”
“I just checked when I went back to get the water and nothing yet.”
“What the hell is taking so long?” she fumed. “If we don’t have it by the time we finish with the parents, I’ll get the chief involved.”
“What about Hamilton?”
“After we get the wife and in-laws out of there, we’ll go at him.”
Freddie’s eyes lit up with anticipation. “Good cop, bad cop?”
“If necessary.”
“Can I be bad cop this time? Please?”
She shot him a withering look that said “as if.”
“I never get to be bad cop,” he said with a pout. “It’s so not fair.”
“Grow up, Freddie,” she shot over her shoulder as she crossed the hall to where the O’Connors waited. Before she opened the door, she took a moment to collect herself, to take her emotions out of the equation. She appreciated that Freddie knew her moods well enough by then not to question what she was doing or why. “Ready?”
He nodded.
Sam opened the door. “I’m sorry to keep you waiting.” She did her best to avoid looking directly at the four faces ravaged by grief as she took them through what the police knew so far, leaving out anything that would compromise the integrity of the investigation.
“So you’re telling me that after two days, you’ve got absolutely nothing?” Graham said.
“We have several persons of interest we’re taking a hard look at,” Sam said as the chief slipped into the room. She nodded at him and returned her attention to the O’Connors. “I wish I could tell you more, but we’re working as hard and as fast as we can.”
Graham turned to the chief. “I’ve known you a lot of years, Joe. I need the very best you’ve got.”
Chief Farnsworth glanced at Sam. “You’re getting it. I have full faith in Sergeant Holland and Detective Cruz as well as the team backing them up.”
“So do I,” Nick said quietly from where he stood against the back wall.
Senator and Mrs. O’Connor turned to him.
With his eyes trained on Sam, Nick said, “I’ve known Sergeant Holland for six years. There’s no one more dedicated or thorough.”
As Sam fought to keep her mouth from dropping open in shock at the unexpected endorsement, Senator O’Connor held Nick’s intent gaze for a long moment before he stood and held out his hand to his wife. “In that case, we should let you get back to work. We’ll count on you to keep us informed.”
“You have my word, Senator,” Chief Farnsworth said. “I’ll show you out.”
“Before you go,” Sam said, “can you tell us who Patricia Donaldson was to your son?”
Graham and Laine exchanged glances but their expressions remained neutral.
“She was a friend of John’s,” he said.
“From high school,” Laine added.
“A friend he paid three thousand dollars a month to?”
“John was an adult, Sergeant,” Graham said, appearing nonplussed to hear about the payments. “What he did with his money was his business. He didn’t have to explain it to us.”
“Where does she live?” Sam asked.
“Chicago, I believe,” Graham said.
Inter
esting, Sam thought, that the senator knew, without a moment’s hesitation, the exact whereabouts of his son’s friend from eighteen years earlier. She debated pushing him harder and might have had the chief not been in the room. In the end, she decided to pursue it from other angles.
“If there’s nothing else, I’d like to take my wife home,” Graham said with a pointed look at Sam.
“We realize this is an extremely difficult time for you, but we may have other questions,” she said.
“Our door’s always open,” Graham said, helping his wife from her chair.
Lizbeth and Royce got up to go with them.
“Mr. Hamilton,” Sam said. “A minute of your time, please?”
Royce’s eyes darted to his wife.
“Go ahead, Daddy.” Lizbeth kissed her parents. “Take Mom home. We’ll be by after a while.”
After Graham and Laine left the room with Chief Farnsworth and Nick following them, Sam turned to Lizbeth. “We’d like to speak to your husband alone, Mrs. Hamilton.”
Tall, blond, blue-eyed and handsome in a rugged, hardworking way, Royce slipped an arm around Lizbeth’s shoulders. “Anything you have to say to me can be said in front of my wife.”
Sam glanced at Freddie, who handed her the printout detailing the Hamilton’s financial situation. “Very well. In that case, perhaps you can explain how you’ve come to be almost a million dollars in debt.” Only because she was watching so closely did she see Royce tighten the grip he had on his wife’s shoulder.
“A series of bad investments,” Hamilton said through gritted teeth.
“What kind of investments?”
“Two horses that didn’t live up to their potential, and a land deal that’s tied up in litigation.”
“We’re handling it,” Lizbeth said.
“By mortgaging your house?”
“Among other things,” Lizbeth said, her tone icy.
“What other things?”
“We’re considering a number of options,” Royce said, adding reluctantly, “including bankruptcy.”
“You expect us to believe the daughter of a multi-millionaire is on the verge of bankruptcy?”
“This has nothing to do with my father, Sergeant,” Lizbeth snarled. “It’s our problem, and we’re handling it.”
“Are your children the heirs to your brother’s estate?”
Lizbeth gasped. “You think…” Her face flushed, and her eyes filled. “You’re insinuating that we had something to do with what happened to John?”
“What I’m asking,” Sam said, “is if your children are his heirs.”
“I have no idea,” Lizbeth said. “We weren’t privy to the terms of his will.”
“But he was close to your children?”
“He adored them, and they him. They’re heartbroken by his death. And you think we would’ve done that to them—to him—over money?”
Sam shrugged. “He had it, you needed it.”
Shaking with rage, Lizbeth moved out of her husband’s embrace and stepped toward Sam. Speaking in a low, fury-driven tone, she said, “I had only to ask, and he’d have given me anything. Anything. There would’ve been no need for me—or Royce—to kill him for it.”
“So why didn’t you? Why didn’t you ask him for help?”
“Because it was our problem, our business. Other than my husband and children, there was no one in this world I loved more than John. If you think my husband or I killed him, I encourage you to prove it. Now, if there isn’t anything else, I need to take care of my parents.”
“Stay available,” she said to their retreating backs.
After they were gone, Sam turned to Freddie. “Impressions?”
“Pride goeth before the fall.”
“My thoughts exactly. They’d rather declare bankruptcy than let her family know they’re in trouble.”
The door opened, and the chief stepped into the room. “What was that about with the son-in-law?”
“Nothing,” Sam said, deciding it was just that. “Tying up a loose end.”
“You know Nick Cappuano?” the chief asked.
Sam cleared her throat. “Technically, yes. I met him once, six years ago. I hadn’t seen him since until yesterday. He’s been a tremendous asset to the investigation.”
“That was quite a show of support from someone you hardly know.”
She shrugged. “It seemed to be what the senator needed to hear.”
“Indeed.” The chief’s shrewd eyes narrowed as he studied her. “Is there anything else you want to tell me, Sergeant?”
He was handing her the opportunity to come clean. But if she told him she’d slept with Nick, had feelings for him—then and now—she’d be off the case and maybe off the force. It was too much to risk. “No, sir,” she said without blinking an eye.
“Anything I can do to help?”
“We’re waiting on a warrant to search Billings’s car and apartment. If you could exert some muscle to speed that up, we’d appreciate it.”
“Consider it done.” He started to leave, but turned back. “Get me an arrest, Sergeant. Soon.”
“I’m doing my best, sir.”
CHAPTER 12
Sam spent two hours with Freddie and the other detectives assigned to the case going over everything they had so far. While she was with the O’Connors, the lab came back with the report from John’s apartment—nothing was found in the sheets, the drain, or elsewhere in the apartment that didn’t belong to the victim.
Beginning to feel frustrated, Sam doled out assignments, told Freddie to meet her at Senator Stenhouse’s office at nine the next morning, and sent him home. Fifteen hours after she’d started her day, she returned to her office to find Nick in her chair with his feet on the desk.
“Comfortable?” she asked, leaning against the doorframe.
He dropped his BlackBerry into his suit coat pocket. “You were my ride.”
“Oh shit. Sorry. You waited all this time? You could’ve grabbed a cab.”
“I was hoping to talk you into dinner.”
“I can’t. I’ve still got a million things I need to do.” She paused, looked closer. “Did you clean my desk?”
“I just straightened it up a bit. How can you work in such a messy space?”
“I have a system. Now I won’t be able to find anything!”
“You need to eat, and you need to sleep. What good will you be to anyone if you make yourself sick?”
“So in addition to bringing your anal retentiveness to my workplace, you’ve put yourself in charge of making sure I eat and sleep?”
His face lifted into a cocky, sexy grin. “Happy to oblige on both fronts.”
“Food, yes. Sleep? No way in hell.”
He shrugged, apparently pleased with the half victory. “Who’s this?” he asked, picking up a photo from her desk.
“My dad.” In the picture, Sam stood to the side of her father’s chair, her arm around his shoulders. “He was injured on the job almost two years ago.”
“I’m sorry. What happened?”
Stepping into the cramped office, she bumped his feet off the desk and sat. “He was on his way home in his department vehicle and saw a car weaving through traffic. He followed it for a mile or two before he pulled it over.”
“He was a traffic cop?”
She shook her head. “He was deputy chief and three months shy of retirement. Anyway, he approached the vehicle, knocked on the window, and the driver responded with gunfire. He doesn’t remember anything after stopping the car. The bullet lodged between the C3 and C4 vertebrae. He’s a quadriplegic, but through some miracle, he can breathe on his own when sitting up. We’ve learned to be grateful for the small things.”
“I remember reading about it, but I didn’t realize he was your father. Happened on G Street?”
“Yes.”
“Did they ever get the guy?”
“Nope. It’s an open investigation. I work on it whenever I can, and so does every other d
etective in this place. It’s personal to me, to all of us.”
“I can imagine. I’m sorry.”
She shrugged. “Life’s a bitch.”
He stood up, stepped around her, pushed the door closed, reached for her and held her tight against him.
Appalled by the lump that settled in her throat, she wrestled free of him. “What was that for?”
He kept his arms around her. “You seemed to need it.”
“I don’t.” She placed her hands on his chest to put some distance between them and to calm her racing heart. “I can’t be alone in here with you. People will talk, and I don’t need that.”
He reached for the door and opened it. “Sorry.”
Sam was relieved to find no prying eyes on the other side of the door and annoyed to realize she had needed the comfort Nick offered, that it somehow helped. The discovery left her unsettled.
“What?” he asked, studying her with those intense hazel eyes that made her melt from the inside out. “You’re staring.”
“I was just thinking…”
He tipped his head inquisitively. “About?”
“You’ve aged well. Really well.”
“Gee, thanks. I think.”
“That was a compliment,” she said, rolling her eyes.
“Thanks for clarifying. Of course, I could say the same to you. You’re even sexier than I remembered—and I remembered everything.” He took a step to close the distance between them.
Her heart tripping into overdrive, she held up a hand to stop him. “Stay out of my personal space.”
“You’re the one who started handing out the compliments,” he said with a grin that she much preferred to the grief she’d witnessed earlier.
“Temporary lapse in judgment brought on by fatigue and hunger.”
“Then how about that dinner?”
“Pizza and you’re buying.”
“That could be arranged.”
“Speaking of arranged, the M.E. is set to release the senator’s body to the funeral home in the morning.”
Nick immediately sobered, and Sam was sorry she’d dropped it on him that way. “Okay. Once the funeral home is done, the Virginia State Police will accompany him to the state capitol in Richmond,” he said. “I was going to ask you if I could get into his place to get some clothes. The funeral director needs them.”
