MADIGAN'S WIFE

by Linda Winstead Jones

  Just sex.

  *

  With Ray behind her, Grace didn’t worry about being on the street. He was right. She couldn’t let what she’d witnessed change her life. Knowing he’d been seen, surely the murderer had left town. He was probably in Mexico by now. Or Canada. She didn’t care where he was, as long as he wasn’t here.

  Ray made a show of disdaining all physical activity, but he must be doing something to stay in shape. He didn’t lag behind, or ask her to slow down or stop. He kept a steady pace directly behind her. Some virgin.

  She didn’t run her usual route through the park, but turned on the next street over and ran in the shade of ancient oak trees. From here she could see the park, the flowering trees and the expanse of grass, but she couldn’t see the corner where the man had been murdered. She didn’t ever want to see that place again.

  There were a few other runners out this morning. Two women jogging slow, talking and laughing. An older man walking his two black labs. A muscular man with short-cropped blond hair ran straight ahead. He wore shorts that fit much too tight and a shirt with ripped-out sleeves. Showing off for the ladies, no doubt.

  There was no menacing man in a trench coat, no squealing tires.

  It took her a while, but she finally relaxed, enjoyed the run, tried to forget that Ray ran right behind her.

  But she couldn’t forget, and to be honest she didn’t want to. Not yet.

  They made a circle around the block and headed for home. As she neared her driveway, Ray sped up to jog beside her.

  “That’s it?” he asked, a touch of disdain in his voice. “I haven’t even worked up a sweat.”

  She maintained a steady jog and glanced sideways to see his face. “Yes, you have.”

  He grinned at her. She fought the urge to grin back. She had a sinking feeling he was about to suggest they shower together. She had a sinking feeling that if he asked at just the right moment, in just the right way, she’d agree that it was a fine idea.

  But suddenly his focus changed. He wasn’t looking at her anymore, he stared straight ahead. His smile disappeared and he moved past her. “That’s Luther’s car in your driveway.”

  They both sped up, running faster than before. They met Luther as he was returning to his car.

  “Where the hell have you been?” Luther snapped. “I was just about to call someone down here to bust your door in. Both cars in the driveway, no answer at the door.” He narrowed his eyes and glared at them, first at Grace, then at Ray. “You were running?”

  “Yeah,” Ray said, all business. “What’s up?”

  Luther took a deep breath and stared Grace dead in the eye. There had been a time when she could read his expressions almost as well as Ray’s. No more.

  “We have a body.”

  *

  Chapter 6

  «^»

  Luther paced, cutting his eyes to Grace as she placed coffee mugs on the counter then glaring at Ray with eyes that were somehow accusing.

  “His name was Carter Lanford. Forty-two years old, married, no kids. Owned a local software company. Made a lot of money in the past seven years, but because of his family connections he’s always been wealthy. Big in charity, local government, donated money and computers to a number of school programs. Sounds like a great guy,” Luther said with a grimace. “Early this morning his car was found at the foot of Justin Mountain, Lanford in the driver’s seat. He’s been dead a couple of days.”

  “Neck broken?” Ray asked tersely.

  Luther nodded. “It looks like his neck was broken in the crash. It’ll be a couple of days before I have the medical examiner’s report, but…”

  “His neck wasn’t broken in the crash,” Grace said calmly.

  Luther ignored her. “A couple of kids out searching for arrowheads at the crack of dawn found the car. It was pretty well hidden from the road by trees, so if those kids hadn’t found the car it might’ve been winter before it was spotted.”

  “Making it very hard to tell exactly how he died, I would imagine,” Ray said.

  He wondered if Luther felt guilty for doubting Grace. Luther didn’t look particularly guilty, but then as he’d grown older he’d gotten pretty good at hiding his feelings. Hadn’t they all.

  “Now what?” Grace asked, bringing them both coffee. Luther’s black, his with a little sugar. After all these years, she remembered.

  “I’d like you to take a look at some photographs of the victim, just to be sure he’s the one you saw.”

  Grace nodded once and turned her head away, not wanting either of them to see that she was disturbed by the thought of those photographs. Too late. Her emotions, her fears and uncertainties, were there for the world to see.

  “Then I’d like you to meet with a sketch artist.”

  “I guess we need to do all this at the office,” she said, sipping at her own coffee.

  Ray watched Grace, noted the way she didn’t look directly at him or at Luther. She had always called the detectives’ pit an office, never “the station” or “downtown,” as if giving his former workplace an ordinary name would somehow make it ordinary.

  “If you don’t mind,” Luther said.

  She excused herself to take a quick shower, and Ray immediately placed himself in Luther’s face.

  “You owe her an apology.”

  “I do not.” Luther didn’t back down.

  “You didn’t believe her.”

  “Well, I’m here now.”

  Luther finished his coffee quickly and placed the empty cup on the kitchen counter.

  “Who did it?” Ray asked, watching Luther’s back.

  Luther shrugged his shoulders and reached into the pocket of his dark blue jacket for a piece of hard candy. “I don’t know. The wife didn’t seem overly bereaved when I broke the news to her before coming here. There’s a definite possibility she was involved.”

  “Why didn’t she report him missing?”

  “Said he was supposed to leave town Thursday morning. A business trip to D.C. They’d had a tiff before he left, so when he didn’t call…” Luther shrugged his shoulders. “Sounds like a convenient excuse but I can’t prove she’s lying.”

  Luther roamed the room, picking up this and that, peeking behind pillows, shaking the snow globes. Ah, old Luther was fidgety. He might not admit that he owed Grace an apology, but he did feel guilty. Just a little.

  “She’s certainly not the one Grace saw,” Luther said as he picked up a small snow globe and shook it gently, “but the man who did the dirty work could be a boyfriend, a relative, an accomplice of some kind.”

  Ray’s heart lurched. “Gracie could be in serious trouble.”

  Luther didn’t seem concerned. “We don’t know for sure that Lanford is the man Grace saw killed. All we know right now is that he’s dead.”

  “Of a broken neck,” Ray added.

  Luther shrugged, conceding ungraciously. “Let’s say Lanford is the man she saw murdered. It’s possible the wife isn’t involved at all. I haven’t checked into Lanford thoroughly yet. Who knows what kind of dirt we’ll dig up? The killer could be a thousand miles away by now.”

  “Maybe,” Ray muttered. Grace entered the room from the hallway, her hair slightly damp and hanging around her shoulders, her shorts and T-shirt traded for a pair of khakis and a white button-up blouse. She’d put on a little makeup, some pale lipstick and a touch of mascara, but that was it.

  She looked a little scared, more than a little nervous. “Let’s get this over with.”

  *

  Freddie watched them drive away, the three of them in two cars.

  If they looked back they might see him leaning against the tree, then bending over to tie his shoe. They wouldn’t pay him any mind, just as the woman and the one who’d run with her this morning hadn’t paid him any mind on the street.

  But they didn’t look back. Dammit, they were intense, in a hurry, and that one cop, the one who had been running with her, had hovered over the witn
ess protectively as he’d escorted her to the car.

  The body had been found, or else someone had reported Lanford missing.

  It was a complication, but not an insurmountable one. People who had threatened to testify against him in the past had met untimely deaths, freak accidents and out-and-out executions. The woman wouldn’t be any different.

  He made yet another mental note of the address he’d followed them to, studied the front door and the placement of the windows. As he jogged away from the house he was already making plans. An accident would be best. Would cause less commotion; attract less attention. And if that didn’t work he’d burn her house to the ground or put a bullet through her head. Made little difference to him. He had time. Lots and lots of time.

  An attractive, fair-haired woman jogged past him, heading in the opposite direction. He smiled at her and she smiled back.

  Freddie made a U-turn in the street and pulled up alongside the blonde. She was tall. He liked that. Her blond hair was cut too short for his liking, almost like a man’s cut, but on her the style looked classy. And she didn’t turn her nose up at him the way that redhead had.

  “Hi.”

  “Hi yourself,” she said, glancing coyly to the side.

  “Nice day for a run.”

  She nodded, smiled again. One of those secret, female smiles that drove him wild. Someone classy like this, she probably had a husband, or a boyfriend. Maybe both. She was too pretty to be on her own. Still, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

  “Who’s Martha?” she asked, grinning as she nodded at his tattoo.

  “An old girlfriend,” he admitted, cursing himself for his youthful foolishness. One day he was going to have the damned thing removed. “She’s been out of the picture for a long time.”

  “Oh,” the blonde muttered.

  “I’m new in town,” Freddie said, not bothering to waste her time or his with more pleasantries. “My name’s Jimmy.”

  She looked him over, taking in the tattoo and the muscled arms he worked so hard to sculpt. Apparently she liked what she saw. “I’m Gillian.”

  “What a beautiful name.” He smiled at her again, and she blushed. “I don’t know many people in Huntsville, and I was just wondering … what are you doing tonight, Gillian?”

  *

  Grace didn’t protest when Ray insisted on coming inside with her. He made the usual quick rounds while she fastened all three locks on her front door.

  Seeing the pictures of the dead man had made this all too real again. Going over every detail of the killer’s face with the sketch artist had brought back too many memories of that morning.

  What she really wanted to do was pack her bags, load up the car, and head back to Chattanooga. Returning to Huntsville had been a really bad idea. She was definitely not working Ray out of her system, as she’d hoped, and now this. Yeah, coming back had been a really bad idea.

  “So,” Ray said calmly as he exited the hallway. “Do I move in here or are you coming to my place?”

  “What?”

  “Just until we ID the man who killed Lanford. You shouldn’t be alone when we have no idea what we’re dealing with.”

  “We?” she said, ignoring the question. “You’re not on the force anymore, and since this is an open investigation you have to stay out of it. Right?”

  “Right,” he said with a sarcastic edge to his voice. “I’m going to sit back and wait.”

  “There’s nothing you can do.”

  He lifted his eyebrows, silently challenging her. “Can I borrow your phone?”

  She grabbed the portable phone from the handset on the kitchen wall and handed it to him. He dialed the long-distance number from memory.

  “Chambers,” he said, turning his back to her. “I know you haven’t had time to find anything yet, but I have an update. We’ve found the victim. Carter Lanford, local muck-a-muck, lots of money, not-so-grieving widow.” There was a pause, and while he waited Ray paced. “I know the description of the suspect I gave you is sketchy, at best, but to narrow it down…” He spun and faced Grace, looking her square in the eye. “Look for a pro. A hit man who’s maybe done business in the south in the past. It’s too early to tell, but this definitely smells like a professional job.”

  Ray answered a few questions, gave the man on the phone her number in case he wasn’t at home or in the office, and his beeper number in case there was no answer at either. He ended the conversation with a promise to call again on Monday.

  “You’re trying to scare me,” Grace said softly as Ray returned the phone to its hook.

  “No, I’m just trying not to hide anything from you.”

  “What makes you think the killer was a hit man?”

  Ray fidgeted. A situation like this one, not knowing what had happened or what would happen next, always put him on edge. “For one thing, Lanford had a lot of money. When there’s money at stake, anything’s possible. His wife didn’t seem too sorry to see him depart this earth, but we know she didn’t kill Lanford herself. It makes sense to at least consider the possibility that she hired the murder out. And the crime scene was squeaky clean. This guy didn’t leave a single clue behind.”

  “Except for me,” Grace said softly. Ray nodded once. The idea that she might have faced a professional hit man and escaped by surprising him with pepper spray and a well-placed kick made her go weak in the knees.

  “I can leave town,” she said. “Maybe stay with friends in Chattanooga for a while.”

  Ray quit pacing and stared at her. “And give up your great job with Dr. Doolittle?” he deadpanned.

  “It’s not working out exactly like I’d planned,” she admitted. Nothing had. “Besides, it’s not fair to ask you to put your business, your whole life, on hold while you baby-sit me. I’m not your responsibility.” Not anymore.

  “Yes, you are.” Ray took the two steps that separated them and placed his hands on her face, forcing her to look up at him.

  His hands were large, warm and comforting, and still demanding. Making her face him, making her look him squarely in the eye. She fought the temptation to lean into one of those hands, to turn her head and kiss his palm and beg him not to go.

  “You came to me,” he said softly. “When you were scared, when you didn’t know where else to go, you came to me. Do you think I can turn my back on you now? Pretend nothing has changed?”

  “Nothing has changed,” she said weakly, trying, so hard, to mean what she said.

  “Gracie Madigan,” he whispered, his mouth moving toward hers. “Everything has changed and you damn well know it.”

  Ray kissed her, long and deep, soft and gentle. But he did not push, he didn’t steer her toward the bedroom or let his hands roam enticingly over the body he knew too well. He just kissed her, his mouth brushing across and then lingering on hers, and she loved it. She wallowed in it.

  “So,” he said as he reluctantly took his mouth from hers. “Your place or mine?”

  *

  With his feet propped on Grace’s coffee table and the laptop sitting on his thighs, Ray began his own investigation. A narrow cord ran from her kitchen phone to the computer, where he searched the Internet for information on Carter Lanford.

  He’d brought a few things from home, including the Lyle Lovett CD that played softly on Grace’s stereo. She’d been in her room for an hour now, since just after ten, and was no doubt sleeping like a baby.

  His mind was only half on the task at hand. Gathering information was a dull but necessary part of any investigation, but he had to start somewhere. Who, besides the rich widow, might want Carter Lanford dead?

  The name was not entirely unknown to Ray. Lanford’s Huntsville-based business had grown quickly and had made him very wealthy at a relatively young age. He was on the board of the Children’s Hospital Charity, employed over three hundred people in the Huntsville area and played softball on an over-forty league. Ray pulled up old newspaper articles about Lanford, as well as a feature that had run la
st year in a national financial magazine.

  There weren’t that many reasons for murder. Money. Love and the baggage that came with the damnable sentiment. Hate and the jealousy and delusions that came with it. Self-preservation.

  Lanford had money and lots of it. Any successful man of his age had surely had his brush with love and hate and all that went with those emotions. Was there a girlfriend out there? A jealous husband? A business rival who’d been pushed over the edge?

  Ray cursed beneath his breath as he read the articles. Lanford’s PR was good, you had to give him that. His skeletons, if he had them, were still in the closet, waiting to be uncovered.

  “Lyle Lovett.”

  Ray turned to watch Grace as she stepped from the hallway and into the room. Covered with a blue terrycloth robe that hung to the floor, she looked smaller than usual. Vulnerable. Scared.

  “I Love Everybody.”

  She cracked a small smile. “I know.”

  “That’s the name of the CD,” he clarified. “I Love Everybody.”

  “I don’t remember it,” she said, stepping close to peer over his shoulder to the screen.

  “I didn’t have it when we were married. I got it after you left.”

  “Oh,” she said, her voice small.

  He turned off the computer and closed the cover, then unceremoniously dropped the laptop to the cushion beside him. He wasn’t getting anywhere, anyway. “If the music’s keeping you awake…”

  “No,” she interrupted. “I just can’t sleep.” She sat in the fat chair to his right and curled her legs beneath her. “My mind is spinning, and every noise I hear, every car that passes on the street startles me.”

  She smiled at him, a sad, small smile, and he knew in that instant what he had to do.

  He wanted Grace in his bed, he craved her to distraction, sometimes. She’d crawled into his head and she stayed there, keeping him awake at night, teasing him during the day when he should be thinking of a hundred other things. He needed her beneath him, he needed her to wrap her legs around him while he buried himself inside her. Only then … only then would he get her out of his head.