“I don’t really do flowers,” Karen said. “Sandy sometimes buys me roses.”
“I see.” Faye turned a few pages in the book. When Karen glanced at her watch, Faye smiled politely. “I believe Mrs. Alexander said you’re a police officer. Is that right?”
“Yeah. Homicide detective.”
Faye leaned back, away from the book. “Really? I think that’s amazing. You must live a fascinating life.”
“Yeah, it’s fascinating, all right.”
“I have the utmost respect for anyone who puts their life on the line for the sake of society,” Faye said, “but especially for a woman who does so. Such a difficult and challenging career to have chosen.” She reached out and touched her on the arm. “Mrs. Alexander has given us carte blanche, so how about if I help you spend a little of her money this morning? Then you can get on to much more important things.”
Karen looked the woman in the eye, saw genuine humor and sincerity, and nodded. “Sounds good to me.”
Faye reached for another book and opened it on top of the first one. “Do you have a favorite color?”
“Not really. Red flowers are nice, I guess.”
“Ah.” Faye grabbed about an inch’s-worth of pages and turned to a section near the back. “I have an idea. What do you think of this?”
Karen looked at a photograph of a slender model in a white wedding dress holding a bouquet of red and white flowers.
“Your posy could feature roses, Asiatic lilies, alstroemeria, and dahlias, just like this. Isn’t it lovely?”
Karen admitted that it was.
“The posy’s a popular choice for a bouquet because it has a very contemporary look. Plus, it’s much more convenient to hold.”
“Sounds good,” Karen said. “It’ll make it easier for me to draw my gun without dropping the flowers.”
Faye tittered, turning the page. “These would make nice bouquets for your bridesmaids and matron of honor.”
“Okay.”
“This is a lovely accessory,” Faye said, pointing. “Two red garden roses attached with hairpins make an attractive fascinator.”
“No thanks,” Karen replied. “I’d look like I had flowers growing out of my head. My brothers would never let me live it down.”
“All right.” Faye turned the page.
By the time Karen had completed Lane Alexander’s shopping list and chosen corsages, boutonnieres, flowers for the church, flowers with the guest book, outdoor urn arrangements, chair-back arrangements, table centerpieces and garlands, she felt as though she’d just blown six months’ salary and had a great time doing it. Faye shook her hand firmly at the front door, they exchanged business cards, and Karen left feeling a little better about the whole wedding thing.
She hustled through the rain to her Firebird, started up the engine, and switched on the windshield wipers. Her hand reached out and flicked on the police radio as she pulled into traffic. The rain had lessened somewhat from earlier in the morning, and was now a steady drizzle. She drove slowly, thinking about the flowers. Her brother Brad had already begun the renovation of the barn on the Alexander property. Faye had recommended arrangements of red peonies and white hydrangea to complement the unusual height and depth of the venue, and Karen thought they’d look nice. Brad was a genius when it came to interior design, and—
“—Dispatch, we are ten-nineteen with possible felony suspect. Wearing a suit and carrying an umbrella as reported.”
“Three twenty-six, HQ now requests you transport to their twenty.”
“Ten-four, Dispatch.”
Karen grabbed the mike and keyed the button. “Dispatch, this is thirty-four seventy-two, off-duty. Where was the felony suspect picked up?”
“Thirty-four seventy-two, we received a report of a suspicious pedestrian matching description of possible felony suspect on the five-hundred block of Cooper Street, west side, near Clovis.”
“Got it,” Karen said. “Three twenty-six, what’s your ETA at HQ?”
“ETA ten,” came the reply.
“Ten-four,” Karen said. “Attaboy.”
When Karen arrived at the ninth floor, the suspect had already been placed in an interview room. Horvath sat at his desk, on the phone, head resting in his hand, intent on something in front of him. Officer Wilcox was parked nearby, in Karen’s visitor’s chair, shaking raindrops from his hat. Seeing that Hank’s office door was open, she looked in and saw him at his desk. A woman sat in one of his chairs, her back to the door. She was doing all the talking.
Karen walked back to Wilcox. “What’s the story?”
“The witness is Nicole Sample, thirty-four. She works as a receptionist in a dog grooming place on Clovis. She went out to mail some stuff and was on her way back when the suspect accosted her.”
“Accosted her how?”
“According to her, the suspect approached her on the sidewalk and asked her if she was busy this afternoon. He held his umbrella over her when she stopped, and handed her a post card. He told her he was working for a cosmetics company that had a booth at a trade show for women, the one this weekend at the Roosevelt Trade Center in Bering Heights. When she tried to walk around him, he made physical contact with her by pressing the card against her forearm, trying to get her to take it.”
As she listened, Karen leaned back for another peek into Hank’s office. From what she could see, Nicole Sample looked as though she was about five feet, seven inches tall and weighed about one hundred and sixty pounds. Her hair was brown.
“Then what?”
Wilcox shrugged. “She ran across the street to get away from him and called nine-one-one. Said she’d just been attacked by the Rainy Day Killer. My partner’s in the washroom right now, if you want to talk to him when he comes out, but that’s basically it.”
“Thanks.” Karen strolled over to Hank’s office and leaned on the door frame.
“He said if I took the card to their booth,” Sample was sobbing, “I’d get 10 percent off any purchase. I thought I’d never see my husband again!”
Hank stood up, excused himself, and motioned Karen to step out into the bullpen. “He’s carrying a Maryland driver’s license in the name of Thomas Peter Kirk, Baltimore address, DOB eleven twenty-two eighty-eight.”
“Twenty-five years old,” Karen said.
“A little on the young side,” Hank agreed. “DiOrio was already in the building,” he said, referring to the assistant state’s attorney, “so she’s waiting in the observation room. He was Mirandized and waived the right to call an attorney.”
“Cocky bastard.”
Hank shrugged. “Horvath’s running down the ID. Why don’t you see what you can get from this guy?”
Karen turned on her heel and strode down the hallway to the interview room. Hank followed, letting himself into the observation room. Horvath brought Nicole Sample out of Hank’s office and sat her down in his visitor’s chair while he continued his work.
The suspect sat at the table with his head in his hands. He wore a navy double-breasted suit, a white shirt, a red tie, and black leather shoes. He had a scrape on the left side of his forehead, and the front of his suit was soaked and covered with dirt and grit, no doubt the result of having been taken down on the wet sidewalk by Wilcox and his partner. His hair was longer than she’d expected.
“My name’s Detective Stainer,” she said, sitting down across the table from him. “You’ve already heard your Miranda rights, but I’m going to explain them to you again.” She recited them briskly. “Do you waive your right to an attorney at this time?”
“I told the others, I don’t know any lawyers and I don’t need one. I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“We can send for a public defender.”
“I told you, I don’t need a lawyer. I didn’t do anything!”
“Yeah, sure. How’d you come up with this bullshit about cosmetics?”
“At a job fair.”
Karen paused a beat. “What’s that again?�
�
“I got the job at a job fair last month. I’ve been out of work for a year. My girlfriend left me because I had to sell my car and move back with my parents. Do you know how humiliating that is? So I went to this job fair and these guys were hiring practically everybody who stopped at their booth with a CV. The only catch is you have to dress up and travel to the places where they’re doing the trade shows and stuff. I don’t get paid unless at least twenty people turn in the post cards at their booth. Can I have the rest of my cards back? I really need the money.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“I’m not! I’m practically broke.”
“She’s a little off your usual type, isn’t she? What were you doing, slumming?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Just a warm-up rape? Couldn’t find a blonde on short notice?”
“Oh my God, you think I was attacking her?”
“You must think we’re complete fucking idiots, Bill. Or whatever your real name is. Where’d you hold Theresa Olsen, you bastard? Where’d you do her?”
“Oh my God, this isn’t happening. My name’s not Bill, it’s Tom. Tom Kirk. I live in Baltimore. I’m here with a group for the convention.”
“You’re here with a group.” Karen paused a beat. “Okay, doorknob, I’ll bite. Who’s this group? Who hired you? What’s your boss’s name?”
“The company’s called Tremont Products. My supervisor’s name is James. I don’t remember his last name, but his card’s in my wallet. They took it. My wallet. Can you call him and tell him what’s going on? I’m scared they’re going to fire me.”
“You’re scared they’re going to fire you. That’s rich.”
“They will! They fire you for practically anything.”
Karen put her hands flat on the table, staring at him. She popped air through her lips, pressed her tongue against a back molar, then suddenly stood up.
“Sit tight.” She left the room and went out into the hallway, narrowly avoiding a collision with Hank and DiOrio, who were coming out of the observation room.
“Let’s see how Horvath’s doing,” Hank said.
“Okay, here it is,” Horvath said quietly, glancing at the witness as they gathered around his desk. “The photo on the driver’s license matches what’s in the DMV database. I spoke to this James Repple, who answered the number on the business card, and a patrol car’s bringing him and another person supposedly from the company down from the convention center. He confirms they have a guy with this name and general description working for them, handing out post cards downtown. We’ll have to wait and see if he makes a positive ID. I think he’s going to. This seems off, to me.”
When James Repple arrived, he took one look through the one-way glass in the observation room and shook his head. “His ass is completely fired. What’d he do?”
Karen confronted him. “You confirm that this is Thomas Peter Kirk of Baltimore? An employee of yours?”
“Lorraine hired him, I didn’t. But yeah, that’s him. Complete doofus. What’d he do, trespass or something?”
Karen turned to the woman who’d accompanied Repple from the convention center. “What about you?”
“I hired him, yeah. Big mistake, obviously.”
“How long have you known him?”
“About a month,” Lorraine replied. “I gave him his training, along with six other guys. We brought three of them down here with us last night to work the show. They put their initials on the back of their cards; that’s how we know who’s driving the traffic up to us. We only saw one of his cards, so far. He’s not working out.” She glanced at Repple.
“Complete dope,” he agreed.
“Can you confirm his whereabouts on Wednesday, April 24?”
Repple thought about it. “A week ago last Wednesday?” He pinched his chin. “That would be Bowie, I think. Right, Lorraine? Yeah, a Thursday-Friday-Saturday show at the Rec Center. Wednesday was our travel day. He rode down with me and John Ferris.”
“Thanks for your time,” DiOrio said.
Karen’s shoulders dropped as the observation room began to empty.
“Cut him loose,” DiOrio ordered. “A swing and a miss.”
“God damn it,” Karen muttered.
“I know. We all want this one real bad, but it’s not him.”
“I know it isn’t. But for a short, sweet minute, I thought we’d nailed the fucker.”
At that moment Helen Cassion walked into the room.
“I’ve called the press,” she announced. “They should be here any minute.” She looked at the one-way glass. “Is that him? Is our statement ready?”
Karen looked at DiOrio and, despite herself, began to laugh.
19
Friday, May 10: mid-morning
The following Friday morning, six days later, Eleanor Montgomery parked her Chevrolet Suburban in the lot of the Food Basket, a rather expensive grocery store in the Springhill neighborhood where she lived. It was a bright, fresh, sunny morning, and it was her day off.
As she walked through the sliding glass doors, she caught a glimpse of her reflection. She was wearing her Ralph Lauren fringed suede jacket over an indigo-striped t-shirt, faded blue jeans, and suede oxford wingtip lace-ups. Slung over her shoulder was a leather tote bag that matched the shoes. Her blonde hair was tied in a neat ponytail draped over her shoulder. It was a look that pleased her, all the more so because it was very different than what people saw of her on television. She preferred not to be recognized when off duty.
She grabbed a shopping cart, removed the tote from her shoulder, and put it in the cart’s fold-out flap. She stayed close to her bag at all times while shopping, not only because it contained her cell phone and wallet but also because she had her off-duty service weapon in it, a Glock Px4 Storm nine millimeter. She began to fill her cart with a selection of greens, bags of baby carrots, fresh cilantro and curly parsley, fresh lemons, a sack of basmati rice, a bag of freshly-made tortilla shells, and a half-dozen bagels.
She was thinking about her boyfriend, Jerry Garrett, as she shopped. A reporter for the Glendale Mirror who worked the entertainment beat, he’d just written a blog post covering a recent tattoo arts convention held in Baltimore. Always fascinated by the fringes of modern society, Jerry had done a very good job exploring the culture, and had worked in several intriguing character sketches of the people who inhabited that world. She’d liked the post very much, but he’d come back from the convention with a large tattoo of a spider on his forearm that she didn’t like at all. On top of that, he was pestering her to get a tattoo of her own; something small, he said, where the cameras wouldn’t see it.
It wasn’t going to happen.
She wasn’t the kind of person who was into body art. She preferred to augment her appearance in more conventional ways, with clothing, accessories, makeup, and hair style. She knew they referred to her at work as The Ice Princess, a nickname she’d picked up as a patrol officer in Granger Park for her firm refusal to notice the advances of her male colleagues. While it bothered her to be thought of as aloof and disinterested in others, she preferred it to the alternative. She kept her personal and professional relationships separate. If Jerry had worked the city beat, she probably wouldn’t have agreed to go out with him. As it was, their jobs occupied separate orbits that never intersected, which was just fine with her.
She was in the middle of an aisle when she realized she’d passed the tea without remembering she needed more. She grabbed her tote bag and walked back to the end of the aisle, where she chose a box of her preferred green tea. She paused, running her eye along the shelf to see if there was anything else she wanted. The store was not very busy for a Friday morning. An old James Taylor song, “Fire and Rain,” played lightly on the store audio system. The lyrics began to track through her head as she slowly returned to her cart.
A man passed by the far end of the aisle. She saw a brief glimpse of a dark windbreaker, jeans, and a ca
mera with a large lens on a shoulder strap.
Someone moved behind her and passed her in the aisle, jostling her: a large-hipped African-American woman in a flower print dress, arms filled with loaves of bread, heading for the check-out.
Montgomery tossed the box of green tea into her cart, put the tote bag back in the fold-out flap, and continued to shop.
She thought about Lieutenant Donaghue. Although he was twenty years older, he was still an attractive man. She liked tall men, and she definitely liked men with curly hair. Of course, she preferred men her own age. What she appreciated about Donaghue, though, was his attitude. He kept his eyes where they were supposed to be, he spoke to her with respect and genuine interest in what she had to say, and he had a certain style about him that mixed professionalism and humor in a way she liked. He’d kept her in the loop on the serial killer case, he appreciated her daily reports on the information she was culling from the TIPS line calls, and he used the statements she drafted for him with very few changes.
She decided she would ask him for a letter of reference when she applied for the upcoming detective competition this summer. Word was, the chief was finally going to do something about the acute shortage of detectives on staff. She was already studying for it.
She was lost in thought as she reached the check-out and began unloading her cart. Fresh fish, boneless chicken breast, the sack of rice, Tetra boxes of chicken stock, bundles of fresh green lettuce.
She paid for her purchases, piled the bags into her cart, and left the store.
She pushed the cart across the parking lot toward her Suburban, parked down the row on her left. Her eyes were drawn to movement in a parked white van on her right. She saw a man sitting behind the wheel of the van. He was lowering a camera out of sight, onto his lap, and his head was turning away from Montgomery to look straight ahead through the dusty windshield of the van. As she drew even, he flipped down the sun visor, which prevented her from seeing his face. She glanced behind her and ran her eyes in a one hundred and eighty degree arc across what would correspond to the man’s field of vision. She saw nothing whatsoever that would be worth photographing.
The Rainy Day Killer Page 11
