Trigger Effect

by Maggie Price

  “I don’t intend on giving him the opportunity.”

  “Good to know,” he said levelly. “You ready to get to work?”

  “Yes.”

  “All the paperwork’s locked in my desk.” He swept a hand toward the door while giving her a pointed look. “After you.”

  Paige glanced at the door, then looked back at McCall. She didn’t for one second interpret the gesture as an attempt on his part to be polite. In the world of law enforcement, prisoners walked in front; guards followed. The person in the back was the one in charge, the one calling the shots. Nobody forgot that. Ever. McCall might concede to working with her, but he wanted her to know who was in charge.

  What the hell, she thought. He had done more than a few favors for her and both cases were ultimately his. He deserved to win the point.

  She turned and moved to the door. Her hand was on the knob when McCall said, “By the way, around here we don’t call the homicide of someone high on the food chain a ‘red ball.’”

  She looked across her shoulder. “What term do you OCPD guys use?”

  “We call them ‘holy shit’ cases. So far, that describes this one to a T.”

  Chapter 8

  “Let me make sure I’ve got the facts straight,” Paige said after she finished reading a slew of reports on the Gillette homicide. McCall had settled her at his partner’s desk, which faced the opposite direction from his. With their chairs backing up to each other, she had to swivel hers to face him.

  The remaining desks in the squad room were now all empty, the lone detective having left about an hour ago on a homicide call.

  “Shoot,” McCall said, setting aside the report he’d been reviewing.

  “During your interview with Davis Gillette, he said the last time he saw his wife was right after the party they hosted Saturday night. Mrs. Gillette—Lauren—and the housekeeper were in the kitchen, dealing with the caterer, when Davis went upstairs to bed.”

  “The housekeeper verified that much,” McCall said. “She left around eleven-thirty, at the same time as the catering crew. Since the councilman and his wife maintained separate bedrooms, Gillette says he doesn’t know if Lauren actually slept in hers that night. My guess is she didn’t. The housekeeper was off the next day, and when she got to work Monday, Lauren’s bed was in the same condition the housekeeper left it in on Saturday.”

  “So Davis wakes up Sunday morning and discovers both his wife and her Jaguar gone.” As she spoke, Paige slipped the silver chain from beneath the neckline of her white tailored blouse and toyed with the links. “The Gillettes were scheduled to attend brunch at their country club. Instead of searching for her, or at least calling friends to ask if they’d seen her, Davis goes to the club. His wife didn’t call or show up at home that night, or the following day. Yet he never notified the police.”

  “He claims Lauren had a habit of going off without telling him. So he wasn’t overly concerned.”

  “There’s an understanding husband. Does he have any idea where she went during those previous times?”

  “According to him, she was always with one or the other of the two female friends I told you about. The thing is, neither of them was in town when Lauren went missing. One of those pals, Brenna Freeman, isn’t even on the same continent. She’s in Botswana.”

  “Have you talked to her?”

  “Yeah. She got upset when I told her about Lauren. But she refused to answer questions over the phone. Said she’s cutting her business there short and will get back here as soon as possible.”

  “What about the other friend of Lauren’s?”

  “Elizabeth LeMonde. She’s jetting home late tonight in her hubby’s Lear from L.A., where she spent the past week luxuriating at some ritzy spa. Since she hasn’t returned the messages I’ve left her, the lady will find me on her doorstep first thing in the morning.”

  “Just you?”

  “Here’s a news flash, Carmichael. You might be a lot more fun if you’d lighten up and stop analyzing every word a person says.”

  “I’m not here to have fun.”

  He gave her a tight smile. “I would have never guessed.”

  “Getting back to business,” she said, sending him a pointed look, “is Lauren Gillette’s Jaguar still missing?”

  “Yeah. Her purse wasn’t with the body, so it’s possible that’s where we’ll find it.”

  Paige nodded. “So, Lauren disappeared from home late Saturday night, and her body was found Monday in a coffin-size box in a warehouse freezer. How did you ID her?”

  “Fingerprints. She met Gillette while working as a cocktail waitress at his country club. The club conducts a background check on all prospective employees, which includes a run on their prints.”

  McCall snagged a thick manila envelope off his desk, pulled out color photos and handed them to Paige. “Those are the crime scene pics from the freezer. The company that owns the place is called Lang. It’s a nationwide food distributor.”

  Flipping through the photos, Paige studied Lauren Gillette’s mink-clad body lying in a cardboard box. Her blond hair was swept up in an elegant twist, her pale skin flawless, save for the gash on her left cheek. “I didn’t realize she was so young.”

  “Late twenties,” McCall said. “Hubby is pushing sixty.” His mouth curved. “Trophy wife.”

  “Whom it doesn’t sound like shared her husband’s bed on a regular basis.” Paige leafed through the remainder of the photos, noting the diamond studs that glittered coldly at Lauren Gillette’s earlobes. “Has the M.E. established time of death?”

  “With the victim a corpse-sicle it’s hard to say. We know what food was served at the party she and Gillette hosted, so once we get the analysis of her stomach contents we may be able to close in on a T.O.D.” McCall rested an ankle over his knee. “The box she’s in is interesting.”

  Paige glanced back at the photos. “How so?”

  “It’s got a manufacturer’s model number stamped on it. That company went out of business a few years ago. Lang’s got a couple of warehouses on its property and there’s still some of those old boxes in use there, but not a lot. Right now it doesn’t seem like any of them are unaccounted for.”

  “Any luck getting fingerprints off the box?”

  “None, it’d been wiped down with some sort of solvent. Inside there were dust particles, and a couple of different fibers lodged under the corner of one of the flaps. The debris has been sent to the trace lab.”

  “Is there life insurance involved? If so, how much and who’s the beneficiary?”

  “The lovebirds took out a ‘survivor’s’ policy right after their marriage. That means when one dies, the survivor gets a cool million dollars.”

  “Was that Lauren’s idea?”

  “Given their January-December ages, you’d think so. The odds were certainly in her favor to begin with. But the insurance agent said he got the impression Gillette used it as an incentive to get her to marry him.”

  “Does he need the million?”

  “Good question. I’ve just started digging into his financials, but on the surface he looks flush. There’s a lot of old money in the Gillette family from oil production.” McCall angled his head. “Running for governor takes a big chunk of change. Wouldn’t hurt to have an extra pot of cash on hand.”

  “Having his wife murdered would get him some sympathy votes.”

  “Unless it turns out he’s the one who iced her.”

  “True.” Paige paused, her mind working to digest the information. “You said Lang is a food distributor. Does Davis Gillette have ties to the company?”

  “Lang’s property is located in the ward the councilman represents. He was even on-site earlier this year when Lang finished construction on a state-of-the art warehouse.”

  “So, Gillette’s familiar with the layout of the place.”

  “Very. He helped Lang get a business-incentive tax reduction from the city. I’ve got a copy of Gillette’s report he submi
tted to the council that details all of Lang’s facilities. The list includes the old warehouse where his wife’s body was found. It also states the warehouse is used solely for storage of former employee and other records Lang never got around to microfilming. Its walk-in freezer is kept in operating condition in case it’s needed for backup. Lang’s manager told me the only time anyone goes to that particular warehouse is to retrieve old files. That happens maybe once a year.”

  “There was no forced entry into the warehouse. Does Gillette have a key?”

  “Not officially. I’m working on finding out if there’s a way he could have gotten one on the sly. Or if there’s a record of him buying an automatic lock-pick device.”

  “So, why didn’t the killer bury Lauren? Why stick her in the warehouse?”

  “We’ve had an especially brutal winter—lots of ice and snow, multiple days of freezing temps,” McCall explained. “The ground is frozen, which means it’s way too hard to dig a grave if all you’ve got is a shovel. The guy could have planned to leave the body in the freezer a few weeks until the ground thawed. Obviously, there’s some reason he couldn’t stash the body, either frozen or in the crawl space under his house, like Jeffrey Dahmer and John Wayne Gacy did their victims. Our guy could have opted to rent a unit at a storage facility under an alias and keep Lauren in a freezer there, but those places present even more problems beyond his control than the freezer at Lang.”

  Paige nodded, trying to view the scenario in the killer’s mind. “Random burglars, nosy managers with duplicate keys, which most storage facilities demand all unit renters supply. And those on-site managers could ID the guy from photos, which would negate his using an alias. Power out-ages you might not know about until too late.”

  “All that and more,” McCall said. “And if the murder wasn’t planned, the guy suddenly has a body on his hands and no idea how to deal with it. Maybe he’s in a time squeeze. He’s in some way connected to Lang. He knows the odds of anybody going into that old warehouse are on his side. It was just bad luck that a couple of juvies tossed rocks through the windows, and brought a security guard down on them, but shit happens.”

  “Amen,” Paige agreed, rubbing her numb scar. “I take it you’ve got a list from Lang of all its present and past employees?”

  “You take it right. One interesting point about Lang is that it’s probably one of the single largest employers of off-duty OCPD cops. The main reason for that is all the traffic coming in and out of Lang’s warehouses. A lot of truckers are more apt to take instructions from a cop than a security guard.”

  “Have you had a chance to question any of the cops who were on duty at Lang between Saturday night and Monday when Lauren’s body was found?”

  “Yeah. No one noticed anything out of the ordinary. Too bad Lang doesn’t have security cameras on that old warehouse. Or the back gate that I figure the killer used.”

  “No kidding.” Paige paused, thinking about the information she’d read in the reports. “You said some of the guests at the Gillettes’ party heard them arguing?”

  “Right. But they’d closed themselves off in the study so no one knows what the argument was about. That was approximately an hour after Gillette announced his run for governor. You’ve got to figure the spat with the missus put a cap on his night.”

  “I can imagine. Chief Quaid mentioned that everyone who attended the party was questioned. Their statements were recorded, then transcribed. If you want, I can get started analyzing them tonight.”

  “I want.” McCall unearthed a bulging file folder off his desk and handed it to her. “I’ve read them all. There’s nothing in any of them that jumped up and hit me between the eyes. Of course, I wasn’t dissecting each word under a microscope.”

  “No telling what you missed,” Paige murmured. “What about the catering crew? Did you get statements from them?”

  “They’re in that same folder, clipped separately. I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing the owner of the catering company. Calls himself Mr. Markie. Guy’s so light in the loafers it’s a wonder he doesn’t float.”

  Paige rolled her eyes at the description. “Did Mr. Markie overhear the Gillettes arguing?”

  “No, he spent most of the night in the kitchen, issuing orders to his worker bees.”

  Angling sideways, Paige set the file on her desk. When she turned back, she saw that McCall had rolled his chair closer to hers.

  “What’s this?” His knuckles grazed her throat when he snagged the silver chain. Fire ants, she thought, would have had less effect on her system.

  “A real handcuff key,” he said. “And a miniature badge. Texas Ranger, right?”

  “Right.”

  He lifted his gaze and gave her a wide, mischievous smile, friendly and gleaming. “You into kinky, Carmichael? Find yourself in a lot of situations where you need a handcuff key?”

  “Try to drag your mind out of the gutter, McCall.” She gripped the chain between a finger and thumb and slid it from his hold. “The necklace is a gift from my grandpa.”

  “Isn’t that kind of an odd gift from a grandpa?”

  “If you knew mine, you wouldn’t have to ask.” She rolled her chair back until it thumped against her desk. “Grandpa Carmichael’s a retired Texas Ranger. One of his former partners was transporting a prisoner when the guy overpowered him and cuffed him to a tree. The Ranger lived about four days before he died of exposure. My grandpa found him. He said he was cuffed with his hands in front of him, and if he’d had a spare handcuff key, he might have been able to free himself. Grandpa gave me this necklace when I graduated from the police academy. He calls it my lucky necklace. He asked me to wear it always, and I promised I would.”

  McCall wiggled his brows. “Even when you get lucky?”

  Damn the man, she couldn’t help but give him a reluctant smile. “Even when.” No way would she admit she hadn’t gotten lucky in three years.

  Studying her, McCall angled his head. “When you talk about your grandpa, your eyes go soft. So does your voice. He’s special, right?”

  “I’m crazy about him.” Paige smiled. “He’s big as a bear and cantankerous, but has the most soothing touch. He was my surrogate father. While I was growing up, my mom and I lived with him on the ranch he owns outside of Dallas. Grandpa had me up on a horse before I could even walk. He taught me to ride, to rope, to brand.”

  “You know how to rope and brand, huh?” McCall gave her a head-to-toe study. “You could be a dangerous woman for a man to be around, Carmichael.”

  “Bet on it, McCall.”

  She tucked the chain inside her blouse and shifted the conversation back on track. “How did Davis Gillette take the fact his wife occasionally disappeared without telling him?”

  “I wouldn’t say it was okay with him.” McCall stretched back in his chair. Nice stretch. Nice chest. “More like something he had no control over.” He pursed his mouth. “It wasn’t until after I interviewed him that I found out both Elizabeth LeMonde and Brenna Freeman were out of town. And Gillette knew that.”

  “So, if he’s guilty, why would Gillette name two people Lauren couldn’t have been with during the critical time? He could have just said he had no idea where she went.”

  “That’s a matter I’ve been pondering. Gillette could have done it to tie up my time. Keep me looking in one direction so I wouldn’t look in another. Still, I think he’d only do that if he’s stupid or panicky. He didn’t strike me as either.”

  “Have you asked him why he told you Lauren might be with either LeMonde or Freeman when he knew for sure she wasn’t?”

  “Not yet. His lawyer’s blocking a second interview. Keeps insisting his client is in seclusion. In mourning. Since the lawyer lives next door to Gillette, I can’t exactly drop in on his client to have a chat. It’s interesting that the grieving councilman still managed to call the mayor over wanting the media—and most everyone else—blocked from getting additional information about the case.”
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br />   “Lauren had a habit of disappearing every so often, which tells us she had something going on. Have you found evidence she had a man on the side?”

  “Maybe. You might have noticed in the crime scene photos that she was wearing just one leather glove, her right one. I don’t know what happened to the other one.” He unearthed a file folder from one of the stacks on his desk, flipped it open and handed a photograph to Paige. “That’s a picture of the note written on a small cocktail napkin the M.E.’s assistant found folded inside her glove.”

  “‘Meet me at Midnight,’” Paige read. Written in red ink, the words lay like a bloody gash upon the white napkin.

  “It’s possible some guy at the Gillettes’ party slipped that to Lauren. We know that the housekeeper and catering crew left around eleven-thirty. That would have given Lauren enough time after hubby went to bed to change out of her party attire, take off in the Jag and meet some guy at midnight.”

  “She maybe was going to meet someone, but I disagree about the time. You’re making an assumption.”

  McCall scowled. “How? The note says midnight.”

  “True, but look at it again.” She angled the photo his way. “‘Meet me at Midnight.’”

  “Yeah, Carmichael, I got that.”

  “People mean exactly what they say, McCall. Exactly what they write. When midnight is used to refer to twelve o’clock at night, the word isn’t normally capitalized. The author of this note used caps. Midnight could very well be a proper name.”

  “Meaning a place.”

  “Correct.”

  “It could also mean that whoever wrote it doesn’t care squat about the proper use of lower and uppercase.”

  “You could be right.”

  His eyes stayed steady on hers. “And so could you.” He tugged open a desk drawer, pulled out a phone book and flipped through the pages. “There’s no business named Midnight. Or with Midnight the first word of its title.”