Drop Dead Crime: Mystery and Suspense from the Leading Ladies of Murder

by Lisa Regan

  “I’ll handle Evan Porter,” Jocelyn said.

  ~~~

  It took Lonnie nearly a month to get permission to have his “expert” inspect the Porter vehicle prelitigation. Jocelyn had her supposed expert all lined up. She’d had to go to her Uncle Simon—her mother’s brother. Once upon a time, Simon Wilde had been a successful criminal defense attorney. When Jocelyn and her sister were teenagers, Camille was gang-raped by a group of their classmates. Their father chose to cover it up rather than bear the brunt of the bad press. He was the most prominent criminal defense attorney in the city, and he hadn’t wanted a trial where Camille would make a less-than-stellar witness to tarnish his reputation. Simon, his partner at the time, had had no idea.

  After Jocelyn and Camille’s parents died, Simon fulfilled a promise he’d made to their mother. He framed Camille’s attackers for crimes they hadn’t committed. Jocelyn had figured it out and turned him in.

  Although he had been disbarred and was on house arrest now for framing Camille’s classmates, in forty years of practice he had met every type of criminal imaginable and remained friendly with most of them—especially those he managed to gain acquittals for—in case they proved useful later. Simon put her in touch with a guy only a little older than her who would clean up well enough to pose as a mechanical engineer and be able to download whatever GPS coordinates were in Molly Porter’s vehicle’s system. As it turned out, Evan Porter hadn’t done a damn thing with the vehicle since Molly totaled it. It sat on the back lot of Porter’s Pub next to several dumpsters, according to Lonnie, who had accompanied Simon’s guy to the inspection.

  “Porter looked like he wanted to kill both of us,” Lonnie related with a chuckle when he showed up at her office a few days later with a manila envelope in hand.

  Jocelyn licked her lips as she took the envelope in hand. “I bet he did. I hear his temper is a real problem. Thank you, Lonnie.”

  She took it into the conference room where Anita joined her. “How much did you pay for this?” Anita asked as Jocelyn shook the contents of the envelope onto the table.

  “You don’t want to know.”

  Together, they searched the pages for what they were looking for. “She was in Ardmore less than thirty minutes before she crashed into us,” Anita remarked when she pinpointed the address.

  Ardmore was a wealthy suburb outside Philadelphia, part of an affluent area that locals referred to as the Main Line. “What the hell was she doing there?” Jocelyn asked.

  Anita left the room and returned with her laptop. “Let’s type it into Google Earth and see.”

  As Anita worked on the computer, Jocelyn looked over the times and coordinates. Molly had spent just over an hour at the location that Anita was now pulling up on her computer. It turned out to be a commercial area with a large office building on one side of the street and a strip mall on the other. Anita tried zooming in on the strip mall to see which businesses were there, but the street view image blurred the closer she got. “We’ll have to drive over there,” Jocelyn said.

  Her cell phone rang, and she answered without looking, her eyes still on Anita’s computer. “Rush,” she said.

  A woman’s voice said, “Jocelyn? It’s Kim.”

  Kim Bottinger was a nurse at Einstein Medical Center. She also happened to be dating Jocelyn’s old partner, Kevin. “What’s up?” Jocelyn asked her. “Is Kev okay?”

  “Oh yeah, he’s fine. I’m at work. I’ve got a woman here. She was just admitted through the ER, and she asked me to call you.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Lacey Gaither.”

  ~~~

  Anita went with her to Einstein Medical Center. Kim met them in the waiting room of the ER and took them upstairs to the patient rooms. “She’s already talked with the police,” Kim told them.

  “The police?” Anita asked.

  As they entered the room, Jocelyn saw why. Lacey Gaither had been beaten so badly, she was barely recognizable. Her face was swollen and bloomed with red and purple bruises. Her lower lip had been split nearly to the bottom of her chin. The doctors had evidently stitched it back together when she got to the ER. Her right eye was swollen completely shut. Jocelyn was fairly sure she could see the impression of a boot tread on her left cheek. A large cast encased her left arm from shoulder to the base of her fingers.

  “Not too much time, okay?” Kim said. “They’re going to be taking her to surgery for her leg soon.”

  As Kim slipped out of the room, Jocelyn approached the bed. She wanted to touch Lacey, but it didn’t look like there was any place on her that wouldn’t hurt with contact. Instead, Jocelyn said softly, “Lacey, it’s Jocelyn Rush. I’m here.”

  Her left eyelid flickered. Her mouth barely moved, but her voice came out scratchy and faint. “Thank you for coming.”

  Jocelyn pointed to Anita, who stood at the foot of the bed. “This is Anita Grant, my partner. She was in the accident with me. Is it okay if she’s here?”

  “Fine,” Lacey breathed.

  “What happened to you?”

  “P–Porter’s friends. They got me.”

  “Evan Porter’s friends attacked you?” Jocelyn asked, already feeling a white hot ball of fire forming in the pit of her stomach. “How many?”

  “Four.”

  “Jesus,” Anita whispered. “Where were you?”

  “Walking home from work,” Lacey labored. “On the street... pushed me into an... alley.”

  She took a moment to catch her breath then continued, “Beat me. Left me. Someone found me... brought me here.”

  “How do you know they were Porter’s friends?” Jocelyn asked.

  Lacey took a few ragged breaths. “They looked like him. White, wealthy, well-dressed but trying to look like they belong... in the hood. I think I... saw one in Molly’s wedding pictures. One of them said, ‘You might have gotten your DNA test, but you won’t get the kid,’ and another told me to ‘drop the court thing.’”

  But she wouldn’t be able to prove that it was anyone Evan Porter knew. Even if she were able to positively identify one of the men from Evan and Molly Porter’s wedding photos, Jocelyn was sure the men would give each other alibis. They would never pay for what they’d done to Lacey. Jocelyn’s knuckles ached from clenching her fists, but she tried to focus.

  “The DNA test,” she said. “Why did you ask for it?”

  “My lawyer’s idea,” Lacey said. “Thought it would... buy time.”

  Her eyelid fluttered. She wouldn’t be lucid for much longer. As Lacey drifted off to sleep, Jocelyn touched her fingertips. “I’m going to help you,” she promised. “I’m going to take Evan Porter down.”

  ~~~

  “Rush,” Anita said once they were back in Jocelyn’s rental car. “Just how do you think you’re going to—what did you say—take Evan Porter down?”

  White-knuckling the steering wheel, Jocelyn weaved her way through the streets of the Logan section of the city, turning on Broad Street, which she could follow to Center City and from there to the upscale Rittenhouse neighborhood. “I’ve got to talk to my Uncle Simon again,” she said.

  “Well, that doesn’t sound like a good idea,” Anita remarked, ignoring the acerbic look that Jocelyn shot her.

  Anita remained silent as they drove, leaving Jocelyn with her thoughts. She had only a vague idea of how to stop Evan Porter. Any man who would arrange such a savage attack on a lone woman deserved to be in prison, not to mention whatever abuse he’d been doling out to Molly Porter during their marriage. The thought of Evan raising little Christopher alone made her ill.

  She understood now why Lacey had gone to such lengths to gain custody of the boy. Lacey had exposed herself not only to being shamed in court because of her past but now in the press. She’d endangered her own life to try to get Christopher Porter away from his father. Because Evan was a monster, and just as Jocelyn would have done in the same situation, Lacey would rather die than live with the guilt of not fightin
g for the boy. Jocelyn had taken in her sister’s daughter without hesitation the moment she realized that Olivia would grow up in a drug den being pimped out as early as age four.

  A shudder ran through her. Anita said, “Think about this carefully, Rush, before you go back to Simon. At least let’s stop for coffee. Talk it over.”

  Jocelyn found a parking spot a block away from Simon’s apartment building. She pulled into it and turned off the car. She looked at Anita. “You know I can’t walk away from this Porter thing.”

  “I do.”

  “So I won’t be upset if you wait in the car.”

  Anita smiled. “I don’t need to wait in the car. I wanted to stop for coffee because I want to make sure you can live with what you’re about to do. I was down with this the minute we walked into that hospital room. But I lived the life, Rush. I can live with breaking the law or doing something wrong to make something right. I’m just not sure you can.”

  Jocelyn sighed and opened her door. “I’m not sure either.”

  ~~~

  Simon Wilde was nearing eighty, an aging Al Pacino look-alike with shock white hair. He answered his door with a smile, dressed in silk pajama pants, a white tank top, and a robe draped over his thin frame. “Jocelyn,” he said, stepping aside so she and Anita could come inside. He looked out onto the sidewalk. “No Olivia?”

  “She’s in school,” Jocelyn said.

  Simon ushered them into his sitting room where two leather Chesterfield sofas angled toward a fireplace. Embers glowed from a pile of ash in its hearth. A coffee table sat between the couches, newspapers spread haphazardly across it. “Sit,” Simon instructed. “Can I get you ladies anything?”

  Jocelyn shook her head. She and Anita sat side by side on one sofa, and Simon sat across from them. She couldn’t help but notice the thick, electronic bracelet around his ankle. Every time she saw it, her heart felt sad, and yet she knew Simon held no ill will toward her. He had told her many times that things could have turned out worse for him. After a lengthy trial, Simon had been found guilty of most of the charges levied against him, and somehow during sentencing he’d managed house arrest for what would likely be the rest of his life–which he could live with.

  “What can I do for you, Jocelyn?”

  “I need your help with something. Something that’s not technically legal.”

  Simon smiled as if waiting for the punchline. When neither he nor Jocelyn spoke, Anita cut in, “She’s serious, Simon.”

  He gestured to his ankle bracelet. “I can get you one of these pretty cheap, Jocelyn.”

  Jocelyn rubbed her eyes with both hands. “You know I would never ask for your help with something that wasn’t legal if it wasn’t absolutely critical.”

  “I know that you are your mother’s daughter, except with more backbone than she had. Before I go on, what is it exactly that you want me to do?”

  “I know you know people,” Jocelyn said. “People who can do things for the right price. There’s a DNA test pending at a private lab for a custody case. I need the—” She broke off. She couldn’t believe the words were about to come out of her mouth. She’d spent seventeen years of her life boiling with rage at her parents for covering up Camille’s assault.

  A crime was a crime and should be punished. She’d always believed that. That’s why she’d become a police officer instead of finishing college. She hated people like her father. People who thought they were above the law. But her father had traded Camille’s justice for his reputation. Simon, in framing Camille’s attackers, had at least had a more honorable reason for breaking the law. Now Jocelyn was proposing to break the law to ensure the safety of Molly Porter’s son. But did that make her any better than her father? Or Simon?

  She wasn’t sure.

  “I need the DNA results to be changed. I need them to not be a match.”

  Simon was silent for a long time. “Jocelyn, think about what you’re asking me to do.”

  She began to explain the situation, but Simon silenced her with a hand in the air. “I’m certain your reasons for being here are noble. You wouldn’t be asking something like this if they weren’t. But Jocelyn, my career—my legacy—was destroyed, my freedom taken, because you believe a crime is a crime and that crimes should be punished. Because of you, Jocelyn.”

  “No,” she said. “Because of you—you chose to frame those men. And should what I’m asking come out, I’ll never give up how the results came to be falsified. I never spoke to you. Anita was never here. I’ll take full responsibility.”

  She could feel the weight of it as she spoke. She knew on a visceral level that she was right. At worst, Evan Porter would abuse his son. At best, he’d raise Christopher to also be an abuser. Neither option was something she could live with—not knowing what she knew and having the resources to change the course of Christopher’s life.

  Simon let a few moments pass. Then he sighed and leaned back into the couch. “Well, it will cost quite a bit. What you’re talking about—it’s not that easy.”

  “You know how much Mom and Dad left me,” she told him. “I can afford it.”

  He nodded. A few more moments passed. Finally, Simon said, “Okay, tell me what I need to know.”

  ~~~

  Jocelyn didn’t sleep for three days. Several times a day, she picked up her phone, pulled her contact list up, and found Simon’s name. She could call it off. It wasn’t too late. So Evan Porter would lose custody of his son. Would that stop him from going after Lacey? And who was Jocelyn to play judge, jury, and God and change Christopher Porter’s life? What right did she have? She kept trying to justify it in her mind. She could keep Christopher from Evan, but would Christopher or Lacey ever be safe?

  She had to keep moving. Otherwise, the thoughts would sink her. Anita suggested they drive out to the place that Molly Porter had gone on the Main Line the day she died. They parked in the strip mall, taking note of the businesses: a coffee shop, a daycare center, a laundromat, a children’s swim school, a boutique clothing store, a pet supply store, and a hoagie shop. Nothing that stood out to either of them, unless she’d been meeting someone for coffee or lunch. They walked across to the office building and went inside, studying the directory. A pharmaceutical company, doctors’ offices, lawyers’ offices, an accounting office—the list of tenants was lengthy, but again, nothing stood out to either of them.

  Feeling defeated, they trudged back to the car and drove back to their office, where Jocelyn dozed in her desk chair until Anita came in with her open laptop in hand. “Rush, wake up,” she said. “Look at this.”

  She set the laptop on Jocelyn’s desk. Jocelyn blinked the sleep from her eyes and stared at what looked like property records. “What is this?”

  Anita pointed to the screen. “The office building belongs to Porter Investments.”

  “Evan Porter’s father’s company,” Jocelyn said, adrenaline shooting through her veins. “But wait, Porter doesn’t have an office there, does he?”

  Anita shook her head. “No. But there is a suite that’s being leased by a charity foundation that Mrs. Porter works closely with. I called the building’s management office and said we were looking for a space. I was able to confirm that that suite has been vacant for almost two years, but it’s not available because Mr. Porter instructed them not to rent it out.”

  “Not rent it out? Why would he choose to just leave it empty?”

  “It’s not empty,” Anita said. “The building manager says it’s furnished. The foundation just doesn’t use it.”

  “Which makes even less sense.”

  “Clearly Mr. Porter uses it. This whole arrangement is on his say-so.”

  “And Molly Porter came to this block every Tuesday,” Jocelyn said. “The two of them used it?

  “Looks that way.”

  “Well, let’s go see him.”

  ~~~

  David Porter’s secretary was an impenetrable force until Jocelyn told her that she and Anita were the women M
olly Porter rear-ended on the day she died. The woman got up from her desk, which sat on the 27th floor of a tall, glass building in Center City, Philadelphia, and walked back into David’s office, closing the heavy, wooden door behind her. A moment later, she returned, motioning toward the door. “You can go right in,” she said, without looking directly at them.

  David’s office was massive and awash with light. The city sprawled before them from every angle the windows offered. David was a taller, better-looking, older version of his son. He was thinner than Evan, fit, with crinkles at the corners of his eyes that gave him a kind look. He wore a light-gray suit with a white, long-sleeved, button-down shirt, and pink tie. He stood and came around to the front of his desk as they entered, shaking both their hands as they made introductions. Anita and Jocelyn sat in the guest chairs while David perched on the edge of his sleek desk.

  “Ladies,” he said, “I’m so sorry to be meeting you under these circumstances. I’m not sure we should really be speaking, given the fact that you’re bringing personal injury claims against Molly’s estate—which is basically my son.”

  “We’re not here about that,” Jocelyn said. “We’re here because we know you met with Molly Porter on the day she died.”

  To his credit, David showed almost no reaction. Only his Adam’s apple quivered in his throat as he swallowed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “When is the last time you saw Molly before her death?” Jocelyn asked.

  He looked helplessly around the room. “I don’t know. I don’t remember. We weren’t close. My son and I aren’t close. I really don’t understand—why are you here? I’m sorry my daughter-in-law hit you, but I don’t see what any of this has to do with anything. I’m afraid I have to ask you to leave.”

  Jocelyn heard her phone chirp inside her jacket pocket. As she and Anita stood to leave, she pulled it out and saw a message from Simon. Call me ASAP.