Anarchy answered on the first ring. “Jones.”
“It’s Ellison.” My lungs refused to fully inflate. “I’m at Karen Fleming’s and she’s been attacked.”
“Who is Karen Fleming?” He sounded cool and calm and in control—all the things I wasn’t.
“She was a friend of Khaki’s.”
“What’s the address?”
“The Washington Irving apartments. Number five-twelve. Anarchy—” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “I’m afraid she may die.”
“I’ll send an ambulance, and I’m on my way.” He hung up.
“Hello?” The voice, a woman’s, came from the living room.
I hurried down the hall.
Mary Beth Brewer stood just inside the door, clutching the strap of her handbag with both hands as if it was the lifeline that kept her from drowning. “Oh my God, Ellison, what happened?”
I swallowed before I spoke. “Karen was attacked.”
Mary Beth stumbled backward. “Where is she?”
“The kitchen. She’s…I just called the police.”
“She’s dead?” Mary Beth’s skin turned as white as the paint on the walls. “She can’t be dead. We’re supposed to have lunch.”
“She’s not dead.” And she wasn’t going to lunch.
Mary Beth shook her head as if her neck was a metronome. Side to side. Side to side. “We have lunch on Saturdays during football season. Every Saturday.”
“Maybe you should sit down.” The poor woman was obviously in shock—beyond shock. She looked as if she was ready to shatter like Karen’s porcelain lamp. At least the couch was in one piece; I pointed at it.
“I need to see her.” She didn’t move. “He did this.”
He? “Who?”
“Her ex-husband.”
“It could have been a robber.” It wasn’t. I knew it. The attack on Karen was too vicious. Too personal. But I didn’t want to believe a man who’d once stood in front of a minister and vowed to love, honor, and protect could do this.
“No. Not a robber.” Mary Beth stumbled over the broken chair. “Karen didn’t have anything to steal. It was Daniel.” She pushed past me, stopping abruptly at the entrance to the kitchen, presumably as frozen by horror as I had been. She grabbed onto the door frame. “Oh my God.”
“Why would Daniel do this?”
Mary Beth turned her head and stared at me as if she couldn’t believe I’d asked such a stupid question. “Because she left him.”
“Women leave their husbands all the time.”
Mary Beth’s eyes drooped. Her shoulders drooped. The corners of her mouth drooped. She looked twenty years older than she had when she walked through the front door. “Not husbands like Karen’s.”
“You have to tell the police.”
“The police?”
“They’re on their way.”
“I can’t.” The metronome-like shaking of her head returned. She loosened her hold on the door frame and backed away from the kitchen.
“But—”
“I can’t! Daniel and my husband are friends. They golf. They watch football. They go hunting. I can’t tell the police. I can’t.” She picked her way through the wreckage of the living room.
“I thought you and Karen were friends.”
That stopped her.
For a half-second. “Karen would understand.”
“Then I’ll tell them.”
She stopped again. “Please, Ellison.” Her brow puckered and she held her splayed fingers against her cheeks and mouth. If I couldn’t smell the fear on her skin, she’d have looked comical.
“But—”
“You can’t tell anyone I was here. I’m begging you.”
“But—”
“Please.” Tears filled her eyes. “Pete and I just worked things out. I don’t want to rock the boat.”
“Fine.” Giving in felt wrong, but she was crying. “I’ll keep your secret, but—”
With my assurance that I wouldn’t tell the police, Mary Beth wasn’t interested in buts. “You promise?”
Idiot that I was, I nodded.
“I have to go. I can’t be here.” She slipped through the front door, closing it softly behind her.
Dammit. Was Mary Beth worried Karen’s husband would come after her? The destroyed furniture that littered the floor offered no answers. I returned to the kitchen, knelt next to Karen, picked up her limp hand, and waited.
Only a few minutes passed until I heard sirens.
“Ellison?” The sound of Anarchy’s voice coming from the living room soothed some of the tension from my shoulders.
“In here.”
He appeared in the doorway and the starch that had been keeping me upright dissolved. A tear ran down my cheek and my jaw ached with unspent sobs.
If my expression was grief-stricken, Anarchy’s was all cop. Lips in a thin line, eyes narrowed, and a diamond hard cast to his forehead.
A man I didn’t know stepped around Anarchy and joined me on the floor. He claimed the hand I held and checked for a pulse. “She’s still alive. Would you give me some room, ma’am?”
“Of course.” I rose from the floor.
Anarchy closed his warm hand around my elbow, led me to the living room, and sat me on the couch. He even took a seat next to me. “Tell me what happened.”
I told him about finding Karen, about calling for help. I even added, “I’ve heard that Karen and her ex-husband had an acrimonious divorce.”
“Where did you hear that?”
“Around.” Could he tell I was avoiding his question?
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
“Let’s get you out of here.”
We walked out into the hallway where a small crowd had gathered. An attractive woman stepped forward. “Is Karen all right?”
“Who are you, ma’am?” asked Anarchy.
“I’m Joanne Graham, Karen’s next door neighbor.”
“Did you see or hear anything unusual this morning?”
“No. But I just got home from a trip a little while ago. My flight was delayed because of the weather.” She tilted her head. “Although, I did see someone leaving her apartment when I got off the elevator.”
My heart sank.
“When was that?”
“Just before the sirens.”
Anarchy turned his cop gaze on me.
This was going to be fun to explain. Not.
eighteen
“You lied to me,” Anarchy whispered, the angry roar of a Camaro looking to win a race was all too evident in his voice.
“I didn’t actually lie.” I’d lied by omission. “And I told you everything she told me.”
“Oh?” One dangerous, engine-revving word.
“I told you exactly what she said. Daniel Fleming may have done this.”
Anarchy grabbed my wrist and pulled me over near the window, away from the paramedics and ambulance personnel. “Who is she?”
“Someone who doesn’t want to get involved.”
“It’s a bit late for that.”
I looked out the window. The freezing rain had stopped. For now. “She asked me to keep her out of this and I promised I would.”
“I could arrest you for interfering with a police investigation.”
I pulled my wrist free of his grasp and shook my head. Obstinate? Me? Probably, but I’d promised Mary Beth. “I gave her my word.”
“This is an attempted homicide investigation.”
“She arrived after I did—after I called you. She has nothing to do with the attack on Karen.”
“You protect people who don’t deserve your protection.”
&nbs
p; “How do you know what she does and doesn’t deserve? It’s not as if you have to go home and explain to your husband why you ratted out his friend.”
Anarchy opened his mouth. Another furious reprimand ready on his lips. But instead of berating me, he snapped his mouth closed with an audible click of his teeth.
Had he seen reason?
“Does he hit her?”
What? “Who?”
“Your mysterious friend. Does her husband hit her?”
“No! Of course not.” I rubbed my face with my hands and stared at the slightly worn carpet. I looked up and said, “You have to understand. She’s totally dependent on him. She doesn’t have any money.” Anarchy would never know about asking for a few dollars back when writing a check to the grocery store just to have cash in his pocket. He didn’t have to justify the purchase of a new blouse or new underwear. “If he’s angry—”
“She doesn’t get to go out to lunch with her friends?” His desire to catch a killer was getting in the way of his seeing my point. “She could get a job.”
“Doing what? Spritzing perfume at a cosmetics counter?” Women like Mary Beth, who’d spent their lives raising children and doing volunteer work, didn’t have a plethora of job skills.
We glared at each other.
I blinked first. “I can’t tell you. I can’t.”
He crossed his arms.
“But—” I crossed my arms too “—I may know something about Khaki’s death.”
“You think this is related?”
“I don’t see how it could be.” Khaki’s murder had been clinical, almost sterile. What had happened to Karen was messy and awful and spoke of unchecked rage.
“What do you know?”
“Khaki was involved in a charity called Phoenix House. It keeps coming up.”
Anarchy lowering his brow and deepening his scowl was not what I expected. I’d been hoping for something more along the lines of thanks, Ellison! I’ll investigate that immediately followed by a pat on the back—or a peck on the cheek.
“What do you know about Phoenix House?”
He sounded angrier than ever—the Camaro’s engine was about to throw a rod. I wasn’t sure what that meant—I just knew it was bad.
“Nothing really.” I glanced around the dim landing. What can of worms had I opened now?
The medics wheeled a gurney out of Karen’s apartment and loaded it onto the elevator. The doors slid closed behind them.
“What are you doing today?” he asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, what are you doing today?”
“Nothing. Errands. Chores.”
“Can you wait here for an hour?”
“Why?”
“I want to take you to Phoenix House.”
Oh. I nodded.
“Good. Stay here.” He lifted an admonishing finger.
Detective Peters grunted his way onto the landing. “I should have figured you’d be here.”
“Give her a break, Peters. This looks domestic. No way she had anything to do with it.” Anarchy was defending me.
“Two murders and an attempted in less than a week, and she’s been around for all of them.”
It was hard to argue with Detective Peters’ logic.
I didn’t try. Besides, Anarchy was on my side. Who cared what Detective Peters thought?
“Let’s do the walk through.” Anarchy jerked his head toward the door.
Peters merely grunted.
Together they entered Karen’s apartment.
“She let him in. Door’s intact,” said Peters.
I edged away from my assigned spot near the window, closer to the bannister, where I had a view inside Karen’s apartment.
“They fought. Someone got hit with a lamp.” Peters was just full of insights.
I’d seen the blood on the lamp shards; it wasn’t as if he was blazing new territory.
“At some point, she ran for the kitchen,” said Anarchy.
“Why? You think she wanted a knife?”
She’d wanted the phone and her attacker had ripped it from the wall.
“Phone.” Anarchy had reached the same conclusion I had. “We ought to look at the ex-husband.”
“Oh? Why?”
“Mrs. Russell says they had a nasty divorce.”
Detective Peters shifted his gaze from the ruins in the living room to the hallway where I stood. “Does she?” He kicked at the door and it slammed with a bang.
A first. I’d never actually had a door slammed in my face before. I didn’t much like it.
“He’s very grumpy, isn’t he?” Joanne Graham, the woman who’d inadvertently started all the trouble between me and Anarchy, stood in her doorway.
“Yes.”
“Would you like coffee? You look as if you could use a cup.”
I dredged up a smile. “That’s very kind of you. Thank you.”
“Come on in.”
When one door closes, another door opens.
Joanne Graham’s apartment was similar to Karen’s—except for the destroyed part. That and the furnishings. Karen’s place looked as if it was populated with things she’d won in her divorce settlement. A mish-mash. Joanne’s place managed hip and cozy at the same time—papasan chairs with red cushions, leather poufs, and a glass and brass coffee table.
“Let me take your coat.” She held out her hands.
I’d been glad of my coat in the chilly hallway. Here in Joanne’s warm apartment, I didn’t need it. I took it off and handed it to her.
She folded it over her arm and disappeared into what was presumably the bedroom.
“Have you lived here long?” I asked when she returned.
“Two years.” She led me to a tiny kitchen where Mr. Coffee’s identical twin waited to make all things right with the world.
“How well did you know Karen, Miss Graham?”
“Please call me Joanne.”
“Thank you, I’m Ellison.”
She smiled and added water and grounds to Mr. Coffee. “I knew Karen to say hello to. She was quiet when she first moved in. It’s only recently that she’s started coming out of her shell.”
“Oh?”
“This guy on the third floor had a Halloween party for all the tenants. Karen and I chatted and I warned her about John Hasty.”
“John Hasty?”
“The building Lothario. He hits on every woman he sees.”
“And he hit on Karen?”
Joanne nodded and took two mugs down from the cabinet. “Cream and sugar?”
“Just cream.” I liked Joanne Graham. A lot. “Did Karen go out with him?”
“You know—” Joanne tilted her head “—I think she did.” She shuddered. “The women in the building call him Hands. He asked her and she said yes before I had a chance to warn her.” She reached into a small refrigerator and paused, her hand hovering above the cream. “You know, I think they went out last night.”
We pondered that for a few seconds.
The hand holding the cream shook. “You don’t think he—”
“That he got angry when she kept his hands at arm’s length?”
“Exactly.”
There’d been so much anger. Surely too much for one date. “No. Of course not.” But maybe Karen going out on a date had made Daniel mad enough to beat her. “You should tell the police what you just told me.”
“It would be no hardship to spend some time with the tall one.”
I liked her less. A lot less.
We took our coffee to the living room and chatted—about living on the Plaza, about Mr. Coffee’s many stellar qualities, and about her cat, Felix, who wandered in from the bed
room.
“Ellison?” Anarchy’s voice was audible through the door.
“There’s the tall one now.” I stood. “Do you mind if I let him in?”
Joanne smoothed her hair and pinched some color into her cheeks. “Please do.”
I opened the door to Joanne’s apartment. “In here.”
“I asked you not to move.”
True, but Peters had kicked a door shut in my face and the gray light that filtered in through the window on the landing was beyond depressing. I shrugged and offered him an apologetic smile. “Joanne made coffee. I bet she has another mug.” Who could refuse such an offer?
Anarchy Jones, that’s who. “We have someplace to be. Get your coat.”
I glanced over my shoulder at Joanne (I swear she put on lipstick in the few seconds my back was turned to her). “You should come in, if only for a moment.” I opened the door wider and waited for Anarchy to cross the threshold. “Joanne, would you please tell Detective Jones what you told me about Hands?”
“Of course,” she purred like Felix. A nice, attractive (very attractive) woman with good taste and a pleasant cat, and suddenly I couldn’t stand her.
“I’ll grab my coat.” We would not be lingering in Joanne’s apartment.
“Coffee, Detective Jones?” she asked.
“No, thank you.”
Whew. I grabbed my coat from her bed and hurried back to the living room.
Anarchy wore his cop face and had a small notepad in hand. He looked impervious to Joanne’s charms—maybe she wasn’t so bad after all.
“John Hasty?” He jotted the name down. “Anything else?”
“No. That’s all.”
“Thank you, Miss Graham.” He shifted his gaze to me. “Are you ready?”
“Yes. Thank you for the coffee, Joanne.”
“You’re welcome. Come back anytime.” Why did I get the feeling she was talking to Anarchy and not me?
Anarchy and I descended five flights of stairs and stepped outside into the cold.
I shivered. “Brrr.”
“I’ll turn the heat up.” He took my arm and led me to his car.
“But—”
“Your car will be fine where it is, Ellison. Just get in.”
I didn’t argue.
Watching the Detectives Page 17
