Next of Kin

by Sharon Sala

  Beth nodded. “I couldn’t sleep.” She got up from her chair and walked back to the window, then hugged herself to keep from shuddering. The memory of what she’d seen was horrifying. “I’d been up for a while when I saw the telescope and tried it out. That’s when I saw the couple fighting in the apartment directly across the street.”

  She pointed to the brightly lit apartment across the way, where a large number of people were now moving about. “The man was older and bigger, but the woman was in his face screaming right back at him. He pushed her. She slapped him. Then all of a sudden he pulled a knife and slit her throat so fast I wasn’t sure what he’d done until I saw blood spray across the window. That’s when I screamed.”

  “Her screams woke me up,” Sarah said. “I nearly fell getting out of bed, I was so scared, and when I got in here, Beth was telling me to call 911, so I did.”

  “Did you see him, too?” Burroughs asked.

  Sarah shook her head. “By the time I looked, he was walking out the door. All I saw was the back of a bald-headed man in a dark suit. But we both saw a black sports car come out of the alley a few minutes later and drive away really fast. It went south as the police came in from the north.”

  Both detectives were making notes as the women kept talking.

  “Did either of you know the woman in the other apartment?” Burroughs asked.

  “No,” Beth said. “I’ve never been here before.”

  “I don’t even know my neighbor across the hall,” Sarah said.

  Burroughs eyed Beth. “Do you think you could identify him if you saw him again?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you be willing to come down to headquarters and go through some mug shots?”

  “I can do better than that,” Beth said, and hurried back to the table. She tore the top sheet off her sketch pad and gave it to Burroughs. “I’m an illustrator.”

  “This is amazing,” Burroughs said. He was eyeing the drawing she’d made when a frown suddenly furrowed his forehead. “He looks familiar.”

  Franklin glanced over his partner’s shoulder at the drawing Beth had made, his eyes widening at her attention to detail. She’d even added a small puckered scar between the man’s nose and upper lip. “The LAPD could use someone as skilled as you.”

  Beth shook her head. “Thanks, but I’ll stick to illustrating children’s books.”

  Burroughs rolled up the drawing and dropped his notebook in his pocket. “We’re going to need you to come down to headquarters to give an official statement.”

  And so it begins, Beth thought. Like it or not, she was now a witness in a murder investigation.

  “Let me get my purse and jacket.”

  Sarah shivered. “Do I have to go, too?”

  “No, ma’am. Your testimony would be secondhand, since you didn’t actually witness anything.”

  The relief on Sarah’s face was obvious. She gave Beth an apologetic look and then hugged her. “When you’ve finished there, come back. Tomorrow is my day off, so even if you’re not back till morning, I’ll still be here, and you’ll need a place to shower before you go in for that meeting you said you had.”

  Beth hugged her. “I’m sorry for causing so much trouble for you.”

  “You didn’t cause anything,” Sarah said, and then ran to her hall table, opened a drawer and took out a key. “This is an extra key to the front door. I’ll probably still be asleep.”

  “See you later,” Beth said.

  Sarah waved goodbye and locked the door behind them.

  Ike Pappas had wasted no time as he strode out of the elevator into the underground parking of his ex-wife’s apartment building. He’d glanced at the security cameras, confident that they were all still off, and jumped into his Aston Martin. As soon as he cleared the alley and got back in traffic, he’d looked up in the rearview mirror and flexed his jaw, which was still stinging.

  His eyes narrowed angrily. He couldn’t believe Lorena had flipped out like that. Granted, he’d once been married to her, which he supposed gave her a sense of false security, but she’d been wrong—very wrong—to threaten him. He’d expected her to be pissed because he’d finally taken their son into the business, but he’d underestimated her anger. She kept screaming that he’d reneged on his promise—the one he’d made to her years ago that he would keep their son, Adam, out of organized crime—and she was going to make him pay. She’d said she would rather see Adam in prison than turn into a killer like Ike.

  What Lorena hadn’t given him time to explain was that Adam had plans of his own. He had been grooming himself to step into his father’s shoes and wouldn’t be dissuaded. Ike had to admit he was proud of his son’s ambitions. What man wouldn’t want his son to follow in his footsteps? In Ike’s case, very lucrative footsteps.

  He knew the law would be calling once her identity was known, and he knew they would find his DNA and prints all over the place, but he wasn’t worried. He owned the building. Once Lorena was dead, he’d gone straight to the security room, killed the guard on duty, then scrubbed the past twelve hours of security footage before disabling all the cameras, making sure there was nothing to tie him to the scene.

  He’d set her up in the apartment years ago, and he and Adam visited regularly, often for a meal. She was, after all, the mother of his only child, and family was important—to be revered. But after screaming at him that she was going to the Feds, she’d given him no choice.

  It wasn’t until Ike had driven back through the iron gates marking the entrance to his estate that he began to relax. The guard at the gates wasn’t on duty at night. The gates automatically swung shut behind him as he drove onto the grounds.

  The mansion in which he lived was more like a castle, minus the moat, standing three stories tall at the center, with two-story wings spreading out on either side and sprawled over three acres of land, with ten more acres surrounding it. It was built like a fortress for a reason. Ike Pappas had made many enemies during his rise through the ranks of organized crime. There was always someone interested in taking down the kingpin of a syndicate like his.

  He turned off the headlights as he neared the house and quickly drove into the garage under cover of darkness. Once inside, he made a sweep through his own security footage and deleted the few minutes that showed him leaving in his car earlier, then reappearing later.

  He took the back stairs up to his suite so he wouldn’t pass Adam’s bedroom to get to his own. Once inside, he stripped out of his clothes, underwear and shoes included, rolled them up and stuffed them into a garbage bag, then left the bag in the middle of his bedroom floor as he headed for the shower.

  The hot water sluicing down his body washed away the last remnants of his ex-wife’s blood in a swath of soap and heat. He scrubbed until his skin was stinging, then took a nailbrush to his fingers, making sure there was no evidence of her DNA left behind.

  Once he was out, he dressed in a pair of navy silk pajamas and black Gucci lounge shoes, and carried the plastic bag down to the basement. He entered a closet housing a dozen electrical panels that controlled the entire property, turned on a light and walked in, closing the door behind him. Once inside, he pressed on a hidden panel. Another door opened, swinging inward on silent hinges. He tossed the bag inside, then quickly shut the door. It wasn’t the first evidence that could send him to prison he’d stowed in there, and it probably wouldn’t be the last, but it was as safe in there as anywhere on earth. No one—not even Adam—knew about the existence of the room he’d added to the house after he’d bought it, seeing as the man who’d designed and built it was no longer alive to tell the tale.

  Ike exited the closet and went back to the main floor, then into the library, where he poured himself a stiff drink. If Adam caught him up at this hour of the morning, all he had to say was that he’d been unable to sleep and had gone down to get a drink. A little ouzo should serve his purposes and help him unwind.

  He was pouring his second drink when the phone
on the desk began to ring. It was a dedicated line and only rang in this room. The only people who had the number were his snitches. He emptied the glass, then answered on the second ring.

  “Pappas.”

  “Mr. Pappas…this is Donny Franco.”

  Ike frowned. He had people everywhere, including the LAPD. Nothing happened in the city that he didn’t know about—certainly nothing that mattered to him.

  “It’s late,” he said shortly.

  “They brought a woman into headquarters tonight who’s claiming she witnessed the murder of your ex-wife.”

  Ike’s heart skipped a beat. How the hell? But he wasn’t giving himself away to anyone, especially to a cop on the take. He injected a note of incredulity into his voice.

  “Is this true? Is my ex-wife really dead?”

  “Yes, sir. A woman named Sarah Steinman, who lives in the building across the street, called the police. Apparently she witnessed it through a telescope from her apartment. Apartment 9B.”

  “I see. Thank you for the information.”

  “Uh…Mr. Pappas?”

  “Yes?”

  “That’s not all. They have a sketch of the killer—a very good sketch. I thought you’d want to know.”

  “I always appreciate information and reward it accordingly.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Ike ignored the excitement in Franco’s voice and hung up. He went to his desk and pulled out a throwaway. There was only one number programmed into the phone, and once it had served its purpose, it would disappear like his clothes.

  He made the connection, knowing Pacheco would answer by the second ring.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Sarah Steinman. Brickman Apartments. 9B. Now.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Call me back on this number when it’s done.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The line went dead in his ear.

  He went back up to his bedroom, then stretched out on the bed and closed his eyes. The police would be here within hours. Might as well get a little rest while Pacheco cleaned up.

  Beth glanced up at the wall clock over Detective Burroughs’s desk. It was after 3:00 a.m. Why was it taking so long? She’d given her statement, picked a man from a photo lineup even though she’d already furnished them with a sketch, and agreed to testify in court should he be brought to trial. What more could they possibly expect from her?

  Her eyes were burning from lack of sleep, and she was in the process of getting a headache. There was no way she was going to be able to make it to that meeting tomorrow. She hoped people would understand. Deadlines were a big deal in the publishing world, and client approval was always the first order of the day, although in this case all her sketches were done and turned in. The meeting was just a follow-up, in case any changes needed to be made.

  All of a sudden the door to the captain’s office swung open and Detective Burroughs came out. There was a strange expression on his face, but when he spoke, he was all apologies.

  “I’m sorry to have kept you waiting,” he said. “If you’re ready, I’ll take you back to Miss Steinman’s apartment.”

  Finally. “I’m ready,” she said, then gathered her things and followed him to the parking lot.

  Once inside the car, the silence got to Beth. “So the man I picked out in the photo lineup…who was he?”

  Burroughs hesitated. They didn’t want to spook her, but on the other hand, they couldn’t just let her go about her life without knowing how dangerous he was.

  “He’s associated with organized crime. Let’s just say it would be best not to mention names at this point, not until we’re able to gather more evidence against him.”

  Beth was shocked. “You mean you aren’t going to arrest him right now?”

  “He’ll be questioned, but I can promise you, he’ll have an airtight alibi. It will come down to your word against his, which won’t hold up in court, and we don’t want him to know there’s a witness. We’re still processing evidence from the scene. Finding his DNA on the victim’s clothing would be a plus. It’s complicated.”

  Beth frowned. “But I saw him push her, then cut her throat as calmly as if he were slicing a loaf of bread. Not even an expression on his face. What good does it do for a witness to come forward when this is all that happens?”

  Burroughs knew how she felt. Sometimes the police felt just as helpless. The justice system was complicated, and quite often the people with the most money and power could get away with a lot. It was going to take an ironclad case against Ike Pappas to bring him to justice, and they didn’t want to mess it up by jumping the gun.

  After that, the drive was silent. Beth wasn’t in the mood for conversation, and the detective seemed focused on the street traffic as well as the traffic on the police radio. When they finally reached the Brickman Apartments, she breathed a quick sigh of relief. The sooner she could put this behind her, the better.

  “Here we are,” Burroughs said as he pulled up to the curb. “I know there’s a security guard on duty, but considering the hour, I’ll walk you back in.”

  “Thank you,” Beth said.

  They entered the building in tandem. Beth stepped aside long enough for the detective to flash his badge and remind the guard that Miss Venable was a guest in 9B; then they got on the elevator together.

  “You really don’t have to walk me all the way to the door,” Beth said.

  Burroughs smiled. “It’s not a problem.”

  There was nothing more she could say. The elevator stopped on the ninth floor with a jerk. As they neared the apartment, Beth began digging for the key Sarah had loaned her, and when they stopped at 9B, she slid the key into the lock.

  She paused. “So here we are. Thank you for the escort.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Burroughs said, and stepped back as Beth opened the door, revealing a darkened interior.

  “I guess she turned off the lights,” she said, and fumbled for the switch just inside the door.

  In seconds the interior lit up.

  Beth walked inside. “I’ll be okay from here.”

  Burroughs nodded as he turned and headed for the elevator.

  The unfamiliar feel of a strange apartment was still with Beth as she walked toward the sofa, where her bed had been remade. She tossed her jacket on the arm and dropped her purse on the floor. She was just about to kick off her shoes when she glanced up, then stopped short. The door to Sarah’s bedroom was ajar, and she could see flashes of light, probably from the television screen. Beth wasn’t in the mood to talk, but if Sarah was awake, the least she could do was let her know she was back.

  The moment the door swung inward her mind went blank. It took another second for her brain to register the scene.

  The television was on, but muted. Sarah was lying in bed with two pillows propped up behind her and the remote in her hand. Her eyes were open. But it was the hole in the middle of her forehead and the blood-soaked pillows behind her head that made reality kick in.

  Beth screamed, then covered her face and screamed again before it hit her that the killer might still be inside. With her heart in her throat, she bolted for the door.

  Burroughs was halfway to the elevator when he heard the first scream. By the time she screamed again he had already pulled his weapon and was running back down the hall. Just as he reached the door, it flew open and Beth Venable fell into his arms.

  “She’s dead. Sarah’s dead. Someone shot her. There’s blood everywhere. Oh, my God. Oh, my God!”

  Burroughs gave her a rough push. “Stay back,” he ordered, and slipped inside with his gun still drawn. He quickly checked out the living room and kitchen, then moved toward the bedroom and the gaping door. He’d seen plenty of bodies during his career, but it was something he’d never gotten used to.

  Beth Venable was right about one thing—Sarah Steinman was definitely dead. From the size of the hole in her forehead, he would guess a .38 caliber. The odd thing about the room was that nothi
ng was out of place. There’d been no fight, no resistance. The muted television was odd, and he couldn’t help but wonder if she’d heard something out of place and muted her program to listen closer. He could picture an intruder entering the apartment, pushing open the bedroom door and firing point-blank. She wouldn’t have had a chance to scream or run, and since nothing had been reported, he suspected the killer had used a silencer.

  A few hours ago this twentysomething woman had called in to report a murder, and now she was dead.

  The whole setup stank.

  He holstered his gun, got Beth Venable out of the hall and called in the murder. When he turned around, Beth was still standing where he’d put her, white-faced and shaking so hard he thought she might faint.

  “Sit there,” he said, pointing toward the sofa. “I’ve called it in. Police will be here shortly.”

  Her eyes were wide with shock. “Why did this happen?”

  The first thought that went through his mind was that Pappas already knew there was a witness, which meant there was a snitch in the department. The possibility definitely existed. It made him sick.

  “It’s hard to say. Obviously someone took her by surprise. She didn’t even have time to fight or run.”

  Beth wrapped her arms around herself, rocking back and forth where she sat, but the expression on her face was one of dazed disbelief. She kept remembering that moment in the dark when she’d felt as if the killer were staring straight into her eyes. Maybe he had seen her at the window. This was Sarah’s apartment. He would have had no way of knowing Beth had been the witness—the only witness.

  “It was the killer from across the street, wasn’t it? There was a moment when I thought he saw me. He must have. That’s why this happened. Oh, God. It’s my fault. It’s my fault Sarah’s dead.”

  Two

  Rebel Ridge, Kentucky

  Ryal was finishing his first cup of coffee as day broke in the east. He tossed the remaining dregs into the rosebush by the front steps and then set his cup on the porch railing. He needed to deliver a special-order hutch he’d made for a customer’s wedding anniversary, but for some reason he didn’t want to leave. That uneasy feeling he’d had last night was still with him, but business was business.