Hurriedly, Harper scrolled through it, adrenaline helping her absorb the information it contained at sonic speed.
‘Minimum twelve stab wounds’, ‘Most confined to torso’, ‘Attack occurred in kitchen’, ‘Defensive wounds to right hand’, ‘Finger severed’.
As Harper moved through it, suddenly a series of bloody photos appeared. Each portrayed Whitney’s body from a different angle, some were close-up shots of the gaping wounds – raw and garish red against her pale skin.
Clicking through them hurriedly, Harper glanced at her watch. She’d been down here nearly ten minutes already. She had to go.
‘Witness statements’. These were limited to neighbors saying they heard nothing, and to Camille Whitney.
Harper stopped on that one.
Witness was asked if anyone was in the house when she returned.
Response: I don’t know (Witness is crying).
Witness was asked if her mother was afraid of anyone.
Response: My mother was never afraid. She said there was nothing to be scared of if you were strong. She was strong.
At the end of the statement, a note had been added in Smith’s neat, right-slanted handwriting.
Camille Whitney will be living with her father, James Whitney, at 12057 Bromley Street, in the town of Vidalia. Social Services have been informed.
Harper scribbled the name and address in her notebook with her left hand, while frantically shutting the computer down with her right.
Shoving her notebook back into her pocket, she raced across to the door, turning off the light and reaching for the handle, just as the door opened on its own.
There was no time to hide. No chance to duck out of sight.
Detective Blazer stood in front of her, a cup of coffee in one hand, a chocolate cookie in the other, staring at her with a look of frank astonishment.
‘McClain? What the hell are you doing in here?’
Chapter Thirty
When the worst thing that could possibly happen finally occurs, a kind of icy calm descends. Everything goes dangerously quiet. People who’ve been in car accidents talk about the sudden uncanny silence as the world spins and glass flies.
In the instant her eyes met Blazer’s disbelieving stare, Harper understood that. She felt no fear at all. Only a distant dull surprise.
Instead of thinking up a reason for her presence in a secure area, she noticed odd details – his tie was off and the top buttons of his pale blue shirt were undone. His hair was rumpled. The lines on his forehead were carved deeper than usual, his chiseled features softened by fatigue. There was a file tucked under his arm, and it struck her with cool clarity that he must have come to the archive to return it before heading home.
‘McClain?’ Blazer’s sharp voice jarred her, shaking her back to reality. ‘An explanation, please?’
The room zoomed back into view – the seriousness of the moment rushing at her like a tornado bearing down on a trailer park.
The problem was, she had no good answer to give him.
Fleetingly she considered the umbrella story, but she knew it wouldn’t fly. What would her umbrella be doing in the basement archive room?
She’d have to come up with something else.
Remembering something Tom Lane had told her long ago about lying – ‘Hide the lie among the truth and no one will see it there’ – she forced her expression into a look of surprised innocence. Eyes widening, breathing normal – slow and steady.
‘I was looking for a file,’ she explained, as if this made perfect sense. ‘An old case file.’
Blazer’s eyes narrowed.
‘Nothing in this room is public record. Did you get permission?’
‘Not exactly,’ she admitted. ‘But I’ve been allowed to look through cold case files before. And it’s a very old case, so I didn’t think anyone would mind. I could have waited until next week, but it was a quiet night so I thought I’d do it now and tell the lieutenant about it tomorrow.’ She gave her shoulders an easy lift. ‘Usually it’s no big deal.’
His mouth twisted.
‘It’s ten o’clock at night. And you’re in a secure area without permission. I can assure you, McClain, this is a big deal.’
Blazer’s steady stare was unrelenting. She knew detectives well enough to know he was searching for minute signs of deception – looking for tells she didn’t know she had.
She fought back the panic rising in her chest. Aside from the two of them, the corridor was silent and ghostly. No one knew she was down here.
She was certain if she talked too much he’d clock her nerves, so she said nothing – she just waited for him to ask a question.
‘What case file were you looking for?’ he asked after a long pause.
In an instant, Harper thought of other crimes she’d written about, images of bodies lying on concrete flashed through her mind, blood pooling on marble floors, walls riddled with bullet holes, guns lying forgotten in long grass.
So many cases. But the only name that came to mind was …
‘I was looking for the files on my mother’s murder.’
Blazer’s hand jerked, sending coffee splashing onto his polished leather shoes.
‘You were … Why?’
Now Harper began watching him closely. Had mention of her mother’s case made him nervous?
‘I have a theory that my mother’s murder is connected to the Whitney case,’ she explained. ‘To know if I’m right, I need to see the records of my mother’s case. There’s not much going on tonight, so I thought I’d take advantage of that and check the files, but I forgot I’d need the case number and I don’t have that. So I gave up.’
‘You didn’t see the file?’
She gestured at the long rows of metal shelves behind her, filled with stacks of cardboard boxes.
‘How could I find it without the number?’
His eyes assessed her so coldly Harper fought the urge to shiver.
‘What on earth makes you think the two cases are connected?’ he asked brusquely.
Harper didn’t blink. ‘Same weapon, same MO, same clinical crime scenes, similar victims.’
If he noticed how easily those facts tripped off her tongue he didn’t show it.
‘That is extremely unlikely,’ he said, ‘your mother was killed over a decade ago.’
‘I am well aware of that.’ Her tone cooled. ‘If the person who killed her was thirty-two years old, that would mean they’re, what now? Forty-seven?’
At that moment, the lights in the corridor turned off, plunging Blazer into shadows. This happened regularly – the hallway lights were connected to motion detectors. All he had to do to get them to come on again was move. But he didn’t move.
They stood facing each other in total darkness. Harper could barely see him.
‘How would you know the age of your mother’s killer? He’s never been caught.’
There was a quiet menace to his voice.
He was standing too close. She didn’t like this at all.
‘I …’ Her mouth went dry. ‘I don’t,’ she said. ‘It was only an example.’
Blazer took an abrupt step back. The small movement was enough to send light flooding through the corridor, illuminating the gray concrete walls. And the unexpected sympathy in Blazer’s eyes.
‘Look, McClain,’ he said with a tired sigh. ‘I don’t know how you know as much as you know about the Whitney case but, given that you do, I can understand why you might think it could be tied to your mother’s murder. There are enough superficial similarities that we noticed them, too.’ He paused. ‘You might not know that I worked on your mother’s case as a junior detective. I remember it well.’
Harper was struck speechless by this. Blazer continued without waiting for her to respond.
‘I can’t explain why the killings look so similar,’ he admitted. ‘Sometimes you get two, unconnected crimes with the same MO. It happens. In the end, the simple fact is, there are critical differ
ences that indicate to us it’s not the same person.’ He paused. ‘I thought the lieutenant talked to you about this.’
‘He did,’ Harper said, recovering. ‘But—’
‘But you don’t believe him,’ he cut her off. ‘And you don’t believe me.’ He took another step back, his expression flattening. ‘You know what your problem is, McClain? You’re not as smart as you think you are. And people who are half-smart like you get other people in trouble.’
‘I’m not getting anyone in trouble,’ she said.
But his patience had expired.
‘Forget it,’ he said, stepping back into the corridor. ‘McClain, you’re trespassing in a secure area without authorization. I intend to report this infraction to the head of the Information Unit and ask that your press credentials be revoked. I suggest you notify your editors.’
He gestured for her to walk in front of him.
‘Let’s go.’
Harper knew there was no point in arguing any further. She had no choice but to do as he said.
All the way down the cold, damp hallway and up the stairs he marched her, always unnervingly close behind, that coffee still clutched in one hand.
When they reached the security door, he slammed his fist against the green exit button, shoved the door open and stood to one side, pointing across the lobby at the front door.
‘Get out now, McClain, before I arrest you.’
At the front desk, Dwayne stood up, a worried line above his eyes.
Harper shot him an apologetic look as she passed.
When she reached the front door, she looked back. Blazer still stood there, watching her every step. Making sure she was gone.
Chapter Thirty-one
When Harper’s phone rang shortly after nine the next morning she was sitting on the living room sofa, waiting for it.
She pressed the answer button. ‘Harper.’
‘What the hell did you do?’
Baxter sounded incensed.
‘Look, Baxter,’ Harper began, ‘I was only—’
But the question had clearly been rhetorical. Baxter spoke over her.
‘The deputy chief of police called Paul Dells at home this morning. He gave him an earful about his reporter breaking into the police records room and digging through sensitive files. Paul had to endure a lecture about the Open Records Act without having a clue what was going on.’
She paused to take a furious breath.
‘Baxter,’ Harper tried again. ‘It isn’t as bad as he made it out to be.’
‘Oh, isn’t it?’ Baxter’s voice rose a decibel. ‘For your information, I’ve just spent half an hour talking Dells out of firing you. I do not believe I’ve succeeded. I can’t exactly blame him. Harper, what the hell were you thinking?’
The editor was incandescent. Harper decided she’d better withhold her defense for now.
‘I made a mistake.’
‘Damn straight you did,’ Baxter snapped. ‘Now you need to get your ass in here ASAP, and be prepared to apologize profusely. Dells is expecting you to be here in no more than twenty minutes. And I warn you – if you don’t handle this right I’ll be advertising your job by noon.’
The call ended so abruptly it took Harper a second to realize it was over.
The phone fell from her nerveless fingers onto the arm of the chair.
‘Oh, hell.’
It had taken everything she had to sound calm on the phone, and now her stomach felt like it might leap out of her body and fly across the room. She’d spent most of the night working on her defense, and now that the time had arrived, she couldn’t remember anything she’d come up with.
She was so screwed.
After leaving the police station last night, she’d gone back to the newspaper and sleepwalked through her shift. She’d said nothing to Baxter, who didn’t seem to notice her subdued mood.
She’d thought about calling Smith to warn him, but that would have put him in a terrible position. He’d find out soon enough, anyway.
Now, of course, he knew.
Blazer must have called him as soon as he’d escorted her from the building.
In a daze, she left her apartment, locking the door without looking at it. She climbed into the Camaro – already warm from the sun – and drove down leafy Jones Street, where Spanish moss swung gracefully in the morning breeze. Turning onto Broad Street, where the moss ended and the city grew grittier, the paint less fresh on the rambling Victorian buildings. To Bay Street, and her first glimpse of the river, gleaming in the blinding sun.
The short drive – one she’d made thousands of times over the last seven years – seemed interminable and foreign. As if she were looking at the long familiar landmarks for the first time.
The art students with their multi-colored hair, the expensive cars pouring into the downtown parking garages, the tourists in their baggy shorts – everything jumped out at her with painfully intense clarity. And then evaporated from her memory just as quickly, like a dream that fades when you wake.
What was she going to say? How was she going to convince them not to fire her?
Her normal parking space was taken at this hour – in fact, the entire newspaper parking lot was full and she was forced to park a few blocks away and feed the meter.
Nerves made her clumsy – the coins kept slipping through her fingers.
When she walked into the newsroom it was packed with the daytime crew. She hadn’t been in at this hour since that first year at the paper. She’d forgotten what it was like when the morning sun poured through the big windows, highlighting the white columns and the rows of cluttered desks. It was a different place when it was full and night wasn’t pressing its weight against the walls.
The noise of the room – half a dozen people talking on their phones at once, others typing furiously, laughter soaring down the hallway from the kitchen – was jarring.
Couldn’t she get fired in peace?
There are no secrets in newsrooms. Whatever conversations Dells and Baxter had, they wouldn’t have been quiet ones. And Harper was certain everyone in that room knew what was going on. The fact that they didn’t look up now only indicated how serious the situation was.
They would all listen. But none of them relished seeing one of their own executed.
DJ was the only one to catch her eye. From across the room, he shot her a look of anguished sympathy. He’d texted her at least a dozen times so far today. Twelve variations on ‘WTF?’
She hadn’t replied. She was waiting for the call.
Now, holding his eyes, she shook her head very slightly.
‘McClain.’ Baxter barked the word from the doorway of Dells’ glass cube of an office behind the city editor’s desk. ‘In here. Now.’
For a second the noise in the room diminished – a collective intake of breath.
Holding her head high, Harper made her way towards Baxter.
The editor’s face was pale. She’d worn her best dark blazer and wool-blend skirt – too warm for today’s sunny weather. But perfect, Harper thought, for a hanging.
Wordlessly, Baxter stood back and gestured at the open glass door.
Harper walked in.
Dells’ head – brown hair perfectly blow-dried – was bent over a stack of papers on his desk. The cufflinks at his wrist gleamed, and the room smelled pleasantly of an unidentifiable but tasteful cologne.
Baxter closed the door. The noise of the newsroom faded to a low, distant rumble.
There were two modern leather-and-chrome chairs in front of Dells’ sleek black desk, but Harper hadn’t been invited to sit, so she stood awkwardly behind them, waiting for some indication of what she should do now.
Baxter was in the room behind her, her back to the door. She didn’t sit either.
They stayed like that for what seemed like a very long time before Dells looked up. He wore frameless glasses with lenses so thin Harper couldn’t imagine they served a purpose. All the professional friendliness she’d s
een on his face the other day when he complimented her work was gone now, replaced by an equally professional disapproval.
‘Miss McClain.’ His voice was cool. ‘I’m very sorry we have to meet under these circumstances.’
He laced his fingers together on the lacquered black top of his desk.
‘A serious allegation has been made against you by the Deputy Chief of Police and I intend to get to the bottom of it. So, please, do me the courtesy of telling me the truth: did you or did you not break into the archive last night at the police station without permission?’
‘I didn’t break into anything,’ Harper told him. ‘I went into that room, but I’ve been in there before many times and I did not know it would be such an issue.’
This was the answer she’d come up with about three in the morning. Now it sounded hollow even to her own ears.
She couldn’t tell what the editor thought – behind the thin lenses his pale eyes gave nothing away.
‘Let’s not indulge in wordplay here. The police consider this a break-in, because you went in without permission.’
His tone was still measured but she could sense the slight sheen of temper on the surface.
‘Did you tamper with the files?’
She didn’t blink. ‘Absolutely not.’
‘Then what did you do in that room?’
‘I was going to look up a cold case file,’ she explained. ‘But I didn’t know the case number, and without that I could do nothing.’
‘Interesting.’ His tone was cool. ‘When you logged into the police computer, did it not give you the case file?’
A shard of pure crystalline fear pierced Harper’s chest.
He knew.
He knew she’d logged in using her old pin number. The police knew. They knew everything.
She was finished.
‘Excuse me?’ Unable to summon the breath to speak normally, she whispered the question.
‘My understanding,’ he said steadily, ‘is that you logged in to the police computer using an old identifying code, one issued to you when you were an intern years ago, and accessed a number of files. Is that not true?’
He enunciated each word with unhurried precision.
The Echo Killing Page 26
