“A long time ago.”
“That’s not what I heard, and if I heard it, the cops heard it as well.”
His gaze narrowed. “What do you think you know?”
“You kept in touch with her. You went to see her. In the now. What’s going on? Why won’t you tell me the truth?”
“I haven’t lied to you. Starr wasn’t a part of my life. I felt sorry for her, if you want to know the truth. She was never strong. She had looks for a while, but those faded and so did she.”
“You dumped her because she got old and ugly?”
“I stopped seeing her because she slept with someone else.”
“She cheated on you?”
“Our relationship wasn’t going anywhere. She wasn’t truthful about much. It drove me crazy that she said what she thought I wanted to hear. She never sounded sincere. Finding out she slept around was all it took for me to walk away from an intimate relationship with her.”
He caught my hands and kissed them. “I swear to you. Starr was my past. She and I never swapped keys or much of anything else six years ago. I dated her for a few months, that’s all.”
I stated the obvious. “We’ve only been dating for a few months.”
“Yes, but what we have is richer, deeper. Your words have the ring of truth. You’re consistent in what you do and how you care.”
“I’m an open book. You’re not. There are secret recesses in your life. Places you won’t share with me. Things about your family. Things about your personal life.”
“I don’t ask you about your married life or how many times a week you had sex with Charlie. That’s private.”
“You think this is about sex?” I hated that my voice broke.
“Isn’t it? Aren’t you upset because you think I slept with Starr while I dated you?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” I got up and paced the small office. “I want to keep you safe, to make sure you’ll stay in my life, but I don’t understand your ongoing relationship with Starr. If you cared so much about her, why didn’t you go to her funeral?”
Amusement danced with sadness in his eyes. “My lawyer told me to stay away.”
I sighed out my relief. “Thank goodness for that, at least. If Britt had seen you, he might have made another false assumption.”
“I don’t see why you’re so wound up.”
“Why did you go there, Rafe? Her neighbor identified your car and you. She said you visited once a month.”
His voice roughened. “I told you to stay out of this.”
“The fact that you won’t tell me what happened is a big red flag.”
“I don’t want you anywhere near the investigation into Starr’s murder.”
“I’m trying to help.”
“I don’t need help. Everything is under control.”
“Take off the rose-colored glasses. We’re neck-deep in a sucking mud hole. Time is not our friend. In the absence of hard evidence, Britt will line up the circumstantial facts and move against you. That’s how he operates.”
“Trust me. Everything will work out.”
“I can’t leave it to chance.”
“Promise me you’ll stay out of it.”
“I can’t do that. I love you, and I don’t want you to spend the rest of your life in prison.”
“Leave it alone.”
“We’ve already cycled through this argument. I won’t leave it alone. Where does that leave us?”
“Stalemate.”
“Not checkmate?”
“Is that what you want?”
“No.”
“Stalemate it is, then.”
My lips tightened into a thin line. I hunted for my purse, knowing if I didn’t get out of here in the next thirty seconds that tears would start streaming down my face. We weren’t broken up, but we were darned close.
“Cleo?”
“Yes?” I glanced up to see mischief in his dark eyes.
He stood between me and the door. “I’d like a pastrami on rye tomorrow for lunch.”
“Tomorrow’s Monday, your day off.”
He smiled and glanced hopefully around the office. “I know. But we can still eat here if you’d rather come to the club instead of my place.”
“I’d rather you tell me why you aren’t worried about this murder investigation.”
“Simple. I didn’t do it.”
“That’s not how it looks.”
He was silent for a bit. “Do you think I killed someone?”
I chose my words with care. “My heart says absolutely not. But my mind isn’t convinced. You’re withholding information, and it makes me uncomfortable to know you don’t trust me. I don’t know who killed Starr. The cops think you did it. I need to shoot holes in their theory. I need to know who wanted the woman dead.”
“I don’t want you involved in this.”
I reached around him for the door. “Too late. I’m involved. Get used to it.”
Somehow I made it to my car without crying, but once I was safely locked inside the Gray Beast, the tears wouldn’t stop.
CHAPTER 19
* * *
Knowing that Charlie had the girls this afternoon, I drove straight from the golf course to my office. It was past time for some answers. Snooping through Rafe’s past might be viewed as a breach of trust; however, I rationalized the action as client research. If I hadn’t been flattered and blinded by his initial interest, I would have done this long before I ever sat in his flashy red sports car.
No point in beating yourself up over coulda-shouldas. The point is to move forward from where you are today. Now, more than ever, I wanted to make sure Rafe stayed out of prison, but I had to know what I was facing.
I searched online for newspapers in his home town of Potomac, Maryland, but other than learning I couldn’t afford a parking space there, I didn’t find any bad news about him or his family. After searching two weekly papers, I tried the Washington dailies to broaden my scope.
As if I’d hit the jackpot, the number of entries for Rafe’s family kept racking up. His mother, Amanda Golden, spent much of her spare time serving on community boards, bettering the world, along with acting as CEO of Golden Enterprises. His father, Shep Golden, had retired from the family firm to sail and play tennis.
His sister, Regina, worked as chief counsel for Golden Enterprises, but she sat on several community boards as well. Younger brother Hill frequented the society pages with his new fiancée, Tiffany Ellis. Beautiful blondes, every last one of them. Not a brash redhead or a sultry brunette in the Golden crowd.
A chill shuddered through me. Nothing about my bright red hair came close to a soft yellow color. Would Rafe continue to thumb his nose at family tradition and date me?
I rubbed my throbbing temples. Why was I worried about hair color when the true problem was my perception of the big picture? I wanted us to keep moving toward a legal commitment. Rafe preferred having an affair.
Deep in my bones, I knew something was off between us. Rafe’s actions to date had been consistent. Until recently, he’d been creative in ways to steal time alone. With Starr’s death, that had changed. He’d changed. He’d become unavailable.
Why?
I dug a little deeper in my mental database, trusting my instincts to sort through the meager facts. Published reports indicated Rafe’s family members moved in different circles. Other than the family business, they appeared to have little else in common and weren’t shown together in any local news or society pages.
Had something devisive happened in their collective past? The idea felt right. Given the minimal data points, nothing else made sense. Still, searching public records was a long shot at best. Their discord could be from feuding over an inheritance or another private family matter. But it wouldn’t hurt to keep looking.
Searchable newspaper features only went back so far online before I hit a dead end and needed to find a library and a microfiche machine to continue. That would be tedious and time-consumi
ng. With Britt hot on the trail of Starr’s killer, time was of the essence.
I had to keep moving forward on the case, but nothing I’d discovered so far was worth feuding over, nor was it worth killing anyone. After searching several more keyword combinations to no avail, I thought to search obituaries. Those electronic archives stretched back farther than the regular news stories. The surname of Golden cropped up often, though not as often as Jones. Even so, there were a lot of records to sift through.
That’s when I saw the notice. Brenna Nicole Golden. Same parents, same brothers and sister. I rubbed the chill from my arms. One of Rafe’s siblings died as a teenager.
The cause of death wasn’t listed. I scrolled down to the end of the obit. None of the big-name charities was listed as a beneficiary either. I had no idea how this fourteen-year-old died. Using her name and death date as search terms, I found another article from the archive of a competing newspaper.
Brenna Golden died of an accidental gunshot wound.
What?
I tried to focus on what a teen’s sudden death might do to her family. There would be sadness, of course. Perhaps anger, too.
Was the fatal injury self-inflicted, a misfire, or an instance of being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Any of those possibilities would be heart wrenching. Parents might blame each other. Siblings might be bewildered. Any or all of them might feel guilty and responsible.
Turning off the computer, I paced my shadowed office, turning the new information over in my mind. Rafe had never mentioned Brenna. He’d never hinted about a family tragedy.
On the other hand, Rafe was estranged from his family. Sure, he claimed it was because they didn’t approve of his golf vocation, but what if that wasn’t the entire story? In the course of my career as an accountant and two forays into homicide investigations, I’d seen broken families, families where hate and distrust thrived and took a dark turn.
I’d met Rafe’s brother and sister. Hill seemed privileged and spoiled. Regina seemed intense and overachieving. Rafe fit somewhere in between his siblings. He had Regina’s strong work ethic, but he also had a caring side she lacked. His fancy car and condominium were indulgences worthy of Hill.
I shook my head. The things I knew about Rafe Golden dwindled daily.
Rafe. How would he feel if I mentioned Brenna’s death to him? Would he think I’d overstepped?
I walked some more, circling my desk, striding through the outer office, skirting the front door, and starting another loop. What to do?
Did Detective Britt Radcliff know about Rafe’s sister?
Brenna’s shooting would be on file. Britt was thorough. He would have found it. Which meant he had access to details I didn’t have.
Realizing my mouth was dry, I stopped at the fridge and grabbed a water bottle. The cold liquid hit the bottom of my clenched stomach and bounced.
Decisions.
Did I let Britt trample through Rafe’s past and reach the wrong conclusions?
One thing was certain. Worrying never solved anything.
I whirled, picked up my phone, and called Rafe at work. “We need to talk.”
CHAPTER 20
* * *
Needing privacy, I stayed in my office while I waited for Rafe. If Charlie or Mama or the girls came home, they’d respect that I was over here working, even if it was a Sunday. I couldn’t sit still, so I grabbed a bottle of window cleaner and removed a coat of grime from my office windows.
I squirted the blue liquid, wiped it off, and squirted some more. A pleasing routine, most of the time. Today it didn’t slow the racing of my heart or the sick feeling in my gut.
Did I believe in Rafe?
I did.
But was that an automatic answer built of misguided loyalty?
Loyalty was important to me, but so was trust. Did Rafe trust me enough to tell me the whole story about Brenna? It bothered me that I couldn’t anticipate his reaction.
Outside the open windows, a familiar engine pulled up and stopped.
A car door shut.
I tossed my wet paper towels in the trash. Time’s up. He’s here. I opened the door for my boyfriend, and he strode in, his brows beetled.
“What’s wrong?” Rafe asked, taking my hand.
He leaned in to kiss me, and I gave him a quick buss on the lips and sidled over to pick up the obituary I printed out. “I found something.”
“And?”
I needed to explain my train of thought first. I let out a deep breath and set the page down. “I wonder if it has any bearing on Starr’s murder.”
His face clouded.
Before he spoke, I quickly laid the groundwork for talking about his sister. “Britt is using every tool at his disposal, every police report he can access to make his case against you.”
“So?”
“I found something online, which means he found it, too.”
“You’re talking in riddles. I didn’t kill Starr. There are no police reports in our brief past. It wasn’t like that at all.”
“I wasn’t talking about Starr.” I retreated, needing space between us. God, this was hard. I cleared my throat. “I was talking about an incident fifteen years ago.”
His tan face paled then burned bright. “Cleo—”
“I need to know,” I interrupted. “I promise to keep the information private, but I’m concerned about the case Britt is building against you. And I, oh dear.” I stopped to fan my face. “I noticed a gun was involved in this prior incident. I’m asking if there’s any reason to believe the police might draw the conclusion that you are connected with the prior event.”
“Damn it, Cleo. That was a long time ago.”
My heart went out to him. I softened my voice. “If there’s something in your past, in this incident about your sister or another incident that made it into police records, Britt will find it. I’m asking if any official record links you to another shooting.”
He turned from me, staring out the window I’d cleaned. He didn’t speak for the longest time. The silence ate at me, nibbling at my good intentions.
This was a huge turning point in our relationship, a point that needed an investment of trust from him to yield a fruitful dividend for our future.
“I loved my sister.”
I took a step closer, hoping his response meant we were no longer at odds. “Of course you did.”
“Brenna was full of life. She was into everything and everybody, like your Charla. I miss her. I was seventeen when she died.”
I stayed my hand before it touched him. He needed to get this out. “What happened?”
“Her death was an accident.”
“Was she playing with a gun?”
“Nothing like that.”
“What was it?”
“There was a rifle range on our property. We had guns, all of us, though they were locked in the cabinet downstairs.”
“I don’t understand.”
He turned to face me, his brown eyes dull with pain. “Goldens are outdoor people. We hunt. We fish. We ski. We boat. We golf. You name it, we do it. I know how to tango on a sailboat, to flush teal from a wetland, to carve a trail down a mountain of snow moguls. So did my sister. We had every opportunity.”
“What happened to Brenna?”
“Her death was an accident.”
“I got that part.”
“We had a routine. On Saturday mornings, we kids went down to the range to practice target shooting. Hill and I arrived first that morning. Reggie came a few minutes later and said she couldn’t find Brenna. Reggie thought she was with us. After waiting a few more minutes, we decided to shoot without her. How I wish we’d done something else.”
The raw edge in his voice ate at my soul. “Rafe?”
He stared into the distance as if he was seeing the event play out on a big screen. “I shot first. Then Hill took a turn. Reggie went last.”
“Go on.”
“I can’t.” He hung his head. “It was te
rrible.”
“Please.”
He glared at me. “Brenna was behind the target, and we didn’t know until the maid’s husband found her later that day. We killed her. We killed our sister.”
He finished on a broken whisper that tore me apart. A low crooning sounded in my throat. I ached for all of them. The sister who was slain. The children that survived. Poor Rafe. How awful. How horribly, terribly awful.
I finally found my voice. “I’m sorry.”
“That was the worst day of my life. I can’t forget it, and neither can my family. My father threw out every gun in the house. My mother can’t look us in the eye to this day. Reggie blamed herself for not finding Brenna first. Hill and I should have gone to look for her; God, it was bad. It still is.”
What a horrible burden to bear. I reached for him, and he came into my arms, trembling. Tears welled in my eyes. Poor fellow. If I could have turned back the clock for him, I would have.
“I’m so sorry,” I mumbled into his golf shirt, knowing I was repeating myself, knowing words weren’t enough, knowing I’d reopened this terrible wound and made him relive this awful day.
He held on tighter. “I never wanted to hurt anyone, and especially not Brenna. She was the best and the brightest of us all. She made the best grades in school, had the most friends, and won her sporting events. She was our future.”
I felt for what he’d lost, but a sense of maternal justice wormed its way out instead. “Brenna may have been a superstar, but each of you kids was super in your own right. Your parents should have told you that over and over again.”
“Not all families are as wonderful as yours.”
Wonderful? We were controlled chaos at best, but love threaded through everything my family said and did. I didn’t see a close connection between Rafe and his siblings, nor did he claim to have one.
I retreated half a step, as if we were dance partners, and held his gaze. “I feel like a heel for dredging up this painful memory. I wish neither incident had ever happened, but we have to think like cops. Your sister and Starr were gunshot victims. Both were female. Both had personal ties to you.”
3 Dime If I Know Page 10