“Because Leonard Petrov is a pervert,” Claire said flatly.
“Now, Claire,” Sean said, praying he wouldn’t lose it. “We investigated him thoroughly and found nothing to support any evidence of a crime. He just has, um, unusual tastes.”
“Very unusual.” Aidan chuckled, but he straightened in his chair when Claire turned angry black eyes on him.
“What on earth happened last night?” Afton asked.
“Leonard attacked me at the end of the date,” Claire said, “and these examples of Washington D.C.’s Finest almost wet their pants laughing.”
“He didn’t actually attack you,” Sean pointed out, chuckling in spite of himself.
“That creep licked my foot!” Claire brandished the shoe as evidence.
Both men doubled over and howled. They laughed until they cried and still kept on laughing. Claire took the shoe and whacked Aidan with it, because he was the only one she could reach.
“It isn’t funny,” she said.
“Oh, God, yes it is! If you’d only—seen the expression—on your face,” Sean managed between gasping laughs.
“I’ve had it with you two clowns,” Claire said. “You’re supposed to be protecting me, not laughing yourself into a coma at my expense.”
“I consider it a fringe benefit,” Aidan said, wiping his eyes.
She gave him another smack with her shoe.
Safely out of reach, Sean kept chuckling. As she glared at him, she realized she’d rarely seen this side of Sean before. Aidan was usually the mischievous one, but right now Sean’s dancing blue eyes and infectious laughter were delightful, taking years off his age. Normally her own sense of humor would have been charmed by the entire situation, and she’d be laughing as hard as both men put together.
But she wasn’t feeling like herself. She’d spent the last four nights living like a bug under a microscope, wired for sound and having every moment studied and catalogued for the police files. Death-row inmates had more privacy than she did. It was fraying her nerves and temper.
“Now I’m dying of curiosity,” Afton said carefully. “What happened on your date?”
Claire took a deep breath. “I should have known it would get weird when the guy introduced himself. He was short, blonde, and had a very slight build. I’m sure I outweighed him by at least…by quite a bit.”
“Wait a minute.” Afton pulled up Petrov’s file on her computer. “That doesn’t match his photo or description.”
“He said he’d had someone else come in for the initial consultation and photo. He claimed he’d joined another service using his own picture and had very few replies, so he asked a more attractive friend to stand in for him.”
Afton made a tsking sound and typed something in the database.
“I was pretty sure right away that he wasn’t the killer,” Claire said. “Way too short and skinny and blonde. In fact, I thought he was completely harmless.”
“And you said so into the microphone. We felt confident you were safe,” Aidan pointed out.
“You’re cops. You’re supposed to know a pervert when you see one.” She stuffed her shoe into her purse so that she wouldn’t be tempted to hit him with it again. “Anyway, we had a quick dinner. I cut the evening short because it was a dead end.”
“Dead end from an investigative standpoint or a romantic one?” Afton asked with a grin.
“Both,” Sean and Claire answered together.
She turned her head around to look at him. “How do you know I wasn’t attracted to him?”
“Come on,” Sean said. “I’ve been watching your every move for the last four evenings. I can read body language well enough to know when there’s no chemistry between two people.”
Not to mention the fact that he’d engaged in enough verbal and physical foreplay with her to recognize when she was interested in a man. She hadn’t been even remotely attracted to the harmless podiatrist, which had allowed Sean to relax enough to see the humor in the entire situation.
“Great,” she said. “Just one more piece of my private life ripped out into the open for public commentary and entertainment.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Sean said, no longer laughing.
“That’s what they all say.” She wanted desperately to rub away the unhappy ache building behind her forehead, but she figured he would probably read and understand that gesture as well.
“So you cut the evening short and?…” Afton asked.
“We took a cab back here and he started to get kind of pushy,” Claire said. “He wanted to go somewhere for a drink or drop me at my place or whatever. I wasn’t worried, but I made sure I said good-bye on the steps outside the building.”
“She stood on the step above his to emphasize his lack of height,” Sean said. “Nice move.”
“Christ, am I that easy to read?” Claire asked.
“Don’t answer,” Aidan said quickly to Sean. “It’s one of those trick female questions.”
“You’re killing me,” Afton said. “Finish it.”
“I said good night and pulled my keys out,” Claire said, “but he jostled me and I dropped them on the stairs.”
“Allow me to point out,” Aidan said, “I was in position less than fifteen feet away and Sean was across the street in his car.”
“Yeah, yeah, I was never in any danger. We got that part, Detective,” Claire said. “Anyway, Leonard bends down to pick up my keys, but then stays there at my feet, staring at my sandals. He says I shouldn’t wear high heels, they cause all kinds of problems, blah, blah.”
“Sounds like good medical advice to me. He is a podiatrist, after all,” Afton said.
“Yeah, well then he starts to undo the straps on my right shoe, saying how they cut off the circulation when they’re tight. He looks at my feet and says how beautiful they are, how I should take better care of them and not subject them to such stress.”
Sean began to snicker again. “You should have seen Claire’s face. Total deer-caught-in-headlights look.”
“So he starts rubbing at the marks the strap left on my foot,” Claire said, ignoring Sean. “He tells me he has just the trick to make things feel better. Then he licks my foot from toes to ankle.”
“Omigod,” Afton said. “What did you do?”
“She executed one of the more interesting gymnastic moves I’ve ever seen,” Aidan said. “She went straight up in the air and backwards at the same time. I took the guy down about a second later. When I looked up, the revolving door was going around and Claire was gone.”
“And there’s poor Leonard getting cuffed, her shoe still clutched in his hand, wondering what the hell is going on,” Sean said, grinning.
“Poor Leonard? How about poor Claire? Do you have any idea how revolting that was for me?” she said angrily. “And the whole thing gets recorded and logged into the evidence file for this case. It’s humiliating.”
“I think you’re overreacting,” Sean said. “Leonard insisted he was very sorry if he offended you and wanted to offer you a free foot exam to show he’s got no hard feelings.”
This time Afton joined in the explosion of laughter that echoed around the room. Claire waited until it was quiet before turning to Afton.
“Et tu Brute?” she asked.
“You have to admit it’s kind of funny.”
“Really? This pervert is running around dating clients from your company and it’s funny?”
“That reminds me,” Afton said, turning to type a notation on the computer.
“Are you removing him from your database?” Claire asked.
“No, we’ll just see if we can find a foot fetishist to hook him up with,” Afton said.
Everyone but Claire laughed.
Afton sighed as she looked at Claire’s angry face. “Of course we’ll remove him.”
“I’m starting to wonder about this service of yours. Look at my last two dates—gay and weird, in that order. Washouts, along with the other dates I’ve had so
far.” Claire felt mean for being hard on Billy, but facts were facts.
“I know the last few days have been difficult,” Sean said, “but remember what we’re trying to achieve here.”
Afton added, “You’re not the average customer looking for a dream date.”
“That’s how I started out,” Claire said stubbornly.
“But now we’re trying to help the police catch a killer. How can you say the dates were a disaster if through them we’ve managed to eliminate some suspects?” Afton asked gently.
“Because I wanted to find…”…someone like Sean. Claire forced herself not to look at him. “Oh, forget it. I just feel all this tension building, like something is going to happen and I can’t do anything about it. I feel like the butt of some huge cosmic joke right now. Usually I’d be laughing, too, but I can’t.”
“Sorry,” Aidan said. “We didn’t help with the Leonard thing.”
“I thought for sure you’d see how funny it was,” Sean said.
“Try my sense of humor after you’ve caught the killer,” Claire said, turning on him. “Have you found anything yet?”
“We’ve run several dozen Camelot clients through police background checks,” Aidan said.
“I assume you didn’t find anything interesting, since these individuals have all been extensively screened by our own private security firm,” Afton said, tapping her pen on the desk. She really hoped her sister’s screening methodology would stand up to checks run by the police.
Sean and Aidan looked at each other.
“Our checks are a lot more thorough than those done by a private firm, although we missed the photo switch by the podiatrist,” Sean said. “In the future, we’ll check driver’s license photos against Camelot’s records.”
“We have access to national criminal databases,” Aidan added, “and we can see when there’s evidence of things like sealed records or juvenile convictions. We’re also less likely to take things at face value than a corporate security firm, which works on a very high volume of clients.”
“What are you trying to say?” Afton asked.
“Among the approximately four dozen clients we’ve screened to date, we’ve found some pretty serious misdemeanor crimes. Not surprising, since I’m sure your private firm only did a check for felony offenses,” Sean said.
“That’s right. Maura decided to only flag felonies because they were getting so many hits for neighborhood noise complaints and violations of doggie leash laws.”
“I understand the policy. But a lot of felonies get pleaded down to misdemeanors, so they’re a red flag for us,” Sean said.
Afton braced herself. “Go on.”
“We found three clients who are legally married, although we can’t confirm the de facto status of those unions.”
“Did the files show that?”
“No. They just said single, no mention of divorce or separation.”
Clenching her jaw, Afton picked up her pen again. “I’ll need their names. Withholding that type of information is grounds for cancellation of the membership.”
“And we’ve found evidence of at least four clients with sealed juvenile records. I’m assuming everyone is required to divulge any and all criminal activity in their past, and so we flagged these names as well,” Sean said.
“What kind of juvenile records?”
“It could be anything from malicious mischief to drug charges to murder,” Sean said. “When juvenile records are sealed, nobody has access to them. But we’ll speak to the arresting officers and see if they remember the cases. Until then, we’ll have to assume the worst.”
“Why?” Claire said.
“Many serial killers become active in their teens,” Sean said without looking away from Afton. “Things like interest in the occult, misdemeanor sex crimes, animal cruelty—these can all be precursors of true sociopathic behavior in adulthood.”
“If the crimes are that serious, why can’t you access the files now?” Claire asked.
“Our legal system believes anything that happens before the age of eighteen shouldn’t be held against someone once he or she is an adult,” Aidan said. “It takes a court order to unseal juvenile records, and we don’t have enough evidence for that.”
“Great. So if the police can’t even get this information, how is Afton’s private security firm supposed to do a thorough background check?” Claire demanded.
“Amen.” Afton threw down her pen in disgust.
“You do the best you can,” Sean said. “There’s nothing wrong with Camelot’s system. You have the same limitations that your competitors do.”
“What I have is a personal responsibility to my clients, people like Claire,” Afton shot back. “They believe we offer them a safe alternative to the singles scene. What a farce.”
“Aren’t you being a little hard on yourself?” Sean asked.
“A week ago,” Afton said, “when you came to me and said Camelot might have a killer hidden among the clientele, I thought you were crazy, that there was no way a murderer could get through the screening process. I can’t say that now. This could be the end of my sister’s company, her dream.”
“No one is going to close this place down for having some inherent risks in the business. Hell, look at airlines,” Aidan said.
“I won’t need to wait for anyone to shut Camelot down,” Afton said grimly, thinking about what she had already been through. “If I find we’ve been hiding a killer in our databases I’ll close the place myself. I can’t live with murder.” She looked at the detectives. “Are you one hundred percent certain you can protect Claire?”
“Nothing is one hundred percent certain,” Claire said.
Neither detective disagreed.
Chapter 42
Washington, D.C.
Wednesday morning
“Thanks for coming in on such short notice,” Sean said, holding the door open for Claire.
“No big deal.” She glanced at him, wondering if his heart was beating as fast as hers. Probably not. “Since I’m burning vacation time at work, and all my accounts have been divided up among the other managers, my time is pretty much my own. What’s up?”
“We were lucky to get some time with the department’s psychiatrist. It’s not quite like working with an FBI criminal profiler, but hopefully we can come up with a sketch of our killer that has a stronger scientific base than the one Aidan and I threw together.”
“What does the shrink want from me?”
“He’ll ask about your memories on the night of the murder, and any impressions you’ve formed since then. Maybe he can help jog your memory. Ever been hypnotized?”
“No, and I’m not about to start.”
“Just a joke. Hypnosis isn’t that reliable anyway, and it’s not admissible in court.” Sean steered her down another hallway. “We’ll meet with him back here.”
“We?”
“You and me.”
“I’d rather talk to the doctor alone,” Claire said.
Sean stopped outside a door that said Conference.
“Why?”
“Because that’s the way I feel.”
“But you know I’ll be reading the notes from your session.”
She winced and reached for the door. Great. “Read whatever you want, but one person poking into my brain at a time is all I can handle.”
She shut the door, closing him out. Soon he reappeared at the window overlooking the room, crossed his arms, and leaned against the wall. She yanked out a chair facing the window, sat, and stared right through him.
A middle-aged, balding man stepped into the conference room through a side door. “Hi, Marie. I’m Dr. Morton.”
“Actually, it’s Claire.”
“Right, sorry.” After offering her a soft handshake, he pulled out the chair directly opposite her.
Sean hovered over his head like an impatient ghost.
“You’re working on a profile of the killer with the police?” Claire as
ked, looking away from the glass.
“Yes. This is actually the first time I’ve worked with Detectives Richter and Burke, but the department has me on retainer to provide a number of services related to psychiatry and counseling. This is actually the fun part of my job.”
The hinges on the swivel chair squeaked noisily as Dr. Morton leaned way back. The position caused his powder blue golf shirt to strain across the spare tire around his middle.
“I’ve reviewed the known case files on the victims and other crime scenes, and feel I’ve gotten all I can from them,” he said. “I’d like to start with what you remember from the night of the murder.”
“I don’t really remember anything. Didn’t Sean tell you?” Claire asked, glancing at the detective through the glass.
“Sean? Oh, Detective Sean Richter. No, he didn’t say anything. Why don’t you tell me?”
“I fell down a flight of steps and hit my head on the night of the murder, apparently running away from the killer. People at the scene reported that I talked about seeing a murder, and I mentioned a school. The police checked out the area nearby and found the victim.”
“And you can’t remember any part of the night?”
“No. I don’t remember anything after leaving work that Friday afternoon, even though I’m told I went to Camelot Dating Services and spent hours there. I know I’d planned to walk to the bus at Dupont Circle after my appointment. That path would have taken me directly through the school’s property. Sean and Aidan have pretty much pieced together everything since then, but I can’t confirm any of it.”
“Interesting.” The hinges squeaked as Dr. Morton adjusted his position. “Your diagnosis at the hospital was a concussion, but they released you after a few days, even though you hadn’t recovered your memory.”
“I wasn’t seriously injured. My doctor said the memories might come back slowly over time, or maybe not at all. So far, I haven’t remembered anything except for some impressions and images, mostly in dreams or nightmares.”
Dr. Morton leaned forward and picked up her file from the desk, scanning through the first page. “Hmmm. It says you have a memory of seeing a photograph that reminded you of the killer.” He continued to read, occasionally repeating phrases from the document.
When the Storm Breaks Page 20
