"Meaning..."
The bell over the diner's door jangled and Claire looked up again. It was her favorite Goth, Chain. She watched him, hands stuffed in the pockets of his black jeans, as he took the only empty stool at the lunch counter. He spoke to Al Collins sitting next to him reading the paper and the older man struck a friendly conversation with him, which she found interesting, considering Chain's appearance. She'd seen the teen at the post office yesterday and had noticed him chatting with a woman with a baby in a stroller in line. Despite the dyed hair, black clothes and stud through his brow, people seemed to like him. Everyone but her.
Claire returned her gaze to Graham. He was waiting patiently. "I'm sorry," she said. "Got distracted."
The new waitress, Carol, lumbered over, all six foot, two hundred forty pounds of her, carrying their lunch. Loretta had told Claire the other day that she and Carol had agreed, with a laugh, that Carol would be safe waitressing at the diner. In her mid-fifties, overweight and a brunette, there was no chance the killer would be interested in her.
Claire brushed her fingertips through her blond hair that fell across her shoulders. Over the last weeks, she didn't recall ever feeling vulnerable, even though she fit the profile of the murdered women, but last night she had dreamed he had come after her. No identifiable features, but she had known it was him. She had awoken in a sweat, breathing hard. She wasn't really afraid, but she would be a fool not to take into consideration what kind of women he was looking for. This morning, she'd realized that despite her haranguing Ashley, she was actually glad her daughter's hair was as black as shoe polish right now.
Carol set the Greek salad in front of Claire and the tuna croissant, no chips, extra pickle platter, on the table and walked away.
"You were saying you thought this case could be more than you're seeing," Graham prodded, cutting his croissant in half. "What do you mean?"
She dumped the vinaigrette dressing over her salad. "I don't know. I just feel as if I need to think outside the box. I mean, what if there's more than one killer? Or what if he's a she?"
"Has there been any evidence to indicate either?"
She stabbed at a black olive with her fork. "No, but we don't have any evidence. We have nothing but an umbrella and some silicone powder from inside disposable latex gloves. Other than six women who've been bled to death, that's all I've got."
Graham was sympathetically quiet for a moment. He took a bite of his sandwich, chewed. "Listen, I know you said you can't really use my help, but what about my sister's?"
"The FBI agent?"
"The FBI provides information to law enforcement agencies; it's their job. I was wondering if a profiler would help."
Claire popped a grape tomato into her mouth. "You didn't say she was a profiler."
"She's not, but she knows people who are."
When the door jangled yet again, Claire instinctively looked up. That was part of the reason why she had joined Graham for lunch, even after turning him down yesterday. Seated at this booth, with her back against the wall, she could watch everyone who came in or out of the diner.
To her surprise, it was Ashley who walked in and she was so glad to see her. She felt so damned guilty about neglecting her these last few weeks. She was sure that was why she was acting out—the party, the missed curfews, the smoking. Claire started to rise, and then realized Ashley hadn't even seen her. Her eyes were all for the boyfriend.
"Could you excuse me for a minute," Claire said, wiping her mouth with a paper napkin as she rose. "It looks like my prisoner has found a way to sneak under the fence."
Graham turned around to see Ashley.
"Go easy on her," he warned. "You kill your kid with a fork in plain sight and you're definitely out of a job."
"Smart-ass," she muttered as she walked away from their table. "Remind me not to have lunch with you or come to your office anymore."
Ashley threw her arms around Chain and they locked lips.
"Ashley," Claire called cheerfully, walking up to them, hand on her firearm.
Ashley tore herself out of the guy's arms. "M-Mom, I thought you had a meeting—"
"You're supposed to be at work," Claire interrupted.
Ashley glanced around them. "Mom, people are looking," she whispered. "You're going to make a scene and embarrass—"
"You're damned straight I'm going to make a scene. The agreement was that you would not be walking into town for lunch anymore."
"Chief Drummond," Chain piped in.
She turned and glared. "You probably don't want to get in the middle of this, Chain."
Ashley snatched her backpack off the floor and flounced away.
"Where do you think you're going?" Claire called, following her. So what if everyone in the diner was staring. So what if they would gossip among themselves that the chief of police had lost control of her teenage daughter. They were all talking about her anyway.
"I can't believe you would do this," Ashley threw over her shoulder as she shoved the diner door open and stomped out.
Claire ignored Chain, who was right behind her. "Ashley Anne! You won't walk away when I'm speaking to you. I won't have it."
At the bottom of the steps, Ashley halted, arms crossed over her chest, hip thrust out, her back to her mother.
"You were supposed to be at work," Claire said, coming down the steps. "You were supposed to stay at work until your grandmother or I picked you up."
"You didn't tell her yet?" Chain circumnavigated Claire to get to Ashley. "Man, Ash—"
Claire felt the heat rise in her face. This was all she needed today. "Tell me what?"
"Mom..."
"Tell me what?" Claire repeated, barely able to control her anger. She pushed on the teen's shoulder, forcing her to turn and face her mother.
Ashley stared at the loose gravel at her feet.
"What is it you haven't told me?"
"I lost my job," Ashley said softly.
"Lost your job, as in you can't find it?"
"It wasn't her fault, Chief," Chain said.
Claire glanced up, hoping to bore holes in him with her gaze. "Your being here is probably not the best idea right now. I realize my daughter isn't an angel, but you know, we didn't have any smoking, parties, nor past curfews until you came into the picture."
"This doesn't have anything to do with him," Ashley snapped, viciously.
"Doesn't have anything to do with him?" As Claire turned to her daughter, something on Chain's neck caught her attention. She turned back to get a better look, the realization of what it was slowly sinking in.
A tattoo. A fresh one, still red and welted. It was a vampire bite with two drops of ruby red blood flowing from the black marks. "What is that?" Claire demanded of Chain, her voice gruff to cover her emotion.
"What?" Realizing what she was staring at, he laid his hand on his neck. "A tattoo."
"You're not old enough to legally get a tattoo."
Claire couldn't stop staring at the boy's neck, trying to process the possible implications. All she could think of was the wounds on Brandy's neck. Two puncture wounds—like a vampire's bite.
"I turned eighteen this month," Chain said, now obviously more than a little annoyed with her. "It's perfectly legal."
"What is it?" Claire demanded of Ashley, pointing at the boyfriend's neck.
"What do you mean?" Her daughter looked at her as if she were a babbling idiot. "It's a tattoo. Of a vampire bite."
"Are you two involved in some kind of satanic cult or something?"
Chain shook his head in disgust and walked away, stuffing his hands into his pockets. "I'm out of here, Ash. I got to get back to work. Talk to you later."
Still staring at the young man as he cut across the parking lot, shoulders hunched, Claire took Ashley by the arm and led her toward the car.
"You can't do this," Ashley spat. "You don't have a right to put your hands on me like this! You don't have a right to—"
"Stop talking, A
sh. Stop talking and get in the car before I put you in the car. And you know I can do it." It took all of Claire's emotional strength not to shove her daughter as she willed her fingers to release her arm.
Ashley stomped around the front of the cruiser, jerked open the door and threw her backpack into the backseat. "I was going to tell you."
"When did you lose your job?" Claire climbed into the driver's seat. She was so upset that her hands were trembling. What if Chain was the killer? Graham had warned he would be someone they all knew, someone she knew. The thought that she could have allowed her daughter to be near such a monster... it was more than she could consider.
"I didn't tell you because you've just been so busy with murder cases. I didn't want to be a problem—"
"How long ago did you lose your job, Ashley?" Claire repeated, grabbing her sunglasses from her pocket just below her badge.
Ashley crossed her arms over her black T-shirt, obscuring most of the bat graphic. She stared straight ahead through the windshield. "About a week ago."
"About?" Claire thrust the sunglasses onto her face. "You don't know? I need to call Mr. Stewart and further embarrass you?"
"Mom, it was stupid. It was my fault. I was going to let things blow over and call him and apologize and see if he would let me come back to work."
Claire started the engine, not even sure where she was going. She knew one thing; Ashley was not going home alone. She wasn't going anywhere that Chain could get to her until she looked into this. "Ashley, I don't understand." She looked at her. "You loved your job."
"I know." Tears filled her eyes and she rubbed at them, embarrassed.
"Why did he fire you?"
She sniffed. "I was late getting back from lunch a couple of times and I... I kind of skipped a day or two."
"To be with Chain, who I could have sworn you told me was sixteen." Claire threw the car into reverse, backed out of the parking space and shot forward, throwing loose gravel all over the lot.
"What was I supposed to do?" Ashley stared ahead. "You don't want me going out with him. You don't want him at our house."
"Without me there."
Ashley's head snapped around. "And just when are you there?"
Claire was the one who broke eye contact this time. Ashley's accusation was like a punch in her stomach. Because she was right. Claire was thankful she had the sunglasses on so her daughter couldn't see the tears in her eyes. She waited until she had her emotions in check before she spoke again, and then it was calmly. "We'll talk about this tonight. I need to get to the station house. You may have to talk to one of the detectives."
"Why?"
"About Chain." Claire stopped at a red light and glanced at the car beside her. It was a couple of hospital employees who looked as if they were headed to the diner for lunch. Alan Bradford was driving. Kevin James was in the front passenger's seat; he waved. Claire hadn't realized the two men were friends. Though they were always friendly to her, they both struck her as loners. Of course it made sense that they knew each other. Both in the medical profession and Kevin was constantly in and out of the hospital. She nodded, half smiled. The light changed and she pulled ahead.
"I'm not talking to any cops about Chain," Ashley declared, tightening her arms around her stomach. "I don't care what you do to me. You can torture me if you want, I'm not talking."
"Spare me the dramatics," Claire said, feeling better in control of her emotions again. "And if Chain has nothing to hide, there's no reason why you should feel as if you need to protect him. All the detective will want to know is where he hangs out, who his friends are. Maybe where he's been certain nights."
"I'm not protecting him," Ashley sneered. "It's an invasion of privacy to ask those questions!" She dared a glance at Claire. "And why do you want to know that stuff anyway? Is this your way to pull us apart? You don't like him, so you're going to launch a criminal investigation against him? I pretty sure that's not legal."
"Nope, you're right, it's not. But you know what is legal?" Claire said, her dander up again.
"What?"
"Sending a girl to live with her father in Utah, that's what."
"You wouldn't dare."
Claire cut her eyes at Ashley as she pulled into her parking space behind the station. "Try me."
* * *
"I don't know. Sounds a little farfetched." Detective Robinson looked up from behind his desk in the tiny office he shared with the department's only other detective, Cal Parker, who was on vacation for two weeks.
Claire had left Ashley in her office, threatening to put her in a cell if she moved, and had come to speak to the detective privately. Walt was a good guy, late fifties, potbelly and receding gray hairline. He was a retired air force MP and had been with the Albany Beach police for almost fifteen years. He had served Claire's father well, and served her well. The only real problem with Robinson was that he wasn't a creative thinker. He hadn't been much help with the serial murders so far because without any evidence at all, he didn't know how to come up with various scenarios. He didn't know how to guess who might be killing these young women.
"Walt, think about it." Claire pulled the only other chair in the office, Cal's, over in front of the detective's desk. "A young man, tall, strong, personable."
"Yeah, I know the kid. Works in the head shop. Also volunteers over at the Boys' and Girls' Club with me during the school year. He dresses like he works in a funeral parlor," Walt scoffed.
"Yeah, but you have to admit, people like him." She waggled a finger. "I've been taking notice around town. He's chatty with people. People talk to him."
Robinson loosened his cheap tie. "You already considered him a suspect?"
"No." She glanced past the detective's head where he proudly displayed several awards he'd won in the military and with the Albany Beach police over the years. She looked back. "My daughter's sort of been dating him."
"Aha, I see." He leaned back and the desk chair squeaked under his shifting weight.
"No, you don't see. One has nothing to do with other. So, I don't like him. I don't like his hair stylist or his fashion consultant. But I keep my personal opinions out of my cases."
"Chief, with all due respect, I have two daughters. My Katherine, she gave me a run for my money the years we were stationed in Germany. Hanging out with the wrong crowd, skipping school, staying out all night. I'd have done anything to steer her straight. Anything," he said meaningfully.
Claire rose, annoyed by his implication. At the same time, she couldn't help being proud of him. So what if he wasn't creative; he was good at his job, and part of his job was to keep them all on the straight and narrow, even the chief of police. "I'm not saying this kid is the killer. He probably isn't, but I know there are some interesting circumstances with his home situation and you can't help but see the connection between Brandy Thomas's wound and the tattoo. We'd be derelict in a duty if we didn't investigate the possibility."
He rested the heels of his hands on the gray metal desk and pushed himself up to standing. "I'll run his name through the system. Stop by and have a chat with him."
She struck the back of the chair she'd been sitting in. "I want him interviewed. Officially. It's time we started being more proactive. I'm bringing in a couple of the guys on our possible suspects lists. Top two or three."
"We haven't got much to go by, Chief. People are going to be pissed if we start hauling in their husbands, their neighbors, their employees."
She shrugged as she opened the door. "They're already pissed. Let me know what you come up with. My daughter will be with me the rest of the day, so you have anything for me, buzz me and I'll come to you."
He rubbed the bald spot on the top of his head the way she knew he did when he was nervous. "Will do, Chief."
Claire strode back down the hall toward her office. "Jewel!" she called as she passed the fishbowl.
The dispatcher got up from her chair at once, opened the door and stuck her head out. "Yeah, boss."<
br />
"I want an available car to pick up Billy Trotter."
"You're kidding?" She cracked her gum. "You think he's the killer? I went to school with Billy. Danced with him junior prom."
"I'm just running some interviews, that's all. Starting at the beginning again."
"I'll put the call in now," Jewel hollered down the hall.
Claire jerked her office door open, half afraid Ashley would be gone when she walked in. When Claire had parked her there, Ashley had been making halfhearted threats about running away. She said she wouldn't go to her father; they couldn't make her.
Claire hadn't intended to threaten Ashley with sending her away; ordinarily she wasn't that kind of parent. And it would break her heart to lose her only child. But what Walt had said about his own daughter had really struck home with Claire. She would do anything to set her back on the right path. Do anything to protect her life.
Thankfully, Ashley was there, seated in the same chair where Claire had left her.
Claire walked around the desk to her chair. "It's going to be a long day. You have anything to read in your bag?"
Ashley wouldn't look at her. "I don't want to read."
"Fine." Claire sat down and reached for a file of work unrelated to the killings that she needed to tend to. "I plan to work until six, stop at the grocery store, and then head home. I don't want you out of my sight until we look into Chain's nifty tattoo."
"What is it about the tattoo that's got you so fired up?" Ashley gestured with both hands.
Claire opened the folder in front of her and scanned the memo on top. "The last girl who was killed, Brandy Thomas..."
"Yeah?"
Claire glanced up. "She had what appears to be a vampire bite on her neck."
Ashley seemed to visibly pale. "No shit," she breathed after a second. "That wasn't in the paper."
"It's one of those details we're keeping to ourselves until we investigate further." Claire watched Ashley for a moment, almost certain there was something the teen wasn't saying. She seemed pretty disturbed. Did she know something Claire didn't?
She'll Never Live Page 9
