Pretty Dead

by Anne Frasier

  While cameras were rolling, Mayor Chesterfield planned to introduce Elise as the new interim chief. “We must present a united front,” he’d told her over the phone. But what she dreaded most was fielding questions about David.

  On the way to Mary of the Angels, Lamont grudgingly rode in the passenger seat of Elise’s car. Ten minutes later, they arrived at David’s apartment building. “I can’t believe Gould lives in this hole,” Lamont said as they took the marble stairs to the third floor; he’d refused to get in the cage elevator. “It’s a sign of his mental deterioration.”

  “It’s not the happiest of places, but it’s grown on me.” Even as she defended David, Elise found herself agreeing with Lamont on a certain level. She was pretty sure her partner’s choice of housing had originally been a punishment. The dark sorrow of Mary of the Angels had appealed to him when his soul was hurting.

  On the third floor, Elise slipped the key into the ancient lock and pushed open the door.

  Isobel hid under the bed while Elise and Lamont searched the space. At one point, Elise took a break to clean the litter box and put out fresh food and water.

  “Nothing but this,” Lamont said with disappointment two hours later. He held up an evidence bag containing the brown prescription bottle of sleeping pills.

  Not exactly true. It seemed David had saved all of his worked crossword puzzles. May 12 was missing, a finding Elise wasn’t yet sure she should mention—she was afraid Lamont would read too much into it. David carried his unfinished crossword puzzles with him until he finished them, so it wasn’t necessarily unusual for a recent puzzle to be missing.

  “Let’s check out his car,” Lamont said, holding up a spare set of keys he’d taken from a hook next to the door. “I spotted it in the parking lot.”

  Going through David’s vehicle was like processing an archeological dig as they sifted through the layers of years. In the console between the seats Elise found a newspaper.

  With gloved hands, she pulled it out, stood back, and unfolded it.

  Her small sound of dismay caught Lamont’s ear, and he abandoned his search of the driver’s side to look at her over the roof of the car—and to especially look at what she held.

  The May 12 paper, with the crossword puzzle removed. Not cut with scissors, but torn.

  Everything she thought she knew about David Gould shifted and collapsed, and yet she refused to believe murder was anything he’d done with conscious thought. And now he was in hiding. Not only in hiding—he might have left the city, all because of her. All because she hadn’t been able to see what was right in front of her.

  While Elise’s mind reeled, Lamont circled the car, evidence bag in hand. She wanted to drop and pound her fists against the ground. Instead, without a word, she passed the paper to him.

  He gave it a quick scan, smiling when he spotted the date. He pulled out his phone and took a series of photos. The clearest one would be sent to John Casper and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to see if it matched the piece found in Major Hoffman’s throat. Elise had little doubt as to what they’d find.

  Lamont attached the image file to an e-mail and hit “Send.” “Should have confirmation within hours,” Lamont said. “Now we just need to find Gould.”

  “That might not be so easy.”

  His eyebrows lifted in mock disbelief. “Come on, Elise. How stupid do you think I am? Somebody tipped Gould off yesterday, and I know damn well it was you. I’m willing to let that go if you help me get him for good this time. You’ll be hearing from him if you haven’t already. When you do, we’ll be ready.”

  CHAPTER 37

  I don’t have anything much against rootwork,” David said, “but does it have to include things like cat piss and some nasty-smelling weed?”

  It was late morning, the day after Strata Luna had answered David’s knock, and he was comfortably settled in one of her bedrooms, the bed itself so soft he almost got trapped in it a couple of times.

  The previous night he’d managed a shower. Afterward, Strata Luna applied some kind of healing crap to his arm. She claimed the bullet had grazed him; he preferred to say it ripped a furrow. But he’d live, and now, after a breakfast served up by Javier, David felt almost human.

  “They don’t smell bad to me,” Strata Luna said as she redressed his wound. “Something that’s gonna help you heal shouldn’t be derided like that.”

  “I haven’t caught a whiff of anything that doesn’t make me queasy.”

  “You ungrateful child.” Finished with his arm, she straightened away from the bed. “Jackson and I worked this up last night, and you should be damn glad to have it.”

  “I know, I know.” Contrite now.

  No reprimand from her about what he’d done. No talk of his running from the cops, and no encouragement to turn himself in. He liked that about Strata Luna. She didn’t judge. “Do you get the Savannah Morning News?” he asked. “Since you don’t have a television, I’m guessing you don’t read the paper.”

  “You’re making me old and irritated. If you weren’t so good-looking, I’d toss you out.”

  He knew better, but she had a reputation as a hard-ass to maintain, a reputation that was quickly slipping. He’d seen the way she acted around Sweet.

  “I’ll have Javier see if today’s issue is outside. The delivery boy’s afraid to come close to the house. Sometimes he doesn’t get the paper over the gate, and people steal it.”

  “I work the crossword puzzle every morning,” David said. “You should give it a try. It’s as good as a cup of coffee to get the brain going.”

  “My brain is always going.”

  Strata Luna glided away. Javier brought the Savannah Morning News, handed it to David, and left the room.

  David gave the paper a crisp snap. Damn, if his own face wasn’t staring back at him from the front page. Without reading the article, he flipped to the puzzle, folding it just so. Five answers in, his hand stilled and his gaze tracked down as he read one clue after the other.

  Son of a—

  David threw the paper aside, tossed back the covers, and lunged out of bed. After a wave of dizziness passed, he grabbed his keys from the bedside table and, barefoot, hurried downstairs, wearing nothing but the striped pajama bottoms Strata Luna had produced from somewhere, and the gauze taped to his arm.

  He found Javier in the kitchen chopping vegetables, a white towel slung over one shoulder. He looked like he should be in a fashion spread. “Can you do something for me?” David asked.

  “Strata Luna said to get you whatever you want.”

  On the surface, Javier was polite, but David sensed resentment. And why not? Javier had been Strata Luna’s boy toy ever since the last one was killed. But now, with Jackson Sweet on the scene, Javier probably wasn’t spending much time, if any, in Strata Luna’s bed.

  “I need you to go to my apartment and pick up something,” David said. “You’ll have to use the tunnels because the cops will be watching. Here.” David offered him the set of keys.

  Javier didn’t take them. “I don’t like the tunnels.”

  “It’ll be okay. I’ll draw you a map.”

  “I won’t go through the tunnels,” Javier said firmly.

  “Fair enough. But whatever you do, don’t take Strata Luna’s car to get to my apartment. People will recognize it. Drive your own vehicle, ride a bike, whatever. When you get there, just walk in the front door. If cops are watching the building, and they will be, they’ll think you’re a tenant.”

  Javier took the keys. “You sure about that?”

  “No.”

  An hour later, Javier knocked on the guest room door. Stepping inside, he placed a bag—along with David’s clothes, washed and pressed—on the bed. “You were right. Nobody gave me a second look.”

  Once Javier left the room, David opened the bag and sifted through the contents. Within minutes, his suspicions were confirmed.

  The newspaper pieces are a match.

  Standing
in the task force station of Savannah PD, Elise stared at the text from Lamont.

  “Everything okay?”

  She looked up to see Avery watching her closely and with concern. Behind him, officers sat at computers and manned tip lines.

  Elise had known the match was coming, but even now her mind tried to reject the results and instead raced ahead, going down one path after the other in an attempt to find a different answer.

  “Fine,” she said, trying to pull herself together, unwilling to share the news with Avery until she’d fully absorbed it herself. “I . . . um, just remembered something.” She turned and left the room.

  In the crowded hallway, her phone vibrated with another text. Expecting a follow-up from Lamont, she checked the screen.

  Not Lamont. Strata Luna.

  She swiped the screen and realized the message was from David and he was using Strata Luna’s phone.

  I have to see you. Right away.

  She swallowed hard, and her hand shook as she typed her reply: Where are you?

  Strata Luna’s.

  Be there in fifteen minutes.

  With resolve and a weighted heart, Elise headed to her office where she checked and holstered her weapon, tucked a set of handcuffs into the waistband of her slacks, and covered everything with a jacket even though the day was hot.

  She wouldn’t tell Lamont about the text message. Not yet. She wanted to see David alone. Not that she expected to learn anything new, but she didn’t want Lamont rushing in with a SWAT team and assault rifles.

  CHAPTER 38

  You shouldn’t have texted,” Elise told David once Javier led her deep into the heart of the mansion. “Lamont is watching me.” She wasn’t sure why, but she felt the need to subtly warn him about what was about to transpire. Not so he could get away, but to hint that he’d initiated the steps that would lead to his capture and arrest. Her visit was about easing him in slowly. Or maybe it was about easing herself in slowly.

  They were alone in a room Elise had never seen, located at the back of Strata Luna’s home. It had pink walls and heavy gold curtains that blocked the light and supplied privacy. Above their heads was a ceiling painted with cherubs on a pale blue background. David couldn’t have looked more out of place as he got up from an ornate chair, a bundle of folded newspapers in his hand.

  “You’re the one who told me to run,” he said. Wearing black slacks and an untucked and mended white dress shirt, he was pale and needed to shave, but otherwise didn’t look in grave physical danger.

  “An impulse.”

  “I’m sensing it’s an impulse you regret.”

  He was picking up on her discomfort and distress. “It’s an impulse I regret because now you’re in more trouble than you were before.” A logical explanation for her agitation. “Lamont said he fired at you.”

  David lifted his arm slightly, and now she noticed what looked like a band of gauze under the fabric. “Graze.”

  She nodded, relieved, all the while aware of an emotional distance between them that was new and foreign.

  Getting to the point, he said, “I’ve got something I want you to take a look at.” He lifted the papers.

  “Crossword puzzles? Really, David. Not now.” Leave it to him to make light of a serious situation. He wouldn’t be making light if he understood what was coming.

  He gave her one of the folded newspapers. “Today’s,” he explained. “Look at the answers. It’s about Coretta’s murder.”

  She glanced over the completed squares, but didn’t see any strong connection. A desperate man will grasp at anything. “I could see how you might misconstrue this.” She attempted to return the paper—a gesture he ignored.

  “That’s what I thought at first. Just a coincidence, right? But look at these.” David’s voice was typically laid back even in the most stressful of circumstances. Now he was talking fast, clearly excited as he spread the puzzles on a table in the center of the room, arranging them by date of issue.

  She stepped closer and recognized his handwriting and the bold black ink he preferred. The very puzzles that had been in his apartment just that morning. “How did you get these?”

  “That’s not important. I want you to look at the clues. These earlier puzzles?” He tapped a paper. “They reference a string of murders in Pennsylvania that took place over a period of a year. Last one occurred five months ago, before the Layla Jean Devro murder here in Savannah.” He looked up at her with expectation.

  “I’m following this to a degree,” she said cautiously. “I can see the puzzle designer is fascinated by serial killers. A lot of people are.”

  “That’s not all. After the killings here, the tone of the puzzles began to change. The answers began to reference details of the Savannah Killer murders. Some were things the media and public didn’t know, like the exact word left on one of the bodies.”

  Elise leaned closer as he pointed to several other puzzles.

  “David, this is like a horoscope. You can always find a way to apply it to your own situation.”

  He ignored her skepticism. “Look at them from a distance. Stand back and look at them.”

  She did. She gave it two minutes, then shook her head.

  “You don’t see a pattern?”

  “No.”

  He made a frustrated sound. “We keep talking about how the murders have no patterns, but we all know serial killers like to re-create. That’s part of their psychosis. Here’s the pattern.” He shoved a paper toward her.

  “I don’t see anything.”

  “You aren’t looking.” Frustration.

  She shook her head.

  He grabbed a Sharpie. Leaning over the table, he began outlining the answers, stopped, and looked at her. “How about now?”

  “If you really stretch it . . . an Egyptian soul glyph, I suppose. But it also seems like a typical crossword pattern.”

  He shook his head. “No. Look at them. All of them. This one, this one, this one.”

  She tried to keep the doubt from her face while she thought about the newspaper they’d found in his car. The newspaper that matched the puzzle shoved down Coretta’s throat. Was Lamont right? Had David lost his mind? Was he unaware of his role in this?

  “One of these things by itself might be me projecting,” he said, “but this is too much to be a coincidence. This cannot be a coincidence.”

  “Okay, let’s say it’s not. It still means nothing. I’m going to go out on a limb here, but I’m guessing if you profiled ten crossword puzzle makers, you’d find that almost all of them have some form of obsessive-compulsive disorder. From the clues, we already know our puzzle maker is obsessed with current events. This pattern you’re seeing is just an outlet for that obsession.”

  David tossed down the Sharpie. “Damn it, Elise.”

  She’d delayed the real purpose of her visit for too long. “I have something I need to tell you.” She looked up at a cherub, then back at David. When she finally spoke, her words were clear and concise. “Your apartment and car were searched.” She watched him for a reaction.

  He shrugged. “I figured that would happen.”

  “We found something.” Pause. “In your car.”

  No sign of guilt, but that didn’t surprise her, especially if he had no memory of what he’d done. “I don’t like the look on your face,” he said.

  “Major Hoffman’s autopsy turned up something interesting,” she said. “A crossword puzzle torn from the newspaper.”

  “Okay . . . ?” The word was a careful question.

  “It was determined that it was the puzzle from May twelfth.”

  “And?”

  “The day your son died.”

  “I know that. Believe me, I know that. What about the car, Elise? Get to the point.”

  “They found the May twelfth paper in your car. With the puzzle removed. Torn out.”

  He stared at her, not with guilt, but shock.

  He might be a cop, yet Elise understood his need
to hear it all. She had to lay it out. “An examination of both pieces of evidence determined that the paper in Major Hoffman’s throat exactly matched the paper in your car.”

  Still no strong response. Instead, he said, “So, you finally drank the Kool-Aid.”

  “Lamont was right,” she said. “I’m afraid the anniversary of Christian’s death set you off. That, combined with Hoffman’s treatment of you on the twelfth.”

  “You think I killed Major Hoffman.” His voice was wooden, removed.

  “Yes,” she said quietly. “That’s why you shouldn’t have texted me.”

  She reached behind her back and pulled out the set of handcuffs.

  “You’re arresting me? Are you kidding? You’re the one who told me to run.”

  “I thought you were innocent.”

  “But not now.”

  “Not now.”

  “Jesus H.” David dropped into a chair and passed a hand over his eyes, then looked up at Elise, puzzlement and confusion on his face.

  There were documented cases of killers who’d killed without knowing it, without memory of the event. He knew that better than anyone . . . and she could see he was wondering, doubting himself.

  She wanted to reassure him. Tell him she would be there for him, help him get through this. Then she thought of his mother. Someone, maybe David, would have to break the news to her.

  “Stand up, turn around, and put your hands on your head.” She followed with the Miranda warning: “You have the right to remain silent; anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”

  As she continued, David turned. He knew the drill. After one handcuff was in place, he lowered his arms so she could attach the next one. The movement broke open his wound, and a small area on the sleeve of his white shirt bloomed red. “We’ll have someone look at that,” Elise said.