Cavanaugh or Death

by Marie Ferrarella

  But she had. She’d gotten him wondering just what her private life was like.

  And how it would feel to kiss that mouth of hers that seemed to never stop moving.

  Granted she was a more than passably attractive pain-in-the-butt, but up until now, he hadn’t given any real thought to her life outside the precinct.

  Of course the woman had a love life, he admonished himself. She was outgoing, vibrant and could probably make friends with the devil himself if she had to. And she had this trait, he’d noted. A trait that made the person she was talking to feel as if he—or she—was the only person in the room even if the room was stuffed to maximum capacity with people.

  It was a gift, he supposed, one that went a long way toward making the woman popular—as well as damn desirable.

  Davis almost jolted as the last word jumped out at him from out of nowhere, all but setting the surrounding world on fire.

  What the hell was he doing, having thoughts like that about a woman who was the bane of his existence? The only thing he desired about Moira Cavanaugh was to have her go away, stay away and stop bothering him.

  Because he’d fallen into silence and he realized that Moira was looking at him as if waiting for him to say something, Davis muttered, “Remind me to send my condolences.”

  Well, that certainly came out of nowhere. “To who?” she asked him.

  “To whomever you’re having that love life with.” Davis all but snapped her head off. “Can we get back to work now?”

  The smile she flashed at him seemed to say that she knew what he was attempting to do and that she had his number.

  All he knew was that he didn’t like the way her smile seemed to corkscrew into his system, all but short-circuiting everything it came in contact with.

  “Ready when you are,” Moira announced brightly.

  His eyes narrowed as he looked at her. “I’m ready,” he growled.

  But he wasn’t, he realized.

  Whatever else he might have been—and now was—he was definitely not ready for her.

  Desperate for any sort of a diversion that would get her attention away from this personal venue they seemed to be traveling, Davis grasped the first thing that came into his head.

  “We need to check out the other cemetery.”

  The words had practically burst out of his mouth, catching her entirely off guard. She looked at him, not even sure she’d heard him correctly, and asked, “What?”

  “Aurora has another cemetery in the city, doesn’t it?”

  She had to stop to think for a second before she could answer. “Yes. It’s a smaller one. I think it was here before they built St. Joe’s,” she recalled from her initial research. “Why?”

  “Well, maybe some of the graves at that cemetery have been disturbed, too,” Davis suggested. “If they have, maybe we’ll find the key to all this at the other cemetery.”

  Davis wasn’t prepared for her face lighting up the way that it did.

  And he definitely wasn’t prepared for that sudden quickening he felt in the pit of his stomach as he witnessed her reaction.

  Maybe this whole “partner” thing was getting to him, making him anticipate things going wrong on some level and that was why he had been so out of whack lately. Waiting for a shoe to drop.

  “That’s great,” she told him. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  She wasn’t being defensive, wasn’t acting as if the same thought had occurred to her and she just hadn’t voiced it. Instead she was saying it as if she was complimenting him.

  For a second he fell into silence.

  Since he was no longer accustomed to working with a partner, he wasn’t used to being on the receiving end of any sort of praise—not that either one of his two late partners had praised him outright. But approval—and that went both ways—had been tacitly understood.

  Words hadn’t been necessary, even though hearing them now felt good in an unsettling sort of way.

  He wasn’t happy about it.

  Feeling awkward, Davis shrugged off her obvious approval.

  “Yeah, well...seems only logical. You want to take any backup with us?” he asked, ready to call in the officers they’d made use of previously. To be honest with himself, right now the thought of having a few more bodies around acting as silent buffers was welcome.

  He was surprised when Moira shook her head.

  “Not yet,” she told him. “Let’s have a look around the place first and see if we can make nice with whoever’s in charge over there.”

  “Make nice,” Davis echoed reprovingly as they left the squad room and headed down the corridor to the elevator. “You make it sound like we’re going to be dealing with a bunch of kindergarten kids.”

  She smiled indulgently as they reached the elevator. Moira pressed the down button. “Okay, how would you like to refer to it?”

  “How about calling it an investigation?” he suggested tersely.

  Moira inclined her head. “If that’s what’ll make you happy.”

  He blew out an exasperated breath. He was tired of this restless feeling that kept infiltrating his system because of her.

  “What would have made me ‘happy,’” he told her, “is if you hadn’t been jogging by the cemetery that morning. Or, if you had to, that you’d done it either half an hour sooner or half an hour later.”

  The implication was clear. Half an hour either way and their paths wouldn’t have crossed—and he wouldn’t be working with her now.

  Rather than taking offense and backing off the way he’d thought she would, Davis saw laughter in the woman’s eyes.

  “You know that you don’t mean that,” she told Davis as she stepped into the elevator car first.

  She kept her hand out, blocking the beam that in turn signaled the power grid that there was something obstructing the path. It kept the elevator doors from closing prematurely.

  When Davis got on, she withdrew her hand and the doors closed.

  “I never meant anything more in my life,” he muttered under his breath.

  Moira pretended she didn’t hear.

  But the smile on her lips told Davis that she had.

  * * *

  Unlike the initially surly, combative groundskeeper at St. Joseph’s Cemetery, Jack Campbell, Weaver’s counterpart at Aurora’s First Cemetery, was only too happy to answer any and all questions, as well as to offer his assistance in any manner he could.

  Obviously lonely, the balding, fifty-something groundskeeper seemed delighted to have someone to talk to—and he talked up a storm, going on and on in response to each and every question put to him, even the simplest ones.

  Campbell personally took them on a tour of the smaller cemetery, offering commentary on almost each and every grave.

  And he appeared gleeful when, toward the tail end of the little tour he’d conducted, one more disturbed grave was discovered, adding it to the total from St. Joseph’s and bringing the final number up to five disturbed graves in all.

  According to the date carved into the headstone, Maryanne Wilson had been laid to rest twenty and a half years ago.

  That, Moira noted, made the woman’s grave the first in this small, artificial group. When she exchanged glances with Davis, she could see that the same thought had occurred to him.

  “Would it be possible for you to look up her records to see if there’s a next of kin for us to get in contact with?” Moira requested.

  She’d expected the man to get on it immediately. Instead, he made no move except to look at her with a puzzled expression. Apparently, Campbell now saw himself as part of the investigation and wanted to know more.

  “Whatever for?” he asked.

  She could feel Davis tensing beside her. She couldn’t really blame him. It did feel
as if this investigation was dragging. Still, she didn’t want him to snap at the groundskeeper. At least he was being helpful.

  To balance out the tension Davis was giving off, she told Campbell in a calm, reasonable voice, “We’d like to exhume the body to see if it’s been disturbed or if there was anything taken from within the coffin.”

  Campbell’s brow furrowed as if struggling to comprehend what was going on. “You mean like her jewelry or something?”

  Or something, Moira silently concurred.

  Out loud she told the groundskeeper, “It might be a little more complicated than that.”

  Campbell was already moving toward the small building where all the business that went into running the small cemetery was conducted.

  “I can look it up, but I’m pretty sure no one’s been by to see Maryanne in a few years.”

  Davis looked at him a little suspiciously. In his own way, Campbell struck him as odd as Weaver did. “How would you know that?”

  “I make it a point to know all the people who come by to visit their loved ones,” Campbell replied proudly, like a sentry who never left his post, at least not figuratively. “Let’s go back to the office,” he suggested. Not waiting for them to agree, the groundskeeper turned and began to lead the way.

  * * *

  Campbell beamed when he was proved right.

  According to the copious records he kept, the name of Maryanne Wilson’s next of kin—Sheldon Wilson—was crossed out and a date—November 1999—was written in pencil above the crossed-out name.

  It was, he informed them, the last time anyone had visited the grave.

  “You actually keep records?” Davis asked, looking at the man incredulously.

  Campbell nodded then almost sheepishly confessed, “Not much else to do around here.” He laughed softly to himself. “Just so much raking, watering and fertilizing a man can do before there’s nothing left to rake and he’s drowning the flowers and the lawn. And then it’s not pretty for them anymore.”

  “Them?” Moira questioned.

  Campbell nodded. He scanned the immediate area and went on to proudly inform his all but captive audience, “I like to think of the people resting here as family.”

  Chapter 15

  “Dear lord, I hope you never find yourself being that lonely,” Moira said to Davis when they finally left the cemetery almost four and a half hours later.

  Thanks to Blake Kincannon’s new court order and the ever-amazing swift efficiency of the crime scene investigators who arrived on the scene, Maryanne Wilson’s coffin had been exhumed and opened. It was immediately evident that the elderly woman’s body had been disturbed and then returned to its place. However, none of it was done as carefully as with the other four coffins over at St. Joseph’s Cemetery.

  Not only that, but there were also scuff marks evident on the coffin lid, as if someone had pried it off. Recently, from all appearances, since the marks looked fresh, no more than a month old if that much.

  Moira’s guess was that Maryanne had been the grave robbers’ first.

  But first what?

  And why?

  Her remark to Davis as they left the grounds now had him scowling at her. “What the hell are you talking about?” he asked.

  He liked to think of himself as an intelligent man, but trying to follow Moira’s train of thought was like hoping a sidewinder would travel in a straight line for at least a little while. It just wasn’t going to happen.

  “The way Campbell referred to all those dead people as his ‘family.’”

  Davis shrugged, dismissing the whole scenario. “The guy’s strange. I’m not strange.”

  “But you are lonely.”

  Getting into his vehicle, he slanted a warning look at Moira. “Don’t start.”

  “I won’t—” she promised, getting in on her side “—if you come to the christening this Saturday.”

  The days since he’d begun working with the woman who never stopped talking all seemed to run into one another, like fudge that refused to set. “That’s not over with yet?”

  She snapped her seat belt, the click underscoring her response. “Nope.”

  He jammed his key into the ignition but didn’t turn it. Instead he shifted in his seat to glare at her. “Look, we’re working together—it seems like continuously—isn’t that enough for you?”

  The corners of her mouth curved into a wide, innocent smile. “I repeat. Nope.”

  Davis blew out a breath. “Well, it’s going to have to be. Get used to it.”

  He was about to turn the key when her next question had his hand freezing again. “You have a landline, right?”

  His eyes narrowed. What did that have to do with anything? “Yes. Why?”

  She was the face of innocence as she answered. “Just wanted to know if you’re rather have the call come in on your cell phone or your landline.”

  He felt as if he was going around in circles. “What call?”

  It amazed him how long she could go on looking so innocent when everything she said pointed to the opposite. “The one from the Chief of Ds to personally invite you to the christening.”

  He was getting that itchy feeling in his hands again, the one that had him wanting to strangle her. “You’re like a damn plague of locusts, you know that?”

  “But I’m prettier,” Moira said sweetly, deliberately batting her eyelashes at him like a heroine in a B-grade movie out of the 1950s.

  Davis wasn’t sure just what possessed him at that moment. Most likely it was frustration.

  Or maybe he just wanted to get her to back off once and for all and the only way he felt he could do that was to frighten her off. He reasoned he could do that by kissing her.

  That was why he turned toward Moira and, operating on what amounted to automatic pilot, he suddenly, and without a word, pulled her to him despite her seat belt. He didn’t even remember leaning against the rather awkward transmission shift that was between them, dividing them from one another like an old-fashioned bundling board. All that he did remember was that he kissed her.

  Kissed her hard.

  Kissed her until neither one of them could breathe anymore and the only sound within the sedan was the one created by two pounding hearts.

  “Well, guess that definitely settles it,” Moira said when she was finally able to drag enough air into her lungs to speak again.

  This time she managed to lose him in record time. Davis looked at her rather uncertainly. “Settles what?” he asked.

  She raised her head just a little, so that her eyes met his. “That you don’t think of me as locusts. You wouldn’t have kissed locusts.”

  I shouldn’t have kissed you, either, Davis thought, upbraiding himself ruefully for his monumental descent into insanity. He wasn’t even sure just what had brought it on—other than the plain fact that some sort of a raw attraction sizzled between them. One he neither welcomed nor wanted.

  Moira took in another breath so that she could speak above a ragged whisper. “So, will you be needing that personal phone call from Uncle Brian, or are you going to surrender peacefully and come to the christening of your own free will?”

  There was no doubt about it, the woman made his head ache. He had never encountered anyone so tenacious. “Just how can it be of my ‘own free will’ if you’re threatening me?”

  Moira shrugged. “That’s for you to work out,” she told him and he had the feeling that she meant what she was saying, even if it made no sense. “It’s just a matter of semantics, anyway. So, what’ll it be?”

  Davis finally turned on the ignition and pulled onto the road, away from the cemetery.

  “I’ll come,” he said between gritted teeth. It was the only way he knew of to make her back off.

  Moira spared h
im a small, skeptical look, but for now she kept her thoughts to herself.

  Instead she gave him all the details he supposedly “needed to know” to make it to the christening, which was going to be at ten in the morning that coming Saturday, and to the after-party that followed, conveniently, immediately after the christening. In both cases, she gave him the address of the church and the address to the former chief of police’s house—twice.

  * * *

  Davis intended to be out of his apartment and gone no later than nine that Saturday morning. Not to get to the church where the christening of one Brian Andrew Cavanaugh was to take place, but to make good his escape so he didn’t have to attend the christening. Having come to know how Moira operated, he wouldn’t put it past her to appear at his door with the intentions of dragging him to the christening.

  As it turned out, he was a decent judge of character, especially when it came to Moira, and he had called it. What he hadn’t taken into account, however, was the fact that she was obsessively—and almost criminally—early. So while he was shooting for a getaway before nine, Moira showed up at his aforementioned door at 8:01 a.m.

  Thinking it was his neighbor who periodically enlisted his help in finding her wandering cat, a calico tabby appropriately named Houdini, Davis grudgingly came to the door.

  Opening it, he began his usual mini lecture by saying, “Mrs. McBride, you’ve got to learn to keep your windows and doors closed.”

  “Puts on quite a show, does she?” Moira asked wryly, moving him slightly aside as she walked into his apartment.

  She forced herself to keep her eyes on the disheveled state of the apartment and not on the arousingly disheveled state of the man who had just opened the door for her. Dressed in worn, cut-off jeans that were precariously hanging on to his hips, Davis was bare-chested as well as bare-footed. His hair was still tousled from his night with an uncooperative pillow and the day-old stubble on his face seemed to make his cheekbones appear even more prominent than they already were.

  He was the kind of man that caused nuns to seriously consider chucking a lifetime of celibacy for one night of ecstasy.