No Unturned Stone

by David James Warren

  Everyone stills as we look at her.

  “I didn’t kill my daughter! But I did go there to plead with her to talk to me. To come home and let us…let us help her.” She’s crying now and gone is the woman of poise. Her headband is torn free, her eyes blackened, mascara running down her face. “She called me to meet her, but she never showed up. And I didn’t want Jeff to know—”

  “I knew.” His voice is quiet and for the first time, I see a man broken, a man beyond the golf shirt, the perfect hair, the million-dollar home. “I knew you were visiting her.”

  “How?” Karen’s eyes fill.

  “I heard you talking to her. And I knew you were giving her money. But I just…” He closes his eyes. “I just thought, in time, she’d come home.”

  Oh. Denial. I’m painfully familiar with that game. For a moment, I’m standing in the middle of my kitchen, looking at an empty bottle of Macallans.

  “Are you sure she was pregnant?” His eyes are fierce even as they cloud over.

  I have a terrible, sinking feeling.

  “Not for sure,” Karen whispers. “Why?”

  He shakes his head. “I don’t trust him.”

  And I know who, even as Burke asks.

  “Robert Swenson,” I say, and Jeff nods.

  “I think he talked her into leaving. I think maybe…maybe he was sleeping with her. We had it out a few weeks ago, before a game. He was coming from some deal he made, all cocky, like he was some hotshot, and I confronted him.” Jeff takes a breath. “He told me that my daughter didn’t belong to me anymore. That she was eighteen and could make her own choices.”

  “And what did you say?”

  “We scuffled, but I…” He looks at me, then Karen. “I loved Gretta. I would never hurt her. And I feared that he might say something to her to make her push us out of her life.”

  “A father never stops caring.” I don’t know why I’m channeling my father. “The only way you survive is to hang onto hope.”

  Jeff looks at me like I get it. And I do. Oh, wow, I do. More, I’m doing some scant math. What if during the scuffle, his cufflink fell off, lodged into the door of the Lexus? And maybe, while Karen was at Lulu’s it fell out…

  Before I can test this theory, however, I hear a voice.

  Oh no.

  “Did you call Booker?” I hiss to Burke, who frowns at me, but Booker strides in before I get an answer.

  “Stone!” His voice rings out again. I slowly look up at him.

  “Yeah.”

  “We got a 9-1-1 call from a neighbor,” Booker says, “And dispatch ran a search on your cars. Placed you both here.” He walks over to Jeff, looks at me. “Wanna tell me what’s going on?”

  He’s giving me a hard look, and for some reason, I feel like his arrival has something to do with our previous conversation, the one about changing time. I shake my head. “Following up on a case.”

  “And?” He looks at Jeff.

  I’m unlocking the man’s cuffs. Mostly because I believe him, and yes, he took a swing, or two, at me, but you were there. You heard what I said. So, “You good?” I ask Jeff.

  He rubs his wrists, glances at Booker, then nods. “We have an alarm system. You can check the time I returned from my run. My wife was back from her breakfast—or I guess, her visit to Lulu’s—by then.”

  My hunch is that it’s long before we showed up at Lulu’s to find Gretta’s body still warm.

  Which means, I’m still looking for a killer.

  Booker glances at me, and gestures with his head. And I know I’m in for it when we step out on the stoop and he shuts the door behind me.

  He purses his lips, puts his hands in his pockets. He’s wearing his badge on a lanyard around his neck, his leather jacket, and that watch on his wrist. My watch.

  I want to ask if he’s done any traveling lately.

  “I know where you were last night.”

  My head pops up and all I can think was…Eve?

  “You went to that stakeout with Danny to stop him from getting killed.”

  Yeah, I did. But here’s the thing. If he believes that I stopped Danny’s murder, then maybe he won’t get his knickers in a knot when I go over to the Mulligan’s house today…

  To, um, stop the murderer.

  So I nod. I really hate lying, but maybe I've already stopped Danny’s death. Because if I hadn’t been there, it would have been him chasing down Hassan, and Danny would have been in the sights of his brother, the gunman. So I make a face. “I just…”

  “Can’t live with yourself if you don’t try. I get it…I’ve done it.” His face grows hard. “Don’t do it again. I promise, there are some consequences you can’t live with.”

  I want to ask, but don’t. Still, I apparently can’t keep my youthful mouth shut. “We make changes to our timeline all the time—we just don’t know what the outcome would have been. But imagine being able to save lives, to never let someone suffer—”

  “You don’t know what havoc you’re setting in motion. A thousand tiny changes—all that carry their own ripples. It never ends…” Booker’s mouth tightens. “Don’t make me regret giving you the watch. I might not give it to you after all.”

  I can’t think past the time conundrum that he already did give it to me so…okay, let’s agree that he could go back and rewrite time, too, so maybe I’ll just keep my mouth shut. “I won’t,” I say, my words true.

  “Try and stay out of trouble, Stone.”

  The door opens and Burke walks out. “I got the report from the alarm company. Their alibi checks out.”

  “Jeff and Karen didn’t do it,” I say, my hands in my pockets. “And Swenson has an alibi.”

  “Yeah,” Burke nods, again frowning. “Did I mention that?”

  “Probably.”

  Booker is looking at me, and I’ve had enough scrutiny for today.

  I’m going to pick up some ice cream and go to a party, and somehow, try and stay out of trouble.

  17

  Eve didn’t expect Rembrandt to show up, despite his words last night. If the altercation with her father was as bad as Rembrandt looked, the man should probably steer clear of Danny Mulligan for a while. A decade, maybe.

  Still, the absence of Rem’s black Camaro in the string of cars parked along the road in front of their Minnetonka home had her wondering why she’d spent all morning in her office, digging into the membership roles of Sigma Chi.

  Oh, of course she knew. It was the look Rem gave her as he walked out the door, the words, uttered as if torn from someplace desperate inside. They shook her, really. If I lose you, I lose everything.

  Talk about intense. Perhaps he meant it in a professional, she-was-working-on-his-case kind of way.

  Probably.

  The words drove her out of bed, however, and to the office to hound the Sigma Chi offices for the list of loyal life members from the three chapters in Minnesota. Then she spent the morning accessing the DMV records and putting faces to names in the picture from last year’s event.

  Tracking down the owner of the cufflinks.

  She’d finally shoved the list into her pocket, glanced at the clock and high-tailed it to her parents’ party.

  Now, she walked up the driveway. Music blared from the back yard, Usher singing You Make Me Wanna…Clearly Asher, in charge of the boom box.

  She headed around the house. The sky over the lake was a pristine blue with not a hint of last night’s clouds, the lake alive with boaters and water skiers.

  At the Mulligan dock, Samson was just pulling up in their ski boat, her older brother Lucas, home from Chicago for the weekend sitting copilot, a couple girls she didn’t recognize sitting in the open bow.

  The scent of the freshly cut grass, climbing roses and thick hosta that lined the walk suggested her mother had put her father to work. She spotted a few neighbors sitting in lawn chairs drinking cold brews.

  Her father stood at the smoking grill, armed with a metal spatula and a baseball cap.


  He didn’t look like he’d run down a killer last night. But that was her father—he didn’t bring his work home. Mom’s rules.

  In fact, her mother would like to live in denial that he worked for the police force at all, never mind her only daughter.

  Eve bypassed the food table—piled with watermelon slices, chocolate chip cookies, brownies, and a bowl of kettle chips—and headed straight for the cooler. Pulled out a root beer, dripping and chilly.

  “Hey Evie Bear.”

  “Dad, please.”

  He grinned at her, winked. Dressed in his jeans and a purple Minnesota Vikings t-shirt, Detective Mulligan didn’t quite inspire the fear he did when hunting down a murderer. She leaned into a one-armed hug from him.

  “Are you okay?” She stepped back, looked him over.

  “I’m fine.” He turned to the grill, opened it, testing the burgers. The smell of summer billowed into the air. “Why?”

  She ran her thumb down the side of the can. Glanced out toward the dock where Sams was now bobbing in the water with one ski, waiting for Lucas to hit it.

  Her father closed the grill. Stood looking out at the water as Sams shouted. Lucas revved the boat and Sams popped up on one ski.

  “I heard about the shooting.” She didn’t know why she admitted it, but…well, Rem had been so…unraveled.

  She sort of thought her father might be—

  “From whom?”

  She drew in a breath.

  “Stone, right?”

  “Dad. He was just—he’s worried about you. Says that maybe this Hassan guy will try and come after you.”

  “He should worry about himself. I wasn’t the guy chasing Hassan.”

  “But you killed his brother.”

  Her father’s mouth tightened.

  “Do you think you’re in danger?”

  He looked at her now, his eyes losing the veneer of playfulness. “I’m always in danger, honey. But that’s the job, right?”

  His words reached in and found her heart, squeezed.

  “Eve!”

  The voice, coming from the porch, turned her.

  Her mother stood on the deck. “Did you bring the ice cream?”

  The ice cream. “Sorry!” She turned to her father. “Whoops.”

  “Caught up in a case?” He raised an eyebrow. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll run out after we eat and get some. Have a burger.” He scooped one onto a bun and handed her the plate.

  She wandered down to the shore, watching Sams ski by, shredding the water. Asher sat on the end of the dock and she settled down next to him with her plate.

  “Hey,” he said, glancing over. “I thought you were bringing your friend.”

  She frowned. “Really?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe not. It’s just…” He smiled. “I think he likes you. I saw you two kissing—”

  “You need to forget you saw that, bro.”

  “So, you’re not a thing?” He glanced over her shoulder, toward their father. “Because if you are, you should know Dad came home last night, late, ranting about Detective Stone and how he nearly got himself killed. Dad’s on twenty-four hour leave for his shooting investigation and he’s hot. He doesn’t look like it, but—”

  “No, Rembrandt and I aren’t a thing.” Although, really, she didn’t know what they were. The man showed up at crimes scenes, and in her lab, and then at her house to kiss her…what was that?

  “We just work together.”

  Asher smiled, his mouth a thin line. “Mmmhmm. That’s why you’re blushing.”

  “I’m not—”

  Sams picked then to ski by and shower them with water. Her burger went into the lake. “Hey!” She sprang to her feet.

  Asher laughed, also drenched. Sams sank into the water as he came to a halt. “What, sis, you get a little wet?”

  “Just come over here and we’ll see who is a little wet.”

  “I’m way wet, so…” He splashed her.

  Perfect. Water dribbled down her neck, her T-shirt nearly see through—

  Okay, so maybe she cared a little that Rem might show up.

  She got up and stalked away.

  “Hey!” Sams yelled. “Where are you going?”

  “To buy some ice cream!” She glanced at her father, still at the grill as she marched past him. “Someday I’m going to be head of my CSI department, and you’ll have to stop calling me Evie Bear.”

  His mouth opened, but she stalked past him, around the house toward the front entrance.

  Jerks. Just because she was the only girl—

  “Eve? Whoa!”

  She looked up just in time for Rembrandt to dodge her.

  “Rembrandt!” She staggered back a step.

  “Hey.” He was wearing a pair of jeans, a Journey t-shirt, his hair a little wild, unshaven and… he looked good. Wore a little smile, too, something of a smirk as he stepped back and surveyed her. “You go in the drink with your clothes on?”

  “No. Sams sprayed me.” She wanted to cross her arms over her shirt, but shoot, she just didn’t care. She was fully clothed, wearing more than her bikini. Still, she looked bedraggled, her unruly hair in corkscrews, her clothes glued to her body.

  “Want me to go drown him for you?” Rembrandt moved the bag he was carrying to his other hand, then reached up and moved a chunk of her hair out of her eyes.

  Just the way he asked it, such a laughable suggestion, but one that so sided with her, she just grinned. Nodded. “Please.”

  “Okay. You get the getaway car ready. The keys are in the Camaro.”

  She laughed. “Oh, Rembrandt.”

  He grinned, something warm and sweet in his eyes and his Adam’s apple dipped in his throat, as if he might not be quite as confident as he let on. “Anything for you, Eve. Even jail time.”

  She glanced at the bag and noticed it dripping. “What’s in there?”

  “Ice cream. I figured I should…bring something.”

  “Oh, you’re a life-saver. I totally forgot.” She made a face. “I was at the office all morning.”

  “Of course you were.” He set the bag down. “You work too hard.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Yes, you do.” He stepped back from her, his gaze roaming her face. “You’re so amazingly smart, and someday everyone will figure that out, I promise. But you don’t have to kill yourself to get there.”

  She stared at him, nonplussed. “How do you…how do you do that?”

  “Do what?”

  And she didn’t want to say it because it sounded just so…so… “You just know me.”

  He smiled then, his eyes warm. “I…yeah. Well, I want to, I guess. And it doesn’t take a detective to figure out how hard it might be to stand out in a family of overachieving brothers. And, to be the only other cop in the family. I’m sure your mother wasn’t thrilled.”

  “No, she wasn’t. In fact, she forbade us from being cops. The night my father was shot, she was so angry with him. Called him reckless and…and, well, she’s told me more than once that I’m just like him.”

  “Oh, no, Eve, you’re nothing like Danny. You’re not reckless or stubborn, okay a little stubborn, maybe but—”

  She swatted at him.

  He dodged it. “Listen. You’re a great CSI. And you’re going to be at the top of your game.”

  “You mean I’m not already?”

  His mouth opened.

  “I’m playing with you, Stone.” Then, and she couldn’t put her finger on why, she said, quietly, “Can I tell you something?”

  He nodded.

  “After the coffee bombings, after you were nearly stabbed, I…well, I felt like I should have done a better job. I should have helped you find the location, maybe even the bomber—”

  “Eve.” He took her by the shoulders. “Stop. That was an accident—”

  “What? Finding the right coffee shop?”

  His expression turned a little pale. “I got lucky.”

  �
�No, you didn’t. You got stabbed.” She took his hands. “You could have been killed.”

  And for a second, the same hollow look from last night came over his face. Then, “Naw. C’mon. You’ve met me. I’m indestructible.”

  She gave him a look, but he winked at her.

  There it was. The guy her father warned her about. Cocky, arrogant, and disarmingly charming.

  “Besides, Eve. Don’t tell me that you didn’t stay up for days afterwards picking through the evidence to confirm the bomber.”

  Huh. Because yes, she had. “I connected him to all three bombings, just like you said. But, the one thing I’m still looking for is his designer.”

  Rembrandt frowned. “What?”

  “The guy who designed the bombs. Ramses Vega made them, for sure, but he didn’t design them. That guy is still in the wind.”

  The words settled on Rembrandt like an anvil and he took a breath. “Right.” Then he looked at her. “Maybe we’ll find him together.”

  Maybe. “You trust me?”

  “With everything inside me,” he said quietly, his eyes in hers.

  And somehow, when Rem looked at her like that…she could hear her heartbeat thunder in her chest.

  She’d taken a step toward him, touched his shirt. From the backyard, the radio station had turned, maybe her mother taking control. Bryan Adams was belting out a love song.

  “Everything I do, I do it for you,” Rem said softly, in tune with the song, his blue eyes in hers. He touched her hair. “I love it curly like this.”

  Her gaze fell to his mouth, nearly tasting his urgency from last night. He smelled fresh, as if he’d recently done laundry, and the smell of him, the way the summer wind moved around them, reaping the scent of freedom—

  “Eve, honey, go get changed. Asher and your father will go for the ice cream.”

  Her mother’s voice emerged from where she was coming out of the garage.

  Rembrandt sucked in a breath, and Eve stilled.

  “Uh oh,” she said, and Rem made a face. Then, she turned.

  Her mother stood in the driveway, but behind her, Danny was walking out, swinging his car keys.

  Her mother’s eyes widened.

  Her father stopped, looked at Rembrandt and the expression on his face turned lethal.