by Nan Sampson
Ellie sat down across from him. "I'm sorry. I truly am. You're right, I have no right to judge you."
He looked at her, then gave her a weak grin. "Damn skippy." A pained look quickly crossed his face and he scrubbed it away with long slender fingers. "Gah! I'm sorry too. Didn't mean to go off on you like that. It's just staying here makes me a little tense."
"I get that. Me too." She got up, grabbed a couple of bottles of water from the fridge. "Here. We both need this after all the salt in the pizza."
"I'd rather have a soda. Or a beer."
"No soda. Too much sugar and caffeine. You need some water to flush your system. You'll feel better for it."
"This from a woman who peddles caffeine for a living?"
"Hey, I sell decaf too."
The water was cool and fresh and felt a lot like the air at the park had. It helped further clear the cobwebs from her head. "Okay, so Kaela is upstairs with her little friend, Kirby is building something with Legos in his bedroom so he can destroy it later, and Dan and Kyle are out scouting. Can we talk about the elephant in the living room now?"
"For that, I'd rather have a scotch."
"That bad?"
"Isn't violent death always bad? Why do you think I'm not on the force anymore?"
She hadn't given it that much thought. Except maybe that he hadn't liked real work.
"Should I go get Kate?"
He glanced toward the family room. "I don't know... I don't want her to get all upset."
Ellie appreciated his concern, but she wasn't going to hide anything else from Kate. "You said it yourself last night. She's tougher than we think she is. Besides. She needs to know the truth, so whether it comes from you or me, she's going to hear it one way or another. May as well just get it from you."
"I suppose."
With an audible scrape, she got up and tread loudly down the hall to the family room. Kate looked up from channel surfing. "You two through smooching?"
Ellie groaned. "We weren't. Gah, don't even put that picture in my head." She heard a laugh from the kitchen - Charlie was apparently eavesdropping. "Charlie wants to talk to us about what he got from the cops today. Care to join us?"
"Why don't you two come in here? I can keep an eye on the stairs for little eavesdroppers that way, and the fire is nice and cozy."
"True enough." She turned back to the kitchen and hollered for Charlie. "Nice idea, the fire. Makes me feel like I'm home."
"I don't know how you manage without central heating. It's like you're living in a cave up there, Ellie. You know, I could lend you some money..."
"I don't need it. But thanks, I do appreciate it."
Loping in like a puppy not quite grown into his paws, Charlie plunked himself down at one end of the couch and stretched out, resting his feet on Kate's lap. He wiggled his toes. "Wanna give me a foot massage?"
Kate wrinkled her nose and pushed his feet off, but she was smiling when she said, "Get those stinky dogs off me. Good Lord, Charlie. You act like you're a kid."
"I am. I always will be. I intend to die that way."
Biting her tongue, Ellie took a seat in the overstuffed leather chair by the fire. "Okay, we've probably got a limited window of time here. Let's hear the story."
Charlie looked to Kate, who nodded seriously. "Okay. So I called Abel Morales. You remember him, Kate?"
Kate nodded. "Such a nice man."
"Abel trained me," he explained to Ellie. "What he doesn't know isn't worth knowing. He said he couldn't tell me anything he'd learned through official channels, and I said no, of course not."
It was hard not to hurry him along. So Ellie focused on the tassel of the multi-colored afghan that hung across the arm of her chair, sorting the yarn strings into like colored bundles, while Charlie wound his way to the meat of his story.
"So I said, just off the record, what's the scuttle butt on the street? He gave me an earful. Apparently a couple of the unis who were first on the scene went for a drink afterward and told some of their buddies what they'd seen, and Abel heard it from them when he went into the same bar afterwards."
Ellie couldn't hold back any longer. "And that was?"
"Well, first of all, she wasn't found exactly in the alley. I mean, not just lying there. She was actually in a dumpster a couple of yards from the restaurant's back door."
Kate blanched. "Oh, God."
He touched her arm. "I'm sorry, Katie, but it gets worse. Or at least, weirder."
Kate glanced over at Ellie, who was watching Kate for a reaction and trying to look unfazed. "Don't look at me like that, Ellie. I'm not a shrinking violet."
Ellie raised up her hands. "I wasn't looking at you any particular way. Go on, Charlie."
"Okay, so, she was in full rigor, so they estimated TOD – time of death – at around 10:00 p.m. the previous night. According to statements by the people she was having dinner with, that meant that she must have been killed very shortly after she left the restaurant to go home."
"How was she killed?"
"There were ligature marks around her neck, although the angle was odd, as though the killer had been standing below her. The thinking at the moment is that she was on the steps, on the back stoop of the restaurant, and the killer was behind her. Maybe she'd stepped out back for a breath of air or something. Hard to say. The killer grabs her from behind with something, a rope maybe. Pulls her down."
"So she was strangled."
Charlie nodded. "At least, that's the way it looks now. The M.E. hasn't finished the post mortem yet, but it was strangulation, either manual or ligature, although probably ligature."
"And the killer?"
"Some gang banger, or that’s the current line of reasoning goes. Her purse was found a couple of streets away. Wallet was empty of cash and credit cards. Someone used the cards online, but so far the cops haven't been able to trace the user."
Ellie scowled. Typical cop. Go for the easiest solution - the one involving the least amount of work. "So they're going with the robbery theory. Crime of opportunity."
"It's what fits the facts at the moment. What else could it be?"
Ellie looked at Kate. Kate raised her eyebrows in a sort of shrug. Frustrated, Ellie swung her legs off the chair and planted her feet on the floor, resting her forearms on her knees. "Okay, in for a penny, in for a pound, but Charlie, if I tell you this, I need to know I can trust you. You have to be one of us, not one of them."
"Who's them, Ellie?"
"I don't know. Them. The cops, maybe. The bad guys. Whoever ‘they’ are."
Charlie looked from Ellie to Kate and back again. "You guys been smoking a little wacky weed and not sharing?"
"This is serious, Charlie."
"Okay, fine. I'm in, whatever that means. I mean, you can trust me."
"I came down here because Wednesday morning, Lacey called me at work to ask for my help. She said someone was trying to kill her and that she wanted me to find out who."
Charlie made a face. "Seriously?"
"It's true, Charlie." Kate was nodding. "She called me saying the same thing."
Ellie watched emotions dance across Charlie's face. "Stop gulping like a fish. Say what you're thinking."
"I don't know what I'm thinking. Not yet. Other than it seems... unbelievable."
Kate's tone was defensive. "Well, we're not lying."
"I didn't mean that you were," he told her gently. "I just mean that it seems hard to believe anyone would want this Lacey dead."
"That's exactly what I thought. She worked in the catalog industry. In marketing and circulation. Not exactly a high risk kind of job."
"Industrial espionage?"
A nervous giggle slipped out and Kate clapped her hand over her mouth. "Oh, please. This isn't an episode of Remington Steele."
Ellie scoffed. "No, more like Murder She Wrote. I come to town and people start dying."
"Okay, okay, stop it. So you're telling me she really believed someone was trying to kill her."
"Yes. She said they'd already tried and failed a couple of times and that she wasn't sure how long she could dodge the bullet."
"Did she give you any details about the previous attempts?”
Ellie thought back. “No, no she didn’t. Kate?”
Kate chewed on her lip. “I remember her saying something about the gas in her apartment. She said it was impossible for her to have left a burner on because she never used her stove.”
Charlie scribbled in his notebook. “So it sounds like she thought she’d been gassed. Do you know if she reported it?”
Kate shrugged. “That was the impression I got. But I don’t know for sure.”
“You said a couple of times, Ellie. Any idea what the second attempt might have been?”
Ellie shook her head. “Lacey wasn’t exactly forthcoming. Just insistent.”
“Kate?”
Kate shook her head too. “Not that I can think of, Charlie.”
“Ellie, when she called you, can you remember her exact words? Sometimes there’s clues in the details."
Looking into the flames of the fire, she tried to recall the conversation in detail, found she couldn't. "I'm sorry. I was so anxious to get her off the phone, I wasn't really paying attention. I didn't want to come. I didn't really want to see her again."
Kate leaned forward. Ellie could tell she was trying to get Ellie to look at her, but Ellie kept her gaze fixed on the fire. She wasn’t ready to talk to Kate about the cruise. Not yet. She wasn’t sure what she was afraid of, wasn’t sure why she thought Kate would get mad, but the thought of Kate not being there for her terrified her.
Charlie stood up, paced a bit. "Did she give you any indication who she thought was behind it?"
"No. But it was clear she thought she knew. She said she couldn't say. It sounded like she thought her phone might be bugged."
He stared at her then shook his head. "Really? Wow. That’s kind of crazy." Then, "You've got to tell this to the police."
"I don't trust Kowalski."
"I don't care. You've got to tell them. They have no reason right now to even look for a different kind of suspect. Morales said that they looked briefly at the folks she was at dinner with, but they all alibied each other. So if you don't say anything to the cops, chances are this thing will go unsolved." He paused. "If it was, indeed, more than just what it looks like."
"Ellie, he's right. We have to tell them what we know."
"I know, I know. It's just that Kowalski is such a cretin."
"Why don't I take you down to the station tomorrow? Kowalski won't be there, I know for a fact he'll be off shift. We can speak to one of the other investigators."
"Are they all like him?"
There was a laugh behind Charlie's eyes, but he had the grace to keep it stifled. "No. He's certainly of a breed, but no, they're not all like him."
Why didn't that make her feel any better? "Fine. Okay."
"Good. This will give them someplace to start looking. Sounds like maybe it could be work related, although I can't imagine the world of catalog circulation is really that cut throat."
Ellie thought back to her days in marketing. "I guess it depends. Some of those people take their jobs and themselves incredibly seriously. I kept having to remind myself, every time I missed a deadline, that it wasn't brain surgery, that nobody was going to die. But to some of those people, it might just as well have been." She shook her head. “Still. Murder? It just doesn’t make sense.”
The fire crackled in the silence. Charlie watched her in a way he never had before, and it made her uncomfortable. He was looking at her like a cop – and she didn't like it. Seems like maybe he would have made a good one if he'd stuck it out.
Finally, he said, "Probably a good thing you got out then. You don't strike me as the type to get all worked up over things that aren't really important."
There was something more buried in that comment, but she hadn't the energy left to suss it out. "I'm beat. I don't see that there's much more we can do today."
Kate pushed herself off the couch. "How about some tea or cocoa and a movie. Thanks to Dan, we have more DVDs than Blockbuster. Charlie, why don't you take Ellie down to the new movie library and the two of you can pick out something to watch. Something that will take our mind off all this."
Charlie rubbed his hands together and in a rather good imitation of a British accent, said, "Capital idea, my dear Katherine." He proffered Ellie his crooked arm. "Come along, my dear. I don't believe you've had the chance to see the new and improved McCallum Entertainment Library. It's downstairs, right next to the wine cellar."
"Wine cellar?"
"He's joking, Ellie. But Dan did install some nice built-in shelves in the rec room. You guys go fight over – I mean, choose – a movie and I'll make some popcorn and get the hot water going."
The idea of a good old fashioned movie night was appealing in so many ways, Ellie couldn't even come up with an argument. Maybe she wouldn't even argue with Charlie over a title. She had to imagine his taste in movies and hers were worlds apart, but maybe they could find something that neither found too objectionable – and that Kate would want to watch too.
So she took his arm and let him guide her to the "entertainment library".
Chapter 17
The interview room in the precinct house Charlie escorted them into the next morning smelled like disinfectant and stale coffee. The disinfectant she could understand but the stale coffee smell came from the cups that the detective had just brought them. For someone who made her living serving a good cup, it was torture.
Terry Borchard was probably in his early-to-mid forties, although his hairline had clearly receded years before. He wore his tweed jacket and worn white oxford like a uniform. Ellie figured he had about six of the shirts, and just rotated them through the dry cleaners. His Dockers were nicely creased, so those had to go to the dry cleaners too. No wedding ring – and even Kate didn't press Dan’s pants anymore. Clearly, Borchard wanted to make a good impression, and had at least a little extra cash to do it – although not enough to afford the expensive suits a cop on the take might wear.
She almost laughed. Did cops on the take really wear expensive suits? Or was that just on NYPD Blue?
Borchard didn't seem to notice, although Kate had and shot her a glance. If she'd been close enough, Kate might even have kicked her under the table.
Borchard passed around the Styrofoam cups full of the noxious coffee then seated himself. Charlie stood by the window, clearly trying to separate himself a little, but wanting to be there nevertheless.
"So. Charlie says you may have some information for us about the Silberson case. May I ask how you knew Ms. Silberson?"
At least he'd gotten her name right. That was a start. She glanced at Kate, who just looked at her as if to say, this is your gig. "Kate and I went to college with Lacey. I... we... well, I haven't seen her in probably ten years. Kate? Have you?"
Kate nodded. "A couple of times, the odd lunch downtown. But even that's been a couple of years. We spoke on the phone a couple of times a year though."
Again, more evidence that Lacey had insinuated her way back into Kate’s life. It rankled that Kate hadn’t shared that bit of information.
"You had plans with her this weekend, I understand?"
Ellie took a breath. "Well... Sort of." She pushed the coffee cup aside. The smell was making her sick. Or maybe just being here was. "You see, Lacey called me the other day - Wednesday morning." She went through the story again, trying to recall, without any more luck than she had the night before, exactly what Lacey had said.
"And she gave you no indication at all who she suspected?"
"No. I wish she had. I even asked her. But she was so damn mysterious about it."
Borchard made a few notes, then looked up at her. "Do you know why she would have called you instead of the police?"
"That's what I told her. That she should call the police. She said she couldn'
t. I got the impression she was involved in something. In over her head."
"Something like what?"
"I have no idea." She squeezed her eyes shut, tried to imagine Lacey involved in something shady. Sadly, it wasn’t hard. Lacey was a game player. "I don’t know - but she could be driven. Ambitious. If she wanted something, nothing would stand in her way, she’d make sure of it."
“What was it she currently wanted?”
Ellie raised her eyebrows. “I wish I knew.” She glanced over at Kate. “Kate? You had more recent contact.”
Kate shook her head. Was that a little guilt in her eyes? “I know she was always talking about work. About her successes, her ‘wins’, as she called them. She did seem to get a great deal of satisfaction over beating other co-workers in terms of accomplishments.” She looked over at Ellie, who couldn’t help smiling tightly at the admission. “I didn’t really pay too much attention, I’m afraid. Outside of work, we mostly talked about family, and most recently about an upcoming college reunion.”
Ellie winced at the mention of a reunion. No way was Kate going to rope her into going. She pushed that thought aside.
Borchard looked bored. “So she never mentioned this suspicion of hers to you.”
Kate slumped in her chair. “Well, not until the other day. But it had been several weeks since we’d spoken. I guess I assumed all of this had started recently.”
Borchard turned back to Ellie. “Was this kind of behavior normal for Ms. Silberson? Did she tend to be a suspicious person?”
Ellie fidgeted with the cuff of her down jacket. That’s right, she thought, blame the victim. Turn her into a crazy paranoid. “If you mean, did she invent midnight assassins to get attention, the answer is no. If Lacey said someone was trying to kill her, she wasn’t lying.”
Kate shot her a look. “Well, you said it the other night, Ellie. She could get... dramatic when she wasn’t getting her way about certain things.”
“Kate!” What was she doing? Deliberately trying to get the cops to bury the case in a deep hole?
