Surely someone had mentioned this before, but looking down into her shocked face, he wondered if all her other lovers had been too polite.
“I do not.” Alicia frowned and propped a balled fist beneath her chin.
Drew took a deep, calming breath and lowered his pitch.
“I couldn’t sleep so I went out for a walk.”
Her eyes brimming with righteous indignation, she glared at him.
“How would you like it if I left in the middle of the night without leaving a note or anything?”
“What exactly did you think I was doing? Out screwing the neighbor or something equally vile?”
It sounded ludicrous when he said it like that, and Alicia’s hard expression crumbled. She dropped her gaze and looked contrite.
“I’m sorry. I know it sounds silly, but when I woke up and you weren’t there, I was worried.”
Drew didn’t answer. He stalked into the kitchen and poured himself a mug of hot coffee. God, he needed this—needed something to help get him through the rest of the day. He downed half the mug in silence, then marched out of the room to the shower.
Hot water sprayed his face, and Drew rubbed his eyes, feeling like he hadn’t slept in a week.
He propped his hand against the shower stall and dipped his head low. Water sluiced down his back, washing any trace bits of blood and God knew what else off his body.
Last night had been a huge fucking failure. He still couldn’t believe Kim had taken the coward’s way out and Brooke had done nothing to stop her. Not to mention what that freak Sully had hidden in his trunk. Another complication in what had already been a horrendous night.
But that’s what happened when you went off script. You took risks. You fucked up. You got caught.
Back in the living room, Alicia stood staring at the television, coffee cup in hand.
“Have you seen this?”
He glanced at the screen.
The marquee read “Standoff in Shoreline,” and Drew recognized Charles Sully’s apartment building in the background. His arms went slack. A television reporter spoke into the microphone, her expression sober.
“Early this morning, police responded to a hostage situation in Shoreline. Charles Sully held his pregnant girlfriend, Lara Menendez, at gunpoint. The half-hour standoff with police ended in tragedy as Charles Sully shot Ms. Menendez point-blank. Mr. Sully was shot dead at the scene . . .”
Alicia covered her mouth, still staring at the screen.
“My God, Drew, she was pregnant. What kind of monster would kill his girlfriend and his baby?”
That wasn’t all Sully had done, Drew thought as he strode across the room to the table where he’d left his coffee cup. Behind him the reporter droned on.
“Police found the remains of a dead woman in a duffel bag in Sully’s trunk. The identity of the victim is not yet known.”
“How awful,” Alicia said.
Strolling into the kitchen, Drew allowed himself a small smile. That dumb son of a bitch had gotten himself killed. Execution by cop. A fitting end for a fucked-up night. Without Charles Sully alive to testify, everyone would believe he had been responsible for Kim Covey’s murder. And with one of Brooke’s things thrown in for good measure, the case would be closed.
Drew sipped his coffee, feeling suddenly energized. The day might have started off shit, but it was getting better with each passing minute.
Alicia whirled toward him, remote control still in hand. She clicked off the television.
“I can’t believe this city. What’s next?”
“I know. It’s terrible.” Drew draped an arm around Alicia’s shoulders, pulled her close, and pecked her cheek. “I’ll call you later.”
“Okay.”
Grabbing his coat, he stopped just shy of the front door.
This day was going so damned well, he felt like celebrating. Drew thought about the engagement ring in his dresser drawer. He thought about Charles Sully’s explosive exit from this world and how he might not have a luckier day. He turned back toward Alicia.
“Why don’t we go out for dinner tonight? Wear something nice.”
Chapter 38
Marissa’s cell phone rang. Groaning, she rolled onto her side and plucked it off the nightstand, checking the call display. Her heart lurched.
Kelly.
“Hi, Mom.”
The words were like sweet rain on parched earth, soaking into her heart and easing the pain of last night. They spent a few minutes just talking—nothing profound. It was just so good to hear Kelly’s voice. Marissa thought about how close she’d come to ending it all. Staring into the bathroom mirror, her hand filled with pills, she’d realized she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t abandon her girls. No matter what, she would find Brooke. She would win Kelly back. She would fix her broken family.
Fueled by that realization, she pushed herself out of bed and took the train into work.
“Ah, you’re here, Ms. Rooney,” Holt said, looking surprised to see her. “Do you mind if I . . . ?”
Her words trailed off, and she waved toward the fan on the desk. Marissa shrugged. Why should she care if Holt smoked? Her lungs were probably screwed anyway.
“You left suddenly yesterday. Is everything okay?”
Marissa folded her coat over the back of her chair and nodded.
“Kelly was attacked outside her school. She was taken to the Renton Police Department.”
Holt’s expression changed. Concern filled her gaze as she drew a long white cigarette from the pack stowed in her desk drawer. She flicked the button on the cigarette lighter, touched the orange flame to the end of the cigarette, and sucked deep. A plume of silvery smoke issued from her lips. Reaching out a bony finger, she turned on the fan. The whirring turbine sucked Holt’s sins from the air.
“Was she hurt?”
“She’s okay. She’s staying with my ex-husband for a while.”
Holt tapped the gray stack of ash off into a black onyx ashtray. She took another drag on the cigarette and held the warm smoke in her lungs for a beat before releasing it into the air. Looking deep in thought, Holt watched Marissa and fiddled with the gold pendant hanging from the gold chain around her neck.
“Ms. Rooney, I see now it was unfair to offer you this position. How can I expect you to focus on the foundation when you are under such enormous pressure at home?”
Marissa needed this job. Money aside, how could she possibly stay sane if all she did was sit alone in her kitchen waiting for the phone to ring? She knotted her hands together on the desk and stared across the room at Holt.
“I can do this, Ms. Holt. I need to do this,” she said in a shaky voice. “This is my best shot at staying close to the investigation. Please.”
Marissa rose. She pulled a piece of folded paper from her pocket. She’d spent the entire train ride into the city writing, and while she knew it wasn’t perfect, she hoped it was enough to show Holt she was serious about the job.
“I’ve been working on a press release for the foundation.”
Holt took the copy from her outstretched hand and quickly scanned it. Her eyebrows rose. Marissa didn’t know if this was a good or a bad thing.
“Did you do this yourself?”
“I did a little online research.” On her phone.
Writing didn’t come easily to her. She could take dictation and draft business letters, but capturing the foundation’s mission statement in a press release had been like composing a sonnet in Klingon. Her purse was filled with crumpled drafts.
Holt read the copy out loud.
“‘The Holt Foundation is here to help victims of violence piece their lives back together by providing support and services to help those in need. Our network of professionals can help victims deal with the trauma of victimization while also providing critical legal support in the courtroom and criminal justice process.’”
“It’s a little rough,” Marissa admitted.
Elizabeth nodded and picked up
a red pen. She marked up the page with broad strokes, slashing some sections and scrawling notes on others before handing it back to Marissa.
If doctors were notorious for their bad handwriting, lawyers weren’t much better. Holt’s cramped and narrow script was worthy of a third grader. Marissa glanced at the edits and stowed the paper beside the keyboard on her desk. Anxious to show she’d put some thought into the matter, she turned back toward Holt.
“It’s a good start, Ms. Rooney.”
“Thank you,” Marissa said softly.
Holt gripped the pendant between her fingers, looking pensive.
“Work saved me. After the attack, I mean. I decided to go to law school. That’s how I worked through my grief. My rage.”
“You became a lawyer.”
A short bark of laughter escaped Holt’s lips.
“Yes. In my weaker moments, I fantasized about prosecuting the man who raped me, which was ludicrous, of course. And while things never worked out exactly the way I planned, it was still the right path for me. The law. I think the foundation is the right place for you, Marissa.”
Holt’s cobalt eyes held Marissa’s, and she could feel a frank sincerity in the old woman’s words. Like Kelly’s call this morning, they brought a measure of comfort.
“I hope so too, but . . .”
Marissa was interrupted by Holt’s upraised hand.
“No. No more self-doubt. I’ve read your file. I know you have overcome your share of obstacles. You have raised two daughters single-handedly, put yourself through school, and worked hard to build a life for your family. I believe you can do whatever you set your mind to. It is time you started believing in yourself.”
No one had ever believed in her before—not her parents or her husbands. Not herself. “I’ve rendered you speechless.” Holt smiled.
She had.
Overwhelmed by Holt’s confidence in her, Marissa focused on something concrete—the next steps for the foundation.
“I’ve been thinking about the types of professional services the foundation could provide. Like helping with the search for missing persons,” she said, thinking of Alice Chang and her army of volunteers. “And legal support, of course. And maybe counseling.”
“Counseling.” Holt nodded.
“Absolutely,” Marissa said, thinking about the handful of pills swirling down the bathroom sink and how close she’d come to making a desperate decision. “Families need support. And the victims, once they’re safe, will need therapy.”
Holt’s lips stretched into a satisfied smile, and she stretched back in her chair, her sagging chin tilted toward the ceiling. She took a drag on her cigarette, collecting her thoughts.
“I like the way you’re thinking. Investigators.”
“Investigators? You mean like Henry Cahill?”
“Yes, and we’ll need others. Private investigators, maybe former police officers. We’ll need a network of people who have different types of expertise to engage in the different types of cases.”
Marissa jotted down some notes. Maybe Detective Crawford knew some retired cops she could contact. More staff meant more expenses.
“All of this will cost money,” Marissa said.
“I expect our network will consist of paid employees, special consultants, and experts who volunteer their time. But yes, money is key. The heartbeat of any foundation is its ability to fund-raise. You need money to do good work, and although I’ve already seeded the foundation with enough money to get it off the ground, it will eventually need to become self-sustaining. We need other benefactors. To that end I’ve arranged a fund-raiser on Saturday night. It’s a black-tie affair at the convention center. I’ll send you the guest list. I want you to add three more Seattle VIPs. Call them. Pitch the foundation. Get them to come.”
Marissa swallowed. She didn’t know any VIPs. How was she supposed to find willing benefactors with deep pockets? Why didn’t Holt just give her the names so she could call them?
Then she got it. It was a test. Holt wanted her to dig. Teach a man to fish, or something like that. She had some contacts through the law firm. Mr. Regis. Maybe Logan knew some people too. It was a starting point, and if all else failed, there was Google. There had to be a list of wealthy Seattle philanthropists posted somewhere online. She would find it.
“What else?”
Holt smiled. She took another pull on her cigarette. A fierce coughing spasm rattled her gaunt frame. Holt grabbed a handful of tissues from the box on her desk and covered her mouth and nose.
Evan Holt burst through the door. Elizabeth Holt’s watery eyes glanced up, and she held out a hand warding him off. Finally the coughing fit subsided. Marissa stepped back. Holt tossed the wad of tissues in the trash can, but not before Marissa noticed the bloody streaks of mucus. Evan handed her a glass of water, and Holt sipped slowly.
“Are you going to put that out?” Evan asked, nodding toward the smoldering cigarette.
Holt cocked her chin at a defiant angle and took another long drag on the cigarette. Evan frowned and shook his head. Marissa could feel disapproval radiate off him. Even she was surprised by the depth of Holt’s defiance.
“Lizzie . . .”
Evan’s rebuke was interrupted by a curt knock. Detective Crawford entered the room. Marissa felt a twinge of surprise, and something else. Fear.
Crawford’s eyes met hers. She knew by the look on his face that something was very wrong.
“Have you been watching the news?”
Marissa shook her head, her throat closing tight.
The color drained from Holt’s face. “What is it, Detective?” she asked.
Looking stricken, he locked his eyes on Marissa’s.
“We found a . . . a girl.”
Chapter 39
Marissa gritted her teeth. Traffic oozed like lipid-rich blood through sticky arteries. Everywhere she looked, the city streets were choked with gridlock. Moronic drivers paid more attention to their electronic devices than what was going on around them. She cursed pedestrians for crossing against the lights. Most of all, she cursed the city planners for designing a system so fundamentally broken it took half an hour to drive ten lousy blocks.
The girl in the morgue could be her daughter. Oh God. The thought was so terrible, so unbearable, that Marissa struggled to breathe. She cracked the window an inch. Cold air blasted her face and helped quell the waves of nausea.
“Can’t you go any faster?”
“Two more blocks and we’ll be there,” he assured her.
Marissa covered her eyes and focused on her breathing. She’d always believed she could face anything as long as it was the truth. But now, faced with the horrifying possibility that her daughter was dead, she knew she’d been wrong. For the first time in her life, she dreaded the truth.
“Is it Brooke?” Marissa asked Crawford in a small, scared voice she didn’t recognize as her own. “If you know, you’ve got to tell me now, before we get there.”
Crawford shot a concerned glance her way.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not good enough. How can you not know? What does that even mean?”
Crawford hesitated.
“I wish I didn’t have to tell you this, but the body . . .” He stopped and Marissa braced for more bad news. Nothing prepared her for the horror of what he said next. “This girl has been severely mutilated.”
Marissa felt the weight of Crawford’s stare, but she refused to look his way. She couldn’t bear to see the compassion, the pity in his eyes. She was barely holding it together. She needed proof. She needed to see for herself this girl wasn’t her daughter. Proof was still blocks away, though, as they continued their agonizing crawl through city traffic.
Marissa’s head pounded with a sickening thud as a migraine took root behind her eyes. She didn’t drop her hand away from her face until she felt the car stop.
The King County medical examiner’s office looked like any other office building located a
t the base of Capitol Hill. Modern construction, made of concrete and glass, it stretched fourteen stories up into the gray sky.
On shaky legs Marissa entered the lobby, trailing a step or two behind Crawford. It felt like they walked for miles along the arterial maze of hallways pulling them deeper into the building’s core. Each step came slower, harder, weighted down by the paralyzing dread she felt that her worst fears might soon be realized.
If it was Brooke, if it was, Marissa didn’t know how she would face it. How she would get through the rest of her life. Hell, the next few days, hours, minutes—if Brooke was dead.
She stopped, staring at the double doors ahead like she’d reached the gates of hell. Crawford turned. His compassionate gaze met hers. She trembled as her fears overwhelmed her.
“You don’t have to do this, you know.”
“I do,” she said at last. “I have to know. If it’s Brooke back there . . .” Her voice caught. She swallowed and pushed the painful words out. “If it’s Brooke, she shouldn’t be alone.”
Steeling herself for whatever truth lay beyond, she stepped toward the doors. Crawford gave a solemn nod. Placing a hand on her back, he guided her down the remaining stretch of hallway. Grateful he was standing by her side, she pushed through the doors.
#
Nothing had prepared Marissa for the smell. The sharp scent of ammonia did not mask the deeper sickly sweet, coppery smell in the room, like rotten meat. Marissa’s head pounded, and her stomach took a nauseating dive. She pressed a hand against her mouth to stop from gagging.
She remembered once riding on her bike past a dead raccoon smeared on the road. She might have been ten, maybe eleven, at the time. Flies swarmed around the carcass, and Marissa had pedaled faster, desperate to get away from the stench, from the horror of the poor animal’s remains. A lifetime had passed, and still she had never forgotten the smell of death.
A thin middle-aged man in green scrubs stood by the table. He turned and greeted Crawford with a nod of his head.
“Detective.”
“Dr. Meeks, what can you tell us?”
In the Dark Page 20
