The Whisper f-4

by Carla Neggers

  "You and Taryn worried me even before you were born. The day Mom announced she was having twins, I knew I was screwed."

  Sophie smiled. "We had a happy childhood."

  "Right. You did." But this was pure Damian. "Wendell Sharpe called me. He had to rave about how brilliant you are first. Then he told me he'd just met with a British woman who's in touch with the BPD. She asked about you. I sent you to Sharpe not for a second thinking you'd get mixed up in criminal investigations. Bombs, murders, kidnappings. Damn, Sophie."

  "I'm not involved in any of that."

  "The cops you're hanging out with are, and you found a murdered police officer yesterday."

  "I don't know that he was murdered. Do you?"

  "Not officially."

  She stood up and looked out at the brick courtyard, inviting and romantic in the midday autumn sun. She'd planned on lunch outside among her mums. "What else did Wendell Sharpe tell you?"

  "Nothing you don't already know. Sophie..." Her brother hesitated, which was unusual for him. "Last September in Ireland?"

  She couldn't go through it. Not again, not so soon. "Unusually dry and mild."

  "Damn it, I'm trying to help--"

  "I know you are, Damian," she said, her head clear now. She could see him in some FBI office, with his dark auburn hair, his good looks, his gun strapped to his side. He loved his work as much as she and Taryn loved theirs. "Maybe it's just as well you don't know all the details."

  "You're my sister. I want to know." He sounded worried again, less combative. "I have some of the details. I can get a flight up there the minute you say so. If you have any information on where Percy Carlisle is, tell me or tell the police. Then back off. I don't like how this thing feels, Sophie. If we were talking about a major archaeological excavation, I'd listen to you."

  Sophie sat at the table, in Scoop's chair from yesterday, when he'd patiently listened to her story. "The internal affairs detective who was hurt in the bomb blast has been on my heels. We ran into each other in Ireland."

  Damian was silent a moment. "Cyrus Wisdom. Scoop."

  "Do you know him?"

  "Of him. He's top-notch. Just remember, Sophie. Cops tell you only what they want you to know, and they can lie. You can't lie to them, but that doesn't mean they can't lie to you."

  "Do you know Scoop is lying to me, Damian?"

  "That was a general statement. If I were you, I'd be very careful trusting anyone right now except Taryn, Mom, Dad and me."

  She thanked him for calling--for his advice and concern--but he was back to being Damian and just grunted and disconnected. It was all Sophie could do not to throw her iPhone against the fireplace, not because of her brother but her situation. She'd felt safe when she'd headed to the Beara Peninsula to check out Keira's ruin, figuring if Jay Augustine was responsible for both their ordeals, at least he was in jail and no longer a danger. But what if Cliff Rafferty's death had nothing to do with either her or Keira, and the Celtic symbols in his apartment were just a diversion--a way to obfuscate and mislead?

  To what end?

  Sophie shut down her laptop and headed out to the courtyard. She smiled at her pots of mums, as if they were a symbol of happiness and normalcy. She could easily see Scoop taking up gardening. He was physical, results-oriented--he'd appreciate hoeing, weeding, harvesting.

  She gave herself a mental shake and remembered her brother's cautionary words. Scoop was a detective recovering from a bomb exploding within yards of him, and yesterday morning she'd led him to the probable bomb-maker--who was dead.

  What if the bomb-making materials had been planted on Cliff Rafferty's coffee table?

  Whatever the case, did she really think Scoop had gardening on his mind?

  Feeling considerably less jet-lagged than she had yesterday, Sophie was too restless for lunch and continued through the archway and up the steps to the street. Damian was right. She was accustomed to being contained and decisive in her world as an archaeologist, but she'd been off balance ever since she'd learned more details about Keira Sullivan's experience on the Beara Peninsula.

  Avoiding Charles Street and the Whitcomb Hotel, she wound her way down to busy Beacon Street and crossed to the Boston Public Garden, a Victorian botanical oasis in the heart of the city. She immediately relaxed amid its enormous shade trees and well-kept lawns and flower beds. She noticed leaves just beginning to change color, tinted gold, orange and red, and walked past the shallow man-made pond where the foot-pedaled Swan Boats had entertained tourists and locals alike for more than a century. She could have spent the afternoon on a bench, or brought her laptop with her and worked on turning her dissertation into a book, as Colm Dermott was encouraging her to do.

  Instead she crossed Boylston Street and continued toward Jay and Charlotte Augustine's showroom in the South End.

  Scoop materialized on the next corner and fell in next to her. Sophie angled a look at him. "How long have you been following me?"

  "Since the Swan Boats."

  "I'm not good at spotting a tail. I guess I'd have to learn if I decide to be an FBI agent, huh?" Her breath caught at his grim intensity. "What's wrong?"

  He stayed close to her as they crossed the street. "Jay Augustine died this morning in his jail cell, probably of a massive stroke."

  "Then whatever secrets he had died with him. Had he been sick?"

  "Not that anyone knew. He was one evil son of a bitch. I wouldn't be surprised if he willed his own death--made himself have a stroke so he could be with the devil he admired so much."

  A crowd of office workers and shoppers swarmed past them. "Could he have suspected something was wrong with him and refused to tell anyone?"

  "It doesn't matter now. He's done."

  "Did Cliff Rafferty ever meet him, talk to him?"

  Scoop shook his head. "Not that we know of. What's on your mind, Sophie?"

  She nodded vaguely down the street. "I'm on my way to the Augustine showroom in the South End. I wonder if anyone's there to let me in."

  "All right." Scoop was cool, hard to read. "We'll walk over there together. Someone will be there today."

  Because of Augustine's death, she realized.

  Scoop matched her pace. "Hell of a coincidence after yesterday. Maybe Cliff had a word with the devil and they summoned old Jay home."

  They came to a narrow building with an upscale health club on the first floor. Scoop opened a glass door to the small entry. The Augustine showroom--or former showroom, Sophie thought, since it was now closed--was on the third floor. They took a cramped elevator that barely fit the two of them. She was intensely aware of the brush of his arm against hers, the shape of his chest, his thick thighs.

  Scoop smiled at her as if reading her mind. "Tight quarters."

  The elevator clanked to a stop and opened into a reception area. Frank Acosta was there with a uniformed officer. "Figured you two would show up," he said, leaning against the edge of an empty rolltop oak desk. "I came by after I heard about Augustine. Bastard did us a favor by dropping dead on his jail cell floor. He was never going to talk."

  "We'd like to take a look around," Scoop said.

  Acosta dropped onto a chair at the desk. "Go right ahead. We're done here. Charlotte Augustine has an auction house lined up to sell off the inventory as soon as she's legally cleared to get rid of this place. It'll be easier now with her husband dead on his jail cell floor. Everything's packed up." He glanced at Sophie with half-closed eyes. "Take your time."

  She started to thank him, but Scoop stepped in front of her and pushed open the door to an adjoining room, holding it for her. She entered a long, narrow storeroom with deep shelves on one wall. The floor and shelves were stacked with neatly labeled crates and boxes, only a few pieces not packed up and ready to be moved out.

  Scoop followed her down a row of crates. She ran her fingertips over one that came up to her waist. "I'm telling you," she said. "Detective Acosta doesn't like you."

  "He doesn't like i
nternal affairs."

  "Has he had run-ins with other internal affairs detectives or with you personally?"

  "Sophie, I can't discuss--"

  "Internal affairs deals with administrative issues that aren't necessarily criminal," she said, moving down the row. "Laziness, lying to superiors, sexual indiscretions, showing up drunk on the job. Any of those describe Detective Acosta? Did he cross a line that got him into trouble with his bosses but not the district attorney?"

  Ignoring her questions, Scoop bent down for a closer look at a hip-high marble statue. "He's not wearing any clothes."

  Sophie gave up but couldn't resist a smile. "You can be very stubborn. That statue is a high-quality copy of the Greek god Apollo, by the way. It's marked as such, so there's no deception."

  He straightened. "I don't think I'd want Apollo here in my dining room."

  She checked out more crates, noting labels and staying alert in case anything jumped out at her that could help her understand what "Celtic pieces" the worker claimed to have seen and were now nowhere to be found.

  "Tell me what you see, Sophie," Scoop said, serious now.

  "A lot of crates. It'd be helpful to find one labeled 'stolen Celtic artifacts,' wouldn't it?"

  Acosta came up behind them. "I can let you into the climate-controlled room where the kid who used to work here said he saw them."

  "That'd be great," Sophie said as he hit buttons on an alarm panel.

  "You must have brought an ill wind back from Ireland," Acosta said, standing back from the door. "Cliff dies. Now Augustine dies, not that anyone will miss him."

  Sophie felt Scoop stiffen next to her, but he made no comment as they entered the climate-controlled room. "How did Cliff Rafferty end up working security here?" she asked. "Did he request the assignment?"

  "Take a look around, Dr. Malone," Acosta said, ignoring her question. "Tell us if you see anything."

  "Maybe he stole the missing artifacts himself. If he had a buyer in the wings--"

  Acosta didn't let her finish. "I'll wait outside."

  He withdrew, and Sophie frowned at Scoop. "He doesn't like me, either. Do you know how Rafferty ended up working security here? Did he and Detective Acosta know each other when the break-in happened at the Carlisle Museum?"

  "Probably." Scoop's dark eyes settled on her. "No freelancing, Sophie, remember?"

  She smiled suddenly. "I ask a lot of questions. It's the nature of what I do."

  "Same here. I understand, but you still need to watch yourself--for your own sake."

  She moved deeper into the small, windowless room, taking note of more boxes and crates of canvases, statues, porcelain and metalwork on shelves and leaned up against the walls. "Are other pieces missing from the inventory, or just the Celtic artifacts the worker says he saw?"

  "Just those."

  She looked up at an ornate clock set on a top shelf, then stepped back to the middle of the room. "Anything Celtic is in high demand these days. It doesn't matter what era or country of origin. I don't see anything here that's obviously Celtic--Iron Age or otherwise--never mind resembles what I saw in the cave. I thought it might help to see what's here. I'm not sure it does."

  They returned to the reception area. Sophie thanked Acosta.

  "Yeah, no problem," he said, then grinned at her. "Don't you have a job?"

  "As a matter of fact, I'm on my way to see about tutoring my hockey players."

  "I'll meet you downstairs," Scoop said.

  She took the stairs instead of the elevator. When she reached the street, she called Tim O'Donovan in Ireland. After a quick hello, she said, "When I met Percy Carlisle at the pub the other night, he had just come from Killarney National Park. Last year he was staying with friends there when he looked me up. I wonder if they might know where he is now."

  "You don't expect me to know everyone in Killarney, now, do you?"

  "No, of course not."

  Maybe Percy was having an affair, Sophie thought, although she had no reason to think so and it struck her as ridiculous. He and Helen seemed happy together, with plans for the future. More likely, he was simply off enjoying himself--golfing, hiking, whatever--in an ultra-private setting and had no idea that his security guard was dead.

  Sophie shook off her thoughts. "I was hoping maybe you or one of your friends had seen Percy with these friends from Killarney."

  "Are they Irish?"

  "I don't know. They'd be well off if they're Percy's friends."

  "I'll see what I can do, Sophie," Tim said, his tone neutral. "What are you up to?"

  "Jay Augustine is dead--the serial killer."

  "That's not a bad thing."

  "Did you get the photo I e-mailed you of the police officer who died?"

  "I did. I don't recognize him, either. I'll show him to the boys when I ask about the friends from Killarney. I'm no help. Sophie..."

  She heard the worry in his voice and smiled into her phone. "We'll be back to dancing an Irish jig and drinking Guinness before long."

  "Your new detective friend?"

  "I don't know if he's much on dancing, but we can teach him."

  Tim didn't sound very reassured before they disconnected.

  Scoop caught up with her at an intersection. "Figured I'd give you a minute to finish your call. Family?"

  "Tim O'Donovan."

  "The fisherman and fiddle player." He stepped off the curb and flagged a passing cab. "Have fun with your hockey players."

  "I doubt I'll actually start tutoring today. I'm just getting acquainted with everyone."

  He opened the cab door for her. "Stay busy. Keep my number handy."

  She nodded, thanking him as she climbed in and sank against the seat. She was keyed up, and just as Scoop shut the door, she almost asked him to get in the cab with her--almost told him she didn't want to be alone. Instead she flashed him a quick smile. The man had enough on his mind without adding her to the equation.

  Ten minutes later, the cab dropped her off at a squat, unattractive building near Boston University. The tutoring center was located on the first floor. She enjoyed working one-on-one with students, and she needed the income.

  As she headed inside, Tim called her back. "None of the boys recognized your cop," he said, "but they have an idea of who Percy Carlisle's friends in Killarney might be. They're in Kenmare often."

  "You have any names?"

  "I do, indeed. David and Sarah Healy."

  He gave her what details he had on the Healys, and after he hung up, Sophie dialed Scoop's number. "Are you back at work?" she asked him.

  "Nope. I had this urge to make sure you got to your destination. I'm half a block behind you."

  She turned around, and he waved to her from farther down the wide sidewalk. She laughed. "I'll have to take 'Spotting a Tail 101.' I'll wait for you--"

  "Tell me now. I can hear in your voice that you have something for me."

  What else, she wondered, could he hear in her voice? She shook off the thought. "I have the name and address of a couple in Killarney who are friends with Percy Carlisle. They might have an idea where he is." Sophie paused, watching Scoop make his way steadily toward her. "Maybe your British friends can check them out."

  18

  Killarney, Southwest Ireland

  Josie had steeled herself for Myles to abandon her in Dublin, but not only did he accompany her to the airport, he boarded a small plane with her for the short flight to the west of Ireland. She'd arranged for a car when they arrived. He took the keys. She didn't object.

  "I'll navigate," she said, reaching for her seat belt in the passenger seat.

  It was very dark when they arrived at an attractive stone house just past a confusing roundabout near Killarney National Park. Lights shining in the first-floor windows suggested Percy Carlisle's friends, David and Sarah Healy, were at home.

  Myles popped out of the car with no hint of the fatigue Josie had noticed when she'd first walked into Keira's cottage, and there he was.
As they headed up the walk in a light rain, she fought a sudden sagging of her own energy and spirit. "I'd love just to wander among the oaks and yews with nothing more pressing to do than find the next waterfall."

  She expected a smart retort from Myles, but he brushed his fingers over the top of her hand. "We'll get there, you and I."

  "Ever the optimist." She mounted the front steps to the house. "I wonder if we'll find Percy Carlisle sitting by the fire with a whiskey."

  Myles didn't answer right away. She thought he might go soft on her again, but he rallied. "Let's find out, shall we?"

  David Healy, an amiable middle-aged Irishman, greeted them at the door, obviously curious as Josie introduced herself and Myles as best she could. "A mutual friend told us we might find Percy Carlisle here. We thought we'd drop in and say hello."

  "Sorry, you've missed him. He was here four or five nights ago. He stayed just the one night. He'd come straight from London. Helen wasn't with him. She'd already left for Boston--or maybe it was New York, then Boston. Percy and I took a long hike in Killarney National Park. My wife stayed behind. He left early that evening."

  Myles leaned against a wet iron rail. "Did he say where he was going?"

  "Kenmare. He planned to see an archaeologist he knows."

  "And after Kenmare?" Josie asked.

  Healy's expression by itself said he hadn't a clue. "He didn't say. He was quite preoccupied. He gets that way. He did say he wanted to go off on his own for a bit--I don't know more than that, I'm afraid. My wife, either."

  The man was looking worried. Josie gave him a cheerful smile. "Well, we're terribly sorry to have missed him. Thank you for your help."

  Healy started to shut the door but stopped. "There's nothing at all unusual in Percy wanting to be on his own. He's been like that for as long as I've known him, which has been for at least ten years. Percy's always appreciated his solitude. He says that's why he married so late. Helen understands."

  "She wasn't upset, then, about him going off?" Josie asked.

  "Not according to Percy."

  Myles stood up from the rail. "Percy visited you last year around this time, as well, didn't he?"