“You’d be doing them a favor,” she told him. And this, at least, was the truth. “They know how wonderful their daughter was, but talking to me will be hard for them right now.”
He hesitated, leaning hard against the door, one hand still poised to push it shut.
“I’d really appreciate your help.” Harper held his gaze steadily.
Finally, he took a step back.
“I guess you better come in. We’re letting the air out.”
Harper followed, closing the door behind her.
Inside it was dim and cool. It smelled faintly of disinfectant and beer.
Fitz shuffled to the bar and climbed unsteadily onto a stool in front of a tall glass filled with ice and clear liquid.
Harper perched on the stool next to his.
“I can’t understand it.” He turned to her, his face haunted beneath that tangle of hair. “She was right here last night.” He pointed across the bar to the empty space in front of the bottles. “She was fine. Now, they say she’s dead.”
Ice rattled as he lifted the glass and took a long, shaky drink.
It was ten thirty in the morning. If he was already drunk, Harper couldn’t imagine what he’d be like a few hours later.
She needed him to talk quickly before he passed out.
“What can you tell me about Naomi?” she asked. “What was she really like?”
“Oh, everyone who knew her will tell you she was a great kid.” He stared into his glass. “And it’s true. Hard worker. Smart as hell. Always smiling. People came in here just to see her smile, I swear. And ambitious as hell. I thought she’d be president someday.” He looked at her helplessly. “Who would do this to her? Can you tell me that much at least?”
He seemed genuinely grief-stricken.
To an extent, this fit with what Harper knew of him. She didn’t encounter Fitz often—he didn’t tend to hang around on the late shift, and she rarely arrived at the bar before one in the morning. But Bonnie always described him affectionately.
“Fitz is everyone’s dad,” she’d told Harper once. “He worries about me more than my own father does.”
Still, Naomi had only worked at the bar a few months. Harper was a little surprised at the intensity of his reaction.
“Were you close to Naomi?” she asked. “Did you know her family well?”
“I met her dad a few times when he came to pick her up.” He reached for his glass. “Can’t say I know him particularly well. But he’s a good man.” He took a long drink, the ice rattling in his glass, before adding, morosely, “This’ll kill him.”
“I know the police are on this,” she told him. “They want to get this guy.”
“They better get him.”
Reaching across the counter, he swiped up a bottle from the other side, and poured himself an unhealthy measure.
“Can you tell me anything else about her?” she asked.
He waved his glass.
“Her mom passed a few years ago. Her dad’s a cabdriver.” He’d begun to slur his words. “She was an only child—she and her father were very close.”
He slapped his hand hard on the bar. “Dammit. This doesn’t make sense. I keep thinking someone will come in here and tell me it was a mistake. For a minute, that’s what I thought you were here for.”
“What about her boyfriend?” Harper asked. “Wilson Shepherd, isn’t that his name?”
“Wilson?” His gaze sharpened. “What about him?”
“How long had they been together?”
“A year maybe?” He rubbed his face, fingers rasping across his unshaven jaw. “Poor old Wilson.”
“The police think he did it,” she told him, watching for his reaction.
“What?” His head jerked up, eyes wide in a drunken pantomime of shock. “You can’t be serious.”
“They’re looking for him now.”
“Then they’re nuts.” He was angry. “No way. They were crazy in love. He wouldn’t hurt Naomi.”
But the first hint of uncertainty had entered his voice. They both knew crazy-in-love people hurt each other all the time.
“Did they ever fight?” Harper asked. “Fall out over anything?”
“Hell, I don’t know.” He held up his hands. “I’m not the one she’d talk to about that. But she seemed happy with him. Except—”
He paused, thinking.
“Except what?” Harper pressed him.
But he wouldn’t be hurried. He gripped the glass tight, and rattled it, lost in his thoughts.
“It’s probably nothing but, I’ve been going over it all in my head—trying to think of anything—something I should have noticed,” he said, peering at her. “Only thing I could think of was something that happened a couple weeks ago. Struck me as strange. Seemed like nothing at the time but now—”
“What happened?” she asked.
“It was a busy night. A Saturday. Naomi was helping Bonnie at the bar. Everything was fine, and then out of nowhere she came over to me and said she had to go right now. I wouldn’t have noticed, but she seemed real upset.”
Harper’s brow creased. “Did she tell you what happened?”
“Sort of. We were packed. It was midnight. I mean, where could she have to go at midnight? I asked if she could at least stay half an hour. And she begged me—literally begged me. ‘Let me go, Fitz. I have to.’ In the end, I gave in. Couldn’t stand to see her so upset. She was shaking. It was like she was scared or something. She ran out the door like the devil was on her tail. Didn’t even stop to take her apron off.”
“Did you ever find out what she was scared of?” she asked.
The lines in his craggy face deepened.
“She was off the next three days. By the time she came back to work, I had other things on my mind.” He looked at her. “You know how it is. You lose track.”
“But after that she was fine?”
He made a vague gesture. “She seemed fine. Maybe a little more distracted than usual. But I figured it was school keeping her busy.”
Harper thought it over. “Are you saying that you think she was scared of Wilson?”
He glowered at her.
“I’m saying I don’t know what happened but she was scared.” He reached for his glass again. “Ah, hell. Why’m I yelling at you? It’s my own damn fault. If I’d thought to ask what was going on—why she was so scared that night—what was going on in her life … If I’d paid more attention …
“She might still be alive.”
5
After talking with Fitz, Harper went back to the newsroom to update her article and work the phones. The story moved quickly. At noon, the police formally identified Wilson Shepherd as a suspect on the run.
At a hastily convened press conference that afternoon, the police chief revealed that officers had been searching for him since the night before. They described him as “armed and dangerous.” In a message delivered directly to the news cameras, the chief asked Wilson to turn himself in.
“Do it for your family,” the chief said, seriously. “Nobody else needs to get hurt.”
With the TV stations all in overdrive, several false reports came in of sightings around the city, but by eight o’clock that night, when things finally quieted down, his location was still unknown.
It was still four hours until the paper’s final deadline, but Harper had done all she could for now. She’d worked eleven hours straight on precious little sleep, and the exhaustion was taking its toll.
She stretched the tight knots in her shoulders and looked around blearily. The newsroom had emptied without her even noticing. Through the tall windows, the last rays of the sun were fading to rose and gold as she glanced at her watch, her brow creasing.
She’d been so busy there’d been no time all day even to check in on Bonnie.
She grabbed her phone.
Bonnie answered on the first ring.
“Harper! You sneaked out while I was still asleep, like a bad date.”
“Hey.” Harper fought a yawn. “You needed your sleep.”
“If I’d been conscious I would have thanked you for looking out for me,” Bonnie said. “I’m sorry I lost it like that when you were working.”
“Don’t apologize. It was a shock seeing her there.”
“I still can’t believe it.” Bonnie sounded somber.
Harper hated to give her more bad news—but she had to know.
“Have you been following the case? Do you know what’s happening?”
“I heard about Wilson, if that’s what you mean.” Bonnie let out a long breath. “It doesn’t make sense, Harper. He’s such a nice guy.”
“Nice guys kill, too.”
That came out more sharply than Harper intended.
“I’m sorry,” she said, instantly contrite. “It’s been a long day.”
“I bet it has,” Bonnie said. “Listen, Fitz has closed the bar for a couple of days. So, I’m around if you need me.”
“I spoke to him today,” Harper told her. “He was incredibly drunk.”
“Yeah…” Bonnie sighed. “He was sloshed when he called. I don’t blame him. Wouldn’t mind being drunk myself right now. I just wish I understood what the hell Naomi was doing down on River Street. When she left the bar, she said she was going home. I’ve been thinking about it all day. The way she left in a big hurry. Like she was late for something. What could she be late for in the middle of the night?”
This was strikingly similar to the story Fitz had told about another night when Naomi left early in a rush.
“Did she say anything to you when she left? Was she meeting Wilson Shepherd?”
“All she said was she needed to go right away; something had come up. She was really urgent about it.” She paused. “The only thing was, thinking back, it seems to me that … I don’t know. Something didn’t feel right.”
“What do you mean?” Harper picked up a pen.
“Maybe I’m adding this to my memories because I know what happened later,” Bonnie cautioned, “but she seemed jittery. Like, she was trying to be normal but she was nervous. Almost like she was scared of something.”
Her words mirrored Fitz’s, precisely.
“You know, Fitz told me a similar story earlier today. Naomi leaving on a busy night, without warning. Being scared. Only he said it happened a few weeks ago. Do you remember that?”
“No.” Bonnie sounded surprised. “I must not have worked that night. He didn’t mention it to me.”
“He said he more or less forgot about it after that night but, something was definitely going on in Naomi’s life. Someone scared her. And they scared her enough that she kept it to herself.” Harper paused, the pen hovering above a blank sheet of paper. “Did she ever tell you she was afraid of Wilson? Did they fight?”
“She never said anything like that.” Bonnie’s voice was firm. “I always thought they were happy. But, like I said last night to that detective, Wilson hasn’t been around much lately. I thought they were taking a break because school and work were so busy.”
“Maybe Wilson didn’t want to take a break.”
“You think he was mad enough to kill her?” Bonnie was skeptical.
“Wouldn’t be the first time it happened.”
“I just don’t see it,” Bonnie said. “He’s not the type.”
“They’re all the type.”
“God, Harper. You’re so cynical,” Bonnie chided. “This is why you don’t have a boyfriend.”
“This is why I’m still alive,” Harper replied without missing a beat.
As she spoke, she wrote one word in her notebook and underlined it: Motive.
“The thing is, if it wasn’t Wilson, who was it? There’s no way she was caught up in drugs or gangs, is there?” she asked.
Bonnie gave a husky laugh. “Oh, hell no, Harper. Naomi was a Girl Scout. I could hardly get a beer down her.”
Dropping the pen, Harper rubbed her forehead.
It just didn’t make sense. Girl Scouts did not go to River Street at two in the morning to get themselves shot.
It was becoming clearer that Naomi had secrets. She’d kept them well. And somehow that had gotten her killed.
“Look,” Harper said, “if you think of anything else, let me know.”
“I will,” Bonnie promised, then added as an afterthought, “Oh, God, I almost forgot to mention. I went to see Naomi’s dad. He wants to talk to you.”
Harper nearly dropped the phone.
“You saw her father? I’ve been trying to reach him all day.”
“Yeah, I went to his house to give him my condolences. I couldn’t get him on the phone,” Bonnie said. “His address was in our records at the bar—Naomi still had her pay slips sent there. He told me he turned his phone off because it won’t stop ringing.”
Harper didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. She’d called Jerrod Scott at least five times today without success. And Bonnie had just walked right in.
“What’d he say?” She couldn’t keep the eagerness out of her voice.
“Yeah. He’s real upset about Wilson,” Bonnie said. “Says there’s no way it was him, but the cops won’t listen. I told him he should talk to you. I gave him your number. I hope that was okay.”
Harper could have kissed her.
She’d dropped the hottest interview in town right in her lap.
* * *
When she hung up the phone, Harper climbed to her feet.
It had been twelve hours since the last time she ate anything more substantial than a candy bar. Her stomach felt hollow.
Shoving her scanner and phone into her bag, she headed across the empty newsroom.
Baxter was at her desk, typing furiously, her face creased with concentration. Dells had finally gone home a couple of hours ago.
“I’m going to grab some food,” Harper announced. “It’s gone quiet.”
“Could you keep your phone on, for a change?” Baxter’s tone was peevish. “I will personally fire you if I can’t reach you.”
“You sweet talker,” Harper said, heading out the door.
There was no point in arguing. They both knew Harper would keep everything turned on tonight.
The guard glanced at her without interest as she pushed the button that unlocked the double glass doors and stepped into the dark street.
Outside, the muggy evening air hit her like a warm, soft fist. Even this late, it wasn’t cool. Night merely took the edge off the heat.
The streets were quiet at last. The air carried the faint syncopation of music from one of the River Street bars, which were filled at this hour with people whose nights involved something other than murder.
Harper had parked her aging red Camaro in front of the newspaper building, and the engine started with a pleasing rumble. The car had nearly a hundred and thirty thousand miles on the meter, but Harper kept it in mint condition. She loved only a few things in this world, and her car was one of them.
As she drove, she kept the window down, hoping the fresh air would revive her. The scanner propped in a holder on the dash buzzed and crackled with a constant stream of information. Her mind sorted through the noise for anything about Wilson Shepherd.
After her years of listening to it nonstop, the codes used by the police were second nature to her.
“Unit four-nine-eight,” a voice said.
The dispatcher replied after a second. “Unit four-nine-eight, go ahead.”
“Unit four-nine-eight, I’m at the code five on Veterans.”
Code five—car accident, Harper translated to herself.
“Everybody’s pretty shook up,” the cop said, in a deep Southern drawl. “Better send a code ten to check them out.”
Code 10 was an ambulance, and Harper homed in on his voice for a minute. But he never came back to ask for backup.
She was hungry and tired, and she wasn’t about to go out to a wreck where everyone was shaken up. She needed more than that.
�
�Death and destruction,” she murmured to herself, as she pulled the car into the parking lot at Eddie’s Twenty-Four-Hour Diner. “I don’t get out of bed for less.”
When she walked in the door, a bell jangled merrily, but nobody could hear it above the Everly Brothers blasting from the stereo.
Eddie’s was a retro diner, with vinyl-and-chrome booths, and waitresses with perky ponytails wearing high-collared blouses and tight jeans.
Harper signaled to one, who bounded up to her, dark hair swishing.
“Can I get you a table?”
Her bright eyes skimmed Harper’s face, and took on a sympathetic glint. It occurred to Harper that she must look like hell. Her hair hadn’t been brushed since she left the house this morning.
The waitress was young—her scarlet lipstick annoyingly perfect.
She had no idea yet how hard a day could be.
“I need food to go,” Harper told her. “A turkey sandwich, no mayo, and fries. And the biggest coffee you’ve got, as black as you can make it.”
“You got it.” Pulling a pen from behind her ear, the girl scribbled the order down.
“Take a seat,” she chirped. “I’ll get it out to you in a jiffy.”
When she’d disappeared into the kitchen, Harper sat on a padded bench by the door.
The restaurant was mostly empty. The music played loudly for no one.
The bench wasn’t that comfortable, but at this stage she could have slept in the middle of the highway in rush hour. She leaned back against the wall, her eyelids drooping. Even her hands seemed to have weight.
Feeling herself drifting, she jerked upright.
Busy. She needed to stay busy.
She pulled her scanner out of her bag, plugged her earbuds in, and turned it up loud enough to hear over the music.
The usual chatter filled her head, and she forced herself to listen. She was half asleep when a female voice said, “Unit three-six-four.”
“Unit three-six-four go ahead,” came the crisp voice of the dispatcher.
“Signal twenty-five in the thirty-four thousand block of Abercorn Street. I’ve got a white Ford pickup, stand by for the license.”
Signal twenty-five, Harper thought, distantly, her eyes drifting shut. Traffic stop.
A Beautiful Corpse--A Harper McClain Mystery Page 4
