by Karen Harper
“What ancients were the inspiration for these?” Claire asked.
“Just in the style of the ancients,” Pippa said. “I take inspiration from many cultures, Inca, Egyptian, Celtic, an amalgam. I do these from study sketches and my imagination.”
“Oh, I see,” Claire said and forced herself to inquire about some of the metal coin banks on display. But her imagination was running rampant. Brad Vance had just become more interesting and yet more mysterious.
* * *
“Can I just walk you to your car, boss?” Heck asked, appearing so suddenly in the nearly empty parking lot behind the law firm that Nick startled. He’d been worried about Claire and Kris possibly being followed, but he’d been unable to convince his stubborn wife not to go off by herself today. She’d insisted she needed the “think time.” But did he have to start watching himself to see if he was being followed?
“Didn’t know you were here,” Nick said.
“I called your place, and Nita said you’d come in here, though it’s Saturday. You’re working late, boss, but didn’t want to bother you till you were done. Been sitting over in my car. I just need to bounce an idea off you real fast, if you got a minute.”
“For you, my friend, of course. Want to go back in?”
“How ’bout we just sit on that picnic table people eat lunch at sometimes?”
“And breakfast and dinner. Lots going on here as usual.”
Heck nodded and slid into the bench across the table from Nick and said, “On second thought, is it okay with you if we don’t sit out here, boss? I mean since that drone broke the windows and broke up your party, I been antsy about being in plain sight.”
“Let’s go back inside then.”
They got up, and Nick dug his master key out again. This whole thing was making him not as much scared as angry. He’d thought he was done looking over his shoulder, but now this. Damn, if someone was after Claire or any of them, he had to be more careful. He’d been thinking too hard to be careful.
He locked the door behind them, and they sat at one of the two small tables Bronco used when he was working security. The one in the front lobby was a lot nicer than this one.
“Tell me,” he said to Heck.
“That friend of Claire’s—Kris Kane. She has face blindness, right? I heard her explaining some of it and looked it up—formal name is prosopagnosia.”
“Right.”
“I’m thinking of researching it better, maybe talking to her about it if you or Claire could set that up. And I’m thinking of steering clear of that face recognition tech firm I was interested in. Maybe I could go out on my own in a small way at first—not leaving my consulting job with you. What if I could invent some kind of eyeglasses or something that read people’s faces, then with an earpiece informed the wearer of that device who the person approaching them was?”
“Interesting!” Nick told him, leaning closer. “And a real help to someone like Kris. Claire says, as intelligent and successful as she is, her face blindness always held her back, always made her a bit afraid of people. Who knows, maybe that’s one reason she works in archaeology, with people who won’t be offended, right?”
“Right,” he said with a sheepish smile. “So then I’m hoping you could draw up some official resignation letter from this consulting company’s job offer. I didn’t sign nothing yet. Caramba, if I’m the target of what could have been a deadly drone, I think there must be some kind of spy in that organization. Or maybe a competitor who wants to do them and me in. If I make a big deal about declining the offer, maybe it will take me off that hit list—if someone’s after me.”
“Sounds like a plan, a good one.”
“Gotta admit I took the idea from Jace and his pilot friend going public.”
“I’ll draw the letter up and have Cheryl type it up and see that it’s hand delivered Monday morning after you sign it.”
“Whew! I’m just gonna lay low till then since I can’t see Gina this weekend anyway. She’s working in the campus clinic.”
“You have this tech firm’s address and contact person?” Nick asked, digging out a ballpoint pen. “Good move to examine who might want to hurt you. I’m looking through old cases where someone was disgruntled or worse and blamed me, but nothing so far. Man, I’d like to think Claire and I are out of the line of fire for once.”
* * *
“Claire, Kris is here!” Nita called to her.
Claire had just changed Trey’s diaper when the doorbell rang, but, with him in her arms, she came into the Florida room to greet her friend.
“Want me to take Big Boy?” Nita asked. “I’m glad we put off going over to our house until tomorrow, since Nick went in to work.”
Claire knew that Nita was especially glad to put off facing their house until after the freezer was gone. Nick had received permission from the police to get rid of it, though they were going to put it in a storehouse in case they arrested a suspect for Cyndi Lindley’s murder and wanted to use it as evidence for a trial.
“Sure, thanks, Nita,” she said, shifting Trey to her.
“He’s a good baby, isn’t he?” Kris asked, putting her finger into his hand. When he grasped her finger, she bounced it a bit, and he gurgled in delight. “Can’t say I know much about babies,” Kris said, studying his face almost wistfully. “Maybe someday.”
Claire lowered her voice. “Trey’s even better than Lexi was, but she’s going through a stage right now. Let’s sit down,” she said as Nita carried Trey out. “You look happy.” Claire wanted to find out what Kris knew about the Vances’ store, but she didn’t want to break what she sensed was her friend’s really good mood.
“I just had a first date with Mitch Blakeman, and it was great.”
“Wow! I thought he told you he’d have to call you later to be sure he’s not the one that drone was aimed at. He must figure that newspaper article about moving on to hurricane hunting is insurance.”
“We did a special ops date, he called it. Low-key. Unexpected. Out of town in a place no one would target for us. Claire, we went—get ready for this—ice skating at the Germaine Arena, where the Florida Everblades hockey team plays! They give ice skating lessons there and have an open rink during Saturdays if the team’s not playing and they aren’t converting it into a concert venue for the evening.”
“You ice skate?”
“I do now. Mitch once lived in Minnesota and he’s good. He held me up, if you know what I mean. Holding hands, arm around my waist.”
“Oh, that’s a riot. An ice skating first date in South Florida when it’s near eighty! How romantic.”
“I thought so too. And he met me there so we weren’t in a car together. He told me he’d have on a bright green shirt so I would know him. Wasn’t that kind? I guess I sound like a teenager, but I don’t care—except about him.”
Her friend looked so starry-eyed that Claire decided to ask her about the Vances’ art stores on Monday. She just couldn’t bear to change the glow and the near giddiness.
“I’m going to get two glasses of wine, and we’re going to drink to that,” she told Kris. “Those flyboys can make you fly pretty high!”
She stood and turned to go into the kitchen and saw Nick had come in. He was just standing there, listening to them. What she’d just said—she hoped he didn’t take it wrong.
“Glad you’re home,” she said, trying not to sound nervous. “Kris was just telling me she had a first date with Mitch.”
“Great!” He gave Kris a wave, then lowered his voice so only Claire could hear. “Sure got to watch out for those flyboys.”
Even when Claire told Nick about her day writing short entries to psych out bog people and checking out the Vances’ shop, there was an unspoken icy chill in the air. He said no more to her about Heck’s idea to invent his own facial recognition solution, though he had asked Kr
is if she’d be on board to help him test it out, and she’d happily agreed. Surely, Nick didn’t think his own wife was still in love with Jace, Claire agonized. Tension between them made her want to scream. Rather than just go to bed uneasy or hardly speaking, she decided to clear the air.
“Nick, it’s just that I feel bad for Jace lately. Not seeing Lexi. More or less separated from Brit against their wishes when they were planning a wedding.”
“I know. Don’t worry, I’m just tired.”
“And overworked. And worrying about Dale, because you’re afraid he’s guilty. I’m sorry if I upset you,” she said, walking behind him and wrapping her arms around his waist. He was wearing only the shorts he slept in and, wearing only a silk nightgown herself, she could feel each tight muscle in his back.
He turned in her arms and hugged her hard to him. “I know I get overpossessive,” he whispered, burying his mouth in her hair. “I’ve nearly lost you more than once, and I worry. Now that we’re a family—I honestly don’t want you to just stay home but—well, I guess I do, but you shouldn’t. You’re talented, you’re helping people. Honestly, sweetheart, I’m proud of you, but I just can’t stand the idea of your being hurt again.”
“Understood. Nick, we’ll see all this through just as we have bad times before. I was really shook at our belated wedding reception being blown up—like it was an omen—but we persevere, don’t we? Our love makes us strong and—”
He had just put his hands down to cup her bottom and pull her even tighter against him when his cell phone on the dresser rang.
“I’ll ignore it,” he said. “I need you.”
“But with everything that’s going on...just check the caller ID, and I’ll be right over there in bed.”
“No, I’m not letting you go,” he said and, clamping her to him, he moved them a couple of steps to the dresser to lean over the phone.
“Damn,” he muttered. “It’s Detective Jensen.”
She clung to him as he took the call. She could clearly hear every word.
“Nick Markwood here. What’s up, detective?”
“Counselor Markwood, I thought I should inform you that your client Dale Braun is under arrest for a woman’s murder.”
Nick’s grip on her tightened. “The murder of Cynthia Lindley?”
“That may come, but this is for the murder of Marian James. Murder and arson of his own property. We are at the site of the Twisted Trees mansion, and it’s damn dark as pitch out here, except for the headlights of fire trucks and police cars and the remnants of the fire. It was Dale who ID’d the deceased. Somehow she was trapped inside the garage, knocked out, I don’t know—flames or smoke inhalation. She’s badly burned and definitely dead. ME is on the way.”
“And so am I,” Nick said and punched off.
Claire held him even tighter for a moment. “I’m going too. I’ll knock on Nita and Bronco’s door and tell them.”
They scrambled for their clothes, for calm, for courage.
25
Nick and Claire hardly needed their flashlights by the time they approached the ruins of Twisted Trees mansion. They’d left their car in the same spot as when they’d been there in the daylight, then walked around a police barrier a little farther on. Through the hulking line of trees ahead, flashing light bars from at least six police cars lit a lurid scene while blinding white beams of light from two fire trucks slashed the smoking rubble.
They held hands, helping each other over the rough ground. Wet leaves smacked their faces, so they bent low under the boughs of the ficus trees. The smell of smoke bit deep into their lungs and clung to their clothes. They walked up to the barrier of yellow plastic Crime Scene Do Not Enter tape.
Nick told the officer who hurried toward them, “Detective Jensen called me. Nick Markwood, Dale Braun’s attorney.”
“They’re both over there,” he said, pointing. “Watch where you walk. Fire hoses all over. No fireplugs here, so they used what little water was stored on the trucks. The bay’s too far to get water from.”
He lifted the tape for them, and they ducked under. How different the grounds and the ruined mansion looked at night, especially with the garish lights. Nick thought of a movie trailer he’d caught Lexi watching of a zombie movie, Night of the Living Dead.
People’s shadows loomed huge. Hot spots still flickered from the rubble of the skeletal two-story garage and apartment. The pulsating red-blue-white strobes from the police vehicles made everything look as if it would burst into flame again.
They turned off their flashlights and stopped gripping each other’s hands as they approached a dark unmarked car with Jensen standing next to it. Nick saw Dale was in the back seat; Jensen had the front passenger door open and one foot in the car, talking to him. An officer stood nearby as if guarding Dale. When Dale spotted them, he held up his wrists, either in greeting or to show Nick he was handcuffed. Nick noted his hair was a mess, his face cut and bruised, his shirt torn.
“Counselor. Claire,” Jensen said, looking surprised to see her. “I read him his rights.”
“Detective Jensen,” Nick said, and they shook hands.
Nick leaned down into the open car door. “Sit tight, Dale. No comments right now. We’ll get you out on bail.” Turning back to Jensen, he asked, “Why is he cut up and bruised? I’m sure he didn’t resist arrest.”
“That happened before we got here,” Jensen said with a lift of his eyebrows Nick could not quite decode.
Dale shouted, “It’s my property! I had no idea she was up there—trespassing again. I tried to pull her out of the rubble when I saw her after the upper floor collapsed, but she was unconscious or dead by that point! No comment?” he went on, ignoring Nick’s raised hand for silence. His voice broke. “My only comment so far is I didn’t kill her either. Yeah, I set the fire, but I also called it in. Someone’s trying to frame me, and it’s costing people’s lives and mine too! She had to be unconscious in there or she would have run out—at least have screamed or pounded on the door or window. The smoke wasn’t that bad at first to knock her out.”
“I said, hold it for now,” Nick said, bending down to look at Dale. “I’ll be with you when you make your statement. Anything you say can be used against you—remember that, counselor.”
Jensen closed the car door and the hovering officer stepped closer. “Over there,” he said, pointing, “under that tarp is Marian James’s body. As I said, Dale ID’d her, though we found her burned purse and camera near where Dale says he found her body, and both items had her ID too. Hope the camera’s not too melted to access its photos. That place burned hot. Arson investigators might find an accelerant.”
“You do see a pattern here,” Nick said, trying to steady his voice. “However shaken he is right now, Dale Braun would not set himself up so obviously to kill two women and have the sites of their deaths and or bodies linked to him. He would not have called the fire department, but let it burn and be miles away.”
“I get all that. It makes him look good that he hauled her body out, right? But why did he torch the place? Was he also in a struggle with her beforehand? Will there be any DNA under her nails or even in her body after that conflagration? One victim, frozen, one burned to death? Nick, I can’t possibly let him walk this time until we do an investigation. He could be a flight risk. Or a serial killer.”
“Hardly. I just hope the judge is fair enough to keep the bail bond reasonable. Can I see the body?”
“Photos of it later. You beat the ME here. The evidence techs haven’t even had time to sift through things—too damned hot.”
It annoyed Nick that what popped into his head was not only that things were getting too hot, but that Claire had been upset lately that Bradley Vance had shared only pictures of the bog artifacts with her, not the originals.
“Then can you tell us what you know of the scene?” Nick asked. “I need
to tell you that Dale took us through the apartment above the garage two days ago. Marian James could have broken in to try to see it for herself as it’s pretty much all that’s left of the historic old mansion. I can testify to the fact she was trespassing here the day we visited, so no doubt again tonight.”
“News flash, Nick. Whether or not the deceased—who was evidently trapped in a burning, arson-set building—invited herself here or was invited, she was incinerated, and your client admits he started the fire. Both his alibis have holes leaking like crazy, and however good a criminal defense attorney you are, I’m betting you can’t dam up those holes.”
“Granted, arson is a criminal act,” Nick said. He could tell Claire wanted to say something but he was proud of her for letting him handle this. “But he owns what he burned. No one else but an intruder who was trespassing was hurt, and he’s not after insurance or involved in some sort of scam. Get him for not having a burn permit. If Marian James was trespassing again, her death was an accident and not first degree murder.”
“So he says. But with the other murder charges pending, maybe he wanted to look like a hero, kind of like that Jace Britten who was at your reception and showed up in the newspaper as a valiant hurricane hunter.”
Nick could tell Claire also wanted to respond to that too, but, thank heavens, she didn’t. Headlights cut across them as the ME’s van drove in, bouncing across the thick grass. As Jensen walked away to meet it, Nick pulled Claire back out of the glare of crisscrossed headlights.
“Are we leaving?” she asked.
“Strange as it sounds, I think we can see clearer here in the darkness. Don’t turn on your light again.”
“You want a glimpse of the body?”
“I do. Don’t you look.”
“Not so different maybe from studying those bog bodies. Method of death, yes, but all so wrenching, so tragic.”
But the two men from the ME’s office blocked their view when they bent over the thin, twisted and blackened form on the ground. Damn, but Nick had been hoping things would not blow up, that Dale could ride it out so the Eva Braun connection wouldn’t come to light. But it sure would now, under the glare of publicity that could do nothing but hurt the case and hurt the firm—and maybe cost Dale his life.
