Bad Things, page 23
“What was he going to say?”
“He tried to see Stipe that Memorial Day weekend before graduation, but he wasn’t home. Lisette’s mom was already ill. Died a few years after Lisette did. Heart trouble. Broken heart, most likely.” He absently rubbed his own chest. “I told Nick at the time there was nothing to apologize for, but he disagreed. I don’t know if he ever contacted Stipe, but that was only part of it. He blamed himself. Said he caused her to kill herself and wouldn’t listen to anyone saying different. I thought he was over it ... all these years ... but this last time he came home, I don’t know. Some of his friends tried to talk to him about it, but it was no good.” Jerry closed his eyes and sighed.
Kerry opened her mouth to ask, “Which friends?” but Jerry looked wiped out. She could ask them herself. She got up, wished him goodbye, and leaned in and kissed him on his forehead again, then headed out.
Her phone buzzed again as she was getting in her car. Josie. A second time. It took her a while to answer and by the time she did, Josie was gone. She texted her that she was on her way home and had some time if Josie wanted to call back.
* * *
Josie aborted her call to Kerry when she heard her doorbell ring, a tinkling of bells that went on for-effing-ever. Something she’d had to have when they moved into the house and now was like fingernails scraping on a blackboard. “Be right there,” she called, then headed into the den with its window that faced the front door, catching a corner of it so she could see who was there.
She carefully twisted the blinds to allow herself a view. A man’s back was to her.
Chad.
Well, you invited him over, didn’t you? Why the trepidation now?
She smoothed her hands down her short skirt, worrying it was too short. She’d put it on precisely for that purpose, but now she was nervous, almost scared. It had pockets in the back where she’d slipped her cell phone, which she touched now, making sure it was there. The light blue blouse she’d chosen had delicate buttons that would be difficult to undo, if she were to, say, be taking her clothes off for any reason ...
What the hell are you thinking?
Man, she wished Kerry would have answered her call. Kerry would have talked her out of it, if Josie had told her about inviting Chad over, which she might not have. She didn’t know her that well. Expecting her to be some kind of conscience was wrong. But she knew that was what she would get from Kerry.
“Hi, there,” she greeted him, hanging on the door while she looked out at him on her doorstep. He was attractive enough, in an average sort of way. Nothing like Nick really, seeing him in the light of day. What had she been thinking, inviting him over while Kent was away? He had to be focused on one thing and one thing only, and he’d be right. She’d invited him over knowing full well that they might get together and let one thing lead to another and . . . well, it wasn’t going to happen now. She’d come to her senses.
“Hi, yourself,” he said. He slid a look toward the driveway and garage. “Your husband ... on that trip?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to invite me in?”
She was still hanging on the door, hesitating. Did she want him to come in? She sensed she was angry at Kent for just about everything. Nothing was that big of a problem, but there were problems. Dallying with Chad would only add to them.
“I don’t know,” she said a bit sadly.
“I didn’t take you for a prick teaser.” He said it with a smile, but it got Josie.
“I’m just flagellating.”
“Whoa. That sounds dirty.”
“It means I haven’t made up my mind.” That was what the word meant, wasn’t it? Sometimes she got them a little wrong.
“Uh-huh. Well, flagellate this.” He grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed into her, driving them both into the entryway of her home, kicking the door shut behind him.
“Hey,” Josie protested, but then his mouth was on hers and his viselike grip on her upper arms tightened even more.
She went slack, sensing to fight would do her no good. But she was panicking inside. She remembered Taryn saying how persistent her ex-boss had been, how she’d understood the power and been desperate to get the power back.
“You’ve got to be wilier than they are or they’ll take everything from you . . .”
She tried to think of Nick, but it was no good. He went from kissing to biting her neck and ear. “Ouch,” she whispered, hoping he would let up.
“You like that? You like that, bitch?”
There was an underlying trill of excitement in his tone that she found more worrisome than anything else. Oh, God. What had she done?
She let him manhandle her against the entry-hall wall for several moments, her thoughts sharp and rapid. She flinched a bit at his increasingly painful bites at her neck, mouth, and ear.
He finally surfaced, his lizard brain slowly becoming aware that she was a nonparticipant. He pulled back to look at her hard, his hands, which had briefly released their grip to cop a feel of her breast, one sliding between her legs to squeeze her hard in the crotch, one still gripped like a claw on her upper arm. There was a cold flame of desire in his eyes. Desire to hurt, maybe.
Oh, Jose. You really did it this time.
“Oh, come on,” he whispered. “Bet Nick wasn’t the only one. You’re bored with your husband.”
“Not bored.”
He gave a harsh laugh. “All right. Come up with some word that describes it better. Disgusted? Turned off? Repelled? Nick said you married for money. How’s that money keeping you satisfied in bed, hmmm? Not much, by the looks of things.”
“I didn’t marry for money.” Josie’s heart was heavy. He wasn’t completely on target but close enough.
“Money’s not all bad. I certainly wouldn’t do without it.” He moved in closer again, rubbing against her. “Let’s move this to the bedroom.”
“No.”
He laughed again, his hard, marauding hand back at her upper arm, both hands squeezing tightly. She was going to have bruises. “All right, we’ll do it right here. Your ass is going to hurt against that hard wall.”
“I didn’t sleep with Nick.”
Josie kept her lips together, but her mouth was trembling uncontrollably.
“Yeah?”
“You said you wondered about it. That Nick didn’t sleep with married women. Well, you were right. I flirted with him. I probably would have, no, I definitely would have slept with him, but we never got that far. I just made it up in my head. I’ve always just made it up in my head. Everyone kind of assumed and I let them.”
Chad pulled back for a moment. “Who cares?”
“I do. I didn’t sleep with Nick and I’m not going to sleep with you.”
Her heart was pounding so hard, it felt like it was battering her rib cage. She knew he was calculating whether she was lying or not. She wasn’t, and the truth rang like a bell to her own ears.
“Makes no difference. I’m here now. I don’t give a rat’s ass what you did or didn’t do with Nick.”
But he did . . . She could tell his passion had subsided and he was having a helluva time picking it back up.
“And now he’s gone,” she added. “Just like that. And Diana’s gone, too.”
“What?” he asked sharply.
“Guess you haven’t heard. Diana’s dead. Someone strangled her.”
His hands lost their grip. He stared at the floor as if not being able to grapple with his thoughts. Josie’s every instinct was to run. Push him aside. Race to her bedroom, or the bathroom with the lock. But she stayed frozen, poised, waiting.
“Fuck,” he said, a note of worry, maybe fear, in his voice.
“I know,” she said, watching him carefully.
And then her cell buzzed. It was in her back pocket and had dug into her butt cheek when Chad had pushed her to the wall. Carefully, she reached a hand back for it, but Chad didn’t seem to care.
“It’s Taryn,” she said.
He didn’t seem to hear her, just stepped back, clearly lost in his own thoughts.
She answered with a careful, “Hi,” her eyes never leaving Chad.
“Have you heard?” Her voice was high and panicked. “About Diana?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh. My. God!”
It was rare to hear Taryn so out of control. The one thing she always was, was in control. “I know.”
“I’m . . . I’m . . . was it suicide? Over Nick?”
“I don’t know.” Josie’s mouth was suddenly desert dry. She needed a glass of water, and maybe one of wine.
“Oh, God, Jose. What are we going to do?”
Taryn never called her Jose. Not that she could recall. They weren’t that good friends. “I don’t know. Can I call you back?”
“Are you getting together with anyone from the Team? Oh my God. Diana.” A sharp breath. “I was so . . . hard on her.”
“I can’t really talk right now. Maybe Miami this afternoon. . .”
“I thought Miami was working.”
“I don’t know what her schedule is. I’ll check.”
“Are you okay? You sound strained.”
“Taryn, I’ve gotta go,” Josie said, edging away from Chad a bit.
“I’ll call Miami. Okay?”
“You do that.” She clicked off, tried to shove the phone into her back pocket and missed.
Chad gave up his perusal of the tile entryway floor and now lifted his eyes to look at her. “You seeing Miami today?”
“I don’t know. We might get together.”
He ran his hands through his hair and closed his eyes. “Man, I don’t know what to think.” When Josie didn’t answer he reopened his eyes and regarded her with chagrin. “You didn’t want to have sex, did you?”
She almost laughed, but the danger wasn’t completely over. “No.”
“I knew you hadn’t done it with Nick.” His mouth was hard.
She didn’t answer that. Didn’t know how to.
He turned to leave, and Josie got ready to lock the door behind him, but he stopped at the threshold. “I’m going home tomorrow. I just wanted to pay my respects and meet Nick’s old friends. He always had this charmed life.”
She didn’t know if that was completely true, but she saw that Chad never felt quite good enough. Nick’s friend, maybe ... Nick’s competitor, definitely.
As soon as he was through the door, she snapped the lock, then ran back to the bedroom, heart galloping, and peered through the blinds, willing him to go. If he came back, she didn’t know what she’d do.
As soon as he drove off in his rented Audi, she threw herself on her bed, sick with relief, sick with grief. You’re pathetic, she told herself. Effing pathetic. Fucking pathetic!
She realized his mauling had torn one button off her blouse, while another was hanging by a thread, gapping the fabric, showing the lacy bra underneath. Immediately she got up and ripped off her clothes. Then she stepped in the shower and let the hot water run over her body. Her fantasy affair with Nick had never made her feel this dirty.
Some half an hour later, when she finally ran out of hot water, she turned off the taps and toweled off.
Then she phoned Miami.
Chapter Sixteen
Cole got back to the station to find Charlie gone. He checked in with Hoffman, who said she’d left about an hour earlier, then went into his office, sat in his chair, linked his fingers behind his head, and stared at the ceiling. He’d spent a lot of time thinking about Kerry and he needed to set that aside for the moment to concentrate on Nick’s and Diana’s deaths. Unless the ME found something that said otherwise, they were both homicides, and in Cole’s mind, based on the evidence, they were linked.
So what was that link?
He’d gone to The Candy Woman and met with Eileen Conger, Diana’s dour-faced aunt. The pink-and-white-striped shop was redolent with the sweet perfume of chocolate and sugar, an almost fairylandish venue, a direct dichotomy to the stern woman who ran the establishment. He’d already met her once today, and he was hit anew by her lack of warmth, hardly the image for a purveyor of confections, but then, she’d been burdened with terrible news.
“Why?” she’d asked him earlier, after viewing Diana’s body. “Why?”
He’d had no answer for her. She’d hardly changed expression before or after viewing Diana’s body and all she’d said as she left was, “I’ll call Martin,” who was Diana’s brother, Cole knew, from Charlie’s ever-growing compilation of people, facts, and impressions about Nick Radnor. Charlie would be adding the same for Diana Conger.
When he’d arrived at The Candy Woman, he’d asked a young woman behind the counter for Eileen, who appeared from the back a few moments later. She immediately shooed the girl away from the counter and then said, “I know who killed my niece. That neighbor.”
“Diana’s neighbor? Alan Jenkins?” Cole had asked. The bell to the shop had tinkled as other customers arrived. Eileen had given them a hard look, then called the girl out from the back to take care of them. She’d then come from behind the counter and quickly waved Cole outside and out of earshot.
“He was first on the scene at her apartment when that poor boy was killed.”
Nick Radnor was hardly a boy, but Cole decided to remain quiet and let her go on, which she did.
“He was always pressuring Diana. Coming over. In her way. Diana told me all about it. He’s who you should be looking at.”
Cole nodded. Ben Youngston had been on scene when Nick’s body was discovered. “They weren’t friends?” he asked, recalling how Youngston had mentioned Diana falling into Jenkins’s arms.
“Not the way you mean,” she said, affronted.
“I only meant friendship. Nothing romantic,” Cole clarified.
“Well, I know Diana had a reputation with men.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “But she didn’t ask for his attention. He was just always there. He’s psychopathic. Jealous. He killed that boy out of jealousy, if you ask me, and Diana knew it, so he had to kill her, too.” She fumbled over the last couple of words, sniffing against sudden tears, finally connecting to her loss.
Cole almost told her that Spano had seen Jenkins, who’d been devastated by Diana’s death. Cole hadn’t yet interviewed Jenkins today, but the way Spano had described his horror, loss, and bewilderment had convinced both him, and therefore Cole, that it was unlikely he was part of the crime. But he decided to keep that to himself. He had sensed that whatever he might say, Eileen Conger was armed and eager to shoot down. It was a battle that could not be won, so he wasn’t going to even start.
Instead he listened to her expound on the same theme for several minutes, until the traffic into the candy shop increased enough that she was forced to help out.
“You’ll arrest him?” she said as a closing salvo.
“When there’s enough evidence against him,” was Cole’s answer.
“There will be,” she decreed as she headed back inside, pasting a totally fake smile on her face as she held the door for arriving customers.
Now Cole considered if he should maybe interview Alan Jenkins again today. But Spano was pretty right on with his impressions. “If he faked it, he deserves an Oscar,” Spano had said, so that was an avenue of investigation he thought he might put aside for the moment.
Don’t get distracted.
He let his mind travel back to Nick’s death. It was the first homicide and the possible kickoff to Diana’s as well. What had happened? Why had someone felt compelled to kill him? Cole had spoken to a lot of people who knew Nick, both locally and in Silicon Valley. Most who’d seen him within the last year said he’d seemed the same as he’d always been, though a handful had said he’d been quieter, more serious. Had something happened in the last few months? Something that had caused him to start coming to Edwards Bay more often, something he was working through? Even Kerry had mentioned it, though she didn’t know its cause.
He thought about the means of Nick’s death and made a note to himself about the hypodermic needle. Not hard to obtain, but not something the general public had lying around as a rule. So who’d brought it to Diana’s apartment that night? Diana swore she didn’t have one, and there’d been none on the premises, but the ME had determined that was what the tiny puncture wound was from. And Diana, for all her documented drug use, didn’t shoot up. She was strictly a pill popper. Even so, he’d asked the ME to look for evidence to the contrary in the autopsy. So far de la Fuente hadn’t contacted him. Cole doubted he would.
So . . . the killer had brought the syringe with him or her.
With the intent of doping Nick? With or without his consent? Maybe Nick, whose personality had by all accounts changed, had requested the heroin shot? As a means of numbing reality or pain? That would be way outside what Cole knew personally about the man. Could he have changed that much?
Alternatively, the killer brought the syringe for himself... or Diana. But Diana had balked at the sight of it. She’d sworn she had nothing to do with it, but had she? And now the real killer considered her collateral damage?
His mind shifted to Diana. She’d been under the influence of something at the memorial service. She couldn’t follow the simplest directions, and she couldn’t remember what had happened that night in her apartment. She’d been spouting theories about a third person, something she’d picked up from seeing a hypnotist.
He picked up his phone and called Kerry, feeling a bit of something like heat in his chest near his heart. He hadn’t meant to go so deep into emotions with her earlier. He wasn’t one to just suddenly break down and confess his feelings. But he wasn’t sorry either. Since seeing Kerry again, the hard lock he’d placed on his feelings had sprung open.
He paused, deciding to wait a bit before calling her. Had to get himself together. They’d had a breakthrough of sorts, and he didn’t want to screw it up. There were other calls to make anyway.
The first was another to Durant Stipe, whose cell number Charlie had found for him. As with the first two times he’d called Lisette Benetton’s stepfather, the call had gone straight to voice mail. This time Cole didn’t bother leaving a message. He’d left two already. He had an address for the man, but he lived in Woodinville, on the other side of Seattle. With traffic, it would take up the rest of the afternoon if he decided to go to his residence, and there was a good chance he wouldn’t be there anyway.
