Rite of Wrongs Page 11

  She wondered if he’d done that for the funeral. “This is my partner, Detective Melvin Stonebridge. I’m sorry to stop by unannounced, but do you mind if I ask you a quick question or two?”

  He gestured behind him with a lift of his chin. “Theodore’s napping, and I don’t want the girls upset.”

  She raised one hand, took a step back. “Of course. I don’t need to come in. Or more than five minutes of your time.”

  It took him a moment to decide, then he nodded and stepped out, pulling the door closed without latching it. “Make it fast.”

  “Thank you,” she said, opening her notebook and clicking her pen. “Do the names Edward Lacey or Dorothy Lacey ring a bell?”

  Dr. Gardner rubbed at his forehead as if the ache there would never go away. “No, I’m sorry. Should they?”

  “Dorothy Lacey was Gina’s foster mother. Edward is Dorothy’s son. There were four other foster children in the home at the same time as Gina. I was hoping she might have mentioned them to you. One of them was named Corky,” she said, holding on to the rest of her cards for now.

  No bobbing of his Adam’s apple. No change in his pupils. No tic in his jaw. “As I told you before, Detective, Gina didn’t talk about her childhood. It was probably the only part of herself she kept to herself. The only thing we didn’t share.”

  “You didn’t find that strange? If she was open about everything else?”

  “It was painful for her. Of course, I was curious, but I respected her wish to keep the past in the past,” he said, going quiet when Eloise cracked open the door and stepped outside. The girl wrapped her arms around her father’s hips because she wasn’t tall enough to reach his waist.

  Her face was pale, her skin nearly translucent, her blue eyes overly large, like an anime or manga character. Sailor Moon, maybe. Miriam didn’t remember her looking so fragile at the station, so unreal, as if she wasn’t human at all.

  Melvin stepped forward then and offered his hand. “Thank you, Dr. Gardner.”

  “Have you made any progress?” the doctor asked as they shook. “Have you learned anything you can tell me?”

  Miriam started to ask him if he’d watched the news, if he’d heard about the murder of Franklin Weeks, but something had her keeping that connection to herself. Something more than his daughter’s wide, blank eyes. “I’ll call as soon as I have more.”

  Miriam turned away, putting on her sunglasses. The door latched softly behind her as she walked with Melvin to the SUV. She was only an aunt; she couldn’t truly understand the hopelessness a parent must feel dealing with a child’s sorrow.

  Dr. Gardner having three such damaged dolls . . .

  Her chest tight, her throat aching, Miriam tried not to think of Haven, Lori, and the rest of her nieces and nephews as she climbed into the passenger seat and slammed the vehicle’s door. She tried not to, but all their young faces filled her vision, their innocence and their joy, their smiles that came so readily.

  She wondered when Eloise Gardner would smile again.

  “Do you believe him?” Melvin asked after navigating out of the subdivision.

  Miriam stared up through the passenger window at the canopy of trees, blinking the unexpected dampness from her eyes. “I haven’t decided.”

  “What reason does he have to lie?”

  “You mean, if he wasn’t the one who killed his wife?”

  Melvin let that settle for one heartbeat, then another. “You think he killed Franklin, too?”

  She wasn’t sure what she thought. Not yet. “I’m trying to work out that wrench.”

  They traveled in silence for the next several minutes, Miriam turning over both Dorothy’s and Edward’s revelations. Obviously, the murders were related. And obviously the Laceys were connected, too, though how remained to be sussed out.

  She was certain the family would’ve known the suspect in the past, or at least the suspect had known them, and well enough to use the Scriptures to make his point—whatever the hell it was—about parents and kids. But that was all she was certain about. And more than a week into the investigation, it wasn’t enough.

  At last, Melvin flipped the blinker and slowed as they approached the station. He nodded toward the expanding file she’d had with her all day. “You find anything useful in her diary?”

  There was still a ton to go through. “No revelations so far. Just personal stuff. Outings with her husband. Decorating the nursery for Eloise’s birth. Thoughts about becoming a mother.”

  “You want some help looking at it?”

  “I’ll want a second eye,” she said, which she knew Melvin understood to mean maybe later. She easily could rule out what wasn’t relevant, and she would want to digest anything iffy before airing what might be dirty laundry. Should she run across something obvious, however, Melvin would be the first to know. The same with whatever she might not be sure of.

  At the moment, unfortunately, there was very little of that.

  Once back in the squad room, Melvin stopped to talk to Danny Garcia while Miriam headed straight for her cubicle. She tossed her crossbody at her desk so hard, it hit her stapler and both went flying. She shoved the diary file at her in-box, then picked up the mess.

  A thought had been niggling at her since Edward Lacey had mentioned his mother fostering three children besides Gina Gardner and Franklin Weeks: I suppose it was no different from growing up with blood siblings.

  Two of those not-related-by-blood siblings were dead. Killed by the same person. Similar messages left at the scenes of the crimes. This did not bode well for the other three, though she couldn’t help but think about Edward. If he wasn’t the one throwing rocks and slitting throats, how safe was he? He said he hadn’t kept in touch with any of the five he’d grown up with.

  And that had her wondering: What if the foster siblings had kept in touch with one another?

  With the thought on her mind, she pulled up a browser window. Once Facebook loaded, she searched out Gina Gardner’s name. There were only a gazillion or so. Even narrowing her search to Texas, then Union Park, didn’t give her what she was looking for.

  Next she searched for the Paisley Cricket, figuring Franklin and Alejandro would have a business page for advertising the bistro, and they did. But nothing posted there gave her more than she already had. She clicked away with no desire to visit for lunch.

  Obviously identifying then locating the other three was going to require more than searching out the Facebook friends of her murder victims. She reached for the expanding folder, dumped out the rubber-banded copy of the diary, and opened her notebook to the insert she was using for her reading notes.

  Deciding this time to work backward through the dead woman’s life, Miriam flipped to the final entry. Gina had written it the night before she’d died.

  Finalized details for Imogene’s piano lessons today. That takes care of everyone’s summer activities. Who knew children were no longer allowed to stay home and play in the backyard, or read books in a blanket fort, or ride bikes for hours without carrying a cell phone to show their location?

  I do love being able to give them every opportunity, but sometimes I think times were so much simpler when summer meant being free from school and doing nothing but hanging out until it was time to go back the next year. Then again, I hardly had other options. No piano lessons for me.

  If I wanted to go to the library, I had to get there on my own. And it wasn’t like I had a lot of friends except for the Tatters. I’ve never told Jeff that’s what we called ourselves, or anything about that time. Me, Autumn, Corky, Darius, and Frank. A play on Dorothy’s last name. Tatting was a way to make lace. And all of our lives were in complete shreds.

  Hmm. So Gina hadn’t trusted her husband with her past, but she wrote about it openly? And left her journal on her nightstand where he could easily flip through it?

  Was he truly that trustworthy? Or was he lying?

  She thought about Eloise clinging to her father, about Bongo b
arking as Melvin had walked with her to the front door. She picked up her phone and dialed the crime lab.

  “Sosa.”

  “Karen, it’s Miriam Rome.” She clicked her pen on, clicked it off. “I know it’s probably too soon, but have you processed the blue tarp from the Franklin Weeks scene yet?”

  “Hello, Detective. How nice to hear from you. I’m fine, thank you, though this weather is killing my sinuses. And, no. Not yet. We’ve got a bit of a pileup in here.”

  “When you get to it, you’ll check for dog blood on this one, too, right?”

  “Of course, Detective.”

  Miriam exhaled deeply. “I’m sorry you’re having trouble with your sinuses. If I’d figured out how to deal with mine, I’d share the secret. I just snort my way through. Pop a lot of Sudafed and ibuprofen. I can’t deal with the antihistamines. They all put me to sleep, no matter their nondrowsy claims.”

  Karen was quiet for a minute, and Miriam had just started frowning when the other woman laughed. “Why, Miriam Rome, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say so many words at one time that weren’t about a case.”

  Guilty as charged.

  They chatted about their allergies for another couple of minutes, Karen recommending an herbal tea she particularly loved, then Miriam got back to work. Pulling up the desktop folder with the photos she’d taken at both the Gardner and the Weeks crime scenes, she began clicking through the pictures.

  She’d looked at them before, and it wasn’t like the images weren’t seared into the backs of her eyeballs, but after a few days and having input more data, she hoped something might jump out now that hadn’t earlier. The first thing that did was realizing both Gina and Frank had good taste. Expensive taste.

  The Gardner house and the condo Frank and Alex shared were showroom worthy. Jeff Gardner’s income obviously accounted for his family’s home, but Miriam found herself wondering if the bistro brought in that much cash. Maybe Alex came from money, because neither man worked another job.

  Ballard was going through both victims’ financials. She rolled her chair into the aisle to ask him what he’d found, only to look up and see her deputy chief standing at the end of the row of cubicles and gesturing for her to come to his office.

  She shoved the diary back into its folder with a groan. Maybe one of these days she’d get a chance to finish what she started.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Wednesday, 4:15 p.m.

  Chris Judah was only six years older than Miriam, but he intimidated her in ways that left her feeling as if she’d been called to see the principal instead of her boss. It wasn’t a feeling she liked. Mostly because she hated having her focus slammed to a stop.

  Judah was sharp. He was exact. He said what he meant. He meant what he said.

  And that, unfortunately, was the problem.

  Standing in his office and doing her best not to scream, she stared at him where he sat behind his desk. She hoped she’d heard him wrong. She knew she hadn’t. Knew, too, she’d do what he’d told her. That didn’t mean she’d be happy about it. How could she be?

  Five years now. She’d steered clear of Father Augustine Treece for five years. She’d followed through on her decision to let him go . . . though no one really believed she was done with him, over him. That their relationship was finished, kaput. No one but her and Augie.

  Or Augie, at least.

  What was she going to say to him after five years?

  “Rome? Did you hear me?”

  Staring at the knot of his tie, another psychedelic Jerry Garcia number, she nodded because her ears were still ringing. “You’re assigning Ballard and Branch, when he gets back Monday, to work the case with me and Melvin.”

  He cocked his head. “And?”

  She tightened her hold on the back of the visitor’s chair separating her from his desk. “The rest of our cases get reassigned or back-burnered. And on this one, I’m still lead.”

  “Dammit, Rome.” He slammed down his palms on his chair arms. “Stop skirting the issue. I want you to go talk to Treece about the case. See if he has any thoughts on the religious angle. Something besides what you’ve come up with.”

  She blew out a huff of a breath. “He left this life, this job, behind for a reason, sir. I can’t imagine any incentive that would get him to come back.”

  The deputy chief reached for a pencil. “I don’t want him to come back, Rome. I want to get his take on things. His feel for what we might not get from the verses. A consultant, as it were. He’s got insight the rest of us don’t.”

  “I get that, sir. I really do.” She reached up to rub at her forehead and the ache starting there. “But if you don’t mind me asking—”

  “I do,” he said, pointing at her with the pencil’s sharp end. “But go on.”

  “Why Augie? Union Park’s not exactly lacking in spiritual leaders, Bible scholars. Pastors, ministers. Even other priests.”

  “I don’t want the details of this case leaking to the media. It’s gotta stay close to the vest, Rome. That’s nonnegotiable.”

  “Then why not the department chaplain?” she asked, pressing forward with her lost cause. “He’s one of us when it comes to confidentiality. He won’t speak out of turn.”

  “I have the utmost respect for Reverend Murphy, but he’s not police. Augie fills every bill, and Augie’s the one I want you to talk to. He was a damn good cop,” he said, rapping the pencil’s eraser against a file folder in front of him, one eye narrowed. “I assume he’s a damn good priest. Put the two together and maybe we can get somewhere on this before it gets out of hand. I’d rather not have to call in the Rangers.”

  Because she wasn’t good enough? Or she wasn’t good enough without Augie? She scratched at an itch on her forehead. “Sir, I think with the four of us working this—”

  Judah threw down the pencil. It bounced off his desk and into his full cup of coffee. He grabbed it just as it started to spill. “Do it, Rome. Go see the man. Let me know what he says.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  Wednesday, 8:00 p.m.

  “Rome! Damn if you’re not sizzling tonight. How’s it hanging?”

  There was something about walking into the True Blue Bar that put a smile on Miriam’s face every time. Something more than the rich smells of burgers and fries and beer. More than the pounding loud music that meant shouting—or leaning close—to be heard. Something besides anticipating the tequila, and a night with her best friend.

  She was pretty sure her favorite bartender had everything to do with it. She just wished his perpetually upbeat mood was contagious and not just his smile. Her stomach was in knots. The ache in her chest grew worse with every breath she took. Her palms were nearly raw from digging her fingernails into them to keep herself from screaming.

  Pretending she wouldn’t be seeing Augie an hour from now, she smiled right back. “I’m good, Sugar. You?”

  Sugar was probably fifteen years her senior, but she doubted anyone else would ever think him that old. She only did because she was trained to look for details. His weren’t obvious.

  His hair was a spiky Guy Fieri ’do, bleached to hide his roots. He was clean-shaven, no gray beard to give him away. Tats covered most of his exposed skin: arms, chest, neck. He had smile lines around his mouth and crows’-feet at his temples, but no obvious wrinkles.

  He was lean, not gaunt, healthy, even, with black dime-size plugs in both earlobes. He wore T-shirts and jeans and Doc Martens. His appearance was pretty much ageless.

  “Couldn’t be better for a hump day.” He waggled both brows, the motion tugging on his forehead and the spikes of his hair. “Unless there was some actual humping going on.”

  That brought out an actual laugh. “The night’s still young.”

  “Now that’s what I’m talking about.” He leaned across the bar, motioning her closer. “You okay? You look a little green. Or maybe blue?”

  “I’m fine.” She nodded, reaching out to pat his cheek, his scruff strangel
y comforting. Like petting a wiry terrier. “Work’s just being a bitch.”

  He grabbed her by the wrist and kissed the back of her hand, as if he were a true gentleman and she a lady. “Bummer that, but this is the True Blue, and you are never alone. You need to talk, you got ears everywhere willing to listen.”

  He said it like it was a good thing. She wasn’t so sure and pointed toward Nikki, where she sat at the end of the bar, watching them. “Those right there are the only ears I need.”

  Sugar laughed and waved her on her way. Nikki’s eyes widened at her approach; she lowered her drink, her lips parting as if her jaw had dropped and she hadn’t yet realized it.

  It was the reaction Miriam got from everyone she knew anytime she put more than minimal effort into her appearance. Minimal worked for the job, and usually for drinks with her girl, who she’d actually met because of her job when Nikki had been a witness to a crime.

  She climbed onto the stool at Nikki’s side. “Just say it, okay? Just say it.”

  “I don’t think I need to. In fact, me telling you how amazing you look will probably explode your big head, and I just bought this dress and do not want to have it cleaned of brains.”

  Miriam signaled Sugar to hit her with a match to her BFF’s grapefruit margarita, thinking she didn’t look half as good as her go-to girl. Tonight Nikki wore a sleeveless sheath dress in a pumpkin color that complemented her beautiful brown skin.

  The neckline was modest, and a chunky necklace of hammered brass lay against her chest. Matching hoops no larger than a dime hung from her ears. She wore her hair in a short natural crop. It did amazing things for her incredible cheekbones.

  Miriam reached for her drink as soon as it arrived. A burst of laughter punctuated by the clink of bottles had her looking over her shoulder before saying, “I actually spent twenty minutes doing my face after I got home and showered. Twenty minutes I could’ve spent on a nap.”

  “Well, that twenty minutes was a hell of an investment. Mmm-mmm-mmm.” Nikki clucked her tongue, then picked up her glass. “Sorry about bailing on you last week. As if things with that stupid brother of mine weren’t bad enough, work was absolutely crazy.”