Every Dark Corner (The Cincinnati Series Book 3)

by Karen Rose

  Charity had helped make him a very rich man.

  ‘Yes, he would have,’ Nell said fondly. She’d loved the old ass, even though he’d made her life a living hell. That was the difference between him and Nell. I don’t love anyone.

  Not even Nell. He cared about her, but he’d walk away from this place in an instant if it suited him. So far, it hadn’t suited him.

  He straightened in his chair, stretching his neck until he felt it pop. ‘Unless you have anything else for me to do, I think I’m going to call it a day.’ Because Mallory was making steaks for dinner and strawberry shortcake for dessert.

  And because he still had to take care of Rawlings, the prison guard.

  And then he’d talk with his newest customer and share the plans he had for his latest group of initiates. His customer was very, very interested. And very, very rich. There would be no profits from future downloads, because his customer would buy the assets along with the film for his own private use, but the upfront money was more than enough to make up for it.

  ‘No, you’re done.’ Nell patted the stack of file folders she’d brought in with her. ‘I’ve got a few hours of paperwork yet to do, though.’

  ‘We could hire a receptionist.’

  She rolled her eyes. ‘We did. Her name is Gemma. She comes in when she feels like it. Today she didn’t feel like it because she had to shop for Macy. Back-to-school clothes, you know. Even though Macy’s home-schooled.’

  Their sister was completely unreliable, doing a piss-poor job when she actually did show up. ‘You know you can fire her. I’ve told you that before.’

  Nell’s face twisted in a pained grimace. ‘I tried. She cried.’

  He frowned, annoyed with both of his sisters. ‘She cries because you let her. Fire her ass, Nell. Hire a competent assistant.’

  ‘What about Mallory? She’s eighteen now, right?’

  No. No, no, no. Letting Mallory go to the grocery store was one thing, especially when he could track her every movement. He knew where she’d gone, how long she’d been gone, and what route she’d taken – and that she’d made no stops. Letting her sit in an office, with a computer? No fucking way in hell.

  He kept his expression bland. ‘She’s doing some charity work for Roxy and me.’

  A slight frown of concern wrinkled Nell’s forehead. ‘How is Roxy doing?’

  ‘She’s a raging alcoholic, Nell,’ he said sharply. ‘Just like she was the last time you asked.’ Which was just the way he liked it. His wife was the equalizing presence – no one questioned that he had Mallory living with him as long as Roxy lived with him too. No one knew that ninety percent of the time Roxy was sleeping off a drunken binge. Not even Nell knew how bad it really was. Because before her liver had gone on strike, Roxy had been a totally functional drunk. Now that Mallory was eighteen, Roxy had become less important to the equation. Which was convenient timing, because Roxy was dying.

  Nell looked hurt. ‘I worry about Roxy, Remy. She’s my sister-in-law. She needs help.’

  Of course Roxy needed help. But she’d never get it, not as long as he drew breath. He liked things just the way they were, thank you very much. ‘You’re trying to divert attention from the fact that you could hire a perfectly good admin assistant if you fired the one you’ve got.’

  Nell sighed. ‘All right. I’ll try.’

  And she’d fail. So he wasn’t going to feel guilty that she’d be here late doing the work she should have hired someone else to do a long time ago. He stood up, clearing the trash from his desk and tossing it in the wastebasket. ‘What are those, anyway?’ he asked as she pushed the stack of files to the cleared space on his side of the desk. She’d take the chair when he was gone, but while he was here in the office, she’d never dare. She deferred to him out of habit, and he let her. It kept their relationship neat and tidy.

  ‘Files of patients who either graduated last year or . . .’ She sighed. ‘Or who died.’ She patted the top folder.

  Sidney Siler. ‘Oh, right,’ he said quietly, his face twisting in sham sympathy. ‘Poor kid.’

  Nell’s eyes hardened. ‘She was using for a long time, Remy. She made bad choices.’

  ‘I can still be sorry she’s gone,’ he said mournfully, while inwardly he rolled his eyes. Nell could be hard on a coke addict, but she let her own baby sister run roughshod all over her.

  ‘Yeah, I guess so. Well, I’ll see you tomorrow, Remy. Have a good evening.’

  He dropped a kiss on her upturned cheek. ‘You too.’

  He paused outside the office door to call Mallory and tell her that he was on his way home so she could put the steaks on, then he went to his car and put the top down, forgetting about Nell, the practice, and even Sidney Siler as soon as he felt the wind on his face.

  Eleven

  Cincinnati, Ohio,

  Thursday 13 August, 6.50 P.M.

  Kate knocked on the door of Sidney Siler’s apartment a third time, listening for any indication of activity inside, but heard nothing. Sidney had shared the small efficiency with Chelsea Emory, another King’s College grad student. If Chelsea was inside, she wasn’t making any noise. And she wasn’t coming to the door.

  She glanced at the uniformed CPD officer that Deacon and Scarlett’s lieutenant had assigned to guard duty. ‘Nobody’s come in or out?’ she asked.

  ‘Not since I got here at four fifteen. A few other residents have come and gone. I noted a description of each one, the apartment they came in or out of, and the time.’

  ‘Did any of them approach you?’

  ‘No, ma’am. They avoided me like the plague.’

  ‘Okay, thanks.’ That Chelsea had not returned to her apartment was worrisome. Sidney was – presumably – killed because she knew something that her killer didn’t want known. If she had confided in Chelsea, the roommate could be in danger as well. And if Chelsea believed that Sidney had died of an overdose, she’d be vulnerable. Unable to take the most basic of precautions. Hopefully Chelsea wasn’t dead, too.

  It could be more simple than that, though, and Kate hoped it was. Maybe Chelsea wasn’t home because she’d sought solace with other friends or family. Sidney and Chelsea had been friends before they became roommates, according to the police report. Chelsea had ID’d Sidney’s body at the scene early that morning, providing the first responders the contact information for Sidney’s parents, who lived in Houston and who were now on their way to claim their daughter’s body. They were expected to arrive sometime this evening and, according to Carrie Washington, had not yet been to the morgue. Which was good, because they didn’t know their daughter had been murdered any more than Chelsea did.

  Damn. The parents would have to be told, and Kate would be the one to tell them.

  Since no one was answering the door, Kate went to the next apartment. It was university housing, so the women’s neighbors would be fellow students. She needed to know who Sidney hung with, specifically anyone who knew about her drug use and the identity of her dealer. If no one was home, she’d hit the eateries around campus next since it was supper time.

  She’d raised her fist to knock on the next door when she heard voices coming around the corner from the elevator. One young-sounding female and an older male. A third person – most likely a woman – was sobbing.

  ‘Are you sure, Ruth?’ the female was asking. ‘You don’t have to do this today. You can rest tonight and do it in the morning. I can find you a hotel room and—’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ the sobbing woman insisted. ‘I need to do it tonight. Tonight.’

  ‘We’d like to get it over with,’ the male said hoarsely. ‘I won’t be able to rest until this is done. Until . . .’ His voice broke. ‘Until I see her with my own eyes.’

  The trio rounded the corner, a female who was grad-student-aged with her arm around a sobbing ol
der woman who appeared to be in her fifties. The man’s red eyes were evidence that he’d been crying too. The three stumbled to a stop when they saw Kate standing at the neighbor’s door.

  ‘They’re not home,’ the young woman told her.

  ‘Are you Chelsea Emory?’ Kate asked, and the young woman’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘Yes. Who are you? And why is there a cop standing outside my door?’

  Kate held out her shield. ‘I’m Special Agent Coppola, FBI. I’d like to talk to you.’

  ‘This is not a good time,’ Chelsea said impatiently, but fear flickered in her eyes.

  ‘I know,’ Kate said gently. ‘There’s never a good time for this. May I come in?’

  ‘This isn’t my apartment. That is. And why is there a goddamned cop standing there?’

  Ignoring Chelsea’s repeated question about the officer, Kate turned to the older couple. ‘You’re Alan and Ruth Siler?’

  Mr Siler jerked a nod. ‘What’s this about?’

  Kate could tell that the man knew something was wrong. More wrong. ‘I don’t want to do this in the hall.’ She walked to Chelsea’s door and waited. ‘Please.’

  Chelsea looked uncertainly at Mr Siler. ‘Go ahead,’ he said. ‘Let’s get this over with too.’

  Kate waited until they were all in the little apartment and had pulled the door shut. It was a tight fit – the place was even smaller than Kate’s college apartment had been. Chelsea started to move things, a nervous attempt at tidying, and Kate stopped her.

  ‘Please don’t. Don’t touch anything yet.’ She pulled two desk chairs over to an ugly orange futon. ‘Mr and Mrs Siler? You might be more comfortable using the chairs.’

  Silent, hostile, they sat. Kate perched on a wooden bar stool that had seen better days and Chelsea sank down onto the futon.

  Kate drew a breath. ‘First, I’m sorry for your loss.’

  Mrs Siler glared at her. ‘Just get to the point, Agent Whatever-your-name-is.’

  ‘Ruth,’ Mr Siler murmured, still holding her hand. He met Kate’s gaze head on. ‘We came here to see what’s left of our daughter’s life before we identify her body in the morgue, Agent Coppola. Please make this brief.’

  ‘All right. Your daughter, Sidney, didn’t die of an overdose. She was murdered.’

  Three gasps sliced through the air. Three pairs of shocked eyes stared at her.

  Chelsea was the first to speak. ‘No. The EMT said it was dirty coke.’

  Carrie had tested the residue she’d found in Sidney’s nostrils and had also determined that the cyanide had been delivered in a capsule that Sidney had crushed in her teeth – there was still residue of both the cyanide and the gelatin used as the capsule wall between her molars.

  ‘Yes, she did take cocaine. It was mixed with ketamine, in a dose high enough to temporarily paralyze her. But before the ketamine kicked in, she was given poison.’

  Mr Siler shook his head, as if trying to comprehend another language. ‘The cocaine was . . . is poison. So many kids snorting their lives away. We’d thought she’d escaped it.’

  Kate addressed Mr Siler, but from the corner of her eye she was watching for Chelsea’s reaction. ‘Your daughter seemed to have been using cocaine for some time. But last night she was also given cyanide.’

  Mrs Siler began to hyperventilate. ‘Wha— What? How? Why?’

  Chelsea’s mouth fell open in what seemed once again to be genuine shock. Either that, or the girl was a damn fine actress.

  ‘You’re saying our daughter was murdered?’ Mr Siler demanded.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Kate said calmly. She’d said it before and it hadn’t sunk in. It seemed to be sinking in now. ‘We believe the cocaine was supposed to cover the real cause of death, which was cyanide poisoning. We’re not entirely sure why yet. Or who.’

  ‘Oh my Lord.’ Mrs Siler began to cry anew, rocking back and forth, her hand tightly clamped over her mouth to stifle her keening sobs.

  ‘We’re looking for her dealer,’ Kate said bluntly. ‘Chelsea, can you help me?’

  ‘No,’ Chelsea whispered. ‘I don’t know who she bought from. I . . . don’t do that. I begged her to stop, but I don’t know who her dealer was.’

  Now the girl was lying. A simple test would show if she’d snorted any coke recently.

  ‘I see,’ Kate said quietly, and Chelsea flinched, but offered nothing more. Kate decided she’d table the drugs for now. Chelsea might be more willing to talk when not in the presence of Sidney’s parents. ‘Sidney made a trip to the jail yesterday to visit an inmate.’

  The parents looked tormented. Chelsea, however, frowned.

  ‘That damn paper of hers,’ Mr Siler spat. ‘Interviewing deviants and sociopaths. I bet one of them targeted her.’

  Mrs Siler wrung her hands. ‘I told her no good would come of that. But she didn’t listen. And now she’s dead! My baby is dead,’ she added in a mournful wail.

  Kate said nothing, waiting for Chelsea to speak. Finally Chelsea nodded, but slowly, like she wasn’t sure what to say but wasn’t trying to hide anything. ‘She’d done that a few times. For her research. She was a clinical psych grad student, working on her dissertation.’

  ‘Did you know she was going yesterday?’

  ‘No, but I knew something was up because she was so . . . excited. I thought she’d snorted some coke but she said it was a natural high. That she was gonna get published in all the psych journals.’ Her eyes filled with tears. ‘She always wanted to get published. Now she never will.’

  ‘Did she keep notes?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course.’ Chelsea went to one of the two desks in the room.

  Kate followed, pulling on a pair of gloves. ‘Just point, Chelsea. Don’t touch.’

  ‘That one.’ Chelsea indicated a generic notebook, one that could be bought in any drugstore in the country. ‘That’s her current volume. The drawer has all of her older notes.’

  Kate flipped to the last entry. ‘These are dated several months ago.’

  Chelsea looked over Kate’s arm to study the page. ‘Yes. That was her last interview, up in Chillicothe Prison. She went with her grad advisor. They’re writing an article together.’

  ‘Why is this important, Agent Coppola?’ Mr Siler asked fretfully.

  Alice’s death was already on the news. The Silers might even have seen the reports on the TVs in the airport that morning. If they hadn’t, they’d soon put two and two together. ‘The inmate she went to see was killed this morning,’ Kate told them. ‘She was poisoned.’

  Mrs Siler’s sobs had quieted. Now she just rocked and Mr Siler pulled her into his arms. ‘Dear God,’ he whispered. ‘Dear God. What did you do, Sidney? What did you do?’

  Chelsea closed her eyes. ‘Did you find her pen with her things?’

  Kate stilled. That’s an odd question. ‘I don’t know. Why?’

  ‘She had a fancy recorder pen. A spy pen,’ Chelsea said, her mouth twisting bitterly. ‘She thought she was hot stuff because she’d sneaked it through the jails several times. She recorded every word when she went on these interviews. Her grad advisor thought she had a genius memory. Sid said it was her ace in the hole.’

  ‘Give me a moment.’ Kate opened the apartment’s front door and motioned the officer to stand inside. ‘I’ll just be a moment. Can you make sure no one leaves the room?’

  Mr Siler gasped in outrage. ‘Are we suspects?’ he thundered.

  ‘No, sir,’ Kate said kindly, then looked directly at Chelsea. ‘Not you and Mrs Siler.’

  Chelsea paled and Mr Siler lurched to his feet, dragging his wife with him, still awkwardly patting her shoulder. ‘Are you accusing Chelsea of killing Sidney? That is crazy talk. Just crazy! They were like sisters!’

  Kate kept her gaze on Chelsea’s pale f
ace. ‘We’ll search the apartment, Chelsea. We’ll find your stash too. I need to make a phone call, and then I’m going to ask you about Sidney’s dealer again. You need to be thinking about your answer. A little hint? “I don’t know” is not the answer I’m looking for.’ She looked at the officer. ‘No phone calls, nobody touches anything. She stays in this room. All three of them stay. For their own protection, if nothing else. Okay?’

  The officer nodded once. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  Kate called Zimmerman, Deacon, and Troy, conferencing the three of them together. ‘Do we know where Sidney Siler’s effects are located at this moment?’ she asked them. ‘Specifically her backpack.’

  ‘It’s either with the morgue or with Forensics,’ Deacon answered. ‘Give me a minute and I’ll call Tanaka in CSU.’

  ‘What’s this about, Kate?’ Zimmerman asked when Deacon had put them on hold.

  ‘Possibly the motive for Sidney’s murder,’ Kate said. ‘Let’s wait for Deacon and I’ll tell you all together.’

  Deacon was back in less than a minute. ‘Vince Tanaka said that her backpack isn’t with CSU. It must still be at the morgue.’

  ‘Okay. We need someone we trust to get over there and search it. I need to finish this interview.’ She gave them a brief update. ‘So we’re looking for a spy pen,’ she finished.

  ‘Sidney recorded her conversation with Alice,’ Zimmerman said with satisfaction. ‘I’ll go over there myself and supervise the search.’

  ‘You can trust Tanaka to do that,’ Deacon said with conviction. ‘And Carrie Washington, too. But just to protect everyone, please record the search on video.’

  ‘And then upload the contents to the evidence server right away,’ Kate added. ‘And send us copies.’