Breathe Your Last: An addictive and nail-biting crime thriller (Detective Josie Quinn Book 10)

by Lisa Regan

  “Her backpack,” Christine said.

  The lobby footage would show whether or not she still had her backpack when she walked into the pool building. They’d also need to check the locker rooms. That backpack and her phone had to be somewhere.

  Josie continued with her questions. “Was Nysa dating anyone?”

  “No. She said she didn’t have time for it.”

  “Was she seeing anyone casually?” Josie asked.

  “You mean, was she hooking up with anyone? I think that she might have been, but I’m really not sure.”

  “What makes you think she might have been?”

  “Just, like, she would be late sometimes coming back from practice or class and she was all flushed, and—I don’t know. Like, you know how someone looks when you walk in on them doing something they don’t want you to see? She would look like that.”

  “Did you ever ask her about it?”

  “Not directly. I asked her where she was or what was going on sometimes, but she always said she’d been out for a run or stayed late to ask a teacher for help or something like that.”

  “You didn’t press the issue?” Josie asked.

  “No. I’m not her mom. She’s an adult. She can do what she wants. We live together and we’re friends, but she doesn’t have to tell me everything.”

  “If she was seeing someone but didn’t want to talk about it,” Josie said, “do you have any idea who it might have been?”

  “None.”

  “Someone on the swim team, maybe?”

  “I guess, but I don’t know why she wouldn’t just tell me that. It’s not a big deal.”

  The cool air that was so wonderful a few moments earlier now sent a chill through Josie’s limbs. “Was there anyone she seemed particularly interested in or someone who was interested in her, that you know of?”

  Christine hugged herself again and started shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “I don’t know. She always said she only had time for school and swimming and that dating was a waste. Maybe, after saying all that stuff all the time, she was embarrassed to admit that she was seeing someone and that’s why she wouldn’t tell me.” Christine said this last part almost to herself.

  Josie coaxed, “What about anyone who was interested in her?”

  “Oh, I guess Hudson. He’s on the swim team. He had a big crush on her last year, but Nysa shot him down. This year they’re just really competitive with each other, like trying to outdo each other and stuff. He was part of the special they did on the news over the weekend. They’re, like, the two best swimmers or whatever. They were supposed to just do the piece on Nysa ’cause she won the big scholarship, but Hudson’s mom had a shitfit that they didn’t include him, so he was on there too. That was kind of awkward. Anyway, he’s a nice guy, and she liked him, but she said his family was a little intense for her.”

  “I saw the piece,” Josie said. “Intense in what way?”

  Christine shrugged. “I don’t know, like overbearing, I guess. Nysa said he was one of those guys whose mom would be in the middle of their relationship the whole entire time, and she didn’t have the energy for that.”

  “Any chance they could have been seeing one another in secret? Maybe not telling anyone?”

  Christine said, “I don’t think so. He still looks at her with those puppy dog eyes all the time. It’s kind of sad.”

  Josie’s list of mental notes grew the more that Christine talked. She pulled her phone from her back pocket so she could fire off some texts to Mettner. After the flooding in Denton five months earlier, during which Josie had been in the water more often than not, she’d purchased a Samsung Galaxy 9 which purported to be waterproof. Jumping into the pool with the phone in her pocket was the first test of its ability to withstand water. As Josie pressed the power button and then tapped in her passcode, she was relieved to see that the phone had, in fact, survived her plunge.

  She tapped in text messages to Mettner even though he was still by the pool, telling him that they needed to interview all swim team members and, in particular, someone named Hudson. She asked Christine, “Was Nysa having any problems with anyone recently?”

  “No. Everything’s been great.” Her chest rose several times in succession as a sob worked its way up into her throat. More tears streamed down her face. Josie gave her a moment to regain some of her composure, then asked, “How has Nysa’s stress level been lately?”

  “Fine. It’s only the beginning of the year, so things aren’t that bad yet.”

  “How about her mood?” Josie asked. “Was she upset or depressed lately? Distraught?”

  Christine’s body went still. “Why are you asking that? You think she killed herself or something? No way. Nysa wouldn’t do that. She’s one of the most upbeat and driven people I know.”

  “You’ve known her for a year. Did she ever mention any history of depression or anxiety?”

  Christine shook her head vigorously. “No, no. Definitely not Nysa.”

  “Okay,” Josie said. “I understand. How about drugs or alcohol? Did she use them at all?”

  “You know we’re not twenty-one yet, right?”

  Josie gave a weak smile. “Christine, in my experience, that’s never stopped anyone, certainly not on a college campus. It’s okay if she did. We just need to know.”

  “Definitely no drugs. She rarely drank. She was very focused on her conditioning for swimming. I mean, there were times last year at parties where she had a drink or two, but she was really into healthy eating and staying fit. Especially with this swim scholarship. Her parents aren’t rich or anything, so it was a big deal for her to get it. If she performs poorly on the swim team or falls behind academically, she could lose it.”

  “Christine,” Josie said, “I’ve got to confer with my colleagues, but after that, I was hoping you could take me to see yours and Nysa’s apartment.”

  “Sure.”

  Goosebumps erupted along Josie’s bare arms. Her clothes were still wet, and she was getting colder by the minute. “Will you wait here for me?”

  Christine nodded.

  “Can I call anyone for you in the meantime?”

  “Nysa’s parents, maybe. They’re still in town. They visited this weekend because WYEP was doing that special on the swim team. They’re staying at the Marriott.”

  Josie was most certainly not going to call Nysa Somers’ parents to come to the scene of her death, particularly while it was still in chaos, but she would have someone dispatched to the hotel to speak with them and ask them to come to the morgue to make a positive ID. Perhaps Noah or Detective Gretchen Palmer, either of whom would handle the death notification with compassion and sensitivity.

  Through the glass doors, Josie could see the flashing red and blue lights of two police cruisers pulling up in front of the building. She stepped closer to the entrance and saw Dr. Anya Feist’s small pickup truck pulling in behind them.

  “I’ve got to talk to my colleagues,” Josie told Christine. “If you wouldn’t mind—”

  Christine folded her arms over her chest. “I’m not going anywhere. I want to know what happened to Nysa.”

  Seven

  Josie met the other Denton officers and Dr. Feist at the doors. She stationed a uniformed officer just outside the front doors and another outside the pool entrance with a clipboard so that he could log anyone entering the scene. Then she led Officers Hummel and Chan of the ERT and Dr. Feist into the pool area. Josie felt a shiver in spite of the welcome heat in the room. A loose circle had formed around Nysa Somers including Sawyer, Owen, Chief Hahlbeck, one of the other campus officers, and Mettner. Glancing at the benches lining the wall, Josie saw Patrick still seated there, watching the emergency personnel. She walked over to him and asked if he was okay. He answered with a tired nod. Touching his shoulder, she told him he was free to go and that if his boss had an issue with him taking the day off, he could take it up with her. He squeezed her in a brief, unexpected hug and jogged off.
Josie turned to the new arrivals and gave them the rundown of what had happened and what little they knew, including what she had found out from Christine Trostle.

  “We’re treating this as a suspicious death,” she concluded.

  Hummel and Chan began unpacking their equipment. Dr. Anya Feist knelt on the tile, peering down into Nysa’s face. Josie took out her phone again and dialed Noah. It rang eight times and went to voicemail.

  “Mett,” she said. “Did you see Noah at the station this morning?”

  He shook his head. “No. Try Gretchen.”

  As Josie scrolled her contacts for Gretchen’s number, she said, “Was it busy this morning?”

  “No,” Mettner said. “Not particularly.”

  Noah was working the same shift as Josie. She was wondering where he was when Gretchen’s voice came through the receiver. “Boss?”

  Josie put the phone to her ear and quickly explained the situation, as well as her request for Gretchen to go to the Marriott to notify Nysa Somers’ parents and bring them to the morgue. After she hung up, Hillary said, “Gerry is in the back, pulling footage. I checked the women’s locker room to see if she’d left anything in there—perhaps a swim bag or something like that. Didn’t find anything. Also checked her pockets. Nothing. I checked the men’s locker room just to see if there was anything unusual in there. Didn’t find a thing. I know you’ll want to have a look yourself, though.”

  Josie nodded. The Evidence Response officers took photographs while Dr. Feist stood back. “I’ll have a look now, if you don’t mind.”

  Hillary followed her, first into the women’s locker room, then the men’s, answering Josie’s questions as she asked them. There were no assigned lockers. The rooms were cleaned twice a day by custodial staff. Once mid-morning and once mid-evening. No custodians had yet reported to the building. Finding nothing of interest, Josie returned to the body.

  Dr. Feist knelt on the floor beside the body once more, her gloved hands probing Nysa Somers’ limbs. “Bag her hands, would you, Hummel? In case there’s skin under her nails.”

  Hummel and Chan went to work as Dr. Feist stood and snapped off her gloves.

  Josie asked, “You think there was foul play?”

  Dr. Feist shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t see anything that indicates she was trying to defend herself, but what are the odds that such a strong swimmer would drown? Unless she was under the influence of drugs or alcohol, which is the most likely scenario. We’ll run toxicology, but you know that takes almost two months. We could also be looking at a sudden medical event like cardiac arrest or something like that. She could have come for a swim but gone into cardiac arrest and drowned.”

  Josie frowned, looking at Nysa Somers’ clothes once more. “She wasn’t dressed for swimming.”

  “Right,” said Dr. Feist. “That’s your department, not mine. However, I don’t think a sudden medical event is very likely. We don’t typically see those types of things in young, healthy people. It’s not unheard of, but based on my experience, the most likely scenario is that she was intoxicated, thought it would be a great idea to go for a swim, and drowned accidentally.”

  Josie turned to Hillary. “Do you think Gerry’s got that footage ready for us?”

  “Come with me,” she answered. She led Josie and Mettner out of the pool area toward the back, to the brown door Gerry had gone through earlier. Up close, Josie could see that it was marked with a large, intimidating red sign with white letters that announced: Emergency Exit Only. Do Not Block. Door Alarm Will Sound. From her belt, Hillary produced a laminated card attached to a retractable lanyard which she held under a silver box beneath the door handle. A swirl of red lights danced over the card and then a beep sounded. Hillary pushed through the door, no alarm sounding. Josie and Mettner followed her into a drab gray hallway. Josie looked right and then left. At the end of each side of the hall were two more doors simply marked Exit.

  “This way,” Hillary said, pointing left.

  Josie and Mettner walked in single file behind her. Several feet before the exit, on the right, was an unmarked brown door with another scanner on its handle. Hillary scanned her card and they followed her inside. It was a small tile and concrete office with desks lining the walls. Each desk held two laptops, their screens lit up. One set of computers showed three views of the lobby, and the other showed multiple views of the exterior of the building.

  Gerry sat at the closest desk, focused on the computer. He waved them over, clicking away until three equal-sized boxes filled up the screen. Each showed a different view of the building’s lobby. As he worked back to find Nysa Somers on the videos, Josie asked, “How difficult would it be for someone to get into the pool area from these back doors?”

  Hillary said, “As Gerry said earlier, you’d need a staff ID card to get inside the exterior doors as well as the door at the back of the pool area. That’s exit only, so the alarm would sound if you opened it.”

  Mettner said, “If one of those doors was breached without a staff ID card, where would the alarm sound?”

  “Inside the building, and an alert would go to our main switchboard as well as to the phones of any staff currently on duty. We’ve got an app.”

  “Even in the middle of the night?” Mettner asked. “Before Gerry came in?”

  Hillary nodded. “Yes. In that case, the alerts would go to the main switchboard and our night patrols. But I can tell you that no alarms were triggered in this building last night or this morning. I already checked.”

  “How about a list of ID cards that were used to access the building?” Josie said. “If someone accessed it using a card last night or this morning, would you have a record of that?”

  “Yes,” Hillary said. “I thought of that. I checked, but no one except Gerry used a card to enter this building this morning, and he was here at five forty-five a.m.”

  “How about the guard from last night?” Josie continued. “What time did he or she close up the building?”

  “Ten p.m.,” answered Hillary.

  “We’d like both those logs, if you wouldn’t mind,” Josie said. “The one showing the alarms for the last twenty-four hours and the ones showing key card use as well.”

  “Of course.” Hillary walked over to a touchscreen tablet mounted on the wall and started punching and swiping with her fingers. A moment later, a printer beneath one of the desks whirred to life and began to spit out paper.

  “Here’s Nysa,” Gerry said, motioning toward the laptop.

  Over his shoulders, Josie and Mettner leaned in. On all three views, the timestamp at the bottom right read 6:02 a.m. One view showed a set of exterior lobby doors opening. Nysa Somers stepped inside, wearing her tank top and shorts, carrying nothing. She stopped midway through the lobby. Her head swiveled to the left and she smiled. She waved and said something. One of the other views showed Gerry behind his rounded reception desk, smiling and waving back. He said something to her in return. Then Nysa walked up to the doors to the pool area and pushed through them.

  “Gerry,” Josie said. “You said she came most days to swim. Did she usually have some kind of bag with her?”

  His brow furrowed. He stopped the footage and met Josie’s eyes. “Well, yeah. All the girls carry some kind of bag even if they come with their suits on under their clothes. Usually she has a duffel bag. Sometimes she has that and her backpack.”

  Josie said, “So she showed up at 6:02 a.m. wearing regular clothes with no bathing suit underneath, carrying nothing. She walked inside. What did she say to you, Gerry?”

  “She said, ‘Good morning, Mr. Murphy.’ I said good morning back to her.”

  Mettner said, “She called you by name. Did you know her well?”

  Gerry shook his head. “No, not well. I knew her better than most of the kids on campus because she’s in here almost every day. I get to know the kids on the swim team, chat with them sometimes, but that’s it. I don’t know them well. Just names and faces, really.�
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  “Do you know a student named Hudson?” Josie asked.

  “Sure,” Gerry said. “He’s on the team too. I see him and Nysa together a lot. He’s got a pretty big crush on her, I think, but mostly they’re just real competitive with each other. They were real competitive. Jeez.” He took a deep breath. “Sorry. It’s just hard to believe something like this happened. It’s so awful. So tragic. Poor Nysa.”

  “Do you know if Nysa and Hudson were dating?” Josie asked.

  “Oh, I don’t know. The kids don’t talk to me about that kind of stuff.”

  Mettner said, “What time did Patrick get here?”

  “I’ll show you,” Gerry said. He began to click, but Josie put a gentle hand on his forearm.

  “Would you mind fast-forwarding through to the time Patrick appears so we can be assured that no one else came in between Nysa and him?”

  “Of course,” said Gerry.

  He clicked a few times more, and the screens fast-forwarded until footage of Patrick entering the lobby came up on all three cameras. Josie noted that Gerry remained at his desk the entire morning, so there was no possibility that he had slipped into the pool area and done something to Nysa. On Patrick’s arrival, the time stamp read 8:16 a.m. He carried a backpack which he set down beside him when he plopped onto one of the benches. They watched as he bent his head to his phone. A moment later, he stood, stretched his arms over his head, and headed toward the vending machine area. Two more minutes went by and then Josie saw herself on the screen.

  The lobby was quiet. Gerry sat at his desk reading a newspaper. At 8:20, Patrick came running back out into the lobby, arms waving, mouth stretched open. Gerry jumped out of his chair, pulled his phone out of his pocket, and started running toward him. The doors swallowed both of them up.

  “That’s enough,” Josie said. “Can you show us the footage from the exterior of the building?”

  Solemnly, Gerry clicked out of the footage they’d been watching and returned the screen to the present views of the lobby, which showed one of Denton PD’s uniformed officers standing sentry with a clipboard; a campus officer milling around; and Christine Trostle waiting on a bench.