by Lisa Jackson
Good news.
She grabbed the newspaper from her box as Ansel, a mouse in his mouth, slunk around the corner. “Oh, geez, what have you got?” she asked, seeing that the little rodent was still alive and squirming, its beady eyes fixed in fright. “Oh, Ansel,” Abby whispered, not wanting to deal with the field mouse alive or dead. “Let him go. Now! And don’t catch him again or bring him back to me without a head! Ansel!” The cat started to dart away as she heard the sound of a car’s engine. She turned just as a police cruiser pulled into the driveway. Her heart nose-dived. What was it her father used to say? The police only stop for two reasons, neither one good.
Either someone is dead.
Or you’re about to be arrested.
The spit dried in her mouth.
From the corner of her eye, she saw the mouse somehow wiggle free and scamper quickly through the underbrush, Ansel in hot pursuit. Abby barely noticed. She was focused on the police car and the man who was climbing out.
He was five-ten or -eleven with an athletic build, jet-black hair, and chiseled features that suggested a bit of Native American tossed into his Latino gene pool. A trimmed goatee surrounded his mouth, and in one ear, a gold ring winked in the sunlight.
“Abby Gierman?” he asked and slid off his shades to reveal dark, intense eyes guarded by thick black eyebrows. Though he wasn’t exactly Hollywood handsome, he was good looking and there was something about him that hinted at danger. He hooked the shades on the neckline of his open-collared shirt where a few dark chest hairs were visible.
“I’m Abby.”
Though he was staring hard directly at her, squinting against the last of the sunlight, she figured he saw everything that was going on around him. His expression said it all: he was delivering bad news. Probably the worst.
She thought of her father . . . dying by inches from complications of emphysema and cancer. No, dear God, please, don’t let Dad be dead! Her heart was beating like a drum, her nerves strung tight as high wires.
“My name’s Chastain. Abby Chastain.”
He reached into a pocket and withdrew his badge. “But it was Gierman,” he said and added, “Detective Reuben Montoya, New Orleans Police Department.” His badge, glittering in the poor sunlight, confirmed his identity.
“Are you looking for me?” she asked, bracing herself.
“Unfortunately, yes. Maybe we should go inside.”
“What is it, Detective?” she asked, then remembered the conversation with Maury Taylor the day before. Maury had been worried about Luke. And the cop had called her by her married name. It wasn’t her father, after all! “Oh, God, it’s Luke,” she whispered, her hand flying to her mouth. “What happened?”
“Ms. Chastain, he’s dead. I’m sorry.”
She let out a gasp, and though she didn’t realize it, her knees began to buckle. Quick as lightning, Montoya grabbed hold of her arm. His strong grip helped her stay on her feet.
Her mind stalled. She felt disconnected. Then images of Luke flashed like quicksilver behind her eyes. Luke sailing on Puget Sound, his hair flying around his face as he tacked into the wind. Luke giving her a single rose when he asked her to marry him while they were hiking in the Olympic Mountains. Luke hurrying out the door before dawn to report the news on the Seattle radio station. Luke, disheveled, coming home late, his eyes bright, his excuses lame. Luke, drunk, telling her about Zoey . . .
She closed her eyes. Fought tears. Her stomach lurched and she thought she might be sick.
Dead? He was dead? Luke? No way! He couldn’t be. It was impossible. She’d just talked with him, argued with him on the phone a couple of nights ago. She blinked rapidly against hot, unlikely tears. “I—I don’t believe it.”
Montoya’s face said it all. This was no prank, no publicity stunt set up by the master of self-promotion himself. “I’m sorry,” he repeated.
She let out her breath, shoved her hair out of her eyes, and saw that Montoya’s strong fingers were still around her arm. As if he, too, suddenly realized he was holding her upright and recognized the fact that she wasn’t going to faint dead away, he released her.
“Why did you think I was talking about Luke Gierman?”
She lifted a shoulder and silently wished their last conversation hadn’t been in anger. “Because Maury Taylor called here yesterday looking for him. Maury was worried that something bad had happened. But I blew him off. I thought it was just one of Luke’s tricks . . .” She squeezed her eyes shut and pulled in a deep breath. This was wrong. So very wrong. “I can’t believe it. There must be some mistake.”
“No mistake.” Montoya’s voice was firm, his expression convincing.
“Sweet Jesus.” Luke . . . dead? She fought a sudden rush of tears for a man she no longer loved. “What happened?” she asked, and her own voice sounded distant and detached, the words coming out right and yet seeming as if they were from someone else. He must have been in an accident . . . his damned car, that was it.
“I think we should go inside.”
“Why?” she asked and then saw something in Montoya’s eyes, something dark and suspicious and frightening. Her heart started pounding double-time again. “What happened, Detective?” she demanded, her voice stronger, her mind racing.
“Gunshot wound. Close range.”
“What?”
“He was murdered.”
“No! Wait!” She took a couple of steps backward. No, no, no! “Someone shot and killed him?”
“That’s right.”
She heard him, but the words sounded as if they’d come from a long distance, through a deep tunnel.
“Dear God. I—I thought it had to be a car accident . . .” Automatically she reverted to her youth and deftly made the sign of the cross over her chest while her brain pounded with the news and bile crawled up her throat. Rain began to fall in fat drops that peppered the ground and ran down her face. “Who?” she asked. “Why?”
“We don’t know yet.”
“Oh, God.” She rolled her eyes toward the sky, unaware of the raindrops splashing against her cheeks, running down her neck.
“Ms. Chastain,” he said, motioning toward the front porch. She looked up, saw the clear drops catch in his hair and trickling past his collar, darkening the shoulders of his shirt.
“Oh, yes . . . of course,” she said, finally realizing that they were both getting soaked. “Let’s go inside.” Dazed, she walked to the garage door, where she punched an electronic code into the keypad. The keypad blinked in error. She tried again. Rain was already gurgling in the gutters, gathering on her eyelashes. Again the keypad flashed and didn’t unlock the door. “Damn,” she muttered. On the third try the heavy door rolled noisily upward, and before it had settled, she ducked beneath it and led the detective inside. Dripping, she walked between her parked hatchback and shelves filled with cans of paint, gardening supplies, and bags of cat litter, then kicked off her shoes as she opened the back door. With Montoya only a step or two behind, she headed straight for the sink, twisted on the faucets, and splashed more water over her face.
Luke was dead. Dead! Oh, Jesus.
She couldn’t believe it. Everything seemed surreal, blurred around the edges.
Snagging a kitchen towel from the counter, she swiped her face and all the while the words Luke’s dead. Luke’s dead. Luke’s dead! The thought pounded through her brain, creating a headache that began to throb.
“Are you all right?” Montoya’s voice was soft. As if he cared for her, for her feelings. He’d done this before. Probably dozens of times. Was used to giving out bad news. And yet his brown eyes missed nothing. Sexy and dark, they observed her every reaction. She felt it, and didn’t trust it. At all.
She exhaled a little disbelieving puff of air. “Okay?” she repeated. “No. I’m definitely not okay.” Shaking her head, feeling her wet ponytail rub against the back of her neck, she leaned a hip against the counter for support and offered him the towel.
“No, thank
s. I’m okay.”
“I can’t believe it,” she went on as she folded the towel. “I know I said that before, but it’s just so damned hard to accept.” Her heartbeat was slowing but she was still stunned beyond belief. “I mean . . . we just talked the other night.” She remembered the fight about her getting rid of Luke’s things, and her face, which she was certain had drained of all color, suddenly flushed hot. A stab of regret cut through her at the thought that their final words had been accusing and spat in anger. She refolded the towel automatically.
“What did you talk about?” From out of nowhere it seemed he had extracted a notepad.
“Oh . . .” She let out her breath and shook her head, remembering. “We fought. Of course. We always did. Couldn’t ever seem to get past the divorce. This time it was about the things he’d left here after he moved out. He was pissed that I got rid of them.” She looked away, not wanting to stare into those knowing eyes. She realized then that she should be careful about what she said to this intense man. He wasn’t a friend or a preacher, or even an acquaintance. He was a cop. In her hands was the dish towel. How many times had she folded and refolded it? Four? Five? She hadn’t been aware of her actions. “Anyway, it’s been impossible to get along.”
“Do you have children?”
She shook her head and tried not to show any sign of regret as she dabbed at the sweat that had collected on the back of her neck. She’d wanted kids, had thought, fleetingly, that they could be a happy family. Two miscarriages had devastated her, but as her marriage had unraveled, she’d decided her inability to carry a child past the third month of pregnancy had been a blessing in disguise. “Just a cat and a dog,” she said, shaking off the bitter memory. “When we split up, I got Ansel, the tabby, and Luke ended up with Hershey, our chocolate Lab. Losing the dog was bad enough; I can’t imagine what would have happened if we’d had children.” At the thought of the dog, panic swept through her. “What about Hershey?” she demanded. “Where is she?”
“We’ve got people at Gierman’s town house now.”
“I want my dog back,” she said emphatically.
“A big dog for an apartment.”
“I know, I know. I wanted to keep both the animals, but Luke wouldn’t hear of it. He was supposed to be moving into a bigger place, a house with a yard . . . soon, I think.” Her eyebrows slammed together as she tried to remember. “How do I get my dog back? I’ll drive over there now.”
“No.” He shook his head. “Gierman’s place is still being processed.”
“What? But Hershey—”
“I’ll see to it.”
“Would you?”
“Yeah. It’ll be later today.”
Something inside her sagged. The single act of kindness by this hard-edged policeman got to her. “Thank you,” she whispered, shoving a hand over her damp, pulled-back hair. She blinked and sniffed before she shed any tears. The shock of it all was settling in.
“Are there people at the town house now? Can you call and find out that Hershey’s okay?”
“I was there earlier. The dog’s fine.” His eyes held hers. “Someone from the department took her outside and walked her, then put her in a kennel, but she’s fine.” When she started to protest, he added, “Really.”
“Okay, okay. This is all just so . . . weird. Disturbing. Do you have any idea who did this?”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out.”
“So where was he, you said you were processing his apartment, did someone break in?”
Her head was pounding with a million questions and she felt disengaged from her body, as if this were a bad dream, and through it all, she sensed the detective scrutinizing her; as if she had something to hide. His eyes never left her face. Well, let him look all he wanted. “Let’s sit down.”
She nodded, and though her legs were rubbery, she managed to lead him the few steps to the living room, where she sank into her favorite chair, a rocker her grandmother had left her. Abby had positioned the chair in the corner near the window and often retreated to it whenever she wanted to think. She would rock for hours, staring out the window at the wildlife, or into the blackness of the night.
Now, though, the rocker remained motionless. She bit her lip and observed the detective with his jaded, I’ve-seen-it-all eyes; tense, razor-sharp lips; and straight white teeth. His nose was long, a little crooked, and she guessed it had been broken at least once, probably a couple of times. His hands were big, like an athlete’s, his shirtsleeves pushed up over his elbows to show off golden skin with a dusting of black hair.
He was handsome, no doubt about it, and he probably knew it. There was something about him that suggested he used that innate sexiness to his advantage, as a tool.
Not your typical detective in pushed-up sleeves, jeans, and an earring.
Not on a typical mission.
So why would she even notice?
“Could I get you a glass of water or something,” he offered and she shook her head.
“I’ll be fine.” That was a lie and they both knew it, but she added, “Now, tell me, Detective, what happened to Luke?”
He took a seat in the corner of her couch and sketched out a story of finding Luke in an isolated cabin in a swamp about ten miles from Abby’s house. Some fisherman had noticed that the place wasn’t locked properly, went in to investigate, and found Luke dead.
“. . . the thing is,” Montoya went on, hands clasped between his knees, “your husband wasn’t—”
“Ex-husband,” she clarified quickly, though the scene was surreal, Montoya’s words sounding far away, as if she were in a cave.
Montoya cleared his throat, and if anything, his gaze became more intense, more focused. “Your ex wasn’t alone. There was another body in the cabin.”
“What?” she asked, staring at him. “Two people were killed?”
“Yes.” He nodded curtly.
Her insides froze. More bad news was on the way. “Another person was murdered, too?”
He hesitated. “It looks that way.”
“How?”
“We’re not exactly certain how it went down. Still working on it. The scene was staged, we think, made to look like a murder-suicide. At this point it appears to be a double murder, that the victims were taken to a small cabin in the woods about fifteen miles out of town.”
“You don’t know?”
“Not yet, no. Until we go through all the evidence, we’ll be exploring all possibilities.”
She was floored. “So . . . what do you think happened?”
“As I said, we’re not completely cer—”
“I know what you said, Detective, but you’ve got a gut feeling, don’t you? Isn’t that what everyone talks about? Hunches? A policeman who’s been around a lot of crime scenes and murder investigations usually has some idea of what went down.”
“We’ll know soon.”
“This is unbelievable,” she whispered, feeling a chill run through her bones despite the warm temperature. Bracing herself, she asked, “Who was the other person?” Was she about to hear that someone else she knew, someone she was close to, had been murdered as well? Her fingers gripped the arms of the rocker so hard her knuckles showed white.
“An eighteen-year-old woman by the name of Courtney LaBelle.” He paused a second, near-black eyes searching her face for some kind of reaction. “She was a student, a fresh-man, at All Saints College in Baton Rouge.”
Courtney LaBelle? Had she heard the name before? Something about it teased her mind, but she couldn’t remember why.
“Do you know her?”
“No.” Abby shook her head slowly, rolling the name around in her brain and coming up with nothing. Eighteen? The girl was barely an adult? Oh, Luke . . . You stupid idiot!
“Did she know your ex-husband?”
“I don’t know.” Abby was thinking hard, trying to come up with a name and face that matched, a girl they’d both known, or she’d been introduced to at parties, b
ut that was impossible . . . the girl was just too young. “I’m sorry. Luke and I have been divorced for over a year. I don’t keep up with whom he’s dating . . . or . . . or even seeing as a friend or acquaintance. He has a girlfriend, Nia Something-or-other.”
“Nia Penne,” he responded without checking his notes. “She appears to be an ex-girlfriend. She’s in Toronto. Has been for the last week.”
She thought back to the phone call from Maury. So that’s what he’d been going to say to her. Luke and Nia had broken up. She grimaced, remembering the panic in Luke’s friend’s voice and how she’d blown him off, certain Luke was involved in some kind of sick publicity stunt.
Abby shook her head, trying to make sense of it. “Maury didn’t tell me when he called yesterday. Maury Taylor works with Luke. He was looking for him.”
“Any particular reason he thought Luke would contact you?”
“I have no idea. He must’ve already talked to all of Luke’s friends . . . but I’m not sure of that. You’ll have to ask him.”
“I will.”
Abby didn’t doubt it. From the glint of determination in Montoya’s eyes, she was certain he was going to get to the bottom of Luke’s death.
“Did your ex-husband have any enemies?” he asked, and she looked at him as if he’d sprouted horns.
She almost laughed. “He made enemies for a living, Detective. You know that. I’m sure if you check with the station manager or producer of the show, they’ll have a list a mile long of people who have complained about him.”
“What about personal enemies?”
She shrugged and tried to concentrate, but the fact that Luke was dead, that someone had killed him, made it impossible to think. “Probably. I . . . I can’t think of anyone in particular. Not now.” And even if she had, she wasn’t certain that she would tell him. There was something about Montoya that put her on edge; something that seemed relentless and suspicious; something slightly dangerous, that suggested he knew what it meant to be on both sides of the law; and something sensual and dark, as if he might be able to guess just what made her tick. As a woman. As a suspect. And she didn’t kid herself. Ex-wives made damned good suspects. She warned herself to tread gently, say the truth, but be careful.