A Grand Murder

by Stacy Verdick Case

  I had to think for a second. This was a monumental decision.

  “Two weeks of vacation.”

  The face of a little boy who’d just been told school was closed because of snow grinned back at me. God, he was cute.

  “Are you sure? Two weeks?”

  I couldn’t speak. I nodded.

  I wasn’t sure at all. Dread took up residence in the pit of my stomach.

  I would be away from the office, away from my bed, and away from my familiar surroundings.

  “I know exactly where I want to go,” he said. “A buddy of mine at work has a lake place, and he invited us to come for a stay.”

  “Lake place?”

  Oh no, not a lake place. That meant cooking food outside over an open fire, bugs, sunburns, boats, and worst of all—fishing. I felt nauseous. I might be sick for those two weeks.

  No, I can’t be sick. This vacation is for Gavin—for our marriage.

  On the brighter side, at least he’s not making me get on an airplane. I’m certain I will die whenever I set foot on an airplane, regardless of the accident statistics people loved to throw in my face.

  Gavin was a world traveler, but I was born in Minnesota, lived here my whole life. I vacationed here and I couldn’t imagine anywhere better to be than Minnesota.

  “I’ll talk to him tomorrow and find out where his cabin is. I think it’s just a few hours north of here. Do you know when you’ll be able to take off work?”

  Gavin was already on vacation on some northern lake in his mind. Floating in a boat, with fishing pole in hand, and I was drowning in regret.

  “Well, I have to wrap up the case. I don’t know how long that will take. It depends on when the trial is and everything we have to do to prepare for it. I should be able to let you know in a few weeks.”

  With that statement, I was committed. I was going on vacation, whether I liked it or not.

  Chapter Nineteen

  I dragged my butt into the office the next morning, still regretting my decision to go on vacation. I dropped into my chair and slumped down.

  Louise handed me a cup of burnt coffee.

  “Got anything stronger?” I asked. “Maybe a little French roast?”

  “It can’t be that bad.”

  “Oh yes, it can be.”

  I slugged down a mouthful of coffee and swallowed hard. Then I stared into the dark liquid as if the answer to how I could get out of going on vacation waited at the bottom.

  She sat on the edge of the desk and crossed her arms. “Catherine?”

  I didn’t look up.

  “Gavin’s not leaving you, is he?”

  I shook my head.

  “It’s worse.”

  “Worse? Jesus, Catherine, what’s going on?”

  “I am going on vacation.”

  “You’re not.” She covered her mouth with her hand and giggled. Louise had heard stories of my vacation tragedies before.

  “I am.”

  “When?”

  “Right after this case.” I took another slug of coffee. “For two whole weeks.”

  “And the angels wept from heaven.” Louise raised her folded hands to the sky. “Dear Lord, how the mighty have fallen.”

  “That’s exactly why people don’t like you, Louise.”

  I slammed the cup down on the edge of the desk. Coffee slopped onto the desk and edged toward some papers. I grabbed a blank sheet of paper from my printer and tried to sop up the coffee before it reached my reports.

  It didn’t help. Coffee only soaks into paper you don’t want to get coffee on. Louise grabbed a napkin from her desk drawer and came to my rescue.

  “People love me,” she said, mopping up my spill. “You’re just cranky today because you made a promise you don’t want to keep. But I have something that should cheer you up.”

  She held up a warrant and waved it in front of my face.

  “The district attorney feels we have enough to prosecute.”

  “Carter and Stanley?”

  “Two for one.”

  I laced my fingers behind my head, and leaned back in my chair to savor the moment.

  “I think maybe it will be a good day after all.”

  “I’m so glad you feel that way, Catherine.” She laid a manila envelope in front of me and smiled. “This is for you, too.”

  I turned it over.

  Damn it.

  “You didn’t give it to him yet?”

  “No, I knew you’d want to talk to him about the envelope,” she said. “You and the chief have a special relationship. He likes you, and since you’re in such a good mood today. . ..”

  Louise was so full of shit. Murderers, extortionists, rapists, psychos, hell, even lawyers couldn’t rattle her, but under the scrutiny of the chief, she always crumbled. He could fluster her like no one else.

  I picked up the envelope and turned it over in my hands. Was it my imagination or had the envelope grown heavier overnight? It felt like a lead ball in my hands, or worse, around my neck.

  “Is he in a good mood today?”

  “Seems to be. He’s waiting for you.”

  “Great.”

  Louise patted me on the shoulder and gave me a reassuring smile.

  “As my Grandma Montgomery always said, do what you dread right away in the morning. Then you have the rest of your day to look forward to.”

  “Maybe your Grandma Montgomery should give the chief the envelope then.”

  “She probably would have helped you out, but she’s dead.”

  She spun my chair around and pushed me toward the chief’s office.

  “Now get in there, Catherine.”

  “Lucky woman. I wish I were with Grandma Montgomery right now.”

  I knocked on the chief’s door. The knock was light. That was an understatement. Actually, it was more like I rubbed the door with my knuckles instead of knocking. I hoped I could get out of talking to him, at least for a little while.

  There were some pretty tough questions that needed to be answered, and I wasn’t looking forward to asking them.

  Why wouldn’t the chief mention being blackmailed by the victim when we started the investigation?

  Why wouldn’t he have told us what to look for?

  Why didn’t he help us?

  Maybe because it would have made him a suspect. I knew that was the most obvious answer.

  I didn’t want to think about that. What I wanted was to slink back to my desk, get my warrant, arrest our suspects, and obsess over my impending vacation. Stopping to talk to the chief was cutting in on my obsessing time.

  A few seconds passed. I would wait another ten seconds before I’d give up. There was no way I was going to rub the door again. He might hear me if I did.

  “Come in?” he said, as if he wasn’t sure he’d heard someone knock.

  I cracked the door and peeked around the corner. The chief sat at his desk with piles of paper stacked in front of him.

  “Oh, you’re busy. This is a bad time. I can come back later.”

  I turned to leave.

  “Now’s fine, O’Brien. Come in.”

  Damn it. Most of time the chief was so buried in work he didn’t have time to grunt at you, but today he would have all the time in the world. This had not been my week.

  I stepped into his office and stood by the door with the envelope clutched between my hands, as if it would get away from me if I didn’t keep both hands at two and ten.

  “Come in and sit down,” he said. “Close the door.”

  The door sounded like an iron barred cell slamming shut behind me. There was no getting away now. I was trapped like vermin.

  He stacked the files he was looking through and set them aside. He folded his hands in front of him on the desk and waited.

  He stared at me and I stared back.

  What was I going to say? It wasn’t like I’d had time to prepare some sort of preamble to accusing him of knowing more than he’d let on. Something as weighty as the issue
before me seemed like it needed something benign to ease you over the threshold and into a conversation like this.

  “Are you here to update me on the Stanley/Forster murder case?”

  “Sure.”

  Yeah, that would work as an aperitif. I sat on the edge of the chair across from him and laid the envelope on my lap.

  His stare told me he expected me to drive this conversation. Now I was certain the envelope in my lap was getting heavier and pressing down on my legs. Even without knowing what was inside, this conversation would be a son—of—a—bitch.

  “We’re making an arrest today.” Finally, a start. I heaved a heavy sigh. “Louise just showed me the warrant, so we’re ready.”

  He waited expectantly and nodded.

  “Good.”

  I was at a loss as to how to approach the next subject. Hell, I was all ready away from the edge of the pool, time to kick like mad and get to the other side as quickly as possible, or drown right here.

  “There are two suspects. I’m sorry to tell you that Mr. Stanley’s ex—wife is one and Philip Carter is the other.”

  Chief sat back in his chair and pursed his lips. He nodded. “I assume you have the evidence you need to support your claim? If you don’t, Barnett Calloway is going to have a field day with this one.”

  Barnett was the least of my concerns right now.

  “We have fibers that connect the ex—wife at the first scene. Carter was her alibi and last night we found out that—”

  Just do it, Catherine. Rip off the band—aid fast. It won’t hurt for long.

  “We found out that Nathan Stanley had been blackmailing them both.”

  “Blackmail?” He sat forward. “You’re joking. I can’t believe it. He was blackmailing Belinda?”

  He doesn’t know? How could he not know?

  Maybe he thought I didn’t know that he was being blackmailed too and wanted to cover it up. But he seemed genuinely surprised.

  There was only one way to find out, and it was too late to turn back now anyway.

  “No sir, I’m not joking.” I twitched the edge of the envelope. “I kind of thought that you knew about his blackmail schemes.”

  “That I knew?”

  He jumped half out of his seat.

  “Don’t you think if I knew, I would have had the bastard arrested? What kind of a fucking cop do you think I am anyway, O’Brien?”

  I knew I’d fuck this up.

  “I didn’t mean to imply . . .”

  Yes, actually I did mean to imply.

  I couldn’t think of anything else to say. Nothing else would come. Mainly because I couldn’t think of anything that would dig me out of this hole—only put me in deeper. So I just stopped digging.

  He dropped back into his seat and glared at me.

  “Here.”

  I shoved the envelope at him.

  His brows drew together as he read his name on the envelope.

  “What’s this?”

  “We found this envelope along with some other envelopes at Stanley’s house last night,” I said and left it at that.

  Chief opened the flap. He withdrew some papers and a photo. He dropped them back into the envelope like they’d spontaneously combusted.

  The blood drained from his face. Sweat beaded up on his forehead and lip. He looked like he was about to be sick.

  I wasn’t sure if I should leave or not. Even if I did know what the proper thing to do was, I couldn’t move. My feet had decided to root themselves to the floor.

  Part of me wanted to know. What had the chief done that he could be blackmailed with?

  I looked up to him and respected him. I wanted the answers. Then again, another part of me didn’t want to be let down by him.

  He let out an audible breath, then looked up at me. “Did you look at this?”

  “No, sir.”

  “It’s part of your investigation, Detective.” His voice grew strong. “You’re telling me you didn’t look at the contents of this envelope.”

  “No, sir,” I said, more forcefully this time. “I wanted to respect your privacy.”

  “Thank you,” he said. “He hadn’t yet started to blackmail me.”

  He turned the envelope over and smoothed his hand over his name. His world was standing on its head right now. His friend had planned to betray him and would have if he hadn’t been murdered.

  “Chief, I have to know. Is what’s in that envelope illegal?”

  “It’s not illegal, O’Brien,” he said. “It’s personal and embarrassing, but it’s not illegal.”

  With shaking hands he handed me the envelope. I didn’t touch it.

  “Take the envelope, O’Brien.”

  He set it on the desk, shoved it toward me and nodded.

  The photo was of the chief kissing a woman who wasn’t his wife. Pretty tame compared to the other photos we’d seen.

  “A few years back my wife and I were having some problems. She went to stay with some friends for awhile.”

  Oh God, I just wanted him to stop.

  “Nathan and I had gone out for some drinks. I drank a little too much and ended up with the woman in the photo. According to the letter in the envelope, he had more photos.”

  I held up my hand to stop him. “I don’t need to hear any more.”

  “Like I said, it wasn’t illegal, just personal and embarrassing. I would appreciate it if this information didn’t get shared with the entire precinct.”

  “I understand,” I said. “I’m sorry I had to put you through this, but the envelope made you a suspect so I had to ask.”

  “Yeah.” He stood and came around the desk to show me to the door. “And I’d have fired your ass if you hadn’t asked. Nice work, O’Brien. Now go catch a killer.”

  When I strode out into the bullpen, all eyes were on me. Obviously word had gotten around about the envelope. So much for letting the chief have his privacy. At least I could prevent them from knowing what was inside the envelope.

  I walked over to my desk, where Louise waited for me with expectation on her face.

  “Well?” she said. “What did he say when you showed him the envelope?”

  I picked up some files and stacked them neatly on the corner of my desk.

  “Come on, Catherine.” She put her hand on the files to halt my clean up. “What did he say?”

  “He said we should go catch a killer.”

  I grabbed the warrant from Louise’s desk, and shoved it into my pocket. Then I grabbed my purse and slung it over my shoulder.

  “So let’s do.”

  Chapter Twenty

  We arrested Belinda Stanley first. She kicked, screamed, cried, and bitched all the way to the station—again. She threatened our jobs, saying that Barnett Calloway had been pissed off by our last encounter and he’d probably sue us for free.

  Barnett had already considered filing a suit against the department because of us. This time Belinda would see that he not only sued the department but she would make sure we would be thrown off the force.

  A serious case of deja—vu floated through me. Didn’t we go through a Belinda Stanley outburst once already this week?

  We arrived at the station to book Belinda in, and I asked Brenda, who had the honor of being abused by Belinda while we went to arrest Carter, to drag out her booking. Let Belinda wait for awhile before she could make her one phone call. If Brenda could manage to delay for a half an hour, that should be enough time for us drive to Stanley and Forster.

  No sense letting her warn Carter about his impending arrest.

  Brenda checked her watch.

  “Look at that.” She tapped her wrist. “It’s my break time. I guess she’ll have to wait fifteen minutes before we can begin.”

  “Thanks Brenda, I owe you big.”

  “No worries.” She put her hands over her ears when Belinda screamed from the holding area. “She’s hurting my head anyway.”

  Driving through St. Paul on our way to Stanley and Forster,
I thought about how many times we’d made this ride, Louise and I. Warrant in one hand, bad guy in the other.

  We had a good string of arrests under our belts, but forty—eight hours had to be some kind of a record without a confession or a witness. We had never before so easily solved a case.

  Something about that fact rubbed against my grain. We had the evidence we needed to make the arrest and a district attorney had agreed. Still, the nattering little voice that kept me awake most nights wouldn’t stop expressing doubt.

  Motive, means, opportunity—we had all three. So why couldn’t I shake the feeling that we’d missed something obvious?

  I pushed away the nagging self—doubt. We had them, pants down, hand in the cookie jar. There was nothing more to do except turn the information over to the prosecution. It was the jury’s job to decide if we had arrested the right suspects.

  We pulled up outside of the office building that housed Stanley and Forster.

  “So how do you want to do this?” I asked and looked up at the sparkling glass building.

  Louise jammed her car into park. “What do you mean?”

  We were right back where we were when we started this investigation.

  “How—do—you—want—to—do—this?” I pretended to sign the words as I said them.

  “Very funny,” she said. “We don’t normally do good cop, bad cop during an arrest.”

  She unbuckled her seatbelt and guided it back into place. A habit she’d picked up ever since I let a seatbelt snap back on its own in her old car, and the buckle had shattered her passenger window.

  “I meant, do we drag Carter out through the lobby or do we take him down the secret stairway?”

  I followed her seatbelt example and guided mine back to its resting place.

  “Do we preserve his dignity or treat him like a putz?”

  “Mmm, tough call. On the one hand, he’s a successful executive who’s spent years building his reputation at Stanley and Forster.”

  She rubbed her fingers across the bottom of her chin and gazed at the ceiling of the Toyota, as if lost in thought.

  “On the other hand, he’s cheating on his wife, involved in illegal business transactions, and we suspect he’s a murderer.”