by Nora Roberts
Ben cocked a brow as he wrote it down. “Fantasy calls?”
“That’s a PG way of putting it.” On a sigh, Grace rubbed the heels of her hands under her eyes. “Phone sex. I thought she was being pretty innovative, even wondered how I could work it into a plot.” Her stomach turned over again, so she reached for a cigarette. When she fumbled with the lighter, Ben took it, flicked it, then set it beside the tumbler of brandy. “Thanks.”
“Just take it slow,” he advised.
“I’m all right. She was making a lot of money, and it seemed harmless. None of the callers had her name or number, because everything was put through from the main office, then she called the john—I guess that’s the word for it. She called him back collect.”
“Did she ever mention anyone who got a little too enthusiastic?”
“No. And I’m sure she would have. She told me about the job the first night I got here. If anything, she seemed to be a little amused by it, and a bit bored. Even if someone had wanted more personal contact, they wouldn’t have been able to find her. Like I said, she didn’t even use her own name. Oh, and Kath told me she didn’t talk anything but straight sex.” Grace spread her palm on the table. They’d sat at this very spot that first night, while the sun went down. “No bondage, no S and M, no violence. She was very picky about who she’d talk to. Anyone who wanted something, well, unconventional had to go elsewhere.”
“She never met anyone she talked to?” Ed asked.
It wasn’t a fact she could prove, but one she was sure of. “No, absolutely not. It was a job she took just as professionally as her teaching. She didn’t date, she didn’t go to parties. Her life was the school and this house. You lived next door to her,” she said to Ed. “Did you ever see anyone come here? Did you ever see her stay out past nine in the evening?”
“No.”
“We’ll need to check on the information you’ve given us,” Ben began as he rose. “If you remember anything, just call.”
“Yes, I know. Thanks. Will they call me when—when I can take her?”
“We’ll try to make it soon.” Ben glanced at his partner again. He knew, better than most, how frustrating it was to mix murder and emotion, just as he knew that Ed would have to work out his involvement in his own way and time. “I’ll file the report. Why don’t you tie things up here?”
“Yeah.” He nodded to his partner as he rose to take the cups to the sink.
“He’s a nice man,” Grace said after Ben had left. “Is he a good cop?”
“One of the best.”
She pressed her lips together, wanting, needing to accept his word. “I know it’s late, but would you mind not going yet? I have to call my parents.”
“Sure.” He stuck his hands in his pockets because she still looked too delicate to touch. They’d only begun to be friends, and now he was a cop again. A badge and a gun had a way of putting a lot of distance between him and a “civilian.”
“I don’t know what to say to them. I don’t know how I can say anything.”
“I can call them for you.”
Grace drew hard on her cigarette because she wanted to agree. “Someone’s always taking care of the ugly things for me. I guess this is one time I have to do it myself. If something like this can be easier, it’ll be easier for them to hear it from me.”
“I can wait in the other room.”
“I’d appreciate it.”
Grace watched him walk out, then braced herself to make the call.
Ed paced the living room. He was tempted to go back to the murder scene and sift through everything but held back. He didn’t want to chance Grace walking in on him. She didn’t need that, he thought, to see it all, to remember it all. Violent death was his business, but he’d never grown completely immune to the ripples it caused.
One life was over, and often dozens of others were affected. It was his job to look at it logically, to check out the details, the obvious and the elusive ones, until he compiled enough evidence for an arrest. It was the compilation that was the most satisfying aspect of police work for him. Ben was instinct and intensity; Ed was method. A case was built, layer by logical layer, fact by detailed fact. Emotions had to be controlled—or better, avoided altogether. It was a fine line he’d learned to walk, the line between involvement and calculation. If a cop stepped over the edge on either side, he was useless.
His mother hadn’t wanted him to be a cop. She’d wanted him to join his uncle in the construction business. You’ve got good hands, she’d told him. You’ve got a strong back. You’d make union wage. Even now, years later, she was still waiting for him to turn in his badge for a hard hat.
He had never been able to explain to her why he couldn’t, why he was in for the duration. It wasn’t the excitement. Stakeouts, cold coffee or, as in his case, tepid tea, and reports in triplicate weren’t exciting. And he certainly wasn’t in it for the pay.
It was the feeling. Not the feeling when you shouldered on your gun. Never the feeling when you were forced to draw it. It was the feeling you took to bed with you at night, sometimes, only sometimes, that made you realize you’d done something right. If he were in a philosophical mood, he would talk of the law as the finest and most important invention of mankind. But in the gut, he knew it was more elemental than that.
You were the good guy. Maybe, just maybe, it was that simple.
Then there were times like this, times when you ended your day by looking down at a body and knew you had to be a part of finding the one who’d caused it … and bringing him in. You enforced the law and depended on the courts to remember the heart of it.
Justice. It was Ben who talked of justice. Ed pared it down to right and wrong.
“Thanks for waiting.”
He turned to see Grace standing in the doorway. If possible, she was more pale. Her eyes were dark and huge, her hair disheveled as if she had dragged her hands through it again and again.
“You okay?”
“I guess I just realized that no matter what happens in my life, no matter what, I’ll never have to do anything more painful than what I just did.” She pulled a cigarette out of a crumpled pack and lit it. “My parents are getting the first flight out in the morning. I lied and told them I’d called a priest. It was important to them.”
“You can call one tomorrow.”
“Jonathan needs to be contacted.”
“That’ll be taken care of.”
She nodded. Her hands were beginning to shake again. Grace took a long drag from her cigarette as she struggled to keep them steady. “I—I don’t know who to call about arrangements. The funeral. I know Kath would want something subdued.” She felt the hitch in her chest and filled her lungs with smoke. “We’ll have to have a Mass. My parents will need that. Faith cushions despair. I think I wrote that once.” She took a pull on the cigarette again until the tip was a hard red ball. “I want to have as much taken care of as possible before they come. I have to call the school.”
He recognized the signs of emotions thawing. Her movements were jerky, her voice wavering between taut and trembling. “Tomorrow, Grace. Why don’t you sit down?”
“I was angry with her when I left, when I came next door. I was upset with her, frustrated. The hell with it, I thought. The hell with her.” She took another shaky drag. “I keep thinking if I’d just been able to get through, if I’d just been willing to push hard enough and stay to have it out with her, then—”
“It’s a mistake, it’s always a mistake to take on things that you don’t have any control over.” He reached for her arm, but she moved aside, shaking her head.
“I could have had control. Don’t you understand? Nobody manipulates like I do. It was just with Kath that I couldn’t find the right buttons. We were always edgy around each other. I didn’t even know enough about her life to name six people she had contact with. If I did, I might know. Oh, I’d ask.” Grace gave a quick, breathless laugh. “Kath would put me off and I wouldn’t push. It
was easier that way. Just tonight I found out she was an addict—prescription drugs.”
She hadn’t told them that, Grace realized. She hadn’t intended to tell the police that. Letting out a shaky breath, she realized she wasn’t talking to a cop anymore but to Ed, the guy next door. It was too late to back up; even though he said nothing, it was too late to back up and remember he wasn’t just a nice man with kind eyes.
“There were three goddamn bottles of valium in the drawer of her bedside table. I found out and we fought, then when I couldn’t get through, I just left. It was easier.” She crushed out her cigarette with quick, violent taps, then immediately reached for another. “She was in trouble, she was hurting, and it was easier to walk away.”
“Grace.” Ed moved over to take the cigarette from her. “It’s usually easier to blame yourself too.”
She stared at him for a minute. Her hands went to her face as the dam burst. “Oh God, she must have been so scared. She was all alone, no one to help her. Ed, why? Dear God, why would anyone do this to her? I can’t fix it. I just can’t fix it.”
He put his arms around her and held gently. Even when her fingers curled into his shirt and dug in, he held gently. Without speaking, he stroked her back.
“I loved her. I really loved her. When I got here, I was so glad to see her, and for a little while it seemed we might get close. After all these years. Now she’s gone, like this, and I can’t change it. My mother. Oh God, Ed, my mother. I can’t bear it.”
He did the only thing that seemed right. Lifting her into his arms, he carried her to the sofa to rock and soothe. He knew little about comforting women, about the right words to use or the right tone. He knew a lot about death and the shock and disbelief that followed it, but she wasn’t just another stranger to question or offer polite sympathy to. She was a woman who had called to him from an open window on a spring morning. He knew her scent and the sound of her voice and the way the slight movement of her lips brought out small dimples. Now she was weeping against his shoulder.
“I don’t want her to be gone,” she managed to say. “I can’t stand thinking about what happened to her—about what’s happening now.”
“Don’t. It doesn’t do any good.” He held her tighter, just a little tighter. “You shouldn’t stay here tonight. I can take you next door.”
“No, if my parents call … I can’t.” She pressed her face hard against his shoulder. She couldn’t think. As long as the tears kept coming she couldn’t think. And there was so much to be done. But the shock was taking its toll in exhaustion and she couldn’t sort it out. “Could you stay? Please, I don’t want to be alone. Could you stay?”
“Sure. Try to relax. I won’t go anywhere.”
He lay in bed with his heart hammering and screams still echoing in his head. The fleshy part of his arm was still throbbing where she’d torn at it. He’d wrapped it to keep blood off the sheets. His mother was fussy about her linens. But the steady ache was a reminder. A souvenir.
My God, he’d never known it would be like that. His body, his mind, maybe even his soul if there was such a thing, had risen so high, stretched so tight. Every other device he’d used, the alcohol, the drugs, the fasting, none of them had even come close to that kind of rough-edged pleasure.
He’d felt sick. He’d felt strong. He’d felt invincible.
Was it the sex, or was it the killing?
Laughing a little, he shifted on his sweat-damp sheet. How could he know, when it had been a first for both? Perhaps it had been that fascinating combination of the two. In any case, he’d have to find out.
For one cold, brief moment, he considered going downstairs and murdering one of the servants in her sleep. When the idea didn’t stir his blood, he discounted it just as coldly, just as quietly. He needed to wait a few days, to think it through logically. In any case, it wouldn’t excite him to kill someone who meant as little to him as a servant.
But Desiree.
Turning again, he began to weep. He hadn’t meant to hurt her. He’d wanted to love her, to show her how much he had to give. But she’d kept screaming, and her screams had driven him mad, driven him to a passion he’d been unaware existed. It had been beautiful. He wondered if she’d felt that wild, rising flood just before she’d died. He hoped so. He’d wanted to give her the best.
Now she was gone. Though she’d died by his hands, and he’d unexpectedly derived pleasure from it, he could mourn for her. He’d no longer hear her voice, arousing, teasing, promising.
He had to find another. Even the thought of it had his muscles trembling. Another voice that spoke only to him. Surely such glory wasn’t meant for only once in a lifetime. He would find Desiree again, no matter what she called herself.
Rolling over, he watched the first pale light of dawn seep through his window. He’d find her.
Chapter 5
Grace awoke at first light. There was no buffer of disorientation, no momentary lull of confusion. Her sister was dead, and that one bleak fact hammered in her head as she pushed herself up and struggled to cope with it.
Kathleen was gone, and she couldn’t change it. Anymore than she’d ever been able to change the flaws in their relationship. It was harder to face that now, in the daylight, when the first burst of grief had dulled to a dry kind of ache.
They’d been sisters, but never friends. The truth was she hadn’t even known Kathleen, not in the way Grace could claim to know at least a dozen other people. She’d never been privy to her sister’s dreams and hopes, failures and despair. They had never shared giddy secrets or tiny miseries. And she’d never pushed, not really, not hard enough to crack the barrier.
Now she’d never know. Grace rested her face in her hands for a moment, just to gather strength. She’d never have the opportunity to find out if the gap could be bridged. There was only one thing for her to do now: to handle the details that death callously left scattered for the living to sweep up.
She pushed aside the blanket Ed had spread over her sometime during the night. She’d have to thank him. He’d certainly gone above and beyond the call of duty to stay with her until she’d been able to sleep. Now she needed a gallon of coffee so that she could pick up the phone and make the necessary calls.
She didn’t want to stop in front of her sister’s office. She wanted to walk straight by without a glance. But she stopped, felt compelled to stop. The door would be locked, she knew. The police seal was already stretched across it, but her writer’s imagination made it too easy for her to see beyond the wood. She could remember now what even through shock her mind had absorbed. The overturned table, the shower of papers, the broken paperweight, and the phone, the phone upended on the floor.
And her sister. Bruised, bloody, half-naked. In the end, she hadn’t even been allowed her dignity.
Kathleen was a case now, a file, a headline for the curious to scan over coffee and during car pools. It didn’t help to realize that if Kathleen had been a stranger, Grace would have read the headline while downing coffee too. Her feet propped on the table, she would have absorbed each tiny detail. Then she’d have clipped the story and filed it for possible reference.
Murder had always fascinated her. After all, she made her living from it.
Turning away, she walked down the hall. Details, she would fill her time with details until she had the strength to face emotions. For once in her life she’d be practical. That was the least she could do.
She hadn’t expected to find Ed in the kitchen. For a man of his size, he moved quietly. It was odd, the moment of awkwardness she felt. She couldn’t remember feeling awkward with anyone before.
He’d stayed, not just until she’d slept, but through the night. He’d stayed with her. It might have been his basic kindness that caused the awkwardness. She stood in the doorway and wondered how you thanked someone for being decent.
His sleeves were rolled up, his feet bare as he stood in front of the stove stirring something that smelled distressingly like
oatmeal. Over that, gratefully, Grace caught the scent of coffee.
“Hi.”
He turned and in one quick glance noted that she was rumpled and hollow-eyed but sturdier than the night before. “Hi. I thought you might be able to sleep a couple more hours.”
“I’ve got a lot to do today. I didn’t expect you to be here.”
Ed reached for a mug and poured her coffee. He hadn’t expected to be there either, but he hadn’t been able to leave. “You asked me to stay.”
“I know.” Why did she feel like crying again? Grace had to swallow, then take a couple of steadying breaths. “I’m sorry. You probably didn’t get any sleep.”
“I caught a few hours in the chair. Cops can sleep anywhere.” Because she hadn’t moved, he crossed to her and offered the coffee. “Sorry, I make lousy coffee.”
“This morning I could drink motor oil.” She took the cup, then his hand before he could turn away. “You’re a nice man, Ed. I don’t know what I’d have done without you last night.”
Because he was never sure he had the right words, he simply squeezed her hand. “Why don’t you sit down? You could use something to eat.”
“I don’t think—” She jolted and slopped coffee over her hand when the phone rang.
“Sit down. I’ll get it.”
Ed nudged her into a chair before picking up the wall receiver. He listened for a moment, glanced back at Grace, then turned the burner off under the pan. “Ms. McCabe has no comment at this time.” After he hung up, Ed began to spoon oatmeal into a bowl.
“It doesn’t take them long, does it?”
“No. Grace, you’re bound to have calls all day. The press knows you’re Kathleen’s sister and that you’re here.”
“Mystery writer discovers sister’s body.” Grace nodded, preparing herself. “Yes, it would make an interesting lead story.” She stared at the phone. “I can handle the press, Ed.”
“It might be better if you moved into a hotel for a few days.”