by Tracy Clark
Eric stared at the bag, then glowered at Marcus, but didn’t open his mouth.
I turned to Tanaka. This was my first time hearing about them finding a letter in the search of Eric’s apartment. “They found the letters?”
She shook her head. “A letter. Typewritten, addressed to her. Him introducing himself to her, asking for a meet. It doesn’t match the one you described seeing—no red ink, no Dear Bitch, and there wasn’t a single flower anywhere in his place. Meisner says Eric doesn’t know a thing about flowers. He only delivers. Inconsistencies. I hate them.”
“Any flowers missing from Meisner’s?”
“No. She says Eric bought a bouquet a few weeks ago, then the roses right before Allen’s signing. Nothing else. She even gave him an employee discount.”
“Hers is not the only flower shop,” I said.
“No, but if he used another, we haven’t found it yet.”
Marcus took a seat at the table. “What about those phone calls to Allen?”
“What about them? How else was I going to get through? She wouldn’t even talk to me.”
“Where were you three nights ago?”
“Working.”
“Where were you Wednesday morning?”
“Working.” Eric sat up straight, clearly frustrated, but angry, too. “I’m always working. That’s what I do. I work. I had a right to be there. I wanted to see for myself who she was. I wanted to know what went on, okay? Why she gave me up. She figured I wanted something from her. Money.” His face twisted in disgust. “I didn’t want her money. She wouldn’t even give me the time of day. She’s a bitch!”
Tanaka and I looked at each other.
Inside the next room Marcus said, “So, you decided to do something about it? Make a point?”
Eric stared at the letter in the bag. “I never mailed that. I wanted to talk to her. I sent flowers once. She never even said she liked them. After that bookstore, I was done chasing her. She’s not worth it.”
Marcus slid photos across the table. I had a good idea what the photos were of and waited to see how Eric would react.
“Linda Sewell and Philip Hewitt. They worked for your mother, if I can use the term. Know anything about them?”
Eric glanced at the crime-scene photos of their bodies and flinched. “Hey, hey, man. I got nothing to do with any of that. I never even saw those people before.”
“You sure about that? It’d be a good way to get back at her, wouldn’t it?”
“What? No!” Eric began to sweat, his eyes landing on the door, which was locked, penning him in. “She’s trying to set me up. All of you are. I told you, I wanted to see her, talk. They came at me. I defended myself. It was self-defense. I didn’t even stab that cop. We were struggling, and he was just there. I didn’t do it.”
Marcus stood. “I’m on your side here, Eric. Trying to help you.”
Eric snorted derisively. “Bullshit. Since when does a cop help anybody out? You’re not sticking me with this. I didn’t kill anybody. It was self-defense. I want a lawyer.”
Marcus didn’t move.
Eric said the word again, firmer this time, determined. “Lawyer. Lawyer! Lawyer! Lawyer! Lawyer!” He punctuated each word by banging his fists on the table.
Game over. Marcus picked up his evidence and left the room empty handed.
Tanaka moved for the door. “Guess I won’t be going home tonight.”
I watched Eric, every line on his face, his body language. It didn’t look like he had it in him to walk up to complete strangers and blow their heads off. That took a special kind of defect, a special kind of sick. One letter found, but not like the ones Allen had been receiving. No flowers missing from the shop he worked at, except for the ones he had bought himself. And he had no obvious connection to Hewitt or Sewell, and none really to Allen, except for the DNA.
“It’ll hinge on his alibi,” I muttered, more to myself than to Tanaka.
She stood at the door. “Yeah, that’s next.”
I turned to her. “I have a feeling it’s going to check out. He’s good for the bookstore, but I don’t think he’s good for Hewitt or Sewell, and not for the others. Those feel personal.”
Tanaka groaned. She had a tough job ahead of her and knew it.
“Heard about you and Farraday,” she said. “Wow, huh?”
I turned to stare at Eric through the glass, trying to get a sense of him. I didn’t want to talk about Jim Farraday not one more time.
Tanaka wisely took the hint and headed for the door. “You know, I didn’t ask about you not wearing shoes. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. Now I feel I have to.”
Eric, still at the table, scrubbed his hands across his face. He was scared.
“I stepped in something in that field. Maybe dead cat,” I answered absently.
It had been some kind of viscous goop matted with fur that had slimed the bottom of my shoes. Could have been rat instead of cat. I hadn’t wanted to look too closely. I had dumped the shoes in a trash can before I got back in my car. I had spare shoes at my office and shoes at home, but I wasn’t at either place. I stood in my sweat socks. I’d have to toss them, too, when I got home.
Tanaka shuddered.
“It could have been anything, really. Raccoon, squirrel, dog,” I added.
She backed out of the room, looking a little green.
I smiled. Score.
* * *
Carole and Mrs. Mickerson were in the ICU waiting room with the rest of the family when I showed up later to tell them the news. Everyone looked like they’d just marched to war and back on half rations; but when they found out Eric was in custody, they revived, clapping, cheering, slapping me on the back; but that wasn’t the only thing to celebrate. They’d just gotten news that Ben was improving. It felt like Christmas and the Fourth of July all rolled into one, and the knot of dread that had planted itself in the pit of my stomach for days was suddenly gone. We’d reached the light at the end of the tunnel.
When I ducked in to see him later, I was taken aback by how small he appeared in the bed, not like himself at all. But he was going to be all right. He was coming back. I took the night shift so the family could get some rest and fell asleep in a chair by his bed. It was the easiest sleep I’d had in days.
Chapter 29
All along the winding path, the tree leaves fluttered in the evening breeze, casting eerie shadows along the stone walkway, the thick bushes and bramble hidden by dusk. No fear, just unfilled space, quiet, unseen.
Someone should have called in that broken sewer grate months ago. It teetered underfoot. A slow walk up the path to the stone steps, around the memorial fountain and back, that was the route. The blue light on the emergency phone was reassuring.
A quick rattle of things dropped into big pockets, one heavier than the other. Full stop. A moment to listen to the night. Was that movement in the bushes? Nothing in the end.
The gun barrel gleamed blue-silver in the lamplight. When the shot punched through the night, there was a flinch, a desperate stagger. Pain came next, then blood. It spread fast; the belly burned. The phone. The blue light.
“I’ve been shot.” The whisper could barely be heard, over each labored breath. “Huddleston Park. By the fountain. Hurry!”
Just shy of the grate, the legs gave way and vision blurred. A shaky grope, eyes shut, ears straining for the sound of salvation. Heartbeats sped, then slowed. Then the night took over.
* * *
I woke to find him watching me. At first, I thought I might be dreaming, but it was real. Ben was awake. I shot up from the chair, raced to the bed rail. I fumbled with the call button to summon a nurse, and a voice piped in from the nurses’ station.
“He’s awake.” I only half believed it. I placed a hand on his arm to see if he was warm. He was. “Welcome back.”
“You believe this shit?” His voice was hoarse, low, and he seemed a little out of it still, but there was that familiar glint in his eye, the one I’d
missed and feared I might never see again.
“Which part?”
His eyes traveled around the room, as though he was trying to get his bearings. The nurse rushed in, checked him out, rang for the doctor. The machines beeped steadily. Ben was still hooked up to them, but they’d done their job. He was awake, alert, back.
“Hey,” he whispered, so the nurse wouldn’t hear. “Where’s my sandwich?”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. I stepped away from the bed when the doctor and another nurse came in. They asked Ben questions, checked him out some more. The sun wasn’t up yet, but it felt sunny all the same. I dialed Carole’s number to give her the news. She cried on the phone. I did, too. It was going to be a good day.
* * *
All the Mickersons crowded around Ben’s bed to watch him sit up and pick at his soft breakfast. The look on his face told me he didn’t like this meal tray any more than he’d like the last one, but there was nothing he could do about it.
“Eat all of it, Benny,” his mother ordered. “You’ve got to get your strength back.”
I stood in the background, leaning against the wall, my arms folded across my chest, tickled to death at all the motherly clucking. “That’s right, Benny. Eat all of it.”
He shot me a look, then smiled. “Shut it, smart-ass.”
My cell phone rang. Tanaka. I stepped out into the hall. “Yeah?”
“Chandler was shot last night. She’s alive. Luckily.”
I turned my back to Ben’s room so they wouldn’t hear, then lowered my voice. “What the hell?”
“She was walking in Huddleston Park. Don’t ask me why.”
“Rogers?”
“We still have him.”
“Then we’re back to where we started. I knew he wasn’t good for the murders.”
“Doesn’t look like it. She’s in the same hospital as Mickerson, room eleven-oh-six. How fast can you get here?”
“I’m three floors above you. I’m coming down now.”
I ended the call, stuck my head into Ben’s room. He was in good hands. “I’ll be back.”
Tanaka stood outside Chandler’s room; Marcus was on his cell phone halfway down the hall, his back to us.
“What happened?”
“Walking in the park, like I said, around nine last night. She thinks she heard something in the bushes, and the next thing she knows, she’s down.”
“Did she get a description?”
Tanaka shook her head. “She says she might have gotten a glimpse as he ran away. Says it could have been the guy from the bookstore.”
Our eyes held. “Which is impossible,” I said.
“Could be the shock. Things get mixed up. Either that or we took a wrong turn somewhere. Anyway, the bullet’s out. It didn’t do any major damage, they say.”
We watched as Marcus walked toward us. Tanaka sighed, turned her back. I did, too.
“Did you get anything else from Eric?” I asked.
“Not after his public defender showed up. And it looks like he was telling the truth about his whereabouts for Hewitt and Sewell. He’s accounted for.” She lowered her voice. “Jones is working overtime to punch holes in it, but he won’t. I think we’re missing a crucial piece of the puzzle here.”
Marcus walked up, looked right through me. “You’re not going in there. You’ve loused this thing up enough, you and Mickerson.” He scowled at Tanaka. “And you’re going to need to choose which side you’re on or get yourself a new partner.”
Tanaka returned his stare. “I know what side I’m on, Jones. And I’m way ahead of you. The paperwork’s already in.”
He made a face, then disappeared inside Chandler’s room. Tanaka took a moment and then followed. I stayed in the hall. After I’d paced for some time, Chandler’s door suddenly swung open, and Marcus stormed out and headed for the elevator without so much as a glance my way. Tanaka stuck her head out and motioned me in.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Tell you later.”
Chandler lay pale in the bed, bandages bulky underneath her hospital gown. She asked for water, and Tanaka poured her a cup of it from a mustard-colored pitcher on her tray table. Chandler sipped just a little, then put the cup down.
“You were right,” she said. “If I’d gone to the police at the very start . . . none of this would have . . .” Her voice trailed away, hoarse, groggy.
“You said you might have gotten a look,” Tanaka said.
“Maybe I just thought I did.”
I moved closer. “Maybe you smelled something—cigarette smoke, aftershave, perfume?”
Chandler thought for a moment. “Nothing. I was walking, and then I felt such a pain in my side. And the blood. I called for help. That’s all I remember. He could have killed me.” Her eyes searched ours as the reality of her situation began to set in. “Why can’t you catch him?”
It couldn’t have been Eric. Who else? “Do you always walk that park late at night?”
She nodded. “It helps me sleep. I barely made it to the phone. I don’t remember anything else.”
Hewitt and Sewell had both been killed by a single shot to the head at point-blank range. Why was Chandler still alive? I looked over at Tanaka. I could tell she was thinking the same thing.
Chandler closed her eyes. “I’m tired. So tired.”
Tanaka and I walked out into the hall. Last night this whole thing had been on its way to being wrapped up, maybe. Today it was wide open again.
“You didn’t tell her it couldn’t have been Rogers?”
“Intentionally. I wanted to hear what she had to say.”
“And?”
Tanaka glanced at Chandler’s door. “I got nothing.”
“What happened with Marcus storming out?”
Tanaka buttoned her jacket on our way toward the elevator. “He went in heavy handed, determined to get something out of her. He wants to solve this thing before you do, like it’s a race. He’s obsessed with showing you up. We had words. He took offense.”
I punched the DOWN button and the UP button. Tanaka was going out; I was going back up to Ben’s room. “Who cares who gets there first?”
“Well, one of us better get there first. Bodies are starting to pile up.”
Chapter 30
A couple of days went by, and Ben recovered well enough to begin making a pest of himself at the hospital. I brought him his sandwich, extra peppers, and he devoured it like a caveman downing a Flintstones brontosaurus burger. While he slept, I popped into Chandler’s room again. I’d done my job: I’d found Eric. But I couldn’t stop turning things over in my head—the Peetses, Dontell, the missing letter, the fact that Chandler was alive and the others weren’t.
There was an IV going and the blinds were drawn when I stepped lightly into her room. A huge floral arrangement sat on the table near the window, its wild, arched fronds sticking out everywhere. The room smelled like a tropical rain forest. I had a good idea who the flowers were from. Chandler was asleep. I was backing out to leave when she opened her eyes.
“Detective Raines?”
I approached. “I didn’t mean to disturb you. How do you feel?”
“Lucky.”
I glanced at the frond monster. “Someone went all out.”
“Vonda. She’s been so nice.” She caught the look on my face. “She has her good side.”
I doubted it, but okay. “Have you been able to remember anything else?”
“The police keep asking me that, too, but no.”
I glanced at Allen’s flowers and wondered about the ones she’d received. “The flowers Allen got. Do you remember what kind they were?”
Chandler concentrated, fighting against the medication. “I think so . . . The first was a beautiful lotus. Vonda barely looked at it.”
“How about the next one?”
“I can’t remember.”
“That’s okay. Get some rest. We’ll talk again.”
She faded. Her eyes c
losed. I let myself out, only to turn and see Allen sweeping off the elevator into a crowd of hospital staff clamoring for her autograph. I could not catch a break.
Norman wasn’t with her this time, but there was another Titan Security guy standing close who was almost as big. Allen’s fake smile disappeared the moment she saw me. She headed my way, and I stood waiting for her.
“What are you doing here?” She asked.
“Visiting. You don’t strike me as the stand-by-the-bedside type.”
“Kaye is a valued employee.”
“Yes. I saw the flowers. Couldn’t find anything bigger?”
She said nothing, but her eyes were communicating loads.
“Maybe when you’re done visiting Chandler, you’ll have time to visit your son in police custody. He’s going to be hard to sweep under the rug, isn’t he?”
The look Allen shot me was as cold as death. She leaned forward, just slightly, and lowered her voice to a chilling whisper. “You’re beginning to be a problem for me.”
“I know, and I’m beginning to worry about your problem-solving skills.”
“I’m going in to see Kaye. Go away.”
She brushed past me and entered Chandler’s room, her guard going with her. I started to walk away, then got a feeling. Allen didn’t like problems. I went back into Chandler’s room to make sure she’d still be breathing when Allen left it.
* * *
“A lotus? Nice.” Ben was eating orange Jell-O out of a plastic cup with a plastic spoon too small for his man hands. He was out of the ICU and in a private room and was sitting up in a chair, in a gown, robe, and those saggy hospital socks with nonskid soles. I sat beside him, watching him eat.
“What’s so big about a lotus?”
“I was just thinking about the symbolism.”
I looked at him blankly.
“Flowers have meaning. They’re symbolic.”
Again, a blank stare from me.
“Red roses mean deep, romantic love, right? White roses can mean death. Am I speaking Portuguese?”
We were back to the easy back-and-forth between us. I hadn’t brought up what Carole said about him having feelings for me, and if he was aware of her sharing the information, he wasn’t letting on. That was good. It meant maybe we could slide right by all of it.