8
Her shadow followed her out. Caught her leaning against the wall trying to gather herself together.
“What’s wrong with your grandmother?”
“Besides being seventy-five?” Gillian ticked off the answers in her head: her daughter murdered, her granddaughter attacked. The sight of uniforms brought back memories. Bad memories. Enough to make anyone feel faint. “Family reunions.” Gillian pushed off the wall. “Always hell.”
She continued down the corridor to the elevator. “Where to?” she asked Ray.
Ray said, “Look, you’re not really going to—”
She didn’t answer.
“I mean, I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Ray said.
“This floor?” Gillian punched the elevator call button. “Or downstairs?”
Ray looked annoyed. Shook his head. “Carlson said they stashed her in one of the offices until Metro shows up.”
“If I remember, the second floor contains more exhibits and classrooms. That means this floor or the one below. Or the basement. Which is it?”
He leaned against a wall, crossed his arms. “Why are you doing this?”
She felt his eyes on her, another being wanting another explanation from her. Someone else who wouldn’t understand the overpowering need to stare down the face of violence.
“Because I have to.”
“Glutton for punishment?”
“Since birth.”
“And if I don’t tell you where, you’ll just open every door on every floor?”
“Probably.”
He sighed and touched his earpiece. “I’m bringing Miss Gray.” He listened, his eyes on her. “Not my idea, no.” Nodded toward the elevator. “One floor down,” he said, and checked the elevator before he led her into it.
They made their way to a workshop with a double-paneled door that swung inward. Wide drafting tables and workbenches dotted the space. Shelves lined the walls. They were stacked with wood, foam core, supplies, and tools. The design room. Where the exhibits were built.
Someone had cleared a space in the middle. The server was in a chair, her hands cuffed to the legs. It was a horrendously distorted position. As she was unable to sit up, her back was bowed like a hunchback’s and her head hung down.
“Couldn’t get her to stop screaming,” the man guarding her said by way of explanation. “All that decency crap.”
“For God’s sake, let her sit up,” Gillian said.
Ray nodded, and the man guarding the waitress complied. But he relocked her hands to the chair arms.
Slowly, the woman sat up. Her eyes were red, her face tear-streaked. She drilled Gillian with a hot, angry look. “What did you do that for?”
A weird kind of peace rippled through Gillian. Not him. Not this time. Not tonight.
The relief made her giddy. Of course it wasn’t him. Couldn’t have been. Not if it was a her. So, no monster with big hands. Just a fragile woman, bound in anger like she was bound in cuffs.
Been there, done that.
Gently, Gillian asked, “What’s your name?”
The woman looked at her sullenly. “Ruth.”
“I didn’t like to see you like that, Ruth. The position they had you in looked painful.”
“So? What do you care?”
Gillian shrugged. “Couldn’t talk to you that way.”
“Talk about what? Don’t expect me to say I’m sorry. What you do is disgusting. The blood, the cruelty. It’s sick. You’re sick.” Another surly stare from the waitress. “You have no right.”
Nothing Gillian hadn’t been accused of before, but there was something else in the other woman’s face. Something more. “No right to do what?”
“No right . . .” Huge tears gathered in Ruth’s eyes. She looked away. “To make money off it. Sell art. Get famous.”
Gillian didn’t bother saying she inherited her money from her mother after she was murdered. Or that whatever fame she had was swollen out of proportion because of that murder. Or that she needed the fame to draw out the monster who’d given her both.
She only observed the bound woman. The chair, the tied wrists, the aura of submission. Automatically, she framed the shot, lit it, titled it: Victim. She’d spoken about her work to hundreds of people. Received dozens of e-mails daily on her Web site. Those who were the most vehement were often wounded themselves.
She took a guess. “Did something happen to you?”
Ruth didn’t answer.
“What happened to you, Ruth?”
She shook her head fiercely. “Not me,” Ruth said at last, her voice tight and broken.
“Someone you love?”
“My sister. That picture . . .” She swung around, and Gillian swallowed at the raw loss in Ruth’s face.
“I’m so sorry.” She pressed her hand over Ruth’s cuffed one. “I hope they caught whoever hurt her.”
“He’ll die in jail.”
“That’s good. You’re safe.” Ruth’s hair had come undone from its ponytail. Sweaty strands clung to her forehead. Gillian brushed them back. Ruth shuddered under her touch. “Remember that, Ruth. How lucky you are. You’re safe.”
“No one is safe,” Ruth said bitterly.
Couldn’t argue with that.
She held Ruth’s gaze a moment, then turned and left.
Ray exchanged a look with the guy on guard duty. A look that said they were each a little unsure about the sanity of both women.
Silently, Ray followed Gillian to the elevator. Hers was a weird kind of craziness, though. Took guts for a victim to confront the person who hurt her and do it with little or no rancor.
He punched the call button. “Why’d you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Why were you kind to her?”
Truth was, he wouldn’t have expected the person who created such intensely violent photographs to be kind.
“Kindness?” She shrugged and gave him an amused smile. “It was just common decency.”
The word hung in the air, a sardonic twist on the voices that still shouted outside.
They stepped in the elevator, and Ray punched the button for the main floor.
On the way down she said, “Ever see a dead body?”
His awareness of her sharpened. The things she said. Like he never knew what would come out of her mouth next. “I was a cop. I’ve seen my share.”
“It’s not like on TV, is it?”
He shook his head.
“We’re so used to sanitized violence; we don’t even know it’s not real.”
He made the obvious connection. “Not like your photographs.”
“My work is as real as I can get short of dying myself.” She laughed shortly. “And don’t think I haven’t tried that, too.” He gave her a swift, startled look, but she rode right over it. “But it’s important to see the truth, don’t you think?”
For some crazy reason, a picture of his mother flashed in his head. Christ, the last time he’d thought of Sherry Pearce . . . he couldn’t remember the last time. But a clear image arose: her thin, wasted form sitting by the phone, waiting, hoping, hour after hour, day after day, week after week, year after year. Sucking on Virginia Slims and swishing the ice in her glass. She’d spent a lifetime waiting for that phone to ring, for that crook of a husband to come back, and nothing Ray did, no amount of truth telling could dissuade her from that hope.
“Not everyone is strong enough for the truth,” Ray said.
That’s what the gin was for, Sherry always told him.
The elevator door opened on a squat, broad-shouldered man about to enter. Gillian started, and the man paused. Saw the passengers inside. His face split into a grin.
“Well, well, well. Lookie here. Hey, Ray.”
Ray stopped. Stared into the eyes of the man who’d been his professional mentor and his friend. Could the night get any worse? “Burke.” He nodded stiffly and escorted Gillian out of the elevator.
Burke glanced at t
he blood on Ray’s shirt, over to Gillian, and back again. “Didn’t know babysitting could be such rough work.”
“Package is upstairs. Tied in a nice neat bow so you can handle her.”
Burke acknowledged this with another grin and stepped inside the elevator. “Seen Nancy lately?”
“You know I haven’t.”
He held his arms out front, framing a giant invisible stomach. “Big as a house.” The door began to slide shut. “Twins.” Just before it sealed him up, Burke laughed.
“Asshole,” Ray muttered, but he stared at the doors.
“Who’s Burke?” Gillian said.
Ray flicked a glance at her, then back at the hard, closed elevator doors. “Detective Jimmy Burke. My brother-inlaw.” He paused. Frowned. “Ex-brother-in-law.”
9
The police herded everyone into the hallway while one of their own snapped pictures of the ruined exhibit; the remnants of the blood-filled plastic bag; and its contents, which were still smeared all over Ray’s shirt and tuxedo and spattered over Gillian’s arms.
An hour after she’d seen him in the elevator, Gillian spoke with Detective Burke.
“And she just came flying up to you?” Burke asked after Gillian described what had happened.
“Yes.”
“And that’s when Pearce—”
“Tackled me. Like I told you. He . . . got in the way. Prevented her from hurting me.”
Ray was a few feet away, leaning against a wall and watching the crowd. Burke waved him over.
“So you’re the hero tonight,” Burke said.
Ray’s face was a mask. “I just did my job.”
“You were always good at that, weren’t you, Ray?”
“Look, Miss Gray isn’t interested—”
“I heard you were related,” Gillian said to Burke, as if Ray was no longer there.
“Damn good cop,” Burke told her.
“Really?” Curious, Gillian examined Ray, watched his face darken, then turned back to Burke. “Why’d he leave, then?”
“I’m right here.” Ray scowled. “You want to know, just ask.”
But it was Burke, not Gillian, who did. “Why’d you leave, Ray?”
“You know damn well why.”
Burke sniggered. “And look where it got you.”
“Are we done? Because I’m thinking we’re done.”
“Yeah, we’re done. You come down to the station tomorrow and sign a statement.”
Ray grabbed Gillian’s arm and dragged her away.
“Hey, farm boy. Slow down.”
He dropped her arm. “Farm boy?”
She shrugged. “It’s what you look like. Iowa, Nebraska. Pigs, cows, sheep.”
He threw her a puzzled scowl.
“What’s wrong with that? Hey—you’re not one of those roots-rejecting country boys?”
“My ‘roots’ are on Long Island. You live in New York now, so you should know all about it. Malls, traffic, subdivisions. No pigs and definitely no sheep. Unless we’re talking the human kind.”
Well, well, well. A transplant. No wonder she felt a bond.
“So what are you doing here?” She couldn’t keep the scornful disbelief out of her voice.
“Miss Gray,” he said with mock deference, “aren’t you originally from Nashville? You’re not one of those roots-rejecting country girls are you?”
She smiled. Saw the gleam of humor in his eyes. “Okay, busted. Let me rephrase. What brought you down here, Ray?”
“Circumstances.”
She knew an evasion when she heard one. “Ever think about going back?”
“Going back? Oh, yeah, going somewhere.”
“So what’s keeping you?”
Just then, Carlson waved him over. “Excuse me,” Ray muttered, and left. A little too eagerly in her opinion.
It was nearly midnight before the police released the crowd. Gillian and Maddie huddled together on one side of the exhibition room waiting to be dismissed. Across the way, an empty patch of wall marked the spot where her photograph had hung. The blood on the wall around it had dried into a flaked and faded brown. Despite her suggestion, Will had taken it down. By Friday, when the exhibit opened to the public, it would all be sanitized. As if nothing had happened.
Chip stood in front of the bald spot, immersed in a heated discussion with Carlson and Ray. Ray had stashed his bloodied jacket over the back of a nearby chair and stood in his blotched shirt, black tie hanging loose against the white shirt neck, sleeves rolled up on strong arms. She liked the way he looked, rumpled and tired, the black and white an intense contrast, the blood streaked and splattered. Another title popped into her head. Aftermath. If she had her little Nikon, a couple of strobes . . .
“Ole Chip ripping them a new one?” Maddie murmured, cocking her head curiously.
“Ray said the museum handled the catering staff, so if anyone’s getting ripped, it isn’t him or his boss.”
“Well, they’re certainly going at it.”
Gillian didn’t respond, knowing all too well what the group was probably talking about. Keeper number thirty-three in a never-ending list.
She reframed the shot in her head. If she could catch Ray just like that, leg bent, hand straddling his low-slung hip. Maybe shoot two-and-a-quarters with the Hasselblad, get more detail.
Maddie nudged her. “What are you thinking, woman?”
Gillian shrugged, tore her gaze away. “Nothing.” Then couldn’t help looking again.
“Yeah, right.” Maddie snickered. “You can take the girl away from the lens, but you can’t take the lens away from the girl.”
Ray shot a swift glance over his shoulder. At her. Gillian Gray. Bloodstained, exhausted. The sight set something off inside him. A warning bell. An alarm about to go off. Nothing loud and clanging. Just a deep, low tolling. He could feel her eyes pulling at him. Soft, needy, defiant eyes. Troubled eyes.
“Look, it’s a few days, right? Just until the hospital fund-raiser—the whaddyacallit—gala, art auction—next Saturday night.” He was talking to Chip Gray’s frown, knowing he wasn’t getting through.
“Ten days,” Chip corrected.
Jeez. Ten days was plenty long to get into all kinds of trouble Ray didn’t want to think about. He waved the implied objection away. “Okay, whatever. Not a lifetime. If she stays low, is careful, I don’t think there’ll be a repeat. I really don’t think protective service is necessary.”
“You don’t know her,” Chip said. “She’s incapable of keeping a low profile.”
He thought of the scene with the reporters. The way she barged in to talk to her attacker. “Landowe, then.” He grabbed a name out of the air, turned to Carlson. “He’s good with creative types.”
“You’ve already established a relationship with her,” Carlson said, pointing out the obvious.
Ray opened his mouth to deny that, but Chip forestalled him. “I’ll double the fee.”
“Look, Ray,” Carlson said. “Like you said, not a lifetime.”
Ray didn’t like his own words used against him. “I don’t th—”
“And throw in a personal bonus for you,” Chip added.
Christ. He felt himself weakening. It wasn’t the money. He had plenty of that. There was only him to buy for, and he didn’t have expensive tastes. So it wasn’t money. It was those eyes. Why couldn’t he turn his back on them?
Because he didn’t cut and run, that’s why. Sticking was his specialty. Not to mention his private little torture chamber.
“I’d consider it a personal favor,” Chip said.
Oh, well, then. A personal favor to Chip Gray. He wanted to tell him, personally, that he didn’t give a shit. Not about Chip. “All right.” Ray sighed. “You got your ten.”
Chip’s frown broke into a victorious smile. He extended a hand to seal the deal. “I won’t forget this,” he said. “The Grays have long memories. You won’t regret it.”
Ray already doubted that, but he didn
’t say so. He’d made the deal, he wasn’t going to carp about it. Carlson left. Ray grabbed his jacket, and he and Chip headed toward Gillian.
“They’re bringing the car around,” Chip told her. “Let’s go.”
She didn’t jump when the old man said jump. She only flicked a sardonic glance at Ray. “They rope you in?”
Chip frowned. “Mr. Pearce will look after you until you can return to New York. A few days. It’s all arranged.”
Gillian nodded. Things were always arranged, and somehow the arrangements never stuck. Her mother had arranged to move them here, away from her fast-track life, away from the pressure and the drugs and the all-night parties. She had wanted a safe place to raise her child. A nice place. A quiet place. The irony was staggering.
Chip gestured for Gillian to precede him. “Your grandmother is tired. Let’s not keep her waiting.”
The Gray house was miles away, but Gillian felt its suffocating walls close in on her. And outside, the night beckoned, thick with danger, but also possibility. She’d been attacked, but not by him.
He was still out there.
She looked over at Maddie. “Can you see them home?”
A silent message passed between them.
You up to trouble, girl?
Help me out. I can’t go home yet.
“You come soon, okay?” Maddie said at last.
Gillian nodded, but Maddie knew her too well.
Chip peered at her, his square, mottled face irritated but resigned to it. “How will you get back?” he demanded.
She squinted up at Ray. “Mr. Pearce has a car, don’t you, Ray?”
Exasperation flashed across Ray’s face, then was quickly gone. “I’ll see she gets home,” he told Chip.
“Come on.” Maddie tugged at Chip’s arm. “Let me find Mrs. Gray and get you two out of here.”
Her grandfather allowed himself to be led away, and Gillian was alone with Ray.
10
“You have plans?” Ray asked. “Because it’s twelve-fifteen on a Wednesday night in Nashville.”
“You miss your church meeting, Ray?”
Dead Shot Page 4