Had the person who killed Mrs. Starnes already searched the house?
She forced herself to return to the kitchen. A tea kettle sat on a burner of the stove. Two cups were on the counter, along with tea bags. Had Mrs. Starnes started to prepare for her visitor? For Meredith? In her horror over finding the body, she hadn’t noticed yesterday.
The breakfast nook was furnished with a small oak table. Two places had been set; a creamer was filled with soured milk. Was this where Mrs. Starnes had planned to talk to her?
If she had anything to show Meredith, perhaps it would be in this same area.
Meredith spied a pile of cookbooks on a baker’s rack, along with some flowering plants. She went over to them. As she picked up the top volume, several photos fell out.
She sat down and studied them.
Her mother was in two of them. So was a younger Lulu Starnes.
Meredith gazed at the girl who had become her mother. Marguerite Thibadeau smiled through the decades, a mischievous grin spread across her face. She looked as if she owned the world.
Lulu Starnes, on the other hand, looked out of place. Only a forced shadow of a smile crossed her face. A young man stood between the two young girls, his arm draped lazily across her mother’s shoulders. His face was turned toward her mother, and she saw only his profile.
It was not her father. The man was tall, lanky, with his dark hair in a ponytail.
Meredith stared at the photo for a moment. She had never seen that particular expression on her mother’s face. Nor that consequences-be-damned set of her chin.
There was no question that the young man would never have met Meredith’s grandfather’s standards.
She looked at other elements of the photo. The three young people were standing in front of what looked like a tavern. The sign said PAULE’S.
She knew she had never seen it before. It looked as if it were located in some rural area.
“Find something?” Gage’s voice broke her concentration.
“I don’t know. Did you?”
“No. I called my partner. We’re still on the Starnes case, although they are trying to take it away. They are talking about your father’s death as an accidental hit-and-run.”
“No!”
“The detectives aren’t happy about it, either.”
“After what happened to me?”
“Someone is pulling strings, and whoever it is has to be powerful. I trust the chief—it’s not him.”
“Then how …?”
“It could be anyone. The medical examiner. Some judges. Even the mayor. But any rookie cop would know it’s a murder.”
“What can I do?”
“Make noise. Demand answers. Publicly, so you’re no longer a target. Another suspicious death won’t fly.” He hesitated. “Continue to search for your sister. I don’t think the police will help. Someone’s putting the damper on it.”
“But it doesn’t make sense. Why would anyone care?”
“Think about it.” He was pushing her. “Think of reasons.”
“Someone—whoever adopted my sister—doesn’t want anyone to know it was a back door adoption.”
“And?”
“Crimes were committed,” she said.
“Crimes serious enough to warrant murder thirty years after the fact,” he added. “I don’t think it was just because of an undocumented adoption. Perhaps someone had a motive not to let anyone know his or her child was not a child of their blood.”
“I can’t do any more looking until after I bury my father.”
“I realize that. And I plan to stick to you like glue.”
“What about your job?”
“If I can’t protect you on the city’s nickel, then I’ll take leave.”
“But if they are as powerful as you believe …”
“No one is as powerful as they think they are. We will find them.”
Gage was looking down at the photo, a puzzled look on his face.
“What is it?”
He shrugged. “There’s something about that boy but thirty-plus years makes a lot of change in a person.”
“Perhaps we can find the tavern,” she said. “If he went there often …?”
“I doubt whether it still exists but I’ll try. I think Memphis might be a better bet.”
“You could be in danger, too. If they would kill someone as well-known as my father …”
“I know how to take care of myself.”
“I expect my father believed that as well.”
“I’ll be careful.”
She turned her attention back to the photos. There was one other photo.
Her mother dancing with the same young man. Again his face was only in profile. They were in a crowd that looked more like families than young people.
“I’ll have Sarah start researching a bar named Paule’s in the New Orleans area.”
He nodded. “Let’s go see Byers,” he said. “Perhaps with what you’ve told me we can change the decision on your father.”
She felt a little better. They were doing something. She wasn’t just being a victim.
She only hoped it didn’t lead to another death.
nineteen
NEW ORLEANS
Identifying her father’s body was the hardest thing Meredith ever had to do.
Even though she knew the police had identified him, she—as a member of the family—had to do it as well.
She had watched before as family members had identified their loved ones. She had often ached inside for them, even while trying to maintain an objective but sympathetic exterior.
Peering through the window as a tech uncovered her father’s face, she knew she would never again watch such a procedure with any objectivity.
It was like being hit in the heart with a sledgehammer.
His face was gray. There were bruises on his cheek where he had fallen, but other than that he looked … just still. The real damage, she knew, was underneath the sheet: catastrophic injury to every major organ.
Byers, who stood beside her, was silent and patient. He, too, had been witness to this scene often.
She nodded to him. Signed the papers. She took pride in the fact that her hand didn’t tremble.
Then she turned and followed him out of the morgue. At her request, Gage had waited outside.
He reached out a hand to her in silent empathy. She held it tight for a moment, then let go. That brief human contact meant everything, made the present tolerable.
Gage then drove her to the homicide unit and they went into the conference room. Gage’s partner, Glenn Wagner, was already there. Byers would join them soon.
Wary, she paused at the door. Someone with a great deal of influence was trying to squelch the investigation. The fact that Gage might be taken off the Lulu Starnes case proved that. He hadn’t known how far they could trust Byers. Or even his own partner.
Byers walked in several minutes later and eyed her speculatively. “Gaynor said you might have some information.”
She attacked first. “Why is my father’s death being considered a simple hit-and-run?”
“I wish I knew. The call came from above.”
“How far above?”
“I don’t know. It was relayed by the captain.” Byers glanced at Gage. “Your lieutenant as well.”
“Hit-and-run is still murder,” Meredith said sharply.
Byers didn’t blink. “Yes, but not with the same priority.”
“Not even with the fact that my father was rather prominent?”
He gave her a wry look.
“Perhaps Ms. Rawson can change your mind,” Gage said.
“It’s not my decision,” Byers said. “I’m convinced it was intended murder, particularly after the attempt on Ms. Rawson’s life.”
“There’s a lot more.”
“I know about the Starnes murder,” Byers said.
Meredith broke in. “My father visited me hours before his death. He was worried. He told
me … He said I didn’t know what I had done.”
“What had you done?” Byers asked.
“My mother recently told me she’d had a child out of wedlock. She wanted me to try to find her. As soon as I started searching, someone tried to run me down. My home was trashed. I received anonymous phone calls. Records disappeared from my father’s home.
“I talked to my father, and he warned me not to search for my sister, that it would destroy my mother’s reputation. I thought he meant his own. I was angry.”
“Go on,” Byers said.
“I started trying to contact my mother’s friends. Mrs. Starnes was one of them. She was killed before I could talk to her.”
“Have you contacted anyone else?”
“Mrs. Robert Laxton.”
“When?”
“Sunday. And I visited her on Monday.”
Byers looked toward Gage. “Has anything happened to her?”
“No,” Gage said. “I checked on her this morning.”
“Then I don’t see a connection.”
Meredith had a sinking feeling in her stomach. Byers was obviously going along with what had to be a cover-up. She had the photos from the Starnes home in her pocketbook. She decided not to show them. She was not going to put the young man with her mother and Mrs. Starnes in danger.
She gave Gage a warning look, hoping he would not mention the photos.
He didn’t. “Let’s go,” he said.
She stood.
“I have more questions,” Byers said.
“If you think it’s a simple hit-and-run, why?”
“I didn’t say simple.”
“Look, this is a waste of my time. I have funeral arrangements to make, an ill mother to see.”
“I may have questions later.”
“Talk to me then.”
She didn’t have to stay. She was not a material witness.
He knew it as well. He stood. “Thank you for the identification. We will keep in touch.”
“Only if my father’s case is called what it is and treated as such,” she shot back.
She stalked out, slamming the door behind her. She couldn’t remember being so angry. New Orleans had once been notorious for its corruption. She had thought that era had come to an end.
Her father had been a part of it. She knew that now. It hadn’t been only fear in his eyes these past few days. It had been guilt.
Guilt for what?
Something to do with what happened to her mother.
She thought again of the smiles on her mother’s face in the photos she had inside her purse, then of the caution that had always shadowed her face. Meredith had believed her mother just had not loved her enough, that she had cared about her causes more than she could care about fellow human beings. Now she wondered whether it hadn’t been lack of caring, but fear of caring.
Meredith had that fear.
She looked at Gage as they reached his car. “Thank you for not telling him about the photos.”
“It’s called withholding evidence, Counselor,” he said as he quirked an eyebrow questioningly.
“We don’t know that it is evidence. I do know I don’t want anyone else to die because of my search.”
“You can end it.”
She stared at him.
“You can drop it. Forget it.”
“But you said …”
“I was wrong. And anyway there’s no trail.”
“There’s the photo.”
“It’s more than thirty years old. And the father probably didn’t even know about the child.”
“But maybe he did. Maybe his family took it.”
“Then your mother would have probably known about it.”
“I thought you were on my side.” She heard herself and cringed. She sounded like a tired, whiney child.
“I am,” he said. “But let me handle it from now on. Let me investigate the Starnes case. I can’t do that if you are going off on your own. Let it be known you’ve given up.”
“And how do I do that?”
“Stop asking questions.”
She looked up at him. “What about you?”
“I’ll keep investigating. It’s my case.”
“You said you might be taken off it.”
“Now that your father’s death has been ruled a probable accidental hit-and-run, there’s no reason to combine the cases.”
“What if they come after you?”
“A cop? I doubt it. That’s real trouble.”
“My father should have been ‘real trouble.’”
He didn’t answer that observation. “Come on, I’ll take you home.”
“How can you investigate if you keep looking after me?” she persisted. She didn’t like the direction of the conversation. She didn’t like being sidelined. She didn’t like trusting someone else. Particularly now when everyone she’d trusted before was turning out to be untrustworthy.
It would be a very long time before she believed anyone again. Even the man beside her. The man she had started to trust.
Now she wondered.
He had been nearby every time something had happened. He was part of a department that was trying to hide something. He’d encouraged her to find answers. Now he was steering her away.
She remembered that flicker of recognition she thought she saw as he’d looked at the photograph, yet he had not shared anything with her. From the beginning, she’d been the one giving information and he had been taking it.
And if he was not using her, then she was putting him in danger, just as she had put her father and Mrs. Starnes in jeopardy. How many more deaths could she have on her conscience?
Either way, she had to do what she had done in the past. Rely on herself.
She leaned against the car. “You can’t do your job and mine, too.”
He looked at her quizzically. “Is that a brush-off?”
“No. Someone is attacking people around me. Not me. They’ve tried to scare me, yes, but I’m alive.”
“You don’t think I can take care of myself?”
“I don’t want you to be a target because of me.”
He looked at her for a long moment. “Afraid?”
“Of course I’m afraid. I would be incredibly stupid not to be.”
“I don’t mean of what’s happening around you. I mean what’s happening between us.”
She was silent.
He studied her face. “I’m not happy with it myself. I’m distracted when I should be sharp. I’m losing objectivity. That’s not good for a detective.”
“That’s why we should separate.”
“I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way.”
Darn those green eyes that always seem to see into her soul. She resented the invasion, even though she knew it was possible only because of the connection they had with each other. Had always had, though she’d tried to deny it.
“Ah, Meredith. Don’t fight me,” he said. He touched her chin with such gentleness and sweetness, she probably would have pledged him the moon and stars had he asked. Then he leaned down and kissed her, apparently oblivious to several passersby.
When Gage finished his kiss, she was giddy with his taste, his scent. She caught a glimpse of people getting into a car, amused expressions on their faces.
She had just identified her father’s body.
But perhaps that’s why she needed the tenderness of his lips, the heat of his body. She’d been so cold since learning of her father’s death.
She forced herself to step back. She had things she must do. “Please drive me home,” she said. “I’m grateful but …”
“I don’t want gratitude, Meredith.”
“What do you want?”
He looked her straight in the eyes. “Damned if I know,” he said with a smile. “Except I want to keep you in one piece.”
“I like that priority.”
“But you don’t intend to let me do it?”
“I don’t intend to let anyone el
se get hurt.” She reached for the door handle. “And I have funeral arrangements to make and …”
She closed her eyes at the prospect of the next few days.
He touched her cheek and she leaned her face against his palm for a fraction of a second.
She moved and broke the spell. “I have to go.”
“I’ll stay with you.”
She shook her head. “I need some space right now.”
“I’ll make other arrangements for your protection then,” he said. His voice had lost the warm drawl and was clipped. She looked into his eyes and saw a flicker of something like hurt.
Better that, she told herself, than to have his death on her conscience as well as the others’.
Still, the chill had crawled back into her heart.
BISBEE
Doug Menelo slammed down the phone in frustration. No record of an Elizabeth Baker.
She’d said she was from Chicago, but he had neither her address nor the name of her deceased husband. He hadn’t realized until he started searching that she had never once mentioned the first name of her husband.
Still, he ran a check on her. There were any number of Elizabeth Bakers but none that fit what he knew about her. No traffic tickets in Illinois. No arrests.
He searched recent deaths in Illinois for a male with the last name of Baker. He found a number of them but none with a wife named Elizabeth.
He then turned to the driver’s license bureau in Illinois. There were numerous Elizabeth Bakers, including ten in the Chicago area, and three with a birth date that would equate with hers. He found the addresses and called. All were at home.
He tried Arizona. She had not applied recently for an Arizona license, but she still had time to do that.
The lack of information only piqued his curiosity further.
He checked missing children bulletins, mainly custodial kidnappings again. Nothing in the past two months fit Liz and her son.
An overactive imagination on his part?
He looked at his watch. Four P.M.
He didn’t usually force his company on women. He knew he was no matinee idol. But his gut was telling him something. He prided himself on being a good judge of character. And Elizabeth had a sweetness and shyness that couldn’t be disguised or feigned. She was also afraid. He hadn’t missed that, either.
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