Compromising Positions

by Beverly Bird

  She closed her eyes, signed the protocol and tossed it into the finished basket. She wished desperately that Jesse had made some veiled mention of that recorder in his message. She needed to know what they were going to do about it.

  Then she realized what she’d thought and her breath snagged. What they were going to do.

  There was no “they,” she thought frantically. She could not allow there to be a “they.” Okay, so he had kissed her. She knew that that wouldn’t amount to a hill of beans when the chips were down. He wouldn’t protect her if things got really ugly. He would protect her only as long as he needed to in order to take care of his own reputation.

  She remembered the splicing machine again, and her pulse suddenly skyrocketed. What had she done? He’d kissed her and she’d barely had another rational thought since.

  Wildly, she shot to her feet, then simply stood there behind her desk, her hands fisted. She had left for work this morning as he had indicated she should. Sit tight, he had said. Her heart thudded. She had walked out of her house and left that device right where it had been, in her printer drawer.

  He’d wanted her to leave it last night, too. He’d wanted her to leave it and go to his sister’s. Why? Anyone could be in there right now, she realized, in her home, planting more evidence. And if someone else tipped off Homicide that the machine was in her house, that would make matters so very much worse. If they found it in her home and she herself didn’t turn it in, that would look bad, very bad. It wasn’t a piece of equipment that might normally be found in someone’s home. It was sophisticated, reasonably rare.

  She grabbed her purse and hurried out of her office. Brigid came out of the X-ray room as she dashed down the hall.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “Yes,” Angela gasped, then whipped around to look at her deputy again. “Did you get Ponterelli out of my van?”

  “Sure. That’s who I was just taking pictures of.”

  “Thank God.” There was no time to try to catch a cab, and she definitely didn’t want to take the old man with her.

  She raced outside and swung into the vehicle, fumbling for the keys she’d left in the ignition. Please, let everything be all right. Please don’t let him have betrayed me.

  And she knew in that moment that it was too late. If Jesse turned out to be just like the others, she wouldn’t be able to bear it.

  He had kissed her. And she had liked it.

  Jesse got her message when he returned from his lunch with Alvin Carper, the reporter from the Inquirer. He had hoped to pin the man down about why he hadn’t taped his conversation with the person claiming to be Detective O’Donnell. There had to be more going on there than met the eye. But Carper claimed that the caller had caught him off guard and he’d simply forgotten to record their conversation. The guy had been sweating bullets, too, understandably. He’d left himself wide open to accusations of libel.

  Jesse wasn’t worried about that. He had bigger fish to fry.

  He sat down at his desk, then called Angela back.

  “Not in,” said a harried female voice.

  He glanced at the time of the message. “She called me no more than twenty minutes ago.”

  “I can’t help that. She’s gone now, and this place is a zoo. She took off like her tail was on fire, and now this funeral-home guy is here to collect the Chauncy woman, and I can’t find any release form for her. Dr. Byerly didn’t say anything about releasing that body.”

  Jesse’s blood went cold.

  There was no way that Abe or Gwen Chauncy would make funeral arrangements without consulting him. When he’d gone home this morning to shower and change, there had been no less than four messages from the couple, wanting to know when they could possibly bury their daughter. No, he realized, they would not have gone ahead with funeral arrangements before a signed release form had been obtained.

  “Don’t release her,” Jesse snapped, finding his voice again.

  “Well, that’s all well and good for you to say, but—”

  “This is the D.A. And I’m telling you from the top, don’t release her.”

  “Well, I wasn’t going to, not without authorization.”

  “Who is this?” Jesse demanded coldly.

  “Dr. Cross. I’m a deputy. Our receptionist is out or I wouldn’t have been here at the desk at all,” she said, sounding childishly miffed.

  “What does the man look like?” he snapped, ignoring her response.

  “Who?” Brigid asked.

  “Whoever is trying to collect Lisette Chauncy’s body!”

  “Oh. He’s—” She broke off.

  “What?” Jesse growled. “He’s what?”

  “Gone.”

  “Gone?”

  “He must have scooted out of here while I was talking to you.”

  “Weren’t you watching him?” Jesse roared.

  “No. I had my back turned to give this conversation some privacy. I mean, we were discussing him.”

  It made sense, but that didn’t make Jesse happy. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Something’s wrong, isn’t it?”

  “Very.” He grabbed his suit coat again.

  Whoever was doing this was foolhardy and brazen. Walking right into the M.E.’s office to take the body! It boggled Jesse’s mind.

  “I knew it,” Brigid was saying. “I mean, the way she ran out of here...”

  Jesse came back to the conversation, one sleeve still dangling. “Dr. Byerly ran out? Did she say where she was going?”

  “No. But I asked her if something was wrong, and she said yes.”

  Jesse’s blood chilled even more. “Listen to me. I want you to stand beside that body and don’t leave it until you see the whites of my eyes. Got it?”

  “Yours personally, or one of your investigators?”

  “Mine.”

  “Got it.”

  Jesse hung up and left his office. The long center hallway was a madhouse. He jostled attorneys, cops and detectives, just barely resisting the urge to run.

  “Hey, Jesse.”

  He looked up without breaking stride, trying to find who had spoken. The voice came from in front of him, and he plowed right into the corresponding body.

  “Oh. Hi, Charlie.”

  Price dropped an irritatingly familiar hand on his shoulder, trying to detain him. “Got a minute?”

  “No,” Jesse said bluntly, pulling away. “Actually, I don’t. Maybe this afternoon. Check with my secretary.”

  He stepped into the elevator just as the door began to close. He didn’t see the man’s face redden or the way he changed direction abruptly, going back the way he had come.

  It hadn’t been touched.

  Angela had dragged open the printer cabinet again, and the splicing device was still in the same place. She sank to her knees in front of it and leaned her forehead against the cool wood of the desk, forcing herself to breathe deeply and evenly.

  No cops had been here to claim it. No one had tricked her. Jesse hadn’t set her up, and no one else had reported it, either. The adrenaline rushed out of her, and she realized she was crying in relief.

  After a moment, she leaned back on her haunches and swiped a shaky hand over her eyes. And something odd happened to her heart. Her head was still howling that she couldn’t, shouldn’t trust him, but her heart began whispering maybe, maybe, maybe...

  “Oh, Jesse,” she whispered aloud. “Please don’t hurt me.”

  In the meantime, she determined, she was going to do what she knew she should have done last night. She was going to get rid of this thing.

  She’d go directly to Captain Kennery. He was John Gunner’s immediate boss. And he was the one who had found that tape with Jesse’s voice on it in the first place. It was not insurance. She knew better than to believe that. She didn’t think that Kennery would accept her explanation of how she had come by the machine simply because she was one of Gunner’s best friends. He wouldn’t do it because she was now the chie
f M.E. or because she had been with the D.A. when the damned thing had been left in her home. She didn’t trust him. He might well arrest her on the spot. But there was no one else she trusted more in that department, and she had to turn this in herself. She wished futilely that John Gunner was in town.

  She stood up, then she hesitated, that little voice whispering again. Maybe...

  Should she call Jesse and tell him what she planned to do? Were they in this together? The possibility was overwhelming. She pressed a hand to her eyes.

  Maybe, maybe, maybe...

  She dropped into her desk chair and reached for the phone.

  Jesse had returned from lunch, then he had gone right back out again.

  “Well, please tell him that I called again,” she told his secretary.

  “I’m not sure when he’ll be back,” the woman said defensively.

  “Fine. If I don’t hear from him in an hour, I’ll call again.”

  She hung up. She wasn’t going to wait an hour. At least she had tried.

  She found a box of latex gloves in the medical bag she kept at home. She went downstairs to the kitchen and got a large plastic trash bag from under the sink. Then she went back to the office and slid the device into the bag, touching it only on the edges, having as little contact with it as possible.

  She was halfway up Ninth Street when her beeper sounded. She kept driving and fumbled for it in her bag, keeping one eye on the traffic. She checked the number.

  Her office.

  She didn’t dare park the city van with its precious cargo anywhere long enough to use a pay phone. She would call in from Kennery’s office, she decided. She kept driving.

  “She’s not answering her pager,” Angela’s secretary said fretfully.

  “She’s probably not near a phone. Give it time,” Brigid suggested. Her calm irritated Jesse. Then his stomach moved with a sudden, sick sensation.

  Was Angela all right? Dear God, had this nut moved on her? His pulse began to race, and he had to work to get control of it. There was nothing he could do about it right now except wait awhile longer and pray that she would call in.

  He turned his attention back to Brigid. “All right, give it to me again.”

  “I didn’t really pay a lot of attention to his personal appearance,” she repeated for the third time. “I mean, he was dressed like someone from a funeral home. Black suit. White shirt. Dark gray tie. I’d guess he was in his late thirties, maybe his early forties. I told you—what struck me most was his hair.”

  Greasy, the woman had called it. When Jesse had pressed her for details, she’d said it had been slicked back off his forehead with some kind of “goop.”

  Jesse looked at the investigator he’d called over from his office to make sure the guy was getting all this down. They’d already questioned all the other employees. The morgue was hectic today, and everyone else had been so busy they’d scarcely noticed one more funeral-home employee hanging around at the reception desk.

  No one had noticed any unusual cars in the lot, either. But then, a hearse wouldn’t be considered unusual here, and if the guy had been masquerading as a funeral-home employee, then it was a safe bet that that was what he was driving.

  Where the hell would he have gotten a hearse? Jesse wondered.

  “And you’ve never seen him before in your life?” he clarified, thinking with another lurch of his gut that that ruled out his original supposition that this was the work of someone in Angela’s office.

  That left someone from his own office as a possibility, he reasoned. The deputy medical examiners would not necessarily know his own deputies and investigators by sight. He remained convinced that the culprit had inside knowledge or access to one or both of their offices, dating back to the Shokonnet release form he’d forged.

  Brigid sat back in her chair, frowning. “You know, maybe it’s just because you’ve asked me that so many times now, but—”

  “But what?” Jesse demanded.

  “I’m starting to think that maybe I do know him from somewhere.”

  He started to ask her where and realized how stupid that was. “Think about it,” he said instead. “Think hard.”

  “If I did recognize him, he probably doesn’t usually wear his hair like that.”

  “That’s a safe assumption,” Jesse said tightly, and she gave him an unpleasant look.

  Damn it, the bastard had been here. Right here, right under their noses. Jesse thought again that whoever he was, he was bold as brass.

  “And you didn’t see his paperwork,” he said aloud to Brigid again.

  “No. I told you. The first thing I did was get the case protocol from Dr. Byerly’s desk. She’d signed it, but there was no release form attached. I’d just brought the protocol back to the reception desk when you called. I turned my back to talk to you, and that was when he disappeared.

  Jesse swore. Now he had another question. What had happened to make the guy turn tail and run? He couldn’t have known at that point that it was the D.A. on the phone. Brigid hadn’t initially known it was the D.A. on the phone.

  The answer hit him like a jolt of electricity. The guy must have seen someone who might have recognized him. Maybe he’d taken off quickly before that person could notice him. Another hint that it was someone who worked for the city?

  His stomach burned.

  The phone finally sounded on Angela’s secretary’s desk. He almost lunged for it and restrained himself at the last moment.

  The secretary answered and spoke briefly, then she held out the phone to Jesse. “It’s Dr. Byerly.”

  Jesse grabbed the phone.

  “What are you doing there?” Angela demanded. “Oh, God, something else has happened, hasn’t it?”

  Inherent caution rose in him, some instinct not to talk about it over the phone, if for no other reason than he rarely said too much on a telephone. “How far away are you?” he countered.

  “Ten minutes, barring gridlock.”

  “Good enough,” Jesse answered. “I’ll be here.” Then his voice softened. “Something nearly happened, but we’ve got everything under control.” He remembered how tense, how dazed, she’d been last night. He didn’t want her driving in that condition. “Be careful,” he added, then hung up. He immediately picked up the receiver again to call his office. He was going to be here awhile. “Libby,” he said when his secretary came on the line, “any messages?”

  “The medical examiner called a couple of times.”

  “I’ve caught up with her.”

  “And Captain Kennery of the homicide unit called no more than thirty seconds ago.”

  Jesse’s heart skipped. “What did he want?”

  “For you to call him back ASAP. He says it’s urgent.”

  Jesse disconnected and called Kennery back. He identified himself and thought the captain’s response was slow in coming.

  “You want to tell me what’s going on with this Chauncy thing?” Kennery asked finally.

  Jesse had a sense of a dark, evil net settling over him, around him, ensnaring him. “I’m not following you,” he said cautiously.

  “The chief medical examiner just left here. She’s submitted a tape-splicing machine for evidence.”

  Jesse’s heart stopped.

  What the hell was she doing? After his shock came livid anger. Ten minutes away. That could certainly have put her at the Police Administration Building. Why hadn’t she said anything?

  He answered himself in the next moment. Because she didn’t trust him. She was still running this show on her own.

  “I’ll get back to you on it,” he said sharply.

  “Yeah, well, I’m in no position to force your hand,” Kennery snapped, equally as angry. “But if your office isn’t planning to charge Dr. Byerly with anything, I’d sure as hell like to know why. I’ve got six guys working their butts off on this thing. I’ve got everyone from the commissioner to the mayor breathing down my neck, calling me on it daily. Someone spliced that tap
e with your voice on it, and while I’m trying to keep that quiet—at your request—Dr. Byerly turns up here with the goddamned machine.”

  “We’re not charging anyone with anything at this time,” Jesse said tersely. “And I would appreciate it if your office would refrain, also.” He grimaced. It was nothing more than a polite warning. If the P.P.D. charged her, he was making it clear that he would not take the case to the grand jury for an indictment.

  “Do you have any more evidence that you’re not sharing with my guys?” Kennery demanded.

  “No,” Jesse said honestly. His own investigators hadn’t found anything pertinent yet. And Kennery hadn’t asked him if he had people on it.

  “So how in the hell did she get this? I’m not sure I buy her explanation.”

  “What was it?” Jesse asked neutrally.

  “She said she was out last evening and came home to find someone had broken into her home. I checked and there is a police report. That district is sending a copy over to me. She said she didn’t find this thing until sometime after the cops had left.”

  Jesse hesitated only a heartbeat. “To my knowledge that is correct.”

  “So why did she wait so long to bring it to me?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “And if you knew about it, why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I didn’t say I knew about it.”

  Kennery swore again. “Manilla said you were there last night.”

  “It takes some time for things to go between the channels of my office and yours,” Jesse countered, relenting without actually admitting anything.

  “A phone call would have done it,” Kennery snapped.

  Jesse said nothing. Kennery gave up.

  “Well, be in touch. She’s a name in this city, a top-ranking officer, and damn it, I hate these political cases. And I still have this tape here with your voice on it.” That seemed to overwhelm him for a moment. He was silent. “And John Gunner likes her, and I like Gunner,” he finally finished lamely.

  “I understand,” Jesse said, and inwardly shuddered at his own repertoire of deliberately-vague comments. His pulse was still jackhammering.