Keri Locke 02-A Trace of Muder

by Blake Pierce

  Keri suddenly felt a nervous pit in her stomach but made sure not to let it show.

  “I remember,” she said, as she helped him to his feet.

  “Good,” he replied, wrapping his huge arm around her shoulder for support. “Because I always say, stuff is one of my favorite topics.”

  *

  She got permission to be discharged on Friday evening and had just changed out of the hospital gown and back into her own clothes when she got a surprise visitor in her room: Jackson Cave.

  He walked in unannounced as she was putting on her socks.

  “Hello, Detective,” he said as if his being there was the most natural thing in the world. “I was just visiting a client on the second floor and heard you were here. I had to stop by and offer my best wishes. But I do have to say, you seem to spend an inordinate amount of time in hospitals.”

  After the initial shock of seeing him there at all, Keri studied Cave hard, trying to determine if he knew about her late-night visit to his office earlier in the week. Neither his comments nor his body language betrayed anything. She forced herself to be equally inscrutable.

  “I do use more of my healthcare dollars than the average person. But it’s well worth it, in my opinion. You could ask Payton Penn about that. Or Alan Pachanga. Okay, maybe not him.”

  “No, Mr. Pachanga is certainly not available to comment. But I’m sure he’s here with us in spirit. I feel like he’s the kind of man who had much more to offer before he was taken from us.”

  “More to offer—like what?” Keri asked, wondering if this was just the sick admiration of one warped mind for another or a veiled reference to Pachanga’s laptop, which had set her on the path that ultimately allowed her to crack Cave’s code.

  “That’s the point. I guess we’ll never know, will we? It’s not like he can speak out from the grave and share his secrets, now is it?”

  “I suppose not,” Keri said, refusing to bite. “Was there anything else you wanted, Mr. Cave?”

  “No. I just wanted to make sure you were well. And now that I see you are, I’ll be on my way,” he said, making his way to the door. “But I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again. You’re a real comer, Detective Locke, and I’ve got my eye on you.”

  “Goodbye, Mr. Cave,” Keri said, ignoring what she considered a threat.

  He started to leave, pulling the door closed behind him, but then poked his head back in.

  “If you don’t mind my asking one last thing, Detective, I just wanted to know if you’d ever considered dyeing your hair.”

  “Why?”

  “I think you’d look lovely as a brunette.”

  And then he was gone, leaving Keri alone in the room to try to get her shoes on and come to terms with the fact that he most certainly knew she had stolen his cipher. She tried to disregard the shiver that suddenly ran up her spine.

  CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN

  Two days later, on Sunday morning, Keri woke up and felt genuinely good for the first time in almost three weeks.

  Her ribs only really hurt when she coughed or laughed. Her shoulder was coming along more slowly but wasn’t a constant source of pain anymore. Her head still ached dully but not so much that she couldn’t function. And two consecutive nights of decent sleep had left her with more energy than she knew what to do with.

  As she lay on the bunk in her houseboat for the last time, she reviewed her plans for what was turning out to be a busy day. The movers would be here at 9 a.m. to take what little stuff she had over to the apartment in Playa.

  She was leaving most of the furniture here anyway and replacing it with items she’d ordered online while in the hospital. The marina management had offered to buy the boat “as is” from her and that money would pay for her new stuff and give her a decent nest egg for a few months. Besides, the entirety of her personal belongings could easily fit into the bed of a pickup truck, which was what the movers planned to use.

  After she got squared away at the new place, she had to go into the station to finish up some paperwork on the Burlingame case. Lieutenant Hillman had let her hold off because of her hospital stay but now he was getting antsy to officially close the case and insisted she come in, even on a Sunday.

  She needed to handle her report delicately, as she had broken into the mansion. If Burlingame had just shot her on sight, he might have had a case for self-defense. Luckily he had felt the need to share his brilliance with her before exacting some kind of poetic vengeance.

  Now he was dead and she could say whatever she wanted in the police report. And what she intended to say was that she had gone to his house for an interview. When she turned her back, he knocked her out and threw her in the pit. Lying in her report wasn’t exactly a source of pride. But she wasn’t going to sweat it that much under the circumstances.

  Kendra’s body had indeed been found in the pit, about four feet below where her husband’s ended up. The preliminary forensics indicated that Burlingame hadn’t been lying when he’d said he buried her alive. The thought of the terror that woman must have felt in her last moments shook Keri to her core. It also wiped away what little guilt she was feeling about strangling a man who was probably only minutes away from dying anyway.

  Burlingame had derisively called her “famous finder of the lost.” Keri didn’t care so much about the “famous” part. But she embraced the rest of that label. It was her purpose, her mission in life, to try to find those who had gone missing and return them safely to their families.

  In her head, she knew that not all of those people could be returned alive, but that was still her goal. And that’s why she felt a nagging rawness in her gut, a sense that she had failed Kendra Burlingame, even if the woman was dead before Keri was ever assigned the case. She’d felt this guilt before and she knew that there was only one thing that made it better: time.

  It also wouldn’t hurt to have distractions and she’d scheduled one for Monday. She was supposed to meet Mags for lunch. When she’d gotten the voicemail message asking if she wanted to meet up, Keri had initially been reluctant. But then she thought about it.

  The case was over. There wasn’t going to be a trial so there was no professional conflict. And Margaret Merrywether was a hoot. Keri hadn’t had a real female friend in years and the idea that Mags might become one filled her with something approaching comfort.

  She also suspected that in the wake of Kendra’s death, Mags needed a friend right now too. So she was going. She might even let Mags call her Keri instead of “Detective.”

  As to the rest of her Sunday, after signing off on the case paperwork, it would be off to the hospital to meet Ray, who was being discharged in the afternoon. She planned to give him a ride home—after that coffee, of course—and help square away his apartment so he could function on his own.

  As she got up and puttered about, brushing her teeth and getting ready, Keri’s thoughts turned, as they almost always did in quiet moments, to Evie.

  Standing in the shower at the marina comfort station, also for the last time, she let the warm water lull her into a sort of reverie. She closed her eyes and immediately saw her little girl: blonde pigtails, wide, gap-toothed smile with one chipped tooth up top, eyes as green as emeralds.

  If I found her today, would Evie even recognize me? Would she answer to that name anymore? Would she be happy to reconcile or angry at how I failed her?

  Keri stepped out of the shower and dried off slowly. Pulling out her phone, she looked at the message from the Collector again.

  i was there. you were not. caution is good. you passed that test. but trust is key. maybe next time.

  That last line—maybe next time—ate at her. She so wanted to set up a next time right now. Her fingers itched at the thought of typing out a reply.

  But she knew she couldn’t. She likely only had one more chance to connect with him. If she handled it poorly, he’d be in the wind, perhaps forever.

  And right now, she didn’t have the ability to pursue him
properly. She might have the financial resources, with the boat sale. But all her information was obtained illegally, so she couldn’t count on the department’s help. In fact, if they learned what she’d done, she could be arrested.

  And just as bad, she was pretty sure Jackson Cave was investigating her now. He might be bugging her home. He might be tapping her phone. He was surely having her tailed. And if he got wind of her plan, he might find a way to pass that information along to the authorities, or worse, to tip off the Collector. She had to be very careful from this point forward. She had to behave as if she were constantly under surveillance, constantly being watched.

  Because she probably was.

  CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT

  Keri, full of jumpy anticipation at the thought of picking up Ray from the hospital, had wrapped up all the case paperwork and was heading out of the bullpen when Hillman poked his head out of his office.

  “Locke, I need you in here.”

  She walked over, trying not to let her nervousness show.

  Has he found out about the stakeout at the Promenade? Or worse, the break-in at Cave’s office? Has he just been waiting for me to close out this case to fire me?

  “Have a seat,” he said, motioning to the loveseat.

  Noting that he usually directed her to the hard-backed metal chair across from his desk, she reluctantly did as she was told. He sat down in his chair and settled there, unspeaking.

  “Yes, sir?” Keri asked, unable to handle the silence.

  “Detective Locke,” he said, clearly uncomfortable, “I just wanted to tell you that…you should know that…well…good job.”

  “I’m sorry, sir?”

  “I’ve submitted your name for commendation for your work on this case. When everyone else in the department, myself included, was ready to close up shop, you stuck with it, sometimes in contravention of my direct orders. We’ll set that aside for the time being. The point is, this case would not have been solved without your diligence and dedication. I’ve told Captain Beecher this and she agrees that a commendation is in order. So you know, expect that sometime soon.”

  Keri forced herself to keep a straight face. It looked like Lieutenant Hillman had been in literal pain as he’d spoken the words. But he had spoken them. And she didn’t want to mess up the best interaction they’d ever had with an ill-timed smile.

  “Thank you, sir,” she said quietly.

  “Dismissed,” he replied, rediscovering his typical gruff demeanor. But as she reached the door, he added under his breath, “You’re welcome.”

  As she walked out, Keri kept her jaw set, refusing to let anyone see how giddy she felt inside. She hurried through the station, in danger of being late to get Ray, who would tease her mercilessly for it. But just as she got to the outer doors, the desk officer called her back.

  “You received a letter yesterday,” the woman said.

  “Thanks,” Keri said, slightly perplexed, and took the envelope. In over a year as a detective she’d never gotten an actual mailed letter. As she walked out to her car, she noticed that there was no return address. She got in and opened it. The note was typed in all caps. It read:

  WANT TO HELP. CHECK WAREHOUSE AGAIN. YOU DIDN’T COVER EVERYTHING.

  She suspected that this message was from the same raspy-voiced person who’d left her the voicemail telling her to investigate the abandoned warehouse in Palms for information about Evie. That had been a dead end and she would have chalked it up as a cruel prank if not for one thing.

  When the techs tried to scrub the call, they couldn’t find a thing. The number was untraceable. The voice, while human, had been altered so much that she couldn’t even be sure it was male. Whoever had left that message had gone to a lot of trouble to avoid being discovered. Why go through all that just for a prank? It didn’t make sense. But with everything that had happened since then, Keri hadn’t given it much more thought.

  But since the warehouse was on the way to the hospital, and despite her sense that she was being played, she decided to stop by again. It probably wouldn’t help but it couldn’t hurt.

  When she arrived, Keri parked in almost the same spot as last time. She made the short walk to the warehouse, keeping her eyes peeled for anything out of the ordinary, anything she might have missed on her last visit. Nothing jumped out at her.

  She walked past the same sign reading Priceless Item Preservation, the one that seemed to be taunting her, and entered the warehouse. It didn’t look any different than the last time. She did a cursory walk-through of the place before returning to the one unusual spot she’d initially discovered last time.

  The metal folding chair still sat above what she knew was a false floor panel, with chunks of drywall resting on the seat. Other bits of drywall debris lay on the floor beside the chair, where they’d fallen when Keri moved it. It didn’t look like anyone had been here in the interim.

  She slid the chair to the side again and popped the raised button on the wooden floor panel painted to look like concrete. Once again it released easily and she removed it to look at the small hole beneath. There was nothing inside.

  Keri sat down on the floor beside the hole and tried not to let her growing frustration get the better of her.

  Why would someone do this to me? Just to be cruel? How many wild goose chases am I going to go on before I finally stop putting myself through this?

  Keri tried to shake the self-pity out of her head and focus on what was in front of her. Someone skilled had left her that voicemail. Someone had taken the time to follow up with a letter. Maybe there was more to this.

  She pulled out the note and reread it:

  WANT TO HELP. CHECK WAREHOUSE AGAIN. YOU DIDN’T COVER EVERYTHING.

  The first two lines seemed pretty straightforward—purely informational. But the phrasing of the last one seemed a bit off. It was more cryptic. Why not say “you didn’t look everywhere”?

  Could it be a clue? You didn’t cover everything. What does that mean?

  Drawing a blank, Keri sighed and grabbed the wooden cover to return it to its place.

  The wooden cover—you didn’t cover everything.

  She stared at the square of wood in her hands for a long second before turning it upside down to look for anything unusual—writing or odd markings of some kind. Nothing.

  She shook it. There was the faintest rattle from the inside. She shook the panel more vigorously and again heard the sound. There was definitely something in there.

  She felt around the sides, searching for any unusual protrusion. On one side, she found a small indentation, about the size of a dime. She pressed on it hard. There was a tiny click and a thin slot appeared. She turned the panel so that the slot was facing down and shook. One small piece of paper fell out.

  Keri put down the panel and picked up the paper. It was a blank piece of plain white paper, about five by seven. She turned it over. On that side was an image, black-and-white, grainy and obviously taken from far away, likely with a telephoto lens.

  It was a close-up of a girl, cropped so much that the surroundings couldn’t be identified. The girl looked to be about thirteen. Despite being black-and-white, it was clear that she had blonde hair, cut very short. Her face was slack and inexpressive but her eyes were sharp. Her mouth was open slightly and Keri could tell that she had a chipped upper front tooth.

  She stared at the image for a long time, unwilling (maybe unable) to draw any conclusions about it. Was it Evie? Was it some Photoshopped image of a random girl meant to torture her? The very fact that she couldn’t tell at first glance whether or not this was her daughter made Keri sick to her stomach.

  What kind of mother am I that I don’t know immediately whether this is legitimate or fake?

  She felt the room starting to spin around her, felt the world fading from her control, as it had so many times before. Her breathing became rapid and shallow. The warehouse grew fuzzy. Beads of sweat appeared suddenly on her brow. She felt herself sinking into that
familiar panicked despair.

  No! I will not let this happen. I will not fall apart. No more. I’m through with this crap. Pull it together, Locke!

  And as quickly as the panic attack had started, it was over. Her vision cleared and her breathing slowed. The spinning stopped and the nausea disappeared.

  After taking a moment to regroup, she made a decision. She would take the photo to Edgerton to see what he could do with it. She would have the wooden floor panel and the metal chair and everything else in the warehouse searched for prints. She would pursue this lead with the same ferocity that she followed every lead involving Evie.

  But she would no longer allow herself to be the victim, forever at the mercy of her loss and the moments of uncontrollable terror it caused. She had to stay strong for Evie and, just as important, for herself. For one way or the other, she would find her daughter.

  Evie, hang on, she called out to her silently. I’m coming for you.

  NOW AVAILABLE!

  A TRACE OF VICE

  (A Keri Locke Mystery—Book 3)

  “A dynamic story line that grips from the first chapter and doesn't let go.”

  --Midwest Book Review, Diane Donovan (regarding Once Gone)

  From #1 bestselling mystery author Blake Pierce comes a new masterpiece of psychological suspense.

  In A TRACE OF VICE (Book #3 in the Keri Locke mystery series), Keri Locke, Missing Persons Detective in the Homicide division of the LAPD, follows a fresh lead for her abducted daughter. It leads to a violent confrontation with The Collector—which, in turn, offers more clues that may, after all this time, reunite her with her daughter.

  Yet at the same time, Keri is assigned a new case, one with a frantic ticking clock. A teenage girl has gone missing in Los Angeles, a girl from a good family was who duped into drugs and abducted into a sex trafficking ring. Keri is hot on her trail—but the trail is moving fast, with the girl being constantly moved and with her abductors’ single, nefarious goal: to cross her over the border with Mexico.