Accused

by Janice Cantore

  His expression was cop unreadable, his tone a trifle conciliatory. “First of all, I want you to know that I came here unofficially. I want to help you before things get out of hand. I’m sure you’ve heard the gossip about Jeff and the mayor.” He didn’t give Carly a chance to respond before continuing. “It’s more than gossip. And there is a real fear that evidence will show Jeff paid those two kids to kill the mayor.”

  Carly failed a second time to keep the shock from registering. Is that why Jeff wanted to talk to me, to see if Londy dropped his name?

  “I know it’s hard to believe,” the sergeant said, holding his hand up to stop Carly’s response. “But Jeff is a cop. He found out who interviewed the suspects. He knew you talked to the minor and located the hooker, and he got antsy.”

  “Whoa, I can’t believe this!” Carly stood and paced her small living room. Andi’s words echoed as she digested the sergeant’s accusations. “He could have been out doing anything, including murder. . . .” Anger flared as doubt about Jeff swelled. Was he just using me to get information? Is Jeff really a killer?

  “I know.” The sergeant was all compassion and understanding now. “It’s a horrible thing. But if you had stayed out of things like you were told, you never would have led Jeff to the working girl.”

  Carly’s stomach knotted in fear and disgust. If what the sergeant said was true, Jeff had merely been trying to manipulate her. If what Jeff said was true, the sergeant was doing the manipulating.

  Something wasn’t right.

  “If Jeff was having an affair with the mayor, why would he kill her?”

  “It’s the oldest story in the book. She was going to tell his wife, and he would have lost everything.”

  That didn’t add up. Teresa would have lost more by exposing an affair than Jeff.

  She remembered Jeff’s warning to trust no one, including his best friend, Nick. His paranoia had bugged her at the time. I just can’t see Jeff as a murderer. Why is Tucker convinced?

  “Why are you telling me all this?” She stopped pacing and faced the sergeant.

  “Because I have a feeling you know where Jeff is.”

  Why? Unless he knew she’d shared dinner with Jeff. She’d told no one about meeting Jeff, except for Joe. And she trusted him implicitly. No one would know about the dinner unless they’d been watching her or Jeff.

  Derek. But what possible connection could he have to any of this?

  Nothing made sense. Carly banked on her instinct to rebel against pressure, and the sergeant was the pressure. “I have no idea where Jeff is. He’s a narcotics officer; I work juvenile.”

  “Carly, I’m trying to help you.” Tucker’s patience and compassion drained away like a wave receding from the shore and his tone became pleading. “Why would you cover for someone who in all likelihood is a murderer?”

  “Why do you think I would know anything about Jeff?”

  “I’ll ask you point blank.” He stood, and for a second she thought she saw anger flash across his face. “Have you had any contact with Jeff Hanks? This case is too big for any kind of game playing. The political pressure is intense.”

  Is he mad at me or mad at the politics involved? she wondered. He was right about game playing, but she wasn’t the one playing games. And now Carly’s choice was clear: who to believe, Jeff or Tucker? Which side would she pick?

  “I have nothing to tell you.”

  Tucker blew out a breath and brought a hand to his mouth, dragging it down his chin and letting it drop to his side. Carly again couldn’t read his expression and wondered if she had just committed suicide, in more ways than one. She didn’t look away.

  “Carly, my hands are tied here. For your own sake, stay out of my murder investigation. I’m making the keep-out order official to help you, not to hurt you. But if you disobey a direct order, there are people with more power than me who will see to it that you are suspended so fast your head will spin.”

  14

  What brought that on?

  Carly shook her head as she closed the apartment door. Reeling from the sergeant’s shakedown, she whistled softly to herself and walked to the window to watch him leave. His flattop disappeared into a plain car, and in a few minutes the beige vehicle left her range of view.

  Her racing heartbeat slowly returned to its normal cadence. It wasn’t the shakedown itself that ruffled her; it was the target that suddenly seemed painted on her chest.

  Last night Jeff seemed to think I had the key to the universe. Now Tucker thinks I’m Jeff’s keeper. Carly left the window and sat down at the kitchen counter. She chewed on her bottom lip and wondered how the sergeant could have known she’d met with Jeff. He hadn’t said it, but he knew.

  The only answer was that Derek told him, and that made no sense. She ran her fingers through her hair and closed her eyes, alarmed by the image flashing in her mind of someone like Derek watching her and reporting back to Tucker.

  The sergeant’s threats of suspension were not empty, and the thought of being watched, followed, monitored—anything like that—made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. I’m a cop, not a crook.

  She grabbed her fanny pack and searched out the phone number Jeff had tossed her at the restaurant. How could Jeff and Cinnamon possibly be connected? Are there connections between Cinnamon and Mayor Burke? Jeff was the only one who would have any answers. She dialed the number.

  “The mobile unit you have reached has not been activated or is no longer in the service area.”

  “Argh,” Carly muttered. She paced and chewed her lip some more. If I can’t find Jeff, who can I go to now? Joe immediately came to mind, but when she phoned, his overexcited mother greeted her. Christy was on her way to the hospital in labor.

  Elaine. Carly dialed Elaine’s number as if she were grabbing onto a lifeline. A male voice answered, and it took a second before his identity registered.

  “Hello?” the voice repeated.

  “Nick.”

  “Yeah? Carly, is that you?”

  “What are you doing at Jeff’s house?”

  “I got a tip about the investigation last night, and I felt Elaine would need a shoulder. I got out here just in time to watch homicide serve a search warrant. It wasn’t pretty.”

  Carly bit her bottom lip as old anger flared. Of course, it was just like Nick to be the knight in shining armor! She opened her mouth to say something cutting but stopped. There was no rational reason to be angry with Nick for wanting to help Elaine. She wanted to help Elaine.

  “Carly, you still there?”

  Clenching a fist, she fought to be civil. What was going on with Jeff was so much bigger than a year-old divorce and heartache. “Yeah, I was just thinking. How’s Elaine?”

  “She’s doing okay or—what’s the cliché?—as well as can be expected. The kids are confused. I thought I’d hang out and try to help.”

  Help. I may need your help. Calmer now—and thinking more clearly, she hoped—Carly felt the irony prick her somewhere in the center of her chest. Just days ago, on her birthday, she had shut the door on Nick and didn’t want to trust him on any level. But in all this mess, when she didn’t know where else to turn, he might well be the only person she could trust. First things first—Elaine.

  “Can I talk to her?”

  “She just went to sleep. That’s why I’m still here. Her parents are on the way and she wanted me to keep an eye on the kids until they get here. I’d wake her, but . . .”

  “No, don’t wake her. How about I just come out. I need to talk to her.” I hate to say it, think it, or do it, but I probably need to talk to you too.

  “Sure, she’d be happy to see you.”

  “Does she need anything?”

  “No, she’s pretty set. Her church has been very supportive, but . . . uh, I hate to ask. Can you do me a favor?”

  Carly could tell by his voice he expected her to tell him to pound sand. The impulse was there; his voice alone was able to wind her up. But she n
eeded to put her anger on the back burner, at least until she knew whether or not he could help her.

  “Sure, name it.”

  “Can you stop by the house and get me a change of clothes and my shaving kit? I’m a little scruffy, and I might be out here awhile longer. The spare key is still where we used to keep it.”

  For the briefest of seconds, Carly flushed with fury. How dare he ask me something like that! But she bit her tongue and swore to keep an open mind. Closing her eyes and swallowing her pride, she responded, “Okay, I can do that. I’ll leave here in about twenty minutes, so it will be about an hour and a half before I get there.”

  “Great, I really appreciate it.”

  Carly hung up the phone and raised a hand to her forehead, hoping she hadn’t made the wrong decision. She hadn’t been back to the house since she’d stormed out after discovering Nick’s infidelity. Her mother and Andrea had packed up her clothes and belongings. The thought of being in the house—their house—lit a fire in her stomach.

  She’d fled the house as if it were somehow infected. Carly shuddered, the feeling of having her heart ripped from her chest branded in her memory. The house was a painful symbol of what she thought was marital happiness. Reality had slapped her when she realized Nick was faking everything.

  If he was as happy as he pretended to be, how could he cheat?

  She gave him the house without contest and sought to separate herself from anything that was “them.” Nick begged her to reconsider—“At least take money,” he’d said—but she wanted nothing from him, especially money. All Carly wanted was custody of the dog. Nick kept the house, and Carly and Maddie moved to the beach.

  Carly showered, changed into jeans and a sweatshirt, and inhaled a quick breakfast. She hated the idea of swallowing her pride. This bites. I just told him to get lost the other day; now I have to talk to him. But even at his worst, she had to admit Nick was a good cop.

  When he wears that blue suit, Nick holds up the truth and enforcing the law as more important than life. He should have cared about our marriage as much as he cared about the uniform. If he’d worn his uniform twenty-four hours a day, he never would have cheated.

  After gathering up the backpack that served as her purse, Carly took Maddie and trotted for the car. Maddie pranced and bounced around at the prospect of a car ride. Carly wanted company, K-9 or otherwise, as a shield between her and Nick.

  A lingering paranoia from the sergeant’s visit caused Carly to scan the area surrounding her apartment for any possible surveillance before she opened the car door. Seeing nothing, she unlocked the car and let Maddie jump in first.

  She’d be easy to follow if someone wanted to keep track of her. Her midnight-blue 1970 Ford Bronco stuck out in a crowd, to say the least. The older-style, boxy build of the car made it unusual. Carly bought the car as junk and restored, repainted, and modified what was now called “the dogmobile.” The truck didn’t have a backseat, just a flat, carpeted area for Maddie. When she and Nick were married, the car was to be the perfect family sport wagon.

  Carly drove south on Pacific Coast Highway into Huntington Beach. A cloudy, gray, and threatening sky framed the coastline. Glancing toward the surf from time to time, she let the coast occupy her thoughts. She’d driven this way a million times but never tired of the miles of beach and surf stretching south and north endlessly. Under stormy skies the waves were more majestic than normal. Pulsating fists of blue capped in white gloves, they took her breath away. A few surfers braved the water, and she witnessed some good wipeouts as she drove along the bluffs.

  When she turned inland, Maddie paced and whined in anticipation at the familiar route to the house. The dog’s first year had been spent in the house.

  We waited five years to buy a house. We picked a great one, so much potential. We were supposed to spend the next twenty years in it. Ha. It was an older house with only two bedrooms and one bath, but there was a nice yard and room for a dog. For three years, years Carly thought were perfect, they lovingly fixed the house up, spending all their free time and money at the local do-it-yourself store.

  “You remember, sweetheart?” Carly cooed in a high-pitched voice to the dog, who was now standing, tail wagging ferociously as they turned in to the driveway. Maddie loved Nick.

  The house looked the same, but the yard was lush, more grown and mature. Nick had done some landscaping and planted roses under the front window. They would probably be beautiful in a few weeks. Overall the place looked much better than a year ago. She parked and let Maddie out. The dog bounded up to the front door barking excitedly. In happier times Nick would have thrown open the door and grabbed the big dog in a bear hug. They would have tumbled and played on the front lawn until Nick gave in to Maddie’s inexhaustible energy supply.

  Enough! No more reminiscing. I’m just getting his junk and leaving.

  After calming the dog down, she found the key hidden in a small box attached to the water meter. She opened the front door. As soon as she stepped into the entryway, memories hit like a tall, gritty wave. They were happy memories of the work that went into that space. Carly remembered the day she carefully marked all the tiles and then watched while Nick just as carefully cut them. They both reverently laid each one and later celebrated their first home improvement project. She stepped forward slowly, hesitantly, as if restrained by an unseen hand.

  The small living room looked the same but for a new painting Nick must have added after she moved out. Has he finished the bathroom? Resisting the urge to check, she shook off a mantle of discomfort and walked to the bedroom to gather Nick’s things. One wall gaped empty, the carpet still somewhat smashed where her dresser used to stand. The bed was made, covered with a new bedspread. Nick was always neat and orderly, nothing out of place.

  She stopped for a moment at his dresser. There, in a shadow box, were three old badges, with an empty space for a fourth. Carly flashed back to Nick’s passion for collecting bits of police history. For the entire time they were married, he was occupied with a search for original PD badges.

  The Las Playas Police Department badge design had changed four times since incorporation in 1897, the most recent design being the one officers now wore. The three badges in the shadow box were historical pieces that Nick painstakingly and patiently searched out. Missing was the first badge. Carly remembered Nick lamenting that he might never find the first, most unique badge.

  He was wrong, she knew, because she had found the badge. Quite accidentally she ran into a woman whose great-grandfather had worn the silver PD star proudly. He was dead now and the woman didn’t know what to do with the badge. Carly had scarcely contained her excitement when she convinced the woman to sell it to her. She remembered the pure joy that welled up inside her when she imagined how happy Nick would be when he saw the badge. It was to be a Christmas present. But some months before Christmas, Carly had discovered his infidelity.

  She’d almost thrown the badge in the trash, but something stopped her. So the star was still with her, buried somewhere deep in her closet. Tears sprang to her eyes without warning and she brushed them back. Swallowing the pain, she moved to complete the task at hand, working hard to step into the impartial, unemotional mask she wore at work.

  Carly found jeans and a shirt where she expected to and filled a small gym bag. Maddie followed her every move, sniffing here and there as if looking for Nick to pop up from somewhere.

  With one final glance before she left, Carly surveyed the room. It’s so masculine. All the flowers and cozy touches are gone. I wonder if he’s still seeing her. She pushed down a wave of jealousy, embarrassed to feel relieved when she realized that if he was still seeing her, he wouldn’t have asked Carly for his things. It doesn’t matter. Nick is as free as I am now.

  Abruptly she turned to leave the house, not wanting to go down the path her thoughts and emotions were taking her. The problem with Jeff took precedence over her personal problems.

  It’s over. Leave it alone.


  15

  “Why can’t men be faithful?” Carly asked the question of Maddie as she pulled away from Nick’s house. Absentmindedly she scratched her companion’s head.

  Memories, past and present, played in her mind throughout the long ride to the community where Elaine lived. The last time she’d driven this way, she’d been with Nick. They’d picked Jeff and Elaine up and then driven to the Colorado River. They had a great time and talked about doing the same thing again sometime. A wave of depression came over her as she turned onto Elaine’s street.

  Nothing will ever be the same again, no matter what.

  “Life sucks,” she declared to Maddie as she parked behind Nick’s truck. A light rain had begun to fall.

  Anxiety rose in her gut and she suddenly doubted the wisdom in coming here. How do you tell a woman whose husband is a murder suspect that he is also a cheat? What about Nick? Can I really act like nothing ever happened? Taking a deep breath, she climbed out of her car and, together with Maddie, jogged up to Elaine’s front door.

  Nick opened the door before Carly knocked and greeted them both with a warm smile. Maddie communicated her elation at seeing him by bouncing about and wagging her tail ferociously. Nick returned the affection and grabbed her in a bear hug. Watching Nick roughhouse with the dog caused Carly’s chest to tighten.

  It’s not about me, she scolded herself silently. It’s about Elaine and Jeff. When Nick stood up, she handed him his gym bag. She could see why he needed a change of clothes. He’d come in uniform and was now wearing only a white T-shirt and uniform pants. She remembered how often he complained about the stiffness of their issued Kevlar vests. When his shift was over, the vest always came off almost before he got to the locker room. And it was obvious he’d been up all night. His eyes were bloodshot and his jawline dark with stubble. The anger that was so close to the surface threatened to bite again. He’d dropped everything to come to Elaine’s rescue. Jealousy and self-pity swirled around in Carly’s heart like a noxious cocktail, mixing with the reminder of the depth of care he could show for friends.