Killing Secrets

by Dianne Emley

  “Not that particular pen. Whoever lost it might think you know all about it.” Nan got on the freeway and drove at a moderate speed as she fled Pasadena.

  Chapter 44

  Sergeant Kendra Early rang the doorbell and then pounded on the door at Erica Keller’s home, where Ryan Keller was again living. Standing beside her on the porch and surrounding the house were officers from the Special Enforcement Section—the Pasadena PD’s SWAT team—and deputies from the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department, which had jurisdiction over the community of La Crescenta, where the Keller home was located. Also there were Tara Khorsandi, the Forensics supervisor, and two of her techs, each of them carrying an equipment tool kit.

  It was shortly after midnight. Dogs started barking and lights went on inside the tidy houses on the street.

  Early again pounded on the door. Soon after, a light was turned on in the back of the Keller home. It glowed dimly through the front picture window. Before long, the brass speakeasy window inside the door opened and Early saw Ryan Keller behind it.

  “Kendra. What’s going on?” Keller’s voice was raspy.

  She unfolded the stapled document she was holding and raised it so he could see it. “Open the door, Ryan. We have a search warrant. Keep your hands where we can see them.”

  “Seriously? I was asleep. Let me put some clothes on.”

  “Open the door now or we’ll break it in.”

  “I can’t f’ing believe this.” Keller closed the speakeasy window.

  The group standing outside the front door heard cursing and locks being disengaged. The front door opened to show Ryan wearing only a pair of boxer shorts, which were brightly printed with a pattern of partially peeled bananas.

  The cops who were close enough to see his attire started snickering. Even restrained Early struggled to keep a straight face.

  “My wife bought me these.” Keller pointed at his shorts. “Freaking search warrant. Do what you need to do. I’m going to put some clothes on.” He turned and started down the tile entryway.

  “Stop where you are, Ryan,” Early said. “Step outside.”

  “It’s cold out there. You’re not going to cut me any slack? I’m one of you.”

  “I need you outside, now,” Early said.

  Keller went out onto the porch, rubbing his hands over his bare arms, and followed Early down the three steps to the walkway. “Hey, Eddie. Steve. Mark.”

  The officers who were Keller’s friends avoided speaking with or looking at him as they entered his house.

  Early told two officers to stay with Keller as she started to head up the steps after the Forensics team. Before she stepped over the threshold, she said, “I’ll get you a robe or something.”

  Keller said, “There’re some clothes in my gym bag on the bedroom floor. Can I see that warrant?”

  Early directed one of the officers standing with Keller to get his clothes. In the foyer, she pulled Tara Khorsandi aside and said to her, “Focus on the living room and the glass coffee table and the carpet.” Early came back outside, down the steps, and handed Keller the warrant. She told the remaining officer standing with Keller to go into the house and help out.

  Keller took the warrant from her and waved at neighbors who had come out of their homes. “Hey, Tyler, Tiffany. Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Barnes. Everything’s okay. Looks scarier than it is.” He turned his attention to the warrant, shaking his head as he scanned the pages. He refolded the document into thirds along the original creases. “Kendra, all due respect, but this is ridiculous. Erica’s laptop and cell phone and iPad were stolen. Her parents took all her belongings.” He handed the warrant back to Early. “Does Beltran know about this?”

  “He will.”

  “So you went around him.”

  Eddie came out carrying a red nylon duffel bag and handed it to Keller, who told him, “Thanks, buddy.” He unzipped the bag, pulled out a black warm-up jacket and pants, and put them on.

  Early and Keller were both sergeants, so there was no need to defer to rank. “What’s your point, Ryan?”

  “I can’t believe that you’re actually paying attention to Nan Vining’s bullshit. I feel bad for Jared’s family and appreciate that they don’t want to accept what he did, but to investigate me…You’re wasting time and resources on a wild-goose chase. Nan’s lost her mind. You know it, Kendra. She lives for drama and she trades on her reputation.” He mimicked the theatrical vocal style of a TV announcer. “The tragic detective who brought down a serial killer has another suspected bad man in her sights.”

  “If you don’t have anything to hide, there’s no problem.”

  “I don’t have anything to hide. I’m tired and I want to go back to bed.” He yawned. After he opened his eyes, he watched as his neighbors began to return to their homes. “Makes me sick that people think I could do that to Erica.”

  Early tapped the warrant against her closed fist. “Erica did have a restraining order against you.”

  She watched the muscles in Ryan’s neck and face tense and a slow flush creep into his cheeks as his eyes bored into hers. He was looking down at her while she had to look up. He had a good foot in height and about fifty pounds of muscled weight on her.

  “Hey. Erica and I fought. Did we ever. And we made up too. I loved her. With all my heart and all my soul. I loved her.” Ryan looked away and said to an officer who came out of his house carrying a laptop computer, “Knock yourself out looking through my laptop. There’s porn on it.” He laughed sarcastically as others brought out boxes and green garbage bags full of his possessions. “What a waste of resources.”

  Tara Khorsandi came out of the house with a camera on a strap around her neck. She raised her dark, sculptured eyebrows at Early and walked to the driveway, away from Keller. Early followed her there.

  Tara held up the camera so she and Early could both see the display on the back. “We sprayed luminal across the living room floor and walls and on the coffee table, focusing on the corner of the table above where it looked like the carpet had been scrubbed.” She clicked through photos she’d taken of the area she’d described. An irregular patch on the ground beneath one of the coffee table’s sharp corners iridescently glowed.

  Early’s pulse quickened.

  “It’s not blood,” Tara said. “It’s urine. Erica Keller had a dog, didn’t she?”

  “Yes, she did.” Early sounded dejected. “No blood anywhere else?”

  “We’re still looking. Can’t do a thorough job until all the other personnel leave. I did do a quick examination of the edges of Erica’s desk and the bedroom nightstands, possible places where she might have sustained that antemortem head injury. No blood.”

  Early’s tired eyes drooped farther with disappointment. “It was worth a shot. Thanks, Tara.” She was beginning to wonder whether Ryan Keller was right about this search being a wild-goose chase. She took out her phone and called Nan’s cell phone. She was surprised when the call went straight to voice mail. Nan had asked Early to call her day or night when she had results from the search of Keller’s home. Early was about to call Nan’s home phone when her phone rang. George Beltran was calling.

  Early answered, “Yes, Lieutenant?”

  “Do you know where Nan is?”

  “No, sir. My guess is she’s home with her daughter.”

  “She’s not. Her house is locked up and dark. She’s not answering her phones. We found her car parked a few blocks from the Ashton McCarthy murder scene.”

  “That’s strange.”

  “Here’s another thing that’s strange. Her backup gun, that little Walther she wears on her ankle, appears to be the McCarthy murder gun.”

  Early was so surprised that she couldn’t speak for a moment. “Nan reported that gun stolen from her car.”

  “Yes, she did. She also had a big argument with Ashton at Coopersmith School and threatened him if he didn’t stay away from her daughter.”

  Early took a few seconds to process the implications of
what he’d said. “LT, you can’t possibly think that Nan had anything to do with Ashton’s murder.”

  “Apart from what I might think, here’s what I know. At the station, I’ve got Ashton’s grieving mother and his defense-attorney stepfather demanding answers. I can’t help them until I find Nan. Whether I believe Nan is capable of murdering Ashton or not, her gun was the murder weapon. She needs to come in and talk to us, and she knows that, but she’s chosen to disappear. I also don’t have Nan’s daughter, who was one of the last people to see Ashton alive.”

  “Emily’s missing?”

  “Both Nan and Emily are in the wind.”

  Chapter 45

  Wes and Kaitlyn ran out the front door of their McMansion in the wealthy L.A. suburb of Calabasas as soon as Nan pulled into the driveway, where the gate was already rolling open for her.

  Kaitlyn flung herself onto Emily, hugging and stroking the girl and asking if she was okay.

  “I’m okay. I’m just exhausted.” The adrenaline rush that had followed Ashton’s murder had subsided and now Emily was drained.

  Kaitlyn peered into Em’s face as if to discern the truth. “Let’s get you inside.” She guided Emily up the cobblestone path to elaborately carved double front doors that Kaitlyn had imported from a castle in Brittany. Kaitlyn had her hand around Em’s waist as if the taller, more robust teenager needed the assistance of her skinny stepmother.

  Nan asked Wes, “Are you taking Em away by yourself?” Nan had called him from the road and briefly updated him about Ashton’s murder and why Emily was in danger. Nan had had second thoughts about the girl spending even one night at her dad’s house and told Wes that she immediately wanted Em safely away from anyplace where someone might come looking for her.

  Kaitlyn turned from the door, her arm still around Emily. “We’re leaving as a family tomorrow morning. The boys are sleeping. I called the Santa Barbara Four Seasons and they’re getting a bungalow ready for us so we can all stay together.”

  “This isn’t a family vacation,” Nan said with annoyance. “One of you needs to take Em out of here tonight even if you have to sleep in a Motel 6 in Oxnard. The guy who murdered Ashton might come for Em, and when he sees that she and I aren’t at our house, he’ll come here next. Duh.”

  “Mom, please.” Emily leaned against Kaitlyn. “I’m so tired. Can’t I just sleep here?”

  Kaitlyn had an I-told-you-so look on her face that frosted Nan.

  “Nan, we’ll leave tomorrow morning,” Wes said. “This property is completely secure. That iron fence circles the whole thing. The house and garage are alarmed, and the neighborhood is patrolled 24/7 by private security in marked cars. Em will be fine. Take a deep breath, okay?”

  Nan gave up. She wasn’t going to get anywhere with them. “Okay. Just make sure you stay inside, Em.”

  “I will, Mom.” Emily went into the house when Kaitlyn opened the door.

  After they were gone, Nan said to Wes, “I need to put Em’s car in your garage and I have to talk to you privately.”

  “All right.”

  Nan drove the BMW down the long cobblestone driveway to a multicar garage at the rear. Wes entered the garage via a walk-through door. Soon, one of the four double garage doors rolled opened. Cars were parked alongside one another with an area to one side reserved for Wes’s motorcycles.

  Nan pulled into an empty spot beside a brand new silver BMW SUV. She got out of Emily’s car, popped open the trunk, and took out her go bag and her jacket. She closed the trunk, locked the car with the electronic key fob, and handed the key to Wes.

  He hesitated before taking it. He slipped his hand beneath the bottom of his cashmere navy blue crewneck sweater to put the key into his jeans pocket. The sweater settled just right against his body, hinting at his well-developed chest and arms. Nan hated that he’d only become hotter in the years since he’d married Kaitlyn.

  “I’m going to need to borrow one of your cars.”

  “What’s going on, Nan?”

  She filled him in on more details about Ashton’s murder and the aftermath. “I’m going off the grid until I can figure some things out. There aren’t many people I can trust. I need to know I can trust you and Kaitlyn.”

  “Of course you can. You know you can.”

  She couldn’t stop herself from turning up a corner of her mouth. She hadn’t been able to trust him not to cheat on her when they were married. Now he was married to Kaitlyn, whom he’d had the affair with, and Kaitlyn had revealed that he’d also cheated on her.

  He knew what she was thinking. “Anything that involves your or Em’s safety, you know you can trust me. I’d die trying to protect Emily. Kaitlyn would too.”

  Nan wasn’t too confident about Kaitlyn’s potential heroics, but she let it go. “I appreciate that. I’m pretty sure that Ashton was murdered because he had information that could identify the killer of those two people in the Arroyo. This man might think that Emily has the same information.”

  “Was it something they saw when they were at the park that night?”

  “Yes. Emily doesn’t know as much as this guy probably thinks she does. I’ve told her not to talk about it. The more people who know, the worse off everyone is.”

  “Got it.”

  “Don’t let Emily out of your sight. She shouldn’t leave the property. Here’s her cell phone. Leave it turned off until I tell you it’s okay. Don’t let Em get on social media sites or text or talk to her friends.”

  “I won’t leave her alone.”

  “Can you lend me some cash?”

  He looked surprised. “Sure.”

  “I don’t want to use my ATM or credit cards.”

  “We keep some cash in the house for emergencies. About a thousand bucks.”

  “Great. Thanks.”

  “No problem.” He raised his hands toward the five cars in the garage. “Which car do you want?”

  “I don’t care. Whichever one has the most gas and will attract the least attention.”

  “How about the Acura?” He pointed to a deep red sedan.

  “Perfect.”

  “Let’s go inside. I’ll get the cash. Do you want to take some food and things?”

  “That would be great. And if Jim Kissick calls, tell him I’ll be in touch as soon as I can.”

  Chapter 46

  In the family room of the rambling house, Emily looked comfy on an easy chair with a plaid throw blanket tucked around her. A mug of herbal tea and a plate of cheese, crackers, and fruit were on a tray table nearby. The food looked untouched. Em clutched the blanket to her neck with both hands and stared into a fireplace across the room, where flames had begun licking at kindling beneath a few logs. It wasn’t chilly inside the house but the fire was comforting. Woofster, the family’s yellow Labrador, was curled beside Emily’s chair. Emily and Woofster adored each other.

  Emily’s two half brothers, seven-year-old Kyle and five-year-old Kelsey, were in their bedrooms upstairs, presumably sleeping. Kyle had come down earlier, drawn by the activity. He’d said that Woofster could sleep that night with Emily because that would make her feel better.

  A large, open kitchen was two steps above the family room. In it, Kaitlyn was preparing a picnic feast for Nan with hand-cut meats and cheeses and crusty rolls from a local deli, all of which she happened to have on hand. Before the food preparation had started, Kaitlyn had taken Nan into her vast closet and they’d looked for something Nan could wear to disguise herself. Nan thought a hoodie of Kaitlyn’s was sufficient, even though it was hot-pink. A sweatshirt was about the only item of shorter and thinner Kaitlyn’s clothing that Nan could fit into, although they did find a black quilted coat for Nan to take that was big on Kaitlyn. Kaitlyn also left her with an assortment of Jackie O–style oversize sunglasses and sun hats to look through.

  Kaitlyn insisted that Nan put on a long blond wig that Kaitlyn sometimes wore when she didn’t have time to do her hair. Nan thought she looked ridiculous, but Kaitlyn sai
d she looked hot as a blonde.

  Wes had taken the Acura to fill it with gas. He’d also gone to his bank’s ATM and withdrawn all the cash the ATM would allow. After they’d pooled all their cash, Nan had $1,585. It was enough to keep her going for a few days. If she couldn’t do what she needed to do before then, it wasn’t doable.

  Kaitlyn and Wes had leaped into Nan’s clandestine getaway with enthusiasm. Nan was grateful but wanted to make sure they knew that they could be criminally charged for helping her if the authorities wanted to play hardball. Kaitlyn and Wes shrugged off the potential threat. Wearing the pink hoodie with the hood down, the wig, the sunglasses, and a hat, Nan went into the family room and struck a pose in front of Emily, putting one hand behind her head, the other on her waist, and jutting out her hip. The girl turned her eyes from the flickering flames and gave her mom a weak smile. “I like the blond wig on you.”

  “Me, a blonde. Who knew?” Nan took off the hat and sunglasses, set them on a coffee table, and pulled a chair close to her daughter. Emily’s eyes were so world-weary, it cut Nan to the core. She reached out her hands and Em wormed hers from beneath the blanket to grasp them. They tightly held on to each other.

  “Mom, I know you wanted us off the grid so that no one would follow us here, but why are you hiding? Where are you going?”

  “The Pasadena Police want to talk to me about Ashton’s murder.” Nan didn’t want to tell her that her stolen Walther had been used to murder Ashton. The less Em knew about his murder, the better. “I can’t take the time to talk to them right now.”

  “Do they think you had something to do with it?”

  “They have reason to believe that I might.”

  Emily gaped at her. “That’s crazy.”

  “I agree. I have an idea about who killed Mrs. Keller, Jared, and Ashton, and someone is trying to keep me from getting the information to prove it. I can’t get the information I need if I’m in an interview room for hours or even worse.”