False Front (Lucinda Pierce)

by Diane Fanning

  ‘What secret, Ms Cartwright?’

  Olivia opened her mouth, shut it and looked down at the table while she fiddled aimlessly with her fingers.

  Lucinda bent her head down towards the table and looked up at the silent woman. ‘Ms Cartwright.’

  Olivia turned her face away but not quite quick enough – Lucinda saw the tears welling in her eyes.

  Placing her hand on Olivia’s hands, Lucinda said, ‘Tell me. You’ve been keeping this secret a long time. It will do you good to let it go.’

  Olivia shook her head and raised it to look at Lucinda. ‘I’m sure, for a moment, I will feel better; but, in the long run, it will entangle my life in the sordid actions of Tess Middleton. I could go to jail.’

  Lucinda sat up straight and studied the woman in front of her. ‘Tell me, Ms Cartwright: whatever happened, did you take an active role in it?’

  Olivia furrowed her brow and moved her mouth from one side to another. ‘I did show up. But I had no idea of what would happen when I did.’

  ‘Then you shouldn’t have to worry about being charged.’

  ‘I think you’re wrong. All I did was observe but I should have reported what happened to the police and I didn’t. I think they call that accessory after the fact. A person can be charged with that, can’t they?’

  ‘Yes, but how old were you when this event happened?’ Lucinda asked.

  ‘I was sixteen. Old enough to know better.’

  ‘I don’t know about that, Ms Cartwright. I promise you that I will run interference for you. I can make a strong case to the district attorney that you were living in a state of fear and have continued to do so for decades. And if worse comes to worst, I would testify at your trial – but I don’t think it will come to that.’

  ‘Lieutenant, I apologize in advance because I don’t mean to offend you. But I have to say this.’

  Lucinda nodded. ‘Understood.’

  ‘You see stories all the time about how cops can lie to you, can promise you things and then are never held accountable. How can I trust what you are saying?’

  Lucinda reached out for her water bottle and took a sip. She was pleased to see Olivia lift her water bottle to her lips, mirroring her actions. That told her the rapport was built – Olivia was on the edge of talking. All she needed was a little reassurance. ‘I won’t lie to you, Ms Cartwright – that does happen. In fact, it is something I have done from time to time. But I’m not doing it now. All I can do to convince you is offer to put it in writing, sign it, date it and give it to you. And if that’s what you need to feel safe, I will do it.’

  Olivia studied the surface of the table for a long minute. When she lifted her head and looked at Lucinda, she said, ‘That won’t be necessary, Lieutenant.’

  ‘You’ll tell me Tess’s secret?’

  ‘It’s my secret, too,’ she said.

  Lucinda nodded. ‘I understand.’

  Olivia inhaled deeply. ‘Tess was dating the high school quarterback – actually, they were going steady. They’d had a big fight because he told Tess he needed to study but someone reported back to her that he’d been out that night and there was another girl in his car.

  ‘Tess confronted her boyfriend and he admitted that he’d gone out with Lindsey Barnaby and said that he screwed her in his back seat. When Tess ordered him to come with her to confront Lindsey, the quarterback refused. That’s when she called me and Candace.’ Olivia paused and took a gulp out of her water bottle.

  ‘What did you do then?’

  ‘Candace and I met Tess at her house. Tess said that Lindsey needed to be told in no uncertain terms to leave her boyfriend alone. She wanted us to be with her so that Lindsey would realize she was serious. Then, Tess instructed Candace on what to say and had her call Lindsey.’

  ‘What did Candace tell her?’ Lucinda asked.

  ‘She said, “Lindsey, I really, really need to talk to you. It’s really important. And I need you to keep it secret. I know I can trust you. Please, please, meet me on the Field Hockey playing field at the school.” Lindsey agreed and we three piled into Tess’s car and went to the field to wait for her to arrive.

  ‘Lindsey was surprised when three of us piled out of the car. She said, “Candace, what’s going on? I thought you wanted to talk to me alone.” And Tess said, “No, bitch, I’m the one who wants to talk to you.” Lindsey asked why and Tess shoved her, knocking her to the ground. Tess stood over Lindsey and yelled at her, telling her to leave her boyfriend alone. That’s when Lindsey made her mistake,’ Olivia said, and now her tears flowed freely. For a moment, her whole body racked with sobs.

  Lucinda waited for the emotions to run their course and then quietly asked, ‘What did Lindsey do?’

  ‘She jumped to her feet, walked up into Tess’s face and shouted, “If you can’t keep your boyfriend, it’s not my fault. Maybe, like he said, you’re always on the rag and smell like it, too.” Tess backed away from Lindsey. I thought she was intimidated by Lindsey’s response. I thought she was just trying to get away from her. I didn’t realize what was going to happen. But, suddenly, the trunk of Tess’s car was open and when she spun around, she had a baseball bat in her hand. She raised it up and swung it at Lindsey’s head.’ Olivia’s body lurched and a hand flew up to cover her mouth.

  Lucinda was certain she was about to vomit. She grabbed the trash can in the corner and brought it to Olivia’s side of the table. ‘Here, if you have to, you can let it go in here.’

  Olivia made tight shakes of her head, swallowed hard and said, ‘I’ll be OK. Just give me a minute.’ She swallowed a few more times, wiped her lips with a tissue and took several quick sips of her water.

  She inhaled deeply and continued. ‘I can still hear the sound of the bat hitting Lindsey’s head. It was a sickening thud that made my stomach flip and form a hard knot. I hear that sound in my dreams still. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it.’

  ‘What happened then, Olivia?’

  ‘Candace ran forward and placed herself between Tess and Lindsey even though Tess had raised the bat up again and seemed ready to swing it one more time. Candace yelled at Tess and Tess dropped the bat on the ground. Candace knelt down by Lindsey and grabbed her wrist, dropped it and put a few fingers on Lindsey’s throat. She turned towards us and shook her head. That’s when I doubled over and threw up.

  ‘I was down on all fours heaving when Candace said, “We have to call the police.” Tess grabbed the bat again. I stumbled to my feet and threw my body at her. Tess stepped back out of my way and I fell to the ground at her feet. Tess said, “You two just better keep your mouths shut. My dad has lots and lots of money and lots of influence. He can get me the best lawyer in the country. And I’ll tell him that the two of you tricked me. That you brought me out here under false pretenses. That you killed Lindsey. I will be believed, my dad will see to that, and you will go to jail.” Candace said, “You can’t be serious.”

  ‘That’s when Tess laughed and laughed. When she stopped, she said, “Don’t worry. You won’t go to jail. I’ll eliminate you just like her unless you swear to never say a word.” Candace and I looked at each other, then over at Tess. She made us come over to Lindsey’s body and place our left hands on it, raise our right hands in the air and swear that we would never say a word.’

  ‘Then what did you do? Did you help her dispose of the body?’

  Olivia’s hand flew to her mouth and she shook her head back and forth. ‘Oh, no. Omigod, no! Charles Rowland did that.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Lucinda asked.

  ‘When we started to walk away – neither one of us was more than a mile from home – she grabbed me by the hair – I wore it quite long then – and she jerked me back. She said, “Tell Chuck to get his ass over here now. Don’t tell him why. Just tell him I said so.” I called him when I got home.’

  ‘Do you know if he went?’

  ‘I didn’t know for a couple of weeks. Candace and I kept reassuring each other that Li
ndsey was alive – just badly hurt – and recuperating at a hospital. But we had our doubts and we needed to know for sure. So when Chuck got stink-face drunk at a party, Candace and I cornered him outside where he’d gone to take a leak.’ Olivia laughed weakly. ‘Best way to disarm a guy: catch him drunk with his fly down. Anyway, he admitted that he went with Tess that night and helped bury Lindsey’s body.’

  Lucinda knew the next question she would ask could possibly confirm Olivia’s credibility or destroy it. ‘Did he tell you where?’

  ‘Sort of. He said that they drove most of the night – down to Virginia and into the mountains. He said he remembered seeing a sign for the Thomas Jefferson National Forest but wasn’t sure if he was actually in the national park or not. But that’s where they left Lindsey and then they drove back home. He said that Tess was grounded for staying out all night but his parents had more of a boys-will-be-boys attitude.’

  ‘Thank you, Olivia. Here is a statement form,’ she said, passing a piece of paper across the table. ‘Would you please write down everything you told me and sign it on the line at the bottom?’

  Olivia nodded.

  ‘You can use the back if you need more space. I’ll return as soon as I can.’ Lucinda’s heart pounded a tattoo in her chest. She raced down the hall in search of Jake.

  She spotted him pouring a cup of burnt-smelling coffee in the break room. ‘Tess Middleton is at the bottom of this,’ she said, and related all she’d learned from Olivia.

  ‘I need to confront Trappatino with this information,’ Jake said, ‘but I’m not sure if he’s had enough time to marinate on my last words to him.’

  ‘So why don’t we go talk to Selma and see if she can confirm anything I learned from Olivia, first?’

  When they did, they learned that Selma really had no details. She just knew that Olivia believed she was being threatened because she knew someone’s secret. She knew that was why Olivia changed her name and kept moving across the country and back. ‘I kind of hoped that now that she’d moved back to Trenton and was living in our family home, all this would be over. For a long time, I thought it was all senseless paranoia – a symptom of my sister’s mental illness. I’m ashamed that I was so dismissive of her fear.’

  Back in the hallway, Jake said, ‘Are you ready to throw Tess Middleton into Trappatino’s face?’

  ‘Let me make a call and have someone pick her up and bring her in.’

  ‘Can’t that wait?’

  ‘She’s a powerful and wealthy woman, Jake. I’d hate to learn she heard we had Trappatino in custody and decided to make herself scarce.’

  FIFTY-FOUR

  Jake and Lucinda entered the room where Trappatino sat with a sneer embedded in his face. ‘Hey, Trap,’ Jake said. ‘I’d like to toss a few names in your direction.’

  Trappatino shrugged. ‘What’s with the scarred woman?’

  ‘Where are my manners?’ Jake laughed. ‘I’d like to introduce you to your new worst enemy, Lieutenant Lucinda Pierce.’

  ‘She a local cop?’ he said with a chuckle of derision.

  ‘I’m right here, Trap,’ Lucinda said. ‘You can direct any questions about me to me.’

  ‘She thinks she’s the shits, doesn’t she?’

  ‘And she is,’ Jake said.

  ‘OK, Lady Lieutenant, why don’t you stand up and walk back to the door so I can check out your legs again? It seemed like they were long, lean and shapely.’

  Lucinda’s arm flashed across the table and her hand gripped Trappatino’s collar and pulled him up out of his seat. ‘Excuse me?’ she said and then shoved him back into the chair.

  ‘She’s got a bit of a temper, hasn’t she?’ Trap said, rubbing a hand on his throat.

  ‘As I was saying,’ Jake began, ‘we’ve already established your awareness of Olivia Cartwright, formerly known as Bonnie Upchurch – we caught you in a criminal act in her home. How about Charles Rowland? Know him?’

  Trappatino stared straight ahead.

  ‘Candace Eagleton?’

  Still no response.

  ‘How about Lindsey Barnaby?’

  For a second, a furrow flashed across his brow and was gone. Jake looked at Lucinda, who gave him a slight nod. They both realized there was something different about the murdered girl’s name and wondered if he had ever heard it before.

  ‘Surely, you must know Tess Middleton.’

  Trappatino gave them a cold, disinterested look.

  ‘Well, you see, Trap,’ Lucinda said, ‘we think that she’s the woman who hired you to kill Olivia, Charles and Candace. And she’s probably going to be pretty pissed off when she learns you blew it this time.’

  Jake said, ‘In fact, once we pick her up, she’ll probably give you up in a heartbeat.’

  ‘She’s a powerful woman, Trap,’ Lucinda said. ‘She has a major corporation and a political career to protect. She’s going to try to pin everything on you. And she’ll probably get away with it.’

  ‘So here’s your chance, Trap,’ Jake said. ‘Throw her under the bus before she runs you down like roadkill.’

  Trappatino looked at Jake, running his eyes over the agent’s face as if trying to memorize his features. He turned his gaze to Lucinda and repeated the study on her face.

  ‘So what is it? Jake asked. ‘Are you going to take the fall for a rich woman who can buy and sell you a hundred times over?’

  ‘Or are you going to save your own ass?’ Lucinda asked. ‘We have two homicides in Virginia. Throw in how you terrorized your victims before they died and you’ll be looking at lethal injection.’

  Trappatino stared at her with a look of disdain.

  ‘We don’t kill as many as they do in Texas or Florida, but we really want to play a more prominent role in death penalty statistics. It’s a matter of pride for the Commonwealth of Virginia.’

  ‘I want to call my lawyer,’ Trappatino said.

  ‘Really? You disappoint me, Trap,’ Jake responded. ‘I thought you were smarter than that.’

  ‘I bet you say that to all the girls,’ Trappatino retorted. ‘I’m not stupid. I want my lawyer.’

  Jake and Lucinda looked at each other and rose to their feet. Both acting as if it didn’t matter, they walked to the door. ‘Someone will be in with a telephone shortly,’ Jake said as he opened the door and they walked out of the room.

  ‘Dammit,’ Lucinda said once they were out of Trappatino’s hearing. ‘We blew it.’

  ‘Not necessarily. His lawyer might steer him in the right direction. Terrorism charges are federal charges and a smart attorney will latch onto the significance of that very quickly. I’ll have the agent who goes in with the phone remind him that he needs to inform his lawyer of those charges and see what happens.’

  ‘I don’t know, Jake. Trappatino has been in tight corners before and he’s always walked. He has no experience with failure in the courtroom and because of that has no fear of the process. He probably believes he can sail on this one, too.’

  ‘We’ll have to make sure his lawyer sees how airtight the terrorism charge is. We’ll have to make sure he understands his client could easily spend the rest of his life in jail.’

  ‘But we foiled his attempt, Jake. Juries want to punish the successful killers far more than the screw-ups. And what do we have to tie him to the murders in Virginia?’

  ‘We have DNA evidence for Candace and we’ll find what we need for Roland. We may not get a death penalty but his lawyer will have to see that when we’re done with his client, he will never see the outside of a prison again.’

  ‘I hope you’re right.’

  Jake’s cell rang and he looked at the screen. When he saw it was from an agent in his field office, he pulled Lucinda into an empty interrogation room, shut the door and put the call on speaker phone.

  ‘Middleton is not at home, Jake. In fact, we’ve been told she’s left the country.’

  FIFTY-FIVE

  ‘Where?’ Jake asked.

  ‘The
guy didn’t know.’

  ‘What guy?’

  ‘The guy that was at the house when we arrived.’

  ‘Start at the beginning.’

  ‘We got to the house and were greeted by a man and his dog. He invited us inside. At the dining-room table, there was another man with a pile of papers; apparently he was a real-estate agent.’

  ‘And who’s the guy with the dog?’

  ‘He claims to be Middleton’s fiancé. He said that she left him here to make arrangements for the sale of the house. She’s taking a month-long sabbatical from her work at the corporation to raise the media’s interest and plan her election campaign. He said that he’d be joining her in the next couple of days.’

  ‘Where will he join her?’

  ‘He doesn’t know. He said it was a surprise. He said that when she arrived at her destination, she would have a courier deliver his flight tickets to him. He thought that was very romantic.’

  ‘He’s got no clue that he’s probably just been dumped?’ Jake asked.

  ‘Not one little clue.’

  ‘You believe him?’

  ‘Yeah, he’s as bright as a busted light bulb.’

  ‘Keep him under surveillance just in case and flood the airport with agents. Check out any other mode of transportation out of the city, too. Is her car gone?’

  ‘Nope. Her brilliant, self-proclaimed fiancé said that he put her in a cab to the airport earlier today.’

  ‘OK, get busy. I’ll get back there as soon as I can,’ Jake said and disconnected the call.

  ‘We need to get back there right away,’ Lucinda said.

  ‘Just as soon as I can locate the pilot – I’ll get on that now.’ Jake left Lucinda alone with her thoughts.

  Has she already flown out of their grasp? Lucinda wondered. If so, where did she go? She suspected a fleeing Middleton would know enough to pick a destination that did not have an extradition treaty with the United States. And with her money, she could be comfortable in the most backward third world country. Would she elude justice? Would her absence make it impossible to get homicide convictions for the murders of Candace and Charles? And what about Lindsey Barnaby? Would those three cases remain open forever?