Justified

by Carolyn Arnold

  That name had been in front of them since they’d found the list of business owners. Anita Smith was the owner of the second business on Claire’s hit list.

  -

  Chapter 23

  MADISON AND TERRY HAD RETURNED to the station after finding out Darcy’s former identity. He’d decided to call it a day and had walked off, mumbling something about murder not being solved in a day. If only it could be, maybe she’d have time to sleep.

  Even though there were loose ends, she’d conceded to breaking for the day, too. Stepping inside her apartment didn’t exactly bring the feeling of satisfaction that came with a job well done, but rather one of unfinished business. They still hadn’t heard back from Darren Taylor, Claire’s supposed husband twenty years ago, and Simon Angle hadn’t been found yet.

  Hershey ran to the door and barked as he jumped around her feet. Her heart sank. She must have forgotten to put him in his kennel when she left that morning. She walked around her place, letting her nose lead her, and thankfully, he’d only left a couple messes.

  Madison took Hershey outside and when she returned she noticed that the message light on her machine was flashing. Her heart sped up, anticipating that it might be Blake. Maybe he had forgotten about her blurting out I love you and wanted to meet. At least she hoped so.

  She pressed the “play” button.

  “I knew you wouldn’t call me back.” It was Chelsea, and she didn’t sound happy. “Call me,” she added before an abrupt click and disconnect.

  Madison’s heart cinched from disappointment. Somehow her caller being her sister and not Blake stamped home a sense of rejection, as if by Chelsea calling and Blake not that things were over between them. Even that passing thought brought mixed emotions. What would be over exactly? They were just dating. It was casual and something people do all the time. Then when someone decided to move on, there shouldn’t be any explanation necessary. And that’s all it was between her and Blake…at least she tried to convince herself their relationship was nothing more.

  In truth, though, they had been dating for the better part of four months, and she hoped that their time together had meant something to him, that his proposal to be exclusive was at least in part motivated by his own feelings for her and not just to appease her. But he was being so cold given what had slipped from her lips. Maybe it hadn’t been an accident, though. Maybe life was as some people believed. Maybe things happen for a reason. Her blurting out “I love you” just might be what saved her from getting further involved with a man incapable of reciprocating that feeling.

  The phone rang and her heart thumped in her chest. Maybe this was Blake?

  Hershey bounded around her feet. She picked up the toy closest to her, which happened to be the twisted rope that Blake and Hershey had played with, and answered the phone. Her breath stalled as she waited for a response from her caller.

  “Finally.” It was Chelsea. “Do you have a moment to talk?”

  “You’re like my stalker these days, Chels.” Madison laughed, but it was shallow and her insides ached. What felt like needle points laced with acid pricked at her heart. She could bury what she had said and move forward… Why couldn’t Blake?

  “It would be nice if you returned my calls.”

  “What is it?” She didn’t want her annoyance to come across, but a hint of it touched her voice.

  The line fell quiet between them for a few seconds and then Chelsea said, “Mom and Dad are coming to town, and—”

  “What?” The last thing she needed was to face her parents, especially her mother.

  “I wanted to give you more notice, but I didn’t get much. They felt bad they couldn’t make it in to spend Christmas with the girls. Anyway, they’re coming this weekend, and they’ll be staying with us.”

  “Nice.” She sounded so cold and distant to her own ears, but she couldn’t help it. Her parents lived in Florida and only took the trip up to Stiles once, maybe twice a year. It was never to come and stay with her, but always the grandkids. It wasn’t that she was estranged from her parents, but she might as well have been. They rarely communicated. Birthdays used to warrant a phone call, but in the last few years, it had been downgraded to a mailed greeting card with a fifty-dollar gift card.

  “Nice?” Chelsea sniggered. “I know you better than that, Maddy. Nice for you means it’s fine as long as it doesn’t involve you.”

  Her sister did know her too well, because that’s exactly what she was thinking.

  “Anyway, I wanted you to know.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re coming, aren’t you?”

  Did I miss something?

  “Coming?”

  “Yeah, to a family dinner on Sunday.”

  Family didn’t exactly encompass the relationship she had with her mother, at least beyond the biological. “I don’t know.”

  “Seriously? These are your parents. You only get two. How long has it been since you spoke with them?”

  “I couriered them Christmas gifts, sent a card—”

  “Spoke with them,” Chelsea ground out.

  I can’t remember.

  “I can tell by your silence that it’s been too long. You’ve got to come, Maddy. No choice. Our house at three.”

  “Three?”

  “Yes. Three.”

  “Thought it was dinner.”

  “Would be nice to have a bit of a visit in there beforehand, too, don’t you think?”

  Do you want my honest answer?

  “It’s really not going to be that bad,” Chelsea continued.

  “Fine, I’ll be there.”

  “Oh, and you can bring that boyfriend of yours. I’d love to meet him.”

  “’Night, Chels.”

  “’Night.”

  Madison detected the smile in her sister’s voice. Either it was there because of her childish curiosity about Blake or because she felt she had arranged a good deed by getting Madison to agree to a family dinner. The latter wasn’t because she had been left with much choice. Otherwise, she typically avoided coming face-to-face with her mother.

  Their relationship was complicated and the rift between them had grown into a chasm over the years. Nothing Madison did was right for the woman, but their differences got worse when her grandmother, her mom’s mom, had died and left all her money to Madison. Even though her mother had tried to dismiss the importance of it, Madison knew that it had cut her deeply.

  Madison had offered the money to her mother several times, but she’d refused to accept it and the conversations would end with her mother’s protest that nothing had changed between them. But it had.

  The fact that Madison had chosen a life opposite marriage and babies became a bigger deal, and Madison’s career in law enforcement became a bitter source of contention. In regards to the latter, Madison could somewhat understand her mother’s side.

  Madison’s grandfather, Thomas Wright, had started off as a patrol officer and worked his way up to lieutenant. To mark their thirtieth wedding anniversary and his approaching retirement, he treated his wife to a meal out. But a young man named Jimmy Bates came into the restaurant, armed and holding his gun on her grandfather. Before he pulled the trigger, he had said, “You took my father away from me.”

  Thomas Wright was shot right there and bled to death on the tiled floor of The Laguna with his wife leaning over him, praying for him to pull through. But it wasn’t meant to be.

  Bates was the son of a man her grandfather had arrested and who had been convicted of fraud and put away for a life sentence. He had been motivated by the loss of not only a father but also of a lifestyle that he would have become accustomed to.

  But the incident had left Madison’s mother without a dad at the age of twelve.

  Right when a girl needs a father the most.

  Since becoming a sworn
officer, Madison had become the recipient of warnings that came as fired missiles in a war zone—repeatedly and without letup. Not that Madison’s mother had ever put it in so many words, but her mother didn’t want to bury her daughter. Madison turned away from her mother’s fear, though, and drew strength from her grandmother, who understood her need to be a cop.

  Her grandmother, Rose, had pushed Madison when she felt she couldn’t go any further. She helped her to find the strength within to push through the physical pain of training.

  “We’re made for birthin’ babies. Always remember that we’ve got it over men in three ways: endurance, mental focus, and we’ve got the looks. We’re a triple threat.”

  The memory caused Madison to smile. Sadly, she’d lost her grandmother two years ago to a cancerous brain tumor. At least she’d been able to celebrate her advancement to detective with her grandmother, and often when Madison needed encouragement to keep going, she’d think of Rose. She’d been so proud of her granddaughter’s accomplishments. If only her own mother could be.

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  Chapter 24

  “HEY, ABOUT TIME YOU GOT IN,” Madison teased Terry as he took a seat at his desk across from her.

  “Since when do you beat me in?”

  “You mean besides the last time?” She smiled at him, referring to the day when she’d downed three cappuccinos in the hope of waking up. Today, she was in a wonderful mood. She had gotten some sleep. Last night, she’d put Hershey in his kennel, a dark blanket draped over it to encourage him to settle down in the same manner someone would do with a bird. The imagery had made her laugh at the time, but whatever worked. And when her head had hit the pillow last night, all her thoughts about family disappeared along with any worry about her relationship with Blake.

  Her cell rang and she answered, “Knight.” She listened to her caller, and after he identified himself, she was pointing at her phone for Terry’s benefit. “We’ll be here,” she said into her phone and hung up shortly after.

  “What is it?” Terry asked.

  She was grinning. “That was Darren Taylor, and he’s on his way in. Apparently, he was in Tahiti.”

  “Tahiti? That’s where Darcy had been.”

  “Uh-huh. He said when he got my message, he boarded a flight home, and he should be here any minute. But that’s not even the best part.” She paused to build anticipation, and it had Terry rolling his hand. “Darren was at Claire’s the night she was murdered.”

  “Really?”

  “That what he said,” Madison began. “And if he knew about the will and what he stood to gain, he’d have good motive.”

  The phone on her desk rang, and it was Ranson from the front desk. Madison leaned to her right to get a line of sight to the front counter. A man was standing there, a carry-on bag strapped over one shoulder and a wheeled suitcase on the floor next to him. He must have come straight from the airport. “We’ll be right there.” Madison hung up and said to Terry, “He’s here.”

  Terry turned around. “That’s him?”

  “He’s the only one at the front counter.”

  “Oh, this is going to be fun.”

  “Why do I sense sarcasm?”

  “Um, I wonder.”

  “So what? The man is strikingly handsome.”

  “Don’t let it hinder you from doing your job.”

  Madison narrowed her eyes at her partner. “You’re one to talk. You were lenient with Darcy Simms, and it’s not because of her winning personality.” She smiled at him with a look of pure adolescence. But the truth was, it didn’t matter how good-looking Darren was, because he could be a killer.

  She led the way to the front and extended her hand. “Mr. Taylor?” When their eyes met, she felt a catch in her breath. His eyes were the color of steel and carried a mischievousness allure.

  “That’s me.”

  Darren’s jaw was sharp and angular. His hair reached the top of his shoulders and he had it tucked behind his ears, tufts of it poking out. He carried the unshaven look like a model, and while he wasn’t necessarily GQ material, he was undeniably handsome.

  Madison drew her arm back and resisted wiping her sweaty hand on her pants. She pressed on a smile. “Thank you for coming in so quickly.”

  “Hey, no prob. When I found out what happened to Claire, I had to.” His voice brought with it a hint of déjà vu, as if she had heard it before.

  Madison directed him to interrogation room three, where she had him go inside while she excused herself and Terry.

  She turned to her partner. “Let me handle—”

  “You’re kidding, right? You’re like a gushing teenager.”

  Her eyes instinctively narrowed to slits. “Fine, I admit it. He’s good-looking.”

  Terry laughed. “What is it with you women? You go on about how you like your man’s hair trimmed and his facial hair groomed. He probably hasn’t had a cut in months or shaved in days.”

  Madison hitched her shoulders. “Stubble suits some men.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “No, it’s true. And besides, he’s been away, and he just found out about Claire.”

  “You believe that?”

  “Why wouldn’t I?”

  Terry shook his head and paced around her. “He admitted to being there the night of the murder.”

  “You just don’t like him ’cause he’s good-looking.”

  “That is the furthest thing from the truth.”

  “Now you know how it feels,” she snapped back. He’d know that she was referring to Darcy and his accusations that Madison treated her differently because of her looks.

  “Fine. Point taken.” He gestured for her to take the lead into the room, and she’d taken one step when the sergeant came up to them.

  They had almost made it. She had her hand on the doorknob.

  “The husband’s in there?” Sergeant Winston exuded the confidence of a man in charge, but the image fractured at the bald head and rounded paunch. “Heard he’s got every reason to want her dead.” He drew his gaze from Terry to Madison. “Not that I heard it from you. Why is that, Knight?”

  And here she had been impressed that he hadn’t been hounding her as much with this case, but it wasn’t because the sergeant had changed his micro-managerial style. She passed a skeptical look to Terry.

  “That’s right,” Winston said. “At least your partner speaks to me. What’s a quick e-mail take, anyway? A minute? Two?”

  Either way, it was more time than she had for rehashing leads of a case. Heck, she didn’t even have much of a social life. It drove her mad how the sarge always whined about how she needed to communicate better.

  “Guess you can’t complain that you’re not being kept current.” She attempted a smile to soften her words, but they were confrontational in tone.

  His arms crossed and came to rest on his stomach. “As I’ve said before, I would like my lead detective to keep me informed.” The way he’d added emphasis to the word lead came out almost as a threat to her job.

  “Sit in if you wish,” Madison offered.

  “Not for me. I’ll watch from behind the glass.” Winston left and headed toward the observation room where he would be secure behind his two-way mirror.

  “And that’s why I’m the lead detective,” Madison mumbled. “I’m not a chicken shit.”

  “Shh,” Terry cooed.

  “What?” She turned around and saw the cuff of the sergeant’s pant leg disappear into the room next door. “He’s gone.”

  Madison opened the door to the interrogation room. “Mr. Taylor—”

  Darren looked up at her, his eyes wet. They were more hypnotizing than before, and he appeared younger than his forty-three years. He wiped his cheeks with the heels of his palms.

  She choked back an offering of sympathy. Stay strong, he could be the murderer
. “You were married to Claire, but there’s no legal record of that.”

  “Long story. Must we start with that?”

  Madison would give him a momentary pass. “You told me that you were at Claire’s house the night she was murdered. Is that true?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you care to elaborate?”

  “I’ll be keeping my answers brief, Detective, if you’ll afford me that courtesy. I trust that I’ve already presented a show of good faith just by being here without a lawyer.” The bite to his words eliminated any charm his looks conveyed, and this was enough to help her see things objectively again.

  Brief or left unanswered, apparently.

  “Mr. Taylor, let me assure you that if you did this”—she tossed a photo of Claire from her kitchen floor and then one of her on a gurney in the morgue on top of it—“all that I will afford you is a cell in a maximum-security prison where you’ll dream of daylight and the warmth of the sun on your face.” Her words and pictures hadn’t elicited any reaction. In fact, the tears had dried up and his expression was blank. It was either shock or his earlier display of grief had been an act. “What do you think when you see her like this?” Madison nudged him.

  He glared at her, fire licking his eyes.

  “Listen, I’m going to lay it out. You were there the night of the murder, but then you run off to—”

  “I didn’t run anywhere.” He sniffled and pinched his nose.

  Now he’s bringing on the waterworks again.

  Madison settled back against her chair and knotted her arms. “It looks that way from here.”

  He let go of his nose and looked at his hand. “Do you have a tissue?”

  Madison spotted Darren’s red fingertips and gestured for Terry to get some.

  Terry left the room and came back less than a minute later with a box, which he tossed on the table in front of Darren. He pulled out a couple, balled them up, and pressed them against his one nostril.

  “Do you get nosebleeds a lot?” People could get them for various reasons, ranging from dry air to medical issues, but Madison also knew they could be brought on by intense stress.