A Flame in the Wind of Death

by Ann Vanderlaan

  “Matt, I have to go. Kepler’s here.” The lie rolled off her tongue too easily for her own comfort. “I’ll call you later.”

  “Sure. Leigh . . . is everything okay?”

  “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  “You sound funny. Are you upset about something?”

  She squeezed her eyes shut, cursing herself. Of course he would know something was wrong. Too often he could see inside her so clearly, but she’d lose the last of her control if he was gentle with her right now. She needed to end this call before he sensed she was completely falling apart.

  Before he knew what a coward she was.

  “I’m fine. But I have to go. I’ll talk to you later.”

  She set the phone on her desk, her head dropping as she worked to pull herself together.

  Her phone rang again immediately. She didn’t even look up, letting Matt’s call go to voice mail. I’m sorry. I just can’t. Not right now.

  Her phone finally stopped ringing, the silence in the bullpen suddenly oppressive.

  As if by magic, Elanthia’s lyrical voice burst in her mind— Jasper. It’s carried for protection and courage. Leigh slid her hand into her pocket, pulling out the polished gemstone. She turned it over in her hand a few times, the smooth slide of the stone warm against her skin.

  She took a deep breath, centering herself and closed her fingers around the stone. Courage.

  She needed to get out so she could clear away the panic and think. Sitting up straight, she surveyed the bullpen over the top of the dividers. Still alone. In a sudden flurry of activity, she jerkily jammed the photo back into the envelope and then into her bag.

  She didn’t know what the photo meant yet, but she was going to get to the bottom of it. And for now, she’d do it on her own.

  At least until she knew what the hell was going on.

  CHAPTER SEVEN: CONTROLLED BURN

  * * *

  Controlled Burn: a planned fire tended by a qualified crew ignited under specific conditions of fuel and weather. Prescribed fires are set in specific areas to manage vegetation, reduce wildfire hazards, or enhance wildlife habitats.

  Monday, 9:12 p.m.

  Lowell Residence

  Brookline, Massachusetts

  Taking a deep breath, Leigh knocked on the door, and then forced herself to stand still. When her fingers worried the hem of her blazer, she clenched her hand into a fist, cursing her fit of nerves.

  The door opened and Matt stood in the entranceway. His brows rose in surprise at the sight of her.

  “Hi.”

  “Ah, there’s your voice. I thought you’d lost it.” She stared at him, baffled, and he must have read her confusion. “Since I called you this afternoon, the only way you’d talk to me was by text. I was beginning to think you had laryngitis.”

  She drew breath to speak, but there were no words. Her shoulders drooped and she found herself staring at her shoes.

  “Be a gentleman, Matt. Let her in.”

  Leigh’s head snapped up at the sound of Matt’s father. Matt stepped back, pulling the door wide to reveal Mike sitting in his wheelchair a few feet behind his son. Teak, Mike’s Belgian Malinois service dog, stood patiently beside the chair. As always, Mike looked well groomed, from his neatly trimmed gray beard to his stylish clothes. It struck Leigh afresh that Matt’s father always looked strong and capable; she half expected him to climb out of his wheelchair and start striding around the house. But his withered legs would never allow that.

  He smiled up at her, his green eyes warm and welcoming. “Leigh, it’s good to see you. Come in. It’s getting cool out there.” The older man’s gaze darted to his son’s clouded expression and then back to Leigh as she stepped into the hall. “You two must have some case details to discuss. If you need me, I’ll be in the family room with Teak. With the TV on. Loud.” With a pointed look at his son, he deftly swiveled his chair and rolled down the hallway, Teak following close behind.

  When Leigh turned to him, Matt only shrugged. “I didn’t tell him anything. It drives me crazy the way he just knows things.”

  “He’s an intuitive man. Look, Matt—”

  Matt held up a hand. “Why don’t you come in first? You look like you’ve been run over by a truck and need to sit down.”

  “I admit that’s kind of how I feel.” Leigh followed Matt into the adjacent living room. The wide trio of windows looking out onto the street was dark, but a tall brass lamp threw warm light over a comfortable armchair and a well-padded sofa grouped around a cheerfully crackling fire. A hardcover book lay on the table beside the chair, partially covered by an edition of The Journal of Forensic Sciences, spread open, lying face down. Leigh stopped just inside the doorway, shifting her weight awkwardly, her eyes on the homey scene. “I’ve interrupted your evening.”

  “No problem.” He sat down on the sofa, patting the open space at his side. Leigh dropped down beside him, setting her bag down on the floor by her feet. “So . . . what’s going on?” he prompted. When she hesitated, he pushed harder. “I know something’s happened. I could hear it in your voice. And in the silence afterward.”

  Leigh sat back, letting her head fall back against the cushions. “Something came in the mail today that . . . shook me up.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Leigh was silent for a minute before forcing herself to reach for her bag. She withdrew the photo, now sealed in an evidence bag, and held it tightly against her body. “This came just before you called.” She looked up, her face heating as she met his concerned gaze. “I’m sorry I lied to you. Kepler wasn’t there. I just didn’t know what to do. It was a shock and I was struggling to process it, let alone talk to you and—” His hand came down over hers and she stopped the tumbling flow of words. The breath she pulled in felt jagged and ice-cold.

  “Can I see it?” he asked gently, his fingers closing over the bag.

  She nodded, letting the photo slide from her grasp.

  He frowned, his brow furrowed in confusion as he took in the death scene. “I don’t understand. Why would anyone send this to you?”

  “Because that’s my father.” Her voice cracked on the last word. Suddenly he was too close, and the concern in his hazel eyes threatened her tenuous control. She surged to her feet, walking to the dark windows, looking out to the nightscape beyond the glass, lit only by streetlight filtering through the half-denuded fall foliage.

  She never heard him move, but suddenly he was behind her, his arms sliding around her waist to pull her back against him. His head dropped forward, his cheek pressed against her ear and his breath feathering lightly over her throat. She hadn’t realized she was cold, but he felt wonderfully warm wrapped around her. Her hands came up to interlace with his, holding on tight.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “It’s no wonder you were upset.”

  For a few minutes, they simply stood in silence as Leigh calmed herself. Then, blowing out a long breath, she stepped from his arms, instantly missing his warmth as she stood on her own again, but somehow feeling better for the independence. “That’s not the worst of it.”

  “How can it get worse than that?”

  She circled back to the couch, sat down and picked up the photo from where Matt had dropped it on the cushion. For the space of several heartbeats, she simply stared at the image. She hardly needed to study it; it was burned into her memory now. “I was at the scene.” She pushed on, ignoring Matt’s murmur of sympathy. “I was out on patrol that day. Back then, I was still part of Field Troop A. I’m sure they didn’t want me to know, didn’t want me there, but word like that filters through the ranks. I made it to the scene as fast as I could . . . but it was already too late. He was gone.”

  Matt pulled the photo from her fingers and laid it on the table so he could take both of her hands in his. “What happened?”

  “The story I got from Harper that night was that Dad was participating in a joint investigation between the detective unit and the Salem PD’s Cri
minal Investigation Division. Heroin is a big problem in the area. Within the city, that’s Salem PD’s jurisdiction. But there were a couple of associated homicides that brought us into it. Some local dealers had been found dead, so a joint investigation was launched. Dad was out with Detective Oakes that night. Oakes had a CI—a confidential informant—he wanted to question and Dad went along. Oakes wasn’t there when it all went down. According to Oakes, the CI wasn’t at the designated meeting place, so they split up to look for him. Ten or fifteen minutes later, he heard gunshots and went to investigate.” Leigh’s gaze skittered to the photo. “That’s how he found Dad, lying dead in an alley. The CI was dead too, about twenty feet away. They’d killed each other. Dad must have shot first because the CI was hit in the chest, but Dad . . . he . . .”

  “His was a head shot,” Matt finished for her when words finally failed her.

  “Yes.” A strangled whisper. “And just like that, my family was gone.”

  Matt clasped her hands a little tighter, but let her keep some of the distance she maintained. “Why would someone send this to you?”

  “Because of what’s on the back.” She pulled one hand free and picked up the photo. Turning it over, she handed it back to Matt.

  He quickly scanned the message, his expression hardening. “Someone’s trying to sully his reputation. And yours at the same time. Does this have anything to do with the Bradford case? You’ve been a household name since then.”

  “I have to admit the thought occurred to me. Someone out there might resent my recent celebrity status. Our status, really. Every article on me has included something about Dad, about the hero who died in the line of duty. Maybe that pissed somebody off? Someone already holding a grudge?”

  “Possibly,” Matt said cautiously. “Is there any way to trace this?”

  “Maybe. When I first got it, I was so shocked I didn’t handle it properly.” She shook her head and frowned at her own misstep. “As soon as I realized what it was, I should have used gloves to preserve any fingerprints. But I wasn’t thinking clearly.”

  “Leigh, give yourself a break. You were understandably shaken.”

  “Maybe, but that doesn’t change the fact that I may have destroyed my own evidence. As soon as I started to think, I bagged the photo and the envelope. It’s a standard envelope with no defining features, postmarked Boston. We could narrow it down to the individual postal station but in a city the size of Boston, I’m not sure it’s going to tell us anything.”

  “What about DNA?”

  Leigh nodded thoughtfully. “I wondered about that. The envelope is sealed, but I can’t tell if it was licked shut or is one of those self-sealing types. So that leaves me with a choice—do I bring this to the attention of the department and have the lab run it for DNA and prints? Or do I go it alone?”

  “Go it alone? Why on earth would you—” Matt abruptly cut off as his gaze flicked back to the photo. “You’re worried someone in the department is involved.” Color suffused his face. “You think someone in your own department did this?” His voice rose, the words edged with anger.

  “I’d be stupid to ignore the possibility.”

  Matt examined the photo with a critical eye. “It’s a crime scene photo,” he said flatly. “No one else could take a picture like this. If the media got there, they’d have been blocked outside the scene. Look at the angle. This was taken by someone practically standing over your father.”

  “Exactly. But it’s more complicated than that. Anyone in the department could have access to this file without even needing to sign it out. So could members of the DA’s staff. There are electronic copies of the photos, so the computer system could have been hacked. And because it’s a closed case, it’s now officially public record and anyone can request access to the file. It’s primarily up to the DA to grant access. But if he won’t, an application can still be made via the Freedom of Information Act.”

  “So anyone can have access?”

  “Not fully. If the DA allows a civilian access to the file, they won’t be allowed all the information. They’ll get a sanitized version without witness names or personal information like addresses and phone numbers.”

  “The photos could still be there?”

  “Yes. But if someone outside the department requested access, that would leave a paper trail. I’ll look into it.”

  Matt was silent for a long time, with only the crackle of burning wood to break the silence as ruddy firelight flickered over them. Leigh finally tapped his knee. “What are you thinking?”

  He glanced at her sideways. “What about Morrison? He’s pretty pissed at you right now.”

  “He’s always pretty pissed at me; he just has a real reason right now.” Exhaustion washed over her in a rush and she slumped forward, bracing her arms on her thighs. “But I get your point. I’ve thought of him myself. He’d love to see me discredited.”

  “But . . .”

  “But it doesn’t feel right to me. For all his heavy-handed behavior, he’s actually a solid cop and he respects the badge. And when he talks to me about my father, there’s a reverence in his tone. And disgust for me. He thinks Dad would be horrified to see the kind of cop I’ve become and thinks I smear his good name. But he respects Dad’s memory.”

  “Or at least appears to.”

  “Or appears to,” Leigh conceded. “I can’t discount him, but in some ways Morrison almost seems too obvious. Especially coming on the heels of the case being flipped to me, it makes me wonder if someone is setting us both up. Someone is aware of the animosity and is hoping I’ll leap to a conclusion and blame Morrison because of our history.”

  “I don’t like him, or trust him,” Matt said stubbornly.

  “Me neither. But I’m not about to point fingers too easily. If I’m going to accuse anyone, I need to know they really did it. But with suspicions that this could have come from inside the department, I’m not confident about going public. At least not right now, with just this.”

  “You’re expecting more.”

  “It doesn’t make any sense that this is all they’re going to send me.”

  “What about if we do the DNA? We can run it at BU and that keeps it out of the detective unit altogether. You don’t know if there even is any DNA, so that would be a good place to start. Then if there is and you need to run a comparison, you can worry about how to work that later. Maybe take it to Rowe for help. Surely he couldn’t be involved in this.”

  “No way, no how.” Leigh leaned back against the sofa, turning the possibility over in her mind. “That works. If I come to the lab tomorrow, can you take a sample from the envelope?”

  “Sure. You know we’ll help in any way we can.”

  “Thanks. Just talking this over with you makes me feel a little better. It really knocked me off balance.”

  “Of course it would. Especially when you’re up to your ears in a new case.”

  “Speaking of which, I haven’t updated you yet.”

  “You don’t need to do that right now while you’re worried about this other stuff. That can wait until tomorrow, when you’re up to it.”

  “No, I’d like to talk it out with you. It’ll help me clear my head.”

  The range of expressions that flitted over his face told her clearly of his internal struggle to both take care of her and let her stand on her own two feet. “If you’re sure.”

  “I am.” Leigh quickly outlined her trip to Draw Down the Moon. “We’re obtaining dental records for Moira Simpson. The description I got this afternoon certainly makes it sound like she’s our victim. I also can’t reach Ms. Simpson by phone, and no one is at her home. It’s the logical next step. Rowe will be able to tell us for certain at some point tomorrow, depending on when the records arrive.”

  “And if it’s her?”

  “Then I go tell next of kin.”

  “I want to come with you.”

  Leigh met his eyes, surprised. “To inform next of kin?”

 
“Yes. I know it’s a lousy job, but it has to be done. And I remember how hard it was to break the news to Tracy Kingston’s parents. I’m not an official representative of the force, but it’s my case too, and maybe I can answer some of their questions.”

  Leigh stared at him in silence for a moment, then acquiesced. “Okay. But you let me do the talking unless I open up the floor for you.”

  “Deal. Now, can we put this away for the night? How about a glass of wine?”

  “You have no idea how much I’d like that.”When Matt stood, she placed her hand in his and let him draw her from the sofa. Together they left the room, leaving the photo face down on the table, temporarily forgotten.

  CHAPTER EIGHT: IMMUREMENT

  * * *

  Immurement: a form of execution where a person is walled up within a building and left to die from starvation or dehydration.

  Wednesday, 4:43 p.m.

  Simpson Residence

  Salem, Massachusetts

  “Ready?” Leigh asked.

  “Yes.” Matt took a step backward on the shallow front step of the single-story colonial, letting Leigh take the lead.

  She rapped sharply on the door. Then there was only silence.

  “Maybe he’s not home?” Matt suggested. He leaned forward, squinting through one of the long, narrow windows that flanked the front door. The front hallway was empty.

  “Car’s in the driveway,” Leigh said. “Give it a minute.”

  Finally, from inside the house, a floorboard creaked. The dead bolt shot back and the door opened to reveal a slight man with hunched shoulders and buzz-cut brown hair. “Yes?”

  “Flynn Simpson?” When the man nodded, Leigh extended her badge. “I’m Trooper Leigh Abbott of the Massachusetts State Police. This is Dr. Matt Lowell from Boston University. Can we come in?”

  Confusion flashed across the young man’s face but he pulled open the door, allowing them to step inside. The house was tiny, the entire front taken up by an open concept living and dining area. The furniture looked comfortable, but there were few decorative elements.