“Figaroa was in a knee brace. But he had that bump on his head. Someone took a heavy swing at him.”
“Jo?”
Faith laughed, but only out of desperation. “Angie? Delilah? Virginia Souza?”
“The AK by the front door looks retrofitted for automatic.”
“The AR by the back door has a slide fire. That’s one hundred rounds in seven seconds.” Faith shook her head, trying to clear it. “What the hell is going on in that house?”
“Concentrate. Kilpatrick is a fixer. Laslo is a fixer. What problem were they there to fix?”
“If we’re buying that Kilpatrick didn’t know Jo was dead, then that’s not the problem they were fixing.” Faith reminded her, “Miss Lindsay was at Kilpatrick’s on Monday afternoon. That’s when she saw Will. She was upset about something.”
“Her daughter was arrested for possession of drugs.”
“Yeah, last Thursday. Jo was out of jail by Saturday. Her mother was at Kilpatrick’s with a new problem. A Monday problem. An after-Harding-was-killed problem. An after-her-daughter-disappeared-but-we’re-saying-she’s-in-rehab problem.” Faith thought of another red flag. “She went to Kilpatrick, not Reuben.”
“That phone call Reuben got a few minutes ago. That was strange.”
“It seemed like they were all waiting for a call, even Miss Lindsay. The minute the phone rang, she stuck her head out of the kitchen to find out what was happening.” Faith turned to Amanda. “If the call wasn’t about Jo, then the only thing I can think of that would upset Miss Lindsay that much is Anthony.”
“Put it together, Faith. Reuben Figaroa went to Kilpatrick’s office Monday morning. Next, they both met with his lawyer. Reuben spent the rest of the day visiting three different banks, and now they’re all at the house, early in the morning, fully dressed, waiting for a phone call. What does that tell you?”
“Ransom,” Faith said. “Angie kidnapped her grandson.”
Chapter Eleven
Will paced outside Jane Doe’s hospital room while her doctors did their morning rounds. He stuck his hands in his pockets as he paced. He felt weirdly exhilarated, almost giddy, even though he hadn’t slept last night. He was thinking more clearly now than he had in the last thirty-six hours. Obviously, Angie thought she could wind him up with her mind games, but all she had done was laser focus his desire to bring her down.
And he was going to bring her down hard, because he knew exactly what she’d been doing.
“Will?” Faith said. “What are you doing here?”
He didn’t stop to explain himself. Everything that had been knocking around his head for the last seven hours exploded out of his mouth. “I looked back at my notes from the Rippy rape investigation. Reuben Figaroa was Rippy’s main alibi at the party, and Jo Figaroa was her husband’s main alibi. Angie knew this. She also figured out that Jo was a junkie, and junkies are really easy to control. She manipulated Jo into blackmailing her husband. If Jo broke Reuben’s alibi, then that broke Rippy’s alibi, and the whole thing came crumbling down. But instead of caving in and paying them off, Reuben went to Kilpatrick. Kilpatrick put Harding onto solving the problem. Harding called the cops in to bust Jo, and when that didn’t shut her up, he solved it by killing her.” He felt himself smiling, because all the clues had been there right from the beginning. “Angie called me to clean up the mess because that’s what she does.”
Faith didn’t say anything for a few seconds. Finally, she asked, “How would Angie know about the witness statements?”
“They were in my files at home. She must’ve seen them. I know she saw them.” He realized he was talking too fast and too loud. He slowed himself down. “She mixed up the witness statements. She knows my system, the color coding, and she mixed them up to let me know that she’d seen them.”
“Where’s Sara?”
“Downstairs watching the autopsy.” He gripped Faith’s arms. “Listen to me. Angie lost her leverage when Jo died. She’s trying to get us—”
“We think Angie kidnapped her grandson.”
Will felt his grip loosen on her arms.
“He wasn’t at school yesterday. He didn’t show up this morning.”
Will scanned her eyes, trying to understand where this was coming from. “He could have a cold or—”
“Come over here.” She led him to the chairs across from the nurses’ station. She made him sit down, but she stood in front of him, stood over him really, and told him what she and Amanda had found.
Will’s earlier elation over cracking the case started to dissipate the moment she mentioned Miss Lindsay poking her head out when the phone rang. By the time she had finished recapping the last few hours, Will was leaned over in the chair, his hands clasped between his knees, completely deflated.
Everything she said made perfect sense. The lawyers and bankers made sense. The expectation around the phone call made sense. The Angie getting her daughter murdered and still trying to pull some cash out of it made sense.
What was wrong with him? How had he loved such a despicable person?
Faith said, “You could be right about the blackmail plan going sideways, only when Harding took out Jo—”
“Angie saw Anthony as the perfect stand-in.” Will rubbed his face with his hands. Survival of the fittest. Angie always kept moving forward. She didn’t worry about consequences because she never stuck around long enough to deal with them.
He said, “I hit Collier.”
“I figured that out. I wish you’d hit him harder.” She covered a large yawn with the back of her hand. “We’re going to have to rework Collier’s side of the case. He lied about Virginia Souza’s death by OD. She’s alive and kicking as of last week. We’ve got footage of her at the jail posting a cash bail on an eighteen year old picked up for solicitation. Delilah Palmer is still our only solid lead. She could be a victim. She could be a perpetrator. Either way, the first person she’d go to for help is her pimp. We need to find Souza. If she really is the Mama in charge, then she’ll know who Delilah’s pimp is. We get the pimp, we get Delilah.”
“Agent Trent,” the doctor said. “You can talk to the patient now, but keep it brief and try not to excite her any more than she already is.”
Faith asked, “What’s she excited about?”
The doctor shrugged. “Free food, clean sheets, nurses to wait on her, cable TV. We replaced all of her blood, so this is probably the first time in decades she’s been clean. She’s been on the streets for twenty years. We’re like the Ritz here.”
“Thanks.” Faith asked Will, “Ready?”
Will wanted to stand, but he felt like he was weighted down with lead. Yesterday’s numbness had returned. Every lost minute of sleep slammed into him like a pile driver. “We can’t do anything, can we? About Anthony. His father hasn’t reported him missing. We can’t demand to see him because we don’t really have any proof that something’s wrong. Reuben’s got a wall of lawyers telling him his rights, and if he’s as much of a control freak as you say, he’s going to insist on handling all of this on his own.”
Faith said, “Amanda’s working on a warrant to tap his phones. She’s got four cars outside his house. If anyone leaves, they’ll be followed. But you’re right, you and I can’t do anything right now except work our end of the case.”
Will felt the elephant from last night take a tentative step onto his chest. He shook it off. He wasn’t going to humiliate himself again the way he had at the funeral home. “Angie said that Jo was my daughter. Sara says my blood type doesn’t rule me out.”
“Do you believe Angie?”
He told Faith the only truth he knew. “All I can think about is punching her in the throat until her windpipe collapses so that I can see the panic in her eyes while she suffocates to death.”
“That’s disturbingly specific.” Faith got that expression on her face that told him she was going to try to mother him. “Why don’t you go home and get some rest? It’s been a tough couple of
days. I can interview Jane Doe. Amanda should be here any minute. You probably shouldn’t be talking to a potential witness anyway.”
“It’s already tainted. I’m the one who found her.” Will stood up. He straightened his tie. He had to take a cue from Angie and keep moving forward. If he let the stress get to him, if he had another stupid panic attack, he’d never be able to hold up his head again. “Let’s do this.”
He let Faith lead the way. Jane Doe 2 was one of three Jane Does on the ward. Jane Doe 1 was in a quiet room at the end of the hall. Jane Doe 3 had a cop outside her door. Grady was Atlanta’s only publicly funded hospital. There were a lot of Does here.
Their particular Jane Doe was in a tiny room sectioned off by a glass window and a heavy wooden door that wouldn’t close all the way. Machines pumped and hissed. A heart monitor tracked beats. The lights had been left on. Both of Jane Doe’s eyes were blackened because that’s what happened when your nose collapsed into your face. Heavy bandages were wrapped around the top two-thirds of her head, leaving her mouth and chin exposed. Greasy brown hair puffed out between the gauze. Two surgical drains, basically clear bags that caught excess fluid and blood from the wound, were dangling down either side of her face. She reminded Will of the colo claw fish from the bad Star Wars.
Jane stopped eating her Jell-O midbite when Faith and Will walked in. “Leave that door open. I don’t wanna end up being another black woman who dies mysteriously in police custody.”
Faith said, “First, you’re not in police custody, and second, you’re not black.”
“Shit.” Jane rubbed at her white arms. “How’d I manage to fuck up my life so bad, then?”
“I’m assuming personal choice had something to do with it.”
Jane put down the empty cup. She sat back in bed. Her voice was raspy. She was older than Will had first thought, closer to fifty. He had no idea why he’d ever thought she might be Angie.
Jane said, “Whaddaya want? I gotta sponge bath in a few minutes, then Judge Mathis is on.”
“We want to talk to you about Sunday night.”
“What’s today?”
“Tuesday.”
“Holy shit, that was some blow.” The drain bags flopped against her cheeks as she laughed. “God damn, bitch. Sunday, I was on the moon.”
Faith gave Will the look that said she didn’t have the patience for this.
He told Jane, “I feel like we got off on the wrong foot. I’m Special Agent Trent with the GBI. This is my colleague, Faith Mitchell.”
“Call me Dr. Doe, on account’a I’m in a hospital.”
Will doubted the woman was carrying an ID and he couldn’t fingerprint her without arresting her, which brought its own problems. He said, “All right, Dr. Doe. Someone was murdered Sunday night in the building across the street from where we found you Monday morning.”
She asked, “Shot?”
“We’re not sure. Did you hear a gunshot?”
Jane leveled him with a gaze. “Do you know that at least once a year, a dog shoots somebody?” She seemed to think this was useful information. “You ask me, people should be real careful about keeping dogs in their homes. Aha.” She looked past Will. Amanda was in the doorway. Jane said, “The captain always commands from the back of the ship.”
Amanda accepted the compliment with a nod of her head. “Agent Mitchell, why hasn’t this suspect been transferred to the prison ward downstairs?”
Faith said, “You mean the one with no TV or sponge baths?”
“Damn, bitches, you don’t gotta go DEFCON so fast.” Jane struggled to sit up in the bed. “All right, I got information. What’s in it for me?”
Amanda said, “You’ve got one more day in the ICU, then you’ll be transferred downstairs to the regular patient wards. I can get you a couple of extra days on the ward. After that, you’ll be enrolled in a treatment program.”
“Nah, I don’t need no program. I’m back on the coke as soon as I get outta here. I’ll take the extra two days, though. And you’ll give it to me because I was in the building when it happened.”
“The office building?” Will asked.
“No, the whats-it, the one with the balcony.” Her brown teeth showed in a smile beneath the bandages. “Now I got your attention.”
Faith crossed her arms. “What time did you get there?”
“Aw shit. They stole my Rolex.” She patted her wrist. “What time? How do I know what time it is, bitch? It was dark outside. There was a full moon. It was Sunday. That’s what I know.”
Faith stepped back so that Amanda could take over. She knew when a witness had turned against her.
Amanda said, “Start with the gunshot.”
“I was across the street in the office building, bedding down for the night, right? Then I hear this gunshot and I’m like, ‘What the fuck?’ Like, could it be a backfire from a car? Could it be a gangbanger, which, holy shit, that ain’t my jam.” She coughed to clear some phlegm from her throat. “Anyway, so I’m lying there, thinking about what can I do. Then I decide I need to check it out in case there’s some kind of gang thing going down, get my ass outta there, ya know?”
Amanda nodded.
“I’m on the third floor, tucked up in my crib, so it takes me a little while to get down. Place is a God damn death trap. Before I’m out the door, I hear a car streak off, like burning rubber.”
Will bit his lip so a curse wouldn’t slip out. Jane Doe had gotten there too late.
Amanda clarified, “You heard a car leaving the scene?”
“That’s right.”
“Did you see the car?”
“Sort of. Looked black with some red along the bottom.”
Angie’s car was black with red stripes.
Jane said, “But there was another car in the parking lot. White, kind of foreign-looking.”
Dale Harding’s Kia.
“And, so, I go back up to my crib, right? Don’t need to get involved in that shit with cars running off in a hurry. I been out there on the street long enough to know a deal gone bad when I see it.”
Will felt a moment of disappointment, but then Jane started talking again.
“So I’m back up in my crib, just lyin’ there and I get to thinking, well, shit, you know what I’m thinking. Maybe I got it wrong. This is a transactional kind of neighborhood. I got some scratch in my pocket. There’s a car outside that building, another car just screeched off, it seems like there’s gonna be a dealer inside, right? Simple economics.” She pushed herself up in the bed again. “So I mosey on back across the parking lot, go inside the building, and it’s dark as shit. Windows are tinted or something. I’m walking around blind and then my eyes get with the program and I see there’s this gal on the floor. At first, I thought she was dead. Started checking her pockets, but then she moved and I was like, ‘Whoa.’”
Amanda asked, “This is the bottom floor, not the upper level?”
“Correct-o-mundo.”
“Where was she lying on the floor, exactly?”
“Shit, I dunno. I’d need a map, right? Not like I was paying attention. I just walked into the building and boom, there she was.”
“What did she look like?”
“Dark hair. White gal. She’s laid out on her side. Can’t move her arms and legs, can barely move her head, but she’s making this moaning sound, so I’m like, ‘All right, that’s it. I’m gettin’ the fuck outta here,’ only I can’t because there’s another car pulls up in the parking lot.”
“The same car?”
“Yeah, but I seen it for real this time. Square nose like an older car. But I ain’t no car expert, right?”
Angie’s Monte Carlo was black with a square nose. Why had she returned to the scene? Why had she left in the first place?
Amanda asked, “How much time had passed since the car first peeled off?”
“Mebbe ’bout thirty minutes? I dunno. Don’t have to punch a clock in my line of business.” Jane continued, “So, the car
is out front, so I booked it to the back. Hid behind that bar thing. Peeking out, like—” She elongated her neck. “And I see this second bitch comes in. Tall. White. Long hair like the first one. Thinner. Don’t ask me what her face looked like because who the hell can see in that place? Like a fucking tomb.” She pointed to the pitcher on her bedside table. “Gimme some of that, will ya, honey?”
Will was closest, so he poured some water into a Styrofoam cup.
Jane took a drink, drawing out the tension with a loud gulping sound. “Okay, so the second bitch comes in, and she’s just fucking furious, right? Kicking things around. Cursing. Motherfuck this. Motherfuck that.”
Definitely Angie. But why was she mad? What had she screwed up?
“She goes upstairs like she’s marching against Hitler, you know what I mean? Feet just pounding.” She put down her cup. “I hear her upstairs, doing what, I don’t know. Throwing shit around. Going in and out of rooms. Leaving shit. Moving shit.”
Staging the crime scene.
“She’s got a flashlight. Did I tell you that?”
Amanda said, “No.”
“One’a them little lights, that’s real strong. That’s why I’m not leaving my cover, right? Didn’t want that light shining on me. Who knows what the bitch would do?”
She went silent.
Amanda repeated, “And?”
“Oh, well, eventually, the bitch came back downstairs. She says another coupl’a three motherfucks, kicks the chick on the floor. Real hard. And the chick, she moans loud-like: ‘uhhhhhn.’ That’s when it got interesting.”
Again, Jane went silent.
Amanda warned, “Don’t draw this out.”
“All right, I’m just trying to have some fun here. I don’t get to talk to people much.” Jane took another drink of water. “So, bitch just stands there listening to her moan for a coupla’ minutes. Staring down at her like ‘you piece of shit.’ Then, wham, bitch just grabs the chick by the leg and starts dragging her out of the building. And man—” She shook her head. “That chick was moaning before, but when the bitch yanked on her leg, that’s when the screaming started.”
The Kept Woman Page 39