She heard it over and over again. Great job, Graham. Keep up the good work. Get some rest. Tomorrow’s going to be a big day. And from Jim, a hopeful, “Wanna get a beer?”
She’d smiled and yawned and demurred and headed home.
She had her own copy of the murder book—everyone had a copy, things were done in triplicate.
She poured a glass of wine. Heated up some dinner: a simple piccata sauce over mahi-mahi with shrimp and roasted vegetables. She was a good cook. She didn’t cook for many people, she had performance anxiety about it not being perfect, but she knew what she liked, and dinner was ready quickly.
She took it and her wine into the living room. Put on a movie. Ate slowly. Watched and laughed. And when she was done, she cleaned up, took a shower, and got in bed with the murder book.
She’d practically memorized it. Memorized them. Memorized him.
She ran her fingers over a photo of Ethan Montclair. It was his author photo, printed off his website. He was impossibly handsome, younger, not marked by the ravages of life and time. She imagined he looked about like this when he’d met Sutton Healy.
Floppy hair, penetrating light blue eyes—had they been Photoshopped? She thought back to her interviews with him—no, they were that blue, like a late-summer lake, clear and deep. He hadn’t shaved, there was just a bit of scruff. His shirt was a crisp white, his jacket deep blue, offsetting his eyes. He wasn’t smiling, or rather, he was, but it was a charming half grin. A smug smirk, Moreno had called it, but Holly could almost feel the amusement coming off Montclair. She could hear him in her mind: I have to sit here and look serious now. This is my author face. Good God, take the shot already.
Is it possible for passwords to be changed remotely?
Everything—everything—pointed directly at him. So why was she lying in bed, a hand inching down, staring at his picture like he was a model in a magazine and not her prime suspect?
Because you’re an idiot, Holly Graham. Go to sleep.
She closed the book and turned out the light. But sleep was long in coming.
LIVE FROM A CRIME SCENE
A phone, ringing. A long tunnel, harsh white light, burning her eyes.
Holly was disoriented for a moment. Where was she? What was ringing? Who was lying next to her?
Then the pieces fell: the person next to her in bed was Ethan Montclair.
She was naked. She was sore. They’d done it for hours.
And she was dreaming.
A delightful dream, indeed, a bit embarrassing, actually, considering he was a double murder suspect, but it had been a good one, the echoes lingering in her flesh, and she felt sated in a way she hadn’t in months. She’d clearly been alone too long.
The dream faded. She felt a hot rush of embarrassment—yes, Montclair was handsome, but he was a killer. What was her subconscious thinking?
That he’s hot as hell, clearly. And good in bed, to boot.
She came all the way awake with a jerk. Oh, no. Oh, no! She’d slept through her alarm. And the ringing was real: her cell was jangling. She squinted at the phone’s screen. 5:05 a.m. She was supposed to be at the office in fifteen minutes. Crap.
The number belonged to Sergeant Moreno. This couldn’t be good. Of all the days to be late. Oh, she was going to get reamed. She sat up, cleared her throat, braced for the attack.
“Graham.”
“Get dressed and meet me at Gentry’s Farm. We found her.”
* * *
Holly stood in the middle of the fallow field on the edge of the forest in the middle of Gentry’s Farm off Highway 96 where they’d discovered the body, waiting for Moreno to wave her over. She prided herself on being tough as nails when it came to death and dismemberment—she’d caught her fair share of gruesome car accidents, and people died all the time and she was almost always second or third on the scene; dead bodies were simply a way of life in law enforcement—but homicide was rare in these parts, and she hadn’t ever been on the scene of an intentional murder. Not like this. In some ways, she felt like she knew Sutton Montclair. She mourned with her at the loss of her son. She felt anger for her at her treatment by the news blogger. She was maybe even a teensy bit jealous of her once-happy marriage to her excessively handsome husband.
And now she was dead, partially covered in brush, decomposing for all to witness. It bothered Holly. Tremendously. Both that the woman was dead, and that the team she’d been working with had been right about the husband.
She’d heard the rumblings when she pulled up and signed into the scene. Now she waited to see for herself whether the rumors were true. If they were, it was rather clear Sutton Montclair hadn’t been the agent of her own demise.
She’d most definitely been murdered.
And everything they had pointed directly at Ethan Montclair.
The sun was coming up, peeking through the large row of oak trees to her east, casting strange, grotesque shadows across the roped-off area. People milled around; there was no urgency. The forensics team were collecting soil and insects from under and around the body—their composition would tell them how long the body had lain here, hidden practically in plain view. Chances were she’d died soon after disappearing in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, but it was possible she’d been held someplace first and then killed. From what Holly could gather from the comments floating past, there was a lot of decomposition for this early in the year. But they’d had a number of hot days in a row, and a couple of storms, so Holly wasn’t too surprised. She’d spent a week studying at the Body Farm, up in Knoxville. She knew just what a muggy atmosphere could do to a body.
There were multiple jurisdictions on-site in addition to Franklin Police, namely two agents from the TBI and two deputies from the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office. The foursome had been enjoying a pre-eighteen-holes breakfast together at Grays on Main to talk about a case and “came on by” when they heard the news. But there would be no jurisdictional fights: this case already belonged hook, line, and sinker to the Franklin Police, and the body was found well within their borders. Anyway, the body would go to the morgue in Davidson County no matter who was the lead. And she would be there, side by side with Ethan Montclair, as he identified his wife.
They hadn’t told him, not yet. They wanted to be sure. Holly was going to head over with the preacher and Moreno to do the notification shortly—and the arrest, Holly, you’ll be arresting him moments after he learns the news—and she wanted to get a good look at the body first.
Finally, after what seemed like hours, a whistle. Moreno was gesturing for her.
She picked her way into the copse carefully, eyes on the ground, making sure she didn’t tread on some unseen, uncollected bit of evidence accidentally.
The smell hit her first. Deep, intense, rancid, and rank. Wet, musky, rotted meat left in the sun too long. She steeled herself for the first look.
Moreno was waiting, hands on hips. “Tell me what you see.”
The first impression was unbearable. It never ended for her; the dead and the gone were always a mimicry of themselves, wrong, so very wrong. It took her a second to recognize death: slitted eyes, limbs tangled, mouth drawn back in a rictus grin. The next second registered the condition of the body. Though decomposing, something was clearly wrong. She glanced at the hands. Hand. Only one evident, sticking up from the muck and mud like it was reaching to the sky from a grave. Balled into a fist, a huge diamond winking. The rumors were right.
“She was burned.”
“Correct. Why?”
“To hide evidence, maybe? She didn’t do it to herself.”
“No? You’re sure?”
The world had reasserted itself, and Holly was able to look closer, taking the body in sections. “There is clearly animal damage. We’ll have to wait until autopsy to see what might be a w
ound versus a bite mark. Did Forensics find anything nearby, gas cans, lighters, the like?”
The edge of Moreno’s lip rose briefly. He nodded to a pretty, dark-haired woman standing ten feet to his left.
“This is Sherrie, she’s the death investigator from Forensic Medical. Holly Graham, Franklin Homicide. Talk.”
Holly kept her face straight at Moreno’s introduction, simply nodded professionally, as if hearing her name and title associated with the word homicide was a commonplace occurrence. Inside, her heart raced.
Jesus, you got it. Don’t blow it, sister.
“Good to meet you. We have to get her back to the shop, give her a thorough once-over, but it certainly looks like she was burned here. The grass and leaves are scorched around the body.” Sherrie referred to her clipboard. “To answer your question, no, we haven’t found gas cans, lighters, anything else flammable that would indicate she set herself alight. As you can see, the burns are worse on the lower extremities. Could be she was standing up when she caught flame, and then fell down. With her buried in the mud like that, anything could be hidden out of sight, but burning yourself to death without leaving some sort of evidence behind is hard to do. Whether this is our primary crime scene or just a dump site is yet to be determined. I don’t see that we’ll be able to pull usable prints, the hands are in bad shape, so without DNA or dentals... No sense jumping to conclusions until we have a chance to work it all out.”
Holly nodded sagely. “Thanks for the rundown.”
Sherrie made a note. “Cool. We’ll take her shortly, Sarge.”
“Do it. Make sure she’s first up, okay?” Moreno wasn’t asking, but Sherrie didn’t look impressed.
“I’ll let Dr. Fox know, sir.”
She walked to the nearby gurney, started giving instructions to the morgue guys with her.
Holly blocked it out. Even the smell had lessened. She was sure this was Sutton Montclair. She wasn’t recognizable facially, of course, not with the burnt skin and shortened tendons pulling her face into a bizarre death mask. Holly didn’t know what Sutton’s wedding set looked like, either, though based on the house, it was clear the Montclairs had money, and as such, Sutton’s rings would be enormous. It was the spill of reddish-blond hair, still lovely, though matted with rain and muck and the desiccated flesh that clung to it, crawling with all sorts of bugs, that told her so. The hair was the giveaway. Plus, there were no other missing women who fit this description from the area. Hard to argue with that logic.
And then it hit her. “Her hair didn’t burn.”
Moreno was by her elbow again. “No, it didn’t. Not all the way. Isn’t that strange? You’d think it would go up like a phoenix.”
“Regret, maybe? He burned her here, and changed his mind and put out the fire before it consumed her whole head?”
“Hard to control a fire like that. But that’s a solid possibility. Either way, it’s time to go talk to Mr. Montclair. You have your cuffs? You should make the arrest.”
“Yes, sir, I do. Before we go, may I ask...how was she found?”
“Birds. A veterinarian from Animalia across the way called it in. He’d seen Sutton Montclair’s face all over the news outlets, saw a huge circle of prey birds swooping around. From the number of birds and extended time frame, he knew it was something large, and phoned it in last night. It filtered down and I came out to take a look, just in case.”
“You didn’t call me.” The words were out before she could think, but Moreno gave her that avuncular half smile.
“It was zero dark thirty and you looked like warmed-over shit when you went home last night. You needed the sleep. She wasn’t going anywhere without you. And you know the first rule of homicide investigation. You can’t go it alone. We’re a team, and we split things up. You’re here now. And now the real work is going to begin.”
“Yes, sir.”
She glanced to the sky. There were still some hawks hanging around, riding the thermals. Sometimes, it was as simple as looking to the sky to see where the feast was being held.
She’d been so close, this whole time.
Holly shielded her eyes against the sun and watched the ME’s death investigators ready themselves to load the body onto the gurney for transport. A cry went up as they lifted the body. Sutton Montclair’s beautiful, partially burned hair was still in the mud.
“Ugh,” Moreno said.
“Totally.”
The DI grabbed a bag and carefully lifted the remains of scalp and hair into it. Holly finally felt the gorge begin to rise. “Does that happen often?”
Moreno saved her. “Anything can happen to a body left out in the sun long enough. Come on, let’s get out of here. It’s going to be a long day. I’ll meet you at Montclair’s place. We’re all set on the paper. Judge Kerr signed off on the warrants late last night.”
“We should amend the physical search warrant to let us take a look around for gas cans and other flammable materials. Don’t want this getting tossed on a technicality.”
Moreno gave her a smile. “Yes, we should. Good call.”
The van doors slammed. Holly had a momentary bit of sorrow, allowing herself to feel the loss of another human, then slapped her sunglasses down and walked to her car. Better to get it over with quickly, rip off the Band-Aid. She couldn’t deny it now. Ethan Montclair was their indisputable prime suspect, and she wanted to see how he reacted to seeing the results of his elemental handiwork.
Crawling past the ever-present construction on Highway 96, wondering to herself, Did he do it?
For the first time, her gut told her he had.
AND NEVER THE TWAIN SHALL MEET
Ethan was watching for them. He’d woken with a terrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, almost as if he’d known today they were going to find her. When the doorbell rang, he steeled himself. Sure enough, when he opened the door, there was Officer Graham, dressed in plain clothes now, jeans and a T-shirt with a short linen motorcycle jacket over it, her gun clearly visible on her hip. There was a stranger with her, readily identifiable as a priest from his high, stiff collar.
A wave of fear and nausea went through him. She was gone. She really was gone.
“You found her?”
“May we come in, sir?”
Ethan stepped aside without a word. He saw a news van pulling onto the street. He shut the door before they had a chance to see anything. See him fall apart again. He needed to be careful. Watchful. Cautious.
Sutton.
They went to the kitchen. He sat at the table, the same spot he’d been in six days earlier when he realized she was gone. Wave after wave of emotion coursed through him. Love, fear, anger, all the horrible things they’d said to each other. Every beat of his heart brought a barrage of new, horrible words. He realized he was holding his breath.
I failed you. Oh, Sutton, I failed you.
The cop bit her lip, looked mournful. She clearly wasn’t used to delivering bad news. The priest was uncomfortable, too. Ethan wanted to force their mouths open.
Finally, Officer Graham cleared her throat. “Mr. Montclair, this is Father Jameson. He—”
“I get it. He’s here because you found Sutton. Tell me. I’m ready.”
Officer Graham swallowed. “Sir, we have recovered a body. Unfortunately, there is no way to positively identify the remains without DNA or dental records.”
Dread, deep in his gut. “Why not?”
“The body was burned.”
“Burned?” Images he would never shake paraded into his mind.
“Yes, sir.”
I should have called the police immediately. Insisted they look for her. I should have been out there, beating the bushes. What was I thinking? I could have saved her if I’d called. I knew the note was bogus. I knew something was really wrong
.
“Who? Who did this to her?” he whispered. “Oh my God, Sutton.”
And he broke apart, a million memories overwhelming him. He started to cry, heaving, jagged sobs. The idea of her body, her beautiful, lithe body, that gorgeous, smiling face, destroyed, made him want to scream. Not only murdered, but defaced with fire. It was too much.
The priest was saying things, muttering nonsense meant to calm and soothe, but Ethan couldn’t understand a word. All he could hear was her name, over and over and over again, a holy wail building like a wave in his chest until he was screaming it out loud.
“Sutton. Sutton. Sutton!”
A hand on his shoulder. He vaguely heard the cop talking on the phone. Realized the look on her face had changed. The sorrow was gone, and in its place was a steely resolve.
She hung up the phone and faced him. “Sir. Mr. Montclair. I’m so sorry for your loss, but I’m going to need you to come in and have a conversation with us, on the record.”
He saw her hand unconsciously inch toward her belt. Saw the silver glint of her handcuffs.
“Are you arresting me?” Ethan asked.
“We just need to have a conversation. We need to talk about all of this on the record.”
Father Jameson said, “It seems to me the man needs a doctor, not a jail cell.”
“Thank you for your assessment, Father. I’m following orders.” And to Ethan. “I need you to come with me now, sir.”
Ethan didn’t care anymore. He’d known the moment they found her they’d think he killed her. It was as inevitable as the sunrise.
He shrugged. Let them think what they wanted. He knew he wasn’t responsible.
Graham took him by the arm. “There are media parked outside. I don’t know how to get you out of here without them seeing.”
Again, he shrugged. “Whatever.”
The door opened. Shutters began to click. The media rushed the porch, shouting.
Graham immediately slammed the door. “Crap. More than I expected. They’ve surrounded my car, too.”
Lie to Me Page 18