Prime Suspect

by Maggie Price

  Even then, Michael Ryan had been on the periphery of her mind, knowing he would arrive soon to go through Ken’s things. Feeling a dark, primitive desire to be near him, yet frightened of what his search might find.

  “You are seeing Greg, aren’t you?” Helene asked, a faint line of impatience sounding in her voice.

  “We’re good friends.”

  “Word on the grapevine is that you’re more than that.”

  A.J. shrugged. “If that’s all people have to talk about, things must be slow around this place.”

  Helene’s lips curved. “You’re like me, A.J. You don’t appreciate people sticking their noses in your business.” She glanced across the room, her gaze settling on the doorway where her tobacco-cheek-stuffed partner waited.

  “Well, Kevin and I are off to investigate. I just need to check something with the lieutenant first.”

  Helene turned and walked to the head of the conference table, her hips swaying like a flag in a soft breeze. She exchanged a few words with Michael, then smiled at something he said.

  A.J. attempted to block out the sound of Helene’s soft, smoky laughter by forcing her concentration back to the picture of Dianna Westfall’s bureau. Beside the tray of crystal atomizers lay a necklace of pearls interspersed with colored jewels; the matching pearl earrings sat a few inches away. A black haze of fingerprint powder covered everything, even the bottle of fingernail polish on the corner of the bureau. She shoved on her glasses and checked the label: Reentry Red. Despite her wealth, Dianna Westfall had scrimped when it came to polish—A.J. owned a bottle of the same discount brand.

  “I need you to do something.”

  She jerked up her chin, surprised to find Michael standing beside her chair.

  “This came from the desk in Dianna Westfall’s study,” he said, indicating the contents of the plastic evidence bag in his hand. The bag held a mauve leather address book, its cover smudged with fingerprint powder.

  “She carried the smaller twin to this in her purse,” Michael continued. “Since you need to know Dianna’s habits and the places she frequented for your profile, I’d like you to go through the books, build a database of individuals and businesses listed.”

  “I’ll start now.”

  Michael’s fingers brushed hers as she accepted the bag. A.J. tensed against the low-grade buzz that swept through her. God, she needed this attraction to Michael Ryan like a giraffe needed a sore throat.

  “Where’s Dianna’s other book?” she asked, forcing a businesslike tone into her voice. She might be attracted to the man, but she could control it. Control her emotions; concentrate on the job.

  “In the lab. They’ll send it up after it’s checked for prints.”

  Despite her firm intent to keep her mind on business, A.J.’s gaze drifted to Michael’s lips as he spoke. She knew what it was like to kiss that wide, sensuous mouth. Knew the need one kiss could ignite.

  “Anything else?” he asked.

  She forced her attention back to the stack of crime scene photos. “Something’s bothering me.”

  Michael slid a hip onto the edge of the table. “Something about last night?”

  The sudden softness in his voice brought A.J.’s eyes slowly back to his. He watched her with quiet purpose, waiting.

  “Something about the Westfall case,” she answered evenly.

  “What?” he asked, arching a dark brow.

  How many times had she sat inches away from a cop while they discussed a case one-on-one? Too many to count, she told herself. That Michael Ryan had slid his hip onto the table and had leaned in so close she could smell the spicy scent of his cologne shouldn’t matter.

  But it mattered, dammit. It mattered too much. It was that kiss that had done it.

  “The suspect wasn’t interested in anything except Dianna,” A.J. blurted, then dragged in a deep, controlling breath. “That’s where his rage centered. On her. On what was on that bed. I’m wondering about the finger.”

  “What about it?”

  “Did he cut it off before or after she died?”

  “The autopsy report says after.”

  “So, he didn’t do it as a means of torture.”

  “No.”

  “Why’d he go to the trouble after she was dead and not take the finger with him?”

  “You think he should have?”

  “Maybe.” A.J. fanned the photographs out onto the table. “Look at the silver, the jewelry lying around in just the bedroom. He could have gotten a bundle fencing it. But he left it alone. He didn’t go to the mansion to steal, he went there because of Dianna.”

  Michael stared down at the pictures. “Since we found no signs of forced entry, we’re going with the assumption she knew him on some level. Trusted him enough to let him into her home.”

  “I think that’s on target,” A.J. said as she shuffled through the pictures until she unearthed the one she wanted.

  “Her clothes came off without a struggle. You can see her skirt and blouse folded over the arm of the love seat. We know she had sex with her killer, and from what the ME said, it wasn’t forced. He had some sort of relationship with Dianna, and I think he’d have wanted a souvenir of their time together.” A.J. shook her head. “It’s just a feeling.”

  Michael lifted his eyes from the photos. “I make it a habit to go with my instincts. They’re usually on the mark.”

  A.J. stared at the photographs spread before her. She could help catch the monster who’d wreaked this horrific devastation. That, after all, was the reason for the task force. Irritated at Captain Harris, angry with Michael Ryan, she hadn’t brought her usual intensity to the case.

  Now, she felt her determination to track the killer settle around her like a warm, familiar cloak.

  “Tell me what you’re thinking,” Michael prodded.

  “We have a scene where hardly anything is disturbed,” she said. “He brought the weapon with him—nothing was spontaneous. He knew what was going to happen ahead of time.”

  “The guy came prepared, all right,” Michael agreed as he pointed to a photograph of Dianna’s bedside table, where a pair of champagne bottles sat—one empty, one with its cork still wrapped in gold foil. Two stemmed glasses accompanied the bottles, one glass sat upright, the other had toppled onto its side, a small pool of champagne still in its bowl. Some of the pale liquid had spilled onto the snowy silk tablecloth that swooped to the floor.

  “The lab found nonporous glove prints on a bottle of nail polish and on the unopened champagne bottle,” Michael continued. “Everything else was wiped clean of prints.”

  A.J. frowned. “We’re sure he handled the polish?”

  “That’s what the lab says. Do you think that’s significant?”

  “I’m not sure.” She gathered the photos back into a stack, thumping their edges into alignment against the table.

  Michael leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “Heard from your ex-sister-in-law yet?”

  A.J. blinked at his change of subject, then nodded. “Helene took a message from her secretary. Mary’s in Dallas until this afternoon. We can catch her at her office after four.”

  “Good. Plan on our going to the crime scene around two,” Michael said quietly.

  “All right.”

  “Then we’ll go have a chat with Mary Duncan.”

  “You were right,” Michael said as he slid his cellular phone into the inside pocket of his suit coat. “The bastard took...”

  His voice drifted off as he scanned the law firm’s reception area. Decorated in a heavy English motif, with polished brasses and pewters displayed with a curator’s care, the room held an air of quiet refinement. Except for the blond receptionist ensconced behind the marble-topped rosewood counter, he and A.J. had the waiting area to themselves.

  They’d been cooling their heels since a stiff-spined secretary appeared out of nowhere to inform them that Mary Duncan was on an overseas conference call. After he and A.J. declined the offer of
coffee, the woman walked purposefully away, their coats folded over her gray-suited arm.

  The subtle trill of a telephone drifted on the leather-scented air. The receptionist answered before the second ring. Assured that no one could overhear their conversation, Michael shifted his gaze back to the opposite end of the tufted leather couch where A.J. sat.

  “You were right,” he repeated. “There’s something missing from the Westfall mansion. The bastard got himself a souvenir.”

  “What did he take?”

  A.J.’s voice held all the tension that Michael had sensed settling over her the instant they walked through the law firm’s towering mahogany doors. Tension that had her long, graceful fingers absently kneading her right thigh. Tension that emanated from her like a physical force. It was as if he could see her very thoughts skitter in the dark richness of her eyes. Anticipation over what they might find out about Ken had her anxious. Uptight.

  In truth, so was he. But he doubted their tension came from the same source. A.J. wanted to protect her dead brother. Michael wanted the truth. He wondered if she’d let her thinking take her far enough to realize that ultimately the only way to clear herself might be to help prove Ken a criminal.

  The sleepless night he’d spent shuffling through crime scene reports while his thoughts centered maddeningly on a curvaceous body in a black silk dress had heightened his determination to find the anonymous caller. Whoever he was, he was out there, watching A.J. Wondering if she’d told anyone about the call. Wondering if someone was on his trail.

  Someone was.

  A.J. gave an impatient tilt to her head. “What’s missing from the crime scene?”

  Michael arched a brow and realized he’d been staring. For the past two days he’d done a lot of that. Staring at A.J. down the length of the task force’s conference table. Watching. Studying. Already, he was familiar with the slight wrinkle that formed between her eyebrows when she concentrated on her work.

  He shoved a hand through his hair, reminding himself again that with the Duncan investigation active and A.J. assigned to his command, she was basically forbidden to him.

  Yet, he watched her because he wanted her. And he wanted her to want him.

  His gaze moved to the high neckline of her jade jacket, to the dark tumble of hair that drifted past her shoulders, then on to her mouth, her eyes. He felt the heat rise inside him.

  Michael expelled a resigned breath. He couldn’t have her, he accepted that. Not now. Maybe not for a long time. Still, he knew without question that where A.J. Duncan was concerned, there would be no calming of the storm brewing inside him.

  He wrenched his thoughts back to business. “A ring is gone from Dianna’s jewelry box,” he answered. “A six-carat oval diamond on a platinum band. The insurance adjuster faxed its picture and description to the task force room. I’ve assigned Helene St. John and Kevin Stoner to check every jewelry store in town to see if Dianna left the ring somewhere for repair. A team of detectives is hitting the pawn shops in case the suspect unloaded it.”

  “You have to go through the motions,” A.J. agreed. “But if he took the ring, he won’t part with it. Through it he’ll relive his time with her. He’ll hoard the ring in some velvet-lined box as if it were his grandmother’s best sterling.”

  “Here’s something else to think about,” Michael said. “The housekeeper says the bottle of fingernail polish on the bedroom bureau didn’t belong to her employer. Dianna never wore red polish.”

  A.J.’s chin snapped up. “She did the night she died.”

  Michael watched A.J.’s eyes sharpen and he knew she was picturing the same thing he was—Dianna Westfall’s severed red-lacquered finger propped against a bank of lace-covered pillows.

  “He brought the polish with him,” A.J. stated quietly.

  “I guess he’s got a thing for red.”

  “The ME found no ligature marks on Dianna’s wrists, so we know he didn’t tie her up. He must have painted her nails after she died, otherwise her struggling would have messed up the polish.”

  “It looks that way,” Michael said. “I’ve sent an evidence tech to the mansion to pick up the polish and submit it to the lab. Sky says she can compare what’s in the bottle to the polish on Dianna’s nails and determine if it’s the same.”

  Michael glanced across the room to where the prim receptionist was now engrossed in straightening two dozen red roses in a crystal vase positioned on the rosewood counter. On the wall behind her hung a grouping of oil portraits of prosperous-looking gray-haired men. Michael scrubbed a hand across his face. The place was so proper and dignified, one could feel at ease popping in wearing a tux. He wondered if Mary Duncan was as staid as the atmosphere in which she worked.

  Looking back at A.J., he said, “By the way, we’re sure now that none of the knives from Dianna’s kitchen is the murder weapon. The suspect brought it with him.”

  “He went there to kill her,” A.J. said. “He knew her enough to want to kill her.”

  “And maybe we’ll find his name in one of her address books.”

  “Maybe.”

  At that instant, the same stiff-spined secretary who’d seated them approached.

  “Ms. Duncan can see you now.”

  Michael rose, then walked by A.J.’s side as the woman led them along a mahogany-paneled corridor flanked with closed doors. He was aware of his shoes sinking into the pearl gray wall-to-wall carpet, of the discreet gleaming brass sconces that dotted the walls at precise intervals like neat ellipses.

  They passed an empty secretarial desk, which Michael surmised belonged to their officious guide. Just then the woman stopped, swept open a paneled door and stepped back, allowing them to enter.

  Aware of Ken Duncan’s reputation with women, Michael had expected a knockout. Instead, the first thing that hit him about Mary Duncan was her distinct plainness. Big boned and tall, she almost matched his six-foot-two height. Her black suit appeared expensive, but it was clear from the way the jacket hung that she’d recently dropped maybe twenty pounds. The brown hair that curved just above her shoulders was styled, but the sides seemed to close in on her round face. If she wore makeup, he couldn’t tell.

  “A.J.”

  Mary Duncan’s smile was her saving grace. It transformed her face from plain to expressive, put life in her dark wide-set eyes and gave a subtle hint of well-sculpted cheekbones. When she walked from her desk and gripped A.J.’s hands, Michael saw the sincere pleasure in the attorney’s eyes.

  And in A.J.’s. In these first few seconds it became evident that a fondness existed between the two women, yet A.J. had told him she hadn’t had any contact with Mary since her divorce from Ken. Nor had Mary dropped by the house to visit with the family after Ken’s funeral.

  “I’m so glad to see you,” Mary said. “I think about you often, you and Emily.” Her gaze flicked sideways to acknowledge Michael’s presence, then went back to A.J. “How are you?”

  “Fine. Mary, this is Lieutenant Ryan. We need to talk to you about Ken.”

  She pulled her hands from A.J.’s. Turning slowly, the attorney gave Michael a cool narrow-eyed look. He could have sworn the air around him plummeted ten degrees.

  “You’re Michael Ryan?” she asked without inflection.

  He nodded, wondering if he’d met the woman somewhere, and forgotten. “That’s right.”

  “I’m familiar with your name. With you. You’re the Internal Affairs bastard who demoted Ken.”

  Chapter 6

  Her muscles as stiff as cardboard, A.J. stared at Michael, waiting for him to react to Mary’s remark.

  He didn’t—not outwardly, anyway. His shoulders stayed relaxed, his expression remained implacable as he matched the attorney’s defiant stare.

  “Actually, I’m no longer with Internal Affairs,” he said after a moment. “I command Homicide now. As to my being a bastard, I assure you my mother and father were married at the time of my birth.”

  “Too bad they didn�
�t transfer you out of IAD sooner,” Mary stated, refusing to back down. “Then maybe Ken wouldn’t have gotten demoted for something he didn’t do. Maybe he wouldn’t have wound up in a patrol car on the graveyard shift. If that hadn’t happened, Lieutenant, don’t you agree he’d still be alive?”

  “That’s a question no one can answer.”

  A.J. let out a slow breath as she diverted her gaze to a built-in bookcase filled with leather-bound legal volumes. With her senses on alert, she was aware of the soft purr of the building’s central heat. Of faint wisps of sweet dried herbs emanating from a brass bowl on a table across the room. Of Mary’s hostility. An unbridled hostility toward Michael that made A.J.’s throat thick with nerves.

  “I know the answer, Lieutenant,” Mary persisted. “It’s your fault he’s dead.”

  “You’re wrong,” A.J. countered, surprised at her sudden, insistent need to defend Michael. Squaring her shoulders, she looked back at Mary, whose cold stare gave her eyes the look of hard copper. “Ken was like every other cop who signs on the department. He knew the risks. He worked where he was assigned. Period. If you need to blame someone, look to the person who pulled the trigger, not the one who put Ken in the patrol car.”

  “I blame them both.”

  Her ex-sister-in-law’s hard-edged demeanor didn’t exactly surprise A.J. She’d seen Mary in court making legal mincemeat of witnesses. What astonished A.J. was that where Ken was concerned, Mary’s defenses had gone up like a drawbridge. For whatever reasons, she’d filed for divorce and had said no to Ken’s attempts at reconciliation.

  But at some point they’d begun seeing each other. That was evident by the message Mary left on Ken’s answering machine. The knowledge that Ken hadn’t seen fit to reveal he’d reconciled with Mary intensified the now-familiar feeling of disquiet that hung over A.J. But then, she acknowledged, Mary wasn’t the only secret her brother had kept.

  “Detective Duncan was demoted because he violated department policy.” Michael nudged back the flap of his suit coat and slid a hand into the pocket of his slacks. “He conducted several interviews with a female juvenile without her parent or guardian present. Without anyone present. As a criminal attorney, I’m sure you’re aware that’s a definite no-no for a cop.”