Ice (A Chris Matheson Cold Case Mystery Book 1)

by Lauren Carr

  “I’ll drop the car off at the library when I go in after school,” Sierra said. “You can pick me up after I get off, or,” — she flashed Chris a grin — “Doris can bring me home with her, and Chris can give me a horseback riding lesson.”

  “I have plans for tonight,” Chris said. “I can give you a lesson tomorrow morning if it’s okay with your mother.”

  All eyes turned to Helen, who sucked in a deep breath and nodded her head. Sierra threw her arms around her in a grateful hug before moving on to Chris to hug him as well. She was still squealing with glee when she drove off with Katelyn, Nikki, and Emma—who was waving her casted arm like a prize.

  “Were we ever that young and brave?” Helen asked.

  “We still are,” Chris said. “Look at what we do for our living.”

  “I don’t feel brave most days. When I saw Felicia on that gurney—I felt fury. She didn’t deserve what happened to her.” She looped her arm through his and they made their way to the porch. “Do you remember when Felicia and you were partners in chemistry and she came down with laryngitis like the day of your project presentation—”

  “And I had to do the whole presentation, including her part.”

  “For her part, she played Vanna White, posing and pointing while you did all the work. Even Mr. Shatner was laughing.”

  “Which meant it had to be funny because Mr. Shatner had no sense of humor,” Chris said.

  “Felicia could make anyone smile,” Helen said. “That’s why she was the most popular girl in school. But she wasn’t snobby about it.” She sniffed. “I remember my first day of school, in junior high, she walked right up to me and introduced herself. We were best friends ever since.”

  “Remember when she went behind your back and stole your boyfriend?”

  Helen shot a quick glance over at him. She pulled her arm out from his. “We were all young then, Chris. Self-absorbed. We all made mistakes. I forgave Felicia for that. After I moved back here, we reconnected. We’d have lunch and text and talk.”

  “Did she tell you that she was divorcing Rod?”

  Helen nodded her head. “She didn’t love him anymore. I wonder if she ever did love him. Not too long ago, she told me that she made a big mistake dumping you for Rod.”

  “Like you said, that was all a long time ago—ancient history. We’ve all grown up—moved on—”

  “Rod does have a temper. You saw the bruises on Felicia’s arm. And he can hold a grudge. Didn’t he jump at the chance to pin Ethel Lipton’s murder on you? He’s also working with Victor Sinclair on the Sandy Lipton case.”

  “Do you think Rodney is capable of murdering Felicia so that no one else could have her?”

  “I’m praying that he isn’t.”

  Chris opened the door to the mudroom just as Doris was on her way out with her coat on and briefcase in hand. She stumbled across the threshold. “Oh, Christopher, can’t you watch where you’re going?” She hugged Helen. “I take it you saw that the girls left for breakfast.”

  “Because you mixed up the salt and sugar again,” Chris said.

  “Accidents happen. I’m meeting Reverend Ruth for breakfast at Panera. I’m getting a mocha latte and a chocolate croissant for free. Do you know why?”

  Chris rolled his eyes. “Because you use your Panera card.”

  “Because I use my Panera card. Every time I use my card, I get points and those points add up. Then, when you get enough points you get free stuff.”

  “Like chocolate croissants,” Helen said. “Last week, I got a free latte.”

  “Christopher doesn’t get anything for free because he doesn’t use his shoppers cards,” Doris said.

  “Because I only have a dozen or so on my keychain,” Chris said. “I make sure I use the one for the pet store. Their discount is worth my time digging my keys out of my pocket.”

  “How are you getting to Panera since the girls took your car?” Helen asked.

  Doris dangled the key to Chris’s truck. “I assume you’re spending the day with Helen, Christopher.”

  “What if I wasn’t?”

  “But you are.” With a merry wave, she trotted down the steps and across the driveway to the truck. “Oh!” She turned around to shout over the wind to him. “I called Reverend Ruth about Tamara. That’s how we ended up deciding to go to Panera. She had a really good laugh after I told her about it. She says the church owns Tamara’s grave. So if you need to dig her and her baby up, all you need is the permission of the church’s board of trustees.”

  “And you’re the trustee’s chair,” Chris said.

  “Exactly,” Doris said. “So go ahead and make arrangement to exhume the bodies.”

  “Bodies?” Helen asked with a gasp.

  “Reverend Ruth only asks that she be there to make sure they’re treated with respect.” Doris blew a kiss in Chris’s direction before climbing into the driver’s seat and driving away.

  “What bodies?” Helen asked. “Chris, what’s this about? Who’s Tamara?”

  “I suspect Tamara is a missing person,” he said while opening the door and holding it open for her. “To prove it, we’re going to need to exhume a couple of bodies.”

  “I guess I’m going to have to make a few phone calls.”

  “Looks like we have the house to ourselves.” After hanging her coat on a hook, he took off his and hung it up.

  “Just you, me, and an assortment of critters.” Helen jerked a thumb over her shoulder at where Sadie and Mocha were blocking the mudroom doorway into the kitchen. Beyond them, Sterling was sitting on a barstool at the counter eating what looked like a platter of toast.

  “There’s something you don’t see every day,” Chris said in reference to Sterling sitting at the counter like a diner waiting for his breakfast. After ordering Sterling out of the chair, he asked Helen, “Would you like an omelet for breakfast?” He opened the refrigerator door and removed a carton of eggs.

  “That’s right.” She climbed onto the barstool that Sterling had vacated. “You used to say you were a better cook than your mother.”

  “Because Mom never liked to cook.” Chris placed two plates on the counter. “When Dad asked her to marry him, she said yes, but had one condition. She didn’t know how to cook and had no interest in learning. Dad said that would be fine. He was a very good cook.” He proceeded to break one egg after another and plop them into a bowl. “So Dad did all the cooking—until I was ten months old. Then he told her that if they were going to eat, she’d have to learn how to cook.” He arched an eyebrow at her with a crooked grin. “She knows just enough to be dangerous.”

  With a giggle, she answered her cell phone, buzzing in its case on her hip. She checked the caller ID. “It’s the medical examiner. He must have already started his autopsy on Felicia.” Bracing herself for the news, she put the phone to her ear.

  Chris continued his work on their two omelets while casting glances in her direction. He found his thoughts bouncing back and forth between the horrid topic that Helen was talking to the medical examiner about and the past—when all they had to think about was their future and being in love.

  Chris’s relationship with Felicia had taught him a valuable lesson about life at a young age.

  They dated for their whole junior year of high school. Chris was the varsity football’s quarterback. Rodney was their captain. Felicia was head cheerleader and Helen was her brainy, but pretty, best friend.

  The foursome double-dated every weekend. They went everywhere together. By Valentine’s Day, Chris realized that he looked forward to their dates not so much to be with Felicia, as to see Helen.

  He had fun with Felicia. She was his first serious—sexually intimate—relationship.

  But Helen was different. While he had light, fun conversations with Felicia—he found that he could relate to Helen in a way that made h
im want her at an entirely different level. With Helen, he learned the difference between being in lust and being in love.

  “Hey!” Helen snapped her fingers in front of his face to get his attention. “How long are you going to stir those eggs?” She jerked her chin in the direction of the bowl in which Chris had been whisking the eggs for the omelets.

  Chris tossed the whisk into the sink. “Only until you tell me what the medical examiner told you.” He took out the omelet pan and set it on the stovetop.

  “She died of massive internal hemorrhaging. She had received a brutal beating—”

  “Was she raped?”

  Helen nodded her head. “Vaginal tearing indicates rape.” She choked. “Sodomy, too. No semen, though. Spermicide indicates that whoever it was wore a condom. Medical examiner counted seventeen stab wounds.”

  Chris stared down at the omelet pan in silence. Beaten. Raped. Stabbed. House torched.

  “Felicia didn’t deserve to die like that,” Helen said with a catch in her voice.

  “Did Felicia ever go to the Stardust?” Chris lifted his eyes to the wall across from him.

  “If you’re asking if she was a gambler, no.”

  “How about the restaurant?”

  “Never with me. Why?”

  Chris turned away from the stove. “Remember yesterday when Francine and I were telling you about Mona Tabler and Shirley Rice?”

  “The two women who you decided had to be victims of a serial killer?” Helen’s eyes grew big.

  “They were all beaten, raped, stabbed, and their homes burnt down. Locally, Mona Tabler and Shirley Rice. Both had the same MO, and I suspect I know who the serial killer is.”

  “Not Rodney,” she said with a gasp.

  “Why would you think it was Rodney?”

  “Because…” she stammered. “Mona Tabler’s case file was on Rodney’s desk when I went to see him yesterday afternoon.”

  Chris’s eyes met hers. “That doesn’t mean he killed her.” He grasped her hand. “He’s the deputy sheriff. Tabler is a cold case. He had a good reason to have her case file.”

  She nodded her head.

  He read the silent message in her eyes. We can hope.

  Chapter Nineteen

  After they had eaten breakfast, Chris showered and dressed while Helen cleaned up the kitchen.

  The forensics team planned to arrive at the Bell home at the same time as the arson investigator. While Helen wanted to see the crime scene as soon as possible, Chris wanted to check on Carson Lipton’s whereabouts during the time of Felicia’s murder. He had held off on giving his name to Helen, or even anyone on the Geezer Squad. Having been wrongfully accused of murder himself, he didn’t want to accuse Carson of being a serial killer until he had proof.

  After he had finished shaving, he noticed the bottle of expensive men’s cologne that his mother had given him for Christmas in the cabinet. The cologne was so expensive that he refrained from wearing it. After all, the horses and dogs didn’t care how he smelled.

  Helen might. He grabbed the bottle and broke the seal.

  As he caught his reflection in the mirror, he saw himself in a different light. He had allowed his hair, silver with only a touch of his former auburn locks, to grow to where it touched the top of his collar. When was the last time you got a haircut?

  He leaned across the sink to observe the crow’s feet at the corner of his gray eyes when his cell phone blasted. He almost dropped the open bottle of cologne down the sink. While fumbling to catch the bottle, he spilt it down his chest and stomach.

  “Damn!”

  In the bedroom, he slammed the bottle onto the dresser and picked up the phone. The caller ID read Elliott.

  “Elliott, I want to talk to you.”

  “If it’s about me going out with your mother, I have nothing but the utmost respect for Doris,” Elliott said.

  “If you respect her so much, why did you tell her that I’d pay for the tickets for your date?”

  “To convince her that you were okay with it. You are okay with it, aren’t you, Chris?”

  “I’m not okay with paying for other men’s dates with my girls.”

  “Do you want me to pay you back for the tickets?”

  “Yes,” Chris said with a hiss.

  “Boy that was fast. You don’t even want to think about it. I mean, if I play my cards right I could end up being your stepfather.”

  “And I could put in either a good word or a bad word for you with Mom,” Chris said with a chuckle.

  “I’ll give you a check today.”

  “Good idea.”

  “Now that we’ve got that taken care of,” Elliott said, “Have you ever been to Loco Lucy’s?”

  “Not even with a SWAT team for back up.”

  “Yeah,” Elliott said with a chuckle. “I’d figure someone as pretty as you’d get eaten alive in a place like that.”

  “Hey, I can hold my own,” Chris said with a good-natured tone. “Isn’t that where the thugs who killed Ethel Lipton hung out?”

  “Yep. A lot of drugs go in and out of there,” Elliott said. “DEA has been watching it for years. Those two goons who gunned down Ethel Lipton worked for the gang that runs that place. Lucy has a silent partner who runs everything that enters West Virginia on its way to Baltimore.”

  “Jose Martinez,” Chris said. “I’ve heard of him.”

  “Well, our case has nothing to do with drugs,” Elliott said. “We’re talking murder and you would never guess what Lucy’s brother does.”

  “Since you’re asking me, I’m assuming he is connected with the Stardust Casino.”

  “Driver.”

  “Driver?” Chris’s mind went to the driver he had seen the day before sitting at the end of the bar. Seth. “Ethel was driven home a couple of nights before her murder. I met her driver.”

  “Francine told me,” Elliott said. “That driver was the one who hired those goons to take out Ethel. My source tells me that Seth’s girlfriend works in the offices at the casino—something to do with computers.”

  “Cybersecurity?”

  “Considering why he hired those goons, most likely.”

  “Rachel Pine is the director of cybersecurity,” Chris said. “She was extremely nervous when we were there yesterday.”

  “Sounds like Seth’s girlfriend,” Elliott said. “Anyway, Krawford had sent Tommy Bukowski to track down the people who’d made the fatal mistake in locking up his system with ransomware. Well, whoever it is at Stardust’s online casino that uploaded that ransomware didn’t know how sharp Tommy was.”

  “Tommy probably invented ransomware,” Chris said.

  “Stardust’s head of security—”

  “Vice president. Peyton Davenport?”

  “Seth’s girlfriend’s boss gave Tommy free rein to check them out, and he found the virus’s coding in their program.”

  “Did he offer them a deal in exchange for his silence?”

  “Tommy wasn’t suicidal,” Elliott said. “If he withheld that information and Krawford found out, he’d be a dead man. Seth’s girl—”

  “Rachel.”

  “Whatever. She had to have been the one who uploaded the ransomware into the online casino and she realized Tommy found it. According to Wanda at Loco Lucy’s, the girlfriend—”

  “Rachel.”

  “—went running to Seth, who had Ethel passed out in the backseat of his car, and freaked out—”

  “With Ethel in the car?”

  “They thought she was passed out,” Elliott said. “Only she wasn’t. She heard them talking about Tommy’s murder, which according to what Wanda told me, was going down right then. The girlfriend’s partner—”

  “Seth?”

  “No, her partner in the ransomware scheme?”

 
“Peyton?”

  “No, Peyton is the vice president in charge of security at the casino,” Elliott said. “Rachel did the coding and monitored the operations. Her partner in crime selected their targets. According to what Wanda told me, they didn’t just hit anyone who entered the online casino. Rachel would send in a spyware that would gather information off the gambler’s system. She’d then give that data to her partner who would examine the data. She wasn’t just looking for big bucks, but she would also look for off-shore accounts—embezzlement—”

  “Activity that would make the target unlikely to report the ransomware to the authorities,” Chris said.

  “Exactly.”

  “Sounds to me like Rachel’s partner was the brains behind the operation.”

  “And she was the one who lured Tommy out to the stables—”

  “That’s where he got the manure on his clothes,” Chris said.

  “That time of night, races were over and the stables were basically deserted. Wanda said that Seth’s girlfriend—what’s her name again?”

  “Rachel.”

  “Whatever. I guess she could stomach extorting money from faceless victims across the internet, but murder made her freak out. She unloaded on Seth about it.”

  “The bartender told us about a redhead named Josie who was all over Tommy that night,” Chris said.

  “Wanda said Rachel’s partner had red hair,” Elliott said. “She hadn’t met her, but Seth had made the comment about redheads being crazy, and he was talking about Rachel’s crime partner when he’d said it.”

  “So, after the racetrack was closed, Josie lured Tommy to the stables and injected him with a horse tranquilizer to kill him.”

  “What’s her name’s partner then ordered Seth to get rid of the body,” Elliott said.

  “Josie,” Chris said. “Sounds like they had it very well planned out.”

  “Except for a passed out drunk who wasn’t passed out who overheard everything.”

  “When Ethel got a DUI the next morning,” Chris said, “she decided to hold that information over the killers’ heads.”