Tess’s cheeks had lost their rosy glow. “Yes, it’s Mrs. Howard. She’s a widow. She lives alone.”
“Knock on the door while I cover the apartment.” He aligned his body to protect her. But he couldn’t protect her from a bomb blast. His heartbeat skyrocketed and sweat pooled beneath his arms.
An elderly, white-haired woman answered Tess’s knock. “Tess, it’s good to see you.”
Brett interrupted her. “Mrs. Howard, I need Tess to stay with you for a few minutes. Someone has broken into her apartment. Lock yourselves in and dial 911.”
The woman’s eyes went wide. “Oh, my God!”
Tess latched onto his arm, her nails digging in. “Don’t go in there, Brett. Let the police check it out when they get here.”
He laid a soothing hand over hers. “It’s okay, honey. I’m not going in. Tell them to send the bomb squad, Tess. Tell them I’m here standing guard at the door and I’m armed.”
She went into the woman’s apartment, reluctance in every step. When she shut the door and he heard the lock engage, he breathed a sigh of relief. He couldn’t focus on anything but her when he believed she was in danger. He shook off the tension and turned his attention to the apartment door. He paused outside to listen. Whoever broke in wouldn’t use a timer. They couldn’t be certain when he and Tess would return. Was there a trigger around the door?
He debated about whether to pull the fire alarm to clear the apartment building when he heard sirens approaching from a distance.
A couple of minutes passed, then police in full tactical gear exited the elevator, their weapons drawn. An officer at the head of the team spoke. “Ensign Brett Weaver?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Officer Stan Mackey from the Metro Arson Strike Team, sir. I’m going to ask you to put your weapon down, sir.”
Though he’d expected the request, he still had a what the hell? moment. “I’m ejecting the clip and clearing the chamber.”
“Yes, sir.”
He cleared his weapon and laid it and the clip on the floor.
“Do you have any other weapons on your person, sir?”
“No.” Brett removed his jacket and turned to prove it.
“Thank you, sir.” The officer approached him and bent to retrieve the pistol. The tension of the other officers ratcheted down. He posted an officer at the apartment door and gave an order for the rest to start clearing the floor.
“I’ve been made aware of your fiancée’s situation, sir. Where is she?”
“She’s inside a neighbor’s apartment down the hall.”
“Good, let’s step inside with her for a moment.”
Brett led the way to Mrs. Howard’s apartment. At his knock, Tess opened the door and threw herself against him. She was trembling. “It’s okay, honey.”
“Is there a bomb?” Her skin looked white and the freckles across her nose stood out. Mrs. Howard on the other hand looked flushed with excitement.
“We don’t know yet.”
Mackey spoke. “Ms. Kelly, we’re clearing the apartment building and bringing in a couple of dogs to sniff for explosives. Detectives Hart and Buckler are on their way. They’ll meet us out in the parking lot.” He turned his attention to Brett. “You have a permit to carry, Ensign Weaver?”
“Yes, I do.”
“May I see it?”
Brett retrieved the permit from his wallet and handed it over. The officer used his radio to verify the permit and returned it to Brett. “We should have verification by the time we’re downstairs. I’ll return your weapon as soon as we’re outside, sir.”
Mackey hustled them and Mrs. Howard out of the apartment. He bypassed the elevator and went directly to the stairs.
Brett took Mrs. Howard’s arm to steady her as they descended the three floors with a stream of other residents.
“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Howard,” Tess said.
“It’s all right, Tess. Nothing this exciting has ever happened to me before.”
Tess glanced up at Brett, her reaction plain. They could both do without this kind of excitement.
*
An hour later Tess leaned her head on Brett’s shoulder as they sat in an interview room at the station. “Tell me again why we’re sitting here?”
“Beats the fuck out of me, but if they don’t show up within the next five minutes, we’re leaving.”
As if on cue the door swung open and Detectives Mackey, Buckler, and Hart all entered the interview room. Hart carried a large paper bag.
Fuck, this couldn’t be good. Not when they were triple-teaming.
Mackey started off. “The good news is that there was no bomb on the premises.”
“Good,” Tess said and rested a hand on Brett’s chest.
“The bad news?” Brett asked. His gaze trailed from one to the other of the detectives.
“Ms. Kelly’s apartment was broken into. We’ll need you to walk through and identify anything missing.”
After two hours of waiting, Brett was out of patience with their drawing this out. “And?”
Detective Hart opened the paper bag and removed something white from it. Tess caught her breath as he unfolded the item then she cried out.
Though he hadn’t seen it, Brett recognized what he was looking at. It was a wedding dress, a dress Tess would have looked a vision in. Red paint defaced the gown and looked like bloodstains. The circular spots looked like bullet holes.
Chapter Seventeen
‡
The church in the Mission Hills area had a curved sanctuary done in white and stained oak. Great wooden beams crossed the ceiling, moving from a central hub like wagon wheel spokes. Padded pews organized like pie wedges pointed toward the pulpit. Mary’s copper-colored casket lay in state to the right surrounded by flower arrangements.
Tess settled in a pew midway down the section behind Mary’s family. She reached for Brett’s hand and laced their fingers. Since last night she’d bounced back and forth between the urge to weep and barely contained surges of rage. Though there hadn’t been any explosives in her apartment, or anywhere else in the building, her apartment had been violated and trashed. Her computer was stolen—as well as her external hard drive, which was an inconvenience, but replaceable. Thankfully her files were backed up to both an online storage program and to the servers at the paper. All the thieves had was access to stories she was working on.
The worst blow was her beautiful wedding gown had been reduced to a paint-spotted threat. She and the SEAL wives, her closest friends, had taken hours to find just the right dress and now she was back to square one. Not to mention the expense.
Her half-hour meeting with Mary Stubben had triggered a sneaky, dangerous malice the police seemed helpless to combat. She had come to this service as a way to soothe her conscience, but anger warred with her guilt. Would Mary still be alive if Tess hadn’t spoken with her, hadn’t encouraged her to send her more information? Or had she been doomed from the moment she’d copied the files from her boss’s computer? There was no way of knowing until the homicide unit completed their investigation. And the police were being reticent about when that might be.
Brett’s hand tightened on hers, drawing her attention. His jaw had hardened, his eyes sharper as he leaned close to murmur in her ear. “Frye just showed up.”
Tess scanned the rows of pews until she located the CEO of Chanter Construction speaking to one of Mary’s family members. She wrestled back the urge to leap to her feet and confront him. She wanted to beat at him with her fists and scream and rant.
Brett put an arm around her as if he’d sensed her thoughts.
“I’m okay,” she murmured.
Jonathan Frye’s iron gray hair, cut short, lay close against his head. He had a long, narrow face, a slender nose which seemed almost effeminate compared to the sharp, aggressive thrust of a chin dented by a shallow cleft. As he turned to take a seat his blue eyes swept the crowd.
Had he paused for just a second on her and Brett?
It seemed so. But how could he recognize either of them from among the other strangers here? She searched for Henry Sullivan, the private detective Frye had hired, but he wasn’t present. Had he been the one to break into her apartment? The police wouldn’t share their findings until later.
Organ music swelled, signaling the beginning of the service. Tess forced herself to focus on the moment. She owed it to Mary Stubben.
After a couple of songs, the minister climbed the two steps to the podium and gave a sweet eulogy about Mary, who had been active in the church as a Sunday school teacher and as the head of one of the church’s charities. He spoke about how quiet and unassuming she had been. How dedicated to trying to help those less fortunate than herself. He mentioned how she always carried cloth handkerchiefs she’d embroidered herself because they were more feminine than a flimsy tissue.
Tess remembered the shreds of paper left behind after Mary’s nervous frenzy. Emotion blocked her throat and she swallowed against it.
One of Mary’s sisters took the podium and read her favorite poem by Keats, A Thing of Beauty. Then the minister gave a brief sermon about God’s grace offering comfort.
The service painted a picture of a woman longing for romance and being ignored by it. The pity of it was there had been far more to the petite woman than her brown, bobbed hair and cornflower blue eyes. For Mary to come to Tess with the information about her boss had required courage and conviction.
Through it all, Tess watched Jonathan Frye. He had been Mary’s employer for ten years, but there was no evidence of grief on his face or in his body language. At one point he checked his phone and even sent a text. Anger stampeded through Tess at his arrogant callousness. Mary had been a loyal employee for ten years, and he refused her the respect of thirty minutes of his undivided attention.
Though he was probably responsible for Mary’s death, Tess had expected Frye to at least put on a hypocritical show of grief.
When the minister opened the floor to anyone who wanted to share, Mary’s two sisters stepped up to speak of family moments. The longer she listened to their grief-shaken voices, the more her anger built. When Frye walked up to the podium, she was both fascinated and offended.
“My name is Jonathan Frye. I was Mary’s boss for ten years. She was in her early twenties when she came to work for us. She became my secretary five years ago. I will miss her calm presence, her efficiency in fielding phone calls and proofreading contracts, her organizational skills, and her excellent coffee. She should have been an engineer, she knew that much about what we did at Chanter. She kept me on track at work and brightened my day with her dry sense of humor. On behalf of myself, and all the employees at Chanter Construction, we’re sorry for your loss. She will be missed.”
Tess shot to her feet. Brett’s hand momentarily tightened on hers, a what the hell? frown on his face. She tugged free and marched forward.
“My name is Tess Kelly. Mary and I met for the first time at a coffee shop last week, the day she passed away. She and I shared a drink and talked.” She scanned the faces of the mourners and spotted Detective Buckler at the back. “It was just a random conversation between strangers, a thirty-minute exchange that became more meaningful, more sparkling clear because of her sudden death.”
“I interview people for a living, but Mary’s and my conversation wasn’t really an interview.” The similarities between Mary Stubben and Shelly Gooding clarified in her mind. Both were strong women, stronger than they appeared on the surface. One hoped to right a wrong while the other lived with the devastating consequences of one, but both faced their situation with courage.
“Mary shared a small portion of her life with me that day. We talked about our jobs. The personalities of the people we worked with, some of our challenges and what we hoped the future might hold.” Tess focused directly on Jonathan Frye.
“In the few minutes we spent together I learned she was a responsible person of moral strength and character, one who was interested in righting wrongs. Though her physical being was petite, her voice soft, I recognized a core of strength in her. We exchanged contact information so we could keep in touch.”
Frye’s jaw tightened.
Tess leaned forward onto the podium and focused on Mary’s family. Her eyes stung with sympathetic tears, but also tears of guilt and loss. “Sometimes I feel we’re like drops of rain in a barrel knocking into each other. But those momentary bumps in time always leave an impression, and we may not realize what kind of effect they’ll have until later. Mary touched you all, emotionally, intellectually, physically. Maybe it was a brief kiss, a nudge, a pat, or a kick.” Take that, Jonathan Frye.
“But she left a lasting emotional impression, otherwise none of us would be sitting here right now. That’s the only legacy any of us can hope to leave behind.” Her breathing suddenly constricted as the full weight of her guilt came to bear. She was eager to find her seat and feel Brett’s reassuring touch. “I would have liked the opportunity to know her better. I won’t forget the moments we shared. I won’t forget her. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
Though Brett’s jaw pulsed with anger, he slid an arm around her when she scooted in beside him and clutched his hand in both of hers. After the minister’s brief prayer, the mourners began to file out. On the steps outside, Mary’s family waited to greet each person as they left. While she and Brett waited to exit the building, she saw Frye had been cornered by Mary’s sisters and had not yet broken away from them.
Tess urged Brett closer to them so she could listen to their conversation.
“Mary will be missed. She was a member of our Chanter Family. Those of us in the office who knew her best have been grieving her loss.”
“She liked her job,” Her sister said. “She always said since she didn’t have the experience to be useful in the creative process of design and building, she could at least keep everything running smoothly so the rest could move forward.”
Frye turned and his piercing gaze rested on Tess, then narrowed. “Mary was more imaginative than she took credit for. Just recently she offered a suggestion that was very helpful to one of our projects.”
Tess had never heard so much fork-tongued bullshit in her life. He was making complimentary noises without an ounce of sincerity behind them.
“I’m sorry, but I have to go. Chanter will be thinking of you, and we’ll be in touch soon.” He shook each woman’s hand and hurried away, around the corner of the church to the parking lot.
Mary’s two sisters approached Tess. “My name is Trudy Riders and this is my sister, Beth Cummings.” The family resemblance between Mary and the two women lay in the shape of their face and the color of their eyes. Unlike Mary’s chin-length bob, Trudy’s hair was long, pulled back into a tail, and Beth’s was cut short and feathered around her face.
“Mary talked about you. She read all your articles and was a fan. Meeting you must have made her day,” Trudy said.
Mary had been too frightened to enjoy their encounter, but, unable to think of a reply, Tess merely smiled.
“We appreciate your sharing that small part of her last day,” Beth said, her voice stifled by tears. She leaned in to hug Tess. Then the two left to join the rest of the mourners for the ride to the cemetery.
Brett guided Tess down the sidewalk to the parking lot.
Detective Buckler brushed by them on his way to the car, his expression a mirror of Brett’s. “Meet me at the Starbucks on Linda Vista. We need to talk.”
*
With the pressure of his hand against her back, Brett hurried Tess to the car. Though rage threatened to erode his control, he managed to keep his tone to a hoarse whisper…just barely. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Tess?”
“I’m poking the bear. Frye was so fucking smug. Couldn’t even stay off the phone long enough to pay attention to the service. Then gave that canned speech. And everything he said to her sisters. How can he be so unemotional about someone he saw every workday for five years?
How can he face her family?”
“You’re allowing your emotions to cloud your judgment, Tess. You need to be calm and smart, not emotional and rash. You’re allowing your sense of responsibility and your anger over last night to get in the way of your objectivity.”
Was she objective about any story? Just because she had good instincts didn’t mean everything she believed had happened was the truth.
Brett sucked in a deep breath in an attempt to force back his anger. “You wouldn’t go to press with the proof of one witness. You haven’t uncovered anyone who can corroborate the information she gave you.” Brett checked the car, even opened the trunk while Tess followed him.
“That’s why I have an interview with Jason Hamilton on Thursday and another one with Todd Warren, one of Mary’s coworkers, at five-thirty tomorrow. If Mary’s suspicions were true about the blackmail, I’m one step closer to proving she was right.”
“Jason Hamilton isn’t going to own up to that, Tess.”
“If I can get him to react to my knowing about it, I’ll have my answer.”
Brett shook his head. “He won’t.”
“You didn’t think I could get Nicholas Brittain to cooperate with me either.”
“You’re covering his ass, Tess. Of course he’s going to jump on board when everyone else is trying to fry it.”
Tess stalked away and plopped into the car.
Brett slammed the trunk with more force than was necessary. She was following the course of the story through pure instinct, and her feelings were leading her into trouble. Why couldn’t she see that?
“I’m not covering Nicholas Brittain’s ass,” Tess said as soon as he got into the car. “The county building inspector I spoke with on the phone, who has no dog in the fight other than protecting the workers from unsafe building practices, said exactly what Brittain did. I told you that. There was no neglect or incompetence on the construction company’s part. They were right in removing the substandard concrete. It could have caused major issues with the building later on if they hadn’t.”
Building Ties (Military Romantic Suspense) (SEAL Team Heartbreakers Book 4) Page 17