Deadly Sins (25 page)

Harandi had the best alibi possible. He’d been in FBI custody last night. Of course, there was a high probability that this was the work of a professional. If someone had hired the hits, alibis meant nothing.

Adam was mentally updating his profile as his gaze returned to the body. Because hired or not, this looked personal.

Very personal indeed.

Denise Quincy didn’t look to have calmed much in the duration but Bill Fleur, the agent who’d been questioning her, had gotten some information. Adam waited while the man updated Assistant Director Hedgelin, who was absorbing the news with a grim expression on his face.

That expression didn’t ease appreciably when he saw Adam. “You’ve seen him?”

Adam nodded. “What’s the security like?”

Fleur glanced over. “Tight. Decent-model system, touchpad entry. Requires a code, which is changed monthly. And there was no sign of forced entry.”

“And who had access to that information?” Hedgelin asked tersely.

Consulting his notes, Fleur said, “Just Ms. Quincy and the housekeeper, a woman by the name of Maria Sanchez. She’s been with the cardinal for fifteen years. Ms. Quincy for five. There was a cook, but either Quincy or Sanchez always let her in and locked up after her.”

“Where is Sanchez now?” Adam asked the still-teary woman.

“She’s only here Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays,” Quincy said brokenly as she mopped ineffectually at the tears streaming down her freckled face. “The only reason I was going to work today is because I was sick a couple days this week and got behind. Maria probably hasn’t even heard yet.” The words brought on a renewed bout of weeping.

Correctly interpreting the look Hedgelin leveled at him, Adam nodded. “We’ll go over there.” He waited for Fleur to write down the address, and armed with that information, he turned to wend his way through the throng to find Jaid and Shepherd.

He found them on the sidewalk out front conducting interviews with some neighbors and waited impatiently for them to finish. Today the sun shone brightly overhead, and the temperatures were edging their way up again. Even so, Jaid wore her hair down, as if in memory of yesterday’s chill.

He’d always preferred it that way. Framing that lovely face, following the delicate jawline. Her features had haunted his dreams for much too long. A reminder that no one, not even he, could maintain ironclad control over his emotions.

Recognition of that fact eight years ago had scared the hell out of him in a way that facing down the most vicious criminal couldn’t. She’d been his greatest weakness. And he was reluctantly accepting that cutting her out of his life hadn’t erased the hold she had on him.

Only a handful of miles separated the Columbia Heights neighborhood inhabited by Maria Sanchez from the cardinal’s, but they were otherwise light-years apart. The houses wedged between large ramshackle apartment buildings were small, the yards all but nonexistent. Groups of youths huddled on street corners, talking and laughing loudly. Children who looked much too young to be out without adult supervision played in the streets, dodging cars with an ease that spoke of experience.

Sanchez’s house was a small white clapboard without a garage. Unlike most of its neighbors, it had a fresh coat of paint and a roof in a good state of repair. The grass that managed to grow in a halfhearted fashion was neatly cut. Someone maintained the place well. Jaid wondered if it was Sanchez herself or another family member.

Shepherd found a place to park behind a decrepit Chevy truck that looked one step away from the salvage yard. They got out of the car and approached the house. “Any background on her family?” Adam’s words seemed to echo Jaid’s thoughts as they walked up the cracked sidewalk to the small cement stoop.

“The neighbor I spoke to at the cardinal’s earlier knows her slightly, because they attend the same church. She only said that Sanchez was a widow.”

“Guess we’ll find out.” Shepherd walked up the two steps and knocked on the door. The porch was too narrow for Jaid and Adam to join him, so they remained below. Moments later the door was opened by a short dark-haired woman. She peered past Shepherd to Jaid and Adam, and her expression became guarded.

“Good morning. Mrs. Maria Sanchez?” At her slow nod Shepherd showed her his ID. “Special Agent Shepherd, FBI. My colleagues, Special Agent Marlowe and Mr. Raiker, special consultant with the bureau. May we come in?”

After a brief hesitation she unlocked the outer door, and they all filed inside.

“I do not understand.” Her hands were clasped tightly; her face held a worried expression. “What do you want with me?”

“I’m afraid we have some shocking news, Mrs. Sanchez,” Jaid put in. “Cardinal Cote was found dead this morning.”

She staggered a bit, like she’d taken a punch. “The cardinal. Madre de Dios, what happened? Just yesterday he was fine. Was it his heart?”

“Did he have a history of a heart condition?” If so, this was the first Jaid had heard about it. But she hadn’t had an opportunity to gather much information before heading over here.

“Not recently. But seven or eight years ago. He had those . . . I do not know the name. They widen the plugged arteries to the heart.”

“He had stents put in?”

She nodded and ducked her head, reaction setting in. “Why don’t you sit down, Mrs. Sanchez,” Adam suggested quietly. He handed her a handkerchief, which she accepted gratefully as she sank onto the sagging couch. Each of them found a seat. “I’m afraid it’s more serious than that. The cardinal was murdered.”

“No!” Her cry was a mix of anguish and shock. She shook her head helplessly as the tears ran freely down her face. “It is not possible. The cardinal was a good man. A holy man. Who would do such a wicked thing?”

They gave her a few minutes to compose herself, which Jaid spent scanning the area. The furniture was old but serviceable. The carpet threadbare. Through the open doorway to the kitchen beyond, she saw yellowed linoleum. A small table with two settings. It looked as though they’d interrupted breakfast.

“We’re talking to everyone who had the codes to the security system at the cardinal’s house,” Jaid finally said, when the woman’s quiet sobs had tapered off with a long shudder. “We understand that you’re one of them.”

“Sí.”
When Maria looked up, anxiety shone in her dark eyes. “There were only the two of us, Denise and I. And the cardinal, of course. We were very careful. I never left without setting the system again. I would not fail the cardinal in that.”

Which, Jaid thought grimly, was exactly the point. “What time did you leave yesterday?”

The woman began wringing her hands. “At five. I work eight to five, three days a week. Sometimes I work a little later if there is more to do. I like to do a good job for Cardinal Cote. But yesterday I left on time.”

“Denise Quincy said she left at two yesterday.” Adam had heard Fleur relay the information to the assistant director.

“Yes. She works nine to two or two thirty each day, except when the cardinal requests longer.”

“Was there anyone else at his home yesterday?” Shepherd put in. “Did he have any meetings planned? Any repairmen scheduled for a visit?”

Her headshake looked woeful. “No, there was no one. It was a quiet day. Cardinal Cote worked all day in his study. He worked much too hard, I said to him frequently. There was only Denise and I, and Charlotte, the cook. She comes at eleven and prepares lunch for the cardinal and sometimes for guests he has. Then she makes his dinner and leaves it warming in the oven. Always she leaves at four.”

“So you let her out?”

She nodded at Shepherd’s question. “
Sí.
But I set the alarm after her. And again when I left for the day.”

“Did you see the cardinal before you left?” Adam had risen, paced a few steps. Jaid wondered for a moment if his leg were bothering him.

“Always I say good-bye unless he is in a meeting. Yesterday we talked about the cold. He said to bundle up. I walk a few blocks to the bus stop to get home.”

“Did he mention his plans for the evening?”

“He said he had to go out for a while later that night. But I do not know where. Denise kept his appointments. It might be on his calendar.”

Jaid was sure someone had already checked that. She made a note to ask Hedgelin about it.

“I understand that the security code is changed monthly.”

Sanchez looked at Shepherd. “Yes. We are very careful. Always.”

With ease, Jaid followed the other agent’s line of thought. “That must get confusing.” She offered the woman a small smile. “I struggled to remember my new phone number for weeks.”

Something flashed in the other woman’s face, there and gone too quickly to be identified. “It is necessary.”

“And you never shared that information with anyone?” Recalling Sorenson’s bout with the dropped purse, she added “Maybe wrote it down somewhere that someone else could find it?”

“I never told anyone, no. Not ever.”

“But you might have written it down? At least the first few days of the month until you could remember it.”

There was fear lurking in the woman’s eyes now. Her fingers clenched and unclenched reflexively. “The cardinal gave Denise and me a slip of paper on the first of the month. We learned the code and threw the papers away.”

“How long after getting this month’s code did you discard the paper?”

Sanchez hesitated. “I do not remember. Just a few days, surely.”

“And where would you have disposed of it?”

Shepherd’s question seemed to agitate the woman even further. “Here. I am careful. Always careful. The cardinal is . . . he was a holy man. A great man. I tried to do my best for him.”

“I’m certain you did.” She threw a grateful look in Adam’s direction at his words. “The cardinal must have been very pleased with your work. You’ve been with him for a long time.”

“
Sí.
Fifteen years since my Eduardo died.”

“Does someone else live with you, Mrs. Sanchez?” Jaid asked. She nodded toward the kitchen. “It looks like you had a guest for breakfast.”

Following the direction of Jaid’s gaze, the other woman shook her head. “No, I live alone. But my son, Luis, he comes often. He helps me with the house and the yard.”

“Is he still here?” Shepherd sent her a small smile when her attention turned to him. “We’d like to talk to him if he is.”

She didn’t respond. Jaid looked at her sharply. “Mrs. Sanchez, is your son in the house now?”

Her answer was a slow shake of the head. “He left. Hours ago.”

The half-eaten breakfast on the table hadn’t been sitting there for hours; Jaid would bet on that. The entire home was spotless. Not a speck of dust was visible on the small coffee table in front of the couch. Maria Sanchez was a woman used to tending house. The dishes would have been cleared and cleaned within minutes after the meal was over.

Most likely their arrival had ended breakfast.

“Do you have Luis’s address?” Adam asked. “We’d like to talk to him.”

“He . . . he just moved yesterday. He came this morning to pick up a few more things.” Sanchez’s attempt at a smile failed. “His new place is bigger, he says, but I have not been there. I do not know the address.”

“How about a phone number?” Jaid knew, when the woman shook her head, that Sanchez was lying. At least about her son.

Another fifteen minutes of questioning yielded nothing further, and Maria remained maddeningly reticent about Luis’s whereabouts. Finally, they took their leave and headed back to the vehicle.

“I’m guessing Luis Sanchez went through the back door when he saw us out front,” Jaid said, as she got in the SUV. “Bet a background check on him is going to yield a lot more of interest than anything his mother offered.”

“Already on that.” Shepherd pulled out his cell and punched in a number. “What’s the DCPD’s liaison’s name, again? Griega?”