Death Angel (31 page)

“No. They’d never believe me.” Kate’s
answer was almost a moan.
 

“Aside from being abusive to his office
staff, do you know anything about Garvey?”

“Not really,” she admitted.

“Well, I do.” At her look of surprise,
he wiggled his eyebrows. “Honest to God, Kate, that’s why I’m having so much
trouble buying this. He may be an impressive lawyer, but the man’s a cipher.
His wife, Lisa, wears the pants in the family, which may explain why he’s so
nasty to his staff.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Murderers can be
perfectly ordinary people. I remember when I went to look at the pictures at
the police station, I was frightened that I’d see the face of the killer on the
screen. Afterward it dawned on me that I’d been looking for some long-haired,
unshaven, squinty-eyed monster. An easily spotted deviate.”

She heard Mike let out his breath in a
slow, steady stream.
 

“I could never understand why anyone
would suspect Richard,” she said. “I still don’t. The thing is, if people could
look at him and see a killer, then the normality of life is not a standard to
gauge a person’s potential for evil.”

Mike sighed. “You’re right. We all want
the bad guy to look like a monster. If evil doesn’t wear a strange face, then
we might all have the potential for evil. I guess I can concede that point. But
you still don’t have any proof that Garvey’s a killer.”

“I know I don’t have enough evidence to
take to the police,” Kate said, “but I was considering checking up on Garvey.
It sounds stupid, but I might be able to find out something that could be
helpful.”

“This isn’t like Colonel Garvey in the
library with the hatchet. You’re talking murder, and murder’s definitely not a
game.” Mike’s frustration was clear. “Sure you could go to the library and look
up Garvey in the newspaper files. While you’re at it, you could check into
everyone in town with the PF plates?”

He stared at her for a long time before
continuing. “Much as I hate to encourage your delusions, I can see you need to
get this out of your system.”

“I know you’re just trying to humor me
and I really appreciate it.”

“Believe me, Kate, I’m not humoring
you.” His expression was serious, eyes flinty. “Jenny was my godchild. If
there’s the slightest possibility that Garvey was involved in her death, I’ll
kill the bastard myself.”

Despite a jolt of fear at his words, she
felt relieved that she’d finally be doing something active to find Jenny’s
murderer. She’d begin to check out not only Garvey but also everyone she knew
on the license plate list. Maybe just asking questions would elicit new
information that might help Leidecker in his investigation. What could it hurt?

Carl frowned at the clock on the squad
room wall. It was ten after nine, and Tony still wasn’t back. How the hell long
did it take to measure skid marks at the scene of an accident?
 

He picked up the phone and punched Bea’s
extension. “Did Tony understand that I wanted to see him during this calendar
year?” he asked.

“Yes, Carl. It’s only been thirty
minutes since I called him.”

He hung up. He hated waiting. Picking up
the mug on his desk, he took a swallow and grimaced at the mouthful of cold,
bitter coffee. He pushed his chair back, pulled open his office door and,
avoiding Bea’s amused glance, stomped down the hall to the kitchen. The Pyrex
container held a half cup of gritty coffee.

He snatched the Pyrex pot off the hot
plate and rinsed it out in the sink. He filled it to the top with cold water.
He flipped open the top of the coffee maker and pulled out the old filter. It
caught on the edge, spilling coffee grounds onto the counter. Ignoring the
mess, he dumped the rest of the grounds in the wastebasket. He started pouring
in the water, but it ran right out the bottom, hissing and burping as it hit
the hot plate.

“Dammit!” Still holding the half empty
coffee pot, he pulled open the door and bellowed down the hall. “Bea! Get in
here!”

Water sloshed on his shoes as he turned
back to the coffee maker. A few more drops of water fell, bubbling and popping
in the heat. Carl glared.

“What now?” Bea asked.

“That machine hates me.”

Bea snorted. “Honestly, Carl, it’s
simple enough. Even Amy can make coffee, and she has to write out the alphabet
in order to do the filing. You forgot to turn it off.”
 

In no time at all she had a new pot of
coffee brewing and she’d cleaned up the mess on the counter.
 

“Since you came in this morning, you’ve
been a real prick.” She stared at him and he shrugged. “If it’s work related,
maybe it’s something I can help you with. If it’s personal and you don’t want
to talk about it, I’ll stay out of your face.”

“It’s the Warner case.”

“I thought as much.” She poured him a
mug and handed it to him. “Try this.”

Carl breathed in the coffee vapors. He
took a tentative sip. It was hot. And it was good.
 

“That’s terrific, Bea. I really
appreciate it.”

Back in his office, Carl waved Bea to a
chair, but he was still too restless to sit down. He drank more of the coffee
and with each sip felt less frazzled.

“I know you weren’t thrilled about
making the statement to the press about Richard Warner,” she said. “I assume
Mayor Etzel wanted it done.”

“Actually he wanted me to say the case
was closed. I wouldn’t do that. So we compromised.” He paced over to the
windows and then back again. “I hate leaving a case dangling like this.”

“I know you, Carl. You’re holding
something back. Does it have some bearing on the case?”

“I stopped over to talk to Kate Warner
yesterday. I figured the statement would be another blow for her to handle, and
I didn’t want her to hear it on the news.”

“She had to have been expecting it.”

“It doesn’t make it any easier.”

“No. I don’t suppose so.” She waited but
when he didn’t continue, she prodded. “And?”

Carl glared at her over the rim of his
mug. He came around the desk and sat on the corner. He took a last sip then set
the mug down, and reached into his pocket.

“She took it pretty well. She was upset
though and at one point threw a wet towel across the room. It hit the
wastebasket that fell against the wall and some trash fell out. I went over to
straighten things up. I found this.”

Carl pulled his hand out of his pocket.
He opened his fingers to show Bea the cellophane wrapper.

“Where do you suppose Kate got the
ButterSkots?”

Twenty-two

K
ate squinted at the screen
, eyebrows
bunched as she turned the crank of the microfilm machine and searched for the
correct entry. The filmed pages whizzed by in a blur of black and white.
Occasionally she stopped to check the date.
 

She ran her finger down her notes.
January 16, page 6. She found the correct page of the newspaper and adjusted
the focus. It was an article on a fund-raiser for Pickard General two years
earlier. The chaircouple was Lisa and Joseph Garvey. She scanned the article,
but found nothing of particular interest.

She had decided to begin her background
check of “suspects” at the library. Since Garvey was the prime target of her
investigations, she had started with him. It was tedious work looking up each
of the references to either Joseph or Lisa Garvey in the local media. Her eyes
burned from reading text on the computer monitors and the microfilm screen.

Crossing out the last entry on the
yellow, lined paper, she crumpled it up, and tossed it in the wastebasket.
 

It was surprising how much information
she had been able to find. Unfortunately, her hard work had provided a skeletal
picture of Garvey that meshed poorly with the suspicions she had.

According to everything she had found so
far, Joseph Garvey was a respected lawyer, model citizen, faithful husband, and
good father. A prince among men, Kate thought, as she flexed her knees and then
her ankles.
 

Had she been wrong about Garvey?

She honestly didn’t know. Starting at
the front of the notebook, she leafed through the pages, reading the details of
Garvey’s life that she’d been able to locate.
 

He’d been born in Kenilworth, an
ultra-wealthy suburb of Chicago. His father owned and operated a chemical
company, which had profited handsomely during the Vietnam War and continued to
prosper. His mother, an outspoken advocate of equal rights for women, was a
judge. Garvey was the oldest of three children. His sister had married into an
old-moneyed family from the North Shore. His brother worked in the family
business.
 

Garvey had gone to all the right private
schools. She’d found a reference to a party given for him on his graduation
from Harvard Law School. After a stint in Atlanta with Farrington, Beard &
Kruesi, he moved back to the Chicago area. He worked for eight years at
Ginthner, Case, Seyer and Vlach, then went out on his own. Garvey &
Associates had been in business for fourteen years.

Dry references that gave little insight
into the man’s character.

On the personal side, his life appeared
equally blameless. During his last year in law school, he married Lisa Bowers.
They’d been married for twenty-eight years. The Garveys had two sons. Mark was
a lawyer, and Taylor, five years younger, was an artist slash actor.

Kate had looked at dozens of pictures
from the
Pickard
Advocate
. The Garveys appeared to be favorite subjects. Lisa was more
heavily committed to the social scene. She was on several boards, not just a
token, but also an active member. The Pickard Fine Arts Council and Pickard
General Hospital were major recipients of contributions and volunteer help from
Lisa. And to give Garvey credit, he was at her side in all the pictures,
apparently proud of his wife’s successes.

“Oh rats,” Kate muttered, glaring at the
picture of Garvey and Lisa at the benefit for the Youth Campus. “Mike’ll never
believe me now.”

Everything she’d gathered showed Garvey
in a positive light. The only information she had uncovered that might prove of
interest was that two weeks prior to Jenny’s death, Joseph Garvey had
participated in a career day event at St. Madelaine’s. Kate had always
questioned whether Jenny would get in the car with a stranger. However, if
Garvey had been familiar from his visit to the school, Jenny might have seen
him as someone in authority she could trust.

Aside from the school visit info, the
sum total of two days work was exactly zero. All she had to show for her labors
was some unexciting biographical data, and a handful of pictures of a smiling
Lisa in various sequined gowns on the arm of a tuxedoed Garvey. And she’d only
begun to look up some of the other people on the list.

“Damn it!” she said as she stood up and
gathered her things.

“Is that meant for me?”

Carl Leidecker’s sudden appearance in
the study alcove startled Kate. She gave a small squeak of fright, which she
quickly muffled with a hand over her mouth.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I thought
you were talking to me, but I couldn’t hear what you said.”

“I was swearing.”
 

Now it was Kate’s turn to be
embarrassed. She hadn’t meant to be offensive. When she looked up at him
however, it seemed that her blunt reply amused him.
 

“A lot of people swear when they see
me,” he said. He shifted the books under his arm. “But they’re usually doing
something they shouldn’t be.”

“How are you?” She was flustered, but
she managed to get the words out without stumbling.
 

“Fine, thanks. And you?” Before she
could respond he stepped closer, staring down at her. “I mean it. Is everything
all right with you?”

“I’m okay. I’m sorry you were the target
of my anger the other day. The frustration gets to me occasionally.”

“I’m not sure you heard all that I said
on Wednesday. The case isn’t really closed. We won’t have the same task force
working on it as we had two months ago but it’s still an active investigation.”

“I appreciate that.”

His eyes searched her face. She wanted
to turn away, but refused to let him intimidate her. She held her ground.

“Everyone sees things through a cloud of
their own prejudices and agendas,” Carl said. “We make judgments based on our
own viewpoint.”
 

“That’s human nature.”

“But sometimes the viewpoint is wrong.”

“In this case, you were wrong about
Richard,” she said.

“I dealt with the information I
had.”
 

He halted, as if waiting for some
reaction. Suddenly the alcove seemed far removed from the rest of the library
but before Kate could leave, Carl began speaking again.