Love Inspired Suspense January 2014 (28 page)

Janice buffed her hands together. “Good for you, girlfriend, and good riddance. The nerve of those guys.” She marched down the steps.

Caroline wrapped her arms around one of Laurel's. “Who's our lawyer, Mom?”

Peering into the anxious face just beginning to form into womanhood, Laurel's anger melted into anxiety. Who was their lawyer? She wished she knew. SPC had several attorneys on retainer, but none of them handled this type of criminal law.

“Don't worry, sweetheart. Let your mama figure that out.”

Caroline released her and stepped back, face scrunching into a scowl. “That's the sort of thing you always say, and I'm tired of being treated like a toddler. You quit being my
mama
by the time I was five years old.”

The teenager stomped down the stairs and scurried after Janice, leaving Laurel stranded on the porch, mouth agape. Disrespectful didn't begin to describe her daughter's attitude. And yet, didn't Caroline also feel disrespected by Laurel's instinct to shield her?

Laurel's shoulders slumped. Why couldn't Caroline understand how much her mother wanted to spare her problems she didn't need to carry? What was so terrible about that? Didn't the girl realize how hard her mother was trying—and how close she was to falling apart? If someone had offered to carry this burden for her, Laurel would have been incredibly tempted to accept. But there was no one to fix this for her, or even share the load. As usual, she was on her own.

* * *

David stepped around the side of the porch, pocketing his cell phone. He hadn't meant to eavesdrop on the skirmish between mother and daughter, but they hadn't exactly kept their voices down, especially Caroline.

The girl was awfully hard on her mother, but as a perennial free spirit, he sympathized with Caroline's resentment toward her perception of being smothered. Of course, a little smothering kind of went with the mothering thing, and this was a crisis situation. Then again, Laurel's passion to protect her daughter and herself did occasionally drift into the territory of excessive. What had happened in the woman's life to anchor her in defensive mode?

Laurel was dawdling down the steps, gaze focused ahead but attention a million miles away. Clearing his throat, David stepped nearer.

She gasped. “Where have you been?”

If she hadn't meant the question as an accusation, she'd missed the mark. But coming up on a woman who'd been raked over the coals by the police and then taken a hit in an ongoing war with her teenager wasn't the best moment to find her in a mellow mood.

“As soon as the detectives started telling you to get lost, I stepped out back to call my lawyer in San Antonio.”

“Good for you that you've got representation.” She remained on the bottom step, her gaze now on a level with his.

David extended his lawyer's business card toward her, showing where he'd written on the back. “This is the Denver firm my lawyer suggests for you and Caroline. They're top flight. My cell number is below theirs in case you have any questions about walking through a murder case as the chief suspect.” He offered a rueful half grin.

Her jaw slackened as she accepted the card. “Thank you. That was very thoughtful.”

Surprise leaked through her tone. Wasn't she used to anyone doing nice things for her? Or maybe it was just him that she assumed incapable of a good deed. Evidently, sheltering them from the storm, lending them clothes and giving them a ride home hadn't managed to perch a white hat on his head. His lips flattened into a thin line.

“No, really!” She laid a hand on his shoulder, face softening, and a spurt of warmth went through him. “I'm...amazed...and appreciative. I'm sorry if I seem sharp edged. I must be growing a little shell-shocked at this constant barrage of terrible events.” Her gaze dropped to the card. “I suppose these top-flight legal beagles are also top-drawer expensive.”

“Lawyers are always expensive, but it can't hurt to give them a call and talk to them about your situation and their fees.”

“No, I suppose it can't.” Laurel offered a weak smile as she stepped down onto the sidewalk.

He looked away from her toward the pale pink Victorian house next door where Caroline and Janice had disappeared. While Laurel's home sported modest touches of gingerbread, one turreted tower and tooled spindles on the railing that skirted the wraparound porch, Janice's home took ornate to a new level—multiple towers and gables, plus gobs of gingerbread trim painted pastel blue in every available niche.

Laurel laughed, a pleasant sound that tingled up David's spine. He looked down at her.

“I read the expression on your face,” she said. “Mine is more of an Edwardian style and hers is classic Queen Anne.”

“You know a bit about architecture?”

“No, but Janice does, and she rarely withholds from me any scrap of information she possesses.” The wry words were accompanied by a fond grin. “She's a real-estate agent and excellent at her job.”

“I'll walk you over there.”

“You don't ha—” She bit her lip and then nodded as they went up the sidewalk. “Thanks, but then you don't need to stick around. You've been more than kind already.”

“Could you use a little extra muscle to help clean things up in there?” David gestured toward the house behind them. “When the cops say it's okay to go in, that is.”

Laurel shook her head. “I may hire a company to clean up the mess. Insurance will probably pay. I wonder if the upstairs looks as bad.” Her face paled. “Our rooms are up there, Caroline's and mine. I feel sick to my stomach thinking about anyone pawing through my personal things.”

“I'd be surprised if you didn't react that way.”

“And now the police are going to do the same.”

She wrinkled her nose, which was a very cute expression on her. David mentally kicked himself for noticing.

“Mr. Greene, a word with you!” The bark from Detective Berg on the porch coincided with a van bearing the Denver police insignia pulling into the driveway.

David turned on his heel. “I think not. I gave my statement to the sheriff at my cabin, and I have nothing to add to it. You can refer any further questions to my lawyer.”

He strode back to the porch and handed the detective one of his attorney's cards. Good thing he kept several on him at all times. A muscle jumped in Berg's jaw, but he said nothing as he snatched the card from David's hand.

Suppressing a grim smile, David swiveled away to find Laurel had gone on without him. A glance in the direction of Janice's house caught a glimpse of her disappearing inside. He had no good excuse to follow her. Why did that realization come with a pang?

Get a grip, buddy!

He climbed into his Lexus and drove away in search of the nearest decent hotel. David had packed a bag before the leaving the cabin, and had no intention of leaving town until he'd unearthed some kind of link between the dead school teacher and his murdered girlfriend.

If one existed.

How cruel would that be to have this hope of exoneration, then have it snatched away by some mundane explanation for the matching tattoos? No, he couldn't let himself think like that. There
had
to be a connection between the two women, but how was he going to dig it up? He knew only one person who fit the description of master sleuth who might actually be willing to believe him, but tracking Chris Mason down sometimes required skills on the level of the FBI or CIA.

An hour later, ensconced in a midrate hotel room where no one would expect to encounter a rich, notorious personage, he sat at the desk and took out his cell phone. A swipe and a tap brought up his photo gallery. He pulled up one of the photos he'd taken of the dead woman in Laurel Adams's trunk.

Swallowing bitter bile, he forced himself to study a torso shot of the murdered teacher. He could find no bruises on the throat to indicate that the woman was strangled as Alicia had been. No commonality there. In fact, other than the expression of pain or terror—or maybe both—frozen on the woman's face, there was no outward clue as to how she had died. When he'd leaned in to take the photo, he'd caught the barest whiff of an odd, burnt-almond scent. Poison? Only forensic examination might tell for sure.

He moved to the next photo and peered at the close-up of the tattoo beneath Ms. Eldon's collarbone. Snapping photos with a phone camera in the dead of night in the middle of a blizzard with only a flashlight for illumination didn't capture the best images, but this rendering was clear enough to make out the design of a bird's razor-sharp claws closed around a jewel.

In Melissa Eldon's case, the jewel was a ruby. Alicia's had been a sapphire, but there all difference ended. The claws were identical down to the striated ebony of the bird foot and the golden gleam of the talons. Logic leaped to the assumption that the same tattoo artist rendered both drawings. Didn't that bode well for a possible connection between the women?

David left his photo gallery and brought up his contacts. He had one phone number for Chris, who stood among the few friends he still possessed. Ironically, the friendship had formed as a direct result of the murder investigation that effectively murdered David's good name. More ironic still, David and Chris had gone to grade school together, though they weren't friends then. Who would guess David would come to like and respect one of the top investigative reporters in the world during a time when he regarded reporters on a level with the aphids that sometimes attacked his garden?

Actually, he owed Chris his life. If the man hadn't bluntly gotten into his face with the gospel David might easily have decided to end his personal pain in the final solution of death at his own hand.

However, none of that meant Chris would answer the phone when he called. Chris's job sometimes dictated undercover antics, and then he became incommunicado. Maybe his marriage a little over a year ago had changed the type of assignments he accepted. David could only hope.

Gut clenched, he hit the call button and listened to it ring. Once. Twice. Three times. At least he didn't get a message telling him the number was no longer in service. He should have stayed in better touch with his friend after the wedding instead of becoming absorbed in his own pursuits, but hermit habits can be hard to break, particularly when his natural inclinations were reinforced by outward circumstances.

“Mason here. This better rank right up there with a national emergency, David.”

David expelled a spurt of laughter. No warm fuzzies with Chris, but the fact that the man answered when this wasn't a good time for a chat spoke volumes about their friendship. The knowledge might have put David in a cheerful mood except for the reason for his call.

“I'm in the loop in the murder of another woman, Chris.”

A hissed-in breath, punctuated by traffic sounds in the background, said he'd grabbed his friend's attention.

“You a suspect?”

“Not this time—not yet, at least—but the body practically landed on my doorstep in the middle of a blizzard. In fact, the main suspects
did
land on my doorstep—with the victim in their car trunk.”

Chris let out a low whistle. “Give me the thumbnail version.”

“Why don't I cut to the chase? The woman in the trunk had the same tattoo as Alicia did—and in the same spot under her collarbone.”

“You think somebody may be offing women with similar tats?”

“Not just ‘similar.' It's the
same
tattoo in every detail except the color of the jewel that the talons are holding.”

“You think the two women may be connected.” The words were a statement, not a question.

“I'm
hoping
they may be connected, and that the connection is related to the reason that they're dead. Because I
know
I didn't kill the schoolteacher in Laurel and Caroline's trunk.”

“Laurel and Caroline?”

“The mother and daughter who rode out a blizzard with me in my cabin in the Rockies.”

“You think they might have killed Alicia, too?”

“No!” David sucked in a breath. “I mean, I don't know. If they killed Melissa Eldon, one of Caroline's middle-school teachers, then maybe.”

“But you don't think they did it.”

“I'd prefer that not be the case. Besides, I can't think of any possible connection they could have with Alicia.”

“Hmm.” The sound was ripe with speculation. “I take it that Laurel isn't middle-aged and married.”

“It's not that way.”

“Okay.”

Chris agreed too fast, and David ground his teeth together. “I just want some advice on how to uncover a connection between the two dead women that goes deeper than their tattoos. If that connection turns out to include Laurel, then so be it.”

“Take it easy, buddy.” Chris chuckled. “I'll—”

“Chri-i-i-is! Hurry!” A feminine wail sliced neatly through the conversation.

“Hang tough, honey. We're almost there.”

Chris's assuring words had to be for his wife, Maddie, but David had never heard the ex-army communications officer in panic mode. Something really bad had to be going on.

“Sounds like I'd better let you go. Could you—”

“We're on our way to the hospital,” Chris cut in. “My daughter is eager to be born. Let me—”

“Son!” Maddie's growl nipped David's ear.

“We went the old-fashioned way and chose not to know what we were getting,” Chris said. “I need to turn off the outside world right now, including my Bluetooth, but I'll get back to you when I can.”

“Don't call me. I'll call you?”

“Bingo, buddy! In the meantime, think location, location, location.”

“What?”

“Look into this teacher's background, and compare it to what you know of Alicia's. If they were ever in the same place at the same time, that spot would be a good place to dig.”