For You (The 'Burg Series) (38 page)

He heard the zip go on the body bag.

“Late.”

“I’ll give Mom and Dad a break and close tonight.”

“They’ve only covered for you and Morrie one night.”

“They’re not as young as they used to be.”

“I heard that!” Colt heard Jackie shout in the background.

He would have smiled normally, but he didn’t feel like smiling just about now.

“Feb –”

“Colt, it’s just…” she hesitated, uncomfortable, edgy, not sure if she should share, “I need to store up my markers for when we actually make it to Costa’s.”

There it was. Indication of a future.

That made him feel like smiling. He didn’t smile but he did let it go.

“Is Morrie on with you tonight?”

“No, he’s home havin’ dinner with Dee and the kids.”

“He comin’ back?”

“I don’t know.”

“Call him, tell him he’s comin’ back.”

“It’s okay, Darryl’s on.”

“Honey, Darryl forgets what he’s doin’ in the middle of sharpening a pencil.” He heard her soft laughter and went on. “Do me a favor, call Morrie. Minute Jack and Jackie prepare to leave, his ass is there.”

“Okay.”

“Can you call Stavros? Tell him we’re not gonna make it.”

“Sure.”

“Sorry about Costa’s.”

“Beauty of Costa’s,” she told him, “it’s always a promise, even the minute you leave.”

Christ, he liked this new Feb.

“Later, baby.”

Her voice was a whisper when she said, “Later, Alec.”

That was another promise, one he liked better than the juiciest souvlaki and the sweetest baklava this side of the Mississippi.

He flipped his phone shut, tucked it in his back pocket, turned and called to Marty who was standing inside the front door. Marty jogged up to him.

“Do me a favor, go to your cruiser and call in a team. I want this place printed and combed.”

Marty stared at him and asked, “For a suicide?”

Colt sighed instead of curling his hands into fists. “Just do it, Marty.”

“Gotcha.”

Colt walked out the door and to Julie McCall. He’d spoken to her briefly before entering and again coming out and asking her to stay. She was shaken up and crying when he arrived. She was still shaken up but she’d reapplied her makeup since he’d last seen her.

“Ms. McCall, thanks for staying. I won’t take a lot more of your time.”

“I can’t believe it, I just can’t.”

He nodded and asked, “This seem like something Amy would do?”

She shook her head. “No. No way. She was shy but she seemed… I don’t know…” she searched for a word, “content, I guess.”

She wasn’t content the night she walked into J&J’s. She also hadn’t left a suicide note.

“You didn’t happen to see a note when you walked in?”

She shook her head again. “No, I just, you know, you talked to me about her and her bein’ no call-no show and all, I got worried. Then heard word about Marie Lowe and you talked about Mr. Lowe and well…” she trailed off then continued, “when she goes to visit her folks, I come and get her mail, turn lights on and off, that whole thing, so people won’t know she’s gone.”

Colt nodded and she kept talking.

“I had her key. Keep it on my ring. It’s hard to get them off so I didn’t bother. She goes to see her folks regular, even during holidays, like the Fourth of July if they make a long weekend. I came straight after work, knocked on the door but she didn’t answer. I thought, ‘What the hey?’ Right? I have a key, she won’t mind.”

Julie was right about one thing, Amy wouldn’t mind.
 

“Place felt weird, silent, her car outside, she had to be there. So I had a look. That’s when I found her and called you.”

Death had a feel he knew, the place would definitely feel weird.

“I don’t believe it,” Julie said again, eyeing him and looking like she was trying hard to call up tears.

“Go home, Ms. McCall,” he told her, “call a friend, don’t be alone tonight.”

“Maybe I could… we could…” she paused, “maybe later you’d want to meet for a drink? You know, toast to Amy?”

Was the woman seriously asking him out on a date after finding her friend had committed suicide?

It didn’t matter. He’d toasted to enough dead people recently, it wasn’t much fun then and it was with Feb. He sure as fuck wasn’t going to do it with Julie McCall.

“I got work, Ms. McCall.”

“Yeah, but… later?” she pushed.

“Ms. McCall –”

“It’s just that,” she was searching and what she found was so lame it made him want to roll his eyes just like Feb, “I’m sad.”

It was time to shut this down once and for all and even though it wasn’t exactly true, it also wasn’t false either so he said, “I appreciate this was difficult and I also appreciate the offer but, later, I’ll be with my girlfriend.”

Crash and burn, her eyes screamed it, he knew, he’d seen it enough times. He had no problem with a woman being forward, he just had a problem with the ones who wouldn’t take a hint.

Her eyes flitted away. “Yeah, okay.”

“Call a friend,” he advised, “don’t be alone tonight.”

“Yeah, a friend.”

“Drive safe,” Colt finished and walked to his truck.

He opened the passenger side door then the glove compartment and found some plastic gloves. He closed the door, beeped the locks and snapped the gloves on while he walked back up to the house.

* * * * *

Colt was sitting at his desk, the Station mostly quiet and he was scanning the notes he’d written on a pad. He’d been writing and scanning them twenty minutes and nothing added up so he stopped scanning.

He picked up the phone and dialed the number he’d looked up half an hour ago.

It was late but Doc still answered, “Hello?”

“Doc, Colt.”

“Son –”

“Doc, Amy’s dead.”

There was silence but Colt could feel the shock across the line.

“Murdered?” Doc whispered.

“Suicide.”

“No,” Doc breathed.

“You know I respect you, Doc, but I gotta ask. In light of this, you got anything more for me?”

“She leave a note?”

“No.”

“Then I got nothin’ more.”

He did, the stubborn old jackass.

“All right, Doc.”

“You call her parents?”

“That’s my next call.”

“Give me their number, son. I’ll do it.”

“I don’t –”

“I know ‘em, Colt. Not good hearin’ this from anyone but I reckon it’d be better hearin’ it from someone they know who took care of their daughter since before she could crawl.”

Colt couldn’t argue with that and he gave Doc their number.

He put the phone down at the same time Sully, sitting across from him at his desk, put his down.

Sully was grinning.

“Fuckin’ A, Colt, DNA and some prints lifted from that shit we got from Feb’s fit DNA and prints lifted from Denny’s. We got him at her house.”

Colt grinned back. “Great, Sully.”

“Not done, my man. They also matched prints at Angie’s.”

Colt felt an electric pulse sear through his system. That news was more than great.

“Sure,” Sully went on, “you could argue with the prints at Angie’s, she had loads of visitors, probably why he was careless. He could have visited her anytime. But Feb’s? He’s fucked.”

He was, two plus two were equaling four, more than a coincidence, so much so if the impossible happened and this shit went to trial, a jury would think that too. It was fucking brilliant.

“Anything from Pete and Butch?” Colt asked.

Sully shook his head but he was still grinning. He leaned back in his chair and lifted his arms to place both hands behind his head.

“Those scenes are clean but this is what I think,” Sully started then leaned forward quickly, excited, ready to call it down and he put his elbows on his desk, “he goes to Feb’s before all this shit, we don’t know when, before Marie tips it with her confrontation. Does Feb routinely have her house fingerprinted? No. He doesn’t reckon she’ll ever find the cum rags ‘less she moves and she might not even know what they are. Or, he’s so sick, he might not even care or he might
want
her to find ‘em,” Colt nodded and Sully went on. “Then Marie tips it and he uses what he’s learned from Feb’s journals to go on his vengeance spree. From what we can tell, Puck’s between Marie and Pete, probably still actin’ on rage, maybe even lookin’ for you, but findin’ Puck. He’s careful at Pete’s but not so careful with Angie. Careful enough with the crime scene but, he lives in town, Angie’s place he’d reckon was infected. Might even be he would think we wouldn’t give two shits about Angie, bein’ who she was. He’s back to careful with Butch. After Marie, he’s controlled with all of them, even Angie, perfecting the kill.”

“The profilers get that list? Isolate a victimology?”

“They got it. They figure Angie was his way of announcing this to Feb, on a high from doin’ Pete and decidin’ it was time for her to learn she had a hero. But with that note about Puck, the warning about you and it bein’ Butch and Pete who bit it, they’re thinkin’ his next target is a guy named Grant who lives in Sturgis.”

Colt didn’t want to know but he asked, “What’d he do?”

Sully didn’t want to tell him but he said, “He worked a bar with her, assistant manager. Tried it on with her, wouldn’t take no for an answer, got insistent. She liked the job, liked the town, wanted to stay awhile, she reported him. Grant didn’t like it much and made his feelings known. Her manager made his feelings known by firin’ Grant’s ass. Guy left the job, not the town, kept harassin’ her until she finally took off.”

Colt again thought it was good Feb was home so he and Morrie had her back. He also wished he was the one who told this Grant asshole that there might be a serial killer with a hatchet after him, wreaking vengeance for all the wrongs done to Feb. He would have got a fair bit of satisfaction out of that.

“Grant bein’ warned?” Colt asked.

“Agents headin’ that way,” Sully told him then asked, “You find any link between Amy Harris and Denny?”

Colt shook his head. He’d spent a goodly amount of time in her house and even more time talking to her neighbors. He found nothing in the house. The neighbors, all the same story. Shock at the suicide, she didn’t seem that type of girl. They liked her as a neighbor. She was helpful, watching kids, dogs, cats, picking up mail while they were away. They knew her as sweet, nice, quiet and shy.

“Didn’t even find any evidence she had a kid which means zilch on her having him adopted. Like it never happened,” Colt told Sully.

“Maybe it didn’t and she was tellin’ tales.”

“Weird tale to tell.”

Sully nodded. “This is true.” He gave Colt a look. “Could it be the world just didn’t understand her and she’d had enough?”

In his sixteen years as detective he’d had five suicide callouts. In his career as a cop, he’d seen two more. Colt never understood murder, no matter what. Suicide was different. He didn’t condone it but the seven he’d seen, what he learned after, he understood them.

Amy’s, no.

“Doc’s informin’ her folks, I’ll get to them when they get here.”

Sully nodded. “Speakin’ of here, why are you? You’ll never earn another frittata from Feb sittin’ behind your desk.”

“She’s closing tonight.”

“Ah,” Sully grinned, “still, she’s behind a bar, wearin’ one of her chokers, no doubt, lookin’ hot, definitely no doubt and that bar’s two blocks away. You walk out the front door, you’re off duty, so, again, why you still here?”