“I called him from the car when I was almost home. When I heard him scream for me to run, I immediately called 911 from the car while the driver rushed me to John’s house. You all beat me there.
“If I’d done as I’d originally planned and surprised John by picking him up from his job, rather than go to the hospital, then he wouldn’t be dead. But I didn’t want to take him with me to the hospital. He doesn’t like to see people who are hurting.”
“You only did what made the most sense.”
Kate swallowed at the lump swelling in the back of her throat. “No, I should have taken care of my brother, first. If I had gone to his house I would have found out that something was going on, that there was someone chained in the basement. I would have found out and called the police.”
Kate turned away to stare out the window into the darkness. “Wilma was unconscious and didn’t even know that I was there. I hadn’t seen John in three weeks. I should have seen to him, first, and then this would never have happened. John would have told me if I’d gone to the house. It’s my fault he’s dead.”
“You’re wrong, Kate.” Detective Janek leaned a little closer. “Listen to me. Someone murdered him. That’s who is at fault, not you. The only thing that would be different had you gone there first is that you would have walked into a very bizarre scene—an unexpected scene. You would have been caught unaware and murdered along with your brother. Whatever was happening, his death is not your fault. You need to know that.”
Kate offered a brief smile. “I wish I could believe that.”
“Someday you will. In the meantime, I’m going to work very hard to find the guy who did this. We have a lot of people to interview. We’ll find a lead that takes us to the killer.”
“Do you get the names of all the people who were standing around, watching?”
“You bet we do.”
Kate stared out the window at nothing. “There was a tall man with messy hair in the crowd. He had his hands in the pockets of a loose-fitting, dark jacket. I think it was a hoodie. You should talk to him.”
“Why do you say that? Do you know something about him? Do you know who he is? Has he ever caused trouble for John?”
Kate blinked and looked over at the frowning detective. “What? No—no, I don’t know him. I’ve never seen him before.” She shook her head. “I don’t even know why I mentioned it.”
“Maybe because you know the people in the neighborhood and you didn’t recognize him as belonging there?”
Kate suddenly felt foolish and wished she hadn’t said something so out-of-the-blue. In fact, she was puzzled as to why she had.
“Maybe that’s it. I grew up there and I know most of the people in the neighborhood. I recognized a number of the faces, even if I don’t know their names. But the man just seemed … I don’t know. I don’t know why I said anything.”
“What did he look like?”
Kate tried to remember any details. “I never saw his face. I only saw him from the back. He was six-one, six-two. Something like that. I couldn’t see him very well. He was back where it was dark, so I don’t even know what color his hair was. I could just see by the way he was silhouetted in the lights from police cars that his hair was sticking up and messy.”
Detective Janek was still frowning, still staring at her. “You didn’t see his face at all? Did you make eye contact?”
Kate shook her head again. “No. I guess I’m just so shaken that I’m grasping at straws.”
“Did John have a hoodie?”
“Yes. Dark blue. He kept it in the closet to the side of the front door.”
The detective pulled out her phone and pressed a couple of keys with her thumb. “It’s me,” she said after a moment, when someone answered. “You still at the house? Good. Do me a favor. Go inside and check in the closet by the front door. Tell me if there’s a dark blue hoodie in there.”
While she was waiting, Kate asked, “You think the guy took John’s hoodie? Maybe to cover up the blood?”
Before she could answer, the detective still at the house came back on the line and Detective Janek pressed the phone back to her ear. “Okay, thanks,” she said. “See you in the morning.” She slipped the phone back in her pocket. “John’s hoodie is still there.”
“Oh. Okay. Sorry. I shouldn’t be trying to give you leads when I don’t know what I’m even talking about.”
“It’s part of the job. Most leads end up going nowhere, but sometimes they do.” She frowned again. “Are you usually a suspicious person?”
“It’s my job.”
“I thought you were an accountant. You said you were an auditor for KDEX.”
“Not that kind of an auditor,” Kate said. “I’m a security auditor. I get paid to be suspicious.”
“Really.” The detective was staring again. “Are you good at it?”
Feeling self-conscious, Kate shrugged. “I’m told I have a knack for it. I must be good enough—I still have a job.”
“Who are you paid to be suspicious of?”
“KDEX Systems supplies parts for missile guidance systems. It’s a pretty sensitive industry, so we’re naturally serious about everything we do. We have an electronic security team—that’s a whole world unto itself. I don’t generally get called in on that kind of issue unless it’s an internal breach.
“But there are other threats—thieves trying to steal valuable equipment, corporate spies after sensitive information, people with a grudge against the company who want to cause trouble, that kind of thing. When a bad actor like that slips into the company under the radar, they become my responsibility. I deal with that kind. It’s my job to ferret them out.”
“Sort of a corporate cop?”
Kate offered a weak smile. “I’m hardly in your league. It’s nothing like what you do.”
The woman was back to studying Kate’s eyes but she didn’t say anything.
“Well, it’s pretty late,” Kate said as she curled her fingers around the door handle. “Thank you for the ride home.”
“Kate—”
Kate paused before opening the door. Detective Janek tapped the palm of her hand on the steering wheel.
“What is it?”
Kate couldn’t imagine what questions could be left. She’d answered so many already that the detective probably now knew more about her than anyone alive.
The woman stared down at her hand gripping the wheel. Her jaw muscles flexed as she considered.
“I know this isn’t a good time, but would it be all right if I came in and we had a private conversation?”
“A private conversation?”
“Yes. A private conversation that’s strictly off the record.”
Kate cocked her head. “Off the record? What do you mean?”
“I mean just between you and me. Not to be repeated. Not to anyone.” She finally looked over and held up her thumb, pointing her first finger as if it were a gun. “If you repeat a word of it, I’ll have to shoot you.”
The woman dropped her thumb, imitating dropping the hammer of a gun.
Kate frowned, not knowing what to say.
The detective smiled then in a suddenly human way, breaking the tension, and in the sincerity of that smile, Kate saw the woman beneath the cool veneer of authority. “Just kidding. About shooting you, I mean. But it is strictly confidential and I’m asking you to keep it that way.”
“It’s kind of late, Detective,” Kate said as she glanced past the barren trees toward her house. The trees would leaf out soon. It was a beautiful street when the maples all leafed out. The older neighborhood had deep yards and mature landscaping that afforded privacy. “I haven’t even unpacked, yet.”
“I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t important,” Detective Janek said. She sounded troubled.
Kate stared into the woman’s dark eyes a moment. They were intense with resolve, along with something Kate couldn’t quite figure out.
Worry, maybe.
Or maybe fear.
“Sure, okay.” Kate hooked some of her black hair behind an ear. “I’ll make some coffee.”
Detective Janek smiled with relief. “AJ. Everyone calls me AJ.” She let out a weary sigh. “And coffee would be great.”
CHAPTER
SIX
Kate unlocked the heavy oak door and let them both in. Her house wasn’t large, but it had been built with the kind of care and attention to detail that didn’t grace newer homes. The crown moldings were finely detailed and perfectly fitted; the walls were real plaster, the cabinets real wood. It wasn’t grand or at all extravagant, but it had the kind of simple honesty that had become all too rare. Without being showy, the place exuded a warmth and charm that Kate had always cherished. It was a comforting retreat from the rest of her life.
On the way to the kitchen she noticed that the message machine on a side table beside the couch was blinking. Everyone who knew her called her on her cell. The only people who ever called on her home phone anymore were salespeople and fund-raisers. That kind of annoying message was about the last thing in the world she wanted to hear right then.
In the small kitchen, Kate flicked on the light switch. While AJ followed her in, looking about, Kate pulled a stainless-steel canister out from under the cabinets against the wall. After she set the coffeepot’s filter basket on the white laminate counter and put in a paper filter, she added four scoops of coffee. As she filled the pot with water at the kitchen sink, she watched out of the corner of her eye as the detective studied the family photos on the wall.
“Looks like you get your lustrous black hair from your mother.”
Kate saw that she was looking at a twenty-five-year-old photo of her parents standing on the front porch, with Kate and John sitting on the steps at their feet.
“And you have your father’s green eyes. It’s a rather striking combination.”
“We’re all products of heredity,” Kate said. “It’s not like we get to choose.”
The woman looked back over her shoulder, momentarily giving Kate an odd, unreadable look. She turned back to the photos on the wall and pointed at one.
“What’s this one?”
“It’s when I earned my black belt.”
The detective made an appreciative expression. “Do you still practice?”
“Healthy body, healthy mind,” Kate said. “I find that working out helps relieve stress. Sweating from beating the hell out of a bag is a good way to get rid of frustration.”
“So you work out at a gym?”
“Twice a week at a Combat Concepts with an instructor.”
When AJ raised an eyebrow, Kate explained. “My job is to find out who is causing problems. Sometimes it’s simply incompetence, but most of the time it’s criminal activity of one sort or another. We have security people and I’ve never had any problems, but you never know. I feel better being prepared.
“The rest of the time I work out at home. I have some simple equipment in the basement. A spinner bike for high-intensity work, weights, jump rope, that kind of thing.”
AJ looked back at the photo. “I prefer working out at home, too. My husband is a gym rat, but I don’t like strange men leering at me from behind when I’m doing dead lifts.”
Kate tilted her head toward the nook. “You’ve been on your feet a long time. Why don’t you have a seat.”
The expanse of windows created out of smaller squares of glass in a grid of painted wood mullions looked out over a deep backyard. It made the nook in the kitchen a cheerful, cozy place to have coffee in the morning. With the shrubs and trees all along the property line blocking out other homes, it was like gazing out on her own private sanctuary.
Now, the black abyss out the windows offered no sanctuary, but instead echoed her mood.
AJ set her small business satchel down and then slid it ahead of her into the booth on the far side of the table so she would be facing Kate.
“You aren’t crying,” the detective observed.
Kate took a deep breath as she pulled a pair of white cups from the upper cabinet. “I probably will, later, when I’m alone. Maybe it just hasn’t all quite sunk in yet. It doesn’t seem real. I mean, if John had been hit by a car I think it would seem real, but this …”
“I understand,” AJ said.
“After the things I saw in John’s house, maybe it doesn’t make enough sense to me to seem real.” Kate set the cups on the counter, staring into them for a moment. “Maybe I’m afraid that if I cry, it will become real.”
From a young age she had learned to set her own emotions aside when it came to John. He was like a child who needed her help to survive. That was just the way it was. Her responsibilities weren’t so bad, and they had their rewards. She had a good life. Maybe being somewhat detached and analytical had become her way of dealing with everything in her life, from John to her job.
AJ nodded as she rested her forearms on the table and interlaced her fingers. “Do you have anyone? It’s often easier to handle these kinds of losses if you aren’t alone.”
“My parents are gone.”
“Anyone else? Someone close to you? A special man you care about?”
“No.” Kate shrugged one shoulder, uncomfortable with an unexpectedly alien notion at such a time. “I guess I haven’t found the right one, yet. I don’t know why, but men have always seemed to be intimidated by me.”
“Maybe they’ve seen you taking out your aggression on a punching bag,” AJ said.
Kate smiled. “Maybe that’s it.” She looked up. “Cream or sugar for your coffee?”
Detective Janek was watching her hands again. “Cream, please.”
Kate retrieved a small carton of heavy cream from the refrigerator. She smelled it first to make sure it was still good, and then poured some into a small pitcher.
“John was used to the house because he grew up there,” she said into the dragging silence, feeling the need to explain. “After my parents passed away it just made sense for him to continue living there. I’d already moved out before my parents both passed away—not a year apart.”
She stared at the pitcher a moment, searching for the words. “I just didn’t want to go back. I know it probably sounds cruel that I didn’t go back there to live with John and watch over him, but he was doing fine on his own, and I was on my own, and I just didn’t …”
“I understand,” AJ said in a sympathetic tone. “John needed to be on his own. You both did.”
Kate forced a brief smile along with a nod.
The woman lightened the mood with a change of subject, talking a bit about her husband, Mike, and her little boy, Ryan. Despite how much both AJ’s husband and son obviously meant to her, Kate could tell that the woman was killing time, working up to the confidential conversation she’d wanted to have.
Kate asked some simple questions about AJ’s son, not really hearing the answers. In her mind’s eye she kept seeing her brother’s blood on the floor and the chain down in the basement with the dirty paper plates thrown off to the sides. For the life of her, she couldn’t come up with an explanation that made any sense.
Kate didn’t like it when things didn’t make sense. She could deal with problems, but the reasons behind them had to make sense.
When the coffee was ready Kate poured two cups and set them on the table along with spoons, paper napkins, and the pitcher of cream, then slid into the booth opposite the detective.
As Detective Janek poured cream, Kate asked, “So, what does the ‘A’ in ‘AJ’ stand for?”
As she looked up from under her brow, a crooked smile twisted the detective’s expression. “If I wanted people to know my first name, I wouldn’t tell them to call me AJ, now would I?”
By the way she smiled Kate knew the woman had been asked that question countless times before, and because her answer was so quick in coming, Kate knew that for some reason it was not a question the woman enjoyed getting.
“Point taken.”
Kate poured hers
elf a healthy dose of cream when the other woman handed her the pitcher. “So, what’s the big secret you want to talk about?”
AJ wrapped her fingers around the cup and stared into her coffee for a time, watching in silence as the cream swirled around.
“I knew your brother,” she finally said in a quiet voice.
Kate’s hand with the pitcher froze in midair just before she set it on the table. Goose bumps tingled up her arms.
She finally set the pitcher down. “You knew John?”
AJ nodded, still staring into her coffee. “I propped a card up on his phone on the wall in the hallway. It was my personal card. I told him that he could call me anytime, day or night. My cell is always on.”
CHAPTER
SEVEN
Kate was bewildered as to why John had never told her about Detective Janek. John told Kate everything.
She suddenly realized how wrong she had been about that.
She knew that her being out of town isolated him somewhat, but there were people at work who could help him if need be, and they had Kate’s number. Even though she hadn’t seen him in weeks, she called often.
She couldn’t imagine her brother not telling her about Detective Janek. But even more, she was completely at a loss that he hadn’t given her any hint about having a man chained in the basement. At least, not until the last moments of his life, when he’d told her to run.
“I looked at the phone at John’s house,” Kate said. “I didn’t see any card there.”
“I looked too,” AJ said. “It was gone. Maybe John put it away somewhere.”
“How did you know John and why would you give him your card?”
AJ lifted a hand in a weak gesture. “I wanted him to have it in case he ever … needed me.”
“Needed you?” Kate leaned in. “Why didn’t you say anything at the house? Why didn’t you mention this when we were talking with the other detectives?”