Steven stood up and kicked the chair. “He has the right to—” He cut himself off mid-sentence. Sucked the temper back in. “I’m sorry. I’m not normally a disrespectful man.”
Ross smiled, so subtly he almost missed it. “You believe passionately in your work, Steven. I can respect that.” Her smile dimmed. “My first homicide was a domestic ‘squabble’ gone wrong. I’ll never forget it as long as I live. The bruised body of the wife, the children huddled in the corner, crying. I want to see who put those bruises on Mary Grace Winters brought to justice as much as you do. So sit and tell me how you’re going to get justice for this woman and her child.”
Steven drew a breath and sat, straddling the chair once again, conscious of the barrier of formality now broken between them. “Would Winters have given his wife a religious icon, Toni?”
She shook her head. “No. He hates Catholics.” Her lip curled. “And blacks and Jews and women and homosexuals. I sincerely doubt a Catholic statue would have been a gift from Rob to his wife.”
“Then where would she have gotten it? Winters said she was moody, depressed and temperamental, but believing he is a spouse abuser, it follows that he kept her isolated. She had no friends. Her parents were dead. No siblings. The only time she would have had private access to other people was when she was—”
“In the hospital,” Ross finished. “She made a friend in the hospital.”
Steven nodded. “That’s where I ended up.”
Ross leaned forward in her chair and propped her elbows on her desk, her chin on her fists. “We need to find out who made friends with Mary Grace Winters nine years ago.”
“Already on it.” Steven paused at the door to her office. “You have my cell phone number?”
“Somewhere in one of these piles.” Ross gestured aimlessly. “You’d better give it to me again.”
He did and watched her write it on the palm of her hand. What a difference from his own anal-retentive boss. “Call me if Winters shows up.”
“I will.”
Hickory, North Carolina
Tuesday, March 12
7 P.M.
“Excuse me, ma’am.”
A nurse in a smock covered with teddy bears looked up. She had kind eyes, Steven thought. But tired. It had obviously been a busy day in the ER. Her nametag said C. BURNS.
“Yes? Can I help you?”
“I hope so, ma’am.” Steven showed her his shield. “I’m Special Agent Steven Thatcher, of the State Bureau of Investigation. I’m conducting an investigation and I’m hoping you can help.” He really hoped she could help. Out of the six nurses that worked orthopedics nine years ago, one was dead and two others couldn’t remember anything helpful. Two were on vacation with their kids on spring break. Claire Gaffney Burns was last on his list.
Nurse Burns looked around. “It’s relatively quiet now. We can start, but we may not finish all in one stretch.”
Steven smiled and she smiled back. “I understand completely. Can you take a break and get off your feet or do we need to stay here?”
She looked around again. “The other nurses are all with patients, so as much as a sit-down sounds like heaven, I’ll have to stay here.”
“That’s fine. Nurse Burns, you worked at Asheville General nine years ago, didn’t you?”
She looked taken aback. “Why, yes I did. Why do you ask?”
Steven tilted his head. “Why were you surprised I asked?”
She shrugged with one shoulder. “Because I’ve been here for almost four years and nobody asked. Now you’re the second person in less than a week to ask.”
Steven narrowed his eyes. “Really? When was this?”
Nurse Burns considered for only a moment. “Thursday evening. The paramedics had just brought little Lindsey Daltry in for surgery.” She pursed one side of her mouth. “I can’t remember the other man’s name, but he was looking for someone who’d worked with me back at Asheville General in the summer of …” She opened her eyes wide. “Oh, God. That same summer. That’s too much of a coincidence, isn’t it?”
“Perhaps. Let’s not get too worked up until we compare notes. What did this man look like?” He slipped his notepad and pen from his jacket pocket, poised to note anything Nurse Burns remembered.
Nurse Burns pursed her lips again. “He was tall and big. Not fat, just big. Built like a linebacker.”
“Tall as me?”
She moved her head from side to side, thinking. “Maybe an inch taller, no more. He had shoulders this wide.” She gestured and Steven felt his heart skip to a faster rhythm. Winters was that big.
Steven looked up from his notepad. “Black hair, brown eyes?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No, he had gray hair and … and a mustache. A bushy one. His eyes might have been brown. I’m sorry, I didn’t pay attention to that.”
“It’s okay,” Steven said soothingly. “What did he want to know, exactly?”
“He said … he said his sister had met a nurse while she was sitting with their sick grandmother at Asheville, and that his sister had died recently and he’d found a letter to this nurse among his sister’s things. He just wanted to deliver it. I didn’t think that there was anything wrong with that at the time. The nurse he was looking for was young, and maybe not a nurse. Maybe a volunteer. I told him the only volunteer we’d had that summer was a young woman named Susan Crenshaw. She was just about to start college in the fall. She’d wanted to be a nurse since she was a child.”
“Was this the person he was looking for?”
Nurse Burns shook her head. “No. He was looking for someone named Christy who’d worked oncology.”
“You seem to readily remember Susan Crenshaw. Was she a friend of yours?”
Burns smiled fondly. “Susan made friends with everybody she met. All the patients loved her to death. I remember there was one young woman that summer who was recovering from a broken back. She and Susan were about the same age. They talked all the time.”
Steven raised a brow. “Do you remember the patient’s name?”
“Oh, yes. That would have been Mary Grace.” She pursed her lips again, concentrating. “Her last name was a season. Oh, yes. Winters. Mary Grace Winters. Mary Grace didn’t talk to many people. She was an odd little thing.”
“How so?”
“She had these eyes. Great big, blue eyes that looked like they could see right into you. She was always so sad. Haunted, is probably a better word, actually. She had this little boy who was the joy of her life.” A corner of her mouth tipped up. “He was blond, like her. Same blue eyes. He was … quiet.”
“Did she have a husband?”
“Mmm, yes. Yes, she did. He came to visit every day. Brought flowers and goodies. He was … a policeman. Big, hulk … ing …” The blood drained from her face.
“Nurse Burns?” Steven reached out to touch her face. Her cheeks were as cold as ice.
“Oh, God.” Her eyes slid shut. “It was him, wasn’t it? Her husband. The man last week.”
“And if it was?”
“Oh, God,” she whispered. “He beat that poor woman. Nancy Desmond was sure of it.”
“Nurse Burns, I need you to concentrate.” Steven took her hands in his, barely able to keep his own hands from shaking. “Do you remember if Mary Grace had a statue of any kind while she was here in the hospital?”
Burns nodded, little jerks of her head. “A … a statue of some saint. I can’t remember which one. Not expensive, but Mary Grace kept it by her bed the entire time she was here. I remember thinking it odd because she was listed in the file as being a Baptist, not a Catholic, so I asked her about it. She told me it was the first time anybody had ever given her a gift. She said it in such a small voice. She sounded more like a little girl than a twenty-year-old.”
“You’re doing great,” Steven soothed even as his brain screamed triumphantly. “One more question. Who gave Mary Grace the statue?”
Burns opened her eyes. He’d thought
them kind when he first met her ten minutes before. Now they were terrified. “Susan,” she whispered. “Susan Crenshaw.”
Steven tugged her hands, leading her from behind the nurse’s station to a chair. “Sit here. I’ll get you some water.” He found the water cooler and came back to find her in the same exact position in which he’d left her. He crouched down in front of her and pressed the paper cup into her hand. “Drink this. Nurse Burns, can I use your telephone?”
She jerked another nod. “Yes, of course. It’s …” She trailed off.
“It’s okay, ma’am. I’ll find one.”
Steven stood and looked around for a doctor. He peeked in a room and saw a young woman checking a chart. “Doctor?”
She turned. “Yes? What can I do for you?”
“I think one of your nurses needs some help.” Quickly the doctor returned the chart to its slot and followed Steven, listening intently. When they’d reached Nurse Burns, the doctor was firmly in charge of the situation.
An hour later, Steven searched the doctor out yet again. “How is Nurse Burns?”
“She’ll be fine eventually. She’s had a shock, of course.”
He scanned the woman’s badge. “Dr. Simpson. I’ll let you decide how to tell Nurse Burns.”
Dr. Simpson’s eyes narrowed. “What?”
Steven blinked. It had been a very long day. He drew a deep breath and exhaled it on a bitter sigh. “The woman she knew? Susan Crenshaw?” Simpson nodded. “Miss Crenshaw was found drowned in a river, just outside of Greenville. Her neck was broken. I need to offer Nurse Burns police protection should she request it.”
Dr. Simpson nodded. “I’ve called her husband. He should be here sometime in the next half-hour. You should wait until he gets here to tell them both.”
Chicago
Tuesday, March 13
11 P.M.
Winters had never seen so much traffic. Why anyone would want to live in such a gray, dirty place was completely beyond him. He finally found an empty spot along the curb and slid his rental car next to the parking meter.
He was here. And so, somewhere in this dirty city, was his son.
Too bad secret women’s shelters weren’t listed in the phone book. He’d have to find Hanover House through more creative means. Which was the sole purpose of his sitting here on the corner recommended by the owner of his sleazy motel. The girls were plentiful and cheap, the old guy had claimed. Winters watched the women strut by. The old guy was right. Chicago’s streetwalkers were certainly more flamboyant than those who plied their trade in Asheville. And more abundant. Both in sheer numbers and in … various attributes. There was enough silicone on this street to pump up every flat-chested woman in Asheville. Winters smiled at his own wit and felt the reassuring tug of his false mustache on his upper lip. No slippage. Good enough.
He waited, watching for about two hours when he saw the woman he wanted. She was medium height, with natural tits and an Iowa-corn-fed-wholesome face under her fourteen layers of makeup. She had shoulder-length dyed-blond hair … by which she was currently being pulled down the street by a tough-looking black man wearing purple pants and six earrings in one ear. He was the wrong color to be an outraged father so Winters assumed he was the girl’s pimp. Purple Pants swung Miss Iowa around by her hair until she faced him and got directly in her face, yelling something that made her eyes glaze over with fear. He hauled off and backhanded her so hard her head wrenched to one side. Miss Iowa’s cry of pain could be heard through the bustle of the crowd and Winters’s raised car window but no one stopped the pimp. Nobody cared.
Outstanding.
Then Purple Pants dropped her hair and pushed her to the pavement and delivered a hard kick to her ribs. She curled into a protective ball and he kicked her again.
The man had style.
Winters climbed from his car and intercepted Purple Pants.
“What you want?” The man asked, huffing from the exertion of bringing one of his girls to heel.
“Her.” Winters pointed to the sobbing Miss Iowa. “All night. What’s your price?”
Chapter Thirteen
Asheville
Wednesday, March 14
3 A.M.
Ross herself served the search warrant to a white-faced Sue Ann Broughton who stood out of the way, wringing her hands helplessly. They dusted for prints, searched drawers, closets, cabinets, mattresses.
They came up with three unregistered handguns with accompanying ammunition, four theater catalogs featuring wigs and facial altering props, a belt with a buckle sharpened to razor edge, and a pair of boots on the back porch, encrusted with what appeared to be vomit.
“What’s this, Miss Broughton?” Steven asked, pointing to the boots with a pencil.
Sue Ann hesitated, wringing her hands.
“We know they belong to Rob,” Toni said gently. “I’ve seen him wear them myself. Many times. Why are they covered in vomit?”
Sue Ann Broughton trembled. “Um, Rob asked me to clean them.”
“When was this?” Toni asked.
“Um, um, Monday morning.”
Steven grimaced and threw the pencil in an evidence bag. No way in hell he was ever writing with that thing again. “So, why didn’t you clean them?” Steven asked diffidently.
“Um, I, um, couldn’t.”
“Why not, Sue Ann?” Toni pressured softly.
“I, uh, I tried, really I did, but I got sick. I couldn’t come close enough to clean them without being sick.”
Steven watched Toni’s gaze pointedly move to Sue Ann’s middle, where the woman’s hand lay visibly trembling. “How many months along are you, Miss Broughton?”
Sue Ann seemed to crumble before their eyes. “T-t-two months.” Tears ran down her cheeks and she covered her face with her hands.
“Does Detective Winters know?” he asked as gently as he could.
“No.” She sniffled and scraped at her face with the heels of her hands. “I tried to tell him. But he … didn’t want another baby.” Gingerly Sue Ann touched her jaw and Steven clearly remembered the fading bruises he and Toni had seen the night they’d come looking for Rob. Steven had an unholy wish to give that animal a minor taste of his own cruelty. For even a minor taste of Winters’s brand of cruelty would prove fatal.
Toni gently pushed Sue Ann into a chair and crouched down beside her. “Why not? Why wouldn’t he want your baby?”
Sue Ann shrugged, a pitiful sight. “He only wanted his son. Robbie.”
Toni put a comforting hand on Sue Ann’s knee, lifting it immediately when the woman winced. “Sue Ann, can I see your back?”
Sue Ann grabbed the lapels of her cheap robe and pulled them tight, creating a cocoon around herself, rocking herself. Her eyes clenched and her whole body shrunk as if to take up the smallest space possible. “No.”
“Please,” Toni said softly. “We can help you, Sue Ann. You don’t have to live like this.”
Sue Ann Broughton looked up at that.
And Steven knew he would never forget the look of sheer hopelessness in that woman’s eyes. Because as terrified as she was to stay, Sue Ann Broughton was more terrified to leave.
“Just go away,” she whispered hoarsely. “Just go away and leave us be.”
Steven knelt on one knee. He had to try once more. “Miss Broughton, do you know where Rob Winters is?”
She hesitated, a fraction of a beat. “No.”
“Toni!” The call came from Detective Lambert in the bedroom closet. “There’s something here you should see.”
Toni pointed to one of the uniformed officers. “Watch her. Don’t let her touch anything.”
Steven was right behind Toni and nearly bumped into her when she came up short just inside the closet door. Steven’s eyes widened as he took the room in.
“Nice work, Jonathan,” Toni murmured.
Detective Lambert merely nodded. “Take a look inside. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Neither had St
even. The room was about five by ten, the long wall completely covered by a mirror that ran from the ceiling down to the edge of a vanity counter that also ran the length of the long wall. Smack dab in the middle of the vanity was a sink.
“I’ve never had a closet with running water before,” Toni remarked blandly.
“Or so many heads,” Steven added. It was true. Lining the vanity were Styrofoam heads. Steven counted ten of them. Five sported wigs, the other five were bald, as it were. Some of the heads had mustaches, some had full beards, goatees, sideburns. At the base of each head was a plastic bag. Steven pulled a pen from his pocket and nudged one of the bags. It was squishy.
“Cotton and saline bags. Used to alter the shape of his face,” Lambert supplied. He shrugged. “I’m into community theater.”
He has the looks for it, Steven thought. Lambert resembled Robert Redford in his salad days, only even more golden if that was possible. Toni had stepped up to one of the Styrofoam heads, bending to see a photograph precisely tacked to the wall behind it.
“And even a finished portrait for the how-to,” Toni murmured. “Oh, my God.”
Steven stepped closer, studying each of the color portraits. Each face was Rob Winters’s, although he would never have guessed had he not been looking. He stopped by the first bald Styrofoam head. The man in the portrait had gray hair and a mustache. “This is the one he used when he visited Nurse Burns.”
Toni sighed. “Move that APB right on up to a warrant for his arrest. Dammit.”
Asheville
Wednesday, March 14
8 A.M.
The buzz in the Asheville PD briefing room immediately quieted when Ross walked in beside a guy in a black suit. IA. Internal affairs. Why do they always dress like undertakers? Steven wondered as he stood in the back of the room, silently watching.
The black suit stepped up to the podium and Steven could practically feel the unspoken hisses and boos aimed at IA. “As of midnight this morning, we placed an APB for the apprehension of Detective Rob Winters. As of four A.M. we issued a warrant for his arrest.”