Every Breath You Take: A Novel (A Kristen Conner Mystery Book 2) Page 20

  Bobbie finally looks up.

  “There’s something I should have told you.”

  “Okay,” I say insightfully.

  “Your captain okay?”

  She’s stalling.

  “As of last Sunday he’s doing much better.”

  Another pause. Long enough that I take her cup and pour more hot chocolate in it. I fill my mug up with coffee. I walk over to my stereo system—about the same vintage as my TV—and click the source button until it is on the CD player. I have an old Warren Hill album in the first slot. Great tenor sax player. I saw him in concert on campus when I was at Northern Illinois. Not sure what happened to him. Truth is one of his first albums and my favorite. The first song is “Tell Me Your Secrets.” That’s a nice coincidence. I set the volume low.

  C’mon Bobbie. I’m tired. Tell me your secrets.

  A tear runs down her cheek as she starts to speak.

  • • •

  “You don’t sound like yourself tonight.”

  “Because we’re not fighting?”

  “Maybe,” Reynolds says with a chuckle. “I’ve usually defended my every word, action, and attitude by this point in the conversation. When you’re on a roll my honor and manhood has been called into question as well.”

  “Am I that bad?”

  “I find you delightful.”

  “Thank you. But that’s not what I asked.”

  “You’re complex.”

  That’s what Derrick said.

  “I think I’m simple. Life is complex.”

  “It does take some twists and turns,” he said.

  He called about five minutes after Bobbie left, which was after 11:00. He just got back in the country he told me. I nudged him for his whereabouts but he wasn’t biting. We talked an hour. Maybe a record phone conversation for me.

  I’m exhausted but I set my alarm half an hour early so I can write up the report on my talk with Bobbie before everyone else arrives at the office.

  Unbelievable. I’m still speechless.

  42

  “NO WAY. UNBELIEVABLE. Tell me you’re making this up,” Sergeant Konkade says.

  “¿Qué clase de madre le haría eso a su hija?” Martinez adds.

  We’re back in the conference room. The usual suspects. Blackshear and Konkade, Randall and Martinez, Squires and Conner. Zaworski is on the speaker phone. He doesn’t sound like the captain I know. I fear someone has kidnapped him. The kidnapper must have a gun pointed at him and has given him orders to be very polite and never interrupt my rambling train of thought. Konkade called him to let him know the new development and he insisted on participating. He said he is feeling a lot better. Doesn’t sound like it to me.

  “So Barbara employed her own daughter as an escort?” Zaworski asks.

  “It’s a little more complicated than that,” I answer. “She didn’t know Penny was her daughter when she first met her. But in a word, yes.”

  “That changes things. I personally presented terms of agreement to her. Her not mentioning that one of her workers was her daughter is covered in the full disclosure clause. That’s material to the contract.”

  He sounds tired.

  “Conner?” Zaworski asks.

  “Yes sir?”

  “How do you do it?’

  Uh oh.

  “Do what sir?”

  “How do you get the people that open up to you to open up to you? There’s been days when I almost put you and Shelly in time-out because you two couldn’t play nice together. You push people away from you—and I’m not criticizing you on that, it’s not a bad habit for a detective—but then serial killers, raging alcoholics, and madames can’t help but tell you every last secret they have.”

  Now the captain is accusing me of pushing people away? Mr. Congeniality? And I don’t remember our serial killer telling me any secrets.

  “Sir, I thought you said that the word ‘madame’ is off limits.”

  He laughs at that. “Sorry, Conner, I shouldn’t have said what I just said. Blame it on the painkillers. If the cancer doesn’t kill me, the treatments will. If that doesn’t work, the painkillers will finish me off. Oxycodone is kicking my tail.”

  “I’m glad you are sounding so much better, sir.”

  “Yeah, right. You said it’s more complicated than a simple yes. I may not have the energy to hear how. And you all seem to have this under control—good work, Blackshear—so I’m not getting involved any further. But humor me and give me a quick summary of how it’s complicated. And I mean quick, Conner. I’m fading fast.”

  I sigh. How do I condense this down?

  “Bobbie got pregnant, was going to have an abortion, changed her mind, put the baby up for adoption, used the proceeds to start her business, and tried to never think about her little girl again.”

  “She sold her baby?” Martinez says with a whistle.

  “I don’t think it’s fair to say she sold her,” I say. “She put her up for adoption. I assume she isn’t the first person to get some financial assistance.”

  “You’re right on that, Conner,” Zaworski says. “What else?”

  “Penny showed up on her doorstep. Said she wanted a job. Bobbie gave her a job not knowing it was her daughter. I guess Penny had been hunting her down for some time. She wanted to maximize the emotional revenge and she sure knew how to do it. Bobbie had just found out Penny was her daughter a month or so before the Durham murder.”

  “That’s what she says,” Martinez says righteously. “Not sure I believe anything that comes out of her mouth—or anyone else on this case.”

  “Where’s the father in all this?” Zaworski asks.

  That takes me aback. No mention of the father.

  “No clue, sir.”

  “And she talked to you, why?”

  “She says her daughter is innocent.”

  “That’s a surprise,” Randall says.

  “Okay folks,” Zaworski says, “I gotta get some sleep. Great work. Blackshear, you’re doing good so don’t bother me unless you have a big problem. You have a little problem, you’re on your own.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Konkade?”

  “Yes, Captain?”

  “Tell Helen the soup tasted great. Made me feel a lot better too.”

  “I will, Captain.”

  Konkade obviously married up. She has a drapery business and makes tasty soup.

  • • •

  Martinez, Randall, Konkade, Don, and I are chowing down at Costello’s Sandwiches and Sides on Roscoe. I took too big of a bite of my pineapple chicken salad sandwich on whole wheat and my mouth is crammed too full to answer when Don asked me what’s wrong with people. Since I’m going to be chewing for a while, he decides to answer his own question.

  “This case was already messed up,” he says as he daintily wipes a glop of mayonnaise from the corner of his mouth. “But just when you think people can’t get any worse, they do. A mother lets a daughter work in that business? C’mon. This has to be a sign the Apocalypse is upon us.”

  He shakes his head.

  “Si senor, you are right, esta situación es un lío,” Martinez adds with his mouth still half-filled with corned beef on marbled rye. He doesn’t finish the bite before shoving the last of his Reuben down the hatch.

  “Not sure if this daughter situation changes anything,” Konkade adds. “We made a righteous arrest. Penny lied to us about where she was the night Durham was killed. Now we know she was in Durham’s neighborhood at the time of the murder. The car park’s surveillance camera has her pulling in an hour ahead of the estimated time of death and then back out seventy-three minutes after the window. She paid with cash, but even the grainy black and pictures show her and her car. If this guy that owns the carpark had been forthcoming with the tapes we would have been done a lot earlier.”

  “What can you do when people won’t cooperate and get the lawyers involved?” Randall asks defensively.

  “Not much,” Konkade says.
“I’m not busting on you, Randall. I’ve just never seen anything like that delay on a major murder investigation.”

  Randall’s face is working and he is going to say something but I spare him the effort and say, “But what if Bobbie is right and she’s not guilty?”

  “You think that’s a possibility?” Don asks me. “That girl is cold as ice.”

  “You’re right,” I say. “But why not at least pretend to care if she’s really guilty?”

  “No one here doesn’t care,” Don shoots back.

  “I never trusted her,” Martinez says, “But I didn’t think she was the murderer at first. Just goes to show that women like that are tricky.”

  “I don’t know if she was trying to be tricky,” I answer. “What threw you off Antonio was her legs.”

  “Unas piernas muy bonitas,” Martinez says.

  Konkade ignores us and asks, “How could she be innocent of killing Durham? Because we’re eating lunch I hate to remind you how much she vomited at the crime scene. It all matches up with her DNA, Jerome said.”

  “I just know Bobbie is convinced Penny is innocent,” I say.

  “Good,” Don says. “She’s finally acting like a decent mother.”

  “What I still can’t believe,” Konkade says, “is her mom was supposed to be helping us catch a killer but had zero ideas on who might have done the deed. But as soon as her daughter gets arrested she suddenly has a couple ideas on who might have killed Durham. Maybe the brother because they didn’t get along. Maybe Jensen because Jack slept with one of his girlfriends and was generally jealous of Durham. Maybe Granger because Jack cheated him out of money.”

  “Ferguson’s visit to you does sound a little desperate,” Randall says.

  “She isn’t going to persuade anyone that the real killer is still out there,” Konkade says. “Most of all the District Attorney. I was in the meeting with her and Blackshear. No way is the prosecutor letting us open this thing back up. She’s got her motive and means. The surveillance camera is icing on the cake. Penny’s alibi is out the window. That girl is going down for this.”

  “I hope she did it then,” I say.

  “Like I said,” Don jumps in, “what’s not to like? She did it, KC. Don’t let your mind start working on something that is plain as day.”

  I give Don a dirty look.

  “The only thing Ferguson did by talking to you,” Konkade says, “is to jeopardize the conditional immunity on tax evasion she got for cooperating in the investigation. Zaworski said we have too much on our plates and not to do anything yet, but you can bet he’ll meet with Legal when he’s back in the office. But Kristen, you worked with Ferguson and know what she is. You’ve never been a Ferguson fan. Don’t let her play with your mind now.”

  We make eye contact and I give him a scowl.

  “Just saying,” he says and looks down to find the last bite of his sandwich.

  I’m the last one eating and I’ve lost my appetite with half a sandwich to go. Not like me—but I now have dinner. Don was right. This case was messed up from the start. But it looks like we have the thing wrapped up tight. I’m not sure what’s bothering me. I don’t like Penny or Bobbie. I’m not predisposed to defend them. But something is nagging at the back of my mind.

  “Who’s questioning Bobbie?” I ask.

  “The DA sent Stan Jacobs over,” Randall answers quickly. “I think Flannigan is going to prosecute the case herself and Stan is her right-hand man. I know him from when he was a detective in the Fourth and doing law school at night. He’s good.”

  “Good,” Don says looking at me pointedly. “That means we have nothing to worry about.”

  “I don’t think Flannigan has ever lost a case,” Konkade says. “She’s smart.”

  “If you haven’t lost a case it means you’ve done a lot of plea deals and don’t overcharge,” Squires says. “No one can stay undefeated in our judicial system otherwise.”

  “True,” Konkade says. “But I bet she goes for Murder One with all we gave her.”

  “Some defense lawyer is going to argue that no one whacks someone in the head with a hammer seventeen times based on premeditation,” Don says. “Murder Two can still get her life, so that may be the smarter way to go.”

  “She’ll get a conviction either way,” Randall says. “The sergeant is right. Flannigan’s that good.”

  “Sounds like my amigo has a crush on the DA Is she married?”

  Randall reddens. He plows on, “And with that scummy crowd Martin ran with, her attorney is going to have a hard time getting a jury to feel sorry for her.”

  “Good point,” says Don. “So is she married?”

  Randall waves him off.

  It is a good point. So why do I feel sorry for her? And Bobbie? And why did Gretchen Sanders have to tell me Randall got looked at by IA? I don’t want to wonder about a guy I work with.

  “Go over your paperwork folks,” Konkade advises. “Investigation may be done, but you’re going to be working your tails off for Flannigan while she builds her case.”

  Konkade is the epitome of a good manager. He knows how to get things done and make everyone play nicely together. I have a lot of respect for him. He usually eats lunch in his office. I wonder if Zaworski—the two are even tighter than I thought if Helen Konkade is making soup for him—told him to come out to eat with the troops to make sure we’re on task—and to make sure I don’t try to take off down a rabbit trail. I think he trusts Blackshear but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t have his eyes open, despite his protestations that he isn’t getting involved.

  I know they’re right. We have an ironclad case. So why is my mind still roiling with the thought that something isn’t right with Penny as murderer? Is it just me being difficult?

  • • •

  I drive the Ford Fusion, today’s American-made ride, back over to the precinct. I got to driver’s door first. Don didn’t have anything smart to say. He just handed me the keys. He’s quiet. He’s brooding over something too. It’s contagious.

  “What’s up, partner?” I ask a couple blocks from the parking lot.

  He doesn’t answer.

  “What gives?”

  “Did you know I have a sister?” he asks me.

  I know he’s got a brother who is a big-shot attorney in Los Angeles. I’ve never heard anything about a sister. Should I know that? Has he said something when I wasn’t paying attention? Klarissa and Mom claim I don’t always listen very well—especially for someone who is a detective.

  “Don’t know how I missed that,” I say.

  I start to feel guilty. Maybe Mom is right.

  “You didn’t miss anything,” he says.

  Okay. I wait him out.

  “She was a beautiful girl.”

  Was?

  “Did she pass away?”

  “Nope. She’s alive.”

  “Where does she live?”

  “Chicago.”

  I have no clue where this is going. I decide to keep my mouth shut. That’s about the only time I never go wrong.

  “You know Vanessa wants me to quit CPD. After our Cutter Shark case I gave it serious thought. Heck, Vanessa is making so much money with her real estate I don’t even have to work. She’s wanted me to work with her—but her real motivation is she wants me to stop being a cop. Makes her nervous. She wouldn’t care if I decided to be a stay-at-home dad. I could coach Devon in football like I always wanted and she would love that too. Wouldn’t matter if I made money doing it.”

  What’s he trying to tell me?

  “While you were in the hospital, Zaworski didn’t give us much of anything to work on the first week after we arrested the Shark. You know I still feel guilty it was you that got messed up by him in the takedown. I’d have given anything to be the one in the room with him.”

  “I hope you’re joking, partner.”

  “I’m not. But that’s not where I was going with all of this. I think Zaworski wanted everyone to have a little brea
thing room after chasing that nut job for six months. So I did some soul searching. Why did I join the CPD? I was a business major at Ball State. My brother, Rodney, is making huge money as a high-end ambulance chaser in LA. He said he’d foot the bill for me to go to law school. Not at Northwestern or University of Chicago—but about anywhere else I want to go that doesn’t cost a fortune. I knew I didn’t want to get into personal injury and told him that. He said I could open up any area of law I wanted to as his partner. We would be Squires and Squires.”

  “Your brother really does personal injury?”

  “Oh yeah. He’s on billboards and does late night commercials. He’s a rockstar in L.A.”

  I’ve parked and turned off the engine. We just sit there. This isn’t about his brother or Vanessa. He has a sister he has never mentioned in more than two years of partnering with me.

  “I finally figured out why I became a cop.”

  Another long pause.

  “I wanted to help Debbie.”

  “Your sister?”

  “Yep. My sister.”

  “What happened with her?”

  “Her first boyfriend was the local crack dealer. He got her hooked and put her on the street to pay for her habit. Debbie’s lifestyle has about killed my parents. About killed all of us. I can’t count how many times Rodney and I have got her in rehab. She’s never made it past a week before she bolts to the street again.”

  “I’m so sorry, Don.”

  “Well fifteen years later I’m still a cop and I still haven’t been able to help Deb. But I see her from time to time. Take her some groceries. Clean her place up. Invite her to come live with Vanessa and me while she gets things sorted. She’s never even set eyes on Devon or Veronika. Can you imagine that? Being so messed up you won’t meet your niece and nephew?”

  I can’t. If I ever cried now would be the time. But I don’t.

  “When you got first back you asked me what made me decide not to leave the force. I know when you say your prayers you don’t get to negotiate with God—even if my pastor sometimes suggests otherwise. We go along with him but know better. But I can’t get rid of the feeling that if I ever quit trying to put bad people away and save maybe a few good people, all hope for Debbie will be lost. Doesn’t make sense. Probably not true. I know in my head I’m trying to cut a deal with God. But I can’t shake the feeling. So there you have it. Now you know why I couldn’t quit.