She overheard the murmurs among curious pedestrians as she and her partner, J. J. Rogan, made their way toward the taped perimeter.
“What’s going on? They’re filming?”
“Law and Order, I think. Not the regular one. That got canceled. But SVU still films here. Or maybe it’s that new show—that one with the blonde in the hat. Or was that one canceled too?”
Another bystander noticed them flash their badges to cross the perimeter. “You see that? It’s for real.”
“I thought that was Gwyneth Paltrow’s house.”
“No, she was on Fourth Street. And she sold it a few years ago.”
Ellie could understand the source of the real estate gossip once she had a chance to take in the townhouse to which they’d been summoned. Four floors that she could count above ground, plus what looked like a basement. Twice as wide as the other single-family houses on the block.
Through the etched glass of the front door, she was struck by the spaciousness of the entryway. Larger than her entire living room, the area was empty but for a round table topped with a vase of what appeared to be five dozen fresh tulips and, in the back corner, a sculpture that looked like it belonged in the Metropolitan Museum. A fireplace and Prius-sized chandelier completed the look.
“Damn,” Rogan said.
In short, the place was nice enough to earn a “damn” out of Rogan, who wasn’t as easily impressed as his partner.
The woman who made her way down the curved staircase seemed born and bred to live in this kind of home. Black slacks and an asymmetric tan jacket, for a look that was simultaneously casual and sophisticated. Salt-and-pepper bob, fresh from a salon blowout. But when she opened the door, the redness of her eyes reminded Ellie that they weren’t here to admire her lifestyle.
The woman’s gaze seemed to fix on their clothing. “Who are you?”
“Detectives from NYPD, ma’am. Ellie Hatcher.” She offered her hand, but the woman surprised Ellie by grabbing her forearm.
“Thank God.” Ellie assumed she was being pulled to the staircase, but the woman guided them instead into an elevator. It was decorated with photographs of defining moments of New York City from the seventies and eighties. A bar owner writing on a storefront sign during the blackout of 1977: No Lights, No Food, but Plenty of Booze. The Ramones playing at CBGB. Transients lined up outside the Bowery Mission. John Lennon in a crowd in Central Park. The final Simon and Garfunkel concert. Forty-second Street back when it was fleabag hotels and porno theaters. A graffiti-covered 6 train. It was a New York Ellie had never known.
The woman pushed the button for the fourth floor and the elevator began to creak its way up.
“You have to do something. It’s my daughter. I found her. In the bathtub. The blood. The water was so red. Her face was—so white.”
“I’m very sorry, ma’am, but why are you still here?” Ellie realized her response sounded cold. “I mean, we usually separate the family from this kind of chaos.”
“They’re up there already, but they’re not doing anything. I heard what they said. They didn’t think I could hear them talking, but I’m not deaf. They don’t believe me. They’re saying she did this. To herself.”
When the elevator doors opened, two uniformed officers were waiting—one short and fat, the other tall and lanky, very Laurel and Hardy. They looked alarmed, and then resigned, when they spotted the badges clipped to the waistbands of the latest arrivals in the hallway.
“Crap.” The skinny one spoke first, trying to explain their presence upstairs while a civilian roamed freely through a crime scene. “We were heading down. Waiting for the elevator. Guess she beat us to it.”
Rogan clicked his tongue as the two officers stepped onto the elevator. Ellie could tell he wanted to clunk their heads together. “Get the hell outside and help protect your scene,” he said. “Hatcher and Rogan. Arrived at eleven-twenty-seven. Write it down.” He jabbed his index finger against the fat cop’s breast pocket for emphasis.
The elevator began its creaky descent. “That’s what I was trying to tell you,” their hostess said. “They’re not taking this seriously. Please listen to me. My daughter did not kill herself.”
Chapter Three
The top floor of the townhouse served as a separate residence, complete with its own dining room, living room, kitchen, and long hallway leading to the back of the building. The decor was white-on-white-on-white. Gleaming white high-gloss floors. White sheepskin rugs. White Lucite furniture. White throw pillows on the white furniture. Swank digs for servants’ quarters.
“Julia’s room is back here.”
From the rear of the apartment, Ellie heard footsteps. Voices. The clicks and squawks of radios.
“And you are?”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Detectives. My name is Katherine Whitmire. Julia’s mother.”
“And no one has told you that you can’t be here?”
“This is my home, Detective. My daughter. I said I wouldn’t leave until homicide detectives arrived. I heard what they were saying about Julia, but I’m telling you: My daughter was murdered.”
The callout had come to them as a suspected suicide. When they had pressed for an explanation as to why the case required two homicide detectives, none was forthcoming. Ellie had a feeling she was looking at the numero-uno reason.
“We’re here now, Mrs. Whitmire. And I know you’re hurting. But you can’t be in this house right now, especially if you’re right about someone doing harm to your daughter.” Ellie caught sight of a uniformed officer on the spiral staircase and waved him up. “This gentleman’s going to take you outside. You can wait in one of the cars if you’d like, or he can take you to the precinct if you’d be more comfortable there. We just need to take a quick look around, and then we’ll need to talk with you in more detail.”
She could tell the woman wanted to argue but then seemed to think better of it and nodded. “I’ll let you go back and see for yourselves. I can’t look at her again. I can’t. I just—can’t.” She led the way down the stairs, the uniform following her awkwardly.
The noises Ellie had heard were coming from behind a closed door at the end of the hallway. She opened it.
“Why is this door closed with a civilian running around the crime scene?”
“Because it’s not a crime scene, and that crazy bitch slammed the door before she ordered us not to touch her daughter’s body.”
The two EMTs were young, one with a crew cut, the other with too much gel worked through his spiked hair. They stood passively by the bedroom windows, placing themselves as far as possible from the white marble floor of the en suite interior bathroom they both eyed unconsciously. It was the spiky-haired one who was doing the talking. From his colleague’s shrug, Ellie could tell that he was also the one who’d gotten into some kind of confrontation with Katherine Whitmire.
“So some rich lady in a designer jacket gets a little irate about her daughter being dead, and the two of you decide to just stand in here, scratching each other’s balls? What the fuck is going on here?”
“You got the same callout we got. Sixteen-year-old girl, slit wrists in the bathtub. We came up. Probably only beat your two guys by a minute or so. And it was obvious what we were looking at.” He lowered his voice. “It’s a clear suicide, all right? The blade’s in the tub on the right side of her body. A couple hesitation marks on the left wrist, then a clean cut through the radial artery. The girl even left a note, right there on the bed.”
Ellie saw a lined sheet of yellow notepaper propped neatly against the throw pillows on the low platform bed.