Whatever the intruder’s twisted motive, it clearly couldn’t have been robbery. Shelby was still wearing her engagement ring, and an even bigger diamond was hanging from a chain around her neck. Her Hermès handbag was on the dresser, clipped shut.
So if this wasn’t a burglary, what was it?
A thought occurred to me, the same one a homicide detective would have. Had Andy killed his wife? Was that why he had called me here? Because I was probably the best person in LA to handle this, to make it go away.
I talked calmly to my friend, telling him how sorry I was and how shocked. Then I asked him to leave Shelby where she was and come with me.
“We have to talk this through, Andy. We need to do it right now.”
He came to the doorway, moaned, and sagged against me.
I held Andy up as I guided him to a chair in the living room. I took a seat on the sofa, separating myself from Andy on purpose. The next ten minutes or so were going to be bad — for both of us.
I asked the easy questions first. “Did you call nine one one?”
“I–I didn’t want the cops here until I called you. No, I didn’t call the police.”
“Andy, do you own a gun? Do you have a gun in the house?”
He shook his head. “No. And I never have. Guns scare the crap out of me. You know that.”
“Okay. Good. Did you notice — was anything taken?”
“The safe is in my study. I came in through the garage. I’d been at the office, and I put my briefcase in the study before I went into the bedroom…. Everything looked okay. I don’t know, Jack. I wasn’t thinking about a robbery. I can’t concentrate right now….”
I peppered Andy with more questions, and he answered them while looking at me as though I were a lifeboat and he a man overboard in a turbulent sea. He said he’d last seen Shelby that morning when he left for work, that he’d spoken to her from the car an hour ago. She’d sounded great.
“This is a tough question,” I said. “Was she seeing anyone? Or were you?”
Andy looked at me as if I’d lost my mind and said, “Me, Jack? No. Her? She loved me. There was no reason to do that. We were both in love, totally in love. I never thought I could feel the way I felt about Shelby. We were trying to have a baby.”
I took a controlled breath, then I pushed on. “Has anyone threatened your life, or Shelby’s?”
“C’mon, I’m basically a glorified bean counter, Jack. And who’d want to kill Shelby? She’s a sweetie. Everyone loved her….”
Apparently not.
I had to ask him. “You have to tell me the truth, Andy. Did you have anything to do with this?”
In about five seconds, Andy’s expression went from grief to shock to fury.
“You’re asking me that? You know how much I loved her. I’m telling you now and I never want to have to say it again. I didn’t kill her, Jack. And I don’t know who did. I can’t imagine this happening. I can’t, Jack.”
Night was falling. I reached up and turned on a light. Andy was looking at me as though I’d punched him in the face.
Christ, I was his best friend.
“I believe you,” I said. “The cops are going to grill you, though. Do you understand? The husband is always suspect number one.”
He nodded his head and started crying again.
I got up and went into the foyer. I called Chief of Police Michael Fescoe at his home. Fescoe and I had become friends in the past couple of years. He was depressed due to his crap job, but he was a good man, and I trusted him.
I gave Fescoe the rundown, told him that Andy and I had been childhood friends and frat brothers at Brown and that I could vouch for his character a hundred percent.
I stayed with Andy as the cops and the CSU arrived. I heard him tell a detective that Shelby didn’t have an enemy in the world.
And yet, whoever killed her had made a point.
This was not only an execution.
It was personal.
Chapter 4
JUSTINE SMITH was an elegant, serious-minded, academically brilliant brunette in her midthirties. She was a shrink by trade, a forensic profiler, and Jack Morgan’s number two at Private. Clients trusted her almost as much as they trusted Jack. They also adored her; everyone did.
That evening, she was having dinner with LA’s district attorney, Bobby Petino. Bobby was her best friend and her lover. He was a transplanted New Yorker, a connoisseur of Italian food. He had surprised Justine by picking her up as she was leaving work and driving her to one of their favorite places, Giorgio Baldi’s in Santa Monica.
The restaurant was cozy, casual, family owned; the candlelit tables were close together, comfortably intimate. Several of the customers in the dining room were A-list celebrities, but Bobby’s eyes were on Justine and no one else. Not even Johnny Depp and Denzel Washington, when they walked in laughing and joking as though life were just a big fun movie for them.
Bobby touched his wineglass to hers as Giorgio brought the steaming homemade pasta to the table. There was nobody here but the two of them.
“You know what?” Justine said. “I just love a surprise that puts a truly awful day into reverse. This is perfect. Thank you.”
“All work, no play makes Justine a sad girl,” he said. “And that just won’t do.”
“It’s official. My awful day is in the rearview mirror. I’ve been helping out on a nasty case out of our San Diego office, but it’s done for the day. Yahoo.”
Justine smiled, but Bobby ducked her gaze a little. As if there was something he didn’t want to tell her. They were usually good at reading each other’s minds, but right now Justine didn’t have a clue.
“What is it? Please. Don’t make me guess.”
“I got a call from the chief of police. I was going to tell you after dinner, I swear. Another schoolgirl was killed. They just found her.”
Justine’s mind skidded and spun out of control. She knocked over her wineglass and didn’t move to stop the flow. Her glow was gone, her thoughts shooting back to very bad days in the recent past.
Morgue shots flooded her mind: teenage girls who’d been murdered over the past two years. The poor girls had all been in high school, lived throughout Los Angeles, but most had been from the neighborhoods of East LA. The last girl had been found dead just a month ago.
There had been so much police and media attention on that girl’s death, Justine had almost come to believe that the killer had retreated or even quit. Maybe he was in jail. Or maybe he had died. Wouldn’t that be nice?
But now Bobby had shattered that fantasy, and at least one other she had had about tonight and the possibilities it held for the two of them.
Chapter 5
“I HAVE TO call Jack right now,” Justine said to Bobby. “I have to. Damn it. Damn it!”
He reached over and squeezed her hand. “I already called him. Your ride will be here in twenty minutes. You’re going to be up most of the night, Justine. Have some pasta. Please, honey? You’re going to thank me for making you eat.”
A waiter put a clean cloth on the table and refilled Justine’s wineglass, but she was no longer aware of her surroundings. She picked up her fork and stabbed a tortellini to satisfy Bobby and so she wouldn’t have to speak while she mentally reviewed the case.