Then she would start demanding answers.
38
“Jake?”
“Yeah, D?” Jake looked up from his phone filing system, then went back to it. Photo Joe and Nguyen still puttered around the Lexus, measuring and marking tread marks. Kat had packed up and called for transport. Not a reporter in sight. Maybe, finally, things were going their way. Unless Jane showed up to cover the story again. That might be complicated. But not such a bad thing. Life was short. Maybe they should-He yanked himself back to the present.
The Brannigan scene was almost clear. Until there were cause-of-death updates on Lillian Finch and her boss, he could focus on the already-confirmed murder of Brianna Tillson. That case was bugging the hell out of him.
“Jake?” DeLuca said again. “We’ve got a situation.”
“Yo, Jake?” Officer Hennessey came around from behind the Lexus, flipping through a grimy spiral notebook. “Supe’s orders. He says Kurtz and I are supposed to-”
DeLuca interrupted. “Need a word in private, Jake.”
Hennessey put up both hands in mock surrender, backing away. “Don’t mind me,” he said. “I’m sure you two detectives have big secret detective stuff to discuss.”
“Stuff it, Hennessey,” DeLuca said. “Jake?”
DeLuca’s voice had an edge to it. Maybe he’d picked up some intel. They could use it.
“Just heard a call on the radio,” DeLuca continued. “On the third channel. Response to a nine-one-one. They’re sending two units to Corey Road. Three-forty-seven Corey Road.”
Jake’s blood froze. Three-forty-seven? “Jane’s apartment? Nine-one-one? What the hell for?”
“Detectives?” Kat McMahan trotted toward them, picking her way through the freezing slush, her boots crunching on the pavement. She paused, looked at DeLuca, then at Jake, then back at DeLuca. “Am I interrupting something?”
“Ah, Kat?” DeLuca wiped an invisible smudge from one sleeve. “Give us a sec.”
“Will do. But I wanted to ask you, Jake.” The ME smiled at D, but otherwise ignored him. “When you first saw Mr. Brannigan-”
“When I first saw Brannigan?” He could focus only half his brain on the body in the Lexus. The other half was on Corey Road. Jane’s apartment? Nine-one-one? “I didn’t know it was Brannigan.”
The ME waved him off. “Right. Not the point. When you arrived, did you open the car door?”
“What? No. No one did. That I know of. Seems pretty obvious. Why?”
What was she getting at? He hadn’t touched the car. Neither had Mrs. Richards. Any fingerprints would show instantly in the icy frost of the car’s exterior. There were none. Jane. He had to find out-
“That’s the dilemma.” Kat McMahan tilted her head, staring at the Lexus. “Our victim was in his car. You say it’s registered to Niall Brannigan, and we did find that name on the driver’s license in his pocket. Prelim, my take on it, at least, seems to be a heart attack. So there’s your ID, gentlemen. And a likely cause.”
Jane. What was going on at her apartment? Jake drew the two-way from his back pocket, clicked on “send.” “Brogan to Dispatch. Do you copy?”
“Jake?” The ME turned to him, frowning. “Are you with me here?”
“Copy, Detective,” the radio crackled back.
“The Corey Road call. Can you give me a status?”
“Thanks, Kat,” DeLuca stepped in front of Jake. “If it’s natural causes, score one for the team. We’re outta here. Hennessey and Kurtz can do the next-of-kin thing, Jake and I have some other fish to-”
She held up a hand, stopping D mid-sentence. “Thing is. There’s an issue.”
Jake clutched his two-way, straining to hear an answer in the staticky silence.
“Stand by one, Detective Brogan,” dispatch said.
Jake had to leave. Check on Jane. Now. Niall Brannigan was dead, Kat McMahan’s medical inquiry was under way, Kurtz and Hennessey would babysit. Some things were bigger than his police responsibility. His grandfather always told him, Family first. You’ll never regret the family time. Now the advice from the past moved front and center. How could he have let her go?
“The issue being,” the ME was saying, “our victim has no car keys.”
“No keys?” Jake thought back. He hadn’t tried the car door. “Not in the ignition?”
“Negative. We tried the glove compartment, see if there was a registration, some identification info. That was locked. So we went to the ignition to get the keys. But nothing. No keys in the ignition.”
“In his pocket, then,” DeLuca said. “Or the floor. You look there?”
The ME shot herself in the head with a forefinger. “Oh, no. We forgot.” She paused. “Of course, we did, Detective. Hennessey and Kurtz checked the entire car.”
“Dispatch?” Jake tried the radio again.
“Stand by one, Detective,” the radio voice crackled. “Units are still en route.”
The radio went silent. Jake focused his attention back to the ME, thinking out loud. “So that means the vic got into his car without using the keys. And clearly didn’t plan to drive anywhere. Because he didn’t bring the keys.”
“He could have been visiting,” DeLuca said. “Left the car open, it’s a nice enough neighborhood. Forgot something, came back to get it, opened the already unlocked door, sat down, had a heart attack. Bingo. In the car, dead, no keys.”
“In some reality, yeah, I suppose.” Jake played out D’s scenario. “But no one’s looking for him, you know?”
Jake’s cell phone rang. He jumped. Jane? Maybe it was Jane, thank God, telling him she was okay. Man. She really got to him.
But the display showed “caller blocked.” Still, it might be her. Who knows what phone she might be using.
“Brogan.” He heard the hope in his own voice.
“Detective?”
Not Jane. Damn. Whoever it was, he didn’t have time.
“Yes?” He tried to telegraph “leave me alone” into that one word.
“It’s Bethany Sibbach,” the voice said. “Phillip and Phoebe’s-”
“Yes, Bethany,” Jake said to the therapist. “Can you hold a second?”
“Sure, but-”
“D?” Jake turned to DeLuca. “I’m going to check on that thing, okay?”
“Ten-four, Jake. I’ll follow up on the key situation. Keep me posted.”
Jake trotted toward the cruiser, phone clamped to his ear.
“Detective Brogan? Are you there?” Bethany Sibbach’s voice interrupted his thoughts.
“Sorry, yeah,” he said. He’d head to Jane’s, see what was up. Try to call her. As soon as Bethany got off the line.
“Thing is,” the caseworker continued. “Phillip has said something that-”
Jake stopped, keys in hand.
“I’m listening,” Jake said. “What did Phillip say?”
“Well, Phillip is finally napping now, but we were all on my living room floor, Phillip and Phoebe and I, and we had Phoebe’s dolls out, and a little dollhouse my grandmother gave me as a child, lots of miniature doll furniture, a dresser, and a cradle, and, you know, I had them acting out a happy-”
“Heya, Jake.” A voice beside him.
Jake turned. A camera flashed in his face.
Some photographer. Three cameras looped around his neck. A fourth pointed right at him. It flashed again.
“Bethany? Hold on one more second.” He squinted at the man, put up a palm to protect his eyes from another flash. “Hey. Who the hell are you?”
“Hec Underhill from the Register.” He held out the hand without the Nikon, keeping the camera in front of his face as he clicked the shutter. “Whatcha got? Our sources say there’s another body.”
Jake pointed to his cell. “Look. I’m on the phone. As you can see. You’ve got a big media pass on that lanyard, right? You should know the drill. See those two officers, up by the crime scene van? Ask for Hennessey. He’s handling press.”