Black Diamond Death (18 page)

I took a minute to catch my breath and then crossed the street. The front door was open wide enough for me to stick my hand through. I yelled into the darkness, but the only answer that came was a reverberation of my own voice. With my flashlight lit up I peeked once again through the window of the garage. His car was there so why wasn’t he? I decided to find out.

To lessen my chances of getting caught I stuck with the flashlight. I entered the living room which contained a lot of leather furniture and not much else. A bottle of wine remained on the coffee table and a pair of men’s slippers were on the floor.

I moved further down the hall and entered the master bedroom. There were no windows that faced the street so I turned on the lamp on his bedside table. The duvet hung over the bed and most of it rested in a massive lump on the floor. I searched both side-table drawers and found nothing but several pairs of boxers and an assortment of socks.

After I shut off the light on the lamp I went back down the hall and through the kitchen. On the other side just past the dining area was a room with a large desk in the center of it. The desk was barren with the exception of a few folders off to the side, some framed family photos that didn’t include any of his other women, and a single piece of paper folded in half which sat in the center of the desk. I picked it up and unfolded it. Scrawled in pen were two words,
forgive me
.

The paper slipped through my fingers and fell to the floor. I took a step backward and bent down to retrieve it and stepped on a wet, sticky substance and slid across the floor. I shifted my balance and pushed my hands down to break my fall. My hand swept across something hard upon impact and it slid to the side, making a sharp noise that sounded like the blade of a knife cutting across cement. I bent down to investigate and placed my hand on the armrest of the chair for balance, and that’s when I felt it. The leather on the chair didn’t feel like leather at all. It felt like flesh. Human flesh. It was cold and clammy and wet. I jerked my hand back and flashed the light toward the chair. There on the chair sat Parker. His head faced the floor and his body was slumped to one side. In the soft glow of the flashlight I caught a glimpse of my hands. They were covered in blood. I extended my index and pointer finger to the side of Parker’s neck. There was no pulse, no sign of life. I reached into my pocket and grabbed my phone and pressed number one on my speed dial.

“Nick,” I said, in a whisper. “It’s me. I’m at Parker Stanton’s house. I think he’s dead.”

“What were you doing here?” Nick said.

I shook my head and stared at the wooden grains on the floor.

“When the chief gets here, he’ll want answers. If you talk to me, maybe I can talk to him.”

I nodded. It was all I could do at the moment and even that seemed like too much. My entire body felt like someone took a stick and smacked my funny bone over and over again.

“Sloane, listen to me. Look at me.”

I hesitated.

“Would you look at me please?”

I removed my hands from around my knees and sat up. Nick had a bewildered look on his face like he couldn’t decide whether to scold me or comfort me.

“You’re shaking.”

“I think I’m in shock,” I said.

“That’s natural.”

It didn’t feel that way. I wiped my eyes.

“I shouldn’t have come here,” I said. “I can’t believe he’s dead Nick.”

I tried my best to regain composure.

“Do you know how it happened?”

“I found him on the chair, but I don’t know how he got there or when. There was a paper on his desk with a couple words on it and a gun on the floor and he had no pulse.”

I looked down at my shoes; they had red splotches on them.

“I want to talk you about this, but the other guys are on their way and I don’t want anyone to see you like this.”

“It’s too late for that,” Coop said. “I see little miss thing messed up my crime scene.”

“Go easy on her Coop,” Nick said.

“Why should I?”

“You know what happens if you don’t,” Nick said.

Coop looked at me.

“You want to tell me what went on here?”

“Don’t say a word,” Nick said.

Coop glared at Nick and then turned toward me.

“The way I see it, you and Mr. Stanton fought, he went for his gun, and you shot him. That about right?”

“That’s enough,” Nick said.

“Son, I’ve had about enough out of you.”

I glanced at Nick whose ears were bright red and looked like the filling in a cherry pie.

“I’m not your son, and we both know she’s under no obligation to say anything to you.”

Coop made a move for Nick and they squared off. He wagged his finger at Nick and his nostrils flared.

“Now you listen here—”

I wedged myself between them.

“Enough,” I said. “I want to talk to the chief.”

“I want to talk to her alone, Calhoun,” the chief said.

Nick acknowledged him with a nod and then turned and went.

The chief shut the office door and then his blinds and went around to his side of the desk, but he didn’t sit down. He faced me and pulled on his moustache a few times. I rested my hands in my lap. One of my fingernails was broken. I stared at it like it was an engagement ring that had just been given to me. It beat eye contact.

“Alright Sloane, out with it,” he said.

“Is this my official statement?”

“Someone else can do that later. Right now I want to know what happened.”

I filled him in about my meeting with Kristin at the airport and the comment she made about Parker at the end of our conversation.

“But she didn’t actually say he intended to leave?” he said.

I shook my head.

“It was the way she said it, like she wanted me to know he wouldn’t be around anymore.”

“Then what happened?” he said.

“I went to his house and—”

“Stop right there,” he said. “I asked you to keep your distance. Does anything I say matter to you?”

“At the time it seemed like a good idea.”

“You broke into the guy’s house. I could hold you for that,” he said.

“But you won’t.”

He seized both sides of the desk with his hands and hunched over me like a pack of football players in a huddle, but one thing was different; I had the feeling I wouldn’t be in on the next play.

“A few nights in a cell might do you some good. Maybe you’d listen to me for a change.”

I crossed a line and he wanted me to know it.

“I thought you had a tail on him, but no one was around when I got there. Where were they?”

He mulled it over for a moment.

“Don’t try to change the subject,” he said.

“At least I’m trying to catch Charlotte’s killer. Isn’t that the point of all this?”

He shook his head.

“You think that’s what you’re doing, eh?”

“I don’t have the energy to go back and forth with you on this,” I said. “Not today.”

He backed off and folded his arms.

“Alright,” he said. “Continue.”

“When I got there the lights were off but his front door was cracked open.”

“And you went in.”

I nodded.

“I thought he wasn’t there and that if I could find some evidence that proved his involvement in what happened to Charlotte we could use it to arrest him.”

“You’re so foolish sometimes kiddo,” he said. “No matter I suppose. What’s done is done. You went into his house and found him. Then what happened?”

“When I realized he was dead, I called Nick.”

“And that’s it, that’s all of it?”

“Almost. I did find a note on his desk.”

He held his hand out and motioned toward himself with his fingers.

“Lemme take a look at it,” he said.

“I don’t have it with me. I dropped it.”

“You expect me to believe you found the note and just left it there? That doesn’t sound like you at all,” he said.

“It’s still there.”

“You read it then,” he said.

“Forgive me.”

“For what?” he said.

“That’s what the note said.”

He looked toward the ceiling and uttered the words to himself a few times.

“What do you make of it?” he said.

I tried not to show my surprise that he still considered my opinion after all that had happened.

“It looks like he buckled over the guilt, wrote the note, and then offed himself.”

“That would explain a lot,” he said.

“If that’s the truth.”

“You don’t believe it?”

“I never thought Parker of all people would kill himself, it doesn’t make sense.”

“In what way?” he said.

“Parker slept with a lot of women. On the outside he was selfish and full of himself and proud. But on the inside he was an insecure coward who got his kicks when he bullied those around him. That’s not the type of person who shoots himself in the head.”

“What then?”

“Let’s say he really did want to die for what he’d done. Why not take a bunch of pills and do it the simple way?”

“You ever consider you might be over thinking it a bit,” he said.

“It wouldn’t be the first time.”

“The gun was convenient and easy. I expect that’s why he did it.”

“Maybe.”

“I guess we better notify the father,” he said. “You can imagine what he’ll do when he finds out.”

Three days had passed since Parker’s death, and I spent the majority of it at home. I wanted to avoid any run-ins with Coop and the chief who felt I interfered in
their
investigation. I received no thank you for discovering the body, no words of appreciation, nothing for my efforts.

My cell phone rang. It was Audrey.

“I got your message,” she said. “I can’t believe it’s all over.”

“That’s the general consensus.”

“Parker did himself and everyone else a huge favor.”

I didn’t see any point in debating with her.

“So, what’s next for you?”

“I’m out of here,” she said.

“For how long?”

“Maybe for good. It’s time to move on with my life. This town reminds me too much of Charlotte. It’s hard to drive around and see a real estate sign with her face plastered on the front of it in someone’s yard. I know they will all come down, but I feel like I can’t move forward if I stay here.”

I felt that way a few years back except Audrey was leaving for the same reason I stayed.

“Will you come back?”

“I don’t think so,” she said.

“Any idea where you’ll go?”

“Do you want to know something interesting? A couple days ago I gathered Charlotte’s mail that had piled up since she passed away and I opened a letter from a woman in Haiti. She said she was looking forward to Charlotte and her sister arriving next month to assist with the reconstruction project they started there.”

“Wow.”

“Do you know what that means? Charlotte never planned to transfer to another agency, or maybe she did at first, but not at the end. She wanted to leave this place, and she was going to take me with her.”

“I’m sorry I never got the chance to meet your sister,” I said. “She was an amazing person.”

“If she talked to me about this when she was alive, I can’t say whether I would have gone with her. But now, I feel I owe it to her to go, and there’s nothing I’d rather do.”

“If there is anything you need—”

“There is,” she said. “I want to put Charlotte’s place on the market. I’ve sent some movers over to pack it all up for me, and in the meantime, I’ve listed it with Vicki.”

“What can I do?”

“I’m on my way to the airport and I didn’t have time to drop the key off to her before I left. Since I gave you a copy I hoped you could stop in and do it for me?”

“That won’t be a problem.”

“Thanks for everything. I know I wasn’t the easiest person to deal with.”

“Take care of yourself.”

I pressed the end button on my phone. The news of Parker’s death came as a sense of peace for Audrey. So why didn’t I feel a sense of resolve too?

Lord Berkeley’s ears perked up as Nick walked in with dog treats in one hand and daisies in the other. He opened the bag and placed a treat on Boo’s nose.

“For the Lord,” he said.

Boo wiggled his nose and snatched it up and looked at Nick for a second. Much to his dismay Nick turned toward me and extended the flowers.

“For the Lady,” he said.

“What’s the occasion?”

“Do I need one?” he said.

“I guess not.”

He wrapped his arms around me and squeezed.

“We’ve dropped the case. The ME’s report came back and it’s conclusive. Parker committed suicide.”

“What else did the report say?” I said.

“The latent prints we lifted from the gun matched Parker’s and no other prints were found on it. There is one caveat though.”

“What’s that?”

“Before the ME’s report came back, I checked out the gun and it wasn’t registered to Parker or anyone else for that matter. And Parker’s father said he didn’t own a gun.”

“So where did he get it?”

“Good question,” he said.

“What about the note?”

“We compared it to some handwritten papers we found in his desk and they were an exact match.”

I put the daisies in a vase and then walked over to the couch and sat down.

“I can’t believe it,” I said.

“Now you can put it behind you and move on.”

“I guess so.”

I wanted to feel a sense of relief, but there was something about it all that bothered me, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was more to Parker’s death than what it seemed.

An hour later I sat on a red velvet sofa shaped like a peanut eating a cup of chocolate gelato and tried to forget it was a mere nineteen degrees outside.

Maddie took a bite of wildberry and angled her plastic spoon at me.

“What’s your deal?”

“I’m fine,” I said.

“No you’re not. You’ve got that look on your face.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said.

“Don’t make me pry it out of you.”

“All I wanted was to clear my mind and to spend the day without any thoughts about Charlotte or Parker or the case, but the harder I try not to think about it, the more I do.”