Christmas Cover-Up (2 page)

“That’s all right, I don’t mind. Where will you and Mariah stay until you get this cleaned up?”

“Good question.” Relieved not to talk about his brother just yet, Katie pulled her phone out and started to dial Mariah’s number when she heard a car pull into the drive. She walked out onto the front porch to see her roommate climb from her vehicle.

Mariah spotted Jordan and waved. “Hey, you two, what’s going on?” Jordan and Mariah had met once when Jordan had come by to pick up information regarding her sister’s kidnapping.

“We had a break-in,” Katie said.

Mariah’s pretty green eyes went wide. “A break-in? Are you all right?”

“Yes,” Katie assured her, then explained what had happened. “But it’s pretty bad inside. I think we need to find another place to stay until a cleaning crew can come out here.” She paused. “Although your room looks fine. He didn’t get that far.”

Jordan said, “He just raced out the French doors. But your stuff didn’t look touched.”

Mariah bit her lip and tucked a stray hunk of chocolate-brown hair behind her ear. “You think he’ll come back?”

“No, we caught him. But the kitchen and den area aren’t livable right now. He slashed the cushions and—”

Mariah rushed past her and into the house. Her outraged cry made Katie grimace. Her roommate raced to Katie’s bedroom, then the office and finally her own bedroom. Tears stood in her friend’s eyes. “I don’t want to stay here. And you can’t. He slashed up your mattress.”

“I know.”

Mariah took a deep breath. “We’ll stay with Grandma Jean. She has that big ol’ house with plenty of room. She’d love it if we crashed there for a few days.”

Katie smiled as she thought of the spry eighty-year-old woman who still lived life to the fullest. “All right, you ask her. I’ve got to get down to the station and question our intruder.”

Mariah shuddered. “I can’t believe someone would break into a cop’s house.”

Katie shrugged. “I don’t think he knew I was a cop.” She frowned. “I can’t help thinking this isn’t a random break-in.”

Mariah fished in her large shoulder bag and produced her phone. “I’ll throw some things in a bag and call Grandma Jean and tell her we’re coming.”

Katie looked at Jordan. “Guess I’ll do the same, then we can go. I’ll take my car and you can ride with me if you want. Mariah’s grandmother only lives about a mile from here, so I can bring you back here to get your car before I go over there for the night.”

“That sounds good.”

Katie smiled then walked into her destroyed bedroom. The smile slipped away and anger swept over her, hot and swift even as she gave thanks that Mariah hadn’t been here when the intruder broke in. She grabbed an overnight bag and threw some items in it, including work clothes for the next day. She then examined every inch of her bedroom even though she knew Wray hadn’t taken anything. Her jewelry box lay open, but nothing was missing.

A shudder of revulsion went through her. She dealt with criminals every day. But she’d never had one in her house. Her bedroom. It made her skin crawl.

Katie spun toward the door, anxious to get out of the room, and ran into Mariah coming from her bedroom. Her friend said, “We’re all set. Grandma Jean’s excited to have company tonight.”

“I’ll call someone to come clean this up, and we’ll put better locks on the doors.” She paused. “And maybe an alarm system.”

“All right. I’ll see you later tonight, then.”

Katie nodded and joined Jordan, who waited patiently in the den. “I’m ready.”

He followed her outside and stopped at her vehicle. She opened her door and looked at him. He placed a hand over hers. The heat of his palm seeped through the back of her hand, warming her. “What is it?” When he hesitated, she took a deep breath. His spicy cologne filled the air. Katie told herself she had to ignore the fact that she found him attractive and focus on doing what they needed to do so they could part company. “Jordan?”

He said, “I know my parents blame you for Neil’s death, but I didn’t realize—”

She tensed. “What?”

“You blame yourself for my brother’s death, too, don’t you?”

TWO

S
he climbed into the car and shut the door. Jordan walked around and did the same, wondering if she was going to answer him. Then she bit her lip and nodded. “Yes. He was just a kid.” She cranked the car and backed out of the drive.

“You were doing your job.”

“I know that,” she snapped. Then took a deep breath. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. Neil was at a party and he’d been drinking. He decided to drive home rather than be smart and call someone to pick him up.”

“What male is smart at the age of twenty?”

A short, humorless laugh barked from him. “None. Not a single one.”

“But he shouldn’t have died because he was just stupid.”

“No, he shouldn’t have.”

She drew in a deep breath. “I didn’t know what would happen. I let him make a phone call and put him in the holding cell. Then I went to do the paperwork and about an hour later—”

“I know.”

“There were so many arrests that night,” she whispered. “It was crazy.”

“It was New Year’s Eve. It’s always like that.”

“There was no choice but to fill the holding cells up.”

“Katie, you don’t have to justify that night to me. I’ve worked law enforcement. I know what it’s like.” He swallowed hard and sighed. “You had no idea a meth head would kill two people with his bare hands before someone could get in there. You can’t predict what’s going to happen in those cells. Most of the time nothing does.” His jaw tightened, and his eyes narrowed. “The fact is, if my brother hadn’t chosen to be stupid, he’d still be alive.”

His anger vibrated between them. He was still furious with Neil. But not with her. Not anymore. He looked at her and felt frustration swamp him when he couldn’t read her expression. “So do you want me to quit looking into your sister’s kidnapping or not?”

Katie bit her lip and glanced at him. “I don’t know, but knowing you don’t hold me responsible for Neil’s death helps.”

“I don’t, but I’ll be honest, my parents do and I’m afraid I’ll never convince them otherwise.”

She flinched and nodded.

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “You came to us.”

“I know that.”

He thought about all the work he’d already done, the people he’d questioned, the answers that produced more questions. “I can’t do my job without your cooperation. Your sister’s been missing for fourteen years. Do you want me to keep working on trying to find out what happened to her or not?” Trying to find a person missing for the past fourteen years was hard enough, but trying to find one without the cooperation of the one who’d hired him would be impossible.

“Yes. No.” She hissed out a breath and tightened her fingers around the wheel. After she made a left turn, she said, “It’s harder than I thought it would be.”

“Why?”

“Because every time I look at you, I think of Neil. I think of your father in the morgue and his—” She bit her lip and looked away.

His phone rang and he snagged it, deciding to take the call and give her a bit of breathing room. “Hello?”

“Jordan. This is Erica.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Have you had a chance to talk to Katie?” He and Erica had discussed Katie’s reluctance to have him lead the investigation into her sister’s disappearance.

“In the process now.”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to rush you. I’m just concerned.”

“I know. I’ll give you an update soon.” He hung up and turned back to Katie. “That was Erica.”

“Why did she assign my case to you?” Katie asked.

“Because I had just finished up with one and had the time to take it.” He paused. “Did you tell her anything about our background?”

Katie shook her head.

“So she didn’t know.” He sighed. “Look. If you don’t want me working it, I’ll tell Erica. But you should know everyone is slammed right now. When Erica finally found Molly after three years and brought her home, those front-page headlines had people coming out of the woodwork. There are so many cold-case disappearances with desperate family members thinking Finding the Lost is their only hope. If you back off of Lucy’s case now, it might be a while before someone else can pick it back up.”

She drove without speaking until they were almost to the station. “I don’t know if I can work with you. You’re a constant reminder that I caused someone’s death. How can you work with me day in and day out and not think about him? Not remember? Not feel some kind of anger toward me?” Her low voice reverberated with pain that echoed his own.

His heart hurt when he thought of his twenty-year-old brother. He’d been dead for a little over a year and the pain still cut sometimes.

Neil, the black sheep. The wild young man just sowing his oats. Neil, lying in the coffin because he’d chosen to drink and drive and then get stuck in a cell with the wrong person. Neil, whose dark secrets, known only to Jordan and the medical examiner, went to the grave with him, leaving Jordan with the burden of what to do with them. Especially the question of whether or not to tell his parents the truth about what really had been going on with Neil. Like his drug problem. “Neil doesn’t have anything to do with me doing my job.”

She pulled into the parking lot of the station and turned off the vehicle. She looked at him. “How can you be objective? Your brother is dead because I arrested him and stuck him in a cell with a crazy person. How can you not blame me, too?”

“For starters, you didn’t know the guy was crazy. And second, my brother is dead because he made some really bad choices. I don’t blame you, I blame Neil and the guy who killed him. Period. Those are the only two who deserve the blame.”

“Like you said, your parents don’t feel that way.”

Jordan closed his eyes, remembering his father’s confrontation of Katie at the morgue. Paul Gray had stared daggers at Katie. “You killed my son!”

Katie had winced and held out a hand. “I’m so sorry this happened. Neil ran a stop sign right in front of me. I pulled him over and he was—”

“You did this. You!” He’d jabbed a finger, stopping millimeters from her chest, cutting off her sorrowful words. “Neil called me. Said he didn’t know why he’d been arrested, that it was a case of mistaken identity. You made a mistake, and an innocent boy died because of it. I hope you can sleep tonight knowing how well you did your duty.” The thick sarcasm cut.

“Sir—”

His father had turned on his heel and marched away, never looking back. And Jordan had just stood there and let the man blast Katie. Then again, he’d wanted to do the same thing. Before he’d learned the truth about everything. That Neil was into drugs, buying, selling and using. And he was in deep.

The pain of that day swept over him once again.

The agony on Katie’s face shook him. “He wasn’t innocent like your parents believe, but Neil shouldn’t have died because of that choice,” she reiterated with a whisper.

“No, he shouldn’t have.” Jordan rubbed a hand down his face. “This is why you’ve been avoiding me?”

“Mostly.”

He nodded. “All right. We’ve gotten this far in talking about it, but we’ll have to finish this conversation later. Let’s go see what our prisoner has to say.”

Katie nodded and climbed from the car.

* * *

Katie stepped into the police station. Jordan nodded to an officer and said, “I want to speak to Kurt over there. His father and mine are friends. I’ll be there in just a minute.”

She nodded and took a right down a long hallway. She stopped in front of a room labeled Interrogation Room #2 and took a deep breath.

Questioning a suspect always gave her an adrenaline rush. Mr. Wesley Wray was no different. She knew Jordan would be watching from the observation window. Katie stepped into the interrogation room and dropped a file on the table in front of Wray. She sat across from him and settled one hand on top of the file. His eyes followed her movement. She asked, “You’ve got quite a history of breaking into places, don’t you?”

His gaze snapped up to meet hers. He narrowed his eyes, leaned back and crossed his arms. “So?”

She shrugged and kept her voice conversationally light. “What do you do when you’re not in jail, Mr. Wray? Do you have a family?”

His brow furrowed. She’d confused him. “Yeah. I got a wife and a kid that live over behind the Beacon.”

The Beacon. One of Spartanburg’s most well-known landmarks. Anyone who came through the city as a tourist stopped to eat there. But one didn’t want to live behind it. It was one of the toughest areas in town, where residents kept their doors locked and their weapons nearby.

“So I want to know, out of all the houses in Spartanburg, what made you pick mine?”

“I told you, Detective, it was empty and looked like an easy hit. I thought I’d be in and out before anyone got home. End of story.”

She leaned in. “Oh, no. I think there’s a lot more to that story than you’re telling, and we’re not going anywhere until I’m satisfied you’ve given me quite a few more details. Why did you ask about my laptop? Is there something on there you’re interested in?”

For a brief second, Wray looked startled, a deer caught in the headlights, then he sneered and leaned forward, the tic alongside his mouth betraying his emotion. “Look, lady—”

“That’s ‘detective.’”

“Detective,” Wray sneered. His face cleared, the tic stopped. “There’s nothing else to tell. I needed some cash for a hit. Your house looked ripe.”

Katie studied him. “You’re not a junkie.”

He lifted a brow and shrugged. “I didn’t say the hit was for me.”

She slammed a hand on the table and he jumped. “Quit playing me! What were you doing in my house?”

* * *

Jordan shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. If he didn’t, the temptation to burst into the investigation room and wrap his fingers around Wray’s throat might just be too much for him.

He slid a glance at Gregory Lee, Katie’s partner. The man had come when he’d heard the call over his radio. Jordan said, “She holds her own, doesn’t she?”

“She’s sharp. Can spot a lie a mile away. Only you know as well as I do she shouldn’t be in there questioning him.”

“I know. You going to get in there and tell her to get out?”

“In a minute or two.”

Jordan smothered a smile. Gregory was a good partner. He stood about two inches over six feet, and Jordan knew he’d just celebrated his thirty-third birthday, because one of Katie’s excuses for not meeting with him last week was because she had a birthday party to attend for her partner.

“You have any thoughts on why Wray would have been in Katie’s house?”

Lee shook his head. “No.”

“Any cases y’all are working bring anything to mind?”

Gregory finally looked at him. “Nothing in particular. Why? You don’t think this was a random thing?”

“Do you?”

Gregory shrugged. “Cops don’t have any special protection when it comes to a breaking and entering.”

“I know. It just seems...odd. He breaks into her house at five-thirty on a Tuesday afternoon. That’s about the time a lot of people are coming home from work. Why risk being spotted by a neighbor or the homeowner walking in on him...like Katie did.”

“Good questions.” Gregory eyed him. “Why don’t you pass those on to Katie?”

“She’ll think of them.”

Katie looked up and scratched her nose.

Gregory said, “That’s my cue.” He breathed a sigh of relief. “She’s not pushing. She’s going to let me push the guy.” He shot Jordan a look. “Guess I’ll get to ask those questions.” He slipped from the observation room and soon was in the interrogation room. Katie pressed the file into his hands and within seconds joined Jordan. “You look tired,” he said.

“Tired and frustrated.”

Jordan nodded. “I understand. But just one question.”

“What’s that?”

“If Wray didn’t pick your home by accident, then what was the reason behind the break-in?”

“Exactly what I’ve been trying to figure out.”

Unfortunately, Gregory didn’t get anything else out of Mr. Wray, either, and they left with more questions than answers.

On the way to the car, she asked, “What are your plans tonight?”

“I’m going to stop at my parents’ house, then head home. I need to go over some notes.”

She cocked her head. “Do you work all the time?”

Jordan flashed her a tight smile. “Of course. Don’t you?”

She blew out a short laugh. “Yeah. Pretty much.” She paused and bit her lip.

“What is it?”

Katie sighed. “Are you going to tell your parents we’re working together?”

Jordan pressed his lips together as he pondered that question. “I don’t know.”

She nodded, her eyes troubled. Jordan found himself wanting to soothe the agitation there. He wanted to take her in his arms and reassure her that it would be all right. He swallowed hard and resisted the desire to act on those feelings.

He pictured that day in the morgue. Looking down at his brother’s face. Surrounded by his parents’ grief and Katie’s guilt-ridden eyes.

He shuddered. Yeah. Better to turn those feelings off now before they developed into something that would break both of their hearts.