Kill Fee (22 page)

W
indermere rode the elevator to her room, cursing herself.
You’re a goddamn fool,
she thought.
What the hell were you doing back there?

She
had
been trying to make Stevens jealous. Of course she had. Couldn’t explain why, but there you go. Infuriating.

Stevens wasn’t even her type. Hell, even if he wasn’t already married to a beautiful woman. Even if he didn’t have two wonderful kids. He was a middle-aged white guy. He didn’t dance. Why the hell was she getting so moony?

The elevator doors opened, and Windermere walked out to the hall.
Found her room and unlocked it. The room was dark, cool, serene. She walked to the bed and lay down.

It was proximity. That’s all it was. Emotions were bound to run rampant when you spent so much time with someone else. You weren’t human unless you felt something.

And the history. Pender. Tomlin. Stakeouts and shoot-outs. You built chemistry with a person, especially someone like Stevens. He was a good cop. A decent guy, besides. He was calm and decisive. Smarter than he looked. He—

Enough about Stevens.

It was a temporary thing. Brought on by proximity and the excitement of the case. Maybe Stevens was right not to want to work with her. Maybe he’d figured out the same thing. Maybe he realized he couldn’t trust himself around her. She’d seen something in his eyes down there on the street. He’d always looked at her like she was more than a partner.

“Christ.” Windermere groaned. “Shut the hell up about him already.”

Even if she was a bit moony, what the hell could she do? He was married. Had kids. She sure wasn’t going to put that in danger. She’d met Nancy Stevens, and Andrea and JJ. The whole family was smart and funny and perfect. No way she was going to wreck that.

The whole thing was an illusion, this thing with Stevens. They would solve the case with Killswitch and then it would go away. Soon as they landed in Minneapolis. Hell, maybe she would take Mathers for a night out somewhere. Maybe teach the kid how to dance.

Windermere lay on her bed in the darkness.
Just work the damn case,
she thought, staring up at the ceiling.
Don’t do anything stupid, you hear?

T
he next morning, Stevens found Derek Mathers waiting for him in the hotel lobby with two cups of coffee and a sheepish smile. “Howdy, partner.”

Stevens looked around. “Windermere?”

“Gone.” Mathers shrugged. “Called me this morning, said she was hopping the early flight to Hollywood. Left us Manhattan and more goddamn rain.”

“Sure.” Stevens hoped his disappointment didn’t show. “The Big Apple. Let’s do it.”

Mathers smiled and handed Stevens a cup of coffee. “Consolation prizes,” he said. “For both of us.”

MATHERS DROVE
the Crown Vic up Interstate 95 and into New Jersey. Stevens sipped his coffee and stared out the window. Figured he was a fool to feel so surprised. He’d crossed a line last night.

What would you have done?
he wondered.
How far would you have pushed it?

I love Nancy. I’m not just some asshole who cheats.

Fine, but there was something there with Windermere. Or maybe there wasn’t. Maybe he was an asshole like the rest of the men who hit on her, delusional, and he’d proved it last night. He’d chased her away.

“Guess Windermere heard from the state cops in Jersey,” said Mathers. “Delaware, too. Nobody knows anything about this O’Brien character. We’re going to have to find him the hard way.”

“Sure,” Stevens nodded.

Mathers was silent. Then he glanced over. “You really like her, huh?”

“What?” Stevens turned. “Windermere?”

“Yeah, Supercop. You guys are damn tight.”

“Just partners,” said Stevens. “Professional stuff. We work well together.”

“She’s hot, though.”

Stevens held up his left hand. “So’s my wife.”

Mathers glanced at him again. “Uh-huh,” he said, nodding. “Uh-huh.”

W
indermere took a cab to the airport and caught an early-morning flight to Los Angeles. Spent the whole flight steadfastly refusing to think about Stevens. When the plane touched down at LAX, she was exhausted. Bamboozled. Hardly ready to work a cold case.

An LAPD detective, MacLean, met her at the terminal. He was a young-looking guy, trim. Grinned when he saw her. “Agent Windermere,” he said, shaking her hand. “Welcome to Hollywood.”

MacLean walked her out to his car, a silver BMW. “My day off,” he said. “Kind of a last-minute thing.”

Windermere climbed in. “Sorry,” she said. “This your case?”

“Arnaud? Sure.” MacLean climbed in beside her and drove away from the airport. “Biggest case I ever worked on, bar none.”

“You been in homicide long?”

“Eight years,” he said. He grinned at her again. “I look younger, right? Something in the air out here.”

He slowed for a stoplight. Pressed a button on the dashboard and the
BMW’s roof folded back. MacLean grinned at her again. “Hollywood,” he said.

MACLEAN TOOK HER
across town to Arnaud’s house on Mulholland. Rather, what was left of the house. “Tore it down,” MacLean told her. “The new owners, as soon as they bought it. Didn’t want the bad vibes, I figure.”

Windermere stared out at the remains: a flimsy steel fence and a mile of blue tarp, the sound of a band saw from beyond. Through the trees to either side, she could see the skyline in the distance. Whatever his house looked like, Benjamin Arnaud would have had a hell of a view.

“How’d it play?” she asked MacLean. “The murder. What happened?”

“Hard to say for certain,” MacLean said. “No witnesses. Arnaud’s girlfriend found him shot dead by the pool. One shot, to the back of the head. Spattered his brains all over the film script he was reading.”

“Nobody heard the shot?”

MacLean gestured around the car. “Everything’s kind of private out here,” he said. “People like it that way. They leave each other be.”

“So your killer walked up, found Arnaud by the pool, killed him, and disappeared.”

“That’s right,” MacLean nodded. “Chucked the pistol in the pool before he left. Was a Beretta, nine-millimeter. Serial numbers shaved off.”

“No trace.”

“No trace. Not much for forensics, either. Shooter came in, took the shot, disappeared. Like a ghost.”

Like a ghost. Windermere looked around. The road was mostly deserted, the houses hidden in the trees. “Anyone have a motive?”

MacLean shook his head. “None that stuck. Had a few suspects, but all of them checked out. Alibis, every one.”

Windermere looked at him. “Who was your strongest?”

“Suspect?” He shrugged. “Like I said, they all had airtight stories.”

“Yeah, but who was the one? If you had to figure one person had motive, who would it be?”

MacLean dug around in his pocket. Took out a pack of cigarettes and lit one. Offered the pack to Windermere. Windermere shook her head. “Hate these things,” said MacLean. “But I gotta have something keeping me sane.”

He took a long drag and exhaled. Watched the smoke drift lazily out of the car. “One guy?” he said. “Probably Roy O’Connell. You know, the director? I guess Arnaud slept with his daughter. O’Connell didn’t like it.”

Windermere nodded. “Who would?”

“Yeah, but listen: O’Connell was at some dinner in the valley. Accepting a humanitarian award, of all things. A hundred people swear they saw him. He’s clean.”

Windermere looked out at the empty road again. “Not necessarily,” she said. “Let’s go see him.”

T
he detective looked like she’d walked in from central casting. Jaded New York policewoman. Took no shit. Would kick your ass in a heartbeat. Then she smiled.

She had the kind of smile that would brighten even the worst murder scene, Stevens decided. It dominated the lobby of the Carlyle. “Erin Nordin,” she said, shaking Stevens’s hand. “A long way from home, aren’t you?”

Stevens introduced Mathers. “Seems to be my MO these days,” he
said, matching the detective’s smile. “Not enough crimes in Minnesota or something.”

“So you thought you’d come to Manhattan and start solving ours.”

“Already been through Miami and Philadelphia. Hoping it gets easier the farther north I go.”

Nordin laughed, sharp, unself-conscious. It echoed around the room, drawing glances from the bellhops and a frown from the concierge. “You picked a bad place to start,” she said. “This Nadeau case isn’t exactly a slam dunk.”

“Tough, huh?”

“As they come. Nadeau’s having a fling with some Swedish boy toy in a thousand-dollar-a-night suite. Somebody walks in, shoots them both. Disappears.”

“Like a ghost.”

“No witnesses anywhere. According to the security footage, guy wore a Yankees cap and sunglasses with the tags on ’em. Walked in and walked out and vanished in the streets.”

Stevens looked around the lobby. Met Mathers’s eyes. Mathers shrugged. “You said Nadeau was having a fling,” Stevens said. “You check out the husband?”

Nordin shook her head. “Nothing doing there. He was the first guy on my list. Figured he was jealous, he wanted her dead.”

“She was cheating,” said Mathers. “Of course he’d be mad.”

“He was heartbroken,” said Nordin. “He wept like a baby. Swore he’d known for years and he just didn’t care. Loved her anyway. Crazy.”

“Crazy,” said Mathers. “He have an alibi, though?”

“Checked that out, too. He was in Paris. Actually, about the time Nadeau was killed, he was on an Air France jumbo jet somewhere over the Atlantic. Wasn’t him.”

“We’re dealing with a contract killer,” said Stevens. “Even if Nadeau’s husband didn’t pull the trigger, he still could have arranged the kill.”

“He could have,” said Nordin, “but I’d be damn surprised if he did.
Marc Nadeau was as forthcoming as we could ask for. Opened his house to us, whatever we needed. And, like I said, he knew she was cheating.”

Stevens paced a couple of steps. “And no trace of the killer.”

“None.”

“Find the weapon?” said Mathers.

Nordin shook her head. “No, sir. Probably in the East River somewhere with the rest of the guns.”

“Damn it.” Mathers looked at Stevens. “This guy’s like a damn ninja.”

“Or a robot,” said Stevens.

Nordin watched them a moment. Then she gestured to the elevators. “You guys want to see the room?”

T
he package arrived midway through the day. Lind signed for it and took it into his apartment. Sat on the couch and slit the envelope open.

It was a delivery from the man, a whole new identity: counterfeit driver’s license, Social Security card, a couple hundred dollars cash. Lind set the envelope on the coffee table. Then he studied the driver’s license again.

Andrew Kessler. That was the name on the license. That was what the man had decided his name should be.

Lind memorized the information on the card. His name. Birthday. Address. Just like the man taught him. He made sure he memorized everything. Then he looked at the picture.

It was an old picture. Lind couldn’t remember where it had been taken, or when. He had longer hair and he was trying not to smile, and
failing at it. Lind stared at the picture and tried to remember ever wanting to smile. He couldn’t.

He wanted to remember, he realized. He tried. He stared at the picture until he felt the panic start to well up inside him. Then he threw the ID card aside, out of sight. Turned on the television and tried not to think anymore. He sat on the couch and ignored the package. Watched TV and drank coffee and fought off the visions. A couple days later, the phone rang again.

I
t was a fantastic room. It told Stevens nothing.

Nordin gestured to the king-size bed in the middle of the room. “Here’s where we found them.” She looked at Stevens. “They were, you know,
in flagrante
when the deed was done.”

Mathers stifled a laugh from the doorway. Stevens shook his head. Walked to the window, peered out. Saw nothing but New York beyond. “When’d they make the reservation?” he said. “For the room.”

Nordin frowned. “Good question,” she said. “I’m not sure.”

“Nadeau made it?”

“I assume so,” said Nordin. “I didn’t ask that either, though. Does it matter?”

Stevens walked back across the room. Looked into the bathroom. It was bigger than most New York apartments. “Our killer knew Nadeau would be here,” he said. “How?”

Nordin pulled out her cell phone and punched in a number. Wandered over to the window, her phone in her ear. She muttered something into the handset and waited. Mathers looked at Stevens. “You feeling something?”

“Not sure,” Stevens said. “Getting nowhere with the why. Might as well try the how.”

Nordin hung up her phone. “Front desk says the reservation was made a couple nights before the murder.” She paused. “And Nadeau didn’t make it. Thorsson did.”

“JOHNNY THORSSON
was a twenty-three-year-old party boy,” Nordin told them. They were outside the Carlyle now, waiting for the valet to bring up Mathers’s commandeered Crown Vic. “Lived in a loft in the Meatpacking District. I guess he was some kind of tennis sensation for a while. Sounded like that all went to shit when he met Maria Nadeau.”

Stevens looked out into traffic, the street choked with yellow cabs and black town cars, angry horns everywhere and exhaust. He frowned. “How do you mean?”

“Well, he wasn’t playing much tennis,” Nordin said. “Kind of fell into a fast-moving crowd.”

“And Nadeau was the catalyst.”

“One of.” Nordin glanced at him. “Thorsson had lots of friends.”

The valet arrived with the Crown Vic. Mathers took the keys and climbed behind the wheel. The valet lingered until Stevens shoved a couple dollars in his hand. Then he disappeared. Stevens and Nordin climbed in the car.

Mathers pulled away from the curb. Was boxed in immediately by a stretch limousine and a bread van. He swore and looked at Stevens. “Where the heck am I going?”

Stevens didn’t answer. He stared out at the limousine, black and sleek and anonymous. “A loft in the Meatpacking District,” he said. “I don’t know much about Manhattan real estate, but I’m guessing his digs weren’t cheap.”

“You’d be correct,” said Nordin. “Seven figures, easy.”

“So how does a twenty-three-year-old party boy afford a place like that? Who’s paying for it?”

Nordin frowned. Picked up her cell phone. “I’m not sure.”

Stevens watched the limousine glide away down the street. “Huh,” he said. “Let’s find out.”