Midnight Betrayal (17 page)

“So it
might
be Zoe.” Louisa interlocked her fingers on her lap. Her knuckles blanched. “You’re not sure it’s her.”

“No. Not yet,” Jackson said.

“So there’s hope.” Louisa took a shaky breath.

Jackson didn’t respond. His lips thinned to a bloodless line. Conor’s heart squeezed. Louisa didn’t want to believe Zoe was dead, but Detective Jackson was convinced. Otherwise, why were the cops here?

“Was she burned?” Louisa’s tone matched Jackson’s with its lack of inflection.

The cops exchanged a glance.

Jackson nodded. “Yes, she was burned. Dr. Hancock, where were you on Wednesday evening between six p.m. and midnight?”

Louisa recoiled as if his words had struck her. Conor squeezed her shoulders. All this time, they’d been hoping Zoe would be found alive, but the poor girl had been lying in an abandoned basement, murdered. “That’s when she was killed?”

Jackson leaned forward. “Where were you, Dr. Hancock?”

“I was here.” Louisa’s face drained of color, her pallor adding contrast to the darkening bruise on her jaw.

Jackson pulled out his notebook and wrote something down. “Can the doorman verify that?”

“Yes.” Louisa’s hand twisted in her lap.

Jackson looked at Conor.

“Hey, you know I was at the bar.” He raised his palms. “You had a cop watching me all night.” He stiffened. “Does this mean I’m no longer a suspect?”

“No,” Jackson said. “We don’t even have an official ID on the body. Until we do, you are on my short list.”

But if the body was Zoe, Conor couldn’t have killed her. It was hard to do better than two cops for an alibi. “So you have other suspects?”

Jackson ignored his question.

“Can you think of anyone who would want both of these girls dead?” Jackson asked.

“Why would anyone want to kill two young women? It’s sick. It’s crazy.” Two bright spots of pink flushed on Louisa’s cheeks, and her voice rose with an edge of hysteria. Conor rubbed her arm.

“But the stolen knife suggests the association is with the museum.” Ianelli tilted his head. “Has anyone been acting strangely this week?”

“No.” She stared down at her clasped hands. “Was this woman killed with the same knife as Riki?”

“That will be up to the medical examiner to decide,” Jackson said. “What would you expect to see in an ancient Celtic ritual murder?”

Louisa leaned back and breathed through her nose as if she was nauseous. “Sometimes the Celts killed a victim with multiple methods to appease more than one god. They would likely have made offerings with the sacrifice. There might be symbols to indicate which gods were being targeted.”

Unable to sit still any longer, Conor got to his feet and paced. He dragged a hand through his hair. He turned to Louisa. She was too quiet, too still. Her face and body were frozen. Even her eyes looked empty. But he’d spent enough time with her now to understand that her ice-queen facade meant the opposite of her appearance. Her emotions were escalating faster than she could process.

Jackson stood. “If you think of anything else, please give us a call,” he said to Louisa.

She gave him an almost imperceptible nod.

Ianelli turned to Conor. “You’re not off the hook yet, Sullivan.”

Jackson tucked his notebook into his pocket. “By the way, the DNA report just came back positive on Riki LaSanta. The results will be made public today.”

Louisa flinched.

Conor showed the detectives out. He closed the door. Silence blanketed the air like August humidity. He returned to Louisa and knelt down in front of her.

“I won’t believe Zoe is dead.” Louisa’s bruised chin lifted. “The police don’t even have confirmation that the body is hers, and they’ve stopped searching for her.”

“They didn’t say they’d stopped looking.” Conor moved to the chair and wrapped an arm around her.

She leaned into him. “They have, because they think Zoe is dead.”

22

Through the glass facade of the museum’s entrance, Louisa scanned the street and sidewalk. Vehicle and pedestrian traffic flowed with the usual rhythm. A taxi pulled up to the curb. A couple in cocktail attire climbed out, walked into the museum, and passed through the metal detector. Cool, damp air followed them, sweeping through the atrium lobby and ruffling the hem of the woman’s black A-line dress. On the black-and-white tiled floor, well-dressed people congregated. Conversations echoed on metal, glass, and marble. A waiter circled, extending a tray loaded with glasses of champagne to any guest with an empty hand. In small groups, patrons drifted toward the arch that led to the exhibit rooms. Everything appeared normal.

But it wasn’t.

Could Riki’s killer be part of this group mingling in the lobby right now? Holding a flute of champagne and smiling, making polite conversation about the exhibits, leaning close and gossiping about the murdered girl in hushed whispers?

“Welcome.” Louisa greeted the newly arrived couple with a smile and nod, then checked their names off her guest list. The pen and clipboard in her hands saved her from handshakes. She’d worn a white silk poet blouse with a ruffled cuff that extended over her palms. Black dress slacks covered her bandaged knees, and Ferragamo ballet flats were a concession to her overall soreness. Concealer dimmed the bruise on her jaw. The overall effect was acceptable but more casual than she would have preferred for such an event.

On her right, April plucked two name tags from the small table and handed them to the couple.

April leaned close and turned her face away from the crowd. “Are you sure you don’t want me to get you a chair?”

“I’m sure.” Louisa shifted her weight to ease her aching knees. “Now that the initial crush seems to be over, I should move inside anyway.”

“Go ahead.” April took the clipboard. “I got this.”

Louisa followed the plaintive sound of a string quartet to the wide central corridor. Tuxedo-clad waitstaff circled, offering guests glasses of champagne and hors d’oeuvres. Curators and other museum staff mingled with the guests, encouraging conversation and answering questions. Louisa spotted a few university professors and board members, some of whom overlapped. Interns and some borrowed university students manned the long tables that displayed auction items on either side of the space. Louisa saw Isa selling raffle tickets. Technically, the museum wasn’t attached to the school, but the relationship was incestuous.

A dozen guests lined up at the bar in the corner. Louisa’s eyes roamed and nearly bugged out of their sockets when she spotted a clean-shaven, devastatingly handsome Conor mixing drinks behind the bar.

Oh. My. God.

What was he doing here? A fresh haircut sharpened his angular features. His broad shoulders filled out a classic black tuxedo that looked more than a cut above the rest of the waitstaff’s attire. Louisa took a deep breath. No one appeared to be giving him undue attention, except for the admiring second glances from female guests. As Xavier had pointed out Wednesday evening, the image of Conor circulated by the media wasn’t an accurate representation.

He caught her staring and pointedly looked away.

Right. She could hardly talk to him here. Louisa smoothed her features and walked in the opposite direction.

She crossed the gleaming tile floor and went through a wide arch into the
Celtic Warrior
exhibit room. Three long glass cases sparkled in the center of the space. The middle display was filled with ancient and brittle-looking weapons: spears, swords, and knives. The remaining cases were still empty. On the three long walls behind the cases, murals of life-size warriors engaged in battle depicted their original use in vivid color. The murals and cases were sectioned off with velvet theater roping to protect them from possible spills at tonight’s gathering. Normally, the prohibition on food and drink was strictly enforced.

Patrons wandered in, drinks in hand, and Louisa answered their questions.

She leaned over a row of Iron Age swords. Above the rusted weapons, a new and shiny sword gleamed in the spotlight.

“Is that one of the replicas?” a familiar male voice asked.

Louisa turned. Xavier walked toward her.

“It’s stunning. And looks lethal.” The professor set his empty champagne glass on a nearby tray and stopped just a little too close to her. His slurred speech and pirate-eye told her he’d already had too much to drink.

“If it were sharp, it would be. The artisan tried to mimic the original process as closely as possible.” Louisa resisted the urge to check on Conor. Other than Damian and Louisa, Xavier was the only other person at the fund-raiser who’d met Conor in person. Would Xavier give him away? Thankfully, it appeared he was drinking champagne rather than mixed drinks. She doubted Xavier would want to admit any association with Conor, but she didn’t want to test that theory and hoped Xavier wouldn’t make a trip to the bar, not in this unstable, unpredictable condition.

“The police came to my office today,” Xavier said. “Did you know they found a body? They won’t speculate, of course, but I know they think it’s Zoe.”

“Yes. I know about the body.” Sadness coated Louisa’s throat.

He leaned closer to the display case. “Which one was the model for the stolen replica?”

“I didn’t put it out.” His callous question reminded her that someone at this event could be a killer. But who? The girl had been killed Wednesday evening. Where had Xavier gone after he’d stopped at the café to speak with her and Conor? Was Xavier on the list of suspects?

“Tactful as always.” Xavier’s tone dripped with uncharacteristic resentment. He signaled a circling server and plucked a full flute of champagne from the tray. “I heard about your accident.”

“It was unfortunate, but as you can see, I’m fine.”

“Your beautiful face.” He reached out and touched her chin.

So much for the expensive color-correcting concealer the saleswoman at the cosmetics counter had sold her.

“It looks worse than it is.” Louisa removed his hand with a deliberate motion. She took a slight step back, reclaiming her personal boundary.

Xavier’s eyes narrowed to piggish slits.

“Look, there’s Damian.” Louisa waved at the lawyer, who was chatting up an elegant white-haired woman draped with diamonds and gold.

“I really should say hello.” Louisa smiled. “Excuse me, Xavier.”

She escaped before the professor could utter another word.

“Louisa!” Damian greeted Louisa with a gentle peck on the cheek of the uninjured side of her face. “How do you feel?”

“I’m fine, considering.”

“Yes, you could have been flattened.” Damian touched her forearm. He leaned close to her ear and whispered through gritted teeth. “What is you-know-who doing manning the bar?”

Louisa’s cover smile was tense enough to make her chin throb. “I have no idea.”

“We need to talk after the auction.” Damian flagged down a waiter and plucked a glass of champagne from a tray.

“Definitely.”

Damian looked over her shoulder. “Here comes your boss. Poker up.”

“Damian.” Dr. Cusack nodded politely at Damian before turning to Louisa. “I need to borrow Dr. Hancock.”

“Of course.” Louisa smiled at Damian. “I’ll talk to you later.”

“How are you?” Cusack asked as he steered her away.

“I’m fine.”

“Then there are several important guests I’d like you to meet.” Cusack leaned closer and lowered his voice. “But there will be no discussion of death, and if you want to keep this job, you’ll stop questioning people.”

Louisa stopped. “I won’t stop looking for Zoe.”

“I mean it, Louisa. I’ll fire you if I have to. This matter is police business, and I wouldn’t want to see you hurt again,” he said in a
discussion over
tone. He steered her through the crowd, introducing her to VIPs.

An elderly woman rapped her cane on the tile next to the exhibit case. “Have you gotten those murders straightened out yet?”

Louisa bobbled.

“The police have the situation in hand.” Cusack’s smooth voice steadied her. “Have you met our newest assistant curator, Dr. Louisa Hancock?”

“What a lovely brooch.” Louisa bent her head to examine a cameo pinned to the woman’s jacket. “Is it an antique?”

For the next two hours, Louisa deflected gossip about the murders, talked about the new exhibit, and charmed museum patrons while the throbbing in her knees grew to a crescendo. The auction topped off the night’s agenda. The evening had been a success, in spite of the negative publicity hovering around the museum, or maybe because of it. Louisa overheard too many fascinated whispers speculating about the murders. She surveyed the thinning crowd. Her gaze settled on Xavier. He was Zoe’s mentor, and Riki had been one of his students. He’d shown her a different, unflattering side of his personality tonight. Where had he been during the murder?

Conor mixed drinks and watched Louisa work the crowd. A few hours into the event, the line at the bar dissipated.

Damian approached. “Club soda.” He glanced around. No one was close by.

Conor flipped a glass and scooped ice.

“How did you get in here?” Damian asked in a low tone.

“I blackmailed the caterer.” Conor twisted the cap off the soda bottle. “If you don’t want people to know you’re messing around on your wife, don’t take your mistress to bars.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Damian said. “But seriously, what made you think this was a good idea?”

Conor squeezed a lime wedge into the drink and placed it on a cocktail napkin. “Because Louisa was coming, and one of these people could be a killer.”

“What will the cops think of you butting into the fund-raiser?”

“I don’t know. We could ask the one who followed me over here. He’s probably parked outside.”

Damian shot him a
bad idea
glare. “We need to talk after this. Louisa’s place.”

“You and Louisa are close?” Conor forced the words out of lips tight enough to crack.

Damian’s eyes sparked. “Oh my God. You’re jealous.” He covered his laughing mouth with his fist.

“Why is that so hilarious?” Conor grimaced.

Damian spun around and scanned the crowd. He raised a finger in the air, motioning to a tall, blond man. “Mark?” Damian turned back to Conor.

The blond extricated himself from a conversation with three well-jeweled elderly women and walked over. He gave Conor a critical once-over and raised an approving eyebrow at Damian. “You called?”

Damian gestured. “My
partner
, Mark, will have a Johnny Walker on the rocks.”

“And I’m not his law partner.” Mark smiled.

Cheered, Conor poured whiskey over ice. “Nice to meet you.”

“You too.” Taking the drink, Mark gave Damian a nod. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll just go back to charming those very wealthy widows into making fat donations.”

“You didn’t know I was gay?” Damian asked after Mark returned to his conversation.

“I’ve never felt so clueless in my life.”

“You’ve been preoccupied.” Damian handed over his empty glass for a refill. “Does it bother you?”

Conor laughed. “Damian, you have no idea how happy I am that you’re gay.”

“I didn’t realize you thought there was something going on between me and Louisa. She’s just a friend. A good friend. So if you hurt her, I’ll let you rot in jail.”

“Noted.” Conor nodded.

Damian took his refill and wandered off. Guests drifted toward the lobby. The room emptied out. At a signal from the caterer, Conor started breaking down the bar. He was hoisting a case of glassware onto a rolling cart when he spotted Louisa out of the corner of his eye. She was heading down a corridor. Alone.

He put the box on the cart, glanced around, and set off after her. He caught up with her easily. Her pace was slow and deliberate, as if she was masking pain. “Where are you going?”

“I locked my purse in my office.” She turned and stopped him with a raised hand. “You can’t come back here.”

“Well I don’t want you to go back there by yourself.”

“It’s my office.” She propped a hand on her hip.

Conor crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s dark and empty.”