Playing God (19 page)

"Because he was..." Burgess searched for a neutral word.

"Drunk?" she suggested.

"Well on his way."

Her forced smile was painful to watch. "It was no big deal, detective. Stephen... we... just got a little overextended, with the house and the business expanding and buying the cars and support for Janet and Mackenzie. He was embarrassed about it, but Stephen had to ask Ted for a small loan. He was going to pay it back."

She never could have betrayed her husband the way Pleasant had betrayed her. She was too bad a liar. "Did they make a written record of the loan?" She shook her head. "Otherwise, your finances are stable?"

She looked over at him, scared blue eyes and trembling lips. "As far as I know. Stephen took care of all of that. I was... I've been... it was a difficult pregnancy. I'm afraid I was concentrating on not losing the baby and not much else."

"I'm glad things worked out," he said, and then, "I need to know about your finances, where you had accounts, who your accountant is, things like that."

She stayed where she was, slumped at the table, massaging her forehead with unsteady fingers. "If I take you to his study, can you find those things yourself? Stephen was very neat. There's a copy machine. Help yourself. We've got nothing to hide."

She wanted him to leave before she broke down completely. He wasn't ready to go. "Was your father, Ted Shaw, aware of your husband's infidelity?"

"Infidelity?" Her blue eyes widened. "You mean those women?" Her hand flew to her lips, pressing against them as she tried to read the right answer off his face. "I don't know," she said. "I don't think so."

"Ms. Kelly, were you aware of anyone threatening your husband? Did he ever get phone calls or letters that made him unusually nervous or distracted?" She shook her head. "Did he ever worry that he was being followed?"

She shook her head again. "What are you suggesting?"

"Were you ever aware of any angry patients contacting him or bothering him?"

Her head came up and tear-filled eyes pleaded with him to stop. "No. No. Of course not," she said. "You're being ridiculous. Stephen was a good doctor. Patients liked him."

"Were there any malpractice suits against him that you were aware of?"

"None that I've ever heard of. You'd have to talk to Martha McFarland."

"Did your husband ever abuse drugs?" She didn't answer. "Have you ever heard him mention someone named Kevin O'Leary?" She shook her head, avoiding his eyes. "Any phone calls from someone called Kevin? Any calls he didn't want you to overhear?"

"No. No. No! Detective Burgess, please! I loved my husband. How do you think I feel, having you asking these questions with all the ugly things they suggest? It's bad enough to think he was killed in his car by some prostitute. Why aren't you satisfied with that? Why do you keep trying to dig up more dirt?" She turned away from him, covering her face. "Is it too much to want a few days to get used to all this... a few days with my good memories of Stephen, before you try and rip everything to shreds?"

She pointed toward the door. "Stephen's study. Turn left, go down the hall and it's the last door on the right." When he didn't move, she came over to him, grabbed the front of his shirt, and stared up into his face. Close enough to see her eyelids flutter, the pale blue veins at her temples, the tender, slightly chapped lips. "Why are you doing this?" she said. "Haven't I been hurt enough?"

"I'm not trying to make things worse for you, Ms. Kelly. Truly. I'm trying to find a killer. You're my best source of information, and time matters. I'm sorry I have to do this."

"Are you sorry? I wonder."

"And I wonder why you keep evading me, Ms. Kelly, if you want his killer caught. No one knew your husband better than you. It's harsh, I know, but it's true—try to protect his privacy and you end up protecting his killer. Why would you want to do that?"

She dropped back onto a chair, blinking her teary eyes. "I'm not evading—"

"You are." It came out fiercer than he'd meant. It wasn't easy not to think with his dick. She was a lovely woman, sad, weary, and staring at him with hopeful eyes while she asked how he could be so cruel in that husky, whispering voice. She smelled of baby powder and fresh, clean soap. But even if Burgess the horny bastard wanted to feed her cookies and milk and take her to bed, Burgess the cop wanted truth. "Look," he said, "You lived with him... saw things... heard things..."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Angry now, not pleading. Chin up, back straight. Ted Shaw's daughter. "I'd like you to go now, detective. Leave us alone."

His phone rang, Kyle's tired voice rasping in his ear. "Joe? You there?"

"What's up?"

"Alana called a few minutes ago, really spooked. She says something's happened and she's afraid to go home. She'll be at the Dunkin' Donuts until you come and get her. Says she has to talk to you about Pleasant... or O'Leary. I don't know. She was too upset to make sense."

"I'm in the middle of something. Can you swing by and—"

"She won't talk to anyone else, Joe. I wouldn't have bothered you, but you know she's not afraid of anything. And she's scared. Damned scared."

He looked at Jen Kelly, crying quietly at the table. She was hiding things and he didn't know why, but pushing would be futile. She wasn't as soft as she appeared. The tears might be genuine, but so was the rod-straight back and the reassertion of attitude. What he'd done already was gonna get Cote on his ass faster than flies on a corpse. He'd bet money the minute he was out the door, she'd be on the phone to her daddy the wallet.

"It's gonna take me a while. Get someone down there to baby-sit."

"Done deal, Joe."

He didn't feel like rushing back through this damned storm to try and pry stuff out of Alana. That's how it would be. She was such a confirmed game player, she couldn't help herself. Maybe Jen Kelly was, too. Irritation with being stuck between bad choices bothered him like an unscratched itch. He grabbed his jacket off the hook, pausing a few seconds on the heat. Across the room, too late for him, the kettle cleared its throat and began to sing.

Chapter 15

It was like driving into a ball of cotton, sky, buildings, ground, all the same fluffy white, no divisions where things began or ended, the occasional ghostly tree or telephone pole his only guides. The snow-plastered stop signs were giant lollipops, streetlights only a faint glow. The concentration hurt his eyes and made his head throb, but he liked the solitude. It was his kind of world, something pure and natural you had to take on its own terms. Men thought they were masters of the universe, but weather won every time. Even when it was an incredible pain in the ass, part of him cheered it on.

Eventually he got behind a plow, the stroboscopic yellow lights giving him something to follow. He wondered how the plow's driver could find the road. Maybe they were simply plowing a path though yards and buildings, crushing all beneath the huge blades. There was something massive and elemental about a snowplow, thrumming relentlessly through the dark, sending out twelve-foot waves of snow, like the wings of enormous angels, the driver safe and warm in his cab high above the earth.

Normally Burgess would use this time to sort through the case, plan his next moves. Tonight driving took too much effort. The best he could do was the gut test. What felt right. What felt wrong. Whose lies were closer to the truth. He knew he hadn't gotten the truth from Jen Kelly from the start, but his gut said most of her lies didn't matter. She was protecting herself as a girl who'd made a wrong choice and didn't want her face rubbed in it, the self of a wife and mother who needed some dignity and privacy in a matter both vulgar and public. Occasionally, his gut was wrong. He had to be careful of the obvious assumptions—that she was too young and inexperienced to plot a crime like this. That beautiful rich girls and young mothers didn't kill their husbands. Everyone was a potential killer, given the right provocation.

It was nearly an hour before he spotted the garish pink and orange and brown, softened tonight by the snow. He pulled into the Dunkin' Donuts lot, slammed his car into park, and killed the engine, working his stiff shoulders under his coat, postponing the moment he'd have to face Alana. Never easy, tonight she'd be worse, demanding patience and reassurance while jangled nerves made her desperately seductive. She'd regard the hour it had taken him to get here as disrespect. Alana was like cotton candy—tempting and delicious until you got close and were entangled in a sticky mess.

He waded through the snow to the door. She was at the counter, slouched over her coffee. When she saw him, she flounced and turned away. So damned childish sometimes he wanted to give her a good spanking. At least she'd dressed sensibly. When she turned back, her frown became a cautious smile. "Joe. You came."

He slid onto the stool beside her. "Yeah. So what's up?"

She looked around the nearly empty room. "We can't talk here."

"Alana, there's a blizzard outside."

"I don't care. I'm not talking where anyone might overhear us."

"I'm too tired for games, Alana. I just drove a goddamned hour through a snowstorm to get here. If you've got something to say, spit it out."

"You do look tired." She lowered her voice. "Somebody's after me, Joe. You've got to take me with you."

"I can't do that."

"I don't dare go home. He knows where I live. I don't know his name." She fidgeted with the strings of her hood. "This guy..."

"This guy got something to do with the Pleasant thing?"

Her smile was coy. "Maybe I'll tell you when we get to your place."

"Just tell me, Alana. Please." His clothes were heavy and damp. His stinging eyes wanted to close. He let the lids fall and rested them. Better not to look at her anyway. "I'm a cop," he said. "You're a hooker. I'll take you somewhere else if you want. You got a friend you could stay with?" They'd been doing this dance so long, she should know when she could push and when she couldn't.

She slid off her stool, her feet slamming loudly on the tile. "Yeah. I'll have to call. See if she's home." Furious at not getting her way after cooling her heels so long. Taking it out on him because she was scared. "She's up in Brunswick, you know."

Twenty minutes on a clear day, easily an hour tonight. A grueling hour up, another hour back. "Don't you have..." he began, but she wasn't listening.

She stomped off and used her phone, then stomped back, her hands on her hips. "She says okay, copman. We can talk in the car."

She'd chosen Brunswick hoping he'd give in and take her to his place. He was too burned out not to find it tempting, but he wasn't getting sucked into that game. He waved a heavy arm toward the door. "After you."

She stopped outside, staring in amazement, her bad mood vanishing. "Jesus! I've never seen it snow so hard. Do you own a sled?"

"I own a bed. Which I want to be in as soon as possible. You want a pal to play in the snow, little girl, find somebody else."

"Party pooper." She tossed her hair, striding toward the car. He was unlocking her door when he registered the movement. That faint sixth sense that keeps cops alive. He dove sideways, the blow aimed at his head striking his upper arm instead. His right hand went for his gun, getting the holster unsnapped just as the man's second blow hit with an explosion of pain and a great gush of blood. He went down on his knees, still fumbling for the gun, ducking a third blow that grazed his cheek. His only impression of his attacker that it was a big man in a dark coat.

"Let me go! Let me go! Joe! Help!" Alana was screaming, struggling with someone. Less than ten feet away, they were already disappearing into the falling snow.

He clawed his way up the side of the car, clinging to the handle, his left arm hanging numb and useless. Upright, there was a whirling sensation as much inside his head as from the storm. He got the gun out, focusing on Alana and her assailant, struggling and swearing behind the opaque curtain of snow, but the blood poured into his eyes and he couldn't sight well enough for a safe shot. No crisp black silhouettes with neat white centers. Nothing crisp or neat, though the world was black and white.

Spots dancing in his eyes, he struggled toward them, swaying like a poleaxed steer. Where the hell was the babysitter he'd requested? Given up and gone home? Then a voice yelled, "Freeze! Police." The man holding Alana gave her a shove that sent her sprawling and disappeared into the swirling snow, another figure after him, calling a second warning. "Police Officer. Freeze." Remy Aucoin crossed his small field of vision and disappeared into darkness. Alana pushed herself up and came toward him.