Streak of Lightning (3 page)

Three hours later we hit the Harlem–125th Street station. One more stop and we'd be at Grand Central.

“You look beautiful,” Jesse told me as our train idled while some of the passengers disembarked. “Have I told you that?”

“Once or twice.” I leaned into him, resting my head on his shoulder. “But I don't mind if you keep saying it. It's going to be a great year. You know how I know that?”

“How?”

“Because there's a superstition. Whatever you do on the first day of the New Year, you'll do all year.”

“Then we're set for an amazing year,” he said. “I cannot believe I have you all to myself for the whole weekend.”

“Can we start by getting something to eat?” I asked. “I'm starved, and that blueberry muffin wasn't enough.”

Before he had a chance to answer, his phone rang.

“It's got to be Allie,” I said. “She probably misses you already.”

“She never misses me when she's with her grandma.”

“But you miss her.”

Jesse grabbed his cell phone from his pocket. It was clear from the first words of his conversation that it wasn't his daughter on the other end. He looked confused and agitated as he listened to the caller.

“How?” he asked. “I just don't get it.” After a few minutes of listening, he sighed. “No. I'm coming back. . . . Right now. Just wait for me.”

“What happened?” I asked when he hung up.

“There's been an incident at the jail.”

“What kind of incident?”

“Joe Proctor is dead.”

“Dead?” It didn't make sense. “Heart attack?”

Jesse stood up and grabbed our bags. “I'm sorry, Nell. I have to . . .”

We jumped off the train just before the doors closed, and the train sped farther into Manhattan without us. Whatever disappointment I felt was muted by my confusion. Jesse rushed across the platform to catch the train heading north, the last one for the night, and I ran to keep up. We had barely made it when the train arrived and the doors opened.

“Was it a heart attack?” I asked again.

“It looks like he was murdered.”

“That's impossible. He was in a jail cell, alone in a police station.”

“He wasn't alone,” he reminded me as we settled into our seats. “There was one other person in the police station: Greg.”

“Let's start at the beginning.”

“You were here for the beginning. I arrested him, and we put him in the cell. That's it. That's all I know.”

Greg looked anxious, and I couldn't blame him. The normally quiet police station was filled with people, most of them strangers. Archers Rest shared paramedics and firemen with Morristown, a larger town just north of us, and several were hovering as Greg, Jesse, and I huddled in the main area of the police station. Two people from the county coroner's office were dealing with Joe's body; at least four state police officers were wandering past us; and Larry, a mechanic and volunteer police officer, was giving a statement to one of the state police just out of earshot of the rest of us.

Jesse tried to get Greg to focus on him. I could tell Jesse wanted to bring Greg into his office and question him privately, but a detective from the criminal investigation unit of the state police, a woman named Terri Adkin, had already commandeered Jesse's office, as well as the conference room and the jail cell. We were lucky to be allowed in the station at all. She'd made it very clear that a possible homicide involving a member of the Archers Rest police force, in the Archers Rest police station, meant that the state police were in charge of the case.

“The beginning,” Jesse said to Greg, quietly and calmly, “was when you saw Joe throw the chair into Violet's window.”

“I didn't see it,” Greg corrected him. “I told you. I was on my way back up Main toward the station, and Violet came running over to me, saying Joe was out of control again. So we went over to the flower shop, and Violet and I went inside to see the damage. Joe was already in there getting his chair back. He told me right away that he'd done it. It wouldn't have been rocket science even if he hadn't confessed. So I handcuffed him and brought him here.”

When I'd passed the flower shop earlier in the day, the three of them must have been inside. If I hadn't been in so much of a hurry, I might have stopped. Not that it would have done any good, I reminded myself. Joe didn't die because he threw a chair through a window. At least I didn't think so.

“He said you pushed him.” I'd been quiet up until that point, standing behind Jesse and trying my best to stay out of the way, but it was better any issues with Greg's statement be cleared up now before Detective Adkin found them.

“That's right.” Greg looked even more flustered. “He said that. Well, I didn't push him exactly. I just tried to handcuff him, and he wouldn't let me. So I kind of—you know how it is, Jesse—I kind of grabbed him. He kept going around in a circle, trying to keep me from getting his hands. Like it was a game or something. I wasn't rough on him, I swear I wasn't. He got away from me, so I had to grab him before he did any more damage to Violet's place. And then, once I got him cuffed, he knocked into me. I don't know if he thought he could escape or what he was doing.”

“He was drunk,” Jesse told him. “We could all see that.”

“And the coroner's report will show it,” I agreed. “Why are they so sure it's murder?”

“They're not. I am.” Greg took a deep breath. “He was making a fuss, told me he wasn't feeling well. He said he had some medicine he takes every night and he needed it. I called Mrs. Proctor, and she brought it by. I gave it to him, and ten minutes later he was dead.”

“You're saying Lori killed him?” I asked.

“No, I'm saying I did.”

As Greg spoke those words, Detective Adkin walked over. “Can I get you to repeat that statement, Officer Burke?” she asked.

Jesse stepped between Greg and Detective Adkin. “No. He'll get a lawyer and give an official statement tomorrow,” he told her. “And he's Detective Burke.”

“Okay, Detective Burke. Why did you wait so long to call the police?”

“I am the police,” Greg said. “I called Will Thompson over at the Morristown Fire Department. He's the ranking paramedic there, and he came over and told me what I already knew: that Joe was dead. Then I called Jesse and waited for the chief to come back. It's his jurisdiction.”

“And when I got here, I called the state police,” Jesse explained to the detective.

She smiled. It was a warm smile, which gave me a glimmer of hope. “I appreciate that, Jesse,” she said. “But we've got a problem. I've got to go by the book the same way you do. I'm not looking to hang Greg out to dry, but if he's saying he killed someone . . .”

“He misspoke,” Jesse said sharply, putting his hand up to stop Greg before the detective could utter another word. “We won't know what happened until we have an official cause of death.”

“You're right,” Adkin agreed. “And tomorrow being New Year's Day, I doubt I'll have anything. But January second, I will have an autopsy, and your detective will have to explain himself.”

Greg stepped forward. “Am I under arrest?”

“As your chief has made clear, I don't know if a crime was committed yet, so no,” she said. “But this is the death of a prisoner in custody and . . .” She hesitated for a moment before carefully choosing her words. “There are reasons to be concerned that it wasn't natural causes.”

“What reasons?” Jesse asked.

“I can't share that with you. So, until we know for sure what happened, the jail cell is a crime scene. No one from the Archers Rest Police Department is allowed back there. I'll be posting an officer to make sure—”

“Terri . . . ,” Jesse started.

“And you are not allowed to investigate this incident, Chief Dewalt.” She turned to me. “And neither are you, Miss Fitzgerald.”

“I'm just an art student,” I said. “I make quilts.”

She laughed. “You don't think I've heard the stories about the murders you've helped solve? You and your friends at the quilt shop make a nice unofficial branch of the Archers Rest Police Department. But not this time. Not this case. Am I making myself clear?”

Even as I said yes, I wondered how many of the quilt group I could round up to start looking into Joe's death. And when I caught Jesse's eye, I could tell he was wondering that, too.

An hour before midnight on New Year's Eve is not the best time to try to get people to come to a quilt shop, but Eleanor and Barney made it, as did Carrie. She left her husband to watch their two sleeping children with a promise that she'd kiss him next year, and arrived at Someday Quilts just after eleven-thirty. Unfortunately, the other members of our little group were out of town for the holidays, leaving us with a skeleton crew of amateur detectives. This time we had Jesse, though he seemed a little lost. He was used to being the one who discouraged unofficial investigations; now he was leading one. I felt sorry for him but also, selfishly, a little excited to be working so closely together. I decided to put my disappointment about the weekend out of my mind and focus instead on this rare chance to share every step of the case with him.

We sat, as the quilt group usually did, in the classroom of the shop. Carrie brought leftover treats from Jitters, and Eleanor brought a few sandwiches along with a large pot of coffee she'd brewed at home. Quilters are always prepared to provide comfort, whether it's with food, a quilt, or a few kind words. But right now, I was just grateful for the food. I'd been hungry four hours ago when our train was approaching the city; I was famished now. I grabbed a sandwich and a few of the doughnuts, and sat next to Eleanor.

“Do you guys remember the day I opened Jitters?” Carrie asked as she poured herself a cup of coffee. “Joe stormed in yelling that I'd better not put pizza on the menu or I'd be sorry.”

“I remember,” I told her. “All he had to do was look around. The place was stocked with coffee and muffins, and no pizza or pizza ovens. But Joe wouldn't listen.”

“He never listened,” Eleanor agreed.

Carrie took a deep breath. “He scared my kids. He scared my customers. He scared me. I hate to say this, but maybe this time he tried to scare the wrong person and he was killed because of it.”

“Assuming it was murder,” Jesse pointed out. “Lori said it herself: all that anger and stress could have led to a heart attack.”

“Or Lori could have arranged a heart attack with whatever was in those pills she brought to the police station,” I added.

“Poor thing.” Eleanor spoke quietly, as if she were talking to herself, and patted Barney's head.

“Poor Lori?”

“Yes, her, too. But poor Joe,” she said. “He lived his life with such unhappiness. Never saw joy in anything. Not in his beautiful wife, or his successful business, or in the many friends that were his for the asking. He looked for reasons to be angry. He alienated the people who tried to help him. It's nearly impossible not to be made happy by something, and yet in all the years I knew him, Joe never was. That has to be a sad way to live, and now a sad way to die.”

Leave it to Grandma to remind us that Joe, for all his faults, deserved better than to die at someone else's hand. I turned back to Jesse. “So what do we do?”

“Greg made a semi-confession in that statement that Terri Adkin overheard. She's a good cop, a fair person, but she's got a guy who had an altercation with Joe saying he killed him. If the autopsy shows foul play, Greg's going to be in trouble.”

“Plus, there's that history between Joe and Greg's father,” Eleanor said. “Once the state police look into that, it will add motive.”

Carrie looked at me, but I shrugged. Neither of us were Archers Rest natives, so we didn't know the backstory behind many of the town's feuds, but it wasn't surprising that at least one would involve Joe.

“Why did Greg say he killed Joe?” Carrie asked.

“He was talking gibberish,” Jesse said. “Greg has a tendency to blurt things out without thinking.”

“If you didn't think he meant it,” I asked, “why did you stop him from explaining himself?”

“Because everything he says is on the record. If he changes his story later, it could be a problem.” Jesse took a deep breath, and when he spoke again his voice sounded tired and frustrated. “He's a good cop, and one day he'll be a great one, but his eagerness gets the better of him. He jumps in with theories and opinions when he should stick to the facts. Sometimes he thinks he's solved a case before we've even made it to the crime scene. I don't want him to say anything to anyone in law enforcement, including me, until he has a chance to calm down and think through what really happened. Once that ball gets rolling, I might not be able to help him.”

“But how do you know that he didn't do it?” Carrie pressed him.

“If I thought he had, I would have put the cuffs on him myself. But I know Greg. We all know Greg. Do you think he could murder someone?”

“No, not really,” she admitted. “But if being part of this little group has taught me anything, it's that anyone is capable of murder under the right circumstances.”

She was right, of course. More than once we'd found killers among trusted friends. But I didn't want to think Greg could be included in that group, and I could tell from the expression on Jesse's face that he didn't either.

Jesse shrugged. “I just don't think . . . Well, whatever happened, we'll find out in the morning. I told him to get some sleep and we'd talk about it tomorrow.”

“How long do you think we have until she arrests him?” I asked.

“We have tomorrow,” he said. “I doubt we have much longer. And it's not just what Terri Adkin might do. A prisoner died in Greg's custody. I'm going to have to suspend him until this is all cleared up.”

“But isn't that going to hurt his career?” I asked. “Greg talks about working in the city or joining the FBI.”

“Or taking my job.” Jesse smiled. “And yes, it could hurt him, but I'll have no other options.”

“Unless we can prove he wasn't to blame,” I added.

“And do it before the state police file their report,” Jesse said. “Greg has made himself a great target for an ambitious police detective. She's going to want to clear this up quickly, so we're playing beat the clock here. And I don't have access to any of the reports or the crime scene.”

“You have us.” Carrie patted his hand. “We'll do whatever you need.”

Jesse smiled a little, but he didn't look relieved. He'd relied on us a few times during the last year to solve some of the unfortunate crimes that had befallen our little town, but none of them had happened in his police station and none had involved a member of his police force. He looked out of place, surrounded as he was by fabric and thread instead of crime scene photos and trained officers. But even he knew he had no choice.

As we sat there trying to come up with a plan to investigate Joe's death, the sound of car horns and fireworks broke the night's silence. The New Year had started, and though it was meant to signal a new beginning, we were too focused on what could be lost to care.