The Other Woman (38 page)

It would only take a minute.

65

Jake gunned his cruiser, banged a U-turn in the middle of Hanover Street, hit the lights and siren. Headed for Lassiter headquarters.
Sorry, Janey. This is police business.
He felt bad about lying to her. But this might be dangerous.

Until the Kenna thing, he’d planned to go downtown, where Arthur Vick and Co. were cooling their heels. Still, Jake figured the wait might give the guy some time to get religion. Or for his lawyer to spell out the facts of life. Vick’s breaking point would come soon enough, once he realized he was no longer Mr. Big. Now he was simply Mr. Suspect. Poor Patti Vick.
Till death do us part?
More like life. Without parole. It would feel great to put this sucker in the “solved” column.

At least Vick was safely in custody. The other man, Matt No-Last-Name, was still in the wind.

“DeLuca?” Jake clicked the button on his radio, driving bat-outta-hell with one hand as traffic slowed, moving over to let him pass. “You read? What’s your ETA?”

“In two.”

“I’m pulling up now,” Jake said. He saw an empty parking place right in the front. Good sign. No lights on inside the headquarters. Bad sign. “Looks deserted. Lights off.”

“Copy.”

Leaving his unmarked cruiser running under the glare of the streetlight, Jake trotted to the front window, where only this afternoon he and Jane discovered Kenna Wilkes was not dead. But now, that woman seemed the key to something. Jake had to find her again.

“Sir? May I help you?”

A mousy young woman in a baggy jacket stood beside him, looked up from behind her glasses, questioning. She carried a clacking array of what looked like card-keys attached to a webbed lanyard.

She took a step away, eyeing the cruiser, then looked back at him. He saw the light dawn.

“Are you a po—?” she said.

“Detective Jake Brogan, Boston PD. Are you with the Lassiter campaign?”

She held up her yellow lanyard, both hands fussing, flapping the cards against each other.

“Deenie, um, Denise Bayliss,” the woman said. “Yes, I work here. Is everything okay?”

“It’s fine, Miss Bayliss.” Jake jabbed a thumb toward the headquarters door. “Anyone inside?”

“No, sir, not right now. I just locked up.” She displayed her collection of plastic. “They might be back later, though. After the governor’s event. But he uses the side entrance. Do you need me to call—?”

Jake recognized the rumble of DeLuca’s cruiser. Heard his car door slam.

“My partner, Detective DeLuca.” Jake pulled out his BlackBerry, punched up the photo of Holly and the man Jane called Matt. It wasn’t that clear a shot, a BlackBerry photo of an old picture, but it was all he had. “Let me show you this photo, Miss Bayliss. Do you recognize either of these people?”

The woman peered at it, lifting her glasses, her nose almost touching the screen. One car whispered by in the rain-dampened street, then another. “No, Detective, I don’t think I’ve never seen them before.”

“One more question,” Jake said. “Do you know a Kenna Wilkes?”

She looked everywhere but at Jake. “She’s a volunteer. New. Like, a receptionist. Sometimes. But…”

“But?” Jake kept his voice noncommittal. Encouraging. “You were saying?”

“Nothing,” the woman said. “She—goes places with the governor. You could ask him about her. I guess. Or Mr. Maitland. But I … don’t know anything about her. Why are you asking me this? Is everything okay?”

“It’s fine, ma’am, all we need,” Jake said. He handed her a business card. Nothing for him here. “We have your name.”

By the time Deenie Bayliss was out of sight, Jake had opened the door of his cruiser, and sat, one leg out the driver’s side, radio crackling. “Repeating now?” he said. “We have a BOLO for a white male, approximately twenty-five years of age, brown hair, eyes unknown, first name Matt, last name unknown, who might be in the company of a younger white female, age approximately twenty-three, hair blond, eyes green, who may be using the name Kenna Wilkes. Please do not apprehend, but contact…”

DeLuca rested one arm on the top of the cruiser as Jake dictated his be-on-the-lookout bulletin. “We rock, gotta admit,” he said as Jake signed off. “Howarth solved, Roldan solved, Vick in custody for Sellica Darden. And now—”

Jake clicked the radio mic back into place, moved DeLuca out of the way as he pulled his leg in and closed the door. He buzzed down the window.

“—and now,” DeLuca repeated, cocking his head toward Lassiter headquarters, “all we gotta do is find some dish who’s apparently got an inside with the candidate, and have her give up the guy who killed Holly Neff. And we are four for four.”

“Told you there was no Bridge Killer,” Jake called as DeLuca headed for his car. “See you downtown, D. Time for you and me to rain a little reality on one Mr. Arthur Vick.”

DeLuca peeled out, full speed ahead, beeping his horn in salute. But Jake sat in his front seat, staring out the windshield, more than Arthur Vick on his mind.

Matt No-Last-Name. Approached Jane at the news conference. Showed up at Lassiter headquarters exactly when she did. Now he was whereabouts unknown.

Who the hell is Matt?
What if the guy who killed Holly Neff was now looking for Jane?

*   *   *

So near but yet so far. Jane sat in her front seat, car in Park, engine idling, staring at the
CLOSED
sign in front of Poplar Grove Cemetery. She’d devoured the last of her peanut butter crackers and was starting on a pack of gum unearthed from the bottom of her tote. She tried Moira again. Nothing.

Now she was contemplating the tiniest bit of trespassing. No locked gate in front of her in the driveway, no gate at all. No chain, no barrier, no nothing. Above her a massive cast-iron arch loomed, twisted metal letters spelling
POPLAR GROVE
. Beside her, a very small plastic sign with press-on letters spelling
CLOSED FOR HALLOWEEN
.

What if I hadn’t seen it?
Jane tried out a few excuses:
It was dark. I was looking the other way. The sign is smallish.

But what if there were some alarm thing, that as soon as she crossed some barrier would trip, blaring bells and sirens, announcing her illegal entry to some goons lurking who knew where? Unlikely, though, in a cemetery, right? People were
supposed
to go in. That was the whole point. And the place was lit up—sorta. She could see a winding tree-lined lane, a fork in the graveled access road leading up each side of a grassy rise. Spotlights revealed curving rows of headstones and grave markers, shadowed statues of angels and crosses and sleekly marbled obelisks.
Like Mom’s,
she thought, then pushed it out of her mind. That lectern thing a little beyond the arch must be the locator map. The place was actually kind of—peaceful. Not creepy-scary. Just empty.

Empty.

Traffic whizzed by behind her. No one cared. No one was stopping. All she had to do was pull in. She wasn’t going to hurt anything. It wasn’t
that
illegal.

She shifted into Drive.

*   *   *

Matt drove half a block past the gate, turned into a side street, and made a U-turn. At the cemetery entrance, he turned off his lights and shifted into Park. He was freezing. Sweating. Having a heart attack. His chest hadn’t felt so tight, so constricted since—since the last time he was here. Cissy was enraged he’d added “Lassiter” to the headstone on the Galbraith family plot. Hadn’t spoken to him at the funeral, or after, because of it. But Lassiter was his birthright. It was their history. It was the truth.

He’d visited the grave only a few times since, walking up that little hill, using the big angel as the landmark. His mother’s headstone, pink marble, stood in the shadow of the angel’s wings. He owed her a visit, he knew. But this was too … too much.

His chest clutched again. What was Ryland doing here?

Exhaust plumed from her tailpipe. Her car didn’t move.

And then it did.

66

So far, so good. Jane drove in, creeping along, gripping the steering wheel, shoulders tensed for the blare of alarm bells. But nothing happened. She did a quick scan for security cameras, saw nothing. It was easy to check the locator. Easy to see the diagrams in the dimly warm lights tucked into trees and staked along the paths. Easy to find the name Katharine Lassiter. Section D, Row 23.

When she arrived at the right place, one frustrating glitch. She couldn’t see the headstone from her car. But this would take only two seconds.

Leaving her car running and door open, Jane crunched through fallen leaves and gooshed through mud, glad she’d kept her rubber wellies stashed in the backseat, a leftover-from-TV habit.

Row 23. Up two rows, then down three headstones, picturing the map at the entrance. She carried the flashlight from her console, all powered up and batteries fine. Her cell phone, not so much, still charging in the car.
You can’t win them all.

The night air hit, hazy and sodden with leftover rain. Clammy. She pulled her coat closer. Tree branches bowed and bent in the light wind; wisps of clouds scudded across the navy sky. Alone in a cemetery. On Halloween.
Shut up
. She wouldn’t think about scary stuff; that would be stupid. She could still hear occasional cars on the road. Her own, ready to roll, was right there.

She mentally whistled a happy tune. Not afraid. She’d be here only two seconds.

*   *   *

If he drove in right behind her, she’d hear the car. Matt watched Jane’s brake lights go on, then off, saw her Audi pull in through the arched gateway, stop at the locator. Watched her get out, check the diagrams, get back in the car.

Where was she going? It was an incredible coincidence that whoever’s grave she was visiting was in the same cemetery as his mother’s. Still, that could leave Matt alone with her. He hoped his mother would understand what he needed to do. He needed his life back.
Damn Holly
, he thought again. But family came first. Time to prove he was a real Lassiter.

He watched Jane turn left, toward his angel, then head slowly up the rise. Matt shifted, touched the gas pedal, eased into the cemetery driveway.

Her car was a couple hundred yards up the access road, still heading toward the angel.
Where the hell is she going? Will she get out of the car?
If he followed in his car, she’d hear it. He stopped, backed up, pointed his car’s nose toward the exit. Turned off the ignition and opened the door. Closed it as quietly as he could.

*   *   *

What was that?
Jane stopped at the end of Row 23. Stood absolutely still, muscles taut across her shoulders. She didn’t want to use her flashlight—what if someone saw the beam? Plenty of light without it. The flashlight was merely backup, in case she needed to read something. The moon, almost full, appeared through the tips of the waving poplars as the rain clouds parted. Constellations glistened into view, Orion. The Dippers. The sound didn’t happen again. Probably a squirrel. An owl.

Three headstones to go. Jane took one step, her dark green boots barely crunching in the close-clipped brown grass. Paused. Nothing. The first headstone was for a Walter Galbraith, born … it didn’t matter. She took another step. Paused, eyes closed, listening as intently as her ears would manage. Opened her eyes. Nothing. Another step.

What was that?
She stopped, one hand to her throat. For sure, that was an owl.
Go.

The third headstone was the one she cared about.

It looked like marble. Polished, pink marble. Lighter than its neighbors, waist high, gracefully curved across the top, almost glowing a bit in the combination of moonlight and spotlight. One more step and she could read it. She paused. Listened. Nothing.

She took the step.

And there was the inscription.
KATHARINE FLANNERY GALBRAITH LASSITER,
it said, the elegant letters etched deep into the stone.

B
ORN
O
CTOBER
21, 1956

D
IED
A
PRIL
14, 2010

Smaller letters below. Jane risked the flashlight, played the thin yellow beam across the words carved into the pink stone.

B
ELOVED MOTHER OF
S
ARAH
(
BORN
1989)
AND
M
ATTHEW
(
BORN
1987)

Jane stared at the names.

Then she heard the sound.

*   *   *

It can’t be
. Matt took one last stride, crouched behind the big angel, sneaked his head around the curve of her alabaster wing to watch Jane take a few tentative steps toward his mother’s grave. She took one step, then stopped. Then another.
She looked right at him
. Didn’t she? He darted into the cover of the lofty wings, forehead pressed against the deep grooves in the sleek white stone. Had she seen him?

Jane looked away. She hadn’t. She took another step.

That reporter is visiting my mother’s grave. She knows.

This friggin’ clinched it. Ryland had Holly’s damn photos. Of course, she figured Holly was sleeping with his father. Having an affair. No one would ever believe it wasn’t true. No matter what anyone said. His father would be ruined.
Ruined.

He put one hand on the angel’s cool skin, trying to stay calm.

If this woman had half a brain, she would soon know exactly who he was. But in a few minutes, it wouldn’t matter. His father’s future was at stake.

The carved pink marble of his mother’s headstone still seemed different from the other headstones, somehow. Stood out from them, always had. Secretly, he’d thought it his mother’s light shining through.

Jane was taking another step.

Matt could see her car, just down the lane, door open. Holly’s photos had to be in there. He’d seen the manila envelope under her arm when she left Lassiter headquarters, and she hadn’t gone anywhere else. Matt pursed his lips, calculating time and distance and weight.