Like No One Else (26 page)

It was better to just pretend the whole incident had never happened.

As if he could pull that off.

“Did you go out any time last night?” he asked her.

Tommie nodded. “I ended my last class a little early to take a call from Zhane. I was worried about his nephew and wanted to get an update, and we'd been playing phone tag all day. After I talked to him, I went out for coffee with a friend. I got back around nine, shortly before you showed up.”

Paulo could tell by her troubled gaze that there was something else, something she wasn't telling him. “Did anything happen yesterday that I should know about?” he gently prodded.

She hesitated for a long moment, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth. “It's nothing,” she said at length, looking embarrassed. “An old boyfriend stopped by unexpectedly. It threw me off for the rest of the day. I told my friend about it over coffee, and still had it on my mind when I got back home.” She shrugged. “Maybe I was so distracted I
did
forget to lock the door.”

Paulo was surprised by the stab of jealousy that went through him at the idea of Tommie being so preoccupied with thoughts of another man—not just any man, but an old boyfriend—that she'd forget something as routine as locking her door.

Before he could respond, his cell phone rang. He dug it out of his pocket, glanced at the caller ID, and grimaced. It was Donovan, probably calling to make sure he was on his way. Pushy bastard.

“I gotta run,” Paulo said to Tommie.

“I know. I didn't mean to hold you up.”

“You didn't.” He searched her face. “Are you sure you're okay?”

“Positive. Now go,” she said, shooing him away.

“I'll check up on you later.”

“No need. I'll be fine.”

But as Paulo drove away, he couldn't shake the feeling that Tommie had been hiding something from him. He hoped it was nothing more serious than her rekindled romance with an old flame.

That
he could learn to live with.

Her life being in danger?

Not so much.

 

Ten minutes later, Paulo turned down a street flanked by shotgun houses that became smaller and more decrepit as he approached his destination. Overgrown lawns, sagging porches, chipped paint, and an overall look of decay characterized the neighborhood where the latest victim had been found.

He parked as close as he could get to the white ramshackle house, shoved a tasteless piece of Nicorette gum into his mouth, and climbed out of the car. The crime scene was roped off and already being processed.

A grim-faced Donovan met Paulo at the front door and walked him down a short hallway to the bedroom, where Norah O'Connor and her team were hard at work collecting evidence.

“Looks like your guy has struck again,” she said to Paulo without glancing up from her task. “Same MO as before. Only this time we have a pretty good idea how the perp got inside.”

“How?”

“He used a spare key hidden in a potted plant on the back porch. It's the same way the neighbor got into the house this morning when she came over to ask for a jump. She got worried when no one came to the door, so she went around to the back and used the key to get in. That's when she discovered the body and called 911.”

Donovan added, “Apparently it wasn't unusual for her to let herself into the house. She and the victim were always borrowing stuff from each other and keeping an eye on each other's homes whenever the other was on vacation.”

“Where's the neighbor now?” Paulo asked.

“Went to drop her kids off at day care after one of the officers jump-started her car. She said she'd be back shortly to answer any more questions we might have.”

Nodding, Paulo absently sketched the sign of the cross over his heart before stepping into the room. As he worked his way carefully toward the eviscerated corpse lying in the middle of the floor, he glanced around the small room, taking in the cheap wood furnishings, the clothes spilling from open drawers, and the trio of empty beer bottles on the cluttered nightstand before his gaze landed on the word WHORE scrawled in blood on the wall above the unmade bed.

Save for the untidiness of the room, which was the complete opposite of Maribel Cruz's immaculate bedroom, the scene was exactly what Paulo had expected.

But as he knelt and got his first good look at the victim, he felt a jolt of recognition that rocked him back on his heels and sent a chill of foreboding lancing down his spine.

Noting his reaction, O'Connor stared sharply at him. “What's wrong?”

Without lifting his stunned gaze from the body, Paulo whispered hoarsely, “I know her.”

 

Paulo had met Ashton Dupree for the first time when they were ten years old. He and Rafe had been sent away to a summer camp located an hour's drive from Houston. Despite Naomi's best efforts, Paulo had not been looking forward to a whole week of roughing it in the woods, fending off bloodthirsty mosquitoes, and sitting around a campfire every night singing lame songs with a bunch of kids he'd probably never see again. For the life of him he couldn't comprehend why Naomi—or his parents, for that matter—would subject him to such torture. He'd been homesick before he even stepped foot on the grounds of Camp Cullen.

All that changed when he met Ashton Dupree, a cute, tough-talking blonde who, like him, thought camp was the worst form of torture ever inflicted upon unsuspecting children, a racket supported by cruel parents who shipped their kids off to camp under the guise of exposing them to “new and enriching experiences.”

Proving true the adage that misery loves company, Paulo and Ashton had bonded immediately, a pair of misfits who'd grudgingly participated in the camp's daily activities, but had refused to admit, even to each other, that they were actually having fun. At night Ashton had given her counselor the slip and snuck into the boys' cabin, crawling into Paulo's bed and convulsing with giggles until he'd had to clamp his hand over her mouth to shush her. They'd shared a few quick, sloppy kisses and had groped each other under the covers, but that was the extent of their experimentation. Ashton had once confided to Paulo that she was adopted because her real father had liked touching her too much, and even at ten years old Paulo had understood that she was damaged goods, that the emotional scars she bore would probably haunt her for the rest of her life.

He'd seen her at camp over the following two summers, and then not again for twenty-seven years, when she'd gotten arrested for soliciting an undercover cop four months ago. The moment she was hauled into the station, kicking and screaming and shrilly demanding her rights, Paulo had recognized her. He'd taken over for the arresting officer, who'd already sustained several cuts and bruises in the skirmish and was on the verge of snapping. Overjoyed to see her old friend, Ashton had thrown her arms around Paulo and showered his face with kisses, raising more than a few eyebrows around the busy police station. While Paulo processed her, she'd filled him in on everything that had happened in her life since the last time they saw each other. She told him about dropping out of high school, getting kicked out of her adoptive mother's home, going through a string of abusive boyfriends that led her to abort three babies. She confided that she worked as a stripper and did “odd jobs” on the side to supplement her income. When Paulo arched a brow at the notion of a thirty-nine-year-old stripper, she'd smiled coyly and offered to give him a private show so he could see for himself that Father Time had been very good to her. Paulo had taken her word for it.

“What's really hard to believe is
you
being a cop!” she'd said laughingly. “My God, Paulo, there's a reason I used to call you
El Diablo
. You were the wickedest kid in camp! Remember the time you stole the pack of cigarettes from the camp counselor, then started smoking right in front of him while we were all sitting around the campfire? And you were so cool about it, too. You just leaned into the fire, lit your cigarette like it was a joint, then laid back on your elbows and blew a curl of smoke into the sky. When the counselor started yelling at you, you just told him, as calm as can be, that if
you
weren't allowed to smoke,
he
shouldn't be, either.” She let out a peal of laughter at the memory. “God, you were my idol! How could you sell out like this?”

Paulo had chuckled softly. “I guess we all have to grow up sometime.”

Ashton had sobered, and for the first time since that long-ago night she'd told him about her father, Paulo had noticed a hint of vulnerability in her eyes. The vulnerability of a woman who'd been betrayed by everyone she knew, who'd learned at an early age that trust was a commodity that should never be surrendered too easily.

Paulo had pulled a few strings to get the charges against her reduced to a lesser fine. When she'd offered to repay him with sex, he'd turned her down, telling her that the only way she could repay him was to get her life together. She'd been offended, had accused him of thinking he was too good for her. And then she'd stormed out of his office, snarling bitterly, “Thanks for the memories. Have a nice fucking life!”

Paulo had tried calling her, but after several unsuccessful attempts to reach her, he'd given up in angry frustration.

He couldn't have known that the next time he and Ashton Dupree were reunited, one of them would be dead.

Dr. Garrett, who'd looked none too pleased about being summoned to the scene of another gruesome homicide less than a week after Maribel Cruz's murder, estimated that Ashton had been dead at least twenty-four hours. He wouldn't commit to a date and time for the autopsy, saying only that based on his preliminary visual examination, he fully expected Ashton's injuries to be similar to Maribel's. After getting as much information out of him as they could, Paulo and Donovan left the bedroom to allow O'Connor and her crime lab team to continue vacuuming, photographing, videotaping, measuring blood spatter, and dusting the scene.

They stepped outside to wait for the neighbor's return so they could ask her a few more questions. As they stood on the rickety porch, Paulo took inventory of their surroundings. Uniformed officers were making their way up and down the dilapidated street, knocking on doors and talking to neighbors in the hopes that someone had seen something, anything, that might lead to a crucial break in the case.

Paulo frowned at a group of reporters, cameramen, and curious bystanders gawking at them from behind the police barricade erected at the end of the street. Two sheriff's deputies were filming the crowd, their cameras clipping off pictures of anyone who seemed out of place or exhibited suspicious behavior. Later, when Paulo and Donovan returned to the station, they would review the tape and compare it to the one from the previous crime scene to see if they noticed any repeat visitors. In cases like these, it wasn't uncommon for a killer to return to the crime scene to revel in the havoc wrought by his handiwork.

“The house is mortgaged to a Dorothy Dupree,” Donovan said, breaking into Paulo's thoughts.

He nodded. “Dorothy Dupree was the woman who adopted Ashton when she was eight years old. She was a foster parent to several children over the years, but Ashton was the only one she ever adopted. She left the house to her when she died a few years ago.”

“Maybe some of the other foster kids weren't too happy about that,” Donovan speculated. “Maybe we need to track them down and check out their stories.”

“It wouldn't hurt. I can only recall Ashton mentioning one foster sibling all those years ago, but for the life of me I can't remember his name.”

“His?”

“Yeah. A brother. The last time I saw her, I think she said something about him living in Sugarland.”

“Sugarland?” Donovan whistled through his teeth. “That's some pricey real estate.”

“I know. So it's not likely he would have killed her over this house. But we still need to find him and notify him. And we should talk to her boss and coworkers at the strip club.”

Donovan was nodding vigorously in agreement. “As soon as I heard she was a stripper, the first thing I wondered is whether one of the club's customers had become obsessed with her and started stalking her. Whoever killed her knew about that spare key on the back porch. He must have been watching her for some time, learning her habits and routine.”

Paulo grimaced. “The other possibility is that she was killed by someone she was sleeping with for money. She once told me she was doing odd jobs on the side to earn some extra cash.”

Donovan gave a derisive snort. “‘Odd jobs.' Is that what they're calling it now?”

Something inside Paulo snapped. He shoved his face into Donovan's and snarled, “She had a hard life, okay? She was molested by her damned father and got bounced around from one foster home to another until Dorothy Dupree decided to take her in, and even
she
wasn't exactly Mother Teresa. I'm not making excuses for the choices Ashton made in life, but until you've walked a mile in someone else's shoes, don't fucking judge them. Got that, wiseass?”