Mortal Sin (7 page)

“Before he died?”

“Several hours to a day before he died. Someone pushed him hard enough to leave marks. I’ll verify when I cut him open, but it appears superficial. I scraped his nails and skin, but they were very clean. Consistent with a doctor who would repeatedly wash and disinfect his hands.”

“So he didn’t struggle.”

“Like I said, he didn’t fight back.”

“Why was he on the floor in the first place?” Skye mused out loud.

“Maybe he was surprised and pushed from behind. Tripped and fell. Someone then hit him from the back. He turned his head and was clocked on the side here. That’s my best guess, though I’m going to run a computer simulation based on the cracks in the skull to analyze the blows.”

She looked from Bertrand’s body to Rod. “You can do that? A computer simulation?”

“I can’t, but the new CSI kid you hired can. I was skeptical when you brought in the kid right out of college, but he knows all the tech stuff I haven’t had time to learn.”

“It’s because he came cheap,” Skye grumbled. Their budget was anorexic.

“Are you staying for the show?” He held up his scalpel.

“If I have to for time of death.”

“I can give you a window, and narrow it later. But my conservative estimate is between four and eight last night.”

“You’re certain.”

“Four to eight. I might be able to narrow it down a bit, but since his body was found quickly, I’m confident.”

“Thanks.”

“Does it help?”

“It’s a fact I need, it doesn’t help or hurt.” She stripped off the disposable gown and tossed it in the trash, along with the booties and gloves. “Call me when you have something definitive.”

“I always do.”

Between four and eight last night, Skye thought when she left the morgue. She walked to the police station across the street, grabbed her messages from the desk sergeant, and went into her office. She closed the door, something she rarely did before November, but found herself now doing often.

Message from Truxel. Put that in the later pile.
The Courier
? Toss it. Like
she
was going to talk to the press. Hank Santos. Why hadn’t he called her cell phone?

She immediately returned Hank’s call. “Hank, it’s Skye.”

“A truck nearly ran over Jared and your friend from Ireland.”

She straightened. “When?”

“Nearly three hours ago. Outside the coffee shop near the high school. Jared gave his report to the responding officer—Bob Martin—but there’s more to the story. Your girlfriend bolted. Nothing I can share over the phone.”

Moira hadn’t even called her to explain. What the hell?

“Was anyone hurt?”

“Scrapes and bruises.”

“I’m at the station. Where are you?’

“Home, with Jared. Hold on.”

He left her waiting for several minutes. She would have been irritated, but she skimmed and signed reports that were in her in box. The worst part of being sheriff was the paperwork.

Hank came back. “Skye? You still there?”

“Of course.”

“Moira just came in with Lily. Said they’re going to Montana tonight.”

“Keep them there. I’m on my way.” She hung up. No way could Moira leave. Skye needed her. And she was a potential witness in the Bertrand murder. Skye wanted her to walk through his house to make sure that his murder had been good, old-fashioned, non-supernatural hatred. A revenge killing. Or money. A robbery. Why couldn’t she get something simple like a junkie killing for a fix?

But it was more than that, Skye realized as she sped out of the parking lot. Moira was one of the few people she could really talk to. The woman infuriated her more often than not, but she was
real.
She didn’t bullshit. She didn’t sugar-coat the truth. She was willing to risk her life to do what was right. Skye respected that.

Skye liked her, which made Anthony’s hatred of Moira even more difficult. Because Skye loved Anthony. But he wasn’t being honest with her. She wouldn’t accuse him of lying, but he withheld information. Was that the same thing? And why? To protect her? Because he didn’t think she’d understand? She really didn’t know. She wanted him back with her every night, when he used to talk and tell her what was troubling him.

He’d travelled to Italy twice in the last three months, and Montana three times. Each trip seemed to take more out of him, leaving him aloof and exhausted. None of them were long, but each one seemed to separate Anthony even more from her, as if he felt guilty for loving her.

And maybe he was. He was torn between two worlds. Whenever she tried to talk to him about it, he changed the subject. Talked around it. Or kissed her. He was a sensitive and passionate lover, one she found hard to resist when he really turned on the charm.

And then there was Rafe. Skye didn’t know what to make of him. She kept her distance because there was something off, something
unusual
about him. She couldn’t put her finger on it. It wasn’t only that he’d been untouched in the massacre at the mission, the same massacre that had left twelve priests dead; it wasn’t just that he’d spontaneously woken up after being in a coma for ten weeks, or that he had somehow managed to stop some sort of black magic ritual that had left one girl dead and one girl terrified, or that he was so damn
calm
all the time as if he was watching everything from a distance.

It was all of it and none of it. Maybe what bothered her more than anything was how Anthony was so blind in his loyalty to Rafe that he wouldn’t ask the hard questions. That Anthony had confronted Bertrand at the hospital when Skye had told him to steer clear. That Moira, a smart, sharp, distrustful woman, seemed to have fallen completely and totally head over heels in love with Rafe—that bothered her.

Hank Santos lived only a few minutes from the station. Her personal truck, the vehicle she’d let Rafe use for the last few months, was parked in the driveway next to Hank’s cruiser. She hoped he hadn’t let Moira—who had no license—drive it. She didn’t need that headache right now. Thomas’s supporters were just waiting for Skye to screw up, and they knew that Skye and Moira were friends. Moira was another stumbling block for Skye. Some people—the wrong people—knew Moira was in the country illegally, and while Skye had worked to get Moira a temporary visa, she did it under a false name because Moira was wanted for questioning by Interpol.

What crimes hadn’t she committed since these people from St. Michael’s Order had come to town?

Skye knocked on the door and Hank answered. Moira stood right behind him. “Thanks for calling, Hank,” Skye said. She turned to Moira. “You should have called me, dammit.”

“I didn’t have time. And don’t you have a murder to solve?”

“Don’t play semantics.” Skye closed the door and said, “Where’s Rafe? You didn’t drive here—”

“I’m right here, Sheriff,” Rafe said. He stepped into the living room. “What’s troubling you?”

“What? Like I don’t have enough? You can’t leave. Anthony is in trouble.”

“Because of Bertrand? He didn’t kill him,” Rafe said.

“Tell me what happened yesterday at the hospital. And I want the truth. If you lie to me, I will arrest you.”

Rafe smiled, bemused. “Skye, it’s very simple. Anthony spoke to Dr. Bertrand in his office. St. Michael’s offered a lucrative deal in exchange for him sharing what treatment—or spells—he used on me, plus information about what Fiona’s coven wanted from me. We didn’t think he’d go for it, but Anthony distracted him long enough for Moira and me to search the wing where I was kept.”

She didn’t want to hear this, but she had to. “You’re going to be on the security cameras.”

“Only in the halls. There are no cameras in the individual rooms. No one saw us do anything wrong. We
didn’t
do anything wrong.”

“What time did you leave?”

“Before lunch. Maybe eleven-thirty. Anthony went to visit Juan Martinez, and Moira and I went to the mission. Anthony joined us there sometime around three.”

“Did you learn anything, or was it all for nothing?”

Rafe hesitated, then glanced at Moira.

“Dear God, I thought we were done with the games,” Skye said. “You either trust me or you don’t. If you don’t, just get out of my town and never come back.”

She was overreacting, but today had started bad and gotten worse.

Moira stepped forward. “Skye,” she said firmly, “we confirmed what we already knew. We found a chart that had been Rafe’s, different from the one Bertrand turned over to you. It showed he had been kept in a medically induced coma. But we didn’t find out what Fiona wanted from him.”

“And that’s just a theory, anyway, that she ordered Bertrand to do this,” Skye said.

“I’m certain she did,” Moira said. “Bertrand gave a few things away, nothing we could have used against him, but enough that we think they were trying to get information about something related to the mission.”

“And did they?”

“We don’t know,” Moira admitted.

Skye was relieved, but she didn’t want to show it. “And the three of you were at the mission all night?”

“Until late—well after midnight,” Rafe said. “Moira and I went to the cabin and left Anthony at the mission because the fog was heavy last night, and it was late to be driving.”

Moira said, “What’s going on with all these questions? If we wanted to kill Bertrand, we would have done it months ago.”

“Don’t say that to a cop.”

“I had plenty of opportunity, and I didn’t,” Moira said. “Why? Because we
needed
him. He has the answers about Rafe’s migraines, and now we’re starting at square one.”

Skye turned to Rafe. “You’re still having headaches?”

Rafe had obviously wanted to keep that information to himself. “They come and go.”

Moira rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Look, Skye, I’ll tell you anything else you want to know, but I have to catch a flight. So make it snappy.”

Skye sat down at Hank’s dining table. Hank brought them all coffee, water for Rafe. “What happened today?” Skye asked, then sipped the coffee and mouthed
thank you
to Hank.

Moira took hers, but didn’t drink. She filled them in on what happened outside The Bean Bag. She downplayed the whole saving Jared’s life bit. Skye knew it made Moira squeamish to have anyone think she was some sort of hero.

Jared walked into the room. Lily was behind him, with a small suitcase. “Thinking back on it, it was truly awesome how Moira just threw her dagger at the truck. A little bit David and Goliath.” He grinned.

Skye rubbed her temples. “And you left the scene. Shit, Moira. You should have stayed and given a statement. Called me. But you left.”

“Sorry.”

Moira didn’t sound a bit sorry, but she would never understand the rules Skye had to follow, so she changed the subject.

“So what’s this about a trip?”

“I’m taking Lily to Olivet for her own safety. And Rico has a job for me.”

“I need you here, Moira.” Skye didn’t mean for it to come out that way. “Bertrand. I don’t know what happened to him. He was hit over the head multiple times, that’s how he died, but only one room was touched.”

“You want to know if it was magic.”

“I guess.” She sounded so stupid and needy.

Moira glanced at Rafe. “On one condition,” she said to Skye. “I get to search his house.”

Hell no.
“I can’t let you—”

“I know exactly what I’m looking for, and I won’t take a thing. You know as well as I do that he was our best lead to finding my mother. I need her location.”

How many laws had Skye broken since she’d met Anthony last November? How many reports had she falsified, how many friends had she lied to, friends she’d
asked
to lie?

“I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

Moira nodded. “Lily, stay here with Jared and say your good-byes. We’ll be back in an hour.”

Moira glanced in the side mirror from the passenger seat in Skye’s Bronco. Hank and Rafe were following them to Bertrand’s house. Hank and Moira hadn’t exactly hit it off when she first came to town. Hank thought she and Jared were having some sort of torrid affair. Right—she was nearly thirty and she was doing the dirty with an eighteen-year-old senior? But at the time, Hank had been affected by the demon Envy and not thinking straight. Moira was glad he hadn’t fully succumbed to the demon because he probably wouldn’t have survived. No one quite understood why some people died and some people survived, but it was clear that Hank got better once Envy was captured and contained.

Hank seemed to accept the supernatural with more ease than most people, including Skye, but he still didn’t fully trust Moira. He was protective of his son and now Lily. She supposed if she were in his shoes, she wouldn’t trust herself, either.

Moira glanced at Skye. She was preoccupied, but what else was new?

“Something bothering you?” Moira asked. “Over and above the obvious murder and mayham.”

“Why did Anthony visit Juan yesterday?”

“He goes over there all the time,” Moira said. She hesitated, then said, “I’ve gone with him a couple times. Anthony hated asking me to, but I understand what Juan is going through.”

“It’s been nearly six months,” Skye said.

“Being possessed by a demon changes you,” Moira said quietly. “Sometimes it’s impossible to recover.” Been there, done that. Sometimes, Moira wondered if she’d ever regained her sanity. And until Rafe came into her life, she’d had a death wish. As long as her death had a positive impact—like taking her mother with her.

“I haven’t seen Juan in months. He avoids me.”

“Yeah, well.” What did she say to that? Moira and Anthony had argued over Juan. They argued about most everything, but Juan was different. Anthony’s guilt over not being able to prevent Juan from being possessed affected the way he saw the former detective. What Moira saw was completely different. Anthony thought Juan could be healed if he just did or said the right thing. Moira wasn’t sure. She saw a man who wasn’t fully present, who still saw and felt things he didn’t want to remember. He was damaged, and she didn’t think prayers were going to cure him. Maybe that was a sin to think that way, but Juan was only half-present in this world.