Naked Addiction (25 page)

“So you have arrested more than one person in the murders?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“So what do you mean?”

“Off the record—”

“Sergeant.”

“Listen, I can’t really explain anything further on the record right now. Don’t you people understand how much damage you can cause with one story? It screws up our investigations—tips off suspects, lets them know what we have so they can be ready with good lies.”

Norman wasn’t going to let him off the hook this time. “But the public has a right to know what’s going on with this investigation, sergeant,” he said, following his editor’s advice. “Now, who do you have in custody?”

“Look, kid, I’m not trying to be evasive here. You are welcome to look at our arrest log. That’s all I have to say. Now, is that all? I’ve got to get back to work solving this case.”

“What about the letter? Can I get a statement on that?”

The sergeant took another long, deep breath before he spoke. “You don’t give up do you? Okay. Here’s what I can say. You ready?”

Norman nodded.

“A letter has come to our attention that may help point us in a certain direction in the investigation, but it’s too early to comment on exactly what direction that will be,” he said.

Norman rolled his eyes and kept his pen in mid air. He didn’t write a word of it down. “Sergeant.”

“What?” Stone said.

“That’s a totally nonresponsive statement. I can’t use any of it.”

The sergeant kept on as if Norman hadn’t said a thing. “The letter has been passed on to our handwriting expert and will be checked for fingerprints. Other than that, we’ll just have to wait and see.”

Norman knew that wasn’t going to be good enough to satisfy his editors. “What about the contents of the letter? Do you have any idea who may have written it?”

“No, we do not.”

Ha!
Norman let out a silent whoop of victory, reveling in the fact that he had more than the cops did on this one. Unless, of course, the sergeant was lying. 

“Have you questioned Seth Kennedy about the murder?” Norman asked.

“I can’t speak to that right now,” Stone replied.

Norman groaned. “So what’s the deal?”

“What deal is that?”

“C’mon sergeant. This is ridiculous.”

Stone looked exasperated. “Kennedy is in custody on drug charges. You know that. It’s in the news release. We arrested him for possession, distribution, and trafficking of narcotics last night. We found cocaine and heroin at his house, plus you know about the bust at Pumphouse. So, that’s it and that’s all. I’m afraid your time is up, Mr. Klein,” he said, rising to his feet.

“What about the chief?” Norman asked.

“As I said, he’ll be tied up in meetings all day.” Stone stood with his hand on the doorknob, waiting for Norman to get out of his chair.

“So the chief is refusing to comment?”  Norman said, refusing to move.

“I’ll see you out,” Stone snapped. “And I’m asking you not to put any of the contents of that letter in the paper. It could really interfere with our investigation.”

“I’ll take that under advisement,” Norman said sarcastically.

One thing was clear: if it were his ass or the sergeant’s, Norman would have no problem choosing between them.

Chapter 39

Goode

G
oode was walking up to Alison’s apartment door when he heard her cry out, but he couldn’t make out the words. The detective banged his fist against the door four times. “Alison? Are you all right in there?”

Silence.

“Alison?”

There was still no answer, but Goode could’ve sworn he heard a man’s low voice through the door. He pictured Tony holding her down, with his hand over her mouth. Maybe he was even choking her. Alison’s call was all the probable cause Goode needed to enter the premises by force. Especially after being invited.

He kicked open the door, his gun drawn, and he was right. Tony was straddling Alison on the floor, his hand placed squarely over her heart-shaped mouth. Goode saw fear in Tony’s eyes as he quickly rolled off Alison.

“It’s not what you think,” Tony said. “I was just trying to talk to her but she wouldn’t stop screaming. All I wanted to do was talk.”

A tear rolled down Tony’s cheek. But Goode found it difficult to feel any empathy after what he’d witnessed. Alison seemed physically unharmed as she lay there, but her blank eyes told him she’d gone deep inside herself.

“You must be Tony Marcus,” Goode said. “We talked on the phone the night your daughter was murdered. I’m Detective Ken Goode.”

Tony nodded.

“Listen,” Goode said. “We’ve been working hard to solve your daughter’s murder, but you have no right to take out your frustrations on Alison. She’s been going through a rough time as well and I don’t think she needs you harassing her. You want to press charges, Alison?”

She shook her head.

“Well, that’s lucky for you, Mr. Marcus, but I still have a few questions.”

Tony looked at Goode with a mix of fear, confusion, and sadness.

“Where were you the night your daughter was murdered?”

Tony’s expression turned to disbelief. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about your temper, and maybe you took it out on your daughter just like I saw you doing a minute ago with Alison.”

Tony shook his head and dug his fingers deep into his eye sockets. Goode could hear the squeak of Tony’s eyelids as he rubbed them.

“Well, Mr. Marcus?” Goode asked.

Tony didn’t answer. He just kept rubbing his eyes. When he finally looked up, it was with such hopelessness that Goode almost felt sorry for him.

“I don’t even know how to answer you except to say that I would never hurt my daughter,” Tony said. “But if you must know, I was at home watching TV with my wife.”

He sounded sincere to Goode, who stood at the ready, his legs apart, one hand free at his side, the other on the gun under his jacket. Tony was not going to mess any more with Alison if Goode had anything to say about it.

“I certainly hope that proves to be true,” Goode said.

Tony heaved himself to his feet and lumbered toward the open door, turning so his face was in shadow. 

“Can I call you, Alison?” he asked weakly. “I promise I won’t upset you again.”

But Alison was unreachable. She lay on her back, staring blankly at the ceiling. Even after Tony left the apartment, she didn’t move. Goode kneeled down beside her and touched her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

She wouldn’t meet his eyes.  “I wonder if he could have done it,” she said after a minute or so.

“I doubt it,” Goode said, relieved that she’d come out of it. “But if it’s him, my drug-dealing motive is definitely out the window.”

Goode paused to give Alison a chance to say something more. She didn’t, so he continued. “Besides, what would his motive be to kill his own daughter? And why would he want to kill Sharona and Keith?”

“My head hurts,” Alison moaned, covering her face with her hands.

“Did he hit you again?” If he had, Goode would run outside, grab him, and throw him to the cement.

“No,” she said, rising to a seated position on the floor, leaning against the couch. “You got here in time.”

Alison didn’t appear to be hurt physically, but he could tell the incident had caused some emotional damage. He wanted to help if she would let him.

“What are you thinking?” he asked gently, touching her arm.

“Nothing,” she said in a monotone.

“You can tell me.”

“No, maybe another time.” She turned and gave him a weak smile. Her voice was barely audible. “Tell me about the investigation. Have you learned anything new?”

Goode smiled back, relieved to have been given a safe topic of discussion. “No, not really. I just came from Keith’s parents’ house. Let’s just say they seemed, well, out of touch.”

“How are they taking it?” Alison asked.

“They seemed pretty shaken up.”

“What if Tony comes back?” she said, fear visibly creeping into her eyes now.

Good question. Especially with what I’ve just done to the doorframe by crashing through it.

He hated to see her so scared, but he didn’t really know what to do about it. “Is there a friend you can stay with for a couple days?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “Not really.”

“How about going back to LA to your grandmother’s?”

That must have stirred something in her because she got off the floor and sat on the sofa. “No, I haven’t talked to her much since I got here,” she said, “and I’m not up to going back up there.”

“You could stay at my house for a night or two,” he blurted out, wondering why in the hell he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. “I have a sofa bed.”

Alison’s face lit up like a child grabbing at a helium balloon at a birthday party. “Really? That would be great. Are you sure?”

He couldn’t back out now. “Um, yeah.”

“That would be really great,” she said. “Let me get some stuff together.”

Alison disappeared into the bedroom and returned a few minutes later with a small overnight bag. “I won’t get in the way, I promise. And I’m a heavy sleeper, so I won’t even hear you come in late or anything. . . .”

He knew the sergeant wouldn’t like this, so the sergeant wasn’t going to learn anything about it. Goode wondered what he was getting himself into.

“You aren’t going to get in trouble for this are you?” she asked. What was she, a mind reader?

“What the sergeant doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” Goode said. He half-hoped that saying it out loud would make it true.

Just then, a loud crunching sound erupted from the parking lot, like metal on metal, making them both jump. Goode ran outside and peered over the railing into the lot below. A white BMW had crashed into the stairs, its front end crushed, as if it were made of cardboard.

Tony was yelling something as he ran up the stairwell, but Goode couldn’t make it out until the man was almost on top of him. “My cell phone is dead. Call an ambulance!” he said, gasping for breath after sprinting up the stairs. “My wife crashed her car into the stairwell.”

Goode pulled out his cell and called for an ambulance and a patrol unit right away. Then he ran down the stairs to check on the driver, with Tony right behind him.

Helen was unconscious, her face pressed into the airbag. The sweet smell of gin and tonic filled the car. He couldn’t tell whether Tony’s wife had passed out because of the impact or from drinking. Maybe both.

“God, she reeks,” he said to Tony, who nodded in agreement. “What happened?”

“She must have followed me here. She just tried to run me over,” Tony mumbled, shaking his head in disbelief.

Nice marriage
. “Why would she do that?”

“I didn’t even see her until the car was coming right at me. Luckily, I was able to jump up the stairs and out of the way.”

When the paramedics arrived, they agreed with Goode’s suggestion to take Helen to the nearest hospital with a detox unit.

“You need to make sure she gets into treatment,” he told Tony. “She a daily drinker?”

Tony shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Looks to me like she has a problem, don’t you think?”

Tony nodded, his eyes cast down.

“Well, I suggest you leave Alison alone and concentrate on salvaging what’s left of your family,” Goode said.

Tony nodded again.

By then, the patrol unit had arrived and Goode gave the officer a quick report. After he’d finished, he went upstairs to give Alison his address, and told her to wait a while before she came over.

“I need to clean up a little first,” he said.

The truth was, he needed some time to clear his head.

Chapter 40

Goode

A
lison arrived at Goode’s cottage about an hour later. He gave her a quick tour, steering her quickly through the bedroom without calling attention to the queen-sized bed, and told her she could sleep on the foldout couch in the living room. Letting her stay could get him in enough trouble, but he was determined not to let anything more happen, at least until the case died down a bit. Still, given how long it had been since he’d been intimate with a woman, he couldn’t be sure whether he could stick to his resolve.

The two of them were chitchatting about getting Alison’s apartment door repaired when his cell went off again. It was the sergeant calling. Goode feared that, somehow, Stone found out that Alison was in his living room. He excused himself, closed the door to the bedroom, and took the call.

“It’s your lucky day,” Stone said, a note of triumph in his voice.

As he sat on the bed, which he’d quickly made before Alison arrived, Goode thanked God it was just his paranoia acting up again. “Yeah, why’s that?”

“Listen. With all these photos, we’ve got plenty of evidence to charge Paul Walters for Tania Marcus’ murder, so that’s what we’re going to do. I’m sure his DNA will match the stuff on her stomach. We’re going to make sure his health is A-OK, then we’re going to transport him to the county jail. We’ll parade him in front of the television cameras and pat you on the back.”

“This is all good news,” Goode said, “but I’ve got to tell you, I think something is still wrong with this picture. None of the suspects seems like he could be responsible for all three murders. But my gut says—in fact I would sacrifice my firstborn child on it—that there was only one do-er.”

“Okay, well, if it turns out he isn’t the guy who did all three, maybe the do-er will think he got off scot-free, start bragging to his buddies and implicate himself. Criminals are stupid. That’s why they get caught.”

“Yeah,” Goode said, kicking off his shoes. He needed a shower. “Maybe you’re right.”

“Besides, you’re on a roll,” Stone said. “Multitalented narcotics detective with a penchant for homicides hits it big, first time out. Pulls in three suspects
and
makes two big drug busts. You’d like to taste some glory wouldn’t you? We’ll make the charges stick. Don’t worry your pretty little head about it.”

“You think?” Goode, still not all that comfortable with the scenario, rubbed the lint off his feet.

“There is one thing that happened today that kind of struck me as odd, though,” Stone said.

“Yeah?”

“That cub reporter from the
Sun-Dispatch
came in this morning with a letter from someone claiming that Seth Kennedy killed all three people. It was supposedly written by one of his ex-girlfriends, but it wasn’t signed.”

“Really? Huh. You have it there? Can you read it to me?”

As soon as Stone read it to Goode, he felt in his gut that he knew the author’s identity. “Sounds like Clover Ziegler wrote that,” he said.

“You’re probably right. But it might just be a prank.”

“Could be, but worth checking out, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, I’m having the crime lab take a look at it.”

“Why send a letter like that to the newspaper and not to us? You know, until we check this out some more, I’d feel better if we held off making any big announcement about Paul Walters. Seth still looks like he’s involved in this somehow. The bartender, too. Can we wait just one more day?”

Stone paused for a minute. “Well, this Walters arrest looks pretty good to me, plus, if Kennedy is involved, maybe Walters will turn on him. But if you feel that strongly about it, I’ll see if I can buy you some more time. Trouble is the chief has been in my face to get charges filed first and ask questions later. He wants the mayor off his ass.”

“He said that?”

“Pretty much. I need a confession from Kennedy or that Walters character or whatever other wild card you can pull out of your ass by tomorrow afternoon at the latest. Use the letter if you have to. I’ll email the text to you right now. Get it?”

“Got it.”

“Good.”

Goode hung up and went back into the living room, where Alison was sitting on the couch with that feminine concern thing on her face. It was a nice change, not having to reassure her for once. She gave him a half-hearted grin, which he took as a positive sign after the scene in her apartment earlier.

“What’s wrong, Ken? You look sick. Got a virus or something?”

Goode appreciated her attempt at humor. And come to think of it, he was feeling a little under the weather. But he figured it was a case of mental, not physical, health. The pressure was starting to get to him. “I’m fine, really, it’s just that. . . .” he trailed off. She had enough on her mind without being burdened with his problems.

“What? You can tell me. It’s okay,” Alison said, patting the sofa next to her.

“No, I don’t want to bother you with my stuff.”

“Hey, you were there for me. Now let me return the favor. Maybe I can help. What is it?”

Goode sat beside her. He really wanted to help her, let her stay at his place, but he didn’t want to get too close. Not yet, anyway. “That was the sergeant. He says we’ve got enough evidence to ask the DA to file charges against Paul Walters.”

“That’s great, Ken,” she said, excitedly. “But you don’t look happy. What’s up with that?”

“I’m not so sure he killed Tania, let alone the two other victims.”

Alison’s mouth fell open. “What do you mean? What about the photos and the shorts you found? You know he had a motive—rejection and all that.” 

“Yeah, I know. But something isn’t right. I don’t know. I see no motive or connection with him killing Sharona Glass or Keith Warner, and I have a gut feeling that the same person did all three murders. I told the sergeant, and he said I’m doing a great job, blah, blah, blah. Even so, the last thing I want to do is put the wrong guy in jail.”

Alison gave him one of those
I’m proud of you
looks. “It’s great that you’re so conscientious,” she said. “I mean, you took me into your place and, well, it’s not all that big. I’m sure you’ll figure this whole thing out.”

Alison offered to make dinner, but Goode said he really needed to get back to work. After she described the menu, however, he decided he could squeeze in a quick bite before trying again to interview Clover at her house. They’d tried mornings and afternoons. Maybe they’d have better luck at night. He gave Alison a couple of twenties and directions to the supermarket so she could pick up fixings to liven up his bottled pasta sauce.

“One more thing, Alison,” he said. “I would feel better, and I think you would too, if you got a restraining order against Tony first thing in the morning, just in case he decides to come back. “

“He won’t find me here,” she said.

Despite her insistence earlier that she would stay with Goode for only a day or two, he sensed it might be tough to get her to go home. “No, but this is temporary and he knows where you live.”

“I guess you’re right,” she said.

After showering, Goode was getting dressed when his cell rang again. “Yeah, it’s Goode,” he answered.

The night watch commander, a real snotty guy and a perfect example of the Peter Principle, gave him a short retort: “Paul Walters says he wants to talk to you right away. He’s still in the hospital and his fever has spiked to one-oh-four. They’re not sure what’s going on with him. He may have caught one of those hospital bacteria deals.”

Goode scribbled a note to Alison, telling her to go ahead with dinner, that he’d be back in a while. He grabbed his tape recorder and wondered whether his feverish murder suspect was about to confess.