Sense of Deception (18 page)

Putting the cards down on the desk, I began to arrange them
in random patterns, hoping something would trigger another valuable connection or clue. I kept feeling like we didn't have the whole story. My eye fell on Detective Ray Dioli's card, and that burning anger welled up into my chest again. I hate bullies. Truly detest them, and the more I learned about Dioli and all the evidence he'd overlooked in Skylar's case, the bigger a bully he became. Somewhat blinded by the fumes of that anger, I picked up my office phone and called his cell. He answered with a gruff, “Dioli.”

“Detective? This is Abby Cooper.”

“You can't get enough of old Ray today, can you, Abby?”

I smirked. He thought he was
so
charming. Asshat. Still, it wouldn't pay me to come out all guns-a-blazing right off the bat. “Sorry to bug you yet again on your weekend, but I'm wondering if you could close the loop on something for me.”

“What's that?”

“Well, we had an interesting conversation with a guy named Wayne Babson today. Do you by any chance remember him?”

Dioli was quiet for a moment, and then he said, “No. Name doesn't ring a bell.”

My lie detector didn't exactly go off, but it suggested that Dioli thought the name might be familiar, even though he couldn't quite place it.

I thought I'd help jog his memory. “He used to date Skylar,” I told him. “But they stopped seeing each other shortly before she won back custody of Noah. Anyway, in a somewhat strange coincidence, Babson says that he got popped for something back in 'oh-five, and while he was in holding at county, another inmate there seemed to have intimate knowledge of Noah's murder. Babson claims that it so alarmed him that he talked to his parole officer, who then put him in touch with a detective on the case, and I was wondering if maybe it was you that he'd spoken to?”

Another pause and then Dioli said, “Nope. Wasn't me.”

My lie detector went off. Which meant that Dioli had suppressed evidence that Babson had been in contact with him. Unless Wayne's old parole officer had made a special note of it, we'd be hard-pressed to introduce it to the appellate court as evidence that the APD had purposely hidden some evidence, which I was beginning to think it absolutely had.

I was careful to keep my voice light. “Okay, thanks, Ray. I don't think I'll include the incident in the book, but I just wanted to make sure I'm covering the whole story.”

“Uh-huh,” he said. I doubted he believed me, and I got the distinct impression he was pretty much done helping me with Skylar's case.

“I'll call you if I get any other hits on Pham's case,” I said, still trying to remain in his good graces, although why I wasn't sure.

“You don't need to worry about that anymore,” he said cryptically. “We're all set on that.”

And then he hung up. Abruptly. Not even a good-bye kiss. How would I ever get over it?

With an eye roll, I got back to work sorting through the three-by-five cards. Candice poked her head into my office around six o'clock, looking tired and frustrated. “No luck?” I asked.

She shook her head. “Not really. I got a few hits on some names that're close, but no one who was in holding at county at the same time as Wayne. Still, I'm gonna track down those leads just to make sure.”

I motioned to the door with my chin. Oscar had been working on his laptop in Candice's office when I came into mine. “I take it Oscar didn't have any luck either?”

Candice stretched and yawned. “Not yet, but he promised to work it tomorrow. He left about ten minutes ago and said he'd be in touch tomorrow morning.”

I gathered up the three-by-five cards into a neat stack and stood up. “Okay,” I said. “We'll hit it again tomorrow. Let's call it a night.”

M
onday morning I was back at the office. There was a sense of urgency that went beyond simply knowing that Skylar's life depended on us figuring out who murdered Noah in the next few days. I felt so strongly that there was something more going on, a bigger picture to put it all into context, and I knew that I'd continue to flounder around until I had a chance to talk to Skylar. To that end, I filled out the required online application for a video visitation and impatiently sat back and waited for it to be approved.

About an hour after sending the form, I received notification that the visit had been approved and that I would be able to speak with Skylar at ten a.m. I spent the hour waiting for the visit by going about the painstaking business of creating a list of the e-mail addresses of all my clients whose sessions I'd previously recorded. Matt had instructed me that if I ever wanted to contribute to another federal case again, I'd better get my clients in a row by sending them an amended terms of agreement, which flatly stated that the e-mail copy of the recording of our session together counted as approval for the actual recording of said session, and that they
merely needed to check the little box marked “Agree” at the bottom of the e-mail and send it back to me to make it all legal-like.

This was no small task. I had almost four thousand clients. And while Matt had assured me that I probably didn't need all of them to reply to the amended agreement, I quite likely needed about seventy percent to get on board.

I figured it was going to take me at least a solid month to reach out to them all and beg them to simply click the little check box at the bottom of the e-mail. “Stupid Stephanie Snitch,” I muttered as I squinted at my computer screen. I would never understand why some women could be so aggressively catty to other women. The small child in me was hurt that she'd betrayed my trust when all I'd wanted to do was give her an experience that made her feel good and took away her worries. I'd wanted the best for her, and she'd made an effort to sully my name, and of course get a serial killer off on a technicality. She'd done that just to get some attention. That part alone was unforgivable.

And that gave me an uncomfortable reminder that I had to call Director Gaston at some point and let him know that I'd hit a dead end with the other girls that Corzo had murdered. After poring over the files of the other two victims the night before, it was clear to me, intuitively speaking, that there was nothing new to be gleaned. I couldn't even offer him a new angle to pursue.

I stared into space for a minute as that weight settled firmly onto my shoulders. So much about the week ahead held the potential to absolutely cripple me emotionally, because these weren't just cases to me. When I used my radar to help solve a case, a little piece of me went into it. A piece I never got back. The fact that I could contribute helped offset the loss of that energy. But if I wasn't going to bring home a win on any of the three cases I was currently working, then what was the freaking point?

I closed my eyes and sat back in my chair, trying to remember that it mattered that I was fighting the good fight. That there were plenty of times when I'd helped to put someone seriously dangerous behind bars. That the judgment of others didn't matter; only that of the people who loved me and fought alongside me counted.

Still, I couldn't quite convince myself.

Opening my eyes, I looked at the clock. I had fifteen minutes to go. Sitting up, I reached for the phone and made the call. “Gaston,” he answered before the third ring.

“Director,” I said. “It's Abby Cooper.”

“Good morning, Abigail,” he said, his voice crisp and clipped. He was all business this morning. “Did you manage to find something for us?”

I bit my lip. “Sir, I'm very sorry. Truly. But I went over the files several times and nothing there indicates that there's anything left to discover. At least not that I can pull out of the ether.”

Gaston seemed to take that in before he said, “Very well, Abigail. I'm sure you tried your best. We'll just have to continue to press on with the investigation on our own.”

I felt a pang. His words were right, but I could practically hear the disappointment in his voice. I'd failed him. “Maybe we'll have some luck with the fourth victim,” I said. And then realized that I'd spoken without even thinking about it. In fact, what I'd just said had sprung from my mouth as if someone else had said it.

“What did you say?” Gaston asked, leaping on the statement.

I shook my head a little. Where the hell had that come from? But I already knew. Sometimes my radar acts a bit like a case of Tourette's. Stuff sort of falls out of my mouth without any forethought, and it's those times when what comes out tends to be
the most truthful and predictive. “The fourth victim,” I said, almost whispering it. “There's a fourth victim out there, but either we haven't found her or her case hasn't been connected to Corzo yet.”

“We've done extensive searches within our shared databases, Abigail. No other cases were similar enough to suspect Corzo was responsible.”

“He changed his method,” I said, knowing that was true. “He's altered the way he disposes of his victims. I don't think he leaves them in plain sight, or poses them anymore. He's hiding them now.”

“So you believe there's another woman's body still out there?”

I focused on that question, but my radar was a little iffy on the answer. “I can't say for sure, Director, but there is a sense that we will connect these dots, and that as clever as Corzo thinks he is to change things up on us, he's actually messed up royally. He's left us a giant clue, and we only need to look out for this fourth victim to figure it out.”

And then Gaston asked me something that sent a slight chill up my spine. “You believe that Corzo has already killed this fourth victim, correct? This isn't a woman he intends to kill or has targeted?”

I tapped my finger on the desk. “No. No, it feels like she's already dead. However, Corzo definitely plans to kill again. I hate to say this, but I think he murdered this woman while we were trying to put a case together against him for the murder of the other three. I think it was done within the past year.”

I heard Gaston sigh. “We turned our focus away from him a few times in the past twelve months,” he admitted. “Other, more pressing cases needed our attention.”

Gaston didn't have to say it, but I knew of two cases in
particular that'd taken our attention away from Corzo, one involving Candice, and another involving a different serial killer who liked to blow things up. Literally.

Still, I had a sneaking suspicion that Corzo's fourth victim had been murdered during the time of the bomber, when we'd all been seriously distracted. (And some of us more than others.)

“We should look at missing persons reports from mid-October of last year through early November,” I said to Gaston. “Sometime during that stretch I think Corzo struck.”

“I'll get everybody on it,” Gaston promised. “Thanks for the call.”

I set the receiver down in the cradle of my desk phone with a satisfied sigh. Sometimes, it felt really great to have a little extra advantage over the bad guys, and my radar had often proved to be the thing that they couldn't quite circumvent.

My smug satisfaction lasted all of two seconds, because Candice came into my office carrying a newspaper and slapped it down on my desk. “Dioli's an asshole,” she proclaimed.

I glanced at the clock before looking at the paper. I had three minutes before Skylar's video visit. Enough time to get good and bothered. Eyeing the paper, I read the headline,
UT Research Student Arrested for Lab Partner's Murder
.

“Son of a
bitch
!” I yelled, taking up the paper to glare at it murderously. “I
told
that son of a bitch Dioli that Cheng didn't do it!”

“He's choosing to ignore you,” Candice deadpanned.

“How can he even do this?” I demanded, still staring hard at the paper. “I mean, he's got nothing! Nothing on this kid!”

“Read the article,” Candice said. “He's got a threatening e-mail from Cheng to Pham that was written on a friend's computer, almost as if Cheng didn't want it traced back to him.”

“Oh, bullshit,” I spat, and threw the paper into the trash can.
“He's got squat and he knows it. I'll bet he's trying to get a confession out of him as we speak! And this poor kid is an exchange student from China, where the police can torture a confession right out of you. I'll bet Cheng's not even aware he can ask for a lawyer and stop the interrogation.”

Candice seemed to light up at that statement. “I'll bet you're absolutely right,” she said to me, turning on her heel to head out of my office.

“Hey!” I said. “Candice? Where're you going?”

“To make a call,” she replied from somewhere deeper in the suite.

“But I've got Skylar coming up for a video chat in thirty seconds!” I yelled.

Candice said something, but I couldn't take it in, and in the next moment my computer made a ringing sound. I hit the space bar, and the screen jumped to life, pixelating for a moment before filling with the image of Skylar Miller.

I waved at her and tried to shrug off my irritation with Dioli. “Hi, Skylar,” I said. “Thanks for taking my call.”

Skylar's face held very little expression. It wasn't that her features were flat and withdrawn, more that she put no energy into visually expressing what she was feeling. It gave her an intensely serene aspect, and I will admit that it made me a bit self-conscious. “Cal said you were still intent on working the case,” she said. It was less a question and more a statement of fact.

“Yes. We've got some promising leads.”

Skylar nodded and her serene expression never wavered. It made it difficult to tell if she believed me. “I'm assuming you want to hear my side of the story,” she said.

“Yes,” I said, and moved my mouse over to an icon I had on my desktop. Clicking it, I said, “Skylar, I've just hit the Record button
on my computer. I'd like to record this discussion if that's okay with you?”

“That's okay with me,” she said.

I made a motion for her to continue and she rested her hands on the desk where the monitor was presumably mounted. “Noah and I had had a busy week,” she began. “I bought my house from a builder who'd painted everything vanilla, which is so boring to live with, and Noah was really excited about the idea of painting the house. I was on a pretty limited budget, but I knew a guy at Home Depot who let me pick through all the paint that got returned from other customers, and it was practically free. Anyway, Noah was an amazing little helper. He picked up painting really fast, and we cranked out the whole house in about a week. I also found a duvet and sheet set for him at the thrift store that was still in its original packaging, and you should've seen the look on his face when I brought it home. He thought I'd actually splurged on him.”

For the first time I saw the same sweet melancholy in Skylar's eyes that'd been present at my first encounter with her. Her gaze was far away and there was such a heartbreaking soulful sadness that I felt my own eyes mist a little. She continued. “That day—his last day—Noah and I made a few final touch-ups to the paint job, then picked up all the drop cloths, brushes, and paint cans and stored them in the garage. I would've just left the place somewhat picked up and headed for the couch, but my son wanted the house to be perfect, so we spent an hour vacuuming, and dusting, and mopping, until it was neat as a pin.

“After that, we ordered pizza and watched a movie together. Noah called his dad to say good night, and I took a shower. Then I ordered him into the tub and he got ready for bed. I'll admit that I was so beat from that week that I went to bed at the same time he did.”

“What time was that?” I interrupted.

“Around nine,” she said. “I got Noah tucked in; then I vacuumed the hallway just so the house would be absolutely perfect when we woke up the next morning, and turned in. I think I was asleep before my head hit the pillow.”

Skylar paused for the briefest moment and for the first time the mask of serenity faltered, and her mouth curled down as her lower lip gave a tiny tremor. She blinked, and recovered herself, but I'd seen the flash of gut-wrenching heartbreak across her face. That instant display of vulnerability and truth was enough to convince me that I was right to believe in her.

“I woke up sometime in the middle of the night. I don't remember what woke me. Maybe Noah cried out. Maybe the murderer made some noise. Whatever it was I can't be sure, but I do remember sitting straight up in bed and feeling like something was off, even though I couldn't say what. And then I heard something from Noah's room.”

“What?” I asked.

Skylar shook her head. “A thump, or a bump. Something like furniture being knocked against the wall. I figured that Noah was having a bad dream and maybe he'd fallen out of bed. So I went down the hall and his door was closed. I remember thinking that was so weird, because Noah never wanted his door closed. We had a small night-light plugged into the outlet in the bathroom, and he liked that he could see it from his bed. Anyway, when I opened his door, I saw him on the floor next to the bed. I thought he was sleeping and I even laughed a little. . . .” Skylar's voice broke off for a second. Another flash of heartbreak washed over her face, but it was also gone in a moment. She cleared her throat and continued. “I thought he'd slept right through falling out of bed,” she said. “I went over to him, got my arms underneath him, and that's when I felt how wet he was.
My first thought was that he'd wet himself, but as I was trying to lift him, my hand got sliced on something and I jerked my right arm back in a reflex. That's when Noah made this . . . this . . . sound.”