The Eleventh Victim (19 page)

A
T THE VERY MINUTE VIRGINIA GUNN WAS BREAKING INTO A DEEP
belly laugh over the Palmetto Dunes security guard’s speculating to the paper that stealth terrorists were responsible for last night’s debacle, just a few miles across town the Glynn County Commission chairman was sweating bullets, even with the office window unit on high.

Toby McKissick sat glued to the seat of his brown faux-leather office chair. Four feet of polished oak was the only thing that separated him from the other side of the desk.

There sat Floyd Moye Eugene, darkly shaded aviator glasses covering his eyes and allowing no clue as to his thinking.

But Toby knew Eugene’s reputation well—and something told him Eugene knew his.

Toby’s life centered around dodging his wife, seeking political favor with the bigs in Atlanta, scheming to put another dollar in his pocket, and chasing tail twenty-four/seven.

He owed so many grifters so many political favors he could hardly keep them straight in his own head. Plus, there were always the do-gooders nipping at his heels. And there was the constant fear of exposure…that all his “deals” and “favors” would catch up with him.

But all that was nothing compared to this.

For fifteen minutes now, Toby had been trying to explain why, exactly, the Island police had not yet pinpointed the vandals who had completely destroyed the foundational beginnings of Palmetto Dunes Luxury Living.

“Floyd, I agree two hundred percent, Palmetto Dunes is exactly what the south beaches need. I speak for the Commission in that we absolutely support you in this. It’s a travesty, a
sin
that the beach has just
lain there
, undeveloped, for years.”

Toby’s lower parts burned like crazy. He thought he was about to pass out. His urologist warned him repeatedly about stress. In the past few months, since the hush-hush deal with Eugene started up, his kidney stones were worse than ever. He’d already passed nearly twenty of the pellet-size little monsters in all, and he could feel one coming right now.

The pain of passing his second stone of the day nearly made Toby faint. The first had been pissed straight into a Styrofoam Krispy Kreme doughnut coffee cup this morning on the way to work when he got the word about Eugene.

Eugene’s stare, or at least what Toby took to be a stare from behind Eugene’s darkened shades, made his groin hurt even more. Here it comes, and there’s not a thing he could do about it. No way could he make it to the men’s room down the hall.

“Ah…Floyd…you’ll have to excuse me…damn!” The pain washed over him. It was all he could do to stand at the foot of his desk and whiz straight into his metal trash can. In midstream, a tiny metallic “ping” thunked loudly into the metal can, ricocheting off one side, plunking to the bottom. With a series of groans, winces, and twitches, the agony ended.

In the quiet of the office, Eugene sat unmoving, staring straight at McKissick’s bare butt. Toby fell back into his chair, faint, and the
chair rolled back of its own volition. His legs hung on the sides of the chair like sticks. When the chair came to a halt, the two men locked eyes.

Toby shifted his weight in his chair and struggled to keep his composure as Eugene stared hard at him.

Finally, Eugene said, “What the hell was that?” Eugene stared at McKissick, unblinking.

“Have you ever had stones, Floyd?”

“Can’t say that I have, McKissick, but I can now report with one hundred percent accuracy that I truly doubt whether you and your people can handle the situation down here. Frankly, I’m not convinced you fit into the deal anymore. It may just be too big for you to handle.”

“No Floyd…I’m on it. I’m all over it. I’ll get new security and ramp it up. No more all-night shifts for one person. We’ll rotate like military units do. Constantly changing guards throughout the night. This won’t happen again. I swear it. And Floyd, I’ll find the vandals. Probably teenagers. Trust me, it’s taken care of. Go back to Atlanta, I’ll call you the second we find out who tore up the layout.”

Eugene sat for well over a minute in stony silence, just looking at the disheveled mess of a man sitting in front of him.

“Damn,” Eugene said at last, “you’re one fat, pathetic mess.”

“If you just give me one more chance, Floyd, I know we can handle the whole thing. You won’t be sorry. Pulling out on our people at this point is very premature and—”

“Premature? You idiot! You country-hick moron. This sets us back at least three weeks. Money’s at stake here, you hayseed Billy-Bob. More money than you’ve ever dreamed about in your miserable little life. Now listen to me and you listen good. One more chance. And for God’s sakes, keep it quiet. I’m sending the crew out first thing in the morning to restart. One more screwup on the security end, you’re over. I know about every two-bit bribe you’ve ever taken. You don’t fool a single damn soul with your Rotary luncheons and your Kiwanis membership. I know your broke-down deal in this town and I’ll blow you wide open if I have to. There’ll
be nothing left for the locals to do with you but indict your sorry ass. Understood?”

Eugene turned on his heel and left. Toby could hear his footsteps on the tile of the hallway, passing by Toby’s secretary and heading to the front door. She brightly offered him coffee to go but Eugene brushed by her without answering. He never once removed his glasses.

The sound of the front door slamming made it all the way back to Toby’s office and then the offices settled into quiet, except for the humming of the window unit. Toby sank his forehead down into his hands.

But in one brief moment of clarity, a single thought rang through Toby’s head like a bell in a belfry.

Virginia Gunn.

H
AILEY PLAYED OVER AND OVER IN HER HEAD THE LAST TIME SHE
met with Melissa.

She could hardly think. Had she missed something?

Was there a clue to a problem, some sort of menace? Could she have averted disaster in some way?

Who had done this to Melissa?

Had she suffered?

Of course she had. There was no way of getting around the sheer horror of Melissa’s last moments.

A double knock at her door swung her around again. Her side throbbed.

“Come in,” Hailey called out in the direction of the door.

“Hi, Hailey.” A man appeared, dark hair and eyes, handsome in a way, wearing a white coat. He closed the door behind him. “I’m Dr. Lopez.”

“Hi, Doctor. Thank you for coming by, it’s nice to meet you.”

“Actually, we’ve already met, but you probably don’t remember. I admitted you in the ER. How are you feeling?”

“Hurting.” She was thinking of Melissa.

“Who’s the goon with a badge outside your door?”

“Good question. I take it he’s still there?”

Dr. Lopez nodded emphatically. “You took quite a beating, Hailey. Boyfriend…Husband? You can be totally candid with me. Everything we say is protected by my oath as a doctor.”

Hailey’s jaw dropped, her eyes widened, and then she laughed. “Thank you for your concern, Doctor, but I’m not keeping anything from you. I wasn’t beaten. I was just…shocked.”

He looked confused for a moment, then skeptical.

“No,
really
,” she said, realizing he thought she was covering for someone. “I’m a psychologist with an office in the Village. At the end of the day, I was packing up to leave to go home or maybe to dinner. I picked up my
Post
to take with me and…I saw one of my patients in the paper. She had been killed. She was murdered.”

“I’m sorry.”

She nodded. “Even now, I’m having a hard time saying the words out loud. We’d been working together for over a year. She was so brave, braver just getting out of bed in the morning and facing life every day than I could ever hope to be.” Her throat choked up again.

“I’m sorry. I know how it feels to lose a patient. It hurts. It’ll take a while for it to really sink in. But what I still don’t understand is how you went from reading the paper to landing in the ER, out cold
with a blow to the head and serious bruising, external and internal, to your side. You’ve got two rib fractures, too. You know, your kidneys could have been permanently damaged.”

He paused to let it sink in.

“Listen, I don’t mean to give you a hard time, but your version of what happened last night just doesn’t add up, medically speaking.”

He stood leaning against the heat vent under the window, poised with pen and medical chart in hand, waiting to scribble some plausible explanation into her chart. She looked back at him without hesitation, shaking her head.

“Look at these.” He crossed the space between them in two strides and pulled a series of snapshots out of the file.

When she took the first glance, she couldn’t believe her eyes. They looked like crime scene photos. Her naked side was covered in deep black-and-blue bruises spreading across her ribs and hips like ink. She couldn’t believe these were really of her.

In disbelief, she reached down and gingerly touched the same spots on her own body, and winced in pain.

She opened the side of her hospital gown and looked down at her side to see that it matched the photos, then up to meet his deep brown eyes.

“I don’t understand either. My friend from work was here earlier. She said I hit my head on the coffee table. And I remember that I
was
standing there when I saw the article about police identifying Melissa’s body. But…that’s it. I don’t understand the rest…the bruises.”

“Well, when you’re ready to talk about it, or to think back on it, here’s my card.” He set it on her bedside table. “Page me. Okay?”

She shook her head yes. “Okay.”

“Get dressed, but before you go, you’ll need some directions on how to function with those ribs. A nurse will come by and show you how to wrap them. You’ll have a tough time walking, getting up and down, or coughing over the next few weeks. And for God’s sake, don’t laugh…it’ll hurt like hell.”

She couldn’t imagine what she’d laugh about. “Okay. I’ll be careful…and I’ll keep them wrapped. Thanks.”

“Remember, you have my card. Use it.”

“Thank you.”

The nurse showed up a few minutes later to explain how to wrap her ribs with Ace bandages.

Then she left, and Hailey began gathering her clothes, mentally preparing herself to deal with Detective Kolker, still skulking outside her hospital door.

She couldn’t be too hard on him. He was just doing his job.

Finally dressed, she reached down for her purse, and nearly passed out again. The pain across her ribs was sharp and intense.

Hailey stood up and it hit her. It hit her like a ton of bricks. She remembered.

A pair of legs…in blue jeans…crossing the floor of Dana’s office, walking toward her after she fell.

The blood had been coming down her cheek, she could feel it…and those legs…a man’s legs…

He pulled back and kicked, putting his whole body into it, as if she were the football in a college playoff.

Again, she felt the first vicious kick to her side, then the next and the next, the tip of his boot working its way down her ribs to the soft side of her stomach.

She remembered doubling over, lying there on the carpet, her body reacting defensively to one unrelenting kick after the next, instinctively trying to cover her stomach with her arms…her ribs caving in onto her lungs and blood drizzling into her mouth.

But the face…she couldn’t remember the face. She hadn’t been able to move to look up.

She never saw his face.

Ribs wrapped tightly in layer upon layer of Ace bandaging, Hailey stepped gingerly around the foot of the hospital bed, sheets still rumpled. She leaned over carefully to pick up the doctor’s card.

She tucked the card into her bra and made her way across the room, placing one foot after the next. Stepping through the swinging door from her hospital room out into the hallway, the first thing
she encountered was Lieutenant Kolker, positioned like a vulture in the hallway.

“Still here? I’m damn impressed, Kolker.”

“I have some more questions for you.”

“Look, I’m happy to talk, but it’s pretty hard to catch a breath with my ribs wrapped.”

The smell of medicine in the hallway was heavy. She couldn’t wait for a breath of cold, fresh air.

“If you’ll just tell me—”

“Lieutenant. I’d like to get home to my apartment first. At least take a bath and change out of these bloody clothes.”

It was all she could do to walk. But she did, all the way down the hall. He never offered to help and as she made her way toward the elevator, she could feel him watching her through narrowed eyes. She stepped on and fought the impulse to look back at him. The elevator closed, her back still turned to him.

She had a feeling she hadn’t seen the last of him.

C
ELL PHONE IN ONE HAND, C.C. GLANCED AT HIS WATCH ON THE
opposite wrist and waited.

Tina had impressed upon him repeatedly in the past just how much a performer needed her beauty sleep.

It was one o’clock in the afternoon, though—she should be up by
now. He didn’t have lunch plans, maybe he should just hop in the Caddy and drive on over to her apartment.

Then again, he just
got here
and it was a full twenty minutes drive out to Tara Boulevard. Plus, one of the other judges might see him leaving early again.

But the thought of spending the afternoon with Tina was a temptation. God, she had a beautiful body and wasn’t the least bit inhibited. And hey, locking in the announcement as Democratic candidate for governor didn’t happen every day…. C.C. wanted to celebrate.

Making up his mind, he wheeled his office chair around, picked up the phone, and dialed Tina’s number.

At first the machine picked up and C.C. heard the familiar message. It was the breathy voices of two girls, Tina and Lola speaking in unison, promising the caller they’d return the call as Isaac Hayes sang in the background.

In mid-sentence, the machine clicked off.

“Hello?” Tina’s voice was all sweet and sleepy at first. He had clearly woken her up.

Was one o’clock too early? Damn!

“Hey, baby.” He spoke softly and tried a form of baby talk so as not to irritate her, but the baby talk backfired.

“Damn it C., you
freakin’ woke me up!
How many times do I have to tell you that?”

How she could generate that much lung power lying flat in bed under a pillow with her eyes still closed was a wonder.

“I’m starting to think you don’t respect me as a performer. You continually sabotage my career this way. How am I supposed to
create
tonight on stage if I’m exhausted?”

Tina was not a morning person.

Or, technically, an afternoon person.

“Sweet potato, you’ll be perfect no matter what. I just wanted to tell you I have a meeting tonight about the governor’s race and I’m in the mood to celebrate…. Any ideas?” He couldn’t suppress an anticipatory smile. Maybe she’d describe in detail just how they would celebrate the good news after she got off work.

“I only have one freakin’ idea, C.C.
Sleep!
That’s my big idea. Now call me back after four, okay? Is that so
freakin
’ unreasonable? Just to let an artist
sleep
until a simple four o’clock? Is that
so wrong
? Am I asking too much out of you? To be conscious of
my
career demands just once?”

He paused, not sure how to answer after she posed the rhetorical question loudly into his ear.

Tina seized on C.C.’s silence and continued on.

“I mean, C.C., do you think it’s all about you just because you’re a big-shot judge? I mean, I’m a performer, for God’s sake…doesn’t that mean
anything
? I mean, does it count for
anything
to you? Must I be tortured every morning this way?
It’s not all about you, C.C.
”

God…how close to the receiver was her mouth?

No way was he going to get a sex fantasy phone call at this point.

Nothing to do but retreat and forge ahead after four.

“Yes, kitten…after four. Sleep tight.”

She clicked off without a good-bye.

Artists were so temperamental.

She’d be in a better mood tonight.

Okay, it was decided. He’d hold out through lunch and
after
tonight’s meeting at Bones about the announcement, he’d head over to the Fuzzy to celebrate.

In fact, he’d just eat lunch here. To make sure the others noticed he was here this late in the day, he’d leave his chamber door wide open while he ate and then after lunch, he’d head into the law library and check out some books. Maybe he’d actually
sit
in the law library for a few minutes, for authenticity. Like he was actually
reading
the books. Maybe write in a notepad while he was reading? Or would that be overkill…probably yes.

He buzzed his secretary. “Amanda?”

“Yes, Judge?”

“Can you get my lunch and bring it here, to my desk?”

“Sure can, Judge. What would you like?”

“Fried chicken with mash potatoes and turnip greens on the side. A
light sprinkling
of Tabasco sauce on the turnips would be perfect.”

He hoped to God she’d get the order right this time. He’d given her the exact same order fifty times before and forty-eight of those times, something was wrong…no Tabasco, no plastic forks, forgot the napkins…

Incredible, C.C. thought. Some people just had no ambition.