The Law of Desire (5 page)

And how long could she keep the fact she was wanted for questioning about her brother’s murder a secret now that two more murders had taken place?

“Who did this?”

The detective’s harsh tone shocked her from her thoughts. She looked up and stared at Lawrence. He seemed to be studying her. Probably to see if she was going to tell him the truth.

Un-freaking-believable!
“How would I know? You seem to forget I spent the entire afternoon with you in the freaking police trailer being interrogated like a criminal when I was almost a victim.” She placed her hands on her hips and glared at him.

“I know where you were two hours ago. But until we establish time of death, we can’t really rule you out as a suspect, can we? You seemed pretty resistant to me taking you home. What did you have to hide?” He walked up to her and stood right in front of her, as if he were daring her to answer him. “Unless you have some names to give…Of course this has to do with the people who tried to grab you earlier?”

Here we go again…

“Look, I told you I don’t know!” She moved to walk away and he grabbed her arm.

She shook her arm but couldn’t seem to shake his grasp. She blinked.

No. I will not cry! I will not give this man the benefit of my tears. I refuse.

He gritted his teeth and opened and closed his mouth twice before speaking. “Maybe some time downtown will help jog your memory, Ms. Samuels.”

She blinked again.
No tears!
“What? You have got to be kidding me! You’re going to arrest me? For what? Not knowing?”

“Right now, you were the last person to see the McKnights alive. You’re a person of interest and, yes, I’m bringing you in for questioning.” He let her arm go and threw up his hands as if he had no choice in the matter.

She pursed her lips and nodded her head as she studied him. He kept her gaze as if he halfway expected her to start spilling her guts.

Wait on! I have nothing to say, Detective.

The backup police and the coroner arrived at the same time. Soon the apartment was abuzz with activity.

She bit back the dread threatening to overwhelm her with a real and fierce indignation. Her eyes narrowed and her back straightened. Detective Hightower wanted to play hardball and there was nothing she could do to stop him. She stared at him and tried not to let her fear show in her eyes.

She held out her arms with a smirk. “Are you going to cuff me, Detective?”

I’
ll get him back for this. One day, I will get him back for this!

Minerva allowed sweet, vicious thoughts of revenge to soothe her ego as she propped her feet up off the crusty floor onto the more-than-likely flea-infested mattress.

The only saving grace for her less-than-ideal situation was that she was in a cell by herself. Since it was a weeknight, she could only hope things were slow at the police precinct and she’d be able to remain in the cell alone. But something told her she wasn’t going to be that lucky.

Somewhere between the ride downtown to the precinct and being fingerprinted by that Hightower hothead himself, she realized that Lady Luck must have left her high and dry a long time ago. When she came to grips with the fact that the detective was actually going through with it and holding her for “questioning,” she let the venom take up residence and began to think of creative ways to get even with him.

With no one to call and no money for a lawyer, she was basically stuck there until the jerk decided to set her free. And even when he did decide to let her go, with the McKnight twins now dead like her brother, she had nowhere to go. Even David had disappeared on her.

She might have cried if she weren’t so damn angry with Detective Hightower. He had no right to detain her when he knew she didn’t do it. He was going to be sorry and he was going to pay. The man had no idea who he was messing with.

Lawrence tried to get the slight gleam in Minnie’s eyes out of his head. The fact was somebody had tried to snatch her. His gut told him there was a connection between the attempted kidnapping and the execution-style murder of the McKnight twins. And there was no way he was going to leave her alone so she could end up dead. He was going to help her whether she liked it or not.

At least she hadn’t cried. He could tell she wanted to, but she didn’t. If she had started crying, he wasn’t sure that he could have brought her in, fingerprinted her and placed her in that cell. Something told him that her tears would have stopped him cold.

Not good.

He shook his head and willed the computer to hurry up and give him some background on the mysterious Minnie Samuels. As much as his basic instincts demanded that he protect the woman, he also had the niggling suspicion there was way more to her than she was letting on. He just hoped it wasn’t a criminal past she was hiding.

“What are you doing down here? I thought you’d basically moved into the satellite trailer in the Fourth Ward?”

He looked up to find his youngest brother, Jason. Jason was a cold case detective and the two of them were the only two of the brothers to follow in their father’s footsteps and join the Paterson Police Department. The other Hightower brothers, Joel and Patrick, had followed the other Hightower tradition and become firefighters. Now their father James and brother Joel both worked at the company their father started when he retired from the police force, Hightower Security.

“And what are you doing with my cup? I swear every cup in this place and you somehow manage to always find my Pace cup.” Jason eyed the blue mug that Lawrence drank his coffee out of.

Lawrence couldn’t help but smirk. He’d had to search for the prized mug today, but he’d found it way in the back of the cabinet.

Jason must have taken a lot of time hiding it.

He didn’t know when he’d decided to make it his personal quest to annoy his brothers by using their favorite cups or plates or taking the chair they always sat in. But he knew he liked getting a rise out of them. And none of them got as upset as Jason.

“You now, baby bro, you really shouldn’t covet things. It’s just a cup.
People
are more important than things. Think of how happy it makes your older brother to drink out of this cup.” The grin on his face let his younger brother know he knew it was more than just a cup. “Plus, you weren’t even thinking about this cup until you saw me drinking out of it. This thing was so far back in the cabinet there’s no way you could use it every day.”

Jason gave a rueful smile. “It’s still
my
cup.” He took a seat on the edge of the large metal desk where Lawrence was working.

While the computers and phones had been upgraded around the precinct, many of the furnishings could have used a remodel. The desk he’d been using all night looked like it weighed a ton and probably could have been used as a prop from one of those 1960s cop shows.

He took a slow sip. “Next time hide it better.”

“I thought I did. I would take it home, but then I’d have to watch you drink from it every time you came over for a visit. That’s a sickness, bro. You need to get that checked out.”

“It’s a quirk and you love it. Otherwise you wouldn’t have gone to all that trouble to hide your little mug just for me to find.”

“Yeah, so what are you doing here anyway?”

“The McKnight twins were murdered and someone tried to snatch the young woman who’s been living with them, Minnie…” His voice tapered off as he caught the flash on the computer screen in front of him. He glanced at it quickly scanning the information that the print run had found.

No wonder it had taken a little longer. The information was a little deeper in her past but it looked like
Minerva Athena Jones
had a juvenile record.

“She was arrested for shoplifting when she was fifteen.” He didn’t even realize that he’d spoken the words out loud.

“Huh? What does that have to do with someone trying to grab her? And this is the woman who was at the happy-hours spot with the McKnight twins a few months back, right?”

“Yeah. And it appears that her name is Minerva Athena Jones instead of Minnie Samuels like they told me…unless Minnie is a nickname for Minerva and Samuels is her married name…” He shook his head. She couldn’t be married. Oddly, he would rather she be a liar than be married.

“It could be her married name. You’re looking at the juvenile record, right. If it was Jones when she was fifteen it could very well be Samuels now. And Minnie is a nickname for Minerva. Honestly, with a name like Minerva I can see why she goes by Minnie.”

“Minerva was the Roman goddess of wisdom, warriors and poetry. It’s a beautiful name.”

He liked the name Minerva. It was different for a sister her age.

“Yeah…whatever…I’m just saying. She probably wasn’t lying about her name. It could be her married name. Maybe she was on the run from an abusive husband and hiding out with the McKnights…”

“She’s not married.”

“You won’t know until you do some more checking. Which I’m sure you will. Where is she now? Did you get her in protective custody?”

“Well, she’s in custody, so to speak.” He gave his brother the rundown of his afternoon and evening with Minerva.

Jason cracked a grin. “Man, she must be steaming!”

“What was I supposed to do? She won’t talk and frankly, she was the last person to see the McKnights alive.” He grabbed the forensics folder off his desk. “Although, the coroner’s time of death gives her an alibi for the murders since she was with me at the time.”

“Good thing you’ve become a tad obsessed with her, huh? She could either be kidnapped or dead right about now.”

He didn’t like the know-it-all smirk on Jason’s face so he decided to just ignore his little wisecrack. Leaning back in his chair, he tried to figure out what Minerva was hiding. If he could figure that out, he’d be able to get her out of his system.

“Anyway, man, I don’t want to keep you from all those pressing cold cases you have going on. One of them might be getting lukewarm as we speak. I’m gonna make some calls to LAPD and see what else I can find out about Ms. Minerva Jones.”

“Ohhh snap, I’ve been dismissed. I must have struck a nerve. You used to be able to take a joke.”

“Was that a joke? Ha, ha, I forgot to laugh.”

Jason chuckled. “Well, I hope she doesn’t have a record. Then you’d have to explain having the hots for a criminal.”

“See ya later, bro.”

“Oh, yeah, he’s got it bad and that ain’t good.” Jason kept talking trash as he walked away from the desk.

Lawrence picked up the phone and dialed the Los Angeles Police Department. It was time to get some answers about Minerva Jones.

She raked her fingers through her hair and wished she could rip out the red hair extensions. She just knew something from that cruddy mattress had taken up residence in her hair.

Ewww.

She moved to scratch her arms and her torso before taking her digging fingers back to her head.

Yuk.

She couldn’t believe that cop had kept her there all night. It wasn’t as if she had another place to go, but she could have thought of lots of places that would have been better than this crusty cell.

She would have to burn her clothes, take a steaming hot shower and wash the glued-in extensions out of her hair. She only hoped that would get rid of any of the bugs or parasites she was sure had moved from the cot to her body. The clanging of the cell door caused her to look up and stop midscratch.

“So,
Minerva Athena Jones
…Did you sleep well?” The detective walked into the cell with a sly smirk on his face and his arms folded across his chest. The only saving grace was his slightly bloodshot eyes and wrinkled clothes from the day before showed he hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep, either.

Since he had addressed her by her real name, he must have been able to pull up something about her when he ran her fingerprints. She glared at him and scratched her head. As soon as she got out of there and got the
heebie jeebies
off her, she would plan a slow and painful demise for the detective. Right now, she just had to get out of this cruddy cell.

“So you must have pulled my juvenile record. Way to go, Detective! Although, last time I checked, getting busted for shoplifting when you were fifteen doesn’t make you a murderer.”

“Yeah, but boosting as possible gang initiation activity? Hmmm…What does that tell us about your relationship to the deceased, two known members of the Crips? What does that make you,
Minerva?
A Cripette? Were you here to help them build up the gang here? Were their murders gang activity gone bad?” He leaned against the cell and kept his gaze planted on her.

“I’m not in a gang. I failed my initiation. You know, getting caught and all. And once my brother found out…” She stopped herself.

This is exactly why I didn’t need to be around this pit bull of a detective. It would only be a matter of time before he gets all the information I’ve been trying to hide.

“Your brother…That would be Calvin Jones?” He arched his eyebrow in that annoying know-it-all way of his. “Known gang member…High-level Crip? He was recently murdered and the LAPD have been looking for you to question you about that, but you disappeared. Right?”

She would have leaned back against the wall but the fear of what might get on her if she did stopped her. She needed something to hold her up, though. That’s what happened when it felt like the wind had been knocked out of you. She eyed the floor.

Was that red stuff blood? And what was that brown…
Yuk
.

She carefully rested one shoulder against the wall only bracing herself enough so that she didn’t end up on the floor.

“Minerva, do you care to tell me why the McKnight twins and your brother were murdered execution-style? What are you holding back from the investigation and why are you hiding? I can’t help you if you’re not upfront.”

“Whatever mess Calvin was in will get me killed too if they think I’m talking to the police.”

“And what kind of mess was he in?”

“I don’t know. All I know is these people have people inside the LAPD. I came to Jersey so that they wouldn’t think I was talking. But I really don’t know anything. My brother never let me in on that side of his life. When I was fifteen and almost joined the gang, that was the closest I ever came to his world. He only hit me once in my life and that was when I got arrested for trying to boost those clothes at the mall as a part of my initiation.” She paused, remembering the altercation with Calvin.

To say that Calvin hit her was putting it mildly. But the detective didn’t have to know all that. And she didn’t really want to remember the one time her brother made her hate him. He had beat her so badly, he had left bruises and told her she got off incredibly light, considering what would have happened to her if she had actually been initiated. She shuddered at the things her brother had yelled at her as he hit her.

“I sucked at shoplifting and got caught the first time out. Calvin found out and lots of heads rolled. He didn’t want me in the gang and he had enough pull to make sure I didn’t try again.”

And enough pull to make sure I thought twice before ever going against his wishes again.

Her brother had been a hard man. But she knew he did the things he did because he loved her. And because he wanted her to stay safe and alive.

“So you don’t know who killed your brother or the McKnights?”

“If I knew, I would say. I went to my brother’s apartment the night he was murdered because he was supposed to meet me for a celebration dinner and he never showed up. He wanted to celebrate his baby sister getting her BS degree. He wanted to take me to a really fancy restaurant but I wanted my favorite, chicken and waffles. I was late getting there. After waiting around awhile, I went to his place and that’s when I saw that he’d been killed. There was someone still there going through his things but I never got a look at the person. I don’t know who killed my brother. But I’m pretty sure that they know I’m here now and they’re after me. They more than likely killed Tommy and Timmy. And it’s all my fault.” Her voice cracked and she inwardly cursed and told herself to keep it together.

He paused as he gave her a deep, penetrating stare. “Come on, let’s go.”