Cold Blue Midnight

ADAM MORROW

RICK CORDAY

The names were followed by the same Chicago address and phone number.

But it was the name on the letterhead that held Doris's attention.

ARTHUR K. HALLIWELL

ATTORNEY AT LAW

Arthur Halliwell was one of the most successful attorneys in Chicago, and had been the family's personal lawyer since the days that Doris' father had selected him to guard and administer the Tappley fortune.

Arthur Halliwell was one of the most respected men in the state. And the wisest. And the most conservative.

Doris couldn't imagine him ever helping her mother do something as illegal as get Jill Coffey into some sort of trouble…

'She'll get her comeuppance,' her mother had said earlier.

Still so bitter. Still so angry.

Doris could easily picture her mother contriving some kind of plan to ensnare Jill but Arthur Halliwell helping her…?

Doris slid the letterhead back into the drawer and closed it quietly.

She wanted to see her mother pass on with as much grace as possible. She did not want Evelyn to waste her remaining years pursuing some insane dream of vengeance.

Of his own free will, her brother Peter had crossed the state line into Indiana where, on three different occasionsand perhaps more that nobody knew abouthe'd murdered and eviscerated three young women. And the state of Indiana had put him to death.

Jill Coffey had had nothing to do with any of it.

It was time Evelyn was made to understand that.

And understand it once and for all.

She left the den, climbing the grand staircase to the second floor and her mother's room.

CHAPTER 41

Rick Corday watched the man knock on Jill's ground-floor door. He wondered who he was. This was his second visit tonight.

He waited until Jill appeared silhouetted in the yellow light of the doorframe and invited the man inside.

Rick then got out of his car and crossed the street. He had parked almost a block away from Jill's.

He walked up to the man's car and shone his light inside. All the forms, the nightstick and portable siren told him immediately what the man was. A police detective.

He walked back to his car. He wanted to eat something. A hamburger with lots of onions would be good. And he wanted to think about what this meant, that Jill Coffey had a friend who was a police detective.

CHAPTER 42

The call came just a few minutes after Mitch got to Jill's apartment. The kettle had just started to whistle. Jill poured water into her cup then made the long stretch to grab the phone.

Just before she heard a voice coming from the other end of the phone, Jill remembered something that Mitch had told her a long time agothat Lieutenant Sievers did his best interrogation work on the phone. Sievers felt that a phone was much more relaxing for most people, and that they therefore tended to tell you more than they might have in person. Lieutenant Sievers, Mitch said, had received more than half a dozen murder confessions over the phone during his twenty-some years on the force.

'This is Lieutenant Wayne Sievers.'

'Good evening, Lieutenant.'

A pause. When he spoke, he sounded irritated. 'Our mutual friend Mitch Ayers told you I'd be calling, I assume.'

'Yes. Yes, he did.' She put her hand out and Mitch took it.

'You know about Eric Brooks?'

'Yes, I do. I'm still having a hard time making myself believe it.'

'Why's that?'

'I saw him just a few hours ago and he was alive. I still can't believe'

'Were you two alone?'

'Yes.'

'What was his mood?'

'Oh, he wasEric. You know.'

'No, I guess I don't know, Miss Coffey.'

'There was always something Eric wanted, and he always seemed agitated when he couldn't have it.'

'Was there anything in particular he wanted this evening, Miss Coffey?'

'Not that I know of.'

'Did he want you, Miss Coffey?'

She looked at Mitch. He made a big Happy Face, indicating she should do the same.

'I've already talked to some of his co-workers, Miss Coffey. They told me that he had always been interested in you romantically.'

'I wouldn't say "romantically."'

'Oh, then what would you say?'

'Sexually. But I didn't take that as any kind of compliment.'

'Why not?'

'Because Eric was fascinated with any woman who wouldn't sleep with him. I suppose he just couldn't imagine how we could say no to all his charms.'

'Was he charming, Miss Coffey?'

'He could be. But he could also be very manipulative and cynical.'

'Why did you two split up as partners?'

'There's no easy answer to that.'

'Then give me a complicated one.'

'Well, there was the sexual problem.'

'That being what exactly?'

'That he kept trying to get me into bed.' She looked at Mitch and shrugged. She felt as if she were saying the wrong thing.

'I see.'

'And we had argued a lot about the types of work I was doing. I'm a photographer and that's what I love doing and that's what I wanted to do, but Eric was trying to turn me into some kind of executive. I didn't want that.'

'I'm told you had very stormy arguments.'

'I can't deny that.'

'Did you have an argument tonight?'

She hesitated. 'I wouldn't characterize it as an argument.'

For the first time, a frown wrinkled Mitch's forehead.

'Then how would you characterize it?'

'Eric wanted to seduce me.'

'And you didn't want him to?'

'No, I didn't.'

'What happened?'

'Nothing, really. Before I went up there tonight, I'd had some hope that maybe Eric had changed. You know, grown up a little.'

'But he hadn't?'

'No. He wasEric.'

It was all clear, of course, how Eric had forced a kiss on her and how she'd slapped him. She wanted to tell Lieutenant Sievers about this but every time her lips began to form the words

Her slapping him.

And storming out.

And shortly thereafter, Eric murdered…

Jill remembered what Mitch had said about Lieutenant Sievershow he was one of those cops who pursued the first serious suspect he came upon. She'd heard about cops like that. They spent all their efforts making a case against one person while not considering any other suspects.

So she didn't tell him about Eric's kiss, or her slapping him afterward.

'So you weren't intimate tonight?'

'Not just tonight, Lieutenant. We were never intimate.'

'How long were you there?'

'Fifteen minutes, something like that.'

'Did you see anybody else in the offices?'

'No.'

'Did you see anybody in the lobby or on the elevator?'

'No.'

'Did Eric receive a call when you were there?'

'No. But'

'But what, Miss Coffey?'

'When I first arrived'

'Yes?'

'There was a young woman just leaving Eric's office.'

'Could you describe her, Miss Coffey?'

Jill described her.

'Did she see you, Miss Coffey?'

'No, I don't think so.'

'Then she left?'

'Yes.'

'Did everything seem all right between them?'

'When I first got there, I waited outside Eric's door. I just heard the tail end of their conversation.' She told the Lieutenant everything she'd overheard.

'So Eric seemed angry?' the Lieutenant asked.

'No, that's too strong. Combative is more like it.'

'That's a strange word to describe a social relationship.'

'Not where Eric was concerned. He made a lot of sexual demands on youa lot of innuendo, a lot of what he considered to be sly hintsand you had to fight back. Combative isn't too strong a word for how it felt.'