But Mia knew. A hard knot filled her throat and she shoved her hat back on her head. "I gotta go." She passed the elevator and took the stairs two at a time, which unfortunately brought her toward the very place she'd been avoiding all the faster.
Monday, November 27, 8:40 a.m.
He worked in brisk silence, sliding the razor blade down the straight edge of the ruler, trimming the ragged edges from the article he'd pulled from the Trib. fire destroys home, kills one. It was a small article, with no photograph, but it did mention the home belonged to the Doughertys so it would be a good addition to his scrapbook. He sat back and looked at the account of Saturday night's fire and his mouth curved.
He'd achieved the effect he'd wanted. There was fear in the words of the neighbors the reporter had interviewed. Why? they'd asked. Who could do such a thing?
Me. That was the answer, all the answer he needed. I could. I would. I did.
The reporter had interviewed old lady Richter. She'd been one of the worst of the geezers, always dropping in on old lady Dougherty for tea, gossiping for hours. She was always looking down her nose at them. "I don't know what you're thinking about, Laura," she'd say with a sniff. "Taking in those kind of boys. It's a wonder you haven't been murdered in your sleep by now." Old lady Dougherty would tell her that she was making a difference in her boys' lives. She'd made a difference, all right. Her difference had sent them straight to hell. Her difference had killed Shane.
Shane had trusted her. And she'd turned on him. She was as guilty of his death as if she'd stabbed him in the back herself. He looked down at his hand. It was fisted, the X-Acto blade clutched like a knife. He carefully put it down, reined in the emotion.
Stick to the facts, the plan. He needed to find old lady Dougherty. He should have waited for her to return. To go ahead without her had been foolish. He'd been too eager to use the means. He'd forgotten about the end.
When would she return? How the hell would he find her now? His eyes settled on the article once more. Old lady Richter had been a gossip then. Some things didn't change. When the Doughertys came back, she'd know. He smiled, a plan starting to form. He was clever enough to get the information without Richter suspecting a thing.
He studied the article, pride bubbling deep within him. The fire investigators had ruled it arson. Duh. But they had no leads, no suspects. They didn't even know the identity of the girl yet. They claimed they were withholding her identity pending notification of her family, but they couldn't know who she was. She'd been burned to a crisp. He'd seen to that. No body could have survived that fire.
His hands went still. He'd said those same words the day Shane died. Nobody could have survived. And Shane had not. That the girl had not was… fair.
He gave a hard nod to the newspaper clipping he held in his hands. Nice, straight edges. Suitable for framing. Instead, he slid it between the pages of the book on his desk along with the article he'd cut just as carefully from the Springdale, Indiana, Gazette, thanksgiving night fire leaves two dead. As they should be. Again, it was fair. More than fair. Again, no suspects. No leads. As it should be.
Later, he'd put both articles with the souvenir he'd taken, Caitlin's blue denim purse. Well, it had been blue. Now it was red, splattered with her blood.
He'd been splattered, too. Luckily he'd been able to shower and change before anyone saw the blood on his clothes. Next time, he'd have to take better precautions. Next time he'd need to cover his own clothes before drawing blood.
He stood up. Because he would draw blood again, very soon. He knew exactly where to find Miss. Penny Hill. People thought their addresses were secret because their telephone number was unlisted. Not so. If a person knew how, they could find out anything about anybody. Of course the person searching had to be smart.
And I am. He was already starting to feel the excitement of the next kill. Penny Hill would not die easily. He would not be so merciful this time. Time. Damn. He'd lost track of time. He gathered his things. If he didn't hurry, he'd be late. He needed to make it through the day, then tonight… He'd walked through his plan last night, made sure it was foolproof. Tonight… he smiled.
She would suffer. And she'd know why. Then she'd count to ten, one for each miserable year of his brother's life. Then he'd send her to hell where she belonged.
Monday, November 27, 8:50 a.m.
Mia rounded the corner to the Homicide bullpen. It looked the same-pairs of desks back to back, piled with papers and coffee cups. Except for two. Hers and Abe's. She frowned. Their desks were clean, their folders in neat stacks. Everything else was arranged with an eerie symmetry-coffee cups, telephones, staplers, even their pens were placed in identical mirror-image locations.
"The Stepford wives cleaned my desk," Mia muttered and heard a chuckle behind her. Todd Murphy leaned against the wall, coffee cup in his hand, a smile bending his mouth. With his rumpled suit and loosened tie, he was a most welcome sight.
"Stacy,"' he said quietly, indicating their office clerk. "She went through what you'd been working on when Spinnelli reassigned your cases. Stacy got a little carried away."
"He reassigned all of them?" Mia hadn't expected their lieutenant to allow their cases to go untouched for two weeks, but hearing that he'd reassigned them all left her a little rocked. It was as if Spinnelli hadn't expected her back for a long while. Well, I am back. She had work to do. First and foremost was catching the sorry piece of shit who'd shot Abe. "Who took Abe's case?"
"Howard and Brooks. They worked it hard the first week, but the trail was ice cold."
"So Melvin Getts shoots a cop and gets away with it," she said bitterly.
"They haven't given up," Murphy said softly. "Everybody wants to see Getts pay."
The thought of Getts calmly lifting his gun and shooting her partner twisted her gut and she felt herself freezing up as she had outside. Fighting it, she strode to her desk with a belligerence she had to fake. "I bet Stacy even washed my cup."
Murphy followed her and slumped in his chair two desks down. "It was really gross, Mitchell. Your cup was growing… things." He shuddered. "Vile, unspeakable things."
Mia set the umbrella against her desk and shrugged out of her wet jacket, biting her lip against the twinge in her shoulder as she adjusted the holster under her blazer. "Good old-fashioned mold. Never hurt anybody." She pulled the worn fedora from her head and winced. No wonder the guy downstairs thought she was a street person. Both the coat and the hat looked like they'd been pulled from a Salvation Army bin. On the other hand, what did she care what he thought? You have to stop caring what people think. She sighed quietly. And she'd stop breathing while she was at it.
She turned her frustration to her perfect desk. "Hell, I can't work like this." Deliberately she toppled the stack of folders and rearranged the contents of her desk haphazardly. "There. If Stacy touched the Pop-Tarts in my drawer, she's dead meat." But her emergency stash was intact. "She can live."
"I'm sure she's been quaking in her boots," Murphy said dryly. He eyed the umbrella. "Since when did you start carrying one of those?"
"It's not mine. I'm going to have to find the owner and give it back." Mia eased herself into her chair, her eyes flitting across the unoccupied desk that butted against Murphy's. "Where's your partner?" she asked. Murphy's partner was Abe's brother Aidan. Mia wasn't looking forward to the censure she knew she'd see in his eyes.