Homecoming Homicides (12 page)

“Yes. I want to be there.”

Flippy squatted on the field, put her head down between her knees, and sucked in the cold air.

“Luke, can somebody cover her? She must be cold. She hates the cold.”

Luke shook his head, hopped down from the bleachers, and said a few words to the ME, who covered Traci with a blue mohair blanket she retrieved from her car.

“I’ve got to call her parents now,” Flippy insisted.

“Why don’t you let them get her cleaned up, a little more presentable before you—”

Flippy had already pulled her cell phone from her purse. “Mrs. Farris. It’s Flippy Tannenbaum. We have some news. Is Mr. Farris with you?”

“Have they found her?” Mrs. Farris asked, her voice strained. “Have they found my baby?”

Flippy was silent for a moment. “I’m sorry, yes. I’m with her now at Major Peyton Field.”

“Is she...?”

“She’s gone. I’m so sorry. We’ve lost her.”

Flippy could hear the sobs over the line and then Mr. Farris’ voice, resigned. “When can we see her? When can we see Traci?”

Flippy wanted to tell them that they wouldn’t even recognize her, that she wasn’t really Traci anymore.

“Why don’t you come down to the—um, morgue,” Flippy stuttered. “I’ll meet you there and then we’ll go in together after they’ve, after she’s ready for viewing.”

“That’s our little girl. Tell them to take care of our little girl until we get there. Will you tell them that, Flippy?”

“Of course. I’ll stay with her. I promise.”

She flipped off the phone and walked over to where Luke and the ME were standing.

“I want to go with her. I promised her parents I’d watch over her. Can I do that, Luke?”

“Sure. I’ll be right there with you, if you want me.”

“Yes, thank you. What about your test tomorrow?”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ll try to get in a few hours of studying after we get home.”

Luke’s eyes were on Flippy as she watched Traci’s body being lifted up on a gurney and into the van. Then they trailed the ME’s car as it drove to the morgue.

Flippy sighed.

“The guys are combing the area, looking for clues. They thought he might still be on the premises, but they’ve done a thorough search and they can’t find him. Hopefully, we’ll discover some evidence. He’s managed to stay one step ahead of us. They’ve questioned a university custodian, but he said he didn’t see anything. Jack and Kate are on their way to meet us, to study the body—I mean Traci—to see if she picks up any vibes.”

“I hate this,” Flippy said. “We should have had a guard out at the stadium. I knew this would be one of the dump sites. Okay, Luke, tomorrow we need to be proactive. We need to visit the other university landmarks. There’s the chapel on the lake, the bat house, the new library, the museum, the “B” Dome. We need to make a list and we need to have those areas staked out. Crystal Ball Kate is right. He’s not going to stop, is he?”

“No. He has no reason to. You can expect the media vultures to be surrounding the stadium tomorrow, doing their live feeds. That’s what they are—bottom feeders.”

“They’re just doing their jobs.” Flippy sighed again. “I’ll brief them first thing in the morning. Could you put an officer with the Farrises? I don’t want them hounded.”

Luke delivered some instructions into his phone.

“Done.” He turned to Philippa.

“You look beat, Flippy.”

“I feel numb. I don’t think I’ve really processed it yet. I can’t believe she’s gone.”

“You had to have some idea. She’s been missing for a week.”

“Someone has to tell Jack. It should be me.”

“I don’t want you talking to the jerk. I’ll let him know.”

“The Farrises will want to take Traci back to Miami. But I can organize a memorial service here. Her friends will want to pay their respects. My sorority sisters will want to say goodbye. She had a lot of friends here, Luke.”

“After we finish with the Farrises, let me take you home so you can get some rest. It’s going to be a long day tomorrow. And Flippy, I’m going to find this bastard.”

“
We’re
going to find him,” Flippy corrected.

Chapter Eight

It had started raining again, and Flippy was transfixed by the rhythm of the windshield blades and the eerie glow of the street lights as she and Luke rode down Main Street, heading away from campus.

Her cell phone buzzed in the darkness, and when she finally found it, in the maze of her overstuffed bag, and flipped it open, Jack’s number was flashing. Again. Flippy frowned and didn’t answer it.

“Who’s calling?” Luke asked, keeping his eyes on the road.

“No one,” she said.

“No one you want me to know about?”

“No one you need to be concerned about. It has nothing to do with the case.”

“How do I know that if you don’t tell me? If I’m going to protect you, you have to tell me everything.”

“I don’t have to tell you anything. And for the umpteenth time, I don’t need your protection.”

“How could you look at what was done to Traci Farris’ body and believe that? That could have been you on that table in the morgue, Flippy. That’s all I can think about. It could have been you. And Kate confirmed it again. She took one look at Traci’s body and then she looked over at you and said, ‘You’re in his sights.’ ”

“I heard her,” Flippy acknowledged.

“Did you, Flip? Then why aren’t you listening?”

“I’ve agreed to go home with you, haven’t I?”

“Reluctantly,” Luke said.

Flippy was silent as the car rounded the curve into the Prairie Condominiums. The possibility that she was in danger hadn’t escaped her. Luke entered a code at the gate. “I’ll give you the code when we get inside.”

“You live
here
?” Anyone who could afford to live in the Prairie Condos had to have big bucks. It was the nicest place in the city. “Are you a drug dealer or something?”

“You don’t know everything about me.”

“Apparently not. I thought you were a city beat cop and a starving law student.”

“What gave you that idea?”

“The way you downed that burger at The Zone like you hadn’t eaten in days.”

“That’s the way I always eat. I like to eat. You ought to try it sometime.”

“How long have you lived here?”

“Since I was a freshman. My parents bought it as an investment. Next year, my younger brother plans to move in after he graduates high school. Didn’t you mention you had a brother?”

“But mine is much older and more successful, according to my parents. At least until the bottom fell out of the market. But the patina remains. He’s an investment banker in New York, and he has a perfect wife who works at a boutique hedge fund. They’re the perfect couple with the perfect 2.5 children.”

“2.5?”

“One on the way.
He
was planned.” Flippy hadn’t expected to tell Luke that. But she was in a strange mood. Seeing Traci on the ground at the stadium and again in the morgue had opened the floodgates of her emotions. She needed another drink, although she knew that wasn’t the wisest idea, since she had been drinking the night she’d propositioned Luke, too. Had to have some fortification to screw over a friend.

“Meaning that you were, what?”

“An accident. You know. My dad is a serial cheater, and my mother finally caught him in the act. My parents were in the middle of a messy divorce, but then they decided to patch things up and, one make-up sex session later, lo and behold, I arrived on the scene.”

“That’s rough. How do you even know that’s true, if you were in the womb at the time?”

“My mother tends to be brutally honest when it suits her, and, as it turns out, history repeated itself. Which is how my sister Natalie came to be.”

“Bummer.”

“It’s a little more complicated than that, but that’s me in a nutshell. Second child, always came in second, an unwanted by-product.”

“I had you pegged differently. Daddy’s little girl, leading a charmed life, can get any guy and anything she wants, trades on her looks.”

“You’re not wrong about some of it,” I admitted. “Only Daddy had a lot of little girls. Maybe one day when I know you better, I’ll tell you the whole story.” Luke looked uncomfortable, like he didn’t want to know the rest of that story. Smart man.

“Well, we’re here,” Luke said, pulling into a parking space and helping her out of the passenger side. “Home sweet home.” He started to pick up Flippy’s laptop, but she put her hand on his arm.

“You don’t have to carry my books, Luke.”

“It’s all part of the service,” he said, popping his trunk and lifting out her suitcase.

They walked up the steps to Apartment 5, and Luke disarmed the alarm.

“You have an alarm system?”

“You should get one for that dive where you live.”

“Well, we can’t all count on Mommy and Daddy.”

“Mommy and Daddy don’t pay for my alarm system, and for your information I’m paying them rent.”

“They make their own son pay rent?”

“They don’t
make
me pay rent. I believe in paying my own way.” They had that in common.

Luke opened the front door into what Flippy could only describe as a showplace.

“Luke, this place is like Buckingham Palace!”

Luke smiled and looked pleased with himself.

Flippy ran from room to room, giddy from lack of sleep and the strain of the day, gawking like a star-struck kid. Which made no sense, since she had grown up with the finer things in life. But in the past four years she hadn’t been around anything as nice as this. She didn’t want to take money from her father. She didn’t want anything from him. Unlike her mother, who had never worked a day in her life and was dependent on her husband for every dime. She was never going to be beholden to a man for money or support. Especially not a man who cheated on his wife.

Flippy could appreciate the gourmet kitchen with its stainless steel appliances, the hardwood floors throughout the apartment, except in the bedrooms and bathrooms, the gorgeous window treatments, the very serene decor. And, no clutter!

“Don’t tell me you decorated this place.”

“My mom did. Decorating is her hobby.”

“Isn’t she afraid you’ll have some wild party and trash the place?”

“My mother knows me.”

“You really are a Boy Scout.”

“There are worse things to be.”

Flippy wound her way into the living room and tested the couch and the matching loveseat for comfort. The room was like something out of a magazine, a masterpiece, adorned with Persian rugs, Oriental lamps and Venetian mirrors, not quite the Vintage College style to be found in most apartments in Graysville.

“I could get used to this.”

“Do you want to see your room?”

“As long as I’m here, why not?”

Luke laughed and preceded her into a room off a long hallway.

“If I had known you could be impressed so easily, I would have brought you home a long time ago.”

Flippy slapped his arm, but she couldn’t stop gawking.

“Wow!” was all she could manage.

The cherrywood sleigh bed with a Delft-blue goose-down comforter looked inviting. She couldn’t wait to dive into it. Floor-to-ceiling mauve Doupiani silk curtains shimmered on the windows. The plush wall-to-wall carpet was a cushiony cool gray-green in some kind of leafy pattern. And there was a bathroom en suite.

“Luke, are you sure this isn’t the master suite?”

“You want to see my room?” He raised his eyebrows.

“Only because I’m curious. I don’t plan on spending any time there.”

“Be my guest. He grabbed her by the hand and led her back out into the hall and then into a spacious master suite.

“What did I say about the hands?” Flippy stared at their joined hands.

Luke colored and dropped her hand.

“You’re the touchy feely type,” Flippy guessed.

“I get that from my mom’s side of the family. If you ever met my mom, you’d find out in a hurry. She’s a big hugger.”

“What about your dad?”

“Definitely not. My dad is a clinical pathologist. He mostly hides away in his laboratory and does research. He deals with platelets, not people. In fact, he doesn’t like patients. I don’t think he’s even seen a patient since his residency. And that’s the way he likes it. He’s not exactly cold, but he’s pretty hands-off.”

“I guess opposites attract, then.”

“What about your parents?”

Flippy frowned. “My mother is in everybody’s business and my father is more into monkey business.”

Luke arched his eyebrows like he wanted to know more, but she wasn’t about to spill her guts about her dysfunctional family.

Luke’s room was decorated in muted blacks and silvers. It was tasteful and manly at the same time. His great big king bed loomed, and they both eyed it awkwardly. The sooner they got away from it the better. It was giving her ideas.

“Did your mom decorate this room too?” Flippy asked.

“Yep.”

“Your place is beautiful, Luke.”

“Thanks. I really love living here. I hope you will too.”

“You know this isn’t a permanent arrangement,” she cautioned. “Just until we catch the killer.”

“That could take months.”

Flippy shuddered. “Let’s hope not. I’m not planning to stay that long.”

“Who said I wanted you to?” The cool and sullen Luke was back. After a minute, he relented. “It’s good to see you relax again. What you just went through was brutal, at the stadium, the morgue, with Traci’s parents. I just want you to know I understand that.”

“Thank you.”

Luke went back out into the hall and grabbed some thick seafoam-green towels from a walk-in linen closet and pointed out that her bathroom was already stocked with soaps, a loofah, shampoo, and other “girly” bath products.

“It’s like living in a hotel,” she marveled.

“Mom wanted it to be comfortable. I guess she hoped that one day I’d bring a girl here and—”

“Give her some grandchildren? I guess all mothers are the same.”

A scurrying sound emanated from Luke’s bathroom, reminiscent of a large rat doing cartwheels. Suddenly, the whole house seemed to be shaking.

“What’s that noise?”

“Oh, that’s just Cruz.”

“I didn’t know you had a roommate. You locked him in the bathroom?”