Cuts Like a Knife: A Novel (A Kristen Conner Mystery Book 1) (36 page)

I ring the doorbell. I don’t hear footsteps. My heart starts to race a little. I try to breathe deeply to get everything under control. If he’s here, whether he’s guilty or innocent, I need to look natural. I wait fifteen seconds—I know because I count them off with Mississippi’s in the middle—and ring it again. There are about ten newspapers on the stoop, some of them already turning yellow. Some sales flyers are crammed inside the wrought-iron door. Nothing. Ten seconds go by this time, and I creak open the surprisingly unlocked iron outer door and knock hard. The wooden doors haven’t been shut all the way and groan open. My heart is pounding.

“What’s happening?” Don asks into my ear piece.

“Door was open. I’m going in.”

“Don’t do it,” Don hisses. “Anything you find in there would be tainted evidence for a jury trial.”

I ring the doorbell a couple more times, staring at the clearly abandoned room, and then retreat to the car. Martinez is on the phone with Zaworski.

“Yeah, at least one car’s here, but we don’t think it’s been moved for a while,” he’s saying. “He has a second, but we don’t know if it’s in the garage or not. Newspapers are piling up on the front porch. Conner just looked through the crack in the door and the front hallway is filled with letters and junk mail.”

He listens.

“No. She didn’t do anything to open the door. She just knocked and it opened a little bit. No one’s gone inside, Boss.”

Another pause while Zaworski gives him orders.

“We’ll sit tight, Captain.”

He tells us Zaworski is getting a search warrant from a judge—and is going to call the FBI. If Dell is the Cutter Shark—or is guilty of any other crimes—we aren’t going to do anything to jeopardize a righteous conviction.

• • •

“I’m sorry, Mom. Honest, I was looking forward to coming over and being together, just you and me. It’s this da—this darn case.”

“Are you okay?”

“I am. I’m even getting along with Klarissa these days.”

“That’s not what she told me an hour ago.” She got there first.

I groan inwardly, wishing I’d been able to get to her first, as planned. “We had one little fight. It was nothing. I tried calling her back to apologize.”

“Have you talked to Dell lately? I still worry about him.”

“Believe it or not, Mom, I tried getting a hold of him tonight. He wasn’t there. Look, I’m pulling into my parking lot. I’ve got to get some things out of the car, so I’m going to sign off. But I’m coming by tomorrow for lunch. Just the two of us. We’ll talk. I swear.”

“Well, if you’re not here by noon, I’m going to come find you wherever you are. I still have contacts on the force, you know.”

We laugh.

“Love you, Mom.”

“I love you, baby girl. And Kristen . . . be careful.”

“You got it.”

“Listen to me. I mean it. Be careful. I couldn’t stand the thought of something happening to you.”

I hang up before she can start crying and pull into a good spot near the stairs to my walk-up. I turn off the engine. I just sit and look at a brilliant full moon. I sigh and shake my head. I rub my temples. I can’t believe it. Dell is gone. The warrant signed by a judge, we invaded his rental house. The rental furniture’s still in his apartment along with the two cars. They were both rented as well. Officers started making calls and it looks like everything, including the house, is paid for through the end of August. Otherwise, every stitch of clothing, every book, every knickknack, his toiletries, cleaning supplies, linens, plates—anything that was a personal item—has been cleared out. The place is dusty now, but when he left, probably close to the time he left me the angry message last Saturday, he or someone cleaned the place thoroughly. Top to bottom. Everything. When the full tech crew got there, they weren’t sure they were going to find any evidence of a human presence.

“This guy even vacuumed the traps in all the sinks,” Jerome tells me. “That’s a sure sign of someone with an obsessive-compulsive disorder—or more likely, something to hide. I’m not a detective but I suspect the latter.”

“Thanks for the tip, Jerome.”

He and Bruce, who I’ve now been with at four murder scenes, were called in to maintain consistency on examining any evidence that might be tied to the Cutter Shark case. They are apparently on the same bowling team because they had matching shirts with their respective names stitched on the chest and both were still wearing bowling shoes. They must be good bowlers, I decide, because those weren’t rentals.

We knocked on every door up and down the street. We’ve discovered two things. First, Dell didn’t know his neighbors. Second, his neighbors didn’t know him. No one can definitively say whether they even saw him in the previous month, but some are quite certain they have never seen him. One guy distinctly remembers the Porsche—but not the driver. Now that’s a commentary on society.

I supplied his work number and through some calls back at the office, we got the number of the person who issued a freelance contract to Dell and who is his project liaison at Goff & Duncan, the manufacturing company he is consulting for. Blackshear finally located the guy at an engagement party for his niece; he wasn’t happy that two uniformed officers showed up and insisted that our investigation was a higher priority than a family celebration. They impressed on him the importance of being a good citizen and he got busy helping Blackshear understand Dell’s business arrangement.

Blackshear gave us a synopsis later. On Monday or Tuesday—the guy has to double-check when he’s back at the office tomorrow morning—Dell exercised the “out” clause in his contract. He handed the liaison a final invoice with instructions to send his last expense and fee payments to a drop box with a bank in Durango. He cleared out his temporary office and was off the premises almost immediately. The guy thinks he was in a hurry. Dell’s work was exceptional from start to finish and the guy hated to see him go. He said the company CEO had recently let Dell know that they were prepared to offer him a full-time position. He thought Dell was interested. So he remembered thinking Dell’s sudden departure caught him by surprise.

I unbuckle my seatbelt, push open my door, slide my legs outside the car, and stand up and feel a gentle summer breeze. Actually, summer doesn’t officially start until June 21, but growing up, summer always began on the last day of school—at least in the mind of a school-aged kid. It’s now the end of May. Have we been on this case for two months? It’s been in the eighties during the day, but it’s probably seventy-five degrees right now and it feels great. I push my car door shut and take another deep breath, stretching my tight back.

I feel an explosion on the left side of my body as someone slams a fist into my kidney. I throw up in my mouth as I go down like a rag doll.

Someone whispers, “Don’t even think you can get away with messing with my life,” in my ear before I pass out in a swirl of dark, all-encompassing pain.

58

I LIFT MY head slowly. I am laying in a small bed, but have no clue where I am at or what my situation is. A light shines through a crack under the door. My instinct is to call out and find out what I am up against. Stupid idea. A brass band is playing Pavarotti meets the Rolling Stones. I breathe slowly. In and out. My head begins to clear. I lay still—I don’t want to alert my captor or captors that I am awake. I keep my breathing as slow and quiet as possible.

I take stock. I wiggle my fingers and toes. Check. All present and accounted for, even if they feel slow and unresponsive. Drugged. Not good. I roll my neck back and forth. Everything in working order there, too, but there is now a group of renegade dwarfs that have booted Pavarotti and the Stones and who are swinging pick axes on the inside of my cranium.

I lift one arm and then the other, glad to find I’m not restrained. That is a big mistake on someone’s part. Just because some gorilla can punch like a heavyweight boxer when I’m not looking doesn’t mean he is going to withstand a quick shot to the trachea if I get even half a chance at him. I clench and unclench my fists to get the blood circulating. I begin practicing a couple of attack moves in my head. You are going to have to seize the element of surprise.

I hear footsteps outside my door. I barely breathe. I am pretty sure there are at least two sets of shoes on hard flooring. Maybe three. Might be one person wearing some kind of soft sole. Not what I wanted to hear. More than one captor is going to make escape more challenging than I was hoping for. Does the Cutter Shark have a partner? Multiple partners? My mind quickly runs through a list of drills and strategies for neutralizing two opponents.

The door swings open. One of my assailants creeps slowly toward me. Have I alerted them I’m awake? Then the other turns on glaring lights to blind me. I am as ready as I am ever going to be. I was already moving before he reached the bed, and now I drive the heel of my hand in the direction of his face with the simplest karate punch in the book. He twists his head sideways and gets a forearm up to partially block my punch in a trained move. I know I landed a decent blow that did more than graze his cheek. I was hoping to catch him on the bridge of his nose, which would have temporarily blinded and immobilized him.

I spin up and off the bed to kick and throw another punch. I aim at his groin and throat in a split-second combination—but I don’t think either landed enough to do any damage. Not good. I am light-headed from the sudden change of positions—the drugs haven’t worn off as much as I’d hoped. My movements are too slow. Before I can continue my attack, a pair of muscled arms from my second captor wraps me up tightly from behind. I’m not done fighting. I kick up and backward and hear a heavy oomph. I got him in the groin but not as good as I want because instead of falling down in a fetal position he holds on, cursing in English and Spanish. He pushes me face down on the bed and brings his weight to bear on me. I snap my head back and catch him on the eye’s orbital socket. But I still can’t get free.

Now a second set of hands is holding me down and yelling something. I feel the pinprick of a hyperdermic needle enter my upper arm. There was a third person.

I am sorry I wasn’t better prepared, Mr. Barry. I’m sorry I wasn’t careful enough, Mom.

• • •

I’m sitting up in bed drinking a glass of water. A tray with a bowl of untouched chicken noodle soup is beside me.

Don is sitting across from me, an ice pack on his left cheekbone. Zaworski is standing by the door shaking his head and trying not to smile. Martinez is sitting on the other side of the bed. He has an ice pack on his lap. Enough said.

“
No
nos pagan lo suficiente para este tipo de trabajo,
” Antonio says to me with a weak smile.

“What’s that mean?” I ask him.

“I can answer that,” Don interrupts. “‘We don’t get paid enough to do this job,’ and for the record, I think I agree with Martinez on this one.”

Zaworski walks back over to my bedside. “Kristen, now that your head is clearing a little, you’re sure you can’t tell us anything more about who attacked you?” he asks again. “I’m talking about the parking lot where you live, not here in the hospital,” he says, looking at Don and Martinez with a barely concealed smile.

“I can’t say with any degree of confidence, sir,” I answer.

“You didn’t get a look at his face? Not even a glimpse?” Martinez asks.

“I never saw him coming.”

“You didn’t recognize his voice?” Don asks.

“I didn’t.”

“Was he disguising it?” Zaworski asks.

“Possibly, but I’m not sure it mattered. I was fading fast when he spoke. He did whisper.”

“What did he say again?” Don asks.

“Something about me not getting away with messing up his life.”

“So it’s possible it’s this Dell guy?” Zaworski asks.

“I know he was angry with me. We dated off and on for almost six months. He was having a real hard time accepting that I didn’t have feelings for him and was cutting him off completely. Then he saw me having lunch with Reynolds last Saturday afternoon and left me an angry message.”

The three men say nothing. Zaworski tries not to look surprised. Sometimes the boss is last to know.

“He’s got to be the guy,” Martinez says with enthusiasm and then immediately winces from the movement.

“I don’t know,” I say. “First of all, I have never seen any evidence of violence in Dell. Really, he’s a gentle soul.”

“But you said yourself you never really got to know him,” Don says. “Heck, I’m your partner and I don’t remember you saying anything of substance about him; just that he had wormed his way into your family.”

“Yeah,” I agree, “I really didn’t get to know him. That voice message took me by surprise.”

“So why don’t you like him for being your attacker?” Zaworski asks, puzzled. “He seems perfect. He was obsessed with you, it sounds like, so he definitely has the motive.”

“Well, for one thing,” I answer, “I’m just not sure Dell could hit as hard as this guy did. I’ve never been punched like that. I’m not saying Dell didn’t work out and was weak or anything. I’m saying this guy knew how to
punch
.”

“But you don’t got no meat on you, girl,” Martinez says. “And who stands up to a well-placed kidney shot?”