Death of the Family Recipe (A Scotti Fitzgerald Murder Mystery Book 3) (32 page)

I reached for the file, but Zelda kept her hand on it. "You sure?"

I held out my hand. Zelda hesitated, then gave me the file. The photos were black and white which made the images less personal, still, a skitter of electricity shot through my limbs when I saw them. I spread out the five photos, shot from different angles and focused on the position of the body — Rose lay on her back, arms loosely at her sides, at an angle to the dumpster and about two feet away. If Rose had struck her head on the dumpster, her body would’ve fallen closer to it and probably be slumped against it. I frowned. "Maybe the killer moved her body."

"Why?"

"He had to move the body to get the ring?"

Zelda shook her head. "He might move her arm or lay her down but he wouldn’t drag her two feet." She clucked her tongue. "And he came to rob the place. He wasn’t there to hurt her. He wanted the money not to kill somebody."

"And the ring."

Zelda shook her head. "Nah, I don’t buy that. Why would he waste time on the ring? He had the cash; why didn’t he just split?"

I tried to keep it together, but it was my mother’s murder we were discussing, and I had to fight to keep my lunch down. Then I closed my eyes and envisioned the scene. "Okay, Rose is in the kitchen making a sandwich. Kathy’s gone home to change. She comes out of the kitchen with her sandwich, and sees the guy at the register. She’s startled. She drops her plate. Then what?" I opened my eyes. "She runs back to the kitchen?"

"To call the cops?"

"Could be."

Zelda nodded. "He comes after her. She goes out the back door to the alley."

I buried my hands in my hair and scratched my head. "Why? Why does he run after her? He wants the money and to get in and out. She’s running away from him. Why doesn’t he run out the front door with the money and disappear?"

Zelda stared at her notes. "Maybe she knew him? A regular? Somebody from the neighborhood?"

My stomach lurched. "Then he meant to kill her. If she knew him, yeah, he’d go after her." I grunted. "But why didn’t she keep running?" I tapped a photo with my finger. "Look, the alley was open, she could’ve gotten away. Instead she lets him corner her? And no defensive wounds? She didn’t try to fight him off?"

Zelda shook her head and stared at the photos again. "The arms are wrong. If you’re falling backwards, your arms go out or up to break the fall. It’s a reflex." She tapped her finger on the image. "See what I mean?"

I nodded and went through the motions of falling backward. "And if her arms went out, there’d be bruises or a scrapes from the impact."

Zelda scowled and threw up her hands. "This doesn’t make sense."

I shook my head. "No, it doesn’t. What bothers me is the ring. Why did he want it? It wasn’t valuable, except to Rose. But it was distinctive — anyone who knew Rose would recognize it. So, he’d risk getting caught over something he probably couldn’t sell?"

Zelda leaned back and stretched out her legs. "And he just happened to go in when Rose was alone? And it all took place in the twenty minutes Kathy was gone?"

I stared at Zelda and shrugged. "He could’ve been waiting for an opportunity. Until Rose was alone or Kathy for that matter." Zelda made a face. "You think Kathy was in on it?"

Zelda flipped to the police report. "Nothing here says they even checked out her story." She pounded the table. "Fucking cops."

A sudden downpour pounded the roof, and I stared through the window at the pouring rain. "We need to get Marley’s files from Joe’s."

Zelda nodded. "I’ll swing by tomorrow and get them."

"No, we’ll go together — after work."

The rain pummeled the roof and Zelda raised her eyes. "If this keeps up, we won’t be taking the truck out tomorrow."

I pushed back from the table. "It’s getting late, better put this stuff away."

Zelda packed up everything and put it in the closet. "I take it Ted doesn’t know about these?"

"I have to check the sauce."

Zelda followed me into the kitchen, where I busied myself with dinner prep while she pulled her clothes out of the dryer and changed. When she returned, I put on a pot of coffee for her and the tea kettle for me. "That box that your cousin gave you? Was that everything?"

I dropped meatballs gently into the simmering sauce. "Yeah." I glanced at her. "Why?"

She shrugged. "I’d say the police files aren’t the only thing with stuff missing."

I turned down the heat on the sauce and went to the butcher-block. "It’s a box of random things of Rose’s. What could be missing?"

"Yeah, but why aren’t there any copies of those letters she wrote to Child Services? No bank records, no other photos, no yearbooks, no report cards." She held out her hands. "I know Rose wasn’t a social butterfly, but even loners keep more than that."

I blew out a breath. "Maybe Jennifer only kept the things that had sentimental value. Tossed everything else. Or maybe Jason only grabbed one box. Maybe there’s more? Who knows?"

Boomer’s sudden yapping alerted us to Ted’s arrival. I put a finger to my lips and Zelda nodded.

Thanks to Eric, we knew Joe was at Dan’s, so we let ourselves into the office with our key. Still, I checked the front office and the back room to be sure. I grunted. "Good."

"You and Gramps still on the outs?"

I flailed my arms. "What do you think? He abandons me for a murderer and expects me to do what he wants? Screw him." I opened a storage cabinet, looking for Marley’s files. "Are you and Eric still working on the case?"

Zelda pawed through filing cabinet drawers. "Not since before Christmas. And even then, it was only a couple of interviews. Eric’s still doing document searches and working that stupid website though." She shrugged. "It seems pretty pointless, but what do I know?"

I glanced at her. "Anything coming in on the website?"

Zelda closed a file drawer and rolled another one open. "Nothing worth a crap according to Eric." She creased her brow. "Joe’s going to railroad us into working on it too, right?"

I scoffed. "Let him try. I’ll be damned if I’ll lift a finger to help Atkinson." I closed the storage cabinet and moved onto the next one. "And why should I help Joe, when he dumped my case?"

Zelda scooped files out of the drawer and stacked them on Joe’s desk. "Pay dirt." She frowned at me. "I thought you were on the fence about Atkinson."

I pursed my lips. "Things change. And there’s something I haven’t told you yet." I looked around feeling paranoid. "But let’s get out of here first."

We packed the files in an empty banker’s box and Zelda grabbed it. "Let’s go."

We met Joe on the way out. "Well if it ain’t my two favorite lady investigators."

Zelda said, "Happy New Year, Joe."

He stared at the box in Zelda’s hands. "Whatcha got there?"

I glared at him. "Marley’s files. They’re mine, and I’m going to take them home. Since I’m sole investigator on Rose’s case now."

Joe backed us into the office. "Do tell? Looks like there’s two of y’all to me."

I grabbed Zelda by the arm and stepped around Joe. "So? You have a problem with that?"

He waved an arm at the visitor chairs. "No need to be pissy Miss Scotti. I admit I been derelict in my duties to you, and I aim to rectify that. But we got other things to discuss today."

Zelda gave me a hopeful look. I threw up my arms. "Make it quick."

We sat in the chairs across from Joe’s desk. He plopped into his chair and said, "You’ll be happy to know that we got ourselves a jury in the Atkinson case."

Zelda said, "Congratulations."

He smiled like a proud papa. "Yes indeed. Eight women and four men. And as I’m sure you’re aware, Dan, legal genius that he is, got the bail revisited, which the judge in his infinite wisdom granted."

I shook my head. "I still can’t believe it."

Joe grinned like the carnival was in town. "Believe it. The prosecution has failed to find a second body, and rightly, the charges were reduced to a single count of second degree murder. You got a problem with that, take it up with D.A. Pembroke."

Zelda and I exchanged a look. Pembroke worked another case we were involved in, and she was no cream puff. I smiled. "Pembroke? Interesting."

Joe sat back and rested his laced hands on his belly, looking more pregnant than me. "That’s right. Pembroke wasn’t too happy, but all we did was follow the law."

I smirked. "Not guilty by reason of missing baby? That’s the defense?"

Joe nodded. "Something like that." He rapped the desk top with his knuckles. "Which brings me to y’all. Eric needs help on the tipster website. Doing follow up and such."

I gaped at him. "You’re kidding right?"

Joe’s enthusiasm could not be quelled. "Not at all. I figure you work the website, then Zelda and Eric can do any field interviews needed." He waved a hand. "Oh sure we’ll get our share of crackpots — that can’t be helped. But mark my word, this’ll shake things loose."

I slumped in my chair. "What if we don’t want to work on this?"

Joe shrugged. "I seem to recall a couple of young ladies coming to me and asking for help to get their licensing. Said they was willing to do anything they needed to do. Something changed?" I pouted. "Don’t look so glum, Miss Scotti. Fact is, you should be proud of yourself. It’s you who got us thinking about the baby, and that led to this strategy."

I shook my head. "Oh no, you’re not blaming this on me."

Joe scoffed. "Blame? Ain’t no blame about it. Cheer up. You can get in the hours and do it all from the comfort of your home computer."

I wriggled to the edge of my chair and stood. "I expect a little quid pro quo Mr. Enders. You understand?"

Joe nodded and flapped a hand. "Don’t you worry your pretty little head about that — we’ll get it done." He jotted something on a piece of paper and handed it to me. "That’s the website and the password. If you need help with it, call Eric."

I read the piece of paper and smirked. "Findspencersbabynow dot com? Who thought of that?"

Joe chuckled. "Kinda catchy, ain’t it?"

Zelda stood and picked up the box of Marley’s files.

"Well what are you doing staring at me?" He waved a hand toward the door. "Get going, we got a trial to win."

<<>>

After dinner, I went online and logged onto the Atkinson tipster website. The site was clean and simple. A forum where tipsters could chat back and forth and a tip box for visitors to type in their tips. I scanned the forum — over a thousand people had registered on the site already and there were hundreds of conversation threads going. Most of it was chatter about theories of the case. Some of it antagonistic to Atkinson, some of it sympathetic. I supposed if Dan wanted to get a feel for public perception of his client, scanning the forums could be helpful. Beyond that, I didn’t know what he hoped to gain.

Zelda and I had separate email addresses for receiving the tips, and I logged on to check mine. Thirteen hundred and twenty-seven messages awaited me. "Oh crap."

Grumbling about even participating in the farce, I spent a couple of hours slogging through the emails. Not one of the tips was useful or had any actionable information. Many were ravings of haters. Delete. Others inquired about Atkinson’s marital status and/or his need for romantic companionship. Delete. Plenty of spam promotions for drugs that cured anything from erectile dysfunction to balding heads. Delete. A few from reporters, requesting interviews with Atkinson. Those I forwarded to Peggy.

It was obvious to me that our only function was to be email traffic control. If anyone knew where Atkinson’s baby was, I doubted they’d send me a tip. If they had any sense, they’d contact the D.A.’s office, not a ridiculous website.

I logged out of the email account, then sent an email to Eric asking him to set up filters to trash as much of the spam and hate mail as possible.

Despite my disgust, I had to admit though that the tipster site was a stroke of genius. They do the press conference and make an impassioned plea to the public to help them. Then when they present their case, they have proof that the defense made tireless efforts to find the baby, to no avail. That alone could convince jurors that Atkinson had nothing to hide and sincerely wanted to find his baby. As long as they never found the baby it might just work. However, if that baby turned up, it could tank Dan’s defense. Unless Dan already knew the whereabouts of the child. If so, it explained their enthusiasm for the plan. Like they say, a lawyer never asks a question he doesn’t know the answer to. Maybe I needed to force their hand. God knows, somebody did.

I turned off the computer and stepped into the darkened kitchen. Boomer raised his head, whimpered and went back to sleep. On the living room sofa, I found another snoring creature. I bent down and kissed Ted. "Honey?"

Ted’s eyes fluttered open, and he pulled me onto the sofa for a kiss. "Hi baby. What have you been doing?"

"Work for Joe."

He frowned and sat up. "What kind of work?" I rolled my eyes and sighed. Ted ran his hand through his hair. "You’ve got to be kidding me."

I shrugged. "He promised he’d help me with Rose’s case again." I held up my hands. "But it’s just computer work. You remember the website they mentioned in the press conference?" Ted nodded. "Like I predicted, we’re slogging through all the," I made air quotes, "tips." Ted just shook his head and groaned. I rubbed his arm. "Don’t be mad. I’m tired of people being mad at me."