Guns and Roses (38 page)

“We haven’t released the name of the victim. When she was discovered almost an hour ago, her face was covered by her hair, so no one knows for sure who it is, but I suspect there’s lots of speculating going on downstairs. There’s going to be more when word gets out you might have been up here when it happened.”

Rebel swallowed hard. “You think the killer will come after me thinking I know something?”

“It’s possible.”

“Well, I
don’t
know anything! I was passed out in that closet. Can’t you put that out, like an APB on television?”

“Don’t worry. I’ll protect you,” the detective said.

Rebel caught his intense stare and her belly did a slow somersault.

“I would appreciate that, Detective Cantrell.”

“I’d just be doing my job,” he curtly said.

The detective reached past Rebel and grabbed a bottle of water and a pair of green booties from a large black leather suitcase with the faded white letters LPD CST stamped on the side.

“Put these on,” he said, handing her the booties. “Then have some water.”

With shaky hands Rebel put the booties on her bare feet and idly wondered where her sandals were. Then she took the bottle from his big steady hand. “Thank you,” she said.

“You’re dehydrated and in shock. I don’t want you passing out on me.”

“Just part of the job,” she sarcastically said.

He scowled as he replaced his vomit-covered booties with fresh ones. “What else did you and Jami talk about?”

Rebel rubbed her throbbing temples, trying to get the horrifying vision of Jami lying naked and bloody on the floor out of her head. It would never go away. It would haunt her dreams for the rest of her life. “Good lord, the last thing I clearly remember was swinging at that green and yellow tequila bottle piñata.” She rubbed her forehead then pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes. A deep, shuddering sob wracked through her as tears erupted again.

A big, warm hand touched her shoulder and gently squeezed. “Miss Culpepper, I know this is hard, but I need for you to collect yourself.”

Rebel’s shoulders rose and fell with her deep sobs, but she nodded. Raising her head she swiped the tears away with the back of her hand. “I’m going to help you find her killer.” Sitting up straight, Rebel pushed her shoulders back and looked the handsome detective straight in the eye. “Tell me what to do.”

“Start by telling me the truth about Drew and Jami.”

Rebel bit her bottom lip and looked down at her feet.

The detective nudged her under the chin with his finger until she met him eye to eye. “What don’t you want to tell me?”

“They had a big fight,” she blurted.

The detective’s eyes danced with excitement. “Now you’re talking, girl.” He reached toward her and grabbed the lapel of his jacket. “Excuse me,” he roughly said. When his big hand dove in, and his knuckles brushed against her left breast, Rebel stiffened. “Detective, really? We just met!”

To his credit, his cheeks flushed red. And if truth be told, she didn’t mind at all.

“My apologies, ma’am. I’m just getting my notepad.” Once he retrieved it, he moved a respectable distance away and jotted down notes.

“Just because they were fighting doesn’t make Drew a killer,” Rebel challenged.

“Doesn’t clear him though, does it?” the detective countered.

Rebel shivered and shook her head. She’d never met a killer before.

“I’d like a list of Jami’s friends, as well as the people she worked with if you know them. I suspect Drew’s number will be in Jami’s cellphone?” he asked as he scrolled through it again.

“I have it, too. Every now and again he needed a math lesson and called me for some tutoring.”

The detective’s lips quirked. “I wouldn’t have pegged you for a mathematician.”

She stiffened. “Just what
did
you have me pegged for? Some silly girl who waves her hand and blows kisses from a homecoming float?”

“Among other things…”

“Detective Cantrell, didn’t your mama teach you not to judge a book by its cover? Even one such as myself in my current state of dishevelment?”

He grinned like the tom cat she knew he was. “My mama taught me a lot of things about women, Miss Culpepper, but none of it had to do with what I’m judging you by, right now.” His grin widened, nearly splitting his face in half. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to take a look at your cellphone.”

“I do mind, but for Jami, you can take it apart for all I care.” She handed him the phone.

As he took it, the detective asked, “How old is Drew? Does he live on campus?”

“He’s nineteen, same as Jami. He’s over at the Johnson House dorms, but he was a pledge to join the Kappas here. Jami told me just last week they were going to be initiating him any time now. She was as satisfied as a cat lapping cream about that.”

“Why?”

“She’d never dated a college boy before, much less one in a fraternity.”

The detective scrolled through the phone until he came to the number he wanted, then jotted it down. He looked at Rebel and said, “You have a message. I want to listen to it.”

“I’m not keen on allowing a virtual stranger listen to my personal voicemails.”

“You afraid I might hear something intended for your ears only?”

Her cheeks heated. “I can assure you, Detective Cantrell, there is no one in my life that would be sexting or sending sexy voicemails my way.” Not that she would be opposed to one or two once in a while.

“You say that like it’s a good thing.”

“Despite the unladylike manner in which we were introduced, I can assure you, I’m not a fast girl.”

He smiled that cat-that-ate-the-canary smile and Rebel was glad she was sitting down. Otherwise she just might have swooned. “Well, excuse me then, Miss Culpepper for drawing the wrong conclusion about you.”

“Under these terrible circumstances, your apology is accepted.” She extended her hand to the detective. “My phone, please.” Reluctantly, he handed it to her. She snatched it out of his hand, afraid any lingering touch might shake her up more than she was already shook up.

“Did Jami have any enemies?” he asked as she navigated her phone’s apps. They were a mess. Lord only knows what kind of drunk dialing she had done last night.

“No,” Rebel said, looking up at the detective. “She was a sweet girl. Not very bright, mind you, but sweet as they come.”

“Was she a student here?”

“A freshman on a partial basketball scholarship. She worked the night shift at the Dairy Queen to help pay for what her folks couldn’t.”

“You said she didn’t come from money. Where is she from?”

“Her people are from East Tennessee. Mining folks.”

“How do you think Drew’s daddy felt about that?”

Rebel swallowed. She knew exactly how the Prebe clan felt. “It wasn’t Drew’s daddy Jami was afraid of; it was his sister, Colette. She had a hissy fit with a tail on it when she found out about the two of them.”

Frustrated with her phone, Rebel exasperated. She couldn’t pull up her dang voicemail! The good detective held out his big hand to her. “I’m not simple! I just can’t figure out what I did to my phone. It’s fickle and sometimes I can’t get the touchscreen to respond. I tried turning it off then on again but that—”

“For the love of God and all that’s holy, Rebel, can’t you just keep that motor mouth of yours shut for one cotton pickin’ minute and hand me the damn phone?”

“Well, I—” She slapped it onto his palm. “Be my guest, Detective.”

In just a matter of a few seconds he asked, “What’s your pass code?”

She set her jaw. He looked at her expectantly, but she gave it to him. “One, two, three, four.”

“Wow, that’s genius.” He tapped the numbers on the screen and her voicemail popped up. “This voicemail came in at three oh eight this morning. It’s from Jami.” The detective looked at his watch. “It’s nine thirty-eight. I figured her time of death was four to six hours ago.” He exhaled then looked hard at Rebel and punched the play button.

“Rebel, where are you?” Jami’s voice boomed. “I been waitin’ a half hour. I need to talk to you.” She started to sob. “Oh, Rebel I got myself into such a mess an’ Drew is so mad at me; I thought he was gonna strangle me! But he did worse.
He broke up with me.
Told me to go back home! Oh, God, I need you to talk to him. He listens to you—” There was a brief muffling sound as if Jami put her hand over the receiver. “Why are you here?” she asked someone. A deep muffled voice answered.

Wide-eyed, Rebel fixated on the phone. Her breathing accelerated. “The killer,” she whispered, looking up at the detective.

Detective Cantrell put his finger to his lips.

The sound of a door soundly closing followed an eerie silence. Then Jami said what sounded like, “Did I get what?” A deep sob followed her question. Her last words were followed by a terrifying scream and then the phone went dead.

Rebel’s skin had frosted to ice. She shook violently. She should have been there!

“Don’t blame yourself for this, Rebel. It’s not your fault.”

“Yes,” she whispered, “it is.”

“Dig deep now, because I want you to listen to this again. Listen hard and tell me if you recognize the voice at all.”

Rebel turned blurry eyes up to the detective.

“Can you do that for Jami?”

“I’ll listen to it a hundred times if that’s how many times it takes.”

“Good girl.”

He played the recording again, and again, and each time it was impossible to tell if it was a man or a woman. Just as the detective played the recording a fourth time, that security guard, Sorrel Nelson came walking up the stairs with two cups of coffee.

When Jami’s scream echoed in the hallway his hands shook. “Holy hell, what’s that?”

“That’s Jami and the killer,” Rebel said. “
Recorded
.”

Sorrel turned as white as a sow’s belly. “Fur real? You got ‘im?”

Detective Cantrell took the two cups of coffee from Sorrel and inclined his head toward the stairway. “Get on back down stairs, Sorrel. I’ll call you if I need you.”

“Yessuh, but I wanted to tell you, we had a hard time locating Jason Green, the boy who called it in. Apparently, he was so shaken he took off, but he’s coming directly.”

“Bring him up as soon as he gets here.”

“Can I go with you when you arrest the killer?” Sorrel asked all excited.

“We’ll see. Now go get that boy and bring him to me.”

As Sorrel headed down the stairway, Rebel stared after him. She shivered and took the proffered cup of coffee. “On campus we call him Sorry because he can’t seem to find his way out of a paper bag.”

“He’s a sorry excuse for a security guard, that’s for sure, but he means well.”

Rebel took a sip of coffee and her stomach immediacy roiled. She shivered and set it down on the floor. “Why did the killer leave the cellphone? Wouldn’t he be afraid the person on the other end, which is namely
me
, would have heard him?”

Detective Cantrell looked hard at her then said, “That’s the million dollar question, because he must have known she was on the phone when he entered the room. I found it underneath Jami’s back. Either the killer was in a rush to get out of here and, when he didn’t see it in plain sight, gave up on it, or he forgot about it in his violent tantrum.”

“How exactly did she die?”

“Strangulation.”

Rebel sharply inhaled. “Oh, my God—Jami said Drew was so mad at her she thought he was gonna strangle her!” She didn’t want to accept that whatever it was Jami and Drew were fighting about, got her killed. “Bu-but there’s all that blood.”

“He stabbed her before he strangled her.”

“Why? Why would anyone do that to Jami?”

“Because they were pissed and thought they could get away with it.”

“No one goes unpunished.”

“If your daddy’s a big-shot judge you do.”

Rebel’s skin crawled along her arms. “I can’t believe Drew would do this. He broke up with her. He was done. Why come back and kill her?”

“He had the means; his motive could have been that Jami had something on him or when she refused to accept his break up, he killed her in a fit of rage. We’ll find out soon enough if he had opportunity.”

“What are you going to do?”

“First, I’m going to notify Jami’s family of their loss. Then I’m going to have a little chat with the boyfriend. Just as soon as I talk to Mister Green and the ME gets here.”

Rebel nodded and stood up on shaky legs. “Am I a person of interest, Detective?”

Cantrell’s lips twitched. “You are a person of considerable interest, but not as a suspect in this case.”

Under normal circumstance Rebel would have rose to the flirtation. But her heart was wrung dry at the moment. She needed a little time to collect herself. She stunk worse than a skunk and she needed to get something in her stomach other than coffee or she was going to be sick all day. “I’m flattered I intrigue you, Detective Cantrell. And even under such terrible circumstances as my friend’s murder, I will admit, I am not blind to your charms. But right now, I’m too overwrought to do much of anything except get a shower and sleep for a week.” She cracked a small smile, but didn’t take her eyes of his. “But rest assured, once I bounce back, you will have your hands full with me.”