Just Intuition (26 page)

True to his word, the Deputy Chief kept the debriefing short. Zimmerman and Striker talked about their boat catastrophe and their trek through the swamp. While they told their version of events, both men subconsciously scratched mosquito bites on legs and arms. They
'd been picked up by a fisherman who had nearly run them over on the forestry road in his haste to get home before the storm. First thing this morning, they'd gone out in the ranger boat. Striker revisited his interrogation and the supposition that Derek was not entirely forthcoming.

Erin gave a condensed version of her events, minimizing some parts and leaving others out altogether. She didn
't feel the need to expose Allie's gift, nor was she willing to detail their shared emotional anguish over Fiona's death. Their accounts were taken at face value, with written reports to be submitted within forty-eight hours.

When
the debrief ended, Erin fled from a never-ending series of questions from coworkers. She finally bailed out the back door of the station and made her way to the parking lot. Her Toyota still sat right in front of the security camera. It seemed a lifetime since she'd ridden to her parent's place in Zimmerman's truck. In retrospect, the total destruction of her dad's fishing boat seemed a trivial matter.

"My God, girl! You are hard to get a hold of!" Kathy Banks caught her by the sleeve like a scolding parent. "I need to talk to you!"

"I'm sorry, Kathy." Exhausted, Erin blinked back salty tears. "It's been so crazy. I need to get home. I'm in a hurry. I can call you tomorrow after I've had some sleep. Promise."

"No. You can rest when you
're dead," Kathy said with a smirk. "This is important."

Erin sighed.

"You need to know what I found."

"Did you get a hit?" Her interest piqued. Had there been
a criminal fingerprint identification?

"I developed partial prints on the beer cans from the Dolores
Johnson case. The ones you gave me 'off the books'." Erin nodded and Kathy continued. "I also obtained prints from that beer bottle and the unlabeled dark glass bottle you seized with the warrant on Gunther Schmidt's property. They are all from the same suspect!"

"Who is it?" This would tie both crimes together with one culprit. Erin
's heart leapt into her throat.

"The fingerprints were not identified," Kathy said and Erin
's hope plummeted. As a police officer, Derek's prints would have been in the system. So, not Derek. Erin's head spun. "I need to tell you the rest. Those prints are small and have quite a fine ridge pattern."

"What does that mean?"

"The person who left those fingerprints does not have a criminal record, and they are most likely not from an adult male." Gunther did not leave the beer cans behind Dolores' house either. "You are looking for a child, or a small woman."

A child.
A small woman. She remembered the window in Gunther Schmidt's shed. It must have been seven feet off the ground. Without a ladder, there was no way Lily had watched Derek through that window. The girl was not confused. She was lying.

Erin
's disoriented brain snapped fast forward. But Derek had confessed. Why? Was he really a demented child molester, or was something else missing? She remembered Allie's reaction when she'd touched Lily, and the halo of her handprint on the window glass when she was driven away in Zimmerman's car. It wasn't an infection making Allie collapse. It was a powerful force overwhelming her with the truth.

"What about the duct tape?" Erin remembered the most damning evidence yet. Beer cans in the weeds behind Dolores
' house were only circumstantial. The same went for the bottles at Gunther's. Lily had legitimate access to the property and those might all be explained away by a competent lawyer. The duct tape was used only by the assailant who bound and gagged Gina. That could clinch it. "Whose prints were on the duct tape from the Stop 'N Go?"

"Bad news there, I
'm afraid." Kathy clenched her jaw. "Dave seized that evidence, remember? He should have used Gentian Violet, which does a good job of revealing prints on the sticky side of tape, but he apparently stuck the whole wad into the cyanoacrylate fume cabinet. After three days, when the C.A. had overdeveloped and obscured everything, he backtracked with another chemical process. By the time he did what he should have in the first place, any prints he might have found were obliterated."

"He fucking what? Fuck—"

"I'm so sorry, Erin," Kathy said. "I'm all swore out on that whole thing too. If it's any consolation, the brass is aware of his screwup and he's been suspended from lab duties. They're actually thinking of transferring him out of the unit but they don't have anyone ready to transfer in. His biggest mistake is when he hid the evidence and tried to cover it up. On a case like this, he should have reported it right away."

"He
's drinking buddies with Derek, isn't he?" The picture became clearer. Had Dave suspected Derek's involvement and deliberately destroyed the evidence? Had Derek coerced him to do it to throw the scent off the real culprit? Could it be a vulnerable looking eleven-year-old girl? She did not have to say it out loud. Judging from the tight line of Kathy's mouth, it was a conclusion they had both reached.

"I need to get home.
"

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Erin hurried to her truck and disregarded highway traffic laws in her haste to get home. Her truck
's tires screeched around the last corner and into her driveway. She flung open the front door and called Allie's name.

"I
'm in here."

Erin came to a standstill when she saw Allie hunched on the sofa. Wrong-Way Rachel sprawled across her lap, fluffy tail curled up around her neck. A veritable mound of crumpled Kleenexes littered the cushion beside them.

"Are you okay?"

"I was okay. Really, I was okay, until I saw Fiona
's dish sitting on the kitchen floor." Her voice choked. "I'm sorry, I just lost it." She pulled another tissue from the box and dabbed at red puffy eyes.

"Oh, baby!" Erin swept the trash to the floor and sat beside her.

"I called Judy." She gripped her hand as if it tethered her to planet Earth. "I mean, I called my mom. She wanted to take the next plane down here but I told her we are fine and you would be home soon. I felt better after I talked to her and I'll call again later when I can keep it together."

"I
'm glad she was there for you." Erin's guilt skyrocketed. "What did the doctor say about your leg?"

Allie gingerly touched freshly applied bandages. "It
's basically a dog bite. It's not infected but he gave me a tetanus shot and antibiotic ointment anyway. He said rabies are rare around here so he'll wait a few days to see if I foam at the mouth."

"He did not."

"He said my physical injury should heal on its own." Allie tried to smile but it faded before it reached her eyes. "And he offered me a prescription for Ativan so I can sleep."

"You don
't need a sedative or an anti anxiety drug, baby." If alcohol magnified Allie's abilities until they screeched out of control, Erin could just imagine what medication would do.

"I don
't either. That's why I turned it down." She leaned into Erin's shoulder. "I only need you."

"I
'm sorry I didn't give you a chance to tell me what was wrong at the ranger station," Erin began. "I thought we had it all figured out. I thought you were just overwhelmed by—by everything." She did not want to rip open the emotional wound that had not yet begun to heal.

Allie inhaled sharply. "I should have made myself talk to you. I was fighting a headache when we caught up to the other canoe but I was managing it. In my mind I kept seeing this big wild cat, the one we had been searching for. Suddenly it turned and came back to taunt us, to show us how invincible it was. When we all rode in the big boat, a flood of images poured into my mind. The pressure was unimaginable, like my head would explode into tiny pieces. It was spinning so fast that I had to get away from everyone as soon as I could. I was a little better when you came to get me, but when that kid grabbed my hand, I knew. The whole picture became clear." She searched Erin
's face for any hint of doubt. There was none.

"I
'm beginning to understand." Erin told her about the bizarre interview at the station, halted by the mysteriously appearing attorney. The girl had not called him, so how had he come to be there? Had Derek's phone call been not for himself, but for the girl? In retrospect, it seemed likely that it had. Something Allie had said about Derek slithered up Erin's spine and began to coalesce in her brain. "What did you mean when you talked about a part of Derek's essence?"

"Have you noticed that Lily
's eyes are the lightest shade of green? Just like Derek's." Erin's bones shivered when Allie laid out the puzzle pieces. "They have the same hair and pale skin, don't they? She looks a lot like him, don't you think?" She waited for Erin to finish the puzzle.

"She
's a part of him!" Erin shouted. Wrong-Way Rachel let out a perturbed squeak and with a peevish swish of her tail leapt off Allie's lap. The cat padded out the door to the kitchen and the last piece slammed into place. Erin gasped. "He knows what she's done and he's protecting her because he's her father!"

The mysterious deposits into Gunther
's bank account. Child support? Gunther Schmidt had known too. For the price of a six pack of beer in the fridge and a monthly check, Derek fulfilled his fatherly duties and Gunther kept his mouth shut. Lily played the middle, one man against the other. For what? Her own amusement? Twisted revenge toward a father who deserted her at birth? What did she have to gain by poisoning her own grandfather? Macabre entertainment? Was she simply bored? And where had her mother gone? Nefarious scenarios filed through Erin's mind. She let her breath out, but tension stayed between her shoulder blades. Derek had confessed to it all and Lily was going to walk away, free to do as she pleased.

Erin sprang to her feet and paced across the room. She scrubbed an angry palm over her face until the skin reddened. "All this time, your thoughts were about her, not him. She
's the one who watches and stalks." Erin remembered the night they nearly drove into the barricade on the road. "The rock in your back window. Was that her? Was she watching us at the bog too?"

"The energy felt the same.
Like a dangerous wild cat. I think so."

"I feel like puking." Erin sat down hard beside Allie. "Oh my God, you should have seen her play everyone at the office, all smiles and batting eyelashes. Poor little victim!" Erin groaned. "She played me too."

Allie touched her knee, her hand warm through the fabric of her jeans. Confident, reassuring, sincere. "She thinks she has won. More people will get hurt. You must stop her."

"Derek confessed. He is taking the rap for everything she
's done. I don't understand why. As far as they are concerned, she is a vulnerable little child with no direct evidence implicating her. I can't even talk to her now. How can I stop her?"

"I don
't know. You—" Allie paused and amended, "—we need to find a way. I am in this now, as much as you are." She rested her head on Erin's shoulder and Erin hugged her tight.

* * *

"What did that bastard say?" Erin scratched a fingernail into a worn crease in the kitchen countertop. She switched the iPhone to her other ear.

"Not much." Zimmerman sounded distracted and she heard him get up to close the door. The background noise muted. "When I talked to Striker, he said Derek looked depressed. The interrogation lasted for three hours but he didn't say much, except that his wife is filing for divorce. He seemed more upset about Lily."

"I never guessed she was his kid. This town can sure keep a secret. In retrospect, how did we miss it? She looks just like him. What else did Derek say?"

"Striker said he confessed to everything. Everything but molesting the girl. That, he vehemently denied. Derek signed a skimpy confession, and refused to provide any more information. He simply crossed his arms, invoked his Fifth Amendment rights and asked to be taken to his cell. A disgraced police officer like him will do hard time for one murder and two attempts. The lawyer he phoned never arrived, so I wonder if that will be part of his defense."

"I
'm sure the lawyer was for his kid," she said. "Who would have figured he'd be capable of such family loyalty?"

"You must have gone to school with Lily
's mom, Tiffany Schmidt. Were you aware that she and Derek were an item?"

"I stayed away from Derek as best I could, but it seemed he always had a new cheerleader on his arm. I do remember Tiffany, but we didn't travel in the same circles. She hung out with the drug crowd by senior year and I avoided that bunch."

"You want this?" Zimmerman whispered. "Yeah, come and get it."

"What the heck are you talking about?" Erin shouted into the phone. "Are you doing weird kinky stuff?"

"I am feeding Picasso a cricket," he retorted. "Forgive me for multi-tasking, Ms. Perfect."

"You are one wacky guy. I was afraid I was intruding…"

He disregarded her insinuation. "Striker discovered that Derek couldn't possibly have burned down Dolores Johnson's house. He was with the Staff Sergeant, getting a lecture on deportment, when it happened. The call released him from the boss's office and he seemed genuinely perplexed about the origin of the explosion. He didn't have much to say about the fire at the convenience store either. He said he drove Lily straight home and was with his wife by the time that happened. Unfortunately for him, he already confessed to it and his wife is so angry that she won't corroborate his belated alibi. She's been wanting to leave him for a while and this is the last straw. He'll rot in jail before she helps him."

"Derek hated Gina, but I doubt he tried to kill her. My money is on the kid. She blurted something about the gas can that was used to start the fire. She knew exactly how her grandfather was poisoned."

"Lily is a strange little creature," Zimmerman said. "The murder of Dolores Johnson. The arson of the store and attempted murder of Gina Braun. Do you really believe a kid is capable?"

"I wouldn
't put much past her. Ice water runs in her veins."

"Even if Derek is her dad, why would he be willing to go to jail? Striker said he
'd planned to take the kid north of the border to stay with a friend until he could sort out his life and come for her. I can see him ditching his job for a long-lost daughter, but going to jail? That's sheer lunacy."

Erin nodded. She focused on a spot in the distance.
"It's possible that he was trying so hard to protect his kid that he impulsively confessed, figuring he'd get out of it later. He was the golden boy, remember? He always got what he wanted. Not this time."

Zimmerman continued her train of thought.
"You might be right. By the time he realized what he'd done, he was looking at the inside of a jail cell. His wife had frozen their bank accounts, his lawyer refused to take on his appeal, and now he has to apply for a public defender."

"That makes more sense than the martyr theory. He
's too arrogant and self-centered."

"
So there he sits. You know what happens to cops in jail."

"
I kinda  feel sorry for him. He's an idiot, but---."

"
Don't feel sorry for that jackass! Dude pulled his service weapon on you! Not to mention the souvenir he gave you on your arm. I'm glad he didn't go after your girlfriend."

"
I don't think he regarded her as a threat." Erin's skin crawled at the thought of Derek harming Allie.

"
Not until he was looking down the barrel of the shotgun in her hands. That girl you've got is no shrinking violet, that's for sure!" He snorted.

"
She's definitely not."

"
As far as I'm concerned, you don't owe Derek an ounce of pity."

"Still, I'd like to understand." Erin scrunched her shoulders forward in a semi-shrug.

"
Gunther might have answers." She found a new crease in the edge of the countertop to trace with her fingernail.

He sighed loudly. "If you
're so damn determined, Gina said she was going to the hospital to see him tonight. You could just happen to drop in…"

"Gina?" How did he run across her?

"Uh, she mentioned it…" A knock interrupted him. "I gotta go. My mom needs a hand. Give me a shout after you talk to Mr. Schmidt." He disconnected the call.

Erin jammed the iPhone into her pocket and found her keys. She left a note for Allie, who had gone to the gym. Fifteen minutes later, she parked her truck at the hospital and got Gunther
's location from the information desk. She quietly opened the door to his room.

On the bed, Gunther Schmidt looked like a corpse. Skin on his ashen face had a strange mottled texture. His swollen jaundiced eyes took in the new visitor.

"I was in the neighborhood," Erin lied. "I decided to pop in for a minute."

"Hey stranger." Gina leaned back in a visitor
's chair at the side of Gunther's bed, paperback in her hands.

"Louis L
'Amour," Erin said, glancing at the cover. "My dad loves his old Westerns too."

"We are at the end of the chapter." She patted Gunther
's hand. "Why don't we stop here and pick it up tomorrow?" He nodded and Erin noted a tremor in his movements.

"How is he?" She directed her question to Gina.

"I'm just ducky," he croaked. "I ain't dead yet."

Gina grinned at her apologetically.

"You're right, Mr. Schmidt. I'm sorry." Erin sat in the chair opposite Gina and he turned his puffy face to her. "I should have asked you."

"He
's so much better than yesterday." Gina tucked his exposed arm under the blanket and pulled it around his shoulders. She brought a glass of ice water up and bent the straw to his mouth.

"Will ya quit yer fussin
', girl? I ain't no infant!" His words were belligerent, but his tone was soft. "It's dang hot in here!" He shoved starchy bedcovers aside and pushed his arm back out. Against the stark sheets, dark-colored lesions speckled his temples and the palms of his hands. Had Doctor Holloway talked about it the day she told him about the arsenic? It had been hard to follow the technical specifics of that conversation. How had she not noticed the spots when she found him in his hidey hole?