Justice Served: A Barkley and Parker Thriller (28 page)

Carole had been so deep in her thoughts that
she never even saw the cart she plowed into—or the woman on the
other side of it, who went sprawling backwards into a shelf,
knocking a few boxes over. However, she showed remarkable agility
in maintaining her balance.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Carole stammered,
embarrassed that this should happen. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” the woman said in a sure voice, a
smile raising her high cheeks. “No broken bones.”

The woman, about Carole’s height, build, and
complexion, had long brunette Senegalese twists and almond-brown
wide eyes. Carole imagined her to be in her mid to late
thirties.

“I’m usually not that clumsy,” Carole told
her, feeling foolish. “I was distracted.” She offered another
apology.

“I think it was more my fault,” the woman
surprised her by saying. “I have a bad habit sometimes of looking
up rather than straight ahead.”

Carole suspected she was just being kind. She
noted that the attractive African-American woman’s cart was empty.
Kind of odd.

“I guess we both better try to avoid any more
accidents,” she told her. “At least today.”

The woman smiled, gazing steadily at her.
“Yes, you’re right.”

Carole found herself studying the woman.
There was something familiar about her.

Was it her well-defined face? The somewhat
throaty voice? Carole honed in on the smile that almost seemed to
be at you and not with you. The way the woman stood with an air of
overconfidence. The way she wrung her hands as if a habitually
nervous person.

“Is it possible we’ve met somewhere before?”
Carole asked impulsively.

The woman did not flinch when she responded.
“I don’t think so. I’m usually pretty good with faces. I’m sure I’d
remember yours—”

Carole nodded, wondering if everything that
had happened was starting to get to her wherever she went.
Including diminished cognizance and perception. She was imagining
knowing people she’d never laid eyes on before. Was this part of
the price of being falsely accused and put under the microscope by
peers, police, and the general public? What other things would she
have to endure along the way?

“Well,” Carole said politely. “I guess I’d
better finish my shopping. Goodbye.”

“Bye,” the woman responded with a cool smile
before walking past Carole and leaving the empty cart there.

By the time she had paid for her groceries
and left the store, Carole had put the encounter behind her. Right
now she hoped to get home and enjoy a quiet evening alone, away
from all the distractions that had converged on her lately.

* * *

She watched from a distance as Carole went up
to the checkout counter. The judge had nearly recognized her. Damn.
But the bitch had not been certain, not believing her eyes and
mind. She would have to be more careful next time...

She couldn’t have her plan derailed. Not now.
Not by anyone.

Judge Cranston had been responsible for those
abusing assholes being set free. After all, she was the presiding
judge in every instance, and therefore had the final word. Didn’t
she?

So it was only fitting she be given the
sentence they should have been dealt had she been stronger and more
determined to see that justice was properly served. Life behind
bars, if not death by lethal injection. The bitch deserved no
less.

First, though, there was one more bastard to
be punished while Carole Cranston was out on bail and capable of
being blamed. This one would not only serve notice to the world
about the evils of abusive men, but would be the final straw for
making certain the judge got her just due.

The woman, having no need for groceries,
calmly sidestepped shoppers, casting an artificial smile here and
there. She left the store just in time to see Judge Carole Cranston
climb into a cab.

She watched as it drove off, its occupant
guilty of allowing scum to walk away scot-free from their abusive
crimes against women. For that she would pay dearly. Just as they
had.

The woman sucked in a deep, calming breath
and walked away contemplatively.

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

Carole saw the familiar detective’s car
parked in front of her building as the cab dropped her off. Ray was
leaning against it casually. He looked at her with penetrating eyes
that gave no clue of his purpose for being there.

She wondered if it was as a friend or
foe.

Carole tensed. Had Ray come to arrest her
again? Or was he here to tell he loved her with all his heart and
this whole thing was nothing more than a bad nightmare? She didn’t
allow herself to think too optimistically, for fear of another
letdown.

Carole tightened the grip on the bag and felt
her heart skip a beat. “What do you want?” she asked
cautiously.

Ray moved towards her. “To talk,” he said in
a low voice.

She eyed him with misgiving. “Should I have
my attorney present?”

“Not necessary,” he assured her. “Let me
carry that bag for you—”

He reached his arms out, but Carole
involuntarily stepped around him.

“No, thanks. I can manage.”

Carole had mixed feelings about being alone
with Ray, as though they hadn’t already been in the most intimate
ways. She decided to hear him out then show him where the door was.
No matter what her sentiments for him were, Carole refused to be
manipulated by a man she couldn’t trust. Much less, depend on. Or
even love.

In the condo, Carole put her bag on the
kitchen counter, intending to put the items away afterwards,
expecting his visit to be short.

“There’s been a break in the case,” Ray told
her, a hint of expectation in his voice.

“Oh...?” She was all ears.

“We may have found our killer,” he said. “Or
at least tentatively identified her—”

The way Ray shifted his eyes at her face, for
an instant Carole wondered if he was referring to her. Then she
thought of Vivian.

“So who is she?” Carole asked with a sharp
intake of breath.

Ray ran long fingers across his mouth. “We’re
looking for an African-American woman named Jacqueline Monique
Davis. Trouble is, we’re not sure that’s her real name. She’s a
volunteer at the Rose City Women’s Shelter, according to your old
friend Esther Reynolds.”

Carole listened intently even as she replayed
the name Jacqueline Monique Davis in her mind.

“Appears she’s the same Jacqueline Davis who
was at the scene of Blake Wallace’s murder,” Ray informed her. “It
was actually her statement that led us to Wolfe’s car and
eventually to you—”

Carole didn’t know whether to be elated or
angry. The fact that he and the whole city had all but convicted
her before the facts could come out left her a bit numb and more
than a little disillusioned, not to mention pissed off.

Ray gazed at her studiously. “We’re hoping
you can tell us who Jacqueline Monique Davis is,” he uttered. “My
guess is she’s someone you’re acquainted with as a judge, if not
outside the court.”

“Jacqueline...Monique—” Carole thought out
loud, trying to recall the names. “Hmm... Doesn’t ring a bell—”

Ray began describing her. “About your height,
build, and skin shade; darkish, long, individual pixies, good
looking...maybe in her late thirties—”

The description instantly made Carole think
of the woman she had all but knocked over at the store. Only her
hair was in Senegalese twists. She had seemed eerily familiar.

“What is it?” asked Ray viscerally.

“Jacqueline Lewiston...” the words rang out
of Carole’s mouth almost in song. “She was a temporary court
stenographer for me about six months ago while my regular
stenographer had some personal problems to attend to.”

Ray reacted. “When did you last see her?”

Carole stared into his face. “I may have just
seen her a short while ago...today—”

After she explained her brush with the woman
at the store, Ray said worriedly: “Hell! She must be stalking you.
Or at the very least, she’s toying with you while she plays out
this deadly game of killing male batterers and setting you up as
the villain.”

Carole found her legs growing wobbly. She
might have fallen had Ray not grabbed hold of her, wrapping his
strong arms across the small of her back like a lover.

“Are you all right?” he asked, concern etched
across his face.

“I think this whole damned nightmare is just
starting to catch up with me,” she admitted, her hands trembling.
“As a judge, I’m used to just about everything you can imagine in a
courtroom. But lately my real life has been a soap opera all its
own. Having a sociopath out to ruin me just tops it all—”

Ray continued to hold her, their bodies
pressing together. “I’m sorry, baby,” he spoke tenderly. “Hopefully
the nightmare will soon be over for us all.”

Then what? Would life ever go back to normal
for her again?

She wasn’t even sure what normal was anymore.
Or if she wanted things to go back to exactly the way they
were.

And that included a sexual relationship with
Ray.

“You wouldn’t happen to have an address for
Lewiston, would you?” he asked.

“I’m sure it’s on file at the courthouse,”
she told him.

“Feel up to a drive?”

“Try and stop me,” Carole said, just as
anxious to get to the bottom of what had turned her life upside
down.

* * *

At the Criminal Court Plaza personnel office,
an administrator gave Ray and Carole access to the employment file
on Jacqueline Monique Lewiston. It listed her as a temporary court
stenographer, age thirty-six, along with dates of employment. For
further information, it referred to the Legal Temps Agency.

“I hope I’m not leading you on a wild goose
chase,” said Carole as they headed for the agency. She was
beginning to wonder if this actually was the same woman she had
seen at the store. The woman had given no indication they had ever
met before. Or that their run-in was anything more than a
coincidence. Just the opposite, in fact.

But then even a madwoman—or especially
one—could orchestrate a convincing set up.

Ray seemed to read her mind. “I don’t think
so,” he said knowingly. “This psycho broad’s certainly clever and
daring, but also very dangerous. If there is a goose to be caught,
she’s the one.”

The Legal Temps Agency was in downtown
Portland. They supplied temporaries for virtually all support
functions in the legal field, including stenographers. The office
was large and sectioned off into cubicles with desks and computers.
Phones rang off the hook as employees tried to keep up with the
demand.

The manager was a short, slim, white woman in
her fifties named Rosalyn Bradford. Ray used his police I.D. and a
commanding presence that betrayed his sense of determination to get
what they wanted.

“Here’s Ms. Lewiston’s personnel file,”
Rosalyn said. “What kind of trouble is she in?”

“Right now we just need to find her for
questioning, Ma’am,” said Ray evasively, taking the folder.

“Actually, Jacqueline hasn’t worked for us
for some time,” she remarked. “We called her about jobs, but there
was no answer. It was like she just dropped out of sight.”

“But not out of mind,” Carole muttered
thoughtfully.

Ray studied the file. It included a phone
number and home address, an apartment in Portland. Jacqueline
Monique Lewiston’s marital status was listed as single, he noted.
Was that true? Had she manufactured an abusive, important husband
for the sake of justifying her targets for murder?

He glanced at Carole, wondering if things
could ever be right for them again once this was all over. He knew
he had his work cut out for him to regain her trust.

Her affection.

And whatever else they had going on, till
he’d destroyed it.

Favoring Rosalyn, Ray handed her the folder,
but kept the documents. “I’ll need to hold onto this for a while,
if you don’t mind?”

“Not at all,” she said nonchalantly.
“Everything’s on computer these days anyway. If we need another
file on Jacqueline, we’ll simply print it out—”

Ray imagined that should they ever get their
hands on Jacqueline Lewiston, her employment history and everything
before, during, and after, would no doubt be useful in a
psychiatric case study of the crazy woman.

* * *

“Do you have a gun?” Ray asked Carole during
the drive.

“No,” she responded tersely. “My late husband
collected guns. And I saw firsthand the results. I have no burning
desire to keep one, thank you.”

“Maybe it’s time you reevaluate that,” he
strongly urged. “At least while a serial killer is on the loose who
could come after you—”

Carole bit her lip. “If this woman had really
wanted to kill me, I’d probably already be dead. I’m sure she’s had
her opportunities. I doubt that I fit the profile of the type of
person she’s targeting.”

“Profiles can change,” Ray warned. “If she
thinks for a minute that you’re no longer a serious suspect, then
she just might decide you’re expendable, much like batterers.”

Carole certainly did not take the threat to
her life lightly. But she refused to dramatically alter her view on
guns. Too many people died needlessly when possessing one,
including a man she once thought she could save from such a fate.
She would not be intimidated into arming herself by a mentally
unbalanced woman who blamed her for something she had no control
over.

“I’ll make sure my doors are locked and alert
building security,” she said. “I also keep pepper mace in my purse
and condo.”

Ray cleared his throat and said: “You could
always stay at my place until we get her—”

The offer was admittedly tempting—in more
ways than one—but she wasn’t sure it was for all the right reasons.
She needed more time to sort out her feelings. And allow him to
sort out his.