Negative Image (15 page)

“What?” she said.

“Hope your tetanus shots are up to date.”

C
HAPTER
F
OURTEEN

Molly Smith eyed herself in the mirror, and didn’t like what she saw. The cut across her cheek wasn’t too deep, but it had bled, and Smith had been told to take care of it while Evans processed the two women. Those fingernails should be registered as lethal weapons. As she’d pulled Steiner out of the car, she’d noticed with a small tinge of satisfaction that half the woman’s nails had broken off.

Better put some anti-bacterial on the cut. No telling where those fingernails had been. The thought made her stomach move, and she leaned over the sink. She breathed carefully, paying attention as each breath moved in and out, and when she felt stronger she lifted her head, and turned the water on to scrub off the dried muck. Her rear hurt where she’d ignominiously landed on it.

She and Adam planned on going to the hospital tonight to visit Andy. Her father and Adam seemed to like each other and got on well. Lucky, who had not been pleased when her daughter joined the police, wasn’t too enthusiastic at having a cop as a potential son-in-law, but Lucky’s earlier attempt at matchmaking had gone so disastrously wrong she accepted Adam with warmth.

Smith hated to think what Adam and her dad would have to say about her face. She touched the wound, now clean. She could plaster the make-up on, but that was so out of character they’d immediately know she was trying to hide something.

She could only hope Meredith didn’t put a picture of Molly Smith, flat on her butt on the sidewalk, face covered with blood, all over the front page of the paper. If so, they’d be putting Lucky into a bed beside Andy’s.

Larry Iverson was at the front desk, demanding to see his client. Jim Denton nodded and typed at his computer. John Winters came through the doors, having taken down names and numbers of people to talk to later about the incident.

“You’ll have to wait until Mrs. Steiner has been processed. I’d suggest you come back in half an hour.”

“To whom am I speaking?” Iverson asked.

“Sergeant John Winters.”

Iverson introduced himself and said, “You have no reason to hold her, Sergeant Winters. Mrs. Steiner has suffered an enormous shock at the
murder
of her husband and…” His eyes narrowed as the penny dropped. “Winters. Oh, yes. Your wife is a suspect in that case, I believe. This is outrageous. I demand Mrs. Steiner be released immediately. Clearly, you’re not going to be impartial in any matter regarding the wife of your wife’s…
friend
.”

Winters walked away. He passed Smith, his face set into angry lines.

Iverson pulled out his Blackberry. “I have some calls to make,” he told Denton. “I’ll be back shortly.”

“I’ve no doubt about that,” Denton said to Smith. He studied her face. “Doesn’t look too bad.”

“I’m going to have a long soak in a tub of steaming bleach. God, what a couple of harridans.”

“I can hear the lawyer now—grief does that to a woman.”

“Being a mean bitch does that to a woman,” Smith said. “I’m going downstairs, see if Dave needs a hand. They’re probably trying to get his pants off even as we speak.”

***

John Winters logged onto his computer. His eyes felt like sandpaper and his head was stuffed with cotton wool. Despite what he’d told Barb, the couch in the interview room was not at all comfortable. He intended to keep both Steiner and Barton in jail until they could get to court. One of them had hit Molly Smith, and assaulting a police officer was not a charge Winters took lightly. Never mind causing a major disturbance in the center of town and requiring three officers to subdue them.

But the ink was scarcely dry on their fingers before the Chief Constable came running down the stairs to the cells. Iverson had wasted no time in telling him that Mrs. Steiner, the
grieving widow,
had been arrested two days after her husband’s murder. How would that look? he asked. Winters couldn’t care less how it looked. Iverson had, with more subtlety than his foul-mouthed client, threatened to go to the papers to point out that one of the arresting officers was personally involved in her late husband’s case.

And that, the Chief Constable agreed, would not look good.

Therefore Josie Steiner was released into her lawyer’s care with orders not to leave town and to appear in court when demanded to do so.

They could hardly hold Barton, faced with lesser charges, having released the woman with money and a good lawyer. Perhaps it was time to retire, Winters thought, rubbing the back of his neck. He and Eliza could…Eliza. He couldn’t ignore her forever. His initial anger, his pure white wrath, at her involvement with Steiner had ebbed. Now he just wanted to go home and find out what the hell was going on.

But he couldn’t do that.

Keller had suggested he take some vacation; Winters reminded him they had a spate of high-profile B&Es going on, and department resources were strained with the Steiner investigation. Keller agreed, reluctantly.

“We can’t afford any more suggestions that this department isn’t completely impartial in the way we enforce the law,” he said.

Winters assured him he’d run a mile if he saw Josie Steiner coming his way.

He touched his chest. The picture was still in his pocket. Madison hadn’t said anything about it, which meant Eliza hadn’t told him. Why? Because it didn’t matter? Or because it was so incriminating it mattered a lot?

Winters had only seen Steiner either curled up over a toilet with the back of his head missing or lying on the coroner’s stretcher before the sheet was placed over his face. Not the most flattering of circumstances, but the man didn’t look like he’d have much appeal to Eliza. Unhealthily thin, flabby flesh indicating he’d lost a lot of weight too fast, balding, bulbous red nose. Why would she have been in his hotel room for a
tête-à-tête
over
Moët et Chandon
and a cheese plate?

Was he threatening to blackmail her over the picture? Did she think she had to give in because if her husband saw that picture he’d react…exactly the way he
did
react?

Or, did she decide not to give in to the blackmailer’s demands and sort the problem out another way?

Impossible. Calm, rational, level-headed Eliza coming up behind a man and blowing his brains out? Impossible.

If he loved Eliza and believed in her love for him, he had to trust her enough to let her tell him what had happened between her and the dead man.

He wanted to go home. To curl up in bed with the woman he loved and forget all about Rudy Steiner and Dick Madison.

But as long as Madison remained in town, Eliza under suspicion, that was not going to happen. He wondered if it was time Eliza found herself a lawyer.

His e-mail program beeped. Incoming. Doctor Shirley Lee, the pathologist.

The results of the Steiner autopsy.

No one had thought to tell Dr. Lee Winters had been ordered to stay away from anything to do with the case. Dr. Lee was all business, all the time, and would be unlikely to ask Madison and Lopez, who’d attended the autopsy, where he was. Madison, for whom the term taciturn had been invented, might not have mentioned it, and Lopez, in a rage over the insult to his boss, wouldn’t have.

As always, Dr. Lee had copied Winters with her results.

He opened the file and skimmed the report.

The subject, an underweight Caucasian male in his mid-fifties, had died of a single gunshot wound to the head. Time of death…blah, blah, blah…description of injury…blah, blah, blah…last meal…blah, blah, blah…Existing conditions…Winters went back and read that part again.

The shooter had merely hastened Rudolph Steiner toward his appointment with death. He had a brain tumor, a sizable one, inoperable. Three months to live—tops—was Doctor Lee’s opinion.

Winters leaned back in his chair. On the window sill, Lopez’s carefully tended African violets stood in a neat green and purple row, the only touch of color in the view. Gray clouds hung low over the mountains, hiding the glacier. One window in the office building across the street was open, trying to let in an early touch of spring air. Lace curtains fluttered in the breeze.

Steiner had to have known he wasn’t long for this world. What did people do when they knew they were dying? Theoretically, they tried to make amends, to make up to people they’d fallen out with. Was that why Steiner had contacted Eliza after all these years?

What else did dying people do? They made or adjusted their will. Perhaps someone didn’t want Steiner to change his will. Mrs. Steiner? No need to wonder if she was capable of violence. The evidence was written on Molly Smith’s face.

He’d get a warrant to take a peek at Steiner’s will.

No, he reminded himself. He wouldn’t do anything. If he even suggested Madison open the will, he’d be accused of interfering.

He’d have to trust that the IHIT team could do their jobs.

His phone rang, and he answered.

“John, what on earth is going on over there?”

“Hi, Rose. I’m well, how are you?”

“This call isn’t about me. Eliza. There’s a story going around saying Eliza’s involved in a homicide investigation.”

“Sadly true,” he said. “She knew the guy, that’s all. The story in the paper is wildly exaggerated.”

Inspector Rose Benoit had been Winters’ partner when he first made detective. She was still with the Vancouver Police Department, but had an office job now, investigating serious fraud cases. Her solve rate was impressive, and she seemed to be thriving behind a desk, buried in numbers. Winters and Eliza had dinner with Rose and her husband, Claude, whenever they got a chance. Claude was a well-known, and highly controversial, sculptor, a match ridiculed almost as much as cop and model. Perhaps that was why they’d stayed friends.

“That’s good then,” she said. “The idea’s preposterous. Do you have a leak in your department?”

“A bad one. Heads are going to roll. Providing they catch whoever it is.”

“That’s not the least of your problems. I hear you’ve arrested a lady by the name of Josephine Steiner for assaulting a police officer.”

“How the hell do you know that, Rose? The revolving door is hitting her on the ass right about now.”

“I have a flag set for anything to do with her maiden name.”

“Which is?”

“Marais.”

“Oh, I thought you were going to say something that means something.”

“It means something to me. Guy Marais runs a well connected organization. Very well connected to our friends in New York, if you take my meaning. He’s been moving into the lower mainland over the last year, slowly but surely. All low key stuff, money laundering, extortion, a bit of protection. His daughter, his only daughter, Josephine, aged twenty-one, wanted to be a model but no matter how much pressure her father could bring to bear she was thwarted in that ambition. So she did the next best thing and married a glamorous fashion photographer who goes by the made-up name of Rudolph Steiner.”

“Not so glamorous any more. I’ve seen his autopsy photos. Which I’m not supposed to have access to, so keep that under your hat.”

“Kept.”

“Have you heard of a lawyer name of Larry Iverson?”

Benoit whistled. “Ooh, yeah.”

“Probably not because he can be counted on to side with the police and defend the downtrodden, eh?”

“Iverson is Marais’ west coast lawyer.”

“He’s in Trafalgar, running interference for the daughter.”

“Understandable. Marais is not going to be happy that his dear Josephine is caught up in the police spotlight. Not happy at all.”

“She turned that spotlight directly on herself by getting involved in a punch up in the street in broad daylight and assaulting an officer.”

“She’s the apple of her daddy’s eye. He has four sons, all involved in the family business, but like the old-fashioned crime families, he keeps his females out of it. He might feel the need to come to your town to check up on her. I’ll keep you posted, John.”

“Unofficially.”

“Right. Can I call Eliza, say hi? Is she at home?”

“I don’t know, Rose. I haven’t spoken to her since this broke.”

“That,” she said, “is probably a mistake. I’ll get Claude to phone her.” She hung up.

***

Sergeant Madison was not happy. He stormed into the constables’ office as Smith prepared to go home.

“You,” he said. “Could have told me.”

“Told you what?”

“That Mrs. Steiner had been arrested.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” she said. “I didn’t think you needed to know.”

“I told you I had an appointment with her.”

“I apologize, sir, but I was rather busy.”

“Learn to multi-task,” he snapped, “if you want to get anywhere in this job.”

She bit her tongue and pushed her chair away from the desk.

“You said you’ve never met Mrs. Winters,” he said. “Is that correct?”

“If I said it, then it is correct.”

“Don’t get smart with me, Constable.”

“Sorry, sir.”

“What’s your impression of Sergeant Winters and his marriage?”

“What kind of a question is that? I have no impression of Sergeant Winters’ marriage whatsoever. I’ve never been inside his house, never met his wife, never seen his holiday snapshots. I don’t even know if he has a cat.”

She might not have spoken.

“Would you suggest his marriage is a happy one?”

“I wouldn’t suggest it is or it isn’t. I don’t know. Why are you asking me these questions?”

“In a long-time marriage, I’ve found, if one party is playing away from home, the other usually is as well.”

She stared at him as understanding dawned. She stood up, and spoke before thinking. “Just because your wife screwed around on you, doesn’t mean everyone else’s wife is doing the same. Don’t try to drag me into your nasty insinuations.”

“Am I making insinuations, Constable?”

“Fuck you, buddy.” She grabbed her jacket off the rack. The sleeve stuck on the hook and she struggled to get it off, anger making her clumsy. Finally it came free and she half-ran out the door. When she looked back over her shoulder, she suspected Madison was smiling.