The Kept Woman (Will Trent 8) (13 page)

Faith was getting out of her car when Collier pulled up in a black Dodge Charger. Aerosmith leaked out of the closed windows. There was a figurine of a grass-skirted, half-naked Hawaiian girl stuck to the dashboard. His wheels skidded across the asphalt as he braked, threw the gear into reverse, and backed into the space beside Faith’s Mini.

He gave her the once-over as he got out of the Charger, the same as he had this morning. He seemed appreciative, even though she was wearing her GBI regs—dark blue shirt, khakis and a thigh holster because the uniform was unflattering enough without adding two inches of Glock on her hip.

‘What’s that?’ She pointed to the two round Band-Aids wrapped around the top of his right ear. Blood had dried into the crevices.

‘Cut myself shaving.’

‘With a machete?’

‘My Epilady broke.’ He glanced into the back of Faith’s car, taking in the baby seat and scattered Cheerios.

She laid it all out in the open. ‘I have a one-year-old and a twenty-year-old.’

‘Uh, yeah. You were APD for fifteen years before you jumped ship. Never married. Graduated from Tech. Your mom was on the job. Your dad was an insurance agent, rest in peace. You live two streets over from your mom in a house your grandmother left you, which is how you can live in a nice neighborhood on a state salary.’ He pushed up his sunglasses. ‘Come on, Mitchell. You
know cops gossip like bitchy little girls. I already know everything about you.’

Faith started up the sidewalk.

‘I’m the second oldest of nine myself.’

‘Jesus,’ Faith muttered, thinking of his poor mother.

‘Dad’s a retired cop. Two brothers are with APD, another two are with Fulton County, another is in McDonough. I’ve got a sister who’s a fireman but we don’t talk about her.’

Faith picked up the fake rock, only to find that it was a real rock.

‘Come on, Mitchell.’ Collier was like a puppy nipping at her heels. ‘I know you checked me out. What’d your mom say?’

Faith made an educated guess. ‘That you’re cocky and prone to mistakes.’

He grinned. ‘I knew she’d remember me.’

Faith thought of something. ‘Where did you take Will?’

He stopped grinning. ‘What’s that?’

‘Will disappeared after he found the Jane Doe in the office building. Where did you take him?’

‘That’s some class-A detective work there, partner. But he didn’t find her. Well, he did, but I was there too. So you could say we both found her.’

‘I’m not your partner.’ Faith knelt down and studied the rocks. All of them looked fake. ‘Are you going to answer me?’

‘I took him to his house.’ Collier shoved his hands into his pockets. ‘Don’t ask me why, ’cause I can’t tell you. My sister says I should’a been the fireman ’cause I’m the dumbass who runs into the burning building instead of running away from it.’

‘Do you know why the Jane Doe tried to kill herself?’

He shrugged. ‘She’s a junkie.’

Faith picked up a suspiciously dull rock. This one was a real fake. She slid back the plastic cover, expecting to find the house key.

Empty.

Collier asked, ‘Did your mom tell you I had a wrestling accident in high school?’ He was leaning against the door jamb, his arms crossed. ‘Testicular torsion.’

Faith tossed the empty rock back into the yard.

‘Tragedy, really.’ He ran his fingers through his hair as he squinted into the distance. ‘I’ll never be able to have kids.’ He winked at her, because that was obviously in the script. ‘Hasn’t stopped me from trying.’

‘Hello?’ A hippy-looking woman in flip-flops and a belted yellow shirt dress was walking up the sidewalk. Her long gray hair was loose around her shoulders. She held a stack of papers in one hand and wore a loaded springy keychain on her wrist. ‘Are you the police lady who called?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ Faith pulled her ID out of her pocket. ‘I’m Special Agent Faith Mitchell. This is—’

‘Oh, I don’t need to see that, hon. You’ve both got
POLICE
written on the back of your shirts.’

Faith put away her ID, skipping the lecture about how you could put
POLICE
on the back of anything these days.

The woman said, ‘Can’t say I’m surprised something bad happened to ol’ Dale. He wasn’t one for making friends.’ Her shoes flip-flopped across the front walk. She banged her fist on Harding’s door. The keys on the springy ring clattered around her wrist. ‘Hello?’ She banged again. ‘Hello?’

Faith asked, ‘Was he living with someone?’

‘No. Sorry, force of habit. I do a lot of wellness checks, and I never enter a house without knocking.’ She extended her hand. ‘I’m Violet Nelson, by the way. The property manager. Sorry I was out so long. I got hung up at the library.’

‘Were you involved in leasing this place to Harding?’

‘That would be the responsibility of the owners, and the documents list them as a corporation based in Delaware, I’m assuming for the tax breaks.’ She searched her keyring, checking the neat color-coded labels. ‘Ugh, I need my glasses. Do either of you . . . ?’

Faith looked at Collier, because he was a hell of a lot closer to needing reading glasses than she was.

He gave one of his squinty smiles. ‘I’m younger than I look.’

‘It’ll hit you soon enough. Both of you.’ Violet laughed, but it wasn’t funny. She kept going through the keys. There were at least fifty of them. Faith didn’t offer to help, because Violet struck her as prone to idle chatter. ‘I’ll unlock this door and y’all can take as long as you want. Just slip the keys back through the slot in my office door when you leave.’

Faith exchanged another look with Collier, because this wasn’t the usual attitude of a property manager. Then again, most of the property managers they dealt with worked behind cages or bulletproof glass.

Faith said, ‘I knocked on some of the neighbors’ doors. Doesn’t seem like anybody is home today.’

‘It’s busier on the weekends.’ Violet tried to push a key into the lock. ‘No one really retires anymore. They’ve all got part-time jobs. Some of the luckier ones volunteer. Come four
o’clock, you’ll find most of us down at the club house for cocktail hour.’

Faith would pass out if she had a drink at four in the afternoon. She asked the woman, ‘Did you know Dale Harding?’

‘I knew him well enough.’ Violet didn’t seem happy about it. ‘He was a pain in my posterior, let me tell you.’

Faith rolled her hand, letting the woman know she should do just that.

‘Let’s just say that he wasn’t the cleanest-living person.’

Collier guessed, ‘Women? Booze?’

‘Trash,’ she said, then caught herself. ‘Not like white trash. Like real trash—things that should be thrown away but aren’t. I wouldn’t call him a hoarder. It’s more like he was just too lazy to walk to the trashcan. There were complaints about odors from Barbara. That’s the gal next door. Spoiled food, she said, the stink of it just wafting through the walls to her side of the house. I smelled it myself. Disgusting. I’ve written about ten letters to the company in Delaware, with no luck. We’ve been talking to the HOA lawyers for months about what to do.’

‘That’s horrible,’ Faith said, thinking that it never occurred to normal people that the smell of spoiled food was remarkably similar to the odor from a decaying body. ‘What else?’

‘They were constantly bickering.’ Violet tried another key. ‘Barb and Dale. Well, Dale and everybody, but especially Barb. They just rubbed each other the wrong way.’ She jammed in another key, with no success. ‘I had to step in a few times to help turn down the heat. I hate to speak ill of the dead, but Dale was . . .’ She struggled for the word.

‘An asshole?’ Faith suggested, because that seemed to be the word of consensus.

‘Yes, an asshole,’ Violet agreed. ‘So if this was like
Midsomer Murders
and you were asking if Dale had any enemies, the answer is that he went out of his way to make enemies.’ She pointed to the windows. ‘Those hideous curtains are a perfect example. The bylaws clearly state everyone should have white window coverings. When I sent him a letter about the pink curtains, he sent back a note on fake stationery from a fake law firm saying that I was discriminating against him because he’s a homosexual.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘As if a gay man of that age would buy polyester curtains.’

Faith watched her try another key. She was going through the entire ring. ‘What about Barb, the next-door neighbor? You said it got heated?’

‘He taunted her. For no reason. Just picked and picked and picked.’

‘For instance?’

Violet waved toward the front yard. ‘These were her gnomes, and her grandson gave her that rabbit. We all knew that. She dressed them all in matching seasonal jackets. Red on Valentine’s Day. Plaid for Armistice Day.’ She shrugged. ‘To each her own. But one day Barb comes to me and says the strangest thing has happened. All the gnomes and the rabbit are gone from her yard. We chalked it up to kids. Some of the grandchildren around here are a bunch of juvenile delinquents. Blood will out, as they say. But then two days later, Dale puts out the gnomes and the rabbit in his front yard and they’re wearing pink jackets. And not even jackets that fit.’ She tried another key. ‘Actually, there were four gnomes, but he’d painted one of them in blackface, which is expressly forbidden in the homeowners’
bylaws.’ She lowered her voice, explaining, ‘If we didn’t have the rule, this whole place would be lit up with lawn jockeys.’

So much for Shangri-La. ‘Did Harding have any regular visitors?’

‘Nary a one that I ever saw.’

Collier asked, ‘Did he keep a schedule?’

‘He was home more often than not, which was extremely annoying, let me tell you. Gave him time to mess with people. As lazy as he was, he’d walk two streets over to yell at a grandkid having too much fun in the pool.’

‘When did he move in?’

Violet tried another key. ‘Six months ago, maybe? I’ve got the paperwork somewhere. Give me your email and I’ll scan it to you. He’s past due on his HOA fees.’ She finally found the correct key. ‘That’s homeowners’—’

Collier stopped her hand on the doorknob.

Faith had her Glock in her hands before she completely processed what was happening.

There was a noise inside the house.

Rustling, like someone was trying to be quiet.

Faith looked at the fake rock. There was no key. Why have a fake rock when you didn’t have a key?

Unless someone had already used the key to get inside.

Collier put his finger to his lips before Violet could ask for an explanation. He indicated for her to move back, then back some more, until she was standing on the other side of his car.

The noise came again. Louder this time.

Collier took out his phone and whispered a call-in for backup, then he motioned for Faith to take the lead.

Which meant that fifty years of feminism would probably end up getting Faith gut-shot.

She tapped her finger on the side of her Glock, just above the trigger, which is where they were trained to keep their finger until they had made the decision to shoot. She thought about her bulletproof vest in the car. The baby seat for her precious daughter. The bottle of water her thoughtful mother had given her this morning. The photo of her beautiful son on her phone.

Then she raised her foot and kicked in the door.

‘Police!’ Faith yelled, letting the word explode from her mouth.

She swiveled around, scanning the room. Kitchen. Table. Couch. Chairs. Clutter. Chaos. All of her senses had turned off but one. Her vision tunneled onto doorways and windows, searching for hands holding weapons. Collier checked the coat closet. Empty. He pressed his back against hers. He tapped her leg. They moved forward in unison, both crouched low, both swiveling their heads like gun turrets.

She remembered the Mesa Arms website. Harding lived in the Tahoe. Open concept. Two bedroom. One bathroom.

Doorway.

A separate powder room for your guests!

Doorway.

A well-appointed laundry room with optional storage cabinets!

Corner.

Faith put herself at an angle, letting the corner serve as a visual block to anyone standing in the hallway with a shotgun. If she couldn’t see them, they couldn’t see her. She had her weapon out in front of her, feet wide apart. Without any conscious thought, her finger slipped from the side of the gun and went to the trigger.
She forced herself to put her finger back along the barrel, to buy herself that extra second of hesitation in case it was a kid or an elderly deaf person standing at the end of the hall.

Now or never.

Slowly, a centimeter at a time, she rolled the upper part of her body to the side and peered around the corner.

Empty.

Faith took the lead down the hallway.

Doorway.

A central bathroom with walk-in shower and comfort seat toilet!

Closed doors.

Light-filled main-level bedrooms for you and your guests!

The bedrooms were on opposite sides of the hall, each taking up one side of the rear portion of the house.

Faith let Collier take the room on the right. Again she stood at an angle, covering him and the other closed door so his back would be protected when he breached the room. With an almost painful slowness, he reached down and turned the knob. The door opened. He slammed it back in case anyone was standing behind it. Pink curtains on a bay window to the backyard. A blow-up mattress on the floor. An open curtain where the closet door should’ve been.

Clear.

In the hall, Collier took position opposite the left bedroom and gave her the nod.

Faith kicked open the door so hard that the knob stuck into the drywall. More windows. More pink curtains. Another mattress on the floor, this one with a boxspring, dirty sheets. Cardboard
box for a bedside table. Dangling cords. A lamp. The closet had a door and the door had a keyed deadbolt.

Faith made herself breathe, because she had been holding her breath so long that she was going to pass out. Her lungs would only half fill. Her heart was a stopwatch. Sweat dripped from her hands as she forced her grip on the Glock to loosen so the recoil wouldn’t break her wrist if she had to shoot.