Killing Frost Page 3

  Harold pulled into the drive.

  ‘You know,’ Shanahan said to his seat mate, ‘you were the only one who knew she was coming to see me.’

  ‘I didn’t know when.’ She smiled as if she had successfully volleyed a difficult shot.

  ‘Who else would know?’

  She didn’t answer right away. Harold opened the car door for her. She went to the front door. Shanahan followed.

  ‘Sounds like a good place to start an investigation,’ she said as she rummaged through her purse, finally pulling out a ring with dozens of keys. ‘You can have Harold and the car from noon to eight for the next few days.’ She found a key and inserted it into the lock. ‘I’ll pay the going rate.’

  The door opened. A gush of fresh, cool air greeted them.

  FIVE

  Bailey led the way. The carpeted stairway began in the center of the entry hall. To the right was a wide opening and inside was a formal dining room. An opening to the left revealed what appeared to be a living room. Pale rose and smoky blues dominated the color scheme. A thick, soft, loosely upholstered sofa and two similarly covered chairs meant that, at home, comfort won out over clean lines.

  Narrower halls on either side of the stairs led to the back of the house. Logic suggested a kitchen behind the dining room. And a parlor or den behind the living room into which Bailey disappeared. He caught her movement as she again went out of view behind a Japanese screen. He followed.

  A book, A Beautiful Mystery by Louise Penny, was open, pages face down on the sofa pillow. An afghan was tossed carelessly over an arm of the sofa. A pot of mums occupied a side table beneath a window. Shanahan noted one could easily peer in. There were no signs she had taken any extra safety precautions.

  ‘What a mess,’ he heard her say.

  Why didn’t he kill her here? he asked himself, heading in the direction of Bailey’s voice. ‘What?’ he said, approaching her.

  ‘Nothing,’ Bailey said, looking around. She seemed lost or confused.

  Shanahan stepped into what was obviously Mrs Fournier’s home office. Filing cabinet drawers were open as were desk drawers. Items on the desk were askew, but not wildly so. It was an organized search.

  ‘She wouldn’t have left things this way,’ Bailey said.

  The disarray, such as it was, was limited to the center of the room. The shelves that lined two of the walls were undisturbed. That’s when he noticed the muddy hand print on the glass window that occupied most of the back wall. There was a clear image of a hand, the palm midway up the window, and it was clear that the hand had slipped down, leaving a smudged trail.

  Shanahan approached the window warily. He was pretty sure what he would find. He wanted desperately to be wrong.

  The boy was maybe sixteen. His cheekbone lay against the brick, but his head was cocked back. His eyes were frozen wide open, staring up to the cold, gray sky in surprise or possibly in horror. The kid was dead. A very thin red line, from what Shanahan could see, appeared as a ring around his neck. A wire, or garrote, had been used. He’d seen this sort of thing before.

  ‘Miss Bailey, could you go out front and ask Harold to call Lieutenant Swann and tell him to get out here right away.’

  Bailey moved toward him and the window. She looked. She shut her eyes, looked away. She took a deep breath.

  ‘I’ll do it,’ Shanahan said. ‘Come with me.’ She didn’t move. ‘Come with me,’ he said firmly and took her skinny arm. She began to cry. Her body shook.

  ‘It’s too much,’ she said.

  ‘It is,’ he said. He held her for a moment; this brittle woman was now mush.

  ‘Shanahan!’

  The detective heard it, turned to see Swann approach. He and Bailey were on the front porch. Shanahan was glad for another, living face to replace the boy’s. He stepped down to greet Swann. Harold watched, but stayed in the car.

  ‘You go inside?’ Swann asked.

  Jennifer Bailey came up to them.

  ‘I wanted to make sure I had the right key,’ she said. ‘I went in.’

  ‘And you went around back?’ Swan asked Shanahan. His tone hadn’t changed.

  ‘Stretch my legs,’ Shanahan said.

  ‘Something is being stretched,’ Swann said. ‘You’re not investigating?’

  ‘I’ve hired him to help me clean up my sister’s affairs,’ Bailey said curtly.

  ‘If you don’t mind my saying so, that’s an attorney’s or accountant’s job.’

  ‘I’m an attorney, Lieutenant. Given the circumstances, I need to tie up some loose ends.’

  ‘What might those be?’

  ‘Private. Family matters. I’m sure you understand.’ It was an order, not a statement of fact.

  Shanahan noticed she had relocated her steely core.

  Swann nodded politely.

  The second victim was identified as Nicky Hernandez, 17. Swann volunteered the name and address from the boy’s wallet. On the way to Irvington to drop off a weary Jennifer Baily, she told Shanahan the young man was likely someone from one of the charities. Mrs Fournier would do that. She paid them to mow and trim and paint.

  ‘Did she have offices elsewhere?’

  ‘Where? What do you mean?’ she asked, but her concentration was slipping away.

  ‘Sometimes when you’re involved with an organization, they might set aside a little corner of the office to … I don’t know. What I’m trying to do is see who she met with before she was to meet me. Perhaps she stirred something up.’

  ‘She could do that.’

  Shanahan figured there was little to do with what was left of the afternoon. He asked Jennifer Bailey if she could call the organizations her sister worked with to vouch for Shanahan before he stopped by to ask questions. He gave her a copy of the faxes. The Civilian Crime Oversight Committee, designed to counter police abuse of power, was no doubt sensitive to the kinds of questions Shanahan would ask. Certainly a former attorney general would have some credibility. The nonprofits that involved the young might also be sensitive. Nobody trusted private detectives, including other private eyes. She could make access easier.

  Then there was Judge Halston Fournier, deceased husband of victim number one. He wanted some background on the man, but wanted it as objective as possible. He knew a lawyer. If James Fenimore Kowalski didn’t have the skinny on the judge, he would know how to get it.

  Shanahan had a plan – a rough one. Check out all of the victim’s connections and try to figure out who she talked to right before her demise. He would work the police, though he didn’t expect much. What the police would get from the murder scenes and the autopsies Shanahan believed would be little if any more than he had already. It was a professional job. No amateur could shoot that accurately from that distance. No amateur would have had, thought about, or even known how to use a garrote. It was the perfect weapon to silently kill someone in a residential neighborhood. This wasn’t the work of someone operating on impulse. This was bad news. Shanahan had the skill to identify suspects and then narrow the list. But was he up to this kind of investigation?

  Probably. His approach was motive driven, not based on sophisticated forensics. This might work here. And his range was local. He’d soon find out if he was out of his league. But the only motive a professional killer has is money. It would be the hitman’s employer who would have a traceable motive. The man who pulled the trigger and cut the throat was long gone, a man who had no real connection to the victims and possibly no connection to whoever hired him.

  Jennifer Baily had been wrung of any energy she might have had left after the gruesome morning. Any more time with her wouldn’t be productive for either of them. Shanahan had Harold drop him off and pick up the faxes before the Lexus headed for the increasingly gentrified eastside neighborhood of Irvington and a nap for Mrs Jennifer Bailey.

  It was still early in the day, but Shanahan felt no guilt pouring himself two fingers of J.W. Dant bourbon. He had handled the first murder well, the second not so
well at all. Mrs Fournier had no idea what hit her. The young man had some time to feel the pain and contemplate his fate.

  SIX

  Kowalski returned Shanahan’s call in person. There was warning: the low, loud growl of the lawyer’s Harley in the drive not only alerted a dozing Shanahan but neighbors far and wide as well.

  Kowalski, always dressed in a shabby black suit and a white shirt; all he needed at any time was a tie and he was ready for court. He was a big man. His hair and beard were striped with silver. His presence, as if it were filled with compressed explosives, was intimidating. With him was a bottle of Powers Irish whiskey.

  ‘None of your Kentucky sludge,’ he said, helping himself to glasses from the kitchen. ‘I hear you had your head sewn on?’

  ‘Stapled,’ Shanahan said, looking out of the window. Kowalski’s black Harley was parked where Mrs Fournier went down.

  ‘Stapled?’

  ‘Twice.’

  ‘Maybe you should consider Velcro.’ He handed Shanahan a glass, took one with him to one of the upholstered chairs. ‘You’re still standing.’

  There was a slow exquisite burn in Shanahan’s throat.

  ‘Sorry about Casey,’ Kowalski said, rising his glass in a subtle toast. ‘He’s in heaven herding hogs. Catahoula, right?’

  Shanahan nodded.

  ‘Louisiana Leopard dog,’ Kowalski added.

  Shanahan nodded again.

  ‘You think he ever saw Mardi Gras?’

  ‘Probably not. He was pretty young when he showed up wanting board and room.’

  ‘Not many of those around. Not many of you either, so stick around.’

  ‘What do you know of Judge Halston Fournier?’

  ‘You’re on that? The murder of the judge’s wife?’

  Shanahan nodded.

  ‘What’s your take?’

  ‘Professional.’

  ‘Why?’

  Shanahan shrugged.

  ‘Tell me what you know and I’ll tell you about her late husband.’

  ‘Think that’s a fair trade?’ Shanahan asked. It was fine with Shanahan. It was a good idea to run his theories by a smart and crafty criminal defense attorney.

  ‘And I’ll leave the bottle when I go.’

  ‘Deal.’

  ‘The shooter is based not too far from here,’ he said after hearing Shanahan’s explanation. ‘He most likely didn’t fly in. Security is too tight. Not just the weapons problem, but way too many cameras. Like I said, he doesn’t live too far from here, but most likely he doesn’t live here either. Most hitmen don’t kill where they live. So that means the hitter probably drove. No more than five hours away. Chicago. Detroit. Or some shack or house trailer in the middle of rural Podunk County in the land of the lost.’

  That pretty much validated Shanahan’s decision not to pursue the shooter and connect him to the person who hired him. Only the police could do that and probably only then if they worked with police departments in other cities. He’d talk with Collins.

  ‘A garrote?’ Kowalski asked himself in a near whisper. ‘He knew when to use what tool, didn’t he?’

  ‘And the cold-hearted decision to use it.’

  ‘Special training. You don’t get that off video games. I don’t think so, anyway.’ Kowalski poured a little more whiskey in each of their glasses. ‘The judge has been dead a couple of years.’

  ‘I’m checking all the bases. What kind of enemies does a woman have when she has devoted her life to helping others? If her sister had been killed we’d look at the people she prosecuted.’

  ‘We still should. And the judge’s.’ He sat back. ‘Did you know that Halston – “Hall,” as he was called – was Bailey’s beau before he married Alexandra?’

  Kowalski stayed on for dinner. He told bawdy, exaggerated tales of his most recent adventures.

  ‘I didn’t come up to see you in the hospital,’ he said, downing the remnants of a hearty Cabernet. ‘I don’t do hospitals, unless it’s visiting a client or witness. I don’t do funerals. So, if you croak and are hovering round to see who shows up, don’t expect to see me.’

  ‘About the case,’ Maureen said, emptying the bottle in Kowalski’s glass. ‘It wasn’t the shooter’s only job. He had to find something, right? That’s why the kid was killed.’

  ‘If there was something to be found, he found it,’ Shanahan said.

  ‘What makes you think so?’ Kowalski asked.

  ‘He started at her desk, judging by the level of disorder and worked his way out, but the files and shelves against the outer walls seemed to be undisturbed.’

  ‘Unless,’ Maureen said, ‘he stopped when he realized the kid knew he was there.’

  ‘Maybe. But he is cool as a cucumber …’

  ‘You’re going to have to update your clichés, Shanahan,’ Kowalski said.

  ‘He’s a pro. If it was important enough to take the risk in the first place and then kill a witness to the search, it would be really frustrating not to get what you came for or at least finish searching for it.’

  Kowalski left shortly before midnight. The man would wear him out, Shanahan thought, but given his druthers Shanahan was happier to have the man along for the ride.

  Harold was there at noon.

  ‘Your driver is here, Mr Shanahan,’ Maureen said in a mock-snooty tone.

  She was in good spirits. Last night had been good for her, for them. A little life and a little laughter in the silent, empty house.

  Shanahan’s attempt to climb into the front passenger seat was aborted when Shanahan saw that Harold used it for his laptop, a pair of sunglasses and a brown bag. Maybe lunch. Harold made no move to rearrange things. Shanahan sat, uncomfortably, in the back.

  Not only was he in a luxury car, he was being driven around … and driven around by a black man in what could easily be regarded as a uniform. This kind of class-distinctive ostentation was not only bad for a business that usually prized anonymity if not outright invisibility, but it was a personal misstatement of Shanahan himself. He was not an ‘upstairs, downstairs’ kind of guy.

  ‘Where to?’ Harold asked.

  Shanahan leaned forward, gave him the address of Daniel Holcomb, who aside from having his own private practice, was a senior member of the Public Safety and Criminal Justice Committee for the city, a group of folks ostensibly charged as a civilian police oversight committee, but without the teeth of being truly public or truly civilian. Holcomb was also on the City Council.

  ‘Sit back and relax, Mr Shanahan. Enjoy and let me do the driving. It’s what I do.’

  It was a toss-up. They could go to Washington Street for a straight shot to downtown or, as Harold chose, cruise one-way Michigan Street downtown. The lights were timed so that if you went at thirty-five miles per hour you never saw a red light. Smooth as silk, Shanahan thought. Cool as a cucumber, he remembered.

  Sitting back, Shanahan noticed a roll of fat at the base of Harold’s neck and the broadness of his shoulders. Big and soft. His age was difficult to tell. But he was up there.

  ‘Football?’ Shanahan asked.

  ‘Basketball,’ Harold said. ‘Crispus Attucks.’

  ‘Oh? You know Oscar Robertson?’

  ‘Met him. He was a couple of years ahead of me.’

  ‘A couple?’

  ‘Yeah, three years.’

  Doing the math, Shanahan figured he and Harold were about the same age.

  ‘You play college ball?’

  ‘No. To go any farther I had to be either taller or faster, preferably both.’ He laughed. ‘I did go to college, but I had to pay for it.’

  ‘This is your retirement, ‘Shanahan said. ‘Second career.’

  ‘Right. Trooper. Thirty-five years with the state police.’

  ‘That’s how you came to drive for the attorney general.’

  ‘You ask a lot of questions.’

  ‘That’s what I do. You ever drive for Miss Bailey’s sister?’

  ‘Never,’ he said shar
ply. ‘You done?’

  ‘One more. Are you carrying?’

  ‘It’s legal. Problem?’

  ‘Not for me.’ He made a mental note to check Harold’s background. He could ask Jennifer Bailey, but Shanahan didn’t take anyone’s ‘word for it.’ Not even his client’s.

  SEVEN

  Daniel Holcomb could pass for under thirty, except for his eyes. They seemed much older. Shanahan wasn’t sure whether they expressed wisdom or distrust. Perhaps both. Or maybe they were the same thing. Holcomb’s hair was too long – slightly over the ears and in the back an inch or so beyond the shirt collar – to be an Indiana Republican.

  He extended his hand. A firm but not crushing handshake, after which Shanahan was ushered to a sofa, away from Holcomb’s desk, in the spacious office. The art on the walls looked expensive. Holcomb. Shanahan rummaged through his mind. He hadn’t recognized the name or the photos that came with the stack of papers Maureen had created before breakfast. Then again, he didn’t follow local politics. But now, Shanahan saw him as familiar. He was on TV periodically, the local news, and in the newspaper occasionally in a highlighted editorial. There was no doubt he was being groomed or had ambition for political office.

  ‘You’re a private investigator, right? How do you know Jennifer?’ Holcomb asked in a friendly manner when they settled in.

  ‘I did some work for her in the past.’

  ‘For the state?’

  ‘No,’ Shanahan said, feeling the need to be on the other side of the interrogation. ‘I’m looking into the death of her sister. She said you would help. Will you?’