Sundays Are for Murder Page 7

  Besides, she wanted some time to herself to think about the case. She found the atmosphere at work more conducive to steady and constructive thought. Home provided too many distractions. And home was where her father called her, wanting to be kept abreast of her progress. As if she could somehow magically bring the case to a close if she just applied herself enough.

  At least, that seemed to be her father’s opinion. She’d told him that he couldn’t call her at the office, saying it was against company rules. Her father had no idea she owned a cell phone. If he did, she’d really have no peace. But, mercifully, her father wasn’t one to keep up with the times so she was safe for now.

  Time had stopped for Christopher Dow and for his wife the night Cris was murdered. The only difference being, of the two, her father had continued to function. To get up each morning and go to work, to put the sorrow that haunted his soul on hold until he returned home at night.

  There were times, when she visited, that she’d catch her father looking at her and she knew what he was thinking. Why hadn’t she been the one? Why hadn’t she been the one to have stayed home that night when the killer had struck? Then she would be dead and Cris would still be alive. It was no secret that Cris had always been his favorite. As far back as she could remember, Cris had gotten their father’s attention. Cris had been able to make him smile. It was as if she and her older brother, David, didn’t even exist.

  Her mother had played no such favorites. But her mother had been utterly devastated by Cris’s murder. Within six months, she had fallen completely apart, withdrawing into herself where the world couldn’t get at her. These days, her mother resided in a psychiatric hospital. Part of every paycheck she earned went to pay for the facility. Her father couldn’t handle the burden on his own and she couldn’t bear the idea of her mother living in a state institution.

  She hadn’t gone to visit her mother in several days. Maybe she’d swing by tonight on her way home, Charley thought as she got off the elevator. Not that her mother knew one way or another whether or not she came by. Claire Dow just sat in her chair, staring off into space, existing somewhere in a place devoid of pain. Charley supposed that somewhere in her heart she nursed the hope that if she could catch the killer, if she could bring Cris’s murderer to justice, her mother would come back from her dark place.

  It made her try twice as hard. Gave her twice the stake.

  At eight o’clock in the morning, the seventh floor was still rather empty and quiet. Even though Charley liked the energy generated by agents going at full throttle, she had to admit a fondness for the aura of tranquillity that embraced the various offices before the day began.

  The task force’s room was located in the middle of the floor. Walking in, an extra-tall container of ordinary black coffee in her hand, Charley had fully expected to find herself alone for at least half an hour, if not more. Both Bill and Sam usually arrived at the start of the workday, sometimes a little later if Sam’s new baby had kept him and his wife up, or Bill had had a particularly adventurous and exhausting night with his date of the month. The various other people attached to the task force trickled in around the same time.

  Aside from A.D. Kelly and, on occasion, his secretary, Charley was the only one who came in early on a regular basis.

  So it went without saying that she was surprised to see her new partner at his desk, absorbed in his computer screen.

  So much for solitude.

  Charley put her container on her desk. “Playing solitaire?”

  He’d been aware of her entrance. It was soundless, but she wore a scent that lightly rode the air currents, announcing her presence. He found the perfume appealing, even if the woman’s personality really wasn’t.

  Nick glanced up at her for a moment before looking back at the screen. “Going over the evidence.”

  She pried the lid off her container, tossing it into the empty wastepaper basket beneath her desk. “Very commendable.”

  He couldn’t make out if she was being sarcastic and couldn’t decide if she irritated him or just intrigued him. She was damn attractive, but that didn’t tip the scales one way or another. He’d always been a personality man. Except for once, when he’d miscalculated.

  “I was going for practical,” he told her. On the Internet, he was scrolling through old newspaper stories about the serial killer. “A fresh set of eyes, that kind of thing.”

  So, he was a go-getter, despite his easy manner. Or was he only interested in brownie points? It wouldn’t have taken much for him to find out that the A.D. came in early most mornings. “And what did your ‘fresh set of eyes’ come up with?”

  The stories he’d read were just a rehashing of the data he’d already familiarized himself with. “Nothing new,” he admitted. And then he raised his eyes to hers. “So far.”

  Her lips twisted in a patient smile. Because she had to get along with him, she gave her new partner the benefit of the doubt. “Hope springs eternal.”

  Charley dropped her purse into its usual hiding place, the bottom drawer of her desk, then pushed it closed again with her foot. Picking up her coffee container, she made her way over to the back wall. To the photographs of the dead women impatiently waiting for closure.

  The photograph of her sister drew her to that side the way it always did. Cris was smiling, captured in a moment of pure joy. She remembered when the photograph was taken. Cris has just hinted that there might be someone special in her life. Charley had known by the way her sister talked that she was in love.

  Cris never got the chance to introduce her to him. She was killed the following Sunday.

  Charley stifled a sigh. She felt that same leap inside her throat, that same tightening of her stomach. It occurred each time she found herself standing here looking at Cris. Wondering for what amounted to the thousandth time if her sister had actually been the serial killer’s intended victim, or if he had made a mistake. If he’d actually intended on killing her and had gotten the wrong twin.

  And just like all the other times, frustration overtook her, because she had no way of knowing the answer.

  Not until she had the serial killer in front of her.

  “I don’t know how I missed that.”

  Her partner’s voice penetrated her thoughts, bringing her back to the present. She turned, a surge of hope surfacing. Had Brannigan actually found something, the clue that was continuing to elude them? As sure as one day followed the other, she was confident there had to be one. It was there, probably out in plain sight, taunting them.

  “Missed what?”

  Instead of calling her over and pointing to something he’d found on the screen, Brannigan had abandoned his desk and was making his way over toward her.

  He indicated her sister’s photograph. “That she looked like you.”

  She felt deflated. It was all she could do not to snap at him for having raised her hopes, however unintentionally.

  When this case is over, I’m taking a very long vacation.

  “That’s because all blondes tend to look alike,” she answered sarcastically, “or so I’m told.”

  “By who?” he asked mildly. “A jealous brunette?”

  The response had caught her off guard. Charley laughed. “If you’re trying to get on my good side—”

  Nick raised a brow. “Yes?”

  A clever put-down rose to her lips. Charley shrugged, letting it die unspoken. She’d resolved to be less hard-nosed when it came to dealing with Nick Brannigan. To try to make the best of the situation and sheathe her resentment. It wasn’t his fault that Ben had retired.

  So she smiled and said, “I’d say you made a nice start.”

  Nick moved until he could see both Charley and her late sister’s photograph at the same time. The girl in the photograph looked as if she didn’t have a care in the world. The woman he was partnered with seemed to be shouldering the weight of that same world. The difference had thrown him.

  “Damn, she does look like you.”
>
  The smile on her lips turned sad. “She should. She was my twin. Older by two minutes.”

  “You or her?”

  “Her. We were identical twins.” And I miss her every day. Miss her as much as Dad does. “You couldn’t see the difference between us,” she told him. “You had to be there for it.”

  Nick’s dark eyes narrowed slightly in confusion. “Meaning?”

  “Meaning Cris was the one who was always full of life. Full of energy.” And she had been content to hang back in Cris’s shadow.

  “I’ve only been around you for a day, but you don’t exactly strike me as a slacker.”

  No, she wasn’t. Now she went full steam ahead—until she dropped. “That came after Cris was murdered. I felt I owed it to her. Kind of like living for two,” she murmured, taking another sip from her container, her eyes on the photograph.

  “Is that why you joined the Bureau?”

  “Part of it.” The biggest part, she thought. If Cris hadn’t died, she probably would have gone on to join the local police force. To keep things on a small scale instead of joining a national organization. “I was always interested in criminology, in getting the bad guys.” She wasn’t aware of the sigh until it escaped. “Just never thought it was going to feel so personal.”

  Charley stopped abruptly and looked at the man at her side. She had no idea why she hadn’t realized it before, but the new guy had a definite sexy aura about him. Was that going to be a problem? Did he have a need to charm every woman he came across? If he thought that applied to her, he’d picked the wrong woman.

  “Are you pumping me, Special Agent Brannigan?”

  His expression was unreadable. She didn’t know if he was being sarcastic or genuine. “Wouldn’t dream of it. Just making conversation with my new partner.”

  She studied him for a moment over the rim of her swiftly cooling container of coffee. “You’d rather be working with a man, wouldn’t you?”

  The question had come out of the blue. As far as he knew, he’d done nothing to give her that impression. Maybe she was speaking from experience. “All things being equal, I just want to work with a good agent. Male, female or pollywog, doesn’t matter to me.”

  His response amused her. “The recruitment for pollywogs is drastically down this year,” she deadpanned. “Something about a height requirement.”

  Nick matched her, tone for tone. To anyone listening, they could have been engaged in a serious conversation. “Oh really? I would have thought it might have something to do with the fact that they have trouble hitting the mark on the target range.”

  She nodded, this time using the container to hide the smile that was curving her mouth. “No opposable thumbs.”

  “No hands to put them on,” he countered.

  “That, too.” She lowered the container. The smile remained. “Maybe we’ll get along after all, Special Agent Brannigan.”

  It would go a long way to making things easier. “Then maybe you’ll call me Nick.”

  “Maybe,” Charley allowed as she returned to her desk. She added, “We’ll see,” and then got to work.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE MOMENT Robert Pullman saw them enter his restaurant and head straight toward him, he looked uncomfortable. Rounding the reservations desk, he waved to one of the hostesses, indicating that she should take his place.

  It was obvious that the handsome owner didn’t want them to be overheard.

  “We have a few questions we’d like to ask you, Mr. Pullman,” Charley told the man.

  The restaurant owner stood about six-two, and right now every inch of him seemed to sweat.

  “Of course. Anything I can do to help,” he murmured. “If we could just go into my office.”

  “Your office is fine,” Charley agreed obligingly.

  As she followed Pullman to the rear of the restaurant, she was aware of the fact that her new partner wasn’t trying to take over the interview. She appreciated that. At the same time she couldn’t help wondering why. In her experience, men Brannigan’s age usually engaged in some sort of jockeying for position. So far, he hadn’t. She didn’t know whether to relax or remain on her guard. He could be counting on her relaxing that guard.

  Only time would tell, she supposed.

  The moment the door was closed, she appraised Pullman. Mr. Forty-two Tall, she thought. She was willing to bet a month’s salary that the clothes in Stacy Pembroke’s bedroom belonged to him.

  “What size are you, Mr. Pullman?” she asked mildly.

  Pullman seemed in danger of swallowing his own tongue. “Excuse me?”

  “What size are you?” Charley repeated. “Specifically in jackets.” Charley glanced over toward her left where Nick was standing. “I’d guess a forty-two tall.” She turned her head toward Nick. “How about you, Special Agent Brannigan?”

  Nick backed her up. “That would be my guess.”

  Pullman’s intake of breath was audible. It told them everything they needed to know.

  “We found clothes in Stacy Pembroke’s bedroom, Mr. Pullman,” Charley told the man. “Men’s clothes.”

  “Piled up on the floor,” Nick interjected in a low-key voice. “Like she was dumping someone.”

  Charley straightened slightly. The look in Pullman’s eyes was that of a cornered animal. “That wouldn’t have been you, would it, Mr. Pullman?”

  “Was Stacy dumping you?” Nick pressed.

  Pullman looked nervously from one FBI agent to another. She was willing to wager that ordinarily Pullman was probably a smooth operator. But the layers were being peeled away, leaving a frightened man beneath. A frightened, married man who didn’t want his wife to know about his affair. Graying at the temples and more than twenty years Stacy’s senior, Pullman had probably seen the young waitress as a fantasy come true.

  “No!” he cried with emphasis, then realized what he had just admitted to. “I mean—” Desperate, he appealed to Nick in an apparent man-to-man play for sympathy. “Look, if my wife finds out that I was having an affair, she’s going to leave me.”

  “I think, right at this moment, having your wife walk out on you might be the least of your problems,” Nick said.

  Pullman’s brown eyes grew huge as the words registered. “You think I did this?” His head almost swiveled as he glanced from one agent to the other. His voice fairly squeaked. “You think that I killed Stacy?”

  Charley exchanged looks with Nick before answering. “The thought did cross our minds.”

  “No. Hell no.” Pullman’s voice rose with each word of denial. “I can’t even kill a roach. Ask anyone.” He pointed wildly toward the outer room. “I get one of the busboys to stomp on it.”

  “So who did you get to stomp on Stacy?” Charley asked, moving in a little closer to the man.

  Pullman squirmed. “It’s not like that.”

  Quietly Nick had moved to his other side. “Tell me what it is like, Mr. Pullman,” he urged evenly.

  “Stacy was fun. She made me feel young again. The way I hadn’t felt in years.”

  Same old story, Charley thought. Older man needing affirmation, younger woman needing trinkets. But she wanted Pullman to spell it out for them. “And what did you make her feel like, Mr. Pullman?”

  Pullman gave a helpless shrug of his shoulders. “I don’t know. I—I gave her things.”

  The owner looked from one to the other again uncertainly. Was he trying to guess if he’d given the right answer? Charley wondered. Was this the guilt of a cheating husband they were witnessing, or of a murderer? Everybody was a suspect. Until they had their man.

  “Like promises?” Nick guessed.

  “No,” Pullman cried.

  Charley was quick to push the advantage. If Pullman was going to be pressured into telling the truth, it would be now. “Maybe you promised to marry her and she found out you were lying.”

  “No!”

  Charley continued as if the man hadn’t made the protest. “Stacy threatened to te
ll your wife about the two of you. You saw your business going south, losing everything you’d worked for. You tried to talk Stacy out of it, she refused. You lost your head. You grabbed her by the throat and squeezed, trying to get her to say she wouldn’t ruin your life. You squeezed a little too hard.” Charley lifted a shoulder casually. “These things happen.”

  “No, no.” Panic was rising in Pullman’s voice. “That’s insane.” He was visibly shaking now. Charley raised her eyes to Nick. Her partner kept a solemn expression in place as he listened to the restaurant owner. “Look, I never laid a hand on her. Ever,” he emphasized. “I really liked her. A lot. I wouldn’t have hurt her. I swear,” he repeated, his eyes pleading with them to believe him.

  “You were the last one she talked to. We checked the phone records,” Charley interjected before the man could protest.

  The breath Pullman released was shaky. He was a man on a tightrope, knowing he couldn’t remain in place but afraid of falling if he took a step. “I did call her on Sunday. But it was to tell her that I couldn’t make it. She got really angry at me and hung up. It was the last time I talked to her.”

  The significance of his own words seemed to penetrate. Pullman pressed his lips together, struggling with tears. The tears won. They slid down his cheeks. He brushed them away angrily.

  “The last time,” he repeated in a voice choked with emotion. He looked directly at Charlie and added, “I swear.”

  “You swear a lot, Mr. Pullman.” A tolerant sigh escaped her lips. After a beat, Charley nodded. “All right, Mr. Pullman. That’s all for now. We’ll be in touch.”

  THEY LEFT HIM standing in his office, visibly shaken. Not by the threat of incarceration, Nick thought, but because the death of his mistress had finally registered.

  Walking out of the building, Nick automatically held the door open for his partner. He was mildly surprised that Charley didn’t say something about being able to get her own door. Maybe she wasn’t all that militant after all.