Every Move She Makes (7 page)

"Why come to me? Why not Zim?"

"I don't trust him." That made two of us. "What happened?" "I don't
know. She was already dead." His unshaven face was pale. Drawn. I had no
idea if he was telling the truth.

"She mentioned something to me at the autopsy.

What did she tell you that set you off?"

"I didn't kill her!" He shot to his feet, his fists clenched at his sides.

His movement shocked me, sent my adrenaline racing. I backed toward the
sofa, left my finger at the trigger guard, my meaning explicit. He was a
suspect, and I was a cop. He'd do the same, and I sensed he expected
nothing less. "I got called into IA," I said. "They were searching your
desk when I left. Turn yourself in." He stared right through me,
unseeing. Slowly he turned toward the kitchen. Then he left. I don't
know why I didn't move. I heard the kitchen door open, then close, and
then his footsteps on the stairs outside. What had he hoped to
accomplish by coming here? Had he comitted murder? Was he so in shock
that he didn't recall the event? He was, had been, a good cop-not that
good cops didn't make mistakes. Most major departments had a history
checkered with good cops gone bad. I called the PD, wondering if my
father would approve. In his day, partners stood by their partners, no
matter what. "He was here," I told Torrance when he answered. I gave him
the details of the visit, telling him Scolari had just left the house
and that I had no idea where he was headed. What I didn't include was my
earlier conversation with Zimmerman. The fact that he had concluded
Scolari would tell me his whereabouts weighed on me, and I wasn't sure
what to make of it. Perhaps that was why I wasn't surprised to discover
when I left the house later in the evening that I was being tailed.

didn't notice the car right away, at least not until I'd turned off
University down one of the side streets on my way to a secluded Thai
restaurant. I was meeting my ex. He'd called, wanting to know if I
wanted to have dinner, and I decided I would, mostly because I had no
desire to sit in my apartment alone with nothing better to do than
relive the past two days' events in my head. When I glanced in my
rearview mirror, I noticed that the headlights on the car behind me were
out of adjustment. I didn't give it much thought, except they were still
behind me when I turned down another street. Since I was taking a
shortcut to the restaurant via the residential area, I figured it was
some local on his way home. But then I missed my street-easy to do
watching your mirrors instead of the road-and made a U-turn, which is
when I realized I was being followed. The question was, who? Not to
mention, why?

One possibility was Ed Zimmerman. I decided to find out.

Instead of continuing on to the restaurant, I headed back out to
University and pulled into the parking lot of a mini market I
frequented. I removed my wallet from my black evening bag and replaced
it with my Smith and Wesson from the glove box before getting out. Since
the shoulder strap wasn't strong enough to support the weight of the
gun, I tucked the purse beneath my arm and strode toward the mini mart
doors, my high heels clicking across the pavement. Just before I reached
the entrance, I stopped, opened up my purse, and pulled out my lipstick,
which I applied using the small mirror on the lipstick case.

I nearly froze standing there; I'd left my coat behind.

The car following me, a dark sedan, turned into the lot, its headlights
shining in my small mirror, so I couldn't see who was at the wheel. It
parked well away from where I stood, almost out of sight around the side
of the store. Confident that it wasn't going anywhere for the moment, at
least not until I was, I entered the store and picked up a pack of gum
from the candy aisle and placed it on the counter. "Hey, Rosalie," I
said to the clerk, a Latina woman in her twenties.

"Hot date tonight?" she asked, eyeing my black sheath.

"One can only hope." I paid for the gum with change I dug out of the
bottom of my purse. "Listen, I think someone's following me. Mind if I
go out your back door?" "Suit yourself," she said with a shrug, then
rang up the next customer. I started toward the back of the store when
she called out, "Hey. You want me to phone the cops?" "Only if you hear
gunshots." At the back of the store, I slipped out of my shoes and
carried them in one hand, the pavement ice-cold beneath my feet. The
predicted rain started to fall, but I barely noticed. With my free hand
I slung my purse strap over my shoulder, reached into the purse, and
grasped the butt of my gun, careful not to reveal it, then proceeded
around the corner where the car was parked. If not for the two working
headlights, I'd swear it was the same car I'd parked in front of last
night at the doctor's homicide scene. IAE probably had half a dozen like
it at any one time in the Hall of justice parking garage. It was a late
model, blue or black, I couldn't tell in the dark. I knew a cop car when
I saw one, but had no idea what sort of car Zimmerman had been given
once he was transferred out of Homicide. I wasn't taking any chances.

Staying in the shadows of the building, I made my way to the car, my
hand gripped tightly on my weapon. It wasn't Ed Zimmerman at all.

It was Torrance from IA.

"Son of a bitch," came his sharp oath. He nearly jumped from his seat
when he discovered me at his window. His gaze dropped to the gun I
partly concealed.

"Get in the car," he ordered. He leaned over, opened the passenger door.

He outranked me. I was close to hypothermia. But just to show I wasn't
intimidated, first I dropped my shoes and put them on. The interior of
his car was warm, but my teeth chattered uncontrollably, and I was
grateful when he blasted the heater. His gaze swept over me. "It occur
to you, Inspector, that it's the middle of winter?"

"Forget the weather report. What are you doing here?"

"Continuing my investigation."

"Am I a suspect now?"

"You said that Scolari broke into your house. We thought it possible he
might return. You could be in danger.

"Great," I said. "Just how long do you plan to babysit me?"

"Depends on how long it takes to apprehend Scolari." "Have you
considered that he might not be guilty?" Torrance watched the traffic on
University for several moments, then said softly, "Patricia's throat was
slit.

She was sitting in the Range Rover he'd just bought."

"You forget. I was there." A car pulled into the parking lot, its
headlights flashing in my window, bringing with it Patricia
Mead-Scolari's image as I saw her last night. Though I didn't know her
as well as I knew Scolari, the thought of her so violently murdered-I
fought to control the prick of tears. Then, without warning, a vision of
her on a porcelain table flashed in my mind" somebody else performing
the autopsy. I couldn't shake the cruelly ironic image, and nausea
twisted my stomach. I stared out the window. Scattered raindrops dotted
the glass. "His thumbprint was on the inside passenger door handle,"

Torrance said softly. "Look," I finally said when I thought I could talk
without having my voice crack. "He owned the car. His prints were bound
to be all over it."

"It wasn't your basic latent, Gillespie. It was a patent print."

"In what?" I asked, the evidence against Scolari mounting. A patent
print-versus the more familiar latent found by dusting and lifting with
tape-is made by touching something, like paint, or grease, then touching
something else, leaving behind an impression of a print formed of that
same substance. I'd solved a homicide after finding a socalled patent
print in a tub of margarine, and knew sometimes patents were more
compelling evidence than the latents. This was enough to keep me silent,
waiting for what he had to say next.

patricia's blood," he continued. "His thumbprint was in her blood."

I didn't want to think about it. "He told me she was already dead when
he found her." "Why didn't he call us? And why did he try to hide his
bloody clothes?" I hadn't heard about the clothes, and so couldn't
answer. I wanted to believe Scolari didn't do it, but I wasn't sure why.

Because he was my partner? Because he was a cop, and the thought that
one of our own could commit murder was too horrific? Or was it simply
that I'd found him sitting in my apartment, and I didn't like to think I
was that vulnerable? Despite the heat pouring into the car, I felt
chilled to the bone.

"What now?" I asked.

"Now we put you to bed at night, and we get up with you in the morning.

No one knows why Scolari visited you, but we do know you were the last
one to see him, and you were one of the last to talk to his wife. Until
he's apprehended, we're not taking any chances."

"I love IA-"

"Management Control." "Next time, cut the subterfuge. Pick up a phone,
call me. I'm not that difficult to work with." I didn't say goodbye,
just got out and slammed the door. About halfway across the parking lot,
I heard him call out, and thought about ignoring him until I realized
I'd left my purse in his car. When I looked back, he was holding it out
his window.

I retrieved my purse, turned, and made as graceful an exit as I could.

Not until I got in my car did I realize I'd shredded my nylons walking
barefoot to sneak up on him. I bought a new pair at the mini mart, then
drove through the rain to the restaurant with Torrance shadowing me. I
figured I knew what the First Lady felt like, dogged by Secret Service
every step. In fact, the more I thought about Torrance following me-was
he even now aware I was sitting in my car, changing my nylons in the
restaurant parking lot?-the madder I got. I crumpled up my ruined
nylons, stormed to his parked car, and tossed them on his rain spattered
windshield. Now that I was bundled up in my coat, I felt somewhat smug
as he rolled down his window. "Was there something you wanted?" he had
the nerve to ask. "Don't freeze your tail off on my account." With that
I left, promising that Mike Torrance would have the most uneventful and,
I hoped, cold evening of his life. Reid was seated at the bar when I got
in, drinking his usual vodka and tonic. He stood when he saw me. "Sorry
I'm late," I said, allowing him to take my damp coat. "Something came up
at work." "Dr. Mead-Scolari's case?" he asked. "You hear anything more
about the investigation?"

"Um, no. Not really. Mind if we talk about something else?"

"Of course not. Sorry." His cellular rang. After a brief conversation,
he ordered me a glass of white wine.

Even after being married, he still didn't know what I liked to drink.

I know I wasn't the best company during our leisurely dinner, but I
attempted to appear interested while Reid told me about his latest
investigation, an embezzlement case at Hilliard Pharmaceutical, of all
places. Thirty minutes together, and we were already talking shop. It
was well after eleven and pouring rain when we strolled out arm in arm.

I scanned the parking lot, searched for Torrance's car. He wasn't where
I'd left him. He'd taken a position of advantage in the back corner of
the lot, where he could keep an eye on the front and back doors of the
restaurant. My nylons were no longer on his windshield, to my relief,
and I suffered a bout of delayed embarrassment for my impulsive action.