False Front (28 page)

Trappatino shrugged. ‘What’s with the scarred woman?’

‘Where are my manners?’ Jake laughed. ‘I’d like to introduce you to your new worst enemy, Lieutenant Lucinda Pierce.’

‘She a local cop?’ he said with a chuckle of derision.

‘I’m right here, Trap,’ Lucinda said. ‘You can direct any questions about me to me.’

‘She thinks she’s the shits, doesn’t she?’

‘And she is,’ Jake said.

‘OK, Lady Lieutenant, why don’t you stand up and walk back to the door so I can check out your legs again? It seemed like they were long, lean and shapely.’

Lucinda’s arm flashed across the table and her hand gripped Trappatino’s collar and pulled him up out of his seat. ‘Excuse me?’ she said and then shoved him back into the chair.

‘She’s got a bit of a temper, hasn’t she?’ Trap said, rubbing a hand on his throat.

‘As I was saying,’ Jake began, ‘we’ve already established your awareness of Olivia Cartwright, formerly known as Bonnie Upchurch – we caught you in a criminal act in her home. How about Charles Rowland? Know him?’

Trappatino stared straight ahead.

‘Candace Eagleton?’

Still no response.

‘How about Lindsey Barnaby?’

For a second, a furrow flashed across his brow and was gone. Jake looked at Lucinda, who gave him a slight nod. They both realized there was something different about the murdered girl’s name and wondered if he had ever heard it before.

‘Surely, you must know Tess Middleton.’

Trappatino gave them a cold, disinterested look.

‘Well, you see, Trap,’ Lucinda said, ‘we think that she’s the woman who hired you to kill Olivia, Charles and Candace. And she’s probably going to be pretty pissed off when she learns you blew it this time.’

Jake said, ‘In fact, once we pick her up, she’ll probably give you up in a heartbeat.’

‘She’s a powerful woman, Trap,’ Lucinda said. ‘She has a major corporation and a political career to protect. She’s going to try to pin everything on you. And she’ll probably get away with it.’

‘So here’s your chance, Trap,’ Jake said. ‘Throw her under the bus before she runs you down like roadkill.’

Trappatino looked at Jake, running his eyes over the agent’s face as if trying to memorize his features. He turned his gaze to Lucinda and repeated the study on her face.

‘So what is it? Jake asked. ‘Are you going to take the fall for a rich woman who can buy and sell you a hundred times over?’

‘Or are you going to save your own ass?’ Lucinda asked. ‘We have two homicides in Virginia. Throw in how you terrorized your victims before they died and you’ll be looking at lethal injection.’

Trappatino stared at her with a look of disdain.

‘We don’t kill as many as they do in Texas or Florida, but we really want to play a more prominent role in death penalty statistics. It’s a matter of pride for the Commonwealth of Virginia.’

‘I want to call my lawyer,’ Trappatino said.

‘Really? You disappoint me, Trap,’ Jake responded. ‘I thought you were smarter than that.’

‘I bet you say that to all the girls,’ Trappatino retorted. ‘I’m not stupid. I want my lawyer.’

Jake and Lucinda looked at each other and rose to their feet. Both acting as if it didn’t matter, they walked to the door. ‘Someone will be in with a telephone shortly,’ Jake said as he opened the door and they walked out of the room.

‘Dammit,’ Lucinda said once they were out of Trappatino’s hearing. ‘We blew it.’

‘Not necessarily. His lawyer might steer him in the right direction. Terrorism charges are federal charges and a smart attorney will latch onto the significance of that very quickly. I’ll have the agent who goes in with the phone remind him that he needs to inform his lawyer of those charges and see what happens.’

‘I don’t know, Jake. Trappatino has been in tight corners before and he’s always walked. He has no experience with failure in the courtroom and because of that has no fear of the process. He probably believes he can sail on this one, too.’

‘We’ll have to make sure his lawyer sees how airtight the terrorism charge is. We’ll have to make sure he understands his client could easily spend the rest of his life in jail.’

‘But we foiled his attempt, Jake. Juries want to punish the successful killers far more than the screw-ups. And what do we have to tie him to the murders in Virginia?’

‘We have DNA evidence for Candace and we’ll find what we need for Roland. We may not get a death penalty but his lawyer will have to see that when we’re done with his client, he will never see the outside of a prison again.’

‘I hope you’re right.’

Jake’s cell rang and he looked at the screen. When he saw it was from an agent in his field office, he pulled Lucinda into an empty interrogation room, shut the door and put the call on speaker phone.

‘Middleton is not at home, Jake. In fact, we’ve been told she’s left the country.’

FIFTY-FIVE

‘
W
here?’ Jake asked.

‘The guy didn’t know.’

‘What guy?’

‘The guy that was at the house when we arrived.’

‘Start at the beginning.’

‘We got to the house and were greeted by a man and his dog. He invited us inside. At the dining-room table, there was another man with a pile of papers; apparently he was a real-estate agent.’

‘And who’s the guy with the dog?’

‘He claims to be Middleton’s fiancé. He said that she left him here to make arrangements for the sale of the house. She’s taking a month-long sabbatical from her work at the corporation to raise the media’s interest and plan her election campaign. He said that he’d be joining her in the next couple of days.’

‘Where will he join her?’

‘He doesn’t know. He said it was a surprise. He said that when she arrived at her destination, she would have a courier deliver his flight tickets to him. He thought that was very romantic.’

‘He’s got no clue that he’s probably just been dumped?’ Jake asked.

‘Not one little clue.’

‘You believe him?’

‘Yeah, he’s as bright as a busted light bulb.’

‘Keep him under surveillance just in case and flood the airport with agents. Check out any other mode of transportation out of the city, too. Is her car gone?’

‘Nope. Her brilliant, self-proclaimed fiancé said that he put her in a cab to the airport earlier today.’

‘OK, get busy. I’ll get back there as soon as I can,’ Jake said and disconnected the call.

‘We need to get back there right away,’ Lucinda said.

‘Just as soon as I can locate the pilot – I’ll get on that now.’ Jake left Lucinda alone with her thoughts.

Has she already flown out of their grasp? Lucinda wondered. If so, where did she go? She suspected a fleeing Middleton would know enough to pick a destination that did not have an extradition treaty with the United States. And with her money, she could be comfortable in the most backward third world country. Would she elude justice? Would her absence make it impossible to get homicide convictions for the murders of Candace and Charles? And what about Lindsey Barnaby? Would those three cases remain open forever?

No matter how hard she thought about it, she could not envision a scenario that had a happy ending for herself or for the victims. She couldn’t figure out how she was going to make Middleton pay.

An hour later when she boarded the plane with Jake, she still had no answers. And the agents from Jake’s field office found no sign of Tess Middleton anywhere. Both she and Jake tried to sleep on the flight back but every time either one of them drifted off, they startled awake with one question in their minds: have the agents found Tess Middleton?

Every time the pilot responded that he’d received no updates from the ground. Lucinda felt she was drowning in helplessness. Nothing she could do while trapped in the air in that fancy tin can. She breathed a sigh of relief when they touched down in Virginia.

A car waited for them on the tarmac, dropping Lucinda off at her office. There were a few people present when she arrived that Monday morning but it was still early and many were not yet in for the day. At her desk, she logged into her email, hoping for reports with more information.

She clicked on an email from Lara Quivey. Lindsey Barnaby grew up just around the corner and four houses up from where Candace lived when she was in high school and on the same street as Bonnie Upchurch/Olivia Cartwright. It was pretty much a moot point now that she’d interviewed Olivia.

She sighed and noticed an email from the medical examiner’s office. Attached to it was a toxicology report of the excised area around what appeared to be an intra-muscular injection site. The lab found the presence of Promethazine. The body of the message explained the significance of this discovery.

The investigator for the office contacted Candace Eagleton’s primary physician, who informed them that the victim had a prescription for the injectable form of the drug because of severe anaphylactic reactions to bee stings. Further, the doctor said that she always had a sufficient supply for six injections and had not reported having to use any of them since the prescription was refilled. It was her normal operating procedure to do so.

Coordination with the forensic team revealed that the drug had not been found in the search of the home. That, combined with the presence of the drug in the excised area, led to the conclusion that some, if not all of the injections, were administered to the victim before her death.

‘Promethazine is an antihistamine. Its side effects include drowsiness, blurred vision, involuntary muscle movements and spasms, a weakening of muscles and severe dizziness. In sufficient dosage, it could render a person incapable of defending themselves against an attack.’

Lucinda leaned back in her chair. The drug explained the lack of violent struggle – Candace would be incapable of anything but a weak defense. But, how, she wondered, would Trappatino be aware of her prescription? How would he know where to find it? Is it possible that Trappatino had nothing to do with her murder?

FIFTY-SIX

T
ess Middleton directed the cab to the Hilton Hotel near the airport. She trusted Dufus the dog not to betray her plans but she knew the two-legged dufus she left at her home was not as bright as his pet. If he knew anything, there was a good chance he’d let it slip out to the first person who asked him.

If that happened, a search for Tess at the airport that night would be fruitless. By the time she flew out the next afternoon, anyone looking for her would have given up. She pulled out and examined her tickets. A non-stop flight to San Francisco in the name of Lindsey Barnaby – and the return ticket that she would never use. Passage on a different airline to Singapore. And tickets for a third airline to fly her to the Hulhole airport in the Maldives. She smiled. Paradise would be an excellent place to rebuild her life.

She double-checked to make sure she had the right passport. Opening up the blue booklet she saw her face staring back at her and the words that identified her as Lindsey Barnaby. She’d shredded her own passport and dropped the pieces of cross-cut paper into the James River to wash to the sea.

She had a fortune tucked away in overseas bank accounts and her lawyer had instructions to deposit any further earnings in a segregated account. Even if federal authorities managed to block her access to those newer funds, she still had sufficient assets to live very comfortably – luxuriously – for more than one lifetime.

Tess pushed down her anger at Trappatino’s screw-up. Rage could only cloud her judgment. She needed to remain sharp and on top of everything until she reached safety. From there, she could plan her revenge. She’d dumped her disposable cell into the river, too, one piece at a time.

She’d booked the adjoining room next to hers, creating an imaginary lover to occupy it. Unlocking the connecting door, she went down the hall and entered the other room, opening it on that side as well. She made sure the bolt was thrown and the chain engaged on both doors leading to the hallway. She then unplugged a floor lamp on each side and placed it by those entrances to give her an extra warning should anyone try to enter.

Tess wanted to take a long, luxuriant soak in the whirlpool tub but feared it would make her too vulnerable in case the unexpected happened. She settled for a quick shower and then redressed completely before stretching out on the bed to get what sleep she could.

Anxiety over the next afternoon’s events made sleep elusive. She assured herself that all she needed was rest. She could catch up on her sleep on board the plane – she had many hours of flying ahead. Knowing that, she drifted off but maintained the alertness of a cat, ready to jump at a moment’s notice.

FIFTY-SEVEN

L
ucinda called Jake and relayed her new reservations about the guilt of Julius Trappatino in the death of Candace Eagleton. ‘I just can’t put the pieces together in any scenario that makes sense. He couldn’t have known about her prescription for the allergy drug.’

Jake was quiet for a minute and then said, ‘Unless someone told him.’

‘Who? If we go with the theory that Tess Middleton hired him, how would she know?’

‘But it’s the only thing that makes sense,’ Jake said.

‘Not with the administering of the Promethazine,’ Lucinda insisted. ‘That shoots holes in that scenario.’

‘So what are you saying? That someone else killed Candace for some other reason and it coincidentally happened at the same time that attempts were made on the lives of the other two people who knew Tess Middleton’s secret?’

Lucinda shuddered. ‘Coincidence. I hate that word.’

‘Yeah, but what are we left with?’

‘Frank Eagleton,’ Lucinda said.

‘He has an alibi,’ Jake said.

‘Yes, but if you know something is going to happen, you can make sure you have an alibi.’

‘Now you sound like a conspiracy nut.’

‘I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that, Jake,’ Lucinda said. ‘Now tell me: where is Tess Middleton?’

‘Don’t know. She was not spotted at the airport. No one using identification with that name passed through security yesterday.’