Devil's Corner (13 page)

Suddenly there was a loud knock on the front door, and everyone turned.

Dan
. "I'll get it." Vicki practically jumped to her feet and ran to the door, opening it onto a blast of frosty air that wasn't completely weather-related. Dan was acting casual despite the fact that he was standing on the front step with two uniformed cops. Of course, they'd want to search.

"Look what the cat dragged in," Dan said, with an ironic smile. Vicki's neighbors across the street, Mrs. Holloway and the three kids, were at their window, gawking at the two squad cars that sat double-parked in front of her house.

"Come in, everybody," Vicki said, as if she were the perfect hostess. The three men trundled into the house, and she closed the door after them, getting her bearings as the cops introduced themselves. She shook their hands, still in cold black gloves. "I'd make coffee for you, officers, but I'm busy being interrogated."

The cops laughed, and Dan quickly masked his surprise at Bale's presence. "Hey, Chief," he said.

Bale merely grunted in response.

Detective Melvin smiled again. "Ms. Allegretti, do you mind if the officers look around?"

Dan's eyes widened. "They're really gonna
search
your house? For God's sake, why?"

"Go right ahead, officers." Vicki had no choice but to authorize a consent search. She signed the form when they produced it, with Bale watching her every move, leaning back against the wall again, his arms crossed. She turned to Detective Melvin. "They're welcome to look anywhere. The clothes I was wearing last night are in the upstairs bedroom. It's a black suit, and it's probably on the floor. You'll find hair and fibers from Mrs. Bristow's house on my clothes, and vice versa. I can explain all of that."

"Thanks." Detective Melvin nodded in a way that directed the officers out of the room, and Vicki eased onto the couch while the detectives resettled themselves on the other side of the coffee table. A bewildered Dan Malloy remained standing for a moment in his jeans and his black down jacket, then he walked around the coffee table and sat down next to Vicki, who hoped her gratitude didn't show.

"Well, here's what I did yesterday, from noon onward," she began, while the other detective started to take notes. She proceeded to tell them everything, including her call to Dan, but not her call to Morty's answering machine because she was already feeling exposed enough. In the background, the clinking of her pots and pans told her cops were searching her kitchen. Vicki took a deep, final breath. "That's the truth, and the whole truth."

"I see." Detective Melvin looked up from his steno notebook, which he'd pulled out of his back pocket in mid-lecture. His expression seemed relieved and his frown had vanished. They weren't charging her today, anyway. "I do have a few questions. Was there—"

"Wait a minute," Dan interrupted, leaning forward on his knees. "You guys can't really think that Vicki is a suspect in this murder, or, for that matter, in anybody's murder. I mean, this is ridiculous!"

"We have to investigate our leads, sir."

"Get real, detective. The wallet's not a lead." Dan snorted. He'd been a federal prosecutor for so long, he thought the locals were dummies, and it showed. "Who kills someone and leaves their wallet behind with a library card?"

"We didn't say it wasn't strange, sir."

"You know a lot of killers belong to the art museum? Obviously, that crack addict stole Vicki's wallet. I mean, what are you thinking? Vicki's a criminal? She's law enforcement. An AUSA, for God's sake!"

"Dan, let them ask the questions they need to." Vicki worried he was going too far. Behind her, the clinking from the kitchen had stopped and was replaced by the heavy tread of the officers' thick-soled shoes as they climbed the stairs to her second floor.

"But they're stupid questions!" Dan exploded, and Bale waved him into silence, at the same time that Vicki leapt in.

"Please, detective, you were saying."

Detective Melvin resettled. "Ms. Allegretti, how much money was in your wallet?

"About fifty dollars. Also, my credit cards, a driver's license, and an ATM card. And my Justice creds," Vicki added, as if they were an afterthought, but Bale rolled his eyes.
Now they would both have to think of a lie.

"Did you report it stolen to the police?"

"No, I didn't think it would matter. I chalked it up to bad luck."

Detective Melvin made a note. "I assume you won't mind us contacting the people you mentioned, including your parents."

Oh, great
. "Of course not. Feel free." Vicki recited their addresses and phone numbers, which the detectives wrote down in unison. She would have to call her parents and explain why cops would be calling them, which bothered her almost as much as the officers searching her bedroom. She experienced the completely paranoid fear that they'd plant something incriminating in her house. Then again, she also believed that blow dryers jumped spontaneously into bathtubs.

"Now, you said you visited Arissa Bristow to investigate the murder of the ATF case agent. Did you believe that Reheema or her mother was responsible for this murder?"

"Honestly, I didn't know. That's what I was trying to follow up on." Vicki paused. If they were thinking about possible motives for her to kill Mrs. Bristow, it was a stretch. Did she kill Reheema's mother to get back at Reheema for having the CI killed? Too much. And how would the teenagers have known she and Morty would be at the house? Or was their theory more tenuous, like that Vicki killed Mrs. Bristow as revenge for Reheema having her partner killed? No, motive didn't exist. "But after what I learned, I'm not sure that Reheema was involved in any conspiracy to kill my CI or Morty."

Bale glowered, shifting his weight uneasily from one loafer to another. He didn't want her thinking about stuff like this, much less talking about it, but she couldn't stop now. And she was still curious: "Detective Melvin, the news report said that Mrs. Bristow was found in her home, stabbed to death. What was the estimated time of death?"

"Around seven-thirty last night."

The sentence struck Vicki like a body blow.
I should have gone after her. I shouldn't have been scared off by that man in the hood
.

"Ms. Allegretti?" the detective asked, and Dan put a comforting hand on her arm.

"Vick. You okay?"

Vicki found her voice. "She was killed right after I left."

"Of course, as you probably know, these things are never exact. It's always give or take a half an hour."

"I know." Vicki was trying to piece things together.
While I was eating lamb chops, Mrs. Bristow was being killed
. "My cell was already gone by that time."

"How do you know?"

"Because I called it from a gas station and a man answered. Maybe he had something to do with her murder." Vicki felt a rush of adrenaline. Had she talked on the phone to Mrs. Bris-tow's murderer? "Think about it. Mrs. Bristow had the wallet and cell, and she'd trade the phone and money for crack. Then she'd go somewhere—probably home—to smoke. The man could have followed her home, taken the drugs and killed her.

Or maybe she bought the drugs and the man followed her home and killed her for them, then took the cell. Either way, we need to find that man."

"We?" Detective Melvin arched an eyebrow, and Bale raised his chin. "Who's we?"

"You're right. Not we."
I meant me
. "I meant you."

"Good. Now, what did the man on the phone sound like?"

"A black male. Gravelly voice."

Next to her, Dan was nodding with vigor. "Exactly. He did sound gravelly. I called her cell, too. A man answered and he didn't identify himself when I asked him. He's the one you want to go after, not Vicki."

"What time did you call, sir?" Detective Melvin made a note.

"Around nine o'clock, I guess." Dan ran a finger-rake through his unruly red hair, as he always did in court. "You heard what Vicki said as well as I did. Bristow was a crack addict, wandering the streets in a lousy neighborhood with fifty bucks in cash. Vicki is right. The likeliest scenario is that Bristow was followed to her house and killed for the drugs."

"That's certainly possible, sir."

"It's a helluva lot more likely than an AUSA knifing her to death!" Dan raised his voice, but Vicki cut him off.

"Dan, really, it's okay."

"You should be on Lincoln Street right now, or Cater," Dan continued, heedless. "Wherever it was, right now, you should be canvassing the neighbors! Checking out who went in and out of Bristow's house last night!"

"For your information, we canvassed already, sir." Detective Melvin raised his large hand, with a Bic pen stuck between his thick fingers. "So settle down. We have to ask your girlfriend a couple of questions."

"I'm not his girlfriend," Vicki said for the record.

Dan shot back, "Who are you kidding? You're searching her house!"

Bale stepped forward, easing off the wall. "Malloy, enough!"

he said firmly. "Let the detectives complete their investigation. You and I know Vicki didn't kill anybody, but they have to do their jobs."

Vicki sighed with relief. So Bale was on her side. It emboldened her, or maybe she just liked her promotion to Dan's girlfriend. "Detective Melvin, who found Mrs. Bristow's body?"

"Her daughter, Reheema."

Vicki felt a sympathetic pang. She couldn't imagine how horrific that would be, finding your mother knifed to death. "Where was the body in the house, exactly?"

"A bedroom on the first floor."

"When was she found? I don't know when Reheema was released from the FDC."

"Let's see." Detective Melvin flipped back in his notebook, then ran a thumb down the page. "You met with the daughter yesterday in the morning, right?"

"Right." Vicki had almost forgotten, it seemed so long ago. A loud thump came from her bedroom, which everybody pretended not to hear.

"The daughter wasn't released until after midnight last night."

"Why so late?"

"There were paperwork issues, I understand. She went straight to her mother's house and found her body. We caught the case at about one in the morning."

How awful
. "The report said Mrs. Bristow was stabbed to death. I assume you didn't recover the knife."

"Not yet. It wasn't pretty. The victim was stabbed nine times."

My God
. Vicki's stomach did a backflip. "That sounds like rage, as if it were personal, or maybe drug induced."

Dan added, "Like a crack addict."

"Was she found with any crack?" Vicki asked. "Had she used or what?"

"We field-tested the pipe next to the bed, which was positive. Toxicology tests on the body aren't finished yet."

"She'll be positive." Vicki thought a minute. "Where was my wallet?"

"Still on the victim's person, in a pocket in her dress. It was minus whatever credit cards and money you had."

"Reheema found the body and called the cops?"

"Right."

"Who found the wallet, you or Reheema?"

"The daughter."

"So Reheema knows that it was my wallet. She must have been surprised by that."

Detective Melvin nodded. "She was extremely angry. She demanded we question you, and I told her we were coming right here."

"She can't think I killed her mother."

"I can't speak for her, Ms. Allegretti." Detective Melvin made a note. "Now, about this man who answered your cell phone. What's your phone number?"

Vicki gave it to him, and he wrote it down. But she couldn't stop thinking about Reheema. Did she think Vicki murdered her mother?

"And what type of phone was it?"

"A Samsung, the newer model. It has one of those special covers, it's silver and has blue daisies with little green centers on the front."

"Now
that
should be a crime." Detective Melvin smiled, but Vicki couldn't.

"How will you run that down, detective? Look for the phone? Tap the line? You have enough for a warrant."

"Leave that to us. I'd ask you not to terminate the service, to help our efforts."

"Of course."

Detective Melvin flipped his notebook closed. "I understand that you have a personal interest in this case, but you have to leave matters to us. My partner and I have the highest clearance rate on the Homicide Division. We know what we're doing."

"I respect the Philly police, I was an assistant district attorney." Vicki decided to press her luck. "Though I did wonder why you hadn't called Mrs. Bott, to talk to her about Shayla Jackson."

"We did call, but there was no answer and she didn't have an answering machine. Then we understood she was going to ID the body at three yesterday, not noon. It was a simple misunderstanding." Detective Melvin didn't look happy about it, either. "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, Ms. Allegretti. Everybody thinks he's a detective. You could have been hurt last night, if not killed."

Standing behind Detective Melvin, Chief Bale wasn't saying anything. He didn't have to.

"But what about the drug activity on Cater? Is anybody going to do anything about it?"

"Ms. Allegretti." Detective Melvin frowned all the way to his shaved scalp. "As you well know, we have a Narcotics Division. That's their job. I'll make a point of notifying them of your observations of drug activity on Cater, and I'll also notify the captain in charge of that district. I'm sure they'll step up the patrols. If there is drug activity, they'll deal with it. You can't. In fact, Chief Bale has informed us that you're on a one-week suspension."

"It is indefinite now," Bale interjected, with a deep scowl. "That's without pay."

No
! "Chief—"

"Don't even, Allegretti." Bale warned her off with a raised index finger.

"Fine, Chief."

"I don't need your permission," Bale shot back, and in the next minute, his attention was redirected to the stairs. The two uniformed cops were coming downstairs, carrying the brown paper bags they used to collect evidence.

"You found my suit?" Vicki asked, though the thought of her clothes in an evidence bag was tough to take.