Shot Girl (25 page)

"What’s wrong with you?" Priscilla was pissed. "I’ve been trying to call you, but I haven’t gotten through."

"I’ve got to get to a crime scene."

"I thought they pulled you off that."

"I’m back on as of now. I can’t talk."

"What the hell’s wrong with you?" she demanded again.

Now, that was the million-dollar question, wasn’t it? "Listen, I don’t have time to get into it. You and Ned have a nice afternoon. I’m sure you guys can talk all about Ralph and me and all this shit without me there."

"But I came to see you." Her voice was quieter now. "I’ve been worried about you, since, you know, Ralph—"

"I don’t want to talk about it, okay? Have a nice day with Ned, and I’ll call you later."

I hung up without saying good-bye. I tried to get the headset off, but it got caught in the damn clip at the back of my head. I had a tangle of wire hanging down across my cheek, and at the next light I yanked it out, pulling about a handful of hair with it. Hurt like a sonofabitch.

 
I had to drive through the Southern campus again, down Wintergreen, to West Rock School. I turned on my scanner, but didn’t get anything new. Just before the intersection where I’d turn left to get to the school, two police cruisers were blocking the road. I pulled over, grabbed my bag, and jogged over to them, waving my press ID.

"You can’t drive in there," one of the uniformed cops said.

Three TV vans were parked just beyond the cruisers. Usually they were fashionably late, but today, they were punctual. Must be a really slow news day.

"But I can walk in, right?"I asked the cops, not waiting for an answer but barreling past them.

As I approached the TV vans, I saw Channel 9 reporter—and Dick Whitfield’s girlfriend—Cindy Purcell primping, wiping her forehead and applying a little powder to pretend she wasn’t ready to jump into a cold shower. A bead of sweat dribbled into the cavern that was Cindy’s cleavage, her breasts bubbling over a white lace camisole under a hot pink blazer. I grinned at the cutoff jeans shorts underneath and her sandals. They were probably just going to do a waist-up shot.

"Dick here?" I asked, going up to her, trying not to stare at the bright, unnatural pink adorning her thick lips that looked like she may have had some sort of collagen treatment, but don’t quote me on that.

She looked startled that I asked her a question, then nodded. "I didn’t think you were supposed to be here."

It wasn’t a statement that needed any sort of response, but as I turned to go, I felt a hand on my head. I jerked away. Cindy held my hair clip.

"It was falling out. Let me help you," she said, and before I could stop her, she had my hair twisted up on the back of my head with the clip securely fastened. "There. It won’t come out now."

I felt it with my fingertips. No, it probably wouldn’t. How the hell did she get my hair twisted that tight? I wished I had a mirror.

And then I remembered I didn’t give a shit how I looked.

I mumbled a "thanks" and hightailed it up the paved road and turned up the driveway to the school. The parking lot to the right was crowded with an ambulance, two more police cruisers, and what looked like Tom’s Impala, as well as the coroner’s van. Just beyond the vehicles was a flat field surrounded by trees at the foot of a hill that ran up West Rock. That’s where she was.

I sidestepped the cruisers. Crime-scene tape ran in a yellow circle, cordoning off an area about fifty feet away. Frank Piscitelli and his crew were doing their thing with collecting evidence, but they were in the way and I couldn’t see the body. I spotted Tom beyond Frank; he’d abandoned his usual sport jacket and wore jeans and a Yankees T-shirt. When I’d switched boyfriends, I’d inadvertently switched teams. Vinny was a Red Sox fan. I personally didn’t care, but New Haven was divided, not only by the Sally’s versus Pepe’s pizza question, but by Yankees versus Red Sox. Both were taken very seriously.

Tom’s gun sat at his waist, his gold shield glistening as the sun caught it. He looked damn sexy. What is it about a guy with a gun?

The sun beat down on the small gathering, and I wished I hadn’t left my sunglasses in the car.

I spotted Dick sort of kitty-corner to me, and Wesley was snapping pictures every which way. They had gotten as close as they could. Cindy Purcell and her cameraman still hadn’t come up the driveway; maybe they’d do their newscast from where I’d seen them. No grisly bodies on the five o’clock news, just Cindy’s pearly white teeth set in a grim line as she reported the gruesome news.

Dick frowned when I approached.

"What are you doing here?" he asked. "I thought you were staying away from this beat."

"Marty said I could come," I said, happy to burst his bubble. "Said I could help."

Dick didn’t like that, but he didn’t question authority. That was one of his problems.

"She’s pretty beat-up," Wesley muttered, his camera shutter clicking.

"How bad?"

Wesley peered out over his camera, his eyes unusually dark. "Her face doesn’t look like a face."

That’s what Tom had said. Beaten beyond recognition. I looked around us, seeing some poison ivy just next to the nearest tree, and remembered the photo illustration Wesley had done with Felicia, the one where the poison ivy was snaking down her back. It would be the worst irony if she died in a bed of it.

"Tom says it’s Felicia Kowalski," I said softly. "She’s been missing, and her ID was with the body."

Wesley frowned and shook his head. "No. I don’t think so."

"You don’t think so what?"

"It’s not her."

"How the hell would you know? You just said her face doesn’t look like her face."

"Yeah, but I got some shots of her body. This one doesn’t have a tattoo on her hip."

"What?"

"Felicia Kowalski has a tattoo of a rose on her hip. I saw it when I photographed her for the illustration." Wesley took a deep breath. "I saw a lot of her when I took that picture, and that tattoo was pretty memorable. If the cops think it’s Felicia, they’re wrong."

Chapter 33

On one hand, I was happy that the mysterious Felicia Kowalski was not the girl on the ground. But if it wasn’t her, then who was it? I thought back to the blood at the condo, felt my heart start to pound. Had anyone seen Ashley Ellis this morning?

While I still hadn’t told Tom about my nocturnal visit to the condo, I did have to tell him now that this girl wasn’t Felicia.

I raised my arm and started waving at him. He spotted me, but only after everyone else did and one of the other cops nudged him. He frowned, but he made his way over to us.

As Tom ran a hand through his short blond hair, I could see the wet circles surrounding his armpits. Maybe I should give him one of those little personal fans as a birthday present. He moved his head to look around me, and I turned to see what he was looking at. It was just the school building behind me. But then he touched my hair. The clip.

"What the hell is this?" he teased, like we were the only two there.

Dick’s eyebrows rose, and even Wesley grinned.

I yanked my head away from his hand. "Haven’t you ever seen a fucking hair clip before?" I asked.

"Not on you," he said.

Tom’s gaze came back to my face, and I flushed, telling myself it was the heat and not the intense blue of his eyes. Or the gun at his hip.

"It’s not Felicia," I said quickly.

"What do you know?" he asked.

I glanced at Wesley, whose smile had disappeared. "You might as well tell him," I said.

Tom’s eyes now locked on to Wesley’s face. "Tell me what?"

"Felicia Kowalski has a tattoo of a rose on her hip. This girl doesn’t."

Tom was quiet for a second before asking, "And how do you know that?"

Wesley tapped the top of his camera. "Zoom lens. And I photographed Felicia last week."

Something crossed Tom’s face and he nodded. "That picture, the health and science picture. That was her, wasn’t it?"

Wesley was nodding. "I saw a lot of Felicia that day. There was a tattoo. I Photoshopped it out for the illustration. This girl, though, there’s no tattoo."

"Who found the body?" Dick suddenly found his voice, and it was a damn good question. I was sorry I hadn’t asked it myself.

Tom stiffened, putting his cop armor on. "Body was found this morning at ten a.m. We got a 911 call."

"Who called it in?" I wasn’t going to let Dick ask all the questions.

"Anonymous. No one was here when we got here."

"Did you trace the call?" I asked.

"Cell phone number. Not in any system. Probably a disposable."

"Do you think it was the person who did this?"

Tom shrugged. "No idea. Could’ve been a jogger."

Not around here. The field was secluded enough behind the trees lining the road that a body wasn’t going to be noticeable unless you came up into the driveway and into the parking lot. Tom knew what I was thinking. "Or a hiker," he suggested then, indicating West Rock, where there were myriad trails. But it was the same story. In order to see anything here, you’d have to be pretty close. On school grounds.

"A student?" I asked. "A teacher?" Ashley Ellis, student teacher, popped into my head again.

"Maybe."

"Time of death?" I asked.

"Sometime between midnight and nine a.m."

"Was she killed here?"

"No," Tom said. "Looks like the body was dumped here."

I was quiet a second. It was time to tell him about last night. Because if this body had Felicia’s ID, it seemed like a no-brainer that whoever it was, was close to her. Like Ashley. I opened my mouth, but before anything could come out, I heard Tom’s name being shouted, and he jogged away toward the body.

I took a deep breath, running everything I knew through my head, trying to sort it out and make sense of it.

Ashley and Felicia were involved with Ralph, with his gun scheme, according to Jamond. Ralph had been under investigation; he was cooperating with the feds to get a lesser sentence. Whom was he going to sell out? Did that person find out? Figured Ralph would die before he could do right. The only thing he managed to do was to get a hard-on. And he’d needed a little blue pill to help him out with that.

Shaw had gotten Ralph his attorney. He’d given him a place to live. He’d given his girlfriend a place to live. Somehow he had to be involved.

I couldn’t forget about Jack Hammer. How he was going toward the crime scene last night as Vinny and I left it. What was his role?

And then there was Felicia, who hadn’t been seen since Thursday night.

I had an idea. I waved at Tom, who shook his head, but I waved even harder. He wasn’t happy, but he came back over.

"Listen, Annie—," he started.

"No, I have to say this. I don’t really know shit, but Felicia had a roommate, Ashley Ellis, the girl who got shot at yesterday on the Green." I stopped, struggling to find the right words that wouldn’t piss him off too much when he found out what I’d been hiding.

Something crossed his face, but I couldn’t read it. "That’s right," he said slowly. "You interviewed her for the paper about the shooting yesterday."

"She was mixed up with the guns," I said quickly, hoping I could get out of this without even getting into it. "I heard that from a source. He said Ashley was hooking kids in the projects up with guns." The minute the words came out of my mouth, I realized what I was saying. She was a goddamn teacher. She should’ve known better.

I was stalling.

Tom’s gaze unnerved me, and I braced myself for an interrogation.

"Who’s your source?" he asked before I could speak again.

I shook my head. "I can’t say. I haven’t gotten it confirmed, but that’s what I’ve heard." I paused. "Oh, but I do know Reverend Shaw owned the condo that Felicia and Ashley were renting at City Point." Once I started procrastinating, it got easier.

Tom’s eyebrows shot up. "You know a lot for someone who doesn’t know shit," he said.

As Jamond would say, true dat. I shrugged.

Tom’s eyes searched my face for a second. It was like he knew without me even telling him. But he was going to make me.

"I heard something might have gone down at that condo last night," I said as evasively as possible.

He nodded slowly. "How did you hear that?"

I tried indignation on for size. "You know you shouldn’t ask me."

He wasn’t buying it. But he bit his lip a little, off to the side, before saying, "If you hear anything else, I’d appreciate you telling me."

I nodded. "Yeah, sure."

I watched him walk back to the knot of people surrounding the girl’s body, feeling like a coward.

Dick Whitfield approached. "What was that all about?" he asked.

My cell phone started to chirp, saving me from having to answer. I flipped it open. I looked at the number on the screen. "Hey, there," I said to Vinny, walking out of Dick’s hearing distance.

"Hey there, yourself. Sorry about my mother."

"Yeah. Sorry I had to leave."

"Are you still with Priscilla and Ned?"

I looked around me, the cops bustling, the coroner’s van backing up now into the field, the body ready to be moved. "No. Girl’s body found at West Rock School." I told him what was going on.

He didn’t say anything.

"Felicia’s ID was under the body, but it’s definitely not Felicia. You know, she wasn’t killed here—," I started.

"You think she was killed in the condo." Vinny finished my sentence for me. "You think it’s Ashley."

When I didn’t say anything, he asked, "Are you going to the paper to write it up?"

I looked at my watch. Three o’clock. Since this was really Dick’s story, I didn’t have to go to the paper now. "No. Dick’s here. I’m not supposed to cover crime." God, that sounded so pathetic.