THIRTEEN

 

“That’s not all,” said Zack. He fast-forwarded the feed from the new camera. A few minutes later, it showed the driver racing down the driveway, jumping into the SUV, and peeling out into the street.

“Send me the feed,” said Spader. “I’ll run the plate, but I’m willing to bet we’re dealing with another stolen vehicle.”

“Keep watching,” said Zack.

“There’s more?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah, and it’s quite odd.”

Spader and I continued to watch the video. “Is that someone hiding behind the tree across the street?” I asked, squinting at what appeared to be a head peering out from behind the large maple.

Zack nodded. “Watch what happens next.”

Someone dressed in a three-quarter-length parka with fur-trimmed hood stepped from behind the tree and darted across the street, running down our driveway and into the backyard. The way the person was dressed, including a muffler that partially covered the lower half of the face, made it impossible to determine whether we were looking at a burly man or a heavyset woman.

I gasped. “A lookout?”

Zack held up a finger. “Wait.”

We continued watching as a dark SUV drove slowly down the street, parked across from the driveway, and cut its lights. The driver remained inside the car.

Zack fast-forwarded the feed. Half an hour later, the person who had run down the driveway reappeared with the man who had entered our house earlier that night. He carried a shovel.

They walked down the driveway, turned right at the sidewalk, and continued down the street.

The driver’s side door of the SUV that had parked across from the driveway opened. A slight woman dressed only in jeans and an oversized hoodie that fell over her forehead bounded out, hurried across the street, and confronted the other two people. The man in the puffer coat and ski mask grabbed her arm and pulled her behind a row of waist-high hedges that bordered the property next door to us.

“It’s difficult to tell what’s happening,” I said.

“At least they’re not attacking her,” said Spader, canting his head and squinting at the screen.

“Not physically,” said Zack, “but from their body language, I’m guessing the three of them know each other and are in the middle of a huge fight.”

“Amazing that none of the neighbors heard,” I said. “Then again, scratch that. We weren’t home, the McMansion across the street is empty, and the people on either side of us are extremely elderly and hard of hearing. They also probably turn in by eight o’clock each night.”

A few minutes later, the woman stepped from behind the shrubbery. The lookout held onto her arm. When they crossed the street, the young woman climbed into the passenger seat of the SUV, the lookout behind the wheel, and they drove off. We watched as the man in the puffer coat continued down the street until he was out of view.

“He’s no longer carrying the shovel,” I said.

“No, he’s not,” said Spader. “Good eye, Mrs. Pollack.”

Spader called Officer Eastman over again. “Looks like the perp ditched the shovel in the bushes next door.”

“On it, sir.” Officer Eastman jogged off, returning a few minutes later, his latex-gloved hand holding a dirt-encrusted shovel.

“Maybe forensics will get lucky,” said Spader.

I had my doubts. If we were dealing with mobsters, they’d know to wear gloves or wipe their prints from anything they touched. I’m sure Spader knew that better than anyone. Maybe he was just trying to offer us some hope.

An officer headed toward us from the driveway. “Anyone missing a kid with a dog? He’s out front. Claims he lives here, that he discovered the body.”

“Nick,” I said. “My son.”

“Let him into the house,” said Spader. “I’ll talk to him there. I don’t want the dog near the crime scene.”

“Yes, sir.” The officer headed back toward the front of the house. I noticed another uniformed officer questioning Jesse at one corner of the patio. His crew stood at the opposite corner, presumably waiting their turns.

Spader signaled to Zack and me. “You two are free to go back into the house.”

~*~

Eventually Cormac Murphy’s body was bagged and removed, and the crime scene unit finished processing the yard. Spader spoke briefly with Nick but didn’t bother questioning Lucille. “No point,” he said. “We spoke with her at the hospital this morning. She remembers nothing of her attack, and she was tied up and unconscious in the closet during whatever went down in the backyard afterwards.”

Nick had taken Leonard and decamped to the apartment without a single word to me regarding his discovery of the body. He knew I’d stumbled across more than my fair share of murders since his father’s death, and it scared him. On more than one occasion, he’d pleaded with me to stop investigating. I’d tried my best to honor his wishes, but the universe continued to work against me.

Nick didn’t let much faze him normally, but beginning with Karl’s death, he’d often had uncharacteristic bursts of anger. My boys had dealt with far too much since learning of their father’s duplicity. Add getting permanently stuck with Lucille and their mother’s proclivity for finding those dead bodies, and it was more than enough stress for the average adult, much less two teenage boys.

Cormac Murphy’s murder had to have impacted Nick. Whether he wanted to or not, we needed to talk about it. Armed with a truckload of concern for my son, I headed for the apartment.

I found Nick playing with Leonard in the living room. It suddenly hit me that my son had taken his psychological wellbeing into his own hands, whether he realized it or not. Leonard had become his therapy dog. Still, except for Ralph, pets don’t hold up their end of a conversation.

I sat on the floor next to him and draped my arm around his shoulder. “Want to talk about it?”

He shrugged. “Not really.” He looked up. “I’m assuming we’re going to talk anyway?”

“We are,” I said. “However, I’ll give you a choice—me, Zack, or a therapist.”

“I talk with Alex and Sophie.”

“I’m sure you do, but that wasn’t one of the options.”

“I don’t need a shrink.”

“That leaves Zack or me.”

I thought he’d opt to speak with Zack, figuring male bonding would trump maternal concern. However, much to my surprise, Nick began spilling out a rollercoaster of emotions he’d kept locked deep inside him for the past fifteen months. I listened, commiserated, and comforted.

When he had finally unburdened himself of all his emotional baggage, he heaved a huge sigh, then wrapped me in a bear hug that lasted longer than any hug since his diaper days. “Thanks, Mom. I guess I did need to let it all out. You were right.”

“Mothers usually are.”

He pulled away and looked at me doubtfully. “Even Grandmother Lucille? She’s a mother, too.”

“I’ll admit, there are exceptions to every rule.”

His stomach grumbled in reply.

I chuckled. “Are you telling me I’d better figure out something for dinner?”

He nodded. “Want some help?”

“Only if I can’t convince Zack to order take-out. Go back to playing with Leonard.”

When I arrived back in the house, Zack asked, “Nick okay?”

“I think so.” I told Zack about our conversation and my revelation about Leonard.

“You think Nick would also like to talk to me?”

“Maybe. I’m sure there are things he still hasn’t told me.”

“Things a guy would never tell his mother?”

“Exactly. Besides, one talk is only a beginning. We should encourage him to confide more in us. Alex, too.”

“Agreed, assuming we can pry him away from Sophie.”

“There is that.”

The sounds of yet another one of Lucille’s reality TV shows blared from the den. I suppose she enjoyed them because arguing was her preferred form of discourse, and that’s all that seemed to occur between the participants on most of those shows.

If she’d heard the sirens earlier or any of the police activity in the backyard, she chose to ignore all of it. Zack and I decided not to say anything to her unless she brought up the subject.

“What about Mama?” I asked.

Zack had released Ralph from his cage. The bird flapped his wings and took a spin around the house before returning and landing on Zack’s shoulder. Ralph lowered his beak into Zack’s shirt pocket in search of a sunflower seed.

“What about Flora?” asked Zack.

“How long do you want to foot the bill for her hotel stay?”

Zack settled Ralph on top of one of the cartons of dishes and cookware stacked in the dining room and placed a few more sunflower seeds within the bird’s easy reach. Then he drew me into his arms. “Don’t worry about the money. As I overheard you telling Lucille earlier, I have plenty of money, and I’m happy to pay until the repairs on your mother’s condo are completed.”

Ralph finished gobbling up the seeds and squawked, “But, by the Lord, lads, I am glad you have the money. Henry IV, Part I. Act Two, Scene Four.”

“See,” said Zack, nodding toward the African Grey. “Even Ralph is glad I’m paying for Flora’s hotel room.”

I eyed Ralph before responding to Zack. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

He laughed. “Don’t think my decision is entirely altruistic. One less person in the house alleviates a huge amount of the stress around this place. Besides, with your mother gone, the boys get their bedroom back, and we once again get the apartment all to ourselves.”

“So, your decision stems entirely from selfishness?”

“You have a problem with that?”

“Not at all.” Smiling, I went to kiss him, but the kiss was cut short when my phone dinged with a text from Alex. “You’ll be happy to hear we’ll have even one less person for a few hours. Shane invited Alex to stay for dinner.”

Zack raised a questioning eyebrow. “Shane or Sophie?”

“I’m sure it was Sophie’s idea.”

Before I had a chance to suggest we order take-out for dinner, Zack said, “Given the day we’ve had, let’s order in pizzas for dinner.”

While we waited for the delivery, he headed out the back door to grab a bottle of wine from the apartment, and I pulled veggies from the refrigerator to toss together a salad.

As I chopped, my mind raced, trying to comprehend the events of the past week. No matter where the various threads led, the only explanation that made sense was that everything was somehow intertwined. And I wondered if the key that unlocked the mystery was the box of jewelry Jesse Konopka had discovered in the attic.

Zack returned from the apartment. “Nick said to text him when the pizzas arrive.”

I nodded. “I’ve been thinking.”

“Good thoughts, I hope.”

“Not really. I want to bounce a few ideas off you.”

“Bounce away.”

I added the cucumber I’d finished slicing into the salad bowl and offered Ralph a scrap before placing the bowl in the refrigerator. “What if Murphy showed up here because he either knew or suspected Johnnie Doyle had the jewelry from the burglary Murphy and Garrett Quinn pulled off years ago?”

“How would he have found out?” asked Zack as he uncorked the bottle.

“From the Gangster Grapevine and by putting two and two together.”

He grabbed two wine glasses and filled both halfway. “I had no idea you lurked on the Gangster Grapevine. I’m all ears.”

I landed a playful punch on his bicep. “Not me. Murphy.”

He grinned as he handed me my wine. “Some people just can’t take a joke. Please, continue.”

I took a sip of the pinot noir, then headed into the living room and settled onto the sofa before explaining. “Murphy and Garrett Quinn burglarized one or more jewelry stores. Sometime later, Johnnie Doyle cut that deal with the Feds, Murphy wound up back in prison, and Doyle went into Witness Protection, along with his sister, her husband, and their young son.”

“Well-established facts,” said Zack. He grabbed the bottle of wine and joined me on the sofa. Ralph followed, landed on the back of the sofa, and climbed onto Zack’s shoulder.

I held up a finger. “Bear with me. Murphy and Quinn would either have stashed the jewelry somewhere safe until they could fence it, or Quinn had possession of it. However, by the time Murphy was released from prison this time, Quinn was dead.”

“As was his wife Colleen,” said Zack.

“Right. But Murphy must have known about the raid on the Quinn farm and the story about the locket with the Rembrandt etching. Either he read about it in the newspaper at the time or heard about it from one of his mobster associates.”

“Such as Lochlin Fitzgerald?”

“Exactly. Murphy knew Johnnie periodically holed up in New Jersey with his sister and her family. He would have known Colleen Quinn and Shauna Gallagher were sisters. Since he knew the FBI never found Colleen’s locket with the Rembrandt—”

“How would he know that?”

I rolled my eyes. “If the FBI had recovered one of the pieces stolen in the largest art heist in history, don’t you think the story would have made international headlines? Prisoners are allowed access to newspapers and television, aren’t they?”

Zack’s eyes twinkled as he drained his glass. “Just checking.” He waved his hand. “Go on.”

“If the FBI never found Colleen’s locket,” I reiterated, “Murphy had to assume they also didn’t find the pieces from the jewelry store heist.”

“Why would he assume that?”

“Are you testing me?”

His mouth quirked upward. “Maybe.”

“Stop distracting me.” I leveled one of my classic Mom Looks at him. “Because, as you well know, the FBI had a search warrant for the locket. Logically, the first place they’d look would be wherever Colleen kept her jewelry. They would have recognized the pieces taken during the jewelry store heist, especially since they had previously questioned both Murphy and Quinn after the burglary.”

When Zack nodded, I began to believe he was taking me seriously. “Not only would Murphy have heard if the FBI found the jewelry, but he would also have been questioned again and most likely charged in connection with the burglary. Murphy then must have concluded that Colleen sent Shauna the locket, along with the jewelry from the heist, after the FBI showed up with that first warrant for the weapons.”

Zack rose from the sofa, his expression thoughtful. He began pacing the living room as he said, “But given his connections, Murphy had to know Shauna was no longer living here. And therefore, Johnnie Doyle wouldn’t be here.”

I sipped my wine before answering. “Murphy knew that.”

“Then why show up here?”

“I think he wanted to scope out the house, see who was living here, and what he’d be up against in order to formulate a plan to get his hands on the jewelry.”

“Why would he think the jewelry was still here, if it ever was?”

“Because Johnnie Doyle told him.”

“Except that Rosalie said Shauna didn’t tell anyone else about the jewelry.”

“Just because Shauna never told her brother she was in possession of the jewelry doesn’t mean Johnnie didn’t find out about it.” I drained my glass and handed it to him for a refill.

As he poured two more glasses, he said, “You have a theory about that, too, I presume?”

“I do.” Zack returned to the sofa and handed over my refilled glass. “Before Johnnie Doyle cut his deal with the Feds, he was working as a bagman for Murphy. Suppose he was also the getaway driver for the jewelry store burglary?”

Ralph interrupted. “Flat burglary as ever was committed. Much Ado about Nothing. Act Four, Scene Two.”

I glanced at the parrot. “Thank you for adding your two cents, Ralph. Mind if I continue?”

When he squawked, I resumed. “Johnnie also may have put two and two together and figured Colleen sent the jewelry to Shauna.”

I peered into my glass. Two bodies found on my property in five days is two bodies too many. I needed to figure out what was going on before the body count increased. Maybe I was grasping at those proverbial straws, but there had to be something that connected everything, and finding that something would put an end to this madness.

“Maybe Johnnie searched the house at some point when Shauna wasn’t home,” I said, “but when he went up into the attic, he only looked through all the old furniture and other items stored there, not thinking to check under the insulation stuffed into the eaves. At which point, he figured she had either stashed the jewelry in a bank safety deposit box, had already fenced the pieces, or had never had them in the first place.”

“That still doesn’t explain Johnnie Doyle’s body winding up in an SUV parked in the driveway,” said Zack.

“It does if Murphy caught up with him, and Johnnie was trying to save his own neck. Remember, Johnnie was on the run. He was probably depending on former connections to fix him up with false IDs and anything else he’d need to evade the cops. Someone had to have ratted him out to Murphy. Why else would Murphy and his henchman show up at the house with a shovel? Johnnie must have lied and told him Shauna buried the jewelry somewhere on the property.”

“Doyle would have known Murphy was going to kill him anyway,” said Zack.

“Of course. But Johnnie had to buy himself time. He would have said he didn’t know where in the backyard the box was buried. He probably hoped to escape before Murphy returned.”

“Your theory has a few holes,” said Zack.

“Such as?”

“For starters, Johnnie Doyle’s body showed up four days ago. If you were a mob boss who had abducted the guy who ratted you out to the Feds, wouldn’t you check out his story before you killed him?”

I frowned. “That’s certainly a huge hole.”

“There’s more,” said Zack. “You’re forgetting about the guy who entered the house last night, not to mention the lookout behind the tree and the young woman in the car. Where do they fit into your theory?”

I mulled over his question. “You think he was also looking for the jewelry?”

“Could be.”

“But there was no evidence of him searching the house. If that’s the case, he had to know where Shauna hid the jewelry.”

A queasy feeling settled in my stomach, and it wasn’t from the wine. “You don’t think Rosalie told someone about the jewelry, do you? She wouldn’t have known Shauna left the box behind in the attic, not until I told her today, after we’d turned the jewelry over to Ledbetter.”

“I don’t think Rosalie had anything to do with what happened last night,” said Zack.

The queasiness subsided somewhat but still lingered. “Can we be sure?”

“No, but I find it highly unlikely that Rosalie is involved in any way, don’t you?”

I thought back to my conversation with Rosalie Schneider. She’d wanted to see the jewelry, but that was purely out of curiosity, wasn’t it? I heaved a huge sigh and shook my head. “If Rosalie suspected the jewelry was still hidden in the attic after all these years, why would she have waited so long to tell someone? Or if she’d told someone years ago, why would he have waited until last night to try to steal it? That’s a coincidence that stretches credulity.”

“So how do you explain the man who entered the house last night?” asked Zack.

“A loose thread. But I think we can assume the person lurking across the street was his lookout. We couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman. Let’s suppose it was not only a woman but his girlfriend. And what if the woman in the car was his wife? A wife catching her cheating husband and his girlfriend would explain the confrontation.”

He nodded. “That’s the most obvious explanation for the person across the street, assuming it was a woman. Either way, the lookout alerted him when the car carrying Murphy pulled into the driveway. As for the other woman? You could be right there, as well.”

“But why wouldn’t he have hightailed it out of the house when he learned someone had pulled into the driveway? He took a huge risk going into the backyard, not knowing who was back there and what they were up to.”

Zack narrowed his gaze. “Unless he did know and figured the element of surprise was on his side.”

“So, who is he?” My voice trembled with frustration and fear. I set my empty glass on the coffee table and pounded my thighs with my fists. “And how did he learn about the jewelry?”

“Stop before you hurt yourself.” He placed a hand over my fists. “That’s what we still don’t know and what you’re going to let the police find out.”

I relaxed my hands, lacing my fingers through his hand. Staring at our intertwined fingers, I heaved a shuddering sigh, then looked up at him. “I’m just trying to connect the dots. Finding dead bodies, is one thing. Finding them on my own property rises to a far more frightening level.”

He placed his other hand on top of mine. “I know.”

“Our lives are at stake—my sons, yours, mine, Lucille’s. Look what’s already happened to her. I promise you, Zack, I’m not about to tangle with some unknown mob goon.”

He took me in his arms. “Good. I plan to hold you to that promise.”

Zack was about to kiss me when the moment was interrupted by my mother-in-law. Lucille usually galumphs into a room, her cane pounding on the floor, but neither Zack nor I heard her enter the living room until she bellowed, “Are you both conspiring to starve me?”

“Why would we do that?” asked Zack.

“I know you want to get rid of me.” She then turned to me and said, “It’s nearly seven-thirty. Where’s my dinner?”

I clenched my jaw and gritted my teeth before pasting a smile on my face. Somewhere deep inside me I dredged up the strength to answer her in a soft, modulated voice. “A bowl of salad is in the refrigerator if you can’t wait. The pizzas should arrive shortly.”

The doorbell punctuated the end of my sentence. Zack rose to accept the delivery while I texted Nick.

~*~

Later that evening, I received a group text addressed to all Trimedia employees at the Morris County location. The tech gurus had solved the computer problem.

We were all expected to report to work tomorrow morning at the usual time.