Silenced Page 13

  I sat towards the back of the church, trying to get a good view of the people coming to pay their respects and trying to hide my own extreme exhaustion. Somehow I managed to snag about ten hours of rest on the trip home. From my position, close to the doors, I could see Mayor Christensen at the very front pew. Dressed in an all black turtleneck dress and black, sleek boots she was the perfect picture of grief chic. Her purple painted nails fingered the pearl necklace around her neck. She sat rigidly in her seat. People walked up to her, said a few words of consolation and patted her on the back. Some even hugged her, but she was unbending.

  Jane tumbled into the church from the side restrooms, clad in all black. Her face blank and devoid of expression, she went directly to the front pew. She collapsed in the seat beside her aunt. I saw several other men and women seat themselves alongside Jane on the bench, but I didn't know any of them. Family had arrived from all across the quadrant, and some from as far away as the Floridian Territory.

  Around eleven, the funeral service began and the minister came out to discuss ashes and dust. I looked around the packed church, studying faces, when my eyes landed on Captain Hanson.

  He got up from his seat and in haste hurried to the restroom. When he reached me in the last pew, he stopped abruptly, startled, but forced a smile in my direction. He continued on to the restroom. His eyes were bloodshot and he definitely looked as if he'd been crying despite his charming, on-demand smile.

  Nathan Martindale, the love of Amanda’s life, did not show up at all. Could it be the service was too much? Or had Mayor Christensen stepped in and forbid him from coming?

  Nevertheless, the service went on with cries, eulogies and Amens.

  My mind kept going back to Amanda. To have the pastor tell it, she was a callow young girl. She had a future, a mother in politics, and a cousin who could spit nails and fight the gods for her. Yet, that had been taken away from her. Snatched, stolen out of her grip, and shoved under water.

  Who wanted Amanda dead? Was it kidnappers who failed to ask for ransom? Or had she died before they could? Did she run off, like she had done so many times before, only to meet up with a dangerous drifter who liked little teenage girls?

  So many questions.

  Finally the funeral was over, reporters tried to get pictures of the casket, a nice girlish pink with ruffles and lace. They were kicked out, but not before Mayor Christensen gave a statement on the church’s steps. Mr. Christensen was nowhere to be found, and I made a mental note to ask Jane about Amanda's father. A father wouldn’t miss his own daughter’s funeral unless something extremely important came up—like his own death, critical injury, or incarceration.

  Come to think of it, I’d never met Mr. Christensen, nor had I read or seen anything in electronic print about him. Some celebrities like to keep their personal lives private, but Mayor Christensen shared hers with the media. Yet, there hadn’t been anything at all about her spouse. The man was like a ghost.

  I didn't leave at first, but rather watched everyone file out of the church.

  An hour passed before the place thinned out completely. Bored and itching to leave, it was then that I saw him.

  Derrick Jameson.

  He wore a baseball cap and sunglasses and was heading out a side exit when I spied him making his escape. His tanned face caught my attention because no one had a tan that good in March.

  How did he know Amanda Christensen? Better yet, where was Nathan?

  It was worth investigating and I was thinking about this when Jane appeared at the front doors beside me. We strolled out onto the church’s porch as the backlog of wautos, luxury vehicles, and stretched cargo crafts huddled in stalled traffic.

  "What are you doing?" she asked, her voice tense. “You didn’t have to come. You didn’t even know her.”

  "People watching mostly. No one’s here now. So I’m getting ready to head on out,” I said, fighting the urge to slap her for those soured comments about me not knowing her.

  "We’ve got to get this bastard," she said through clenched teeth. “We can’t go home until we find who did this. I’m not going—you hear me? I’m going to catch the bastard who did this.”

  "Yes," I said back, with a soft smile. "But not for revenge, for justice."

  I felt the tiniest bit of guilt. Who was I kidding? Though I’d never killed anyone in revenge, I had done, ah, other things to get back at those who hurt me. The Change case, for example, was pure, unadulterated revenge, but I wanted to capture the thing, not end its life.

  Only if it hadn’t fought back, it would still be around, caged up in glass at some research facility.

  She looked over at me and smiled, a little one. "A thin line, but I'll take whatever, so long as he pays. You with me?"

  “’Til the end, Jane. ‘Til the end.”

  We stepped down off the porch and on to my wauto. We made a left toward the parking lot. Amanda would be laid to rest on Monday in a private, family-only ceremony. Today’s antics had forced Mayor Christensen to make it private.

  "How come you're not with your family?" I asked, as I unlocked the doors.

  "Aunt Belle said she wanted to be alone," she mumbled. "Plus I can't sit somewhere listening to people cry and talk about how great Mandy was. I need to work."

  I tossed my satchel into the rear seats. "Went to the moon colonies. Rumor has it Amanda frequented a few dance clubs there."

  She raised her eyebrows in question, but she didn’t ask me a question.

  "Amanda never went to the moon colonies."

  "Jane, I have a reliable tip from a source I've used hundreds of times. I went there. I got proof."

  I knew she wasn’t going to like it, but damn it, she was going to have to face the truth sooner or later. I shouldn't have to explain it to her. She should trust my judgments as she had done before.

  "This isn't my first case, so don't scrutinize every move I make. I went there and people knew her. Passed her picture around and people identified her."

  It came out harsher than I intended. Jane's mouth flopped open and then she shut it. She plopped down into the passenger seat and said, "Of course folks knew her! She’s the daughter of a famous mayor! It doesn’t mean anything!”

  “Jane, I know this is hard for you, but she went to this bar and danced there. Nothing lewd, but she did frequent the place. I went myself, in person, and spoke to the people there. They didn’t even know her by her name, but an alias.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything. They could be confusing her with someone else!” Jane spat, her posture rigid with anger. “I want this guy so badly…"

  "I know, which is why personal cases are so hard to work," I said, making sure to keep the attitude out of it. Telling her I-told-you-so wasn't necessary. She knew that already. Lost in grief and rage, Jane couldn’t hear my words of logic, of proof, and for that I wanted to dunk her head in a bucket of ice water.

  She caught the look on my face and took in a long, slow breath. She let it out and clapped her hands together. “Sorry, Cyb., I know…you said we might find out stuff about her that I wouldn’t like.”

  “This is one of those things.” I locked the doors and started the flight sequence.

  "Yeah, okay, I'll keep snooping around here," she muttered. "Where do we go next?"

  "Tell me something. How's your uncle taking this?"

  I could have asked her outright where her uncle was, but that might put her on the defensive. Not that she required any reason to get back on the opposite end of the court to defend her family’s honor. She didn’t.

  You never wanted to be opposite Jane when she was on the defensive.

  "He's taking it badly as we all are," she said, her head bowed. "Badly, I’m sure."

  "Was he Amanda's real father?" I asked, knowing I was slicing close to the bone. But I had to know and Jane could tell me.

  "Yeah," she snapped, her head whipped up. She glared at me. "Why did you ask that?"

  "Jane, again, this is stuff that I'm goi
ng to find out. Someone murdered her," I said, my patience slipping through my hands. "You know how this works! You find out all you can about the victim so you can nail the person who killed her."

  "Fine!" she shouted back at me. Her body was half turned away from me—as much as possible and still be in the vehicle. "Trash my family! Call my dead cousin a stripper! Go ahead! It don’t make any of it true!"

  "This isn't about trashing them," I said, feeling my muscles itching to grab her and shake her. "Inspector rule number two, everyone is a suspect. Everyone!"

  She looked out the window, her whole body hunched in upon itself as if she meant to fold into nothing. "Even your precious Trey?"

  "Yes, even him," I said hotly. "Your aunt! Hell, Jane, you! But thankfully you have an alibi—me."

  Jane shook her head no, but didn't scream back at me. Her hands were tangled inside her lap.

  I lifted off into the air and hovered behind the scores of others in front of me.

  " I'm going to find who murdered your cousin, but you better be ready, Jane for how ugly this might get. Lying to yourself can get us both killed."

  She twisted around to me, tears rolling down her cheeks. "I know."

  On Monday, Captain Hanson emailed Amanda's official autopsy report to me. The coroner concluded she died before she was dumped into the Mississippi.

  That much I knew already. Cybil one, the Memphis Regulators, zip.

  But the report did hold a few surprises.

  Amanda had a lack of defensive wounds, indicating that either she was with someone she trusted or was drugged. She had also been raped and what had appeared to be bite marks were on both of her breasts. There was no semen. Most of the physical evidence was lost I guess in the sludge of the Mississippi.

  Someone out there raped and killed a sixteen and half year old girl.

  I've seen many dead bodies in my somewhat illustrious career. Ripped and mangled, bloated and butchered, but Amanda's haunted me. Children’s deaths bothered me.

  They should bother everyone.

  I sat Indian fashion on my bed in our rental room, dumping this information into my handheld. Jane's cigarette smoke draped the room in a hazy fog. We lacked a foghog inside the room itself. She scanned the telemonitor, listening to news coverage of the funeral and Amanda's death.

  I re-read my notes prior to leaving D.C. for Memphis and a few things nagged at me. I wrote them down.

  I needed to gather unbiased information on Mayor Christensen.

  Captain Hanson and Malcolm said that Amanda was rumored to be a wild child.

  M. C. and Jane say she was an angel.

  Malcolm mentioned an older man.

  Who is Nathan Martindale?

  Derrick Jameson?

  No answers. Nothing.

  Frustrated, I went to the window to look out across the dreary day.

  Memphis skies were again muddled with clouds except a patch of crisp blue where the sun shined through the smoky gray. Overhead crafts and wautos zipped about at speeds too fast for this lousy weather.

  Yesterdays, and this morning’s, newspapers blared headline after headline about Amanda's death. I scanned the files, but didn't come away with stuff I didn't know before about her.

  I glanced down again, my eyes drawn to the store where the T.A. agent stalked us several days ago.

  There was no one now. But I briefly pondered who it could have been.

  I shrugged as I turned away and went back to my bed.

  For the better part of an hour, I typed out my thoughts into my handheld. Jane left to go get something to eat

  I sighed.

  The picture, hell the outline of this puzzle escaped me.

  Nothing added up. Could it be because I had nothing to do addition with?

  The rental room suddenly became too small and restricting. I escaped down to the lobby for an afternoon snack. Dusk approached and the lobby lay cloaked in shadows. Lit candles licked at the air and the robotic staff hovered on energy saver for there were no new customers checking in. I reached the bottom of the stairs and circled around to the right, past the front desk and on back to the area where the restaurant was located.

  Not that I was ever going to eat there again. Vending machines and an ice machine sat in a tiny alcove a short distance before the restaurant’s entrance as if a warning to those approaching. Eat here before going in there.

  Several vending machines sold everything from Peck beer to chewing gum. I only wanted a pack of peanuts. Nothing fancy and definitely not alcoholic. Never buy booze from a vending machine. By the time you pay for it, it may be expired.

  I pressed in my room number and then slipped my keycard through the pay slide. The nuts landed inside the machine with a smack. I bent down to retrieve them and stood when I heard…

  "Oh, there you are Cybil," said Mayor Christensen sweetly like sugar laced with cyanide. "I've been looking all over for you."

  She blocked the exit from the vending machine’s alcove. Today she wore an entirely navy pantsuit with a string of pearls, matching pumps, and smelled of honeysuckles.

  She couldn’t have been looking all over for me since she was having me followed or tracked now could she? She knew exactly where I was, so I wondered why she didn’t get right to the point.

  If she wouldn’t, I would.

  "What do you want?"

  "Why, I've wanted to know how well the search for Mandy's killer was going?" she purred and I felt like vomiting.

  "I'm working on it," I snapped. "No thanks to you!"

  I threw the bag of peanuts down for emphasis.

  "Whatever do you mean?" Mayor Christensen stiffened, her hand gripping the pearl necklace. "Explain yourself."

  "You know exactly what I mean." I shoved past her and stalked down the hallway toward the lobby and the front desk. I could almost feel the steam trailing from my head. How dare she come and demand I give her an update when no one gave me any information to solve the case?

  "Miss Lewis," Mayor Christensen called, walking quickly behind me. The air was laced with her scent of southern honeysuckles and mint.

  "What?" I spun around, my hands in fists.

  "Do not make the mistake of angering me," she said softly, her voice warm with threat. Her eyes drifted past me and around the lobby area as if making sure that no one else overheard her. "I am paying you for this…"

  “Since when?” I barked, my eyes narrowing, my heart pounding in anger.

  “Of course I paid,” she purred again, though her smile seemed stretched to the point of snapping off. “When I asked you to find Mandy. Pity you don’t remember…”

  “You’re lying,” I said, heatedly. I actually folded my arms to keep from smacking her.

  “You didn’t tell Jane, just yesterday, you would find out who killed my daughter?” Mayor Christensen asked, cool and sneaky. “I consider your statements, binding, Lewis, so get off your ass and find out who murdered my daughter.”

  “And I expect a second retainer deposited into my checking account in the next hour.”

  “Fine.”

  I stared back at her and she smiled that media perfect smile, white teeth, and curvy lips painted the right shade of burgundy. It all seemed to fake, so picture ready that it was unreal.

  So much for the grieving mother.

  "Good. I will find the person who killed your daughter," I muttered between clenched teeth. “Not for you, but for Jane, someone who really cared about Amanda.”

  Without another word, I took the stairs down to the garage two at a time. My back tingled as if someone had dropped an ice cube down my shirt, and I knew it was because Mayor Christensen stared at me as I fled.

  Once I reached my craft, I didn’t even bother looking to see if the woman had followed me. I hopped inside and lifted up into the air. Carefully, I flew through the underground garage and out into the fading light of day.

  Jane had told her I said I’d find Mandy’s killer. How could she do it without first talking to me? W
e were going to have to sit and have a very serious talk.

  I typed in the coordinates for Nathan Martindale house. While on the moon colonies, I had the airport 24 mechanic repair my autopilot. The automatic pilot took over as I answered my buzzing telemonitor. Don’t fly and talk on the telemonitor at the same time. Too many mid-air collisions resulted from people trying to do both instead of setting their autopilot.

  Trey's face, partially hidden by shadows, appeared to my surprise.

  "Cybil, listen, there's something you should know about Amanda Christensen." His voice was rough, almost hoarse. With wide eyes, he leaned into the camera, nearly filling the telemonitor’s screen. My body awoke at the mere sight of him, tingling with desire.

  "What are you doing contacting me? You're supposed to be in hiding!" I said, my heart racing to its own rhythm. Trey had that affect on me.

  He waved me off with his hand.

  "I don’t have the time to sit on my ass about this! I heard you're in Memphis working the Christensen case. Listen, very carefully to me, Cybil. Amanda wasn't all the efiles are painting her out to be. The cookie-cutter angel is all propaganda.”

  He kept looking over his shoulders and his voice was barely above a whisper. "She was a Zenith addict."

  My flabber was gasted. Sure, I suspected a little reckless behavior like drinking, and a couple of cigarettes, but Zenith?

  "How do you know?" I asked, my eyes narrowing. There wasn’t any other indication of Amanda’s drug use except from him. Why would he make it up? I didn’t think he did. He had worked undercover for the Raymen Cartel.

  "I-I busted her when I worked for the T.A.," he said rapidly as if he hurried to get it out it wouldn't be so horrible. "I suspect the mayor, her mother, was one of the people who sent in complaints against me and got me fired from the T.A. You’re in hot water down there, sugar—enough to boil your perfect, luscious ass. Do me the favor and protect it for me."