James Patterson - Cross Justice

Maggie had been painted sitting barefoot on a sand dune at sunset. She wore jeans and a collared pink blouse, and she looked out to sea in three-quarter profile with windswept hair and an expression that suggested an awareness of her fading beauty. That’s how you’ll always be, he thought. Sitting on a coast of gold and thinking about loss.

Coco turned, leaving Maggie behind and yet forever with him in the memory of that painting. Beyond the kitchen, he checked the security system in a little room off the garage and was pleased to see it still down.

What had Maggie said? Something about a fifteen-minute reset?

Much more than I need, Coco thought, and flipped a switch that rebooted the system. Moving quicker, he went out into the garage and opened the door behind his beloved Aston Martin.

Coco got in, tied a blue scarf loosely over the wig, just as Faye had done in the famous dune-buggy scene in The Thomas Crown Affair with McQueen driving. He threw the Aston in gear and backed out into the first light of day.

The gate swung open. Coco drove out onto South Ocean Boulevard and headed north with the Aston’s top down. Salt spiced the air. The wind caused the scarf to flicker in his peripheral vision. The gathering day. The warming light.

It was like being in a movie, with Coco as the star, channeling Faye Dunaway as he drove past mansion after mansion bathed in the rising sun. He thought dreamily, You’ll all be mine someday. Mother always said so. You just have to dream it, Coco, and the whole world can be yours.

In town, he stopped for breakfast and played the Coco role to the hilt, feeding on the attention, enjoying how it made him and his audience glow. True glamour was always like that, Mother said. Beauty was a shared experience.

Getting back into the Aston Martin, Coco was confused for a moment, unsure where to go next. Then, like a homing pigeon, he relied on instincts to guide him. He drove for a while, parked the car, then walked to the door of Mize Fine Arts.

He’d spent a full night deep in the trance that was Coco, and it was only in front of the gallery that Mize realized who and where he was. Feeling suddenly weak, he fumbled with the lock before finally getting the shop door open.

Inside, he turned the dead bolt and shut down the alarm. He started through the gallery toward his office but felt so dizzy he had to stop and sit down on a stack of fine Oriental rugs in one of the alcoves. When was the last time he’d slept? A day? A day and a half? Had Coco taken all that time away?

Mize lay down, rolled slowly over onto his side, and passed out.

He had no idea how long he’d been there asleep when the sharp sound of knocking woke him. Mize looked around, dazed, then glanced in a mirror on the wall of the shop and saw the Dunaway look with nary a hair out of place.

More knocking.

Mize’s head began to pound, but he got up and walked around a corner to the front door, where a muscular guy in a white button-down shirt and a tie was peering in and pressing a police badge to the window.

Palm Beach county sheriff’s office detective Richard S. Johnson saw the woman coming to the door of Mize Fine Arts and stepped back.

The lock was thrown. The door swung open, revealing a stunningly attractive woman with flawless hair that looked copper, strawberry, and blond.

She smiled, said in a soft Southern accent, “Can I help you?”

Detective Johnson had never backed down from a fight in his life. He had been in combat six times in Afghanistan and never flinched. But he had also never done well around women in this class of beauty.

“I’m, uh, Detective Johnson, uh, Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.”

“Yes?” she asked, seeming to sense the effect she was having on him, sliding her hand up the doorjamb like some movie star.

“I’m looking for Jeffrey Mize,” Johnson said.

“He’s not here. He usually doesn’t come in for another hour or so.”

“Oh,” Johnson said. “I went by his house and he wasn’t there either.”

“He goes out for breakfast. Come back in an hour and I’m sure he’ll see you. Can I tell him what it’s about, Detective?”

“Routine, follow-up stuff on a case I’m working. And you are?”

“Coco,” she said. “I consult and appraise for Mr. Mize.”

“Can I come in and wait, Coco?”

Coco gave him an uncomfortable sigh. “Detective, I’m not an employee. I work for Mr. Mize on contract and I come in early so I can do my job when it’s quiet. Could you give me an hour? There’s a nice coffee shop down the street.”

“I’ll see you in an hour,” Johnson said.

“Unfortunately, I’ll be off by then,” Coco cooed. “But thanks, Detective.”

“You’re welcome, Coco,” he said, and walked down the sidewalk feeling like he’d been mildly hypnotized by the woman.

Johnson shook his head as he went to the coffee shop. He’d grown up in a tough part of Miami. He’d joined the Marines and done two tours in Afghanistan, and he still fell apart around certain women. He laughed when he thought of the first time he’d met his wife, Angela, how tongue-tied he’d been.

His phone rang. Detective Sergeant Drummond.

“Anything?” Drummond asked.

“I’m supposed to talk to Mize in an hour,” Johnson said. “You?”

“I chatted with Marie Purcell’s chief of staff,” the sergeant said. “She fired Francie four months ago. Suspicion of stealing rare coins.”

“Were we notified?”

“No,” Drummond said. “People like the Purcells don’t like to get police involved. They have their own security people and take care of things quietly.”

“Lot of that up here?” Johnson asked as he stood in line for coffee in a shop that had a nice vibe to it.

“I’d say so.”

“You hear from Cross?”

“On my way to pick him up,” Drummond said.

Johnson was kind of annoyed. He’d hoped to have more time with Dr. Alex Cross, pick his brain about things.

“Who’s next on your list?” the sergeant asked.

Johnson dug in his pocket for a piece of paper, studied the names, and said, “Crawford.”

“I’ll take Schultz.”

Johnson agreed and clicked off. He got an espresso shot and a mug of robust Kenyan coffee black and poured them together over ice. He read the Palm Beach Post cover to cover and made calls to the Crawford mansion and several others on the list but got nothing other than the opportunity to leave messages.

Johnson walked up to the gallery fifteen minutes early and rapped on the door. A man soon appeared. Tall, stoop-shouldered, and completely bald, he wore white slippers, baggy black trousers, a loose black shirt, and white cotton gloves.

“Detective Johnson?” he said in a deep voice. “Coco said you’d come by. Please, come in. Sorry I wasn’t here earlier, and sorry about the gloves, I’ve had a nasty allergic reaction to some lacquer remover I was experimenting with the other day.”

Johnson walked into the shop, gazed all around, said, “Lot of nice stuff in here. What is it you do, sir?”

“I buy and sell things of beauty,” Mize said. “Fine art, jewelry, rugs, and furniture. What can I do for you?”

“I’m here about Francie Letourneau.”

He frowned, and Johnson noticed he had no eyebrows. No hair of any kind. What did they call that condition?

“What about Francie?” Mize asked.

“She’s dead,” Johnson said.

Mize straightened, moved a white-gloved hand toward his slack mouth, said, “Dead?”

“Murdered,” Johnson said. “Her body was found out past Belle Glade.”

“My God, that’s awful,” Mize said. “I always liked her. Well, at least until I had to fire her.”