Catherine Coulter - Split Second

Delion pulled a small recorder from his jacket pocket. “Do you mind if we record this?”

“No, not at all.”

“We believe we know what happened to your wife, Mr. Carpenter.”

He jerked forward on his chair, and the naked hope in his voice was enough to break your heart. “You’ve found her? You know who took Arnette, what they did to her? Is she alive?”

“Mr. Carpenter, I’m sorry, sir, but we believe your wife was murdered. We also believe the person who killed her was named Kirsten Bolger. Do you know anyone by that name?”

Mr. Carpenter looked blank but only for a moment. Then he looked shell-shocked. “Kirsten Bolger? You think she murdered my wife? But why?”

Here was the link. Delion said, “We hope you’ll be able to tell us that, Mr. Carpenter.”

“But I didn’t even meet Kirsten Bolger until maybe six months after Arnette went missing. She called me, said she modeled with my wife and did I want to get together to talk about her? I was wallowing in grief and questions, and so I said yes. I remember it clearly, because I wanted to hear someone talk about Arnette like she was somehow here, alive.

“I met her at McDuff’s—that’s a bar down in the financial district on Sansome Street. You really believe Kirsten Bolger murdered my wife?”

“Yes, sir.”

“But that makes no sense, Inspector Delion. Why would you believe that?”

“We’ll get to that in a moment, sir.” Delion sat forward on the sofa. “I know it’s been a long time, Mr. Carpenter, but do you remember any of your conversation with Kirsten Bolger?”

They heard a toddler scream out, “Mama, Cool Whip!”

“Oh, that’s Kyle. He likes Cool Whip on his Cheerios. He’s got a good set of lungs on him. Missy said she’d keep him out of our hair.” He cleared his throat. “I remember Kirsten was glowing in her praise of Arnette. She never said she had a problem with her or anything bad, just told me how wonderful Arnette was.”

Lucy said, “Can you describe Kirsten Bolger?”

“I remember she was something to behold. She was wearing black, nothing but black, all the way down to a small black pearl in her nose. She had really long straight black hair, parted in the middle, like Cher when she was young, and she looked like a model, so thin you knew she had to be starving, bony arms sticking out of a sleeveless black T-shirt. Arnette was never that thin, thank heaven; she always said she couldn’t live without her peanut butter.” His voice caught, and he looked down at his red sneakers. After a moment, he cleared his throat, met Delion’s eyes.

“Kirsten’s face, it was fascinating, not beautiful, all angles and hollows, and very white, unnaturally white, I remember thinking, but still fascinating, and I thought the camera had to love her.

“I guess what I remember most is right before she left the bar, she said something like boy, was she ever hot, and I’ll tell you, I blinked at that until she pulled off the black hair—a wig—and there was her own hair, blond fuzz, maybe two inches long, all over her head. I nearly fell off my chair, I was so surprised. And then I remember thinking that she shouldn’t be a blonde, her eyes were too dark, her eyebrows, too. I wondered if she’d dyed all that blond frizz. But why?”

Delion said, “You said she was glowing in her praise of your wife. Do you remember exactly what she said?”

“She said Arnette was beautiful and kind and everyone had loved her, that when she disappeared no one could understand it. If you’ve read the interviews, you know this is what nearly everyone else said.” Mr. Carpenter looked away from them for a moment, seemingly at a stuffed brown bear on the floor by a chair. He was struggling with himself, Lucy saw it plainly, but why? “Tell us, Mr. Carpenter, tell us what you’re remembering. It’s important. What did Kirsten say that upset you?”

He looked like he was struggling not to cry. He drew a breath, and his words spilled out in a rush. “She said she was really sorry Arnette had left me, since I seemed like such a nice man. I tell you, I didn’t know what to say. I stared at her. And I asked her why she believed Arnette had left me, since everyone was thinking it was a case of kidnapping. She leaned toward me, picked up one of my hands, and held it a moment between her own two dead-white hands. She said Arnette told her all about it, how she was sorry, but I just wasn’t quite enough.” He swallowed. “That’s what she said— I just wasn’t quite enough. When I asked her if she knew the man’s name, she said all she’d heard Arnette say was the name Teddy.”

Delion said, “No last name?”

“No, only Teddy. I called the police, told them about this, but nothing happened.”

Delion said, “There was nothing about this in your wife’s file, Mr. Carpenter. Did you also give the officer you spoke to Kirsten’s name so there could be a follow-up with her?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Do you remember the officer’s name?”

“No, sorry, I don’t. I do remember he had to put me on hold a minute because there was a lot going on, a big drug bust, and I guess that meant lots of confusion. I could hear shouting and cursing in the background.”

Both Coop and Lucy knew exactly what Delion was thinking: I’m going to find and kill the idiot who took this call. Just a brief note or a couple of words to the lead—Inspector Driscol, now retired—and they might have caught Kirsten Bolger before she killed more women.

Lucy said, “So, basically, she invited you for a drink to tell you Arnette had left you for another man, this Teddy?”

“Yeah, now that I think back on it, all the rest of it was window dressing; telling me about the other man, that was the bottom line.”

“Did you believe her?”

“I believed her for maybe two seconds. I knew my wife, knew her as well as I knew myself. We’d been married for three years, not all that long, but we’d known each other since we were sixteen. I would have known if she’d met someone else. She would have told me. Whatever was in her head was out of her mouth in the next second.

“I wasn’t enough? Arnette wouldn’t say that, I know it to my soul.” He paused, then tears swam in his eyes and he lowered his head. “We were trying to have a child, and I’ll never know if she was pregnant when this Kirsten killed her.” His head snapped back up, and now there was rage. “Why? Why did this woman kill her? And then she calls me and tells me Arnette left me for this Teddy? It makes no sense.”

Coop said, “Your wife never mentioned Kirsten’s name? Ever?”

“No. As I said, Arnette always said whatever was on her mind; sometimes that wasn’t a good thing, but it was simply the way she was. If she’d had any kind of problem with Kirsten Bolger, she’d have told me. And who is Kirsten Bolger? All she ever told me was that she modeled, and that’s how she knew Arnette.”

Delion said, “Have you heard of the killer some of the media is now dubbing the Black Beret?”

“Of course. The guy who murdered two women here in the city—met them in bars, drugged them, took them home, and strangled them, right? No rape, which is why it’s even stranger. Why are you asking?”

Delion said, “The Black Beret isn’t a guy. She’s a woman—Kirsten Bolger, to be exact.”

Talk about a conversation stopper. Even the air stilled. Roy Carpenter looked like someone had shot him. His breathing hitched, and he began shaking his head back and forth. “But these two women murdered right here in San Francisco, they were found right away. Not like Arnette; she’s been gone three and a half years.” He turned perfectly white. “Do you mean she didn’t want Arnette found, and so she took Arnette someplace and buried her?”