Julia Spencer-Fleming - All Mortal Flesh

She heard voices outside the door and hastily sat up again. It sounded like an argument. Then the door opened and, to her surprise, Karen Burns, Geoff Burns’s wife and law partner, strode in. It must have been one of her days spent working at home and taking care of their toddler-she was in jeans and a sweater that had undoubtedly been hand-loomed by Kashmiri goatherds.

“What are you doing here?” Clare said.

“Geoff called me. Right after you made your announcement. Wish I had been here for that.”

Clare covered her face with her hands again.

“Come on, we’re getting out of here. You’re done answering questions.”

“But…” Clare stood up. “I don’t think Investigator Jensen believed me.”

“The woman with the too-tight suit and the Payless shoes? I spoke with her. The archbishop of Canterbury could show up and swear the three of you were playing pinochle all night and she wouldn’t believe it.” Karen smoothed her already immaculate auburn hair and looked at Clare with exasperation. “Why did you agree to talk with her without a lawyer?”

“Well, Geoff was here.”

“Geoff can’t help you. He’s representing Russ Van Alstyne, and the two of you have adverse interests.”

“No, we don’t!”

“Come on,” Karen urged. “I want to get home to Cody. Then we can talk.”

“Oh, my God, you didn’t leave him alone to come down here and bail me out, did you?” She let Karen lead her out the door and into the hall. A phone was ringing in Harlene’s dispatch board. Voices, indistinct but excited, leaked from the squad room.

“One, you haven’t been arrested. No arrest, no bail. Two, I would never leave a two-year-old by himself. Fortunately, the new deacon was over to talk about the capital campaign. She was great. She volunteered to watch Cody for me as soon as she heard what had happened.”

“Jesus wept!” Clare peeked into the dispatch room. It was empty, except for Harlene, entering information on a keyboard with furious strokes. Clare lowered her voice. “Please don’t tell me Elizabeth de Groot knows about this. Please.”

Karen gave her the same look of compassionate contempt her mother had the time Clare righteously walked out on a high school date who had been telling racist jokes and then had to hike five miles home. In heels. “What did you think was going to happen when you told a room full of people that Russ Van Alstyne spent the night with you?”

Clare forced herself not to drop her head like a fifteen-year-old. “I didn’t really think.” She gave herself a shake. “It doesn’t matter. What’s done is done. The important thing is that the investigator understands Russ didn’t kill Linda Van Alstyne.”

“I understand that now.” Jensen emerged from the chief’s office clutching a manila folder. “Sergeant Morin’s just gotten back to me with the oh-so-belated fingerprint report.” Geoff Burns followed the investigator into the hall, and behind him came Russ, looking dazed. Thunderstruck. Jensen narrowed her eyes and spoke directly to Clare. “It seems the woman found dead in the Van Alstynes’ kitchen wasn’t Linda Van Alstyne at all.”

Clare’s mouth dropped open. She clasped her hands so tightly together her fingernails went white. Squeezed her eyes shut. When she opened them, they were bright with tears.

“Oh, thank God,” she said. “Thank God.”

Russ thought he might never have loved her as much as he did at that moment.

He was still unsure if he had awoken from a nightmare or if he had fallen into a good dream. That Linda was alive again was too much like the magical thinking he had returned to over and over since Monday evening. Let it all be a mistake. This isn’t really happening. She can’t be dead.

“Yep. Looks like Mrs. Van Alstyne’s disappearance is simply a case of a grown woman haring off without telling anyone.”

That snapped him out of his reverie. “Wait a minute,” Russ said. “There’s no evidence of that. How can we be sure she hasn’t been abducted by Dennis Shambaugh?”

“Who’s Dennis Shambaugh?” Karen asked.

Jensen turned toward him. “Your deputy chief told me Mrs. Van Alstyne left e-mails to her sister, bragging about a hot date she was heading out on.” She glanced across the dispatch area to the entrance of the squad room. He followed her gaze.

Lyle was standing there. He gave Russ a minuscule shrug. “If she hired a cat sitter, chief, she must have been planning to go somewhere for a day or two.”

Jensen went on. “Given her predilections, I’d check and see if any of your officers have been out since Sunday.”

He could feel the blood rushing to his face. He balled up his hands, then forced them to relax, knuckle by knuckle. Losing it now wasn’t going to get him what he needed. “We have to get a BOLO out on her. We have to get the identities Shambaugh stole into the federal cybercrime database and the Federal Reserve routing system. He’s on the run. He’s going to use one of those card numbers he has to get money. We have to talk to his parole officer and track down any known associates, and we have to do all that fifteen minutes ago.”

Now it was Jensen’s turn to flush. “Don’t tell me how to run this investigation, Mr. Van Alstyne.”

“It seems to me that’s exactly what he should do.” Geoff Burns flicked his suit coat back and squared his hands on his hips. “What looked like a domestic killing seems to be a case of a falling-out amongst thieves. Shambaugh and Audrey Keane were robbing the Van Alstynes’ house, they disagreed, and he killed her. When surprised by Chief Van Alstyne this afternoon, he fled. Under what construction do you continue to abrogate my client’s duties as chief of police? The only error in this entire investigation is that of the medical examiner, who is not under Chief Van Alstyne’s authority or yours.”

“Counselor, that’s an entirely reasonable scenario. And”-she nodded lightly to Russ-“I’m proceeding with the investigation with that in mind. Paul Urquhart is speaking to Shambaugh’s parole officer, and Officer Durkee is continuing to work on the identity fraud aspect of the case. I’ve called in a colleague from the state cybercrimes division to help him.”

Russ bent his neck in acknowledgment. She was just setting him up for some asinine theory, but he could be gracious. His wife was alive. Alive.

“Now let me propose another scenario for you. A couple having an affair. The only thing standing in the way of their happiness is his wife, who insists on boring things like marriage counseling. And who, incidentally, turns out to be worth considerably more than her husband, thanks to her successful business. This couple decides to do away with her. At some point between Sunday afternoon and Monday afternoon, they drive to her house. For whatever reason, the husband can’t or won’t do the dirty. So the woman-” Jensen turned to Clare, looking for all the world as if she were going to ask her for the St. Alban’s worship schedule or the name of a good coffee shop nearby. “By the way, Reverend, is it true you were in the army? Flying helicopters? And that you had advanced survival training? An experience like that must toughen a woman up.”

Russ could see Clare’s jaw muscles bunching as she ground her reply between her teeth.

“Where was I?” Jensen said. “Oh, yeah. So the woman goes inside. She sees what she expects to see, an attractive fiftyish blonde. How many times had you met Mrs. Van Alstyne in person, Reverend Fergusson?”

Clare opened her mouth.

“Don’t answer that,” Karen Burns said.

“Never mind,” Jensen said. “The woman sees the blonde. She slits her throat and mutilates the body.”