Laura Caldwell - Red Blooded Murder

Vaughn pointed at something in a manila file. “These are communications between you and Jane Augustine.”

I stepped forward and looked at what he was holding. “Yeah, I was negotiating her contract with Pickett Enterprises. And most of those communications were between her attorney and me. Those are privileged. You can’t take them. Or look at them for that matter.” I snatched them from his hand.

He snatched them back. Looked at Maggie. “You better tell your client not to touch a police officer. Or come even close.”

I glanced at Mags. She gave me a little nod and made a face like, Careful.

Vaughn handed the file to the uniformed cop, who dropped it in a plastic bag and took it from the room.

“Vaughn,” Maggie said. “I’d like to know why you’re looking for DNA from my client.”

“Why do you think?”

“Her fingerprints were at Jane’s place. We all know that.”

“So maybe we want more than prints.”

“Did you remove anything from her bathroom?” Maggie demanded.

“Not yet, but hey, we’re not done.”

Maggie studied Vaughn. She took me by the arm and led me outside the apartment into the dim stairwell. “I wish I knew why they wanted your DNA. It might tell us more about why they’re looking at you as a potential suspect. I mean, we already know that your fingerprints are in Jane’s house. You were there. But they probably want standards to match with something else.”

“Like what?”

She lifted her shoulders and let them fall. “It could be blood at the scene that wasn’t Jane’s, something like that.”

“Maybe Spence can call his friend at the police department and see if they know something?”

“Excellent! Call him.”

I scrolled fast through my speed dial. Spence had no kids of his own and was devoted to being a good stepdad, even when we didn’t want his help. As such, he almost always answered my calls. And with everything going on now, I knew he was probably watching his phone, just waiting for an SOS.

“Izzy, darlin’,” he said in his big voice. “Are you all right?”

“Not exactly. The cops are here searching my place.”

“What the-Why didn’t George give me a heads-up on that?” George was his friend at the police department.

“Considering the detective on the case, it could have happened fast and without many people knowing.” I explained about the warrant, how they wanted “standards” from my place. “Maggie is here with me, and we’re trying to figure out specifically why they want my DNA. Can you call-”

“Immediately,” he said before I could finish, and he hung up.

Maggie and I stood in the hallway, waiting.

“Let me read the rest of this stuff,” Maggie said. She continued scanning the warrant. Two vertical lines appeared between her eyes. “It says that Vaughn interviewed Zac Ellis, Jane’s husband, and as of yesterday Zac informed him that Jane’s Emmy Award is missing from the living room of their home.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

Maggie pursed her mouth as she flicked through the pages of the other affidavit. “They think that due to the nature of the trauma, blah, blah, blah…Wow.”

“Wow, what?” I was so anxious my skin twitched.

“They think whoever killed Jane beat her with an Emmy Award before they strangled her.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I’m not kidding.” Maggie glanced up at me, eyes scared. “And they think it was you.”

I was still standing there, staring at Maggie, when my phone rang. It was my mother.

“Hi, Boo,” she said. “Are you…are you somewhere you can talk?”

“I’m standing outside my front door with Maggie. The cops are inside.” I looked around. The landing outside my condo was nondescript, decorated with mustard-colored walls and wood moldings. The stairs, which had never bothered me before, seemed too close to my front door now, giving me the feeling that one wrong move would send me tumbling into a dark chasm.

“Spence asked me to call,” my mother said.

“Oh, no, is it that bad?”

“Well, it’s…Listen, Izzy, you know I’m not judgmental, right? Whatever you want to experiment with in your life and your lifestyle, especially now that you and Sam have hit a rough patch, I’m fine with that. You know that, right?”

I pointed at the phone and made a She’s crazy face at Maggie. “Thanks, Mom. I appreciate that. And if you’re referring to the cops saying they thought I kissed Jane or whatever, it’s not true. Jane and I were just friends. If I do decide to come out of the closet, I’ll let you take me shopping for my first rainbow T-shirt. In the meantime, please tell me if Spence learned anything.”

“Yes, well, that’s what I’m referring to.” She said nothing.

“Mom, c’mon!” I said exasperated.

“I don’t know how to say it.”

“Just say it!”

“Well, Spence told his friend he wouldn’t say anything, and this is rather distasteful.” She exhaled loudly. “Okay, George told Spence that they found a small amount of fluid on Jane’s bed on the day she died. They shined some kind of light on it. I don’t know what the light was…Spence!” she yelled away from the phone. “What kind of light was it?”

“Doesn’t matter, Mom. Keep going.”

“Of course. So the fluid didn’t appear to be male or whatever. It wasn’t…” A pause. “Sperm.”

It was the first time I’d heard my mom say that word. She wasn’t the one who had told me about sex. It was Bunny Loveland.

Now, my mother kept rolling along, though. “They tested the fluid in the lab just to be sure, and they were right. It wasn’t sperm. In fact, DNA analysis showed that the fluid was actually from two different people, both female.” My mother sighed here, as if in pain from what she was relating, but she soldiered on. “Because of this finding, your detective apparently believes it was vaginal fluid from two women.” She said this quickly, as if she was desperate to get the conversation over with. “He wants DNA samples to try and show that one of the fluid samples belonged to you.”

“What?” I said, but inside my brain, things were adding up. That’s why Vaughn suspected me. He believed the killer was a woman, someone who’d been with Jane, in her bed, that day.

Maggie mouthed, What? What?

I heard Spence yelling in the background.

“Yes, yes,” my mother said. “Spence is telling me that the fluids could be mucus, saliva, what have you. They can only say it was from two different people, both women. But this apparently was enough for the search warrant for DNA materials from you.”

Vaughn opened my front door, the two uniformed cops behind him like statues, both holding black plastic bags.

“I have to go, Mom. Tell Spence thanks.”

Vaughn handed Maggie a handwritten list. “Here’s a recovered item inventory.” I saw a few things on the list-computer, laptop… “We’ll get you an official inventory later.” He took a step forward. “See you, ladies.”

“Hold up.” I put my hands on my hips and blocked Vaughn, not caring that my back was to the stairs now, to that dark well. “You found fluids in Jane’s bed from two women, and you think she and I were in bed together on the day she died? You really think I killed her?”

“Yeah,” Vaughn said. “That’s what I think.”

He tried to move around me but I held firm, fists digging further into my hips. “Why? Why me?”

“There were secretions in her bed. They were fresh. And DNA shows the fluids were from two different women.” He cocked his head and gave me a pleased smile. “And who was Jane supposed to get together with? Who took over her job? Who took over her boyfriend? Who was obsessed with Jane?” He leaned forward at the waist. “You.”