Sandra Brown - Smoke Screen

The thought panicked Raley. “I didn’t do anything.”

“Of course not. Nothing criminal anyway. You got shitfaced with a woman you didn’t know. Turns out she was a junkie. How were you supposed to know that? You didn’t know she was going to snort after swilling all those margaritas.”

“I only had one, and I don’t think I finished it.”

“More than one, friend.” Jay laid his arm across Raley’s shoulders. “I’ve seen you wasted, but not in years, and never as wasted as you were last night.”

Raley shrugged off Jay’s arm. “I’m telling you, I had one beer. Maybe half of a margarita. I couldn’t have got that drunk,” he insisted.

It was then that Wickham and McGowan arrived. Raley had seen them the previous night, living it up at the party with everyone else. Wickham had been with his wife. McGowan had had an anorexic-looking girl draped on his arm. This morning, they looked hungover, unwashed, and unhappy to be back at Jay’s apartment, especially to examine the body of a dead girl.

“In the guest room,” Jay said, nodding them down the hallway. He and Raley followed.

The somber quartet took up most of the floor space in the compact room. The detectives looked the body over while Jay and Raley stood by, watching.

“Did you touch her?” Wickham asked.

“CPR” was all he managed to say.

Plastic bags had been placed on the girl’s hands. The two detectives turned her onto her side, looking for injuries or wounds on her back. At least that was what Raley surmised.

Jay said, “There’s residue on the nightstand. I think it’s cocaine. There’s a foil packet in her handbag. Dig deeper and we’ll probably find a razor and straw, too. My guess is that she’s a habitual user. She and Raley tied one on. He passed out. She snorted and died in her sleep.”

McGowan said, “Autopsy will tell for sure.”

Raley wasn’t squeamish. In his line of work, he couldn’t be. But hearing the word autopsy in this context made the coffee he’d drunk roil in his stomach. As though sensing his discomfort, Jay scooped his clothes from the floor, took him by the arm, and propelled him out of the room.

“Go get yourself straight.” He passed the bundle of clothing and shoes to him. “Use my bathroom. Shower if you want. They’ll be a while, then we’ll talk.”

Raley moved like an automaton, down the hallway, through Jay’s bedroom, into the bathroom. He threw up. He peed gallons. He splashed his face with cold water, and when that didn’t help relieve his grogginess, he showered, alternating the water from scalding to ice cold.

Feeling a bit restored, he joined the others where they had gathered in Jay’s living area, which was still littered with party debris. Wickham opened the discussion. “Hell of a thing, Raley.”

After that concise assessment of the situation, anything Raley said would be superfluous, so he merely nodded.

“We, uh, found a coupla condoms under the bed, the side you slept on. They’ve been used. We’ll send them to the lab.”

Wickham didn’t pose the question outright, but Raley knew what he was asking. “I don’t know if we had sex or not,” he said. “I don’t remember.”

“She was a babe,” McGowan remarked. “How could you not remember?”

“I don’t remember,” he repeated. The retching had made his voice husky. He cleared his throat. “I’ll tell you what I do remember.”

McGowan made a motion with his hand. Raley began. “I came with Candy Orrin.” His account lasted through reaching the pool area with the girl-Suzi with an i. “But that’s where things get hazy. I remember thinking that the margaritas were damn strong. I was dizzy, wanting to sit down.”

Jay’s phone rang. He excused himself to answer it, turning his back to the room and speaking low into the receiver.

“You were lying down on the chaise,” Wickham said, drawing Raley’s attention back to him. “My wife and I saw the two of you. Embarrassed her no end. We beat it back to the patio, left you going at it.”

Raley’s cheeks grew hot. “I remember kissing her, or rather her kissing me.”

“Kissing?” Wickham snorted. “Yeah, you probably kissed, too.”

Jay rejoined them. “That was Hallie,” he reported softly. “She was worried because she hadn’t been able to reach you this morning. I told her you crashed here last night and were still asleep.”

Raley had to swallow another surge of nausea. He placed his head in his hands and set his elbows on his knees.

Jay patted him on the back. “It’ll be okay. It could’ve happened to anybody. Especially somebody who’s been working as hard as you have. You didn’t realize you could be slam-dunked by a few margaritas.”

“I had less than one,” he said, sitting up. “One, Jay. And one beer.”

Motion drew his attention toward the hallway. The EMTs were wheeling a gurney with a body bag on it toward the front door. Raley was unable to suppress the nausea this time. As he was rushing toward Jay’s bathroom, he heard McGowan suggest that Jay bring him down to the temporary PD headquarters for further questioning. Jay promised to have him there by one o’clock. In exchange, he got McGowan’s promise to treat this like an accidental death.

“No need to alert the media, is there?” Jay said.

Raley was glad to hear McGowan agree. “No need I can see.”

He threw up again, retching with such violence he was surprised his esophagus didn’t bleed. Finally, feeling that he’d been wrung inside out, he came shakily out of the bathroom.

The apartment was deserted except for him and Jay, who told him what to do and when to do it, because he seemed incapable of making even the smallest decision.

“Want some toast?”

“No.”

“You should get something in your stomach.”

“Okay.”

“Orange juice?”

“Sure.”

“You want to borrow a shirt? Yours has lipstick on it.”

“Thanks.”

It went like that until they left for the police station, arriving promptly at one o’clock. Wickham and McGowan-now showered and shaved-were waiting for them in an interrogation room. “Is this necessary, guys?” Jay asked as he and Raley were ushered in.

“It is if we want privacy,” McGowan said. “We’re doing what we can to keep a lid on this.”

He offered Raley something to drink. He declined. Jay had medicated his headache with analgesics and had forced gallons of water on him for hydration. The toast had helped settle his stomach. He felt a little more like himself, more confident and clearheaded when, for the second time, he talked them through the events of the night before.

When he finished, Jay looked at his two colleagues with an expression that said, Satisfied? They didn’t look ready to lynch Raley, but they didn’t look convinced beyond a reasonable doubt, either.

Raley knew the time had come for him to take the first proactive step toward defending himself. “I’ve been thinking about it. I know I was tired. The margaritas were unusually strong. Chalk it up to abnormal metabolism, whatever. One drink could possibly have knocked me on my ass. It could possibly have prompted me to have sex with that girl. She was a looker, and she came on to me.

“But the amount of alcohol I drank last night couldn’t have completely erased my memory. I just don’t believe that.” He drew a deep breath, let it out slowly. “I think I was drugged.”

The three other men just looked at him blankly, their expressions revealing no reaction to his statement. Finally Jay spoke. “Drugged? By the girl?”

“She’s the one who brought me the drink. She’s the drug user.”

“Alleged,” Wickham said.

“Alleged,” Raley conceded.