Circle of Influence (A Zoe Chambers Mystery) Read online

  “You do if you can’t get out to basketball practice because of ice.” She roughed up his hair. “Seriously, there’s got to be something here.” Something worth killing for.

  “I know. But there are a ton of messages. Plus the sent ones.” He clicked the mouse again. “And the trash can is full, too.”

  Her cell phone’s muffled chirp floated up from her coat pocket. She dug it out and checked the screen. “Rose.” Oops.

  “Thank God.” Rose’s frantic voice greeted her. “Where are you? When you didn’t show up I was afraid something else happened.”

  “Logan’s fine,” Zoe said. “I’m sorry. I should have called you the minute I knew.”

  Rose’s weeping came through the line. “Where is he? Where are you?”

  “At my house.”

  Silence greeted her.

  “Rose?”

  “Your house? What the hell is he doing there?”

  Zoe remembered their weak cover story. “He was worried about that computer problem I was having and wanted to try and fix it. I guess he was feeling pretty helpless sitting around home.”

  The chill in Rose’s voice could have left icicles hanging from the phone. “Do not tell me he was hitchhiking again.”

  Zoe chewed her lip. “Okay. I won’t.”

  Rose responded with a string of profanities. “That boy is grounded for the next year. Bring him home. Now. I’m sure your computer can wait until after we bury my husband.”

  Ouch. “Okay. See you in a few.” Zoe stuffed the phone back into her pocket. “As fast as you can,” she said to Logan, “show me how to get back into this e-mail program. Looks like I have a lot of reading to do.”

  Having spent half the night and all morning studying outdated township e-mail correspondence, Zoe came to the conclusion Logan had it right. Pretty boring. But buried somewhere among the mind-numbing posts might be the one to explain everything that had happened in the last couple of days.

  She noted the point at which she stopped reading around noon. Her shoulders ached from hunching over the computer. Her head throbbed, too, but more from tension than poor posture. And where she needed to be that afternoon and evening would do nothing to improve her stress levels.

  Funeral homes freaked Zoe out. Granted, she suspected no one enjoyed spending time there with the possible exception of the funeral director. But every time she walked into one, she flashed back to her eight-year-old self and being told that her dad was inside that shiny, closed box. They never let her see the body. Too badly disfigured after the accident, they said. But how was an eight-year-old to understand? At thirty-five, she still had a hard time grasping the concept of there one minute, gone the next.

  Now it was Ted’s turn. At least the casket was open. It might seem ghoulish to some, but she knew the emotional benefits of seeing for yourself that your father was truly gone.

  The public viewing didn’t officially begin until two. Family members had been asked to arrive a half hour early for some private time. Honored that Rose and Sylvia had included her in that list, Zoe would still rather be anywhere else for any other reason. Even reading archaic e-mail messages.

  She battled her anxiety from the back of the room. Floral arrangements of all shapes and sizes lined the walls, their fragrance choking her.

  Across the gulf of muted nondescript carpet, Rose bent over the casket, her head lowered, shoulders shaking. Her mother, Mrs. Bertolotti—Bert to anyone who knew her—flanked her on one side, Sylvia on the other.

  Swimming in a suit jacket he had yet to grow into, Logan paced the perimeter of the room. Allison’s unnaturally black hair was twisted in a haphazard knot with stray wisps sticking out all over. Zoe suspected it was supposed to look messy. If so, the girl had succeeded in her efforts. She wore a short, plaid skirt and sat knock-kneed in one of the upholstered chairs that edged the room. Her leg bounced in time to the music piped into her brain through ear pods. Thin white wires trailed to the pocket of the pink, puffy winter jacket she’d refused to take off. By all appearances, she didn’t plan to stay long.

  Zoe closed her eyes to block out the room. But the smell of the flowers and the soft strains of a recorded organ refused to be ignored. They swept her deeper into her childhood trauma. Her father’s death. Her mother’s attempt to fill the void with a quick remarriage and an eventual escape to Florida. Zoe’s own effort to find a father-figure by dating a string of older boys in high school, falling in love with a jerk like Matt and the subsequent betrayal that left her susceptible to the likes of Jerry McBirney.

  “You okay?”

  Her eyes snapped open. Logan stood before her, a look of concern mingled with despair on his youthful face.

  “Yeah.” It was a lie, but she couldn’t burden him with her anguish. He had his own. Someday, they might be able to compare notes, but not now. Not here. “How are you?”

  His jaw clenched, and he managed a quick nod of his head.

  She reached out to rub his arm. “I know.”

  “Have you been over—there—yet?” He motioned toward the casket.

  “No.” If it were up to her, she’d stay rooted where she was. But he offered his arm. Sucking in a deep breath of courage, she slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow and, leaning on one another, they crossed the room.

  “Did you read any of the e-mails?” he said, his voice clandestine.

  “Yeah.”

  “Find anything?”

  “No. Like you said, they were pretty boring.”

  He gave her a little nudge. “Told you.”

  They exchanged a look. Zoe was grateful, and knew Logan was, too, for the momentary distraction. But it wasn’t long enough. As if he were an escort, seating her at a wedding, he slipped her hand from his arm and ducked away.

  Bert never looked especially healthy, but she wore the evidence of her recent bout with the flu on her colorless face and in her sunken eyes. Still, she swept Zoe into her arms and whispered, “How sweet of you to come.”

  Sylvia’s embrace came next. Zoe fought off the tears. “I’m so sorry.” She choked on the words that seemed insignificant in the face of such grief.

  Then she stood face-to-face with Rose. Her childhood friend. Her compadre through it all. A lifetime of joy and sorrow, successes and failures flashed between them without a word. They wrapped one another up in each other’s arms and the dam holding back the tears collapsed under the strain.

  Zoe dropped into the chair next to Allison who hadn’t budged. Members of the community filtered into the room. Within minutes, there was a line out the door. A few gave Zoe a sad nod of recognition. Allison picked at her fingernails.

  Zoe drew a deep breath and leaned toward the girl. “I hear the weather forecast for the weekend is calling for a warm up. Maybe we could go riding.”

  “It’ll be too muddy.” Allison’s voice was flat.

  “We’ve got the indoor arena. It won’t be muddy inside.”

  Allison shrugged.

  “Or you could just come over and hang out with Merlin and Jade.”

  Her sigh was loud and exasperated. “I don’t know. Maybe. I’ll probably have homework or something.” She shifted in her chair away from Zoe. Her body language said, “Leave me alone,” clearer than the spoken word ever could.

  “Hi, Zoe.”

  She looked up to find Matt standing over them. In navy blue Dockers and a muted gray sweater snug enough to complement his broad shoulders and narrow waist, he appeared as boyishly handsome as he’d been when they were in high school. For a split second, she was catapulted into the past and fell in love with him all over again. Just as quickly, the years tumbled back in place. His infidelity and his recent accusations about Ted and Marcy slammed her into the reality of the present. She returned his greeting.

  Allison snapp
ed out of her slouch. “Hi, Matt,” she said, her voice cheery for the first time in recent memory.

  Zoe cast a glance in the girl’s direction and recalled Rose’s tale of catching her with a high school jock and Ted tossing the kid out and then taking Allison’s door off its hinges.

  Matt gave a quick nod at the teenager, but kept his attention on Zoe. “How are you holding up? I know this has to be hard on you.”

  “Not as hard as it is on Rose and the kids.” Zoe put a hand on Allison’s arm, but she pulled free, jumped to her feet, and stomped away.

  Matt scowled after her. “Yeah. I see that.”

  “Everyone’s dealing with losing Ted the best they can.” Zoe longed to run after Allison, but sensed the girl needed space. The room was growing increasingly crowded.

  Matt took the chair Allison had vacated. “Have you mentioned what I told you to Rose?”

  “You mean that her husband may have been cheating on her? No.”

  He studied his hands. “Not the right time, I guess.”

  “I don’t know if there would ever be a right time. Especially since I don’t believe it.”

  He met her gaze. “You don’t?”

  Did she? No. Not today. She couldn’t permit herself to think of the possibility. And if she put off thinking about it long enough, maybe she’d forget.

  “You just don’t want to believe it.”

  She ached to grab him and shake him. Tell him there was no way Ted would be unfaithful. Remind Matt that betrayal was his bailiwick. But he wasn’t looking at her any more. His gaze had shifted over her shoulder, and his jaw clenched.

  Zoe turned to find out what had grabbed his attention. The line of people who’d come to pay their respects extended out the door in the back of the room and into the hallway toward the front of the funeral home, with no end in sight. The person Matt was staring at had just reached the threshold of the room.

  Marcy McBirney, wearing head-to-toe black, including oversized sunglasses, clasped a handkerchief to her face as she wept inconsolably.

  ELEVEN

  The Vance Township Police Station had once again grown quiet. Workmen had installed a temporary door to the evidence room while a new steel door, one without those damned exposed hinges, had been ordered. The technician from the security company had changed the locks and alarm codes. Pete spent the night processing his latest crime scene. The station. His station. Having this happen on his watch was damned humiliating.

  His hopes of the surveillance camera providing an easy answer were soon dashed. The recording revealed someone of apparently small stature in an oversized coat with a massive hood entering the building, head down. He turned and must have punched the code into the keypad, although all Pete saw was the guy’s back. Then, he again faced the camera with his head lowered and bustled down the hallway, out of view. The culprit clearly knew the camera was there and kept his face hidden. Or her face. Pete wagered his suspect was a woman. He also theorized she was wearing a man’s coat. And she probably opened the back door so the owner of that coat could gain access without being captured on video.

  But there was no way to make a positive ID from what he had. Note to self—find the funds to purchase and install additional cameras.

  Wayne Baronick was otherwise occupied with a drug sweep in Brunswick so at least Pete didn’t have to deal with him, too. Instead, he seized the opportunity to use some of his old skills from his days with the Pittsburgh Bureau of Police. Vance Township was too small and insignificant to merit a real lab. Trace evidence went to the county crime lab. But Pete had the equipment to process fingerprints and scan them into the computers to run them through AFIS.

  For the moment, however, all he needed was a magnifying loop. Dusting the evidence room for prints had produced several dozen more-or-less usable specimens. The door to the storage room and the back entrance provided a similar number as had the area around the alarm keypad and the front door, but most were too smudged or layered on top of one another to serve any useful purpose. His first task involved eliminating his own prints and those belonging to his men.

  As morning faded into afternoon, he grew more frustrated by the hour. Every single print he’d lifted from the evidence room matched either his officers or his own. The bastard—or bastards—had no doubt worn gloves.

  Pete’s cell phone ringing added to his aggravation.

  “Hey, Chief. It’s Seth. I’m outside. My key doesn’t work.”

  “I’ll be right there,” Pete straightened the already perfectly aligned stack of prints and locked the door to the fingerprint lab behind him. Seth gave him a sheepish grin when he let the officer in.

  “It’s kind of weird to be locked out of your own station.”

  Pete handed him a new key. “Don’t write the alarm code down anywhere. We’ve had one security breech. I won’t tolerate another.” He told Seth the code and suggested he figure out some way to memorize it.

  “Do we have a suspect yet?” Seth asked.

  Pete gritted his teeth. He might just snap the neck of the next fool to ask him that question. “No. If we did, we wouldn’t be standing here. We’d be out there making an arrest.”

  “Yes, sir.” His tone of voice indicated he realized it had been a stupid question. “Uh, Chief?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Could you give me that code one more time?”

  Pete rattled it off and left the young officer practicing the numbers on the new keypad. Back inside the lab, Pete studied the useable prints he’d lifted from around the front door. He divided them into two piles. The first were the matches to staff. The second were unknowns. Those he proceeded to scan and run through the AFIS database. Unlike on TV, where quick hits solved cases in under an hour, the real process didn’t work that way. He found two hits, but all that came up were a set of numbers that he punched into another computer to match to a potential name. In both cases, the prints matched local citizens who had recently been in the station on legitimate business.

  After a break to refill his coffee cup—Seth had made a fresh pot—Pete returned to the lab. He scanned another print and leaned back to wait.

  He should be at Ted Bassi’s viewing. Not only in his capacity as police chief, but for Zoe. She was holding up remarkably well, but this was hard on her.

  Jerry McBirney suspected Marcy had been having an affair with Ted. Interesting. Zoe didn’t want to believe it, but the scenario made sense. Marcy’s reaction to hearing of Ted’s death. McBirney’s reaction to her reaction. But why was Marcy sticking to her story, protecting her husband’s alibi and therefore him? Or was she merely protecting her own ass? Nice ass, though it may be.

  He took off his reading glasses and rubbed his eyes, blotting out all thoughts of Marcy’s ass. Do. Not. Go. There.

  Instead, he reflected on the blizzard two nights ago and the Buick with Ted’s body inside. Was there a link between the murder and this break-in at the station? Had to be. Vance Township wasn’t the type of place to have a rash of unrelated crimes. He stared at the stack of fingerprints.

  He’d managed to find one lone print in the Buick. Baronick had taken it with him. But Pete had a photocopy of it. Odds were slim, but…

  He left the computer running its search and headed back to the evidence room. In the ratty old metal file cabinet in the corner of the room, he hunted for the folder he’d placed there yesterday. Where was it? Tension seized his shoulders and neck. Had the thief taken more than the computer? But, no. There it was. Misfiled, which was normal for Pete. Another reason he missed having Sylvia on the job.

  Back in the lab, he picked up the magnifying loop and started back through the stack of unknown prints. Most were obviously not matches. Those were simple to eliminate. Others required closer scrutiny.

  Near the bottom of the stack, he came across a smudged partial that h
ad been lifted from the wall next to the front door. Near the keypad. He studied it. He studied the one from the Buick. Back and forth. They were similar. But were they a match?

  Yes.

  Pete put down the loop, his heart racing. The same person who’d left one lone print in Jerry McBirney’s car had also been inside his police station. Could the print Pete held in his hand belong to Ted Bassi’s killer?

  Leaving Matt sitting on the sidelines, Zoe weaved her way through the crowd. She stopped short of interrupting Rose as she embraced a guy who lived down the street from the Bassis. What did she aim to do, anyway? She couldn’t drag Rose out of there before Marcy made it to the front of the line. Besides, Rose had no idea about the affair.

  Or did she?

  Zoe squeezed her eyes shut against the first twinge of a headache. What was she thinking? There had been no affair. It was all paranoid lies and rumors fabricated by Jerry McBirney and perpetuated by Matt Doaks.

  Matt. She should slap him for repeating such nonsense. She turned back toward the direction she’d just come, intent on marching up to him and giving him a good verbal thrashing. However, an elderly woman sat in the chair he’d been in. Zoe surveyed the room. No Matt.

  She watched the line inch forward and Marcy with it. The woman’s shoulders slumped, and she visibly trembled as she sniffed into her handkerchief.

  What was with Marcy’s oversized sunglasses? Had the gray skies brightened since Zoe arrived? The indirect lighting of the funeral home definitely did not require them. Zoe studied the woman. Pete’s ex-wife. How in the world could she have left a man like Pete for Jerry McBirney? Then again, Zoe, too, had once fallen victim to McBirney’s “charm.”

  When Marcy turned in her direction, Zoe ducked off to the side and pretended to read the tags on the floral tributes.

  The line and Marcy advanced. Zoe’s headache grew in intensity. Two more people in front of Marcy. Then one.