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“So if she participated in that, did she know Richards might be in that suitcase, either already dead or drugged?” he said.
“I can’t believe she didn’t know,” replied Lancaster. “But then the question becomes why would she do it?”
“She was acting funny,” said Decker. “When she interacted with me. Before and after Richards went missing.”
“Funny how?”
“Guilty, maybe. But then I just associated that with her having a fling with Natty.”
“Guilt, then, but of a different nature.” Lancaster shook her head. “Brimmer was such a straight arrow in my book. Why in the hell would she have become involved in something like this?”
“Well, we don’t know for sure that she was. We found a wig that looks like Richards’s hair, but that could be a coincidence. Women do have wigs in their closets.”
“That’s true. And even if we find evidence of Sally’s hair inside this wig, it’ll prove nothing. If she’s not involved, she presumably bought the wig to wear it.”
“We have to find other proof. If she was paid off, we might be able to find a record of that in her financial accounts.”
“And if she wasn’t paid off?”
“Then someone might have coerced her into doing this.”
“How?”
“Maybe someone who knew about her relationship with Natty?”
“Well, that could be. They kept it pretty secret. Hell, I didn’t know.”
Lancaster took back the wig and placed it into an evidence bag she drew from her coat pocket. “And you still think the motivation to kill Richards was to place blame for Hawkins’s murder on her?”
“They had to cut that investigation off, Mary. The police start looking into Hawkins’s claims, things could get dicey for whoever’s behind all this. Her seeming to commit suicide was a good way to do that.”
“Only it didn’t work.”
“They couldn’t know that. They had to try. And Richards was their best bet for that.”
“Why not Rachel Katz? She had a motive to kill Hawkins too.”
“That’s right, she did. But I don’t think they could afford to kill Katz.”
“Why not? Someone ended up trying to kill her.”
“That was later.”
“So how’d they choose between the two women?”
“Look at it this way:Katz has prospered since the death of her husband. Richards hasn’t.”
“So you think Katz was involved with the murders thirteen years ago?”
“I’m not going to go that far, Mary. But I think Katz ended up being useful. Richards didn’t. So she was dispensable.”
“What in the world is going on here, Decker?”
“Well, whatever it is, it’s been going on for at least thirteen years.”
“Dating back to the murders?”
“Actually sometime before them, probably.”
Lancaster looked at the bagged evidence. “I’m going to have to tell Natty about this. He’s in charge of the investigation now.”
“I don’t think he’s going to take us suspecting Sally of being an accomplice in Richards’s murder very well.”
“That’s an understatement. Unless he’s involved as well,” she added with a sudden thought. “Do you think he might be?”
“I think everybody’s a suspect until they’re not.”
