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"Yes, Ma'am, he does. I'll call and see if he's in. What's your name?"
"Karen Whitlaw."
The officer spoke quietly into the phone, then said to Karen, "He's in, and he said to come to his office." She pointed in the appropriate direction and recited instructions. "Take a right, and it's the third door on the left."
Ceiling fans whirled overhead as Karen followed directions; the stirring air raised chills on her arms after the furnace of the streets. She had never been in a police department before. She expected something approaching mayhem; what she found was ringing phones, people sprawled in chairs, clouds of cigarette smoke, and the odor of strong coffee. It could have been any busy, disorganized office, except for the fact that most of the people there were armed.
She found the appropriate door and knocked on it. That smooth, dark voice she remembered so well said, "Come in."
She opened the door, and her stomach twisted again, this time with pure nervousness, as she looked at the man rising to his feet. Detective Chastain wasn't what she had expected. He wasn't middle-aged, pot-bellied, or balding. Mid-thirties, she guessed. He looked like a man who had seen too much ever to be surprised by anything again. Thick black hair was worn cropped close to his head, and he had thick eyebrows arching over narrow, glittering eyes. His skin was olive-toned, and his five o'clock shadow was heavy. A couple of inches over six feet, broad-shouldered, muscled forearms; he looked tough, maybe even mean. Something about him scared her, and she wanted to run. Only the years of discipline learned on the job kept her from doing so.
Marc stood as Karen Whitlaw stepped into his cramped office. He had the usual cop's talent for sizing up people, and he used it now, studying her with eyes that gave nothing away while he noted every detail about her. If she was distressed in any way by her father's death, she didn't show it. Her expression said that she thought this was all bullshit, but she'd get through it and then get on with her life.
Pity, he thought, assessing her again, and this time with a man's eye instead of a cop's. He didn't have much use for coldhearted people, but she was a pretty woman. Mid- to late twenties, with a face that managed to be both exotic and all-American, clearly shaped but with a slant to her cheekbones, an intriguing sultriness to her dark, slightly deep-set eyes. Better than pretty, he thought, revising his opinion. She was understated, so her looks didn't jump out at a man, but she was definitely worth a second look.
Nice shape, too; medium height, slim, with high round breasts that hadn't jiggled at all when she walked. That meant they were either very firm or she wore a killer bra. On a purely physical level, he would like to find out which it was. Steadily increasing pressure in his groin told him he would like that very much. He gave a mental shrug. It happened sometimes; he'd have a strong sexual reaction to a woman he didn't even like. Mostly he ignored the urge, because the payoff wasn't worth the cost.
He held out his hand to her. "I'm Detective Chastain."
"Karen Whitlaw." Her voice was a little throaty but as composed as her face. Her fingers were cool, her hand delicate in his, her handshake brief and firm. She had beautiful hands, he noticed, with long tapered fingers and short, unpolished, oval-shaped nails. No rings. No jewelry at all except for a serviceable wristwatch and a pair of small gold balls stuck in her earlobes. Miss Whitlaw obviously didn't believe in gilding the lily, but then she really didn't have to.
Her hair was as dark as her eyes, brushed back simply from her face. It hit her shoulders with a slight undercurl. She was neat. Businesslike. Unemotional.
It was the unemotional part he didn't like. He hadn't expected her to be sobbing, but people usually exhibited some sign of grief or shock, however controlled, at the death of a family member, estranged or not. Regret usually caused a few tears even if there was no genuine grief. He couldn't see either in this self-possessed woman.
"Sit down, please." He indicated a chair, the only chair in the tiny office other than his. It was straight-backed and didn't invite people to relax and linger.
She sat, her skirt positioned to fall at the middle of her knee. She kept both feet on the floor. She was so still she reminded him of a porcelain doll. "You said on the phone that my father's death appeared to be the result of random street violence."
"Not random," he corrected, sitting down and closing a file that had been open in front of him. "Whoever killed him meant to do it. But the reason—" He shrugged. The reason could be anything, from drugs to a dispute over a cardboard box. With no witnesses, no murder weapon, no leads of any kind, the case was dead, and no one was going to put out any more effort on it.
She sat in silence for a moment. Though he would have respected at least some show of emotion or remorse, at least she wasn't yelling at him, demanding that he find her father's killer, as if she really cared what had happened to him. Marc toyed with the idea of finding out if by chance she had taken out a large insurance policy on her father. The possibility wasn't remote; money was at the bottom of a lot of murders, though it could just as easily be over something as mundane as how a steak was cooked.
"How long has it been since you saw your father or heard from him?"
"Years." She looked as if she were about to say something else, but instead, she pressed her lips firmly together and let the single word stand.
"Are there any life insurance policies on him?"
r /> "Not that I know of." Shocked, she realized what he was thinking.
"You didn't know where, or how, he was living?"
Karen sensed his hostility, though he kept his face impassive, his eyes hooded. Detective Marc Chastain definitely disapproved of her for some reason, but if he pursued the insurance angle, he would hit a dead end. Maybe he expected her to start screaming at him because he obviously wasn't working very hard to find out who had murdered her father. But she hadn't expected an all-out effort. She was a nurse; she saw all too often what happened when a homeless person was the victim of a crime. Police departments nationwide worked with limited resources, and they couldn't waste their precious time or money on useless causes. Hospitals did it all the time. Triage was necessary, or everyone lost.
She could have told him that, but she was too hot, too tired, and too stressed to care what he thought. Her head was pounding. She felt as if she were about to fly apart in all directions, her emotions roiling, and the only way to handle it was to stay in control. That was the way she did it at work, when a patient died no matter how conscientious she was in her care, no matter how good the doctor was, no matter that it was a sweet-faced child or a lively old lady with a sparkle in her eye. People died all the time. She had learned how to handle it.
"He didn't keep in touch," she finally said.
"He was a Vietnam vet." Statement, not a question.
"Yes." She knew where this was leading. The disturbed vet, in need of psych care, cast out and ignored by his family because he was too much trouble, too much of an embarrassment with his moods and rages and unpredictability.
But Detective Chastain didn't say it; he didn't have to. Karen read it in his cool, narrow-eyed gaze.
"He walked out on us when I was a child," she said sharply, more sharply than she had intended. She could feel her control frazzling, feel the jagged edge of some pain she refused to let herself identify, and sternly fought her emotions back in line. There would be time enough for that later, when she was alone and this hard-faced, dark-browed man wasn't looking at her with veiled contempt.
She didn't owe him any explanations. She didn't have to reveal the pain and anger and fear of her childhood, just so he would think better of her. All she had to do was get through the next couple of days, then return to Ohio and go back to work, to the silent, empty apartment that wasn't home yet despite having lived there for four months.
