Judas Kiss. J.T. Ellison

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      Taylor took Derek Harris outside to chat. They got seated in the chairs on the deck, Fitz and Taylor facing Derek. He was happy to talk badly about his brother-in-law.

      “They’d been having problems for a while. Corinne swore me to secrecy. She knew she could trust me not to tell Michelle. Michelle’s a little intense. If she’d known they weren’t getting along, she’d be badgering Corinne to move out or something.”

      “Tell us what happened.”

      “Corinne didn’t say what they fought about, only that they had a huge, terrible fight. I remember she came over to Mom and Dad’s that night, she looked like she’d been crying. Anyway, we were talking after dinner. She told me he’d gotten furious with her and stormed off. She hadn’t seen him for about five days, didn’t know where he was.

      “But he came home the next day. I went over there after class to check on her, and he was sitting in the living room, drinking a beer. She had this chirpy look on her face, seemed happy that he was home. Do you think he killed her?”

      Taylor dodged the question. “What’s Todd do, Derek?”

      “He’s a contractor. Builds housing developments. The Trace, Harpeth on the Walk, those really upscale communities. He has some out-of-state projects too, that’s why he travels so much. He’s usually gone on the weekends to his off-site developments.”

      “Wolff Construction? That’s him?” Fitz asked.

      “Yeah. You know it?”

      “I looked at one of the show homes in Harpeth on the Walk. It was very nice.”

      “Todd’s great at what he does. He’s driven, always looking for a new deal. He’s a decent enough guy. Until Corinne told me about the fight, I didn’t know they had problems. I guess everyone does, but all I’ve ever seen is my parents, and they’re stupid in love with each other. Fighting wasn’t something we had a lot of growing up.”

      Must be nice. Of course, Taylor’s family didn’t fight, they were just icily polite to one another. Lacking passion, one could say.

      “Would you say that your brother-in-law was capable of hurting your sister?”

      Derek’s eyes were huge. He was young, but not young enough to miss the inference. “Jeez, I just can’t imagine him killing her. I guess anything’s possible, though.”

      That’s what she needed to hear. “Derek, thank you. If you remember anything else, please let me know.” She gave him a card. He took it and went back inside.

      She and Fitz had just started to compare notes when Taylor’s cell phone rang. She took it off her hip and looked at the number. Tim Davis.

      She answered the phone. “What’s up?”

      Tim sounded as excited as she’d ever heard him. “You need to get back over here. I think I found the murder weapon.”

      Six

      Taylor was in Corinne Wolff’s lovely walk-in closet, listening to Tim Davis. The scent of cedar was tickling her nose.

      “So I was just doing a cursory look-through, and saw a little bit of blood on the corner of the drawer. When I opened it, there it was, lying in the clothes. It was covered up, but you could see the outline plain as day. Blood soaked into the scarf covering it. Guess whoever stashed it didn’t expect us to look there.”

      Tim recreated his actions, pulling open a drawer labeled SCARVES. Nestled into the multicolored silk was a tennis racquet. It was bent and dented, and had visible blood and matter coated along the edges.

      Taylor thought about the wounds on Corinne’s body. Sam would have to confirm it at autopsy, but she thought that a tennis racquet could do the damage she’d seen. Wielded with enough force, anything could be a weapon. She asked anyway. Tim had seen it all.

      “Think this could do that much damage?”

      “Sure. It’s nice and strong. Head’s just like a ripe melon. You hit it hard enough, it’ll split open. And you know how head wounds bleed. She had a ton of gashes, that’s where all the blood came from. Enough that the poor little girl was able to cover herself in it and track it around. Someone was pretty hacked off at this woman.”

      “No kidding.” Taylor looked back into the room, at the stain where Corinne Wolff had lain on her carpet, bleeding from a dozen wounds. Not the way she’d like to go. She turned back to Tim.

      “Great job, man. This is going to help tremendously. Get it photographed and see if there’s any prints. Wouldn’t that be nice—we’d be able to wrap this thing up today.”

      “I’ll give it a good going over, Lieutenant. I love it when the criminal’s dumb enough to leave the evidence behind.”

      “No kidding. This seems to be a weapon of convenience. Her gym bag was on the bed, the racquet must have been right there. I’m wondering if he got interrupted, stashed the tennis racquet in a hurry to get out of here.”

      “Could be. Or he didn’t think we’d look in here. You know how people are. They don’t realize we actually have brains.”

      “Truer words were never spoken, my friend. Let me know if you find anything else.”

      Taylor was happy to have so СКАЧАТЬ