Confessions. JoAnn Ross

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СКАЧАТЬ drew back the cloth covering Laura Fletcher’s face. He watched the myriad emotions flicker across Mariah’s face: first shock, then startled recognition, followed an instant later by pain. Then, ultimately, love.

      When she reached out to smooth away a few strands of auburn hair from her sister’s cheek, he made a move to stop her from contaminating the evidence, then decided, what the hell.

      “That’s where she was shot?” she asked, observing the smudged wound at the left temple. Though she was almost as pale as her sister and her trembling hands betrayed her tumultuous emotions, Mariah’s voice remained steady.

      “There and in the chest.”

      “I want to see.”

      “I’m not sure—”

      She raised her chin. “I said, I want to see what was done to my sister, Sheriff.”

      Their stares locked and held. Fuck it, Trace decided. He didn’t feel up to arguing the point.

      Hoping she wasn’t going to faint on him again, he yanked back the sheet.

      At the sight of Laura’s nude body, Mariah flinched and unconsciously put a hand to her own breast as if she suddenly felt the impact of the gunshot herself.

      Trace watched her thoughtful gaze move back and forth, from one wound to the other. The lady, he decided, was no cream puff.

      “There’s carbon stippling,” she murmured, pointing out the unmistakable tattoo of powder soot imbedded in a ring around the head wound.

      “Yeah. Interesting you should recognize that.”

      She heard the question in his voice. “In case J.D. didn’t have time to fill you in, I’m a television scriptwriter. I specialize in crime shows.” She tossed off the names of a few of the more successful ones and a made-for-television movie.

      “I’ve caught a couple of those. The ones I saw were pretty accurate,” he allowed.

      “Thank you. I pride myself on my research.” She looked up at him. The earlier anguish in her eyes had been replaced by an anger much chillier than the artificially cooled air in the freezer. “You know what this proves, don’t you?”

      He crossed his arms. “Why don’t you tell me?”

      “It proves I’m right. Alan shot Laura.”

      “I’m not sure I get your drift.”

      “I don’t need a degree in forensic medicine to tell that my sister was shot from intermediate range.”

      “I’d say twelve to sixteen inches,” Trace agreed.

      “You said on the drive over here that you found her in the bedroom. In bed. Without any clothes on.”

      “Yeah.” He was still bothered about that part. Why lay out all that dough for fancy nightgowns if you weren’t going to wear them? “So?”

      “So who else would Laura have allowed to get that close to her under those circumstances?”

      “Why don’t you tell me? I didn’t know your sister.”

      “There are only two people most women will allow to see them stark naked. Their husbands and their gynecologists.”

      “What about lovers?”

      “Husbands, lovers, same thing.”

      “Sometimes not.”

      Mariah shot him a sharp look. “What the hell does that mean?”

      “It means that a woman’s husband and her lover are not necessarily always the same person.”

      “Are you accusing my sister of having an affair?”

      He thought of the ribbon-bound letters and shrugged. “At this point I’m not ready to accuse anyone of anything.”

      “She was not having an affair.”

      “Whatever you say. Are you finished looking?”

      Her mind reeling with what the sheriff had just implied, Mariah dragged her gaze back to Laura’s body, looking at it so intently Trace thought she might be memorizing her sister’s features. She was.

      “Yes.” She bit her lip as he drew the sheet back over the lifeless form.

      Her emotions in a turmoil, Mariah latched on to the one thing she could handle right now. It was up to Mariah to make certain Laura’s killer did not get away.

      “It was Alan,” she insisted.

      “Maybe.” He shrugged. “Maybe not.”

      Frustrated, Mariah tried another tack. “Did you find the weapon in the house?”

      “Sorry. But I’m not at liberty to discuss the investigation.”

      “Not even with the victim’s next of kin?”

      “No offense intended, Ms. Swann, but technically the senator’s the next of kin.”

      Mariah’s response to that was an earthy, pungent curse.

      Trace turned off the lights. They were walking back down the dingy hallway when Mariah suddenly said, “Could you tell me where the rest rooms are?”

      Her face had turned the color of the puke green walls. “Right around the corner. First door to the left.”

      She was gone before he could finish his instructions.

      After throwing up, Mariah splashed her face with cold water, then swirled more water that carried the scent and flavor of chlorine around in her mouth. She dug through her purse and located a lint-covered peppermint Life Saver, which she popped into her mouth. Then, taking a deep breath, she rejoined Trace, who was waiting exactly where she’d left him. “You okay?” His gaze briefly swept over her too pale face.

      “Fine. Thanks,” Mariah lied.

      Although the basement was a great deal warmer than the autopsy room, she still felt chilled all the way to the bone. She felt, Mariah thought bleakly, as cold as Laura.

      His sharp eyes caught the slight shiver she tried to conceal. “My office is upstairs. How about I buy you a cup of coffee? Or tea,” he amended, thinking about her dash to the toilet.

      The way her nerves were jangling, the one thing Mariah didn’t need was any caffeine. But she’d try anything to warm up. “Tea always makes me feel like a kid with flu. But I could use some coffee, thank you.”

      His office, tucked away in a corner on the third floor, was shabby, but neat. Two chairs, covered in an uninspiring mud-hued Herculon dating back to the earth tones of the 1970s, sat in front of a weathered pine desk.

      A law enforcement recruiting poster featured a scrubbed and polished young man in a starched СКАЧАТЬ