Chapter Twelve
Relief surged through Chloe as Brian’s truck pulled into the parking lot of her apartment building.
Daisy exited the vehicle first, and came bounding straight toward Chloe, and leaned against her, as if to offer a comforting hug.
Brian followed, not running, but walking quickly. “Are you okay?” he asked.
Chloe petted Daisy, resisting the urge to throw herself into Brian’s arms. “I called the sheriff but they’re dealing with an emergency and said I might have to wait for help.” She straightened. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“We had an inbound avalanche this afternoon,” he said. “One fatality and one serious injury that required Life Flight. That’s probably what tied up the sheriff’s office.” He glanced up toward her apartment. “But what happened here?”
“Someone has ransacked my apartment.” She hugged herself, unable to get warm despite her heavy coat.
Brian put his arm around her. She leaned into him. “Ransacked?” he asked. “You mean, torn apart?”
She nodded. “The sofa cushions slashed. Every drawer and cabinet emptied. Everything in my closet dumped on the floor.” She closed her eyes, remembering the scene.
“I was so stunned. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing at first. Then I was terrified whoever did that was still around, so I ran outside and called the sheriff.
And then I called you.” She studied his face, blond beard stubble along his jaw, earnest brown eyes, expression slightly troubled.
“I worried you wouldn’t answer the phone when you saw my number. ”
He shoved both hands into the pockets of his parka.
“I know I said we should stay away from each other, but I couldn’t let you deal with something like this on your own.
” He tucked his chin into his jacket, shoulders hunched.
“You don’t think this has anything to do with the two of us seeing each other, do you? ” he asked.
“No. The way that apartment looked…” Remembering the violence of the damage inside her home made her move into his arms once more.
“I think whoever did this was looking for something,” she said.
“Thanks for coming. I couldn’t be alone.
And I don’t care what anyone thinks.” She hadn’t realized until she met Brian how alone she had been before.
The thought of going through trying to figure out her sister’s death without him alongside her brought stinging tears.
His arms tightened around her. “I was miserable staying away from you,” he said. She pressed her face to his shoulder. He smelled of cold snow and dog fur.
Something nudged her knee and she looked down to see Daisy leaning against her, a look of concern on the dog’s normally cheerful face. Chloe reached down and brushed the top of the dog’s head with the tips of her fingers.
The crunch of tires on the icy road announced a new arrival.
A sheriff’s department SUV turned into the parking lot and drove toward them.
Chloe moved away from Brian and turned to face the deputy who emerged from the vehicle.
He was tall, with the weedy body of an adolescent, a smooth jaw and wide blue eyes adding to his boyish look.
Chloe wouldn’t have been surprised if his voice had cracked when he spoke.
But no cracks. “Chloe Anderson?” he asked.
“Yes. I called about a break-in at my apartment.”
“Deputy Schneider.” He glanced at Brian. “Who are you?”
“Brian Weeks. I’m a friend of Ms. Anderson’s.”
The deputy’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing. “Which apartment is yours?” he asked Chloe.
“Second floor. Number 216.”
“Tell me what happened.”
She gave the same description she had given Brian—slashed cushions, dumped belongings. “Drawers and closets emptied like that—sounds to me like a search for something,” Schneider said. “Do you have any drugs? Anyone else’s belongings they might be trying to get back?”
“No! There’s nothing like that.”
“Is anything missing from your apartment?” the deputy asked.
“I don’t know. I was afraid whoever did all of that might still be in there.”
“All right. Let’s walk up and have a look.” The deputy led the way up the stairs to the door of the apartment. He tried the knob. “It’s locked,” he said.
“I know.” She moved in front of him, key in hand. “It locks automatically when you close it.”
He stopped her before she could insert the key. “Was the door open when you arrived this evening?” he asked.
“No. I had to open it with my key.”
“Who else has a key?” the deputy asked.
“No one else.”
He looked at Brian. “Do you have a key?”
“No.”
“Would a former roommate or an ex have a key?”
“No. The only person who ever had a key was my sister, Sharee Anderson.”
The deputy’s expression sharpened. “Your sister who was murdered?”
She looked away, her throat tight. “Yes.”
“What happened to her key?”
“I don’t know.” She hadn’t even thought about Sharee’s key before now. “Isn’t it with the rest of the belongings she had with her when she was killed? They should all be at the sheriff’s department.”
“I’ll have to check with the people assigned to her case,” the deputy said. He turned to Brian. “You need to wait out here while Ms. Anderson and I check out the apartment. The fewer people who walk through here the better.”
“All right.” He stepped back while Chloe unlocked the door and pushed it open.
“Don’t touch anything,” the deputy said. “I want you to tell me if you notice anything that doesn’t belong to you in here. Or anything that should be here but isn’t.”
She stepped carefully over the shards of a broken lamp, past a sofa cushion spilling stuffing. The violence of the scene chilled her. “Whoever did this must have been here for a long time,” she said.
“They didn’t merely toss the place, they destroyed it,” the deputy said.
She fought a wave of nausea. “Where were you this afternoon?” the deputy asked.
“I was at work. I own the Moon Glow Spa and Salon. I had a client scheduled for treatments all afternoon.” She stopped, struck breathless by a sudden realization.
“What’s wrong?” the deputy asked.
“The client. She said her name was Bunny Allerton. She came in yesterday and made a big deal about having me do all these treatments—a facial, manicure and pedicure. I had to personally wait on her. And then she didn’t show up today for those appointments.
I tried calling but she either didn’t answer, or I got a busy signal.
Do you think she was trying to make sure I wouldn’t be at my apartment? ”
“Can you describe this woman?”
“She had long blonde hair—but it might have been a wig. My coworker, a hairdresser, said she thought it was a wig. She was heavily made up—thick makeup, false eyelashes.”
“What was she wearing when you saw her?”
“A gold jumpsuit and a long fur coat.” Chloe frowned. “Really, the whole getup was more like a costume than something an ordinary person would wear.”
“Would you recognize her again if you saw her?”
“If she was dressed the same, maybe. But her outfit and makeup and hair were so outrageous I really focused on them, instead of the real person.”
“Do you have an address for this person?”
“No. Only the phone number. I don’t even know if her real name is Bunny Allerton.”
“I’ll take down her information and we’ll try to contact her. In the meantime, let’s keep looking and see if you spot anything out of place.”
She avoided Sharee’s room until the last. She stopped in the doorway, the deputy right behind her. “This was my sister’s room,” she said. “The sheriff’s investigators already took a lot of things—her computer and diary and stuff.”
“Is there anything missing now that the investigators hadn’t removed?” he asked.
Chloe stared at the piles of clothing and bedding filling the floor, the fabric viciously slashed over and over.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I just don’t know.
” Her shoulders shook and she began to sob.
She hadn’t seen her sister’s body when they found her, only Sharee’s pale, still face as she lay on a table in the morgue, and the one arm with the tattoo at the wrist. But that mattress—cut to pieces.
Someone had done that level of violence to her sister. The reality of that hit her hard.
The deputy took her arm and led her out of the apartment, to the hallway where Brian waited. He wrapped his arms around her. “Let’s go outside,” Brian said. “You don’t need to be here anymore.”
They walked past neighbors who had gathered in the parking lot. She could feel their curious stares, hear the murmur of conversation. That’s the woman whose sister was murdered. What’s going on now?
Brian led her to his truck. He found a blanket and wrapped her in it, and someone brought her a cup of coffee so hot the first sip scalded her tongue.
The pain provided a welcome distraction.
They sat together in the front of the truck, Chloe wrapped in the blanket, Daisy wedged between the two of them, half draped over her.
Men and women from the sheriff’s department arrived and moved in and out of the apartment, but no one tried to speak with her.
Finally, a familiar figure broke away from a group of officers and came to her. Detective Renfro had even deeper bags beneath his eyes. He stared at Brian. “Where were you between noon and six p.m. today?” he asked.
“I was at work at SkyCrest,” Brian said. “Most of that time I was responding to the avalanche at Ransom Ridge. Plenty of people saw me.”
“All right.” Renfro looked to Chloe. “You’ll need to spend a couple of nights somewhere else,” he said. “It’s going to take us a while to finish our investigation, then you’ll need to have the place cleaned. And you’ll want to have the locks changed.”
“Were you able to get hold of Bunny Allerton?” she asked.
“We left a message for Ms. Allerton to call us,” Renfro said.
“Did you find out if Sharee’s house keys are at the sheriff’s department?” she asked.
“Sharee didn’t have any keys with her when she was found.”
“She had her keys with her when she left that night,” Chloe said. “I’m sure of it.”