Chapter 18
Kinsley Aspen
July
Kinsley jabbed at the elevator button a second time, though the illuminated circle confirmed her initial press had registered.
Her head was starting to throb with the dull, persistent ache that came from too little sleep and too much caffeine, a combination she’d been running on for the better part of a week.
She needed to change something in her routine if she was going to survive the foreseeable future of peering over her shoulder, but the Bell case kept filling every hour that wasn’t already occupied by Gantz-related anxiety, and sleep had become the thing she sacrificed to accommodate both.
The elevator doors finally slid open with a soft ding, cutting off her thoughts.
She stepped inside and pressed the button for the fifth floor, trying to focus on Paul Fisher’s parting revelation about Shannon Utgoff.
Something didn’t add up with Richard Bell’s relationship with her, and the inconsistency had been nagging at Kinsley since she’d walked out of Fisher’s office.
Why would a woman break off an affair with her wealthy, married boss and then resign from her job, all within a week of his daughter’s funeral?
The timing suggested more than grief or moral reckoning.
It suggested fear, or guilt, or the sudden possession of knowledge that made staying in Fallbrook untenable.
People didn’t uproot their lives on principle alone.
They did it when staying put became more dangerous than leaving.
The doors began to close when a hand shot between them, triggering the safety sensor. They bounced apart, revealing Walter Elm.
Wally’s physical appearance didn’t match what most people imagined when they thought of a medical examiner.
He wasn’t pale or lean. He didn’t wear glasses, and he certainly wasn’t an introvert.
He was the complete opposite. A man with the frame of a linebacker, dark stubble on his jaw that added a rugged charm, and piercing blue eyes that had reportedly melted the hearts of several women in Fallbrook and at least one judge during a particularly contentious autopsy report dispute.
He stepped into the elevator with the energy of someone who had already consumed his body weight in coffee and was looking for a reason to keep the momentum going.
“How much?”
Kinsley knew immediately what he was asking about. She normally would have strung him along regarding the preseason tickets, drawing out the negotiation for her own entertainment, but she didn’t have the time or the energy today.
“It’s your lucky day,” Kinsley said, figuring she was about to be his favorite person.
“Dylan’s got his hands full with the farm, and Olivia just told me that she and Ben can’t get any more time off in August. I should have a few extra.
I’ll make sure to save at least one for you, plus Izzy and Alex. ”
“Sweet,” Wally said, rubbing his hands together with undisguised glee. “I’m scheduling our Fantasy Football draft for the last week of August. We drafted too early last year, and half my picks were busted by Week Three. I’m hoping the Vikings have their quarterback situation sorted out by then.”
“Speak for yourself,” Kinsley said with a laugh, knowing full well that he was still sore over her win from last season. “You’re just mad that you didn’t take a chance on the Panthers’ rookie wide receiver.”
“Fifth floor?” Wally asked, his gaze catching the illuminated number on the panel.
“Changing the subject?” Kinsley flashed him a smile.
“Don’t tell me Thompson kicked you out of homicide,” Wally jested as he reached forward to press the fourth-floor button. He was too late, regardless, because the elevator had already reached the fifth floor. The doors slid open with a chime. “What did you do this time?”
“Not a thing, thank you very much,” Kinsley replied, stepping off the elevator. “Toby and I commandeered the large conference room up here. We need the space to sort through everything we’re pulling from the Bell case.”
She turned and held the door with her hand before it could close, struck by a thought that wouldn’t let her step away.
“Why are you stopping in on the fourth floor?”
“Thompson asked me to drop by.” Wally shrugged, his expression suggesting genuine uncertainty about the purpose. “Didn’t say what for, though.”
A ripple of unease moved through Kinsley’s stomach.
Captain Thompson rarely requested face-to-face meetings with the medical examiner unless there was a development in an active case that required coordination between departments.
She mentally reviewed what was currently on the docket, running through the open investigations she was aware of, and came up short.
There weren’t many cases that would warrant pulling Wally in for an unscheduled conversation.
“One of Shane’s cases? The domestic homicide from last weekend?”
“I have no idea, but if this is about the city budget, I’m not walking back my request for upgraded autopsy tables, better forensic tools, and new imaging equipment.
” Wally crossed his arms with the stubborn conviction of a man who had been fighting this battle for years.
“The old stuff is barely functional. I told the finance committee last quarter that I’m one equipment failure away from having to perform autopsies with a kitchen knife and a flashlight. ”
Kinsley hesitated, searching his expression for any indication that the impromptu request from Thompson might be connected to her.
To Gantz. To anything she couldn’t afford to have examined by the county medical examiner.
Finding nothing in Wally’s open, unconcerned face that suggested he was being summoned about her, she slowly withdrew her hand, gave him a small smile, and allowed the doors to close.
She stood staring at the scuffed metal of the elevator doors for longer than she intended, the weight of Shane’s continued absence pressing against her more acutely than it had yesterday.
It had been a full week since their confrontation about Gantz, a week of silence and avoidance that had settled into a pattern she couldn’t see a way to break.
His desk had shown signs of occasional use, a moved file here, a fresh coffee ring there, but she hadn’t seen him face-to-face since he’d stood on her porch.
She’d hoped enough time would have softened his position or at least prompted him to acknowledge her existence beyond the barest professional courtesy.
So far, the silence held.
She wasn’t sure how long she’d been standing in front of the elevator, lost in thoughts she couldn’t afford, when the soft chime startled her back to the present.
The doors slid open, and one of Stretch’s junior technicians stood inside the car, clearly surprised to find her standing inches from the threshold.
She stepped back instinctively, but not before noticing that he was holding a clear evidence bag containing two cassette tapes.
“Detective Aspen, I was just coming to find you.”
“Perfect timing.” Kinsley forced a smile and extended her hand to receive what she hoped was processed evidence. “All done with those?”
“Yes, but you should know that we discovered an additional set of fingerprints on these two,” the technician replied before relinquishing the evidence bag. “They don’t match the foreclosure crew or anyone we’ve already cataloged. We’re running the prints through the system now.”
“Thanks, Les.” Kinsley glanced down at the cassette tapes through the clear plastic, turning the bag over in her hands. “Anything back yet on the prints found on the duffel bag?”
“Yes, actually. They match a male subject by the name of Todd Kusman. I went ahead and—”
“Todd Kusman?”
“Yes,” Les responded, pulling back slightly when she slapped his upper arm in victory.
“There are donuts in your future, Les.”
“You—”
Kinsley didn’t give the technician time to finish.
She was already moving down the hallway, her pace quickening with renewed purpose.
Todd Kusman’s fingerprints on the duffel bag.
The same Todd Kusman who had claimed to be in a hurry to join the block party the night Iris died, too much of a hurry to notice a front door standing wide open directly across the street from his own house.
The same Todd Kusman who had arrived home suspiciously early during his wife’s interview, and whose entrance had carried the urgency of a man who knew exactly what was being discussed in his living room.
His prints on the bag didn’t prove he’d killed Iris, but they proved he’d touched the container that held ten thousand dollars in blackmail money.
When Kinsley pushed open the heavy conference room door, the scale of the operation inside gave her pause.
Toby had outdone himself.
Four uniformed officers sat around the massive oak table, each wearing headphones connected to vintage tape recorders that had probably been unearthed from the station’s basement storage. Some standard size, and others miniature.
The officers typed on department laptops that had seen far better days, occasionally rewinding the recorders to catch details they’d missed, their faces set in the concentrated expressions of people doing tedious but important work.
The air had the stale quality of a room that had been occupied for hours, and two empty pizza boxes sat on a side table next to a cluster of coffee cups.
On the far side of the room, Toby stood before three large whiteboards that had probably been wheeled in from various departments.
Each was covered with names, dates, connections, and potential motives, written in different colors of marker that Kinsley assumed corresponded to a system he’d devised.
Much better than the one she’d created on the fourth floor.
Toby was adding another name to the already crowded third board when he caught sight of her in the doorway.