Chapter 1
Chapter One
Kane
I downed the rest of my coffee before I threw the cup in the bin on the way to the police tape they’d secured around the Victorian house.
I sighed as I looked around from the neighbors clamoring for information to the young officers holding them back.
They all expected to be told what was happening in their neighborhood, the upper class were like that.
I stepped up to the side, and lifted the tape so I could glide underneath.
“Garrick,” I heard one of the senior officers named O’Brien call me over.
“O’Brien,” I said. “What are we lookin’ at?”
“Suspicious death,” he said. “Hysterical wife who happens to be intoxicated, rich couple, husband has a wealth of enemies.”
Good.
It’ll be an open and shut case.
Not.
High society types were always the hardest cases. No one spoke, no one knew anything, they all wanted to help but instead impeded the case just so they could say to their rich friends that they knew more than anyone else. Another cold case to add to my pile.
“Detective Garrick,” I heard a familiar voice call me. I looked for the source and groaned when I recognised the man calling me over.
Stanley Dale was a nuisance investigative reporter who covered crimes in East Wendell.
The city I grew up in and loved was nothing like the Northern Texan town it had been when I was young.
. I suppose I should be happy that it gave me more work with the amount of crime committed now, but instead, it made me sad for the town and its people.
Stanley had been trying to tell me about a repeat offender for months now, but his research was hard to make out and from what the old fellas told me, he was a nutter.
In a word, he was obsessed and wouldn’t let a sleeping dog lie.
I made my way over to him, amongst neighbors and other reporters, as he tried to get my attention.
“I tried to tell you,” he said. “It’s her. It’s the black widow.”
Jesus, I did not have enough caffeine in my system for this conversation right now.
“Stan, please don’t tell me this is about that case you brought me last month.”
“It’s her. I tried to warn him too but he thought I was crazy. Now he’s dead, and she’s going to move onto her next victim after cashing in. That’s just what she does.”
I swiped my hand over the top of my head, feeling how greasy my hair had become and taking a mental note that I needed to wash it. “Stan, I told you, your leads didn’t pan out. If you continue to harass her, she can file a suit against you.”
God only knew what the husband thought of him talking about his wife like she was a killer.
I felt bad for the kid, he was so serious about what he claimed to be a black widow but he just lacked proof.
He needed to move on before he lost his mind or got himself sued.
Or worse, arrested. Just looking at him, he would not handle prison.
“I’m not going to stop until she’s caught.”
Fuck, black widows weren’t that common anymore. Divorce was the way to go, and everyone knew it. Most judges ruled in favor of the wife in most cases. Less hassle.
“Just don’t make me arrest you, Stan, my cells are filled to the brim. It won’t be a fun time for you.”
I caught sight of my partner, Tommy, at the door to the old Victorian home. I headed up the stairs and into the house. Officers and CSI were moving through the house, doing their thing.
“Booties,” the head of the CSI team ordered, looking down at my feet.
“Come on, Sal,” I complained. She was a take no bullshit woman who had been through four divorces in twenty years. She didn’t give a shit and I loved her for it but she also pissed me off when she demanded I put these little paper booties on at every house we had to enter.
“Booties. Now.”
I grabbed the paper things off her and shoved them over my shoes before following Tommy down the hall. I noticed no photos on the walls, everything in the house was sterile, and well, full of wealth.
“What do we know?” I asked him.
“Not much, wife was home but only heard the sound of a thud which would be him falling to the ground. She came down the stairs to find him like this.”
“You believe her?”
“Yeah, she seems believable. In shock, but she’s got tears and that hysterical edge to her tone. There’s a bottle on the table with a note. Looks like someone laced a bottle of wine with poison. We’ll need to wait for the results from the lab to confirm.”
I looked down at the glass at the kitchen door, back at Tommy.
“She dropped her glass when she saw him,” he answered.
I stepped over the shards and entered the kitchen, taking in the sweet almond smell coming from the man’s vomit on the floor.
It was coming off in wafts as I took in his purple-red face.
His neck and face were swollen. It had to be a lot of cyanide to do this.
The almond smell was a telltale sign. Not everyone could smell it, but I’d always been able to.
I looked at the note, reading:
Thank you for your help. I’ll forever be grateful.
Doris x
“Doris?”
Tommy shrugged. “No one’s mentioned Doris and the wife doesn’t know who Doris could be.”
“Possible mistress,” I said, more to myself than anyone else.
Looking around, I was looking for something out of place but there was nothing. It was a tidy house. I opened the refrigerator and noticed drinks, and easy snacks but nothing that told me that they ate in all that often. Not many wealthy couples did.
“Is this their only house?” I asked.
“No,” a female’s broken voice said from the door.
I looked over to see a beautiful woman with tear stained cheeks standing there.
Her purple blouse was tucked into her pencil skirt.
She was the picture of elegance and wealth.
She had her brunette hair pinned up in a clip at the back of her head, a few tendrils had fallen from the clip and hung down on the sides of her face.
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
Her lip quivered as I would expect and I looked down to stop myself from intruding on a grievous moment for her.
“Thank you, Detective. I was hoping to leave this house. I just– I don’t like being here, not right now. Can I please go?”
“Ah yeah, that should be fine,” I said, looking at Tommy. “My partner can take you to another location.” She nodded at him and he followed her out.
I made a mental note of everything I saw and headed out, and down the steps. Tommy was putting the wife in a car as I headed to mine and drove back to the station.
I had a feeling that this case was going to be a hard one. I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off. I had to find out what it was before the Captain rode my ass. I was already on his last nerve.
My intuition hadn’t failed me yet, I just hoped this wouldn't be the case that broke me.
Stan was heading to his car as I started my engine and my mind went back to our conversation.
He believed the woman was a black widow.
I didn’t get that vibe off her, but that didn’t mean I shouldn’t check it out.
There was something about her…something that I couldn’t put my finger on, but I’d figure it out. I always did.
I headed to the station and ran up the stairs from the carpark underneath.
Acknowledging the men on my floor, and from my unit, I headed to my desk and looked through the stack of papers in my tray.
I found the folder Stan had dropped off with his notes full of conspiracies and scribbled notes.
It screamed crazy if you weren’t a seasoned detective like myself.
I knew what it was like to be obsessed with something that you knew wasn’t right but no one listened.
It’s why I was on the Captain's last nerve, and probably would be for a while yet, unless he fired my ass and then where would I be? This is all I’d ever done, I wouldn’t even know what to do if I weren’t a damn cop.
I’d merely skimmed the folder before, but if Stan was so adamant, maybe I should look at it again. It couldn’t hurt.
“Garrick,” I heard my captain call me from his office.
Shit.
I put the folder down and headed into his office, the tension coming off him in waves.
He’d had to cover my ass for my former partner’s dickhead move of becoming obsessed with his case to the point he was stalking a fucking senator.
He was now incarcerated for pissing the wrong people off.
Now, O’Leary was trying to keep me employed, because we both knew I was the best he had.
“You were at the new crime scene this morning.”
I nodded. “Yeah, husband died, looks like poison.”
“Wife?”
“Unsure,” I said. “Tommy’s keeping an eye on her.”
“Good,” he replied. “Just came from a meeting with the brass. Money’s tight, I can’t sign off on overtime for a while. Keep the case going, but know the limits. Head down on this one, Garrick.”
I nodded. “Sure thing, boss.”
“Wrap it up quick,” he said as I headed out. “We don’t need any more issues with the high society pricks who run this town.”
I sighed. “Got it.”
I grunted as I got back to my desk. My last partner, Henry, had been hellbent on bringing down Senator Campbell for his fraudulent practices and work with “escorts”, and had pushed the boundaries of police work and vigilantism. It almost brought down the unit, and sent him to prison for four years.
He was in protective custody but he was still a cop in prison, and that ain’t a place you wanted to be.