“Facts are the only things that matter.”
“Why kill the person you love instead of the person who took them away from you?”
“That happens, too.”
“I didn’t kill my wife, Detective. After two tours in battle, I won’t even kill a spider. But somebody else who doesn’t have the same reverence for life I have murdered my wife. Find him. Please find him.”
“We will find him.”
Sam finally risked a glance at her. She was looking at him sympathetically but without pity, and it seemed strange to Sam that eyes so cold in color could impart emotion. “I’ve been in her house. I helped her move some furniture last week. My fingerprints are probably everywhere.”
Nolan shifted on her feet. He noticed she was wearing very sensible shoes, just in case she had to chase after a fleeing suspect or scale the Hollywood sign in hot pursuit of a killer. “Let us focus on the details of the crime scene. You focus on this man you saw.”
Sam nodded and returned his attention to his monitor, scrolling through unfamiliar faces on the Deaton website. The wall clock ticked away the passage of time. Nolan’s busy phone occupied her. His finger froze on his mouse when he saw the headshot of Dawson Lightner. A pretty boy with an East Coast pedigree and education. Vice President of the Art Department and Chief Cuckold Maker. “That’s him. That’s the man I saw.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Nolan’s demeanor changed from grave to anxious, eager to follow a new lead. She scrawled down some notes. “We’ll check him out.”
“Did you notify Yuki’s mother yet?”
“We’ll be going there next.”
“She’s her only living relative. In this country.”
“Thanks for letting me know. Would you like to call her first?”
Sam thought about the charming Mrs. Saito, her husband long gone and now her only child. He didn’t know her well. The language barrier had always been an impediment to forming any substantive bond. But she had respect for authority figures—maybe not a lot for him anymore because he’d come back from war all fucked up and made her daughter’s life so impossible that she’d had to move out. “It’s probably best you talk to her first. She’ll have a lot of questions I can’t answer. You probably can’t answer them either, but … well, she’d appreciate an official visit from the police.”
Nolan’s face softened and she tipped her head in understanding. The sunlight from the living room window exposed streaks of brown in her right eye. “Of course. Do you have someone you can call, Mr. Easton, someone who can be here for you?”
Melody? His mother? Dr. Frolich? Rolf? He had a veritable rogue’s gallery of support. “I do.”
“Take care. We’ll be in touch. You have my card. Contact me immediately if you think of anything else or just need to talk. Nobody should be alone at a time like this.”
“Thank you.”
“And please stay local for the time being.”
“As in don’t leave the state or the country?”
“Yes.”
“That sounds incredibly ominous.”
“It’s not. This is an active investigation, and we’d like you to be available to answer any questions that may come up, that’s all.” She stood and walked toward the door, then turned back. “Mr. Easton, if you did have something to do with your wife’s murder…”
“I didn’t.”
“Things would be better for you if you told me about it now.”
“I did not kill my wife.”
She fixed her gray eyes on him, then nodded and turned away. Sam accompanied her to the door, but she didn’t linger this time, didn’t even look back. The sun glanced off her hair, highlighting the strawberry in the blond.
He locked the door behind her, then went to the bedroom and opened the nightstand drawer—the Colt was lying there, just where he’d left it, an innocent piece of metal, meek and mild. Guns didn’t kill people, people killed people.
He took a deep, shaking breath and picked it up. His hands were slimy with sweat as he raised the muzzle to his nose. No smell of cordite from a freshly fired weapon, just the pungent scent of gun oil. He collapsed on the bed, his thoughts circumnavigating the suppressed fear and uncertainty that had driven him to examine his firearm.
I did not kill my wife.
Chapter Forty-three
“CHRIST ON A CRUTCH, IT’S LIKE a kiln in here,” Crawford grumbled as he cranked the sedan’s air-conditioning on high. “You could have parked in the shade—under that tree with the camouflage bark would have been good.”
Nolan looked at the pepper tree, its delicate silver leaves shimmying in the breeze. The branches draped and swayed gracefully, reminding her of ballerinas. With camouflage tights. “There was no shade when we got here, so stop grousing.”
“Like it or not, we have a double homicide now, even if they’re not connected in the end, and that’s plenty of reason to grouse.”
“Easton asked me if we thought they were.”
“What did you say?”
“Nothing, I just asked him another question. Do you really think they’re connected, Al?”
“They have to be. Things are looking pretty horseshit for Sam Easton right now. He’s still not clear for Gallagher now that one of his alibis is dead, and the unfaithful wife’s murder moves the needle in his direction big time.”
Nolan thought about what they knew now. Easton had been watching his wife’s house on the morning of her murder. He’d just discovered she was unfaithful, or maybe he’d known about it for a while. One of his witnesses for Gallagher’s murder was dead, and he had no one to alibi him for the time he’d been lifting weights at home today. All circumstantial, useless without physical evidence to connect him to the crime. But Crawford was right, things looked horseshit for Easton. “We don’t have any evidence on him yet, so it doesn’t matter how it looks.”
“Melody Traeger is supposedly his alibi for at least part of the morning.” Crawford let out a half-grunt, half-wheeze, heralding an allergy attack. “Funny how people they love end up dead and they’re each other’s alibis.”
“How is that funny?”
“Not funny, funny. Funny, convenient.”
Nolan appreciated her partner’s suspicious mind, but it also annoyed her sometimes. He could go from zero to full-blown conspiracy faster than a Formula One car, and she sometimes wondered if he did it intentionally, just to see if he could get her legendary ire up. Long fuse, fast burn, he called it. But she wasn’t taking the bait this morning. “We’ll see. Did you take something for your allergies?”
“No.”
“You sound like a sick moose, take something.”
“An LA girl like you knows moose sounds?”
“I watch nature shows when I can’t sleep. You want a Benadryl? I have some in my purse.”
Crawford sighed morosely. “Can’t, it’ll put me to sleep. I’m wondering about this mystery man, too, Mags.”
“What are you wondering about him?”