He drives like a madman, and it’s still not fast enough for me.
When I see the shadow of my partner’s body still in the car, I feel my knees go weak. Javier catches my arm and steadies me, and I press against him for a few seconds until I can get myself right.
The chief is standing off to the side, talking to Sergeant Porter, but he breaks off when he sees me come up to the tape line separating crime scene from lookie-loos . . . only there aren’t any, not yet. Prester’s house is isolated, an old farmstead, plain and well kept. Been in his family a hundred years, give or take. I’ve eaten at his table. There’s no one waiting inside, no grieving widow. His wife passed a few years back. He’s been alone awhile. “Kez,” he says. “You shouldn’t be here. Go on home.”
“What happened?” I ignore the rest of it. I let go of Javi and duck under the tape before anyone can stop me, and even though part of my brain is screaming at me to stop, I walk toward the car. They’ve already marked footprints in the dirt, and I’m careful to stop outside that perimeter. A forensic tech—Lewis, I think, can’t really tell because I can’t focus—murmurs at me to stay back.
I couldn’t go closer if I tried. But I force myself to look at Prester.
The body is a mannequin made of flesh. The face is ashy and relaxed and calm. It’s wearing Prester’s suit, the same one he had on when he left my room. His second-best. I can see the small fray at the left-hand tip of his lapel.
“Somebody killed him,” I say.
“No, Detective, we don’t think so. There’s no sign of violence on the body, no blood, no sign of strangulation, nothing like that. It looks like he drove in here and just . . . died,” the chief says. He’s very gentle about it. “We both know he hasn’t been well, Kez. I’m sorry.”
“Prester tried to call me at three this morning. What time did he die?”
The coroner—Winston, my God, again—says, “I can’t tell you that exactly. Somewhere between two and five, that’s my best guess right now. If you say he called at three, then from three to five. That helps narrow it down.”
I remember the cases. Sheryl Lansdowne’s go-to methods of murder. All indirect. Accidental. Natural causes. “Check him,” I whisper. “This isn’t right. It can’t be right. He was going to look into who sent me flowers—”
“Kez, you’re just out of a hospital bed,” the chief says. “Please. Let us do what we’ve got to do for Prester. He wouldn’t want you out here right now.”
Prester would want me to find his killer. I’m the reason this happened. I have to be. It can’t just happen.
Except it could. I know it could, I’ve been worrying about him, we’ve all seen how bad he’s gotten these past few weeks . . .
I look down. There are footprints in the dirt here, but they’re all large, old-fashioned men’s dress shoes.
No. Not all of them. There are smaller prints. Some kind of sneaker. I wordlessly point to them, and the chief nods. “We marked them,” he says. “But Kez—they’re about your size. You come up here sometimes, don’t you?”
I feel sick, hot, drifting. I force myself to think. “About three days ago. I brought him—” My voice fails. I try again. “I brought him out a case file.”
“Were you wearing the same shoes you have on now?”
I just shake my head. I can’t remember. I don’t know. I don’t know. What size are Sheryl Lansdowne’s shoes? No sign of violence on him—they just said so. “Look for an injection mark, something like that,” I say. “In case.”
“In case what?”
They’re all looking at me with concern. “In case somebody killed him, damn, what do you think?” I feel raw. I just want to sit down and cry right now. Those aren’t my footprints. Can’t be. I look again, and it hits me like a brick to the face that Prester has walked the last step in those stupid Florsheim dress shoes he must still have on. The ones I mocked him about just last week. Come on, old man; treat yourself to something new.
The chief pauses, face pale and older than it was the last I saw him, and then nods. “I’ll get it done. Kezia—go home. Please.” He’s humoring me. He doesn’t believe me. And there’s no damn reason he should; even I know I’m not thinking straight right now.
I don’t argue the point. There’s nothing here for me. Nothing but what I’ve already noticed. I walk with Javier back to the rental car, and before I get in, I check my phone, which is halfway recharged now.
There’s a voice mail from Prester. My heart lurches. I look wordlessly across at Javier, and he pauses in the act of opening his door. “What?”
I hold up a shaking finger to ask him to wait, and I hit the button to play the message.
Prester’s voice takes my breath away. “Claremont, I finally got hold of some-damn-body at the flower shop that made the bouquet, but they don’t have . . . it was an order off the . . . off the internet like I . . .” I gasp and put my hand over my mouth, because he’s struggling. He’s gasping. I have a recording of him dying. I can’t listen to it, I can’t.
Javier is by me in a second, taking the phone from me; I’m crying too hard to speak, and the weight of anguish inside me feels like it might take me to the ground. He listens to the recording, and I watch the grim shock settle on his face. He finally stops it and says, “Get in the car, Kez. Let me talk to the chief for you, okay?”
I can’t do anything else. I collapse into the seat, and I feel a rush of rage come over me, bad enough I want to punch the dashboard and scream the pressure out.
Prester died trying to help me.
Why?
God, why?
Javier wraps me in a warm blanket once I get home, but I can’t sit still; I need to get out of these stiff, bloody clothes. I need a shower. He’s busy in the kitchen making eggs, so I slip away, strip, and stand in the hot water and cry out my frustration and grief. I need you, partner.
I never got to say goodbye.
When I get out of the shower at last, dry off, get dressed, I see that I have a text message on my phone. When I open it up, it’s a video. In the still shot, I see that it’s Prester. Prester, in his car.
I sit down on the toilet, fast, and I breathe through the panic and pain.
Then I hit play.
Prester. Having a heart attack. And someone standing there filming him. I force myself to watch, tearing apart my heart in big, wet pieces, and then . . . then he closes his eyes and goes still.
Gone.
“At least he wasn’t alone,” a woman’s voice says. “Poor old guy.”
Then it goes dark.
Another text comes in. This didn’t need to happen. You could have let it go. Let it go this time.
Another video pops up. I hit play. It’s Javier getting out of the rental car last night in the hospital parking lot.
Another video after that. Pop, in his cabin, washing dishes. Someone filming through his window.
The storm inside me is so violent I don’t know how to feel. Terrified. Enraged. Agonized. Horrified. All at the same time, like an explosion under my skin.
And another text. Stay home, Kezia. This isn’t about you.