Moore chuckled. “Your concern is duly noted, but I’ll take my chances. This is your case. I’ve never cared for the way certain federal agencies play.”

  Kerri nodded her understanding.

  “Asher Walsh died by the same manner and cause as Mr. Kurtz. Except,” Moore qualified, “his lab work came back with a positive hit. He had used cocaine before he died.”

  Kerri and Falco shared another look. Asking the ME if he was certain wasn’t necessary. He was, or he wouldn’t have released the information.

  “Thank you, Dr. Moore,” Falco said. “This could be very helpful.”

  Kerri thanked him as well before following Falco from the room. They didn’t speak until they were out of the building and halfway to their vehicles, but tension throbbed as thick as coagulated blood between them. Words weren’t necessary to understand something was way, way off.

  Falco stopped and turned to her. “Are you buying this?” He shrugged. “I mean, there’s plenty of people out there who preach one thing while doing the other. Just because Walsh stayed on his soapbox about drugs doesn’t mean he didn’t dabble.”

  “No question,” Kerri agreed, though every instinct she possessed was screaming at her that this was wrong, wrong, wrong. “But his aunt seems awfully certain he was squeaky clean.” Kerri was the one shrugging now. “Then again, sometimes family is the last to know.” On a purely personal level the idea scared the hell out of her.

  Falco’s gaze narrowed, and his lips thinned. “But not Cross.” He moved his head side to side. “Cross is adamant about Walsh’s antidrug standing. The aunt might have missed the mark when reading her nephew, but Cross wouldn’t have. No way. He wouldn’t be able to fool her.”

  “I have to agree with you there. I can’t see Sadie missing that about him.” Kerri drew in a deep breath, mostly to slow the pounding in her chest. She watched the anger dance across her partner’s face.

  “They want us to believe Walsh was buying from Kurtz,” he said, the fury simmering in his voice.

  Kerri could see the beauty in the plan. It flipped everything. “It was a simple drug deal gone wrong. Territory dispute or something like that.”

  Falco braced his hands on his hips. “I saw this kind of cover-up all the time when I was undercover. This is the way you shift attention to make the potential witness or, in this case, the victim, look dirty. Walsh loses credibility, and the investigation turns in a whole different direction.”

  “How do you suppose his father is going to react to this?”

  “I was wondering the same thing.” Falco’s nostrils flared with a big breath. “Someone is working hard to change the direction of this investigation. Someone who was there the night Walsh and Kurtz died.”

  “The shooter,” Kerri suggested, “or the one who gave the order.”

  “Cross thinks McGill may have been the source Kurtz and Walsh were going to confront.”

  Kerri considered the idea, then said, “What do you think?”

  “I think she’s onto something. McGill had opportunity. She could be the link between the shop and the cartel’s local, low-level distributor. Cross thinks her motive is money. She’s doing some more digging.” He held Kerri’s gaze for a moment. “Whatever she finds, this is going to get ugly, Devlin.”

  “This case isn’t the only one getting ugly.”

  Falco cocked his head. “What’d you find out from your friend?”

  “Sue says there was a girl—she wouldn’t ID the kid—who came to her about Alice Cortez’s bizarre behavior.” Kerri shrugged. “Rituals related to Santeria. Allegedly, Alice and the two girls who attempted suicide were practicing these bizarre rituals. Sue insisted on speaking to the girl before giving me her name. She’s supposed to call me as soon as she has talked to her.”

  “There are extremists who do some weird shit in the name of Santeria,” Falco said. “Did you learn anything about the family who took in the Cortez girl?”

  “That’s another strange aspect of all this. I can’t find anything on these people before August of last year. It’s like they appeared out of thin air to be available for Alice. Their Alabama driver’s licenses were issued in August of last year. They rented the house here in the same month. Bought the big Escalade they drive in August. The man, José Cortez, started his job at a warehouse over by the port in August. The woman has a nursing degree from UAB, yet I couldn’t find any record of her attending the University of Alabama here or anywhere else.”

  “Sounds like someone set up new identities for these folks and planted them here.”

  Kerri nodded. “Like a bought-and-paid-for, ready-made family.”

  “Damn.” Falco shook his head. “What about Alice? Did you find anything on her?”

  “Not one thing except that she supposedly lived in Mexico with her parents, who died in a car crash, and now she’s here. It’s all very vague. The dead father was supposedly the brother of the man, José Cortez, who took Alice in. It’s all too clean but at the same time very ambiguous.”

  “Less information provides less to dissect,” Falco offered.

  “Exactly.” Kerri frowned. “It’s hard to follow leads when there are none.”

  “Maybe,” Falco said slowly as if he were still laying out the theory in his head, “these people are in witness protection?”

  “I considered that possibility,” Kerri granted, “but I figured if it was the feds, they would have moved the family out of Alabama as soon as that first trouble happened at Walker Academy.”

  “Yeah, yeah. They would have. Definitely.” Falco considered their limited information. “Unless no one informed the family’s contact. Alice’s name didn’t come up—publicly, anyway—in the Walker Academy incident. So far, no one’s fingered her in the Myers girl’s death. It’s possible there’s a lapse in communication. Whatever is going on, it’s way wrong.”

  “It is, and I can’t confirm enough facts to make any movement in the right direction,” Kerri admitted. “I feel like I’m spinning my wheels.”

  “How’s Tori holding up?”

  “She’s sad, depressed, scared.” Kerri should be at home with her right now. Damn this job!

  “Look.” Falco reached for her arm, gave it a squeeze. “You can’t do this alone or even with just my help. This thing just gets bigger and creepier. You need to take what you’ve learned to the LT.”

  Kerri shook her head. “He’ll be pissed I’ve been nosing around.”

  “He’ll get over it. If something else happens with this Alice girl, no one can say you didn’t do all within your power to head it off.”

  He was right. “Okay. I’ll go see the LT; then I’m going home to my daughter. Did you learn anything else from McGill that might substantiate Cross’s suspicions?”

  He scrubbed at his unshaven chin. That was something else about her partner that had driven her crazy at first. He didn’t shave every day like the other male detectives in MID. He seemed to prefer that scruffy look. Not that it was a bad look on him, just not the norm for his current position.

  “I think she’s trying to play me.”

  “Play you or play with you?” Kerri teased.

  “Ha ha, Devlin. She has all these elaborate excuses and alibis. You were just talking about vague; hers are too full of detail. She’s covering her skinny ass. I just don’t know if her motive is murder.”

  “Sounds like she has something to hide. She was the last person to see Kurtz alive—besides his shooter, I mean.” Kerri squared her shoulders, ignored the exhaustion pulling at her. “Anything else I need to know?”

  “Not yet. Go.” He jerked his head toward her Wagoneer. “Talk to the LT.”

  “I’m going. I’ll catch up with you later.”

  He gave her a two-fingered salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Kerri laughed as she climbed into the driver’s seat. Her partner was right. It was better to give her thoughts to the LT than risk more trouble by keeping potentially significant information to herself.

  Birmingham Police Department

  First Avenue North, 5:00 p.m.

  “You just caught me, Devlin,” Brooks said as he shouldered into his jacket.

  Kerri closed the door behind her, giving them privacy from anyone else who might stroll by the LT’s office. “I have some information I need to pass along.” She braced herself and said the rest. “It’s about the Brendal Myers case.”

  Pushing back the sides of the jacket he’d only just slipped into, Brooks sat his hands on his hips. “Devlin, I warned you to stay clear.”

  “I know, but a friend who was concerned about my daughter called me,” she improvised. Lied. Whatever. At this point all that mattered was ensuring this aspect of the case was investigated thoroughly. “She and I went to school together. She’s the librarian over at Walker Academy. Has been for years.”

  “All right, I’ll bite. What did this friend have to say that you feel I need to hear?”

  “Alice Cortez attended Walker Academy last semester. There was trouble, and she transferred to Brighton at the beginning of the new semester. January.”

  The LT stopped prepping to leave the office. “What kind of trouble?”

  She had his attention now. “Two girls attempted suicide. Thankfully they weren’t successful.” Before he could ask how that tied into the Brighton Academy situation, she told him the rest of what Sue had shared with her.

  “If I’m understanding you correctly,” he said, sounding dubious, “you think this Alice Cortez might be playing some sort of cultlike games to prompt other students into doing her bidding.”

  When he said it that way, it sounded like something from a Scooby-Doo episode. “I’m saying there was trouble last fall when Alice attended Walker Academy, and now there’s trouble at Brighton. She was friends with the girls involved in the incident at Walker, and she’s friends with the girls involved at Brighton. Coincidence? Maybe. But it’s something Sykes and Peterson need to check out.”

  Brooks mulled over her story for a bit, his brow lined in concentration. The LT was barreling toward sixty, but he looked like a forty-year-old. The man was a health nut and addicted to working out. More importantly, he was a good listener, a fair leader, and a damned good cop.

  “What you’re telling me is an interesting twist and one that bears further investigation,” he agreed. “I’ll have Sykes and Peterson give it a go. I appreciate the heads-up, Devlin, as I am sure they will.”

  Kerri managed her first decent breath since walking into his office. “Thank you, sir. No one wants this case solved more than me.”

  “I’m very much aware of your personal interest in this case, Devlin.” He grabbed his briefcase. “But I will remind you again; stay out of the investigation. Sykes and Peterson have got this. I don’t want to hear about you digging around again. Are we understood?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Go home, Devlin. That’s exactly where I’m going.”

  “Good night, sir.”

  Devlin Residence

  Twenty-First Avenue South

  Birmingham, 6:30 p.m.

  Kerri had left the office, driven straight to her sister’s house to pick up her daughter and then home. She needed some alone time with Tori. She wasn’t sure exactly how she would go about this diplomatically, but she wasn’t going to sleep until she’d had this talk with Tori.

  She started with, “You want me to order Chinese?”

  Tori tossed her backpack onto the sofa. She never bothered taking it to her room if her homework was done. “Sure.”

  Kerri made the call and then sat down on the sofa next to her daughter. “Can we talk until the food arrives?”

  Tori shrugged. “Guess so.”

  “I spoke to someone at the school Alice attended last fall.”

  Tori’s eyes rounded. “About what?”

  “I wanted to find out if there was any trouble there when Alice attended. I have a friend who works at Walker Academy, and I asked her.”

  “Did she tell you something?” Uncertainty, hope welled in her voice and eyes.

  Kerri nodded. “She told me about a group of girls Alice hung out with. There was some trouble, but no one died, thankfully. One of the girls talked about this religious stuff Alice was into. I think they were doing some sort of rituals. Not at school, of course.”

  Tori looked away.

  Kerri’s gut clenched. “You mentioned that you didn’t like visiting Alice’s house. Can you tell me more about that? It could be really important.”

  Tori moistened her lips. “Are you going to tell the other detectives what I say?”

  “Only Falco—if that’s okay with you.”

  Tori nodded. “You can tell Falco anything. He’s my friend.”

  He was. He was Kerri’s too. Her heart lightened at the thought.

  “Did Alice do some sort of ritual when you and Sarah were there?”

  Tori took a breath. “She would like wear this creepy mask and do all this chanting. It was really weird.”

  “Did she tell you things you should be thinking or doing?”

  Tori frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “When she did the chanting, was she suggesting things about either of you or suggestions for any actions you should take? Like being mean to other kids or hurting yourself in some way?”

  Tori shrugged again. “I don’t know. It was all totally creepy, and it made me feel creepy. I don’t remember all of it. It’s kind of . . . I don’t know . . . blurry. Like a dream.”

  A new worry nudged Kerri. “Did you eat or drink anything before this chanting ritual began?”

  Tori bit her lips, seemed to search for the right answer.

  “Just tell me what you remember,” Kerri urged.

  “We had dinner.” She thought some more. “Then cookies and milk later.”

  “Did Alice’s aunt make you cookies and milk?”

  Tori shrugged. “Alice brought them into her room on a tray. Three cups of milk and a small plate of cookies.”

  Another knot tied in Kerri’s stomach. “Was it after you ate the cookies and milk that she started the ritual?”

  Tori nodded. “A little while later, yeah.”

  Anger unfurled inside Kerri. “I need you to listen carefully to me, Tori.”

  She blinked, searched Kerri’s eyes.

  “I want you to do your best to avoid Alice, okay?”

  Uncertainty stole over her daughter’s face. “But she’ll be mad at me.”

  “Possibly,” Kerri said, “but I think it’s really important that you stay as far away from Alice as possible. If she says anything to you, just tell her you’re not feeling well, and you don’t want her to catch whatever you have.”

  It was an old reliable excuse.

  “She won’t believe me.” Tori picked at her cuticles.

  “You could stay with Diana and just skip the rest of the week. I’m sure—”

  “No way!” Tori shot to her feet. “Then everyone will think the rumors are true. That I hurt Brendal and I’m staying home because I’m guilty.”

  “Tori.” Kerri clasped her hands in her lap to prevent reaching for her. She knew her daughter well enough to know that look. She did not want her mother touching her or treating her like a baby at the moment. “You are not guilty of anything. I know you and I trust you. I need you to trust me.”

  “What if I did?” She wilted back down onto the couch. “What if I accidentally pushed her?”

  Terror chilled Kerri’s veins. “Do you think you pushed her?”

  Tori shook her head. “No. But other people do.”

  “Sometimes other people can be hurtful when they’re unsure of something. They get scared and try to find someone to blame.”

  Tori rubbed her hands over her face, then clasped them together in her lap. “I’m just so . . . I feel like I can’t remember, and I’m scared.”

  Kerri pulled her close, hugged her, and struggled not to let the tears slip past her lashes. “Sometimes I get scared too, sweetie. We’ll figure this out. I promise.”

  Tori pulled back and looked her mom in the eyes. “I hope so.”

  “That day,” Kerri ventured, “did Alice bring any cookies or a snack of some sort from home?”

  Tori frowned, concentrating. “I can’t remember. Maybe. She used to do that a lot. Alice said her aunt was trying extra hard to be like a real mom.”

  “You think about it,” Kerri said. “If you remember something, let me know, okay? It could be important.”

  Tori nodded. “I will.”

  The doorbell rang. Kerri smiled. “Come on. That’s the food. Later we can have ice cream.”

  “With M&M’S?”

  “Definitely.”

  Kerri wished ice cream and M&M’S would make everything better.

  She wasn’t sure anything could, but she refused to give up trying.

  20

  9:00 p.m.

  Chez Fonfon

  Eleventh Avenue South

  Birmingham

  Mason sat at the bar, perfectly positioned to watch the entrance.

  Leland Walsh had asked for a private meeting. Mason had no problem with giving the man a few minutes of his time. After all, Walsh had just lost his son. The issue would likely be what the man expected from the meeting.

  If he’d asked for this meeting for the same reason she had, there wasn’t much to tell. At this time, he had nothing new regarding the investigation. At least nothing the man would want to hear.

  Walsh entered and glanced around. Mason didn’t bother raising a hand to call his attention to the bar. The hostess would bring him over. Mason had tipped her well for the trouble.

  Walsh glanced at Mason, then headed his way. Mason had done his homework on Leland Walsh. His firm took no prisoners when it came to courtroom battles. He was accustomed to winning and to having those around him do as he asked without question. Though Mason had never met him before, he knew his sort. The sort who thought he ruled his slice of the world. Anyone who blocked his path was to be removed by whatever means necessary.

  “Agent Cross.” Walsh approached Mason’s position and extended his hand.

  “Mr. Walsh.” Mason shook his hand, then gestured to the stool next to him. “Please join me. I’ll order you a drink.”