Maybe the mother-in-law hadn’t been happy with her daughter’s husband and had shot him, and her daughter had been injured in the ensuing struggle.

  If the shooter was the wife, there was always the possibility that after the struggle with her mother, remorse had brought her back to the bed next to her husband for a few minutes, long enough to bleed on the sheets. People did strange things when they went over an edge. Even those who had no mental incapacity often suffered a moment’s remorse after it was too late to change their minds.

  Kerri had seen far too much in her seven years to doubt the possibility just because the missing woman was the daughter of one of the vics or because she was injured herself. People did bad things. Sometimes those people were good people—maybe even saints—who for whatever reason snapped. Life could be like that. But there were other, more probable possibilities to rule out first.

  Kerri took another look around the room. “What about jewelry? Cash?”

  Matthews indicated the door to the walk-in closet, which stood open. “There’s a huge jewelry box—more like a small bureau—in there full of dazzling pieces. The wife’s purse is lying on top of it. Credit cards and cash inside. The husband’s wallet is there as well. Credit cards and cash inside, just like the wife’s.”

  “Makes it hard to point to robbery,” Falco said from where he stood near the open french doors.

  Definitely, Kerri agreed. To Matthews, she said, “Let’s see the second victim.”

  “This way.” Matthews jerked her head toward the door.

  Kerri followed her back to the front hall and up the stairs. By the time they arrived at the second-floor landing, Falco had caught up.

  “I checked outside,” he said to Kerri. “The deck off the master overlooks the backyard. Steps lead down to a stone walkway. The ground is covered with that extrathick grass and mulched landscape beds. We won’t be finding any shoe prints back there.”

  Kerri wasn’t surprised. With a property like this one, there wouldn’t be any barren areas where a shoe print might be found. There were times when an ultralush landscape was not their friend.

  Upstairs there was a den and three more bedrooms, each with a private en suite. The first bedroom was that of the second victim.

  “This is the mother-in-law’s room. Jacqueline Rollins,” Matthews said, hesitating before entering the room. “Seventy years old. She moved in with the couple right after their honeymoon. She obviously had a number of health issues. There are some serious prescriptions on the bedside table. I’m no doctor, but”—Matthews gestured for Kerri to go on in—“my father died of lung cancer. I recognize some of the meds. Whatever she had, it wasn’t pleasant.”

  Kerri stopped in the center of the room and surveyed the space. The room smelled of disinfectant, like a freshly cleaned hospital room. The walls were painted a calming hue of blue. Several watercolor prints of the beach and the ocean adorned the wall. As Matthews had said, an array of prescription bottles sat on the bedside table. A walker stood next to the bed. The covers were tousled. But there was no victim.

  Kerri’s gaze wandered to an open door that provided a slanted view of the en suite. “The vic in the bathroom?”

  Matthews jerked her head toward the door. “In the next room.”

  Judging by the expression on her face, there was more to this ugly story.

  Matthews led the way to the next room—a nursery. At the open door she pointed to the knob. “There are a couple of scratches in the paint around the knob. I’m thinking this is where she broke her nails. She was probably terrified and struggling to get the door open. Also, you can see just the tiniest bit of tissue, probably skin, on the edge of the door here.” She indicated a spot several inches above the knob.

  “She wasn’t thinking clearly,” Kerri offered. “But she wanted in this room for some reason. Tell me we don’t have a missing baby too.” Her gut clenched at the idea.

  “Not exactly,” Matthews explained. “But the missing wife is pregnant.”

  Oh hell.

  The second victim lay on her back on the floor in the center of the room. Her gray hair was braided, and she wore a long pale-pink nightgown. The front of the gown was soaked in blood. She’d been shot twice in the chest before giving up her battle. Her face was battered where she’d been punched or kicked.

  Damn. Kerri crouched next to her. Two nails on her right hand were broken. There was a minor scrape midforearm, probably where her arm had scrubbed the edge of the door. The smell of urine and feces served as an unpleasant accompaniment to the metallic odor of blood. The violent manner of death had stolen any final vestiges of dignity from the poor woman.

  Kerri pushed to her feet, glanced around the room decorated in pastel pinks and bright whites. She blew out a breath. “Maybe they were planning to adopt. How do we know the wife is pregnant?”

  “Prenatal vitamins in the master bath downstairs,” Matthews said, “and a photo of her and her husband holding a pic of an ultrasound on the dresser over there.” She nodded to the shiny white piece of furniture across the room.

  This news added another layer of possibility to the case. “We could be looking at a perp who wanted nothing more than the child she carried, but there are far easier ways to handle that sort of abduction.” Kerri couldn’t get right with the idea. “Coming into the house and executing the family seems a bit of an overkill.”

  Falco touched the mobile over the crib, sending it spinning slowly around. “Or maybe the pregnant lady went off the deep end and killed everyone.”

  This, too, was possible. Kerri crossed to the crib and surveyed the unicorn-print bedding and mentally ticked off the info that needed to be included in the APB for Sela Abbott. To Matthews, she said, “Do we have any idea how far along she is?”

  “Due date, appointments, and information on her obstetrician are in her phone,” Matthews said. “She’s thirty weeks.”

  Kerri felt sick to her stomach. Until she had reason not to, she intended to consider the missing wife a victim rather than the shooter or an accomplice of some sort. Considering the pregnancy, she couldn’t see the wife putting a couple of bullets into her own mother—at least not without some serious motivation—right here in the nursery, at that. Wives and husbands killed each other all too regularly, but daughters didn’t kill their mothers quite as often. Besides, a gun wasn’t the typical weapon of choice for a woman when she murdered family members—poisoning was the more common route. Sometimes a knife. But then again, Kerri didn’t know this woman. Maybe she’d grown up with weapons. Her father and/or brothers may have been hunters. She could have frequented the shooting range the way some women flocked to their favorite book club.

  Either way, two people were dead.

  “Does the wife have any other family?”

  Matthews shook her head. “According to the housekeeper, the mother was her only family besides her husband.”

  “Anything from the neighbors?” Kerri could hope.

  “We’ve canvassed the closest neighbors, but no one saw or heard anything.”

  Too bad the closest neighbor hadn’t heard the gunshots, but she wasn’t surprised. Kerri had worked neighborhoods like this one before. The lavish homes were basically built to be soundproof, with sufficient distance between them to provide ample privacy. Even the landscape was designed with privacy in mind.

  Kerri turned all the way around in the room to take in the unsettling scene once more; then she rested her attention on Falco. “The security company says the system was disarmed at five a.m. The shooter came in and executed the husband, presumably with a silencer so as not to wake anyone else in the house. Then he went upstairs for the mother-in-law. She surprised him by being up—or maybe the shooter didn’t use a silencer, and she heard the first shot—the mother-in-law struggled, tried to get away, requiring two shots to take her down. What the hell did he do with the wife—assuming she isn’t our killer?”

  Murder was never good or kind, but there was something particularly grotesque about it when a family member was the killer.

  “I guess we won’t know the answer to that until we know the why.” Falco held Kerri’s gaze a moment, then turned to Matthews. “Who found them? You mentioned a housekeeper.”

  “The housekeeper showed up at eight,” Matthews explained. “She was here a few minutes before she realized something was wrong and went to the bedrooms and found the bodies.”

  Beyond the fact that at least two people were dead, and a pregnant woman was missing, the entire scene felt wrong to Kerri. Something was off. “Why did Ben Abbott not hear the disarming of the security system when there’s a keypad in the master bedroom only a few feet from the bed? He and his wife, assuming she was in bed with him at the time, should have heard the warning tones.”

  “Unless they were asleep,” Falco countered.

  Kerri disagreed. “That wouldn’t wake you up?”

  “Depends on if I took a sleeping pill or had too many beers. Maybe a few glasses of wine. These look like wine people to me.”

  A frown worked its way across Kerri’s forehead. “I would think anything either one of them drank or took at or before bedtime would have been worn off by five this morning.”

  Falco gave a nod. “Reasonable assessment.”

  “Besides,” Kerri expanded on the conclusion, “the wife is pregnant; she shouldn’t have been drinking.”

  “Doesn’t mean she wasn’t,” Falco tossed back.

  “Fair point,” Kerri acquiesced.

  “And why struggle to get into this room?” Falco said as he surveyed the nursery once more. “It’s not like there was a baby to protect already.”

  Kerri considered the room in light of his question. “Maybe she thought the shooter wouldn’t look for her here.”

  Falco walked to the closet and had a look. Kerri joined him, suddenly understanding exactly what he was looking for.

  “There’s an attic-access door.” He crouched down and tugged the small door open. Heat from the attic immediately wafted into the closet. Her new partner looked up at her then. “Makes for a good hiding place.”

  “She came into the nursery to hide in a place she hoped the shooter wouldn’t look,” Kerri concluded.

  He nodded. “Which tells us she heard the shot that killed the vic downstairs.”

  If their shooter hadn’t used a silencer, the lab could easily confirm that when the slugs were removed from the victims. “Let’s talk to the housekeeper.”

  When they emerged from the closet, Matthews said, “The housekeeper’s downstairs in the kitchen.”

  Kerri nodded. Maybe the lady could shed some light on whoever might have wanted these folks dead.

  Or wanted something they possessed.

  Downstairs the Crime Scene Unit had arrived. Kerri gave the okay for the investigators to get started. The ME and his assistant appeared next. Falco followed those guys while Kerri headed to the kitchen with Matthews to interview the housekeeper.

  Officer Matthews made the introductions. Kerri pulled out a chair and sat down across the breakfast table from the woman identified as Ilana Jenkins. According to Matthews’s notes, Jenkins was sixty-seven and had worked as a housekeeper most of her adult life, the better part of that time for Ben Abbott’s family. She had retired at sixty-five, but then Abbott had convinced her to come out of retirement and work for him after he moved back to Alabama until someone suitable could be found. With the news that Mrs. Abbott was expecting, Jenkins had decided to stay on for a while longer.

  Kerri moved on to the harder questions. “I know this is very difficult for you, Mrs. Jenkins, and we sincerely appreciate your help. Can you think of any reason anyone would want to hurt Mr. Abbott or his family?”

  Jenkins shook her head. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying. “They are—were the nicest family. Mrs. Abbott spends all her time fundraising to help others. She told me it was the least she could do after the way she had been blessed. She is the sweetest lady. I hope she’s all right.” Her face scrunched with grief. “I can’t believe this has happened.”

  Kerri kept her expression neutral yet attentive. No reason to tell the woman that the missing wife could be a number of things, but all right was not one of them. She had either gone over some edge no one had noticed, or she was a hostage. Or, worse, the third homicide victim in this case.

  “No marital trouble between them?”

  Jenkins shook her head again. “They were madly in love. I’ve never seen two people more committed to each other. Ask anyone who knows them.”

  So, what they had here was the perfect couple with the perfect life. Unfortunately, half of that equation was dead—murdered. Murder rarely slipped so quietly into such a perfect life. Somewhere amid all the perfection was a flaw, a chink . . . some sort of rub.

  “What about Mr. Abbott’s work?” Kerri asked.

  The magnitude of entries Falco had found in his Google search on the drive here pointed overwhelmingly to the software thing. Apparently, Abbott’s programs for smartphones and other devices had put him on the map more than a decade ago. His last known financial worth listed him as one of the wealthiest men in the world. If Kerri had to hazard a guess, his power and assets would be where the trouble reared its ugly head. All too often that kind of ugliness followed a target to his home.

  “No problems,” the housekeeper repeated. “He traveled a lot, but there was never any mention of problems. Never. You must believe me,” she urged, her voice resolute. “These are the last people on earth you expect to be hurt, much less murdered.”

  “What about close friends?” Kerri flipped to a new page in her notepad. “Were there any friends they socialized with more often than others? Relatives who visited on a regular basis besides Ms. Rollins?”

  “They had many friends.” Jenkins lifted her shoulders and let them fall. “His parents visited once in a while. Most of the time Ben and Sela would go to their house for family dinners. Otherwise, there are no other living relatives.”

  “Ms. Jenkins, as difficult as the task will be, it would be very helpful if you could go through the house and tell us to the best of your knowledge if anything is missing.”

  She nodded. “I can do that. Whatever I can do to help.”

  The rest of the questions garnered Kerri more of the same. Everyone adored the Abbotts. They were an admired and respected couple.

  Except by the someone who had wanted one or both dead.

  And no matter that the wife wasn’t here—Kerri knew in her gut that unless she was involved in the murders on some level, she was dead or soon would be.

  Kerri rendezvoused with the ME, Jeffrey Moore, who agreed with the theory that the husband had been killed with a single shot, probably a .22-caliber handgun, to the head while sleeping. The mother-in-law’s death had been decidedly more violent since the intruder had apparently awakened her. The ME estimated time of death at between four and seven that morning, but since the security system had been disarmed at five, he suggested they go with five to seven for now.

  Unless the shooter was in the house when the security system was armed the night before and then waited all night to do the deed. Of course, there was always the chance he was waiting for something. The go-ahead, a completed business transaction. Or just the courage to do what needed to be done.

  Before leaving the Abbott home, Kerri caught up with the housekeeper on her tour through the house with Matthews and asked once more if anyone—besides the mother-in-law—had stayed overnight with the Abbots recently. Out-of-town guests who had stayed a few days. Anyone at all.

  Jenkins considered the question for a bit before saying the Abbotts rarely had overnight company. When they did, it was generally business associates from California, but no one in the past several months. Christmas, she believed, was the last time anyone had stayed overnight.

  It was conceivable that a visitor had found the code to the security system during a previous stay. Or the code had been leaked by a member of the household staff or someone who worked for the security company. Kerri asked Jenkins to make a list of friends with whom the Abbotts associated at their home, as well as any employees who visited or worked at the house and all members of the household staff.

  Her next stop would be the notification of Abbott’s parents—her least favorite duty. But it was necessary, and often pertinent details could be gleaned in those minutes before the devastating news was revealed. After that unpleasant task, the victim’s workplace, Abbott Options, was next on the agenda.

  Back on the street a couple more cruisers had arrived, and the officers were keeping the media vehicles at bay. Two—no, three—local channels had already appeared. The fourth news van Kerri didn’t recognize. She slid behind the wheel and started the Wagoneer.

  Falco dropped into the passenger seat and closed his door. “He’s the one who created the software that actually works in preventing cell phones from operating when a user is driving.”

  Kerri reached for the gearshift. “A company that’s created and marketed such advanced and intensely popular technology has probably made plenty of enemies.”

  “Don’t you know it,” Falco granted. “It’s dog eat dog, Devlin.”

  Before she pulled away from the curb, her cell vibrated. She braked rather than moving out onto the street so she could check the screen.

  Amelia.

  She smiled. Just over two weeks ago her niece, the new high school graduate, had started full time as an intern at York, Hammond & Goldman, Birmingham’s top law firm. In the fall she was heading off to Princeton on a full scholarship. Kerri still didn’t think her sister had recovered from the shock that her beautiful daughter didn’t want to pursue dance as her mother had hoped. Nope. Amelia loved the law, and she wanted to use it to help others. The girl was always protesting something or working to support some cause. She’d actually started at York, Hammond & Goldman one afternoon a week after school back in January, and already she was acting more like a lawyer than a teenager.