He sat for several more minutes, still grappling with the odd, disquieting feeling that had settled over him in Granger’s office. He might have ignored it, but long ago he’d learned to trust his spider senses.

  He’d worked with Chris Kendall, the officer who had taken Reynolds’s report, back when they were both at the Bethesda station, and he would have liked to talk to him before coming out here. But the patrolman had left the building for a doctor’s appointment before Jack had gotten the assignment. Too bad, because the initial police contact was a good source of additional information. Although the uniforms put down what was required in writing, there was usually a whole lot they didn’t get onto paper. Jack liked to do a little probing into their casual observations, stuff they didn’t think was important enough to go in the report, or stuff they didn’t even know they’d noticed, until he asked about it. He also paid attention to their opinions, which gave them a chance to express “gut feelings” that were often useful later.

  Of course, Jack suspected Granger was probably planning to do the same thing with him. More than once, the captain had sent him out on an interview that hardly seemed top priority, then quizzed him on his impressions.

  After climbing out of the unmarked and locking the door, he glanced toward the second floor of the house and caught a flash of red. Red hair, he realized—as fiery as flames flickering behind the windowpanes.

  Was that Reynolds? Or someone else? Whoever it was had pulled back the moment he’d looked up. So was she nervous about getting caught peering out or curious about who had pulled up in front of her house?

  He hadn’t called ahead. She’d said she worked at home, so he’d taken a chance on catching her in—catching her off balance if there was something going on that she hadn’t shared with Officer Kendall.

  He tucked the folder unobtrusively under one arm and started toward the front door. According to the initial report, Ms. Reynolds owned the house and lived on the upper story. The missing woman had an apartment on the ground floor.

  Jack rang the bell and listened to footsteps coming down an inner stairway. He prepared to confirm the name of the female who opened the door; but the moment the door opened, the breath froze in his lungs so that it was impossible to speak.

  He was caught and held by a pair of emerald-green eyes, a sweep of wild red hair, and skin like rich dairy cream.

  His muscles went rigid. His arm clamped against the folder tucked against his body.

  Time seemed to stop, like a scene from a videotape frozen on a TV screen. Unable to move forward or back away, he stared into her eyes, seeing her pupils dilate and then contract.

  Everything around him was out of focus, with the exception of the slender young woman standing in the doorway. She remained sharp and clear. Details came to him: the way her breasts filled out the front of her wildflower-printed tee shirt. The smell of strawberries wafting toward him. The startled look in those green eyes.

  Along with the physical awareness came a jolt of pure sexual energy, like nothing he had ever experienced in his life. Lust at first sight. It was almost palpable—arching between them like electricity between two contact points. Dangerous and at the same time so compelling that he would have leaped through a wall of fire to reach this woman if she had been on the other side.

  The whole out-of-kilter experience lasted only seconds. Then the world as he knew it clicked back into real time. The moment had passed so quickly that it was easy to tell himself that it had all been in his imagination.

  He clung to that theory, because if it wasn’t imagination, he was hardly equipped to deal with what had happened.

  The woman in the doorway took a quick step back, as if trying to escape from the same emotions bolting through him.

  For several heartbeats, neither of them spoke.

  Finally, Jack dragged air into his lungs and let it out before asking, “Kathryn Reynolds?” He was surprised that his voice sounded normal.

  “Yes. And you are?”

  “Jack Thornton, Montgomery County P.D.”

  Reynolds’s hands clenched in front of her. “The police? Have you come to tell me something about Heather? Is it bad news?”

  “Are you expecting bad news?” he asked, slipping back into his professional mode, carefully watching her reaction.

  “No . . . I mean, I don’t know. I hope not. I don’t know what to expect.”

  “Can I come in? Then you can tell me what brought you to the station house.”

  “Can I see some identification?” she countered, as if she’d just realized she should have asked.

  “Of course.” While he pulled out his ID and shield, he was still mentally shaking his head at his out-of-character reaction in those first few seconds after she’d opened the door.

  She studied his ID, then said, “I already filed a report with Officer . . .” She stopped and fumbled for the name. “Officer Kendall.”

  “Yes.” Jack put away his credentials, then pulled the folder from under his arm, opened it, and showed her the forms. “I have the report right here. So can we talk?”

  This time she nodded and stepped back to let him into a vestibule. He followed her through a second doorway, then up a flight of steps, watching the unconscious sway of her hips in faded jeans.

  He was accustomed to making assumptions about people based on their personal spaces. Seconds after stepping into her apartment, he was thinking that Kathryn Reynolds was a study in contradictions.

  In one corner of the room was an antique desk with a computer under a set of mahogany wall shelves. Catty-corner to the desk area were more shelves piled with neatly labeled folders and plastic boxes. The office atmosphere was broken by all manner of whimsical objects that adorned the work area. He saw ceramic cats, a papier-mâché rooster, at least ten fancy glass paperweights, a glass unicorn. On her computer screen was an underwater scene with swimming fish and coral. When the computer made a belching, bubbling noise like a toilet flushing, she crossed the room and cranked the sound down.

  He cleared his throat. “So when did you first notice that Heather DeYoung was missing?”

  She walked toward one of the easy chairs, picked up a paisley pillow, and clutched it to her middle as she sat down. “It kind of crept up on me. Two days ago I realized she hadn’t come home since Sunday night.”

  “She was missing for five days before you reported it?”

  Her fingers clamped on the pillow. “You’re making it sound like an accusation.”

  “I didn’t mean to. I’m just trying to get the full picture,” he said, still watching her reactions, thinking that facts were never the whole story.

  “Sometimes she stays away for several days. It suddenly dawned on me that I hadn’t seen her in a while.”

  “Okay.” He answered, noting her discomfort, although he still didn’t know if it was because of her friend or because of him.

  For a split second he thought about what had happened when she’d opened the door. Should he say something? To clear the air? Or to find out if she’d experienced the same thing that he had?

  The latter would be his primary motive, he silently admitted. A very unprofessional motive.

  Usually he had an excellent sense of what questions to ask a witness or a suspect. Today he fumbled for the right approach.

  “Let’s see. Ms. DeYoung works for the Montgomery County School System—as a substitute teacher. That pays enough to support her?”

  “She says it does.”

  “But she could have some other source of income?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He set finances aside for the moment. He had other ways of poking into the woman’s fiscal solvency. Instead, he quickly switched topics. “So Ms. DeYoung is unreliable?”

  She tipped her head to one side. “Where did you get that impression?”

  “It isn’t unusual for her to take off for several days—on a whim.” He waited for her to counter the statement.

  “Yes, but she pays her rent on time. She doesn’t give me any problems.”

  “What kind of problems are you referring to?”

  “She doesn’t play loud music. She doesn’t have wild parties. She doesn’t wake me up at two in the morning if the toilet’s stopped up. She gets out a plunger.”

  He nodded, thinking about what she was saying and what she was leaving out. “Does she have any bad habits? Drugs, alcohol? Something that could get her into trouble?”

  “No,” she said, but could have sounded more sure.

  “But?”

  Reynolds swallowed. “I don’t like to make judgments. And I don’t like to talk about people.”

  “I understand. But if it will help us find Heather, I’d appreciate your insights.”

  She swallowed, then answered. “Okay, I don’t like her boyfriend.”

  “Because?”

  “He takes advantage. She loves him, but he doesn’t love her.”

  “How do you mean, ‘takes advantage’?”

  “He’s borrowed money from her.” She stopped, played with the fringe of the pillow. “I wouldn’t tell you this if it weren’t important. He told her he’d stop dating her if she didn’t have an abortion last year, but she was the one who had to pay for it.”

  The guy sounded like a real winner, but Jack still didn’t know whether or not Reynolds was exaggerating her assessment. “She discussed all that with you?”

  “Yes. We’ve gotten to be good friends.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Gary Swinton.”

  “Could she be at his house?”

  “His apartment,” she corrected. “I thought of that. I called and left a couple of messages on his answering machine.”

  “Do you have a phone number for him, an address?”

  “In my Rolodex.” She stood, set the pillow down on the chair, and crossed to the desk, where she flipped through cards—then gave him the requested information.

  “What about a work address?”

  She thought about that. “I know he’s a clerk at Circuit City. The one in Bethesda. I think he’s in small electronics—because he got a good deal for her on a floor model table-top stereo. But I don’t have the address.”

  “I know where it is. Can you give me a description? Some way I’ll recognize him?”

  Her hand skimmed across the desk, settled over a foot-long clear plastic rod with colored liquid and shiny stars and moons inside. When she tipped it on end, the liquid and the glitter began to flow up and down the tube.

  She stared at the bobbing glitter, her brow wrinkling. “He’s about thirty years old. Blond hair. Light eyes.

  They’re set close together. His hair is usually just one beat too long—maybe to hide his bald spot. He’s average height. Not too heavy. He’s got a small scar on the left side of his chin. I guess that would be the most identifying mark.”

  “Okay. That’s great,” he said, writing it down. “You’re good at detail.”

  “My art background.”

  “Yeah.”

  She was still playing with the plastic tube. He watched the swirl of colors. “What’s that?”

  She gave a small, embarrassed laugh. “A magic wand.”

  “Where did you get it?”

  “Don’t tell me you need one.”

  “Sometimes I’d like to have one. But I was thinking my daughter would like it.”

  “Oh, you’re married.”

  “I was . . .” He let the sentence trail off. Probably she thought he was divorced, and he didn’t want her thinking that he couldn’t make a marriage work. Then he reminded himself that it didn’t matter what she thought about him. He was interviewing her about a missing person—that was all.

  “Oh,” she said again, twirling the plastic rod in her hand.

  His eyes were drawn to the bits of glitter and the swirling blue liquid. For a moment they both watched the shifting motion inside the beveled plastic.

  “What would you do with a magic wand if you had one?” she asked.

  “Solve Stone Who Done Its.”

  “What’s a Stone Who Done It?”

  “A case where there are no solid suspects and no leads.”

  “Um.”

  He watched her lips form the syllable, then roused himself from his study of her—a very unprofessional study. “Would it be possible for me to see Ms. DeYoung’s apartment?”

  She hesitated. “I’d feel like you were invading her privacy.”

  “Maybe I’d see something that would give me a clue.”

  “I went down there before I filed the missing person report. I didn’t see anything.”

  “You’re not a trained police detective.”

  She thought that over, then gave a small nod. After putting down the wand, she opened a desk drawer and extracted a key with a pink ribbon threaded through the key chain hole.

  She went back down the stairs to the vestibule.

  “Did you have the house converted into a duplex?” he asked, already knowing the answer, since he could tell that the work was more than twenty years old.

  “No. Grandma O’Shea did it after my grandfather died. She didn’t need such a big place, and she needed the income.”

  “So how did you end up with the property?”

  “My parents got divorced. Dad took off for parts unknown. Mom and I moved into the downstairs apartment. I was just starting college when she got a pulmonary embolism. She died.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It could have been worse. Grandma O’Shea and I were always close, and I moved in with her.”

  “She died, too?”

  “In her sleep. Five years ago. A heart attack. She was ninety-two and able to take care of herself until the end. I guess that’s the way to live—and the way to go.”

  “Yes,” he answered, wondering what his own chances were of dying in bed.

  They were still standing in the hallway. “I took the upstairs flat and rented out this one,” she said, unlocking the other door. She stepped into an apartment that was similar to her own in layout. But the similarity ended there.

  Her abode had been quirky but orderly. DeYoung was—to put it politely—a slob. There were stacks of mail, newspapers, and other paper on every flat surface, including the floor. When he walked farther into the room and looked toward the kitchen, he saw dirty dishes in the sink and on the counter.

  “You say she didn’t give you any trouble. It looks like you’re going to have to blast this place out when she moves.”

  “Okay, she’s not so neat. But she’s a good person. She likes children and animals.”

  “Um hum,” he said, thinking it was probably lucky she didn’t have custody of either.

  He scanned the apartment. To his practiced eye, the owner had stepped out and intended to come back.

  He started with the answering machine, pressed the rewind button and listened to the messages. There were several—two from Ms. Reynolds—both asking DeYoung to call.

  And a message from the boyfriend, Swinton, two days ago. Which proved nothing. If he’d done something to her, he might have left the message to establish his innocence.

  The rest of the messages were at least four days old. One was apparently from the office that handled substitute teachers, asking if she was available to take a biology class at Wootton High School on Monday. Another was from her mother with some chatty news about various friends and relatives.

  “Did she go to work on Monday?” Jack asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  He nodded, then strode down the hall to the bedroom and opened the closet. The hanging rack was full of blouses and jackets, packed so tightly together that they had to come out wrinkled.

  “I’d ask if you thought anything was missing, but I imagine it’s hard to tell,” he said over his shoulder.

  “I looked in her storage closet. Her suitcases are there.”

  “Did you check her dresser drawers?”

  She swiped back a lock of fiery hair. “I opened some, yes. But I felt like a sneak thief, so I gave it up.”

  He opened a dresser drawer and found sweaters in a messy pile. Reaching underneath, he discovered nothing hidden. The next drawer held panty hose—and nothing else. The third drawer was a mass of women’s underpants and bras. This time, when he slid his hand underneath, he felt several magazines and a book. When he pulled them out, he saw that they were pornography—S and M oriented. One magazine cover showed an almost naked woman chained to a crossbar. A man was standing over her with a whip. The other magazines were similar. And the book looked like a dominance and submission how-to manual. He made a snorting sound. It seemed that a routine case had just gotten more interesting.

 

 

  Rebecca York, Killing Moon

 

 

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