LITMIR.BIZ

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Three

      Harrison gave her space and followed quietly. Jamie was obviously spooked at finding the door unlocked. He was more than a little spooked himself. What was he doing here? He should have taken the car and gone for the police.

      Maybe it was the drugs still in his system, or maybe he was punchy from exhaustion, but the night had taken on a surrealism that made thinking straight difficult. This was quite possibly the dumbest thing he’d ever done in his life.

      The smell hit him even before Jamie stilled so abruptly that he bumped into her back. Beyond her shoulder he took in the scene with a detached sense of horror.

      A crumpled form lay on the tiled floor surrounded by a pool of dark blood. The microwave door gaped open above the body. An unpopped bag of popcorn was still clutched in lifeless fingers.

      Harrison forced himself to study the scene and his brain went numb with shock. Ceecee. Impossible. That couldn’t be Ceecee. Not here. Not lying dead like this.

      Ceecee was vibrantly alive. She’d always been an attractive woman, and yes, she’d be in her late fifties now. And her hair had always been dark and soft, her body trim, but always in motion. The summery yellow slacks and casual shirt were so typical of what he remembered, but this couldn’t be her.

      Ceecee had an infectious laugh. She had a way of listening to someone as if they were the most important person in her world. She’d been his mother’s best friend since before he’d been born.

      When he was a boy, Ceecee Carillo would call or turn up every so often no matter where they lived. Their home was always brighter for her visits. His mother was laughing constantly during her stays even when they only sat around the kitchen table, chatting and giggling like a pair of schoolgirls. And Ceecee had always had a present for him when she came. She treated him as if he were another adult, not some boring little kid.

      Until the year he turned fourteen. After his kidnapping, she didn’t come anymore. He’d thought it was because they’d moved and his mother was afraid to have visitors. He knew she still talked to Ceecee on the phone after that, but she didn’t laugh and she always seemed sad afterward.

      He’d never asked why Ceecee didn’t come anymore. Now, staring at her lifeless body, Harrison realized it was one question he should have asked.

      The kitchen was neat and clean. There were no signs of a struggle. It appeared as if someone had walked up behind her as she went to place the popcorn in the microwave and had shot her through the back of the head. Either she knew her killer and didn’t fear him, or she never heard him coming.

      Harrison glanced at Jamie. She stared at the body through a film of moisture. He had known the dead woman as Ceecee, but Jamie had called her Carolyn. Carolyn Carillo. Ceecee. It must have been his mother’s nickname for her.

      The gaze Jamie turned to him held a dark well of pain that trapped his tumbling questions in his throat. Ceecee had been important to her as well.

      Oh, God, surely not her mother.

      Before he could utter a word, Jamie’s gaze hardened. She held up a palm, indicating he should wait. The smell of death made his stomach roil. Ceecee was stiff and utterly lifeless. She had been dead for some time.

      Apparently, Jamie agreed. She made no move to cross the room. Instead, she glided cautiously toward the entrance beyond the kitchen.

      Harrison turned from the scene more slowly, still reeling from the shock of recognition. He watched where he walked as he followed in Jamie’s wake. The last thing he wanted to do was step on anything in a crime scene. His stretched nerves screamed at him. They should call the police and leave the scene, but he wasn’t going without Jamie. He wanted answers.

      Harrison found her in the living room beside a plush leather recliner and the slumped body of an older man. Even from a distance Harrison could see that the man had been killed like Ceecee. The killer had walked up behind his chair and shot him through the temple, no doubt using a silencer.

      Jamie lightly touched the man’s cheek with a fingertip. Once again, the eyes she turned toward Harrison brimmed with unshed tears. Who were these people to her?

      Had Ceecee been married? How could he not even know that much about his mother’s oldest friend?

      Once more he started to speak. Once more Jamie shook her head sharply and motioned him to stay put.

      She flowed up the staircase on silent feet. His stomach twisted at the thought that there might be more bodies up there. He didn’t want to follow her up those stairs. He didn’t want to see her find more death.

      He scanned the cozy living room. Two glasses partially filled with dark liquid sat on the table between the two chairs. If the glasses had once held ice, it had long since melted. The chairs were side by side facing the television set, where an old movie was playing on one of the cable stations. The dialogue and spurts of music were the only sounds in the silent house.

      The couple had obviously settled down for the evening to watch television together. At some point Ceecee had gotten up to make popcorn. The killer had probably entered through the side door they had used and shot one after the other.

      His gaze fell on the table behind the couch, where several framed photographs held prominence. The couple appeared much younger in most shots, and so obviously in love. The two wedding photos had been taken sometime in the early sixties. His stomach clenched when his mother’s face stared out at him from the group shot. Vibrantly lovely in her youth, she posed beside the bride, obviously Ceecee’s maid of honor.

      How? Why? All sorts of wild conjectures swirled through his head.

      There were several photographs of Jamie as a teenager with her hair long and thick and curling past her shoulders as she posed with the couple. Another showed her in a military dress uniform, looking crisp and solemn. The final photo appeared to be more recent. She stood between the couple in front of a Christmas tree with her hair short and choppy, the way she wore it now. There were no shots of her as a child.

      Were these her parents? Some other relatives? He saw no physical resemblance between them, but they appeared to be a family unit.

      Abruptly, he realized Jamie had stopped being silent. She was moving about rapidly overhead as if speed was of the essence. He mounted the stairs quietly.

      “Don’t touch anything,” she ordered, leaving a room at the end of the hall with a duffel bag in her hand.

      Her voice sounded unnaturally loud in the stillness of the house, despite the muted irritant of the television in the background.

      “I wasn’t planning to.”

      He followed her into what appeared to be the master bedroom. Inside the closet she opened a gun case with a key and pulled out several weapons and ammunition.

      “Here.” She handed him a 9 mm. “Do you know how to use this?”

      His eyes narrowed. “Point this end and pull here. Most five-year-olds have the gist.”

      “You’ve never fired a gun.”

      She said it flatly as if it was a stupid omission.

      “Shooting a gun never made my to-do list.”

      “Maybe you’d better give it back.”

      “I don’t think so. Is there a safety on this thing?”

      She muttered something under her breath and indicated the switch. “Move this. The gun is fully loaded, so leave it on for now. I don’t want you shooting me by mistake.”

      “Wouldn’t think of it.”

      He jammed the heavy metal object into his waistband, the way he’d seen it done in the movies. Hopefully the gun couldn’t go off on its own and blow away something vital.

      Scowling, she shoved another weapon in her duffel bag. “If they know we escaped, they’ll come back here. They’ll know this is where

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