Alex Kava Bundle - Alex Kava [584]
“Be right back,” he told Carmichael and nodded at Weston. Before he got to the door, he couldn’t help thinking Kasab looked like a guy with his own secret. He wanted to tell him he should never play poker, but after wrangling Bob Weston, Detective Pakula was too tired for more games.
“What’s going on?”
“I’ve got good news and bad news.”
“Okay,” Pakula said. It took a few beats before he realized Kasab was waiting for him to say which he wanted first. “Okay, good news first.” It was easier to play.
“I was able to get the monsignor’s cell-phone record. The only calls he made were one to Our Lady of Sorrow rectory that lasted about a minute and another to Father Tony Gallagher’s cell phone. He’s the assistant pastor at the church. That one lasted just over seven minutes. It was made about an hour before his flight.”
“So he was probably the last person to talk to the monsignor.”
“Most likely, yes. Outside of anyone at the airport.”
“Sounds like we need to talk to Father Gallagher. Can you arrange that?”
“Oh, sure.”
“So what’s the bad news?”
“I went back to the airport to pick up Monsignor O’Sullivan’s luggage. Remember they told us they’d intercept it in New York and have it back in Omaha this morning?”
“Let me guess,” Pakula interrupted him, “it’s in Rome.”
“No, it made it back to Omaha, but someone picked it up before I got there.”
“You gotta be kidding. What numb nut gave it to someone without any authority?”
“Actually the desk clerk was told it had been authorized.”
“Who the hell told him that?”
Kasab flipped his notebook pages, checking, wanting to be accurate. “It was a Brother Sebastian. Said he was with the Omaha Archdiocese office. And like the guy told me, who’s not going to believe someone sent by the archbishop?”
CHAPTER 12
Washington, D.C.
It was on mornings like this that Maggie O’Dell wondered if perhaps something was wrong with her. Here it was another beautiful day, after rains had washed everything clean, the beginning of a holiday weekend and she had nothing to cancel. No plans to change. No friends or family or lover to let down. Even Harvey, who watched her leave with his head still planted on her bed pillow, let her off the hook too easily, it seemed, by allowing her to postpone their gardening and lounging in the backyard. What was worse, she actually looked forward to this autopsy. Not exactly looked forward to it in the same way someone would relish a good time. But rather, her mind had already begun plucking at the puzzle pieces, trying to place them in some order and needing more details, more pieces. So much so that she had awakened at two in the morning and pulled out the copies of the case files.
Dismemberment cases bothered even the most seasoned of veterans, and Maggie certainly wasn’t immune. Dismemberment cases and ones involving dead kids usually had a way of staying with her long after the killers were arrested, tried and convicted. Sometimes she still had nightmares that included body organs stuffed in take-out containers courtesy of Albert Stucky. And then there were those with dead little boys, naked and blue-skinned, left in the mud and tall grass along the Platte River. Albert Stucky was dead and buried. She had seen to it personally. However, Father Michael Keller had gotten away scot-free, escaping to South America, and even the Catholic Church didn’t seem to know where he was.
Maggie paused at the door to the autopsy suite to clear her mind and to finish her Diet Pepsi. Stan Wenhoff was known to expel anyone for as little as unwrapping a candy bar during one of his autopsies. Not a bad rule, though perhaps Stan’s claim that it was out of respect for the dead might be a bit disingenuous. After all, this was the same guy who yelled things like, “Just scoop it up.”
It felt like walking into a refrigerator. Maggie grabbed two gowns off the pile and said hello to Stan who only grunted. Julia Racine wasn’t in a much better mood. She