Protector - Laurel Dewey [192]
Jane considered the five ounce pile of cocaine at the Lawrence crime scene. Her comment that it was planted amidst the turmoil was dead on. “Cocaine,” Jane said out loud. She suddenly realized that the amount of cocaine found at the scene was just under the amount of coke missing from the evidence room. Chris’ voice radiated in Jane’s head. It was the conversation they shared when she secretly called the lab and got an earful from Chris about Ron Dickson’s suspension.
“With the amount of coke Ron took,” Chris told Jane, “Brass figures he’s been dipping into the powder since May!”
That’s where Chris slipped up. Chris probably stole the coke from a K-Pak evidence bag in early May in preparation for the Lawrence murder and eventual cover-up. No doubt Chris used his altar boy sweetness to con Ron into leaving him alone in the property room long enough to steal the drugs and reseal the K-Pak bag. But when Chris was telling the story to Jane on the phone, how could he or anyone possibly know that the cocaine went missing around a certain date since there had been no audit of the evidence lab for over one year.
Jane wondered if Chris was planning to set up Ron from the beginning. As a detective, Chris was always projecting five steps in front of the case, factoring the variables and coming up with enough possible scenarios to fill several crime novels. He left nothing to chance; he played on people’s character weaknesses and took advantage of every plausible “in” that he could find. Jane flashed onto the scene at the hospital, after Emily fell off the roof. When Chris saw Ron walk into the emergency room with his injured hand and shaken demeanor, he jumped on the opportunity like a cougar on fresh kill. He had to. He was desperate.
Jane rapidly put two and two together regarding that fateful evening. He thought he had killed Jane under the blanket on the couch, not Martha Durrett. As far as Chris knew when he went off shift that evening, Jane was still guarding Emily. He was never aware of her fight with Emily and eventual departure from the scene. Suddenly, the cryptic “PAYBACK” note that was plunged into Martha’s eye made sense. On some level, Chris felt that Jane knew more about the murders than she was disclosing. That’s why Chris bugged the living room to eavesdrop on their conversation. He was convinced that Emily was sharing pertinent information with Jane and so, in his twisted mind, he had no choice but to kill her. No wonder Chris looked so surprised to see Jane when he reached the hospital. Once again, Chris’ words echoed in Jane’s head. He was speaking to her at the hospital, doing his version of consoling her after learning that Martha Durrett was killed.
“Shit happens,” Chris said to Jane. “At least the son-of-a-bitch couldn’t find the kid and had to take off. Don’t blame yourself for this huge mistake.” But in retrospect, Jane realized that Chris misspoke. At that point, Weyler had not debriefed anybody about the crime scene. More importantly, Jane was the only one who had spoken to Emily and knew that the intruder on the roof suddenly left when he couldn’t find the kid.
As Jane began to see everything with clearer eyes, she took into account Chris’ appearance over the past months. His wardrobe had become increasingly slovenly. His breath had taken on an acrid odor. His eyes looked dark and puffy, as if he had been on a five-day bender. Jane concluded that