The FBI Thrillers Collection Books 6-10 - Catherine Coulter [409]
“I see. You’ve already pounded the grieving widow and now you’re ready to move on to the daughter.”
“Yes. Actually, you’re his stepdaughter, aren’t you?”
Callie rose, in his face now. “And your point would be?”
“Just trying to be accurate, Ms. Markham. In my line of work, accuracy is important.”
“Accuracy is important in mine too, Detective Raven, but I try not to be a moron about it.”
He couldn’t find another lick of patience. “We must leave now.” He knew she was angry, for her mother, he imagined. He’d seen her eyes go glassy there for a while, and he’d worried she’d collapse along with her mother. But he wasn’t worried now. She was ready to do battle, ready to chew some nails. He had a feeling that nails were a staple in her daily diet.
Margaret Califano was no help at all. It took both Officer Kreider and Callie to get her into her lovely dark blue cashmere coat, to pull boots on her feet, and to work the gloves onto her hands. She was weeping silently, not fighting them, but not helping either. And Callie kept thinking, Stewart is dead. Someone murdered him. How could this happen?
The three men stood there, of no use at all, uncomfortable but stoic, until she was ready.
Callie and Officer Kreider half-carried her mother to the four-door white Crown Victoria, the last car in line. Detective Raven helped them into the backseat after sweeping away a box of Kleenex, an empty pizza box, and a stuffed dog with a dangling left ear.
He got in next to her, crowding her over, and closed the door. “Bobby, we’re ready.”
“Was that close or what?” Detective Bobby LeBeau said. “Here are the vultures now. Nancy’s going to follow in her car, and Ray will bring yours in, Ben.”
Bobby pulled out onto the snow-covered road as the first of the media vans was searching the street for the right house.
Ben smacked him on the shoulder. “Go, Bobby.”
Callie said quietly to Detective Raven, “How did the killer manage to get into the building, much less up to the third-floor library?”
He frowned at her and grabbed the chicken stick above the passenger window when the car started sliding on the slick road. “Before we get to that, do you know, personally, what Justice Califano was doing at the library last night, Ms. Markham?” To her surprise, he pulled his PDA from his pocket and waited, the small stylus poised.
“I have no idea. I told you he liked to spend time there, to be alone, I suppose, study briefs, review opinions, whatever. If he went for a specific reason last night, I don’t know what it was. May I ask why it didn’t occur to any of you to call me?”
“Your mother didn’t know your hotel in New York. We didn’t try your place because your mother didn’t think you were there.”
“All right. I answered your question, now answer mine. How did the killer manage to get to my stepfather?”
She felt her mother flinch. She was listening. Callie hoped that Detective Raven—what kind of name was that?—had something to tell them. He didn’t answer her immediately because he was looking out the back window to see if any of the media were following. He turned back and said, “All we know so far is that we have one guard, Henry Biggs, who’s in the hospital unconscious because someone whacked him on the head when he went out for a smoke, took his clothes and waltzed right into the building. When Officer Biggs regains consciousness, and the doctors aren’t saying yet if he’ll make it, then we’ll find out all the details. The guards didn’t pay much attention, probably because the killer looked enough like Henry Biggs in size. So that means the uniform fit him well enough.
“The FBI forensic teams are superb. You can bet they will come up with some evidence. It’s rare that a murderer leaves a pristine crime scene.”
“The man who killed my stepfather must have followed him around,” Callie said, “learned his routine, hung around the Supreme Court Building, learned the