The Next Accident - Lisa Gardner [105]
She rolled out of bed and into the adjoining bathroom. Toothpaste helped. So did a quick shower. She donned her three-day-old jeans and white T-shirt, wrinkled her nose with distaste, and bravely left the bedroom.
Quincy and his daughter sat at the brown circular table in the tiny kitchenette that comprised the front half of the living room. Quincy was hunched over his laptop computer, while Kimberly leaned against his shoulder to get a better look at the screen. Both held cups of Starbucks coffee, and both were arguing vigorously. Rainie identified a third cup of coffee, probably hers. She scooped it up, while trying to come up to speed on their squabble.
They seemed to be working on the database. Kimberly wanted to focus more on Miguel Sanchez, Quincy thought it was a dead end—the man couldn’t exactly do much from the confines of San Quentin. Well what about family, Kimberly argued. What family? Quincy countered. Sanchez’s only living relative was a seventy-year-old oxygen-dependent mother, hardly a likely candidate for psycho of the week.
“Touché,” Rainie murmured.
They finally paused, Quincy glancing up from the computer. Something passed over his face, an expression she couldn’t read. Then he said evenly, “Good morning, Rainie. There are croissants in the bag if you’d like.”
She shook her head. “Been up long?”
“A few hours.” Quincy was avoiding her gaze. That was okay; she couldn’t seem to meet his eye either. Had he been surprised to wake up and find her pressed against him on the bed? Pleased? Or had he considered it purely practical—Kimberly already had the sofa. Rainie studiously memorized the Starbucks logo on her cup of coffee.
“Where are you with things?” she asked.
“Working the database.”
Kimberly chimed in, “I think we need to reexamine the Sanchez case. Miguel’s the one who reached Dad by phone, plus, his treatment of his cousin, Richie Millos, proves that he’s big on revenge. Then there’s the Montgomery factor—that Albert Montgomery also worked that case and happens to hate Dad because of it.”
“That I personally took Sanchez’s call was a random event,” Quincy countered. “There were fifty-six other convicts on the answering machine, whose calls I could just as easily have caught in person. And while the ‘Montgomery factor’ is interesting, coincidence does not equal conspiracy. Bottom line: Miguel is securely behind bars in California. He has no opportunity, and frankly, I don’t think he’s that smart.”
“What about the cousin?” Rainie asked.
“Millos? What about him?”
Rainie took a seat. Safe on the comforting topic of homicidal maniacs, she could face Quincy again. “Think of it this way: Your assessment of Richie and Miguel’s partnership led the police to focus on Richie. And by focusing on Richie, the police guaranteed his death at the hands of Miguel. Ergo, someone could argue that you were responsible for Richie’s death.”
“Ergo, I killed Richie,” Quincy murmured. “Not bad.”
“Does Richie have surviving family?” Kimberly asked.
“I don’t know. Grab the case file.”
Kimberly began digging in the box next to Quincy’s feet. Apparently, they’d been through this drill a few times already, because she came up with the manila file in four seconds flat. “Millos, Richie. Let’s see what kind of nuts are hanging from the family tree.” She flipped it open, turned three pages, and began to briskly scan the background report. “Okay, we got a mother—fifty-nine years old and listed as a housewife. We have a father—sixty-three years old, former janitor, now on disability. Oh, condition is listed as rheumatoid arthritis. That probably rules him out.”
“Any siblings?” Quincy asked.
“Two younger brothers and one younger sister. Jose is thirty-five and comes with his own rap sheet. A B&E guy, but not currently incarcerated. That’s food for thought. Mitchell ‘Mickie’ Millos is thirty-three, and hey, no rap sheet. In fact, he’s an engineer with a degree from the University of Texas in Austin. So apparently one of the men in the family made good. Finally we have Rosa Millos, the baby daughter, who is twenty-eight.