LINKED (The Bening Files Book 1) Read online

  No. Of course not. “He was driving in his car, alone, at the time of the murder.”

  Amanda nodded, but didn’t comment. “Mr. Gaidies seems to think she was having an affair.”

  “It’s easy to make accusations to cast suspicion elsewhere.”

  “You really believe that?”

  “No. Mr. Gaidies can’t produce a name. Claims he works all day, then comes home and works from home. He painted a very lonely picture of two strangers who happened to occupy the same house. Jordan and I confiscated the family computer, Mr. Gaidies’ personal laptop, subpoenaed phone records and canvassed the neighborhood.”

  “Jordan’s got a nice shiner under his left eye. You have anything to do with that?”

  McKenna eyed her friend. “Smooth switch of conversation, Nettles.”

  “What’s up with you two?”

  The answer should have been simple. Not complicated by their marriage, their working partnership and the fact that having him back in her life made her question everything about it. “Putting that into the right words might take more time than either of us has.”

  “Give me the shortened version, then.”

  “Maybe some other time.”

  “I’ll dig if I have to.”

  “I married Jordan in Vegas.” The words came out in one jumbled heap.

  Shock worked its way across Amanda’s face. “Excuse me?”

  “I got—we got drunk in Vegas and the next thing I know I’m married to a guy I haven’t seen in years.” The truth slipped out, freeing in its own way, the large elephant parked on her chest, leaving to bother somebody else. “Who does that? Not me. I won’t marry a guy I’ve dated for three years.”

  “Oh, boy.” Amanda grabbed her arm and pulled her toward Java Joe’s outer wall, her voice low. “I figured you were just upset with the fact that he’d been gone so long. Geez, you weren’t supposed to take my advice about enjoying your birthday that far.”

  McKenna raised her coffee to her mouth. “I may have slept with him.”

  “May have?”

  “I did.” She could take almost anything back, a kiss, a stupid four-thousand dollar wedding. Those things she could explain away as unimportant, spur-of-the moment affairs. “I have an appointment with a lawyer tomorrow.”

  “Whoa, okay, hold the phone. You married him, slept with him and now you’re going to divorce him? Just like that?”

  “Sure.” Ending it and burying herself beneath a pile of work had sounded great after she’d lost their basketball game. Now, the thought left her as unsettled as a college graduate with no work prospects and half a million dollars in student loans.

  “You don’t even believe in divorce.”

  There was that. She shrugged.

  “I always thought you had a thing for him.”

  McKenna choked on her coffee. “I didn’t.” Did she?

  “He did. For you.”

  No, way. “You don’t know that.”

  “How many other girls did you see him hanging out with on a daily basis?”

  “You were with us.” Sometimes.

  Amanda sent her a smirk.

  Confusion kicked up a whirl of anxious winged creatures in her stomach. Snippets of their childhood flashed in her mind, a movie trailer stuck in fast-forward. Birthday parties, family vacations. Jordan teaching her how to swim in her family’s pool. The two of them ganging up on her older brothers in whatever way possible. She would find trouble. He would try to stop her and end up in the thick of things instead.

  They shared a lot of history, most of it worth reminiscing.

  “I’ll admit we hung out a lot, especially after his mother died.” She couldn’t add her reasons for that because even Jordan didn’t know they existed. There had never been a right moment to tell him she’d witnessed exactly the same thing he had the day Cassidy died.

  “Tell me you didn’t miss him and I’ll leave you alone. I’ll even help you get a divorce.”

  Her brain told her tongue to form the words. Instead a half-hearted grunt filled the silence.

  “I want to hear you say it in a full sentence.”

  “He left us a note, Amanda. A note. He never wrote to us. Never called to tell us he was okay. So, don’t even insinuate that my missing him means I have any romantic feelings toward him.”

  Amanda wore an expression that said McKenna had given the perfect answer. “Have you asked him if he tried to contact you?”

  “He’s been back in town for a while, but I didn’t know until he showed up at the Gaidies’ house. That’s just the tip of the iceberg.”

  Amanda made a big O with her lips. “Ask him. Might make you feel better.”

  “McKenna.” Jordan waved to her from the other side of the street before he checked traffic and jogged across to where they stood.

  Amanda’s eyebrows floated up her forehead in a ‘just do it’ gesture.

  “We gotta go.” Jordan grabbed one of the coffee cups from her and took a sip. “I sent our tech team over to Rupert’s house.”

  McKenna worked hard at focusing on work instead of their personal problems and the twenty questions floating around in her head. “Why?”

  “Might have our first break.”

  “Sounds like the three of you have an interesting afternoon ahead of you. I would love to be a fly on the wall in that house.” Amanda sipped her coffee, headed toward where she parked her car across the street. She turned back. “I’ll be around if you need backup.”

  Jordan watched her go. “What was that?”

  “No idea,” she lied.

  “You told her about Vegas.” It wasn’t a question.

  “What’s going on at Rupert’s?”

  For whatever reason, Jordan let the conversation switch. “He opened his mail and found a set of severed hands in a nondescript mailing box.”

  ###

  In the Sussex II state prison, mail call was the highlight of Matthew Blaney’s week.

  He loved leading pen-pals to believe he was something more than a fifty-five-year-old convict who’d long since given up hope of parole. One woman believed he was thirty-two, single and owned a mansion in Beverly Hills that he planned to relocate to once his incarceration ended. Another woman promised to put him up in style if he ever visited her in Las Vegas.

  The only letters that contained truth went to his sister, Alexis Blaney-Moore. She was the only consistency he had in this place, even after ten years in prison. Matthew reached in his breast pocket for his pack of cigarettes. After all this time he still occasionally reached for them, the habit hard to kick. Of course he’d never find any, cigarettes being contraband and all. He’d quit smoking the day Cassidy Bening died in his arms. Ironic since she had begged him to quit every time she saw him light up during their five-year marriage.

  Marrying Cassidy had been the smartest thing he’d ever done. Agreeing to a divorce had been for her own good. Not that she’d ever understood his reasons. And he couldn’t explain them. He’d wanted to. Tried.

  They’d almost had a second chance. In one instant, everything had changed. With one bullet and a three-story drop, it had ended. She’d died. He’d died. Since then he’d done everything in his power not to string two words together that would conjure up her face.

  Until today.

  Matthew flipped the unread letter around in his hands. Ten, painless years smashed because of one lousy letter. He turned it over so the address showed. North Carolina. Jordan didn’t live far from Cassidy’s home. Matthew prayed he hadn’t sold the old place. It held some of the best memories of his life. And the worst.

  How old was Jordan now anyway? Twenty-eight. Twenty-nine.

  Had He become like Birmingham? The thought of it made Matthew’s stomach burn. What could the kid possibly want with a dried up convict? Especially one serving time for the murder of his mother. Matthew took a breath and tore the letter open, scanning its contents. One thing was clear. The kid needed all the help he could get.

 
; CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Surveillance at Cassidy Bening’s gravesite proved a giant waste of time and resources.

  Not one person had come close to the Sugar Creek Cemetery in over three days.

  If what they suspected had actually happened, then the culprit wouldn’t be back. Why dig up a ten-year-old grave? It didn’t make sense for someone to bring a crime that old to light, especially since another man sat in prison for the murder.

  Jordan knew McKenna would make the decisive decision to exhume her mother’s grave. Even if doing so put her at the crossroads he now faced. Finding an empty coffin might give him what he needed to convince a judge to have the case reopened, if he could connect the event to her murder.

  The alternative left him with nothing to go on except a vase of flowers that was such a stretch even the old penny pinchers, down at the senior citizen’s home, would laugh him right out of town. Any way he looked at it, vindication wouldn’t be quick—hadn’t been this far.

  McKenna drove them past large brick homes with stone gates and carefully placed and groomed shrubbery. She pulled her rental car to a stop at the curb outside a three story red bricked house with matching maroon shutters on each window.

  Already, two vehicles lined Rupert’s cobblestone driveway, blocking a portion of his three-car garage. A couple of techs surrounded the gold-plated mailbox attached to one of the driveway’s towering stone pillars, gathering evidence. A woman wearing a blue FBI jacket stood on the front steps, talking to Rupert’s sister, Gretchen.

  He couldn’t help whistling.

  McKenna didn’t say anything—hadn’t said much during the fifteen minute trip. The air in the car was thick with whatever she held back.

  Jordan had learned over the years that the quickest way to get her to do something was to demand that she not. This was her job, so it wasn’t fair of him to ask her to stay out of the part of the investigation that included Rupert.

  If she’d given him a hint of unprofessionalism, he could’ve had her transferred from the case. No such luck. Even if he could have her removed for personal reasons, he doubted Robinson would approve it. The man may be Jordan’s friend, but McKenna was one of his favorite agents. That, in itself, spoke volumes about her abilities and work ethic. Jordan hadn’t expected any different.

  Might as well get used to it.

  “Correct me if I’m wrong here. Rupert’s real mother dies when he’s two. He’s got a biological father that’s not in the picture, so she leaves guardianship to Peter Gaidies. Gaidies never legally adopts him and ends up remarrying shortly thereafter. He and Emily Gaidies have a daughter and both she and Rupert grow up with all the advantages. They both go on to college, Gretchen moving out of state and Rupert staying nearby at Duke, where he meets and marries his first wife. They have a kid together, then she splits. Did I leave anything out?”

  “I think you’ve got all the info.” Her words held a definite bite.

  “If this is too awkward for you—”

  “It’s not.” She killed the engine and tried to exit the car as if they were back at the Gaidies’ house a week ago.

  He grabbed her arm, halting her progress. “What’s going on?”

  “Crime scene, remember?”

  “I thought we called a truce? Am I missing something?”

  McKenna looked like she had a smart comment to make. “Why did you run it under the Gaidies case?”

  What was she talking about? “You’re gonna have to be more specific.”

  “I know about the vase, Jordan.” She didn’t give him a chance to deny anything. “Kelly ran the prints and came up with a match.”

  It took everything he had not to demand the information from her, all while trying to decide how to get around giving her the details here and now. “You got a name?”

  “I told Kelly to send you the report.”

  “That’s it?”

  “Isn’t that what you wanted?” She got out of the car, and this time he let her.

  The tech who had been talking with Gretchen headed in their direction as Jordan met McKenna at the hood of her car. “Why don’t you give me the report?”

  She crossed her arms, the corner of her lip tucked between her teeth. “Tell me why it’s so important to you.”

  “It’s pretty expensive, right? For someone living paycheck to paycheck?”

  “It’s not your typical arrangement.”

  “How much?”

  McKenna didn’t bother making eye contact with him, but continued to stare down Rupert’s front door. “At least two thousand dollars. On the low end.”

  “It’s been ten years, and in all those years very few people have left flowers, and never anything that expensive. So, why now?”

  She turned to face him, giving her back to the tech headed toward them. “What do you plan to do with the information, once you get it? What does it prove?”

  “Possibly nothing.”

  “This would be easier if you just told me what you were looking for.”

  “I don’t know.” He only had a gut feeling, which amounted to so little in the world of evidence.

  Hurt rushed into her eyes for half a millisecond before distance replaced it, almost as if she took a giant step away from him without moving. “A little trust would go a long way.”

  Soothing words lodged in his throat, the power to change the subject stuck between his vocal cords and lungs. She had to know his silence didn’t imply a lack of trust.

  “Rupert’s prints were on the vase. And his wife didn’t leave. He kicked her out after he discovered she was having an affair. With men, women, drugs, alcohol. You name it, she’s done it.”

  What?

  “Agent Moore. Agent Bening.” The tech removed a pair of gloves from her hands and tucked a stray strand of brown hair behind her ear. McKenna turned to face her. He could see the other woman’s mouth moving, but couldn’t hear any of the words coming out. Rupert’s prints on the vase blew a huge hole in any theory he had. Possibilities swirled in his mind. Jordan was the connection between Birmingham and his mother. Matthew Blaney married Cassidy a year later and had a teeter-totter of a marriage from day one.

  Rupert didn’t fit in any picture Jordan drew.

  Except the one in which McKenna existed. They broke up months ago and he still hung around. Like a stalker.

  A stalker without an alibi for the night of his mother’s murder. Rupert didn’t like McKenna, but he didn’t dislike her either. Every time the guy’s eyes touched her, told Jordan that much. For whatever reason, Rupert wanted McKenna on this case, but why? Had he planted a piece of ‘evidence’ to get her here?

  “We’ve got a set of hands, but I’m not sure they’re what you’re hoping for.” The tech said. “Not unless decay happens a lot faster than it used to.”

  Jordan’s attention snapped back to the tech in front of him. “What do you mean?”

  “You’ll see.” She waved them along with her as she proceeded toward the house. “I can give you a more exact age of the bones once I take them back to the lab.”

  Chill out, dude. “I’m sorry…” Jordan searched his brain for her name and came up empty.

  “Chelsea Settergrin.” She held out her hand. “I’m bad with introductions, better with bones. I’ve been working with Moore since I got out of college.”

  Jordan shook her hand. “Chelsea, can you give me your best guess on the age?”

  She held the door for them as they entered the house. Two men Jordan hadn’t worked with before stood around an antique table inside the foyer. They nodded as he and McKenna entered, their reflections mimicking the motion in the framed mirror hung above it.

  Even if a clear path to the scene hadn’t been mapped with the buzz of the techs and their equipment, McKenna would have known where to go. She’d been inside this house more times than he wanted to think about.

  It rubbed him wrong.

  “Five to ten years, give or take, depending on the elements the vic’s body was expo
sed to. Again, I’ll run some tests to verify that.” She pointed to the box on top of the table, one end of it torn open. The bones sat beside the box in a heavy duty plastic bag, similar to those they used for evidence. “Mr. Dillon opened the box and they were wrapped like this. From what I can tell, it’s a clean cut just below the ulna and radius. I’ll be able to get a better look with my scope and pinpoint what kind of weapon our guy used and gage when this crime took place. From there, you should be able to tell if this is related to the Gaidies case.”

  “They could belong to anybody,” he said more to himself.

  “The angle of the cut looks similar to Mrs. Gaidies’ wrists.” McKenna slipped on a pair of gloves. She carefully turned the bag so what was once the palm, faced up. “There’s some kind of carving on the middle phalange of the left hand.”

  All three techs gathered around them as they tried to get a closer look. Winter fresh breath wafted in Jordan’s direction. His stomach gurgled. The chattering of Chelsea’s voice hit his ears, but the words didn’t make sense again.

  There are no coincidences. Strange how the one thing he remembered most about Matthew Blaney was the very last thing he said before he disappeared behind the locked door in the courtroom ten years ago. “There are no coincidences, son. The sooner you learn that, the better.”

  Sweat gathered on his upper lip. Any minute now, he’d embarrass himself by rushing out of the house and throwing up somewhere on Rupert’s pristine driveway. The number of times he had come close to losing his stomach contents after signing with the FBI, fit on the digits of one hand.

  “There’s no postmark on the box.” Jordan donned gloves and picked up the box. He broke free of the group, moving from Chelsea and the minty smell. “There’s not even an address. Where’s Rupert?”

  “We’re being targeted.” Rupert leaned against the door frame leading into the kitchen area, his arms across the lettering of a faded t-shirt. “This is a blatant threat to my family. You people need to do something before it’s too late.” His eyes never left the spot where McKenna stood.

  Jordan held up the box, ignored the impulse to crush it. “Seem a little odd?”