The Girl With No Name

Chapter Seven

The search of Misty’s home turned up little more, aside from an ornate antique desk with several locked drawers on each side, but no sign of a key. Noah suggested breaking into it but by the looks of it, having it fixed when Misty had recovered would cost more than the department’s monthly gas budget. Instead, Josie had one of her officers call a locksmith to see if it could be opened with minimal damage. One of Josie’s primary responsibilities as chief was keeping the department afloat financially. She no longer had the luxury of jumping into a case with the sole purpose of solving it; every decision had to be weighed against the department’s budget constraints.

One of Josie’s senior officers managed to find his way into Misty’s laptop, but even that held little in the way of helpful information or leads on a suspect. They could see the sites she visited frequently—her banking site and email, which were useless without a password, Amazon, Babies “R” Us and a site called “Your Pregnancy Week by Week”—but none of that told them anything that would help locate her baby.

Josie hoped they’d get something from the prints taken at Misty’s house, although that would take time as well, as they had to use the services of the state police for all fingerprint searches. It often took a few days, but Josie thought she might be able to convince them to expedite it, especially with such a fragile life at stake.

Josie felt a small thrill working alongside her officers at the crime scene, like she was just a detective again, not stuck behind a desk facing a mountain of paperwork. God, she missed this.

She was pulled away from her thoughts by the sudden buzzing, ringing and vibrating of cell phones all around her. The state police must have accepted the Amber Alert, thought Josie with relief. They were in charge of reviewing all Amber Alert requests and then issuing them once accepted. Now all Josie’s team could do was wait.

She and Noah stepped outside, peeling off their suits. They had done all they could at Misty’s house, gleaned as much information as they could without the kind of testing you could only expect from a lab. “I’ll head over to Foxy Tails with you,” she said.

Noah froze and stared at her. “You sure?”

The last time she’d been to the club had been the night that she caught Ray locked in a passionate embrace with Misty. It was common knowledge on the force and Josie didn’t want to set foot in the place ever again, but the buzz of being back in the field and the thought of Luke’s cold reception waiting for her at home was enough to persuade her otherwise. Besides, Ray was long gone, and Misty’s baby was missing. Her own feelings about Misty had to be put aside. She had a job to do.

“Yes,” she said. “I’m sure.”

“Boss,” one of the patrol officers called. Noah had started calling her boss immediately after she took the position of chief. It was kind of a joke, but now it was what everyone called her. Anything was better than chief. No one would ever replace her predecessor.

Josie and Noah turned to look toward the street where the patrol officer was pointing. Beneath a slowly darkening evening sky, a black stretch limousine sat curbside.

“Well,” Noah said. “That’s not something you see every day.”

One of the tinted windows toward the back of the limo rolled down, and Mayor Tara Charleston’s face peeked out. Her brow was severely arched. “Chief Quinn,” she called. “A word?”

Josie looked at Noah. He shrugged. With a sigh, she pulled off her Tyvek booties and made her way to the limousine. The door opened as she approached, and she climbed in, pulling it closed behind her. The mayor was alone in the back, enveloped in one of its long, taupe leather seats wearing a deep-blue evening gown with pearls to match, her dark hair swept back in an elegant French twist.

“Oh shit,” Josie said.

She tried to pat down her own hair, which had reacted to the static electricity from her cap. She probably looked like she’d stuck her finger in a socket.

Tara frowned at her. “You forgot, didn’t you?”

“The benefit. Tara, I’m really sorry,” Josie said.

“Did you even buy a dress?” Tara asked.

“Of course I did. I—” She broke off, thinking about the slinky black dress that hung on the back of her bathroom door, of how she had agonized for months over what kind of dress the city’s first-ever female chief of police should wear to her first charity benefit—a benefit thrown by the mayor to fund the women’s center she’d always wanted to build. Josie hated hoity-toity, fancy, dress-up events—she hadn’t even enjoyed her prom—but she thought the women’s center the mayor was proposing was sorely needed in their city. It would be a tremendous resource for the women of Denton. Plus, she was chief now. Apparently, these were the types of things chiefs of police got behind and attended. She wondered absently if Luke was waiting at her house in his tuxedo, or if he’d even remembered at all.

“Chief Quinn, you know how important this benefit is to me. I’ve worked for months to put this together. Do you have any idea how hard it was for me to get Eric Dunn and Peter Rowland in the same room? The promises I had to make? Even a small donation from just one of them could make the difference between building this women’s center and scrapping the whole project.”

“I know,” Josie said. “I’m sorry.”

Peter Rowland was a billionaire who had grown up in Denton. He had gone on to make a fortune developing state-of-the-art security and surveillance systems which he sold the world over to various companies, especially casinos. He lived in New York City, but Josie knew he still kept a home in Denton. Eric Dunn was a casino mogul who had been trying for months to close a deal to build a casino on some unused land just inside Denton’s city limits. Josie knew from her previous conversations with Tara that Rowland was interested in negotiating a contract with Dunn to have his security system installed at Dunn’s casino in Denton and any other casino Dunn opened in the future. Personally, Josie thought opening a casino in Denton was a horrible idea, but she understood that Tara was only interested in Dunn’s money. That was what politicians did: they used people. Josie hadn’t been able to figure out Tara’s angle in inviting—damn near insisting—that Josie come to the benefit, but she was a little relieved to have gotten out of it.

“I did buy a dress,” she assured Tara. “I had every intention of attending.” She motioned toward the outside, where Misty’s huge Victorian sat now dark and silent, the officers packing up their crime scene kit and evidence. “But we’ve got a serious situation here.”

“I know,” Tara said. She opened her clutch purse and pulled out a cell phone which she waved at Josie. “I got the Amber Alert and made a call to the station and found out where you all were. This is her house, isn’t it?”

For a moment, Josie simply stared at her. The way Tara said the word “her” was the same way Josie had said it since she’d found out about Ray’s affair. The way any woman would when referring to their husband’s mistress, like something dirty in their mouths that they couldn’t wait to spit out.

Tara dropped her phone back into her clutch and looked out the window. “I knew she lived in this neighborhood, but I’ve never been here before.”

“We are talking about Misty Derossi, right?” Josie asked.

Tara nodded, her gaze lingering on Misty’s house while Josie waited for her to speak again. When she did, her voice was low. “My husband had an affair with her.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Josie said, not as shocked as she should have been. She couldn’t help but wonder if Misty had been sleeping with Tara’s husband while she was engaged to Ray. It wasn’t impossible.

Tara met Josie’s eyes. “He thinks he is the father of her baby.”

Josie said nothing.

“I’m not so sure.”

“Why do you think he isn’t?”

Again, Tara’s gaze flitted away from Josie. She sounded exhausted. “Not many people know this, but my husband and I can’t have children. It’s me, not him. We always said we would adopt, or at least foster children or something like that, but then life just got in the way. We both had our careers… I found out about his affair in November of last year.”

“Misty would have become pregnant sometime in the first two weeks of December,” Josie pointed out.

“Right. Well, my husband claims they… saw each other one more time after things broke off. Late November, early December. I told him the timing doesn’t necessarily add up, but he refused to believe me. Honestly, I think he wants it to be his baby. He had these grand plans for raising it, co-parenting with her while still being married to me.” Here, Tara laughed harshly and rolled her eyes. “Men can be such idiots sometimes. Anyway, he finally confronted her. Imagine his surprise when he found out he wasn’t the only person she was sleeping with.” Here Josie detected a small amount of satisfaction in Tara’s expression.

“Did he let it go after that?” Josie asked.

“Eventually. At first, he said he’d insist on a DNA test, but over time he gave up on the idea. We’ve been in counseling. I’m sure you can imagine the strain the entire thing has put on our marriage.”

Josie wanted very badly to ask why Tara stayed in the marriage at all, but held her tongue. Tara was ambitious, and Josie knew that her husband, a well-respected surgeon, was good for the image she liked to project of a power couple ready, willing, and able to lead the city of Denton. The scandal would not play well if she wanted to be re-elected. Nor would a divorce.

“Why are you really here?” Josie asked.

“I imagine your first line of inquiry will be into who the father of the baby is.”

Josie remained silent. She wasn’t sure she liked where this was going.

“I wanted to head you off at the pass. Save you some time by letting you know that my husband’s name would likely appear on your list of potential fathers.”

“I appreciate your candor,” Josie said. “Where is your husband, by the way?”

At this, Tara smiled. “He’s at the hospital. He was called in for an emergency surgery a few hours ago.”

That didn’t absolve Tara’s husband since they really had no idea of the precise time Misty had been attacked, but Josie understood what Tara was offering, so she said, “If your husband has an alibi, why are we having this conversation?”

“Because I was hoping that having eliminated him as a suspect, it wouldn’t need to be made public record that he was sleeping with Misty Derossi.”

“You understand that my department will have to verify his alibi, don’t you?”

“Yes, of course. I’m only asking for some… discretion.”

“I can be discreet as long as there’s nothing criminal going on.”

Tara bristled. She had expected total compliance, but Josie wasn’t going to give it to her. There was a baby missing, and Josie was going to find him no matter what stones she had to kick over—and no matter whose feathers she ruffled.

Slowly, Tara reached into her clutch and pulled out a compact which she flipped open, checking her eyeliner. “You know, we’ve never really discussed it, but you’re still considered an interim chief.”

“What exactly are you saying?”

Tara continued to look into the small mirror, running a fingernail beneath one of her eyelids. “I’m saying, my first choice for chief of police of this city probably wouldn’t be someone with a history like yours. All that business last year and then the excessive force allegation.”

“That’s all it ever was,” Josie pointed out. “An allegation. Made by a junkie who overdosed two months after I took this position. You know that.”

Tara snapped the compact shut, her eyes burning into Josie’s. “And you know that you have kept your position as chief because I have allowed you to do so. What I should have done after Chief Harris died was find a candidate with the right experience and an impeccable record.”

Josie nearly blurted out the words, “Then fire me” but stopped herself. She’d never wanted to be chief, and missed the kind of hands-on police work her staff got to do, but she didn’t need a war with the mayor right now. She needed to find Misty’s baby. Instead, she said, “My staff are loyal to me. They know me and trust me—in no small part because I was Chief Harris’ choice to take over. I was his choice because I was clean, and I got the job done. I will be as discreet as I can, Mayor Charleston, but if I find out your husband is implicated in anything illegal, my discretion goes out the window.”

Tara glared at her. Her unspoken threat filled up the air between them, making it fizz with tension.

Josie pasted a fake smile onto her face and gripped the door handle. “Well,” she said. “I’m glad we had this chat. I’ll be in touch.”