Chapter 15

FIFTEEN

Josie’s phone vibrated in her palm. A text from Noah, telling her the same thing Turner had just said. She barely registered it, dropping the phone back into her pocket. The only thing she could concentrate on in that moment was the fact that Trinity and Kyle Turner knew each other. How in the hell did they know one another? Wouldn’t Trinity have mentioned that at some point in all the months that Josie had complained about him? Except Josie never used his real name. She always referred to him as Douchebag.

“Quinn,” Turner said. “Did you hear me? I got a real problem.”

“Kyle,” Trinity said. “You know my sister?”

He didn’t even look at Trinity. Josie’s stomach bottomed out at the unwelcome thought that the reason they knew one another was because they’d had some sort of tryst. Was that possible?

“I work with her,” Turner answered tersely. “Quinn, are you having a stroke or something? I need your help.”

No, no, no. Trinity would never. She had to know him in her capacity as a journalist. That had to be it.

“Oh my God,” Trinity gasped. She pushed her way out the door and onto the landing next to Josie. “ This is Douchebag Detective? Are you kidding me?”

Josie wanted to ask Trinity how she knew Turner. Even more than that, she wanted to know why it was surprising that Kyle Turner was Douchebag Detective. Anyone who spent five minutes in his presence would get the nickname immediately. Drake certainly had.

Josie narrowed her eyes at Turner. Why hadn’t he said anything about the fact that she’d been referring to him as Douchebag to her sister? He tugged at his beard again, harder this time. He had a lot of nervous tics but this was not one she’d seen before. “What’s wrong with you? What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything.” He hooked a thumb toward his car. Now that Josie looked more closely, she could see a figure in the passenger’s seat. “Your press liaison is in my car.”

“Why is Amber in your car?” said Josie.

“Kellan Neal came back to the stationhouse. I was working on warrants. He said he confronted Remy about this morning. The guy won’t admit to an affair. Won’t admit to anything. Neal told him that as an act of good faith, and so that we won’t waste precious investigative time looking in the wrong direction, he should let us search his vehicle and electronic devices. Remy Tate refused.”

They already knew that Remy Tate was hiding something. Whether it was a simple affair or involvement in the abduction of his wife was the question. Even if he was innocent of Cleo’s kidnapping, would he admit to his father-in-law, a retired prosecutor, that he was having an affair? Providing an alibi seemed like a no-brainer, but if he thought there was a chance Cleo might come home then maybe he was holding out. Once he admitted to it, the damage was done, and Josie remembered Kellan Neal well enough to know that, in his mind, a mistress would only make Remy more viable as a person of interest.

Josie could feel Trinity’s presence beside her. She wasn’t sure if Trinity was still there because she knew Turner or because she was interested in the details of the case. Probably both.

The dark outline of Amber’s silhouette didn’t move. “That doesn’t tell me why Amber is in your car.”

Turner sighed. “I was talking to Neal when she came in to deal with this Cleo Tate mess. Neal told her he wanted to do a public appeal. Amber said it was a good idea. Highlight this guy’s service to the city. Get him to ask the public for help finding his daughter. She set everything up for him and the Chief to have a press conference an hour from now.”

Josie brushed past him and started walking toward the car. “Get to the point, Turner.”

He followed her. “After Neal left, I was looking for something in Mettner’s desk drawer. Then the drawer got stuck. I had to pull the whole thing out.”

Amber didn’t even look over when Josie reached for the door handle. Turner gently grabbed her wrist, stopping her from opening the door. When Josie glared up at him, he released her. Lowering his voice to a whisper, he said, “The drawer was stuck on this key chain. Couple of keys on it. Not important. It said, ‘Uncle Finn,’ on it. She saw it and just freaked out. Totally lost her shit, Quinn. I didn’t know what to do.”

Josie opened her mouth to say something about him only knowing how to make women cry rather than soothing them when they did, but another look at him under the dim glow of the streetlight stopped her. He wore an expression she had never seen before. “Are you…worried?”

Turner rolled his eyes. “This isn’t about me, sweetheart. Shit. Just talk to her, would you? I didn’t know what the hell to do. I couldn’t let her sit in that stationhouse with people coming in and out constantly, you know, seeing her like that.”

Wait. Was this Douchebag human, after all? Josie shook off the thought.

Turner said, “I hustled her out of there—and yes, she said it was okay—and into my car. She was still hysterical. Then she said to bring her to see you. Gave me the address.”

Josie tapped lightly against the window, but Amber didn’t look over. “You could have called me to come get her.”

Turner groaned and tugged at his beard again. “And waited for you to show up? While the parking lot was swarmed with press? Come on, Quinn. Do I seem like the kind of guy who could spend that much time with a sobbing woman? It was faster to bring her here.”

Josie’s phone buzzed again but she ignored it. She opened the door and touched Amber’s shoulder. Still no movement. Then Trinity was there, pushing Turner out of the way, and helping Josie coax Amber from the car. Trinity had been there the night they lost Mettner. After the shooting, she’d climbed into Josie’s hospital bed and comforted her in a way no one else could, not even Noah. Trinity knew everyone in Josie’s world of found family and was well aware of the magnitude of Amber’s loss.

Trinity put an arm around Amber’s waist. “Sometimes it just hits you like that,” she whispered. “You came to the right place.”

Amber sagged against her as Trinity helped her into the house. Josie watched them go, an uncharacteristic lump forming in her throat. Grief was a wily thing. It made you think that after a year or more, you could handle your loss. It convinced you that you were making progress, that maybe a day would come when your pain would be manageable enough to take a full breath again.

Then grief reminded you that something as small as a fucking key chain could take you out at the knees.

“I’m gonna go now,” Turner said. “You, uh, you’ve got your hands full, looks like. I’ll see you in the morning.”

He walked around to the driver’s side door. Before he got in, Josie said, “Thank you.”

She could count on one hand the number of times she’d thanked him for anything. It always made him absolutely insufferable. The gloating went on for days. Except this time, he only nodded.

“Turner,” said Josie. “You said you were looking through Mettner’s desk.”

His fingers drummed against the roof of the car. “Yeah.”

“Not your desk?”

With a sigh, he said, “Quinn, I’m a lot of things but stupid isn’t one of them. That desk will be mine when I earn it.”

For a moment, Josie’s breath hitched in her throat. Then Turner grinned at her and slapped his palm against the car’s roof. “Now I gotta go get some sleep, sweetheart, ’cause I know as soon as I get into that stationhouse tomorrow, you’re going to be right up my ass making sure I do every single little thing the way the great Josie Quinn thinks it should be done.”

Irritation flared in Josie’s stomach like acid. She bit back her immediate response, that it wasn’t how she thought things should be done, but about how the law and procedure dictated they be done. Instead, she turned away and started walking back up her driveway. Over her shoulder, she called, “I expect two dollars in my jar first thing tomorrow.”

As she stepped inside, she thought she heard him laughing. Taking out her phone, she read the latest text from Noah.

I’m thinking this guy might be smart enough to not be caught in the geofence. Or leave prints. Hummel typed the blood found in the park. It matches Cleo Tate’s blood type. He’s working overtime now to pull everything he can from the car. Chief is having DNA samples expedited.

Josie sighed. They’d already assumed the blood belonged to Cleo Tate. No surprise there. All that told them was what they already knew: she was in big trouble. Expedited DNA results in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania could sometimes still take weeks or months, depending on the volume of samples the state lab had to test. Even if the DNA results came back in a week or two, if the abductor wasn’t in the CODIS database they weren’t going to be any closer to finding him. If Noah was right and the next day brought one dead end after another, the only clue they had left was the polaroid.