Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #2: Books 5-8 (A Dead Cold Box Set) by Blake Banner (best desktop ebook reader .TXT) 📗

Noises that were all too familiar. Maybe you took the knife then. Maybe Jacob had taken it up with him. I don’t know, but I can imagine what happened next.

“You went up and found him raping Mary. The first clue I got was a simple slip of the tongue. You remember, Mary? You said that your mother ‘came back for the brownies at eleven.’ You didn’t say she went back, but she came back. That placed you at home, which made sense with your bad cold, and her being so mothering and careful. I don’t know whether you screamed at him or whether there was some kind of physical fight. I do know that he walked away from you. I can imagine his attitude. I have seen it in his father. Contempt and insults, calling you both whores, and I know that you rushed at him and he fell down the stairs. Maybe you pushed him in self-defense. I hope so.”

The captain glanced his reproof at me. I had just handed her a defense. I didn’t give a damn. I went on.

“He was dead by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs. You grabbed the knife and I am willing to bet that you were out of your mind as you stabbed him. You were not stabbing Jacob, you were stabbing Ahmed.” I turned to the captain. “Sir, my own recommendation to the DA will be not to prosecute. That will be controversial, and frankly, I don’t care. I believe Jacob’s killing was an act of self-defense, and I believe that Ahmed’s killing tonight was partly self-defense, and partly momentary insanity brought on by unendurable provocation.”

He stared at me like he didn’t know whether to sack me on the spot or crucify me first. After a moment, he heaved a huge sigh. “Well, let’s see what the DA says. It is certainly far from clear-cut.”

I turned back to Sylvie and Mary. They had let go of each other and were frowning at me, like they didn’t really understand what I had just said. I gave a smile that had more of reluctance and sadness in it than humor.

“Be smart, Sylvie, and this will soon all be over. Face it this time, see it through, and you might just be able to leave it all behind you. You have nothing to be ashamed of.”

Epilogue

Later that night, as we pulled away and headed north once again toward Morris Park, Dehan asked me, “One thing I don’t really get, is why, after all these years, Ahmed suddenly decided to go after Sylvie?”

“That, I am afraid, was my bad. When I let him know today that we were on to him, he decided, rather stupidly, to eliminate the only witness to Simon’s murder. He was such a stupid, arrogant ass that until then, he had enjoyed the power game of occasionally bumping into Sylvie in the street, taunting her, talking to their son, watching him grow, and knowing that he had an ever more powerful emotional grip on her. But once that grip was broken, and we were closing in on him, he diced she had to die.”

We drove in silence for a few moments, through the dark, empty streets. I turned right onto Morris Park without thinking.

“The lab results on the spit showed that Jacob was, indeed, Ahmed’s son. And the prints I collected from him on that blank envelope…”

She narrowed her eyes and nodded. “I wondered why you did that.”

“Yeah. They were the same as the prints on the plastic bag. Of course, Humberto knew Ahmed. He was their gardener. He was happy to accept that gift from him, considered him a guardian angel.”

She nodded. “That makes sense. What about the kitchen knife? How did he get that?”

I smiled. “That was more complicated. I am guessing that Jacob took it from the block in the kitchen to threaten Mary with it. Maybe he dropped it when his mother turned up. Maybe he dropped it when he fell down the stairs. We’ll never know. The thing is, she grabbed it in a rage frenzy and stabbed him. Then, I figure she wiped her prints off it and hid it. Maybe she buried it in the garden or hid it in the hedgerow and Humberto found it.

“After that, either with Paul’s collusion or not, again, we’ll never know, she swapped her block of knives with the block in the rectory. I checked earlier this evening. The big knife is missing, but the one we have in evidence is a perfect match.”

“Son of a gun.”

“Yup.”

We were silent again, cruising up Morris Park toward Haight Avenue.

“There is one other thing I don’t understand, Stone.”

“What’s that?”

“Why we are heading east on Morris Park. You live up here, but I live down on Simpson Street. Remember?”

I shook my head. “I figure I have done such a damn fine job, I deserve for you to take me out on a date. We are going to have a shower and a Martini…” I looked at her with no particular expression and watched her eyebrows crawl up her forehead. “Separate and discreet showers and Martinis, Dehan, behave yourself. And then you are going to take me to Artie’s Steak and Sea Food Restaurant, fifteen minutes’ drive from my house.”

“Oh, am I?”

“Indeed you are. After that, we will get a taxi to my place and you will teach me your mother’s recipe for margaritas.”

“Ha! That is a family secret.”

“Yeah, but I am family. We are going to get married and have twelve kids. I converted for you, remember?”

“Just twelve now? It was going to be fifteen.”

“Teach me your mother’s recipe for margaritas and we’ll make it fifteen.”

“Hmm, it’s a tempting offer, alright…”

BOOK 6

STRANGE AND SINISTER PATH

One

The captain wandered into the