Price of Innocence Read online

  Price of Innocence

  Book 2, The Innocence Trilogy

  Patricia McLinn

  The Innocence Trilogy

  Proof of Innocence

  Price of Innocence

  Premise of Innocence

  Other romantic suspense and mystery by Patricia McLinn

  Romantic suspense

  Ride the River: Rodeo Knights

  Bardville, Wyoming Series

  Mystery

  Caught Dead in Wyoming series

  Sign Off

  Left Hanging

  Shoot First

  Last Ditch

  Look Live

  Back Story

  Cold Open

  Hot Roll

  Reaction Shot

  Body Brace

  “While the mystery itself is twisty-turny and thoroughly engaging, it’s the smart and witty writing that I loved the best.”

  — Diane Chamberlain, New York Times bestselling author

  Secret Sleuth series

  Death on the Diversion

  Death on Torrid Avenue

  Death on Beguiling Way

  Death on Covert Circle

  Death on Shady Bridge

  Death on Carrion Lane

  Join Patricia McLinn’s Readers List and get news on releases and special deals first.

  Copyright © 2021 by Patricia McLinn

  Ebook ISBN: 978-1-944126-32-2

  Paperback ISBN: 978-1-944126-33-9

  EPUB Edition

  www.PatriciaMcLinn.com

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

  Cover design: Art by Karri

  * * * *

  Dear Readers: If you encounter typos or errors in this book, please send them to me at [email protected]. Even with many layers of editing, mistakes can slip through, alas. But, together, we can eradicate the nasty nuisances. Thank you! — Patricia McLinn

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Day One

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Day Two

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Day Three

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Day Four

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Day Five

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Day Six

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  Chapter Sixty

  Chapter Sixty-One

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  Day Seven

  Chapter Sixty-Four

  Chapter Sixty-Five

  Chapter Sixty-Six

  Day Eight

  Chapter Sixty-Seven

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  Chapter Sixty-Nine

  Chapter Seventy

  Chapter Seventy-One

  Chapter Seventy-Two

  Chapter Seventy-Three

  Chapter Seventy-Four

  Chapter Seventy-Five

  Chapter Seventy-Six

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  Epilogue

  Other Books by Patricia McLinn

  About the author

  PROLOGUE

  Labor Day Weekend

  She needed this.

  A chance to get away from everything and everyone.

  She didn’t mind the rain pouring down outside. Not at all. It made it a great day to finish up, then be on her way.

  Things had … piled up lately.

  Not the first time in her life. She’d learned that sometimes the only way to get out from under the pile was to leave.

  Step out of her life, let the curtain close behind her, take a break to do something else, then restart fresh.

  The front doorbell rang.

  Odd.

  The only person who knew where she was had been here last night … to their mutual satisfaction.

  As far as anyone else was concerned, she wasn’t here. Nobody was. That was the whole point.

  Must be something random. A kid selling candy, magazines. Miserable weather for it, but she wouldn’t mind some candy.

  She opened the door.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Light, glare-white, glazed the lower two-thirds of a townhouse, reflected blindingly off its windows, and darted shadows behind an early drift of leaves pooled at the bottom of its steps. Across narrow Red Hill Street, police tape ribboned the sidewalk.

  Walking between two television vans toward the light, Detective Ford Belichek stopped and looked behind him.

  It wasn’t only light that changed at this border. Dark did, too.

  In the distance, night softly blurred into misty midnight. A quiet place, where people relaxed into peaceful rest.

  That’s where he was supposed to be, starting vacation. Though leave was more accurate. As in, he was ordered to leave.

  But when he heard this call, something deeper than habit and a hell of a lot more insistent than obeying the human resources department impelled him.

  He half-turned, focusing on the close-range darkness.

  On porches, spectators became wraiths topped by pale, shocked ovals of faces. At street level, those behind the light had no form. Only movement betrayed them.

  Murder did this, Belichek knew, dividing its universe into light and dark, truth and doubts.

  Inside the glare, a slender young woman in a vibrant blue dress stepped before a man with a camera perched on the shoulder of his Washington Capitals t-shirt.

  The camera carried the logo of a network-affiliated station from across the Potomac River in Washington, D.C.

  Homicide among the neat brick houses and tidy lawns of Fairlington, Virginia, still had a shock value lost in too many places. Put that homicide in Fairlington’s historic Old Town and media interest ratcheted up.

  A camera light c
ame on, focused on the woman in the blue dress. Holding a microphone near her mouth, she spoke.

  He couldn’t hear words, yet he knew they would recite facts without sharing the truth.

  Because the truth had not yet been excavated. That was his job.

  “Belichek! Over here.”

  Detective Tanner Landis shouted from where he stood, fully in the light. It shaved the clear-carved lines of his face, glossed his dark hair, and starched the white shirt under his sports jacket.

  Some dismissed the guy for how he looked and dressed.

  Lousy policework in Belichek’s view. Reserve judgment until the facts are in.

  The facts of their partnership proved Landis was a good cop.

  Landis called again, impatient. “Told them you’d be listening and wouldn’t go off on vacation like a normal person. The brass will have something to say when they find out, but in the meantime, I can use you.”

  “Coming.” Belichek didn’t say the word loud enough for Landis to hear above the hum of machinery and chatter of humans. Landis hadn’t waited for it anyway, moving with characteristic ease toward the house. Sure of Belichek’s response.

  He caught up with his partner at the base of the steps leading to a front door that looked as old as the house and those surrounding it in Old Town Fairlington, Virginia, which — considering George Washington actually had slept here, along with a number of his contemporaries — had it pushing three centuries.

  “What’ve we got?” he asked Landis.

  “We? As of twenty-seven minutes ago, I’ve got primary on a body, likely homicide. Lucky me, with the department developing a leak some scumbag podcaster’s spreading to the world. What—”

  “Gossip.”

  “—you’ve got is a sickness that brings you here when you’re on vacation as of tomorrow. A sickness I fully intend to take advantage of. You know who they’ve proposed giving me as second in place of you? Terrington. Can you believe it? Terrington. You’d think it was a conspiracy to make me appreciate you. As for the leak, yeah, gossip so far. Doesn’t make me feel warm and fuzzy about the prospects of something about my case not slipping through.”

  Landis jerked his head to the uniform coming down the townhouse’s steps toward them. Ford recognized him. Smith? Was that his name? He’d done a decent job on a domestic murder-suicide earlier in the year.

  “What’ve you got for us, Schmidt?”

  Schmidt, not Smith. Figured Landis remembered.

  * * * *

  Oliver Zeedyk waited until the guy, surely a cop, quit looking around like a murderer was about to drop out of the sky in front of him.

  He took the camera out of his jacket, smoothly to not attract attention, turned it on, and caught that cop talking to the others by the steps.

  With luck— But when was he lucky?

  It probably wouldn’t be usable on the show. Maybe, just maybe, he could use it to help ID the cops. Put faces with names.

  Three cops — two in plainclothes, one in uniform — went up the steps and inside. There were still a lot of cops around, but low level. If he didn’t make a big deal of it, he had a chance to get atmosphere footage for the next show.

  Damn. The light was crap, washing out even the garish police tape.

  Didn’t matter, he reminded himself. People subscribed to the show to hear him, not for glossy video. Maybe the bit with the cops would do for a moody background to sound bites and banner quotes to make an audience salivate. A big audience.

  And there would be sound bites. Killer sound bites.

  He clamped his mouth into a straight line to keep from grinning.

  He’d known this would happen — known something would happen — and he had all the pieces in place to make his mark.

  Screw those jackasses who’d pushed him out. Sanctimonious prigs. Saying he hadn’t lived up to their standards.

  Screw their standards.

  He knew what he was after and he was going to get it.

  Everything was in place.

  This was exactly what he’d planned for.

  “Hey, aren’t you, uh…?”

  He wouldn’t mind mainstream media recognizing him, but if the cops… He turned.

  Not a cop. Not media, either. Had to be a hanger-on. A crime junkie. There was lots of talk about groupies drawn to true crime podcasts, especially women who got their jollies following serial killers, but plenty of guys listened to him, too.

  This guy was young, skinny, pale.

  “Yeah. Oz Zeedyk. I have the DMV podcast.”

  That was aw-shucks modest. He was the DMV podcast.

  “Right, right. Great name. Taking the DMV for the District, Maryland, Virginia, and using it for Death—”

  “Murder and Violence.”

  “Right, right. Suppose I shouldn’t be surprised you’re here, huh?”

  “I go where there’s death, murder, and—”

  “Violence. Right, right.”

  “—violence,” he completed himself. Didn’t like this guy rushing the end of the name. Never knew who could overhear. He repeated the podcast name as many times as he could. “Especially a murder in this sort of neighborhood.”

  “Right, right. That’s the big interest in this situation, huh?”

  “Of course. Rich neighborhood, rich people.” Bitterness eased under a flow of warmth through Oz at knowing more than ordinary people. “This is going to be a big case. Really big.” He tapped the guy lightly on the chest. “Be sure to listen to Death, Murder, Violence. Going to be lots of surprises on DMV during this investigation.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “A reeker, that’s what we’ve got for you. From what the neighbors report, the owner was supposed to have left Labor Day weekend. It must’ve been in the house these past three weeks,” Officer Schmidt said.

  Three weeks with a string of heat records for September dates in the Washington, D.C., area — which produced more than its share of hot air at the best of times — and kept air conditioners running on high.

  Everywhere except in this house, where life had fled, leaving its disintegrating shell. The disintegration hurried along by no AC.

  “Actually, body doesn’t reek much now, but the house—”

  “ID?” Landis interrupted.

  “Tentative. No ID on the body, which makes sense, being at home. No sign of a purse or wallet on cursory look when we made entry. Backed out when we saw the body. Neighbors say a woman lives here alone. Late twenties. Body looks to be the right size, hair color to match the descriptions. The woman who found her is pretty shaken, but she says the clothes — what she saw of them — look like the resident’s.”

  Belichek looked up, frowned.

  The uniform added, “Since she was supposed to be away. Nobody was surprised there wasn’t activity.”

  “Have you lined up somebody to officially ID her? Why not?” Landis asked as Schmidt shook his head. “There’s gotta be family, friends, co-workers, neighbors.”

  “There’s plenty of those,” Schmidt said, starting acid dripping into Belichek’s stomach. “What there isn’t is a face to recognize.”

  “Shit.” Landis snapped the word.

  “With the heat and the time… Not much in the way of hands, either.”

  “Cut off?” Landis’ tone didn’t change, yet Belichek knew the possibilities shifting through his partner’s brain acquired an additional stream.

  “No. Bones are there. More like, maybe she put her hands up in front of her face. Didn’t do any good.”

  Schmidt looked like he wanted to spit. The kind of body he’d described could do that… when it didn’t suck your mouth and guts dry. He glanced toward the TV cameras, refrained from spitting, then continued reporting.

  “Shotgun, from what I saw. Close range. ME’s investigator isn’t committing, but sure looks like both barrels.”

  Landis muttered another curse. “Fingerprints?”

  Eyes on the leaves at his feet and hands propped on his hips, Schmidt s
hook his head again. “Scientists aren’t optimistic. As I said, best guess is she put her hands up to try to protect herself. Add on three weeks being shut up in a house with no AC in this heat. There’s not much there.”

  In the silence, Belichek guessed the others were thinking, as he was, that instinct could be damned futile against a double-barreled shotgun.

  “Shee-it.” This time Landis drew the word out to multiple syllables of resignation. “That means dental records, we’ll have to— Now what?”

  Schmidt’s head-shaking didn’t cease at Landis’ sharp tone. “Told you there’s not much there. ME’s investigator said she’s not optimistic about putting the jaw back together any time soon. Or getting enough useful teeth. They’re mostly shattered.”

  “Shee-it,” Landis repeated in disgust. “At least with bones we can check medical records. Let’s go.”

  Landis started up the stairs, and Belichek followed, reporting their identities and getting outfitted.

  Inside, Belichek skirted the mass that had once been human, and now was the province of the medical examiner’s office. Landis stopped, considering the disposition of the body, judging angles and distances.

  Belichek would do that, too, but not until the lull when the ME team was packing up, after this beehive of activity and before they took the body.

  Landis looked over his shoulder at him. “Suppose you’re going to do your open house tour?”

  “Yeah.”

  He usually started by looking around the crime scene — especially if it was someplace personal. Victim’s or suspect’s, a home gave color and depth to the crime the dead body so seldom could.

  It worked for them — him and Landis — coming at the crime from slightly different angles right from the start. They saw different things.

  He left his partner with the body and the ME’s people. Schmidt stayed there, too, attaching himself to the primary.

  Smart if he had his eye on making detective.

  A break for Belichek, who preferred to observe alone. Except for the crime scene investigators, of course. They had true possession of the house for now. Everyone else was here on sufferance, as long as they didn’t get in the way.

  From the entryway to the living room, he nodded at the woman in protective gear over by a knot of dead plants at the front window as she methodically processed the room.