room was open and broken up into two sides with several desks making up each row. There was a smattering of detectives sitting around, some on the phone, others standing together talking about the Eagles’ shot at the Super Bowl this year. The mood was casual, as the graveyard shift sometimes could be, depending on what the night brought.
Cass was convinced it took a certain kind of person to work the hours from midnight to eight when everything was dark and quiet and most people slept. Sure, the night could be peaceful. But it could also be a time when even the most innocuous things turned sinister. When a bush outside a window transforms itself into a monster in front of a scared child’s eyes.
Or when a man who loves his wife suddenly becomes her murderer.
The night shift, like Homicide, didn’t really fit Dougie’s personality. He was an optimist. Nights at a police station rarely fostered optimism. But she imagined there was some reason he had made the switch.
A tingle at the back of her neck intercepted her thoughts. The room in her mind formed quickly, and the face beyond the door was familiar to her.
“Ow,” she blurted as she reached for her ribs.
“You okay?” Dougie asked, his hand at her back guiding her forward.
“Yes, just a hitch in my side,” she told him. She turned to study him and noticed the dark circles under his eyes that hadn’t registered before the visitor in her head pointed them out. “You’re looking tired, Dougie. Are you getting any sleep?”
“I sleep,” he replied enigmatically.
“Enough?”
“I sleep,” he snapped. “Jeez, you sound like my mother.”
“I’ve met your mother. She’s a smart woman and she worries about her son.” He stopped walking, so she did, too. “I take it that’s him?”
There was only one man in the room who appeared to be a civilian. Dressed in a dark gray suit that screamed quality from a hundred feet away, he sat stiffly in a hard-backed chair. His eyes stared out the window to his right as if he were in a trance, but Cass could see even from this distance that his jaw was tightly clenched.
“Mr. McDonough,” Dougie called to him as they approached the desk.
The man turned, and his steel-blue gaze landed first on Dougie, then switched to her and he came to his feet. Once more, she reached up to brush her bangs down over her forehead.
“This is Cass Allen,” Dougie introduced her. “She works for us from time to time on a consulting basis. I wondered if you wouldn’t mind taking a few minutes to speak with her.”
“I do mind.” His words were clipped. Although his tone was seemingly neutral, Cass could feel the heat of anger in the air. “Am I under suspicion? I came here after hearing about…after seeing what he did to her…to answer any questions that might help you in your investigation. That was over ten hours ago. I wanted to avoid calling my lawyer, but if this is going to go on…”
“I told you we just wanted to talk to you,” Dougie assured him. “There is no reason to call your lawyer. Unless of course you think you need counsel, then by all means…”
The muscles around his jaw flexed. “I don’t.”
“A few more minutes,” Dougie said.
“A few more minutes,” he repeated softly. “That’s a few more minutes that you’re not out there looking for my sister’s murderer.”
“Looking for someone, until we know everything there is to know about Lauren, her habits, her friends, her routine, would be a waste of time. Let us do our job. Talk to Cass. She’s going to ask you some questions.”
Cass’s eyebrow shot up, but she resisted the urge to shoot Dougie an uncertain glance. She didn’t have any questions. She just needed to spend time with McDonough to see if anything happened. Dougie was counting on the fact that something would, but nothing was ever certain. There was never any way of controlling it. Some people she connected with and others she didn’t. She used to question it, but it became pointless when she learned she was never going to find an answer.
As the tingle started she acknowledged this was one she connected with, and she focused on forming the room in her mind. The familiar door opened slowly, almost cautiously, and Cass waited for impact.
A powerful blow shot to her midsection, causing a whoosh of air to escape. She could sense both men looking at her, but she straightened slowly and ignored their curiosity. Instead she smiled and concentrated on breathing.
A serene face greeted her on the other side of the door. Beautiful. Blond.
Lauren.
“So, you’re Malcolm McDonough? And your sister was Lauren,” Cass stated.
He merely stared at her, his eyes moving up and down, taking in first her sneakers, then the rest of her apparel, with a slight sneer.
“You don’t look like a consultant.”
“I got her out of bed,” Dougie told him. “Can’t really expect her to be at her best at this hour.”
“I suppose.”
“I think I need some coffee,” she said.
Dougie hesitated for a moment, but then nodded. He walked off, his agile gait eating up the distance between the desk and the coffee machine.
Carefully, the man in front of her took his seat again.
You have to help him. He won’t know what to do. How to handle this.
Cass felt the words inside her head and tried to make sense of them even as she focused on the seated man. It was sort of like trying to have a conversation with someone while listening to someone else speak into her ear. Like people tried to do with their hands-free cell phone units and usually failed. However, for Cass, keeping the two conversations distinct while acting normally had become an art form. While dramatic pauses made for great television for TV psychics, in real life they tended to make people uncomfortable.
The space between the desks was tight, and she found herself having to step over McDonough’s feet in order to get to the chair that was across from Dougie’s desk. Turning the chair a little, so she could face him, Cass struggled with what to ask him.
“Long day?”
His face hardened noticeably. “Yes.”
He’s so hurt. I can’t leave until I know he’s going to be all right. Make him talk to you.
“What’s the matter with your eye?”
“I’m sorry?” Cass looked up and met his gaze.
“It’s bruised. Did someone hit you?”
“Uh…no…uh, I’m clumsy and I bent down and you know…bang.”
He said nothing.
“I know that Lauren lived on Addison. I live on Addison. It’s a nice neighborhood, but it’s going downhill a little. I just moved a couple of blocks down the street to avoid the danger zone.”
He continued to say nothing.
“Did she have any friends that lived nearby?”
“Of course she had friends. She was a very sweet girl.”
“Anyone you know?” When he remained silent, she pushed. “Were you two close?”
“No.”
“Oh.” She waited for him to say something else, but she was getting the impression that he wasn’t the type to volunteer information, so she had to ask the obvious. “Why not?”
His jaw clenched. “There were several reasons. She is…was…my half sister. There were many years between us. And we were very different.”
We