laughed if someone suggested that she’d be happy to be back here. A week of crossing guard duty had taught her a hard lesson.
She took one of the far spaces in the back of the lot. The engine knocked when she turned the key. Amanda checked the time. Evelyn was running late. Amanda should go inside the squad and wait for her, but she was thinking of this as their triumphant return. Having to spend five days in the grueling heat dressed in a wool uniform while lazy children tromped in and out of traffic had not negated the fact that they had caught a killer.
Amanda unzipped her purse. She took out the last report she was ever going to type for Butch Bonnie. She hadn’t done it out of kindness. She’d done it because she needed to make sure it was right.
Wilbur Trent. Amanda had named the baby because no one else would. Hank Bennett did not want to sully his family’s name. Or perhaps he didn’t want the legal entanglement of Lucy having an heir. Evelyn had been right about the insurance policies. With Hank Bennett’s parents dead and his sister murdered, he was now the sole beneficiary to their estate. He’d let the city bury his sister in a pauper’s grave while he walked away from probate court a millionaire.
So, it fell to Amanda to buy Wilbur his first blanket, his first tiny T-shirt. Leaving him at the children’s home had been the most difficult thing Amanda had ever done in her life. More difficult than facing down James Ulster. More difficult than finding her mother hanging dead from a tree.
She would keep her promise to Ulster. The child would never know his father. He would never know that his mother was a junkie and a whore.
Amanda had never written fiction before. She was nervous about the details she’d put into Butch’s report, the blatant lies she’d told about Lucy Bennett’s life before her abduction.
The boy could never know. Something good had to come out of all this misery.
“What’s the skinny?” Evelyn stood outside the car. She was dressed in brown slacks and a checkered orange shirt that buttoned up the front. The bruise on her jaw had started to yellow, but it still blackened the bottom half of her face.
Amanda asked, “Why are you dressed like a man?”
“If we’re going to be running around the city, I’m not going to ruin another pair of perfectly good pantyhose.”
“I don’t plan on doing much running anymore.” Amanda tucked the report back into her purse. She zipped the bag closed quickly. She didn’t want Evelyn to see the application she’d requested from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Her father had gotten his old job back. Captain Wilbur Wagner would be running Zone 1 again by the end of the month.
Evelyn frowned sympathetically as Amanda got out of the car. “Did you go by the children’s home again this morning?”
Amanda didn’t answer. “I need to wash my hands.”
Evelyn followed her to the back of the Plaza Theater.
Amanda gave a heavy sigh. “I only said that so you would leave me alone.”
Evelyn held open the exit door, releasing the pornographic grunts of
“Your wives send their regards,” Evelyn told them, heading toward the bathroom.
Amanda shook her head as she followed. “You’re going to get us shot one of these days.”
Evelyn picked up their earlier conversation. “Sweetie, you can’t keep looking in on him every day. Babies need to bond with people. You don’t want him getting attached to you.”
Amanda turned on the faucet. She looked down at her hands as she washed them. That was exactly what she wanted with Wilbur, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to say the words. It was hopeless. She was twenty-five and single. There was no way the state would let her adopt. And they were probably right not to.
Evelyn asked, “Did you get that slide with the skin on it from Pete?”
She patted her face with cold water. She had the sealed evidence envelope in her purse. “I still don’t know why it matters.”
“Pete’s right about the science. They can’t use it now, but maybe one day.” She added, “You don’t want it getting lost in lockup. They’ll throw it out in five years.”
Amanda turned off the sink. “If we had the death penalty, none of this would matter.”
“Amen.” Evelyn took her compact out of her purse. “Where are you going to put the envelope?”
“I have no idea.” She couldn’t very well walk into the bank and ask for a safe deposit box without Duke’s signature. “How about your gun safe?”
“It should stay with the baby. Get Edna to hide it somewhere.” She smiled. “Make sure she doesn’t lock it in the pantry.”
Amanda laughed. Edna Flannigan had a reputation around child services, but she was a good woman who cared about the kids. She had taken a shine to Wilbur. Amanda could tell. He was an easy baby to love.
“Can I have one of your textbooks?”
Evelyn stopped powdering her nose. “Why?”
“Edna said we could leave some stuff for the baby to have when he grows up. I thought we could …”
Evelyn knew about the story of Lucy Bennett, star student. She’d helped craft it, giving some inside details about Georgia Tech so the lies seemed more plausible. “If I give you one of my statistics books, will you promise to stop moping?”
“I’m not moping.”
Evelyn snapped her compact closed. “We need to talk about our next case.”
“What’s that?”
“The DNF. We can look into those murders.”
“Are you forgetting Landry’s the one who got us busted to crossing guards?” Duke had found him out in two phone calls. Landry was drinking buddies with the commander who’d signed off on the transfer. It wasn’t a conspiracy so much as a male chauvinist pig who couldn’t take two women trying to do his job. “That’s all we need to do is put ourselves in his crosshairs again.”
“I’m not afraid of that blowhard.” She fluffed her hair in the mirror. “We saved a life, Amanda.”
“We lost three, maybe four.” God knew where Kitty Treadwell was. Probably buried in the city dump. Not that her father cared. Andrew Treadwell refused to return their phone calls, let alone admit that he had a second daughter. “And neither one of us came out unscathed.”
“But we know people now. We have sources. We have a network. We can work cases just like the boys— even better.”
Amanda could only stare at her. The grunting sounds from the porn movie only added to the ridiculousness of her statement. “Is there anything you can’t put a positive spin on?”
“Hitler. World hunger. Redheads—I just don’t trust them.” Evelyn checked her makeup again. Amanda did the same, frowning at what she saw. Evelyn wasn’t the only one who was bruised. Amanda’s neck was still ringed dark from Ulster’s hands. Her ribs were tender to the touch. The cuts on her palms and the soles of her feet were just starting to scab.
Evelyn caught her eye in the mirror.
War wounds.
They were both smiling as they left the bathroom.
Evelyn asked, “Did I tell you about that Green Beret in North Carolina who murdered his entire family?”
“Yes.” Amanda held up her hand to stop her. “Twice. I would rather talk about the case again than hear the details, thank you very much.”
The lobby was empty. Evelyn stopped. She put her hands on her hips. “You know the insurance policies still bother me.”
Hank Bennett. She couldn’t let it go.
Evelyn pressed, “Bennett went to the mission looking for Lucy. It follows that he’d end up at the soup kitchen and meet James Ulster.”
“Maybe they met, but to say they were working together …” Amanda shook her head. “Why? What would be the point?”
“Bennett gets his sister out of the picture so she can’t inherit his parents’ money. He keeps Kitty Treadwell for himself—and her money, because you know there has to be some.”
