Killer Style (Stella Knox FBI Mystery Series Book 2) by Mary Stone

Author:Mary Stone [Stone, Mary]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-07-16T16:00:00+00:00

18

Min Zhao opened her front door, leaning a shoulder on the doorpost as though she barely had the strength to hold herself up. The intensity that had burned in her eyes when Stella talked to her at the Morville County Sheriff’s Department was gone now. The light was out. The darkness had settled in.

Stella didn’t need to ask how the poor woman was doing. She knew. Even if she hadn’t experienced grief so personally, years of volunteering at the children’s hospital had shown her the impact that loss made. The constancy of death gave the doctors and the nurses a thick skin and some a dark sense of humor. But the effect of long-term mourning was carved deepest on the faces of parents who had lost their kids.

They’d turn up for events and fundraisers, some with a warm hug and an easy smile for the volunteers, even though they seemed infinitely tired. Other parents were cold and brittle. Some parents remained forever fragile. One mother, at the rededication of one of the wards, had turned to Stella, tears flowing down her face. “My child died. Am I still a mother?”

Was Min now asking if she was still a daughter?

Stella swatted the question away, refusing to go down that dark path.

“I’m so sorry for your loss.”

Min stared blankly, the beginning of grief holding her trapped in denial and shock.

“Do you mind if I come in? I just have a few questions. They might help us to find the person who…” Stella paused. The words were on the tip of her tongue, but their arrival reminded her that she—the team—had failed. Yesterday, Min’s father was alive. Today, he wasn’t. His death wasn’t her fault, but the words dug the responsibility deep into her bones. “The person who took your father.”

Min shrugged and turned back into the house. Stella followed, closing the door behind her and heading into the kitchen. Min sat on a barstool, folding her arms on the cold surface of the island.

The kitchen was a mess. The sink contained three days’ worth of dirty dishes. The dishwasher was both half-open and half-full of clean plates. A mug of coffee stood undrunk in front of Min’s arms, the milk having already developed a light crescent on the surface. It must have been left there, untouched, for days. A vase stood next to it. The red phloxes and white geraniums it contained were wilted and dried.

Stella pulled down the door of the dishwasher. “You sit. I’ll do this.”

She opened the kitchen cupboards and found where Min stored her plates. Her host didn’t move, didn’t protest. Stella pulled a clean plate out and stacked it in the cupboard with the others. “Min, did your father have a lot of friends?”

“Hmm?”

“Your father. Was he popular? Sociable?”

Min pulled a tissue from her pocket. “No, not really. He was friendly. And people always liked him. Whenever he did a book reading, people always wanted to stay and chat. The bookstore would have to kick them out. But he liked being alone.

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