The Bequest by Mike Farris

Author:Mike Farris [[email protected]]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-03-18T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 34

Mike stood by Teri’s side as two crime scene techs processed the scene, not that there was much to process. Broken glass, a bullet hole all the way through the couch, and a slug gouged into the hardwood floor just behind the couch.

Detective Swafford stood at the threshold to the porch and looked through the gap in the curtain, to the hills, then turned back to Teri and Mike. “If we can trace the angle of the shot, we might be able to figure out where it came from. It’s a long shot, though.” He smiled involuntarily at his pun, as if embarrassed to have said it. “Literally,” he added.

“We’ll get you a guest spot on Leno,” Mike said, his tone harsh and even. “As soon as you finish your comedy act, maybe you can start working on who tried to kill Teri. Look at her face. Who did that to her? And now this.”

“It’s all right, Mike,” Teri said. “I always appreciate a good pun.” Swafford dropped his eyes and nodded, a tacit “thank you” for her defense.

“Let’s go through it one more time,” Swafford said.

“The answers won’t change,” Mike said.

“No, I don’t expect so. But she might remember something new. Not that you need a lesson in police work, or psychology, for that matter, but repetition seems to fuel memory. You told me to do my job; well, I’m doing it.”

“Thank you, Detective,” Teri said.

She was growing tired of Mike’s posturing and, quite frankly, his unwarranted antagonism. In her experience, cops didn’t take kindly to that. In fact, it seemed to confirm suspicions in their minds that, despite protestations of innocence, you were guilty of something, even if not the immediate crime. She also had to admit that there was an awful lot of death and near-death swirling around her, beginning with Leland Crowell’s suicide. Swafford would be a poor detective, indeed, if that didn’t raise at least some suspicions.

“Now, you and this Annemarie Crowell were sitting here, you on the couch and her on the chair.”

“That’s right.”

“How open were the curtains?”

“Just like they are now. I haven’t touched them.”

He looked at the one foot opening. “Kind of odd, don’t you think? Not really open, but not really closed, either.”

“They were open all the way when she got here, but she complained that the sun hurt her eyes,” Teri said. “I didn’t want it to be too dark, so I closed them most of the way.”

“Couldn’t you have turned the light on?”

“I suppose.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“I don’t know. I just didn’t.”

“What the hell has that got to do with anything?” Mike asked. His voice sounded as if he was on the verge of shouting, but fighting the urge. Teri knew from experience that Mike never shouted, but he wasn’t above dramatics. He had learned as much about acting from his years in show business as she had.

“Probably nothing,” Swafford said. “Just trying to get the details down, that’s all.”

Their attention was diverted to the entryway by sounds of footsteps and the mutter of male voices.

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