Angelina Bonaparte Mysteries Box Set, Nanci Rathbun [shoe dog free ebook txt] 📗

think you’re right.” He gently disengaged my hand and turned to stare out the windshield at the beautiful grounds. “But we’ll never bring it to the DA without proof. And you heard the man, he’ll never tell by work or deed or inference what she confessed.” He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “I have a bad feeling about this one, Angie. It might be number four.”

“Number four?”

He continued to stare straight ahead, avoiding eye contact. “Most murders are easy to solve. The perp is stupid or strung out or too emotional to cover their tracks. The evidence or the motive is strong. You ask, they confess.” His hands, placed awkwardly on his knees, tensed and his knuckles whitened. “I’ve been a cop for twenty-two years. I made detective fifteen years ago. Three times since then, I’ve had cases that didn’t fit the mold. Cases where some smart guy—or gal—set up a homicide with such precision and planning that there didn’t seem any way to bring them to justice. It eats at you, Angie.”

I wanted to put my arms around the big lug and hug him, but I knew consolation wasn’t what he needed. He needed justice. It was his reason for living, it was what he’d talked about and agonized over ever since Elisa Morano’s murder. I couldn’t give him justice, but I could listen, let him talk out his frustration and anger … if he would. “So, what happened in those three cases, Wukowski. Did the bad guys walk?”

His shoulders hunched up as he tensed again, then he let out a breath and turned to me. In the little car, our knees and arms were just inches apart and his breath fanned my face. He closed his eyes and started to talk, almost as if he were visualizing the evidence. “Maloney, he claimed to be disabled from an industrial accident. The insurance investigator caught him on film, lifting a big table saw out of the back of his pickup. Two days later, the investigator is missing and Maloney has no idea what might have happened to the guy.” He opened his eyes, reached over and took my left hand in both of his. Looking down, as if he’d never seen my hand before and was infinitely fascinated by it, he continued. “We never found any physical evidence to link him to the disappearance, but we did get a conviction on the fraud charges.”

He started to caress my fingers, one at a time, running his thumb up and down each finger while he gently held my hand in his. I could barely breathe. “Then there was Sue Chappel. Remember her? The woman whose baby was killed in an attempted carjacking?” His voice turned into a low rumble, as he moved up to my wrist, turning my hand over and massaging the pulse point. “We never even suspected that she wanted to eliminate the baby and live the free and easy single life again. But the accomplice, the carjacker, was caught on a security tape from a building across the street. He sang like one of the Three Tenors when we charged him.”

He released me and ran both his hands up and down my bare arms, still looking down. “Then there was Liz.” His voice broke and he pulled me into his arms.

The stick shift jammed me in the knee, but I tightened my embrace and rubbed his back. “God, Wukowski,” I whispered, “I’m so sorry.”

“Angie,” he murmured in my ear.

Wait a minute! Was that his lips on my earlobe? Oh, yeah. And then, little nibbles from his teeth that sent heat to areas further south. His hands caressed the nape of my neck and started to move down my dress, making circles through the cloth, as if he were trying to memorize the topography of my back. This isn’t wise, I told myself. Shut up and enjoy! I responded. I flung my legs over the shifter and rested them on his thighs. He leaned further into me, pressing me into the seat back.

As my dress rode up and his right hand followed suit, I heard a clear “Harrumph” and opened my eyes to see an elderly priest observing us from the sidewalk. Feeling like a guilty teenager caught necking in the cloakroom at a CYO dance, I pushed Wukowski away, retrieved my limbs and straightened my dress. “Sorry, Father,” I murmured to the priest.

Wukowski’s head snapped around and a deep red darkened his neck and face. He hastily opened the passenger door of the Miata and climbed out, then slammed the door and leaned over to kiss me quickly on the cheek. “I’ll call you at your office. Okay?”

“Definitely okay,” I answered.

Chapter 28

Virtue consists, not in abstaining from vice, but in not desiring it.

—George Bernard Shaw

The message on my office voice mail was short and sweet. “Angie, it’s Tony. Baby number five is here, little Angelina. Eight pounds, two ounces. Twenty-one inches long. Gracie’s doing fine. We’re at St. Mary’s, so stop by if you have time today. If not, Mama and baby will probably come home tomorrow. They don’t keep them in the hospital for long anymore.” Click.

Angelina. Named after me? No, it couldn’t be. I barely knew them. And Angelina is a fairly common Italian name. Probably the baby was named after an older relative. A nonna or a bisnonna. My watch read three-thirty. Time to do some baby shopping!

What does a couple with four children need when number five arrives? Of course, they already had plenty of clothing, crib linens and toys. They didn’t need a car seat, a stroller, a carrier.

I decided to stop concentrating on the baby and to focus on Gracie and Tony. What do new parents need, regardless of the number of their previous offspring? Sleep. Privacy. Time together. I made a few calls, then stopped at the local drug store for a greeting card, slipped three of my business cards into it, and signed it ‘Love, Angie.’

Gracie was snoozing when