“He had parties. He invite many girls.”
Girls. A bitter taste settled on Carla’s tongue. It seemed the older and richer guys got, the younger the woman they dated became. To them, thirty was over the hill. “You were here for these parties?”
“No, but I—Never mind.”
Carla frowned. “What?”
The woman folded her hands in her lap; Carla saw that they trembled. “Twice I came to work, and the girls, they were still here. And once I saw … pictures.”
“Pictures?” Carla repeated, straightening. “Of the girls?”
The woman shifted her gaze. “I am ashamed … I shouldn’t have … Mr. Bernhardt, he would be very angry—”
“Mr. Bernhardt is dead. And anything you can tell me will help me figure out why. Where did you see these photos?”
“I can show you.”
The woman led Carla back up to Bernhardt’s bedroom and the highboy to the right of the bed. The evidence guys didn’t even glance up. She opened the top drawer, reached inside and pushed aside the neatly arranged rows of folded handkerchiefs. “I found by accident,” she explained. “I was putting away his things and … there it was.”
“It” was a false-bottom drawer. And now its compartment was empty.
Carla frowned. “Did Mr. Bernhardt know you’d found this?”
“No … I was too ashamed and … what I saw—” Her face went red; she glanced at the officer kneeling beside the bed, examining it. “I prayed for him. I ask the Lord to forgive him his sins.”
Carla could get little else out of her. Apparently, the girls in the photographs had been very young, naked and performing various sexual acts. The housekeeper had been unable to say if they had been underage. She had been unaware of any illegal activities occurring on the premises.
Some sins, Carla thought, glancing back at Bernhardt’s home as she boarded the ferry back to the main island, even death couldn’t erase.
CHAPTER 7
Monday, November 5 10:15 a.m.
The Key West Police Department was located in Old Town on Angela Street. The pink, stuccoed building, the color so typical of south Florida, also housed City Hall. The unexceptional, aging two-story building, surrounded by a riot of trees, flowering shrubs and runaway weeds, hardly seemed a modern law enforcement hub.
But like everything else Liz had seen so far on this island, it possessed a casual, sometimes dilapidated, charm.
She had spent the weekend unpacking, planning and familiarizing herself with the key. She had done the latter on foot and with the motor scooter she had rented from a kiosk just up the block from her office.
It had been a difficult weekend. Everything she’d seen had reminded her of Rachel. When her sister had first come to Key West, she had called Liz almost daily. She had described the island vividly, the people, her new church and congregation. She had described the local landscape with its wild profusion of flora in a palette of oranges, pinks and reds; its palms in so many varieties it boggled the mind—Chinese, sawtooth, coconut and windmill—and the island’s architecture, with its Caribbean, Victorian and Latin influences.
Seeing the island through her own eyes had brought Rachel’s conversations to life. In the moments Liz had been able to detach from her emotions, she had understood why her sister had fallen in love with this place.
Those moments had been punctuations in a narrative of pain. How could she see any beauty in the place that had taken her sister from her?
Liz turned her attention to the task before her: Lieutenant Lopez. Step number one in the plan she had put together over the weekend. She hoped to convince him to reopen his investigation into Rachel’s disappearance. At the very least, she intended to put him on notice: she had loved her sister and wouldn’t rest until she uncovered the truth about her whereabouts. She wanted a copy of her sister’s case file and she wouldn’t leave until he gave it to her.
A nervous laugh bubbled to her lips. Big bad Liz. Right. If any more butterflies landed in her stomach, she’d throw up.
Taking a deep breath, she squared her shoulders and started up the police department’s front steps. She hadn’t made an appointment; she had wanted the element of surprise on her side. She imagined Detective Lopez would be anything but happy to see her.
She entered the building and crossed to the receptionist’s station, located to her left. The woman behind the desk greeted her with a perky smile. Liz figured her to be in her mid-fifties although she dressed more like a teenager, complete with rhinestone-studded butterfly clips in her hair.
“How can I help you, hon?” she asked.
Liz forced a confident smile. “I need to see Lieutenant Lopez. Is he in?”
“Your name?”
“Elizabeth Ames.”
She drew her cotton-candy pink lips into a pucker. “Do you have an appointment?”
“No. But he’ll know what this is in reference to.”
“Okay, doll.” She motioned the logbook on the counter. “Sign in. I’ll see if he’s available.”
Liz did as she requested, heart beginning to race. This was it, the moment of truth. She scrawled her name, turned and crossed to the seating area behind her, though she didn’t sit. From behind her she heard the woman asking someone named Becky if Val was available. As she listened, she stared blankly at the worn vinyl seats, struggling to get a grip on her runaway nerves. She understood cops because professionally she had crossed paths with quite a number of them over the years. That tended to happen when counseling families in crisis and delinquent teens. She had even done a stint at the St. Charles County juvenile detention center. Those six months had been a trial by fire—and had convinced her to go into private practice.
What she had learned during those months, however, had been invaluable. Including the best way to deal with police officers. They were a proud breed, independent, sometimes arrogant, often stubborn. She had to play this just right. Lieutenant Lopez could make what she had come to Key West to do easy for her … or extremely difficult.
“Lieutenant Lopez said you should come on up.” Liz turned to face the receptionist. “You know where his office is?”
“No, I—”
“It’s a piece of cake. Take the stairs.” She pointed. “Top of the stairs, take a right. His is the one with the Dutch door. And don’t worry, sugar. Unless you’re one of the bad guys, Lieutenant Lopez is a real sweetheart.”
Unless she was one of the bad guys. Why didn’t she find that comforting?
Liz followed the woman’s directions. As promised, finding Valentine Lopez’s office posed no difficulty. The upper half of his door was open and she tapped on the casing. “Lieutenant Lopez?” she asked.
Valentine Lopez looked up
