A dozen, maybe eighteen, people at most.”
“You left early,” Bryan said, eyes lowered, gaze turned inward. “A few more people showed up later on. I think I remember most of them—I don’t know. I must have drunk way more than I thought. I woke up on the bathroom floor. Everyone had gone. I headed to the bedroom, wanted to get a few more hours of sleep—and Bette was there. And…” He lifted his head, looking the men in the eyes, first Nick and then Chief Mac. “She was dead,” Bryan said. He had to force out that final word, and his voice broke when he said it. “She was already cold. And there are ligature marks around her neck.”
The chief gaped, his jaw dropping as if its spring had broken. He took a step back, turned to stare at the house and pushed a hand through his crazy white hair. Then, swearing a blue streak, he started forward, hurrying toward the house with that swinging gait of his.
Nick clapped Bryan on the shoulder to get him moving, and in spite of his resistance to the notion, Bryan fell into step, the two of them following close behind the chief.
“You didn’t hear anything?” Chief Mac asked without looking back.
“No.”
“Careful, don’t touch a damn thing,” the chief went on as he stomped through the house and into the bedroom. Just inside the bedroom door he stopped, and his voice, when he spoke again, was lowered. Maybe out of respect for the dead. “In fact,” he added, “stay out of this room, Kendall. Di Marco, get in here. But be careful.”
Nick went into the bedroom with the chief, while Bryan stood in the doorway, his eyes riveted to the blue-tinted skin of Bette’s face, those sightless red eyes, the grotesquely twisted mouth.
The chief looked closely, not touching anything. “Strangled. Sure as shit. And she— Holy fuck.”
“What?” Bryan asked from the doorway, even while the chief gripped Nick Di Marco’s wrist and nodded at the nightstand.
Bryan followed their gazes and saw what was sitting there. A shot glass with a black scythe painted on it, a red rosebud above, severed from its stem by the blade and trailing tiny red droplets.
It was a design the three men had seen before.
“That can’t be,” Di Marco whispered. “There’s no way.” And despite the whisper, his voice trembled. “Sniff the glass, Chief. Check—”
“Whiskey,” the chief said after leaning over and in haling. He turned to Nick. “Check her mouth.”
Nick nodded and leaned close to the dead woman, his face so near hers it might have seemed to an outsider that he was about to kiss her. Without touching the body at all, Nick sniffed, and then he jerked upright again. “Whiskey,” he said. “God, this can’t be happening.”
“What?” Bryan asked. “What…what the hell is going on, Nick?” But he had a sinking feeling that he knew.
“Is that your shot glass, Bryan?” Nick asked.
“No.”
“It’s a trademark, Kendall,” the chief said. He came out of the room, flipping open his phone as he did and hitting buttons. “Calling card of the Nightcap Strangler.”
Bryan blinked in shock, processing that, along with all that he knew about the old case—which was probably a lot more than either of these two men realized, considering that all the files and all the evidence was currently taking up space in a storage bin in his garage. The three of them walked out of the house and stood in the driveway again, and the chief ordered up a crime-scene investigation unit and an ambulance.
When he hung up, Bryan faced him. “Chief, how can this be? The Nightcap Strangler was caught, what? Sixteen years ago? Nick, you caught him. You put him away. You solved it. It was the biggest case of your entire career. He’s in prison.”
“Not anymore, kid,” Nick said softly.
Bryan blinked, puzzled for one terrifying moment before he remembered that the convicted serial killer had died in prison three weeks ago.
“He bought it in a fight,” the chief said. “Didn’t you see it in the papers? So there’s no way this was him. Unless…” He looked at Nick, not finishing the thought.
“No way did I bust the wrong guy, Chief. No way in hell.”
“You’re confident about that?”
Nick was offended by the question. He looked mad enough to punch something, Bryan thought. “He was guilty as hell. And you know that, Mac. You know it as well as I do!”
The chief nodded, keeping his trademark calm. “I also know that we never released certain details to the public. No one knew what the design on the glasses was, Di Marco. Or the specifics about the kind of whiskey he used. No one but you and me. Unless you told your protégé here,” he added with a look at Bryan.
“I never discussed the details of the Nightcap case with the rookie, Chief.”
“Right. You’re his mentor, and you never talked to him about the case that made your career? He never asked? You wrote a book, Di Marco. They made a freaking movie. You telling me you never talked about it with Kendall here?”
“That’s what I’m telling you.” Nick braced himself, getting in the chief’s space, his chest thrust out, chin up, challenging. “Now why don’t we get to what you’re telling me? Are you saying a rookie cop turned into a copycat killer just ’cause he took a couple of classes from the retired cop who solved the case? ’Cause I think that’s a stretch, even for you, Mac.”
“He shot a guy last month, Nick.”
“In the line of fucking duty!” Di Marco shouted. “He was cleared of any wrongdoing. It was a clean kill.
You know that.”
“It was a clean kill and it left him a basket case,”
Chief Mac argued.
“According to you.” Nick jabbed a finger in the chief’s direction, and for a moment Bryan thought he was going to actually poke him in the chest with it. He only barely missed doing so. “The department shrink says he’s fine.”
“Now,” the chief said.
Because he hadn’t seemed fine right after the shooting, Bryan thought. Then again, who would have? Bryan had never shot a man before. He’d had no choice, though. The guy had his girlfriend in a headlock, a knife at her throat, and he was getting ready to use it. There had been no question. Hell, she’d been bleeding already when Bryan had taken the shot. He was the only one with a clear line. He’d had no choice. But he damn well didn’t like it.
“Yeah, now,” Nick repeated. “And now is when this killing went down. The kid didn’t do it, Chief. Come on. You know the kid didn’t do it.”
“Quit talking about me like I’m not in the room, you two,” Bryan said. He kept his tone level, his voice low. “I’m standing right here. And I didn’t do it. I’ll tell you both, I didn’t fucking do this. I had no reason. I liked Bette.”
“Liked her?” The chief
