What Have You Done(27)

Liam stood at the midway point of the stairs and looked out at the city’s skyline toward Eakins Oval. The very tops of the tallest buildings were hidden in a fog that had rolled in after the temperature dropped. The stone and marble around him still glistened with moisture from last night’s rain. It was beautiful. He dug into his pocket and came away with a gold pendant, holding it up, twirling it in his fingers, looking at it from different angles, front to back, side to side, all the while thinking of her. Kerri had given him the mini–magnifying glass as a gift when things were still fresh in their relationship. After he’d returned home the night before, he’d uncovered the lost memory and was struck to find the thoughts and emotions the pendant had attached to it were still as fresh as the day she’d given it to him. She used to call him the Great Inspector and would tease him in what she called her Sherlock Holmes accent.

“Hey, little brother.”

Liam quickly palmed the pendant and looked up. “You’re late.”

Sean was one step below him. “Had to finish my reports on Cutter Washington. They put me on mandatory leave for a weapon’s discharge, but more importantly, it looks like we finally got him.”

“How long you out for?”

“A few days.”

“Any word on the kid who got shot?”

“He made it through the night okay, so that’s a good sign. Docs think he’ll make a full recovery. Has a tough road ahead of him, though.”

Liam put the pendant in his pocket. “Come on—let’s walk.”

The two brothers made their way down the rest of the steps and followed the sidewalk that would bring them around the back of the museum and into Fairmount Park. The trees in the park were budding, small white flowers popping from the tips of the branches, all lined in a row.

Liam watched two kids running around a tree, chasing each other while their mother looked on. The sound of drilling and hammering filled the air, and he looked up to find a maze of scaffolding fanned out across the back of the museum. He couldn’t tell what the men were working on, but it appeared to be a sizeable project.

“I think I’m being framed, Sean. It’s the only explanation.”

Sean nodded. “How do you figure?”

Liam took out his phone, pulled up several pictures of the crime scene, and handed it to his brother. Tiny circles were drawn around several objects in the hotel room. “We got some preliminary results back from the crime scene. The prints we lifted are mine. Two from the dresser there, and one on her watch. The blood we extracted from her fingernails matches my blood type. My rare blood type.”

“Are you serious?”

“I talked to Gerri Cain this morning, and she said it’s possible for someone to have a psychotic break and not remember long stretches of time, but if I really did do it, even in a state where my subconscious had taken over, wouldn’t I know how to clean up a crime scene and not leave any traces of anything that would point to me? Everything had been wiped down but the dresser and her watch. Those were the only things that point to no one but me. It doesn’t make sense. I felt no ill will toward Kerri. We ended the affair mutually. Why would I do something like what you saw at the Tiger? And the paper flowers.”

Sean looked at the pictures on Liam’s phone, then handed it back to his brother. “So who’s doing this, then?”

“I don’t know.”

“And why?”

“Don’t know that either. Whoever it is, they know a hell of a lot more than most people do. They know about Kerri, and they know about Mom. The paper flowers she left for us weren’t in the news back then. Neither was the way she cut up her hair.”

“So who else knew about you and Kerri? We need to start there.”

“Just me, you, Don, and Kerri.” Liam stopped walking. “I just saw Vanessa and Joyce. They were having lunch. Joyce mentioned Don was out Saturday night on a case. Last night too. Where was he?”

“He was with me at the stationery store. The Cutter case.”

“No, that was the morning. Joyce said he was out all night.”

Sean laughed. “I think we can erase Don from our list of suspects. He’s the most honest guy I know. He wouldn’t take a pencil home from the department if it wasn’t authorized. No way he could do what we saw at the Tiger.”

“But where was he Saturday night?”

“His mom’s. She had an episode, and he had to go see her.”

“Any way we can confirm that?”

“He has no motive, Liam. Why would Don kill Kerri and frame us? There’s no reason.”

“Can we confirm it or not?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Then do it.”

The boys playing around the tree ran over to their mother, laughing. A street performer began playing a guitar and singing.

Sean took a breath. “I heard about the autopsy results.”

Liam didn’t respond.

“She was pregnant.”

“I know.”

“Is it yours?”

“The DNA from the fetus matches the DNA from the blood found under Kerri’s nails, so…” Liam couldn’t look at his brother. He stared at the crowd walking up the path toward the museum. “I found Kerri’s phone in the trunk of my car this morning. My clothes that were missing too. There was blood all over my clothes.”