Deadly Cross (Alex Cross #28)(44)

“I deeply apologize for this, Mr. Vice President. My wife does too. We never wanted to disrespect your wishes. I guess we expected more out of Commissioner Dennison, but ultimately I shoulder the blame.”

I thought I’d get a harsh response, but Willingham just studied me a long moment and then reached out to shake my hand. “Thank you, Dr. Cross. I respect a man who accepts the consequences of his actions.”

Then he walked past me and stood at his ex-wife’s casket, his eyes roaming over her. He touched the back of her hand with two fingers, raised his fingers to his lips, then touched her lips.

“Bye, Kay,” he whispered, and he reached up to shut the lid.

When he turned, his eyes were watery, and he had to clear his throat. “She’ll be sent south in an hour.”

“And from there?”

“Her second cousin and her executor will meet the casket at the plane and see to her burial in the family plot on the old family plantation.”

“No funeral or memorial, sir?” Mahoney asked.

Willingham shook his head. “In her recently revised will, she specifically requested no remembrance of her other than a headstone. Cruel, really, to those of us who loved her.”

I found that puzzling but didn’t comment. “Again, I apologize for what happened,” I said.

“Apology accepted, Dr. Cross, and I appreciate you finding Kay’s murderer.”

“Thank you, sir. I know it’s not the time or the place, but could I ask you a question?”

His chief of staff, Claudette Barnes, appeared and walked toward us. “Mr. Vice President?”

Willingham held up a finger. “One second, Claudette. Go ahead, Dr. Cross.”

“When you and Kay were estranged, back when you were governor, did you hire someone to follow her?”

“Follow Kay?” He smiled and shook his head. “No. Never. What’s this about?”

“There appear to be photographs of her from that time taken with a long lens.”

His expression narrowed. “What kind of photographs?”

“Just of Kay out and about in DC, sir,” I said. “In one of them she was with me. It was taken the night I drove her home from a fundraiser. The picture was shot in front of her place in Georgetown.”

Barnes said, “Mr. Vice President, we really need to be going.”

He held up his palms. “I’m sorry, Dr. Cross. It upsets me to hear she was being followed, but I have absolutely no clue who was behind that. I can tell you that Kay was ramping up to one of her episodes about that time, which was why we were separated. I had Alabama to run while I waited for her to come crashing down again.”

With that, he turned, moved fast past his chief of staff, and said, “Air Force Two is not going to fly without me, Claudette. I am the vice president. It’s got to count for something, for God’s sake!”

“Yes, sir,” Barnes said. She glanced at us, threw up her arms, then followed Willingham out of the room.





CHAPTER 49





I TOOK AN UBER HOME. On the ride, my thoughts drifted to Elaine Paulson and her daughters at the funeral the day before, to Tina saying, We know absolutely that Mom did not do this. I don’t care what the report said about that old gun and the bullets. And Rachel saying, Mom never shot that gun but once or twice. And it scared her.

I didn’t have to reread the ballistics report to know for certain that the gun that killed Kay and Christopher was the same gun I took from Elaine Paulson. Sometimes you hear about lab tests being contaminated. But comparing the grooves in a gun barrel with the markings made on a bullet fired through it is an exact science. There’s no mistaking it.

Still, could someone lost in a fit of jealousy who had fired the gun only a few times and was supposedly scared of guns have displayed the kind of cold-blooded marksmanship shown in the tight grouping of the bullet wounds? Unless Paulson had secretly trained herself to shoot, I couldn’t see it.

I supposed it was possible that she had not had the gun the night of the killing and that the real shooter had used it and then brought it back to her house, but that was so unlikely, I set it aside. I got out of the Uber and thanked the driver.

It was after ten a.m. when I walked into the kitchen and found Nana Mama having coffee with John Sampson. He was dressed in jeans and a dark polo shirt with his service weapon in a shoulder holster. His badge was visible on his left hip. His jacket hung on the back of his chair.

“What are you doing here, John? Where’s Willow?”

“With her brother and sister,” he said. “They decided to take Ned up on his offer and bring her out to his place on the Delaware shore.”

“Great spot,” I said. “Don’t you think you should be with them?”

“At the moment? No. At the moment, I need to work.”

“I think you should be with your family. Billie’s funeral was yesterday, John.”

“Alex, I’ll join them in a day or two, but right now I need to work. Okay?”

There was such desperation in his eyes. I glanced at Nana Mama, who nodded sadly. Sampson was looking for a case to get lost in so he could forget his grief, and I realized it was more merciful to let him.

“I have to cancel a few appointments, but I agree, let’s go to work, John.”