Chosen To Die (Alvarez & Pescoli)

The sheriff scratched the back of his neck. “Okay, so no wives or kids. But the old man—Hubert—he’s still with us?”

“Barely, I think, but I never heard he died. Brady had him in a nursing home, I think in Denver. But I could be wrong.”

“What about siblings?” Alvarez asked.

“He’s got a sister. Padgett.” Santana glanced out the window, but Alvarez guessed he wasn’t seeing the snow falling over the trees and vehicles parked in front of the house. It seemed as if he were looking inward. “I knew Padgett when we were kids, she’s a little younger than Brady. A year? Maybe two, I can’t really remember, but she’s been in some kind of care facility since the accident.”

“What kind of accident?” Alvarez asked. “When?”

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“Boating. Maybe fifteen years ago?” Santana frowned. “Clementine will know.”

“What happened?” she questioned.

It was Grayson’s grim voice that answered, “A bunch of kids were out and hit some rocks, flew out of the boat. Padgett got trapped underwater for a while.”

“Only two people on the boat,” Santana corrected. “Padgett and Brady. He survived, ended up with some cuts and bruises, but he couldn’t get his sister out from under the wreckage.” His eyes darkened. “At least that’s the way he told it. Padgett, she never spoke again, far as I know. Again, ask Clementine. She was working for Hubert at the time. Just started, I think.”

“So where’s Padgett’s care facility?” Selena asked. Santana shook his head. “Hell if I know. The Longs didn’t talk about her much. Figured that’s the way the family wanted it, you know? Out of sight, out of mind.”

The deputy coroner straightened. “Okay, I’ve got all I need, you can move the body now,” Bellasario said to the sheriff. “When you’re done, we’ll haul him outta here.” Bellasario was already unzipping the body bag while an assistant rolled in a portable gurney.

As soon as Long’s body was removed from the chair in which he died, Johnson went to work. Blood had stained the expensive chair’s seat and back, and a small hole had been torn in the oxblood leather.

“Here we go. I want to see . . . aha . . . think I found it.” She was digging at the back of the chair. “Our boy was shot clean through. Entry wound in his chest, and exit a little lower, near his spine, like the killer

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was standing over him.” Using a knife, she urged the bullet from the padding. “Come to Mama,” she said, biting her lower lip. With her gloved fingers, she removed what appeared to be a bullet from the leather.

“This,” she held up the bullet for inspection, “probably would have blown through the chair, too, maybe lodged in the floor of the baseboard if it hadn’t been for the steel reinforcement in the back cushion.”

She eyed the bullet critically and her eyebrows drew into a concerned knot. “Seen this before. .30 caliber.”

Alvarez’s heart went stone cold.

“.30 at close range.” The sheriff was eyeing the slug as Johnson dropped it into a plastic evidence bag. “Lotta firepower for a close-up job.”

“And just like the bullets that tore holes in the tires of Star-Crossed’s victim’s vehicles.” Alvarez’s words seemed to hang in the air, hollow and cold. She didn’t want to believe it. This brazen murder of one of the richest men in the country couldn’t be related to the other homicides. And yet . . . Fear and incomprehension crawled through her.

“Star-Crossed?” Santana’s jaw had tightened.

“Hey, get him out of here,” Grayson said to Spitzer.

“Yes, sir.” She snapped to attention.

Santana was having none of it. “The same son of a bitch who’s got Regan?”

The sheriff glared at Santana. “We don’t know where Detective Pescoli is.”

“Don’t give me the company line, Grayson!” He was agitated now. Cords on the back of his neck strident, his lips blade thin, he looked as if he were trying, and failing, to rein in his temper. “Everyone in this room, hell, in this whole damned house knows that her Jeep was shot and wrecked and she’s miss-196 Lisa Jackson

ing. Now you’re telling me that the same freak who’s done who the hell knows what to her has walked in here and killed Long?”