12th of Never (Women's Murder Club 12)

KENNEDY PUT HIS BlackBerry on the table and said to Brady, “Last night. Well, it started in the afternoon. We had a party. Me and Faye. A bunch of our friends came over. Different people at different times drifted in and out.”

He spoke haltingly. Was he remembering the event? Had he been coached? Or was he in shock? Brady asked for the names of his friends and Kennedy listed six ballplayers and eight women, including Faye Farmer.

“What was the occasion?” Brady asked.

“No occasion. Just hanging out. Drinking. Watching videos of old games. And then Faye got worked up about nothing. She’d do that if she wasn’t getting enough attention. Or if I was getting too much. I told her to chill, and she told me to eff myself.”

His cheek muscles twitched. His hands clenched on the table, as if he were having a bad dream or an angry thought.

“You’re saying you fought,” Brady said.

“I ran after her,” said Kennedy, “but she drove off. The next thing I know, it’s morning and a friend is calling to say, ‘Turn on the TV.’”

Kennedy shook his head as if he still couldn’t believe it.

Brady said, “Which was it this time? She didn’t get enough attention? Or you got too much?”

“There was an extra girl. Friend of one of the other girls. She was showing a little too much skin. Kept flouncing around me. Touched me a few times.”

Kennedy named the girl and the girl’s friend, and then Brady asked, “Did you see or speak to Faye after she left your house?”

“No. I didn’t call her. I was still pissed that she went all diva in front of my guys. If only I’d stopped her. Taken her for a walk or a smoke or something. What the hell am I supposed to do with myself now? We were supposed to get married.”

Conklin asked Kennedy what time Faye left the party, and Kennedy said he didn’t know.

“It was late,” he said. “I’d had a few. Now I gotta live with the fact that we had a fight and I never saw her again. Christ. We were in love. We were really in love.”

Tears fell from Kennedy’s eyes. He used his forearm to dry his face. Fenn put a hand on his back, said, “Take it easy, Jeff.”

Brady said, “Mr. Kennedy, do you know of anyone who wanted to hurt your fiancée?”

“You cannot know what people think about people they see on TV,” said Kennedy. “People are crazy. They stalk celebrities. Sometimes they shoot them. But do I know any specific person who hated Faye enough to kill her? No. And now I have a couple of questions for you.”

I looked up from my notepad. Kennedy had his massive forearms on the table and was leaning in, looking menacing. “Where is Faye’s body? How could someone have stolen her out of the ME’s office? How are you going to find her killer if you don’t have her body?”

“Forensics is processing her car,” I said. “Do you own a gun, Mr. Kennedy?”

“Hell, no. Are you seriously asking me that?”

I said, “Does the name Tracey Pendleton mean anything to you?”

“Who?”

I repeated the security guard’s name. Kennedy grunted, “Never heard of him.” Then he shot up from his seat and, crying, stumbled out of the conference room.

Fenn was saying, “He’s understandably upset.”

Kennedy seemed appropriately devastated and clueless. But I wasn’t buying that his breakdown meant that he was innocent. He had graduated from Stanford with honors. He was 230 pounds of muscle and he’d had a fight with his girlfriend.

Kennedy was a smart jock with a cultivated violent streak.

That could be a lethal combination.

Chapter 41

I OPENED THE front door to our apartment at just about 8:00 p.m. I was desperate to hold our baby, have a bath, a glass of wine, and a bowl of pasta with red sauce. I wanted to get out of my clothes and hug my husband and sleep until morning, not necessarily all at the same time.

I called out, “Helloooo. Sergeant Mommy is home.”