Page 47 of Murder Notes

“Tonight.”

He scowls. “I already told you I’d send it tonight.”

I nod. “Okay.”

“Okay.”

We glower at each other, and I decide to just go with the tone we’ve set. “I don’t like Samantha for you,” I say again.

He grabs me and kisses my forehead. “Got it. You don’t like her.” He releases me. “Stay around and you can harass her and me.”

“And endure dinners here, with her, Alexandra, and Eddie? Not a chance in hell. I’m going home.”

“This is home,” he says, reaching for my door. “Remember that.”

I back up and let him open it for me. “I’m pretty sure Dad will be glad for me to go back to LA and call it home.”

“Nonsense,” he says. “I’ll e-mail.”

“You’d better.” I climb into the car.

“You always need the last word,” he says, shutting me inside.

I roll down the window, shouting after him as he heads back to the house. “Yes, I do!”

He laughs, a low, friendly, wonderful laugh that makes me miss my brother, but not enough to stay. I roll the window back up and sit there for several beats. Why am I so damn against Woods as a suspect? He doesn’t fit. I dial Tic Tac. “You don’t give a person time to work, you know that, right?” he answers. “I guess I should be glad you’re not here and standing over me. What do you want to know?”

“Woods,” is all I say.

“I can confirm his clientele reaches beyond Manhattan and the Hamptons to LA.”

“Which connects him to all the victims. Loosely, but it’s a connection.”

“Loosely is right. There’s no record of him building in LA or even visiting.”

“We could probably connect dozens of contractors to those three places,” I say. “Is there any connection between Woods and the New York City victim directly?”

“No,” he says. “Nothing. No business dealings. No mutual friends. Not even a shared pharmacy. That’s how deep I went on this.”

“Did you cross-check phone records?”

“I checked pharmacies but not phone records? Am I an amateur? Of course I checked phone records. I haven’t gotten to the LA victims as of yet, but as far as New York goes, I have. Woods had no phone calls, e-mails, or texting exchanges that I’ve located. Of course, there could have been unregistered numbers or e-mails with remote-location access that I can’t see. I’d need any actual devices you find to be sure. As of now, I’ve pinged the phone we’re aware he owns. It’s dead or turned off. I’m watching it and his e-mail.”

I have a bad feeling this guy is going to show up dead. “I need to know if our LA victims are tied to him. Get help. Get me answers.” I hang up and sit there a moment before I make a call I dread. I dial Murphy.

“Agent,” he answers. “I thought you needed space?”

“I need you to know that there’s been a confession tied to the local murder,” I announce.

“So it was a coincidence that it happened when you landed,” he says. “That makes more sense. Had it been connected to the others, it would have been eerily timed.”

“It is connected.”

“Are you telling me we have an arrest for all these open cases?”

“No,” I say. “There’s a manhunt for the man who confessed.”

“He confessed, but he didn’t turn himself in,” Murphy goes on to assume. “And you don’t think he did it. Is that right?”