Page 35 of The Morning After (Savannah 2)

Nikki stopped short. “Alive?” she repeated, shocked, her blood turning to ice water. In Nikki’s mind she envisioned being in a tight space, running out of air, no escape. “She was alive?” As horrified as she was, she felt a thrill of excitement. She’d not only learned the ID of one victim, but the unique method of the killing. “Was she awake? Or…or drugged? Did she know what was happening to her?”

He blanched. Realized he’d said too much. “That was off the record.”

“You didn’t mention anything being restricted.”

“Quote me and I’ll sue,” he said over his shoulder, but it didn’t matter. Nikki was jazzed. This was it! The story she’d been waiting for. She had two sources saying that Barbara Jean Marx was the victim. She’d double check with Cliff about two bodies in one coffin, about Barbara Jean being buried alive, but she had her scoop.

“Do you know who the other woman was?” she asked, her mind already spinning to her angle.

“No.”

“Did your wife have any enemies?”

“Too many to count, and this interview is over—not that it really began.” He shouldered open the door to the third level. Nikki caught the door and was through it as he made his way to a black Mercedes.

“Do you have any idea who would want to harm Barbara?”

He paused at the sleek car’s fender. “Ask Pierce Reed,” he said angrily. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.” He unlocked the car and was behind the wheel before she could respond. With one final glower, he backed o

ut of his parking space and drove down the ramp.

Wind howled through the open spaces of the parking garage and Nikki stood on the concrete between oil stains and tire marks. The lot was empty except for a few cars. Nikki’s boots slapped on the dirty concrete as she headed to the stairs. Barbara Jean Marx was left for dead in the coffin. With another body? The gruesome thought turned Nikki’s stomach and for a second she felt the victim’s fear. Nikki was claustrophobic by nature, preferred wide open spaces to tight closets or elevator cars, or small rooms. The thought of waking up forced into a coffin between a dead woman and the lid or floor…oh, God, it was too gruesome to consider. Who would do such a thing? How passionately could one person hate another to place them in such a grisly situation?

Nikki walked to the staircase and started down.

Ask Pierce Reed.

Of course she’d ask Reed. He was involved in the investigation.

And yet, the way Jerome Marx had spit out the suggestion, as if it were an invective, was odd. As if there were something more to it. You’re making more of it; your imagination is working overtime. Again.

She heard a door slam from a floor above her and the soles of shoes scraping on the stairs.

But why was Reed called in on the investigation?

And why did the name Barbara Marx ring some sort of distant bell with her? From the moment she’d heard the name it seemed familiar. Maybe it was a movie star or other celebrity, a famous person she’d read about in a gossip column or the credits of a movie, but she had the feeling…

The footsteps overhead were gaining on her and she considered the dark figure she’d seen this morning, the stranger in the shadows. Her pulse quickened a bit; the stairway wasn’t all that well lit, and she increased her pace, hustling to the first floor as the footsteps rang ever closer. She threw open the door to the street and put some distance between herself and the parking garage, glancing over her shoulder in time to see a man in an overcoat dash away from her, as if he were in a hurry of his own. He didn’t even as much as look in her direction as she reached her car, but her heart was drumming a hundred beats a minute as she unlocked the door.

She nearly climbed inside when she noticed the piece of paper tucked under her windshield wiper. Inwardly she groaned. Great. A parking ticket. But it was after hours, right? And it really didn’t appear to be a citation. Oh, God, someone had hit her car. That was it. And they left the scene. She ripped the note from beneath the wipers and opened the folded page. She’d expected to find a name and phone number. Instead, there was one word:

Tonight.

What the hell did that mean?

The wind kicked up and dry leaves skittered down the street. A car passed and Nikki glanced around, looking for the person who’d left the note. No one was close by. No one lurking and watching that she could see. The few pedestrians visible seemed like office workers hurrying through the dusk to their own vehicles or homes. There was a kid on a skateboard, a woman pushing a carriage, an older man walking his dog, a teenaged couple cuddling and laughing as they jaywalked across the street. She looked back to the parking area…the door was closing…the hairs on the back of her neck raised, though there was really no reason.

She shoved the note into her purse and scooted into her car. She was usually pretty fearless, but there was something in the air today, something that put her on edge, and the thought of Bobbi Jean Marx crammed into a coffin with a dead, decomposing woman bothered her. She was a reporter. She’d become inured to a lot of the pain and suffering in the world, but when the suffering was children or animals, it got to her. Big time. Anyone who inflicted harm on the innocents should be locked away forever or worse. The same went for any creep that threw a living, breathing woman into a coffin with a corpse. What death could be worse? She shuddered and drove away from the curb.

Tonight.

Tonight, what?

“What in God’s name were you thinking?” Katherine Okano was standing behind her desk, staring out the window as Reed knocked on her partially opened door, then entered. The District Attorney’s arms were crossed under her breasts, the fingers of one hand tapping angrily on the opposite arm’s sleeve. Thin, imperative and determined, she nailed Reed. “You knew Barbara Jean Marx, a victim in a homicide investigation, and you requested to be on the case?” Before he could answer, she added, “And she was pregnant. The child could be yours. Do you see that there is a conflict of interest here?” Her voice dripped sarcasm.

“I want to find her killer.”

“No doubt, but you’re off the investigation.” She looked over the tops of her wire-rimmed glasses. A no-nonsense woman in her mid forties, she sported a blond bob, quick mind, and a stare that could cut a person to the bone.

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