Gallagher Justice. Amanda Stevens
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was strong in spite of his lean physique. Beneath the dark suit he wore, his body was hard and muscular. More than capable of holding Fiona up if she needed him to.
But she didn’t need him to. Or want him to. She was still in shock, but she could stand on her own two feet just fine. She’d seen corpses before, only usually, thank God, they weren’t someone she knew.
She stared down at the victim’s beautiful face. That beautiful, pale, lifeless face, and Fiona’s legs began to tremble in spite of her resolve.
Doggett’s hands tightened on her arms. “You’re not going to faint or anything, are you?”
“No, I’m okay,” she insisted.
“Do you know her?” His deep voice rumbled in her ear and Fiona shivered.
“Her name is Alicia Mercer. Her mother is a friend of mine.”
“Then I assume you know how we can get in touch with her next of kin?”
Fiona nodded. Doggett’s hands were still on her arms, but for some reason, she didn’t seem to mind. She hardly even noticed until he took them away. “Her parents—her mother and stepfather—live in Houston. Lori and Paul Guest. They’re both attorneys. I have their phone number and address at home. Alicia and her twin sister, Lexi, are students at Hillsboro University. They share an apartment off campus. Or at least...they did.”
Doggett jotted down the information in his notebook, then glanced up. “You say the victim is a twin? You’re positive about her identity?”
“Yes, I’m positive. It’s Alicia. She and Lexi look a great deal alike, but they’re not identical. You can check her fingerprints, but I know it’s her...” Fiona trailed off as she gazed down at the body. “She does look different, though.”
“Different how?” Doggett said sharply.
“I never saw her dressed this way. And she’s changed her hair. I didn’t know the girls all that well, but I had the impression Alicia was the conservative one.”
“What about the mark on her shoulder?” Doggett asked. “You ever see it before, on either sister?”
Fiona shook her head. “No. Alicia certainly didn’t seem the type who would go in for tattoos. She was so levelheaded—” She stopped abruptly as something occurred to her. She turned, putting an unconscious hand on Doggett’s sleeve. “Oh, my God.”
“What?” Something flickered in his eyes, a curious little flame that made Fiona suddenly aware of how close they were standing.
Most of the time she tried very hard to keep herself aloof—from situations and from the people around her. Body contact, even a touch as slight as her hand on a man’s arm, was never something she instigated. Ever. It didn’t bode well, she decided, that she’d done so now quite automatically. She dropped her hand. “Alicia called me last week. She left a message on my voice mail. I’d forgotten about it until now.”
If he noticed her reaction, he didn’t let on. “Did she say what she wanted?”
“No.”
“Did you call her back?”
Fiona swallowed. “No.”
One brow lifted slightly. “So how well did you know her?”
“As I said, I didn’t know either of the girls very well. Their mother moved to Houston several years ago after she remarried. Alicia and Lexi were maybe fourteen at the time. I didn’t see them again until last year when the girls started the fall semester at Hillsboro. Lori called and asked if she could give them my phone number.”
“Why?”
“She said she’d feel a lot better if they had someone nearby they could call if they...got into trouble.” The irony was devastating. Fiona had to work to keep a tremor from her voice. The guilt, for a moment, was almost overwhelming.
“When was the last time you saw Alicia?” Doggett asked.
“Last winter. She, Lexi, and I had dinner just before they left to go home for the holidays.”
“Did she mention any problems she might have been having? Trouble with a boyfriend? A professor? Anything like that?”
Fiona shook her head. “We didn’t talk about anything personal. I don’t think either of them would have felt comfortable confiding in me about their private lives. I’m sure the only reason they agreed to see me at all was to appease their mother.”
“Did you have dinner with them often?”
“Only a couple of times.”
“Did you have the impression that Alicia got along with her parents?”
Fiona glanced at him in surprise. “As far as I know. I never saw her with her stepfather, but Lori and Alicia were very close.”
“What about the sisters?”
“They were inseparable.”
“But you did say that you didn’t know the girls all that well, right? And you hadn’t seen much of the mother in recent years?”
Fiona hesitated. “It was my impression they were all very devoted.”
“Still,” he said, “Families have problems. It would be pretty unusual if they didn’t tick each other off at least once in awhile.”
“All I can tell you is that I never saw it,” Fiona said a trifle impatiently.
He didn’t press the point further. “So you haven’t seen or talked to Alicia since before Christmas.”
“No.”
“Tell me about the message you got from her last week.”
Fiona closed her eyes briefly. “I was in court when she called, and by the time I got her message, I was swamped with meetings and interviews. I completely forgot about it.”
“She called on your cell phone?”
Fiona nodded. “I gave them my cell phone number because I’m hardly ever at home.”
“What was the message?”
Fiona frowned, trying to recall Alicia’s exact words. “She identified herself and then she asked me to call her back. She said she needed to talk to me.”
“Did she sound frightened? Anxious?”
“I don’t remember noticing anything out of the ordinary about her tone or the message. I assumed she wanted to set up another dinner before she and Lexi went home for the summer break. I intended to call her back in a day or two when my schedule lightened up.”
“But you never did.”
“No.”
Behind her, Fiona heard the rasp of the zipper closing on the body bag, but she didn’t turn. She didn’t want to look. Didn’t want to see that face, so rigid and silent but still so beautiful in death.
“I have to call Lori,” she murmured. But it was a call Fiona dreaded making more than anything in the world.
“Don’t make that call just yet,” Doggett said.
Fiona glanced at him. “She has a right to know what’s happened to her daughter.”
“The mother may be a personal friend of yours, but this is still a homicide investigation,” he said gruffly. “And you know as well as I do that first impressions on hearing this kind of news are important. I’d appreciate you letting me get in touch with the parents when I feel the time is right.”
Fiona frowned. “And when will that time be, detective?”
“You let me worry about that.”
“What about Lexi? Someone has to tell her, and I don’t think she should