Page 42 of So Deadly
Faith felt the same way.Either they were about to kill some time pillaging an innocent woman’s home, or they were going to discover what skeletons lay buried in her closet.
CHAPTER TWENTY
An hour later, Faith and Jessica sat in their rental car watching the last rays of sunlight wink out on the western horizon.Jenkins was wrapping up an uneventful search of Jennifer Suleiman’s house.Jennifer had retained her oddly disconnected personality during the search.
Faith had led Turk through the house for the first part of the search, but he’d come up with nothing, and neither had Faith.There wasn’t so much as a speck of incriminating evidence in the entire place, nor in the Nissan Leaf parked in Jennifer’s garage.Faith hated to be wrong, but it was beginning to look like she’d missed the mark on this one.
So why couldn’t she shake her suspicion?
Her radio crackled, and Jenkins’ voice huffed and said, “Well, that’s that.We’ve got nothing.A for effort, agents, but it looks like she’s clean.”
Jessica sighed irritably and leaned back in her chair until her head smacked the rest.Faith’s lips thinned, but she controlled her reaction.“Very well.Thank you, Detective.”
“How is Crawford?”Jessica asked.“Can he talk yet?Maybe we can get a description from him.”
“Afraid not,” Jenkins said.“I stopped by the hospital after we finished at his house.He’s in a coma.Doctors don’t think he’ll stay that way forever, but they’re keeping him that way for the next few days at least to give themselves time to finish all of the reconstructive surgeries he needs.”
Faith nodded.“All right.Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.Hey, we had to check, right?It doesn’t always pan out.”
“Right.Thank you, Detective.”
“Yep.”
The transmission ended, and Faith looked through the windshield to see the forensics team leaving the house.Through the open front door, she could see Jenkins talking to Jennifer.The suspect—and Faith still saw her that way—had her arms crossed, and she was nodding at something Jenkins was saying.She looked through the door, saw Faith, and lifted a tentative hand.
Faith didn’t return the wave.She put the car in gear and drove toward the city, away from their hotel.
“Don’t beat yourself up about it,” Jessica said.“We can cross her name off the list now.”
Faith tapped the steering wheel, but she didn’t say anything.Jessica looked over at her.“You don’t think we can?”
“I don’t know what I think,” Faith said.“Something just seemed off about her.”
“Off how?”
Faith shook her head.“She just didn’t seem real?”Jessica raised an eyebrow, and Faith said, “Let me get some food in me and try to gather my thoughts.Hopefully I’ll have a better idea of what I’m trying to say when I’m done.”
“Fine with me.”
***
Thirty minutes later, Faith surprised herself by making good progress on a fajita bowl at a fast casual Mexican place near downtown called Taqueria Jalisco.She didn’t feel hungry, but apparently her body’s need for fuel overruled her mind’s fixation on the case.
Jessica had polished off four street tacos in ten minutes, and Turk had enjoyed a sixteen-ounce slab of beef in about half the time.He was currently a few tables away entertaining a small crowd of children who had, with Faith’s permission, surrounded him for pets and hugs.
“She felt disconnected,” Faith explained to Jessica.“Like she wasn’t entirely there.”
“That’s still vague, Faith,” Jessica replied, almost managing to hide her irritation.“What do you mean by that?”
Faith sighed.“She felt like she wasn’t comfortable in her own skin.”
“Still vague.”
“Well, that’s kind of the point,” Faith said, irritated herself that she couldn’t figure out how to explain this.“It all felt almost right, but none of it feltrightright.The house and yard were perfectly clean, but there was nothing there.No flowers, no houseplants, no pictures, no decoration of any kind.The curtains were primer gray, and the rug in the living room was the same color as the floor.She said she’d lived there for fourteen years, but it looked like she’d lived there for ten days.”
“Yeah,” Jessica said, nodding a little reluctantly.“That was odd.”
