The Third Grave (Savannah #4) - Lisa Jackson Page 0,109
would be, Nikki would have to attend and somehow deal with the guilt that would surely settle on her. She would have to endure the silent accusations in the eyes of Morrisette’s coworkers and family.
For Reed.
Nikki made a note to drive back to the Marianne Inn.
Once Detective Sylvie Morrisette was laid to rest.
I tell myself not to panic. I should be able to handle this. Haven’t I always? Haven’t I been able to keep my secrets and hide the truth for twenty years? It’s not the cops that worry me. I can handle them—they’ll never even suspect. But that damned Nikki Gillette. She’s a problem. A wild card. And she won’t back off. She might be the one who exposes me and I have to keep track of her. The tracking device will help. Now, I just need to keep track of her until I finish my job.
Then I’ll deal with her.
CHAPTER 27
The funeral was tough.
Reed, with Nikki at his side, sat on a hard pew in the church and avoided staring at the black coffin, atop of which was a blanket of white and blue flowers, along with Morrisette’s official department picture, a head shot of her in uniform. She would have hated this, Reed thought, avoiding looking at the posed picture, preferring to remember her as she was, alive and sassy, all grit and determination, her hair spiked, her ears studded, her language salty and her heart, always, in the right damned place. Now gone. Grief grabbed hold of Reed’s soul. He tried to listen as the minister, a bald-headed man, his clerical collar stretched tight around his fleshy neck, gave a brief account of Sylvie Morrisette’s life, but Reed’s mind filled with images of the mercurial partner he’d once doubted but had come to trust.
From his pulpit, the preacher kept his remarks short, thankfully, but stumbled when speaking about Sylvie’s early life and her career. Obviously, he’d never met Sylvie Morrisette. Reed guessed she’d never stepped one snakeskin-booted foot into this nave with its soaring ceilings, stained-glass windows and slow-moving fans moving the air around in the nave. Minister Linley glossed over Morrisette’s marriages and concentrated on the fact that Sylvie was a dedicated cop and devoted mother.
No doubt Minister Linley had received his information from either Bart Yelkis and the Internet or possibly someone at the department.
Reed knew far more about his partner than the man leading the service.
Throughout it all, Nikki, dressed in black and seated next to him, had been respectful and solemn, bowing her head during prayer while, during the rest of the service, she’d kept her eyes on the preacher, avoiding the accusing gazes of Morrisette’s friends—mainly cops—or family. Though Reed and Nikki had chosen to sit near the back, more than once Bart Yelkis had looked over his shoulder from a front pew, where he’d sat wedged between his children, both dressed somberly, both quietly weeping. When Yelkis caught sight of Nikki he’d sent her a hateful glare that Nikki either didn’t see or ignored.
Reed didn’t. His jaw tightened and he reached into his pocket to rub his new talisman, Morrisette’s key chain with its star fob. It had been a rough day already as he’d had to explain to Margaret Duval that the woman who’d posed as Rose was a complete fraud. “I should have been there,” she’d said over the weak phone connection. “I would have known immediately if that woman was my little girl.”
“She wasn’t,” he’d said as gently as possible. “It was a scam, I’m afraid.” He would have proof soon, when the DNA came through.
“Then find my daughter,” Margaret had said brokenly.
And then there was Nikki’s wild theory that Rose Duval could be the love child of Margaret Duval and Baxter Beaumont when they hadn’t yet established the two had been involved in an affair. He’d posed the idea to his new partner early this morning while they were both sipping coffee and going over the reports that had come in overnight.
Delacroix had looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. “Are you serious?” she’d asked.
“Anything’s possible.”
“But is it probable? More importantly, is it a fact?” She reminded him, “We deal in facts.”
“And theories that are supported by facts. So we need to find out the truth and before we go asking Margaret Duval or Baxter Beaumont if they had a child together, we’d better make certain they were really involved and this isn’t just local gossip that’s been embellished over the years.”