Page 100 of The Family Cross

Sampson went to the victim and searched his pockets, and I looked around the room. My stomach dropped ten stories when I spotted something familiar by the wall. I took two steps in that direction and froze.

“Meet the owner of this hellhole,” Sampson said, holding a wallet aloft.

I barely responded.

“Alex,” he said. “You hear me? Our vic is the guy who’s tearing this place down.”

I pivoted slowly, wondering how it all fit. “Jeffrey Frost?”

“That’s what his ID says.” Sampson peered at me. “What’s going on with you, sugar? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

I pointed to the crumpled clothes in the corner. “That Ravens wool cap there,” I said, emotion surging in my throat. “And that filthy old baseball coach’s jacket. They’re both my brother’s, John. They’re Charlie’s.”

87

WHILE JOHN SAMPSON CALLED in the medical examiner and forensics, I stood by Jeffrey Frost’s body, but I stared at my brother’s clothes six feet away. Part of me wanted to go over and pick up the wool cap and jacket, but I knew full well I could not. If Charlie was alive and visiting the place, he might have been surprised by Frost, fought, and…

I looked around but saw nothing to suggest a struggle had occurred. In fact, now that I took in the rest of the scene, I could not determine how Jeffrey Frost’s corpse had gotten here. There were no footprints in the room, not even his.

Sampson had noticed that too. When he hung up the phone, he gestured at the floor. “Someone went to a lot of trouble to sweep the dust on the way out,” he said.

I moved closer to the developer’s body, looked down at it from my full height, then squatted near Frost’s shoulders.

“Except right here,” I said. “Shooter ordered Frost to the ground, then angled the barrel so the shot would drive brain matter out of the top of his head and avoid the rebound spatter from a straight-through shot into the floor. And look at the skin stippling around the wound. The gun barrel was two inches away, maybe less.”

I studied the halo of dried blood below Frost’s head, saw some smears in it. “Shooter picked up his spent shell, then swept his way out.”

“Feels professional.”

“Hundred percent pro. I’m going to get Bree’s take,” I said, pulling out my phone.

“Smart,” Sampson said. He went to the glassless window and looked out. “Forensics is here. I’ll show them the way.”

Bree answered on the second ring. I told her what we’d found.

“Wow,” she said. “Wow, wow, wow. Execution-style?”

“What it looks like,” I said. “Shot Frost through the temple at close range, picked up his brass, and swept his way out.”

“I knew Frost was into something nasty. Sounds like it caught up with him.”

“It did. So who takes control of this property and the ones around the Bridge to Nowhere now that Frost is dead?”

She paused, then said, “You’ll have to check his will, talk to his corporate counsel. But I’m going to bet that his closest relatives will not be the beneficiaries.”

“The Russian woman?”

“Tatiana Volt,” Bree said. “That’s who I’d be focused on.”

My phone beeped with a call from Sean Brundage. “I have to take this.”

“Talk soon,” she said and hung up.

“Sean,” I said. “Where are you?”

“Library,” the former detective said. “Look, my phone’s almost dead, but I just discovered something you should know. Colin O’Hare’s late aunt Marie O’Hare was married to Professor Drake Conway.”

“The Georgetown vic? Well, that adds to the pot, doesn’t it,” I said. “Impressive, Sean. How did you figure this out?”