No Remorse Read online

  My male senses were drawn to her shapely form as I walked behind her. It was very obvious how Effridge had found himself in the predicament he had. This woman was quite breath-taking. Her curves were hypnotizing, bordering perfect. And her blonde-brown mane hung loosely from a messy ponytail. Her hair was the only thing in this house that wasn’t perfectly neat. And, coincidentally, it was also not the color of either of the hairs Skip mentioned from the scene.

  We made our way into her gourmet kitchen and were instructed to have a seat at her table. My eyes roamed the space and confirmed my original suspicion that she was a compulsive cleaner.

  She joined us at the table and worked hard to silence her low-toned sobs. “I’m so sorry, my mind has been all over the place since I heard the news about Chase. I can’t believe he’s gone.” Her voice was soft and pleasant, unlike the rasp of Carlotta’s. She sniffled again and used the crumpled tissue in her hand to dab at her tears. “Can I get you gentlemen anything to drink?”

  “Water, please.” I replied.

  “Thank you for taking time to talk with us,” Jones said.

  “I didn’t think I had much of a choice, as I had to clear my name. I want you both to know I loved Chase very much, and still do. I probably always will. I could never do something like that to him.” She made her way over to the table and set a glass of water down in front of Jones, then one in front of me.

  “Where would you like me to start?” she asked.

  “Tell us how you came to know Mr. Effridge.”

  “As you probably already heard, I worked for his wife, Carlotta Dupree. I was her secretary.” She fidgeted with her fingers. “It seems kind of strange saying that. I can only imagine what you must be thinking of me.”

  Jones interjected, “We aren’t here to judge you, ma’am. You can’t help who you fall in love with.”

  “Thank you, I appreciate that.” Her tone wasn’t as convincing as her words. Her red-rimmed eyes didn’t convey the hint of a smile on her face. And although it seemed odd hearing her say that she was involved with her boss’ husband, that wasn’t our business. Our business was to find out who murdered Effridge, period.

  “How long had you known Mr. Effridge?”

  “Oh, for about four years. I met him right after I accepted the position with Carlotta.”

  “How long had the two of you been in a relationship?”

  “I guess it’s been a little over two years now. I would see him when I’d run errands and sometimes had to drop off things at their apartment, like Carlotta’s dry cleaning, or things she may have purchased at lunch.” A slight smile spread on her perfect mouth. “What started out as the everyday cordial ‘hi and bye’ eventually led to more. We realized we had a lot in common, and spent a lot of time talking.” She stared off and a tear trickled down her face. She wiped at it and sniffled. Her voice crackled when she began to talk. “I didn’t mean to break Jonathan’s heart, but we were already growing apart before I began dating Chase.”

  “Were you concerned about Mrs. Dupree and how she’d take it when she found out? You having an affair with her husband?”

  “It wasn’t supposed to go that far. I never intended to fall in love, it just happened. I was so terrified of how she’d react when she found out. She has a really bad temper. Jonathan, too.”

  “They both seemed so calm when we talked to them.”

  “Don’t believe that for a minute. They’re cut from the same cloth and are anything but calm. They’re both very vindictive people.”

  I glanced at Jones, who was jotting in his notepad. He must have felt my gaze and raised his head, looking over at me with eyebrows raised.

  “Tell us about your break-up with Jonathan,” Jones said.

  “Oh my goodness. That was just awful.” Larissa’s eyes filled with wetness but she somehow kept the tears from tumbling down her cheeks. I was glad she showed such restraint. I hated seeing women cry. She inhaled deeply, shook her head, and had a look of complete fear on her face. “He was livid. He screamed and cried, then threatened that he’d never let another man have me. He grabbed me by my arms and slammed me into the wall. When I told him I was pregnant, he let me go, but went ballistic. He called me every terrible name in the book and stormed out.” The tears that she had been holding at bay tumbled down her face. “He called me later that night when he got home. He was in tears, apologizing and begging me to come back to him. He swore he’d help me raise the baby if I put his name on the birth certificate and promised to let him be the baby’s father.”

  “How did you respond?” I asked.

  “I knew he was crazy. I told him over and over that we were done. We had grown apart and there was no need trying to hold on to us because there was no us anymore.”

  “Did he know who you were seeing at that time?” I asked.

  “No, but he told me when he found out who it was he’d make sure that guy could never get his hands on me again.”

  I didn’t want to give her too much of the information we’d garnered from her ex or Mrs. Dupree, so I chose my questions carefully. “We know he stalked you and eventually found out. Did he have any other contact with you after that?”

  “He called several times. He tried to blackmail me into leaving Chase and coming back to him. He told me he had hired a private investigator and was going to prove to me that Chase wasn’t right, and wasn’t faithful. He sent pictures of Chase and me to my work address. He said if I did what he wanted, he wouldn’t tell his mother.”

  “What do you think was the significance of that threat – to tell his mother?” Jones asked.

  “He knew if he told his mother about the affair I’d lose my job for sure. I’m sure he hoped Chase would be thrown out, and possibly fired from his job at the university. Jonathan hated Chase, and he wanted to ruin both of us.”

  “Do you think your ex is capable of murdering someone? Effridge?”

  “He’s crazy and has a real mean streak. Yes, I think he could.”

  “Did you see Mr. Effridge on the day he was murdered?”

  “I went by the apartment to see him; he had left his wallet on my dresser the day before. He was in a hurry to leave that Thursday evening because he was expecting Carlotta to come over. When I stopped by his house on Friday morning, he told me Jonathan had stopped by. We didn’t talk long; he said he had errands to run.”

  “When did you see him last on Thursday, and what time did you stop by to see him on Friday morning?” I asked.

  “He left just a few minutes after nine Thursday night. He probably got home around ten o’clock. He wanted to get into the house before Carlotta got there.”

  “Did he say when his wife was expected?”

  “I believe he said she was planning to come over just before ten. Is that important?”

  “Right now, everything’s important. We’re trying to put together a timeline of what happened from Friday morning leading up to his body being discovered,” I said.

  “What time did you say you stopped by on Friday morning?” Jones asked. His pen was ready to write down the details.

  “It was probably nine-thirty. I didn’t stay long. I needed to see Chase. I needed to know everything was okay after his meeting with his ex.” Larissa twisted her cup around on the table.

  “I didn’t realize they were divorced,” I said.

  “Well, technically they aren’t, or weren’t. But Chase assured me he’d never get back together with Carlotta no matter how much she begged him. He loved me. He wanted to be with me and our son.” She sniffled, and a tear was wiped from her face by the crumpled tissue.

  I nodded at Jones, who immediately began writing in his notepad.

  “Did he say anything else to you about his conversation with Mr. Calhoun?”

  Larissa was staring off into space. I wasn’t convinced she’d heard my question. “Ms. MacDonald?”

  “Sorry,” she said. She slowly returned her gaze toward us. Her eyes were welling with unshed tears. “No, he did
n’t normally tell me about their run-ins. I really didn’t want to know.”

  “Thank you for your time. We may need to contact you again if we have any additional questions,” I said.

  “That’s fine. I have a lot of time on my hands since I’m no longer working for Carlotta.” She twisted her mouth into the tiniest of tiny smiles.

  We stood from our chairs and followed her through the house to the door. Just as we were about to leave, Jones turned and asked a question. “Do you know anything about McKenzie Sims?”

  Larissa let out a sigh and her mouth fell open, yet no words came out. It took her a second or two to speak. “McKenzie, yes, she’s one of the new models. She’s also dating the photographer, Billy Clark. What makes you ask about her?”

  “Her name was mentioned in our conversation with your ex.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised if he tried to date her, but Billy is really possessive and jealous. Jonathan wouldn’t want to tangle with him. Billy might be one of the few people who is more unstable than he is. I guess I never really realized how irrational the people around me were until now.”

  “Thank you again. Have a nice day,” Jones said.

  “Good luck, Detectives. I hope you catch whoever did this to Chase. He didn’t deserve to die. He was a good man. Now my son has to grow up without his father.” Her sobs grew louder as we crossed the threshold.

  “We’re doing everything we can, ma’am,” I said. We stepped outside and Jones pulled the door closed behind him. We heard the lock click immediately.

  Chapter 10

  “That was an interesting conversation. She surely painted a completely different picture of our calm Mrs. Dupree. Her son, well, we both figured him to have a temper,” Jones said.

  “Yes, very interesting. And so far, she’s the only one who thought Effridge was a good guy. Maybe we need to look at Dupree and her son again. And I can’t wait to talk to McKenzie Sims.”

  No sooner had I finished my sentence than Jones’ phone rang.

  “Jones here.” He listened to the caller for what seemed like several minutes before he spoke again. When he did, he told the person on the other end that we were on our way.

  “That was Ms. Sims returning my call. Seems she has a few minutes to talk to us right now,” he relayed.

  “Let’s go.” We buckled our seat belts and headed off to visit with our fourth person of interest. I couldn’t wait until we could refer to someone as a bona fide suspect.

  I tried to make sense out of all the conversations we’d had so far. I hadn’t realized it, until Jones chimed in with some of his own observations, that my comments were being verbalized out loud. We continued to mull over the details we knew up to this point for the rest of the drive. When I pulled up to the curb and parked, we both just looked at each other.

  “Someone has to give us something. Maybe Sims is a vital key. Everyone who saw Effridge on that day swears he was alive when they left. Someone killed him,” I said.

  “That’s the truth. Let’s go see what she has to say.”

  We exited the car and approached the woman with dark reddish-brown hair we suspected was Sims. She was sitting at an outside table at the soft-serve ice cream joint. Her body language looked relaxed. Her cell phone was sitting on the table beside her cup of ice cream.

  I couldn’t help but wonder if her hair color was the red we were looking for, or if we needed a more vibrant, true red.

  “McKenzie Sims?” I asked to make sure we were talking to the correct person.

  “Yes, that’s me. Are you Detective Jones?”

  “This is my partner, Detective Jones. I’m Detective Oliver.” I inhaled deeply and then exhaled. Three women on the suspect list and none of them had blonde or naturally red hair. Even Calhoun didn’t have blonde hair.

  She smiled her greeting. “Please, you guys can sit down.”

  We both sat. We had agreed I’d ask most of the questions, that way she wouldn’t seem bombarded by both of us. But I knew if Jones had a question, he wasn’t going to hold it in. I hoped he wouldn’t.

  “Ms. Sims, we have a few questions for you.”

  “Please, call me McKenzie. I’ll help as much as I can, but I don’t really know much.”

  “How did you know Mr. Effridge?”

  “I met him at a photo shoot. Carlotta was there and he came by to talk to her one day. She introduced us.”

  “What kind of relationship did you have with him?”

  “There was no relationship between us. I have a boyfriend.”

  “Had you ever gone out with him?”

  “On a date with Mr. Effridge? No. Not anything I’d call a date. We just went to dinner twice.”

  “And you don’t consider either time to be a date?”

  “No. I told you already, I have a boyfriend, so it was just a friendly get-together.”

  “Did your boyfriend know you were going to get together with Mr. Effridge?”

  “No way. He’d kill me, or kill him.”

  “That’s a pretty strong reaction. And yet, now, we have a dead man. And it happens to be the man you got together with twice,” Jones said.

  “Look, don’t start insinuating that things were happening between us!” She crossed her arms over her chest and squinted her eyes at him. “There was nothing between us like that.”

  “Help us understand why you went out with him. The husband of your boss.” I watched her fingers slide up and down the phone case, then made their way over the keys. She seemed nervous, or irritated.

  “You don’t get it. You’re reading more into this than there was. Chase was a really friendly guy. He said he wanted to see some of my pictures. I took my portfolio with me and we had a great time talking while he looked at my work.”

  “Why would he need to see your portfolio? He was a college professor, and you already had the job. His wife had already hired you. Am I missing something?” I asked.

  “What types of pictures do you have in your book?” Jones asked.

  “I have a variety. Most are fashion shots, but I do have a few tasteful nude shots. Not full-on naked, but like the waist up.” Her cheeks flushed a healthy shade of pink.

  “What was the reason he gave you for wanting to see your portfolio? Did he know about the nude shots?” I asked.

  “Tasteful nudes,” she muttered.

  He eyes were anywhere except on us. I got the feeling she wasn’t being completely truthful. Somehow, I think Effridge knew about those photos, and I think our little Ms. Sims wanted to show him.

  “Did he try to make an advance on you?” I asked.

  “Yeah, he tried. A lot of guys do. But I told him I wasn’t interested, and I wasn’t going to cheat on Billy.”

  “Then why on earth would you go out with him a second time? Isn’t that sending mixed signals?”

  “Billy and I got into an argument earlier on that day. Chase was standing nearby and overheard him belittling me. When Chase called later and asked if I wanted to go grab a bite to eat, I said yes. I just wanted to get out of the house for a couple hours and let Billy cool down.”

  “And was he cooled down when you got back home?”

  “No, he was still furious.”

  “Did he ask where you had been?”

  “Yeah, he asked, and I told him. I didn’t lie.”

  “How did he react?”

  She slumped her shoulders and lowered her eyes. “His face got red. He grabbed me tight by my arm and asked me if I was cheating on him. I told him no, because I wasn’t, but I don’t think he believed me. He told me if I ever cheated on him …”

  “What? What did he threaten?”

  “He swore he’d kill me and the prick I cheated with.”

  “Do you think there’s any way he didn’t believe what you said? Maybe he killed Mr. Effridge?”

  “No. I can’t believe Billy could do something so horrible. And I’ve never given him a reason to not trust me. I think he just wanted to scare me. I’ve gone out with
plenty of male friends before.”

  “But were they male friends who were knowingly trying to pick you up?” I raised my eyebrow.

  “I don’t have to talk to you anymore, you know.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  We sat in silence for a couple more minutes.

  “I guess I liked the attention I was getting from Chase. He was a gorgeous man, and he was really nice. I knew it was wrong. Especially since it was my boss’ husband and all, but I just couldn’t bring myself to say no. Billy just takes me for granted. I hate that. I just liked feeling special, even if I knew deep down I’d never leave Billy. Going to dinner, having someone buy Champagne for me, it just made me feel …” she stopped talking and sighed. She shook her head, “just special, that’s all. I didn’t mean anything else by it. I swear, that’s the truth.”

  “When was the last time you saw Mr. Effridge?”

  “I talked to him on the morning he was murdered. On the phone. He called me right after Carlotta left. He had to get off the phone because someone was at the door. He asked me if I’d go to dinner with him that night.”

  “Do you happen to remember the time?”

  “It was just before seven-thirty I think,” she said.

  “Did anyone hear you on the phone?”

  “Yeah.” A tear slid down her cheek. “Billy walked into the room and heard me.”

  “I’m guessing he wasn’t too happy.”

  “Not at all. He told me we’d talk later. I had a photo shoot to get ready for. He knows if I’m upset, I take really shitty pictures.”

  “Did you two ever have that talk?”

  “No. He never said anything.”

  “Do you think Billy might have confronted Effridge?”

  “I don’t know when he would have had time. He drove to the photo shoot with me, and he was the photographer. He never left. As a matter of fact, he watched me like a hawk the entire time because he thought Effridge might show up, again.”

  “Thank you for your time. We may need to ask a few more questions, but we appreciate you taking time out of your day to talk to us.”