Page 150 of Look Closer

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“Are you absolutely sure you don’t know Vicky Lanier?” Jane asks.

“I... don’t recognize that name.”

She smirks at me.

“Okay, Simon,” she says. “We’ll be in touch.”

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Jane

Jane and Andy don’t say a word to each other until they’re back inside their car and have driven away from Simon’s house. Andy has the wheel.

“So what do you think?” she asks. “You saw the look on his face when we mentioned Vicky’s name. I was just trying to rattle his cage.”

“And it worked,” Andy says. “That’s your real theory, isn’t it? She’s the one who helped Simon pull this off? The one on the other end of the cell phone texts?”

“Somebody helped him, Andy. And he lit up like a firecracker when we mentioned her name.”

“So this receptionist, Emily Fielding, says this woman named Vicky Lanier and Nick were getting it on in his office,” says Andy. “And that was the last time she saw Vicky. So let’s say they’ve hooked up, they’re sleeping together. How does that fit in? If Simon’s behind all this, if he’s the puppet master, where does Vicky Lanier fit in? Why does she need to get close to Nick Caracci? How does that help Simon with his ultimate goal of killing Lauren Betancourt?”

“Well, Nick’s the patsy, right?”

“Sure, so the theory goes, but why does Vicky have to get close to him?”

“Well, to get inside his apartment to steal half his toiletry kit, if for no other reason. Maybe to get him to kill Lauren—maybe Nick did that. I don’t know all the details yet.” She wags her finger. “Yet. But you agree, we’re onto something here.”

“Oh, shit, I don’t know, Janey. I mean, Nick Caracci was probably a player, right? Good-looking guy. Rich, or at least pretending to be rich. Thefact that he bangs some woman in his office? I mean, that would never happen tome, but it’s not a total shock he’d have success with the ladies. It could be that and nothing more.”

Jane looks at Andy. He’s being practical, reasonable. He might well be right. With all the evidence piled up against Nick, Jane won’t be able to hold off the chief and the Village president much longer. “If it’s that and nothing more,” she says, “why did Simon react like that in there when we mentioned the name Vicky Lanier?”

“No, you’re right about that. He did.” He groans. “This case is giving me a stomachache.”

“Why?”

“Because we have a slam dunk on Nick Caracci, Jane, that’s why.”

“Yeah, but what does your gut tell you?”

Andy makes a noise, taps his fingers on the steering wheel. He pulls their car into the parking lot outside the police station, kills the engine, and turns to her.

“My gut tells me he knows Vicky Lanier,” he says.

“For sure.”

“But we know nothing about her. I mean, if she’s in on this with Simon, if she was part of some plan to lure Nick Caracci into this plot, I highly doubt ‘Vicky Lanier’ is even her real name.”

“Probably not. The name itself is almost surely a dead end. We’ll run a background just in case, but you’re right—her name probably isn’t Vicky Lanier.”

“So we don’t know squat.”

“Not yet,” she says. “You processed all the prints from Lauren’s crime scene, right?”

“Yep. Sent them to AFIS yesterday. If there’s a hit on anything, we’ll know hopefully today or tomorrow at the latest.”

“And Cheronis sent prints from Nick Caracci’s apartment,” says Jane. “Maybe we’ll get lucky on a fingerprint. Forensics may be our only saving grace here. Simon can manipulate all he wants, but he can’t manipulate a fingerprint.”

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Tags: David Ellis Mystery