Free Lethal Confessions by V. K. Sykes Page B

And especially after seeing Noble’s reaction to Carrie’s corpse. When he collapsed against her, he’d been dead weight, like he’d been close to fainting. That was pretty hard to fake.
    Did Carrie have sex here last night? If she did, it was with someone other than Noble. Was that man the killer? And what the hell was the connection to Krista Shannon?
    The autopsy would answer the first question, and maybe they’d get DNA or fiber evidence from the bedroom. Possibly a neighbor saw whoever visited Carrie last night. Scarpelli, Ryan, and Washington would meet her and Poushinsky at HQ at three for a debriefing on the results of their interviews.
    But for all their earlier certainty that Carrie’s murder was the work of a serial killer, Amy couldn’t ignore the whispers of doubt drifting through her mind. Maybe Cramer and Knight were wrong about that. There had to be some kind of connection between Krista and Carrie beyond simply being married to ballplayers. A reason for someone to want to kill those two particular women.
    She hoped to God there was, because then it might end here, with Carrie Noble. Maybe she was trying to talk herself into that, but the scene in the bedroom didn’t seem to add up with the serial killer assumption. Whatever had happened here, there was no evidence of any violence.
    Amy blew out a tight breath, hating the uncertainty. Because, of course, the killer might just be a whack job who for some screwed up reason simply wanted to kill baseball players’ wives. Any he could get his hands on.
    The faint crackling of anxiety that had been hovering in the back of Amy’s consciousness suddenly grew to a roar.
    Any player’s wife.
    Amy didn’t believe in fate, but this case was getting more personal by the minute.

 
    11
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    Thursday, July 29
    3:05 p.m.
     
    Amy headed straight back to HQ, a single thought racing through her brain. M.L.’s loser husband, Justin Wilson, played for the Palm Beach Cardinals. Different team, but the husbands of Krista Shannon and Carrie Noble played for different teams, too. Whatever this was about, it wasn’t about a particular team.
    Poushinsky watched her carefully as they wound through the burgeoning rush hour traffic but kept his mouth shut. Thank God for that. She didn’t want to have to explain her growing—and surely ridiculous—fears about her sister, or tell her partner to mind his own business.
    Ever since Carrie Noble was identified, Amy had told herself there had to be something solid connecting Krista and Carrie. That the killer must have known them both—which meant there was a good chance they knew each other. But Matt Noble had denied any knowledge of Krista, and claimed not to know her husband personally, either.
    They’d start digging with Krista’s and Carrie’s friends, hoping to uncover a link. There had to be one. Amy didn’t want to believe a guy would be killing women just because they were married to ballplayers. But what, then, was the killer’s motivation? Had he picked Krista and Carrie because they were easy targets?
    That theory—and all kinds of others, no matter how far-fetched—rattled around in her brain. She prided herself on her cold, analytical mind. On logic, not emotion. But when it came to her little sister, her only remaining sibling, logic fled the scene in a fast-moving vehicle.
    All the way back to HQ, she told herself the chances of that theory panning out were remote. But all the self-assurances wouldn’t ratchet down the anxiety that sent nauseating flutters through her gut every time she thought about M.L.
    As she pulled into the sprawling HQ parking lot, Amy let out a tense breath that she felt like she’d been holding in for hours. Poushinsky gave her another concerned look.
    “What’s the deal, Robitaille? You look ready to explode.”
    She shot him an irritated glance. “I’m fine,” she managed in a calm voice. She couldn’t talk about the fear. Not to anybody. They’d think her past