Knife Edge (A Dead Cold Mystery Book 27) Blake Banner (10 best books of all time TXT) 📖

the bruise and making it look as though an unknown killer had murdered both kids.”

I heard Mitchell rasp, “No, no, never! We would never…!”

But my eyes were on Marcus whose face was bright red, while his knuckles were white where he was gripping Dehan’s hand.

“It was,” I said, “the only viable theory we had. But there were aspects that troubled both Detective Dehan and me. Then it came to me, when Dr. Wagner was telling us about her meeting with Emma in White Plains.

“She said that Emma was terrified that you, Dr. Mitchell, and Dr. Wagner would, and I quote, ‘…allow Marcus to start talking.’ She then added, ‘I told her surely that would exonerate her and Brad…’ ‘But,’ Dr. Wagner said, ‘she was hysterical and convinced that we were going to manipulate Marcus and fill his head with false memories.’”

I paused, sighed and shook my head. “This woman, Emma Mitchell, was holding a gun on Dr. Wagner, accusing her of trying to frame her for the murder of Lee and Lea, so that she and Brad could be rid of her and get married. Emma’s full intention by then was to kill Margaret Wagner; there was absolutely no reason for her to pretend she was innocent of the killing. Her very motive for killing Dr. Wagner was her belief that she was being framed. So clearly, if she believed she was being framed, she didn’t do it.”

There was a deathly silence in the room. Outside, in the backyard, a bird was chirping sporadically. I said, “So, if she didn’t, who did? We were out of options. And then another thing struck me that should have struck me much earlier. It probably would have if we had not been looking at an apparently inexplicable situation. But in retrospect it was obvious.

“If Lea had fallen and struck her throat on a hoe or a wheelbarrow, she would not yet have been dead by the time you arrived. She would have been asphyxiating. But she showed no signs of asphyxia. There was, according to Dr. Mitchell’s account, and the crime scene photographs, a huge amount of blood at the scene. Lea had bled out from her wound, which meant she was still alive when she received it.

“The only possible explanation was that Lea had her throat cut before you arrived, by Lee Brown. As happens with so many abused kids, he acted out what had been done to him on another, more vulnerable child. He was no stranger to violence and death—he had killed his own mother. My suspicion is that he was trying to rape Lea, as he and his sister had been raped by their father.”

I caught the movement and looked over at Dehan. She nodded. “He says that is correct.”

I nodded and smiled at him. “And you tried to rescue her, didn’t you, Marcus?” He leaned his head against Dehan’s arm and started to weep. I went on, “You tried to take the knife from him, but it was too late. He had already killed her. You had had enough, you had all had enough, he had destroyed your happy family, and now he had murdered your sister. Maybe you even feared for your own life. You took the knife from him and killed him. Is that right, Marcus?”

Dehan nodded and said, quietly, “That is correct.”

Dr. Simone Robles gestured me to be quiet, stood and hurried around to hunker down beside Dehan, talking quietly to Marcus. Mitchell had folded in on himself and had covered his face with his hands, sobbing like a child. After a moment Wagner went over and, in a strange echo of Simone Robles, she hunkered down in front of Mitchell, took one of his hands and started murmuring softly to him.

I stood and went to the door. Looking back I could see that Marcus was now clinging to Simone Robles and Dehan was getting softly to her feet. She joined me at the door and we stepped out onto the landing, closing the door quietly behind us. Olvera and Sanchez were there, waiting.

“Give them a while, take their statements, no need to book anybody.”

We moved down the stairs and out into the cold, bright light of the morning. Clouds were gathering in the east. Rain was coming, and with it the spring.

I turned to Dehan. “We need to brief the chief and the DA.”

She nodded. “And then?”

“And then?” I unlocked the burgundy growler and leaned on the roof. “And then I need a good, rare sirloin at the French Roast, and a good bottle of fine red wine.”

“But first ersters, please, and Gewurztraminer.”

“Indeed, first ersters, Gewurztraminer, and then Argentine sirloin.”

“And then Bushmills and that cheese that smells like rotting feet.”

“Yes, and then that. And a taxi home.”

We climbed into the big burgundy beast, and drove away from the Mitchells’ house, in Castle Hill.

Let Me Help

As I mentioned before, I love writing. Because of this, I end up writing new books at a much faster rate than most other authors—typically one a month (sometimes more).

Some call me crazy, and though I definitely agree, it's not because of my ability to write quickly. To that, I credit hard freaking work.

However, this rapid release schedule has one major drawback, and that's with staying up to date. I can't tell you how many times I get emails that go something like this.

Hey, I didn't know (insert new book title here) was out already?! What the heck!

I know, a travesty. But, thankfully for you I've come up with a solution (and it's quite revolutionary). It's thing magical new thing called a “mailing list.” Through it I am able to send you emails whenever I have a new book available for reading. You don't even have to do anything! I just send you the links. I know, what a guy, right? ;)

Well, not really. Because I lied. You do have to do something, and that is sign up. I know, I know, I can hear the whining and