Bleed (Detective Ellie MacIntosh) Read Online Free PDF Page A

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    “I killed him.”
    Ellie eyed the pale, set face of the young woman before her and took a moment. “Okay … tell us what happened.”
    “I can’t talk right here.” She indicated the body with a slightly unsteady hand. “Can we do this alone somewhere else?”
    Considering there were crime scene techs all around them, not to mention that Dr. Hammet had just arrived, Ellie gave a nod.
    Grasso indicated the nearby family room. “Fine. By all means, Ms. Garrison. Let’s sit down and discuss this.”
    The actress was much calmer than the other morning, or even than when Ellie had talked to her last. She wore a camisole under a gray cashmere sweater, and dark slacks that made her hair even more vibrant, and a slight smattering of freckles were visible across her nose that Ellie had never seen before, no doubt because she was so pale.
    The couches were Italian leather, the fireplace black marble, and the French doors looked out over a courtyard with the same Olympic-sized pool visible from the dining room. They sat down, and it was interesting to see that Greta seemed more lucid than she had been the last time they talked, less anxious, her calm either drug-induced … or maybe the plausible explanation was in a congealing pool of blood in the dining room.
    Ellie said matter-of-factly, “I take it you were expecting your ex-husband.”
    Grasso, sitting in his tailored slacks and pristine white shirt with a patterned silk tie, looked at Greta at the question, a small notebook in his hand. The actress nodded, her hands quietly folded.
    “You told me yourself, Detective, he would come after me.”
    “I said,” Ellie corrected carefully, “that if you knew who had shot Cranz and his friend, he might worry about what you could tell us. Are you saying he killed them?”
    “I suspected Sam.” Greta wiped the corner of her eye. “I didn’t know .”
    Ellie nodded. “Where did you get the gun? You told us just two days ago you don’t own one.”
    Greta hesitated, but then shuddered. Her voice was a thin whisper. “It was his. He showed it to me. Said he was going to kill me. He set it down on the kitchen counter as he was ranting. I’ve always known he hasn’t accepted the divorce. I … well … I picked it up.”
    It was a valid explanation for another corpse, but only to a certain extent. “If he killed two men to protect you, it makes no sense to us that he would then turn around and pose enough of a threat to give you cause to defend yourself with deadly force. That would negate the reason for the first two killings.”
    “What reason?” Greta stared at them with limpid eyes, her body slightly slumped. “What are you talking about?”
    “Money.” Grasso was matter-of-fact. “Wasn’t he protecting his investment? Obviously, the two of you don’t get along. The body in the kitchen kind of indicates that, Ms. Garrison. He gets a percentage of your earnings, and it isn’t chump change. I can tell you, people have killed for a lot less.”
    The laugh she gave held an edge of hysteria. “You think this is about money? Any of it? That’s … wrong, mistaken. Stupid even.”
    Ellie fought a surge of frustration because she knew well enough that they were missing something in this case, but whatever the hell it might be, she had no idea, and this latest shooting just added more brain fog. She leaned forward. “Look, Ms. Garrison, neither Lieutenant Grasso nor myself are stupid. What we are is in the dark as to what the motivation could be if you don’t believe it was money. Mostly because you are not a very cooperative witness, for which we can detain you and, depending on the circumstances, maybe even arrest you. Now, if we are ‘mistaken,’ please explain.”
    Greta straightened her spine in a manner that Ellie had seen before. Her mouth tightened. “Sam had an obsession with me. It was why he cast me in the first place, and it was why he never accepted the divorce. I loved him, but I