Page 12 of View from Above
Photos of Virginia Green’s body on the pavement.
Mallory’s heart double-timed as she studied the suspect’s face.
“Stop.” Angie splayed her hands against the steel table. “Please.”
“Here’s the way I see it, Angie.” He didn’t stop. “You endured years of criticism for a mistake you just wish would’ve gone away, but she wouldn’t let it, would she?” Payton tapped the closest photo to Angie Green. “And nothing you did—paying the mortgage on her house, making sure she was taking care of herself, running her errands—none of that eased the tension between you two. You sucked it up. Because what other choice did you have, right? You couldn’t let your secret get out. It’d ruin your marriage. Your husband might take your kids, and your mother suddenly wouldn’t be the only person you’d disappointed.”
He slid one photo from the keepsake box to the end of the table and sat it upright. The one showing Virginia Green and Roland Kotite dancing in the middle of some unrecognizable living room. Happy. In love. “Then one day you find out she made the same mistake you did years before, and that was it. You couldn’t take it anymore. Not only had she kept her affair from you, but she used it to punish you.”
“No, that’s not…” Angie shook her head. “You’re twisting my words.”
“Nothing you’d done had made up for your mistake. Not in her eyes. She didn’t care you were trying to love her or that you’d made an effort to keep your children in her life. Your need for answers didn’t matter to her.” Payton’s voice grew louder, tensing every muscle down Mallory’s back. Her fingernails cut into her palms as her defenses kicked in, but the distraction failed to soften the blow. “So you did what you had to do to make the pain and the betrayal stop. She’d hurt you for years. You decided you were going to hurt her back. Starting with Roland Kotite. Did you drug him, too, Angie? Did you lure him off the roof of his law firm? Is that how it went down?”
Angie clamped her hands to her ears. The tears slid easily down her face now as Payton’s personal attack landed. “You don’t understand.”
No. Mallory shook her head. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. She was moving. She was ripping open the door to the observation room and rounding toward interrogation. Her shoulder protested at the hard shove against the door. It felt as though she’d left her body and all the insecurities, all the self-doubt, had taken over. In that moment, the hard shell her father had forced her to build to stave off his barbs and detachment to his own flesh and blood had crumbled, and she didn’t know how to get it back. “That’s enough! Can’t you see how much you’re hurting her?”
Mallory snapped back into the moment as Payton shoved to his feet. She’d interrupted his interrogation. She’d broken her promise to let him take the lead. She’d endangered his case. If he hadn’t found cause to block her from this investigation before, she’d just handed it to him by losing control.
He closed the distance between them, faster than she thought possible, and led her back into the hallway. The door locked securely behind him, and before she had a chance to apologize for her outburst, his hands framed her face. “I’m sorry, Mallory. I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to overhear any of that, but I wasn’t getting anywhere with her. I had to make her believe you were more than Roland Kotite’s daughter. I had to make her think you’re someone she could open up to.”
Her heart rate thundered hard behind her ears, and it wasn’t until he swiped his thumb across her left cheek that she realized her eyes burned with tears. He’d played their suspect. Just as he’d played her. To get a reaction. To force her to step in. Because she’d been right. She and Angie Green were similar, and they had a lot in common.
Mallory tugged free of his hold despite her body’s determination to melt into all that warmth and solid muscle for balance. Her jaw ached as she steadied herself on her own two feet. It hadn’t been personal. Not for him, but her face stung as though she’d been physically assaulted. “You’re a damn piece of work, Detective Nichols. You know that? You could’ve just asked.”
“Would you have barged in there the same way as you just did to defend her?” Payton added a foot of distance between them. “All I have is circumstantial evidence. She had the opportunity and the motive to kill her mother, but I can’t hold her for more than twenty-four hours without something more solid. If she had anything to do with Virginia Green’s or Roland Kotite’s deaths, I need her to confess. You might be the only one she’ll talk to at this point.”
“You think if I relate to her, she’ll confess?” She checked over her shoulder, not exactly sure why she was protecting their conversation by lowering her voice. “You’re out of your mind. I’m not law enforcement.”
“No, you’re a psychologist,” Payton said. “I think you have more influence than you know. Hell, look what you did with me, and that was in the first five minutes of our session.”
“We never had a session, and I am not your therapist.” His admiration of her abilities massaged the tension from her neck and shoulders, but doubt had taken hold again. Was this legal? Letting some woman he’d met on the rooftop of a crime scene sit in on an interview of a suspect? Mallory’s attention slid to the door separating them from the suspect on the other side. Angie Green was on the verge of a break down. Maybe even close to hurting herself or someone she cared about. Mallory could help. “Fine. I’ll help, but I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it for her.”
She didn’t wait for an answer and pushed into the interrogation room. “Mrs. Green, I’m sorry about Detective Nichols. He can be…” Infuriating. Insensitive. Intense. She had a lot of “I” words lined up she didn’t dare admit. Especially considering he’d most likely taken up watching her from the other side of the glass. “Relentless.”
Angie Green stared up at her, red eyes rimmed. “What is this? Is he supposed to be the bad cop, and you’re… what?”
“A psychologist.” Mallory took her seat. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“You want to make sure I’m okay? You’re his daughter. Roland Kotite’s. Yeah, I know who you are.” Angie picked up a photo from the keepsake box and tossed it at Mallory. “What makes you think I have anything to say to you?”
“You’re in pain.” Mallory collected the photos of Virginia Green and stacked them together. “You have been for a while. I can see it. It’s dripped into every corner of your life. It’s affected all of your relationships. Your husband, your kids, your friends. They can see it eating you alive, changing you.”
“You say that as though you have some experience with a mother like mine,” Angie said.
“Not a mother.” Mallory turned the photo of Virginia Green and her father toward Angie and tapped it. “My father. He never forgave me for not following him into the family business. Held it against me for years.”
Silence settled between them as Angie studied each and every photo splayed out in front of them. “Have you ever seen him this happy?”
“No,” Mallory said.
“Your partner wants me to be the one who killed her, doesn’t he?” The reality of the situation drained the fight from Angie Green’s expression. Her humorless laugh burst from her mouth and triggered Mallory’s nerves. “It’s not enough she tortured me for the past decade, she has to haunt me after she’s gone. I have an alibi for the time Trooper Wells said my mother died, if you think that will help. I was at couple’s therapy with my husband. I’m happy to give you my therapist’s contact information and address to prove it.”
“I take it your husband knows about the affair. That’s why you’re seeing a counselor?” Awareness prickled down her spine from the one-way glass. She’d gotten through.
“He does.” Angie folded her arms across her chest. “Because my mother told him after I asked her about hers.”
Mallory straightened. “Your mother told him?”