Cat and Mouse
By Terri D. Thomas
Part 16
"So you think that Murdock killed Sara McCarthy?" Harry asked Cassy.
"I think that the evidence suggests it."
"Why? Why would he want to kill her? What's the motive?"
"He doesn't need one. . .Hell, why did he kill Brad in the first place?" Cassy responded, clearly frustrated.
"He had a motive, Cassy. It may have been a weak one, but in his mind, your actions in that parking lot created one. What could Sara McCarthy have done to him to set him off?" Harry's question was met with silence. "Besides, why would he take so many chances to try to prove his innocence? Twice now he's confronted Tom and made it clear that he didn't kill the woman. Why would he do that?"
"I don't know, Harry. Maybe it's to pit Tom against me."
"No, St. John. I don't buy it."
"Okay, fine," Cassy huffed. "Let's try this from the other side. Why would anyone else have a motive to kill both Sara McCarthy and Burt Murdock? Tom said that you were looking at Jason McCarthy. Okay, so let's say he kills Sara for God- knows-what-reason. Why would he kill Burt Murdock? That makes no sense."
Harry considered her words. He moved the phone receiver to his other ear as he sat on the bed. He felt the mattress give as Frannie sat behind him. "Hesch, what's wrong?" Frannie whispered, concerned by the look on her husband's face.
Harry ignored his wife's question. "Cassy, in a warped way this whole thing does make some sense."
"What? How?"
Harry glanced at his watch. "Can you be ready in thirty minutes?"
"Why? Where are we going?"
"To find Thomas."
Tom reached down to readjust the gun. It was smaller than his and didn't fit right in his holster. 'Oh well, beggars and choosers,' he muttered to himself. He was just lucky that by knowing Cassy the way he did, he knew all of her tendencies. And that one of those was that she was a creature of habit. She always kept her spare in her dresser drawer.
Under normal circumstances he would have never dreamt of entering her house and taking her gun without permission, but this was hardly a normal circumstance. Harry, in a fit of rage, had suspended him, taken his badge and gun. And, as luck would have it, he needed them. He had the evidence to put Jason McCarthy behind bars. Further, based upon his confrontation with Murdock, he was convinced that he needed to act on the evidence immediately.
He had started to retrieve his backup weapon from his home, but then heard the call go over the radio. His house was being watched. There would be no way to get to his weapon without interference from his associates. However, they weren't watching Cassy's place. He was able to slip in and out undetected.
Now he was in route to Riviera Beach. He glanced at the dashboard clock. He would be at Jason McCarthy's home before dawn.
He could hear Harry's voice in his mind, the words berating him for his actions. He knew he should have told Harry about the file. He knew he should have waited until morning and talked to Harry about the suspension and try to convince the captain to change his mind. However, Harry's attitude had infuriated Tom. The man refused to listen to what Tom was trying to tell him. It was clear that Harry refused to believe Murdock could be a viable source for evidence in the case.
Tom sighed. He couldn't believe he had just come to that conclusion. Murdock was the one who framed Cassy for murder. Worse, he was the maniac who tried to kill her. The man had attacked her in her own home. Why now was Tom so willing to push that aside and believe the man was innocent?
It was a simple reason, really. Independently, the facts in the case pointed to Murdock, but the clues didn't add up. Even though Murdock was a monster, Tom wouldn't allow himself into being manipulated into pinning the crime on the crazed man if Murdock didn't do it.
He glanced at the file beside him. The information it held certainly convinced him that Jason McCarthy had a better motive for killing his wife than Murdock. Now it was just a matter of confronting Jason McCarthy about the evidence. He'd bait the hook and see if McCarthy would bite.
Harry explained to Cassy's bodyguards that he was taking the woman with him. He wasn't sure that was the wisest decision he could make, but he was now relatively certain that the danger to the woman was not immediate. For whatever reason, Murdock appeared to be ignoring her. Murdock was focusing his efforts on Tom.
The question now was 'where was Tom?' What information was in that file? Harry was not a big believer in hunches. He had let Tom know that on more than one occasion. However, he did have to agree with the younger man that hunches had their place. When there was no evidence to the contrary and no leads to go on, sometimes a cop only had his gut instinct to guide him.
Harry's gut instinct was telling him that if he wanted to find Tom then he needed to think like his detective. Tom seemed to believe Murdock when the man told him that he didn't commit Sara McCarthy's murder. If Murdock gave Tom evidence to support that claim, then he knew that Ryan was acting upon it.
If Murdock was removed as the prime suspect, that left Jason McCarthy as the sole candidate. The information that Murdock had given Tom had to point to him. Harry felt his stomach roll. He had no doubt that his detective was going after Jason McCarthy, alone and unarmed.
Tom sat outside of Jason McCarthy's house. He turned on the map light and read the information in the file for a third time. It was unbelievable to him that the local police had failed to dig further into the man's history.
One piece of paper contained copies of two clippings from newspapers. Each revealed a dark piece of history about the man who had married Sara Kersey. Jason McCarthy had been married twice before, and worse, the marriages had ended abruptly in death. Both wives had died. One was killed in a hit and run accident. The other was brutally murdered during a mugging. In neither instance was the culpable party caught. Now, all of the facts in this case, pointed to the conclusion that a maniacal killer had murdered Jason's third wife, Sara McCarthy.
Tom examined the second piece of paper. It was a copy of a life insurance policy written on the life of Brad Kersey. The beneficiary of the policy was Sara McCarthy. The policy amount was for $1,000,000. At the bottom of the copy was an image of a check which had been paid to Sara McCarthy.
Tom thought back to his conversation with the local police. They had said that Sara had relatively few assets to her name. According to their investigation, she didn't have enough to justify being murdered for them. However, a million dollar life insurance payoff would be a sufficient motive for murder. So the real question was what happened to the money?
It was now almost five in the morning. He was ready to take on McCarthy. With the file folder in his hand, he reached for the door handle of the sedan and exited the vehicle.
Part of his mind screamed at him that he was fool to do this alone, but the other part told him that he had the upperhand. He had one excellent ace up his sleeve, and if he played his cards right, Jason McCarthy would surrender to him without incident. The man would have no choice but to give himself up when he finally realized the seriousness of the predicament he had created for himself. 'It's time to trap a murderer,' Tom thought as he walked to the front steps of the house.
End Part 16
To Part 17