CHAPTER TWO

. . . .

. . .

On the way to Bates' home to execute the search warrant, Juliet finally broke. "How did the informant cause the bad dream?"

In profile, her partner seemed to be made of stone. He glanced at her, his own expression unreadable and his blue gaze giving nothing away. "We don't know that he did."

"Well, it's a hell of a coincidence, don't you think?"

"Yeah, I do. But Torrance himself said something about his subconscious, so it could just be that."

"He's a judge. He's made tougher decisions than this."

"Think about it, O'Hara. This was a public murder which put three people in the spotlight. A reasonably innocent wife, a young mistress who was guilty only of loving a killer, and a perpetual 'person of interest' who's eluded arrest for two decades. To sign off on to the warrant without thinking about all the ways it could backfire? Torrance is too careful for that."

"You weren't feeling so tolerant yesterday when he put us off."

"Yesterday I was crabby."

Juliet eyed him, and he had the sense to smile just a little. "So you don't think…"

"What? That our informant snuck into the judge's bedroom and whispered in his ear while Clarice lay right there beside him? Or do you think he might be Clarice?"

She'd seen Clarice. It was possible. She snapped, "Why are you arguing with me? I'm asking what you think, Carlton. What you, my partner and my… my partner, think about this."

He relaxed his grip on the steering wheel. "I think sometimes things work out the way we want."

Turning fully in her seat, she stared at him until he had to look her way. "You, Carlton Lassiter, never think things work out the way we want, and if I have to remind you of a certain kiss and a certain—"

"Enough! I get it. Let's just… let it percolate, okay? For all we know, Torrance has dreams like that all the time."

There was no point pursuing it anyway, because they'd arrived at Jason Bates' large Victorian-style mansion, and joined the cadre of other police vehicles lined up out front.

McNab met them at the door. "Sir, the property is clear of all civilians except for Bates and his two lawyers. We have them… um… corralled in the parlor."

"Good work, McNab. Everyone's set up in the study?"

McNab couldn't help but beam at the compliment. "Ready for you, sir."

Juliet always enjoyed Carlton striding into a scene to take command. Even when he was wrongheaded about something—which typically involved Shawn Spencer—he was always compelling. She kept up with him as they entered the study, where the shelves were lined not with books but with bits of art—boats, tigers, other generally outdoor-activity-related objects. Lila Crane thought of Bates as romantic because he kept a journal, but wasn't fazed at the absence of actual books?

Dobson came to greet them, cup of coffee in hand.

"How big is the space?" Carlton asked.

"Comparing floor plans to actual room measurements, at least six feet wide and ten feet long. There's no sign of an entrance and Bates isn't talking, so the team started testing and they say the walls are reinforced on both sides. They can get through, but without knowing exactly what's in there, they could damage evidence."

Journals, Juliet thought. Paper would be very easily damaged, and this paper was precious like gold.

"What's on the other side?"

"The kitchen. Specifically, the sink and various plumbing lines."

More trouble for paper.

Carlton digested this. "Where's the parlor?"

They were led to an open room on the opposite side of the main hall, where they found an outwardly smug but perhaps just a little bit nervous Jason Bates flanked by his two attorneys, both of whom were extremely annoyed.

"Detective Lassiter," Lawyer Number One started, "this is a complete outrage. Our client has not been charged with any crime, and to continually harass him during his time of mourning is beyond cold."

Ignoring this, Carlton fixed his icy blue gaze on Bates. "I'll ask you once. How do we get into the hidden room?"

Bates shrugged. "What hidden room? I don't know anything about a hidden room, and Stoker and Shelley plan to sue you personally for inventing one as an excuse to wreck my home once again."

"Ah. And who are Stoker and Shelley?"

The attorneys weren't amused. Juliet couldn't remember which was which and didn't care. She said, "You know we looked at the floor plans, and we know the space is there."

"Maybe it is. I don't know anything about it. I didn't build the house, lady. It's been in my family for eighty years. Do I look like Bob Vila?"

"No, you look like the brother of Justine Bateman, and I don't like her."

Bates frowned, his lawyers frowned, and Carlton smirked openly. "You think we're not already calling in your childhood buddies to tell us all about the secret room you showed them when you were kids?"

"Yeah? Tell 'em I said hi." Bates leaned back against the fireplace, radiating confidence.

It only meant he didn't show anyone, or didn't find out about the space until much later. Given the location of the room, it was unlikely he'd built it himself undetected.

Juliet's phone buzzed and she stepped back, but it only took a moment to read the words.

Go upstairs.

She tapped Carlton on the arm, he sent a cool glare at the three people who were stymieing his need for justice, and they went into the hall. When she showed him the phone screen, he didn't even blink; he bounded up the grand staircase and she followed.

At the top, in the sunlit hallway graced with a large stained-glass window which colored the light around them, a door to the left closed suddenly.

She tensed, and Carlton asked, "Didn't McNab say the place was clear?"

"Yes, he did."

"That better not be one of our guys skulking," he muttered, drawing his weapon. He pushed the door open and it swung wide.

Juliet could hardly take in the opulence of the bedroom before them. She was aware that every single thing in there was hugely expensive, from bedspread to footstool to curtains to knick-knacks, but neither awe nor disgust could take hold, because all she could really see was Carrie Bates standing in the middle of the deep blue carpet.

Carlton breathed out part of a curse.

They knew her image well enough; not just from crime scene photos but from her high-profile charity work. Everyone in Santa Barbara knew what Carrie Bates looked like: tall, regal, long blonde hair, always the diamond necklace, always the long flowing dresses. Beautiful and ethereal in life, and seemingly more so in… Juliet swallowed… death.

She did not speak. Her solemn green gaze was steady as she simply pointed, silk rustling as her arm moved, and silver bracelets reflecting the light from the hall.

"The closet," Carlton said a bit weakly.

She didn't react. Her arm was as steady as her gaze.

"The closet," Juliet repeated. "It's directly over the hidden room. There must be a ladder or a staircase down."

But neither moved. They could only stare at the late Carrie Bates… until slowly, slowly, she faded from sight, leaving the room empty and cool and… empty.

He was first to thaw. "Get the team up here."

He didn't have to tell her and not a word about this to anyone.

. . . .

. . .

It wasn't, of course, as simple as finding the secret room, because here too, Jason Bates—who still claimed complete ignorance even as they were carting out the room's contents—had maintained his normal (abnormal) levels of secrecy.

The journals were identical in appearance. Small enough to fit in a man's jacket pocket, all dark blue. They filled each shelf in the cramped space, which also included a tiny desk with a lamp, a chair, a locked safe, and unexpectedly, a photo of Jason and Carrie on their wedding day.

The problem was there was absolutely no order to the hundreds and hundreds of plain unmarked journals. It was as if he'd bought in bulk specifically to fill the shelves, and then randomly chose which ones to write in. For every journal he'd used there was one unused, and no apparent sense to how they were shelved.

"He figured he could at least slow people down," Carlton commented.

"He was right." She looked as if she wanted to go after Bates and thwack him with one of the journals.

"Well, pack it all up and haul it to the station. We'll be reading for a few days." They were going to do this right.

He had a touch of grudging admiration for Bates' technique. The man was thoroughly determined to keep his secrets. But when he and Juliet headed out, he only gave the fuming man the briefest of glances.

Your dead wife—the wife you betrayed and murdered—outed you, he considered saying. How's that for losing control of a situation?

As they strode to the car, Juliet informed him they were taking an early lunch. He glanced at his watch and found it wasn't even 10:45. "We are?"

They were. She was tense but made it clear he was to call in that they'd be along in an hour—time enough for some quick handwriting authentication to take place in their absence—and that he should drive to the condo immediately.

He had a feeling this was about seeing Carrie, but what couldn't they talk about in the car?

Juliet said nothing else on the elevator ride up, nothing going down the hall, nothing as she locked the door behind him and took his wrist and pulled him into the bathroom.

And nothing as she began to take off her clothes.

He tamped down the immediate (and familiar) rush of desire for her. "Uh… not that I'm not always turned on by you, but—"

"Hush it," she interrupted. "Get undressed."

"Juliet, this might not be the time for—"

"I said get undressed!" She was already two-thirds nude, and reached in to turn the shower on. "Hurry!"

Well, the sight of her golden flesh was certainly an incentive, so Carlton shed his clothing in pretty good time, aware of her waiting impatiently for him on the other side of the curtain. Once he'd stepped into the warm spray of water, she wrapped her arms around his neck, pressed her delightful wet and slippery body to his and whispered words in his ear he never expected her to say in this situation.

"I think he has us under surveillance."

He drew back to see her face. "Who?"

"Who do you think? Santa Claus? The informant!"

"What? Why?"

"Because of the timing of everything! It's like he's with us every step. He could only be doing what he's doing if he knows what we're doing when we're doing it!"

Carlton started to speak, but she put her hand to his mouth. He peeled it away with effort but she was still talking.

"That message today. It came right after Bates denied knowing about the room. The team would have gone up there eventually to see if there was any access, but he wanted us up there right then, so he could show us, and only us, his little trick."

"You think…" He couldn't say her name. "You think what we saw was a trick?"

"It had to be!"

"But this morning when I said it was probably a coincidence about Torrance having a bad dream, you—"

"That was this morning."

"Yeah, and I was only crabby yesterday," he muttered.

Juliet frowned, shifting against him in agitation, and he grasped her hips to stop her movements, because in her agitation she was agitating him in ways which were very… very agitating.

"Juliet. Are we naked in the shower because you think he's listening to us?"

"Of course! He could have planted something in our clothes or phones. I don't want to take any chances, Carlton. He's been right there from the start. Even if he's not listening, I think he's watching. He could have been outside the courthouse yesterday when you and Ripley and I stormed out all pissed off. He'd have known we didn't get the warrant."

"But he couldn't have known Torrance only asked to think about it. Even if he did somehow plant a suggestion or, hell, I don't know what he could have done to cause a bad dream, there was no guarantee it would work. For all he knew, Torrance passed us off to another judge."

She shook her head adamantly, tendrils of damp hair curling against her neck. "One way or the other he knows what's going on."

"But… but he's helping us," he said plaintively, and damn, naked wet Juliet was distracting.

"If you thought Shawn was behind this, you'd be all over my theory."

"But what am I supposed to do about your theory?"

"Share it with me," she retorted. "And pay attention to exactly what goes on in the moments before he contacts us. We can catch this guy."

"Do we need to?" He stilled her movements yet again, because she was killing him. "What makes you so sure that was fake this morning? After last year with Cartavious?"

"Because the whole time we were in his house, we were creeped out. I didn't feel anything like that with her. Did you? Were you cold? Did you have goosebumps? Did you have any sense of evil?"

"No, but unlike Cartavious and that damned house, she wasn't evil! She was only trying to get a message through."

"So you think it was real? You think that was a ghost we saw?"

"Damn near anything is possible." Except for them getting back to the station on time, not if he was able to do what he badly wanted to do right now.

"Even though he knew we were going to be in the house, he knew he could lure us up there apart from the others, and he knew we'd have to follow the lead and wouldn't have time to figure out how he pulled it off, giving him time to remove the evidence?"

Carlton briefly seized control of his raging libido. "Juliet, this is not an argument we need to have. The guy's whole purpose is help us put Bates in jail. We can figure out who he is and how he's done all of this later."

Juliet sighed, resting her head on his shoulder.

After a bit, she finally said, "You're right." It was muffled against his skin, and the vibration was tantalizing. "But let's be careful what we say, okay?"

"Deal. Just… one more thing."

Her inquisitive expression changed when he grasped her thigh and lifted it to hook around his hip. "Ohhh…"

"Yeah, ohhhh." He kissed her hard, and she gave it back. "When a naked woman lures a naked man into a shower, there's going to be an incident."

"I take full responsibility for my actions." She nibbled at his throat, sliding her hands down his arms, pressing to him.

"You'd better," he growled. "Because since I'm not getting lunch, I'm having you."

She gasped as his own hands went wandering. "I'll make you a sandwich later."

Much later, he thought, and then stopped thinking with his conscious mind at all.

. . . .

. . .

Seven o'clock. The day shift was gone and the second shift was settling in. October's shorter hours of daylight meant the conference room lights were already on.

Juliet opened the seven hundredth Bates journal and abruptly tossed it across the room.

Carlton's head jerked up. "Evidence shouldn't be used as a weapon." He could see from where it had fallen open that it was one of the blanks.

"It wasn't loaded," she groused. "And I didn't throw it at you."

He closed the one he was 'reading.' "We should quit for the night."

"I hate this man. Have I told you that? I hate Jason Bates."

"You told me at three o'clock. And four o'clock."

"I could tell you again."

"You did. At four thirty, six and six-fifteen."

Juliet rubbed her temples. "He's just so smug. Even the blank journals piss me off."

He pointedly glanced in the direction of the one she'd tossed. "Really?"

"Carlton, take me seriously when I'm whiny."

"We've spent a lot longer than seven hours poring over evidence before. Are you going soft on me, O'Hara?"

Instantly a dark blue glare was aimed at him, and he remembered her in the shower and had to smile because he loved her no matter what kind of mood she was in.

"You know I'm not. It's just between his stupid little code and his smug little remarks when he does use English, his list of… of… atrocities is really yanking my chain!"

To make it worse, they hadn't yet found the journal—coded or otherwise—which referred to the murders of his wife and lover.

D.A. Ripley was already happy with their preliminary reports about all the other stuff they could finally get Bates on, but the murders of Lila and Carrie were top priority. Everyone "knowing" he killed them wasn't enough to guarantee even a trial, let alone a guilty verdict.

"Call him," Juliet said in the middle of his musing.

"Who?"

"Santa Claus," she said with extreme emphasis.

"How?"

She looked at him, eyebrows raised. "You carry this thing called a… wait… let me think of the name for it… oh yes: cell phone. Ring a bell?"

"And what number do I call, Ms. Smartass? My own?"

Now she floundered. "Well… just return the call you got. It's worth a try, right?"

"Sure. You do it. With your own—now what do I call it?—oh yeah, cell phone!"

They scowled at each other.

"Fine." She grabbed up her phone and scrolled through the recent calls, and he watched as she pushed the button to call… herself? Phone to her ear, she had the audacity to stick her tongue out at him, and Carlton couldn't decide whether to threaten to spank her or… take her.

After a few moments, she disconnected with a fresh new scowl.

"Didn't work?"

"No, I changed my mind. Decided I didn't feel like talking."

He couldn't help it; he laughed.

She was startled, but eventually she was smiling at him instead of looking as if he'd make a good target. "Okay. Maybe we should quit for tonight, like you said."

Carlton agreed quickly, and they packed up the current batch of journals, deciding to go get some dinner and some fresh air and be around people—at a considerable distance—who weren't as annoyance-inspiring as Jason Bates.

There was a beachside place which wasn't busy on this Wednesday night, and they sat on the deck and had good fresh seafood and wine, then started home under the mid-evening stars with the windows of his Fusion down to let in the late October breeze as they drove.

He was relaxed, his lovely Juliet was in a far better mood, he still had delightfully salacious memories of their lunchtime tryst (she had indeed made him a sandwich after), and tomorrow they would find the bastard's notes about murdering the women who loved him and send his skanky ass to jail.

His cell rang, he pretended not to know what it was—cell phone? what's that?—they laughed at each other, and he said hello.

"Come see me," the man said pleasantly. "We'll talk."

"When and where?" As always, he felt Juliet's instant awareness.

"Right now. You know where."

He was surprised. "Addams?"

"It's familiar ground," he said, and Carlton could almost hear the shrug that went with it. "I'll be waiting."

There was silence, and Carlton put the phone away. "We're going back to Addams Street."

Juliet was surprised too.

It meant her very logical theory—that he wouldn't use the same meeting place twice—was wrong, except not really. No matter what tricks the man had set up this time, Juliet wouldn't fall for them.

But Carlton doubted the guy had used up everything in his arsenal.

It didn't take long to get there, and once again it was about quarter after nine. The other shops were closed and the street largely empty.

They stood by the car looking up at the old building.

He felt a chill in the air around them, and felt Juliet's shiver.

About to take that first step forward, he stopped when a light came on in a third floor window. They were both still, silent as a shadow moved in the pale glow.

"I thought this building was abandoned," she whispered.

"He said it was."

"Why is there a light in the window?"

He regained rationality. "Could be a candle. A lantern." It was too steady to be a moving flashlight.

"Maybe." She seemed unconvinced. "It's bright."

It was indeed, and seemed to grow brighter as they watched.

The shadow—a silhouette—moved closer to the window and stopped dead center.

Almost, Carlton thought, as if it could see them, despite the closed curtains.

Restless, Juliet started toward the building. "Come on. Let's get this over with."

He was a few steps behind her... so he was the one who saw the light go out abruptly.

It was better, wasn't it, that he was also the only one to feel sudden sharp unease.

. . . . . .

. . . . .

. . . .

. . .

(A/N: Thanks MUCHO for the comments; I'll respond to you all later. Right now I'm in a Biloxi hotel room with sluggish Internet using my tiny-brained mini laptop, but I'll have near-to-nuttin' for a few days after I leave here shortly. Happy Halloween!)