Page 3 of Simon Says… Fight (Kate Morgan Thrillers #11)

She shrugged. “It’s just so weird, you know? You go to all these places, deal with all these people, and they seem so normal. Then you find out their secrets, and it’s just… shocking, even to us,” she muttered.

“And we’ll likely see it again, but that’s not our issue now,” he stated, with a wave of his arm. “Let’s just keep focused on what we have to do.”

“Of course,” she muttered.

“Off to the family next, I suppose?”

Kate nodded and got behind the wheel. “That’s what I was thinking.” It didn’t take very long to reach the deceased’s address in Point Grey. As she pulled up, she noted a really nice stately house. She looked around and whistled.

Rodney agreed. “I know, right? This is pretty amazing.”

“It is pretty amazing. I’ll give you that. But why would somebody from here end up getting involved in something that seems to be street fighting?”

“We don’t know that he was involved,” Rodney pointed out. “It may not have been voluntary. Remember what Simon told us, and yet it could be something completely different.”

“I suspect it was something completely different,” she replied. “It’s still strange to think that somebody who lives in this world, this neighborhood, ends up in the morgue, beaten to death.”

“Maybe,” Rodney conceded, “but we still have to investigate it regardless.”

Kate walked up the front steps and rang the doorbell.

Almost immediately a middle-aged woman opened the door.

It was obvious she had been crying. The woman stared at the two people on her front steps.

Kate smiled, pulled out her badge, and identified herself.

The woman started sobbing in earnest. Kate winced and glanced at Rodney.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” she told the woman, “but we do need to ask you some questions.”

The woman nodded, tried to get control of herself, and whispered, “Please, please, come in.” And then she started to cry again.

“I know it’s hard,” Kate added, “but I don’t have any way to make this any easier on you.” The woman just sobbed, stepping back so they could enter. As Kate went inside, the house was an expensive, expansive, very beautiful home, and it looked to be very well cared for. “Mrs. Forbes…”

“Call me Kendra, please.”

“Kendra, we know that your husband has just passed away,” Kate began, “and that is why we’re here.”

“Of course,” Kendra noted, trying to regain control. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to tell you. He went to work on Thursday, and he didn’t come home that night. I called his cell phone and got no answer, but a lot of times he just stayed late for work.”

Kendra took a moment and then sighed before continuing.

“Sometimes his work can get crazy, and he doesn’t check in, and that’s what I assumed had happened this time.

” Kendra led them into a small sitting area and motioned at the couch.

She collapsed into the easy chair nearby, using a handkerchief to dry her face.

When she was finally calm enough, she added, “I never heard from him again.”

“And when he left that morning,” Kate asked, “did he appear to be upset? Did anything seem to bother him? Was there anything at all along those lines that you can pinpoint?”

Kendra shook her head. “No, I would have thought everything was totally fine.”

“Is everything okay at work? Was there any reason to suspect a problem at the office?”

Again Kendra shook her head. “Outside of the fact that he works constantly, no. Other than that, I would have said that Dennison was totally fine.” She sniffled into a tissue.

Kate studied her. “You do understand the way that he died?”

“No, I don’t understand any of that,” she wailed.

“When they mentioned floater , I thought they meant that he had committed suicide, and that was tough enough, but now I understand that wasn’t the case at all.

” She frowned. “I don’t understand, Detectives.

What could it be then? Did he have a heart attack?

Was the bruising on his body from being bounced around in the waves? ” At that, she started to cry again.

Kate hesitated, sharing a look with Rodney. Then she got up, walked over to Kendra, crouched in front of her, and added, “There’s no easy way to tell you this, but your husband, Dennison, was beaten to death.”

Kendra stared at her in shock. “What do you mean, beaten ?” she whispered. “Dennison wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

“That’s what we have been told, so why don’t you tell me about him?”

“You don’t understand, Detective.… My husband was a typical businessman, his nose in the books, always thinking about how to improve the bottom line.

” She shook her head frantically. “Sometimes that alone was really frustrating because we wanted his attention at home, but he was always more focused on work. So he definitely wasn’t the kind to get beaten up and certainly would never fight back.

If he got mugged, he would have just handed over his wallet, then figured out how to address the financial damage later.

I just don’t understand,” she whispered, staring at Kate.

Kate nodded. “I do realize this is all a huge challenge for you,” she replied, “and at this point we have no way of knowing who may have done this. Obviously we’re running tests and collecting data.

As always, we’re hoping for DNA of some kind to turn up somewhere, but even that is still only valuable if we have DNA to match it to. ”

Kendra blinked several times, as Kate went through her explanation. Then Kenda shrugged. “It still doesn’t make any sense because he would never have hurt anyone. The idea that somebody would hurt him is just mind-boggling.”

“Was he a fighter at all? Even to stay in shape? Was he somebody who worked out?”

“No, no, no,” she stated, raising her hands in protest. “He didn’t like any of that.

He wasn’t into being hot and sweaty. He wasn’t into getting punched.

He didn’t like sports or anything physical,” she said, with half a smile.

“He was really very…” She sighed. “I know it sounds silly, but he was really just all about business. Nothing else.”

“Was it his own company?”

“No, not just his, but he was a shareholder, and he took his job very seriously,” she explained. “Did you talk to them yet?”

“That’s next on my list,” Kate said. “We’ll find out when he left, where he may have gone, and see if they have any cameras.”

“Yes, cameras would be good,” Kendra agreed eagerly. “Honestly, I haven’t seen him since Thursday morning, and I’ve just been beside myself. I was surprised when I heard he was found in the water. Are you sure you’re not mistaken?”

“I don’t believe so,” Kate stated, her tone apologetic. “I’ve just come from the morgue.”

At that, Kendra’s eyes filled with tears. “Right,” she whispered. And then she stiffened her back and looked at Kate. “When can I have my husband back?”

“Not yet,” Kate told her firmly. “It’ll be a little bit yet.”

“I need to bury him,” Kendra muttered. “I don’t even know how one does these things. I’ve never had anything like that to deal with.”

“What about your children?” Kate asked.

“Yes, we have two, but they’re adults now. They’ve both been asking for answers, but I don’t have any answers to give them,” she whispered.

Kate winced at that because not having answers was always one of the hardest things, as she knew very well. She had long been waiting for answers regarding her missing brother for almost two decades now, answers that likely would never come.

She looked over at Rodney, who then had some questions to ask Kendra.

“Do you know whether he had any enemies? Or issues, like investments that went wrong? Any problem that somebody might have blamed him for?”

“I guess we’re wondering if this is personal,” Kate added, as she patted Kendra’s hand.

“It can’t be personal,” Kendra declared. “You don’t understand. He’s literally all about business. There is no personal in his life.”

“What about friends? What about family?”

“Sure, we had friends, and we do have family,” she admitted, “but we’re not close to any of them, other than our children, and we don’t entertain. We live very quietly,” Kendra noted.

“What do you for a living?”

“I’m an artist. I tend to spend most of my time in my studio,” she murmured, once again looking as if she would cry.

Kate frowned, then continued with questions. “So, going back to Thursday. What time would you have expected him home?”

She blinked several times. “He was usually home by six, depending on the traffic—which, as you know, is getting worse and worse all the time in Vancouver,” she muttered.

Kate nodded, then asked, “And what about the people he worked with? Did he ever talk about them?”

“Only in the sense that some of them did their jobs. The others?… Well, they weren’t very good at their jobs or didn’t put in the effort, and that always really bothered Dennison.

He felt somebody should have been fired, and the fact that they kept him on really riled him.

” Kendra smiled briefly at the thought. “He did get riled over injustice.”

Kate nodded as she listened, forming an idea of who this man was. “And his age?” she asked.

“Fifty-four,” Kendra replied, tears welling up in her eyes again.

“Fifty-four. Right.”

Knowing there wasn’t an easy way to end the conversation from here, Kate stood up. “Again, we are very sorry for your loss, and we may need to contact you again.”

“That’s fine.” Kendra waved her hand about. “Yet I don’t think I can tell you anything more. Seriously,… he was just all about the business.”

“Maybe so,” Kate acknowledged, “but somebody apparently hated him enough to beat him to death.”

Kendra gasped, a fist going to her mouth, as she stared at Kate. “Wouldn’t that have been random? You know, somebody on the street, like a mugger or a junkie?” Kendra asked, again sounding completely bewildered.