Within Plain Sight

by Bruce Robert Coffin

  Faherty lowered the gun barrel slightly. Byron heard Roberts’s voice again. “Get down, John!”

  As Byron dove to the ground he heard the deafening boom of a shotgun. He only hoped it wasn’t Faherty’s.

  Chapter 20

  Sunday, 9:05 p.m.,

  July 16, 2017

  Elmer Faherty was in custody and on his way to the Maine Medical Center to be treated for the minor injury he’d suffered after being shot with a bean bag round. Morgan Bates was also en route to the hospital after being checked out by MedCu. Byron made sure that uniformed officers were assigned to guard both men.

  As Byron stood inside the Longwood garage looking down at the bloodstained concrete floor, two thoughts ran simultaneously through his mind. The first was whether the blood belonged to Danica Faherty. Could this be where she had been decapitated? There were several different types of power tools strewn about the garage, many of which were saws, several reciprocating. Byron’s second thought was how lucky they were that Elmer Faherty hadn’t found the stain first.

  “What do you want to do, Sarge?” Stevens asked.

  “Let’s get a search warrant started so we can get Gabe out here to process this scene. We’ll work our way through the rest of the house.”

  “What about Holcolm?”

  “Let’s get him back to 109 and into an interview room. Holcolm’s the one who called us out here. Maybe he can explain this.”

  As Stevens worked quickly to prepare the warrant, Byron pulled out a chair in CID Interview Room Two and sat down across from a very nervous looking Stephen Holcolm. Using that nervousness to his full advantage, Byron took his time wordlessly preparing for the interview by writing on a fresh yellow pad the date, time, and Holcolm’s name. When he had finished, Byron pulled out his cell and checked it as if checking for messages. He gave a slight grin and nodded before sliding the phone back into his pocket and turning his full attention to Holcolm.

  “Quite a night, huh?” Byron said.

  “Y-yeah,” Holcolm stammered. “Quite a night. I could really go for a smoke, you know, to calm my nerves.”

  “Sorry, my bosses don’t allow that inside the building. But I’ll tell you what, why don’t we go over a few things first, then we can take a smoke break outside? How’s that sound?” Byron meant neither statement as a question, but it sounded better for the tape if anyone ever questioned the voluntariness of Holcolm’s statement.

  “Okay.”

  “So, why don’t you tell me again how it went down tonight?”

  “There’s nothing to tell really,” Holcolm said. “Me and Morg were just doing some work on the house, like always, and this guy comes barging in like he owns the place, waving a shotgun around.”

  “Did you know who the guy was?”

  “Not at first. Not until he started yelling at Morg and talking about Dani.”

  “Did you know Dani?”

  “Sure, I knew her. Morg and I have been friends for a long time.”

  “So, what did Dani’s father say to you?”

  “To me? He said it was between him and Morgan and that unless I wanted to get shot, I should get the fuck out of there.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I got the fuck out of there. I’m not stupid.”

  Byron wasn’t convinced on Holcolm’s second point, but it was hard to argue with the first.

  “Did you hear anything that Dani’s dad said to Morgan?”

  “Yeah. He accused him of murdering Dani. Said he’d hurt her before.”

  “And Morgan, what did he say?”

  “Said he didn’t do it.”

  “Which?”

  “I don’t know. Neither.”

  Byron took the interview slow and steady, asking many easy questions to try and acclimate Holcolm to the softballs he was tossing. He wanted what they’d found in the garage to come as a complete surprise when he finally confronted Holcolm with it.

  “Listen,” Holcolm said. “We been going like this for a while. How about that smoke break you promised?”

  Byron lowered the pen to the table and sat back in his chair. “You’re right. We should go grab some air.”

  Holcolm started to rise from the chair.

  “Just one more thing. Where did all the blood come from on the garage floor?”

  Holcolm froze halfway between standing and sitting. Byron had caught him off guard exactly as he’d hoped. Holcolm returned to a seated position. Byron watched the man’s eyes dart all over the place as he searched for an answer to an unexpected question.

  “Well?” Byron asked after a moment.

  “We—uh, I mean, I—cut myself the other night.”

  “We, meaning you and Morgan cut yourselves, or just you?”

  Holcolm licked his lips. “Um, just me.”

  “How’d you manage that?”

  “We were working with some aluminum and I cut myself.” Holcolm pulled up his shirt and showed Byron the bandage covering his chest.

  “Did you seek medical attention?”

  “Yeah, Morg drove me to a Quick Care, and they closed up the cut with superglue, or something like that.”

  “Which one?”

  “Which Quick Care?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Um, the one in Westbrook on 25. Out near Mast Landing Brewing.”

  “That’s all the way out on the other side of Westbrook,” Byron said, toying with him. “Why not go to one of the closer ones, in Portland?”

  “I don’t know. I wasn’t driving.”

  Byron nodded his understanding. “What was the metal you were working with?”

  “Um, rain gutters for the house.”

  Holcolm was lying and they both knew it. Byron hadn’t seen any indication of gutter work being done when he’d previously poked around the property.

  “So, if we went back and checked the garage, we’d find rain gutters?” Byron asked.

  Holcolm said nothing.

  “What happened?” LeRoyer asked as Byron walked out of the interview room and closed the door.

  “He is sticking with his story,” Byron said.

  “Almost done with the paperwork, Sarge,” Stevens called out from her desk.

  “Good. And, Mel, we’re gonna need to subpoena Holcolm’s medical records from the Westbrook Quick Care, too.”

  “You think that’s really his blood in the garage?” LeRoyer asked.

  “We’ll know soon enough. I got a feeling it wasn’t gutters they were working on, though.”

  Byron retreated outside to 109’s plaza. He realized that Stevens’s work on the warrant wouldn’t go any faster with him standing around bothering her. The air had cooled significantly; it was refreshing. He stood leaning against the warmth of the station’s brick façade and closed his eyes for a moment.

  “I guess they’ll let anyone loiter about these days.”

  He grinned and opened his eyes. “Lady Di.”

  “You okay?” Diane asked.

  “I’m fine.”

  “You’re lucky. What the hell were you thinking?”

  “I was thinking that I didn’t want to see a desperate man destroy his life on a piece of shit like Bates.”

  “You think the DA will go easy on Faherty?”

  “I think it all depends on Holcolm and Bates, and what we find at the house. You heading out?”

  “Yup. Walk me to my car?”

  “Of course.”

  They were mounting the steps to the rear garage when Byron broached the subject. “So?”

  “So what?” she said.

  “You never said. Did you throw your hat into the ring?”

  “I just slid the envelope under the chief’s door.”

  “Nothing like waiting until the last minute, Joyner.”

  “Right?”

  “I’m happy for you,” Byron said.

  Diane stopped walking as she reached her car. “Are you? Really?”

  “Of course.”

  “You’re not at a
ll worried that this will screw up what we have? You said it yourself. CID is crazy stressful. A relationship killer.”

  “I’m not worried at all,” he said, but he was.

  She studied him and he could read the doubt in her expression. “Well, who knows, I might not end up getting the job anyway.”

  Byron wasn’t so sure about that. Given that it was Lynds who had approached Diane about submitting her name, it might well be Diane’s position to lose.

  She leaned in close and kissed him. “Good night, John.”

  It was nearly midnight by the time the search warrant had been signed and the detectives reconvened at the Bates house on Longwood. Byron was overseeing the recovery of evidence when Stevens called to Byron from inside the garage.

  “Hey, Sarge. You got a sec?”

  Byron departed the kitchen and entered the garage. “What’s up?”

  “Take a look at this,” Stevens said as she removed the tarp covering of a stack of junk in the corner.

  Byron saw the remains of several peeled safes partially hidden beneath a stack of building materials and scrap. Visible on the jagged metal casing of one of the safes was a dark crimson-colored stain. Holcolm had cut himself on metal all right, but it hadn’t been rain gutters.

  Byron pulled out his cell and searched for Detective Gardiner’s number.

  “Who are you calling?” LeRoyer asked.

  “The guy who should have been working on this case with us from the start. The guy you sent home.”

  Gardiner picked up on the third ring. The sound of sleep was still thick in his voice. “Hello.”

  “Luke, Sergeant Byron. Get dressed. It’s time to go to work.”

  Byron had Stevens prepare an addendum to the original warrant, attaching information from all five safe burglaries to the affidavit. It complicated the process when cases that seemingly weren’t connected suddenly became so, but it wasn’t unusual for criminals to cross lines into multiple illegal activities. They woke the judge again but this time obtaining her approval was far easier, as she had already reviewed the original probable cause statement that got them into the house.

  Whatever cobwebs of sleep Gardiner may have been fighting when Byron woke him were long gone as the young detective stood eyeing the recovery of all five of his burgled safes, including the one stolen the previous week.

  “Probably won’t be as easy to locate the missing items,” Byron said.

  “That’s okay, Sarge. We’ll figure out where everything went as soon as one of these idiots starts trying to cut a deal.”

  Byron planned to use that leverage to get Bates and Holcolm to back off on the charges facing Elmer Faherty.

  While the others continued to work the scene, Byron and Gardiner returned to 109. Holcolm, who was still being held in Interview Room Two, had fallen asleep with his head down on the wooden table.

  “Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” Byron said as he and Gardiner entered the room.

  “When can I go home?” a groggy Holcolm asked as he eyed Gardiner.

  “Probably not as soon as you’d planned,” Gardiner said.

  Holcolm ignored the comment. “I don’t see why you’re holding me here. I didn’t do anything. It’s Dani’s dad who should be charged. I’m a victim.”

  “That’s only partially true,” Byron said as he scrolled through the photographs on his cellphone. After finding the image he wanted, he held the phone up for Holcolm to see. “Rain gutters?”

  The color drained from Holcolm’s cheeks, and he hung his head in defeat. “I want to talk to an attorney.”

  “I don’t blame you,” Gardiner said.

  Chapter 21

  Monday, 5:35 a.m.,

  July 17, 2017

  Byron had driven home hoping to get several hours of sleep before they were back at it. He had set the alarm for seven, then laid down thinking sleep would come easy. It hadn’t. His window-mounted air-conditioner wasn’t keeping pace with the prolonged period of heat in which Portland was mired. It was beginning to make those strange noises of demonic possession that a refrigerator makes just before it dies. He was wide awake and staring at the ceiling.

  Not helping his cause was the fact that the bedding was wrinkled and damp with perspiration. Lying there, Byron realized there was more than the heat behind his insomnia. The close call with Elmer Faherty and the boom of the shotgun played over and over in his head. Thoughts of how differently that incident might have gone had Elmer not trusted him, the same way he had trusted Byron to keep the gruesome details out of the press. Dani Faherty, and the gruesome way she’d met her end. They occupied a significant portion of his gray matter, ate at him.

  If the blood in Morgan Bates’s garage really was from Stephen Holcolm, as it appeared, and the two idiots were only using the flip house as a place to strip the safes, then neither of them were likely involved in Dani’s murder. Normally it would have been a good thing to rule out one of their potential suspects, but, in this case, there remained far too many possibilities and not nearly enough cooperation from anyone. He couldn’t remember a case in which the person offering up a reward was also hiding behind a lawyer. And that was exactly what Lina Stavros was doing. Like an expert chess player, she’d moved her attack dog into position to protect Alex from further scrutiny, while publicly pretending to assist the police.

  Defeated, Byron threw back the sheet. Lying there wouldn’t accomplish anything. He grabbed his cellphone off the nightstand, checked the time, slid into a pair of faded blue PPD gym shorts, then padded downstairs to the kitchen. The Keurig wasn’t set to activate until six o’clock. He pressed the power button, overriding the timer, then sat down at the table to wait. The room was dark except for the streetlight spilling in through the front windows. The clunking and bubbling sounds emanating from the coffee maker as it warmed only served to further remind him of his failing air conditioner. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine what Dani Faherty’s last moments had been like.

  They already knew the blood found on the floor of the garage was not Faherty’s. They still needed to match the DNA profile, but they’d already confirmed that it was the wrong blood type. It was type O, the same as Holcolm’s. The patient treatment forms acquired from the Quick Care confirmed that Holcolm and Bates had come in seeking treatment for Holcolm’s wound on Sunday morning when Dani most likely was killed. Holcolm, brain surgeon that he was, who hadn’t even been bright enough to dispose of the burgled safes, had gouged himself badly trying to peel the latest one. Bates may have been a stalking, abusive ex-boyfriend, but Byron didn’t believe he was bright enough to do what had been done, no matter how much Elmer Faherty had wanted him to be responsible.

  Had Dani even known her killer or was this truly some random encounter? Simply happenstance for the perpetrator and bad luck for her? The known suspect list was still too long. What were they missing? Was there really a connection to the Horseman cases, or was this someone’s attempt to throw them off? Assuming it was the Horseman, had this sick bastard sojourned to Portland for another reason? Business perhaps? Had Faherty just wandered into his path, or had the killer been hunting? Were the cops in Boston mistaken in their assumption that the Horseman was a resident of Massachusetts? What if the Horseman actually hailed from the Pine Tree State? What was the old saying about not shitting in your own backyard? Maybe he had been traveling down to Massachusetts to hunt, but now he’d screwed up, deviating from his pattern of behavior. Perhaps he’d gotten sloppy.

  He opened his eyes and looked toward the counter. The Keurig’s three lighted buttons were glowing. It was ready. He’d always wondered why there were three. What kind of person brews a small coffee? Not a cop, certainly.

  He got up and grabbed a clean mug from the cupboard. The dark blue mug with white block lettering read: World’s Best Sergeant. It had been a joke gift from Diane. Diane, who had sought his approval in returning to CID. No, that wasn’t right, he thought. It hadn’t been his approval she was seeking. She didn’t need hi
s approval. What she had wanted was his support, and he’d failed to give it. He could still recall the disappointment in her eyes as he’d reacted negatively to the news. Byron’s first thought had been a selfish one. How would her return to CID affect him? They had made up, but he still felt guilty. He sighed deeply, loaded a Green Mountain cup into the Keurig, then slid the mug into place.

  He should have been excited for her, but he hadn’t been. What did that say about him? Was he too set in his ways, or was he so used to getting his own way that he couldn’t see past himself? Was he still carrying that same selfishness that had cost him his marriage to Kay? His head hurt. It was much too early to be wrestling with such heavy thoughts.

  The coffee maker sputtered its last drops, and Byron carried the mug back to the table and sat down. His personal life was important, his relationship with Diane even more so, but he couldn’t allow the white noise of his many mistakes to overtake the focus he would need to solve this case. He owed his best to the Fahertys. He owed his best to Dani.

  He went upstairs to shower.

  At eight o’clock Byron descended 109’s back stairwell to the third floor to see Dustin Tran.

  “Hey Striped Dude,” Tran said, greeting Byron as he entered the computer crimes office. “I discovered something quite interesting regarding the Faherty dump site.”

  “And that would be?”

  “Well, you know how the newspaper has been all over this thing, and how it looks bad having a body found on a development site?”

  Byron knew if he didn’t rein him in, Tran would drag his find out like Tolstoy. “Any chance you could cut to the point, Dustin?”

  “Yeah. Sorry. Okay, so one of the bidders on the project pulled out. The top bidder, actually. Investacorp from California. A company spokesperson cited the negative publicity now surrounding the property. I can’t really blame them. I wouldn’t want to build where a serial killer dumped a body.”