Extreme Malice

by R E Swirsky

  Chapter 14

  Thursday, October 13th 6:04 pm

  Nearly a week passed without any news. Barry's press conference did not have the effect he had hoped for; Josh was still locked up at the remand center. Jack heard nothing from Dean, and he still had not spoken to or even seen Fred and Tracey.

  The temperature warmed considerably, and Jack was eager to continue having things return to normal. He donned his sweats and set out for an evening run while it was still light.

  As soon as he left his property and jogged down the sidewalk toward Head Park east of town, he started to choke up. This was the first time he ran in over a year without Donna running alongside him. He missed having her there, and his mind retraced some of the moments they experienced together on this same path.

  Head Park was just shy of two kilometers from his house. The park, where the Bluffington Bulldogs played their baseball all summer, was sandwiched between the highway and the Highwood River. It also contained a soccer field, wading pool and open playing field. At the north side of the park near the river, partially obscured from the highway and fields by rows of thick trees, was a gravel parking lot. Head Park was named after Mount Head, which towered above the town just across the river, but to those who parked here at dusk, the name took on a completely different meaning. Cars filled with teen males looking for their first sexual experiences and female teens eager to be accepted could be found here after sunset.

  Jack and Donna's regular route was to jog from the house down Founders Road to Centre Avenue and then to follow the highway down to Head Park. From Head Park, they would cut in from the highway to the back of the park over to the parking lot and along the river path upstream until they were back at their house.

  Donna's laugh and smile were in Jack’s thoughts as he jogged alone. He told himself he wasn’t supposed to feel like this. He shouldn’t be crying over Donna, but the truth was, he missed her more than he ever thought was possible, and he wasn’t sure if the pain would ever go away. He really thought this jog along the river was going to help him clear his mind and put some of the emotional distress he was experiencing behind him, but it was having the opposite effect.

  He turned to enter the park and jogged steadily along the gravel to the parking lot. He spotted what he thought was Sherri's car. As he approached, he could see exhaust puffing out the tail pipe. Sherri sat in the driver’s seat alone. He approached the car and tapped on the window, startling Sherri, who turned towards him with tears flowing down her cheeks.

  Jack immediately opened the door, took Sherri in his arms, and embraced her.

  "What's wrong?" he asked.

  “It’s just…Donna…” Sherri choked out through her tears.

  “I know…I know,” he said and comforted her. He shared her misery. He told her how difficult life without Donna had become.

  “From the moment I woke up to the moment I retired at night, Donna is always on my mind,” he said.

  “I feel the same way…too many things remind me of her. I try to talk to mother about it, but she has become unreasonable! She denies any happy times she had with Donna. She is caught up in the fact that Donna was being unfaithful to you and had deceived everyone. She is obsessed with Donna's deceit…she is ashamed to even say Donna's name anymore.

  “Mother cries all of the time…she is tearing the family apart,” Sherri said and wiped her tears. “I just needed to get out of the house and away from all of the negativity.”

  “It’s okay, Sherry…Um, did Donna ever mentioned any other guys or say she was unhappy being married to me?” Jack asked without much hesitation.

  “Never. She never once said anything less than endearing things about you, and she never talked about anyone other than you,” Sherri said.

  "Are you sure? She didn’t talk about other men she met, maybe one of the teachers at the university?" Jack persisted.

  "Nothing about her colleagues at the university. She only talked about the students. She'd laugh when she told me about at some of the silly things they'd come see her about sometimes."

  "I just miss her so much, that's all," Jack said. "Any student in particular she talked about?"

  Sherri's expression changed. She looked back at Jack with her head tilted to the side. Jack had struck a chord with the question, and the vibrations were loosening some forgotten memory.

  "None really, but..." she said.

  She stopped and stared at Jack as if she was waiting for the memory to fulfill itself with some sudden realization of the truth.

  "They said Josh was a student there," she said slowly as if hearing this news for the first time. “Oh my gosh! I never thought about that before. Do you really think she…and one of her students...? Josh...?" She put her hand to her gaping mouth.

  Jack pressed her for more. "Did she tell you she was seeing Josh? C'mon Sherri, do you remember anything? Try to remember."

  "No, Jack! She didn’t talk about Josh. She talked about others, but she never said a word to me about Josh. Well, she didn’t tell me any of the student's names and she certainly didn’t ever say she was fooling around with any of them. I heard what was said about her and Josh in the papers, but...I didn’t think…I'm so sorry Jack."

  "You needn't be. It has nothing to do with you. Be strong, Sherri. Hold onto the good memories of your sister. I’ll always be here if you ever need to talk.” He hugged her once more, said goodbye, and then continued his run up the path along the river towards the house.

  Jack mused over the coincidence of meeting Sherri in the park like this. He'd never seen her in Head Park before. Sherri was not athletic like Donna, and he tried to recall if he had ever seen Sherri jogging, taking part in any team sport, or even riding a bicycle, but he remembered nothing.

  It was a good ten-minute jog up the river path to the house as the trail wound its way along through the dense trees and shrubs. Even with most of the leaves now fallen, Jack could see that the path was still far enough away from the homes that backed along the river that it remained screened and secluded. Someone would have to be watching purposefully through the trees from their windows to see anyone jogging along the path. Even if they did see anyone, it would be very difficult to identify a specific person.

  Jack jogged along and thought over what Sherri told him. It was what he already suspected; Sherri offered up nothing new. He wondered how many people ever noticed when he and Donna passed by on their evening jogs along this path. They rarely came across anyone they knew along the path. The usual passersby were students from the University who were either jogging themselves, or just enjoying the peacefulness the river offered to those seeking some solace.

  He was almost back to the house when he heard someone shouting. He could not make out the words he heard at first, but as he rounded a bend in the path, he spotted the Anderson's beagle, Googles, dashing towards him. A distraught and fretting Fred trundled after, shouting the dog's name and hollering for him to stop. The metal clip of the leash bounced behind him in the dust.

  Jack stopped as Googles ran up to him. Fred stopped cold in his tracks and stared at Jack with his mouth wide open. Suddenly Jack knew the confrontation with Fred he had been afraid of was now unavoidable.

  Jack knelt down and grabbed Googles by the collar. He held on as Fred slowly edged his way forward and clipped the leash on to the dogs collar. Fred’s flustered expression remained.

  Jack stood up. "I'm sorry, Fred," Jack uttered.

  "Sorry?" Fred responded in confusion. He shuffled about nervously.

  "About Josh, I mean."

  "Oh," Fred said and rubbed his chin with his free hand.

  "Uh, yeah. I'm sorry too…you know, about Donna. We both are," he motioned toward his house.

  Jack nodded.

  "I'm sorry we didn’t come to the funeral. We both wanted to, but...Josh. You know, uh..." Fred stuttered.

  "I understand, Fred. I still don't beli
eve it myself, and I'm not sure what I would have done if I saw you and Tracey there."

  They stood staring at each other for a moment. The close friendship they shared was now fractured, and neither knew how they were supposed to move on.

  "How's Tracey holding up?" Jack asked.

  "Better than Josh, that's for sure."

  "Uh huh," Jack replied. It's all about Josh now, isn't it, he thought. "Any word about them letting him come back home until the trial?"

  Fred shook his head, and Jack could see Fred was dying to either sprint away or confront Jack about the suggested affair.

  Fred began to tremble and a tear ran down his cheek. "Jack, I don't know what to do. I'm so upset over this whole business. I still find it hard to believe Josh had anything to do with this, and it would really make me feel a whole lot better if you told me that you also knew nothing about what I'm told was going on. Josh denies everything. He has denied it since this whole thing started, and, frankly, I want to believe him. You know him, Jack. You know Josh couldn't have done this to Donna." Fred wiped the tears away.

  "I was surprised as you were to hear Josh was involved. I really don't know anything except what I've heard on the news."

  "I thought Detective Daly was your friend. He hasn't told you anything?"

  Jack thought about Dean's accusations that Jack had killed Donna. "Daly's told me nothing."

  "Oh. So you don't know all of the evidence they have against Josh and what they are saying about Donna, then."

  "Is there something I should know about Donna?"

  "It's all of the evidence. There is so bloody much evidence that suggests Josh and Donna were fooling around, and I just don't know what to make of it. I didn't even go see Josh today after what happened yesterday. Tracey told me she doesn't want me going back up there."

  "Geez, what happened?"

  "I lost it. I lost it on my son. I should have been there standing behind him when he swore he had nothing to do with it, but after seeing all the evidence, I can’t help but think he's lying to me about all of it. I just started screaming at him to tell the truth yesterday. He just cried, and I got angrier and angrier."

  "I'm so sorry, Fred."

  "No, Jack, don’t be! The evidence. There's a lot more than you probably know about."

  "Should you be telling me any of this?"

  "You'll find out sooner or later." Fred continued to sob.

  "They don't have any DNA from Josh, but they do have lots of incriminating evidence. There's the guitar wire, for one. The big E string. Josh just changed his strings a few weeks ago. He says they were all in the drawer by the bed, but one E string was missing. They found an E string around her neck. And then there's the shoelace…”

  "Shoelace?"

  "A broken tip of a shoelace was found in your bedroom. It matched a piece missing from a different pair of Josh's shoes. And there's the footprints at the back door. Same size and type of shoe as Josh's new ones."

  Fred shook his head. He was trying to stay strong. "And you know they found an earring belonging to Donna in his bedroom. I was told you identified it for the police."

  "Uh huh," Jack replied.

  "And there's the phone call she made to our house after you left. Josh denies talking to her. I was just so pissed at him." He clenched his fists.

  "But there's no DNA evidence. That's something, right?" Jack offered.

  "Jack, Donna's dead, and they think Josh did it. Even I think Josh did it. I am so sorry, Jack. I’m just so sorry."

  Jack shook his head and wiped away a few tears of his own.

  "There's more."

  "More?"

  "About Donna. They have all this evidence linking Josh to the crime, but there's way more still. They have other evidence that they are keeping hush right now, but I've been told about some of it."

  Fred grew quiet and took a couple of deep breathes. Jack knew Fred had something important to tell him.

  "They found DNA evidence in your house that does not belong to you or Josh."

  "What are you saying? Someone else may have killed her?"

  "They still think it was Josh, but they found more DNA suggesting...I really don't want to tell you this, but you are going to hear it soon anyways."

  "Go on."

  "They have DNA from a cigarette found in a tin on your back steps matching DNA from an empty 7-11 coffee cup found in your kitchen garbage. I am pretty sure they also have a hair sample from your shower drain matching both items as well."

  "What?!" Jack exclaimed.

  "I'm not done yet. In your bedroom, they found black hairs in the bed that weren't yours, and they weren't Josh's. They found matching hair in your shower drain. And here's the big one." Fred started to stammer; he was eager, but reluctant, to continue.

  "They found a used condom in your garbage…and a Kleenex tissue with the same DNA."

  Jack stared at Fred.

  "You're sure about this? You're telling me that the police have evidence of at least two other suspects, and they are also saying that Donna was cheating on me in our house with multiple people?"

  Fred nodded. "Exactly. I'm so sorry. This is what makes it worse for Josh."

  "I don't get it. How does this make it any worse for Josh? He is saying he didn't do it, there's no DNA evidence, and there are two other possible suspects."

  "I don't know, Jack. Barry says the DNA evidence just supports the fact that it was highly probable Donna was cheating with Josh because they have evidence that clearly shows she was cheating with at least two other guys."

  Jack feigned dissolution and responded, "Why not take in those other guys as suspects then?"

  "They have no idea who the DNA belongs to. They thought that maybe it was DNA from Josh and someone else. It doesn't match anyone they thought might even be remotely close to you and Donna. I hate talking about this, but Barry and I have been over and over it all as he was trying to build a defense for Josh. Barry told me the DNA from the condom and tissue was at least a few weeks old, judging by how dried out the evidence was, so that doesn't even put the guy anywhere near your room at the time of the murder."

  "Did he say where they found the evidence?"

  "The bottom of a trash bin in your bedroom."

  Jack nodded. Fred’s explanation matched up Dean's line of questioning about the coffee and trash.

  "The coffee cup and cigarette...that must have showed up after I left on Sunday?"

  "Jack, Barry's defense will mimic the prosecution by painting a picture of Donna as being loose and sleeping around with a number of different guys behind your back. Barry says the prosecution will portray her this way to show this was no random attack, and Barry says he's going to use this tactic to show that there are other possible suspects."

  Jack thought about Donna's parents. This slander would hurt them greatly.

  "Jack?" Fred asked. "You seem to be taking these accusations pretty well."

  Jack ignored Fred's question. "It was storming the night I left. You didn't see anyone pull up in our drive that night?"

  "We were in Denver, remember?"

  "Oh yes, that's right. Denver. So you were."

  "No one out back either? You saw no one out on this river path?"

  "Are you okay, Jack? I just said we were in Denver. Maybe you better go home and lay down for a bit. You don't look too well. Maybe this news really is affecting you."

  Jack thanked Fred for sharing what he knew. He walked back up the path towards home as dusk settled in on the valley. Fred went down the other direction with Googles at his side.

  When Jack returned to the house, it bothered him that he had forgotten Fred and Tracey were in Denver the night he left for Vancouver. It was unlike him to forget details like that, and he knew he would have to start dealing with the root cause. He went upstairs to the bedroom and entered the walk in closet. He began rooting through all the pockets on all of his dress co
ats he wore for work, but all the pockets were empty. Of course they would be empty. The police had been thorough.

  Jack began to fret. He wasn’t exactly sure what he was looking for, but he was sure there was something. He went to the garage to look through the vehicles. He wasn’t looking for anything in particular. He just wanted to see what was in both vehicles, especially his, after the police had brought it back from Vancouver.

  He started with Donna’s vehicle. He opened all the doors and searched the pockets. He searched the glove box and console between the front seats. Nothing appeared unusual nor missing. The road maps were still where they were supposed to be. The extra pens and note pads in the side pockets all still seemed to be accounted for.

  He moved on to his own vehicle and began rooting through the glove box and compartments. Extra pens and note pads were tucked everywhere. Jack was glad to see the two audio books he purchased were still in the side pocket. He popped both cases open and saw the CDs for each were inside. The cops had even removed the one from inside the CD player and returned it to its case. He smiled.

  He opened the garage door so he could open up the back gate of his Pathfinder. When he opened the back gate, he saw what he had been looking for, but he really did not want to see it at all. All of the tote boxes from his Vancouver trip were still in the back exactly where they were when his car was brought back from Vancouver.

  He had forgotten to complete his ritual of taking these back to the office and emptying them immediately after receiving his vehicle back. His forgetfulness bothered him. He quickly began pulling each tote out and flipped through the contents of each tote. Sales brochures, catalogues, and sales forms filled the first two of the totes. The samples of the sterile bags, hand sanitizers, and latex gloves were in the last tote. He lifted the last tote out, set it on the ground, and knelt down beside it.

  He began to inspect the contents to see if all was still there after the investigators combed through it all. Just as he reached inside the last tote and lifted out a pair of light blue, latex gloves from an open sample box, he caught the reflection of a flash from across the street behind him in the chrome bumper. He turned quickly to where he thought the flash came from but saw nothing in the darkness. He realized he may have just made a grave miscalculation.