by A F Carter
one of them.”
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“Sorry.”
I watch Bobby withdraw to a place where every atom
is weighed and measured, a cop again. He’s been thinking
about this for a long time. Just like us.
“Let’s start with the crime scene, the way it appeared
when I first arrived at one thirty-seven a.m. That was before the Crime Scene Unit or a death examiner from the ME’s
office. I was standing in the doorway, looking into a small, dirty room. The paramedics had already pronounced the
victim dead, leaving me without an excuse to enter, so I
contented myself with a quick inventory. There was a table
against the wall closest to me with a half-empty bottle of
Jack Daniel’s and an empty glass on top. A chair next to the table was covered, seat and back, with the victim’s clothing.
On the far wall to my left, a sink, also dirty, hung at a slight angle. To my right, the wall was broken by a secured door
leading into the adjoining room.”
He stops long enough to stare into my eyes for a moment,
then continues. “Hank Grand was lying on a bed opposite
the door. He presented as a man in late middle age, paunchy
but well-muscled with tattoos on either side of his chest, one of an angel, the other a demon. Half of his body, his bare
torso, was exposed, while his legs were tangled in a pair of faded green blankets. From what I could see of his head and
his torso, there were no wounds on his body.” He pauses
long enough to glance around the room, maybe for reassur-
ance. “Detective Greco arrived as I was standing by the door and CSU came up a few minutes after that. They cleared a
path to the bed and we finally approached the body. From
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the foot of the bed, I counted three distinct stab wounds in the victim’s back. In addition, a section of the blanket was soaked with drying blood. From the consistency of the
bloodstains, I judged the victim to have been killed within
the last six hours. That was the death examiner’s opinion as well.”
I raise a hand, and he stops speaking, his expression
quizzical. I want to remind him that we lived without his
presence for thirty-seven years. If necessary, we can live
another thirty-seven. But I don’t. I simply nod once and he
continues.
“First things first, me and Greco spent the next six hours
working the hotel. We were hoping the killer was close by
or that at least, between the hookers, pimps and johns, we’d develop a lead. That didn’t happen, but we managed to pick
up a few things from the hookers and the slimeball who
sits behind the desk. First thing, every bed in the hotel had a fitted sheet covering the mattress and there was a towel
in every room. Neither was found in Hank Grand’s room.
Without doubt, they were taken because they contained
trace evidence. Second, Hank Grand rented that same room
every night, he and a pal named O’Neill. The pair of them,
according to the hookers we questioned, were selling ten-
dollar bags of heroin. The clerk also told us that Hank Grand rented the same room every night and that made the inn’s
regulars, all of them, potential suspects. In any event, we
came to your apartment straight from the inn, mainly to do
the notification. By then we knew you were—”
“Emotionally disturbed? Crazy as bedbugs?”
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Bobby’s expression doesn’t change, though he appears
tired now. He doesn’t respond to my challenge, either.
“Homicide cops think in terms of means, motive, and
opportunity. Though it wasn’t dated, the note I read most
likely provided you with the opportunity. As for motive and
means? You had motive aplenty and a long-bladed knife can
be purchased at thousands of stores.”
I finish my wine, refill the glass. “You had no right to read those messages.”
“Sure, I did, but I wasn’t looking for notes when I wan-
dered around. I was looking for bloodstains. Anywhere on
anything.” This is ground that’s already been covered and
Bobby moves on without pausing. “The autopsy determined
that the first stab wound passed between Hank Grand’s third
and fourth ribs on the left side of his body. It penetrated to a depth of seven inches, slicing through the right ventricle of his heart. This wound was fatal by itself and he probably died before the second and third strike.” He turns his head to face me. “Postmortem, the front of Hank Grand’s body had been
washed from head to knees, probably with a disinfectant
meant to clean the hotel’s floors and bathrooms. No killer
would do that, spend extra time with a victim, without a
very good reason. I took it to mean the perpetrator expected to become a suspect and feared a DNA comparison.”
Bobby’s interrupted by a knock on the door. It’s Marshal,
who’s been a good friend to us. I send him off anyway. Bob-
by’s in the kitchen when I return. He emerges with a plate of cookies, chocolate chip, baked not from an old family recipe but from the directions on the back of a box. Bobby lays the 261
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cookies on the table and sits beside me. He begins again as
though we hadn’t been interrupted.
“I don’t have this part in exact order, the bits and pieces
that drifted in from the various labs, but here goes. Blood
tests showed Hank Grand’s blood-alcohol level at time of
death was two point one. In addition, his blood tested posi-
tive for a significant concentration of a drug called Temazepam, which works like Valium. Between the two, according
to the pathologist, Hank Grand was almost certainly uncon-
scious and maybe comatose at the time of the attack. Then a
second lab discovered traces of Temazepam on the one glass
in the room, so we knew how the drug got into his system.
That led us to look harder at the Golden Inn’s prostitutes
because robbing johns is probably the world’s second-oldest
profession. But we also showed your photo to everybody we
questioned, which is how we dug up the witnesses. While
this canvas was still in progress, our own crime lab reported that the front of the body had been thoroughly scrubbed
with a highly concentrated floor cleaner, confirming the
ME’s impression. Thus, the initial report we received from
the DNA lab came as no surprise. The lab only managed to
isolate small amounts of DNA, which they were attempting
to amplify.” He pauses long enough to grab a cookie. “I can
teach you how to bake these from scratch, Martha. If you’re
interested.”
“I already know how. I was just too lazy. Meanwhile, you
need to get back to your theory. Before I do to you what you think we did to our father. You’re having too much fun, Bobby.
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Especially for someone who committed what amounts to a
murder.”
He only smiles, but I’m not letting it go. “You didn’t have
to kill O’Neill,” I tell him. “You could have called for backup, enough force to convince him to surrender. But you wanted
him dead.”
“I didn’t force O’Neill to draw his weapon. Remember, he
got off two shots. Murderers, as a general rule, try real hard not to get shot at.”
“That’s not the issue. Why you did it is the issue. Why you
risked your life to protect us and why you’re here, sounding like a prosecutor making his closing argument.”
Bobby shakes his head. Not now. “The blood we observed
on the blankets originated on the side of the blankets clos-
est to Hank Grand’s body. Most likely, the perpetrator used
the blankets to wipe the knife blade as it was withdrawn,
eliminating potential blood spatter. Personally, I think Hank Grand’s murderer came away clean, closing off that avenue
of investigation.”
I watch him pop the cookie he’s been holding between
two fingers into his mouth, the wafer at some crazy cop
communion.
“It’s pretty obvious,” he continues, “to me if not my part-
ner, that the killing was carefully planned, from the initial contact to the cleanup. Oh, and one thing I failed to mention. I ran into a prostitute who works from inside the hotel.
Seems there’s something of a brothel on the second floor.
She told me that she knocked on Hank Grand’s door at nine
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o’clock that night and nobody answered. So, you got lucky,
too, lucky you weren’t interrupted, that nobody got a good
look at your face.”
I shake my head. It’s the wrong time for a detour. “What
about Greco? What did he think?”
“He was too focused on O’Neill and the pimps to get it.
But there’s no way O’Neill or some anonymous pimp would
stick around long enough to clean the body or carry away
the sheet and the towel. Or for that matter, to carefully drape two blankets over an unconscious man to eliminate blood
spatter. Your IQ, by the way, is one thirty-five. O’Neill’s is eighty-eight.”
I’m listening for advice, but my brother and sisters aren’t
talking. Maybe that’s because there’s nothing to say. “I
assume you’ve got a theory of how it all went down.”
“More like a movie.”
“And who’s the star?”
“We need to start earlier than that, Martha. It’s not all
that easy to make a plan if you don’t know who’s going to
show up when the time comes to run it. This implies an ele-
ment of control, don’t you think?” He stares at me for a minute, then smiles. “Last chance to confess.”
“No go, Bobby. I’m stickin’ to my story. We’re innocent.
You got the wrong psychotic.”
“Alright, have it your way.” His smile fades, and his eyes
turn inward. “I don’t think your father expected you to show up. Not after all those years. Most likely, he was playing with you, like claiming he wanted to reconcile. Psychopaths love
to manipulate. But he had to be worried about having his
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parole violated, too. Believe me, it doesn’t take much, not for a convicted pedophile, and Hank Grand, after twenty-seven
years in the system, had to know it. So, when you arrived,
he would have been on his guard, suspecting, maybe, that
you’d come to set a trap. Meanwhile, you’re carrying the
Temazepam, already ground up, maybe in a pill bottle. How
do you get it from the bottle into his body? Not while he’s
watching. Not while he’s standing there, wondering what to
make of you. No, you came there to kill him, no matter the
personal cost, no matter how much it hurt, and so you took
him to bed, knowing he wouldn’t resist. What happened
then? Already drunk, maybe he fell asleep for a few minutes.
In fact, in my movie, you carry the spiked drink to his bed.
You wait until he sits up, then hand the glass to him. ‘Here, Daddy, you must be awful thirsty.’”
“You’re a bastard, Bobby.”
“What can I say? I’m a cop and bastard is what cops do.”
“That doesn’t give you the right to dissect us. We’re not
specimens.”
His expression momentarily softens, but his tone remains
firm. “It’s the planning that impresses me the most. Who
was going to go in first? And who would be kept in the dark, like Serena? Me, I don’t believe that Serena just happened
to be present when Greco knocked on the door. Serena was
sent forth to do battle precisely because she was defense-
less, because she wasn’t armed with the truth. Likewise for
the identity—God, how I hate that word—who knocked on
Hank Grand’s door. She had to be carefully chosen. For sure, it couldn’t be you or Kirk, no way. As for Serena, leaving the 265
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interrogation aside, she’s far too timid. She could never bring it off. And try to imagine fastidious Victoria stripping out of her dress. Imagine her displaying herself for a moment
before reaching out to touch Daddy’s flesh.”
It’s like Bobby’s inside me, opening doors, and I don’t like it. I’m thinking about relief, but there’s no relief coming.
“Eleni would be the obvious choice. But Eleni has this
habit of only sleeping with men she wants to sleep with.
Could she fake that attraction with her father? Make him
feel comfortable? Eleni is the most fearless among you, but
she has no guile, and game plans are far from her strong suit.
No, Eleni wouldn’t do and that leaves—”
“Tina.”
“No, not Tina. Carolyn Grand went to the Golden Inn
that night. She knew her daddy better than he knew him-
self and she had murder in her heart. Already drunk, Hank
Grand never had a chance. This was his most sordid prison
fantasy come to life. Yes, Daddy. No, Daddy. I’ll be good,
Daddy. Do you think Eleni could pull that off?”
I stand up and walk to the window, just as if there were
something I really want to look at. No, I can’t imagine Eleni saying those words. I can’t imagine anyone saying them.
Nor do I want to. At the same time, I know they must have
been said.
“Once your father was unconscious, Carolyn laid both
blankets over his back, then straddled him, her torso above
his hips. Most first-time killers hesitate at this point. The initial wound is usually the most shallow. Carolyn, by contrast, raised the knife above her head and drove it straight 266
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down with all her might. As a matter of pure luck, it passed between two ribs and Hank Grand bled out in less than a
minute. If the knife had been driven into a rib, on the other hand, the tip would probably have broken off and Carolyn
would’ve had a really pissed Hank Grand in her face. But
it wasn’t. The blade went in clean. The essential goal was
accomplished. Now for the cleanup.”
I know I’m wasting my time, but I can’t h
elp myself.
“How can you think that Tina, after everything—”
“Martha, there is no Tina. The being you call Tina is
what’s left of Carolyn Grand.”
“I just don’t understand how you can believe that Tina,
and I’ll call her that until the day I cease to exist, could—”
Again he stops me. “I think Carolyn Grand is the bravest
human being I’ve ever known. She protected her brood and
I admire her tremendously. And there’s no use pretending
anymore. You were all she had, you and Kirk and Eleni and
Victoria and Serena. Insane? Four pretend children living in the same body? I don’t give a shit, Martha. I only know that she stood up to the monster who took her childhood. And
the revenge she sought and got? It was for all of you, just as her remembering was for all of you.”
A minute passes, then another. Bobby wants me to
speak first, but I won’t. Finally, he gives up. “Carolyn
wouldn’t know a toilet cleaner from dishwashing liquid.
She didn’t sanitize the scene. She called in a self-described drudge named Martha. And it worked. You were thorough
enough to prevent a positive ID, but we both know who
killed Hank Grand and it wasn’t Alfred O’Neill or some
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broke hooker who needed a fix. The fatal blow came from
the hand of Carolyn Grand. You became an accessory when
you cleaned up.”
I stare into his eyes. Cop or friend? There’s a question
out there, waiting to be asked, but I can’t manage to say
the words as I watch him pour the last of the wine into our
glasses. I can’t speak, but I have to speak.
“Let’s say you’ve got it right, every detail. What are you
going to do about it?”
“Do you still think I’d hurt you, Martha?”
“Just answer the question. What are you going to do?”
“Nothing. Nothing I want to do and nothing I can do.
That’s because there’s no evidence to back my theory. Greco
can’t even prove that you left your apartment on the night
your father was killed. No, everybody’s agreed, Ford, Greco, and myself. We’re gonna put the murder on Alfred O’Neill.”
“How do you explain the cleanup afterward?”
“Hank Grand’s body was sanitized with a floor cleaner
used by the hotel. There are gallon jugs in cleaning closets on every floor. As for why . . .” Ortega’s thin smile broadens.