Devils Among Us (Devin Dushane Series Book 1)

by Chastity Harris

  “They were engaged?” Devin couldn’t disguise her interest this time. In her entire life she had never heard this detail.

  Beth was quick to answer. “No, at least not yet. At the rate they were going they could have been engaged by the end of the summer. But they never got that chance.”

  “What happened to Michael after the murder?”

  “He practically had a nervous breakdown. I remember all that summer you could see him just walking around town all hours of the day and night. Somehow he pulled it together in the fall and went to college. I don’t think he ever came back to Fenton, his parents were older and he didn’t have any other family. I tried to find him a few years ago on the internet when we were planning our thirty-year reunion, but I couldn’t find a trace of him.”

  Devin made a mental note to ask Shane and Adam if they had a location for Michael Leary. She definitely would like to talk with him about what was going on in Laney’s life then.

  “So the police believed Henry killed her out of jealousy?”

  “I suppose they did, but it just wasn’t possible.” Beth became emphatic. “There is no way Henry could have ever hurt Laney. He would’ve been more likely to kill himself! If Michael was truly Laney’s choice, Henry would have suffered in silence, because her happiness was always most important to him. The police may have spent all their time investigating him, but in my mind he was the least likely person to kill Laney.”

  Devin sensed her opportunity and pounced. “Who do you think was the most likely to have killed her?”

  Beth didn’t bat an eye. “Dean Delluca, Laney’s ex.”

  Devin thought back through the case files. Delluca had been interviewed along with everyone else at the Summit that night, but no special notations had been made as to him being a suspect.

  “Why do you think that?”

  Beth took a sip of her lemonade and stared into her glass for a moment and then gave Devin a weak smile.

  “Peter tells me I shouldn’t judge because I don’t know all the facts, but there was something going on with Laney and Dean for a couple of weeks before she died and they were arguing that night at the Summit.”

  “That wasn’t noted in the file, that there had been a fight that night. Why wasn’t Dean ever interviewed as a suspect?”

  “Supposedly he had an airtight alibi, though I never heard what it was. Dean was under a lot of pressure at the time, he had dropped out of school to support his wife and unborn child, a wife he didn’t want to marry in the first place. I think that stress could have caused him to snap.”

  Devin considered everything Beth had just told her, but something wasn’t adding up.

  “Why would Laney be messing with a married man if she was so happy with Michael and talking about her own marriage?”

  “That I don’t know. But I do know that Dean very much wanted to be with her. Dean and Laney were dating when Angela showed up pregnant, he did the decent thing and left Laney to marry Angela, but he was never happy about it.”

  “So what do you think they were arguing about the night she died?”

  Beth paused and chewed her lip a bit, worry creasing her forehead. “I don’t know anything for sure, it would just be speculation.”

  “I’m not writing anything down.” Not yet, anyway. “I’m just theorizing, looking for possible angles to follow since the crime scene evidence is so thin.”

  After a long pause, Beth finally relented. “I think Dean was asking her to run away with him. When they were arguing I could see Laney shaking her head and pushing away from him. I don’t think he got the answer he was looking for. I don’t think Laney could have broken up a home.”

  Devin swiped another cookie and waved it in the air as she worked out her theory. “So maybe she wasn’t involved with him. Maybe it was one sided, and he was pursuing her. He wants to escape his trapped life, runaway with the girl he’s really in love with. She rejects him…that could be motive for murder.” She punctuated her sentence with a bite of her cookie. “Is Dean still local?”

  Unknowingly Beth had stopped rocking while Devin spoke, even the wind had become still. But, she now began her graceful movement again and the gentle breeze blew across the porch, fanning the flag out once more.

  “As far as I know he’s still here. He’s been in and out of jail several times, but he always comes back to Fenton.”

  “How charming. I believe I’ll look him up and see what he has to say about that night.”

  “You’ll give him quite a fright with your resemblance.”

  “Oh, I’m counting on it.” Devin murmured into her almost empty glass.

  Beth’s sweet laughter peeled through the humid June air. “Laney would have loved you!” She leaned over to refill Devin’s lemonade. “She would have said that you were her kind of people, but really everybody was her kind of people.”

  There was a part of a Devin, beyond her investigative instincts, that just wanted to know a little bit about her family, her blood.

  “Would you tell me about her? Dad spoke very little about her or Fenton when we were growing up.”

  “Goodness, how do I explain Laney to you?” Beth sank back in her rocker with a sigh. “That’s like trying to move a mountain one teaspoon of dirt at a time.” Suddenly she clasped the arms of the chair as her honey eyes brightened with an idea. “I know just the thing. You wait right here.” And with a pat to Devin’s knee she was off into the house only to return moments later with a high school year book, its cover darkened by time.

  Beth was really shining with excitement now. “This was Laney’s yearbook from junior year. Aunt Carol gave it to me afterwards as a keepsake.” She was scanning through some of the signatures on the inside cover. “I think looking at what people wrote to her and the kinds of people she hung out with will give you a good idea what Laney was like. Here, look at these two.”

  The very top inscription on the page was from the principal congratulating Laney on her academic achievements for the year and being an upstanding example to the student body. Right below it was a comment from “The Weasel” congratulating her on having an upstanding rack and what he’d like to achieve with her student body sometime.

  Devin and Beth laughed until they cried. As expected Beth pulled a tissue out of her skirt pocket to dab her eyes. “That’s the way it was with Laney! She got good grades and was enough of a straight arrow that teachers loved her, but what they didn’t know was that she was the one smoking in the girls’ room in between classes.”

  Beth flipped over a few pages to candid shots of juniors and seniors, it seemed like Laney was in every other picture.

  “Look, she had no bias as to who her friends were, that picture she’s in the jock hall with all the athletes but there she’s walking on the arms of Fred and Milton Polk. Those boys were dirt farmers, only in school about 70% of the time because they were helping their daddy on the farm. You could barely get two sentences out of them, Milt especially, because he had such a bad stutter. Most Fridays they’d be huckstering in the city selling eggs, milk, vegetables, anything the farm produced. The kids in school all thought they were better than the Polk boys, but not Laney. Every Monday morning she’d find them in the cafeteria and plop down in one of their laps and ask ‘hey, Freddie what are those crazy city folks payin’ for eggs these days?’ And he’d tell her the price, and then she’d roll her eyes and say ‘Milt, when are they gonna learn to just buy the chicken?’ Then she’d tell them some crazy story about her weekend, every word of it true, too.” Beth was shaking her head, reveling in the memory.

  “What about this one? Who’s that?” Devin pointed to a picture of Laney with another girl at what looked to be a library counter, leaning up on their elbows with their shoulders pressed together. Laney looked bubbly and sparkly, but the other girl seemed very unsure of the pose and her smile was timid.

  “That is another great example. Her name was Eloise Faulkner; she moved to Fenton that year and was a total outcast. Her pare
nts had died in a car crash so she was living with her aunt and uncle that ran Gibson’s Funeral Home, for cruel teenagers that’s creepy. Plus she just seemed to be obsessed with death. I guess today you’d call her a ‘Goth’, she dressed in black, always wore that heavy silver cross necklace, used to hang out in the cemetery making drawings and tracings of headstones just enough to make her odd in high school culture. Pair all that with being awkward and shy and it’s social suicide. Luckily for Eloise she was partnered with Laney as a library assistant. They used to have these in-depth discussions on Shakespearean literature and nineteenth-century poets. I think Eloise even planted flowers on Laney’s dad’s grave.”

  Devin pulled back to get a better look at Beth’s face to see if she was pulling her leg. Apparently not, because her face was still serene as she relived the memories.

  “That is creepy.”

  “Hmm, you would think, but Laney loved it.” For the briefest second Devin heard something in Beth’s voice slip. Bitterness? She remained quiet and continued to watch Beth’s face as she spoke, but it gave away nothing. “If I remember correctly it was a thank you. Devin had pushed Eloise into trying out for the Science Bowl Team and she made it. Although Michael hadn’t been too happy, apparently Eloise was very good, and he almost lost his spot on the team.”

  The cousins talked their way through the morning like old friends, catching up on years of births, deaths and achievements of all kinds. Devin was especially thrilled with stories of her father’s childhood. They ended their visit with Devin promising to come back the following night for dinner and to meet Beth’s husband, Peter.

  “Oh, and when you come back tomorrow, I can show you my photo album. I had a new camera the night…” Her voice faltered and softened. “That night. And I took all kinds of pictures.”

  “Thank you Beth, but I’ve already seen them. There’s a set in the case files.” Devin set her glass down on the tray and stood up to leave.

  “I had forgotten that. The police made a copy of all the pictures on the roll in hopes of finding a clue. I guess that never worked out.”

  Devin once again thanked Beth for her hospitality and promised to come back the next day as she headed off the porch. Halfway down the steps she stopped and turned back to Beth.

  “Could I ask you one more question?”

  Beth smiled the smile that turned her eyes into liquid honey. “As long as it’s not my age or weight.”

  Devin grinned back at her. “No, nothing like that. I was just wondering…lots of people lose siblings in horrific ways. Why do you think Laney’s murder affected my father so profoundly?”

  Beth’s expression became serious, and Devin thought she saw pity in her eyes. “Guilt. Bobby has always felt responsible for his sister’s death.”

  Chapter 9

  When Devin was back in her car, she fished her cell phone out of the glove box. As she headed back across town to her Grandmother’s house, she dialed the number for the sheriff’s office and crossed her fingers. It paid off.

  “Sheriff’s Office, Detective Lentz speaking.”

  “Adam! Thank goodness. It’s Devin. I was sure Shane would answer the phone.” She breathed her relief into the phone. She needed information right now, not bad pick-up lines.

  “Hey, Devin. It’s always nice when a pretty lady wants to talk to you.”

  Devin groaned internally. Not you, too! But her despair was short-lived. Adam cut right to the chase.

  “What can the Fenton Sheriff’s Department do for you today?”

  “I need a last-known address for an individual I believe has a record.”

  “Hang on one second Devin, let me get this computer going.” She heard him feverishly hitting keys in the background as she waited. “Okay, what’s the name?”

  “It’s Dean Delluca. I don’t have a middle name…” Adam’s bark of laughter cut her off.

  “Oh yeah, he’s got a record.” She heard a flurry of key strokes again. “Okay, here it is, Delluca, Dean Allen, 201 Eagle Street. I’ve also got the current employer listed as Wilsons Tire and Auto on North Street. What else do you need?”

  As Devin pulled up to a stop sign she scribbled the information onto the legal pad she kept on the seat beside her, then she tapped her pen on her leg as she thought. She glanced in her rearview mirror to make sure no cars were behind her, she needed to sit a little longer at this intersection.

  “What’s his sheet look like?”

  “Oh, where to begin? He’s got half a dozen misdemeanors, a couple of felonies ranging from grand theft auto to armed robbery. He’s even got a charge in here for transporting illegal alcohol across state lines.”

  Devin’s brow knitted as she checked her mirrors again. “What does that even mean?”

  She could hear the grin in his voice. “It means he was running moonshine.”

  “Oh, I don’t see a lot of that in Richmond.”

  His laughter was now barely contained “I’d wager you don’t.”

  “All right, funny man, when was his first arrest?”

  “It was in June of 1964, he robbed a convenience store at gunpoint.”

  There was a silence for a moment as both of them absorbed that piece of information. A horn blaring broke their concentration. Devin waved an apology to the car behind her and gunned her mustang through the intersection.

  “Adam that was the month after Laney Bennett was murdered. Are you sure he used a gun and not a knife?”

  “I’m sure, the witnesses described a .45 and he had it on him when they caught him. Hang on, let me see if he had anything else on him.” Devin pulled into a parking space at the bank on the corner to avoid an accident while Adam banged away on his keyboard. “Okay, he did have a knife when he was arrested, but it was only a 3” pocket knife.”

  “That doesn’t really help. I’m sure it was common then to carry a pocket knife, and that doesn’t match the description of the knife that was used to kill Laney. Thanks for your help Adam, I’ll go talk to this Delluca in the morning, see what he has to say about his relationship with Laney at the time of her death.”

  “Relationship? I thought Laney was seeing someone else at the time.”

  “She was, but she was also seen arguing with Delluca in the weeks leading up to her murder. It makes sense—he missed the freedom he had with Laney before he was saddled with a wife and child so he takes out his jealousy and frustration on her.” Devin put the cap back on her pen and tossed it into the ashtray. She was a closet smoker and trying to quit. Her theory was if the ashtray was used for other purposes, she would be less tempted to smoke in the car and stink up the very expensive leather upholstery.

  “Well, you’ll have to wait until Friday to talk to him. His parole officer’s report says he’s at Smith Mountain Lake with his family until Thursday night.” Adam approached his next statement carefully, likely not wanting to incur her wrath. “Devin…be careful, this Delluca is a pretty rough character.”

  He could almost picture her devilish grin as she answered. “So am I, but if it makes you feel better I’ll be going to his work, with witnesses.”

  “Alright, that does make me feel better. Before I forget I should tell you that the Sheriff is looking for you.” He was trying to disguise his laughter with a stern tone, but it wasn’t working.

  “Ugh. Do I want be found?” She had been ready to back out of her parking spot, but now her hand was frozen above the gear shift.

  “No, I’d say not. Something about a bar fight and setting an example…” He broke off in restrained laughter that he tried to pass off as choking. In the background she could hear falsetto karate cries. “Devin I’ve got to go, good luck.” He was able to gasp out before he hung up. Devin frowned as she snapped her phone shut and dropped it on the seat.

  How do I just know that Shane was involved in that?

  She was so irritated with the juvenile maturity of boys that she hit the gas a little too hard as she pulled out and barked the tires. No sooner than let
ting off the gas, blue lights were flashing behind her. Come on! I wasn’t really even speeding! She was fishing her badge and I.D. out of her bag when a deep southern voice came through the window.

  “Well, well, well, you’ve made quite a stir in our little town Ms. Devin.”

  Crap.

  “Afternoon Sheriff. What can I do for you today?” She was playing it very sweet and innocent.

  “There was a little disturbance last night that I need to hold someone accountable for.”

  Sweet and innocent went out the window. “Now wait just a minute. That was self-defense. I’ve got a half a dozen witnesses that will say so.” She held one finger up. “Plus I gave the jerk three warnings to take his hands off of me, and I warned them that I was a police officer.” She held up a second and third finger for each of her points and began to shake all three at the sheriff like she was scolding a child. “I am not the one going to jail for this.” Devin was mad, and when she got mad, she tended to get loud. That’s hard to miss in a town the size of Fenton.

  Sheriff Bittner held up two hands and backed away a step. “Hold on, nobody said anything about going to jail. I don’t doubt that those idiots deserved every lick they got, but I can’t go around condoning bar fights and vigilante justice.” Now that he could see she was calmer he leaned down, putting his elbows on her door and pushing his hat back. “I’ve already talked with the boys and they’re going to be doing some community service. I think it’s only fair that you do the same.”

  Fire flew back into Devin’s eyes. “If you think I’m going to pick up trash on some highway with those creeps, you’ve got another thing coming…”

  He interrupted her in a soothing voice. “Just calm down, I had something a little different in mind for you. A ‘punishment’—” he raised his hands to make quote marks in the air “—that’s not really a punishment and does some good in the community.”

  Devin’s mother used to say she was born suspicious. She folded her arms across her chest. “What did you have in mind?”