by R. G. Oram
The smooth lubricant splashed his face. Lewelyn was drenched, his skin tingling. Luckily, Lewelyn had reacted instantaneously and immediately closed his eyes – the muscles clenched and the balls went black. He had shut his eyes out of instinct, his vision was gone but he could still use his other senses. The eyes were mercifully untainted due to the lack of any stinging, but he couldn’t open them until he got something to wipe them with.
Lewelyn had a smell of dry-dirt flavour with a mild sweetness. Then a hard metal object made contact with his cheek. The object didn’t seem to know if it should push further into Lewelyn’s cheek or slash the brazened flesh. He tumbled to the ground. A chorus of shouting started, he couldn’t make out the precise words.
Waiting for another strike, but none came. Daniels must have fled, Lewelyn hoped at least. He was at the mercy of anyone now. On the ground covered in oil, momentarily blinded. All someone had to do was flick a lighter or grab a blow torch and that could be it. He recalled the funk of stale cigarette smoke on Daniel’s overalls when colliding with him. Did he keep the fire igniter in his pocket or locker?
Chapter 13
A pair of hands placed themselves on him. He couldn’t see who it was.
‘Hey!’ The sound was muffled, some residual hearing. Gently, hands set him upright.
Get it over with, Lewelyn thought. He wanted it over with. A soft furry material was placed in his hand.
‘Wipe your face!’ the voice commanded.
Lewelyn did so, running the towel around his face. He brushed it roughly like rasping a wooden surface with sandpaper, trying to get off as much oil as he could – the smell of it was degrading enough.
He moved on to his eyes, rubbing them slowly and carefully. Not being able to tell how much damage had been done to them. Lewelyn briefly put the towel through his hair, knowing he’d need a shower to extract it. Slowly, he opened his eyes; like a tedious automatic door, taking seconds longer than it should.
Light entered through both. He recognised the garage’s artificial illumination. They hurt, but he was thankful to have retained his sight. A crowd encircled him, clearly the mechanics. Not far from Lewelyn a man lay flat bellied on the dust floor, an immense shine rebounded off the shackles on his wrists.
The handcuffed figure fidgeted, attempting to adjust his current awkward position, Lewelyn identified the man as Greg Daniels. At the sight of him Lewelyn was reminded of a hot source of irritation in his cheek.
‘You all right?’ the voice asked.
‘I’m fine. Any chance you can tell those guys to take a hike,’ Lewelyn signalled with his head at the crowded form of surrounding mechanics gazing down at him. Forsythe gave a smile to the sitting Lewelyn.
‘I called for some back up. A patrol car will be here soon. They’ll take this moron here to First Street.’
‘Hey! Don’t call me a moron,’ the prone Daniels exploded.
‘Shut up! The truth hurts. Deal with it. And keep that mouth of yours shut. Do you know what you threw at me, moron? A goddamn wrench! So stay quiet!’
‘Hey I got rights.’
‘I read those to you earlier. Use that head of yours for a change. So sit tight and wait.’
Lewelyn noticed Forsythe desperately fought to keep one leg off the ground.
‘Leg okay?’
‘No, caught me right on the knee. Feels like there’s a hole burning through it.’
A patrol car with flashing lights entered the garage. The circle of onlookers around Lewelyn disbanded their synchronised stares.
After bundling Daniels away the patrol left for the station, Forsythe argued with the manager, the latter stamping the ground and threatening to sue, the former purposely not paying attention.
Both Forsythe and Lewelyn got to the sedan. Before getting in Forsythe told Lewelyn to take the oil embroidered suit off and cover himself with a blanket. Lewelyn didn’t have much choice in the matter.
Lewelyn could see Forsythe was having difficulty driving. It was hard for him to control the fitful shaking when his foot reached to press the accelerator down. The application or reduction of pressure produced painful gasps.
On reaching the ‘New Glass house,’ Forsythe took Lewelyn to the employee showers. He told him he’d get someone to bring him some new clothes. The detective said to him he wanted to be the first to interview Daniels. Even though hobbling on a clearly compromised leg, the detective was gone in a blink.
So, Lewelyn was on his own, a stream of warm water on his skin seemed to perform the trick, making him feel less alone. He felt his muscles unlock from their previous vice-like prison. A trail of brown liquid streamed down the shower’s drain, Lewelyn couldn’t picture the size of the oil can, but you could have filled up a car with it.
He finished, dried himself off. Still a hint of oil on him but no longer bathed with it. When checking his face in one of the mirrors he saw a deepening shadow on his face; he had forgotten to shave this morning. His hand bristled over the sharp rooted hairs of his lower face. Nobody this morning had seemed to notice or they didn’t care, the LAPD didn’t appear to have pogonophobia.
Just above the unshaved the area, where the oil can had left its mark, the burning sensation on his right cheek, reminding him of the inevitable bruising and swelling.
There was a bundle of clothes on a bench by the lockers. Assuming they were for him, he put them on. They looked like exercise gear, something you would wear when performing fitness tests: pants, shirt and his own leather shoes. Surprisingly the shoes didn’t seem too damaged.
Lewelyn walked out of the locker room and searched for signs pointing to RHD, finding it without any trouble. He went to the desk opposite Forsythe’s and waited. A couple of detectives abandoned their duties, briefly, to observe Lewelyn’s reckless fashion sense; the leather shoes and training gear didn’t seem to have quite entered modern day de rigueur.
Didn’t you know that curiosity killed the cat? He said mentally to the observers.
Perhaps it was an hour later before Forsythe emerged; Lewelyn’s watch and other belongings were also with his suit. Forsythe saw him immediately. You could barely see the limp in the detective’s walk; sitting down in the interview most likely helped.
He didn’t offer any words, Forsythe just dropped heavily into the chair. His sharp breathing looked to be of frustration.
‘Something wrong?’ Lewelyn broke the silence.
‘He didn’t do it.’
Chapter 14
Hannah Miller dated Greg Daniels for some time. She’d thought the world of him, at first. Charming, polite, well mannered, had one of those faces without the tight, fixed structure – a smooth gleaming coating. Lewelyn even noticed her smile being wider than normal back then. Then things turned frail. The first sign was when Hannah’s smile started to fade. She still worked but with little of her usual conscientious enthusiasm. Another sign was when she asked for an advancement in her pay-check – getting paid a couple weeks early.
Lewelyn was fine with this. She was an excellent employee, real benefit to DL Nonverbal. The issue was she now asked almost every month, for six months. This was when he intervened.
He asked her the reason behind these numerous financial advancements. At first she was too embarrassed to speak, keeping silent. Then, when Lewelyn gave her the confidential: ‘Nothing leaves this room’ speech, she opened up. It turned out Greg was a compulsive gambler, had a thing for one armed bandits. He kept asking Hannah for money when he was penniless. She did as he asked, she loaned him the money. She was beginning to feel his poverty with her own bills to pay: apartment, car and her mother’s retirement home. She told Greg this, but he couldn’t see past his own addiction and kept asking for more.
In the end Lewelyn told her to stop. The guy had a problem and it was his problem, the best thing she could do was to stop opening her wallet and get the guy some help if sh
e truly cared for him. All seemed well after that. Hannah appeared daily with her familiar smile and hardworking attitude, Lewelyn wasn’t asked for anymore pay advances.
Then one working day, Greg came to visit Hannah at work and Lewelyn had to intervene. In that moment Lewelyn could see what kind of person Daniels was; a guy who smiles on the surface to hide any hint of his predatory traits.
Lewelyn had met many men like this before when working with the FBI and in life. They took advantage of kind, honest people. Using their politeness against them, depending on their ability not to say no and be good, generous people. That’s how they operated. They were manipulators; the kind that preyed on the selfless.
When you want to say no, at first it feels unpleasant, almost like you’re breaking some kind of rule and you would immediately be damned if you did. In his experience there was nothing wrong with saying no. If you had a good reason not to trust them or your instincts tell you not to – then tell them: ‘Sorry, but no.’
They didn’t care what pain they caused, they were only interested in themselves and didn’t care about the consequences their actions had on other people.
Back to the present, Lewelyn and Forsythe were making their way to an interview room, Forsythe had decided they couldn’t get him down for murder but they’ll see what he knows. They’d interview him together except that Lewelyn would just sit there and watch the guy.
‘Do as I say,’ Forsythe had said, omitting anything else.
It was a different interview room to the one Lewelyn had been in, but it shared the former’s interior design. Greg Daniels was sitting down with a leg twitching uncontrollably. He made eyes with Lewelyn.
Without warning, Daniels jumped from his chair, it shot backwards.
‘GET THAT PSYCHO AWAY FROM ME! I’M NOT TALKING WITH HIM HERE!’ Daniels screamed, agitated and fearful while pointing a shaky finger at Lewelyn.
Forsythe, confused from the man’s explosive behaviour, ultimately pulled Lewelyn and himself out of the room, he then took Lewelyn into a room that observed the interview room.
‘What was that?’ Forsythe demanded.
‘I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know? Let me ask you something. Why is moron over there so scared of you? The mere sight of you nearly made him piss his pants. Now look at him,’ Forsythe pointed at the glass that presented the interview room.
Daniels hugging, more like marrying the wall.
‘Fine. Fine. Do you remember when I told you I had to tell the guy to leave Hannah alone? Well I asked him to come into my office and when he came inside I told him to leave her alone, he didn’t listen to me so I got a little more serious,’ he paused to catch a breath. ‘Then I more or less threatened him. I said if he didn’t leave her alone I’d call the cops.’
‘That was it?’ Forsythe looking intensely into Lewelyn’s eyes.
‘Yeah. I can be pretty convincing when the situation calls for it.’
Lewelyn wasn’t sure whether Forsythe accepted this, the man kept his face blank, making it hard for him to read it.
‘Fine. What’s going to happen now is, you are going to stay here and I’m going in there and ask him some questions. If you see anything important, knock on the glass. Understand?’
‘Yes.’ Lewelyn replied.
He had neglected to mention that when Daniels came into his office that day, he had started to blow hot air at Lewelyn. Lewelyn not liking remnants of spit in his face grabbed the man by his shirt and brought him up close. The adrenaline had stopped coursing through Daniels’ veins. He had uttered the word ‘Freak’ when being man-handled. Lewelyn hadn’t liked to try and intimidate the man like that, but there was no other way to get his attention. Technically, an assault, but he had only thought of that in the aftermath. Lewelyn had told him to stop harassing her. His grip tough on Daniels, because he remembered hearing some of the threads in his t-shirt tearing. He wasn’t intending to hurt Daniel’s unless the guy hit him first.
To Lewelyn it looked to be the first time anybody had even tackled him like that. The guy assumed that his bulked frame made him tough. A lot of people believed that but, realistically a trained fighter, no matter what size, will always be victorious in a physical confrontation. Bulging muscles didn’t stop punches – putting your arms up to block the force would; and knowing when and where to strike – fast. It isn’t how big you are, it’s how well you can fight.
Daniels had been cornered by Lewelyn and didn’t have a clue what to do. Lewelyn ordered him to apologize to Hannah and never bother her again. When the wannabe God of Olympus left his office and made it to her desk, Lewelyn watched him talk to her. Then a glass vase fell over from a shove of a hand. As the water and flowers swam over the floor Daniels had already made it to the exit. Lewelyn had gotten a box of tissues out of his office and gave them to Hannah while he picked up the plants and shards of glass without the use of gloves. He didn’t look at Hannah, having already seen balls of tissues on her desk, stained with mascara, he couldn’t face seeing her. Kept eyeballing the door when he took a piece of glass, felt his hands wanting to crush what they held.
He assumed that had been it, all over; Daniels achieved his own personal interpreted form of victory. A week later Hannah was late for work. When she finally got in, two hours later, she told him her car wouldn’t start. The unleaded fuelled car had been filled with diesel, destroyed the engine, still in the repair shop now. She tried to apologize to him, except Lewelyn put his hand up to stop her. He knew it wasn’t her fault. Asked her how she intended to get to work from then on. She told him she’d catch a bus. Lewelyn told her he’d pay for her bus fares and repair bill. At first, for some reason, she thought he was angry with her, said she could afford it. He said to her it was fine, DL Nonverbal would pay for it.
Now the interview began.
Forsythe sat himself down in the interview room. Daniels still engaged to his favourite wall. Lewelyn a spectre behind the mirror. All the recording equipment was set up. The body language expert able to see and hear everything in the other room and with multiple screens displaying Forsythe and Daniels in front of him, as well as being on the other side of the two-way mirror.
‘Pick up that chair and sit down,’ Forsythe started.
‘As long as that guy doesn’t come in.’
‘Which guy? The guy you drowned in motor oil and hit square in the jaw?’
Daniels didn’t appear to hear this. It was as if he was in his own world, denying the existence of the one he was in.
‘Sit down,’ Forsythe said again.
This time Daniels obeyed, stabilising the chair and sat to face the detective. Lewleyn’s senses immediately jumped into gear as he began to observe the man’s body language.
To study body language you first had to find the baseline behaviour. This is the individual’s normal continuous body movement; what they’re normally like in that specific situation. Once you had a fix on that, it made it easier for you to detect any anomalies in their baseline. What a lot of people made the mistake of doing when observing body language, was that they assumed every nervous gesture made is a guilty action. Sometimes people simply have a habit of twizzling their hair or biting their lip. That’s where Lewelyn came in, he knew how and when to separate instinctual habits from actual self-condemnation signs.
Right now Daniels normal behaviour was legs pressed together and hands clasped with fingers interlaced, as if he was praying.
‘So tell me Greg, do you like assaulting police officers?’
‘I didn’t know you were a cop. I just wanted to get away from the guy who was next to you.’
‘Really? Well if you wanted to get away from him, why did you throw the wrench at me?’
No change in the baseline.
‘I don’t know, I wasn’t thinking. It was the heat of the moment. I couldn’t think straight.’
‘You can aim straight though,’ Forsythe argued before moving on. ‘Tell me, have you been to Santa Rosalia recently?’
There! Daniels takes a lungful of breath.
‘Like I told you earlier I didn’t kill her.’
‘I didn’t ask if you killed her. I asked you if you’ve been in the vicinity of Santa Rosalia recently.’
Daniels remained silent.
‘Hey, I need an answer for the record,’ Forsythe referred to the recording device in the interview room.
‘Nope. Haven’t been there for months.’
This time the telltale eyes blinked more frequently.
Daniels asked a question, ‘Do you think I need a lawyer now?’
Shit! Lewelyn thought.
‘That’s up to you. You know you’re entitled to one. But do you need one if you’re telling me the truth?’
Eureka! Lewelyn exhaled.
Daniels reserved his rights for now.
‘How long have you been working at that garage?’
‘A while, I like working on cars.’
‘Do you consider yourself a good mechanic?’
‘I guess so. Don’t get any complaints. Don’t see the same car too often.’
‘So you have a high degree of knowledge about cars.’
‘Yeah I do,’ Daniels smiled thinking Forsythe was paying him a compliment.
‘Tell me, what’s the best way to completely incapacitate a car?’
‘Why are you asking me this?’ Daniels asked, Lewelyn could see the man’s lips purse.
‘I’m asking because it seems Miss Miller’s car has been in the shop for some time. Somebody, it seems, tampered with it.’
The interlaced fingers tightened.
‘Really? How?’
‘Looks like someone put diesel into her unleaded fuel tank. Do you know what’s interesting about that little fact?’