by Justice
He sat back in his chair. “First thing I’d want to find out is why she did it. That’s what I’d like to discuss with you, Terry.”
“Would you be mad at her?”
“It depends.”
“What if she told you it was art. Nothing sordid or dirty…or shame—…it was just art. Would you accept that? Or would you still be mad at her? Think that she’s a whore or something?”
“Terry, I don’t think you’re a whore. No one does.”
She lowered her head. “Thanks. But it’s not something you’d want your daughter to do, right?”
Decker considered the question. “If this was an honest interpretation of what she considered art…if her posing wasn’t coerced either physically or psychologically…and if she had considered the consequences, I wouldn’t be mad at her. But as a father, I’d feel real squeamish about it. Even though my daughter is of legal age.”
“Which I’m not.” She covered her face. “I’m very embarrassed you had to see them.”
Decker didn’t know what to say. When in doubt, be a professional. He took out his notebook. “When are you going to be eighteen, Terry?”
“I’ll be seventeen in a month.”
“You skipped?”
She nodded. “What are you going to do with the pictures?”
“They’ve been filed and entered as evidence in Cheryl Diggs’s murder case.”
“So a lot of people are going to see them, right?”
“Some people might.”
“Am I going to have to appear in a trial or anything?”
“I can’t tell you any specifics, Terry, because I don’t know them.”
“Can you give me an educated guess?”
“It’s likely the State will present the drawings to a grand jury in order to obtain an indictment.”
“Will the sketches be in the papers?”
“No,” Decker said.
“Not even in the tabloids?”
Decker rubbed his hand over his face. “You’re a minor. They shouldn’t touch you.”
“Ah…the recklessness of youth,” Terry muttered.
“Your parents will probably find out, Terry. You should talk to them about it.”
“I’ll pass, thank you. Let them find out. Deal with it one step at a time.”
Decker said, “Tell me about the sketches, Terry.”
“They were art. Chris’s interpretation of Jesus dying on the cross. We’re both…influenced by Catholicism. Him even more than me.” She shrugged. “That’s it.”
“That’s it?”
She nodded.
“You were just his model?”
“Yes.”
Decker studied the girl’s face. She was telling him half-truths. “After he tied you up, you two didn’t become physical?”
“No. It was all very polite.”
“He never touched you?”
She shook her head no. “I was his model…that’s all.”
“You told me you and Chris weren’t talking for a long period of time.”
She nodded.
“So how long ago did you pose for him?”
“About five months ago.”
“While you were still tutoring him?”
“Yes.”
Decker looked up. “How’d he get you to pose so explicitly?”
Her eyes moistened. She didn’t speak.
“He told you he loved you,” Decker stated.
“You think I’m an idiot.”
“Not at all,” Decker said. “A mistake doesn’t make anyone an idiot. Not if you learn from it.”
“And what’s the lesson, Sergeant? Not to trust men? I already learned that from my father.”
Decker kept his expression neutral. So jaded, so young. Or maybe that was just teenage hyperbole talking.
Terry said, “Yes, he told me he loved me. He also said he didn’t want to sleep with me because he was engaged to someone else. He said this was a way we could be intimate without having sex. Maybe that was a line, also. But he sounded sincere. First time I posed for him, he didn’t do anything weird.”
Decker raised a brow. “Did he do something weird the second time, Terry?”
“No, not at all,” Terry said, quickly. “I just meant that the first time, he posed me in a very normal way. You saw the pictures, right?”
“The ones with you hunched over?”
She nodded.
“Yes, I saw them.”
“He had acted very respectful. So, the second time, when he asked if he could…tie me up for his vision of Christ…I did feel squeamish. But then I figured, why not?”
She took off her hair clip and shook out long strands of red-tinged mocha.
“You know, I asked him for the sketches when I stopped tutoring him. He wouldn’t give them to me.”
“I’m sure now he wishes he had.”
Terry suddenly slumped. “That’s true. The sketches are certainly more harmful to Chris than to me.”
Decker said, “How many times did you pose in binds for him?”
“Just one time. That’s all.”
“He never asked you to do it again?”
Terry’s eyes went to the ceiling. Decker regarded her face. “Or was it because of the modeling that you suggested he get another tutor?”
“One of the reasons, I guess.”
“You showed very good judgment.”
“I modeled willingly,” she said, softly. “There was no coercion.”
Decker said, “A boy as savvy and as good-looking as Chris gets you alone. He tells you he loves you. He tells you this is a way to get intimate without sex. He probably tells you to trust him, that if you really love him, you’ll do this for him. Something like that, right?”
Tears flowed down her cheeks.
“Don’t waste your tears on him,” Decker said. “Whitman’s not a nice boy. He’s been arrested for murder. Consider yourself lucky.”
Terry shook her head. “He didn’t kill Cheryl, Sergeant.”
“Terry, it’s time to drop the party line,” Decker said. “There is a very strong likelihood that you will be called to testify before a grand jury. I want you to tell the truth. I want you to tell how Chris manipulated you, how he used your vulnerability and emotions to get you to do what he wanted—”
“That wouldn’t be the truth!”
Decker paused. “You wanted to be posed like that?”
“No, but…” Her eyes watered. “I love him—”
“Terry, you’re too smart for that.”
“You didn’t let me finish.”
Decker stopped himself. “Sorry. Go on.”
“I love Chris, Sergeant. But I’ve got a fierce sense of justice. If I truly…believed that he killed Cheryl, I might still love him, but I’d want to see him punished.”
She looked pained.
“If you put me before a grand jury, I will tell the truth. But it won’t be your interpretation of the truth…which is a legitimate interpretation but…”
Decker waited. When she didn’t continue, he filled in the blanks. “Terry, if Chris really loved you, he wouldn’t have compromised you like that.”
“He didn’t compromise me. Those sketches were just between the two of us. They were very personal!”
“If they were so personal, why did I find them doing a simple, routine search around his apartment?”
She paused. “They were just lying around?”
“I had no trouble finding them,” Decker said breezily.
“But that doesn’t make sense. That he’d leave them out in the open. They’re incriminating if nothing else.” She glared at him. “I thought you were honest. Now I see you’re lying. All you care about is getting Chris indicted.”
“Hell, yeah, I want to get him indicted!” Decker said, forcefully. “You said you don’t like dangerous boys. Terry, Chris is a real bad egg. Do you know who his father is?”
“Joseph Donatti.”
Well, so much for the element
of shock.
Terry went on, “So what if Joseph Donatti is Chris’s adopted father? So what if Chris is from mob? It doesn’t make him mob. You know what Chris is?”
“A saint?” Decker said.
“Very funny!” she said defiantly. “He’s a pawn, Sergeant! A trapped and manipulated pawn used by vicious men. And now you’re manipulating me to testify against him. Look elsewhere. I won’t bring him down.”
“I’d try elsewhere except Cheryl Diggs is dead.”
“He didn’t kill her!”
“Terry, while Chris was proclaiming his love for you, he was sexually involved with Cheryl Diggs. The guy is not a poor little frog prince. He’s a toad!”
She spoke each word with precise enunciation. “He…didn’t…kill…Cheryl…Diggs…period.”
Decker sat back in his chair. Confrontation wasn’t working. The more he attacked Whitman, the more the girl dug in her heels. Because above all, there were emotions between the two of them.
He thought for a moment.
The girl had told him she had a fierce sense of justice. For her, fear and anger weren’t powerful motivators. Perhaps he should be stressing kindness…fairness. He softened his expression, folded his hands, and looked her in the eye. “Would you like to know where I actually found the sketches?”
Terry didn’t answer.
“In Chris’s hall closet was this tiny locked slot that blended in nicely with the paneling in the wall. Way up high…” Decker stretched his arms to emphasize the point. “At the very tip-top of his closet. I almost missed it.” He smiled. “But I didn’t because I’m a real pro. Chris just about fainted when I found them.”
Terry looked up.
“Man, I almost felt sorry for him,” Decker said. “I think he would have accepted cigarette burns on his butt rather than give out your name. But I backed him against the wall. I told him if he didn’t give it to me, I’d pass the pictures around your school until I found someone who recognized you.”
Her face froze with fear. “You didn’t…”
Decker shook his head. “No, it obviously didn’t come to that.” He gave her a sad smile. “Yes, he gave me your name. But he was miserable about it. He told me to tell you he was sorry.”
Tears formed in her eyes.
Decker said, “You know what, Terry? I truly felt bad for him. I feel bad for you, too. But my real sympathies are with someone else. Do you know who I really feel bad for?”
Terry was silent.
“Cheryl Diggs. She died so ignominiously. Young girl tied up like a beast to be slaughtered. That’s no way to die.”
Wet tracks ran down her cheeks.
Decker said, “Cheryl never got a chance to tell me her side of the story. Corpses can’t talk. So I have to talk for them. You understand what I’m saying, Terry?”
She wiped her cheeks and nodded.
“I took one look at that young face…staring at me with dead eyes…” Decker paused. “I swore I would talk for her…avenge her. Because someone viciously killed her, without regard for her feelings, for her life. And I’m sorry to tell you, I do believe it was Christopher Whitman. What do you think, Terry?”
In a whisper, she said, “Does it matter?”
“It matters to me. It’ll matter to Chris. And it’ll matter a great deal to a grand jury. Most important, it’ll matter to you. It will determine how you can live with yourself after this whole mess is over.”
She looked up with dry eyes. “Chris didn’t do it.”
Decker kept his frustration in check. He studied her face. No longer defiant. Very sincere. Calmly, he asked, “And why do you think that, Terry?”
She didn’t answer.
Decker waited a beat. “Do you think Chris is capable of murder, Terry?”
Slowly, she nodded her head yes.
“So why don’t you think he killed Cheryl?”
She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I used to go to the rages…the parties. I wasn’t an active participant…I sat around. But I used to go to see Chris. Moon over him. It was pretty pathetic.”
Decker waited.
“Chris drank like a fish! It wasn’t unusual to see him polishing off an entire fifth by the end of the evening. Yet, when he left, he was always perma-pressed…perfectly coherent and alert.”
She spoke in a soft monotone.
“Christopher Whitman is the most…controlled…compulsive…obsessively neat person I’ve ever met. And that’s saying something. Because I’m not exactly freewheeling and spontaneous. He makes me look like a hippie. I’ve seen him drunk, I’ve seen him stressed, I’ve seen him angry, I’ve seen him…aroused, I’ve seen him happy, I’ve seen him miserable. I’ve seen him in many different emotional states. But I’ve never seen him sloppy.”
She met Decker’s eyes.
“Cheryl’s murder was…messy. If Chris had killed her, he would have been neat about it.”
Decker didn’t speak. Was she serious? “Terry, even compulsives freak out—”
“Not Chris.” She shook her head. “Uh-uh, no way, not him! For him, sloppiness is the ultimate abomination. If Chris were a killer, he’d be a ninja.”
“Terry—”
“And if he didn’t do it, Sergeant, it means someone else did! And if you’re not going to look for him, I will.”
Decker didn’t speak right away, feeling a rise of acid in his gut. He was angered by the kid’s audacity, but also forced to admit to himself that he was worried. Whitman was probably guilty—the kid had killer eyes. But Decker had never fully suppressed that nagging tug in his brain.
The African-American pubic hairs found on a routine pubic comb. The semen inside of Cheryl.
Another man.
When he spoke, he tried to appear calm. “This is not a request, Terry. This is an order. Stay out of police business. Because if you get involved, you’re just going to muck things up for you and for Chris—”
“Sergeant, if you’re so sure it’s Chris, why do you care if I ask a couple of questions?”
“Because people get scared when you imply things. And when they get scared, they don’t act rationally.” Decker made his hand into a gun, placed his index finger at her temple and drew an imaginary trigger with his thumb. “Now where are you, Terry?”
She was silent.
Decker said, “You’re an honest kid. Swear to me you won’t interfere.”
Terry said, “Sir, can I make a deal with you?”
“No, you cannot!”
“I won’t interfere…sir…Sergeant…if you promise me you’ll investigate every single angle of Cheryl’s death.”
“Terry, that’s exactly what I’m doing.”
“Sergeant, with all due respect…sir, I think you’re trying to put Chris away, not find the murderer…sir.”
Decker ran his hand over his face. “And what happens when it’s proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Chris murdered Cheryl?”
Terry blinked several times. “I’d be devastated of course. But as long as I know that…Sergeant, if you promise me you’ll investigate everything, I’ll butt out. Because I really do think you’re an honest man. Do we have a deal?”
Decker bored into her eyes. “No, we do not have a deal. I don’t make deals with anyone, let alone sixteen-year-old adolescents. You back off and stay away and let me do my job. If you do that, we’ll both be satisfied, all right?”
She paused, then nodded.
Decker flashed on Cindy, remembering their post-midnight marathon debates. She wore him down by sheer attrition. Such was the mission of adolescents. Turning adults into Jell-O!
“I don’t know why but I really trust you.” She looked at him with tiger-gem eyes. “I envy your daughter. I wish you were my father.”
It was said so guilelessly that Decker was tempted to reach out and hug her. But of course, he didn’t. Even the sweetest of faces could have an evil agenda.
Above all, Decker was a professional.
26
&n
bsp; Flipping through the sketch pad, Oliver let go with a long whistle. “Not bad,” he said. “Not bad at all, mama. You can sit on my face anytime.”
Decker entered the squad room, saw Oliver ogling the drawings, and felt his temper rise. Oliver looked up and caught Decker’s expression. He closed the pad and smiled boyishly. “Just checking out the evidence.”
Slowly, Decker walked over, counting to ten mentally. He held out his hand. “The pad, please?”
Averting his eyes, Oliver spoke angrily. “What the hell is it to you? You’ve sifted through tons of shit in your years. You mean to tell me you’ve never taken a peek?”
“The pad, please?”
“Or is feeling horny against your born-again religion?”
Decker was impassive. “The pad, Scott?”
Oliver paused, then handed it to him.
“You have the evidence-slip number?” Decker said.
“Yeah.” Oliver sorted through his desk drawer. “Here it is. Also, here’s the numbers for Whitman’s other sketch pads. They’ve already been entered and filed in the evidence room. Davidson told me to go through this one since it’s the most incriminating. Make photocopies of all the sketches that resemble the Polaroids taken at the Diggs crime scene. To me, they all resemble the postmortem snaps.”
“Have you done anything?”
“Oh, fuck off, Mr. Holy Roller!”
“I’m not being sarcastic,” Decker said evenly. “If you haven’t done it yet, I’ll do it.”
Oliver blushed. “Sorry. I’ll do it.”
Decker was quiet.
“No, really, I’ll do it,” Oliver said. “You’ve got more pressing business. Whitman’s been asking for you for the last half hour.”
“Has he contacted his lawyer yet?”
Oliver said, “First thing after he was booked. He and Moody must have conferred for an hour. Bail hearing’s set at Van Nuys.”
“And Whitman’s still here?”
“Yeah. Moody wanted to hold him at Van Nuys jail, but the kid refused transfer until he’d talked to you. We’ve penned him solo, holed up in one of the padded numbers. High-profile case plus he’s a mafioso’s son. Davidson wanted him segregated.”
“A good idea.”