“Okay.” She was mixing up the two Joes in her life. “Do you know anything about Joe’s friends?”
Another spoonful of cornflakes. “All gone or in prison.”
“Yes, Joe Senior’s friends are all gone or in prison. What about Joe Junior’s friends?”
A blank look. “The boy?”
“Yes, the boy. What about his friends?”
She gave him another blank stare. Then she said, “Who are you?”
“I’m Detective Peter Decker from Greenbury Police. I called an ambulance for you to go to the hospital last week. Do you remember that?”
She didn’t answer; then she gave a small shake of the head, indicating no.
“Do you remember how you got here? In the hospital?”
Her eyes moistened. “A car accident.”
Again, she was mixing up two traumatic incidents. It wasn’t the time to correct her. And now that she was talking, there was the possibility that her thoughts would become more coherent as time passed. “You look better,” Decker said.
Another stare. “Who are you?”
“I’m a policeman. My name is Peter Decker. I came to visit you in the hospital after you were admitted.”
She stared at him with intense eyes. “A policeman.”
“Yes.” Decker paused. “Someone broke into your house, Jaylene. Do you remember that?”
“Ask the boy.”
“I’m trying to find Joseph, but I can’t seem to locate him.”
“He was there.”
Decker bit his lip, trying not to rush things. “Joseph was there when someone broke into your house?”
“Someone broke into my house?”
“Yes. What do you remember about that?”
“Ask the boy.”
They were going in circles. Decker said, “What would the boy say if I asked him about people breaking into your house?”
“I don’t know.” Jaylene pushed aside her cornflakes. She picked up a coffee cup, but then put it down. “It’s cold.”
“I’ll get you some fresh hot coffee.”
“Thank you.”
Decker walked over to the nurses’ station and snagged a busty, short woman who looked to be in her sixties. She had gray, curly hair and light brown eyes. Her tag told Decker that she was Aileen Jackson, RN. “Excuse me, could someone get Jaylene Boch a fresh cup of hot coffee?”
Her eyes narrowed. “This is a restricted area, sir.”
A smoker’s voice. “I’m Detective Peter Decker from Greenbury Police.” He showed her his badge. “I needed to talk to Mrs. Boch regarding her missing son, but her memory isn’t sharp. I’ll come back tomorrow and see if she’s a little less confused. In the meantime, can I get her a fresh cup of coffee?”
“You shouldn’t be here talking to her, especially after yesterday.” A hard stare. “You guys don’t give up, do you?”
“You guys?”
“You and the two who were here yesterday.”
Decker took a deep breath. “Who was here yesterday?”
Aileen sneered. “Don’t you people talk to each other?”
“Ma’am, what are you talking about?”
“The two policemen who came here yesterday, right after we moved Jaylene into her hospital room. They said they needed to talk to her about something important, but as soon as they entered the room, her blood pressure and heart rate shot straight up. I ordered them to leave, had to shout at them, actually. It took us a while to stabilize her.” When Decker didn’t answer, Aileen suddenly because cautious. “Fellow cops, right?”
“Not my colleagues.”
“They were policemen. I saw their badges. They were legitimate.”
“If you saw their badges, did you get their names?”
“Well, no.” Aileen swallowed hard.
“They didn’t say their names when they identified themselves?”
“No, but they showed me their badges.”
“Which should have had their names and ID numbers.” When Aileen went silent, Decker said, “Which police department were they from?”
“I think it was Hamilton PD.”
“They were from Hamilton PD?”
“I think.”
“Were they in uniform?”
“No.” She glared at Decker. “You’re not in uniform.”
“No, I’m not. I haven’t worn a uniform in thirty years.” A beat. “Was one of the detective Vietnamese, by any chance?”
“No. Two white men.”
“Okay. Young? Old?”
“I don’t know if I should be talking to you.”
“Actually, I’m the one you should be talking to, because I went through the security desk as witnessed by my fancy stick-on visitor’s name tag. Plus, you know my name and where I’m from and I didn’t cause Jaylene Boch to have a panic attack. What did the two men look like?”
“They were older white men. Nothing remarkable about the way they looked. I didn’t give them much thought until they came into the hospital room and Mrs. Boch’s vitals went through the roof. We had an emergency situation.”
Decker’s jaw began working overtime. “I’m going to call someone from my department to send a police guard to watch her room. No one who isn’t on staff goes in or out without my permission.”
“Why should I take orders from you? I don’t even know who you are.”
“Yes, you do,” Decker said. “I’m Detective Peter Decker of Greenbury police, and right now, I’m the one in charge. But just so everyone feels okay with this, I will clear this through the hospital administration. I have to go back to the room to keep an eye on her. I don’t think it was an accident that her vitals went nuts after she saw those two men. They might have had something to do with the attack.”
“What attack?”
“Jaylene Boch was attacked.” Decker headed back until he was in front of the doorway to Jaylene’s semiprivate room. Nurse Jackson had followed him. He said, “You didn’t know?”
“I knew she was brought in here severely dehydrated.”
“Because she had been tied to her wheelchair and left to die. Her son is missing. She needs to be protected. No one in or out without my permission no matter how many badges they flash.”
“They looked legitimate—their badges.”
“The men may have been legitimate, ma’am, but without names, I can’t verify anything.” He looked at the forlorn lady. “It’s not anyone’s fault, Ms. Jackson. They might be detectives. I just have to find out who they were.” He took out a cell phone. “I need to make a couple of calls. Could we get her a fresh cup of coffee, please?”
“I’m not leaving you alone. I don’t know if you’re spinning me a yarn or what.”
“Then could you call someone to get her a cup of coffee?”
“I’m not budging from this spot, and you really shouldn’t be using the cell phone out here. There’s an area right down the hall.”
“I’m not budging, either, Nurse Jackson. It looks like we’re at a Mexican stand-off.”
“I could call security.”
“You’re not going to do that.” Decker brought up his Favorites list on his cell phone and punched in Tyler’s name. “Then you’ll have to admit you were snowed by two men posing as cops.”
“They might have been cops,” she said. “You said that yourself.”
Tyler’s voice mail kicked in. Decker left a message and hung up. “Yes, I did say that.” He thought a moment. “I know you said that you don’t remember what they looked like. But maybe if you sat with a police artist.”
Her face softened. “Maybe.”
“Could I arrange something? It would really help us out.”
“If it would help, I suppose I could.”
“Could you get Mrs. Boch a fresh cup of coffee?”
“She shouldn’t be drinking anything too hot. In case you hadn’t noticed, she has limited control over her right arm.”
“Can you still get her a fresh cup of warm coffee?�
��
“I’ll see what I can do.” She stared at him. “You want a cup?”
“That would be grand. Just black—no cream or sugar.” Decker smiled. “See, it’s better to be friends than enemies, right?”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Aileen countered. “With my enemies, I know where I’m at. With friends, you never, ever know.”
Chapter 24
With a Greenbury uniform outside Jaylene Boch’s room, Decker spent over an hour coordinating with the hospital. Although there were forms to fill out and hurdles to jump, he found the administration to be cooperative. It took over an hour for the paperwork, and once that was out of the way, Decker left St. Luke’s for work. Once in his car, he excoriated himself for being so slow to find the two men in the Toyota Camry. Greenbury was leisurely, downright soporific, compared to the pace of Los Angeles, but a homicide is a homicide, and he should have gone at it with full force. After beating his chest in the Latin mea culpas and the Hebrew al chaits, he stopped the rumination and was back in business mode. From his car, he called up Wendell Tran and gave him a brief update.
Over the line, he said, “I’m going back to Greenbury to pull out a police Identikit. Aileen Jackson, the nurse who actually saw faces, agreed to meet us there in the afternoon. Would four o’clock work for you?”
“Randy’s got a court case, but I’ll be there.” A pause over the phone. “Who are these guys, and why do you think they’re from our police department?”
“I’ll answer your second question first. The nurse believes that the badges she saw were from Hamilton, but she isn’t sure. I don’t know if they’re actually from your department or just pretending to be.”
“Well, nobody I know in Hamilton was assigned to go to visit Jaylene, but I’ll check just to make sure I didn’t miss anything. My opinion is they’re frauds.”
“I agree,” Decker said. “These two guys may be the same ones we found on CCTV leaving Canterbury Lane the night Brady Neil was murdered. They may also be the same ones who broke into Lennie Baccus’s apartment and stole the original Levine murder files. What those two things have in common is anyone’s guess. But we do know is that Jaylene Boch panicked when she saw them. I’ve got a uniform watching over her room.”
“From Greenbury?”
“Until we know that they’re not associated with Hamilton—present or past—I think that’s wise.”
Tran reluctantly agreed. “I’ll update Baccus. Have you gotten anything out of Jaylene?”
“No, she’s still confused. I’m hoping that her brain will clear with time. Her panic at seeing those two men is the most revealing thing we have so far.”
Tran said, “You know what bothers me?”
“Yeah, why Jaylene wasn’t murdered along with the boys. I can’t answer that. Maybe she had a heart attack or a stroke with all the stress. I’m sure whoever did it thought she’d die.”
“Why not just kill her? Why leave it up to chance?”
“I don’t know. That is the most surefire way to make sure she wouldn’t talk again. Just whack her head.” A thought. “Getting rid of Boch Junior was the main goal. She may have been an afterthought.”
“Still, if he—or they—killed two people, why not three?”
“Sparing her life does seem weird.” Decker paused. “Maybe he knew her, had a soft spot for her.”
“If she knew him, all the more reason to kill her, not just tie her up and hope she dies.”
“Yeah, you’re right about that.” Another pause. “Maybe he didn’t notice her at first. She heard what was going on and played dead. I’ve seen things like this before where families have been murdered, but one person is spared. The killer doesn’t perceive that remaining person as a threat—a child or a baby or an elderly person. The maniacal frenzy has subsided, the adrenaline rush is gone, he doesn’t have it in him anymore. All he wants to do is escape.”
There was a pause over the line. “Then why tie her up?”
“I don’t know, Tran. Could be he was intending to finish the job after he killed Boxer, but after the frenzy, he forgot about her. Maybe he was tying her up when Boxer came in and the murderer shifted his attention. Maybe he didn’t want to kill her, but he didn’t want her calling for help.”
“Did she have a phone nearby when you found her?”
“No, she didn’t. Maybe the killer took it, because Jaylene does have a cell phone number.”
“Makes sense.” Tran was quiet for a moment. “I’ll relay what you told me to the chief. I’ll see you at four.”
Decker hung up. When he returned to the station, it was a quarter to three and he was wiped out. Talk about adrenaline depletion. He was so tired that he poured himself a cup of rotten stale coffee. After taking a couple of sips, he spit it out.
McAdams and Butterfield emerged from an interview room, both of them wide-eyed at the bright artificial light. Tyler said, “Don’t drink that swill. Use the new pod machine I bought.”
“Not strong enough, kiddo. I need a caffeine fix.” Decker shook his head. “Not a lot of sleep last night, and age creeps up on you.”
Butterfield nodded. “Ain’t that the truth. Anyway, I was about to get Harvard and me some fresh cups from the new café across the street. I’ll pick you up something full strength while Tyler fills you in on our CCTV tapes.”
“Yeah, what’s going on?”
“Nothing so revealing as seeing their faces clearly, but we have a couple of side views. It’s definitely two people in the car, Pete, but we can’t even see if it’s male or female. They’re going by fast, and the quality is really poor.”
“We’ll work with what we have. How are we doing with our Camry list?”
“Nothing in the area looked promising, so I’ve expanded the search. I’ve also asked for any recently stolen Camrys. No luck on either front. Our next step is rented cars.”
“I’m working on a list of places within fifty miles,” McAdams said. “I’ll start making calls after we’re done looking at all the CCTV tapes. But if the car was stolen, we’re sunk.” He gave a small shrug. “Everything squared away at the hospital?”
“Jaylene’s got a guard on her.” Decker recapped what happened to Butterfield. “I have to organize my thoughts before Aileen Jackson comes in at four. Do we have anything in the way of a police artist?”
Butterfield smiled. “No. It hasn’t come up all that often.”
“Do we have anyone on the force who can draw?”
“Melanie Sarzo,” McAdams said. “She’s uniform. When I first came on, she drew me in a caricature.”
Butterfield grinned. “I remember that. It was really funny.”
“Funny is in the eye of the beholder,” McAdams grumped. “I’ve held a grudge against her ever since. But this’ll give her a chance to redeem herself.”
“I’ll contact her,” Butterfield said. “Four o’clock, right?”
“Yes. And while you’re making phone calls, ring up Lennie Baccus. She’s entitled to see who probably broke into her apartment. And there’s always an off chance that she’ll recognize them from somewhere else.”
“No prob.” Butterfield rubbed his eyes. “But first I’ll get us all some coffee. After the last two hours, I need to see daylight.”
It was a large interview room, but it held a crowd. Besides Decker, there was Melanie Sarzo, the artist cop; McAdams; Butterfield; and Radar from Greenbury. Representing Hamilton was Wendell Tran. Chief Baccus was due to arrive any moment. Lennie Baccus had the unique status of straddling between police stations. It was warm outside, and she was dressed in black cotton pants and a crisp white shirt. Aileen Jackson, the star of the show, had just come from work, so she was still in uniform.
“He had a round face . . .” Aileen was rifling through the police Identikit. “Kinda like this one.” She pointed to a figure. “Not as round. It was longer. A long, round face. Like a guy who might have had a long face when he was younger, but he gained weight and now it’s round.” A gl
ance at Decker. “I really don’t know exactly. I just saw them for a few seconds. My focus was on the patient.”
“Aileen, you are all we have,” Decker said. “Do the best you can.”
She nodded with grave solemnity. Whatever job she was assigned to was serious business. Twenty minutes later, they got their first peek at one of the two men who almost gave Jaylene Boch a heart attack.
Melanie Sarzo said, “Is there anything you’d like to add or subtract?”
Aileen stared at the rendition of Person of Interest #1. It took her several moments before she spoke. “Something’s off.”
“Take your time,” Decker said. “We’re here for you.”
Aileen said, “It’s the eyes.” Silence. “He gave me a death stare, I remember that. Not that I cared a whit. Glare all you want, just get the heck out the room.” A pause. “It was like looking into a vacuum. There was no there there.”
“Maybe his eyes were lighter?” Melanie began to erase the shading.
“No, it wasn’t just the color; it was something in the eyes themselves. There was no life in them.”
“When people are angry, their eyes dilate,” Decker said. “If his eyes were dark and dilated, it looks like you’re peering into a black hole.”
“Maybe.”
Melanie went from erasing the shading to darkening it. “Like this?”
“Kinda yeah. Except . . .” She paused. “Maybe the eyes were closer set? Like when you focus on a face that’s too close to you. The eyes go together. Am I making any sense?”
“Perfect,” Mike Radar said.
When Melanie made the changes, Aileen nodded. “Yeah.” Another positive nod. “Yeah, that’s it.”
Melanie handed it to Decker, who handed it to Tran. “Look like anyone you know?”
The man studied the likeness for a long time. “There are three station houses in Hamilton, and while I don’t know everyone, I know most people by sight. He doesn’t look familiar. He also looks way older than most of the guys I know.”
“Yeah, he looks around my age,” Decker said. “If he had been an officer or detective in Hamilton, he would have been active maybe ten to fifteen years ago. Most normal people retire from a real police force in their fifties.”
Walking Shadows Page 20