"He could meet somebody in a bar and next thing you know, Charley has a new best friend. The two of them are going to buy a boat and go to Alaska fishing for King Crab or travel to South America where Charley, a renowned archeologist, has discovered ancient Mayan treasure. The friend, of course, would make a financial investment in the non-existent boat or the rights to the Mayan treasure or whatever happened to be the victim's dream."
"I see."
She shook her head slowly. "Sometimes I think Charley actually believed he was going to do these grandiose things. He was very convincing."
She'd believed him when she first met him, throughout their two-month whirlwind courtship and even for a couple of weeks after their marriage. She'd wanted to believe. Her parents had hated Charley immediately, so that had gone a long way toward validating him and ensuring that she'd marry him.
The motorcycle repair shop he'd promised to help her open had happened, though the "partnership" element had never materialized. He hadn't produced the financial backing or the clientele, but, to give the devil his due, he had helped her find the courage to do it, to quit her most recent default job as a real estate agent.
Daggett's left eyebrow lifted again. "So," he said, "the deceased was a small-time con artist. Did he have a day job?"
A small-time con artist. That made it sound crude and insignificant. "Yes, he was a con artist who never made the big-time," Amanda admitted. "And no, he didn't have a day job. He worked at being a con artist twenty-four seven. He was dedicated to his career."
The detective made a few notes, then again directed his stern gaze to her. Apparently there wasn't going to be a "good cop." "Was Charley involved with another woman?"
Amanda stiffened, but waved a hand negligently as if the matter were of no import, was not totally humiliating. "Women, not woman. Yes, Charley's charm and lack of morals extended to other women."
"Can you give us names?"
"We were never formally introduced."
Daggett's lips almost curved into a wry smile, but he caught it just in time. Yeah, she might like him under different conditions. "Did you catch him with another woman?"
"I never actually caught him in the act, or I might have shot him. Justifiable homicide." She glared at him, daring him to contradict her assessment. "But they called him. He came home smelling like cheap perfume and wearing his shorts backward. If we went out together, women would come over and flirt with him. A couple of them called me to ask me to let him go. One even came by our home. I felt kind of sorry for her. She stood at the door and cried and begged me to let her see Charley. I told her I'd toss his sorry ass out and let her have him but he wasn't home. He wasn't home a lot."
"Were you jealous of these women?"
"Of course." The first time, she'd been insanely jealous, but after that initial betrayal, she'd simply hated...the women, Charley and herself.
"So you've had personal contact with some of these women, but you don't know their names."
Amanda shrugged. "I can give you first names and descriptions. None of them were around for more than a few days. Charley wasn't into long-term relationships." Except with her. She wanted to get away, and he didn't want to let her go. Typical Charley.
Daggett leaned back, blew out a long sigh, and rubbed his square, stubbly jaw. "You know, you're not being very helpful. It's in your best interest to give me another suspect."
Amanda threw up her hands and opened her mouth to protest, but Brian interrupted her. "May I remind you that our presence here is on a voluntary basis. If you've finished questioning my client, we'll leave now."
The cop scowled at Brian, then forced a pseudo-smile. "I appreciate your coming in," he said, his voice dripping with honeyed sarcasm. "And while I don't want to be a nuisance, I do have a couple more questions, if you don't mind."
Brian gave a curt nod.
"What did you and the deceased fight about the day he was murdered?"
"I advise you not to answer that."
Daggett dropped his pen on the table and looked frustrated. "We've already taken statements from the neighbors. It's not exactly a secret that Mr. and Mrs. Randolph were arguing about their divorce. I'd just like to get a few details so we can find out what happened in that apartment on the day of the murder."
Amanda didn't really want to discuss her problems with the police, but she didn't want to look guilty, either. She supposed she'd already admitted most of the sordid details anyway. What difference did a few more make?
She clenched her hands in her lap and ignored her attorney. "That morning we had another court date for the divorce. I thought it was finally going to happen, and I planned a motorcycle trip out of town as a celebration. But his freaking lawyer got another freaking continuance. I decided to take the trip anyway, even though there was nothing to celebrate. Then Charley called and said he needed me to bring him the gun."
Daggett's eyes widened slightly. "The gun?" he repeated.
"Amanda, I advise you not to say anything else," Brian said, his tone adamant.
Amanda looked at him and shook her head. "This is all going to come out. I'm not going to say anything that will make me look guilty because there isn't anything that could."
Brian and her father exchanged worried glances.
Amanda rolled her eyes, then turned her attention back to Daggett. "Charley gave me a gun when we got married. Said it was for my protection. I thought that was a little strange at the time, but it made sense when I realized what he did for a living."
"And he wanted you to bring this gun to him?"
"Yeah. Said he'd sign the divorce papers if I'd bring him the gun. I didn't believe him. I figured he just wanted to sell it. He persisted, of course. He's good at that." She frowned. "He sounded funny, kind of tense, stressed. I could tell he really, really wanted that gun, and I thought maybe, if he wanted it badly enough, just maybe he might sign those papers. So I went to his apartment."
"You told him you were bringing him a gun?"
"Yes."
"But you didn't?"
"No way! If he'd signed those papers, I would have taken it to him. But I know better than to give him what he wants and expect that he's going to give me what he promised."
"So you went to his place without the gun?"
"Yes. My bike was already packed for the trip, so I rode over to his place. He opened the door just a crack and asked me if I had the gun. I told him he had to give me the signed papers first. He freaked out, started yelling at me, and I started yelling at him. I tried to get inside so we could yell at each other in private, but he kept me from coming in, and that made me really mad."
"He kept you from coming in? Did he have company? Somebody he didn't want you to see? A girlfriend?"
"I thought about that. But usually when I catch him red-handed, he gets…" She spread her hands, searching for the right word. "He turns into Super-Conman. Ultra slick. Really lays on the charm."
"He didn't do that this time?"
"No, he just kept shouting at me to go home and get the gun, and he was adamant that he wasn't going to let me into his apartment. So naturally I kept trying to get in."
"You thought he was hiding something in his apartment?"
"I wasn't really thinking rationally at that moment. He didn't want me inside his apartment so I was determined to get in."
"You threatened him."
"I advise—"
Amanda interrupted her attorney's admonition. "Brian, there's no point in my denying it. Yes, I threatened him. I'm sure all the nosy neighbors heard me, that time and a hundred other times. I threatened him on a regular basis. But I never actually threatened to kill him. It was always something like—" She waved a hand negligently, trying to call up some of her promises of bodily harm that didn't involve Charley's genitalia and a rusty serrated knife. "Like pouring hot wax in his ear while he slept or drilling a hole through his forehead, inserting a peg and hanging a potted plant from it…stuff like that."
Da
ggett grimaced. "And you don't think those things would have killed him?"
Amanda shrugged. "Probably. But obviously I didn't do any of them. They were just fantasies." That probably didn't sound right. "Anyway, I never threatened to shoot him. That's far too quick and easy, not enough suffering."
Her father cleared his throat. Amanda refused to look at him. She didn't have to. She could envision his reproving expression.
"So after you threatened Charley, he let you into his apartment?"
Amanda shifted on the hard, wooden chair. "Sort of. I stomped on his foot with my motorcycle boot, and when he bent down, I shoved past him."
Daggett flinched. "When you were inside his apartment, did you see anything unusual?"
"Greasy pizza boxes, dead French fries, empty beer cans, dirty socks. The usual. Charley was not a neat freak."
"So the place was a mess. What happened after you got inside?"
"Nothing. We yelled at each other some more, but it was even more pointless than usual. He was obsessed with that stupid gun, and I was obsessed with divorcing him. Finally I threw up my hands and left."
"This gun Charley gave you, was it a .38 revolver?" Daggett asked.
"Yes. But you already knew that, didn't you? I registered the gun. Law-abiding citizen."
"Would you be willing to bring your gun in for us to test fire so we can eliminate a possible match to the bullet that killed your husband?"
"No," Brian said, but Amanda overrode his protest.
"Yes. I'll be happy to do that," she stated firmly.
"Good." He shuffled his notes. "So, what time would you say you last saw Charley?"
"About five-thirty. I left his apartment, got on my bike and rode away. I didn't look back because I knew he'd be standing in his doorway, watching me." She shivered. "He always did that, went to the door and stood there and watched me, trying to look pitiful and make me feel bad. Surely at least one of those neighbors saw him after I left."
Daggett shook his head, his face inscrutable. "The neighbors say you ran out of the apartment, slammed the door, raced down the stairs and rode away as if the devil was chasing you, but Charley never opened the door or came out."
"Oh." Amanda bit back a brief, unexpected feeling of rejection. It was a good thing if he didn't come to the door and look longingly after her. No reason to feel rejected. "Okay, but what about the gunshot? Surely all those people who were fascinated with our fights would have heard a loud gunshot if I blew him away while I was there. They apparently heard every word I said, and I can't shout nearly as loud as a gun."
Daggett shook his head. "Sofa cushion. Homemade silencer. Nobody heard the shot. Nobody saw Charley after you went inside his apartment."
Amanda shifted uneasily. Apparently her father and Brian hadn't been overreacting when they'd insisted on accompanying her or when they'd warned her to say nothing. This was starting to get scary. They might really arrest her. Put her in jail.
"Who found Charley?" she asked quietly.
"One of the neighbors. Said he went over to borrow a cup of sugar."
Amanda snorted. "More like a can of beer or a baggie of marijuana."
Daggett lifted an eyebrow but made no comment. "When Charley didn't answer the neighbor's knock, he tried the door. Said Charley often left it unlocked. Sure enough, it opened, and the neighbor walked in to see Charley's body. He went home and called the cops."
"I wonder if he got his cup of sugar first."
Daggett looked down at his notes but not before she saw the edges of his lips twitching upward. He'd like to smile, she thought, but he sure wasn't going to let her catch him at it.
"We'd really appreciate it if you'd bring in the gun and a list of anybody Charley had dealings with," he said, lifting his gaze to hers, his stern look restored, "victims of scams, rejected girlfriends, buddies, anybody."
"I'll bring in my gun, you can compare it to bullet that killed Charley, and when it doesn't match, we'll be done, okay?" Amanda moved to the edge of her chair, ready to rise, ready for this to be over.
But the detective leaned back, obviously ready to continue.
"How did you get along with Charley's family?"
At least that was an easy question. "Charley didn't have any family. His parents were both dead by the time he was ten, and his younger brother drowned a year later." There was, she thought, no need to go into the horrible details. None of Charley's life story was pertinent to the present situation.
The silence in the room reminded her of the silences she typically caused at family gatherings. It would seem she had expanded her silencing ability to police interviews.
Amanda stole a glance at her father. He was looking at his knees. That wasn't a good sign.
Brian appeared to be as puzzled as she at the reaction to her uncomplicated answer.
"Both your husband's parents are very much alive," the detective finally said, "as well as two brothers, three sisters, several aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews and too many cousins to count. Half the population of Silver Creek, Texas, is related to your deceased husband."
Chapter Five
The walls of the room seemed to move closer, making it harder to breathe. Silence whirled around her, trapping the words inside her head where they bounced from one side to the other and back again, echoing over and over.
"Both your husband's parents are very much alive, as well as two brothers, three sisters, several aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews and too many cousins to count. Half the population of Silver Creek, Texas, is related to your deceased husband."
Her oft-repeated assertion that every word out of Charley's mouth had been a lie took on a new depth of meaning.
Charley had a family, a large family. She had in-laws she'd never met, never even known existed.
Charley had claimed to be an orphan from Waco, had told her in graphic detail how his father, a twice-convicted drug-dealer, had been shot by an aggrieved husband when he'd caught Charley's father with his wife in a local motel the night Charley was born. Then when he was ten, his mother, a prostitute, died in his arms of a drug overdose.
If his parents had any relatives, none stepped forward to claim Charley or his five-year old brother, Grady. Both had been sent to foster homes. Before a year was out, Grady drowned in the Brazos River, though Charley had taught him to be a strong swimmer. The couple had later been charged with physical abuse by another foster child, and Charley felt sure they killed his brother. As for Charley's experience, he lived in five different foster homes where he'd been used and abused and discarded, finally running away to Dallas when he was sixteen.
Amanda had cut him a lot of slack, excused much of his bad behavior, because of his troubled childhood.
Now as she contemplated the extent of his duplicity, she realized all those lies had tipped the scales in her decision to marry him. When she'd been indecisive, he declaimed sadly that he didn't blame her for not wanting to marry someone who was the son of an adulterer and a prostitute, someone who'd never been a part of a family and would likely be a poor excuse for a husband and father.
She'd protested that her own family, while intact, was certainly no model for a '50's TV series, and to prove she didn't hold his unfortunate circumstances against him, she had, of course, agreed to marry him.
Lies, lies and more lies.
He'd manipulated her as surely as he'd manipulated all his other victims.
If he weren't already dead, she'd kill him. Rip his lying tongue out of his filthy mouth, cut off his arms and legs with a chain saw, then shove his body in a wood chipper set on slow.
She glanced across the room to her father. He met her gaze briefly but couldn't maintain eye contact. Judge Caulfield could stare down the toughest lawyer or criminal in the courtroom, but he was a marshmallow when it came to his daughters. Charley had a family, and her father had known it before today. A long time before today, she'd guess from his reluctance to face her.
Detective Jerk, on the other hand,
was studying her intently. "You're saying you didn't know anything about your husband's family? He never took you home to meet his parents? No holiday dinners with the in-laws?"
Amanda glared at him. She'd just realized the enormity of her husband's deception, been confronted with the probability of her father's, and this creep wanted to twist the knife. She drew in a deep breath, straightened her spine and leaned forward, returning the detective's gaze defiantly. "What part of con artist do you not understand? Charley conned me just like he conned everybody else."
"He married you."
"Con artists don't marry their victims?" She flipped her hand through the air. "Give me a break. You hear about that on the news every day."
The Ex Who Wouldn't Die Page 4