Luther wasn’t through. “They found two giris murdered up there the month before I got arrested.”
“Up at the ski resorts?” Richardson asked, looking puzzled. “I’m not from Colorado, so I wouldn’t know nothin’ of those murders.... How many murders did they try to pin on you?”
“Well, those two,” Luther said. “I was a suspect. They didn’t really try to pin me, you know, but they questioned several people, like I say, you know, they’d go down where my girlfriend at the time worked, and they would ask her questions and get her upset, and leave her there cryin’.”
Richardson asked about the sexual assault. Luther shook his head, “Well, I’m not gonna go into all the details on that, but I picked a girl up at a bus station, you know what I mean, and, uh, you know, it ended up in an assault. It was more of an assault than it was a sexual assault, but you know how they do things.”
Luther complained that he’d been screwed by the system. He was due for mandatory parole after about six years, but ten hours before his release they changed the rules on him. “I ended up serving ten years, ten months and three days.”
The ex-convict squirmed in his seat and mentioned that he’d have to leave for work soon. Richardson knew he needed to speed things up. In trying not to alarm Luther, he had gone slow, but if he didn’t get it done now, chances were the next time, if there was a next time, it’d be with a defense attorney present.
Maybe if he could convince Luther that the investigation still centered on Byron and his brothers, he could buy a little more time. “Could you come to Lakewood tomorrow, so we can sit drown and talk some more? Byron, J.D., Tristan—all these people have lied to us. Now, we gotta go back and talk to them again.”
Luther grimaced like he’d eaten something rotten. “Like I told you, they know that there was no foul play on my part. They know they seen her leave there. You know, even if there is foul play, they suspect that, you know, she’s lyin’ up somewhere. She’s a girl that had a serious drug problem in her past, you know that, right?”
Richardson struggled to keep the anger out of his eyes. “No,” he said. “What kind of drug problem?”
“She hung around with a couple of dealers,” Luther said. “Snorted cocaine, was, uh, you know, heavily addicted to the chemical...”
“Was she snorting that night?” Richardson asked.
“No. No. Not in front of me if she did,” Luther said, shaking his head.
Richardson decided it was time to ask the question that had been hanging fire ever since his telephone conversation with Luther was interrupted by the presence of Debrah Snider. “What kind of sexual contact did you two have up on the hill? Honestly. I’m not gonna call your girlfriend up and say, ‘Debbie, guess what?’ But I want you to be honest with me.”
Luther nodded. On the way back, he said, they turned off the highway and went to a little parking spot on the mountain above Golden. Richardson pictured the dry and barren hills outside of the town; one had a large “M” painted on its side for the Colorado School of Mines, a top-notch engineering college.
It was cold and windy, Luther continued. He smoked a joint. “Then we did some kissin’ and some pettin’ and stuff, which led to a little quick intercourse thing, you know what I mean?”
Well, they hadn’t been the first words out of his mouth, Richardson thought, but just about the first chance he got. A quick little intercourse thing? Luther made it sound like an afterthought.
“In the car?” the detective asked.
“In my car.”
“Front seat? Backseat?”
“Front seat. They fold back.”
“Passenger side? Your side?”
“It was on her side. She was drivin.’ It was just a little quick intercourse thing. She got very upset about it.”
Suddenly, there was the sound of the front door opening. Luther said it would probably be his girlfriend, Debrah Snider.
Quickly, Richardson asked if he could get her to stay outside for a few minutes. He pretended it was because he didn’t want Luther’s girlfriend to hear about the sex with Elder, but he had another reason. Someday, he might want to question this woman, and he didn’t want her trying to recall Luther’s version of this conversation.
A moment later, a woman came into the kitchen. She was a slight woman with long, curly brown hair that hung nearly to her waist. She wasn’t beautiful nor unattractive, just plain, sort of outdoorsy.
The woman he assumed to be Debrah Snider didn’t seem particularly surprised to find her boyfriend talking to a couple of guys who introduced themselves as Lakewood cops, only that Luther hadn’t left for work yet. He laughed. “It’s ’cause I’m being questioned. Um, they’d like you to leave for just a few minutes. Can you go take a run around the block maybe?”
Debrah Snider stared at him for a moment, then nodded. When she left, Richardson rolled his eyes like they were prepubescent boys caught by their mothers with a Playboy magazine. “Geez, terrible timing for a girlfriend walking in.”
Luther laughed and shrugged, then got back to his story. “Like I say, Cher got upset about it. She had these feelings for Byron, and she did it kinda out of spite. Evidently, she, you know, she made me believe that she didn’t sleep around a lot, although we did a little quick thing in the front seat of a car. In fact, afterwards she threw up on my back seat.”
Richardson’s mental notebook was working overtime. People with head wounds or concussions often vomited. Another possibility was forced oral sex, which usually produced the same reaction.
An ex-convict like Luther knew that if the police laboratory crews ever started going over his car, they’d find the vomit and possibly be able to trace it back to Elder. He needed a good story to explain its presence.
“How come she threw up?”
“She just got sick to her stomach.”
“No oral sex?”
“No oral sex. It was just straight intercourse. Neither one of us were fully unclothed... it was just like a heat of passion thing. Real quick.” She drank a few beers up in Central City, he added, and then she helped him drink a bottle of cheap red wine.
Richardson changed the subject to what happened after Luther brought Cher back to Byron’s apartment. He didn’t want his quarry settling in on any one part of his story.
“She left after saying something to Byron.”
“Never wrote a note or nothin?” Richardson asked innocently.
“No, she didn’t write no notes. She was there like about thirty seconds.”
Richardson nodded. He looked at Heylin, who had remained quiet during the interview, as if to ask if he wanted to ask any questions. When Heylin shook his head, Richardson said they were about done but might need to contact him again.
“What for?” Luther asked. Now it was his turn to scowl.
Because, Richardson said, with all the new information he’d have to talk to the Eerebout boys again. He shook his head and said he couldn’t quite figure out why they said some of the things they had.
“When you get a simple case,” he went on, “like a missing person, I mean, this is a simple case, and you go talk to the—her boyfriend, who’s the last person to see her, and they sit there and lie to ya and give you this whole story...” Richardson threw up his hands.
Luther tried to explain. “Well, they didn’t necessarily lie to ya, you know what I mean?”
It was the opening Richardson was waiting for, a good opportunity to demonstrate just how angry he was with Byron Eerebout. “Oh no,” he said, “he lied like hell...”
“He just didn’t put my name into the—”
Heylin jumped in. “He denied knowing you.”
Richardson quickly added, “He denied everything. He denied her comin’ in. He denied the whole shootin’ match. That’s what I’m sayin’. He wasn’t just a little lyin.’ He was deceptive from day one on this thing.”
The detectives figured that if they continued to heap the manure on Byron Eerebout, Luther might star
t worrying about what his young friend would do if the cops turned up the heat. Sow a few seeds of distrust. At the same time, they kept up the pretense of taking Luther into their confidence.
“What’s relieving is to talk to somebody that’s... that’s talkin’ to us, and tellin’ us the truth,” Richardson said, “because we been poundin’ walls down tryin’ to figure out what in the heck’s goin’ on, and why is Byron tellin’ us one thing, and someone else tells us another, and nothin’s addin’ up ... and then you come into the picture...”
Obviously, he added, it was now going to take some time to unravel all the different stories. He needed Luther to come to Lakewood after the detectives had a chance to talk to the Eerebouts again.
Luther shook his head. No, he didn’t really think that’d be necessary. He’d been cooperative, but like he’d said from the beginning, he didn’t trust cops... not since his experiences in Summit County. “This fuckin’ guy bald-faced sat right there and lied that I gave him a fuckin’ confession when I didn’t. I mean, I’ve given you guys a statement. I have nothin’ further to say...”
Uh oh, Richardson thought, here it comes. The door was starting to swing shut.
Heylin took one last shot. “If we developed some questions from talkin’ to these other guys, we can approach you again, right? I mean, there’s gonna be follow-up questions after we talk to all the other guys and...”
Luther invoked the magic words that cops have hated since the Miranda warnings became the accused’s bill of rights. “Well, I’m gonna insist that there be an attorney present if that’s the case.”
Heylin shrugged; they couldn’t let on that they were disappointed. “That’s your... that’s your choice.”
“I’ve been burned,” Luther continued. “And you people can’t get me again like that. I think that’s only reasonable that I protect myself as fully as I can.... I do retain full rights ...”
Richardson looked hard at Luther. So the guy wanted an attorney? That pretty much shot any reason to keep the gloves on. In a way, he was relieved to drop the buddy-buddy act. He didn’t like Luther. It went beyond the Cher Elder case, even the Summit County rape. There was something wrong with this guy behind the cool blue eyes. He was passive as hell around other men, but dangerous as a rattlesnake when alone with women. A real Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. That much was clear.
“Well, you have all the rights in the world, and you aren’t under arrest—” Richardson began.
Luther interrupted. Maybe the detectives were just barking up his tree and that of the Eerebouts’ because they had no place else to turn. Cher could have met with foul play after leaving Byron’s. “You people keep dead-endin’ at Byron’s house. That’s why you keep goin’ back to him.”
Heylin answered for his partner. “We have zip on her gettin’ molested goin’ from Byron’s to the grocery store where her car was found. But we’ve got all these lies that we’ve gotta sort through.”
As he spoke, the men got up from the table and walked toward the door. Outside, Richardson looked over at Luther’s blue Geo Metro, the car that Karen Knott had described from the last time she had seen her friend. “Do you care if we just look in your car?” he asked.
“I don’t see why not,” Luther shrugged.
“Well, I don’t wanna make ya mad,” Richardson said sarcastically as he walked toward the car, still holding his tape recorder in his hand where it could pick up the conversation. “I’ve never seen such a defensive group of people over a missin’ person in my life.”
Luther wasn’t backing down. “Well, you keep shootin’ them little innuendos, you know what I mean, about us bein’ defensive. Well, it could be because we’re not trustin’ of the law. Them boys... their father spent years in the penitentiary. All of their father’s friends spent a lot of years in the penitentiary. They seen how the guards work down there, you know, they’re the most vicious bunch of fuckin’ chicken farmers you ever seen in your life down there running’ that spot.”
“Would Byron hurt a woman?” Richardson interrupted.
“Naw. Maybe another guy. Self-defense.”
“Why is a man your age hanging out with these kids?”
“When I went to the penitentiary I was a kid myself,” Luther replied. He met the Eerebout boys when they were little and came to visit their father in prison. They were good kids, he said, they hadn’t really lied to the detectives. They were just trying to protect a friend. Convict code, honor among thieves and all that.
Richardson waved his hand. “We do this for a livin.’ You aren’t the first convict we ever come across in our careers.”
“But I’m sure that they didn’t come to you with open arms and want to tell you everything they knew, either,” Luther shot back. “Like I say, these boys were raised by a convict. They have somewhat the mentality, you know? You don’t tell on nobody. You don’t give the cops no information. You know what the drill is. I understand you guys gotta job to do, but I think that you guys are spinnin’ your wheels in the wrong section.”
Richardson looked in the driver’s-side window. He could see a large stain on the backseat behind the driver’s side. Immediately, he saw the implications. Luther was trying to feed them a story to explain why a crime lab would find body fluids.
Heylin looked in the window on the other side. They had a report that Byron and his brothers were suspects in a number of burglaries, including one in which some tools were taken from the garage of a man named Thomas Dunn. The detective saw a circular power saw on the backseat with the name Dunn inscribed on the handle. “Is this your saw?” he asked, pointing.
“Mmm-hmmm.” Luther nodded.
“It’s stolen.”
Luther swallowed hard but stayed cool. “I bought it off some guy in a bar down in Lakewood, at Whiskey Bill’s. I gave the guy ten bucks for it. Would you like it?”
Heylin ignored the offer and instead reached in and grabbed the saw. “We’re going to take it. Byron’s been named as a possible suspect in some burglaries and this guy named Dunn is missin’ some saws. Now, you gotta saw with Dunn’s name on it.”
Further inspection revealed tools that had been reported missing from other burglaries in which Byron was a suspect. Again, Luther claimed to have purchased them from the same long-haired “biker type” at the bar.
“You guys aren’t doin’ no burglaries, are you?” Richardson asked.
“Hey, like I said,” Luther said putting up his hands, “I just got out of the fuckin’ penitentiary... and I ain’t gonna bind myself up with a bunch of fuckin’ stolen shit.” He was glaring at the detectives. He accused them of coming to Fort Collins on the pretext of looking for Cher when they just wanted to nail him for some small-time burglaries. “This is all a fuckin’ smokescreen.”
Heylin answered. “Tom, this ain’t no smokescreen and you know it. It’s a legitimate missing person. I happen to glance in the car and look what’s in it. I know what the fuck was taken from a burglary. Don’t pin it back on us.”
But Luther was growing more agitated, pacing up and down by his car. “Worst case scenario is happenin’ right here,” he said pointing a finger at Richardson’s chest.
“I told this girl right here—” now he indicated Debrah Snider who was sitting in her car next to the Geo Metro—“I told her the year before I got out of the penitentiary. It’s the worst thing that I fear. You people are tyin’ my name to any type of fuckin’ shit and then riding me until my fuckin’ chin falls off.”
Richardson had heard enough. In all probability, this asshole killed Cher Elder, and now he was whining like a beat dog. “Well, I hate to burst your bubble here, but I didn’t know you existed until about three hours ago,” he spat. “You’re sittin’ here sayin’ that we’re houndin’ you, and pursuin’ you, and tryin’ to pin you. We didn’t even know you were alive, bud, until you called my office.”
Luther looked stunned. But Richardson wasn’t done with him yet. His eyes darkened beneath his black eyebrows an
d bored into Luther. It was his turn to point a finger at Luther’s chest. “Don’t give me this crap that we’ve been tryin’ to pin you on crimes.”
Richardson looked like he wanted to rip into Luther on the spot. To diffuse the situation, Heylin noted that it was Luther who said Elder threw up in his car. They were just checking out his story when he spotted the stolen tools.
Luther exploded. “You wanna verify,” he yelled, “you wanna verify that she threw up, man, smell right there.” He pointed his finger to the backseat. “Smell right there! Put your nose down right there, man.”
Heylin raised his hands in mock surrender. “That’s good enough for me.”
As they drove away, Richardson looked back. Luther’s girlfriend had gotten out of her car and was standing next to him, but the ex-con just stood there with his fists clenched, staring after them.
Richardson had drawn first blood, but he knew it was far from over. “This is going to get personal between me and Mr. Luther,” he muttered, “real personal.”
Chapter Twelve
April 20, 1993—Breckenridge, Colorado
As much as Sheriff Morales expected a call, when Detective Richardson asked what he knew about Thomas Edward Luther, it still sent a chill up his spine. “Who’d he kill?” was as much a statement as a question.
Over the past ten years, Morales had kept track of Luther. Every time that the convict appeared in court or at a parole board hearing, he was there to recount what had happened to Mary Brown. “It was a sudden, vicious, unprovoked attack,” he’d say. “I believe he will always be a threat to women.”
There was no question the two men hated each other. They glared at each other from across every room they shared over those ten years, Morales’ soft brown eyes holding their own against the intense blue stare of Luther.
Tom Luther was 180 degrees from everything Morales believed in. He wasn’t just a rapist, he was a chameleon who could appear to be the sensitive listener, any girl’s friend—until she said the wrong thing or didn’t go for his “ladies’ man” approach. Luther was a predator and a true sociopath. His troubles were always someone else’s fault, and he’d never expressed a moment’s remorse for what he had done to Mary. In fact, he’d tried to have her killed so that he wouldn’t have to pay for his crime.
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