On the day I turned him in to Crow Wing County, Hawk told me if I had been betrayed and kept hostage for three weeks, I’d have taken the shot, too. I don’t know, maybe, but the jury would decide Hawk’s fate. It should have occurred to me earlier, but if he got a not-guilty verdict, my life might be in danger. I made sure I turned on the alarm system.
26
Wednesday, December 24
SHANNON WAS ALONE in the squad room when I checked in. “You look like shit,” she said. “Not sleeping well?” “Hawk called me about ten last night, stinking drunk.”
“He must be scared.”
“He mouthed ‘Fuck you’ during my testimony.”
“You can’t expect him to be thrilled with his life-long buddy testifying for the prosecution.”
I grimaced. “Then he shouldn’t have shot Paul in the back and told me about it.”
She shrugged. “If I’d been held captive for three weeks and my brother had been part of it, I’d been pretty pissed off, too.”
“Meaning?”
“I understand his rage.”
“And you think he was justified to shoot Paul in the back?”
“No, of course not, but I get why he did it.”
“I hope the jury doesn’t think like you do.”
She squinted. “Hey, are you worried he’ll come after you?”
“You’re damn right. He’s a crack shot, and if he’s acquitted, I’ll be looking over my shoulder.”
“Well, he’s guilty, so you should have nothing to worry about.”
“I hope you’re right. Have you heard back about the bone scan?”
“No, hopefully today. You’re coming for dinner tonight at my parents’ house. Right?”
“I’ll drop by, but I’m not sure about dinner. I’m also expected at the Bradley’s.”
“Oh.” She turned her back and pretended to read the bulletin board. “My family would be extremely disappointed if you don’t eat with us.”
“What time is dinner?”
“Six o’clock.”
She poured herself a cup of coffee and leaned against the table. “Mom suggested we move brunch to your house—she would bring everything.”
“Sure, fine. I stopped and bought Santa presents for the twins. You said you’d handle Luke’s.”
“Oh.”
“What?”
“I bought some, too.”
I scrunched up my face. “Why?”
“I wasn’t sure you’d remember. I’ll save some things back for their birthday.” “Whatever.”
“How’s the Donovan case going?”
Like old times, I shared my current theory on suspects and their motives. She listened, as she used to, and said she thought I might be on to something. “What will you do now?” she asked.
“Find the evidence I need. Put the screws to Grady LaMere.”
“Patrice said he’s spending Christmas with her family.”
“When did you talk to her?”
“Last night. She called to find out how I was doing. She also told me about David. I guess she assumed you’d told me. You used to tell me everything.”
Zing.
“It’s sensitive.”
“Well, it didn’t surprise me he was having an affair.” “Why not?”
“Do you remember the department picnic Patrice hosted at their lake house?”
“Of course. What happened?”
“He was too interested in the women.”
“Wasn’t he just being a good host?”
“Nah, he was seriously flirting.”
“Huh. I didn’t notice. Did Patrice say anything else?”
“Zabrina had a hard time at the memorial service and is super depressed. I don’t know what she expects. The girl’s life imploded.”
“True”.
I CONTACTED DETECTIVE RYAN to give him the lowdown, starting with the Shakopee interviews.
“What made you go to see his mother?”
“I took a long shot.”
“Well, it may have paid off big time. Want me to pick up Quinlan?”
“I think we should talk to him.”
“Okay, I’ll be in touch.”
I CALLED PATRICE to update her and ask if Grady was there.
“Cal, it’s Christmas Eve, and as much as I need you to solve this case, you will not disrupt my family’s celebrations. On December 26, he’s fair game.”
“All righty. So how did the kids take the news about Waldo?”
“I haven’t told them. What do I say? Merry Christmas, your father is a man-whore.”
I laughed.
“Speaking of which, can we possibly keep this out of the news?”
“If he didn’t kill Sonya, I don’t see why it would be newsworthy.”
“Of course he didn’t kill her. Look, I should go. My family’s giving me the evil eye. Merry Christmas to you and your family.”
“Same to you and yours.”
God rest ye merry gentlemen, deck the halls, and all that ho-ho-ho shit.
DETECTIVE RYAN CALLED ME mid-afternoon to inform me they’d picked up Quinlan. He asked if I wanted to be in on the interrogation. I said, of course I did. I immediately texted Shannon to tell her I was on my way to Minneapolis for an interview.
She texted me back: “Merry fucking Christmas.”
I replied, “I suppose I deserve that.”
I texted Dallas the same message about heading to Minneapolis.
She replied, “I thought we were okay.”
“We are. Love you.”
27
THE MPD HOMICIDE DIVISION was quiet on Christmas Eve. Those who could be home with their families were—except for work-driven assholes like me.
“You gotta see the film of the apprehension before you question Quinlan,” Martha Gill said.
“Was his mother home at the time?”
“No, he said she was at work. She’s an aide in a nursing home,” Ryan said. “He tried to slam the door in my face, but my steel-toed boot stopped it. Anyway, all I could see was the back of his shaved head as he bolted out his patio door. He has elaborate tattoos of medieval weapons covering his scalp.
“Anyway, he was five feet into the snow before he fell on all fours. I thought I had him, so I trounced through snowdrifts. Before I reached him, he got up and took off again. I tackled him about three yards later. He was facedown in the snow, in his stocking feet and no coat. I patted him down and found nothing but a snack-size plastic bag with remnants of weed in the pocket.”
Gill said, “I asked him where he was going without shoes. He said he didn’t know. Said he ran because he was scared.”
“We got him for fleeing but couldn’t get him to confess to murder, but you can give him a go,” Ryan said.
“But you gotta watch the film first,” Gill said.
I did and laughed along with Ryan and Gill as they reminisced the comical scene. Gill handed me a bottle of water.
“Give this to him. You can play the good cop.”
QUINLAN JERKED HIS HEAD UP and off his arms when the door opened—his eyes were screwy like he’d been sleeping.
“Robert Quinlan?”
“Yes?” he said.
“I’m Detective Sheehan from Birch County. I have some questions for you.”
He rubbed his neck as he moved his head in a circle. He smelled like weed and cheap aftershave. I set the bottle of water in front of him.
“Thank you,” he said.
“You’re welcome.”
I watched as he opened the bottle and gulped it half down. I could be imagining it, but my thought was Grady looked like him around the eyes. Same narrow face.
“Do you go by Robert, Rob, or Bob?”
“Robert or Rob.”
“Nice tats. Really great work. You have it done in the area?”
“Yeah, a place on Chicago in South Minneapolis. You inked?”
“No, I’m concerned the ink goes directly to the brain.”
The
muscles around his eyes twitched as he considered whether I was insulting him or joking.
“What do you do for employment, Mr. Quinlan?”
“I work at the airport.”
“Doing what?”
“I clean johns . . . okay?”
I spread my hands. “Nothing wrong with honest work. So, how do you know Brenda LaMere?”
He blinked a few times. “We’re old friends.”
“Before she made Shakopee Correctional her residence?”
He nodded. “We go way back. I knew her old man first.”
“How?”
“Orty and I went to high school together.”
“And were partners in the drug business?”
His head bobbed back and forth. “Okay, yeah, way back when.”
“Brenda calls you her boyfriend.”
He studied his thumbs as he rubbed them together.
“You visit her regularly. Don’t you?”
Quinlan hesitated. He took a breath and slowly released it through pursed lips. “I’ve gone to see her a few times. She’s lonely.”
“Who initiated contact?”
“She did.”
“How ’bout your old pal Orty? You visit his lonely ass, too?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“Tell me about Grady LaMere.”
“What about him?”
“I understand you’ve helped support him.”
“I do what I can.”
Bingo. Grady had another source of income.
“Took him under your wing? Taught him all you know?”
He closed an eye and winced. “I just watch out for him like Brenda asked me to.”
“He looks like you.”
Lifting a hand, he made a swipe across his mouth, then his eyes slowly met mine.
“He’s your kid, isn’t he?”
“Most likely. Never had the tests done.”
“Does Orton know?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“What’s gonna happen when Brenda gets out? Are you two gonna be together?”
“Hell, I don’t know what’s gonna happen tomorrow. You have to take life as it comes.”
“You’re a real philosopher.”
He cracked a smile.
“Does Grady know you’re his father?”
“Brenda told him when he turned sixteen.”
“How often do you see him?”
“Maybe monthly.”
“Have you met his girlfriend?”
“No, sir.”
“But you know who she is?” He took a breath and nodded.
“And you also know that her mother and grandmother have both been killed?”
“Yeah, Grady called to tell me. He was very upset.”
“But it was all planned, wasn’t it?”
“I know nothing about it.” He rubbed the side of his nose, scratched his head, then cleared his throat. He was displaying classic signs of lying.
I purposefully remained silent for a time, then said, “That Brenda.” I gave him a smile. “She has dollar signs in her eyes. She figured out a way to have it made in the shade when she gets out next summer.”
The red started creeping up his neck. He began fidgeting with the water bottle, ripping off the paper wrap.
“I bet Brenda’s pretty persuasive. Convincing you to off Grady’s girlfriend’s family, then abracadabra . . . the girlfriend is next in line for the inheritance.”
He screwed up his nose. “That’s absolutely crazy.”
“Crazy, huh? So where were you on the night of December eleventh and morning of the twelfth?”
“I don’t recall.”
“Come on, it’s not that long ago.”
“I’m sure I was working.”
“We’ll soon have a search warrant issued on your employment records, which means work schedule, phone records, and your credit cards.”
His left eye twitched. Twice. Three times.
“When was the last time you were in Dexter Lake?”
“I guess it was when I picked up my niece to take to her college interviews.”
“You have family in Dexter Lake?”
“My sister, Adelinda, and you know what? It could have been December eleventh. Yeah, it was, because her interview and tours were on Friday the twelfth.”
“What’s your sister’s last name?”
“Moore.” Wowzer.
“Is she married to Marvin?”
“Yeah, you know him?”
“I do. He worked for Sonya Donovan. But you know that, don’t you?”
“Actually, I have no idea who the man works for. I try not to talk to him. He’s not a nice person.”
“So you just happened to be in Dexter Lake when your son’s girlfriend’s grandmother was killed?”
“I was not aware I was.”
“Have you been to Kenwood lately?”
“Kenwood?” He laughed. “Yeah, like that’s my stomping grounds.”
“You three have high hopes, don’t you? Like the little ol’ ants and the rubber tree plant. Mm-mm. That’s quite a mansion Zabrina lives in. Isn’t it?”
“If it’s in Kenwood, it probably is.”
“But you’ve never been there, so you don’t know. Well, I have news for you that I’m sure you’ll be disappointed to hear.” I could see in his eyes his interest was piqued.
“Zabrina won’t inherit any of it until she’s thirty-years-old . . . thirty. That’s a long time. And I have a sneaking suspicion she’ll see the light sometime before that.”
His head dropped, a hand moved to his temple. They’d never considered she wouldn’t have immediate access to her money.
“Okay, Rob, you can make it easier on yourself if you tell me how it all went down. Maybe with your history of cooperating with the law, you can get some kind of plea agreement.”
“I . . . can’t . . . because I didn’t do anything.”
“Did you get your sis and brother-in-law to help you?”
“No. I didn’t have a thing to do with any murders. I had no idea Marv worked for that lady. A guy does a good deed and what does he get? Accused of murder.”
I continued for several minutes hammering him with the same questions phrased differently, but he gave me the same bullshit, so I walked out to find Ryan.
“You got a lot more than we did,” he said. “Gill contacted Robert’s mother. She’s home and has given us permission to search the apartment. Martha’s doing the paperwork on the search warrant. So let’s give our buddy a place in holding and go see what we can find.”
“Hopefully, my partner’s Smith & Wesson M&P, forty caliber.”
QUINLAN’S APARTMENT SMELLED like baked cookies and not marijuana. Ryan informed Quinlan’s mother we had a search warrant and asked her to have a seat on the couch, but she stayed standing in the middle of the living room, wringing her hands.
“Should I shut off the oven?” she said. “I’m baking Christmas cookies.”
“That might be best,” I said.
Sugar cookies were cooling on flattened brown paper bags on the kitchen table. Two cookie sheets were on top of the stove ready to go in.
Ryan asked if she could turn off the television, which was tuned to a game show. A cheap artificial Christmas tree stood in the corner—the kind with green metal limbs and little greenery. A few wrapped presents lay under it on a patchwork quilted tree skirt.
“Your daughter lives in Dexter Lake?”
“Yes.”
“And your son went to get your granddaughter to take her to college tours?”
“Yes, she had two in Minneapolis. Moriah’s such a smart girl.”
She gave the same date as Robert.
Ryan suggested I search Robert’s bedroom while he and Gill took other rooms. I snapped several photos of the room, which was organized and clean. Even the socks in his drawers were arranged by color. I hadn’t thought fastidiousness was hereditary, but perhaps it is, and there is hope for my messy toddler
s.
While searching the closest shelves, I found a half-pound bag of weed in a shoebox. I took photos of it and placed it on the bed.
Vents are poor hiding spots because the police always check them first. Robert’s bedroom’s cold-air return vent contained a nine millimeter handgun.
Gill stood in the doorway. “Is that your partner’s firearm?”
“Unfortunately not—this is a Glock, not a Smith & Wesson.”
“Well, since he’s an ex-felon and guns are no-no’s, we can arrest him on that. We’ll check the rest of the vents in the other rooms.”
While they did, I looked at the linen closet right outside of the bathroom. On the middle shelf of the neatly arranged linen closet were two fluffy, sage-green towels taking up as much space as six of the worn blue towels next to them.
“Ho-ho, here we go.” I snapped photos before I disturbed them to look at the labels: the sage-green were Ralph Lauren and the thin blue were Fieldcrest.
“Did you find something?” Ryan asked as he walked out of the second bedroom.
“Come look at this.”
“What?”
“Notice anything odd about the towels?”
“Not really.”
“See those two sage-green towels?”
He nodded.
Gill came up behind us. “The missing towels?”
“Yep. They’re Ralph Lauren just like those missing from Sonya’s pool area.” Ryan said, “Oh, I get it. The rest are all different colors.” “And a quarter of the size,” Gill said.
I pulled them off the shelf and placed them in two large paper evidence bags.
His mother said, “Why are you taking my towels?”
“Where did you get them?” Gill said. “Robert gave them to me.”
“When?”
“A couple weeks ago.”
Gill looked at me and grinned. “They are evidence and will be taking a trip to Birch County.”
“Why would my towels be evidence?” she asked.
“They connect your son to a murder that occurred the night he was in Dexter Lake,” Gill said.
Mrs. Quinlan’s hand went up to her mouth as she literally fell backwards onto the couch.
WHEN WE GOT BACK to the MPD downtown station, Quinlan was brought back up to the same interrogation room. Ryan sent me in alone.
Love 'Em or Leave 'Em Dead Page 21