Proof of Innocence

by Patricia McLinn

  The sheriff narrowed his eyes. “A word. Nothing official. Report to me. And don’t make it so I can’t come back to him. Now, what about connections with Pan Wade’s murder?”

  “Nothing solid.”

  “But?” Gardner prompted.

  “But here’s a thread runs through both,” Dallas said. “Money.”

  “Sex,” Maggie said at the same time.

  The sheriff’s grimace might have been intended as a grin. “Two threads. Neither exactly earth-shattering. How many murders don’t involve one or the other, if not both?”

  Not many, Maggie conceded as they walked out.

  She glanced at Carson’s unyielding and unrevealing face.

  What about a third thread frequently woven in?

  Revenge.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  As Carson pulled the outside door of Shenny’s open for her again, Maggie turned to him and Dallas. “I’m asking the questions this time.”

  She lengthened her stride to preserve the head start they’d given her, and went straight to the pony-tailed bartender.

  “We have a few more questions.” She kept it quiet, but couldn’t do anything about two stool-sitters watching them.

  Barry heaved a sigh, gave the bar a wipe, and jerked his head toward the far end, protesting when they got there, “I don’t have time and I told you everything I know about Laurel’s murder — which is nothing.”

  Monroe and Carson joined them. She didn’t look away from Barry.

  “It’s interesting how often a murder investigation surfaces other crimes.” She let that hang.

  Barry’s face wasn’t bad, but he shifted his weight.

  “How’s business since Laurel’s body was found?”

  He seemed confused, but said, “Great. Everybody wants to come to her hangout — that’s what the paper called Shenny’s. Tips are good. Everybody’s real generous when they think it might give them the inside scoop.”

  “But you keep the inside scoop to yourself, don’t you? Especially when it’s rewarding. Say that nice shiny new Wade Auto truck you get every year.”

  Dallas had taken a call from the sheriff as they’d arrived and relayed that Gardner said his deputy confirmed Barry had driven a new truck with a Wade Motors sticker each of the past four years.

  “I’m in a position to do him good — talking up his cars here. He’s grateful. That’s all.”

  “Or maybe he’s grateful because you’ve done him good another way. Have to be something ongoing to keep getting trucks. Some service you’re doing him. Or — here’s a thought — something you’re not doing?”

  Barry puffed up with indignation. “I don’t know what you’re driving at, but—”

  “We’re driving at what you might know that would make Rick Wade grateful enough to want to see you in a brand new truck each year since — now, how long has it been?” She locked eyes with the bartender. “Four, nearly five years.”

  Barry dropped his head, indignation deflating.

  “Interesting timing. You said you’d told us all you knew about Laurel’s murder, what about Pan’s?”

  His head jerked up. “What? Whoa. You’re talking crazy, lady. It has nothing to do with — uh, anything.”

  “Two young women murdered, found in the same place — they might have a lot to do with one another.”

  “Not with me,” he insisted.

  “Tell me about her.”

  His mouth sagged. “Pan? What about her?”

  “She frequented this place. What did you talk to her about? Who’d she come in with?”

  He’d started shaking his head before she finished the first sentence. “I knew her to say hello, but she was strictly on Janice’s side.”

  “The restaurant,” Dallas murmured.

  “Yeah,” Barry said eagerly. “She came in often enough, but to the restaurant. I don’t know that I ever saw her on this side. I told you honest what I knew about Laurel, and I’m telling you honest I know nothing about Pan Wade. Nothing.”

  He started to step back.

  She didn’t have enough to push him on the trucks or — by extension — a connection to Wade. Only enough to make him edgy, though that could do more softening up than a week of questions.

  But among the things Bel and Landis had taught her was to make it clear you decide when the interview’s over, not the interviewee.

  “Are you saying that to your knowledge Laurel had no connection to any of the people affected by the murder of Pan Wade?” The question was meant to close off any you-didn’t-ask-that excuses.

  His eyes flickered. “Didn’t say that, now did I?”

  Maggie concentrated on keeping her face still. “What connection or connections did she have?”

  “Well, it wasn’t like she was involved in the murder.” Barry glanced at Dallas and Carson, either for confirmation or hoping they’d rescue him.

  They said nothing.

  “What connection or connections did she have?”

  “It was what you said before — about people affected by Pan’s murder. One of those things, you know. Not like it was the first time for either of them, or nothing. Only not with each other ’til then. Odds were they’d get around to each other by and by. Only reason to remember was it was right when Pan got killed. That’s a connection, I guess.”

  Maggie pieced together those fragments. “You’re saying Rick Wade was having an affair with Laurel Tagner four and a half years ago?”

  Barry smirked. “Yeah, I’m saying. Those two went at it like—”

  “That’s enough.” Carson’s voice was low and cold.

  For the first time, Maggie shifted focus from Barry.

  Wouldn’t Carson be more surprised if he were hearing for the first time that Pan’s husband had been having an affair with Laurel when Pan was murdered?

  On the other hand, his training involved controlling and masking emotions. Plus, she’d seen a good number of criminals put on convincing acts.

  “All right, I get it. Just the facts,” Barry said. “She was Laurel Blankenship when it started, about this time of year, making it five years back, but otherwise, yeah.”

  “How do you know?” Maggie asked.

  “She told me. And one night after closing — about a month before Pan got killed — I was heading out, and saw Rick’s pickup with the dealer tags. Headlights hit them and I saw them doing it. No mistaking.” Barry chuckled. “Bet the poor slob who bought that Wade pickup didn’t know how it was christened.”

  “Was the affair still going on when Laurel was killed?”

  “No way. Stick with somebody that long, either of them?” He rubbed at the bar with a rag. “Come to think of it, I never saw them together after Pan got killed. Laurel got together with Eugene not long after.”

  “Who else knew?” Dallas asked.

  “Don’t know. Wasn’t much talk at the time, now I think about it. Not one Laurel bragged about. There were two kinds with her. The ones she kept close, like money tucked in her bra — only a few of those — and the ones she flashed around to impress folks.”

  “But she told you,” Carson said.

  “Yeah,” Barry said, with no hint of defensiveness. “She liked telling me things. I don’t run my mouth. She liked talking — liked it a lot — and who else was she going to tell things to? Tagner after she bagged him? The judge? That sour sister of hers? Besides, she was entertaining. In her way.”

  “Sounds like you were fond of her.”

  “I guess you could say — Hey, wait a minute. Are you saying—? You got to be shittin’ me.” He laughed. He looked at Dallas and Carson, as if sure they would get the joke. “Doranna would kill me if I screwed around on her. And God help me, she’d know. Listen, I gotta get to work. It’s not like I can tell you anything that’ll help find who murdered those two girls. Honest.”

  * * * *

  Dallas took Maggie’s arm and demonstrated a surprisingly strong grip when she would have gone toward the restaurant.r />
  “We should question Janice about connections between the victims,” Maggie protested.

  “What she had to say about Pan is in the file. As for Laurel, she knew her as little as Barry knew Pan. There are those who come here for a pleasant meal, and those who don’t. The two sides of Shenny’s are divided by a nearly impenetrable wall.”

  Outside, she said, “Barry knows an awful lot about someone supposedly a customer. Not a bad motive for Doranna.”

  Dallas shook his head at her subtext. “He’s right about Doranna. She’d kill him, not the other woman.”

  Maggie snorted. “We need corroboration about this supposed mystery lover in Laurel’s life. It only comes from Doranna and Barry.”

  “It matches with the calls,” Dallas said. “Need to see if Sheriff Gardner’s caught up with that beautician in Lynchburg.”

  “Hope he doesn’t call her a beautician.” Maggie started the car. “He won’t get a thing out of her.”

  Carson spoke for the first time. “Wade will be at the dealership. First right, then take a left at the stop sign at the bottom of the hill.”

  “You think he was Laurel’s new love interest? Or repeat love interest. But — Oh. You want to talk to him about having an affair with Laurel five years ago? Barry’s information needs to be corroborated before we’d talk to Wade.”

  “With you or without you I’m talking to the sonuvabitch.”

  No clenched jaw, no narrowed eyes, no ticking muscle in his cheek, yet J.D. Carson’s face displayed the same attitude she’d heard in his voice. Implacable.

  If she’d gotten him to show that face at the trial the jurors would have known he was capable of murder.

  Discomfort pulsed through her.

  Which was stupid. She should be accustomed to reminders of her failure to get him convicted.

  “Generally, I would agree with you, Maggie,” Dallas said, as if discussing a hypothetical legal nuance. “However, in this case, what we lose by not having more information from additional sources, might be offset by talking to Wade before he likely hears what Barry has told us. Besides, the husband is the most likely suspect.”

  She started backing the car out. “He had an alibi.” She hadn’t looked up the details of that alibi yet. Maybe tonight.

  “Ah,” Monroe drew out the pleased syllable, “you did consider him as a suspect back then.”

  “I wasn’t considering suspects. That was all done before I got handed the case. I read the file. If Wade had been a strong suspect, Carson wouldn’t have been on trial.”

  “It’s refreshing to find such trust in one of your temperament, Maggie. Naiveté, I might even say. Of course, you haven’t spent much time in a community like this.”

  “You’re saying Wade’s family name protected him? Are you going to spout conspiracy theories next?”

  “Family is the greatest conspiracy of all. Especially in Bedhurst County.”

  “If you’d believed that, you would have used it at trial to bolster reasonable doubt. Besides, as I said, Wade had an alibi.”

  She glanced in the rearview mirror, braked to a stop, then twisted around to Dallas.

  His gaze never wavered from the back of Carson’s head as he said, “Unlike a prosecutor, a defense attorney must balance sometimes conflicting elements of his obligation to his client.”

  She got it. She just didn’t buy it.

  “You expect me to believe Carson instructed you not to go after Wade?” She leaned back against the driver’s door, looking at the man in the passenger seat. He offered only his profile. Implacable had lost no ground. “There’s sure no love lost between you and Wade. If you and Dallas seriously want to sell me that, you better start talking.”

  “Alibi,” Carson said.

  “Yeah, Wade had an alibi. Still, Monroe could have thrown enough dust over any alibi to make the jury wond — Shit.”

  Because Rick Wade had been the most likely choice for the defense to bring up as an alternative murderer, she’d studied all the material on him, having Ed and Nancy re-interview him, and preparing to interview him herself if necessary.

  It hadn’t been necessary, because the defense hadn’t brought up Wade. That unused prep work had sifted to the bottom of her mental file on v. Carson.

  Until now.

  “Wade’s alibi was Laurel.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  “Well, well, well.” Dallas murmured. “We arrive at last.”

  “Wade said he and Laurel were working on a charity event, and according to the sheriff’s report, Laurel confirmed it,” she said.

  She hadn’t known then how unlikely it was that Laurel Blankenship bothered to work on a charity event, but she did now.

  “You knew he was having an affair with Laurel,” she accused Carson.

  His silence sat dense with unvoiced thoughts.

  She faced Dallas. “Why the hell didn’t you use it at trial?”

  From the back of Carson’s head, his gaze dropped to his hands, bringing his wrists together.

  His hands had been tied.

  Bull.

  “You let your client dictate that you would not use that information? C’mon. Reasonable doubt for tossing some mud, and you wouldn’t use it?”

  “Tossing mud?” Carson repeated, low and cool. “No. Smearing Pan.”

  “But you’re willing to have it come out now? Why?”

  “You think after that—” His head jerked back toward Shenny’s. “— it won’t come out? If Barry has been blackmailing Wade and his leverage is gone because the authorities know, that affair will be too juicy a piece of gossip to keep to himself.”

  “In addition,” Dallas said, “if Charlotte did, in fact, know her sister’s amorous partners, that’s another means for the information to emerge.”

  “If she knew and hasn’t said—”

  A horn blared. Maggie jumped, looked over her shoulder at a rusted white pickup. She gave an apologetic wave for blocking the exit.

  As she faced forward, Carson’s profile brought back a moment in the trial.

  The one moment during her cross-examination he had not met her gaze fully.

  The one moment when he had looked toward his attorney.

  The moment when she had asked if he and Pan had talked about her marriage.

  Q. Did you also talk about her marriage to Richard Wade at that time?

  A. Pan did.

  Q. Pan did? You were silent on the subject?

  A. Yes.

  A waitress from Shenny’s had already testified she’d observed Pan weeping and had heard her refer to my husband. Maggie had thought Carson was being cute, acknowledging the bare minimum of what was already in the record.

  Had he, instead, been reminding his attorney of the limits of what he would testify to?

  “There was one thing in the original file that was interesting. Pan went to Rambler Farm the week before she died and had a long conversation with Charlotte. Perhaps another try at Charlotte is in order.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  “Four and a half years ago, you told the sheriff Pan Wade came here the week before she was killed. Why did she come here?” Maggie asked.

  Charlotte shook her head.

  The two of them were in a glassed-in room Maggie suspected was the sunroom described in the statement by the youngster from the landscaping crew.

  When she and Dallas and Carson had arrived, they were admitted by Allarene. The Rambler Farm household was finishing dessert. The judge welcomed them all into the dining room. But Charlotte insisted she and Maggie withdraw, while “the gentlemen enjoy their cigars and brandy.”

  Good Lord, what century was this woman from?

  Not that Maggie objected. Talking to Charlotte solo suited her fine.

  She’d started by asking about Wade’s alibi for Pan’s murder.

  “I have no idea if he was with Laurel,” Charlotte said coolly. “They were not at the meeting for the charity auction. I was.”

  More qu
estions didn’t garner more details, so she’d moved on to Charlotte seeing Pan shortly before her murder.

  “What are you denying? That you said that? That Pan came here the week before she died, because we have other statements—”

  “I did not say it to the sheriff. That would have been tolerable. Instead, he sent an underling to get my statement.”

  Definitely not this century.

  “What did Pan talk about?”

  “I’ve said all this before.”

  Maggie could try to hammer at Charlotte, or she could finesse. “We find having people repeat information frequently brings up more detail. Especially with people who have a lot on their minds — many responsibilities. Someone with many other things to deal with can’t remember everything the first time. Repetition brings more out with people like you.”

  Charlotte bought it. “She said she came by to visit. But it wasn’t long before it became clear she was troubled. About her marriage to Rick. She cried.”

  “She confided in you because you’d known each other so long?”

  “Yes.”

  “Any other reason?”

  Charlotte gazed at Maggie’s face, but she had no sense of the other woman probing past the surface.

  When Charlotte didn’t answer, Maggie suggested, “Perhaps she confided in you because of your connection — an indirect connection — with the immediate cause of her marital problems? If there’d been gossip — and you’re far too socially astute to think there wasn’t — when the gossip reached Pan, she might naturally come to you and—”

  “I hope you are not saying I was the one who told Pan — or anyone else — her husband was screwing Laurel all over this county.”

  Maggie had actually been angling toward the idea of Pan coming to Charlotte as a source of information. But this was too damned interesting a thread not to follow.

  “It would make sense. Your sister, your friend. Who better to let the wronged wife—” This past century stuff was contagious. “—know the situation?”

  “Who better? Laurel.”

  “What?”

  “Laurel,” Charlotte repeated distinctly, as if Maggie’s hearing were the bar to her understanding.