That was the first time Channing had heard that word used in connection with the murders.
“Assassinations?”
Wirrer cocked his head slightly.
“Why, yes. I suppose that’s the proper term when political figures are killed, isn’t it? I mean, just because Mr. Abdella did not hold an elected office, doesn’t mean the killings aren’t politically driven, right? I think we have to assume that some person or persons out there can see the progress this administration has made in combating crime and poverty, and these murders are a misguided response.”
“Mr. Mayor,” Channing said, “I don’t think you’re fully aware of the effort this killer is—”
“Mr. Mayor,” Captain Wyche broke in from across the squad room. “The media is set up for the press conference. I’ve got the head of the task force, Detective Hatley, standing by to answer any questions you have before you address the media.”
Wirrer acknowledged the captain and turned back to Channing.
“That’s my cue. I’m sure that with you two on the case, this thing will be wrapped up in no time. Stop by my office sometime, Jackson,” said the mayor, not meaning it. “We’ll catch up.”
With that, Mayor Wirrer fell in behind Wyche, and he and his staff headed toward a door leading out of the squad room. As Wyche held the door open for the mayor, he shot Channing a look that could not have been misinterpreted as anything other than contemptuous.
Alone again in the room, the detectives sat back down at Channing’s desk.
“Friends with the mayor?” said Lambert with mockingly raised eyebrows. “I had no idea you were so connected.”
Channing gave a slight smile and shrugged.
“I’m not. A few months ago, he hung a medal around my neck and that’s the extent of our friendship. He used the whole thing to kick off his Steel Spirit anti-crime initiative. I’m surprised you don’t remember it.”
“I remember it. But the mayor acted like you two really knew each other.”
Channing shook his head.
“Just being a politician, I guess. And I suppose that’s why he wants to put an assassination spin on this case. Why not play the role of the brave leader standing up to the city’s criminal population? It makes for good print, I suppose.”
“And you don’t think it’s possible that there could be some element of truth to that theory?”
“No,” Channing replied.
“Because these killings are too…purposeful.”
Channing thought about that word. Purposeful.
“Yes.”
“And you’re convinced that whatever message the killer is trying to send, it’s personal.”
“Yes,” answered Channing.
“Any other reason?”
Channing thought for half a minute before answering.
“Assassinations have a political goal. But, historically, the end result is the opposite of what was intended by the assassin. Julius Caesar is knifed—a series of sadistic emperors step in. Lincoln gets killed—the South is hit with harsh measures during Reconstruction. Martin Luther King is shot—he becomes a martyr and the civil rights movement carries on.”
“Your point being?”
Channing lowered his head and pondered his next words.
“Have you seen anything in this killer’s behavior so far that would suggest that the consequence of each and every action hasn’t been thought out?”
Lambert shook her head.
“Aside from that, even the dumbest gang-banger in the Hill District knows that if you start killing city officials, any crackdown on crime is going to increase tenfold. No…these killings are indicative of restrained and calculated rage.”
“You think this guy—assuming it’s a man—who’s been punching holes in lungs, cutting throats, and transforming bodies into grotesque billboards, has been demonstrating restraint?”
Channing carefully thought it over, looked at his partner, and said, “So far.”
Lambert waited for Channing to expound, but nothing more came. She broke eye contact and slid the computer’s keyboard in front of her. She searched for more stories about the kickback allegations against Culligan, but as Channing was informed on the night of the murder, the story seemed to lose traction and vanish from the media outlets.
“We need to talk to Bryan Clifton,” Lambert suggested. “It seems odd that he threw out these accusations and then let it all go.”
“Or, the reporters followed-up on the story, discovered it wasn’t true, and dropped it. Journalists don’t have a fondness for writing retractions and apologies.”
“True,” said Lambert. “I’ll go run a PennDOT check on him and pull his state tax information to get an address. He may still live up in Butler. Are you up for a road trip?”
Channing said, “Absolutely. When you pull his info from the Department of Transportation database, see what kind of car he drives. And I know the Detective Sergeant there. If we need to go up there, I’ll give him a courtesy call to let him know we’re interviewing someone in his jurisdiction.”
“And Hatley?” asked Lambert.
Channing smirked, “You heard the captain. Hatley’s very busy briefing the mayor. We wouldn’t want the worker bees to disturb him.”
Lambert typed on the keyboard to retrieve an address for Clifton and asked, “Do you think he knows that the leader of the hive is called the queen?”
Channing said, “You know…I think he might.”
– – –
The drive to Butler took thirty minutes. Morning traffic was light and for most of the drive, the two detectives sat in silence not wanting to address the elephant in the room. Channing knew that Lambert was debating if she should ask any more questions about Jayakody’s basement. He was feeling guilty for telling her anything at all. His burden was his alone. Sharing that with his partner—whether she asked for it or not—was unfair.
Anticipating the uncomfortable trip up north, Channing had snuck a few sips from his flask prior to hopping in the car. The shaking and sweating were becoming manageable with less and less alcohol, but were still a problem to contend with. He chewed his gum and tried to stretch his legs in the limited space in front of the passenger seat. His muscles were sore from the run, but a kind of sore that gave him pleasant recollections of a time of normalcy.
Bryan Clifton’s trailer was a quarter of a mile off Route 422 in the Riverfront Estates Trailer Park. Channing wondered if the facts that the community was miles from the nearest river and the diminutive muddy lots could hardly be classified estates, were even considered before the name was chosen. Lambert slowly navigated the car over a broken asphalt road that contained the remnants of speed bumps and long-ago-faded yellow road paint.
Lot 23 sat on the edge of the park. An old Ford Bronco sat off to the side. An Igloo cooler and fishing pole that looked like it hadn’t been touched since the summer sat next to the wooden steps leading to the front door. Lambert pulled half the car off the road, put it in park, and read off the plate number on the Bronco. Channing pulled out a notepad and silently read the plate number he had written down earlier when checking Clifton’s state Department of Transportation records.
“It’s a match,” Channing confirmed and opened the car door. “Let’s go hear what he has to say.”
Lambert took a stride up the step to the trailer. Her knuckles hit duct tape as she knocked on a storm door that mostly consisted of dirty glass held within a thin aluminum frame. She backed down the steps to allow room for the door to open. Channing saw a dingy, ripped curtain move behind a small window at the end of the trailer, and then heard footsteps coming toward the door. When the wooden door behind the storm door opened, it did not reveal Clifton, but instead a woman who had obviously been asleep.
With one hand rubbing tired eyes on a face that was probably much younger than it looked, the woman pushed open the storm door and gave the detectives a curt, “Yeah?”
Lambert pulled one side of her coat back
to reveal a badge and said, “Pittsburgh Police, ma’am. We would like to talk to Bryan Clifton.”
The woman yawned, scratched a head covered by blonde hair that looked like it would have the feel of a Brillo Pad, and asked, “Pittsburgh?”
“Yes, ma’am,” answered Lambert.
“Bryan don’t ever go down there. Whatever it is, he ain’t done it.”
“We’re not accusing him of anything, Miss…”
“Twickle. Loretta Twickle. I’m Bryan’s girlfriend.”
Lambert nodded and continued, “We think he may be able to help us with a case we are working in the city. Is he home?”
Twickle started to speak, but stopped and glanced over to Channing, eyeing him suspiciously.
“You with Pittsburgh, too?”
Channing pulled back his coat to reveal his badge. “Yes, ma’am.”
The groggy woman closed the storm door a few inches and said, “You can get badges anywhere. How do I know you two are the real thing?”
Channing gave the woman a disarming smile and said, “The Butler Police know we are here. If you want, call them and ask for Detective Sergeant Hopkins. He’ll verify who we are. We can wait out here while you make the call.”
Twickle opened the door slightly and asked, “Backhoe Hopkins?”
Channing grinned widely, shook his head, and said, “Well, not everyone can get away with calling him Backhoe. These days he insists on ‘Detective’ or maybe ‘Darrel’ if he likes you. And I’d sure want to stay on his good side.”
A hint of a smile appeared on Twickle’s face and she said, “He’s a good man. My younger brother got busted with some stolen tractor parts. He was already on probation and was looking at doing some time. Hopkins talked to the owner of the tractor and convinced him not to press charges and let my brother do some work around his farm to make up for everything. Hopkins didn’t have to do that.”
Twickle looked down at her feet and seemed to be part remembering, part debating. She looked up at the detectives and said, “Bryan’s over by the fairgrounds. They’re building a new community center over there and the guy who got the contract is letting Bryan help out.”
Channing looked at the Bronco and glanced back at Twickle who understood the unspoken question.
“I just brought the car home a while ago. I work midnights over at the hospital. One of the guys Bryan works with came by in the van and picked him up this morning.”
“The van?” Lambert asked.
“You know, one of the company vans they use on jobs.”
Lambert raised an eyebrow, “What color are their vans?”
Twickle thought for a moment and said, “I don’t know. I’ve only seen white ones, but they may have more.”
Lambert looked at Channing who showed no reaction.
Lambert spoke up. “Is he back working for Harper Construction?”
Twinkle’s expression immediately changed to one of anger with a trace of fear.
“Those bastards can go to hell! They’re the whole reason Bryan has to go around begging to assist on simple jobs. He should be running projects, not looking for scraps of work to do.”
“Ms. Twickle, do you know why Bryan stopped working for Harper Construction?” asked Channing.
The woman closed the storm door and yelled through the glass. “Why? You want to ask why? Why did the company have to be greedy? Why couldn’t Bryan mind his own business and not ask so many questions? Why couldn’t he keep his mouth shut and just do his job when he overheard the phone calls to that politician down in…”
Twickle’s eyes flared with rage and she slammed an open hand onto the glass.
“That’s why you’re looking for Bryan, isn’t it? You think he killed that son of a bitch Culligan! Get out of here and leave us alone! How much do we…do I have to lose?”
The wooden door slammed and the detectives heard muffled crying and the sound of a glass or plate thrown against a wall. Lambert looked over to Channing who signaled they should leave.
In the car, Channing pulled out his cell phone started dialing. Lambert asked, “Who are you calling?”
“Backhoe. If Clifton gets the same idea his girlfriend just had, he may run…or fight.”
“We were looking at this guy as a witness. Should we be thinking suspect?”
Channing finished dialing and started speaking into the phone. He gave a quick summary to his friend with the Butler PD and arranged to meet him in a parking lot near the fairgrounds. He hung up the phone and gave Lambert quick directions to the meeting place.
As the car pulled out of the trailer park, Channing said, “Maybe.”
“What?” asked Lambert.
“He would have access to a van. He would presumably have access to ropes and pulleys. We still have no idea what kind of weapons the killer is using. Maybe some sort of construction tools we aren’t familiar with?”
“Or maybe he built something with his own hands,” Lambert interjected. “Something hard to identify.”
“Could be,” Channing agreed.
“But,” Lambert replied. “There are problems with that aren’t there?”
“Yes.”
“It doesn’t explain Abdella. As far as we know, Abdella had nothing to do with Harper Construction.”
“Right,” said Channing.
“And the trailer…” Lambert thought aloud.
Channing nodded. “The trailer.”
“It wasn’t the worst I’ve ever seen, but far from meticulous. There was dirt all over that door, fishing gear and a cooler out in the open—and it’s much too cold to go fishing. And even without seeing the inside of the trailer, it didn’t have the feel of…”
“Purposefulness,” Channing finished the sentence.
“Yes,” Lambert agreed. “That place was too disorganized.”
The two drove along 422, watching the scenery of open fields transform into a more urban landscape as they moved closer to the fairgrounds.
“Backhoe?” said Lambert.
Channing smiled and said, “He says he’s not proud of it, but secretly I think he is. Hopkins told me that when he was a teenager, he and some of his friends would drink a few beers, search the roads for construction sites, power up some of the larger pieces of equipment, and drive them around. Back then, crews would just leave the keys in the equipment out here. Who’s going to steal a bulldozer or a—”
“Backhoe,” said Lambert.
“Right. Well, Hopkins was apparently notorious for doing this on Saturday nights, and this one time he got really drunk and drove a backhoe right down Main Street at four in the morning. The problem was, the one cop on duty happened to be getting coffee at the only convenience store that was open, and he stood and watched as this kid drinking a beer passed by on a giant yellow backhoe.”
“So, your friend the cop got his nickname from committing grand larceny.”
“Not really. If the cop had simply pulled Hopkins over and took his drunk ass home or to juvie, that would have been that. But on that night, Darrel Washington Hopkins was drunker than usual. He saw that cop pull out of the convenience store parking lot and he made a turn down a one-lane road. The cop pulled in behind the backhoe, but Hopkins just kept on driving. Thus ensued the slowest pursuit in the history of the Butler Police Department. For the next six miles, Hopkins drove that monster at the furious speed of five miles per hour, until the thing ran out of gas. At one point, the officer got out of his car and tried to run up beside the thing, since his car was too big to pass, but Hopkins pelted him with beer cans and swerved all over the place. Once the backhoe died, Hopkins peacefully went off with the officer and a legend was born.”
Lambert let out a little laugh and then fell silent.
“I’m jealous.”
Channing waited for her to continue.
“I would never admit this to the others, but stories like that are what you miss out on when you’re a black face in the department.”
Channing was confused and
asked, “How so?”
“Well, how did you meet this guy, Backhoe?”
Channing responded, “I was working a case where an ecstasy dealer named Jamison was killed in West Park. The main suspect lived up here. Backhoe and I found the guy, spent six hours interviewing him, and eventually got a confession. We ended up staying in touch and getting together every once and a while. When I was in the hospital, he visited every few days. He’s a good man. Why do you ask?”
“Because if it had been me…if I had caught that case and come up here to God’s country and paired up with some rural cop with a nickname of Backhoe, do you really think we would have hit it off to the point that he would have shared that story with me? Do you really think your friend would become friends with me, visit me if I was in the hospital? You may not see it, but there is a certain camaraderie among white cops that’s exclusionary by nature. Sometimes it’s not intentional, but sometimes it is.” Lambert stared at the road in front of her, then slowed the car to make a turn into the parking lot adjacent to the fairgrounds. “I’m not criticizing you. I’m just saying…it makes me jealous sometimes. It’s not easy for me to admit that.”
Channing spotted an unmarked SUV with tinted windows in a corner of the parking lot and said, “That’s the one. Pull up behind him.”
The car came to a stop and Lambert reached for her door handle. She suddenly felt a hand on her right arm. Channing was looking at her with a dead serious expression.
“Tina,” he said, catching Lambert off-guard with the use of her first name. “You’re right. I can’t imagine what it’s like for you to have to battle barrier after barrier. I know psychologically, the subconscious mind tends to make one feel a certain comfort level with those who are similar in looks and behavior. It’s probably the case in many of our relationships, just as it is probably the case with me a Backhoe. I’m sure it would have been different if you had caught that case and had to work with him. Backhoe and I are basically carbon copies and we were bound to feel a certain comfort level with each other. Or, as you said, a sense of camaraderie. But I want you to know that I don’t ever want you to feel excluded around me. When we get out and talk to Backhoe, I don’t want you to feel like you don’t belong. And believe me, if I get the sense that he’s treating you any different because you are black, I’ll pick his ass up and throw him out into the road. Deal?”
Measure Twice Page 12