by Todd Morgan
Alone, I wondered about the questions concerning my wife. When I was a detective, I had never put an innocent man in prison. That does not mean they were always guilty of the crime they were accused of. I took the case to the district attorney’s office and they decided to pursue it or not. They went to a grand jury who determined if there was validity to the charges. Then you had the judge and a jury. So it wasn’t all on me. But I never pushed it unless I was sure they were guilty of something.
The door opened. Their faces had hardened. I could read it in their eyes. They were sure I was guilty of something.
Randall: “We just pulled out the second car.”
Not a question.
Randall: “Your wife’s car. Adrian was in the back seat.”
I rocked back in my chair, palms to my eyes. No amount of training could prepare me for that. It was a physical blow, a punch stronger than any I had ever known, deep into my soul.
Randall: “Stella was in the trunk.”
The tears came.
Chapter Forty
I walked out of the station into a cold night. That’s what I had done in the interview room. Stood up and walked out. Randall and Larry may have tried to stop me. I hadn’t noticed. Stella was in the trunk and I was on my feet, moving in a fog. They would have had to put me in chains and behind bars to keep me. I would have resisted. Maybe they knew that. Or maybe they were showing me mercy. Randy, perhaps—not Larry or the lieutenant.
My Jeep was still at the quarry. I didn’t know how I was going to get home, only that I had to. I could walk to the Jeep or I could walk home. They were both within five miles. I had walked much further.
A Suburban rolled to a stop at the curb. I opened the passenger door and climbed in. “Lucky you happened to be riding by.”
“Lucky my ass,” Nero said. “I’ve been going up and down this block for three hours.”
“You heard?”
A nod.
“All of it?”
Another nod.
I wasn’t surprised that Nero had better connections than I with the Indianola Sherriff’s department—especially after the bridges I had nuked.
“I’m sorry.”
My turn to nod.
His sharp features were illuminated by the green of the displays, his hair pulled back in a tight pony tail. “What happened?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
Nero shrugged. “They found a woman in the trunk of her car. While they were down there, the boys kept diving—probably milking the OT—and came across Stella’s car. Male body, hands still cuffed, in the back seat, female in the trunk.”
“That’s what I got.”
“How are you connected to the woman?”
His source must have been a patrolman, possibly a diver, since he didn’t know the rest of it. “Amber Noble. She was my neighbor. Her husband had me looking for her.”
“Ah.”
“She was also my lover.”
Nero took his eyes from the road and shot me a look. “Bees.”
“I know.”
“You want me to take you to your ride?”
I shook my head. “Home. And we need to hurry.”
***
My father’s van sat in front of the house, all the lights on the ground floor burning. Nero parked in the driveway. “You want me to come in?”
“Yeah. For a minute.”
Dad greeted us at the front door, the lines in his weathered face etched deeper in worry. “What’s going on?”
“Where is Sarah?”
“She’s fine. I took her to Gus’s. I didn’t know when you were going to be home or if you would need me. Sarah thinks it’s a party.”
“Good.”
Dad looked from me to Nero, back to me. His worry multiplied. “Hey, Nero.”
“Hey, dad.”
“Now, what the hell is going on?”
“They found Stella.”
He blinked, actually taking a step back. He knew this wasn’t going to be good news, had no idea how bad it really was. “Where?”
“At the bottom of the rock quarry.”
He closed his eyes, dragging a calloused hand over his face. “What about…your partner?”
“He was with her.”
“They been there all this time?”
“I imagine so”
“And they think you put them there?”
“I’m sure somebody does.” I ran up the stairs to the guest bedroom, dug under the single mattress and came out with the journal. Back downstairs, I gave it to Nero. “You need to keep this.”
He held it up, eyeing it suspiciously. “Is it what I think it is?”
“Yeah.”
“You want me to read it?”
“Up to you. Just don’t give it to the law.”
“Don’t believe you gotta worry about that.”
The door banged open. Me, dad, and Nero huddled together in the kitchen.
Erin said, “I go home for one weekend.”
***
They came two hours later. Blondie gave her early warning bark and I drug her into the backyard, returning in time to get to the front door. Dad was still asleep on the couch. Erin had gone to her room, though not changing into her nightgown. I hoped.
“I’m really sorry about this, Beason.”
“No problem.” I moved out of their way. Larry Coleman shoved the folded paper into my chest.
“You know what this is.”
I didn’t bother opening it. “Knock yourself out.”
I returned to the den, taking my place in the easy chair. Dad stirred.
“They’re finally here?”
“Yeah.”
“Took long enough.”
“They had to wake up a judge.”
A half-dozen pair of feet stomping in the dining room/playroom and Larry barking commands. Randall came into the den. The TV was off. He did a double take at seeing my father.
“Mr. Camp.”
“Detective.”
“We apologize for the intrusion.”
“Uh huh.”
To me, Randall said, “You left before we had the chance to tell you some things.”
“I was all done talking. Still am.”
He nodded. “We’re pretty sure it was Amber in her car, but it’s not official. The other two…bodies haven’t been identified yet. I don’t know how to say this except to say it; the bodies are pretty decomposed.”
“I bet.”
“So I’m going to ask you not to tell anyone until we’re sure. No sense in causing the families undue pain.”
“Who else could it be?”
Randall shrugged. “You know how these things work.”
“Yeah.”
“Who might want to kill Amber Noble?”
“Steven.”
“Anybody else?”
“Not that I’ve talked to.” I considered Starling and Fletcher. They wanted Amber found and I believed they wanted to talk to her—maybe even hurt her. If that was the case, it meant that they hadn’t already killed her. “Only Steven. He might or might not have abused her and then he found out she was having an affair.”
“Oh, we’re going to talk to him. How do you think your lover and your wife ended up in the same lake?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Any idea who might want to cause Stella harm?”
“No.”
“How about Adrian?”
“Me.”
“But not Stella?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“No matter what else she was, Stella was the mother of my child. I would never hurt my daughter like that.”
“Looks like you’ve done okay by her all these years.”
“If you say so.”
“If she always thought her mother had run off,” he said, “it wouldn’t hurt her so bad.”
I shook my head.
“What?”
“Two things. One: how long h
as she been since we had a drowning in the quarry?”
He thought about. “Six years or so. The Chilla kid.”
“Before that?”
“I don’t know. Ten years?”
“Exactly. Any car at the bottom of the quarry would inevitably be found. It was only a matter of time.”
“Okay. What’s the other thing?”
“What would be harder on a child? Her mother dying or her mother running off because she didn’t want to see her daughter?”
“It might depend on if her father killed her mother.”
“Whatever. I’m done talking to you.”
Randy waited. He was hoping I would fill the silence. I didn’t.
“Detective!” The voice came from the unfinished bonus room over the garage. Randall struggled to his feet. I didn’t envy him. He had spent all of Friday night searching for Trey and his friends and most of Saturday before being called in Sunday for the dive at the quarry. Now it was well after midnight.
When he left, dad and I exchanged a look.
“Nothing to worry about.”
A few minutes later, Randall returned. “You always leave your gun safe open?”
“Only when I’m expecting visitors.”
“Quite an arsenal you got there. Rifles, shotguns, automatics and revolvers—even an assault rifle.”
“All legal.”
“Is that all?”
“No. My .45 is in the glove box of my Jeep.”
“Which is where?
“Gravel pit.”
“I don’t guess you have the registration on you?”
I pulled out my billfold and handed him my concealed carry permit. He copied the numbers in his little notebook. “Anything else?”
“No. Were any of the victims shot?”
“Too early to tell.”
“Bullshit. All you have to do is look. It doesn’t take a pathologist to see if a bullet has gone through a body.”
Randall made a face, wondering how much he could tell me. Finally, he said, “Doesn’t look like it. Stella ever keep a journal?”
“A journal?”
“Yeah, you know, like a diary. You ever see her writing in anything like that?”
“No.”
Chapter Forty-One
“You look like hell.”
“Yeah.”
“Rough weekend?”
“You have no idea.” Melvin Jenks was in his dapper Monday best, dark London Fog overcoat over a charcoal grey suit, red tie. “You want coffee?”
“Sure.”
I pushed my own mug across the desk and pointed to the maker in the corner. Sarah and Erin were both at home, both sleeping. Both skipping school. Melvin took my cup with him, filled it and one of his own and returned. “What’s up, Melvin?”
He stirred his coffee. “I just came by to tell you that you are a genius.”
“Finally.”
“Finally?”
“Finally, somebody else noticed,” I said. “What did I do?”
“That King Ralph idea of yours. I couldn’t wait until Saturday, so I popped it on Cynthia before I left for the movies with the kids and we watched it when I got back.” He shrugged his shoulders. “It worked. One thing led to another and now I’m not getting a divorce. Absolutely brilliant.”
I doubt Eric Hendricks thought so. “I’m glad for you. Congratulations.”
Melvin took one of the old client chairs and blew in his cup. “Thank you.”
“You can’t leave it there. You still need to go to counseling and keep working it. If you don’t, the affair will keep coming up.”
“I know. I will always be in your debt. Thanks again.”
“You’re welcome.”
“That boy in here the other day…”
“Nero?”
“He’s an interesting fellow.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “He is.”
“That his real name?”
“Yes.”
Melvin nodded. “I never met anyone named Nero. His parents know about the Roman emperor? The Nero that made torches out of Christians to light his garden?”
“I doubt it. His mother had a dog named Nero when she was little. She always liked the name. The dog, too.”
“He a good friend?”
“Yes. The best.”
“I could tell. He is devoted to you? How did that happen?” he asked. “A ghetto kid and an ex-cop and ex-ranger?”
“I helped him out once.”
“You do that a lot.”
“What’s that?”
“Helping people.”
“Not really.” I sipped my coffee. It was dark and burnt. “You serious about taking him golfing?”
“Why not?”
“Ghetto kid and a banker?”
Melvin shrugged. “What’s that got to do with it?”
“Nothing.” I thought for a minute. Ghetto kids, I could work with. Bankers were a totally different breed. “Your bank handles mortgages, right?”
“Of course. It’s what banks do. Why?”
“I remember reading something about the government helping people stay in their homes. You know about that?”
“Yeah.” He set the cup gently on my desk, leaning forward on his elbows. “You having problems with your payments?”
“Yeah.”
Melvin leaned back, going into banker mode. “I can help you. How far behind are you?”
“I’m not sure.”
“You’re not sure?”
“No.”
“It depends a lot on how far the process has gone.”
“I don’t know.”
“How can you not know?”
“I quit opening the letters.”
Melvin shook his head. “I know the world has a dim view of bankers—fat cats throwing people out on the street. But foreclosing is the last thing we want to do. If we foreclose, we have all that legal expense and end up with a house we don’t want. We are in the business of loaning money—not selling houses. Ignoring correspondence from a bank is the stupidest thing you can do.”
“Melvin,” I said, “I have done much, much, more stupid things than that.”
***
It was a busy day at Camp Investigations. People coming and going. Not a single paying customer.
Nero was next. He came into the office without a knock, only a whisper on the metal stairs, blue jeans, spotless sneakers, red sweatshirt under his dark overcoat. He settled into one of the two visitor chairs.
It might have been the first time I had seen him settle anywhere. Nero had a unique way of moving, gliding really, never showing any effort. One second he was in one spot, the next he was somewhere else. Catlike. Today, though, there was a foreign heaviness.
“You bring the book?”
“In the sled. You want me to get it?”
“Not yet,” I said. “You read it?”
A slight nod.
“Anything in there about who killed her?”
“Lot of stuff in there,” he said. “Nothing that says Billy Joe Bob killed me.”
We were silent for a minute.
Nero said, “You get any sleep?”
“No. You?”
“Enough.” That could have been anywhere from twelve hours to zero. “Beason?”
“Yeah?”
“I don’t think you should read it.”
“No?”
He slowly shook his head. “You won’t find her killer in there. What you will find is nothing but pain.”
“I know.” Two passages into the infernal diary and I could guess what it held—nothing good for me. A careful accounting of betrayal. Entry upon entry of my wife stabbing me in the back. Going on for years. “I’ll have to.”
“Yeah.”
***
The metal stairs creaked. One man alone. I had my boots on the desk, hands interlaced behind my head, eyes closed. Resting. Nero sat silent and still.
Randall Rodgers was in khakis, light blue shirt and a darker tie. Hi
s dress up uniform. Nothing good—aside from a press conference—came from an Indianola deputy in a tie.
He stopped at seeing Nero in my office. “What are you doing here?”
“Nunya.”
“Nunya?”
“None of your business.” And without a further word, stood up and left.
If Nero had been tired, then Randy looked one step from the grave. Deep bags under his eyes, shoulders sagging, his body screamed exhaustion. “You got coffee?”
“Yeah.”
“Want some?”
I shook my head. I didn’t figure it had gotten any better in the hour since Melvin had left.
Randall filled a cup, dumped in creamer and sugar and stirred it with a plastic spoon. He took the recently vacated chair.
“You doing notifications?”
“Yeah.” He sipped from the cup. His taste buds must have been worn out as well since he took another.
“Where’s Larry?”
“Not the time or place.” He took a deep breath. “Positive identification on all three. Stella Camp, Adrian Shipley, and Amber Noble.”
“That was fast.”
He nodded. “It’s all on the computer now, the dental records. We knew who they were so it didn’t take long.”
I wasn’t surprised, but it still dug the hollow of my soul deeper.
“I am sorry for your loss.”
“Does that mean you don’t think I did it?”
“Not what I said. I said I’m sorry for your loss.”
“So you think I did it.”
“I don’t know.” He took a deep breath, let it out, shook his head. “How many people have you killed, Beason?”
“I don’t know. It was war. Sometimes you shoot and they fall and you can check them after the firefight. Sometimes they fall and get back up. Sometimes you can’t check. Sometimes they don’t fall and go back into the hills and bleed out. Many times you’re not the only one shooting and you have no way of knowing who fired the fatal shot.”
“Take a guess. Twenty?”
“Probably more.”
“Forty?”
“Probably less. Not counting airstrikes I called in.”
“See, Beason, that’s my problem. My instinct tells me you didn’t do it. I grew up with you. We worked together. You have killed between twenty and forty people. That’s serial killer stuff—the kind of thing they make A & E specials about if it happens in the States.”