by Aric Davis
My head’s telling me I’m wasting my time, that Jack is going to let me down. My gut tells a different tale, though, so here I am, pedaling in the cold. Claire’s suspicions agree with my gut’s. But then, how many ex-wives don’t believe their husbands capable of dire deeds? My gut and his ex might like Jack for the death of Mandy, but my head knows there’s nothing besides circumstantial evidence pointing toward him.
As it turns out, I really didn’t need the GPS. I haven’t reconned him at night yet, but I have my guesses about his habits, and they prove accurate. The closest bar on this end of town is the Shipwreck. Rolling into its unpaved lot, I see a few cars, all with varying body damage, and Jack’s Impala happens to be among them.
I park the bike at the back of the lot, do my thing with the chain, and then walk on over to the car. I should have done this at the house when quiet streets would have made for easier work, but my curiosity is killing me, and the car is beckoning me like a Detroit siren. Jack’s house didn’t stand a chance against my lockpick set, and neither will the Impala.
The tumblers roll like a bowling ball down a bumpered lane. There are a few slow spots, but I know I’m going to knock them all down. I’m inside in less than a minute.
Jack’s car isn’t the vehicle you’d expect a terrible husband, dangerous father, and possible murderer to drive. It’s more boring than his house. The home itself was a mess, but the man’s clothes were neat, the woodsheds out back had been well organized, and his projects well thought out to my eyes. And now here is his Impala, banged up but pretty much neat as a pin inside. Everything together does the opposite of setting off my warning bells. In fact, I’m downright calm. Jack’s just a guy out on a date, and his car doesn’t even have the typical stray fry to throw under the microscope.
I leave the vehicle after just a few minutes. I could’ve been more thorough, but cars keep pouring into the lot, and between their headlights and the door to the Shipwreck flashing open, I was having a hard time maintaining my calm.
It doesn’t matter. Jack isn’t hauling around rope and a buck knife, nor is the car covered in bloody handprints. The car is just that, a sedan owned by a lower-middle-class man, and nothing in it tells of anything else. I feel a little silly to have even fantasized it would, after all this time.
I’m not as disappointed as I ought to be, though, as I fade back into the darkness, slide into a small grove about a hundred feet from the parking lot, and flick on the night-vision monocular. I don’t know why I’m not more discouraged. Yes, Jack is everything a good prosecutor would have been happy to find if he hadn’t been handed a junkie’s confession to run with. He was a relation by marriage, so he had to have known of the girl at least, and there was just no way he’d made it to that point in his life without falling afoul of the law at least once or twice. He was way too angry not to have a record.
But none of that matters. Even if Jack had killed her, the police already had that confession, already had an easy bust.
This is the talking-to my head is giving my gut as I huddle behind my monocular in that stand of trees, but my gut’s ignoring it. It’s too intent on waiting for Jack to leave the bar.
And then Jack does leave the bar, and everything changes.
Jack’s only been in the Shipwreck with his date for a little over an hour, but the drinks must have been flowing pretty well, based on the lean they both carry into the parking lot. The woman stumbles, mutters something indecipherable, and then I can hear Jack ask her, “What the fuck did you just say to me?”
There’s laughter after that—from the woman, not Jack—and then he hauls off and smacks her. It looks like an open palm strike from where I’m sitting, but that doesn’t really matter if you connect well, and from the way she drops, I’d say Jack put his weight into it.
I’m moving across the span before I realize my legs are in motion. Jack is hurting her, and he’s going to hurt her again, and my thoughts are pitch black.
Jack beats my pace across the field, though, giving the woman one more wallop—softer this time, but still audible—just as she regains her feet and then telling her, “Get in the fucking car.”
I’m close then, close enough for him to see me if he’s looking, but I stop dead in my tracks as the two of them get in the car like nothing’s happened. There’s no way Jack should be driving, but the woman—what in the hell is she doing, getting in there with him? Hasn’t he just been beating on her?
This is obviously just another night out for these two.
It’s disgusting and sad, but nothing I can do anything about, so I’m turning away when I’m stopped by something about the shape of the woman’s head, or the way she moves as she checks the damage to her face in the mirror in the Impala’s sun visor.
I know her.
She’s my damn client.
FORTY-FIVE
School was every bit the drudgery Betty had become accustomed to. By the time she and June made it to the library, the day’s sole bright point was that she’d only seen Jake once. She was starting to feel like officially breaking up with him might even be a bit redundant at this point; it couldn’t have been much clearer to him that his request had had the opposite of its intended effect on her. Still, as Betty walked into the library she really doubted she was going to get off that easy. She was going to need to put Jake down, and she knew, after her meeting with Nickel, that today was going to be the perfect time to get the unfortunate task over with.
June walked into the library ahead of her, and they headed to the bank of computers near the back of the room, where they had been holding court during fourth period for the last few weeks. June had an impatient look on her face, and as she sat, she said, “About the only good thing to come of that trip was the fake IDs. That and the fact that, though Duke’s a bitter piece of crap, we both left with the impression that he probably didn’t kill her. Not that that’s exactly a good thing.”
“He’s just angry,” said Betty. “You find anything on the roommate?”
“Nope.”
“Me neither,” said Betty. “I’m hoping Nickel can help with that. And maybe he can convince us the trip to Jackson State wasn’t a complete waste of time.”
“Hey, it wasn’t all bad,” said June. “I was in prison, waiting to get arrested while I sat with the guy who knew my aunt, and maybe even killed her, and it was still better than spending time with my dad. I swear, the only reason he even has me over is so he can feel like he’s getting a good return on the child support.”
“That gives me a crazy thought,” said Betty. “What would you think about us interviewing your dad?”
“No way,” said June. “Not going to happen, not possible.”
“Don’t be so negative. Think about it. He had to have known Mandy. Maybe he has some inside information. Not about how she died, of course, but about what kind of person she was. For all we know your dad even knew Duke, or met Jason for some reason.”
“No,” said June.
“Why not? Seriously, we can’t talk to your mom, and your dad is the only person we know of besides Duke and that cop that were even close to this case. What if he can give us a little piece of the puzzle we’re missing?”
“Just drop it, OK?” June implored her. “My dad barely wants anything to do with me in general. He’s not going to put up with us going over there and asking him questions.”
“June.”
“What?”
“Please?”
“Seriously? I don’t think I can be much more clear. He’s going to say no, and he’s going to get pissed that I even asked.”
Betty just looked at her. For a while June pretended not to notice, but finally she heaved a sigh and locked eyes with her.
“Just ask him,” urged Betty. “It can’t hurt to ask.”
“I’ll ask, fine,” said June. “But you’re wrong about the second part. Trust me. My dad’s creative, and he’ll find some way to make me feel like an absolute asshole for bringing this up. He alwa
ys does.”
FORTY-SIX
I’m furious, but I don’t want Claire to see my anger. I’ll just give her the chance to tell me why she was at the bar with Jack last night, and why she’s having me investigate him in the death of her murdered sister if she’s OK with going out with him for a few drinks and a beatdown. Jack was slipping off my radar, but now I’m fully focused on him, benign lifestyle or not. Mandy was beaten savagely before she died, and now that I’ve seen him in action, imagining Jack doling out that punishment is all too easy to imagine.
I see Claire waiting for me in her car, just as I instructed, and I climb into the passenger seat through the unlocked door.
Claire looks a little worse for wear. Not only is this the earliest in the day we’ve met, but she had a late night. To indicate this further—as well as the two solid shots I saw her take—Claire has on enormous sunglasses and is wearing thick liquid makeup. She looks like hell.
“Anything you want to tell me?”
“No,” says Claire, taken a little aback. “You called me, so I thought you had some information.”
“Where were you last night?”
“Home,” she says, before pausing and asking, “Why? What does this have to do with me?”
“You were out with Jack last night,” I say softly. “You were at his house, then the bar, and then the parking lot. After that, I stopped caring what else you did with him. Let’s cut the crap: I need to know why you were with him, and I want to know why you’re not at the police station filing a report right now.”
“You saw me,” she says, a statement, not a question. “How did you know—”
“I didn’t know, I had to see it for myself. I was doing the job you hired me to do. I was following him, checking things out, just like you asked me to, and then I saw him beating you up in the parking lot. It was an eye-opener. He’s got a talent for it. Seeing how much he enjoyed it, I think he’s obviously—”
“Jack didn’t hurt Mandy,” says Claire, her voice subdued but solid. “I provoked him and he hit me. It’s no excuse, but we were married for a long time, and I still know exactly how to push his buttons.”
“You’re damn right it’s no excuse. He hit you, it shouldn’t matter what you—”
“That should be true,” Claire says, “but the world isn’t black and white. I knew exactly what would happen when I said what I did.”
I cock my head at her. “So you’re saying you literally asked for it.”
She doesn’t respond to that.
“It doesn’t matter,” I say. Though of course it does—but that’s not my job. “What matters is that if he has a history of abuse, if it’s the kind of hobby for him it obviously seems to be, that could be his link to Mandy. Someone as vulnerable as she was, out on the streets, nobody but a junkie looking out for her—”
“Stop it. I don’t want to hear that. This wasn’t anything like that. I tricked Jack into taking me out so I could rag on him in front of his friends about child support. I know he’s got unreported income, and some of that money should be mine. I’m raising our daughter, and I’ll happily take a lump or two if it means that bastard will kick June a few more bucks every month. God knows the state won’t help me out.”
Again, all I can do is cock my head at her like a puzzled parrot. “Let me get this straight. You got just what you were after? This was your plan? What did you say to him?”
“Enough in the bar to make him look like the piece of shit he is in front of his idiot buddies, and just maybe enough to make them look at old Jack Derricks a little cross-eyed when he starts bragging about pulling in some extra money on side jobs.” She smiled coldly, then said, “But I saved the good stuff for when we were alone.”
I’d say this was the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, but I’d be lying. It’s a contender, though. All I can think to say is, “You can’t expect me to investigate him for killing your sister if you’re going to compromise your own safety with him.”
“Then don’t,” she says. “Keep your eyes on June, just like you were doing before, and just let this Jack business go. He had nothing to do with my sister’s death, and I was a fool for ever saying as much. I was with him then, we were still good, and there was nothing that happened back then that would make me think he had anything to do with Mandy’s death.”
“All right,” I say, because there’s nothing else to do. I step out of the car feeling cold, even though it’s warmer out than it has been in days.
I’m not sure I should let Jack go so easily, but I’m not sure there’s a point in doing anything else. Claire knows the man, says she knew what she said would get her smacked, and in a rough-and-tumble-looking bar like the Shipwreck, that seems about par for the course. I don’t like that she got hurt, but it’s clear it wasn’t Claire’s first rodeo.
I check my phone as she pulls out of the parking lot. I have hours until I need to meet Betty, and right now all I want to do is ride. Between this mess with Paul, the revelations from last night and now this morning, my ongoing investigation, and my still-healing wounds, I’m feeling overwhelmed and beaten down. Hopefully putting some miles under the tires will make me feel better, and even if it won’t, there’s no point in not trying. I need my head clear right now, so I jump on my bike and get moving.
FORTY-SEVEN
Betty sat on the bench at Riverside, convinced that Nickel wasn’t going to show up. Then, as she scanned the area behind her, a voice of growing familiarity uttered a greeting.
“Hey,” said Nickel.
When she spun to see him, her frustration must have been visible, because he followed up the greeting by saying, “Everything all right?”
“I’m good,” said Betty, “so long as you discount the fact that I’m completely over school, I’m at a dead end in the Mandy thing, and everything else in my crappy life is driving me insane.” Betty almost told him about Jake—the words had been about to slip out of her mouth—but she caught herself just in time.
But why do I care, if Nickel and I are just friends? It wasn’t a question Betty was ready to deal with, at least not right then, and it was a blessing when Nickel spoke.
“Well, I can’t help very much with school, but I would like to hear all about Duke, and about why you think you’re at such a dead end.”
Nickel sat next to her and she began to recount everything that had happened at the prison, starting with the fake IDs being accepted, the pained look on Duke’s face whenever June would speak, Jason Lattrell, the man in the green jacket, and the diary. She finished by describing for Nickel exactly how she’d felt when Duke had left them, and how useless the whole thing had felt once he was gone.
“It was almost like he was getting off on it,” said Betty. “Like he enjoyed the fact that we thought we might find some answers by speaking to him, but that we’d failed like everyone else. He said the only thing that was going to help him was money, and that we were just a couple of fools for wasting our time with him.”
“Ouch,” said Nickel. “That considered, though, there’s really only one thing left to do.”
“What’s that?”
“We need to go through their old house,” he said, making it sound about as exciting as going to buy groceries. “If Mandy kept a diary even Duke couldn’t find, it had to have been spectacularly hidden, especially since the cops didn’t find it, either. Are you sure he wasn’t lying, and he didn’t just dispose of it?”
“He wasn’t lying,” said Betty, “at least not about that. I do agree that we should go in the house, though, especially if you’re game to come along.”
“I’m in,” he said. “My weekend was busy, but I’ve got some free time until tonight, and I’m always up for some urban spelunking.”
“Isn’t that what they call it when you go in a cave?”
“Yeah, that’s why there’s the urban part in front of it. It basically means exploring abandoned property somewhere, like Chernobyl, or that creepy Six Flags that got blasted by Katrina.
”
“Well, I’ve never done anything like that,” said Betty, “but I’m up for looking through that house. It could be creepy, though. We’ll need flashlights and maybe a baseball bat or something.” When Nickel cocked his head as if to question the need for a bat, Betty said, “You know, in case there’s, like, people that aren’t supposed to be there.”
“Fair enough,” said Nickel. “If you want to give me a ride back to my house, we can grab everything we need.”
“You have flashlights and stuff like that?”
“Sure.”
Betty just shook her head. “Is there anything you’re not ready to handle immediately?”
“I hope not,” said Nickel as he stood.
Betty wasn’t sure what to say to that, so she stood as well and the two of them began to walk to her car.
Betty would think later that she should have seen it all coming, that she should have been able to predict what was about to happen, but she didn’t.
As Betty and Nickel crested the hill to leave the playground, Betty saw someone parked near her car but she thought nothing of it. As they came closer she realized that someone was standing by her car and staring at them, and when she shielded her eyes from the sun with her hand, she saw that the someone was Jake and that he was furious.
“Who are you with?” said Jake as they stepped onto the asphalt, and Betty wasn’t sure what to say to him. Instead, she turned to Nickel.
“Let me handle this,” she said, but Nickel didn’t say anything back, and then Jake was walking quickly toward them.
“I asked who the fuck you were with.”
Betty felt like she was being filmed for some stupid teenage soap opera. “He’s a friend,” she said as she took a step toward Jake, and then there was something buzzing toward her face, and she dropped to the ground as though she’d been shot, her mind dull and murky.
This wasn’t supposed to happen. We were supposed to go to the house. That something else was wrong had yet to occur to her. Betty struggled to stand, but she felt drunk, felt like that time she’d taken a bong rip while she stood on Kevin Felman’s kitchen table and then had to be helped down.