by J. A. Jance
“How about if I bring my wife along?” I asked. “That’ll make it look even less official.”
“By wife I take it you mean Mel Soames, the new chief of police in Bellingham?”
Clearly Sheriff Loper had checked me out. “That would be the one,” I said.
“Why the hell not?” Loper replied. “That way there would be two sworn police officers in that interview room rather than just one.”
“Are you going to brief Detective Gonzales beforehand?” I asked.
“How long were you a homicide cop—thirty years or so?”
“Give or take.”
“Here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to tell him who you are, that you’re investigating a long-closed case, and that Betts Harrison may be a person of interest in said case. I want you to put him in the know. At this point, I don’t want to do or say anything that could be prejudicial to the case.”
After getting off the phone with Gus Loper, I did not immediately pick up the phone and call Estelle back to let her know the playing field had suddenly shifted under our feet. I had a feeling Sheriff Loper and I were on to something, but I wanted to deliver results rather than promises of results. The person I did call was Mel. I was determined that she would be briefed well in advance of the interview even if Detective Gonzales wasn’t.
Late in the afternoon, sitting in front of the gas log fireplace and watching the sunset, I told her everything I knew or thought I did. “So you and Sheriff Loper think the bad actors here are Betts Harrison and this Buzz guy, and that Anders Harrison is just some kind of innocent bystander?”
“That’s how it looks to us.”
“I don’t think so,” Mel said.
“Why not?”
“Because he’s the husband. It’s always the husband.”
I might have pointed out that this was sexual stereotyping of the first water, but I didn’t. Sometimes maintaining marital harmony is more important than making a point.
On Sunday afternoon, Mel and I showed up at the Island County Sheriff’s Office in Coupeville at 1:45, fifteen minutes ahead of our scheduled 2:00 p.m. meeting with Betts Harrison. Mel, with her hair pulled back in a ponytail and dressed in a pair of slim jeans topped by a bright blue cashmere sweater, didn’t look the least bit police-chiefy. When I introduced her to Detective Emilio Gonzales as my wife, I couldn’t help but notice the appreciative way in which he looked her up and down.
“I’m not with TLC,” she told him with a disarming smile during their initial handshake. “I just came along for the ride.”
Sure she did, and I’m a monkey’s uncle.
Betts Harrison drove up a few minutes later in a slick little Mercedes SLK Roadster that was several years newer than my aging S550. As she exited her tiny car, I noticed that she was tiny, too—five-two at the very most. And that’s when I remembered the forensic report about Janice Harrison’s T-Bird. Because the seat and mirror adjustments hadn’t been changed, everyone had assumed Janice was the last person to drive the car. What it really meant was that Anders Harrison liked his womenfolk to come in small packages.
Entering the lobby with all the gracious assurance of a homecoming queen, Betsy Davis Parmenter Harrison greeted Sheriff Loper with an effusive hug. “Why, Gussy,” she said, “I didn’t think you were going to be here.”
I caught a glimpse of the shocked expression that momentarily shot across Detective Gonzales’s face. I doubt any members of the department had ever heard that schoolboy nickname applied to the man who was their tough-guy boss.
Sheriff Loper fended off Betts Harrison’s enthusiastic greeting and pointed her in my direction. “I have to run,” he said, “but before I do, I wanted to make the introductions. This is J. P. Beaumont. He and Mel here are with an organization called TLC. And Detective Emilio Gonzales who’s with my department is here to provide whatever assistance might be required.”
“Of course,” Betts said. “That makes perfect sense.”
She turned a dazzling, white-toothed smile on me. Taking in that perfectly sculpted face, it occurred to me that she’d most likely had some work done. The short jacket she wore looked like a David Green mink for sure, and the rings on her fingers collectively boasted several carats’ worth of diamonds. Clearly she had cashed in by marrying Anders Harrison, and she was making the most of it.
“So you’re the ones who are looking into Janice’s case?” Betts asked. “I thought that whole mess was cleared up ages ago.”
“It was,” I said, “but Janice’s sister, Estelle, still has a few questions, and Sheriff Loper thought it would be better to discuss them with you rather than bringing them up with your husband.”
“Absolutely,” Betts said. “It was a terribly difficult time for poor Anders, and I’m happy to spare him the emotional pain. Be advised, however, since I wasn’t on Whidbey at the time everything happened, what I have to say is bound to be secondhand rather than first.”
Bingo! As the saying goes, the first liar doesn’t stand a chance. Betts had no idea we were there for her—none at all. She had gotten away with lying about all this for so long that it never occurred to her to think otherwise.
Mel stepped into the discussion just then. “We’ve made arrangements to use an interview room,” she said. “TLC likes to maintain a video record of all proceedings—if that’s all right with you.”
“No problem,” Betts said. “I’m glad to do whatever I can to help out.”
Detective Gonzales ushered us into an interview room crammed with a table and four chairs. It was very tight, but in terms of putting the squeeze on Betts Harrison, tight and uncomfortable was exactly what was needed. We waited while Detective Gonzales activated the recording equipment. Mel and I had strategized about this in advance. Following our game plan, she asked the first question.
“You weren’t actually in town during all the unpleasantness?”
“No, not at all,” Betts said. “I was living in Seattle at the time with a toddler of my own and a gravely injured husband—my first husband.”
“It sounds like things weren’t smooth as glass for you back then, either,” Mel observed.
Betts took Mel’s proffered hook of sympathy and swallowed it whole. “You can say that again,” she agreed.
I made a show of turning on my iPad and consulting the screen. “My understanding is that you and Anders dated in high school prior to his marrying Janice Marshall. Is that correct?”
Betts nodded. “It was one of those young love things that ended badly. I married for the first time on the rebound after that breakup, and so did Anders. Both of those first marriages ended in tragedy. Afterward, Anders and I somehow found our way back to each other. Nobody expects to be widowed while you’re still in your twenties.”
“Your first husband died, too?” Mel asked.
Betts nodded. “Ron was a championship snowboarder who had messed up his back. He overdosed on his pain meds.”
“So an accidental death then?”
“Totally,” Betts replied. “Anyway, when Anders and I got together again, we were both trying to pick up the broken pieces of our lives. I had my son, Anthony, to look after, while poor Anders had lost everything. At first we were like our own little private grief-support group. Before long, though, we realized that the feelings we’d once shared were still there, and in between we’d both had a chance to grow up. What is it they say about love being lovelier the second time around? That’s what it’s been like for Anders and me. It’s been great. Anders helped me raise Anthony, and then we had two girls together—Amber and Jasmine.”
“Sounds like you were both incredibly unlucky and incredibly lucky at the same time,” Mel observed. Betts nodded in happy agreement. Believe me, when it comes to playing good cop, nobody tops Mel Soames, and by then she had Betsy Harrison eating out of her hand.
“Where exactly were Janice and Anders living at the time she disappeared?” I asked.
“On a bluff south of town,” Betts told us
. “When Anders and I were dating in high school, his grandmother was still alive, and that’s where she lived. By the time Anders and Janice got married, Grandma Harrison had passed on, and his folks let the newlyweds move in and live there rent-free. If they’d had kids, that little cabin probably would have been tight quarters. I doubt they would have stayed on there permanently.”
“So by the time you and Anders got together, he was no longer living there?”
“No, he was back in town with his folks.”
“And you never visited their house, the one on the bluff?”
“Never,” Betts said. “Why would I?”
Why indeed!
The interview didn’t end there. We kept Betsy Davis Parmenter Harrison jabbering away for another hour and a half, but we had the one thing we needed from her on tape—the woman’s bogus claim that she had never been anywhere near the house where Janice and Anders lived. We had nothing but circumstantial evidence at the moment, and I figured this was only the tip of the iceberg as far as building a case was concerned. What I hadn’t anticipated, however, was that Gussy Loper was about to throw a Hail Mary.
When the interview concluded, we left the room and escorted Betts back down the hall. We entered the lobby to find a middle-aged man seated in front of the windows on the far side of the reception desk. I was following Betts and saw her shoulders stiffen with recognition when the new arrival looked up at her as we came through the doorway.
“Hey, Buzz,” she said, catching herself and trying to paper over what had clearly been a shock to her system. “Long time no see. How’s it going?”
“Fine, fine,” Buzz Buford said quickly. “Just stopped by to see Gus for a moment.”
“Okay then,” Betts said. “See you.”
The pallor on Betsy Harrison’s face as she hurried out to her car was a joy to see. Just then, Sheriff Loper emerged from his office. “Oh, there you are, Buzz,” he said to the newcomer. “Sorry to keep you waiting. I’ve just been out to the Creager place, looking at the footings. I’ve got a guy with a specially trained cadaver dog coming out tomorrow. The remains may be old, but he’s pretty sure if there’s anything to be found, his dog will be on it.”
All color drained from Buzz Buford’s face. Watching a six-foot-something fold into himself and almost disappear is an amazing sight to see, but that’s exactly what happened. Buzz seemed to shrink before our very eyes. As for cadaver dogs? I’ve never heard tell of one that could sniff out remains more than three decades old, but that’s the interesting thing about cops and suspects. In situations like that, cops are allowed to lie their heads off, and we do.
“What was she doing here?” Buford asked, nodding in the direction of the parking place Betts Harrison’s SLK had just vacated.
“It’s about Janice’s case,” Sheriff Loper said quietly. “It’s just been reopened. Betts stopped by to discuss the possibility of taking a plea deal. No agreement was reached, at least not yet. In instances like this, the first one to sign a confession and turn state’s evidence usually gets the best deal.”
Clearly Buzz Buford was panicked. “What did she say?” he demanded. “What did she tell you?”
“That getting rid of Janice Harrison was all your idea,” Loper told him. “That you’re the one who knocked her off and then came up with the idea of dumping her body in freshly poured cement over at the Creagers’ place.”
“Why that lying bitch!” Buzz blazed. “It wasn’t my idea; it was hers. She’s the one who did it. I just helped get rid of the body.”
Sheriff Loper smiled. “Here you go, Detective Gonzales. Maybe you should take Mr. Buford here back to an interview room and read him his rights. As I said before, the first one to sign a confession usually gets the best deal.”
This time Detective Gonzales had the suspect and the interview room all to himself, but Sheriff Loper, Mel, and I used the video hookup to follow the action from the sidelines. The story came out gradually at first and then in a rush. Betts had come to Coupeville that day for the express purpose of having it out with Janice. Betts’s own marriage was over, and she wanted Anders back. The two women had argued. Rather than agreeing to Betts’s terms, Janice had ordered her out of the house. On their way outside, Betts had plunged a syringe loaded with some of her husband’s powerful painkillers into Janice’s bare neck. Then Betsy had called her old beau and asked for help.
“Betts told me Janice had fallen and hit her head. She said it was an accident but no one would believe her. She asked me to help her get rid of the body. You don’t know what Betts was like back then,” Buzz murmured. “It was like she was bewitching me or something, so I did what she asked. But then . . .” He stopped cold. For the better part of a minute, he said nothing at all. He just sat there staring at his hands.
“What?” Detective Gonzales urged.
“That’s the worst part of it,” Buzz groaned as tears suddenly coursed down his cheeks.
“What’s the worst part?”
“Janice wasn’t dead. We were carrying her from the car to the footings when I realized she was still alive.”
“And you dumped her into the cement anyway?” Detective Gonzales asked.
“God forgive me but I did!” After that, with an anguished groan, Buzz Buford buried his face in his hands and sobbed.
For a long time, that was all we heard—the sound of Buzz’s broken sobs. Finally Detective Gonzales reached across the table and shoved pen and paper in front of him.
“If you want God to forgive you,” Gonzales suggested gently. “Maybe you’d better write this all down.”
Four hours later and decades too late, Mel and I sat in the conference room at Bainbridge Realty and Trust and told Estelle Manring about her sister’s horrifying last moments.
“They buried her alive?” Estelle gasped.
The prospect was too awful to consider, but it was the truth. I nodded, and for the next very long minute, no one in the room said a word.
I had taken the yearbook along with us to the interview in Coupeville, so now it was here with us, lying on the conference table in front of us. Finally, Estelle reached over, picked it up, and opened it to the homecoming page.
“You’re saying you don’t think Anders had anything to do with what happened to Janice?”
“We don’t believe so, no,” Mel said.
“And that Betts killed her first husband, too?”
“That has yet to be proven,” I told her. “And we may not be able to so, but with Buzz’s signed confession in hand, she’s for sure going down for Janice’s murder. When Mel and I left Whidbey to come here, Detective Gonzales and a pair of deputies were on their way out to the house to take Betts Harrison into custody.”
“It’s over then,” Estelle murmured at last. “It’s finally over.”
We spent the better part of an hour with Estelle after that, talking to her, grieving with her. It was dark and raining sheets when we finally headed out to drive back to Bellingham.
“You did a good job,” Mel told me. “You found a way to give her the answers she needed.”
“Awful answers,” I said. “I never should have told her the truth.”
“Necessary answers,” Mel corrected. “Estelle wanted the truth, and she’s right. It finally is over.”
“That’s the whole problem,” I said.
“What’s that?”
“Answers or not, this will never be over.”
“Why not?”
“Because,” I said, “no matter what, Janice Marshall Harrison is still dead, and she always will be.”
An Excerpt from Proof of Life
Before he retired, J. P. Beaumont had looked forward to having his days all to himself. But too much free time doesn’t suit a man used to brushing close to danger. When his longtime nemesis, retired Seattle crime reporter Maxwell Cole, dies in what’s officially deemed an accidental fire, Beau is astonished to be dragged into the investigation at the request of none other than the deceased victim
himself.
Caught up in a situation where old actions and grudges can hold dangerous consequences in the present, Beau is forced to operate outside the familiar world of law enforcement. While seeking justice for his frenemy and healing for a long-fractured family, he comes face-to-face with an implacable enemy who has spent decades hiding in plain sight.
Keep reading for a sneak peek at the next J. P. Beaumont novel
PROOF OF LIFE
Coming September 2017 from William Morrow
Prologue
The door slammed shut and Chrissy Purcell’s eyes popped open. She groped under the covers until she found the comforting softness of her frayed teddy bear, Oscar, and then lay there, staring up at the ceiling, waiting to see what would happen next. Maybe, if she was lucky, he would go to sleep. That’s when the window-rattling snoring would start, but she could sleep through that. They all could.
The bedroom door was shut, but it wasn’t dark in the room. The lights from the parking lot made the ceiling above her glow in a strange, orangish light. Chrissy was grateful for that light. Sometimes, when she did something wrong, Daddy would lock her in the closet where the only light was from that tiny crack that showed at the bottom of the door. She would lie there with her heart pounding, gasping for breath until Mommy would finally come and let her out.
Mommy knew Chrissy was afraid of the dark. That was why, when they set up the bunk bed, Chrissy had been given the top bunk.
“You’re two years older than Lonny,” Mommy had said. “Since he still falls out of bed sometimes, he should be in the lower bed. Besides,” she had added. “The lower bunk is a lot darker than the upper one.”
The part about their ages was true, of course. Chrissy had just turned seven. Lonny was only four—a baby almost. But so was the part about the lower bunk being darker. Once or twice, when the scary sounds from the other room got to be too much, Chrissy had scrambled down the ladder and tried snuggling in with Lonny, but that hadn’t worked. It was too dark—like being in a cave. She needed the brightness of the ceiling overhead.