Sick Man

by Paul Spencer

  “Cut the crap,” Buchanan said. “Time to start talking. Where were you Wednesday night?”

  “At a friend’s house.”

  “I thought you told us you were at home.”

  “Yeah. I didn’t want to drag my friend into it.”

  Buchanan caught on quickly. “This would be a lady friend?”

  “Yes.”

  “And does your lady friend have a name?”

  “Robin Carmichael.”

  Buchanan’s eyes lit up. “Would this be your client Robin Carmichael, who smashed her husband’s jaw with a frying pan?”

  “My ex-client.”

  “Oh boy, that’s rich,” he said, laughing. “Just when I thought you couldn’t be any more of a douchebag. I suppose you can’t be disbarred for sleeping with a client any more. You might want to be careful, though. Apparently it’s not a good idea to piss her off.”

  “Very funny, Detective.”

  “The way I remember it, you got her a sweet deal. I’m guessing she thinks she owes you a favor. You two rehearsed your story yet?”

  “Don’t give me that bullshit. I know how this works. I’ll tell you how things went down on Wednesday night. You talk to her, check it out. If you can’t pick holes in a fake story, you’re dumber than I thought you are.”

  Buchanan scowled. “Okay, genius, where is Ms. Carmichael?”

  “We’re working on that,” Casey said. “I’m hoping to have her here by the end of the day.”

  “Well, you better hope she turns up, Mick. You’re on thin ice here.” Buchanan said.

  “You know, you could spend your time looking for who actually did it,” I said.

  “I’m getting sick of hearing that shit. Start talking.”

  I told him about Wednesday night with Robin, and some background on how we got together. I made sure I gave him details that Robin would remember, so that her version was more likely to coincide with mine. Buchanan took notes, and asked the occasional question. When I was done, he stood up and left, and Malone followed him out without having said a word.

  Casey closed her briefcase. “I’ll try to get her here as soon as I can. But if she’s reluctant, it might be a while.”

  “Yeah, I know.” Casey could try to use a subpoena to force Robin to testify, but that could backfire in too many ways. Robin might get a lawyer and fight it, which could drag on for weeks. And even if she did appear, I needed her to give her statement willingly. If she was reluctant, or worse still didn’t back my story up, I was in deep trouble.

  “Mick, is her story going to match yours? As your attorney, I need to know.”

  “If she tells the truth it will. Why?”

  “You’ve already lied to the cops once about where you were on Wednesday. If they think you lied to them again, there won’t be much I can do. They’ll charge you with murder.”

  “I know. Find Robin. That’s the only hope right now.”

  “Right. I’ll call you later today, when I know more.”

  Casey left, and the same uniformed officer who had brought us up took me back to my holding cell. He came back a few minutes later with a breakfast tray for me. My clients had told me about jail food before, but that didn’t prepare me for how bad it really was. The plastic tray held a scoop of yellow substance that I assumed was meant to be eggs, a slice of white bread, and a plastic cup of something orange. I took a sip. It sure as hell wasn’t juice. Sickly sweet and water thin. I drank it though, more for the hydration than anything else. I managed to force the food down too.

  When I was done I put the tray on the floor by the bed and paced the room for a while. I had never been good at waiting, and now it was all I could do. Casey would find Robin soon enough, but she would still have to convince her to talk to the police. Robin went through a rough time when she was arrested. For a lot of cops, women trying to kill their husbands didn’t fit their view of traditional gender roles. Robin didn’t get a lot of sympathy, despite the extensive hospital records of fractures and contusions we produced. They left her locked in with the general jail population, and she didn’t do well. I tried to get her out on bail, but our judicial system still has little sympathy for battered women. The judge just looked at the attempted murder charge and denied my motion outright. It wasn’t hard for me to understand why Robin was so eager to take the plea deal. Now I was going to drag her back through all those bad experiences again. I hoped she had the strength to do it.

  I killed a few hours alternating between pacing and sitting. I did some exercises too. Push-ups, sit-ups, dips, stretches. Anything to take my mind off worrying about whether Robin would back me up. Every now and then I found myself motionless, arguing with myself about whether she’d do it. She had to. If I couldn’t get out of here, I had no chance of clearing my name.

  When they brought me lunch, it was just as bad as breakfast. Vegetables steamed to mush, and a greyish meat-like product. I ate it, and as I did I couldn’t help but think how Tony would react if you put a plate like that in front of him. He’d probably throw it at you.

  Thinking of Tony made me wonder about what Casey had said. Connected to bad people. That didn’t seem right to me. I’d known Tony for a long time. Like most good investigators, he knew some back doors to get information most people couldn’t, but he was no crook. Admittedly, there was always something guarded about him. The way he never liked to talk about his past in Mexico. Occasional private calls. I didn’t buy it though. Tony was a big boy, and we all have our secrets. If I ever got out of here I’d have to ask him about it, but I was still glad to have him on my side.

  Someone banged on my cell door a few hours after lunch. I stood up. A uniformed officer opened the door.

  “Wray, you’ve got a phone call.”

  He led me down the hall to a row of open phone booths. They were like public phones from the 80s, spaced about three feet apart with shoulder-high dividers between them. If it got busy, you wouldn’t get a lot of privacy. Fortunately, I was the only one there. The cop directed me to a phone, and leaned against the opposite wall, close enough to hear everything I said. I picked up the phone.

  “This is Mick.”

  “Mick, it’s Casey. I found Robin.”

  “Great! Is she coming in?”

  “I don’t know. She admitted to me that you spent the night at her place, but the idea of talking to the cops clearly scares the crap out of her.”

  “I’m not surprised. What do we do now?”

  “I’m inclined to let her sleep on it, but I can try to get a subpoena if you want me to.”

  I thought about it. “No, don’t do that. At least not yet. Let’s see how she is in the morning.” Part of me was screaming that we should drag Robin in here as fast as we could, but that was a bad idea. People react badly when you force them to do what they don’t want to do. I’d seen too many subpoenaed witnesses tell the opposite of the truth out of spite, and I needed Robin on my side.

  “All right. How are you holding up?”

  “Bored out of my fucking skull. And the chef keeps overcooking my steak.”

  Casey laughed. “I’ll call you in the morning, after I talk to Robin again.”

  “Sounds good.”

  I hung up the phone, and the officer took me back to my cell. I sat on the bed and put my head in my hands. Would Robin agree to talk to the police? The uncertainty was killing me. I paced my cell. Being in here for one day was driving me crazy. The thought of being locked up for years, even for life, made me weak at the knees. I had to get better at dealing with it. Stop fighting it, be more accepting. But how do you do that? How do you stare at four bare concrete walls day after day and not go crazy? I hoped with all my soul that I wouldn’t have to find out.

  Somehow I made it through the rest of the day. I didn’t eat much of dinner, but I managed to draw out what I did eat to pass the time. The rest of the evening I spent laying on the bed and trying not to fret about whether Robin would talk to the police. I slept a little, but not close to
enough.

  When morning came, I felt like I was coming apart at the seams. Breakfast was exactly the same as the day before. I couldn’t bring myself to eat any of it, but I forced the juice down again.

  A couple of hours after breakfast, someone banged on the door. I sat up as the door opened and Casey was ushered inside. I stood up.

  “Good news,” she said. “Robin came in this morning.”

  Relief washed over me. I let out a big sigh. “Thank Christ.”

  “You’re lucky to have a friend like her. Buchanan and Malone grilled her hard, but she didn’t waver. She’s strong.”

  I thought about Robin’s case, and the amount of abuse she’d taken before she finally snapped.

  “Yes, she is.”

  “You didn’t tell me she’s engaged,” Casey said, frowning at me.

  “I didn’t know.” I meant it. Robin had never said anything about it to me, and I was sure she hadn’t been wearing a ring on Wednesday night. Now I felt even worse about what I’d done to her.

  “They’re going to release you once they get the paperwork processed. You’re still not off the hook, though. You need to keep your nose clean. Don’t give them any more reasons to suspect you.”

  “Okay, I can do that.” I planned on doing the exact opposite, but Casey didn’t need to know that. “I suppose I’m still not going to get any protection.”

  “No.”

  “Figures.”

  “Do you need a ride anywhere?”

  “No need for you to hang around. I’ll call Tony when they let me out. Thanks for everything. With Robin, I mean.”

  “No problem.” Casey shook my hand. “Mick, you’re a decent guy. How do you keep getting mixed up in these fucked up situations?”

  I shook my head. “I wish I knew.”

  Chapter 25 – Breaking the Fast

  Another two hours passed before the cops actually let me out of the cell. I called Tony, and he came to pick me up. Even though it was afternoon, he suggested we get breakfast. I was starving. The nearest hole in the wall would have been fine for me, but Tony insisted on going to Grain and Gristle for Eggs Benedict and a Bloody Mary. It was only a ten minute drive back across the river and up to Prescott, so I said fine.

  The cops had given me my phone back when they turned me loose, so I checked for messages as we drove over there. I only had one, from my boss. He was righteously pissed at me for not showing up at work on Friday. He made it very clear that if I wasn’t in bright and early Monday morning, I was out of a job. I thought about calling him up and apologizing, but I couldn’t tell him that I had been locked up on suspicion of murder, and I didn’t have it in me to make up some bullshit story about being sick again.

  I deleted the message and called Robin. She answered quickly, but her tone was cold.

  “Hello, Mick.”

  “Robin, I just wanted to say thanks. I appreciate you coming in and talking to the cops. I know it must have been really hard for you. And I’m sorry. I had no idea this would happen.”

  “I almost didn’t answer when you called on Wednesday. I wish I hadn’t.”

  “I can understand. Look, I really am sorry.”

  “I know.” Her tone softened. “Are you in trouble?”

  “Yes, I am. But I think I can find my way out of it.”

  “I hope you do.” She paused again. “Mick, don’t call me anymore, okay?”

  “I won’t.”

  “Thanks. Good luck.”

  She hung up. I understood why Robin didn’t want me to call again, but the thought of not seeing her again upset me. I hadn’t realized until now how much she really meant to me. I knew it was for the best, especially since she was engaged. That didn’t mean I had to like it, though. I was still brooding about it when we arrived at the Grain and Gristle.

  I followed Tony inside. The place was crowded, but we got lucky and scored a booth by the window. A waitress carrying two pots of coffee turned sideways so we could squeeze by. It was a hell of a lot warmer in here than my cell at the detention center, and the smell of that coffee made my mouth water. I sat down opposite Tony and did a double take.

  “Holy shit! What happened to your eye?”

  Tony’s left eye was swollen, and the skin around it was turning a dark purple color. I hadn’t noticed on the drive over here.

  “Don’t worry about it. It’s nothing.”

  “Nothing my ass. What happened? Was it Malone?”

  “No, not the cops. I said it’s nothing. Let it go, will you?”

  Tony stared at me, expressionless. I decided not to say anything right now, but you could be damned sure I wasn’t going to let it go.

  The waitress came by our booth and poured us both a coffee. I took a sip. It felt good to get something warm inside me. Tony acted as if nothing had happened, and asked me about how the last couple of days had gone. I gave him the Cliffs Notes version, including my confrontation with Buchanan.

  “Good for you,” he said. “Those assholes need to be taken down a peg or two.”

  “Did they come looking for you?”

  “Yeah. I gave them the runaround until Saturday afternoon.”

  “How was it?”

  “Malone was a prick as usual. Buchanan was okay. They grilled me for a couple of hours, then they let me go. Apparently you had an alibi.”

  “Yeah, I hooked up with someone after I left you at the Woodsman. I’m not proud of it, and I think I just lost a friend, but in a crazy way it worked out for me.”

  Tony looked at me. I could tell he wanted to ask me more questions, so I got in a preemptive strike.

  “Tell me more about what went down with Buchanan and Malone.”

  “Nothing to tell, really. They did everything they could to get me to say that you shot Robbins. I didn’t do it.”

  “Good.”

  The waitress brought our drinks. I took a long pull on my Bloody Mary, and Tony did the same. We contemplated our drinks until our food arrived. I took a bite of my Benedict. I had to hand it to Tony, it was really good. As usual, Tony attacked his food like he was starving to death. When he’d cleaned his plate, he put his fork down and mopped at his face with his napkin.

  “Good news and bad news,” he said.

  “Bad news first.”

  “I don’t think we’re going to get much joy from anyone related to the faith healing cases. I’ve tracked down three people so far, and it’s just like Linda said. They won’t say a word to an outsider. Didn’t matter what tricks I pulled.”

  “So much for Jan’s idea. What’s the good news?”

  “You’re going to like this. In the last month, there have been eight calls to the Servants of Christ Church from the same cell phone number. The final one was last Friday afternoon.”

  “Right before Aaron was killed. I’ll bet it was his phone.”

  “We’ll know tomorrow. My guy is looking into it.” He rubbed his nose. “Hey, I did learn one other thing. That thing where Larsen kissed the man and the woman on the lips? It’s how church members greet each other. They do it to everyone. Locals call them kissers. Weird, huh?”

  “Yeah, probably not the only weird thing they have going on.” I looked at Tony. “There’s something I need to ask you about.”

  “Sure, what is it?” he said, around a mouthful of Benedict.

  “Casey told me some things. That Metro don’t like who you’re hanging with. What’s going on, Tony?”

  He took a deep breath. “It’s a long story.”

  “I’ve got time.”

  “Can we talk about it some other time?”

  “No. I’m in a lot of shit here. I need to know if you’re going to make it worse.”

  “I don’t see you for three years, you hit me with this murder stuff, and I drop everything to help. Now you want to give me a hard time?”

  “Look, Tony, I’m grateful for everything you’ve done. But I’m sick of being in the dark about everything. I need you to be straight with me.”

/>   “Yeah, you’re right.” He drained his Bloody Mary. “It’s not something I’m happy about. Some guys I grew up with in Mexico moved to Oregon a couple of years back. They’re mixed up in some bad shit. Drugs, mostly. When they heard I was an investigator, they started leaning on me to get them information about the cops. Planned busts, intel on informers, anything I could get my hands on. I wouldn’t do it. They kept at me, and I kept saying no. They sent some guys to get heavy. That didn’t go well for them, so they turned the cops on me. Malone was like a kid in a candy store. He couldn’t believe his luck. All these brown people to arrest. I pled to felony assault, served six months. And they still come at me from time to time.”

  “And is that related to your black eye?”

  “Yeah. A guy came around yesterday, tried to get me to change my mind. He sucker punched me, so I put him on his ass.”

  “You think that was a good idea?”

  “Who cares, man? You hit me, you’re going down. Besides, I think he was just some punk kid trying to make a name for himself.”

  “And the felony? That why you’re not getting work?”

  “Mostly, yeah.”

  “Are you still licensed?”

  “No. You know they pull your ticket for felonies.”

  “Shit, man, I’m sorry. I had no idea.” I thought of something. “You need to be careful about carrying a gun. A felon in possession charge would put you back inside.”

  “I better make sure I don’t get caught, then,” Tony said, and smiled.

  Now I knew why Tony had free time to help me out, I felt like a jerk. “Look, I’m sorry about giving you a hard time. I really do appreciate what you’re doing for me.”

  “Yeah, I know. Now hurry up and eat so I can get you back to your place for a shower. You smell like shit.”

  Chapter 26 – He’s Back

  We got into Tony’s car. While he drove us back to my place, I called Linda.

  “Linda, it’s Mick Wray.”

  “Is this the Mick Wray who said he would call me on Friday?”

  “Yes, it is. Sorry about the delay. I was occupied.”

  “‘Occupied’ isn’t much of an excuse. Do better.”