Start with Chapter 1
CHAPTER 23
January 14, 1979
The station had only one usable interview room. The wooden table legs were bolted to the floor and the top of it was a rich tableau of nicks, cuts, and scars from years of subjects, often left alone, or cops themselves. Three wooden chairs, one with a short leg courtesy of Sergeant Benjamin Sidesdale, now retired. In it sat Josh, his forehead beaded with sweat and him thumping his foot lightly, occasionally forgetting the lopsided chair and catching himself.
Dean was pleased with the orchestrated arrival of Corey, Alex, and Josh. Etheridge had picked up Alex, while Zach picked up Corey. Both were brought to the station and seated across the room from each other. Guthrie and Dean walked in a few minutes later with Josh, who they marched into the main area before turning into the short hall with the file room and the interview room beside it.
Dean knew, with what they had, it was their best shot for rattling anything loose.
“What do you want?” asked Josh. He put his hands on the table. “Why did you have to drag me out of work?”
Guthrie slapped the table, not hard, but enough. “We’re trying to solve your friend’s murder.”
“You’ve already talked to me. I told you everything I know.”
“Did you?” asked Dean, his arms across his chest. “Did you?”
Josh blinked at him.
“See, we’ve got this issue. We talked to you, but you were, well, a bit cagey. I mean, why are you making sure you remember your story the same as Corey?”
“What’s that about?” Guthrie lit a cigarette, shaking out the match and tossing it into a styrofoam cup with water.
“I’ve been thinking about that. I think you guys misunderstood me.”
Guthrie looked at Dean and shrugged. They both looked at Josh, who blinked his eyes rapidly.
“You misunderstood me,” he said. “I mean, how often does something like that happen in this town. That’s big city stuff. And he was our friend, so we compared notes. ‘When did you last see him? Same as you.’ That kind of stuff.” He rubbed his temple. He looked pale, like he would pass out at any moment.
“You seem awfully nervous,” said Guthrie, who stood up. He walked toward the back wall, forcing Josh to look back and forth between him and Dean.
“My partner has a point. You’re acting like you did something wrong. You look terrible.”
Josh shook his head. “I didn’t I’m telling you.”
“Hmmm.” Dean tapped his chin. “Would you be willing to take a lie detector?”
Josh looked at Dean.
Dean scratched the back of his neck. “I mean, let’s clear this up real quick. If you’ve got nothing to hide that is. If you’re telling the truth.”
Josh looked back at Guthrie. Looked back at Dean. The kid somehow went even more pale. “Yeah. Yeah. Yes.”
Dean held his surprise back and instead nodded. “That should clear things up. It’ll have to come from a town over. Let me make the call.” He left Josh and Guthrie in the interview room and walked out to his desk. Usually when police bring up a lie detector, the suspect goes on the defensive, and those defenses can take time to break down, if lawyers have not been brought in. He had not expected Josh to embrace the idea so quickly, though it fed into the plan he had. Did that mean Josh was innocent, that Dean had gone down the wrong path? He shook his head. No, Josh was weak, he told himself.
Alex and Corey were still sitting across the room from each other. Etheridge was sitting in his chair, typing a report and giving both of the men accusatory glances every once in a while. Dean picked up the phone and dialed the number of Barry Archer, the area’s primary lie detector provider. He worked many of the towns in northeast New York.
“Barry Archer Security Services,” said the woman who answered the phone.
“This is Detective Dean Wallace with the Zion police. Is Barry in?”
“He’s not. May I take a message?”
“Yes,” said Dean, who then elevated the volume of his voice, hoping that Corey would hear it at the far end of the room, “Tell him I’d like him to give me a call. He has my number. I’m in need of his lie detector. Today if possible.” He had to hold back from looking at Alex’s and Corey’s reactions.
“I’ll let him know. What’s the number?”
“He has it. Thanks.” Dean hung up and walked back to the interview room, smiling at Corey and Alex as he went. He found Guthrie still standing against the wall behind Josh, who was leaning over with his hands around his stomach. Dean looked at Guthrie, who shrugged. He told Josh he had called the lie detector services and it would be a while, so he needed to wait out in the station while they talked to his friends. Josh stood up and walked through the door Dean held open. Guthrie followed them out and called Corey to the interview room. Josh and Corey passed but did not acknowledge each other. Dean patted Josh on the shoulder after he was seated. “Officer Stone here will get you a coffee or water or soda if you want it.”
Dean walked back into the interview room, where Guthrie had set Corey up much in the same way they had Josh.
Corey glared at them and ground his front teeth together. “What’s this all about?”
“What do you think, numbskull?” asked Guthrie.
“Billy?”
Guthrie punched Dean in the shoulder and pointed his finger at Corey. “What a bright young man we have here. He figured out we wanted to talk to him about his murdered friend.”
“He’s the smart one,” said Dean.
“What else can I tell you? What did Josh say?”
“Did Josh have something to tell?” asked Dean. Interrogations were like the shell game, he thought. When in New York City, he would play with the young boys on the streets, knowing it was a hustle but feeling bad for them and letting them take a dollar here or there. Detectives want the people on the other side of the table to feel they are honest brokers but not see the trick. In this case, Dean knew he was playing the game with a hand tied behind his back.
“I don’t know, man. This is bullshit.”
“You’re free to go,” said Dean.
Corey froze in surprise. “What?”
“You’re not under arrest, so you can go anytime.”
“But you picked me up.”
“Yeah, that was a courtesy. We can get you back to the store.” Dean rubbed the top of the table with his thumb. “But I got to tell you, if you do leave, you’ll seem uncooperative. I mean, Billy was your friend, right?”
Corey nodded. “He was my friend, but last I saw him was about eleven-thirty the night he disappeared.”
“Hmmm. Seems that’s the last anybody saw him. Where was he going?”
“He didn’t say. I presumed home. He usually went home. We all did.”
Dean looked up at the ceiling, rubbed his neck. “So you’re out drinking. You guys decide to call it a night. And that’s it.”
“Yep.”
“What’s this about having to compare your stories and get them to match up?” asked Guthrie.
Corey twisted his lips and looked at the detective. “Josh tell you that?” Guthrie shrugged. When Corey looked back at Dean, he received no acknowledgement. Corey sighed and looked down at the table. “It sounds worse than it is. We were just comparing notes. Seeing if Billy said something or did something that was odd. Nothing came up.”
Dean nodded once, clasped his hands together, and set his elbows on the table. Both Josh and Corey had given the same explanation, and it made sense. “So tell us about Alex and Sarah and the fighting between them and Billy.”
“Fighting’s too strong a word. Sarah was after his money. I let it be known I didn’t like that. Alex? Well, I’ll let him tell you what his issue was.”
“Did Billy own a gun?” asked Guthrie.
Corey shook his head. “I loaned him one.”
Dean leaned backward. “Thirty-eight?”
“Yep. I’ve had it for years. My grandpa gave it to me to kill raccoons.”
“Why’d you loan it to him?”
“We took the thing out in the woods occasionally and shot bottles and shit. He asked to borrow it. So I gave it to him.”
“When was this?”
“After Christmas. Why?”
“We found it in his coat pocket when we found him in the woods.”
Guthrie and Dean talked to Corey for another hour but obtained nothing more than he had already told them. He scratched his chin, repeated himself, and said he hoped they would catch Billy’s killer. Still, Dean thought he was hiding something. Maybe not related to Billy’s murder, but something, and he could not put his finger on it, but his instincts had helped him get out of Vietnam alive and survive the New York streets on patrol, and he trusted them here. He considered bringing up the cash found in Billy’s closet, but stopped himself. He decided to wait to spring that on Alex. Guthrie walked Corey out and escorted Alex in.
After he was seated across from Dean in the interview room, Alex maintained a casual, relaxed air, often twisting his thumbnail into the table. His face looked worse than the previous day, the bruises beginning to turn ugly colors.
“So tell us your issue with Billy and Sarah. Were you sweet on his girl?” asked Guthrie.
“Please. She’s not that hot.” He tapped a finger in the air at Guthrie. “But she’s got some fine features.”
Dean leaned forward. “We talked to Sarah first, you know?”
Alex’s eyes darted away from Dean’s. He brought them back but could not hold them there.
Dean continued, “We know. And if we don’t know something we will. Hiding information, not cooperating—”
Alex brought his fist down on the table. “Goddamnit!” He breathed in and out once. “Fine. Fine. We slept together. Happened a few times.”
Dean was pleased his instincts were still on. “When?”
“Ah man. You got to believe me. The first time, they weren’t together. They had broken up. It was a couple of years ago. They were always breaking up.”
“And getting back together,” said Guthrie.
“Yeah, I’m an asshole. I get it. I already knew it.”
If Guthrie took the moral high ground, Dean decided to sympathize with Alex. “But she is that hot. I’ve seen her. She’s a fine piece of tail. And that Puerto Rican vibe. I can see why you fell to her seductions.”
“She did start it.” Alex paused and gazed into nowhere, living in his memory palace, seeing her body. Dean did the same with Sadie. Imagined her in various states of undress.
“When was the most recent?” asked Dean.
“October last year. A few nights.”
“Did Billy find out?”
Alex shrugged.
“What does that mean?”
“Means, ‘I don’t know.’ Maybe he did. Maybe he didn’t.”
“That the reason you weren’t hanging out with your friends the night William disappeared, right?” Dean crossed his arms. He watched Alex frown and knew he had gone back to the reason they were in the interview room too quickly.
“And because I wasn’t there, you think I had something to do with his death? Over a girl?”
“I’ve seen murders for a lot less. Decided you wanted to be the lone man in Sarah’s life? Or William found out. Confronted you. You had to defend yourself?”
“No man. No.”
“Was there something else you were arguing about? Money perhaps?”
“Money. Hell, man, Billy didn’t have any money.”
Dean smiled. “Oh, but he did. Found nearly twenty thousand in his closet. Cash.”
Alex’s eyes darted a look at Dean and then Guthrie. He pushed and rubbed his thumb on the table. “News to me. I should’ve had him pick up the tab more often.”
The knocking on the door broke the conversation. Guthrie got up, opened the door, leaned out, and then leaned back in. To Dean, he said, “We’re needed.”
Dean nodded. He looked at Alex. “Something’s still not right about your story. I’ll find it out.” He got up and walked out into the hallway, closing the door behind him. He found himself face-to-face with tall and heavy-set District Attorney Henry D. Smith, Alex’s father.
A full head of dark brown hair, vibrant green-brown eyes, and a mustache that cascaded down the side of his lips, Henry wore a gray suit, white shirt, and red tie with tiny gray anchors. He gestured to the door. “Let my son out. He’s not to talk to you without a lawyer. Me. Did you read him his rights?”
Dean looked at his father, who stood beside Henry. Eric shrugged. Guthrie had taken up a spot outside the triangle. Dean scratched his head. “Your son’s not under arrest. He’s cooperating in the William Nimitz murder investigation.”
“So that’s a no.”
Dean nodded. “Are you here as the DA or as his father?”
Eric said, “He’s here as a concerned father.”
“Okay, then, but Alex is an adult, and he can talk to us if he wants.”
Henry’s eyes narrowed. “Then I’m here as the DA. Let him go. He’s not your guy.”
“Have you reviewed the case file?”
Henry ignored the question and walked past Dean and opened the interview room door. “Come on. You’re done here.”
Alex walked out and down the hallway, followed by his father. Dean grabbed Alex’s arm as he passed. “What happened to your face?”
He pulled his arm from Dean’s grip.
“So why’d you show up at the Shambles the night of Billy’s death at near midnight?”
Alex’s eyes snapped up and met Dean’s. Henry grabbed his son’s arm and jerked him away.
Dean felt the cold January air rush through as father and son exited the station. Josh and Corey were absent. Etheridge shrugged and pointed in the direction Henry and Alex had just followed.
To Dean, it felt as if his case—as meager and absent as it was—walked out behind them.
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