Secrets Never Die

by Leigh, Melinda

  “No.” Tina’s voice went flat.

  “You left the hotel yesterday. Where did you go?” he asked.

  “I was driving around, looking for Evan,” Tina said.

  “Are you sure you didn’t meet him?”

  “What’s the meaning of this?” Morgan interrupted. “Tina is frightened for her son’s safety. She has no idea where he is.”

  Sheriff Colgate sat back and studied Tina.

  Esposito joined in. “I hope not. Because if you have any knowledge of where your son is or if you have helped him in any way, then you could be charged with aiding and abetting or conspiracy after the fact.”

  “Hold on.” Morgan stood and turned to Tina. “Do not answer any more questions.” Morgan faced Esposito. “You are out of line. If you want to charge Mrs. Knox, do it. You have zero evidence.”

  Esposito changed the topic. “We have plenty of evidence against Evan, though.” He lifted his forefinger. “Paul Knox was shot with a 9mm bullet, the same caliber as his own weapon, which is missing. At the time of his death, Paul had been cleaning his gun. The weapon had been out of the safe and available to Evan. So the boy had the means to murder Paul.

  “Next is opportunity.” Esposito raised another finger. “There is no evidence of a break-in the night of the shooting. There is no sign that anyone else was in the house the night of the shooting. Paul was killed between midnight and one a.m. The teen was dropped off by a friend at the house at twelve thirty a.m., more than two hours past his curfew. We received the results of the expedited DNA tests on the blood on the fence and back door. The tests confirm that the blood is Evan’s. So we know that Evan was at the house when Paul was killed.”

  Shit. Juries loved DNA.

  “And finally, motive,” Esposito said. “Two months prior to the shooting, the sheriff’s department responded to a domestic disturbance at the Knox residence. A neighbor heard the teen and his stepfather fighting loudly. The teen took a swing at his stepfather, indicating a history of violent interactions between Paul and Evan. Evan has previous arrests for vandalism and destruction of property. He was also known to be angry about being forced to meet with his biological father. This anger could have been directed at Paul, who was the deputy who arrested Evan’s father and put him in jail.”

  He paused for effect. Tina stared back at him, pure hatred in her eyes.

  The ADA’s body tilted forward, almost imperceptibly, his use of body language subtler—and more effective—than the sheriff’s. “This is what we think happened. Evan came in late. Paul called him on it. They argued. They already had friction between them from other disagreements. The fight escalated and became physical. Evan sustained a cut or bloody nose. He picked up Paul’s gun and shot him in the abdomen. He panicked and shot Paul again.” Esposito focused on Tina. “The real question is whether you helped him get away.”

  Lance hadn’t moved since the interview began, but Morgan could sense the hostility emanating from him toward Esposito and Colgate.

  “This interview is over. My client will not be answering any more questions.”

  “Think about Evan, Mrs. Knox.” Sheriff Colgate got to his feet. He leaned his knuckles on the table. “Every law enforcement officer out there knows he is armed and dangerous. It would be easier and safer if he surrendered.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  A new sense of urgency tightened Lance’s chest as he gripped the steering wheel. The sheriff’s department no longer considered Evan an innocent missing teenager.

  He was wanted for murder.

  They dropped Tina off at her hotel, with her deputy guard parked outside her door. At Morgan’s request, Lance took a two-minute detour to pick up coffee and donuts via the bakery drive-through window. He parked outside Sharp Investigations, and Morgan carried the white bakery bag and her giant tote into the building. Lance grabbed the two tall cardboard cups of strong coffee from the Jeep’s console and followed her inside. They settled in Morgan’s office, now the case war room.

  Side by side, Lance and Morgan leaned backward on the desk and faced the whiteboard. She offered him the white bag, and he took a chocolate cruller. With two nights of no sleep, he was running on pure adrenaline.

  Sharp walked in, two protein shakes in hand. He gave one to Lance. “Drink this instead.”

  “I’ll drink that as well.” Lance popped the rest of the donut into his mouth, washed it down with coffee, then accepted the shake. Exhaustion weighed on his body and muddled his concentration. It was going to take caffeine, sugar, and Sharp’s miracle concoction to get his neurons firing.

  Sharp went back to his office for his laptop. “I want to update my case notes while we brainstorm. Mind if I use your desk?” he asked Morgan.

  “Not at all.” She took a second donut.

  Shaking his head at her donut, Sharp opened his laptop and scanned the screen. “I don’t even know where to start. Our primary objective was to find Evan, but finding Paul’s killer now seems equally important. Do we have any more leads on Evan’s possible location?”

  “No. His friends deny having seen him. We’ve checked his favorite places. The sheriff’s deputies have been trolling teen hangout spots. Every cop in the state is on the lookout for him. He must be holed up somewhere. He’s not at Jake’s farm.” Lance told Sharp about his late-night reconnaissance.

  “You’re sure it wasn’t a cop?” Sharp asked as he typed.

  “A cop would have arrested me on the spot, not bashed me over the head.” Lance drank more of his shake.

  “Right.” Sharp looked up. “An honest cop.”

  “I hadn’t thought about dirty cops.” The idea whirled in Lance’s mind, generating new theories.

  Sharp shrugged. “The sheriff’s department has had its issues with corruption.”

  “If Paul knew something about one of the deputies he’d worked with . . .” Lance went to the board and wrote DIRTY COP? under MOTIVE.

  “Could it have been Brian Springer?” Sharp asked.

  Lance pictured the sedan in the shadows. “What does Brian drive?”

  Morgan turned to the desk behind her, picked up her case file, and opened it. “A four-door black Ford Taurus.”

  “Is he a big guy?” Lance asked.

  “Over six feet tall and in decent shape,” Sharp said. “But he’s not huge.”

  “It’s possible then.” Lance made a note next to Brian’s name. A cop would be trained to fight.

  Sharp got up and paced the space between Morgan’s desk and her credenza. “As the victim, Paul is the center of all this.”

  Lance drank his coffee in the hope that the caffeine would kick in soon. “I have no doubt the sheriff’s office is reviewing Paul’s cases, looking for someone released from prison who held a grudge.”

  Sharp nodded. “We don’t have access to his old case files, so we’ll have to leave that task to the sheriff’s department. I did an internet search but didn’t come up with anything.”

  Morgan closed the file and set it on the desktop behind her. “The Knox front door was unlocked, and there were no signs of a break-in. If Paul let someone in that night, it would have been someone he knew and trusted.”

  “Like Brian.” Lance underlined the words DIRTY COP on the board. “Would the boys have told you if he were corrupt?”

  Sharp stopped pacing. His head tilted as he considered Lance’s question. “They wouldn’t lie to me. They know Evan is missing. But the answers I got were a little too vague for my comfort. Jimmy mentioned an excessive force complaint filed against Brian.”

  Did that mean Brian had a history of violent behavior or poor impulse control? The same argument used for Evan’s motive could apply to someone else.

  “Plus, it appeared as if Brian left his house in a hurry and took his desktop computer with him,” Sharp said.

  “Or someone stole it,” Morgan suggested. “For the same reason that the police seize criminals’ computers—to find out what they’ve been doing. Brian is a seasoned
deputy. I’m sure he knows how to cover his tracks online. But no one sanitizes their actual machine every night. His hard drive would contain plenty of information about his recent activity.”

  Sharp returned to the chair behind the desk. “Jenny is looking for a property on a lake in Brian’s family. We can’t talk to him until we find him. Your mom is also trying to find any information on the excessive force complaint filed against Brian and the department by Sam Jones.”

  “Let’s move on to other theories,” Lance said.

  Sharp leaned forward and pressed a key on his laptop to wake it.

  “Have we ruled out robbery gone wrong as a possibility for his death?” Morgan pointed at the ROBBERY notation on the board. “As Lance pointed out to the sheriff, the fact that there was no obvious sign of a break-in does not rule out a robbery. Even quality locks can be picked by an experienced burglar.”

  “All true,” Sharp agreed. “But since the killing was particularly cold-blooded, other motives come immediately to mind: revenge, elimination, and information.”

  “Don’t forget anger.” Morgan picked up her coffee. “That’s how the sheriff is justifying Evan as the prime suspect.”

  “And with good reason.” Sharp shifted backward in the chair and studied the board. “Evan has means, motive, and opportunity.”

  “I know, and I’ve struggled with that very question,” Lance said. “But I can’t see Evan hurting anyone but himself.”

  Shifting her coffee to her left hand, Morgan walked to the board and picked up a marker. She began to write notes in Evan’s column. “If the weapon is recovered and ballistics proves Paul was killed with his own gun, that would be another hefty piece of physical evidence against Evan. He lived in the house and had access to the gun. His DNA and fingerprints will be all over everything. If he should be arrested, I’m sure the ADA will point out every damning occurrence, no matter how irrelevant or ridiculous.”

  “Even if you prove it’s meaningless, the jury will have heard, and the damage will be done.” Lance rubbed the bruised back of his neck. Three ibuprofen tablets had done nothing to alleviate the pain.

  “What about Tina?” Morgan tapped the marker on the board under Tina’s name. “Is Tina still on our list of suspects?”

  “She’s your client,” Sharp snorted.

  Morgan shrugged. “I promised to represent her to the best of my ability. That doesn’t mean I trust her. Despite her excuses, she has to know that the information she withheld about her father could play into Paul’s murder and Evan’s disappearance. Yet she did not tell us until she was backed into a corner. I’m not as concerned about the friction between Paul and Evan. I can’t see Evan as the killer. What would he have to gain by killing Paul? By all accounts, Paul was kind to him.”

  Lance scanned the names. Someone was guilty. Someone had killed Paul. “Tina was at work, in full view of a dozen people and security cameras. She couldn’t come up with a better alibi if she tried.”

  Sharp rubbed his chin. “But she could have blackmailed or paid someone else to kill him.”

  “But what was her motive?” Morgan gestured toward the board with her coffee. “And why would she then come to us for help?”

  “I don’t know, but I don’t like that she did not tell us about her father either,” Sharp said. “That was a big-ass secret she was keeping.”

  “If Tina was behind Paul’s murder, then where is Evan?” Morgan asked.

  “Maybe Tina’s plan didn’t work out the way she wanted,” Sharp argued.

  Morgan shook her head. “But then wouldn’t she suspect who had taken her son? That scenario doesn’t work for me. Her father seems like a more likely suspect.”

  “I agree.” Lance chugged more coffee, then swigged his shake, the combination waking his brain cells. “Her testimony put him in prison for twenty-five years. I’m sure that pissed him off. Joe Martin had a history of taking revenge. Killing Paul and destroying Tina’s newfound happiness would be the perfect retaliation.”

  “He could have taken Evan too,” Morgan agreed. “As additional payback or to convince her to come to him. Maybe he wants her to watch him kill Evan.”

  They were all quiet for a few seconds. Lance didn’t like that scenario one bit, but it was all too plausible given Tina’s story. “Can we verify any of the details Tina gave us on her background and her father?”

  “Revenge is a great motive, but it wouldn’t be very satisfying unless she knew it had been Joe who had done the deed,” Sharp pointed out.

  The printer on Morgan’s credenza whirred and spit out a picture. Lance retrieved it.

  “Your mother emailed this to me this morning,” Sharp said. “That is Joe Martin when he went to prison twenty-five years ago. She is still looking for a current picture.”

  Lance positioned the photo on the board and labeled it.

  Sharp said, “I have another lead on some info regarding Joe Martin and his gang. I’ll follow up on that today.”

  “What lead?” Lance asked.

  Sharp stared into his drink. “Twenty-five years ago, Olivia Cruz did an in-depth piece on gang violence in Newark, New Jersey. She covered Joe’s trial and interviewed gang members.”

  “Olivia Cruz?” Lance grinned. “The same reporter who helped us out on our last big case?”

  “Yes,” Sharp said in an irritated tone.

  “The same woman you owe a favor to?” Morgan asked, her mouth twitching with a small smile.

  “Yes.” Sharp jabbed a finger in the direction of the board. “Can we get back to the case?”

  Sharp could deny it all he wanted, but he had a thing for Olivia Cruz. Considering that Sharp thought all reporters were the direct descendants of Satan, the attraction he was trying to fight was hilarious. If Lance weren’t so worried about Evan, he would enjoy the hell out of Sharp’s discomfort.

  “Sure,” Lance chuckled. “Evan’s father, Kirk Meade, is next on my list. What do we know about him?”

  “He has a supposed alibi at the group home, where he checked in for the night at seven thirty,” Morgan said. “But when I asked the sheriff if anyone saw him after that time, he didn’t answer.”

  “That’s probably a no,” Sharp said. “But we should talk to the supervisor and other residents of the group home.”

  “Morgan and I can do that this morning,” Lance volunteered. “By all accounts, Kirk is a manipulative, lazy scumbag. Tina was his meal ticket. He was causing trouble for Tina and Paul, dragging Tina to court for visitation rights, charges of violating the court order, and parental alienation. All bullshit charges designed to make Tina’s life difficult.”

  “Revenge for divorcing him,” Morgan added. “How far would Kirk go to get even with Tina?”

  “He blamed Paul because she wouldn’t take him back,” Lance said. “We need to talk to Kirk.”

  “Do we want to talk to Jake again?” Morgan asked.

  “I don’t see why. Lance already searched the farm.” Sharp tapped his fingers together. “Evan wasn’t there. When you questioned him, did it seem like he was lying?”

  Morgan shook her head. “I didn’t pick up on any lies.”

  “Me neither.” Lance switched back to coffee. “But I’ll bet the person who attacked me was looking for Evan there too.”

  “Do we have any other leads?” Sharp asked.

  “Rylee Nelson, Evan’s secret girlfriend.” Morgan wrote her name on the board. “She was super defensive about her brother. Something is up there.”

  “My mother will research the family, but maybe we should drive by her house,” Lance suggested. “Evan didn’t want his family to know he was dating Rylee. Maybe the reason lies with her family, not his.”

  “Where shall we start?” Morgan scanned the board. “Are we agreed that our most likely suspects are Brian, Kirk, and Joe Martin?”

  “Yes,” Sharp said. “Let’s focus on those three for now.”

  “Let’s start with Kirk, then move on to Rylee.” Lance picke
d up his empty cups. He’d finished the shake and the coffee and was feeling almost human. “Do we visit Kirk at the group home or furniture warehouse?”

  “Group home first.” Morgan turned away from the board. “Kirk is a parolee. His employer will be keeping a close eye on him. We shouldn’t jeopardize his job. He can claim harassment. Besides, we want to talk to the group home supervisor anyway.”

  Lance glanced back at the board. They’d gathered information and generated leads, but their case still felt scattered. The lines of investigation bloomed across the white space like a spiderweb when what Lance wanted was a neat grid.

  He tossed his cardboard coffee cup in the wastebasket. “Let’s go poke some holes in Kirk’s alibi.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Standing on the doorstep of the group home, Morgan buttoned her blazer and pressed the doorbell. The door lock was an electronic card key entry system, with a slot to swipe a card and a keypad to enter a code.

  She stepped back and scanned the street. A Hand Up Transitional Residence for Men occupied a huge brick-fronted Tudor-style house. The neighborhood was zoned for mixed use, with several of the large houses on the main street having been converted to professional offices. The group home sat between an accounting firm and a similar house that had been divided into apartments.

  Next to her, Lance tapped an impatient boot on the cement. But they didn’t have to wait long. A tall, thin man opened the door. Behind him, a chime echoed in the house.

  “I’m Morgan Dane, and this is my associate Lance Kruger. We’d like to speak with the supervisor, Mr. Dougherty.” Morgan offered him a business card. She had called ahead, so Dougherty should have been expecting them.

  “I’m Stan Dougherty. Please come in.” Mr. Dougherty moved back to allow them inside. “Welcome to A Hand Up.”

  “Thank you for seeing us.” Morgan stepped into the foyer, well aware that Dougherty had no obligation to cooperate. Lance crossed the threshold to stand next to her.

  “We’re always happy to explain what we do.” Dougherty closed the door. “We’re very proud of our work in the community.”