I Am Quinn

by McGarvey Black

My name is Erin Delaney Danzi. I am Quinn Delaney Roberts’ sister. I know you were seeing Alec Roberts at the time of my sister’s death. I’m not suggesting you had any part in it. My family is frustrated with the lack of progress from the police investigation. We hoped you might remember something from that time that might help us. We would be grateful for anything, even something tiny. Thank you.

  –Erin Delaney Danzi

  A few weeks later, Alison Moore responded.

  Hi Erin,

  I am so sorry about Quinn. I had grown close to your nephew and niece when I was with Alec and learned much about your beautiful sister from them. The whole awful thing is so disturbing, and I too really wish they would solve her murder. As time passes, it bothers me more and more. In fact, given that I was seeing Alec at the time of your sister’s death, I was surprised the police never contacted me.

  What day did they actually narrow her murder down to? I’m not sure I ever really got a straight answer on that from Alec. Weird things were going on the week before your sister was found, and I often reflect about them myself. If I knew anything, I would go to the police, but unfortunately, all I have is a bad feeling. I would be more than willing to talk with you although I don't think I know anything that would help. – Alison Moore

  Excited that maybe this was a break they had been waiting for, Erin responded immediately. Despite Alison’s initial offer to help, she never responded to Erin again. What were the ‘weird things’ Alison referred to the week before Quinn was found and why did she have a ‘bad feeling’? Those two comments haunted Erin.

  Also, Erin fumed, why hadn’t the police interviewed Alec’s girlfriend? Everyone knows when it comes to murder, it’s always the husband or boyfriend. Watch any cop show, that’s how it always happens. In her extensive research, Erin read that when it comes to murder, ninety-eight percent of the time, the killer is the significant other or someone the victim knows, not a stranger. Erin wanted to know why the police hadn’t interviewed the woman her brother-in-law was sleeping with. Either the cops were hiding something, or someone screwed up. She was going to find out what happened.

  Chapter 69

  Detective Crews had talked to the owner of Kenny’s Kwik-Mart ten months before. McQuillan wasn’t sure there was much point in interviewing the owner a second time, but it had been almost a year since the murder, and he was out of fresh leads.

  ‘That last time Ms. Roberts was in my store, it was crowded, and I didn’t have a lot of time to talk like I usually did,’ said Kenny. ‘A couple of construction guys from that big apartment building going up over on Division Street put in a big sandwich order for their whole crew. My assistant manager and I were knee-deep in mayonnaise and Swiss cheese when Ms. Roberts came in. She looked nice, pulled together. Some days she didn’t, but that day she looked good.’

  ‘Was there anyone else in the shop that day?’ McQuillan asked.

  ‘Some construction guys nudged each other, they were watching her,’ Kenny said. ‘They spoke in a foreign language, like Hungarian or Polish. It was obvious they were talking about her. Guys can be real dogs, you know? I kind of felt a little protective of her even though I didn’t know her that well.’

  ‘Seems like she had that effect on people,’ the detective said ruefully.

  ‘When she came up to the register she asked me how I was like she always did. Before I finished ringing her up, I got an emergency call from my ex-wife. My idiot son had been suspended at his high school, and I had to go pick him up. I left right away.’

  ‘Were there any other customers besides the construction workers in the store while she was here?’ McQuillan asked.

  ‘Yeah, there were two other guys in their thirties, not together and not my regulars,’ Kenny said. ‘I didn’t know ’em.’

  ‘Quinn Roberts didn’t appear to know any of these men, correct?’ McQuillan asked.

  ‘Nah.’

  ‘Was she on foot that day?’

  ‘I don’t know, but I got a security video if you want to see it. I’d have to find it and…’

  ‘That’s not necessary right now,’ McQuillan said. ‘I’ll be in touch if we want to see it.’

  ‘You know something, Detective. This murder scared the shit out of everyone in this part of town,’ said Kenny. ‘Right after it happened, every customer who came into my shop said something about it. Not so much anymore, but every once in a while, somebody brings it up. People are still nervous.’

  ‘Yeah,’ McQuillan said. ‘We’d like nothing better than solving this one.’

  ‘I don’t think she even knew many people in town, she was always alone,’ said Kenny. ‘She told me once she was looking for a job, said she had to start over at the age of forty-four. I remember thinking she looked pretty good for forty-four.’

  McQuillan thanked Kenny for his time and then headed back to the station. The truth was, it didn’t matter who was on that security tape. He knew who killed Quinn Roberts. There was no point wasting time chasing after other people. They needed something concrete on Alec Roberts. Goddamn Yancy.

  Chapter 70

  Mike, Colleen and Erin were seated in the Newbridge police department conference room. The homicide team assigned to Quinn’s case along with the assistant DA and the Chief of Police sat across from them. The Delaneys had asked for this meeting and were armed for a rumble. It had been one year since the murder, and the cops were nowhere. They told the family they were still following up leads but with each passing day, Quinn’s killer was getting further away.

  The Delaneys had stopped being politically correct with the police months ago and openly talked about Alec as the person they believed had killed Quinn. The detectives wouldn’t confirm or deny it and used words like ‘alleged’ or ‘person of interest’. Over time, the Delaneys began to understand ‘cop-speak’. When dealing with the police they learned, it’s not always what they said, sometimes it’s what they didn’t say that mattered. The cops never corrected the Delaneys when they talked about Alec being ‘the killer’. For Erin, that alone was telling.

  The thing that puzzled Quinn’s sisters was why the cops weren’t able to match any of the DNA samples from the apartment to anyone, and in particular, to Alec.

  ‘I’m going to be direct,’ said Mike. ‘We’re ninety-nine percent sure Alec murdered Quinn. You’ve got his DNA, why can’t you match it? Don’t you think he’s the one who did it?’

  ‘We’ve hit a wall with Alec Roberts,’ said Bernie Gonzales, the assistant DA. ‘You remember he came in that first day and spent a few hours with Detectives McQuillan and Crews. After that, he clammed up and hired a lawyer. All communication since then has been through his attorney.’

  ‘Can’t you make him talk to you?’ Erin asked. ‘He’s a suspect, can’t you bring him in?’

  ‘Unfortunately,’ said McQuillan, ‘unless we have grounds to arrest someone, we can’t force them to talk to us, it’s up to them. That’s the law.’

  ‘It’s a stupid law,’ said Erin.

  ‘If any of you can encourage him to come in, we’d be grateful.’

  ‘Wouldn’t a husband do anything he could to help find his wife’s killer?’ Mike asked. ‘If someone were innocent they would volunteer as much information as possible, not shut down communication. Isn’t that strange?’

  ‘Yes,’ said McQuillan.

  ‘You think Alec did it, too,’ said Colleen.

  ‘All I can say is that Alec Roberts is a person of interest,’ said McQuillan with a weary look. He would have loved to tell them that he thought their brother-in-law was a craven homicidal nut job, but he couldn’t, the Chief would put his ass in a sling.

  ‘If Alec is responsible, how come none of his DNA matched the crime scene? Why would he agree to give you his sample?’ said Mike. ‘He won’t talk to you, but he gave you his DNA? It doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Maybe he gave us his DNA because he knew we wouldn’t find a match,’ said McQuillan.

  The detective was trying
to tell them something without actually saying it. Exasperated, Erin wondered why the police had to be so obtuse.

  Puzzled by McQuillan’s comment, the Delaney contingency looked at each other for a moment trying to decipher what exactly McQuillan was getting at.

  ‘Are you saying you think Quinn’s murder was done by someone else but Alec may have been involved?’ Mike asked.

  ‘It’s possible,’ said Bernie Gonzales without emotion.

  ‘It’s one scenario,’ McQuillan said. ‘We’re running down a few different threads. Nothing conclusive.’

  It never made sense to Mike and Erin that Alec did the DNA swab and then refused to talk to the cops. Now they understood. They wouldn’t find Alec’s DNA in Quinn’s apartment because he was never there.

  This was even worse than the Delaneys had imagined. Quinn’s murder wasn’t because of an argument or a moment of passion. Alec didn’t just lose his mind in a moment of temporary insanity or rage. He planned it. Erin felt dizzy and faint and she started to cry in front of everyone. She didn’t care that the cops saw her cry; she wanted her sister back, and she wanted Alec to pay.

  Chapter 71

  After they broke up, Alison Moore never contacted Alec again. She knew something was going on around the time of Quinn’s death, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. All she was sure of was that things were really strange the week before they found Quinn dead.

  Right after the funeral and the first few weeks that followed, Alec had been remarkably calm. He’d busied himself with his hobbies like working on an old car or taking pictures and hiking. He was surprisingly content, which Alison thought was odd given the circumstances.

  He took a two-week break from teaching when Quinn died and then went right back to work at UR. Hannah and Jack returned to school around the same time, and it was like Quinn never existed. Alison thought she was more upset about Quinn’s death than Alec and she had never met her. Hannah and Jack used to talk about their mother all the time, and she had seen loads of pictures, so it felt like she knew her.

  ‘This was Mom when she was a model in high school,’ said a proud Hannah holding up an old magazine cover. There was a time when Alison felt insecure about Quinn’s good looks. I’m attractive, Alison thought, but Quinn was crazy pretty. She couldn’t help but compare herself to the woman who came before her. Despite all of Alec’s nasty comments, she always thought Quinn was the kind of person she might have been friends with. They liked the same things like music and cooking. Quinn played the ukulele badly, and Alison was about the same on the piano. From Alison’s perspective, Quinn had raised two good kids. She couldn’t have been as bad as Alec made her out to be.

  A few months after the funeral, Alec got mean and started to belittle Alison.

  ‘Why are you wearing that dress?’ he asked. ‘It makes you look fat.’ The little voice inside her head wanted to say, ‘screw you’. But all she said to him was, ‘Oh, it does, I’ll change.’

  It wasn’t just because he picked on her appearance, although that should have been enough. He also started to chip away at her intelligence saying her opinions were ‘uninformed’ and even ‘stupid’.

  ‘I don’t understand why you never support your opinions with facts,’ Alec said on more than one occasion. ‘You’re worse than my students. Don’t debate me, Ali, unless you know what you’re talking about and can defend your position.’

  Sometimes he’d raise his voice, and he always had to be right. Always. At some point, she was sure he used to make stuff up just to bully her.

  At first, Alison chalked up the combative behavior to the trauma of his wife’s murder. She figured Alec’s new nastiness was a mask covering up his pain, and it would eventually fade. The police had leaned on him pretty hard, and Hannah and Jack were still in a dangerous place emotionally. Hannah almost didn’t go back to school. Alison tried to give Alec the benefit of the doubt.

  She toughed it out for a few more months but the relationship wasn’t fun anymore. He scared her when his volatile temper emerged. She also caught him in a few lies and noticed how effortlessly twisting the truth came to him.

  Then there was that other thing. She had blacked out a few times at his apartment after only a single glass of wine. When she woke up the following morning, she was naked with a whopping headache and no memory of the night before. When she asked Alec about it he said she must have had too much to drink and passed out. Alison thought it odd because she wasn’t a big drinker and usually only had one glass of wine.

  She cared about him and liked his kids, but things didn’t feel right, and she finally ended it.

  When she told him it was over, the smirk on his face turned into a sneer. She hadn’t seen him look at her like that ever before. It sent a chill down her spine and reinforced her decision to break it off. Still, she had been in love with the guy and wished him and his kids well. Namaste.

  When Alison got the that message from Erin on Facebook, it took her by surprise. It had been over a year since Quinn died. Erin’s email dredged everything up. The week Quinn was killed, she and Alec were together every night, which was very unusual for them. They never saw each other on weekdays but that week, they did, and she remembered Alec got a lot of phone calls. She had teased him because he kept sneaking away whenever his phone would ring.

  ‘Why do you keep going out in the yard every time you get a call?’ she asked. ‘What are you, CIA?’

  ‘I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you,’ he replied with a grin, saying it was ‘just university stuff’. She remembered thinking his behavior was odd, atypical. He was acting funny.

  Maybe she shouldn’t have communicated with Erin. Alec had been through enough, and she certainly didn’t want to cause any hardship for his kids. Feeling a little guilty, she decided to call Alec. He was surprised to hear from her but was warm and friendly. They chatted like old friends, laughing and teasing each other like they used to, even flirting a little. For a second, she wondered if she had made a mistake breaking up with him. Alec was his old charming self, the guy she fell for at the car wash.

  ‘So,’ she said, ‘the reason for my call is I got a message on Facebook from someone you know.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ he said. ‘Who?’

  ‘Erin Delaney,’ she said. Dead silence. ‘She’s your sister-in-law, right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘She’s a whack job just like my ex-wife. What did she want?’

  Alison wondered why he called Quinn his ‘ex-wife’. They never got divorced. She died. She was murdered before the divorce was final. Alison thought his choice of words was peculiar.

  ‘She asked me if I knew anything that might help them solve Quinn’s murder,’ Alison replied.

  ‘What did you tell her?’ he said suspiciously.

  ‘That I didn’t know anything, but I had a bad feeling that week,’ Alison said.

  ‘You stupid bitch,’ he screamed. ‘Why would you say something like that? Why would you give her any ammo? They’re all after me. They think I killed Quinn.’

  ‘I didn’t say anything, Alec. I just told her I had a bad feeling, that’s all, like a sixth sense.’

  ‘Keep your mouth shut and stay out of my business,’ he shouted. ‘If I find out you talked to any of them, you’ll be sorry. I’ll shut you down, you got that?’

  She was shaking when she hung up the phone. Now she was afraid. A lot of people thought Alec was guilty of killing his wife. Alison had always defended him. Quinn’s family and all her friends from New Jersey were convinced he did it. One of Alison’s friends used to date a reporter for the Rochester Bulletin, and he told her all the cops thought Alec did it. That’s why they weren’t looking for anyone else.

  Alison wondered if she had been sleeping with a murderer for all those months. She’d seen his temper, and it was bone chilling.

  The next day when she got to work, she walked over to her manager without stopping at her own desk.

  ‘Hey Ted,’ she said, sticking he
r head into his office. ‘You got a minute?’

  ‘For you, Ali, always,’ he said, closing his laptop. ‘What do you need?’

  ‘Remember last month you asked me if I’d consider relocating to run our office in Austin? I’ve changed my mind. I’ll do it.’

  Alison never communicated with Erin Delaney again. She didn’t want to get mixed up with those people. Strange things were going on the week Quinn died. If the cops ever contacted her, she’d tell them to check Alec’s phone records. She pulled out her calendar and added a few thoughts to the detailed notes about the weeks leading up to Quinn’s death, in case she was ever asked about it down the road. For now, she didn’t need any more trouble, and she didn’t want Alec Roberts pissed off at her. Austin put 1,600 miles between them. Maybe now, she’d be able to sleep at night.

  Part VI

  THREE YEARS AFTER MY MURDER

  Chapter 72

  Erin, Mike and some of Quinn’s Jersey friends organized another vigil to mark the third anniversary of Quinn’s death. They met in Newbridge on the street where Quinn had lived to do community outreach, handing out flyers followed by a march around the neighborhood. Somebody out there knew something, and they hoped this show of force might encourage that person to come forward. They even contacted local newspapers and TV stations to keep Quinn’s name in the news, so she wouldn’t be forgotten.

  By the third anniversary, Jack and Hannah, who had somehow managed to finish college, had both found jobs in Rochester. They came to the vigil, too. No one invited Alec. None of the Delaneys had spoken to him since Quinn died. He’d never have the guts to show up at their event, anyway. He knew they all thought he did it and he stayed away.

  ‘An innocent person would be looking for his wife’s killer,’ said Mike. ‘Alec never spent one minute looking nor did he give any help to the police. That’s all you need to know.’