Ardmore Green

by Jeff Siebold

  “Seth, this is Mr. Traynor from the FBI,” said Roger. Zeke nodded at him.

  “And Miss, uh,” continued Roger.

  “Call me Kimmy,” Kimmy said. She circled the table and took a seat next to Seth, on the far side. Seth sat and rolled his chair away from her slightly.

  Defensive, thought Zeke. And nervous about something.

  The attorney, still near the door, looked at Roger, who had taken a seat near Kimmy across the table from Zeke. Roger shrugged, and the attorney sat down next to Zeke.

  Seth’s t-shirt was green with “Bong” printed across the front in capital letters. He was thick, like Roger, but not yet overweight.

  He looked at Zeke. “Man, I talked with the cops already,” he said. “I can’t believe this happened.”

  “OK, let’s go,” said Zeke, when everyone was seated. He set a small recorder on the table, more to intimidate Seth than anything else. He turned it on and said, “Seth, I’m a consultant with the FBI and I’m here running a parallel investigation to the police department, looking into the death of Will Burns and Susie Lopper.” He stopped talking.

  Seth looked at Zeke and then at his father. He nodded to his dad.

  “They were found in the dumpster on Monday morning, Seth. When’s the last time you saw Will?”

  Seth thought for a moment. “We hung out the day before, Sunday afternoon and evening,” said Seth. “I told the cops that.”

  “Sure,” said Zeke, ignoring the comment. “Was Will alone then?”

  “Yeah, Susie’s folks took her home and she couldn’t get back out to meet up with Will. He was mad.”

  “How did you know she couldn’t get back out?” asked Zeke.

  “She was texting him,” said Seth with a ‘what did you think’ tone in his voice.

  “Where were you hanging out?”

  “Uh, well there’s a place we like to hang behind the Main Line YMCA. Across from Suburban Square,” he said, slowly. “They have a grassy yard and a couple picnic tables to sit on.”

  “When were you there on Sunday?” asked Zeke.

  “Oh, we started out in Suburban Square and then grabbed a bite and drifted over to the Y around dark. It’s a quieter place.”

  “Good place to smoke pot?” asked Zeke.

  “Hey,” said Roger Gordon immediately. “Hey.”

  “Not interested in misdemeanor offenses,” said Zeke. “Seth?”

  “I guess,” said Seth.

  “OK,” said Zeke. “What was Will’s mood.”

  “I said, man, he was mad that his shorty couldn’t get free.”

  “Shorty?” said Roger.

  “Girl, his girl,” said Seth. He sipped his Red Bull from the can.

  “Anything odd that night? Did you see anyone acting strangely, anyone out of place?”

  “No,” said Seth.

  “Did you and Will exchange words with anyone, get in any fights or arguments?”

  “No, nothing like that, man,” said Seth. “Will was pretty focused on breaking Susie out of her folks house. He kept saying that she was better off with him, that he’d take care of her, like that.”

  “Did that go on for a while?” asked Zeke.

  “Yeah, whenever I thought he was done with it, he’d get another text from her and it would set him off.”

  “What did you end up doing?” asked Zeke.

  “Around twelve-thirty we broke it up and headed home.”

  “You drove,” said Zeke. “Did Will drive?”

  “No, he doesn’t have a car.”

  “So you dropped him home?” asked Zeke. “Did anyone see you?”

  “No, no one saw us after we left the Y. But he said he didn’t want to go home. He was still mad about Susie, and I gave him a ride to her house. I left him there. I think he was trying to sneak her out of the house.”

  * * *

  Zeke turned to Roger Gordon. “Where were you that evening?” he asked.

  “What?” asked Roger.

  “Sunday, the evening of the murders, where were you?”

  “Why?” Gordon looked stunned.

  Zeke waited.

  He suddenly moved his head and looked at Zeke. Then he got very still. “I was at home, I think,” he said, finally. “Must have been.”

  “You and your wife, Tiffany, are getting a divorce, right?” asked Zeke.

  “Uh, well yes...”

  “And your wife is living somewhere else, away from the house?”

  “Well, yes, but that doesn’t have anything to do with...”

  “It may, actually,” said Zeke. “But right now, I’d like to corroborate Seth’s story. Can you confirm what time he came home that evening?”

  “Oh, well, I think I was asleep when he came home. It was pretty late, and I usually have a staff meeting at 9:00 AM.”

  “Any way to know what time he actually got home that night?” asked Zeke. He looked at Seth.

  “I’m right here, man,” said Seth. “You can talk to me.”

  Zeke said nothing.

  Push their buttons, wait for someone to make a mistake, thought Zeke. Kimmy smiled across the table at him.

  “Well,” said Roger Gordon. “Well, I don’t think so.”

  “Do you have an alarm system? Monitored?”

  Roger nodded absently, “Well, yes, we do.”

  “We should be able to get that information from the alarm company, then,” said Zeke. “They keep a record of the times your alarm is turned on and turned off. Would you request a copy, Roger?”

  “Sure, I will,” said Roger.

  Arnie cleared his throat and leaned forward, as if to say something.

  Zeke cut him off. “Tell me about the week before the murders, Seth.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Did you and Will spend much time together? Let’s start there.”

  “Yeah, we did. School was out that week and we mostly hung out around the Square and sometimes at my house.”

  “Where do you live?” asked Zeke, as if unfamiliar with Roger Gordon’s address.

  Seth told him.

  “So this was the week after the girls got their tattoos, right?” asked Zeke.

  “Yeah, they got those on Saturday, so it was after that,” said Seth.

  “And that’s the week that Susie was hiding from her folks, right?”

  “Well, part of it,” said Seth. “Yeah.”

  “Were the girls, Susie and Carrie, around a lot that week? The week before the murders?” asked Zeke. “Did they hang out with you at Suburban Square and at your house? And how about your sisters’ house?”

  “They did, some,” said Seth. He scooted in his chair and pointed his feet toward the door. “Hey, I didn’t know that Susie had run away.”

  “Jury’s out on that, Seth,” said Zeke.

  “What?” said the boy.

  “It means I don’t believe you,” said Zeke.

  “Hey, man...” started Seth.

  His dad said, “Mr. Traynor...”

  “It doesn’t matter,” said Zeke. “Tell me about their plans.”

  “Plans?” said the boy.

  “Susie and Will were, what, running away together? What else?” asked Zeke.

  “You don’t understand, man,” said Seth. “They fed on each other. Got each other worked up about their situations. Will’s mom was killed last year, and Susie’s dad was...is dying, so they were trying to get away from it all, get out of Philly... She was really broken up about her dad, really angry.”

  “What were they going to do for money?” Zeke asked, keeping his rhythm and changing the subject.

  “I don’t know. Will said he knew where to get some. Said he and Susie were going to take it off the top, that there was so much that no one would miss it.”

  Chapter 19

  “Other than that one part, his knowing about Susie being missing, I didn’t see any obvious signs of lying,” said Zeke. “I think the kid told it fairly straight.”

  Kimmy
nodded. “So we’ve got Will possibly meeting up with Susie at her house, and seven hours later, they’re both dead in a dumpster.”

  “Yes,” said Zeke, thinking. “Somehow she got out of her house, George and Carol’s house, and at some point she and Will made their way back to Suburban Square. Either alive or dead, we don’t know yet.”

  “What they said about the money bothers me,” said Zeke. “Taking it off the top.”

  “They went to see someone, someone they could get money from,” said Kimmy.

  “In the middle of the night,” said Zeke, “and without a car.”

  “So they walked? Or got a ride? Or called Uber?” asked Kimmy.

  “The situation at home was escalating for Susie. First the tattoo, and then she was grounded, locked down. Enough for her to disobey her folks and sneak out to be with Will,” said Zeke.

  “And for the two of them to do something that got them killed,” said Kimmy. “They needed money to travel...”

  “...and it sounds like they asked the wrong person for the money,” said Zeke.

  * * *

  “I got a copy of the current police file on this,” said Clive. “It fills in some of the blanks.” He was calling on a secure line from his office in Washington, DC. Zeke and Kimmy were listening on their cell phone’s speaker in Zeke’s hotel room at the Radnor Hotel, six miles up the Main Line from Ardmore. It was just after seven o’clock on Wednesday evening, and Zeke and Kimmy had been comparing notes when Clive called.

  “Anything from the M.E.?” asked Kimmy.

  “That, and the interviews they’ve completed. And the crime scene data in more detail,” said Clive. “And more photos.”

  “Ask Sally to send us a copy, e-mail,” said Kimmy. “Anything from the Medical Examiner jump out at you?”

  “Actually, yes,” said Clive. “The cause of death was rather odd.”

  “How did they die?” asked Zeke. Clive’s being dramatic, he thought. As usual.

  “Their hands were wired behind them with coat hangers, and they were each shot in the heart,” said Clive. “Bloody awful to think that they watched it coming.”

  “Were they dressed?” asked Zeke.

  “Yes. They both were wearing jean shorts, cotton shirts, trainers.”

  “British for tennis shoes,” Zeke mouthed to Kimmy.

  “And the boy had socks on,” Clive continued.

  “The M.E. says that the girl had signs of recent sex, vaginal sex, but he wasn’t able to say whether it was voluntary or not. Could have been with the boy before this mayhem happened,” Clive continued. “Or it could have been a rape-murder. They’re checking DNA.”

  “That makes for a pretty short time frame,” said Zeke. “He picks her up after midnight, around 12:40 or so, they spend some time together, and then, what, they go somewhere and something happens that gets them killed.”

  “Seems like it,” said Kimmy.

  “Do they have a time of death estimate, Clive?” asked Zeke.

  “Not reliable, but the guess is between 2 and 4 AM,” said Clive.

  “Based on the liver temperatures?” asked Zeke.

  “In this case, it’s the best estimate they have so far,” said Clive. “The bluebottle fly larva on the bodies seems to support it.” They could hear him shuffling some papers over the line. “They’ll know more after the autopsy.”

  “Let us know,” said Kimmy.

  “Also, the results are in from ballistics,” Clive continued. “The same gun killed both of them. The bullets were identical, .22 caliber long rifle bullets, 40 grain, solid rimfire slugs most likely made by Federal. Solid copper bullets you can buy at any sporting goods store.”

  “That won’t help us,” said Zeke.

  “And no residue,” added Clive.

  “Shot from a distance then,” said Zeke.

  “The shooter is pretty accurate,” said Kimmy. “Two bullets, two heart shots, dead center.”

  “Doesn’t sound like there was any hesitation,” said Clive.

  “Actually, it sounds like the killer’s a pro,” said Kimmy.

  Chapter 20

  Kimmy and Zeke parked on the street in front of Oscar’s house because there was a black Crown Victoria parked in the driveway. Oscar had called and asked them to come by the house as soon as they could. It was Thursday morning, three days since the murders, and Zeke and Kimmy were scheduled to talk with Will Burn’s father, Chester, later that morning at his home in Conshohocken.

  Oscar opened the door and swung his wheelchair back, out of the way. “Come on in,” he said. “The cops are here.”

  They followed Oscar into the living room.

  “I’m Detective Harrison, Lower Merion Police,” said the man on the couch as he stood to meet them. He was tall and had good posture, almost a military bearing. His gray hair was cut short and his brown eyes looked both intelligent and suspicious. His face looked as if he’d just asked a question and was focused on hearing the answer. Zeke guessed that it was his normal expression.

  “Zeke Traynor,” said Zeke, shaking his hand. “And this is Kimmy.”

  “I was talking with Oscar just now,” said Harrison. “He was explaining your part in this investigation.”

  “Mostly background,” said Zeke. “We’re trying to find out what happened that caused this whole tragedy.”

  “Right,” said Harrison. His expression stayed skeptical.

  “Coffee?” asked Oscar, obviously trying to lighten the tone of the conversation.

  “Sure,” said Zeke. “What do you have that’s dark?”

  “Ethiopian,” said Oscar. He smiled a mirthless smile at Zeke. “It’s funny how things just go on, even in the face of such tragedy.”

  “Is it yirgacheffe?” asked Zeke.

  “What?” asked Oscar. “The coffee? It’s coffee.”

  “Never mind,” said Zeke. “How’s George doing? How’s he holding up?” asked Zeke.

  “He’s crushed,” said Oscar, rolling out of the room toward the kitchen. “He was so close with that girl. And Carol, now she’s going to lose her whole family, almost all at once.”

  Detective Harrison said, “What have you found out so far?”

  Direct, to the point, thought Zeke.

  “Not much, actually,” Zeke said. He smiled a self-effacing smile. “We’re interviewing friends and family of the two kids and trying to piece together the reason for the murders, mostly aimed at motive and background events. Honestly, it’s not very exciting.” He paused. “Do you have a suspect?”

  Harrison ignored the question and said, “Who have you talked with about this?”

  “So far,” said Zeke, “Seth Gordon and his father, Roger Gordon.”

  “And?” said Harrison.

  “Seth was Will Burns’ best friend, so we thought he might have some ideas about why this happened. He said he didn’t. We also thought that he’d be able to share the events leading up to the murders, at least from his perspective.”

  “How’d that go?” asked Harrison, still not warming up.

  “Not so well,” said Zeke. “I think he told us most of what he knows, but apparently Will and Susie didn’t include him in the specifics of their plans.”

  “Their plans?” asked the detective.

  “From what we can tell, they were planning on running away,” said Zeke.

  Oscar called from the kitchen, “Coffee’s ready, but you’ll need to fix your own.”

  * * *

  “What’s your theory about what happened?” asked Harrison after they had served themselves the coffee.

  “Nothing’s clear yet,” said Zeke. “Oscar told you about Susie disappearing last week.” He looked at Oscar who nodded.

  “The kids were going to run away,” said Harrison. He had a notepad out on the coffee table.

  “Apparently,” said Zeke. “It turns out that she was staying with her friend’s sister. Seth Gordon’s older sister,” he added.

  “Did Seth know about that?” ask
ed Harrison.

  He’s asking to keep this going, hoping for a lead or a direction, thought Zeke. “I think so, but it’s not been confirmed,” he said. “It sounded to me as if they were getting ready to travel somewhere.”

  “Where?” asked the cop.

  “Not sure. We never got that far,” said Zeke. “I’m not sure they really knew.”

  “So we’ve got a 14-year-old girl who was going to run off with an 18-year-old boy, her boyfriend, and then they both end up with their wrists wired up, shot in the heart, and their bodies put in a dumpster,” said Harrison.

  He’s going for shock effect, thought Zeke. He’s trying to gauge Oscar’s reaction. Zeke was quiet.

  “Right?” asked Harrison.

  No one spoke.

  “OK, well, what else do we know?” he continued.

  “That’s what Zeke’s doing, trying to find out what’s going on here,” said Oscar. “For the family.”

  Harrison made a short note in his notebook. “For the family,” he repeated. “Wasn’t the Larosa family involved in some illegal enterprises a few years back?”

  Oscar looked at him. “No, I wouldn’t say that,” he said.

  “Yeah, I remember something about running numbers and maybe a protection racket. Something. I wasn’t in Vice at the time, but there was talk.”

  Oscar didn’t comment.

  “No arrests, though,” he continued. “Any Larosas on the force?”

  “I don’t like the direction this is going,” said Oscar. “You’re a guest in my house.”

  “Just trying to solve a double homicide,” said Detective Harrison. “Sorry if I step on some toes along the way.”

  “Sure,” said Oscar.

  “So,” said Harrison, looking at his notebook again. “Do you know a Carrie McCarthy?”

  “Sure, she was one of Susie’s best friends. Why?” asked Oscar.

  “Well, apparently she’s gone missing, now,” said the detective. “You don’t know anything about that, do you?” He stopped talking and focused on hearing the answer.