Her Lost Alibi: A gripping suspense thriller. (An Amber Cross Thriller Book 1)

by David F. Berens

  He took a deep breath and clucked his tongue a few times. “Then, to the best of my powers of examination, I cannot find a single reference to the contact the detectives made with the alibis.”

  “Are you saying they arrested, tried, and sentenced Marcario Morales without contacting any of his alibi witnesses?”

  Tweed stood up, walked to the French doors overlooking the street. He pushed open the doors with both hands and turned around. “That is exactly what I am saying.”

  “But why not?”

  He crossed his arms and shook his head. “Google tells me that all of the alibi witnesses are friends or relatives of Mr. Morales who would say anything to clear his name. That plus the fact that the officers had two witnesses who independently picked him out of a set of mugshots is enough to have them pass on contacting any of these people.”

  Amber realized with a jolt that she had taken the list with her last night. She reached behind her to where she’d hung it on the back of a chair, pulled it out of her purse, unfolded it, and smoothed the creases. She took out her phone, but Tweed shook his head.

  “Not from a personal line.” He nodded at a phone on the corner of his desk. “Use that one.”

  She walked around and plopped down in the leather office chair. It was the smoothest, buttery leather she’d ever felt. She shook her head and reached for the black, plastic receiver.

  Tweed puffed on his unlit pipe. “In my estimation, you can skip numbers one through twelve. They are all family or friends of the family. You know what they will say. Start with Latimer Cordell down there. He’s an acquaintance of Morales, but only because he’s a warden at the Everglades Correctional Institution where Marcario spent the better part of a year clearing away a marijuana charge. Amber scanned down the list. She was about to dial the number for Latimer, when she noticed that the last name on the list was blacked out. In the same way a spy document had black bars concealing sensitive information, the handwritten alibi report had one name completely hidden.

  “Why would they do this?” She said pointing at the blacked-out name.

  “A very good question, Miss Cross.”

  “You can just call me Amber, Mr. Tweed.”

  “My mother would never approve of such a thing. God rest her soul,” Minter said, looking skyward out the open French doors.

  “How can I find out who this concealed person is?”

  “There’s only one way, my dear.”

  Amber realized with a tinge of sadness that her white chocolate latte had gone cold. “And that is?”

  “Naturally, you go to the source,” he said, inclining his head toward the paper. “You will have to visit the presently incarcerated Mr. Morales. Look into his eyes, judge the man, see if you think he’s innocent … or guilty.”

  8

  Into the Cage

  Marcario Morales, known as Marc to everyone except his mother, had spent ten years in prison, bouncing from hellhole to hellhole as the overcrowding of one penitentiary after another forced a shuffling of detainees on a near national scale. Amber flew—on the Tweed & Associates black Amex centurion card again—to New York. After an excruciatingly long Uber ride from the airport, she arrived at the Sullivan Correctional Facility, home of Ronald DeFeo, Jr., the inspiration for The Amityville Horror and David Berkowitz, the “Son of Sam.” The prison was built with plain red brick, tiny windows, and a lot of chain link fencing. It wasn’t particularly ominous, but the stormy, gray skies above didn’t help the growing feeling of unease germinating in Amber’s stomach.

  She was checked in by people whose faces looked incapable of smiles, led through cold and sterile hallways that smelled vaguely of urine and strongly of bleach. She entered a small room with nothing but a square wooden table and two chairs in it. The soft bluish white of the cinder block walls peeled in a few places, but for the most part … it was clean. Behind her chair, a four foot by six-foot two-way mirror assured her that security was just a few steps away.

  Somewhere outside the door, a buzzer echoed and something metallic clanged. And then, the door swung open and an officer led him in. His jumpsuit was bright orange in contrast with his black curly hair and black chin beard. The officer was smiling and jovial. Marcario was shackled, but he was walking under his own power and appeared to be willing to be here.

  “You okay, ma’am?” The officer asked. “Shall I hook him to the floor?”

  Amber noticed for the first time that there was a metal ring buried in the floor.

  “Oh, um, no,” she said. “That’s fine. I’m fine.”

  Marcario Morales sat down in the chair and put his cuffed hands in his lap. His eyes were dark and kind with creases around the corners. He was a man who smiled, even given his years in prison. His hair was shaved close to his head, exposing some kind of tribal tattoo that had surely been rendered with a ballpoint pen and some sharp object. But for the most part, Amber thought he didn’t look like a murderer—whatever that might entail. She extended a hand to shake his, but he looked forlornly at the shackles holding his wrists.

  “Ah, right,” she said. “Sorry. Water?”

  She pointed at a plastic pitcher and a couple of Styrofoam cups in front of him. He shook his head no. There was a long, silent pause, the only sound a faint ticking from a clock over the door and the sound of her pouring water into one of the cups.

  “So, I only got twenty minutes,” he said. It was the first time she had heard his voice.

  He was well-spoken, literate. “Maybe you should ask me what you came to talk about?”

  “Yes, right,” Amber said, realizing she had been staring at him, sizing him up. “I came to discuss your case.”

  “Okay.”

  “My name is Officer Cross.”

  “Pleased to meet you Officer Cross. All my friends call me Marc,” he said, an enigmatic twinkle in his eye.

  “Ah, oh, okay, um, Marc. I’ve been going through your file at the request of Governor Cruz.” At the mention of the governor’s name, Marcario smiled a little wider. “See, we’re digitizing the whole thing. We’re scanning it into the cloud.”

  “Probably some pretty dull reading,” he said.

  She inhaled. “Actually, parts of it are interesting. I mean to say, there are some things I’d really like to discuss with you, if you’ve got the time?”

  He laughed and glanced up at the clock. “I got nothin’ but time.”

  “Of course,” she said, trying desperately to hide her nerves.

  She pulled a clipboard out of her bag; they had taken her pen away. “It seems that you were convicted on the strength of two eye witnesses. Is that correct?”

  “Yeah, but one of them retracted his statement,” Marcario said. “Seems his lineup was a couple of pictures of white dudes and me. Easy choice for him really.”

  “I’ll look into that, thank you.” She pulled the yellow piece of paper out and placed it on the table. “What I’m really interested in, though, is your alibi witnesses.”

  His face, that had been congenial up to this point, darkened. He looked like a Tarot reader who had just turned over the death card. “Nobody every called ’em. I got seventeen people who can vouch for me. I wasn’t in New York at the time this happened. I was in Cooper City. ‘Bout three blocks from the Walmart at a friend’s house. Him, his wife, his parents, her parents, they all on the list. They can all tell you I was there.”

  Amber knew the area. South Florida. Not the slums, but nothing like the shining towers of riches just a few miles to the east on South Beach.

  “So, they’re all family? How can they be sure you were there on this particular day?”

  “Because Gemma had a baby.”

  “And Gemma is your friend’s wife?”

  “Yeah. She don’t like me much, but I knew I had to be there to celebrate my boy’s kid bein’ born and all. The detectives didn’t ever call anybody because they’re all family. They say they would all lie about me bein’ there, but that ain’t true by a long shot. Gem
ma would probably love to see me rot in prison. She don’t like me influencing her husband.”

  Amber’s gaze landed on the last line on the page. “What about this one? Why is this one blacked out?”

  “Blacked out?” Confusion spread across Marcario’s face. “Lemme see that.”

  She turned the page around so he could see it. For a second, he sucked air across his teeth considering it. Then suddenly, he looked up, nodding his head.

  “That’s the preacher. I almost forgot about him. We all went to church that Sunday, the day they say I killed that dude.”

  “That was the 20th of June, 2010?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Do you remember the preacher’s name?”

  Marcario squinted his eyes, looking into the past. But the time and the distance had clouded his memory. “It was like, uh, Jack, or maybe Jim. Can’t remember his last name, but he was the preacher at the New Wine church.”

  Amber had taken a sip of water and she nearly spewed it over the table. “The New Wine Ministries Church? Are you … are you sure that’s the one?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I remember ‘cause I asked if they were serving wine at the service we was going to,” he said, with a smile. “You find that preacher, um Jack, Jim, or whatever. He knows I was there ‘cause I shook his hand after he blessed the baby.”

  Amber said nothing. She squeezed the edge of the table tightly to keep her hands from shaking.

  “You could probably call Gemma and find out the man’s name. He preached good that day. I remember that much. Went to eat lunch with him after the service. He had fried chicken and black-eyed peas. I can still taste ‘em.”

  Before Amber could ask him anymore questions, the door opened and the officer told her time was up.

  “But, I…”

  “Sorry, Mrs. Cross,” he said. “Rules are rules. You can always come back tomorrow.”

  She knew she would not be back tomorrow. She had another plane to catch to South Florida.

  9

  New Wine Ministries

  When the plane landed at the Fort Lauderdale - Hollywood International Airport, Amber hurried off into a wall of heat that took her by surprise. She knew that the temperature would be hotter than New York, but it still caught her off guard. But as she speed-walked through the terminal, the familiarity, the déjà vu quality of it all, chased her toward the door.

  She punched up the Uber app on her phone and requested an economy car. As she stood on the curb, she realized she couldn’t stop her feet from fidgeting. Her hands tapped the sides of her legs relentlessly like a court reporter in a hurry and her breathing was shallow and quick. It had been less than twelve hours since she spoke with Marcario Morales and the full import of his revelation had been getting heavier and heavier as she got farther away from him.

  His alibis were his friends and their family members, all of them. All of them, except for one. He’d told her about visiting Gemma and her husband for the birth of their child and how they and the extended family could all vouch for him being there. And though Gemma wasn’t exactly Marc’s good friend, her husband was … and they would likely say anything to keep him out of jail. The more she considered it, the more she thought that was the reason the detectives hadn’t called them. It would be like asking the hyena to vouch for the wolf.

  But the last alibi he’d come up with, the one who wasn’t related in some way to his friend’s family, the one that had been blacked out on the report … this one rocked her to the core. When he’d said the man was a preacher near Cooper City at the New Wine Ministries Church, her blood had turned to ice. Strange images chased her as the Uber flew in and out of traffic, hurrying her into the center of the Florida peninsula. Images from her own childhood and what the church had meant to her drifted into her mind through a fog of years and … pain.

  “Okay, lady,” the driver said, bringing her out of the past. “We’re here.”

  She saw that he had pulled up to the front door of the Holiday Inn Express. She thanked him and walked into a deserted lobby. Most people who came to Pembroke Pines were there for the casino and gamblers didn’t spend much time in their hotel rooms.

  She checked in. Took the elevator up to her room. Chucked her backpack on the bed and collapsed. She hadn’t had much sleep and had been wound up ever since she’d left the prison. She pulled up the notes she’d made on her phone as she flew and went over Morales’s last words.

  “Yes, ma’am. I remember ‘cause I asked if they were serving wine at the service we was going to. You find that preacher, um Jack, Jim, or whatever. He knows I was there cause I shook his hand after he blessed the baby. You could probably call Gemma and find out the man’s name. He preached good that day. I remember that much. Went to eat lunch with him after the service. He had fried chicken and black-eyed peas. I can still taste ‘em.”

  Amber hadn’t needed to call Gemma. She didn’t need to find out the preacher’s name from anyone else, because, as a young girl, she had attended the New Wine Ministries Church in Cooper City, Florida. She knew the man’s name wasn’t Jack or Jim.

  It was Joseph. Joseph Cross.

  10

  Lunch Time

  She waited until after the Sunday morning crowd had piled out to knock on the only office door inside the church. As buildings of inspiration go, it wasn’t all that inspirational. The structure was a prefab steel building that looked like it was originally designed to house a basketball court.

  The man who opened the door acted as the church’s only preacher, the music director, social coordinator, and janitor. The only thing he didn’t do at the New Wine Ministries was answer the phone. A woman named Irene did that now. And before that, Amber’s mother had done it. She had acted as the receptionist until her illness made it no longer possible.

  Reverend Joseph Cross looked from his Bible. He almost hid the shock in his face, but Amber saw his bottom lip tremble slightly. His eyes moistened as he removed his reading glasses.

  “Hello, daddy,” Amber said, her voice quivering more than she’d thought it would.

  He was up and around the desk, pulling her into a hug. “Hey, bear-bear,” he said, squeezing her tightly.

  He held her at arm’s length. “You’re all grown up. When did that happen?”

  Amber shrugged and smiled. “I dunno. Sometime in the last few years.”

  She knew exactly how long it had been since she’d seen him, but his age was starting to show. She winked at him. “You’re all gray now. When did that happen?”

  He ran a hand through his thick, coarse hair. “Sometime in the last few years.”

  “Touché,” she said.

  “Not that I’m upset,” he said, “but what brings you to town? And without a phone call?”

  She nodded. “Sorry about that. I’m working a case and I have a lead I’m following up on.”

  “My smart little detective,” he grinned.

  She shook her head and her smile widened. “Not yet, daddy. I’m still just a junior officer.”

  “Give it time,” he said. “Say, are you hungry? Let’s get some lunch.”

  Without waiting for her reply, he opened his office door and ushered her out. In the parking lot, he saw the non-descript sedan she was driving. “You get rid of the Datsun?”

  “Nah,” she chirped the key fob at it, “that’s a rental I grabbed after I got into town. I’ve still got Brownie.”

  Her father smiled at her. “Your mom loved that car. Tried to get her something new when you were born, but she wouldn’t have any part of it. She always wanted you to have it when she was…”

  His voice trailed off. Amber jumped in to keep the melancholy away. “Where shall we go, daddy? I’m famished now that you mention it.”

  She knew the answer. Her father only ate out at one restaurant on Sundays, The Blue Moon Diner. And he only ever ordered one thing, fish and chips. He always slathered it with so much vinegar it stung the nostrils of everyone in the place.

 
; She purposefully chose a booth near the back, away from the other patrons. After they’d placed their orders, she told him about the case.

  “I remember that day,” he said, turning to gaze out the window beside them. “I remember it well.”

  She was stunned. “Wait… so, you remember Marc? How is that even possible?”

  He tapped her yellow pad that she’d been reading the details from with his finger. “June 13th, 2010. The anniversary of your mother’s death, bear-bear. How could I ever forget it?”

  Words caught in her throat. Something inside her broke loose. It felt like a dam was cracking, or maybe a puzzle was coming together.

  “I have preached so many sermons that I can’t possibly remember them all, but that one … that one was different. There was a young couple in our membership celebrating the birth of a child. I had notes planned for that message, but I didn’t use them.”

  He looked at her and smiled. “But the spirit gave me new words. A life ending and a life beginning. It was quite … quite meaningful.”

  For a long moment, Amber couldn’t speak. She was afraid if she did, the tears wouldn’t stop. He reached out and squeezed her hand. “It’s okay, bear-bear. I feel it, too.”

  The waitress came and placed their food down, giving them a break from the heavy subject they’d just laid out between them. She took a couple of bites and regained her voice.

  “But this guy, Morales,” she said, “are you saying you remember him as well?”

  Something changed in her father’s tone, it went flat, emotionless. “I do. He came down front at the end of the sermon. I didn’t make an altar call, we had another event or something at the end. But he came down and knelt and asked me to pray over him and the baby. He was friends with the couple who’d just had the child.”

  Amber slid a picture out of her backpack. “Is that him?”