Humpty Dumpty: The killer wants us to put him back together again (Book 1 of the Nursery Rhyme Murders Series)

by Carolyn McCray

  Agent Cooper wasted no time. As soon as Curtis’ butt touched the chair, she started in with the questions, not giving him much of a chance to get his bearings. Not a bad interrogation technique, he had to admit.

  “When’s the last time you carried fertilizer?”

  Joshua could see that the question rattled the trucker. He shifted in his seat and cleared his throat, classic indicators of stress… and possible guilt. Maybe Coop was right about this guy after all. It didn’t fit, but Joshua was hard pressed to come up with alternate explanations at this point. After a nod from his lawyer, Curtis answered, his voice quavering a bit.

  “I dropped some off in Cedar Rapids a few days ago.”

  “Which is exactly where my companions and I were almost blown up just the day before yesterday.”

  The lawyer sat up straighter. He might be a total schlub, but even he could see that this wasn’t going at all the way he might want it to.

  “What?” Howse had gone still, like a mouse trying to hide from an owl.

  His defender leaned in close. “You don’t have to say a word.”

  Joshua watched as the suspect licked lips that seemed to have gone bone dry. This whole thing was off. Curtis seemed guilty enough, but there was just something… He refocused as Agent Cooper began speaking again, her tone soothing.

  “Oh, I think you understand exactly what I said. But just in case, here it is spelled out. You carried one of the ingredients for the bomb that killed four cops to the exact location where it was used.”

  “But I—”

  She held up a hand to forestall his next statement. “I’m trying to help you here. It’s pretty obvious this was you. The other ingredient of the bomb is what fuels your truck. Down to the gas station you purchased it in.”

  Curtis held up his hands, almost as if he were protecting himself from her. Maybe he was. His lawyer leaned in close to his client.

  “I advise you not to say anything more.”

  “But I had nothing to do with any of that,” the trucker answered, speaking both to his defender and his attacker.

  “You had nothing to do with a bomb that happened where you were, with ingredients you were carrying, at the same moment you were right there?” Coop shook her head in disbelief. “That’s what you’re telling me?”

  “Agent Cooper, you’ve already asked that question,” the lawyer said, loosening his tie and unbuttoning the top button. “And don’t say anything else,” he murmured, speaking this time to his client.

  Curtis apparently wasn’t listening. “I know you must think—”

  “Here’s what I think. I think you’re in a lot of trouble. I think you need our help.” Agent Cooper’s tone was soft, reasonable, almost kind. Joshua could see himself wanting to trust that matter-of-fact tone himself. “You’re going to lose everything that’s important to you if you don’t.”

  “What do you mean?” Curtis asked.

  “Agent Cooper, that feels like a threat,” challenged the lawyer, standing up this time. “I won’t allow you to use intimidation tactics against my client.”

  “My apologies if it came across that way, Mr. Torrance,” she responded. “I’m just trying to help him to understand what’s going to happen. I don’t want things to be worse for your client than they have to be.”

  “Fine.” The attorney sat back, seeming a bit mollified, but his gaze was locked on her. Joshua couldn’t blame the guy. She was skewering his client.

  “We have enough on you at this point to get any kind of warrant we want,” she continued to Curtis, as if there had been no interruption of their direct communication. “Anything hidden in your family is going to come out. It’ll be a circus. They won’t have a day’s peace for the next ten years. The police will swarm over your house and never give you a second to be alone and unworried.”

  The lawyer grunted at that. “That’s definitely sounding like a threat to me. You need to knock it off right now or we’re out of here.”

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Coop responded. “I have enough to charge him.”

  “No, you don’t,” he fired back. “Or at least you won’t if you’re at all intelligent. It’s circumstantial. It’d get tossed. And you know it.”

  It seemed this ineffectual lawyer wasn’t so ineffectual after all. But Agent Cooper wasn’t done yet.

  “Whether or not I keep him, he’s mine. And he knows it. Your client understands just how bad it’s going to be for him, and for his family, if he doesn’t cooperate.

  Joshua reached up a hand to restrain Coop, but she shook it off.

  “I just have a few more things to say to your client, and then we’re done,” Agent Cooper said. Her tone was mild, but there was an intensity to her that was almost frightening. “I want you to listen and listen close. You understand?”

  Curtis Howse nodded. It seemed his voice had left him for the moment.

  Coop continued, her tone level, even as her cold words bit deeper than frostbite in the Arctic. “Confess, and things will be better for your family.”

  She slapped down a photo of the kidnapping victim. Her name was Taylor Jensen, a young co-ed back in her freshman year of college. The picture practically radiated youth and innocence.

  “Who is that?”

  “That’s the girl you just abducted. The one who’s trussed up in some dark corner or basement, scared out of her gourd, waiting for you to cut her into tiny little pieces.”

  “This is ridiculous!” the lawyer yelped. “If you don’t tone it down, I’m going to call and have a conversation with your superior.”

  Joshua knew that the lawyer was right. She was riding the edge of what was okay, and was about to teeter off into the abyss. Joshua knew what that dark pit looked like from painful experience.

  “Are you going to help me, or not?” she asked, pointing a finger at the picture on the table in front of the suspect. “You help me, I help you.”

  “I can’t help you because I don’t know anything. Besides, I was here. How could I kidnap anyone?” Curtis responded, his tone getting more desperate the further the conversation went.

  “You could have been working with an accomplice,” she replied, her tone calm. “Please, Curtis. I don’t want to ruin your family’s life. Think of them. They’re going to go through every inch of your life. You don’t know what scrutiny is until they’ve done it to you. And they will find what you’re hiding, and your family will suffer for it.”

  Curtis’ shoulders slumped in defeat, and the blood drained from his face. Joshua had seen that reaction before. Howse was done. Coop had taken her typical directness to a new level. She’d gone not just for the jugular, but for the main artery, and the suspect was emotionally bleeding out. Beaten.

  Coop turned to the lawyer. “We’re not going to charge him, but we’re keeping him in custody.” It was a textbook move. Make sure your prime suspect was right where you could keep track of him.

  So why was Joshua so sure that an enormous mistake had just been made?

  CHAPTER 18

  It was a rush, Sariah had to admit.

  She’d gone in determined to get what she needed, and while she didn’t have a confession, she had the next best thing. Her suspect was beaten.

  The moment it had happened, Sariah knew exactly what it was. And her blood had sung with the Siren song of the victor of coming out of a battle to the death, alive and unscratched.

  But apparently, the scratching came later.

  Joshua planted himself right in front of her. His face was pulled into a frown, his stance was powerful, but the effect was sullied by Bella, who was prancing around at his feet, straining at her leash.

  “What is it, Joshua?”

  “Can we talk about what just happened?”

  “What do you mean?” she asked, hearing the criticism in his tone.

  “I still think this whole thing is off.”

  “How can you say that? Everything about him screams I’m the one. He might as well have a sign.”<
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  Joshua frowned. “That’s just what I’m talking about. Humpty is a planner. A schemer. This guy has made more mistakes… well, than Had would if he were out killing people.” He pointed to the young cop, who shrugged his shoulders in agreement.

  Sariah gawked at him. “But you saw the way he was acting in there. Nervous, on edge… guilty.”

  “Yes. Guilty about something. But what if it’s not about what we think it is?” Joshua said. “And you pushed him too hard. It was way too much, there at the end.”

  “You… of all people, you are the last one that has the right to say that to me.”

  Joshua nodded. “I know. I’m a total hypocrite. But here’s the thing.” He leaned in, his face close to hers. “Humpty Dumpty slaughtered my family. I’m physically and psychologically a pathetic mess. I’m also an alcoholic. What’s your excuse?”

  Sariah just sat there, her mouth ajar. It was so patently unfair that she wasn’t even sure where to begin. So rather than dispute his assertions, she went on the offensive.

  “An alcoholic. When you say it, it sounds almost enlightened somehow. Like you understand how messed up you are. But it really just says you’re a coward.”

  Had stepped forward and placed a hand on her arm. “Coop, hey,” he coaxed.

  But Sariah was not ready to be talked down. Not just yet.

  “No, I’m going to say it. You point to your family getting killed as the source of all your problems. And I get it. It was bad. More than I can imagine.”

  “C’mon. Don’t go there. This isn’t going to end well,” Had murmured in her ear. He was right. She knew he was right. But at this particular moment, she just didn’t care any longer.

  “But you’ve used that excuse to wimp out on your life without having to pay your bill. But here’s a little bit of information for you… the bill always comes due.

  “You get that out of a fortune cookie?” Joshua asked, giving her a tight smile. Bella was pressed up against his leg, her tail tucked under her, whimpering softly.

  “That’s right. Make a joke out of it. That’s your standard response. You’re a sloppy mess. You destroy everything positive you can find around you. You’re like a pig wallowing in its own filth.”

  Joshua just stared at her. “You’re right,” he said. “But so what? I’m right, too. This is too open-and-closed and you know it. Stop looking for the easy conviction.”

  “You think this is an easy conviction?”

  “For a serial killer like Humpty? You bet your ass.” He bent down and scooped up Bella, who was whimpering from all the tension in the room. Sariah felt a stab of guilt surge through her.

  “Well, I guess we’ll just have to see,” she finally managed.

  “That sounds like a great idea.” Joshua sat down at his worktable, pretending to go through some files that were lying there. It appeared he was done with the argument.

  Truth be told, so was she. Joshua had said some things that were sticking in her craw. The more she thought about it, the more she could see that perhaps it was too much of a textbook case. But wasn’t that the reason the textbooks had them? She was doing everything right. Exactly the way she was supposed to.

  Her ankle itched, and Sariah realized it was time to move the monitor to her other leg. She pulled it off and set it on the table in front of her, scratching at where the device had been.

  And then Joshua did something strange. He walked over, bent down and scooped up the monitor. Before she could snatch it away or do anything other than just gawk at him, he’d returned to his workspace, tossing the device up in the air and then catching it.

  He then snapped it onto his own leg.

  She waited for the thing to go berserk, wailing at them all to let them know the wearer was intoxicated. It more than likely wouldn’t be a pleasant sound.

  Nothing.

  It was probably just calibrating. Sariah waited longer.

  Still nothing.

  Joshua winked at her and pushed himself up to standing, pulling his pant leg down over the bracelet. He pulled on the leash, encouraging Bella to follow as he moved toward the exit.

  Damn if that former agent didn’t know how to make an exit when it suited him.

  * * *

  It hadn’t been the best afternoon so far. Had’s two best friends had been at each other’s throats, they hadn’t gotten a confession out of the trucker, and so far they hadn’t found any additional evidence that proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that he was Humpty. Plenty of circumstantial stuff, but nothing concrete.

  Plus, he hadn’t had a chance to sample even one funnel cake this entire time. And the convention was ending today. All the stalls clearing out. All the truckers, too.

  Well, all but Curtis Howse.

  Had was spending his time divided between two tasks, each one assigned by someone different. Agent Cooper had stormed off after her fight with Joshua, but not before she’d tasked him with finding the smoking gun. Problem was, there didn’t seem to be one. Anywhere.

  After about a half hour, Joshua called him. Apparently, the former agent wasn’t so sure that Curtis was their guy, and he wanted Had to focus on the hobo, or even look for more leads in a different direction.

  Basically, in a nutshell, Had was spending his time being schizophrenic. Whoever said that multitasking was an efficient way to go was a complete moron.

  Thing was, he could see it from both sides. They had two really good suspects they were working with, either one of whom could be their guy. But there was nothing to say that it couldn’t be someone else entirely.

  Finding any information on the hobo was next to impossible. The guy had no bank accounts, no residence, almost no footprint at all. About the only resource Had could find was the stupid blog, and that didn’t give him much in the way of a time line. Apparently, marking his entries with a date was verboten for a guy like King’s Man.

  Going through the other options just felt forced, though. Had sifted through flight attendants, pilots, anyone that would have unlimited flight options, and nothing screamed at him. There were a couple of so-so options, but he would put them at a two on a one to ten scale. The ones they already had were like a nine and a nine-and-a-half. It made him want to tear his hair out.

  So when Preston came by, asking him if he wanted to take a break, he almost wept with relief.

  “You want to go get a funnel cake?” Had asked.

  “Totally. You like read my mind or something. I’ve got the munchies something fierce.” Preston seemed to think about what he had just said, then spoke again. “I mean. I’m totally hungry.”

  “I told you, Preston. I’m not going to bust you for pot. We’re working homicides here. Apples and oranges.”

  “Whatever, bra. They’re both still fruit.”

  That struck Had as strangely profound, but then he caught a whiff of something fried and his attention was diverted. “Hey, speaking of fruit… do you like cherry or strawberry topping on yours?” Had could almost taste the fried confection. It was one of his all-time favorite things to eat, from the first time he’d tasted one at the Michigan state fair back before his dad died.

  “Nothing but powdered sugar for me. I’m a purist,” Preston said, his look pious.

  As they weaved their way through the crowds outside Iowa 80, Had thought back over their conversation. There was something there that was tugging at his consciousness. It was like an itch that he couldn’t scratch. Some connection he wasn’t making.

  “Hey, Preston,” Had asked his friend. “What were you thinking when I first told you I was a cop?”

  “Aw, dude. I totally freaked out. Like wiggin’, you know?”

  “Because of the pot, right?” he asked, looking to confirm a budding idea.

  “Well, yeah. What else?” Preston sniffed, wiping a hand across his nose. “Why?”

  “Just a thought I had.” Had was about to continue, when he saw Coop crossing the open space between the buildings and the convention fairway. Her face
was tight and her stride was violent.

  “Isn’t that your boss?” Preston asked, pointing her out.

  “Yep.”

  “She looks pissed.”

  “Yep.”

  He looked from one side of the field to the other, possibly searching for a place to hide. “I think I’m gonna bail. Sorry, dude.”

  “Yep.” Had didn’t blame him. Not one bit.

  As Agent Cooper approached, she called out to him. “What are you doing out here? Are you looking for someone?”

  For a brief moment, Had considered lying, but not only was that not really him, he sucked at it. There was zero chance he could lie to this woman and get away with it.

  “No. I was just taking a quick break. I needed something to eat.”

  Had wasn’t sure how it was possible, but Coop’s face tightened down even further. A vein he had never noticed was standing out against the skin just above her temple, pulsing in time with her heartbeat. It was mesmerizing, and a little terrifying.

  “You understand that we’ve got a kidnapped girl out there?”

  “Yes, but I—”

  “I would expect this kind of behavior out of Joshua, but from you? I’m beyond disappointed.”

  Wow. Had would never have thought it possible, but Agent Cooper was almost channeling his mama. Now all she had to do was try to set him up with some girl. He tried again.

  “I totally agree, I just—”

  “We have to push past our discomfort. That woman’s life is hanging in the balance, and you’re out here chatting with the locals and grabbing a turkey leg.”

  “Oh, I wasn’t getting a turkey leg. I just wanted a—”

  “Had!” she barked. “I don’t want to hear it. I just want you to track down the information I asked for on Curtis Howse.”

  This was not like the Agent Cooper that Had knew. Something was wrong. Really wrong. He reached out a hand and placed it on her shoulder.

  “Coop, is everything okay?”

  And just like that, she burst into tears.

  Had could see that the strain of this case was getting to her. Heck, it was getting to him, too, and stress usually rolled off his back like water from a duck. Or whatever that phrase was. He patted her shoulder, wanting to give her a hug, but knowing it would embarrass her even more.