“But you didn’t. You tied your dog to a tree. You undressed her. You were going to rape her.”
His head rocks from side to side.
“You tried to have sex with a dead or dying girl.”
“Please don’t say that.”
“That’s why you couldn’t penetrate her.”
“No. No.” The handcuffs rattle against the frame.
“You could have called an ambulance. You could have kept her alive. You could have saved her.”
Snot is running from his nostrils, over his upper lip to his mouth.
“Tell them I’m sorry.”
“Who?”
“Her parents.”
51
* * *
ANGEL FACE
* * *
The weeds reach as high as my knees: nettles and creeping thistles, daisies and dandelions. My feet seem to be taking root like I’m just another unwanted plant, caught between cracks in the broken concrete.
Nobody has gone in or out of the Coach House Inn for the past two hours. Skirting the fence, I duck through a broken gate and approach the main doors. I’m holding a two-foot length of steel pipe, which is hollow yet heavy, keeping it tucked under my arm. The keypad is covered by a plastic milk bottle, cut to form a rain shield. My fingers punch out the code and I nudge the door open, listening.
I cross the foyer and follow the corridor, retracing my steps from the other night, feeling the stickiness of the carpet beneath my feet. The door to the lounge is open. There are beer bottles spread across the table and cigarettes crushed into ashtrays. I try to remember which room belonged to Felix. I look for a padlock. Find it.
Kneeling before the door, I slip a bobby pin from my hair and bend it back and forth until it breaks. This one is harder to pick than Jodie’s locker. My fingers grow sore and sticky with sweat. I wipe my hands and begin again, listening as I hold down the pins, being directed by the clicks. One more . . . one more . . .
The lock falls open. The door swings inward. The room is as I remember—the bed, the rumpled sheets, the soiled mattress, the camera on a tripod. Clothes are strewn across the floor. It reminds me of another room, in another house, where I lived with Terry’s body, watching it bloat and discolor and leak.
Swinging the metal pipe, I shatter the camera, sending shards of broken plastic and glass pinging off the walls like fists full of thrown gravel. The tripod buckles. I tear at the sheets and punch holes in the mattress and rip at the clothes. Breathing hard, I pause, looking at the destruction, feeling dissatisfied. How does this hurt him?
Emptying my mind, I study the room, searching for hiding places. I’m good at this. Nobody is better. Dragging the mattress to the floor, I lever the metal pipe between the narrow horizontal slats, tearing out nails and splintering the wood, exposing the floor beneath. Crawling inside the bed base, I tap at the skirting board, listening for a hollow echo. Silverfish, dead and living, tumble or scurry as I search the carpet for signs of wear or disturbance or concealment. Nothing.
I start again, walking up and down the room, taking small steps. The floor creaks under my right foot. Dropping to my knees, I peel back the carpet, revealing a loose sheet of plywood that covers a gap between the beams. Lifting the board away, I discover a shoebox. Inside the shoebox is a package, double wrapped in tape. I tear open one corner with my teeth and recognize the contents. Crystals. Ice. Meth. There’s something else wrapped in an oily black rag, heavy in my hand: a pistol with a long narrow barrel and brown polymer handle. It looks old, like it should be in a museum.
I test a button and a compartment slides from the handle into my other hand. Bullets are pressed inside, one on top of the other.
I’ve held a gun before. Terry had one. He used to clean it on the kitchen table, taking it apart like a puzzle and wiping down each part with solvent and oil, using a cut-up T-shirt and a brass rod for the barrel.
One day he grabbed my wrist and made me pick it up. I didn’t want to touch it.
“Go on,” he said. “Feel how heavy it is.”
I took the gun in both hands.
“Put your finger on the trigger.”
I did as he asked.
“Point it at me.”
“No.”
“Aim it just here.” He tapped the center of his chest.
“No.”
“Point the fucking gun. I’m a bad man, remember.”
I shook my head.
“Do it! Now. Pull the trigger.”
My hands were trembling.
Terry sighed in disgust and took the pistol from me. “There’s no bullet in the chamber, you idiot.” He showed me how to release the magazine and rack the slide and clear the chamber.
“Next time I tell you to shoot, you better follow my fucking orders.”
I rewrap the pistol in the rag and tuck the bundle into the waistband of my jeans, where it rests against the small of my back. Then I replace the empty shoebox and the plywood and the carpet, before taking the package of drugs to the bathroom, where I rip it open, spilling crystals into the toilet bowl. Most of them sink, while others float on top like soapy scum. I flush. Water swirls and disappears. I flush again. “Bye bye.”
Voices! They’re here!
Edging across the floor, I press my cheek against the door. Keeley. Tuba. Felix. They’re in the hallway, getting closer.
“What time is the memorial?” asks Tuba.
“Three o’clock.”
I left the padlock lying on the floor. What if Felix looks down . . . ? If he sees . . . ?
They’re passing, turning into the lounge. Edging the door open a crack, I look across the hallway and see Tuba unpacking beers and putting them in the cooler box. Felix is wearing a coat and tie. His hair is oiled. I want to stay hidden. I want to curl up and wait them out. But if Felix sees the padlock, I’m going to die.
You have a gun.
He’ll take it from me.
Not if you shoot him first.
Felix lights a cigarette and tosses the lighter onto the table, resting the ashtray on his stomach and tilting his head back. Tuba puts on some music. They’re arguing over whether British rap is better than American rap. This is my chance.
Unwrapping the pistol, I hold it against my chest and slip out of the room into the empty corridor. Quickly, quietly, I pass in front of the lounge, momentarily glimpsing Felix lounging on the sofa. He doesn’t see me. I keep moving. Eyes ahead.
The floor creaks and Keeley steps out of a room, looking at the screen of her phone. I freeze, holding the pose as though we’re playing a game of musical statues.
She lifts her eyes and opens her mouth. I lunge and grab her hair, yanking her to the ground and covering her mouth with my other hand.
“Not a word!” I whisper. “Not a word!”
I close my teeth around her earlobe, feeling the back of a silver stud scratching at my tongue. Keeley whimpers.
I show her the gun, pressing the muzzle against her forehead and holding one finger upright against her lips. “Not a fucking word.”
Keeley cowers.
I get to my feet and walk backwards until I reach the foyer, then the main doors and the steps and the parking area and the road outside. Finally, I run, holding the gun inside my sweatshirt.
52
* * *
CYRUS
* * *
The incident room is slowly being dismantled. Shredded paper spills from bins and the whiteboards have been picked clean of photographs and maps. The bulk of the task force has been reassigned, but a few remaining souls are typing out statements and tying up loose ends.
Lenny’s office is full of half-packed boxes and empty filing cabinets. I haven’t had a chance to talk to her about her transfer and whether she’s seriously considering retirement. She’s too good at her job to walk away but too poor at the politics to change direction.
“I have another week to wrap up the Jodie Sheehan investigation,” she says, putting another box file in a carto
n. “Once I turn over the brief to the Crown Prosecution Service, the lawyers take over.”
“What if Farley’s confession is disallowed?”
“Won’t matter. We have DNA, fibers, and dog hairs. Those things are better than a signed confession. People might not believe in God or ghosts or man-made climate change, but they believe in forensic evidence.”
I move a box from a chair and sit down. “I talked to Farley. He heard Jodie being thrown off the footbridge.”
“Let it go, Cyrus.”
“Tasmin didn’t leave the patio door unlocked. Jodie couldn’t get inside. That’s why she walked home.”
Lenny reads another label on a file. Behind her, Antonia appears in the doorway. “Dr. Ness wants a word.”
“Patch him through,” says Lenny.
“He’s waiting outside.”
Lenny glances at me, raising an eyebrow. The chief pathologist rarely ventures outside the morgue unless it’s to a crime scene or the golf course. Stepping around Antonia, Ness smiles apologetically, his eyes bright and his tightly curled hair looking like a furry helmet. He gives Lenny’s office a quick once-over, as though he might be in the market for one just like it, before taking a seat next to me and pulling off his soft leather gloves, one finger at a time.
“There’s been a development,” he says. “The DNA report on Jodie Sheehan’s unborn child was emailed through from the lab in Boston this morning. It closely matches the traces of semen found on her thigh and indicates that the father was someone close to her.”
Lenny frowns. “When you say ‘close to her’?”
“He shares runs of homozygosity.”
“Runs of what?”
“He’s family,” I say, understanding a little more of the science.
Lenny looks from Ness to me. “Which one?”
Ness gives us both a quick lesson on chromosomes and DNA.
“When children are born from incest their genomes show an absence of heterozygosity because their DNA contains large chunks where the mother’s and father’s contributions are identical because they already share much of the same genetic code. These are called ‘runs of homozygosity.’ The more chunks of the child’s DNA where the mother’s and father’s contributions are identical, the more likely it is that they’re first-degree relatives.”
“OK, so who are we looking for?” asks Lenny.
Ness won’t be rushed. “A brother and sister share fifty percent DNA. If they had a baby it would likely share roughly twenty-five percent. It’s the same if father and daughter incest leads to pregnancy.
“An uncle and niece share twenty-five percent DNA and their offspring would have twelve and a half percent. The figures are the same for half siblings. First cousins share about twelve and a half percent, but any offspring would have less than this. These figures aren’t absolutes, but a Y-chromosome match with the blood relative can confirm the incest.”
Lenny is growing impatient. “Who impregnated Jodie?”
Ness blinks at her before realizing that he’s only told us half of the story. “The fetal sample showed a commonality of twelve and a half percent—so you’re looking at the uncle, Bryan Whitaker. Like I said—you’ll need to test him to be absolutely sure.”
I glance at Lenny. Her fists are clenched. Bloodless.
“He was home that night,” I say. “Jodie could have confronted him—threatened him with blackmail.”
Lenny grabs her coat from a hook on the wall and opens the door, yelling, “Antonia, I want a car. Now!”
We’re moving. Lenny projects her voice across the incident room. “Edgar, you’re with me. Monroe. Get me a search warrant for the Whitaker house and car. I want everything we have on Bryan Whitaker. Sexual complaints. Rumors. Whispers. We need his phone records and Internet search history.”
I’m in the corridor with Lenny ahead of me. Ness has been left behind. Lenny looks over her shoulder.
“Where do I find Whitaker?”
“He’ll be at the memorial service.”
53
* * *
CYRUS
* * *
Bryan Whitaker is arrested in the parking area of the Corpus Christi Catholic Church as the memorial service ends. Mourners are slowly filtering through the doors, many of them dressed in yellow hats and scarves or carrying yellow balloons.
Lenny dispenses with the handcuffs and offers Whitaker a phone call, which he uses to call his wife rather than a lawyer, a poor decision. Felicity is still inside, comforting Maggie or shielding her from sympathizers and reporters.
“I don’t understand what this is about,” Whitaker says from the rear seat of the police car. “What am I supposed to have done?”
“You’ve been read your rights,” replies Lenny.
“What am I being charged with? Aren’t you supposed to tell me?”
“You’ve been arrested on suspicion of murder.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
Lenny ignores his subsequent questions and protests, but lets him keep talking, enjoying his frustration.
We’re nearing the police station when she turns and looks over her shoulder from the front seat. “Are you a religious man, Bryan?”
He doesn’t answer.
“There’s a passage in the Bible. The Gospel of Matthew if memory serves. ‘If anyone causes one of these little ones, those who believe in me, to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.’ ”
“I would never hurt a child.”
“You love them, I know, all the nonces say that.”
Whitaker’s face alters, twisting out of shape, and his fists clench and unclench.
Lenny doesn’t press the issue. Instead, she puts him in an interview room and lets him marinate for a few hours in a toxic slurry of fear and uncertainty.
In the meantime, a search warrant is issued for his house, where laptops, tablets, and mobile phones are seized. Felicity Whitaker is brought to the station, entering through a rear door. Although she’s not under arrest, everything about her body language seems to be weighted down like she’s a deep-sea diver wearing leaden boots, walking along the ocean floor.
“Can I get you something?” I ask as she waits to be questioned in a “comfort room” normally set aside for sexual assault victims.
“No, thank you.”
I bring her a cup of tea anyway. She leaves the teabag dangling inside as she holds it with both hands to keep it steady.
“How long will this take?” she asks.
“I don’t know.”
She’s nursing a leather handbag, touching it occasionally like she’s petting a cat.
“Do you want to be left alone?” I ask.
“No. Stay.” She sips her tea. “I’ve never been to a police station. I mean, I’ve seen them on TV. I used to love The Bill and Inspector George Gently. Crime dramas, you know. I like a good detective story.”
“Are you very good at picking the villain?”
“Hopeless. Half the time they don’t give us a chance, do they? They make it someone so unlikely.” Her hands are shaking. “I’m sorry Bryan shouted at you. He didn’t mean to be rude. What’s this about?”
“Jodie was pregnant.”
“Yes, I know, but what’s that got to do with Bryan?”
“On the night she went missing, did Bryan go to the fireworks with you?”
“No. He had an AA meeting at the Methodist church in Sherwood. He goes every week. He’s been sober for nearly nine years.”
“Was he a bad drunk?”
“He never took it out on the kids.”
“What about you?”
She sighs. “We’ve been married a long time. Some arguments are worse than others.”
“What time did you get home that night?”
“Nine thirty. I was a bit tipsy. Maggie kept filling my glass with champagne.”
“Did you see Bryan?”
“I heard him
come home. I was in bed.”
“What did you hear?”
“The front door. Keys on the table. The shower running.”
“Did he get up during the night?”
Felicity looks at the teabag, which is solidifying in the bottom of her mug. “We don’t sleep in the same room . . . not for . . . not since.” She shakes her head. “You can’t really believe that Bryan had sex with Jodie.”
“The DNA tests on her unborn child show she was carrying his baby.”
Felicity stares at me, as though waiting for a different punch line. Then she shakes her head from side to side, gasping. “Oh God, what will Maggie say? She’ll never forgive me.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“He’s my husband.”
* * *
Lenny carries a pile of printouts and folders into the interview room, putting them on the table in front of Bryan Whitaker. It’s part of the theater—a prop to unnerve the suspect. Right now he’s wondering how he could have generated so much paperwork in such a short time.
Opening a folder, Lenny turns several pages, silently reading the contents while Edgar pulls up a seat and checks the recording equipment, announcing their names, along with the time, date, and location.
“How long have you been married, Bryan?” asks Lenny.
“Twenty-two years.”
“That’s a fair innings. Do you still look into your wife’s eyes when you tell her that you love her?”
“Leave my wife out of this.”
“I’ll take that as a no,” says Lenny. “I doubt if there’s a single drop of passion left after that long, although I’m sure you can pretend. You can close your eyes. You can imagine you’re with someone else. Tell us about Bonnie Dowling?”
Understanding seems to blossom behind Whitaker’s eyes. “She made a vexatious complaint.”
“Vexatious. That’s a big word—a lawyer’s word. You took photographs of her in the showers.”
Good Girl, Bad Girl Page 29
